When I pulled into the pet hotel to pick up Guinness this morning, he was in the play yard having his tummy rubbed by his personal camp counselor. By the time I pulled out my camera and rolled down the window, he was standing staring at me. What a happy boy!
Guinness appeared at my side with a plastic bag in his mouth. I recognized the bag as one I had filled with styrofoam peanuts from a recently received box. I went downstairs to see what kind of mess we had. It wasn’t too bad – just peanuts everywhere. He came with me and immediately filled his mouth with peanuts. I took one to a sink to test if it would dissolve in water, which it did. So no worries as they are cornstarch peanuts, not styrofoam.
Several years ago, Hershey did a similar thing. I panicked. I assumed that all packing peanuts were styrofoam and that they were going to expand in his stomach and possibly kill him. After calling the Emergency Animal Clinic, they told me to test the peanuts to see if they would dissolve under running water. They did! He was only filling his stomach with benign cornstarch.
A friend of Grant’s came to the house today. He did not stand at a wall, but he ignored Guinness. It worked pretty well. Guinness was not as obnoxious as he could have been.
Here is Angela at Greg's wedding last weekend.She arrived willing, in doggie clothes with short sleeves, but, I am sure, not very eager. Guinness was overboard in friendliness, as usual. She moved to a wall, put her face into her arms, and we allowed Guinness to jump at her. (Next time, I will tell our guinea pig to wear long sleeves!) It may have taken a full minute; I’m not sure. It wasn’t an awfully long time before he stopped, walked to a window to look out, then returned to her, sniffing and jumping maybe one or two more times. Then he was calm. I suggested that she try moving to the sofa. He ran to the sofa and jumped on it before she could get there. He was just goofy, so I put him away, and we went out to dinner.
Tonight I took Guinness to meet a trainer at Petsmart. He tested Guinness by watching me with him and by putting him through some paces himself. He pronounced that Guinness is a “great dog. Very well trained. You have no problems with this dog.”
“Yes, I do! When someone comes to our house, he goes bonkers! He jumps on them and won’t leave them alone. We give up and put him in his crate.”
So he gave me multiple suggestions. After explaining a few exercises, I said, “I need a notebook and pen to remember all of this.” He assured me I would remember. Not! Here is all that I could recall upon returning home:
I called two people to see if they would help me with # 1 tomorrow. My neighbor cannot, but Grant’s cousin can! I told her to wear “doggie clothes!”
As we were walking through the mowed grass to reach the sidewalk this morning, a mourning dove flew out about three feet in front of us, squawking. As soon as she flew away, we were on top of the spot where she had been. A baby that couldn’t fly was there! Guinness sniffed it all over while I yelled, “No! Leave it!” pulling on his leash. He willingly left the baby and started sniffing around a nearby tree.
Last year, when we had a mourning dove build a nest in the lower branches of a blue spruce, I read that they build their nests near or on the ground. When we returned I wondered if the baby would still be there or if the mother would have moved it. At first I couldn’t find the exact spot where they had been, then I saw the mother sitting on TOP of the baby! Again, she flew away in a dither leaving her defenseless chick. Guinny didn’t get to sniff the baby this time, but I know he would have been gentle. I left him at home and went back with my camera. The mother had not returned yet, so I got a shot of the baby.
My daughter-in-law-to-be was telling me what her kids had been doing all afternoon with new friends: surfing the Webkinz site. As she was explaining to me what Webkinz is, I went to the site and clicked on “catalog.” There I saw the list of animals available including a chocolate lab! I read to her the description:
As soon as we near the vet’s office, Guinness goes into hysterics. He is way too happy to be there. After dragging me into the building, he attacks the closest people with jumps and licks, then hops on his hind legs at the counter to say “hello” to the staff on the other side. The owner of our clinic is always a riot. He used to say that Hershey didn’t seem to know he wasn’t supposed to like him. But I would tell him that Hershey adored him and was thrilled to see everyone at the vet’s office including the mean doctors. “Thrilled” does not begin to describe Guinness’s ecstasy. Overzealously euphoric is more like it. They are his long lost best friends whom he thinks are as excited to see him as he is to see them. This elder vet comes off with one-liners about Guinness which I can never remember two minutes later. The only ones that stuck with me are the ones he repeated frequently: “goofy” and “clown” plus his original term for him – “the Al Qaeda Terrorist.” He also characterized him as “a flea on a hot brick.” He told Guinness that he is nothing like his predecessor. I chimed in that Hershey was a gentleman. He totally agreed, then added, “Guinness doesn’t know when he has poo in his mouth.” That’s for sure! He managed to wrestle him to a non-jumping position in order to weigh him – 78.6 pounds. Being the most adept of the vets, he gave bouncing Guinny a shot and checked out his orifices in record time. As we left, he commented that Guinness might be slightly calmer in a year.
