I have the same tendency to drift into the southern twang that my mother tried to beat out of me when I was first learning how to count. Boy, she sure hated to hear me say FAHHHve and Nahhhn instead of 5 and 9. Beatings. And I'm not kidding.

Maybe Chuck needs some positive reinforcement when you are on the phone. aka bribe him

Come to think of it now, my mother had a tendency to be out of the room when I was counting. Maybe it's not the volume but the accent? (I personally enjoy the lilting southern accent myself and more than once it's caused me to enter a room to find its source...)

I think I would prefer this to my parent's dog who just gets really pissed and starts barking. You aren't allowed to talk on the phone in the presence of that dog. At least your dog has the common courtesy to leave the room.

My dog has no phone issues, but she WIGS at the sound of that Will Smith "Jiggy" song, Gary Glitter, or Pee-Wee Hermans laugh. In fact, we've gotten her to the point where if we say "Pee-Wee Herman?" she throws her head back and just HOOOOOOWLS.

The fact that Chuck has stinky feet cracks me the fuck up.

I know that has nothing to do with this entry, but I thought you should know I am laughing (hard) at your misery.

Sorry.

that's really funny. you should try giving him a treat every time he stays in the room when you're on the phone...that way it'll teach him he doesn't have to run and hide, and it'll remind you to not yell and scare him off.

At least Chuck is polite. When the phone rings, our cat runs over to the receiver, lifts it up just a bit (with her paw), and then drops it back on the cradle , thus hanging up on the caller. Sometimes she just drops it on the floor. Kind of funny at first ("hey, the cat answers the phone!"), but it's getting really tiresome coming home to an off-the-hook phone and an unapologetic feline.

My dog Daisy barks at the mailman. So unoriginal that it breaks my heart: "What do you MEAN my pooch is just like YOURS?" She makes up for it when she forgets to RETRACT her tongue, leaving a wee bit sticking out. Also terribly UNORIGINAL, but terribly cute.

my mom made her dog listen in the phone, needless to say everytime the phone rings the dog comes running and hits everything in the way to get there first. He doesn't stop burking until everyone says hi to him then you can talk. Its quite annoying.

Come on now. Southern accents are sexy. But talking 600% louder would be quite annoying. Your dog is just confused. You need to take him to the television pet psychiatrist so that he can know that it is ok to talk in a loud but sexy voice. GO SKYNRD!

So, as my mother always asks when my brother talks about his dog like it's a kid, 'When's that baby coming along?'

I wonder if that's why my kids cower in the corner when I talk really loud...oh wait that IS because I'm drunk!

Unless you live in a place with a geographic landmark (like say, Utah or Tucson, Arizona), I bet most people are disorientated. We're all just disorientateers, not know east from a hole in the ground. When I moved to Virginia from Tucson, I felt a particular sense of disorientatation (ok, I'm done, I swear).

my husband speaks at volume 11 while on the phone as well. the handy part is that he never has to reiterate the conversation for me, even from 2 floors away because i heard everything. yes, that part in star trek where spock rode kirk like a horse was funny, yes, halo is a great game, yes yes yes, i heard you.

aubs,
did you ever watch the movie "gummo"? accent-free my arse!
ps. i believe everything i watch, especially foxnews ;)

my dog was only scared of cows.

this really didn't cause too much trouble as everyone knows, the cows just don't ever come home.

Or maybe Chuck's just really polite and doesn't want it to seem like he's listening in on your conversation...

Just because a word exists in the dictionary DOESN'T MEAN YOU HAVE TO USE IT.

"Disorientate" is almost as bad as "discombobulate," and while it's grammatically correct to use either of them, any self-respecting person should at least think twice.

Erica, NO MORE of that word. It's on my 'banned' list that includes:
The word for girls' underwear that starts with a 'p', the word that rhymes with 'busty' but has a 'cr' instead of a 'b', and the second word of a red fish...like 'snapple' but add 'er' instead of 'le'

Yes, I had to write them that way so I wouldn't get the shivers just reading them.

Haha. I think Chuck is offically a celebrity.

My dogs or shall I say my dawgs, K. and E. do exactly the opposite. They see how and what they can do to get my immediate attention when I am on the phone. Today it was K. who pinned E. on top the entry way stairs. E.'s little neck cranked for dear life and breathe on the edge. It happens in mili-seconds. All is good once I hang up the phone.

