Snowy Day

We were complete slugs on Saturday, but yesterday (Sunday) Indie and Katie got a fun run in the woods and Ebby made it to the dog park.

Indie does so well in the woods still, and he learns a great deal from watching Katie. It was a beautiful day, warm but snow-covered. The woods were mostly deserted but we did cross paths with two men at one point. Indie alerted to them with hackles, barking, and distraction, and Diane and I didn't handle it quite as well as we could have. We tried to change direction and go off trail, but I had to put him on leash to ensure that he wouldn't run backwards up to them. This was mostly an issue because we were somewhere they're supposed to be on leash. (Yes, we're bad humans, but we only let them off leash when they're under fully as much control as they'd be on a flexi. They do not run rampant, do not disturb wildlife, and are on back leash by the time any other human would be close enough to know the difference) In hindsight, I wish we'd stopped just off trail and had me stuff him with Charlie Bears while the men walked by. In practice, we ended up with some chaos and probably made the whole thing worse and scarier for him than if we'd done nothing at all. Bah. He also alerted to a neighbor (male) who we stopped to talk to us our near the house last night, although he settled down relatively quickly. We're just going to need to work with that. With the weather as cold as yucky as it's been, we haven't been running into other humans all that much on our regular
walks, and the woods have been particularly private.

Ebby had a howlin' good time at the dog park, and got to play with Rosie, a Jack Russell/Chihuahua/Corgie mix. Rosie likes to play Ebby's favorite game of Chase Me, and the real rip is that Rosie will turn around and get Ebby on the run. It was absolutely hilarious. Rosie also boxes and does this great flying leap as an offensive maneuver. Her front legs oustretch like Superman; it's the greatest. She's one spunky little dog, and I hope we run into her again.

Speaking of boxers, the E-girl was really obnoxious with the one boxer that was there yesterday, a male named Duke. She's gotten better about her nip move, but she was really persistant in nipping at his back. He didn't do much about it, but I don't think he was too thrilled with it, either. Fortunately, his owner wasn't concerned about it, although I did call her off of him several times so as not to let her keep being a pill. I'm very pleased with her that she'll call off other dogs at the park, and hope that it continues to translate over into her obedience training, and perhaps into off-leash training in general. I truly hope we can eventually get to take her out in the woods as well without fear of the Dreaded Bunny Chase.