I'll get to that eventually........!! No picture tonight. Once again, it would be of a sleeping Tippy. So this morning the photographers were there to take our pics for our ID cards, and also for some "action" shots. Now I know some of you are not familiar with the comings and goings of a service dog. You hear "action" and picture some rollicking and frolicking.....WRONG!!!! Especially if your service dog is named TIPPY! I think the better phrase would be shots of service dogs working. Now I make comments about Tippy being slow and deliberate. That's not a bad thing, not by any stretch of the imagination! It's the perfect pace for me now. I relish the thought he puts into every motion, every moment. I adore the look he gives me as he follows the command...."am I doing it right, huh, huh?". I just get a kick out of it. Sometimes it's really hard not to chuckle, especially when he's told, "down". I LOVE IT, I LOVE HIM!!!!!
Today we worked on "Fridge". Ideally and eventually that one command will be the culmination of a series of commands. We need to keep practicing it since Brian said it will be one of the first commands they forget if not used/practiced. It begins with the command "fridge" at which point the dog grabs the rope hanging from the refrigerator door and tugs. Next, when the door is open far enough the command "fetch" is given.
The dog lets go of the rope and goes to the fridge shelf to retrieve the item which is always in the same place. For the sake of practice, an orange "dumbbell" was used. The dog picks of the item with their mouth and you tell them "hold". Next you tell the dog "nudge" and they go to the outside of the door and nudge it until it is closed all the way. You can tell them to "hold" again and they bring the item to you at which point you say "give" when you have a hold on it. As soon as you take the dumbbell you say "yes!" to let them know they have done it correctly and a "special" treat is used as the reward. I'm sure that if I was better at setting it up for success we would not have had to repeat it as many times as we did! I needed to have my self positioned properly so that when Tippy tugged on the rope the fridge would open up enough to give him the chance to "fetch" before the door began to close on him..... I'm also having a little trouble with my word retrieval. I'm sure it is in part due to my age, alas yes, but also due to my "neuro-whatever"! I actually drew a blank on Tippy's name the other day in training! YIKES!!
After we were done with the "fridge" debacle.....Brian gave us a break and then we headed off to the mall. We needed to get some lunch at the food court so that we could demonstrate that we could have the dog's "under" or beside and they would wait patiently while we ate. No problem. YAY! Next we walked a little bit in the mall before Brian had us go into a store to walk around. Now, both Andy and I have large dogs so you can imagine what went through my head as I looked into the small shop crowded with racks of clothes and shelves with trinkets! Both Tippy and Richie, however, maneuvered the maze just fine and we were out without any mishaps..... especially from the "tail zone". One wag of the tail in the wrong direction in the wrong store can spell certain embarrassment, and financial ruin. Thankfully they neither wagged in the wrong direction, nor was it the wrong store....interject HEAVY SIGH here!!!
We next took turns going into a children's play area with our dogs and had them in a "sit/stay". Richie did great, Tippy also did very well but I need to remember to use "watch me" more instead of "leave it". Tippy was just a little unsure of the children moving around and by saying "leave it" at times, I was reinforcing the idea that it was something undesirable. Other than that, it was an extremely positive experience for both handler and dog.
Okay.....now to the "horse" thing. This afternoon we had went through our dog's health file/record. Dan talked to us about their immunizations, Date of birth, microchip information and weight. What to look for when checking out how your dog looks regarding his weight. ***Just an aside, Andy found out that Richie was born the day before he was "blown up" in Afghanistan. Fate? I think so. I think Richie was meant for Andy all along. I think in the grand scheme of things they are destined to do "good" for others. They certainly belong with each other.......their bond is almost palpable. It's kind of interesting, don't you think???? When Brian called to tell me about Tippy he said that her was about 78 lbs. We were talking yesterday and he said that he could see Tippy at as much as 81-83 lbs., but mentioned that he had gotten up to 85 at one point and it was obvious that he was overweight. Brian also mentioned that he could tell that both dogs had lost weight while they were at NEADS, before and during our training, Richie a bit more than Tippy. Andy said that he was told that Richie was about 70 lbs. when he came for training. He weighed in today at, I think, 67.6 lbs. He was in the kennel longer than Tippy, Tippy being here just 11 days prior to training. (they were in the prison prior to that) Tippy was weighed today, and, he weighed in at...........82.6 lbs!! Oh my gosh!!!!! I really didn't think there would be that much of a difference. Richie does look a bit leaner, with Tippy looking quite solid. But, they are pretty close to the same height so I figured maybe an 8-10 lb. difference. Wow! Put that together with the idea that Brian told us both dogs like to check out the garbage, Tippy more so, and that means very careful monitoring of what goes in. I've been very good in the past, switching to carrots when Alli proved that she could pack on the pounds. I think it's all, as Andy said, pretty much common sense. There's no need for the dogs to have "people" food other than some veggies and maybe some fruit here or there. They are supposed to have 1/8 of a cup of veggies every day anyway.
I guess it's time to put the horse in the stable for the night and I'll be turning out the light in the bunkhouse as well......
Peace,
Wendy
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