Where I am Manhandled by a Fat Man in a Red Suit!

My latest adventure started with the fateful words “We’ve got to get ready, I’m going to take you to get your picture taken with Santa.”  The first thing I did after Mom said that that was to jump, run in little circles and whine. That’s pretty much normal for me when I hear we are going bye-bye in the car. Then, she started cleaning me up, brushing my coat and wiping the boogies out of my eyes all of which takes 500 years when all I want to do is GO. Mom told me to calm down and then went down to the basement with me hot on heels. She opened Max-the angel dog’s tub and took out a soft, red jingle-bell collar that she put on me, a toy hamburger that was to die for, and a set of furry pointy sticks connected by a headband. This last item gave me pause as in my experience, headbands never lead to anything good. Mom called these furry sticks “antlers” and I felt very uneasy when I saw her put them in her purse. It was only when I was walking out to the car that I thought “What the heck is a Santa?”

I soon found out. We went up to Feeders where there were about a million other dogs and their people waiting in line. As we walked through the store, Mom refused to let me wipe out all the other nasty smells by saying “No tinkle” every other second. She signed some papers at a desk and then we went to wait in line like everybody else. I wanted to remain standing as a couple of knuckleheads kept trying to challenge me, but she made me lie down and that ticked me off. When they called our name, Mom took me up and gave my leash into the hand of some weird looking fat man in a red velvet suit. Heck, even I know that normal human males don’t wear red velvet. Mom turned and started to walk away, yes that’s right, leaving me with this freak-o-saris  who had possible dog killer written all over him. After all, that red color may have come from the blood of my innocent, but pea-brained kin. I tried to run after her, but he grabbed my collar and for a minute I thought I had met my doom. A minute later, I wished I had. Mom stopped and picked up her purse, then whipped out the antler sticks and planted them on my head. Another guy took a picture of me (O, the humiliation!) and while Mom was looking at it, I saw a couple of frou-frou dogs laughing at me behind their paws. I flashed them a tooth, though, when Mom wasn’t looking and you can bet that wiped the grin off their faces pretty quick. Mom asked the guy to take another picture of me without the antler sticks to see if she liked it any better. But I was done, I’d had enough! I was supposed to get to see a Santa and I never did, it was all a big trick! So I decided right then and there to close my eyes so the camera couldn’t see me. That should teach Mom and all of them a big lesson!

                                                                 

 

                                                                   

Where I become Possessed and Almost Lose My Home

Now comes the worst part………..When I last left you, things were looking up after our first session with Jerry-the-trainer. That following week, though, things went from bad to worse and I was a very bad boy. The only thing I can figure is that I must have been possessed by Eilwen, a demon German Shepherd puppy. (If you listen to his name backwards, it sounds like Newlie.) My head didn’t spin around or anything like you see in the movies and my eyes didn’t turn red, but all the other signs point to it. I wouldn’t listen, I growled at Mom and Dad a couple of times and I chewed on Dad’s big toe. I would block his way every time he tried to walk down the hall and the more he yelled at me to move out of the way, the more I barked. I got in arguments with the dogs on either side of me and took bites out of Mom’s pillows and her mattress and I chewed up her laundry basket.

Finally, Mom started crying one day and left a message for Jerry-the trainer to call her. Then, she talked to my doctor and said that she was at her wit’s end, that she couldn’t have me acting up and scaring Dad with him being sick and all. She wrote on the computer to the rescue people and said that she might not be able to keep me and they said they would take me back if that’s what she and Dad wanted. And all this time, she was crying and crying. When Jerry-the trainer called back, Mom told him everything and said she was heartbroken, but she didn’t see what else she could do. Jerry said for her to bring me over to his house the next day. He said he would step up our training and that he thought he could fix things so she didn’t have to lose me.

The next training class was rough. Jerry had Mom put me in a “sit” and then I had to stay in that position for about 32 days. Whenever I broke the “stay,” the bug would bite my neck, Mom would take me back to the same spot and make me sit again and Jerry would tell her not to be nice about it either. Then we did the same thing with “down-stay.” After that, we did some more walking on the leash and more agility. I tell you, I was one tired puppy when we left Jerry’s house that night. It is very hard for dogs to learn to be still and to do what someone else tells them regardless of what they want to do and that’s especially true if they are possessed! This training class went a long way toward driving Eilwen out of me and looking back, I am glad no one tried to use a stake or a silver bullet.
                                                               

Me staying for 32 days

Mom had also been reading a German Shepherd Forum site on the computer. It talked about a training program called “Nothing in Life is Free.” and it really is pretty simple. In a nutshell, the dog has to do something to get anything. Mom had always made me Sit and wait till she said OK before I could eat. Now, I had to sit and wait before each handful of dog food. If I wanted to go outside, I had to sit and wait. If I wanted a cookie, I had to sit and wait. In fact, I did so much sitting while this was going on, I almost got a blister on my bee-hind.

