Puppy Sitting

We had a great day yesterday, and Honeydew did too!  Glenn and I went on a tour of the Bull Run Watershed. 

As a result of being gone all day, we had to find a "puppy-sitter" for Honeydew...and of course Guide Dogs for the Blind has a lot of restrictions on who can watch her, etc. -- has to be someone that has had the proper "guide dog handling" training, home inspection and waiver paperwork on file!!  Luckily, one of the puppy club members was "between puppies" yesterday (she has raised over 7 guide dog puppies, and her brand-new puppy was set to arrive today!).  Her husband loves Honeydew (calls her his "toasted marshmallow") - so we felt really confident leaving her with them.  She got to go on long walks, to dinner, the mall, the coffee shop - she even got to go bowling with one of the other guide dog puppies (his name is Cruz - like "cruise")!  We speculated on what type of bowling ball Honeydew would pick - I think a swirly purple one.  I am sure she loved all of the old smelly rental shoes!  Apparently she wasn't scared at all - which many of the puppies are (with all of the loud crashing noises, etc.).  

Of course, Cruz's raiser is also the leader of our puppy club - the main trainer we have - so it was stressful, sort of like Honeydew was going for a final exam or something.  We were a bit stressed about that (would she be out of control and the main leader would think we weren't doing a good job??) - but we were also looking forward to feedback from folks that have a lot more experience at this than we do.  Apparently Honeydew did really really really well - she didn't have any accidents, she didn't get into stuff in their house, she played nicely, etc.  They really wore her out - she could hardly keep her eyes open when we went to pick her up and she was sitting in their living room.  This was the first time she has ever been away from us - and she did pretty good.  The lady said that sometimes it takes a puppy a good day or more to get comfortable - but that Honeydew settled in within 2 hours and was responding to their commands and companionship like a pro.  She pulls on the leash while walking - she has always done that.  That was the only "bad" thing she mentioned in the full page write-up she did - the rest of the comments were glowing.  Whew!  They said she was a 'dream' - yeah Honeydew!!

Photo) Honeydew going to town on a plastic bottle.  Guide Dogs says it is OK for them to play with the thick plastic bottles (like OJ jugs or laundry jugs) until they break them down to the point where they can get plastic parts off, then they get recycled.  Honeydew LOVES these toys. I have folks at work bringing them in from home for me - she has built up quite the collection. 

Lucky Lab Bike Ride

Glenn and I went on another big bike ride today - it was the "Tour de Lab" - a bike tour to each of the "Lucky Lab Brew Pubs" here in Portland.  It is one of our favorite pubs because you can bring your dogs.  At each pub you got pieces of a dog costume (first bar the tail, second bar the ears, third bar the nose).  Once you got to the last pub with all of your dog bits, you got a free pint of beer (in my case, rootbeer) in a Tour de Lab pint glass that you got to keep. We also got a couple of cool ride t-shirts - with a lab's head wearing a bike helmet. 

All total (including the ride from and back to our house) it was about 35 miles - so it was easier than the 50-miler we did a few weekends ago, but still challenging.  MUCH of it was uphill....up big hills! Never-ending, winding up and up big hills. Ughh.  I was slow up the hills, but I made it - there were many people that had to get off and walk.  Coming back down was great fun though!  There were over 1,200 riders - quite a site.  I took some photos - below....

Photo 1) The finish line...this is what about 1,000 bikes looks like.  It just went on and on and on.

Photo 2) Glenn, with his "ears" - and with his Lucky Lab...Honeydew is getting so big we can hardly pick her up anymore (she is fixated on the cat standing below her)!

Photo 3) A picture of The Dew...just because she is so darn cute!  She didn't get to go with us (lots of folks had dogs in trailers or baskets), but she was with us in spirit!  Toward the end of this month she is going to be in a parade, so that will make up for missing today (I asked if I could bike commute with her in a trailer - but Guidedogs said no, which is understandable...they don't want to risk something happening while she is back there that would make her afraid of traffic or bikes.  Oh well).

Fun Day

Time for another (long) Honeydew update.  Today we went to quite the event at the Guide Dogs for the Blind campus (in Boring, Oregon).  It was "Fun Day", which is a full day of events, training, entertainment, etc. -- it is an appreciation event for all of the puppy raisers.  There were over 300 puppies in training there!!  It was a sea of dogs...and their raisers.  The only working guide dogs that were there were with their blind partners.  All of the dogs in guide training were in the kennels.  

So, for Honeydew, this was a crazy day.  She is very dog and people distracted...and we were surrounded by hundreds of them!  There were a few times when she lost control and went bonkers - but generally she did much better than we were expecting.  We often just had to sit at the side and let her just watch everything...then she would settle...at least until we got up to walk somewhere, then she was totally geeked up again.  Compared to a normal dog her age, she is very calm....but compared to the other guide dog puppies her age, she is a complete spaz!  We took some photos of our day (see below and/or attached).

