(Since Curly Joe turned a year old last month, I guess I can't call them "pupdates" anymore. Sad!)
Hey everybody!
Quick little update: Curly Joe is still alive and well. And ... fat. Yeah, he's fat. I MADE HIM FAT. I have officially turned into my mother.
Because he's sick (inwardly, anway), I find myself feeding him more than I should. It'd be fine if I walked him enough to compensate, but I don't. Since I am apparently pretty badly vitamin D deficient (thanks, night shift), I need to really get the dogs out after I wake up in the afternoon. The exercise is good for us all, and I'll get all the sun I need. In the meantime, I am taking a supplement. The days are getting longer, which means more daylight, so that will help.
The Big News is, I finally signed Curly up for obedience classes! I went through Petsmart because Petco does clicker training and I kind of hate clickers. Petsmart has a clicker class, but it's nothing to do with the regular ones. Thank gad.
It took a few minutes, talking to one of the employees on the phone, to dig up a class that would fit my schedule, but we found one that starts on the 18th that will probably do just fine. I picked that one because the class meets on Wednesdays at 4:30. I have every other Wednesday off, so that works out well. I could have done Saturday (which I also have every other one off), but the classes started too early. I get home between five and six in the morning and the classes meet at ten. I'm usually in bed by 7:30, so ... no. Not going to work.
In the meantime, I'm going to work on hand feeding Curly Joe. Every now and then he shows a bit of toy aggression, and I plan to nip that in the bud. My dog Luke was toy/food aggressive when we rescued him, and I hand fed him, one kibble at a time, for two weeks, then one handful at a time for another two weeks and never had a problem after that. I've attempted this with Curly a few times over the last week and the boy flat out refuses to take food from my hand. My sister said maybe it's a sign of submission, but I don't think so. I feed the animals after I eat, and when I attempt to hand feed Curly, I hold the food up by my eyes so he sees me and knows that the food is coming from me (because I say so), I hand him the kibble and he doesn't eat it. So we're going to work on that. I also need to get a bin for the dogs' toys.
So that's what we've been up to. I'm pretty sure Curly Joe weighs more than 30 pounds now. Bit of pudge around the middle, yes. Happens to us all.
The other day, I let the dogs out, completely forgetting I'd left the front gate open to bring a couple bags of wood pellets in for the fire. A few minutes later, I opened the door to call the dogs in. Tank trotted over, but I had to call Curly a few times. I could hear his tags jingling, so I figured he'd squeezed through a hole in the small fence and was out "playing" with the geese in the big yard. (He calls it playing, they call it "DIE, PUPPY, DIE.") Nope. The little bastard comes running down the ROAD, just as happy as can be. I probably should have freaked out, but mainly I was pleased that he came when I called him, especially considering he had probably been playing with the two corgis down the street.
Hey everybody!
Quick little update: Curly Joe is still alive and well. And ... fat. Yeah, he's fat. I MADE HIM FAT. I have officially turned into my mother.
Because he's sick (inwardly, anway), I find myself feeding him more than I should. It'd be fine if I walked him enough to compensate, but I don't. Since I am apparently pretty badly vitamin D deficient (thanks, night shift), I need to really get the dogs out after I wake up in the afternoon. The exercise is good for us all, and I'll get all the sun I need. In the meantime, I am taking a supplement. The days are getting longer, which means more daylight, so that will help.
The Big News is, I finally signed Curly up for obedience classes! I went through Petsmart because Petco does clicker training and I kind of hate clickers. Petsmart has a clicker class, but it's nothing to do with the regular ones. Thank gad.
It took a few minutes, talking to one of the employees on the phone, to dig up a class that would fit my schedule, but we found one that starts on the 18th that will probably do just fine. I picked that one because the class meets on Wednesdays at 4:30. I have every other Wednesday off, so that works out well. I could have done Saturday (which I also have every other one off), but the classes started too early. I get home between five and six in the morning and the classes meet at ten. I'm usually in bed by 7:30, so ... no. Not going to work.
In the meantime, I'm going to work on hand feeding Curly Joe. Every now and then he shows a bit of toy aggression, and I plan to nip that in the bud. My dog Luke was toy/food aggressive when we rescued him, and I hand fed him, one kibble at a time, for two weeks, then one handful at a time for another two weeks and never had a problem after that. I've attempted this with Curly a few times over the last week and the boy flat out refuses to take food from my hand. My sister said maybe it's a sign of submission, but I don't think so. I feed the animals after I eat, and when I attempt to hand feed Curly, I hold the food up by my eyes so he sees me and knows that the food is coming from me (because I say so), I hand him the kibble and he doesn't eat it. So we're going to work on that. I also need to get a bin for the dogs' toys.
So that's what we've been up to. I'm pretty sure Curly Joe weighs more than 30 pounds now. Bit of pudge around the middle, yes. Happens to us all.
The other day, I let the dogs out, completely forgetting I'd left the front gate open to bring a couple bags of wood pellets in for the fire. A few minutes later, I opened the door to call the dogs in. Tank trotted over, but I had to call Curly a few times. I could hear his tags jingling, so I figured he'd squeezed through a hole in the small fence and was out "playing" with the geese in the big yard. (He calls it playing, they call it "DIE, PUPPY, DIE.") Nope. The little bastard comes running down the ROAD, just as happy as can be. I probably should have freaked out, but mainly I was pleased that he came when I called him, especially considering he had probably been playing with the two corgis down the street.
Oh, what the heck. More pictures, anyone?
Stormtroopers don't have puppies or Santa Claus. Isn't that sad?
Driving up to see my mom. I'm happy at least one of my dogs doesn't get carsick.
Bedtime!
I actually feel really bad about my schedule, in regards to the dogs. Tank doesn't mind since he's old and sleeps more, but Curly Joe is a young'un. The dogs sleep while I'm at work, then I come home, feed them and we go to bed. So they pretty much just sleep all the time. That's why I need to make more of an effort to walk them every day. Bored puppies are destructive, ANNOYING puppies.
Curly Joe's foster mom, designerd, is going to be in Portland for a visit in a couple of months. This little dog is probably going to explode when he's reunited with her. He'll be so happy! Hopefully she won't laugh at how fat he is or make fun of his wattle.
Well, that's about it. Wish us luck with the classes! It'll be good for both of us, I'm sure, and just think: this is the first step toward eventually getting Curly Joe trained as a therapy dog.
Curly Joe's foster mom, designerd, is going to be in Portland for a visit in a couple of months. This little dog is probably going to explode when he's reunited with her. He'll be so happy! Hopefully she won't laugh at how fat he is or make fun of his wattle.
Well, that's about it. Wish us luck with the classes! It'll be good for both of us, I'm sure, and just think: this is the first step toward eventually getting Curly Joe trained as a therapy dog.
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