Exploring the wider world continues at a pace. Possibly an unsustainable one; I will have to get some other jobs done sooner or later.
Taking advantage of a gap in bookings, and noting the “last time we camped with two dogs…” thoughts as noted last week, we headed out with the caravan for a couple of nights away at a spot near Oswestry. It is a great little site largely used by people with year-round leases, and best of all was pretty much deserted. This meant that we could allow the dogs a bit more freedom than expected to explore the sights and smells of the nice walk around the fishing lake and to snooze in the sunshine. Venn behaved pretty well off the lead, whereas Kip misjudged a lily-pad as solid ground and ended up in the fishing lake. Fortunately no fishermen were present at the time to have us escorted off the premises. The first squirrel of Venn’s life was encountered, but fortunately she didn’t spot it, so there was only interest in the smell to deal with.
They say that having a dog is a great way to meet people, but in the business we are in, social interactions with strangers are part of the daily routine, and so when we get away from work we are usually after a little isolation or quiet times with friends. With Venn’s new post-vaccine status and the consequent jaunts into town and to the pub, we have become reconciled to the inevitable interest from fellow dog-lovers in a cute little puppy, the shared experiences, the common goals etc.; all reasonable behaviour. Then there are the other people. I’m not sure what the correct response is to a person who wanders into the middle of your group, unannounced, uninvited and mid-conversation, and who stands 50 cm in front of your face while they make baby talk and play with the bemused dog sat on your lap. It is almost as though their mystical connection with all dogs absolves them from having to deal with social niceties such as personal space.
Another developing pet-hate (ho ho) is people who want to introduce their dog, and won’t take no for an answer. Venn has a pretty much 100% hit rate for peeing the moment she meets a new dog, and so you might understand why we are reluctant to let this happen while she is sat on my lap, or on the pub carpet. Even explaining this is not enough for some folk, and we’ve had to whisk her out of the way before she disgraces herself on a number of occasions.
Training rolls on. We have maintained “stay” at a maximum of 1 minute, but I’m now experimenting with moving briefly out of sight mid-way through. She ultimately has to manage 10 minutes with me in sight and 5 with me out of sight, so this is an important skill development. We have finally made some progress with walking to heel too; it is a bit scrappy, and to the casual onlooker it might look a lot like “walk three steps then get your leg humped by an excited puppy” but we know it is progress. There have been a couple of shaky recalls, where I have had to work hard to ensure she doesn’t fail, so that is also some way from bomb-proof.
All in all though, a good week on a number of fronts.
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