Kaline opened the fridge!

I have been trumpeting this news all day. Last night, Kaline finally figured out how to open the fridge by himself! It was very exciting.

We worked on it again tonight, and he was a bit rusty. So this will be an ongoing thing. The first time is always the hardest though, and it'll only get easier from here on out.

Kaline is also still having nothing-vomit every morning. Thus, we headed to the vet today, skipping out on training in the park for about 45 minutes. Unfortunately, it was not tremendously helpful. Dr. Harish just recommended feeding Kaline the main part of his dinner later (he ate around 8:00 tonight) and also feeding him a snack even later. That way, we hope, he will not have a completely empty stomach in the morning and won't have his acid reflux going on.

They also said he's small (he's 59 pounds today; big brother Montgomery is 73). Of course, I had a mini-freakout over this, since one of the reasons I got a boy was so he'd be taller than Juno. Kaline hasn't quite caught up to her yet. But Maura, despite having two litters on the ground, quickly allayed my fears by assuring me he might not be finished growing vertically until he is 18 months old. So he has, possibly, 11 months to gain those three to four inches! Go Kaline go! This is one of the many reasons you go with a great breeder. So when you freak out over things that are not a big deal, you can ask her about it, and she can tell you everything will be okay.

At training, Kaline got to roughhouse with Lucky the Golden Achiever, and Juno did most of the work between the two of them. Kaline got a chance at being out with the big dogs on a down-stay, but couldn't handle it after a while. Ah well.

I am planning to really ramp up Juno's formal obedience training, because I just got the entry form for a trial (actually three trials in one weekend held at the same venue) at the end of January. I got all excited about entering both dogs, but it turns out Kaline can't compete until he's neutered. And I'm waiting till the last second to do that.

Anyway, Juno and I worked on about-turns and left-about-turns when heeling off leash, as well as straight recalls and drops on recall. Drop on recall is our major homework, since we can't work on the broad jump (the area in which she has almost no experience) except at training. Freddie said she'll bring her jumps next week so I can practice with Juno on the broad jump and the retrieve over the high jump. She's done retrieves over a jump before, but she has to learn to do it at 26 inches. I doubt we'll get a qualifying score at any of the three trials, but it'll be good experience for her. (She will undoubtedly break on either or both of the out-of-sight stays.)

If she's really not ready for Open by January, we'll just go do Rally. That should be fun and pretty easy for her, since I'll be allowed to chatter to her all I want!

Training games and outings

Kaline got quite the workout yesterday—lots of individual attention at training, because I am already trying to cram him for the CGC on September 17.

Kaline and Juno with our addition for the day, Rocky. He is the only designer poodle-mix I actually enjoy working. Such a love!!

Before training, we had a fairly amusing encounter on our big Palo Alto pack walk. Amusing to me, anyway. We were about to cross the street (me and five dogs) when we saw two people, each getting yanked along by a Boxer in a harness. Each human had the leash wrapped several times around his or her fist, which is unsafe in general but seemed like a supremely bad idea in this case. Clearly the Boxers were not under control, so we remained a safe distance behind and I treated Kaline frequently for looking to me, instead of the dogs.

Then we heard a commotion up ahead—a white fluffy purse rat, at the end of its leash and also in a completely ineffective harness, was yapping and lunging at the two Boxers, whose owners were still a leash-length away and trying to hold their dogs back. Finally, the dogs were all extricated; the yapper was silenced momentarily. Then the puntable turned and saw my five dogs, waiting beside me (I sure wasn't wading into that mess).

It looked at us consideringly, taking in a breath. I looked at the dog (not the owners, so they'd take it as a semi-joke) and said, "Don't even THINK about it." The owners pulled the tiny reactive beast to the side and we passed unscathed. I was just amused that this dog was willing to take on the Boxers but not my guys. Hehe.

I ran Kaline through most of his paces at training, with a lot of emphasis on loose-leash walking. To some people that implies the dog can have all six feet of leash, as long as he's not pulling. To me, it means Kaline needs to walk beside me, but doesn't have to have precise positioning or watch my face constantly, just check in periodically. I made lots of turns and zigzagged all over the place, which usually seems to get him in the rhythm.

We also worked on his retrieving; he's picking up the objects and (mostly) bringing them back reliably, so now Freddie has me walking off while he has the toy, and trying to get him to walk with me while holding on to it. Not much of a problem so far for the Doberman Retriever! Hurrah. Other areas we focused on were: spontaneous eye contact; remote sits and down; flip finishes; and turns in place (also known as the Finding Heel Game).

I came home to find that San Mateo County hadn't issued Kaline's SD tag (they don't differentiate between SDs and SDITs) because I was not specific enough about how he does his tasks (or will do them). I don't know how much more specific than "retrieves dropped items" they really need, but I was pretty angry, since I had sent in Juno's paperwork the same way and gotten the tag without issues. So I typed up two full pages in condescending detail of how each task is performed, and sent it off. Then to cool down, Kaline and I accompanied Mom to two grocery stores.

Again, we were working a lot on walking nicely and on spontaneous attention. I didn't try to stop him from air scenting or looking around, because unlike Juno, it's not like he's been in a bunch of grocery stores before. It's all pretty new to him, so it's understandable he would do that. We just were quick and positive, lots of treats for looking at me and keeping pace with me.

At the first store, we got one of those people who ask prying questions. I now have stock answers for most of those. We got to the one that is so annoying: "You don't look disabled." I replied, "Not all disabilities are visible." She responded by patting me as if I were a small child and cooing, "It's okay, you're doing just fiiiiiiiine." I restrained myself from smacking her.

