Kaline gets back to work

Let's just say I wish I were still on vacation. Now that that's out of the way ...

Kaline was a bit depressed his first day back from Party Central. Then he mostly got back to normal and my faith in him as a baby service dog was fully restored. Our first outing was to Walgreens, and he was superb.

I have mostly gotten his “new” vest (Juno's Petjoy harness vest) to fit right, and he looks really good in it. We practiced the usual things in the store: pressing the buttons for the door, not sniffing things, lots of loose-leash walking around. He only swatted Mom's little pull-cart once, so that's progress, right? At the end we randomly bought some vitamins that are supposed to help you sleep, and I had Kaline carry them all the way from the back of the store up to the checkout line. I even got a terrible video! You can't see the part where I held it out and told him “take it” and he did, but trust me, that also happened.

So that was really fun and uplifting.

Walks this week have been wearing me out for some reason. Soon they're going to tail off for the summer, and while that will be good for my body, it is not good for my anxiety (over income) or, obviously, my income itself. Hopefully we'll get some new pack members soon. In a couple weeks we are adding a new wee Labrador, so that will be lots of fun.

Juno had a nice outing to Red Robin with me and Dad last night, and of course she was perfect. I think she is getting the hang of her new harness (when I talk about her getting the hang of it, I mean that she is positioning herself right and pulling when asked without someone she likes in front of her). Despite the fact that our table really had no under to speak of, the girls one table over had no clue Juno was there until our waiter started to coo at her. (He was having a harried night, and Juno won't respond to that stuff from a stranger, so I just let him do it.) Pretty fun. I love it when people don't realize my dog is there—that's how it should be!

Today at training they were both good. Kaline is finally learning to do a recall without crashing into me or doing a drive by (to avoid the crashing) at the end. Hurrah! He also did really, really nice off leash heeling through this insane pattern Freddie had made up with many weave poles. They both were rock-solid on the recall with distraction—I found a tennis ball, hehe. Oddly, given that Juno is the only one of the two with actual (well, probable) retriever genes, Kaline is the one who really likes balls. So it wasn't surprising that Juno ignored the ball being tossed all along the line of waiting dogs, but I was really pleased that Kaline just looked at it and then looked back at me! Woohoo! When we were working the Labs and Goldens, a little different story, haha. Although with the gun dogs, all you have to say is No Bird and they're like, “Okay, must not chase moving object.”

Hopefully this weekend I'll get to do a lot of work with Kaline—there's a carnival at a local elementary school, we may go to the city, and we'll probably do our usual Sunday morning routine. We also need to focus on his learning positions around me and trying to develop his body awareness ... yeah, I know. Lots of luck on that last one!

Fun with Sonja, going to the doctor, and retrieving tribulations

Sunday we had lovely fun with Sonja after very efficient errand-running with Juno in the morning. I just wanted to get things done, not do real training, so I took Juno to the Farmer's Market, bagel store, and Trader Joe's. We finished everything in about an hour, maybe less. No one noticed I had switched dogs, which I found a little odd. But it was, as always, the best being out with Juno!

In the afternoon, we met up with Sonja on the Stanford campus. While Chief was working on his poolside down-stays, I took Juno and Kaline over to an empty field to romp. They were off-leash most of the time, with e-collars on. Not that I actually need one on Juno, I just had it in case other dogs showed up and she gave stinkeye. Which didn't happen. Kaline had a great time running around and retrieving sticks, and then we came back and moseyed off-leash with Sonja and Chief. It was so delightful. I love the freedom the collar gives me and Kaline.

Sonja, being the fabulous friend she is, drove all of us to Foster City to get my mom's car (she left it with a friend who drove her and Dad the rest of the way to the airport). And then we (Juno and I) got invited to dinner at Buca di Beppo! So freaking delicious. And it was good I brought Juno, cause one of the other people there is afraid of dogs touching her. Can you just imagine Kaline giving her a Doberpoke?! Aaagh! Someday though, we'll go back and I'll take Kay.