My dog has "printer issues." If the printer makes any noise out of the ordinary my dog runs for cover in the bedroom! I guess she figures I'm going to start swearing soon and she'd better get out while the goings good!

What I can't figure out, though, is how does she know EXACTLY when I've had my last bite of cereal and it's time to fly into place for her morning milk leftovers?

Dooce, about your dog's Frito feet. It's probably the corn in his food. Really. Very common!

I can't stand that word for tennis shoes that sounds like snickers, only with an eee instead of an ick. I am madcrazy about PERTURBED and LASCIVIOUS and BEFUDDLED. Love those words! Stick SENIOR and THESIS together, however, and I'll turn green and turn inside out.

I just wanted to second Naaman's request for an mp3 of sultry southern drawl...

dooce get a friend's dog on the line and encourage chucky to chat to his buddy. woof woof!

what no crushed garlic or chives??thats just crimnal

Well, I'm in the dark. You're gonna have to recap your southern heritage. Here I've been thinking you started life in Utah. Silly me.

It could be worse... at least it's not a child hiding from your accent and drunkeness.

so that pavlov guy was right after all.

my boyfriend talks at a super high volume when on the phone as well. he also speaks at that same volume while in bed next to me with his mouth next to my ear. can someone please explain that reasoning to me?? i think he took out my right eardrum the other night. and he wasn't even drunk. and we don't have a dog. i'm the one with the southern accent. and my cat watches tv, poops in the livingroom floor when she's mad, and is always stealing water out of my water glass. did i hit all the topics? no wait...a cool word... oh yea, "ustulate." it means "to burn."

maybe i should keep a can like that by the bed.

I would be *so* happy if my kids would run and hide when I'm on the phone. One of the freedoms you lose when you become a parent is being able to have a peacefule telephone conversation.

Maybe Chuck is just annoyed because you aren't using 10-10-220.

Oh and Some Guy, enthused IS a word (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=enthused).

For some inexplicable reason, my cat Cricket is terrified of things that made whooshing-type noises. Whether they are on or not.
Cat being naughty in the bathroom? Merely reach for the hairdryer and she will bolt. Acting up in the kitchen? Turn on the disposal, and watch her run.

I about peed my pants laughing at this one, I do the same thing!

My kitten Coltrane is scared of the vacuum and pretty much any loud noise. We've had him since he was 5 weeks old. But a friend once commented that Phyllis, who was a street cat for at least a year and a half, was "fearless." The vacuum cleaner doesn't scare her at all. In fact, my boyfriend has started to vacuum her fur, using one of those attachment thingys, instead of combing her. She'll even turn over a little so he can get her tummy.

Reply to John Burton:
I LOVED your college / "leper colony" analogy. Too true!
I went to a Presbyterian College, where they teach born-again Christian dogma. (And I'm not even Presbyterian.) After a while, you DO get that "don't fit-in feeling", no matter how stilted their dogma may be. The rigid top-brass at my college haven't changed their minds (on any issue) since the Carter administration. And they haven’t accepted any fresh, new ideas since the Ford administration.

A diploma is not a passport, but getting a decent-paying job is usually much harder without a diploma.

Dooce: I already had the utmost respect for you as a writer (and as a person truly in touch with reality, in so many ways). But I now also have respect for you as an interviewee. Somehow you were able to land your first HTML job without any prior HTML work-experience, nor any college credit for that code. I doff my chapeau! You must have given one hell of a persuasive sales-pitch, at that first interview. (Or perhaps you personally knew someone at the company. As the saying goes: “It’s not what you know. It’s who you know.”) Barring that possibility, you must have made one hell of a good impression at the interview.

Re vacuuming animals, it works with dogs too. I have a hand-held vacuum that my dog loves. It's a wonderful massage! Chuck might like it.

Doesn't help all that much with the fur problem though. It's still everywhere.

and the only thing worse than sushi burps are sushi farts.

Kate, read that entry and you'll see that it isn't accepted as proper usage. In other words (heh), it's not a word.

Spin 'em to the west. Great! The fact that I don't live in an English-speaking country and so won't be able to do that to people is breaking my heart already. Maybe I should just visit the States. On the other hand, people might be offended by a non-native speaker trying to correct their language...