Practice Makes Perfect

There are actually two stories that came out of our Saturday walk.  One was AMAZING and one was aggravating.

I was going to write the entire post with both stories and then decided that the really good, exciting thing should be celebrated all by itself with nothing negative involved.

On our Saturday morning walk we ran into Brady and his mom.  We walked for a few minutes and then ran into the dog trainer who always has about six dogs with her.

If the dogs are approaching cautiously I generally keep Delilah on leash.  If the dogs are running at us, I usually drop the leash, let them greet and then pick the leash back up.

I was feeling either brave or crazy Saturday and decided to take Delilah completely off-leash.

I made her wait, while she was un-clipped and then FREE DOG.

Delilah was off-leash.

She stayed right with our little pack as we continued our walk through the woods and when I called her to me, she came right away.

I guess in retrospect I was feeling brave, because I definitely wasn’t crazy enough to leave her off-leash too long.  I kept it at about five minutes and then secured her once again.

This was the first time she has been unleashed and allowed to run in about six months.

I was so pleased with her and so proud of her.  I wanted to dance a jig through the forest.

What a good girl!

Will I ever let her start our walk off-leash or let her free in the areas I know are tempting?

I’m not sure.

But this small success proved to me how imperative it is for me to work on their recalls every single day.

Practice makes perfect.

Light Bulb Moment

Yesterday I hinted at a light bulb moment I had during our Tuesday night training class.

If there was an incident or comment that caused it to happen, I can’t put my finger on it.  All I know is I was struck by an epiphany.

I don’t work with my dogs enough.

Granted since we started taking this class, I’ve gotten better with practicing, but I still haven’t set time aside each day to work with the dogs.

I can’t expect Delilah to know what I want her to do, when I’m not consistent with my requests.

It’s not like I don’t attempt to train my dogs, it’s just that once I teach them a command, I expect they know it and then I sort of don’t reinforce it as frequently as I should.

Which brings me to our recall.

How in the world do I expect Delilah to return to me, if I only ask her for it right when she’s found a really enticing smell?

It’s not like Sara hasn’t drilled this into my head.  How many times have I heard her say, I call my dogs back about 75 times a walk?

So how is it, that it never sunk in before?

I’m reminded of learning my multiplication tables, I said it so many times over and over again that it is ingrained in my memory.

Seven times seven is forty-nine.

Which is exactly what I need to do with the dogs, I have to work it over and over again until it is second nature.

I want to work it so much that my dogs come back to me every couple of minutes all on their own.

Is that even possible?

Do you have a training schedule set aside for your dog?  How frequently do you reinforce your commands?

The bigger question is, where do you find the time?

Team Delilah

I wanted to share something really amazing that happened at Delilah (and my) training class last Tuesday.

The class is held in a smallish size gymnasium.  I’m very grateful the class is small because it gives us a bit of room to spread out and not be too close to another dog.

It was our next to the last class and Jackie, our instructor had a little Rally ring set up.  Just to give people a small taste of what Rally is all about.

Before we had the opportunity to do Rally, Jackie stated she was going to test us with our leave it command.  (Coincidentally this is also the class where I had my light bulb moment of everything I’ve been doing wrong, but that is a post for another day.)

I watched as Jackie, armed with a squeaky toy and a handful of treats approached each team in turn.  For whatever reason Delilah and I were last.  I stood facing Delilah, waiting anxiously,  worried that I would fail Delilah and myself.

Finally it was our turn.  From the corner of my eye I saw Jackie approaching from my right, I can’t tell you how close she actually came but I would guess it was within three to four feet.

I had Delilah focused on me, by having a treat in my right hand, with my right fore-finger resting on the tip of my nose.  Our gaze was intent, there is no other way to describe it, I didn’t dare look away.

Squeak.

Delilah’s head shifted slightly to her left.

Eck!  Look, I said.

Snap her head turned back to me.

Squeak, squeak.

Look. That’s right, stay focused on me.  Good girl, you’re doing fantastic.

I heard the handful of treats drop, but neither Delilah nor I looked, or even flinched.

Our eyes were locked and Team Delilah rocked.

Follow-Up Friday

For those new to the blog, my follow-up Friday provides me with an opportunity to update or revise a post from the previous week.

You know sometimes you post about something and you need an update but it doesn’t warrant a whole blog.  Or sometimes someone made a comment that really resonated with you.  Yup, Follow-Up Friday baby!

Please feel free to grab the badge and join me in recapping or wrapping up your week.   It doesn’t matter if you do it every week or just once in  a while.

Drifting – Author’s Note:

This week I was back at work and found I did much less drifting.  I was more focused on getting done what needed to get done.

I caught up on the blogs in my google reader, managed to get most blog posts up in a timely manner.

