Making the rounds on the talk shows this past week, Richard Cohen, spouse of morning show darling Meredith Vieira, has a new book out called “I want to kill the dog.” While, I’m definitely NOT a fan of the book title, which they ensure is tongue-in-cheek, I was interested to hear about their dilemma.

Apparently Richard refers to their rescue dog Jasper as “a terrorist that destroys your serenity.” With incessant barking, and clearly favoring Meredith to a fault, Richard feels the serenity of the household has become non-existent. Delivery men to the house aren’t safe. Guests reel back in horror at the dog’s behavior at times. And supposedly if Meredith goes to bed before Richard, Richard will be lucky IF Jasper lets him in the bed.

I have to say I can relate to many of the stories relayed by Richard, which are both good-natured, yet slightly twisted (hence the book title). He speaks about how he feels his wife places the dog on a pedestal, which gives the dog an inflated sense of ruling the home. He is used to dogs being dogs, not being coddled, which he says has been elevated to an art form with cute little Jasper.

So, the question begs to be asked. What do you do when having a dog in the home is clearly more beneficial to one spouse than the other? I’m sure my husband would like the answer to this, as well. And while I don’t have the answer because I’m getting the better end of the deal in our household with our two girls, I’d love to see the humorous book my spouse could write. Maybe it could be called “When I said I wanted 3 girls in the bed, maybe I should have been more specific.”