Yesterday everybody got to go to the doctor. After our three walks in the heat, Kaline and I headed to my doctor's office so I could get checked out for some things. Also, my wonderful GP totally understood my airport paranoia and wrote me a prescription for a service dog, just in case. Not that I would ever show it to anyone and make them think it was okay to ask for that. I just want to have it.

Kaline was good in the exam room but man, was he squirrelly in the elevator! Ever since he was in the transparent one in Palo Alto, we get the knocking knees. I tried to distract him by asking him to sit, stand, come, touch, all of which he did, but he was not happy. Urgh. And he was pulling and sniffing a bit while we were walking.

Nonetheless, I was proud of how he did at the exam. The nurse always does my damn blood pressure before the exam, which for some reason just sends my anxiety through the roof, plus it's painful. Fibro + squeezing = OW. I sat in the chair and asked her to wait to put on the cuff. I cued Kaline to lap-up, and he did it immediately, and so gently. He was perfect, and I haven't been that calm for the blood pressure ordeal in years.

He tested out our new mat on the slippery floor (not too much sliding, yay) and held a nice down stay during the rest of the exam. Of course, his highness refused to pick up the mat at the end. “Get that? What does that mean? I have never heard that command everrrrrr.”

Next we went to the pharmacy to pick up prescriptions, and since we had to wait, I decided to work on, you guessed it, not pulling and not sniffing. It was a little bizarre. After being such a puppy ass in the doctor's office, he was perfect in the pharmacy. I think I told him leave it once. And I always had a nice loop in the leash. Good boy.

Then later, I had to take Juno to the vet just to make sure nothing was wrong (she's been limping off and on). Kaline came for moral support and still weighs 69.8 pounds. Sigh.

And today we had training. Kaline worked on hold and out (good) and retrieves (AWFUL). So I got Juno, and Anne set up a little course of objects for her to retrieve, going from easy (plastic water bottle, leather dumbbell) to hard (keys with no leather tab, metal Coke can). She picked up every single one like it was the greatest pleasure in the world to do so. I loved on her BIGTIME. I got so spoiled. She learned retrieving so easily with the clicker. Not so for wee Kaline ... He only retrieves the things he likes. Somehow, we shall advance to metal, the leash, and the roll-up mat!!

A non-guilty McDonald's trip

The parents are gone for two weeks in Holland, so I may be posting more due to there being no one around to tell me to get off my computer! Kaline and Juno don't really care.

Today was mostly a Kaline day, because Juno has been a little bit off, physically, and the vet said to rest her this weekend and see how she is Monday. She's not precisely limping, just not moving quite normally. I had wanted to take her to obedience class and then to meet my friend Marissa and her new SD prospect, Macro, but instead she stayed home and Kaline came.

He did really well at class, and even got a compliment from Anne on his hold & out skills! Woohoo! She wants me to start working him more on weird textures and objects, like Coke cans. At the end of class, he got a little over-affectionate with Lynn, who used to babysit him on the sidelines when he was little. She was kneeling down to him and he went for a hug, and tipped her over! Yikes.

On the way home, Kay and I stopped at McDonald's to grab some lunch to-go. Right as we walked in, this little girl barely taller than Kaline came up to pet him, and I asked her not to because he was working. A few minutes later, I heard her and her mom behind us, the mom explaining to the little girl that Kaline is a working dog. They were on their way out, and our stuff was almost ready, so I told them if they wanted to wait a minute, I'd take Kaline's vest off outside and the little girl could pet him.

Kaline was so good with this tiny little human! He could have knocked her over by just leaning on her shoulders, but he was exceedingly gentle, calm, and contained. No fast movements, no paws coming off the ground, just awesomeness. After confirming that the little girl was okay with kisses, I let Kaline go over and he immediately began washing her face all over. She totally loved it and petted him everywhere. He stood so still, except for moving his head to lick different parts of her face. Meanwhile, the mom prompted questions about service dogs in general and I tried to answer them in kid-speak. (I worry about walking the line between speaking in a way they can understand and being a condescending asshole.) At the end Kaline folded himself into a down and happily kissed the little girl's toes. It was absolutely precious and assuaged my usual McDonald's guilt. (Yeah, I know, I really shouldn't eat that stuff, but it's so YUMMY.)

