Friday, November 30, 2012

Cat people

A friend visited me in the shop today, to buy a few toys for a senior's little dog for the holidays. This friend loves dogs, but she's a cat person. Tango was not very nice to her at first. There was a stranger invading his space! Of course, a few cookies changed his mind about that. She asked Tango to sit, sit, sit, which of course he ignored and kept mugging her for the cookies. I told her to stop caving to his cute bearded face, and tell him to do what she wanted. With a more commanding tone, my friend told him, "Sit?!" Tango looked at me, I looked back but didn't say anything, and he sat! My friend was very impressed! I guess cats are different. - Fran

Friday, November 16, 2012

Focus your training!

When you're training your dog, you want him to be focused and ready to work! So it's up to us, the trainer to be focused ourselves. That means: have a plan, stick to it, and keep sessions short! Go into your training session with an intention - work on heeling, get a straight sit, work on wicked weave pole entries, whatever! And work on that for 5 to 8 minutes. No more than that, or you'll both get bored and frustrated. (After all, in class you don't work for a solid hour, do you? No! There are breaks while you're listening to the instructor or when other teams are taking a turn.) During this session, Tango and I worked on heeling. He looks ready to go, doesn't he? - Fran

Saturday, November 10, 2012

People with artistic talent

Oh, how I envy people with artistic talent. This drawing was done by a friend who obviously has buckets-full! Tony added the spats and monocle, of course, but aside from that, it's my scruffy Brussels Griffon (B.G.) Tango! He even got the feel of Tango's rough coat. How cute is this! I framed and hung the drawing over my desk here at GollyGear.com so that I can look at it every day. Tony said that he was working on something else and needed a break, so he drew Tango. Imagine that - to be able to just whip something like this out. I'm lucky to have friends with talent! - Fran

Friday, November 02, 2012

After a hard day's work

Close to the end of a long day, Tango's resting. We packed orders today, answered the phone, waited on customers here in the shop, and on top of that, we practiced some tricky agility moves! - Fran