This pose was taken before one final leap to lick doc's face.
We were the first to arrive at the ballpark for playtime this morning and found the field littered with seagulls. Guinness felt it was his obligation to clear the field for his friends. On the way home, he had his usual 26 foot lead to give him room to meander at will. A bird was on the ground. Of course, he ran up to it expecting it to fly away. It fluttered a couple of inches in the air but didn’t fly away. So he ran towards it again. It flapped its wings and hopped a foot or two. Then I realized – this must be a baby bird that hasn’t conquered the art of flying yet. I moved closer and saw that it was a baby robin. After two tries to chase it away, Guinness ignored it. He must have recognized that it was a baby and chose to not disturb it. What a gentle dog!
A few hours later, I was working at my computer with Guinny sacked out at my feet. Eight feet away from me on our neighbor’s deck, a Kingfisher landed momentarily, then chattered and flew away. What a beautiful, large bird up close!
The workmen are gone and the floors are looking great! Now we can begin unpacking and resettling our lives. Guinness is glad to have his house back but will miss his new friends. He spent many days over the last two weeks tied to a tree to be out of the way of the workmen. Fortunately, most of them loved him and would play as they passed by him in the yard. One morning, I was in the kitchen with the dishwasher running. I could hear some loud scurrying noises, so I turned off the dishwasher and asked, “Are you playing with Guinness or working?” Guess what they were doing. I had to remove Guinness from them so that these adult men could get to work.
I took a few pictures, over the past few days, of Guinness being very patient in the yard.
Look at that face! But the angle of this shot makes his body look too small for his head -- like a cartoon character. ha! Well, he definitely is a funny caricature with a handsome body in real life.
Below you can see where my computer desk is. And you can see Guinness's opening to reach me -- between the arms of two sofas. Then he weaves around the desk chair seen above.
This photo is a birds' eye view (I am standing on my desk chair to take it. The corner of my desk is in the lower left of the photo) of where he wants to be at my feet. To reach his goal, he has to weave to the left around the hutch sitting on the floor.
My path is much simpler. I couldn't fit his way, and he cannot fit my way. I squeeze straight in between two chests. Isn't he a smart boy to have figured this out!
Labs having a romp.
There are 3 chocolates and 1 black lab that are regulars. Today, we are missing Lucy (our neighbor), but Bailey and Riley (black) are having some fun. I am convinced that dogs recognize their own breed.
The non-lab is Smartie, an Australian Shepherd - Border Collie mix.
Calming down after the fun.
This morning at 
We seem to have a prolific pair of rabbits in our yard. When the girls were planting our flowers a month ago, they discovered a nest near our deck with five babies! The gestation period is 31 days, so the mommy and daddy wasted no time in expanding their family!
Yesterday, we saw two darling bunnies snuggled together at the curb.
Today we were cleaning out the garage and tied Guinny to a post outside the garage. A while later, we noted that one of our baby bunnies was on the curb at the edge of the deck not even two feet from the post where Guinny was tied. Guinny did not seem to be paying any attention to the bunny, when, normally, he can smell a bunny a mile away and delights in chasing them. It seemed like Guinny was trying to be kind to his little friend and ignored him to not frighten him.
This evening while Grant was BBQing, he saw a hawk dive out of the sky and grab a baby bunny that had ventured out into the driveway. All the little birds in the trees made a ruckus forcing the hawk to drop the bunny! Here you can see some blood on the driveway and the scratch of two talons in the asphalt.
Grant set him on the curb beside the deck, where they like to hang out. The next time we looked, another bunny was sitting there with him. It is the sibling that is nestled down into the crack. You can see a spot of ruffled fur on back this bunny who is lucky to be alive. Maybe we should name him Peter Rabbit because he is audacious.
