Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Bold and Beautiful

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Delilah’s obsessed with food.  She is constantly in scavenger mode.  When I’m in the kitchen she is either under my feet or sitting guard in the doorway, prepared to dive head-first under the cabinet to catch a bread crumb.

You cannot leave food on the counter or table, if you do, it’s fair game for Delilah.  After we fix our dinner plates, we have to immediately put the food away, or put it in the oven or microwave to ensure Delilah won’t snag it as soon as we finish eating.

She’s not afraid to go into the sink and grab a dirty dish, or plastic bag so she can bring it out into the living room and lick it clean.

That also holds true for the stove and no, she doesn’t care if it’s on or not.  If memory serves me, she has taken a cooking hot dog out of the pan.

Once when I was at the sink, literally three feet behind her, she took a piece of chicken out of the pan.  Yes, she’s that bold.

When I put water on the stove for pasta I always add a little oil.  Delilah loves oil.  She will lick the oily pasta water and given the opportunity will lick strait oil right from the pan.   I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone into the kitchen to find water or oil flicked all over the stove and had to dump the entire pan and start over.  I finally got smart and put a lid on it.

As many times as I’ve caught her licking something out of the pan, I’ve never been able to get a picture of it.  Until recently.

Yes, my bold and beautiful dog trying to get a french fry.

Do you have a counter surfer in your house?  Have you found any creative ways to break this habit?

Go, Go, Go, Go, Go

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In yesterday’s post I mentioned Delilah had a little off-leash hike. If you’ve been reading for a while you know there are certain areas Delilah is prone to running off to.  One of these areas is in the field.

When we entered the park I unclipped her leash and gave her freedom.  I think off-leash works best for Delilah if I try to keep her focus on me, so I call her back to me quite frequently.  She was returning every time I called.

We went to the field.  There was one time where she turned and started running away from me and she didn’t respond to my call.  I turned around and said, “Sampson come.”

As soon as I knew I had his attention I started running the other way and I said, “Go, go, go, go, go, go, go” really loud as we ran away from Delilah.

Do you know that worked?

And the only reason I can think why is that I sometimes psyche the dogs into going outside by giving them a little pep talk.  I think the excitement in  my voice tells her something exciting and fun is about to happen.

Of course I don’t know this with any certainty, but it makes sense to me.

After the field we made our way up the trails and then started back down towards the rail trail.  As we approached the rail trail I leashed Delilah again, and shortly after that we ran into the couple I mentioned in yesterday’s post.

Naturally we got to talking about dogs. This couple had a Husky for 14 years.  The man said he used to walk his dog every day and was so in the habit that he continues to do so.  He also said he always walked his dog off-leash, there was an older man that he used to encounter and the man always said, dogs were meant to run free and not be leashed.

He went on to say, times have changed and people have changed.  There are so many people out there on the rail trail now walking their dogs, but they don’t want you to look at their dogs or pet their dogs and he’s not sure what happened.

I’m not really sure what happened either.  I don’t remember when it changed, but it certainly has.  I don’t ever remember our childhood dogs on leashes.  Is it because our parents didn’t walk them?  Or because there were fewer people?  Have people grown less tolerant of dogs? What do you remember about dog etiquette from when you were a child?

After we parted ways, I kept Delilah on the leash.  I felt like it was best to end our walk with her remaining successful.

And she was.

Sunday Morning Hikes

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We had a weather prediction for (much-needed) rain today.  The rain was supposed to start early this morning and get to be a down-pour by the afternoon.

My plan was to walk the dogs early before the heavy rain started.  I will walk them in the heavy rain, but prefer the lighter stuff when given the option.  While it was cool and overcast (yay, no bugs) the rain held off.

In CT our weathermen (and yes, most of them are men) only have about a 50% chance of being accurate.  Honestly, if I was only 50% accurate in my job, well…..I wouldn’t have one.  But this post is not about weather.

I figured if I hit the trails early and with the cooler weather, we wouldn’t encounter a lot of people on the trails.  And I was right.

The trail system we walk has access to a rail trail.  Whenever we approach the intersection, Sampson gets excited.  He knows people are down there and he wants to go and greet them.

There is a section where two different trails run close together.   When the trees are full, I’m not sure if you can see the other trail but as the trees are just beginning to fill-in here, you can see easily see the trail.

I saw a couple, walking up from the rail trail.  It is a couple we have run into before.  The last time they had their daughter’s dog with them, but today they were alone.

If I see people before the dogs do, I rein them in.  In Sampson’s case I just say, “Sampson No” and he will either sit or wait.  Very rarely will he run ahead if I give him that command.

Today he stood, looking.  The couple stopped and acknowledged us and I asked, “Can he say hello?”

The man responded, “Of course.”

I swear Sampson understood the conversation because as soon as the words had come out of his mouth, Sampson was charging through the brush towards the couple.

Of course once Sampson was on his way Delilah needed to say hello too.  I dropped the leash and after she had greeted them, she turned right around and ran back to me!!

That’s not the end to the story, but it is the end to this blog post.  Tune in tomorrow to hear about the rest of Delilah’s off leash hike.

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