The Rookie Show

I had never had a dog of my own until I got Spooky. I think back to my childhood and I remember a few dogs. First there were Misty and King, both were American Eskimo's that my mom had. I don't remember much about them except that King seemed to stay outside most of the time and Misty was more of a family dog. At the time, my mom was married to my stepdad who was an alcoholic. He was a great guy when he was sober (that I remember) but once he got drunk he was not a fun person to be around. I remember that when he got drunk and abusive, Misty would put herself between him and whoever he was after. She was pretty ferocious. That's probably why he found a "new home for her in the country". Not long thereafter, King was found bleeding from the mouth, and had been poisoned. We always suspected the neighbors, but we never really knew who did it. I also vaguely remember a german shepherd that my sister got. He didn't stay long though because he took a hunk out of my

I've been working with Rook every night since class. I've noticed a definite change in him this week. He seems to really be looking forward to our training time. The biggest change I made this week was to not feed the dogs in the morning. Instead, I wait until evening, after we've done our training time. All of the dogs are very eager to practice. It's odd because most of the time all three dogs sit in a semi-circle in front of me. I give the command "down" and all three hit the dirt. Last night I was doing "shake" and Spook and Brodie would stick their paws out. I haven't worked with Rook much on shake but last night I asked him to shake and he immediately stuck his paw out. The more I worked with him the better he got at it. If he keeps going Here is our homework for this week: 1.Attention--- have your dog sit in front of you and look at your face. Once he is looking for 5-8 seconds, start saying “watch” as he is actually looking at you and cli

Last night started with a bad feeling. Loading Rook up, he jumped into the Jeep on the left side. The back seat was folded up and he clipped the edge which knocked the back of the seat loose and knocked Rook back so he was hanging from the seat. I couldnt get him to jump in on his own afterwards and had to lift him. We got to class about 10 minutes before it started. I started trying to get Rook keyed up with clicks and treats. He was really distracted with his eyes darting around and I couldnt get his attention for more than a second. I sat on the grass with him and tried to get him to looking to me, but I wasn't having much luck. One of the other members of class brought your German shepherd near and Rook apparently felt like his space was being encroached so he lunged towards him with a growl. I quickly pulled him in under control but if I hadn't been watching him there would likely have been a fight. I don't know what he was thinking because that dog was easily twice hi

So a couple of days ago, Bob took me to a weird place that I thought it was a dog park because there were lots of dogs and people around but most of the dogs had leashes on. WTF is up with that? We get there and there are all of these two-leggers with dogs just standing around and I was bored in 30 seconds because there was no frisbee, no balls, just people standing around but in the other fence there was a bunch of "stuff" that dogs were running around and the two leggers were yelling. So we are sitting there and Bob starts making this clicking noise and then handing me little pieces of food. Click, Gulp!, Click Gulp! Well that kind of makes up for the fact that I did not get any food today and I was hungry. Next he's calling my name and then it's Click, Gulp when I look at him and I gotta be honest because I was starting to get full and WAIT A FUCKING minute!?!? I think the two-legger talking pointed at me and said I was fat and I'm guessing she hasn't looke

Tonight after getting home I grabbed my training pouch, and clicker and decided to work with Rook. I realized right away that having two other dogs means that we are going to have to train all three, otherwise it's just going to be confusing for all of them. I started repeating some of the training we did the night before, this time with Brodie. I started by calling his name and then rewarding and clicking when he looked. He knew his name. I next did "Sit" and he did perfectly, having learned those commands a long time ago. Just for grins, I told Brodie to sit and then pointed at the ground with a treat between my index finger and thumb. I told Brodie to lie down and then lowered my hand to the ground. He laid down to get the treat from my hand. Two more repeats and on the third try I told Brodie to Lie down and he immediately did. Right away I see the difference. Brodie only cares about pleasing you. He always looks to people for approval and is very sensitive. He is ver

I've been spending or and more time with my dogs lately. Rookie, my border collie/heeler mix is very intense (read obsessive!), high energy and somewhat socially awkward. He's fine with other dogs, but aside from a handful of people, he doesn't show much interest in people unless they are holding a frisbee. I thought that agility training would give him a good foundation and help him become a more balanced dog. I also thought that the training would be good for me and help to get my mind off the fact that I'm having fairly serious surgery in a few weeks. I think I've just added to my worries. Last night was Rook's first night of school. We showed up around 8:00pm for the 8:15pm class. I realized early on that I was in the minority being a man, as most everyone else there was not. We are taking the "P1" or Pre-agility class and the class before ours was the "P2" class. It was the more experienced beginning class. Most of the dogs were collie m