I read on the Internet that they are weaned after three or four weeks, then they venture out of the nest. At night, they return to the nest to sleep with their mother. The family unit remains together for four or five weeks.
As usual, I was allowing him to have “free” reign on a long lead. He saw a dog on the other side of a fence, and both were crazy to meet each other. Guinness started running in circles like a whacko dog. When he is about to reach the end of his leash, I yell, “Easy!” which usually has an effect on him before pinching his neck with a jerk as he reaches the end of the line. Eventually he shot off next to the fence in a straight line looking for a way to get through, almost yanking my arm out of the socket and pretty nearly pulling me flat on my face. Some day Guinness is going to pull me to the ground and drag me. Today was almost the day.
Guinness wanted a walk today. I knew he did, but I was too busy. I took him out for a potty break; he refused to go potty even though it had been hours. He stood looking at the stairs leading to the driveway. So I decided to give him a mini-prom around the property. We had not gone far when he went potty. Then I turned around to come home. He kept jumping at me and trying to grab the leash out of my hand. In other words, “No, Mom! I do not want to go home! Take me for a walk!” Poor boy…
We had Cousin Camp with four couples gathering to have a gabbing good time! Gary and Ruth brought little Sam, a Yorkie, and Guinness came with us since the Microtel allowed pets. At
“I wonder if the thumping they heard was pipes in the wall.”
“I don’t know what they heard, but, when they checked out, they said that they heard thumping at
I said, “Maybe it was ghosts!” but I was thinking … uh-oh… Every time Guinness heard something in the night, he jumped off the bed and ran to the door barking. And the timing was about the same as when they heard thumps.
Guinny has not had a walk for a couple of days. This morning, after Grant left the house just before
Guinny and I almost died today. I was crossing the street beside our house where the highway ramp comes down to
Guinny enjoyed the activity and people in our yard today! I enjoyed it as well. I love work. I could sit and watch it for hours!
When Emmett and Daddy arrived home late afternoon and we all stood around the driveway, Guinness was enormously good. He tried very hard to not jump on Emmett. When it was more than he could take, he jumped on me instead. He looked down the driveway as if he was considering going to see what or who could be down there, but, with my reminder, stayed where he was. Before Emmett left, he did his “happy dance” of running in circles as fast as he could go around Emmett’s car. He certainly had the freedom and opportunity to run away, but he did not! In fact, it almost seemed like he was a bit skittish about running on the far side of the car as that was approaching the barrier line.
This morning I was awakened at
www.barkbusters.com
Scored Survey Results Survey Score: 75
OK... He needs some training... (surprise, surprise)
| A Score Of: | Means: |
| 19 - 27 = A | This dog is extremely well-behaved. Congratulations! |
| 28 - 50 = B | Dogs in this category are typically wonderful family dogs with a few rough edges. This dog could easily move to the "A" grade with some training. |
| 51 - 85 = C | While these dogs need training, frequently they don't receive it because their annoying behaviors are "just not bad enough". It's unfortunate because "C" dogs can improve quickly and bring great joy and happiness to families. And, with training, the owner can be assured the behaviors will only get better -- not worse. |
| 86 - 139 = D | This category of dogs has issues that can be serious if not addressed soon. Owners of these dogs are constantly being annoyed and irritated by their behavior and are beginning to think "Something has got to be done." Fortunately, dogs can change their behavior quite easily, so these owners should seek help immediately. |
| 140 - 200 = F | Most people with dogs that rate an "F" are desperate for change, but many don't know what to do. These dogs are out of control and serious problems can arise if they are not trained. Owners of these dogs sometimes consider putting them down. However, the vast majority of dogs can be saved with training, eliminating the owner's grief and guilt. |
There seems to be a growing population of rabbits in our area. When we first moved here, we rarely saw a rabbit. Now there often is one in our yard when we go outside. While I was cleaning up sticks in the yard, Guinness was chasing a rabbit. I was standing in the garden, behind the plantings, next to the wooden fence tossing sticks into the woods on the other side. The rabbit was trying to escape by running the perimeter of the yard next to the fence. He tore past me brushing my foot!!! He obviously was less frightened of me than of the big brown dog. Guinness seemed to be confused about where the rabbit had gone. He probably did not expect the rabbit to have run past me either. Clever rabbit.
