I tried to do a little more work on the trim in the house on Saturday. Zeke and Sam objected. Strenuously.
I had put up the vertical casing on three doors a few days earlier and the dogs acted spooked, as they had in the past when I was using the pneumatic nailer. But this time was different.
The dogs were in the bedroom, where I wanted to install the baseboard behind the bed, so we could push the bed up against the wall. I didn’t realize they were there when I put two nails into a loose piece of flooring. They ran out of the room and pushed through the door into the garage. I had already lowered the garage doors because I figured they would want to be out there, so I wasn’t worried about that. But when I started moving the baseboard around — not even nailing yet, just moving — they freaked. Zeke started trying to rip the rubber gasket off the bottom of the garage door. It literally scared the crap out of Sam.
So this is the progress I made on the bedroom baseboards.
Loose baseboard and quarter round, plus abandoned nail gun.
On Tuesday I stopped at the vet’s office to ask their advice. They didn’t think sedatives were the answer. I didn’t either. I have a lot of trim left to do, and I didn’t want two doped-up dogs around for days on end. The vet suggested boarding them, but I don’t think that’s going to be practical. I guess I’ll try to fix up a hidey-hole for them in the garage.
Here’s Zeke in calmer times.
Notice that there are no baseboards on the wall behind him.
That’s so interesting. Wonder why they get so spooked? Is there any other room in the house where they can hide? Or a temporary fenced in shelter outside? Do they respond that way to the sound a regular hammer?
Robin — Both dogs are afraid of loud noises. Zeke has been that way for a long time, and Sam is just naturally skittish. I am planning to put them back in the garage with the doors completely closed, and use a smaller, more portable air compressor that will allow me to close the door of the room I’m working on as well as the door into the garage. I hope that will dull the sounds enough that they won’t freak out. I used a regular hammer to pound some drywall down even with a door frame on Monday. They didn’t seem too upset out that.