Walking the dogs wasn’t too bad.  Monday I gave them a quick walk after work.  Tuesday was training class so I left Sampson’s walk up to Hubby.  Wednesday was too hot to walk during the day so Hubby and I had a quick walk around the block at dusk.   Last night we ran into our walking friend and her dog and ended up going to check out her house, where the dogs got some swimming in.

This time my friend was able to show Delilah how to get into the pool.  Her first couple of returns were a little panicked as she tried to find a way out, but by her third time in, she knew right where to go.

Here is a little video I took of her fetching a toy.

I’m not sure if you can see in the video but she opens her feet so wide, it almost looks like a duck’s foot.

Here Here! – Author’s Note:

When Delilah and I were at training class on Tuesday, our instructor commented on how well she was doing.

Yes she really is.

I really have hope.

Did You Ever Have One Of Those Days – Author’s Note:

When you are having a day like I was, it is sometimes hard to spin it and find the positive, but somehow you need to.  So here is how I spun that.

Work – The little rush to clean the office resulted in me finally getting the majority of my desk cleaned off.  I finished it up yesterday morning.  I switched my phone and calculator and found that I like it much better.  The phone cord is no longer interfering with my mouse which is causing me much less stress.

The Screen – The best thing is that Delilah did not hurt herself in her frenzy to get the cat and the bonus is I get a new screen out of the deal.  The best part is Hubby recently learned to repair screens and the cost will be minimal.

It’s all about the positive here at Stone Manor.

How was your week?

Did You Ever Have One Of Those Days?

Did you ever have one of those days, where no matter how hard you tried to be positive, the negative tries to drag you down?

It was really cool here yesterday morning with the weather person predicting it would become more hot and humid as the day wore on.

Rather than turn the air on at 8:00 am while it was cool, I turned the whole house fan on, opened a couple of windows and gave my mother explicit instructions.

ME: After you’ve finished your laundry Cinderella, before you head back down to your dungeon, shut the window and the two doors, and shut off the whole house fan.  You can turn the air conditioning on as you head down stairs.

Now repeat it to me.

MOTHER: Yes, Queen Mother, shut the back door, the sliding door, the window by the pool table as well as the whole house fan and turn the air conditioning on.

She repeated that to me three times.

Okay, you got me.  I did not really call her Cinderella, and she definitely does not call me Queen Mother.

(She may call me a mutha, I wouldn’t put it past her, but she wouldn’t dare say it to my face.)

Sounds like a fine start to the day, no?

I work for an engineering firm, the office we work from is in the basement of a building.   I don’t know what type of business existed here before us, but there isn’t one damn closet in the whole place.  After much whining and crying negotiating on my part, I finally managed to procure some storage and filing cabinets.  Still we’re an engineering firm, we produce a lot of paper, much of it is rolled up plans.

Which have nowhere to go.

I have the ‘eh’ attitude where I just pile it up.  Really if you insist upon saving every scrap of paper (which my boss does) don’t look to me to find somewhere to stuff file it.

We had three hours notice that our biggest client was coming in.  Naturally my boss turns into what I fondly refer to as “Captain Chaos.”

Trust me, it fits.

The otherwise peaceful day has now turned into what can only be construed as aggravating, still I manage to get through it.

As I’m getting ready to leave to drop my co-worker off to his car, I remember we are having some trees cut down today, and the crew will be starting first thing in the morning.

I need to move the survey truck.

I go into my desk drawer where the keys are kept and nothing.

No keys.  One of my co-workers must have used the keys and not returned them.

She’s on vacation this week and her desk is locked.

I frantically dig through my desk as well as the office safe looking for the spare keys and eventually find them.  I move the truck, we hop in the car and I run my co-worker out to his car.  Then I have to stop at Fed-EX to drop off the plans that are going out to a contractor.

The damn thing weighed 17 pounds and I hurt my shoulder as I muscled them to the Fed-Ex box.

Finally, I am on my way home.

As I stopped to get the mail on my way in, I looked up at the house and noticed Cinderella mom had forgotten to close the sliding door to the small porch over-looking the driveway.

What the hell I thought, she thinks I can afford to cool all outdoors? (It sounds like something a mother would say, right?)

The dogs heard me pull in and rushed to door to greet me.

I pulled into the yard and saw the dogs faces at the window.

You know how sometimes things  happen so fast that you sort of see it coming, but not really?

Apparently the neighbor’s cat was kind enough to come over and hunt chipmunks.  Thank you neighbor’s cat, we do appreciate your help!

Poor neighbor’s cat is afraid of cars.

The cat ran across the front lawn to escape the car.

As the cat crossed the front lawn in search of greener, car-less pastures.

Delilah’s head went through the screen door.

W.T.F./Whoo Hoo Wednesday

Please note this post is not meant to make light of the deeds described here, only to make fun of, ridicule, bully and just plain beat the shit out of the idiots who commit these stupid acts.