I went to pick up Guinness from Holly’s Pride this morning. He has been there for 10 days. While we were away, I found a golf outlet store and shopped for a left golfer’s glove with open fingers to wear in the summer while walking Guinny. It is pink leather with a mesh back to avert suntan lines. Hopefully, wearing such a glove will prevent me from losing layers of skin again. I put it on when I arrived at the pet hotel, because my finger is not healed up yet, and I certainly cannot handle Guinness without some protection on that wound.
I have been contemplating finding a personal trainer, and now I need to call fence companies tomorrow to see if we can do something more sturdy than my flimsy fence.
A painter came today to give an estimate on doing our 3 levels of hallway and foyer. She left a ring of paint swatches for us to decide on the color. When she gave it to me, I set it on the kitchen counter and forgot about it after she left. Yep! You know what happened. I had to chase him around the house. By the time I removed the slimy pages from his mouth, he had managed to mangle one of the swatches and several others were bent a bit. I wiped off the pages and set the blender on top of the book to make the damp pages lie flat. It worked! They looked pretty good after it was all dry. In fact, the painter said that it was fine and I did not need to give her $30 to replace the book.
My normal way to walk Guinny is to put him on a 20 foot cotton web lead connected to a heavy leather leash which I loop over my right wrist and use my left hand to control him. Since he is pretty good about “leash respect,” this system works well to allow him maximum room to roam on his own and have some fun rather than have to walk at old Mommy’s pace. Tonight we did a prom on the long lead in the back of the property, but, when we come to the front on the sidewalk near the road, I have to loop up the long lead and hold the cotton lead in my left hand with no room to roam. He must have seen a bunny or something, because he uncharacteristically bolted from the sidewalk towards the road. I screamed and tried to hold the cotton leash, but it was cutting through the skin of a finger on my left hand. He stopped short of the road, and I felt like my index finger had been sawed off at the second joint. Many layers of skin were gone, yet it did not bleed. Fortunately, we are going to FL for a week and he goes to the pet hotel tomorrow, which will give that wound time to heal before we venture out on a walk again.
Yesterday and today, our walks along the bike path proved that Guinness is growing up and developing some sensibilities. It is almost like reaching age 2 was a magical turning point. Yesterday, we encountered the older man and elderly dog. Today we met a year old Havachon and the blind dog, Winnie, that we have met before. Guinness was very gentle with both dogs.
Later, we were out on our property and met up with a neighbor and her teensy Yorkshire Terrier granddog. We have never allowed Guinness close to Toby, because he is just too rambunctious, but he was calm, and gave Toby a chance to bark at him.
We went for a walk along the bike path today. Along our walk, we met up with an older man and his 14 year old dog. Obviously, a 14 year old does not want to play. BUT Guinness was surprisingly calm around the older dog and older man! He is definitely learning to discern less able dogs and people! The man and I chatted as we walked along, and Guinness slowed his pace to ours (I let him roam on a long lead on the path). He never tugged on me. Sometimes the two dogs would sniff the same interesting spot together. When we reached the ballfield area, I released Guinness to run where ever he wanted. He didn’t run. He stayed with us. He was enjoying having a companion even though it was not a playmate. After we circled the field and headed back down the path, Guinness became his Guinny self and ran like a crazy man in circles around us. He didn’t jump on us, but just raced as fast as he could go. It suddenly stuck me what he was “saying!” He did not want us to leave the ballfield! He wanted to wander around some more with the nice man and congenial dog. 
Guinness was treated to special frosted birthday bones. After dinner, Daddy brought home a real veal bone!
He has become very creative with the items he steals. Today, he enjoyed the papers from the recycle pile. Later I noted paper napkins on the floor, then found him with his mouth full of them!
Grant kept him in his crate for the first two nights I was away after eating the bread and egg. He vomited both nights. Then he had diarrhea on the Oriental in the kitchen and the dining room. Yesterday (the day before I came home), he was in pain when trying to have a BM, so Grant had to take him to the vet. The diagnosis: rawhide-itis. His colon was inflamed. He is on Metronidazole for a week and will not be able to have a rawhide at the pet hotel over the next week.
He did not vomit, but he did not ask for breakfast either. Before my packing was completed, Guinness found the Easter candy I was taking to Greg and his family. He ate the large chocolate covered, cream filled egg I had bought for Greg and Cathi. For certain, he is going to vomit sometime...
