Nick & I went up to Whistler for the weekend — my dads family owns a condo on Creekside that I am pleased to make use of from time to time.
We brought Justice, since one of the benefits of said condo is that I can bring the dog. She does great there — she doesn’t see it as her “home”, so her usual “I have to defend my home!” dumbness is heavily curtailed. And since she doesn’t have any separation anxiety to start with (unless she feels we’ve wronged her by leaving without taking her out when she thinks she should come — in which case, I think it’s more indignant “hey, you forgot me!” barking than separation anxiety anyway) she’s fine left alone in the condo. She snoozes and escapes from her crate. (Oops. I think I may have not latched it properly. Whatever, from the wrinkled blankets… I think she just slept on the bed the whole time.)
And, as expected, she was awesome.
Because Whistler is an EXTREMELY dog friendly town, there are dogs e.v.e.r.y.w.h.e.r.e. I don’t take her into the village because I’m not sure she could handle QUITE that amount of chaos yet (it was CRAZY busy on Saturday — finding parking was actually hard), but walking around Creekside (where our condo is located) is perfect for her. This morning, we took her for a nice long walk to the nearby off-leash park at Alpha Lake, and as we were walking out, there was a golden retreiver & a samoyed outside the side door, both on leash. I kept Justice at a heel and we started to walk past them… and Justice was AWESOME, until the samoyed started throwing a Justice-like fit!
Justice did react back a little — well, no wonder, this dog was pitching a 70lb hissy fit 20 feet away — but I got her to sit and calm down right away, shovelled a few treats into her, then quickly got her to walk past (leaving the samoyed & his handler lots of room to handle their hissy fit) which she did so calmly and politely. The other owner apologized to US! Nick & I were somewhat flustered — aren’t we usually the ones who have to apologize to other dog owners for Justice’s bad manners? SO pleased with her good behaviour. So pleased!
So, we got down to the park, and I found that the battery on her remote collar was dead. Bah. Well, whatever, her recall is generally pretty good anyway without it, I usually just use it for backup when she’s having a total braindead day, or near roads where I just don’t trust her not to bolt after a squirrel or something. Extremely high prey drives are bloody hard to manage with words alone. But, this particular park is nowhere near a road, so … whatever, if she bolts, she’ll come back in a minute after she’s lost her prey anyway.
We had a great time. I got her to wear her new backpack (with nothing in it) so she could get used to the feel of it. She had a great time chasing after other dogs who were chasing their balls. I tell you, ball-obsessed dogs are awesome for Justice. They don’t care that she’s chasing them, and she doesn’t care about their ball. She just likes the chase.
She was loads of fun. We played at the park for a bit, then wandered along the edge of the lake and back. At one point, she saw what she thought was a good spot to jump in the lake… until she realized it was a bit deeper than she thought… and that the path back out was a lot steeper than she thought. She flailed a bit, but then Daddy to the rescue — Nick slid down the enbankment a little (not very far, she’s just a little dog) and hauled her out, only to have her give a good shake covering both of them in mud. Nice one, dog. Well, her backpack is worn in now anyway.
As we were about to leave the park, a cyclist came by. Nothing new about this, cyclists had been going by all morning. Except this one apparently tweaked Justice, and she decided to bolt after it. Idiot. Before I even had a chance to react (ie, panic) she made the realization that catching a bicycle going very fast would be a BAD thing, but she was already pretty committed to her high speed lunge… so she did an AMAZING leap that took her over the back tire of the bicycle, with a perfect four point landing on the other side. Startled the cyclist (so sorry!) scared the hell out of me, and amused onlookers when I recovered from the shock with a “Nice jump, you DUMBASS.” It was a seriously impressive leap, I have to say… but jesus christ, dog. Don’t chase bicycles!
In retrospect, it was kind of funny seeing her brain in motion: “I’m gonna get it! Oh shit, don’t want it, WHEE! Ok, I’m fine, let’s go.”
That’s my girl. *headshake*
OMG. You make me almost pee my pants sometimes. You should honestly write freelance articles for dog publications.