A turning point for Angus

It's Sunday afternoon, and Angus is conked out somewhere--in his bed by the radiator, probably, his favorite spot in the house. Even though it is the second week of April, the warmth from the radiator is welcome. It is barely 34 degrees outside, and cloudy, and gloomy, and -- oh, wait. This is supposed to be about Angus, not about the weather.

This weekend was a turning point for him, or maybe for me--my confidence in him has grown immeasurably. He met many challenges over the last four days and he surpassed each one, easily.

As you know, I've been hyper-aware these last few weeks of how Angus barks at strangers and dogs that we meet on walks. I've been working with him steadily, every single time: He sits. He watches me. He gets a treat.

But on Thursday we were expecting company--first friends Ellen and Steve, stopping by to pick up their car which we had been storing while they were on vacation, and then the entire Myers clan from Duluth, coming down for the hockey game: four people and two big chocolate Labs, the elderly Bigsby and the rambunctious two-year-old Blue.

I was a little worried how he was going to react to so much intrusion, so many strange people and dogs, invading his space.

Thursday afternoon I took him outside to meet Ellen and Steve on the sidewalk, on neutral ground, and while his first impulse was to bark, I wouldn't let him. He sat, he managed a quick bark before settling into his watch me and accepting his treat, and after that it was clear sailing. They each gave him a Charlee Bear, and while he did bark at their roller bag as he followed it up our front steps, that was his only transgression. They stayed about a half-hour and Angus was sweet as pie, though he kept trying to climb into Steve's lap.

As Ellen and Steve drove away up the alley, my phone pinged: The Myerses were six blocks away.  Leashed up Angus again, met them on the sidewalk (people first, one by one, then the dogs), and all went swimmingly. He and Blue immediately bonded and spent most of the rest of the weekend chasing each other around the frozen and bleak and icy back yard.

His new best friend, the young Myers girl

 On Saturday, Angus had a busy morning: a vet appointment to check the stitches from his neutering, and then his first Obedience 1 class. We drove him to the vet and he didn't throw up in the car: that was his first victory. Then, as the vet tech took his leash to lead him into the back room, she asked, "Where is his incision site?" and her question threw me so thoroughly that I didn't know how to answer it. (You don't know where a dog is neutered?) I stammered out, "Well, you cut his balls off," and she nodded as though that was a reasonable thing for me to say. "Ah," she said. "That's what I thought. A neuter."

He was back in seconds; his stitches were fine; and I walked him home.

But the specter of Obedience 1 had been hanging over us. I had emailed the instructor a few days before and told her that Angus often tried to bark at dogs we met on the walk, and I asked how we should best handle the class. Should he try to meet the other dogs out on the sidewalk in advance?

Absolutely not, she said. She said we would have to spend the first few minutes of class behind a screen. Once he had gotten used to being in a room full of dogs, we could emerge from the screen. This sounded demoralizing and embarrassing. I envisioned a six-foot-tall Japanese screen with Angus and me behind it, mysterious and shadowy figures.

As it turned out, though, Angus only had to be behind his screen for a matter of minutes. Other dogs, I will tell you smugly, spent the entire hour behind their screens, one of them popping up every now and then to see what he was missing. The screens are made of wire laced with blue tarp and are about four feet high; Doug and I could see over them just fine to follow along the teacher's instructions, but a dog behind the screen was able to calm down and concentrate on the lesson instead of the other dogs.

I took Angus out from the screen after about five minutes, though it was nice that it was there--when he grew distracted (but not barking; he didn't bark) I could lead him behind it again.

We concentrated on five things in class: Name recognition; Sit; Lie down; Stand; and Watch me.

He knew all of those except Stand brilliantly; we do them every day, many times a day. Oddly, he lost Sit during class and I had to give him the command over and over--I think his habit of sitting on the striped rug in the kitchen has made it hard for him to transfer the command (though he sits on the walk when I tell him to).

We were told to practice these 100 times a day all week, and we will. We have to stop showing him the treat first, though (which might be why he didn't want to sit) and I have to stop bending over at the waist when I tell him to watch me.

But he did so well, worked so hard, looked at the other dogs with interest but without aggression or fear. He ate almost an entire bag of treats over the course of the hour, and I think he's going to do just fine.

The three musketeers. (Bigsby, being quite elderly, was mostly sleeping in another room.)

We had Blue and Bigsby all Saturday night while the Myerses were at the hockey game, and it was actually Rosie who disgraced herself by growing jealous, I think, of the great friendship between Angus and Blue. They did fine at first--she had met Blue many times before and liked him--but as the weekend wore on she got crankier and crankier, barking at poor Blue every chance she got. This morning Doug took her for a long walk in the bitter damn cold just to give her some one-on-one time and settle her nerves.

But Angus!  Angus was a champ. I am so thrilled with him. He turned five months old yesterday and he weighs 33 pounds. He's turning into a fabulous dog.