I leave for
Caught with a crumb on his face!It is still March, but we had a teeming April thunderstorm most of the morning. After lunch, the sun was shining brilliantly, it was 51 F, and the grass even is beginning to look green! In spite of the gorgeous day, I didn’t want to take Guinny for a walk outside due to the mud. We headed for Home Depot. After wearing off some energy, I continued driving around town accomplishing some errands. Being a warm day, I rolled the back windows down about 3 inches. One stop was at the bookstore to buy gifts which took some time. While browsing, I heard torrential rains and looked out the window to see the rain pelting down on a strong slant. Surely Guinness was getting wet, but I was not about to soak myself for the sake of keeping a water dog dry. By the time I finished shopping, the rain had almost stopped. I found a drenched Guinness sitting in the front seat. The back seat was far wetter than I had imagined it could be. I dried him off with a towel. Before banning him to the back seat, I saw that there was white fluff all over it. I assumed that Guinness had made mincemeat of his stuffed toy, so I picked it up off the floor to see what he had done. There was nothing wrong with it. I reached back to see what the fluff could be. Hailstones!!! As large as lima beans!!! Poor baby! He had sat through a hail storm. By the time we reached home, some were still not melted, so I grabbed my camera.
This waggish humdinger of a dog uses anything he can pick up as a game token. Last night, he picked up a hammer! This morning, as I stood over him, he reached for a glass knickknack! A few minutes later, he tried to take a small briefcase off a table. He is having way too much fun, and this is beginning to get out of hand. We may need some professional advice.
So I posted this on the Labrador Retriever Lovers Yahoo Group:
THE GINGERBREAD MAN
Guinness, who will be 2 in one month, is driving me nuts (though I can't stop laughing at him). He LOVES playing the Gingerbread Man Game of "you can't catch me..." Once he was old enough to stay out of his crate during the day over a year ago, he began this game of turning me into the retriever. We quickly learned what were his favorite objects to steal and kept them out of his reach -- like shoes, hand towles, anything in the kitchen sink, etc. It is a game with him; he is not being destructive (unless we don't catch him with the object and he has time to mutilate it); he loves making us run after him -- literally.
Nina (and Guinness who is in time out in his crate)
What a good idea to post on the Yahoo Group! There are some breeders and experienced trainers on the group that always give great advice.
Hershey lived to play fetch. Obviously, Guinness lives to play the Gingerbread Man. He would make a great field/hunting dog. All labs need a job. Hershey’s was to fetch objects – especially the newspaper. He was a pro! Guinness’s job is going to be returning objects to me.
After reading more about the training process, I need to suit him up with training collar and leash, then teach him to return objects to me.
It may be a while before we accomplish this. The recommended book is not an easy one to find and is quite expensive, so I need to see if I can order it from the library on inter-library loan or read the essential parts in a bookstore.
We had a nice long walk on the bike path today, but it did not inhibit his passion for sport. Throughout the afternoon, the rapscallion continued to snatch anything his little eye spied.
This morning was bright and sunny but below freezing. Great day for the beach! Off we went. It was a glorious walk! No one was on the beach, so I released his leash. He had a marvelous time running wherever he wanted to go! The 20 to 50 feet of frozen ice along the shore is gone. There are only large, dirty chunks of ice piled on the beach about 5 to 10 feet from the water. I walked on the side of them away from the water hoping to keep Guinness away from the lake, but that didn’t work. He went in the lake repeatedly as I screamed, “Come! Come! Guinness, Come! Treats!” He was pretty good about coming on command, so he had free range for the whole length of the beach.
We saw some Longtails in the ship channel and Trumpeter Swans napping in a cove of the lake. A pair of Lesser Scaups were among the Longtails. That is the first time I have seen them up close. Guinness was extraordinarily good to “Wait” while I used my binoculars and took photos.
Since he had icicles all over his tummy, we walked back along the walkway to stay away from the water.