Photo 1:  Some of the booths.  Many of the guide dog puppy clubs have booths and sell everything from t-shirts to toys, etc.

Photo 2:  Adorable little black puppy - calmly taking in the sights.  Wish he could teach Honeydew how to maintain control.  There were tons of little baby puppies there - and in the afternoon they were presenting new puppies (8-weeks) to their new puppy raisers.  Two of the members of our puppy club had to leave their dogs there today - including Petunia, the puppy we puppy-sat before we got Honeydew.  

Photo 3:  Michele and The Dew watching the people walk by.  Honeydew was pretty sure that all of these people just came out to tell her how cute she is -- it's all about her ya know.  What a nut.  

Photo 4:  Glenn and The Dew, with some of our puppy club members and their pups.  Honeydew has to hang out on the edge, because she can't control herself with the other puppies.

Photo 5:  They had an area set up where people could get together to meet the other litter mates of their puppy, and sometimes you even get to meet the parents of the puppy.  Honeydew and Glenn were talking with the crazy lady in the pink skirt (she never shut up the whole time we were near her!).  She is raising "Hubert", one of Honeydew's brothers - up in Washington.  She had her other guide dog puppy with her, so we could only see pictures of Hubert - he looks just like Honeydew, but has a white "Z" on his chest.  She has raised 8 puppies so far...and she said Hubert is challenging....and she proceeded to describe all of Honeydew's bad behavior (intense, distracted, lunging, mouthing, jumping, etc.).  She watched Honeydew and said that she and Hubert were very similar with respect to the issues they need to work on -- lots of spunk.  When we told her Honeydew was our first guide puppy, she made a shocked face and said "I can't believe they would give you such a challenging dog for your first one".   You can see some of the other people in the background, meeting their litter mates.  We were in a field the size of a baseball diamond full of people and dogs meeting each other, it was crazy!  Dogs, dogs, everywhere!  (and the strange thing....all of them were under control and none of them barked!).

Photo 6:  The younger girl in the blue sweatshirt was the raiser of Honeydew's mother, "Marikay".  They are from Elko, Nevada.  They came up for the event -- it was fun for her to see the puppies that her dog mothered.  She has raised 7 dogs, and was dropping off one (that was going into formal training) and taking home a new puppy to raise today.  Pretty impressive for a girl her age!

Photo 7:  This big black boy is "Hector", one of Honeydew's brothers.  Look at how big he is - never would have imagined they were from the same litter!  He was very sweet.  Apparently, Honeydew's father ("Eric") is quite a handful.  We went to the breeding area and they had books with pictures of all of the breeding dogs.  When we said that "Eric" was Honeydew's father, they all shook their heads...apparently, Eric is quite a challenging dog.  One of the girls even said "I don't care for Eric, I don't know why they ever made him a breeder".  "Heath", one of Honeydew's other brothers (who was in our Puppy Club) has already been "career changed" because they couldn't get him under control and he was getting aggressive.  I don't know what will happen with him - likely become a pet, or he might go into some other sort of training.  I guess Honeydew comes by her crazy behavior naturally.  :)  Hector (this photo) seems to have gotten the "calm and controlled" genes from his mother's side of the family. 

Photo 8:  This is a picture of one of the play areas for the dogs in the kennel.  The dog at the top of the slide was cracking me up...he would let the bone he was playing with slide down the slide - he would then slide after it - and then get it and run back up the slide and do it again.

The Dew in the News, kinda.

So, before we were able to get Honeydew, they took her to an event called "Pinot and Pups" - a fund raising event.  I just checked the Guide Dogs for the Blind newsletter, and there is a picture of Honeydew!

http://www.guidedogs.com/site/DocServer/GDN_082.pdf  -- see page 5, with "Deena and Mike Bragg" -- Honeydew, working the rich folks for some money!

Official Jacket!

YAY!  Honeydew is now officially a guide dog puppy in training - she got her jacket tonight at our puppy meeting. 

The meeting was actually a "social" - once a month the club does an outing in public...ride the train or bus, go to the mall, etc.  This was our first such social (as the new pups have been too young to go until now).  Tonight it was an outdoor art show with artists who made garden art from recycled materials....it was a sea of people, totally overwhelming!  We drove around for about 20-minutes just trying to find a place to park, and ended up in a dirt lot a ways away.  

