on canines having the upper paw

this human is not yet doggytrained by McBeth.

it is said that a well-adjusted dog will understand that you, the human, are the Alpha in the pack.

Sure this happens, so long as one doesn't use a soft 'here kitty kitty' voice when trying to be the Alpha.

Say, for instance, when a dog is lying on a sofa behind a person seated on the floor. Lets say for illustrative sake that the dog really really would like to have her belly rubbed and that she knows that if she can just reach one long leg around from behind, she can essentially 'tap' on the human's face, thereby garnering the attention the dog seeks.

Then let's pretend that the human uses a soft friendly voice to say "NO, OFF". Yeah, here's the lesson part: it doesn't work very well.

I am, however, considering asking to borrow my friends' dog to do the taptaptap repeatedly and, if I can train her to use fine detail paw/claw work, she could possibly create a semi-permanent eye liner, thereby saving me a good deal of time applying eye makeup. How cool would THAT be?!~