Milestones

Kaline and Juno at the grove in the Arizona Garden.

This past Tuesday, my boy Kaline had his first birthday! It's completely insane how fast this year has gone. And I keep wondering what he did with that adorable little fat puppy who used to have to jackrabbit up the stairs. (Still kicking myself for never getting a video of that.)

On our morning walk, Kaline's friend Kelsey, who works at the flower shop where the dogs get cookies, presented him with a rose. Then she held it for him while he gleefully ripped off all the leaves and petals!

For Kaline's birthday, we did our usual Tuesday things—walks and training—but then finished up with a big delicious bagel burger. I think he was a little shocked that the burger I was grilling was for him. Juno gets fed scraps and such (it's too late to retrain Mom) but the only leftovers Kaline gets are things like fruit, vegetables and rice. He was so delicate about eating it too! Juno was like that her first time, licking the bagel until I mimed chomping it and she got the idea. Eventually Kaline ripped chunks off, but they were little, gentlemanly chunks. It was very cute. (Not as cute: The diarrhea that ensued the next day. Perhaps we'll have to figure out a different birthday tradition for him.)

Last week was not a good one for me, being stuck in a pit of depression most of the time due to being off certain pills and to overreacting to various events. But, it led to another milestone for Kaline. The parents invited me to go see 42, the Jackie Robinson movie, and because I was in a fragile emotional state and Kaline is much more attuned to that and proactive about it, I firmly said that he was going to the movie.

It was his first movie in a theatre other than the Stanford. And he was perfect during the movie! Didn't get up once, barely moved around period! He was awesome. And the movie was great. Some kids are raised on the normal fairy tales, but I was raised on stories of Jackie Robinson and the Brooklyn Dodgers. He was my dad's hero growing up and was mine as well. It almost became a running joke in school, because I would do any American history or biography project on Jackie Robinson, always. The movie was quite good, although the ending was a little meh. It was amazing to see Ebbets Field recreated.

So yeah, doing well in a Real Movie Theatre™ was a huge deal, at least to me.

This was not a huge deal, but quite fun nonetheless.

In other fun news, Juno came along to a birthday dinner for my mom's best friend. Another member of our party arrived after I did, and even though she was sitting next to me, she didn't realize Juno was there until I happened to mention it. Win.

She also came to the Dutch Masters exhibit at the DeYoung and was awesome. We met Sonja and Chief, and also went with my friend Julie and her guide dog, Honda. The dogs were all fantastic. Juno did such great blocking. The exhibit was crowded with clumps of people, and every time I went to stare at a painting for an extended time, I'd motion to Juno to block behind me. After about the second one, the little movement from my right hand was all I needed, and she'd swing herself around in a most wonderful fashion. The rear end awareness exercises we used to do continue to pay dividends.

Chief and Juno at the DeYoung (Honda only holds dog toys).

 And my mom's friend, Dona, finished the travel-mat prototype! It's slightly narrower than our old one, but I absolutely love the fabric and colors! We already have some ideas for improvements and I'm super excited about it. Now I just have to hope people buy them, cause otherwise I'll look like kind of an ass. We're going to try it out at the doctor's office on Monday.

Kaline on the new mat. If you look closely, you can see the silhouettes of dogs (and a few cats) in some of the dots!

Birthday fun

Sunday was my birthday, and of course I did a bunch of things with my two best friends, Juno and Kaline.

Kaline got to do his usual morning of work. He was a little spacey in the Farmer's Market—he didn't sniff or really do anything naughty, but he just wasn't as focused as he usually is. He settled in though; after we had worked the market a while, we went to the bagel store and he settled immediately under the table, without being told. And he only had one pop-up, a little while before we were ready to go. I got to do some fun education with this lady who wanted to know how long it takes to train a service dog.

Trader Joe's was not nearly as much fun as usual. At least two separate sets of kids (I assume siblings) had been given miniature carts by their parents, so they could push them around and pretend like they were being useful. Instead, the little trolls were racing the tiny carts around, screaming and yelling as they went. Kaline was understandably unnerved by just the running and screaming. Maybe unnerved is the wrong word. He wasn't frightened, but he was clearly concerned and distracted. Then, in addition to the running and screaming and general racket of multiple tiny carts, one of the kids almost hit Kaline twice, once with his cart, once with a flailing fist.

If it wasn't obvious, badly behaved children annoy me. A lot. I feel like a 9-year-old should definitely be able to behave as well in public as my 11-month-old puppy. Who despite his distraction, never barked, whined, play-bowed, or lunged. We ran into our usual friend, who complimented Kaline on not reacting to the kids beyond the staring. In a moment of passive-aggressiveness, I recounted the misbehavior of the various children to him knowing that just behind him was the mother of the kid who'd almost hit my puppy. Hopefully the semi-indirect calling-out will inspire her to put her spawn on a leash. Or just leave them in the car.

We finished up on a positive note, with a great mini-outing to Walgreen's. I love having Kaline do the buttons there. There are all kinds of fun challenges to work on, and in the absence of the crazy offspring, Kaline was his usual awesome self.

We broke up the day with a double-dog outing to the grove. Juno didn't run much, but I think she enjoyed herself nonetheless. Kaline made several new friends, including a little five-month-old Australian Shepherd named Sierra.