We came home to a very happy Juno—“I thought you were DEAD!!!!”—and watched a bunch of baseball until it was time to go meet Marissa downtown. Her new little guy, Macro, is so freaking cute. He has the most charming, scruffy little face. He's a mix of Black Russian Terrier and Belgian Malinois, and just a sweet, confident, friendly little pup. He's about twelve weeks old and though he was very interested in everything going on downtown—he needed to be carried sometimes so we could walk faster than a crawl, haha—he absolutely wasn't fazed by anything. Kaline was mostly good (only dabbed a paw at the puppy a couple times), except for being distracted by dogs going by several times and pulling. Freaking pulling, I know someday it'll end but it is driving me nuts right now. It was fantastic to catch up with Marissa and meet her new boy! My ego got a bit of a stroke too cause Marissa, being the wonderfully kind person she is, said that Juno is one of her favorite SDs. Heehee. Totally made up for this guy at McDonald's asking if Kaline was very short for his breed (he is PERFECTLY WITHIN THE MALE STANDARD, dammit!!!!).

Anyway! Juno did get to go out once today, a quick in and out to Draeger's. I figured it was less walking than an average pee break, so why not. She was understandably pissed at being left home twice, and was bursting with glee when I put Kaline in the crate and told her it was her turn now. Put on the vest and suddenly she was walking and trotting normally (we did NO pulling of any kind, just walked in, did a block at the counter, got our stuff and headed out again). Very weird. I would really like to know what is up with her right now.

Training Kaline cheers me up

So, I've been sick and grumpy. Nobody wants to read other people's vents about being sick and grumpy.

Chilly little Kaline in Juno's Hallowe'en t-shirt. Dad's getting him pajamas for Xmas, hehe.

But today I've been doing a bunch of short training sessions with Kaline, and it definitely put me in a better mood.

First, though, an update on his neck. After a few months of being naked as much as possible but using the prong collar when a collar was required looking like the solution to the problem, it turns out it's not. Kaline had a tiny spot of very short hair on the back of his neck for a while, with an irritated follicle in the middle of it. Since it wasn't growing, I didn't really worry. Well, now it's growing. It's where the chain rests on the back of his neck. The hair on the front is still fine, grown in nicely, but he's got a couple irritated follicles there too. Cue despair.

Just kidding. I worked Kaline in the Infinity collar and his flat Tigers collar on Monday, and he worked pretty well in it, though he was pretty spastic in Trader Joe's. Thank goodness we were only there for about 10 minutes. He was trying to smell stuff, swinging his butt around randomly, etc. Then in line he did a perfect block, even leaning gently into the backs of my knees. He's a dog, not a robot, he's a dog, not a robot ...

Mom found a hidden stash of Christmas collars, yay!

Anyway. Tuesday I made a call to Paco Collars, based in Berkeley. I told them Kaline's issues, and they seem confident that one of their collars will do the trick. (Kay will end up working in the Infinity plus Paco Collar, until he progresses to the point where he can just work in the flat, like Juno.) I believe the word used to describe the lining of the collar was "buttery." Sounds delicious. So we are going to head up there on Saturday and hope they have a ready-made black Deluxe collar that will fit the wee man. I think they will. Not cheap, but if it finally solves the neck issue, I'll be happy. I know a ton of Dobermans wear Paco Collars, so it should work. Fingers and paws crossed.

Back to the training. Since the weekend, Kaline has gotten way better at doing the treadmill. He has now had seven total fifteen-minute sessions on the treadmill. On the first and second ones, he threw a fit and needed a lot of help to stay on. Three and four, he threw a fit but was able to stay on by himself. Five, he only put up a token fuss and walked nicely after that. Six, he got on by himself. And the rest is history.

It's really nice to know that that is now an option when Kaline needs to burn off some energy, because at least for now, roughhousing with big sis is no longer an option. He's got two little hairless tooth-marks on his neck. And I think we all know how insane I am about his neck (see above). He loves to have Juno chew on his neck, and she loves to oblige, so ...

