“I’m ready for a dog,” she said.

Innocent words, seemingly, fell off my wife’s lips that late summer day. Surely it was time. Two years sans pooch, kids growing, memories in the making. A soft, wet-nosed little buddy would do nicely.

So my brain twitched and joined the ranks of “dog ready.” The problem with being ready for a dog is you’re prone to get one, dammit. And nothing better cements that fact then when a precious puppy becomes available in your neighborhood.

The kids were at grandma’s that week, so surprising them with a puppy when they got home would make us be like those baller parents in the commercials.

So we went to meet the puppy. I don’t know why you go to meet a puppy. What criteria could it not meet for me to fall instantly in love with it? Am I making sure it’s not too adorable, as if I’d be concerned I’d stop going to work and paying bills and putting on my underwear due to fawning over the dog?

I guess you go to meet a puppy to make sure it doesn’t find you revolting. Look at the big scary ugly not-dog trying to grab me. No thank you.

Really, unless the puppy has more than one head, it’s coming home. And it had one head in the picture.

So we met the puppy and took him home. He did really cute puppy stuff like fall over himself, paw at balls, and nibble on our fingers. The kids came home and just hated him, of course. We named him Finley.

Finley did all the not cute puppy stuff, too. Initially he had no preference where in the house to pee or drop a solid. Feeding him was like trying to put down a bowl of gizzards for a wolf. When we crated him he shrieked and moaned like we were preparing to put him in a soup.

We were going slightly mad. Something had to change.

So we talked strategy and made a game plan for Operation Keep the Dog. I would run Finley every morning to give him exercise. We would confine him to the kitchen. We would teach him to wait for his food. We would be vigilant and take him out every 15 minutes.

Our adjustments, while well-intentioned, couldn’t solve the issue that Finley was an anxious mess and appeared to have a bladder the size of a kidney bean. He asked to go out every 10 minutes. If we didn’t take him he’d whiz right there, no questions asked. If we did take him out, he’d mosey around the yard and when he finally went, all we got was a two-second trickle. Then back in the house for more puddle making. Yippidy-dee.

Often the door opening led to nothing. It seemed that he just wanted to go on our back porch. So exasperated we were from opening the door that we just kept it open. Thus the porch became his tinkle and turd room. Even days where we thought we were watching him the whole time we’d find pee spots and cold, hardened little dookies back there. It became so regular I knew I could look out the porch window every night before bed and spot them. When you know there’s a place in your home you can routinely find feces, that’s a problem.

The one thing a puppy usually has going for itself is you can pet it. It’s where the special, mutual bond is formed between the dog and the human. We couldn’t pet Finley with any regularity without him gnawing on our hands like they were his monkey kong. Even if we didn’t want to pet him he would jump and bite at our clothing as we walked by. Like, hey, you won’t forget me after I put these fresh holes in your pants.

But the coffin nail was him becoming possessive over food, or things he treated like food. Once he got a paper towel, you’d better offer him a t-bone to let go of that thing, or he’d sink his teeth into your hand like a junkyard dog.

In one final food-fanatic hurrah, Finley got up on the table and devoured a whole corncob, which is roughly the size of his torso. Thankfully his body overpowered his brain and he yacked it up immediately. Then he and I had a misunderstanding. I thought it time to clean up, while he was primed to snarf wild on cob puke. Personally I’m puke-eating-averse, so I grabbed the back of his collar to keep him off of it. But you know how it feels to grab a wild animal. One contortion and growl was enough for me to let him return to the feast. Yikes. Seriously, what’s more primal than a beast snarling at you like a demon to keep you from taking away its vomit? This activity repeated itself, until somehow I managed to get a leash on him before he could return to his corny yack for a fourth time…It’s just a damn low moment for the animal kingdom.

All of this food-related insanity felt all too familiar, for it was the indelible characteristic of my last dog, Lilly. Lilly was a beagle in the worst way, and we actually came to find that Finley’s litter mate had a DNA test and turned out 25% beagle.

So basically, our new dog had the indefatigable energy and chewing penchant of a labrador, the devour-anything nature and howl of a beagle, and the neuroticism of a caffeinated squirrel. The perfect storm of an exhausting dog was Hurricane Finley, bless his little heart.

We returned Finley to the foster to find a better home for him. By better home I mean someone who’s there all day and likes to go in and out of their house in 10-minute increments and finds it endearing to be bitten while attempting to connect.

I have learned more about dogs and myself in this ordeal. Mostly, I’ve learned what kind of dog I can tolerate. I like a dog that doesn’t bark, that isn’t high-strung, that doesn’t whimper and moan, that doesn’t need my attention, that doesn’t pursue food like a starving dinosaur, that doesn’t wake me up in the morning, or at night, or ever. I like a dog that I have to wake up. I like a dog that doesn’t move. I like a dog I can pet for 10 minutes and then gives me that look like “OK, are we done here?” or just walks away to its bed. I like a living, furry, non-ugly dog but not much more than that. I like a dog that becomes part of the scenery of my house, like a chair or a fern.

There. That’s a good boy.