Day 2 - September 16

Today is the big day.  I get to meet my new dog.  Very exciting!

At the 9 am meeting in the trainer's room we get our plan for the day.  (I'm glad to see that everything is the same as last time I was here, meaning nothing really starts on time.)  Everyone will go for morning walks while Greg introduces me to my dog.  Greg gives me a brand new leash and collar and takes me down to the courtyard.  I sit down on the first bench then hear a door open around the corner.  A poodle rocket is released!

I jumped up and the poodle came whizzing by me with a friendly bump. Greg follows and says, “Here's your new dog.  His name is Gonzo.”

Gonzo? Did I hear that correctly?  Now that is a weird name.  On his next brush by I'm able to feel him a bit and he seems really small.  Later, once I get a good feel of him (which is challenging since he’s in constant motion) I realize that he's not as small as I first thought.  His head is about mid-thigh.  It's just that Bogart was so tall!  Gonzo and I play around a bit in the courtyard and then head up to our room to get him some water. The plan is to hang with him for the next hour or so and then bring him down for a pee at about 11 am.  He happily drinks up and then we play around a bit.  I give him his roadkill lion.  This is a fuzzy lion-skin squeak toy that is flat and has no stuffing.  I don't think he ever had a squeak toy before because he leaped back when I made it squeak for him.  

To help him relax I lay down on the floor with him.  He did this funny game of walking circles around me and then finally lay down right above my head.  A second later he was upside down on his back, happily kicking his legs while I got my face out of the way.  Bogart loved to spring across the room on his back too, launching off people and furniture.  It’s nice to see Gonzo also has this fun side.  He was still pretty excited so I lay down on my bed to work on the computer to give him space to chill.  Eventually he quieted down and had a little nap.

Around 11 am we headed down for a pee.  I had permission to relieve him outside, on the grass in front of the school.  They've learned that there is no sense in forcing poodles to go in places that they don’t want to go.  Also, you can only take your dog out there if you are confident with your  mobility and orientation.  They don’t want to have to worry about you tripping on curbs or getting all turned around, especially after hours when fewer people are around.  Yippee, Gonzo went on our first try.  It wasn’t quite so easy last time with Bogart, but back then they still had us going inside.

We stayed out in the fresh air until it was lunch time.  Then I got to be one of those people who was constantly having to get his dog to sit and lie down.  Gonzo listens well enough but he just wants to be up and seeing everything.  There are so many dogs and people, lots of distractions.  It makes good practice.  There's an autism program going on at the same time, so lots of people are around.  I learned that Gonzo and I would be the first harness walk after lunch.

Alright, let's get this show going!  Greg brought out Gonzo’s harness and we tried it on.  We noticed he will need a new belly strap since he is going to expand a bit.  We are trying different harness handle lengths.  We’ll start with a 20".  The key is not to have a handle that hangs past the end of Gonzo’s back.  It would put strain on him when the harness is in the resting position.  

Harness on, dog standing ready, off we went!  For the first walk the trainer holds the dog on a long leash while the client, me, gives the commands.  It felt a bit weird to hold a harness again, especially with a young bouncy poodle on the other end.  Gonzo is a little rocket for sure, but he did a good job and didn't run me into anything.  At one point Greg warned me some people were coming, so I said "Gonzo, pay attention."  Then I heard the people say, "We are!" ..Too funny!

I could tell by Greg's reaction that at one point Gonzo brought me pretty close to a curb off to my right, but then he got things under control and moved back over to the left.  Good dog.  At another point Greg asked us to stop, pull over and let some people by.  Gonzo did great and sat nicely while everyone went by and then we were off again.  The walk was over so fast.  I felt a bit disappointed because everyone was going for half-hour walks, but we did the route so quickly it was over in 15 minutes.  It will be our only walk until Monday.  Short but fun. I can't wait to get the feel for the dog and do some more work.

After everyone had their walk we lined up in the hallway for obedience work.  We started with sit and then down.  Except for being a poodle and taking a little longer to listen, Gonzo did great.  I pointed out to Courtney, the other trainer, that Gonzo's down position was on his back, legs in the air.  I had a big smile on my face.  Courtney said that his trainer had mentioned that too—a lot of the time his down is on his back.  Very funny.  Next we had to heel our dog down the hallway with all the other dogs in a sit or down stay.  Gonzo heeled really nicely with no lunging at any dogs.  When it was our turn to sit and wait he did a great job of not trying to sniff anyone as they went by.  Awesome.  Maybe this dog won't be quite as dog distracted as Bogart was.

The training day ended with an official leash session in the enclosed courtyard.  Once we were all in there, we had our dogs sit and then we took off their collars and leashes while keeping them sitting. Again Gonzo did great.  Once they were released, it was joyous mayhem.  When all the other dogs were finally lying down huffing and puffing, Gonzo was still looking for people to play with.  He did show one bad habit—mounting other dogs.  There is one female dog, Heidi, and she is Queen Bitch out here.  She didn't like Gonzo's attention one bit.

The rest of the night was quiet, just relaxing and hanging out.  Tomorrow is a day off so we will have time to hang out some more and just be friends before work begins again on Monday.