We also worked a bunch on the fridge, because he was backsliding a little. Today, our new maize-and-blue tug came from Alex, a friend who is raising money for her future SD from Laughing Eyes Kennels. Both dogs love it, and Kaline is already starting to pull on the long middle part of the tug (on the rope toy, he refused to use anything but the little fringey strings at the bottom, which obviously led to the thing slipping abruptly out of his mouth a lot).

His take it is getting pretty good—he'll go for the blue bone on the floor—and he did very nice hold and out today. He walked around the kitchen with the bone in his mouth (I held my hand really close to his mouth in case he decided to drop it) and even did a sit-down-sit sequence with it in his mouth.

While Juno gets her turns on the treadmill, Kaline gets to practice his down-stay and settle, which is going nicely. I really want to just take a day and go to several different places with him and a book, and just work on settling under chairs/tables for extended periods of time. Super exciting, I know.

Juno did such a cute hold yesterday at training. Anne had left her bait bag way far away and was packing up her car. When I went to go grab Juno's leash (she'd been working off-leash), I saw the bag and told Juno to take it. She did, and she carried it all the way from that little area of the park over to Anne's car—where she sat and politely gave the bag to Anne. Yay.

I think the only other thing Kaline has really been focusing on is finding heel and finding front. Finding front is a lot harder for him, but we'll get there!

What a week

Boy, am I glad this week is basically over. The cold that started just after Thanksgiving got completely full-blown, so I've been sniffling/unable to breathe without nose spray, coughing in periodic fits, having massive headaches, etc. There was much Cancellation of Stuff.

Juno is a perfect dog to have around when you're sick. Okay, who am I kidding, she is a perfect dog to have around at any time ever. She just lies quietly next to wherever I am, for as long as I feel like being there. The past few days, Kaline has been doing basically the same thing! Only he lies on me, not next to me, usually. Yesterday I actually got both dogs to lie on the bed with me. I have a teeny bed, so it was a little crowded, but very warm.

Both dogs on the couch, be still my heart.

It's been storming a bit since Wednesday, so that hasn't helped the cold any. All the dogs have been miserable going out and having to be wet (raincoats only help so much). Poor Kay will stand and shiver whenever we have to stop. I am constructing his Official Cozy Horse Coat™ in my mind, trying to make it as warm as possible. Can't have it at least until after his birthday. And I may get him a Cloudchaser to go underneath it. Because I am insane, and my little dog is wimpy.

I've been experimenting with giving Kaline more access to rooms when we're home, meaning he and Juno are not closed into the kitchen/den with me. I keep everything upstairs closed, so he can't go into bedrooms and get shoes and socks to chew, but now he has access to the dining room and the living room downstairs where he and Juno like to wrestle. It's going okay, I think. We'll see how I feel a week from now, haha!

Kaline is close to giving himself a hot spot on his right front paw from obsessive licking. I got this spray called Bitter Lime to stop him licking. Well, he hates being sprayed with the stuff and will run away, but even if his paw is soaked in this nasty stuff (I got some on my hands, then nibbled a finger, and holy shit, EW) he will lick as though it tastes amazing. Gaaah. 

In addition to continuing to work on opening the fridge, I've been focusing on hold, out, and take it with Kaline. Whenever he gets annoying at night, I grab one of the few toys left to him (blue rubber bone, Nylabone, antler, cookie ball) and we practice hold and out for a few minutes. His hold is getting very nice; he'll hold whatever it is for a pretty long time, and all I have to do is stroke his chin every once in a while to remind him to keep his mouth closed. Anne doesn't want us to work on take it too much until his hold is solid, so we only do that a little bit.

Fridge work is highly amusing. Usually on the first try, Kaline just picks up the tug and then drops it. It takes him a little bit to actually get the fridge open. Once he does get it open that first time, though, it's like he wants to make sure that first part where he messes around ineffectually doesn't happen again. I'll leave with whatever I wanted out of the fridge, and Kaline will stay over there, yanking the fridge open dramatically, letting it close and yanking it open again. Of course, the next time the whole little drama plays out again, but I think it's getting progressively shorter. It cracks me up.

Also quite funny: When I ask Kaline to open the fridge, telling Juno to stay back a little bit; then he messes up and Juno walks in and takes the tug from him and pulls the fridge open. See how it's done, young man.

