Waking up with a dog breathing into your face

Can anyone imagine anything worse than waking up, discovering that a dog is breathing into your face?
Why can't dogs use toothbrushes like the rest of us? There's only one thing that's worse than a dogs breath, and that's feeling a dogs breath in your face the morning after a serious bender, when you've got a hangover that don't intend to leave for the rest of the day.
Of course, waking up after a serious bender, your breath is probably worse than the dogs, so just tell it to blow.

Did you know that you can train your dog to stay asleep (or at least to leave you alone) until your alarm clock goes off? No matter what time you set it for?

It's true! Trust me. I do this for a living.

First, note what time your dog generally wakes up on a regular day. Probably something godawful like 6am. If that's the case, then for the first three to five days, set your alarm to go off at about 10 'til 6. (This is the part that hurts.) The point of the first step is to make sure you're actually interrupting your dog's sleepytime with the alarm. Take him outside immediately.

For the next three to five days, set your alarm for 6am. (Hitting 'snooz' is not allowed!) No matter what your dog is doing, be it breathing in your face or whimpering or poking you in the eye with his cold, wet nose, ignore him until that alarm goes off. Then take him outside immediately.

Note: To effectively ignore a dog, you must not speak to, touch, or look at him.

For the next three to five days, set your alarm for about a quarter past six. Remember, 'snooz' is cheating and it will mess things up. Ignore your dog's efforts to get your attention (even if he licks the inside of your nose!) until the alarm goes off, then take him out immediately.

Continue as above until you're setting your alarm for 9:30 or 10am. By this time, your dog (unless he's a bit of a slow learner) will have realized that no matter how hard he tries, nothing at all (good OR bad, that's very important) happens to him until he hears that goddamned alarm of yours. Therefore, attempting to wake you will no longer be worth the energy it requires. He will associate getting up, going outside, eating breakfast, etc. with the sound of your clock, and he will stop looking for those things in the absence of the sound.

Note: This really works. You can fix it so that your dog wakes up when you do, and not a minute earlier. But -- your snooz button will be a thing of the past.

Oh, and another note: Some of the steps may take a little longer than three to five days. It depends on your pooch. 3-5 is about average though. You don't want to progress to the next step (i.e. later alarm setting time) until your dog is staying calm and quiet until the alarm goes off.) Be patient!

Honestly, this is one of my favourite ways to wake up in the morning.  It sure the hell beats BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP (which, by the way, is unquestionably The Worst Way to Wake Up).  Anyway, in response to the rest of the writeups here, I think that a lot of people would find this annoying, possibly even disgusting, because their dog's breath stinks like shit.

This could be one of two things:

• Your dog is eating shit.  My dog actually used to do this--he'd casually walk up to a pile of shit and take a bite out of it.  Apparently it's due to their love of things with very strong, distinctive smells.  But I digress...
• The food he's eating is of the standard (or even substandard) Pedigree-esque variety.

At the risk of sounding like a used car salesman, I'll let you in on the ground floor:  That shit food is probably the cause of your dog's smelly coat ("wet dog smell") and probably partly responsible for his bad breath.  Bad breath.  No matter what the asshole at Pets 'R' Us tells you, Pedigree is not the top of the line.

What you really want, though it is scarcely available, is some of that "all natural" stuff -- raw ground chicken or tripe (yes, the stomach) mixed with vegetables.  Seriously, the benefits are all there, man:  Shiny coat, better breath, and the mutts go nuts for it, in all of its stinky-ass glory.