Rottweilers Ate My Laptop

Rottweilers. Computers. Cameras. World Domination. Not necessarily in that order.

Rottweilers.
Computers. Cameras.
World Domination.
Not necessarily in that order.

With gratitude

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My computer bookmarks are not always well-organized. This means that sometimes I can’t put my finger on something I need right away. But it can also mean that something might surface right when I need it most.

Like this post, Behaving Gratitudinaeously, from Susan Garrett’s agility training blog. She suggests going through this exercise (and no, it is not a training exercise) with each one of your dogs, and if you are struggling with a particular dog’s training, to start with that one. Right now, that would definitely be Freya.

I want to share a couple of the “gratitudinaeous” moments I thought about as I went through the exercise.

See him at home on the first day, how curious he was, how crazy you are about him.

This was the evening of Freya’s first day home. She’s getting the lowdown on how to be a vom Viersen Rottweiler from our grand old man Oscar.

Next visualize that dog the last time you saw him sleeping in his favourite place around the house, where is he? What position is he in?

This is one of her favorite sleeping positions. She will often be found upside down on the floor, and even in her crate.

Think about how much you love that dog and how grateful you are to have him in your life.
I haven’t done this often enough lately, so today I am also grateful to Susan Garrett for writing her post, and to whatever powers of the universe brought it back into my sights when I needed to see it.

Now put this question out there for your “higher power” or just throw it on out there into the universe. “How can I help this dog to live with more joy and be more connected to me?”
This one I’m still working on, and while I don’t yet have the answer, I’m much more confident of finding the right one after thinking of all of the things that make me grateful to have Freya in my heart and my home.

(NaBloPoMo | July ’10: 13 of 31)

Almost an actual dog training post

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You’ll remember that training hasn’t been going so well for Freya and me. We haven’t been doing very much training except for our minimum daily requirements of sit, down, stand or some combo thereof before meals. This is partly because I was debating about doing a thyroid panel, then doing it and waiting for the results. Also, partly because we both need a break from anything negative, and training and trialing were definitely becoming pretty negative.

I still try to keep up daily with the various dog training blogs in my feed reader. I read several agility blogs. Even though I have almost no interest in ever participating in agility myself, I have a lot of interest in some of the training methods discussed.

The last several posts on Susan Garrett’s agility training blog have been about recalls. Now there is something that the dogs and I definitely need work on. In fact, that is something that most people would (or should) admit needing to work on with their dogs. I’m still working through them, but the posts themselves as well as everyone’s insightful comments and questions are giving me a lot of food for thought.

Check it out if you want to see what I’m reading! Start out with Relationship Truce and go from there.

(NaBloPoMo | July ’10: 8 of 31)