After running free for most of an hour, he was still full of energy (or was it beans?). He has become a huge male tease. His joy in life is to make me chase him. He pulled my hand towel off the towel rack in my bathroom; as I carried an armload of laundry downstairs, he pulled a towel out of the bottom of the stack. All the while, he is laughing his head off. I can’t believe we have done this, but we have. None of our other dogs have ever been spoiled in this way. When you teach a dog Down, with a treat in your hand, you signal to the ground to encourage the dog to lie down to get the treat. The next step is to teach the dog to Stay in the Down position by using treats to reward for a good Down/Stay. I think our fancy dog training school pushed that reward more than any of our other schools. Eventually, you put the dog on a Down/Stay, walk a few feet away and remind them when needed,“Stay,” and walking back up to them periodically to reward them saying, “Good Stay.”
Naturally, dinnertime is a good opportunity to work on this lesson. So we put Guinness on a Down/Stay beside the table and continually rewarded him for staying there. We are now at the point, after doing this for a whole year, that we have to treat him throughout our dinner while we eat to keep him on a Down/Stay. Initially, I didn’t want to waste store-bought treats on this, so I gave him ice cubes. That worked great, until one day we decided to treat him to some carrot sticks. He loves carrot sticks! Now he won’t take an ice cube at all. We never give him food from the table. That is a definite no-no. He might have a scrap as I am cleaning off the dishes at the sink, but never food from the table. At least, we have that much smarts!
Grant is away for a few days, so I was on my own for dinner tonight. Since I had been snacking, I was not hungry at dinnertime (usually around
I was away for the weekend at a Crop-A-Lot Retreat, the company I founded! If you ever want a fabulous retreat to accomplish some scrapbooking, go to a CAL Retreat! (www.cropalot.com) They are they best! The new owners put on a fabulous retreat. I spent my weekend working on dog albums. I had created a darling “Genuine Boy” mini album at CKU two years ago. I completed the album with photos of Guinness from 5 days old to a few months old, and carried it in my purse to show off. One day, it was no where to be found. I was sure it would turn up somewhere, but it has not. So I took my class instructions and more of the Genuine Boy papers and recreated the pages to which I now need to add photos again. The second thing I worked on was Hershey’s album. I got a good start on it right after we lost him, but then Guinness was old enough to be out of his crate all day. If I try to scrap, he plays the Gingerbread Man game with my supplies. I have had to cover my paper rack with an old sheet, because he started pulling my scrapbooking paper and cardstock out of my rack. Really attractive, don’t you think? And you will note that the wrapping paper covered box on top, holding pages from classes, had some of the wrapping paper ripped off when it sat on a low shelf. I wonder who did that?
I think I might be able to get back to scrapping now, but maybe not, as you will read…One of Guinness’s favorite things to steal for the chase game is a placemat. When I clear off the table, if I forget to put the placemats away, one will be in his mouth within minutes. Our placemats have been washed recently more than they ever have been.
While removing clothes from the dyer, Guinness often sticks his head in the door to the dryer. As I pulled out a sheet, he stole a placemat and off he ran.
On our walk today, when we reached the ballfield, Sonya, a one year old yellow lab whom we have met once before, was there. They had a ball playing; they would wrestle with vicious looking teeth, then close their mouths and you could see their smiles. They had so much fun.
On our way home, Guinness fell in a mud puddle, and it was only 27 F today. He probably slipped on the icy coating; I didn’t see it happen. I was not pleased. That meant I had to pull out the “clean” hose, hook it up to the laundry tub to have warm water. First, I had to hose out the garage as it was full of winter yuck, but that was a good thing that I was forced to clean the mess. Guinness then had his bath with warm hose water in the garage and was banned to his crate to dry off.
This is another unique characteristic of Guinness: he sorts his toys into one place. Here he sorted all of his bones plus his beloved Santa. Oh, yes! There is another major difference from Hershey. Hershey never had a stuff toy for more than 10 minutes.
The outdoor world is melting creating a yucky, muddy mess, so we went for a walk at Home Depot again and than at Petsmart. Even after having some exercise at Home Depot, he went bonkers as we entered Petsmart. He was uncontrollable with his elation to be there. Oh, my… It is a good thing I am not shy, because we definitely are the center of attention.
Petsmart has cat rescues available. The last time we were at the store, there was a beautiful black adult cat that seemed VERY interested in Guinness. He came up to his window and watched Guinness’s every move. He did the same thing today – got up from his snooze to watch this amazing dog. I think he wants to come home with us.
There is one and only one way that Guinness surpasses Hershey: he is very good about having his training collar and leash attached before leaving for a walk. Hershey went bananas until he was old as I tried to prepare him for a walk. He was just too excited to relax for a few seconds. Guinness, on the other hand, stands still and waits while I gear him up. Shocking!
