Delilah is French for "Devil Dog"
It’s quite possible that Delilah wins the ‘weirdest French Bulldog ever‘ award, or at least the award for ‘weirdest French Bulldog ever owned or known by me‘ award.
First of all, she still will not come all the way down the stairs. This is not because she’s incapable of it (unlike Dexter, who’s so large in the head that walking downhill causes him to tumble in a slinky-like fashion).
Our stair routine goes something like this –
The stairs from our basement are open at about the half way mark. Delilah, who has no issues going up the stairs, will only come down as far as the opening on the stairs. She lurks there, popping her head over the edge to see what we’re doing. My computer sits right beneath this opening, and I often look up and see her peeking over the side, checking to see if I’ve decided to spontaneously bake her some dog cookies. If she’s in the mood, she will sometimes leap into my arms from this point when I walk over to see her. Usually, though, she waits until I try to approach her, then bolts back to the top of the stairs. It’s like she thinks I have cooties or something. Once she’s sure I’m safely far away from the stairs, she’ll come back down again, for a second look.
Here’s a video of her playing the stair game with me –
If this isn’t enough, there’s the fact that of all the dogs, she’s the only one of our dogs who just will not come when she is called, thus leaving me to play a little game I like to call “Come and get the nice cookie so Mommy can tackle you like a sausage shaped football, you infuriating little beast”. Actually, the term ‘like to call’ is more of a misnomer for ‘am forced to screech every time she gets outside the fence’. Luckily for me, she’s completely food motivated, and would sell her dark little brindle soul for a dried up crumb of milkbone, so I’ll be working on the ‘come!’ command diligently over the next while.
Oh, and I should explain about chairs. Delilah doesn’t sit on them, like normal dogs – she scales the back of them, like some sort of mutant goat. I admit that she’s my ‘go to’ lap dog for chair sitting, but she doesn’t take being left behind very well if I have to get up for any reason. In fact, she barks with a sort of affronted indignation that’s almost as funny as it is alarming. Here’s a short clip of her Majesty expressing her opinion on the topic of my getting up and leaving her.
I’ve threatened to send her to Chicago to live with Hope and Dax, but I like them too much to inflict this kind of punishment on them.