Mom stopped playing with me in the house, too, for a while because it got me too excited. She thought I needed to learn that jumping and running and roughhousing were for outside and inside was for quieter things, like chewing on my ball or chewing on my ball. (That is about the only thing I really like to do that doesn’t involve running, jumping and roughhousing.) We did graduate along the way where now I can play games in the house like Find where Mom hides my ball and I have to find it. Or she will put four or five toys in the floor and say a word and I have to go and get the toy she named. I think this is a sucky game but she likes it.

Anyways, we went to Jerry’s house more times after this and we learned more things. I am a different dog now and Mom is different, too. She has learned how to make her voice deep and loud when I am not listening enough to her. She will sometimes come and stand over me and try to make her shoulders big so that I get the point that she is the boss. She will also make the bug bite my neck and if that doesn’t work, will swat at me if I am really, really bad. Despite the fact I am stronger than her and could do terrible damage with my fangs, Mom is not afraid of me any more than most moms are afraid of their children. She rules by the force of love, not muscle. 

Where I Meet Jerry-The-Trainer at Unleashed Pawtential

Well, I have to admit I didn’t know what to make of Jerry-the-trainer at first. When Mom told me we were going to some training classes, I thought I would be sitting on the sideline giving little woofs of approval when she did something good, but nothing turned out quite like I expected. When we arrived at his house and we had all smelled each other over good, Jerry took my harness off and made me put a spikey collar on my neck. I didn’t want to, but Jerry made me put it on anyway. After it was on, though, I changed my mind because it did make me look like a dog not to be messed with. Later, I asked Mom about getting some tattoos, but she wouldn’t go for the idea.

Then, Mom and Jerry blabbed for a while, all about guess who. She had me show him some of the commands I knew, told him about my bad boy history and went over some of the different things she had tried. She also told him she was concerned about my attitude toward other dogs. He went in the house and came back out with a dog even bigger than me (I know, can you believe it?), a Dane called RD, so that he could see how I would react. Jerry later told Mom that he thought I was young and goofy and probably hadn’t been around other dogs too much, but he didn’t see me as aggressive.

Then, he said “Lets go down the street here to work” so he walked and RD paced and I trotted dragging Mom along behind me at a run. We got to this great big parking lot with grass around it and Jerry hooked on a long, long leash and walked me around. It was weird, though, because every time I got the idea to go off on my own, some big bug would bite or pinch my neck. Then, Jerry had Mom walk me around and believe it or not, the same thing happened! She must have had a smaller bug, though, because it was a smaller pinch. Mom stopped and looked upset the first time or two that I yelped when she was walking me, but Jerry just said to go on walking. He said actions have consequences for dogs just like they do for people.  He said that German Shepherds were just about the smartest of dog breeds (I knew it!) but that our intelligence could be a two-edged sword and a bunch of other stuff that I didn’t understand. Jerry told Mom to make me move out of the way when she walked toward me, not to go around, but go through me if she had to. We must have walked around for about 10 hours before we stopped, but I did learn two things. First, if I stayed close to whoever was walking me, the bug didn’t pinch my neck and second, it is a far, far better thing to move out of the way than to let your toe accidently get stepped on…YOUCH!

Mom mentioned to Jerry about how I had gotten kicked out of doggy daycare and that she had hoped one day to be able to take me to a dog park. Jerry said he wasn’t all that crazy about either idea because of the dangers of dog fights/ attacks and dogs getting sick from stuff they caught from other dogs. But he said things generally worked out OK for golden retrievers, labs and the like, but he didn’t think it was the place for shepherds like me. He said we were working dogs and that we generally wanted to be with humans, not so much with other animals. I think Mom was a little disappointed, but I gave him a high paw for that.

Finally, we went back to Jerry’s yard where he had some of that agility equipment like they had at obedience class, only his was huge. The first time he asked me to jump over one of those big fences I wanted to ask him if he was crazy. But that was actually nothing compared to climbing those mountains in his yard and walking over skinny boards with holes in them. I thought for sure I was a dead dog, but guess what? I did it! Jerry said I was a good boy and rubbed my fur and I decided right then and there that he was my new best friend.