The dog, the box and the football

Poor Murphy. He just got pwned by a cardboard box.

His beloved squeaky football toy wound up inside a cardboard box that's about a foot square and a foot and a half deep. The box flaps are folded inwards, and they serve to act like barbs on a fish hook, making it quite difficult for the Shepherd to simply flip the box over with his paw until his ball comes back out; every time he tries, it catches on the flaps and refuses to come out. I sat at my desk and watched Murphy flip this box around the room, growing visibly frustrated as he continued to experience epic dog fail. I wanted my camera, but it was in the other room and I was not getting up for fear that I'd miss something funny or disturb his antics.
Finally, he tries something new. He puts his paw in the box to swipe at the ball. Alas, no joy again. Then he sticks his head in to grab the ball, but it looks like he doesn't have the clearance to extract his head again with the ball in his mouth. Getting mad now. Growling at the box and petulantly swiping at it with his paws. But the ball's not coming out.
Next, the head goes back into the box, along with a paw. Frantic scrabbling and hobbling now--he's stuck. He stumbles backwards on three legs and falls down. Now I'm laughing, and he gives me a stare of pure death as I quickly look away and pretend that I noticed nothing. It is out of the corner of my eye that I catch his next sortie, this one involving another snout dive into the box, this time sans paw. It looks like he's got the ball for a second, but wait--his head's stuck again. He shakes his head viciously from side to side, snarling, but his snarl turns into a bit of a yelp as his swinging head smacks into a post that adorns the living room as sort of a ceiling support/toe-stubbing device. Ow. Just ow. I felt that one. Never even saw that one coming, did you Murph?
This time I laugh out loud. Murphy drops the box and walks over to bark at me angrily, as if to imply that I'm somehow responsible. I turn to stare out the window, suppressing a giggle. He barks at me louder, then jabs me with his nose. Somehow, this has all become my fault.
I get up, walk over to the box, and in a crushing display of man-over-dog superiority, I reach down into the box and remove his football, which I hand to him. Still grumbling ungraciously, he sulks on over to his dog bed and drops down onto it with his back to me to begin punishing the football.

I was gonna throw the box away but now I'm thinking that tomorrow I might just put his big red Kong toy in it. Hee.