This is really for Friday, March 21

Hi!

Me again. Remember, the woman who vowed to faithfully keep up her blog? Yeah, right!

OK, so it's dog training day and I am now convinced that I am the world's worst person to be writing about this topic. I am not too pleased at how things are progressing. Although the pug pup does fairly well here in the comfort of our own home, she can't heel worth a fig anywhere else. She barks at other dogs and people and if she weren't so small, she would be unpleasant to be around.

Oh, how I hope this is just a puppy phase. She did fine with the 4-H dogs at the meeting, it was just a dog in a yard while we were walking on the sidewalk that got her so rattled recently. A part of the problem is that I don't know quite how to take her most of the time. She is such a silly puppy. I really think she loves us, but when she is playing at attacking our shoes, she can growl and bark like a hound from Hell. I know she doesn't mean it in a vicious way, but it sure sounds bad. I hope that I am misinterpreting her barking at other dogs and people when I see it as a warning and she perhaps intends it as play acting.

Anyway, I am a bit stymied with the training. I tried starting to teach a Back command but she wasn't going back straight so I didn't want to teach her incorrectly and then have to unteach and reteach later. She has started weaving around my legs for a treat and her large circle is getting better. Her crawl is getting worse, with that little back end popping up all the time now. Perhaps I am just in a down mood, but I am a little concerned that I will be ashamed of her at the workshop in April.

I also fear we have lost ground in the housebreaking department. Things were so busy last week that we failed to monitor her as closely as we should have and there were several accidents. So right now I am feeling like a failure as a trainer and that all is hopeless.

Wiping my tears with a clean, extra puppy pad,
Lori