There's also been unpleasant drama in the service dog world. Dani Woodson, who I am acquainted with through a couple SD groups on Facebook, was kicked out of a Whataburger in Pensacola, FL, by a police officer who refused to enforce the laws (state and federal) protecting disabled people from being forced to leave because of their service dogs. She got the whole thing on video and it's gone pretty viral.

 

Of course, when something like this gets on the news, the Whataburger FB page and the Pensacola Police Department FB page, it brings out all the stupid people. Who say things like, "I wouldn't want to sit next to a stinky dog in a restaurant" or "How do you even know it's a service dog?" or "Well, they got their food, it's totally okay for them to be kicked out because they weren't denied service". So the SD community has been rebutting the idiots. I got in there last night for a while, and it was just sending my anxiety through the roof. I watch videos like this, I read things like that, and it's like that stuff is happening to me right now. 

And without being asked, Kaline just draped himself across my lap and went to sleep. I'm extra super in love with him lately.

Madly in love with Juno

Juno's been awesome today. Kaline too has been a very good boy, but oh my FSM, Juno! (Also, the Tigers won the pennant. A very good day.)

After a Trazodone-free night, I feel much better physically. We had two walks this morning, and on the second one, as we were in the little home-stretch, Juno's prong collar just popped off. It has a loose link, so it does that sometimes. Since it's on Juno, I don't worry. And clearly, I don't need to. When the collar fell to the ground, Juno hesitated a little, waiting for me to reel in the leash. Since we were close to "home" (Jett's house), I didn't even try to put it back on her. She stayed perfectly in position without her leash, keeping all three boys—Max, Kaline and Jett—in line as usual. Sped up, slowed down, all perfectly in step with me, all the way there. I was very gleeful!

Training was really good today as well. Freddie returned from the East Coast shows with a new car magnet for me—a silhouette not just of a Doberman, but a natural-eared Doberman! So exciting.

Kaline worked before Juno, and Freddie worked on proofing his down. I had a stuffing-less ferret of some kind, and Freddie had various balls; Kaline had to hold his down-stay or sit-stay while both Freddie and I in turn tried to distract him and make him break with the toys. He only broke once! Sometimes there was no warning when Freddie would throw something either.

Kaline did a beautiful figure eight (I remembered not to look down!). Freddie loves how elegant he looks when he's not being a galumphy pup, haha. Then he got to work on fun retrieves with the ferret, and finally he had his first hold and out session. You gently open his mouth and insert something to hold, in this case a tennis ball bumper, saying, "Hold." Then you keep one hand under his chin to keep his mouth closed, and put the other on the back of his head, where most Dobes have a knob (Kaline doesn't). Then you just kinda wait till he relaxes and holds the object calmly without chomping it or rolling it around. Once you get that, you put one hand on either end of the object, not pulling on it, and say, "Out." Most dogs, when you actually ask them to hold something, don't really want to do it, so they'll immediately let go and back their mouth off the object—exactly what you want when you say out. Kaline did that part perfectly every time. He'll get the hang of hold pretty fast, I think.

After Kaline, I got out Juno. She got to be a post while Peter did figure eights, and then when it was her turn to do it off leash, she went over by Freddie's chair, picked up the "tuff" toy that looks like a flattened doughnut, and handed it to me. I thanked her, then tossed it back to the chair. Whereupon she got it again. So I told her hold and we did the off-leash figure eight—all with the toy in her mouth! She looked so freaking cute. She did an even better off-leash figure eight without it though, haha. She then did perfect fabulous recalls alongside Peter. And then we got to do retrieves.

First we did formal retrieves, with Juno having to wait for me to send her to get the toy, then having to return to front with it, give it to me, then return to heel. So good, so cute. I took a couple videos, none of which were great because Juno gets a little confused when I hold the phone at her. Then we just did fun retrieves with the tennis ball bumper, and she had a total blast. She will only fetch if there are no other dogs around—I don't know why, but Juno will never refuse to give up a toy to another dog (that includes Kaline, and did even when he was very tiny). She was panting and grinning by the end and I just loved her up and told her she's the best dog in the whole world.