May 04, 2003
10:00 p.m.
Dusty and I are having TV night. She's been cuddled up to my back as I watch 'Law and Order.' When she gets tired in the evening, she looks up at me inquiringly and I know what she's thinking. Sometimes, I'll set the bed up with her blankets on one side so she can to to sleep, even if I'm staying up.
We had a relatively unexciting day. We had three really good walks. I've changed my walking strategy with Dusty. First of all, I keep a short leash at all times now, unless we're in the park (I used to periodically let her 'play' and sniff in yards along the way).
The other change is that I don't talk to her as much anymore. Instead, I only speak when I absolutely need to and I only use words that have meaning for her: "Walk with me!" (ie: keep a loose leash), "Sit" "Down" "Enough" "Good girl."
When she pulls on the leash, my response varies based on the circumstances. Sometime, I'll 'be a tree' until she comes back to me and the leash is slack. Sometimes I ask her for a sit or a down and sometimes I just circle around (occasionally a few loops) until she's walking nicely.
So far it's working. I guess she doesn't have enough self-control yet to regulate her own behaviour when she's on a longer leash. She *does* pick up stuff off the sidewalk, but I'm watching her pretty closely, so I catch her with a 'Leave it' or ask her to 'Drop it.'
With these changes, I find that we're communicating better with each other.
One other note about communication:
The bell on the door is a great tool for her to let me know when she needs to go out. Unfortunately, I don't think she's quite grasped that it means 'go out to potty' and not 'go out to play' or 'go out for walkies.' She really likes ringing that bell. We're working on this...
Specifically, I've put the bell up except when we go out for a potty, then I ask her to ring it. I'm hoping she eventually puts two and two together on this one.
But she's definitely cottoned on to the idea that she can ask me to go out. She's become more persistant during the day and at night, she wakes me up when she needs to go, usually by tapping on my arm with her paw or licking my hand. If I'm still asleep at that point, she'll lick my face which almost always evokes a response!