My boss was on vacation last week, as is sometimes the case when he is on vacation I am in charge of driving him to the airport and then making sure his car is there when he arrives.

I’m an admin, it’s part of the job description.

Hubby followed me to the airport.

Here in CT we have this awesome little connector called 291, it connects I-84 to I-91 and makes traveling to the airport about a 20 to 25 minute ride from my house.  The length of the ride is determined by my mood.

I digress.

As I was making the turn from I-291 to I-91 I noticed a car pulled over on the side of the highway.  The passenger door was against the curbing and the driver’s door was on the traffic side.  The driver was standing at his door looking up the hill and his hand was pointing down.  I chanced a quick look as I drove by and saw what he was looking at.

It was his dog, doing its business.

Apparently his dog had to potty and so this fucktard idiot pulls over on a busy highway and lets his dog out of the car without a leash!  It all happened so fast (and I was going at a good clip with cars behind me,) I didn’t think to stop and chew that piece of shit scum out.

WTF is wrong with you letting your dog out, off leash on the side of a highway!! 

Do you have any idea what could have happened to your dog if something frightened it?  Do you have the brains you were born with or did you leave them on the side of some highway?

After I dropped off the car and Hubby and I were riding home he asked me if I saw that car on the side of the highway.

Ooops, Hubby got an earful!

That POS was lucky I didn’t stop.  What’s the penalty for stealing a dog anyway?

Animal Rights Group Seeks Punishment For Men Involved In Throwing Dog Down Manhole, Malaysia

Honest to God you can’t make this shit stuff up.

Apparently these two guys were supposed to be taking care of this man’s dog.

Why agree to take care of a dog if you don’t want to?

Wait, it gets worse.

Not only did they shove the dog in a manhole, but apparently someone videotaped the incident and put it on youtube where it went viral.

WHAT?  Why would you put it on youtube instead of turning the video over to police?

I went to youtube and searched for dog put in manhole to see just what kind of asshole idiot does this shit stuff and you know what I found?

Videos of dogs breeding.

One video  “Dog Breeding…..AND THEY GET STUCK” has had 341,724 views.

Really, there’s nothing on the telly and nothing you can be doing besides watching two dogs….wait how did the intelligent being who created the video phrase it…..ah yes, “bumpin’ uglies?”

And we wonder why the world is in such a mess.  Look no further than youtube my friends.

I don’t know about you, but that’s about as much WTF as I can handle for today.

WHOO HOO!

Michigan dogfighting bust results in 46 dogs seized, 2 men behind bars, Kalamazoo, Michigan

I won’t lie, dog fighting is horrific and barbaric  and in my opinion anyone caught participating in it should be subjected to the same treatment they gave the dogs. (That’s how it would work in Jodi’s World.)

But I digress again.

The pictures of the dogs are heartbreaking, but as I scrolled through them looking at the dogs, I saw love.  Those dogs that were chained, abused and neglected still reached out tentatively at the outstretched hand of man and took a cautious sniff.  I can’t help but think what a different world this would be if we all had the heart of a dog.

Another feel good about this story is the local humane society connected with a pit bull rescue to help treat and assess the dogs.  Petsmart provided food and vaccinations for the dogs.

That gives me hope.  A national chain, who could put their resources wherever they wanted, donated to abused dogs.

Warms the cockles of your heart, eh?

Here Here!

Since I’m back to work I’ve got to either 1) walk the dogs on lunch or 2) walk them after work.  I really do prefer to walk them on lunch, but when it’s this hot, I opt for after work.

It was still hot yesterday but thank God the humidity broke.  There’s nothing like walking in 90 degree heat with 90% humidity.  It feels like you went swimming with all your clothes on and you’re just waiting for them to dry.

My pants seem to have a mind of their own and that’s to sag as far down as they possibly can.  I seriously considered putting a pair of boxers on so they could hang over the top.

You don’t believe that do you?

Good because I would never consider that.

Where was I?  Oh yes, the walk.

I normally let Sampson and Delilah pick our walk, I figure it’s their walk too so why shouldn’t they go where they want?  I keep a pretty good eye on them and if it looks like one of them has really committed to a certain path, I gently encourage the other one to go in the same direction.

What really surprises me is how frequently they go to the same trails, all kinds of possibilities yet they still follow the same paths.  I think they are checking their pee mail and waiting to see if they will run into some friends.

We were getting on towards the end of our walk last night when I saw what I thought was a deer running through the trees off to my left.  It caught everyone’s attention and I shouted to Sampson, “No, don’t do it.”  Thankfully he followed instructions and stopped what he was doing.

When I looked up, Bruno (who the dogs know well) was standing staring at us from about 25 yards away.

I shortened Delilah’s leash and told Sampson NO.

He took off after Bruno.

Delilah whined and pulled but I held fast.