Honeydew did pretty good - but at one point she had a bit of a meltdown.  I think the new jacket (she isn't sure she wants it on), combined with all of the people and the other dogs, was more than she could handle.  She was like a little kid throwing a temper tantrum in the grocery store.  I finally had to drag her behind some bushes where she proceeded to buck like a wild bull and flop around on the ground like a fish.  She has never acted that way before.  After a bit of private time she calmed down and we went back out to join the crowds of people and the other puppy raisers.  She is still just a little pup - so I can imagine it was all just more than she could handle, especially because she is so much more intense about distractions than most of the other pups (who are just chill, sort of with a surfer's attitude or something).  

I (Michele) have been out of town for about 5 days -- Glenn did a great job of taking care of the little dear (along with the other Crim Critter Menagerie).  I can't believe how much bigger she got while I was away...she is starting to look like a little dog instead of a puppy! :( Tomorrow she gets to wear her jacket to work with me - everyone will be so proud!

Anyhow - attached are some updated pics of our big night.

Photo 1) Honeydew in her new jacket.  She is all color coordinated now...people always think she is a boy because of the green halter.  She doesn't seem to care.

Photo 2) Just a few of the pups hanging out at one of the art exhibits (there were a total of 13 guide dogs there).  There are 5 pups in the picture...kinda like "Where's Waldo".  The little one on the left, facing the camera, is Fortune - the pup that is so huge for his age (he is the same as Honeydew).  He has the biggest puppy belly and always seems to be straining under his own weight just to keep his head up.

Photo 3) Another picture of The Dew looking proud in her jacket.  You can see the intelligence in her eyes...that, or she is saying "seriously, if you don't get this thing off of me I am going to pitch another royal fit!"

Puppy Class

Tonight I took some pictures at Honeydew's puppy class.  Next week we get to go on a social with the club - an outdoor art-show.  The best news is that Honeydew should (knock on wood) get her official "puppy in training" jacket!  She did very good at class tonight.  She taught Glenn everything she knows.  :)

1)  First photo is of some of the puppy club members.  As you can see, there is a blind lady (Liz) and her guide partner (Azisis, not sure of spelling) that join us.  It is great to get her perspective on what it is like to rely on a guide dog - and why we are teaching the things we are teaching (e.g like, in photo 3, why they need to ignore pine cones and not pick them up).  The puppy to her left (with the gray pony-tail guy) is Louise...she has always been our favorite of the puppies (until The Dew came along, of course!).

2) Glenn doing the rounds with Honeydew.  I think she was giving me the stink-eye.  You can't see all of the dogs in the background because of the in-shade in-full-sun lighting (of course, Glenn's bro, photographer extraordinaire, would know how to correct for that, but I am clueless).  Honeydew used to run and try to grab the tail of the dog in front of her, but she is much better about that now.

3) "Ahh, Dad.  What do you mean I can't have the pine cone!"  Such torture for little Honeydew.  They kept tossing the pine cones in their path as they were walking, or while they were on a down/stay.  So tempting...but thats a no-no!  So instead, many of them - like miss Honeydew here, just made sure they looked really pathetic about the whole thing.

4) Glenn and Honeydew in line with a bunch of the other pups.  She sure is getting big!

More Pictures

Photo 1:  Honeydew in puppy jail.  She doesn't like this thing - she prefers her darker, plastic, kennel.  But it works well for the times when she isn't in the mood to sleep, but you need her secured.  The other animals wander past and taunt her.  Pretty much pure hell in her book.  She is so abused.

Photo 2:  Bath time!  She does pretty good in the bath, even though she looks pathetic.  I imagine it won't be long before she will be so big that we won't believe she could once fit in the kitchen sink!

Photo 3:  We had some folks come in and do some testing of our house for a study on moisture levels (to help set some national standards...I think our home will likely be the "don't build it like this drafty old thing").  Anyhow, Ruben was determined to escape to the outside world, even if that meant going through the blower fan itself - he would stand in front of it...his hair all blown back and lips flapping in the breeze.  Our house leaks pretty bad - but it isn't the worst they have seen (apparently some guy in Syracuse has that honor).  They put sensors in our home for a year, then come back and get them - and give us free recommendations on how to improve our home (that ought to be quite the tome).  They are currently in the attic measuring insulation levels, etc.  The fun part was when they had to turn the heat on to test leaks in the duct work....ahh, already almost 90 degrees out and the heater on full blast.  Wonderful!!

Photo 4:  Bodine decided to help them with their study.  He actually climbed onto the laptop (one of his favorite things to do) and started one of the blower fan tests for them!  Apparently, once it is started, they can't stop it - it just has to run the full test.  All of the testers started running around the house trying to get things in order for the test because Bodine pre-maturely started it.  They said he has potential and they might hire him to help them test some houses up in Seattle. About time he earned his kibble!