For dinner, my parents took me to Buffalo Wild Wings in San Jose. I know, I should have higher standards. But I absolutely love the food there! I took Juno, and was super glad I did, because once our server found out there was A DOG under the table (Dad told him), he took every opportunity to squat down and try to interact with Juno. Juno wouldn't even make eye contact with him, merely staring off, head comfortably on her paws, while he made a bit of a fool of himself. “You are beneath my notice,” she was clearly saying. He didn't get the message. I probably should have said something, but Juno did such a good job of it nonverbally! It was too funny.


Mom gave me money for my birthday, so I could order the custom 8x8 BLD leash for Kaline that I've been wanting. Woohoo! Definitely a good birthday! Except for the whole getting older part. Boo on that.

Juno's birthday and Jekyll & Hyde outings for Kaline

Juno's (made-up) sixth birthday was on Dec. 26, so of course she got the traditional bagel-burger. I started that with Angel, my first dog, who also had a made-up birthday. Fry up a ground beef patty, put it on a bagel, then hang on while she goes to town! I also gave her tons of little goodies throughout the day—Gouda cheese, bagel & cream cheese, pieces of sugar cookies, extra bait, etc.

Here we have a ground beef patty on a pumpkin bagel, mmmmmm.

Yes, best dog in the world, this is for you.

OM NOM NOM.

Kaline then had two different outings. One went awfully, and the other was fantastic.

We got invited with Sonja and Chief to go to Hidden Villa, a dog-friendly farm where we'd never been. Since it was dog-friendly and Mom didn't seem real thrilled to be on Juno duty for the afternoon, I decided to take Juno with Kaline. First mistake. Second mistake, taking Juno on her martingale instead of her prong.

If Kaline had been by himself, he would probably have done at least a little better. As it was, he pulled constantly against his Halti, so much that my hands were burning the whole rest of the night and he rubbed the fur down on part of his nose. Sonja, saint that she is, took Juno because I couldn't, it turned out, handle both her and Kaline around the very interesting creatures (sheep, goats, kitties, fake horses). Chief got to roam about dragging his leash most of the time. Juno took Sonja seriously about being on vacation now that I wasn't holding her leash. Kaline was just frustrating as hell.

Meeting the Hidden Villa sheeps. Not a typo, I like saying sheeps.

The one really good thing he got the hang of was going up to see something interesting, like a sheep, and then turning away from it when I asked him. It was hard for him at first, understandably, but by the end he would come away pretty easily.

So yeah, mostly that one sucked. Kaline and I were not very team-like.

Then yesterday we went with Sonja and Chief (and not Juno) to IKEA. And both boys were freaking awesome. I did this a lot:

Because Kay had rubbed his nose, we switched back to the prong. Even if it has rubbed his neck hair some, and at points given him bumps, no training collar irritates him less or is more effective. So I guess we're back on the prong. Some lady in IKEA was apparently talking bad about Kaline's prong (in German). Whatever. It works, and Kaline's happy in it. I'm done, for at least a while, messing with his equipment. The little rubbed spot on his nose is driving me all kinds of crazy. Poor baby.

Anyhow. We did a ton of distraction work with Chief and Kaline and had ourselves a fantastic time. Hendrik also came along and I was incredibly impressed with his ability to entertain himself while Sonja and I worked with the dogs.

Right as we entered, there was this big bin of stuffie footballs. We tossed them around the boys, toward the boys, then piled them around the boys' feet and had them do stays among the balls. We also dumped in a big stuffed seal. It was precious.

Sit stay.

Kaline wonders why he didn't get to settle ...

Down stay.

Next, we put the boys in down-stays across an aisle from us and let all the crowds walk between us and the boys. No one would actually walk between Kaline and Chief, but Sonja got Hendrik to do it. Kaline popped up the second time Hendrik stepped over him, so I went out to reinforce his stay with people stepping over him.

Kaline and Chief during a lull.

We chilled on a couch and the boys got to schmooze a little bit.

We haven't been able to get the videos to load yet, but both Kaline and Chief got to work on open and close in one of the model kitchens. It took a little bit for Kaline to realize I wanted him to use Chief's leash as a tug, but once he got it he was pretty good. Chief was freaking adorable, I love how he has to put his whole body into opening a cabinet. He would open the cabinet, find a teddy bear and then bring that to Sonja. Kaline just did open-wait-close. The wait is important, cause if you don't tell him, he will open the door and immediately slam it shut!

We did recalls through a busy area.

Kaline got to practice a little bit on his new "legs" task.

When we found the cheap clearance toy bins, we did more distraction work. We waved toys around, then had the boys walk through a labyrinth of toys, then do recalls through it. We even did retrieving exercises.

And then we made the boys wear silly hats.

 

By then they were both pretty tired, so we took a break in the food court.

 

On the way out, tired Chief got to be carried sometimes, which was insanely cute. That's not an option for Kaline, who now weighs in at 65 pounds, so he got to practice his blocking again. When he blocked at the food court, Sonja even nudged him a little with her knee and he didn't move out of position. Yay! We have to do that more, now that he's pretty solid.

Melt.

You are a good boy.

Service dog training, luckily, can be like baseball instead of American football. If you have a bad day, you can just get right back out there and (hopefully) erase that memory with a better day. I'd much rather do that than stew for a week over a bad outing!