Next store we got an absolutely lovely woman who couldn't stop complimenting Kaline on his handsomeness and his lovely manners. She had never seen a Doberman with natural ears before and though he looked so nice. Win.

Kaline not sniffing candy at Draeger's.

Today we worked more on the remote down, and Kaline didn't realize it, but we were really working on a foundation for his drop on recall!

Juno and I couldn't play the game properly at the special class, because I didn't have a toy for her (we just used a marker word and treats). But tonight Kaline was all rambunctious, so we went down to play fetch, and I got the marvelous idea of playing the drop game with him.

He caught on really fast that raising my hand means I want him to lie down (he's also pretty much got it that the verbal cue, regardless of hand signal, means down). So I'd pretend to throw the toy, then shoot my hand in the air, give the verbal cue, and he'd drop. And then you throw the toy behind them, they fetch it, and you start the game again. It worked like a charm! We had a great time and he got re-tired out. (Re-tired because they had three pack walks in the morning.)

On our third pack walk, a pretty one.

The pups have basically been chilling today since the walks, except for the fetch session with Kaline. He was awesome at our tdoc appointment, settling nearly as fast as Juno!

At our tdoc appointment (the office is dog friendly, so they only wear vests occasionally).

Oh, and I will post a video of this at some point: Kaline chews hard things like an old man with bad dentures, and it is hilarious. It's because he's losing and growing teeth all the time. His lower jaw does this funny quivering thing as he tries to get the food between whatever teeth are available. My mom does an excellent impression of it.

Open Foundation Class

Dog of supreme awesomeness.

Tonight Juno got some quality alone fun time! An obedience club was having an Open Foundation Class (i.e. a class where you get advice and get to work on various aspects of Open-level obedience) in Santa Clara and I got invited. Junebug and I met this lady who is involved in running the club when we were at a match once, and she's really into mixed-breed competition, so obviously we had stuff in common.

We were a bit late getting there due to traffic, but we still got to be there for all the important stuff. We didn't get to hear all the tips on heeling—about five minutes after we arrived, we got sent into the ring along with a bulldog (for the rest of the evening, we were known as "the odd couple") to show our skillz to the instructor. Juno was predictably not so awesome at that. First of all, obedience heeling (where they keep perfect pace with you and stare lovingly into your eyes at all times) is not one of her best areas to begin with. Add to that we had not warmed up, I wasn't sure if we were supposed to use bait (so I didn't), and I had just switched from her prong to her flat collar ... and yeah, we kinda sucked. Enough that the instructor asked if Juno had ever been worked off leash. Oh the shame. (Not really.)

Between exercises, Juno gleefully lay on her back for belly rubs and attempted to mooch food off our neighbors. Training classes are the only places where she actively solicits attention from strangers, because she knows everyone has food.

Our next focus was the drop on recall and Juno was awesome at that one! First we did random drops; on the first one, she was like, "Wait, are you sure?" Then she got a treat and was on. Any time I raised my hand, she threw herself into a down and lashed her tail eagerly. The only challenge was trying to get her to stay far enough away from me to start getting some distance. (Anytime I released her, she came bounding up to me, like, "I did so good, didn't I, Mom?")

Then we did drops behind barriers; again, Juno just needed to be shown what to do, and then she got it. I love watching the little gears turning in her brain. She is always so up for learning new stuff and she wants to know exactly how it's done. She flopped on the barrier at one point, and I moved her back off it; the next time, she dropped with her front paws about an inch from the barrier. For that, we need to work on the folding-back style of down; perhaps I'll put a new word on it other than down.

The instructor then talked to us a ton about proofing stays for the out-of-sight sits and downs. The exercises to try were hilarious, and sounded just like the kinds of things you'd do to proof a service dog in training. Throwing balls past them, having random people come up and talk to them or offer food, letting another dog play near them, etc. I can't wait to try all this stuff with Juno and Kaline, it sounds like a blast.

At the very end—we'd run over time—those who decided to stay got to practice short out-of-sight group stays. Juno broke once, when I first left her on the sit-stay, and after that was good. The instructor had me go outside but keep talking continually to Juno, which really seemed to help. It was interesting, because when we practiced the same thing Tuesday at the park, Juno did a perfect three-minute sit-stay, but then popped up into a sit when she was doing her long down. Tonight the down was good.

I wish this kind of stuff happened more often! Juno loved it, you could just tell she was having a blast. I can't wait till we can start trialing again.

Kaline update: He worked more on retrieving at the park, and I worked on his loose-leash walking with him on his own at night. That actually went really well. More individual work on that is in order, possibly in a different collar, since he can't wear the prong for the CGC. I just don't want to rub the fur off his neck, cause I think it's looking better.

Juno and Kaline sacked out at Red Robin yesterday.

We ran into a woman on our middle walk today who saw Kaline and went, "A baby Dobie!" I practically hugged her for knowing without asking what Kaline is. He was kind of a pill on that walk (he, Xena and Jett all amp each other up) but then he was excellent with Juno, her boyfriend Ellis, and Teddy. Woohoo.

Life update: My beloved 21-year-old Honda Accord, affectionately known as Faithful Little Tygs On Top, has just had what I assume will be his last very expensive appointment with the mechanic. Dad and I are planning outings to showrooms this weekend just to get more information on my main options, a Honda CRV and a Toyota Rav4. I'm thinking of taking Juno to one showroom, doing a recharge at home, then taking Kaline to the other. Hopefully it'll go well ... maybe by October or so I will have a new (to me) car more suited to my dog profession. I will sorely miss my little Honda though. My faithful dog-nail-scarred Tigermobile.