We braved the coldest day of the winter yet and trudged to the bike walk. It was very difficult walking because the path was several inches of packed snow frozen into a slippery mass. The snow beside the path was like a brick of Swiss cheese with deep, frozen footprints which were equally difficult to navigate. No one was around, so Guinness ran freely for most of the walk. He even escaped into someone’s backyard, but came running when called! Good boy!
We had a beach walk today. Due to the weather (very cold and not easy walking), there were very few people out. As we walked the length of the beach, it was very sunny, though well below freezing. After the 6 or 8 inch snowfall followed by rain and then freezing temperatures, the snowfall was compacted to about 5 inches and frozen solid. We walked on top of the snow with ease. It certainly was easier to walk on the smooth, crusty surface than where people had sunk several inches into the snow leaving frozen sunken footprints making walking treacherous with the landmines that could break ankles. I noted black and white ducks scattered in the lake instead of in their usual bunched together positions. I assumed that they were Lesser Scaups. But, when we reached the ship channel, ice flows were moving fairly rapidly out to the lake. The longtails could not float in peace in the channel. They were the ducks dotted over the lake. As we started a loop back, I spied a purple and white “ball” ahead. Fortunately, Guinness didn’t see it or it would have been in his mouth. It was a beautiful head of a duck, but I don’t know what duck has a purple head with white stripes. By the time we were back on the snowy beach, the sun had begun to melt the frozen snow so that our feet sunk an inch or more with every step, and our previous silent steps now crackled . It is fascinating to observe the changes in nature.
I received a call asking if I would like to have my home air quality tested. Yes, in fact, I do want that done. They said that they were doing research and wanted to collect two air samples from our home; could they come within an hour? Sure! Then I checked out the company on the Web and made a call to them to be certain that this was not a boogey man coming to my house. To avoid needing to crate him, Guinness wore his training collar and dragged his leash so that I could prevent him from mauling the person. It was a very nice young man who came and gave Guinness lots of attention, tummy tickles, and ear rubs while he collected air samples.
As soon as he left, we headed out to run errands. After having a virtual blizzard all day yesterday, then rain all night, I did not want to go for an outdoor walk today through the puddles and slop. Our first stop was Home Depot where we could walk up and down every aisle of the store for our exercise. This was our third time to use that store as a place to walk on bad days. Every time, it is a bit better. He was so excited as we walked through the parking lot, even squealing, that he had exiting customers laughing. He did not charge ahead, but walked beside me quite sedately. I had to give him constant reminders, “You don’t have to say ‘hello’ to every one.” “No sniffing.” “Side!” which means he is to walk at my side, not ahead of me. Of course, there always are a few who look at him with a little fear in their eyes. Most find him amusing. If he saw someone that he thought might be friendly, I would have to use two hands to prevent him from jumping on them. Many in the store, sales people and customers, asked to pet him, complimented his good looks, and gave him the attention he craved. Even two young children petted him, and he was very gentle with them. Hurray! They have a lab/shepherd mix at home, so they understand dogs of this size and exuberance. We picked up some light bulbs and a new indoor/outdoor thermometer. I was shocked and pleased with the patience he exhibited while I made my selections! As we approached the self-checkout, a goofy woman, much like myself, was audibly responding to the talking register. She made a big fuss over him, as she has a 160 pound Mastiff at home.
For fun, I tried to keep track of the items Guinness stole for playing his Catch-me-if-you-can Game this past week: a washcloth, my Uggs (repeatedly), a sponge, the album of Kevin while still in Russia, a Kleenex box, Tupperware, placemats (repeatedly), mail with Grant's health card replacement form, and a glove. Of course, there was the mixing bowl incident, plus I caught him trying to take from my desk an ancient picture of me in my youth! Grant was packing his suitcase and set his underwear out. The next thing we knew, Guinness was running around with a wad of underwear in his mouth. He does keep us laughing!
Grant and Guinness were up before me. When that happens, Guinness eventually comes back to bed to rest some more or to tell me to get up. This morning, I was aware that he jumped on the bed, but I went back to sleep. When I awoke and lifted my head to rise, Guinness’s Santa toy rolled off my head. ICK!