Bruno is a big dog, but he’s also a big baby.  As soon as Sampson took off after him, Bruno took off too.

Sampson chased Bruno around a really large rock and I saw Delilah gear up to go and I knew I was a gonner.  So I dropped the leash.

I figured it’s better to chase her through the woods, than get pulled along the trail…on my face.

The dogs all converged at the rock, sniffing each other and I clapped my hands and called, Here, Here, come on let’s go.

What do you suppose happened?

Yup, she came right back to me.  I did the happy dance, gave her some yummy liverwurst, praised and petted her and we finished our walk.

I don’t think I am ready to take her off-leash but it’s nice to know I can give her a small bit of freedom.

Yes I’m Back At Work

I complained to Hubby yesterday after Sampson, Delilah and I got back from our walk.

Maybe it was because I walk in long pants, with a long-sleeved shirt, socks, sneakers and a ball cap and it’s hot as freakin’ hell.  Really, within five minutes (or just as soon as I’ve reached the top of the hill) I’m sweating like a 500 pound man in a 500 degree oven.

Maybe it was because I can’t walk in the summer without  the bugs…well bugging me.  I swear to God a big sucker flew past my ear and was so stinkin loud the other day that the hair on my body stood on end.

Maybe it was because the bugs keep bugging Delilah and I’m constantly asking my dog to stop or wait while I swat at her.

Maybe it was because the dogs get hot and tired too and stop in the middle of the path and block my progress.

Maybe it was because those stupid spiders build their stupid webs across the trail and I’m constantly flailing and screaming like a little girl, and basically look like a lunatic swatting at nothing.

Or maybe, just maybe it was because it was my last day of vacation and I knew how much 1) I didn’t accomplish while I was home, 2) I’ll miss walking the dogs first thing in the morning and 3)  I’d hate going back to work.

Maybe it was all of the above.

Do you have a hard time adjusting after vacation?

Drifting….

Hubby and I have been on vacation all week.  We were also on vacation two weeks ago.  Don’t ask, he chose the weeks.

I had a list of things I wanted to accomplish while we were on vacation.

• Shampoo my carpets.
• Paint the outside of the french doors.
• Clean up my office/scrapbook room.
• Take my grandson and do something fun for a day.
• Get a couple of blog posts ready to go, to help take the stress off me when I’m writing.
• Move the blog to self-hosted.
• Design the new website.
• Clean out the garage.
• Give the house a good douching.

I managed to take my grandson for the day and we went to The Dinosaur Place.

I also started writing the daily blog the night before, so I can tweak it first thing in the morning and get it up earlier.

And that’s it.

Oh, I spent almost every waking minute on the computer, the problem was I found myself drifting.  I’d drift to my gooogle reader to see what you all were up to, or I’d drift over to facebook and check my words with friends games.

I first heard about drifting from the other awesome Jodi, over at Kol’s Notes.  Jodi wrote a post Things I Learned At #BlogPaws: Time May Change Me, But I Can’t Change Time.

Ah, suddenly I have a name for what I’m doing, I just don’t know how to stop myself.  Jodi says there’s a tool you can download to block the social media sites when you need to be working.

That won’t stop me.  I’ll just shut it off.

I need motivation.

Where do you find your motivation when you just don’t have any?  Have you ever suffered from Drifting?  What steps did you take to help keep yourself on task?

Follow-Up Friday

For those new to the blog, my follow-up Friday provides me with an opportunity to update or revise a post from the previous week.

You know sometimes you post about something and you need an update but it doesn’t warrant a whole blog.  Or sometimes someone made a comment that really resonated with you.  Yup, Follow-Up Friday baby!

Please feel free to grab the badge and join me in recapping or wrapping up your week.   It doesn’t matter if you do it every week or just once in  a while.

I find myself a little light on the Follow-Up Friday post today.  Do you think that means I’m actually becoming a better blogger and covering everything I need to in the initial posts.

NAH, me either!  I think I just got lucky this week.

Happy Birthday My Love – Author’s Note

Thank you so much for all the birthday wishes for Sampson.  He had a pretty decent day.  I took him for a long walk Monday morning and I made sure to put some watermelon in his Kong for his night-time treat.

For some reason my posts never come out quite as good on the blog as they sound in my head.   I actually downloaded a recording app for my phone so when I think of something I can immediately record it.

The post in my head was WAY better than the post I actually wrote, but unfortunately I didn’t use the recording app so it’s lost forever.  Or at least until the next time I think of it.

I do have one question for you, does anyone else get sad on their pet’s birthday?  For some reason the older he gets the sadder I am on this special day.

How Do You Train Two Dogs? – Author’s Note

Most of you already figured out it’s best to separate the dogs, I just don’t know why I didn’t think of it!

So how was your week?  Did you accomplish everything you set out to?  I know I didn’t.