Karen Shinkins: "Honey, You Married MacGyver"

Right before Husband left to fly to US Indoor Championships this weekend the strap on Dexter's detection collar broke. What is a detection collar I hear you ask. Well, we have an underground wire that runs the perimeter of our property and it sends out a radio signal. If Dexter gets too close to the wire, the signal is picked up by his detection collar and warns him, via a Beep, that he is getting too close to his boundary. If he pushes his luck, which he does often, it will then issue a small shock which he should instantly back away from. I say should, cos little Dexter has been known to hear his Beep but think "f*#k it, I'm goin for it anyway" (yes, my dog has an Irish accent too) and he belts it across the boundary wire leaving his owners (Husband and I, but mostly Husband) in angry, hot pursuit, on foot. Its seriously funny to watch and I wish I had some video footage of the whole fiasco to share.

Anyway, with the strap of the detection collar broken this meant that if left outside, Dexter would be a high flight risk. But staying inside was not a option either, he's way too hyper and Fintan is not a fully fledged fan of his company just yet. So this left me with a few options.

1. Buy a new collar, which would entail sitting down with a booklet full of instructions, in a variety of languages, in an effort to get it programmed. Hmmm? I'm thinking "No" on this one.

2. Wait until Husband gets back on Monday and have him deal with it. Again, "No". We are not what you would call the perfect TV family. We (Fintan, Dexter and I) would go nuts if stuck in the house together all weekend. Someone would not get out of it alive.

3. See if I could find a temporary solution by pulling a MacGyver (popular 1980's TV show).

I went with option 3.

While on a hunt for some safety pins strong enough to withstand the wrath of Dexter I came across one of Husbands old rock-climbing grippy things and straight away I knew this was the answer. And it was. I immediately went to work on the collar and in less than a minute the problem was resolved. OMG, I was so happy for myself. I even went so far as to announce to the world, which is to say I made a phone call to Husband, telling him that he was the proud owner of a very smart wife indeed. Up to this point, I swear he had zero idea. Now thank goodness, he knows.

And of course such intelligence needs to be documented/photographed cos Lord knows when my brain will fire on all cylinders like this again.