Heart Like a Dog

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

2012 Goals – Check Point

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Six months ago I wrote a post titled 2012 Goals, I thought it might be a good time to review those goals and see how I’m doing.

The Blog.

Subscribers. 

I wrote: The last time I published a post WordPress informed me I have 54 WordPress subscribers and 164 Twitter followers.  My goal for 2012 is to double my WordPress subscribers.

Update: I currently have 105 WordPress subscribers, and 187 twitter subscribers.  I’m quite pleased with this, if my subscriptions continue in the fashion I will reach and surpass my goal before the year is up!

Subscribers = A

Author’s Note: For some reason WordPress keeps changing the way they show their statistics, a week or so ago they began combining my facebook followers as subscribers.

When I checked the blog and it said I had 475 followers I almost fell over.  I quickly checked the front page to see if I’d been pressed.

Being freshly pressed = Epic fail.

Posting.

I wrote:  My plan is to continue to post every, single day.  If I make it, that will be two full years of daily blogging.

Update: So far I’ve been able to post every single day, and I don’t at this time see any reason for this to change.

Posting every day = A.

Product Review.

I wrote:  I would like to be able to do a product review on this blog.  Preferably a product I like, so I can write a glowing review.

Update: I’m holding off at the moment because there are certain things you can and cannot do with the free WordPress account, until I can move the blog to self-hosted, I will proceed with caution.

Product review = C.

Twitter.

Tweeting.

I wrote:  My Twitter goal is to learn to tweet.  Seriously.

Update: Yeah, I’ve tweeted some but it’s just not something that comes naturally.  My niece who is a great tweeter, says you just do it.  I haven’t figured it out on my phone and I just can’t sit there with my twitter feed open all day long.

Twitter = D-.

Twitter Followers.

I wrote:  My other Twitter goal is to get Bob Harper to follow me.   I know, it will be tough but I think I’m up for the challenge.

Update:  This has proven harder than I expected.  You’d think with a twitter name like AuntieJodi you could practically shame someone into following you!   Bob Harper, follow your AuntieJodi, I mean really, what must his followers think?  He doesn’t even follow his own aunt. 🙂

Twitter Goal Bob Harper = Epic Fail.

Writing.

Paid Writing.

I wrote:  I’m not going to say I want to get a full-time writing job, but I would like to get paid to write something.  Anything.  I don’t care if someone pays me to write a freakin’ ad on Craig’s list.  I just want to be able to say I made money by writing.

Update: I haven’t really pursued this one either.  I did enter a writing contest, which technically would have counted.

Yes it would.  But I didn’t even place.

Paid Writing = D-.

My Book.

I wrote:  I’m writing a book.  There I said it!  Now you know.  Taking a page from Donna and the Dogs, I will be posting a line at the end of each blog letting you know how many words I currently have.

My goal is to write a little bit for my book each day.  In three days I have slightly over 1.000 words, I need to pick up the pace on that, because I hope to have the book complete (in rough form of course) by the time this blog is two years old.

Update: My book has stalled, it’s not that I don’t want to write it anymore, I just kind of lost steam.  I’m on vacation this week so I hope to get some writing in.  The last time I checked I think I had somewhere around 27,000 words.  So it’s not a total loss, I’ve written 26,000 more words than I had in January.

My book = C.

Sampson and Delilah.

I wrote:  My goal for Sampson and Delilah never changes.  It is to give them the best life I can and enjoy the time I have with them.

Update: I think Sampson and Delilah are doing great, they are happy, fairly well-adjusted dogs.  They require a lot of work, but they are totally worth it.

Sampson and Delilah = A+.

How about you, have you made progress with  any of your goals, either professionally or personally?

Follow-Up Friday

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For those new to the blog, my follow-up Friday provides me with an opportunity to update or revise a post from the previous week.

You know sometimes you post about something and you need an update but it doesn’t warrant a whole blog.  Or sometimes someone made a comment that really resonated with you.  Yup, Follow-Up Friday baby!

If you like this idea of wrapping posts up on your blog, please feel free to use Follow-Up Friday.  I plan on working on a badge that you will be able to use should you choose to participate. (Thanks for the idea, 2BrownDawgs!)

Mock 10 With My Hair On Fire – Author’s Note

Some of you noted I have quite a bit of Springsteen on my playlist, what can I say, I’m a Jersey Girl at heart. 😉

Siriusly, Springsteen’s music really helped me through a hard time and I find myself still turning to the songs that made me feel so good when things were so bad.  So many of his songs still resonate with me.

My Vet’s In A Sling – Update

I think we caught this allergy really early, I noticed Sampson doesn’t seem to be breaking out with any new hives.  The few that are there appear to be drying up.

He finished his third full day of two per day Prednisone today, tomorrow he starts one per day.  I did cut him back on the Benadryl because something seemed to be making him a little uncomfortable.  I noticed he was really clingy on Wednesday night.  Since his last Prednisone was this morning I may just give him two Benadryl tonight and see how that goes.

BTW when we were are the vet’s I mentioned my little cell phone post and she said that’s exactly WHY she doesn’t give her number out.  LOL

WTF Wednesday – Author’s Note

I was heartened to hear Victoria Stillwell is calling for an investigation into the Belfast City Council’s actions.  Whether Lennox was actually euthanized on Wednesday or if he had already passed their actions were cruel and callous, bordering on pure maliciousness.

The stories I am hearing just make me want to cry.  I cannot believe people can treat animals and other human beings so cruelly.

If I were a citizen of Belfast and Ireland in general I would be calling for terminations of positions and I would be letting people know in no uncertain terms exactly what I thought of them.

Lennox may be gone, but he will never be forgotten, as cruel and horrific as this is, I pray it’s an enlightenment for many as to just how unfair and unjust BSL.

Puppy Steps – Author’s Note

Our homework for this week (besides working on the commands we worked on in class) was to start learning the take command.  I saw my opportunity when I walked in the door tonight and Delilah brought me her stuffed toy.

I said, take and held out the treat.  She dropped the toy like she was supposed to but once she knew I had treats, she wouldn’t touch the toy again!

Any thoughts on how to work through that? LOL

That’s it for me, I hope you have a great weekend.

Thanks for reading!

Puppy Steps

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Delilah and I started our Intermediate Dog Handler Class this past Tuesday.

Never having been there before and not sure of what to expect we arrived a few minutes early.  It worked out great since Delilah didn’t get a chance to tinkle before we left the house.

The class is held at the Community Center, which appears to be a recycled school.  Our class was in what I would consider to be a gym.  The instructions said, drive around back and enter through the double gray doors.

I scoped out the situation and timed our entry so we weren’t walking in with any other dogs.  I never know if Delilah will react or not. 🙁  I choose a spot away from the door and settled down on the inner wall.

If you’ve been following this blog for any period of time you will know one of my many pet peeves is clueless dog people.  Sure enough, safely settled on the far side of the room, in bops an older woman with her King Charles Cavalier Spaniel through the interior doors.

I’m almost certain I heard the words, this isn’t good come out of my mouth.

Thankfully the instructor was right on top of the situation and quickly moved the woman to the other side of the room.

We began by working on wait, using both the hand signal and the verbal cue which we combined with front.   The front command was the release of the wait, and we were told to give the command, hold a treat out in front of us and then pull it into our belly button.  This brought the dog to a sit position right in front of you.

It worked like a charm.  Delilah was amazing working on this command.

Once we had worked on those two commands for a bit, the instructor said we’re going to learn the leave it command.

I think I’ll use your dog, she said as she looked at me.

I know I snickered.

She started with a treat in her hand and placed her hand on the floor, “Leave it” she told Delilah.

Delilah licked the instructor’s hand.

“Ignore the licking” she said, as Delilah began to paw at her hands, “Ignore the pawing” she said.

Delilah rolled over onto her side showing her tummy and pawed with one paw.

The instructor turned her head and said, “Don’t smile or laugh when they do this.”

Finally Delilah sat up and looked the instructor in the eyes.

“Yes!” She was treated from the opposite hand.

Apparently when using the leave it command you are never to give the dog the treat you are asking them to leave.

Good to know.

The whole process took a good minute if not more.  I didn’t have my camera because it was the first night and I wasn’t sure how the instructor would feel about pictures. (But I’ll be sure to ask next week.)

She worked Delilah a couple of times like this and then took her out into the middle of the room and dropped a bunch of treats, “Leave it.”

Delilah almost went for them, but then changed her mind and instead looked up at the instructor.

If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it!

Once I started working her, it took her a minute or so but once she figured it out, she was staring me straight in the eyes  and her look said, I get it. 

When she looks at me like that, I feel like we are a team working towards a common goal.

She worked great the entire class and was perfectly fine until we left and the lady I parked next to came out with her dog.  She lost her mind and started barking and snarling.

I wonder if they have a class for guarding?

I’ll leave you with a picture I took tonight when we were working on our wait/front command in the field.  I’m not brave enough to take her off leash but every time I gave her that front command on our walk, she came back to me!

Puppy steps. 🙂

She is 15 feet away from me here.

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