2020 Life Logs, Day 48: The Work Continues
Date: Monday, February 17, 2020
Weather: Partly Sunny; High 46 degrees, Low 28 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
We were all up early this morning, as Heather had an early morning appointment to get her hair cut and Jed went home to get the stairwell painted. By the time the boys and I arrived at their house around 10 am to get clean socks and a shirt for Ollie, Jed had finished the stairwell. Ollie, Jonah, and I left Sam at my house with Shadow and we went into town to find some sort of storage box for each of them to pack up everything on their desks. We wanted a wooden box with a lid, but we ended up with plastic as that was the only alternative in the size we needed. We then rushed home to get their desk items packed up. Once done, they went off to play Harry Potter with Joey and Molly next door and I went home to get Sam and Shadow. We got back just in time to fix lunch and head to the our ‘people training for good dogs’ class. The Goldpebbles and I spent a couple of hours with Melissa Berryman learning how to think like a dog. Melissa asked the boys to tell her how people greet one another. They answered that sometimes people shake hands. Then she asked them how many times they had seen dogs shaking hands. Well, never. But she explained that people often extend their hand with outreaching fingers to a strange dog to show that they are friendly and that some dogs will see that as an invitation to bite. She recommends patting your leg and inviting the dog to come to you. If it does, then you can pet it. Otherwise, no petting of dogs you don’t know. And if you are walking your dog and people ask if he is friendly before attempting to pet him, tell them that your dog is friendly with you, but that you suggest they ask the dog if he would like to be petted. You then directing them to pat their thigh along with a friendly greeting and see if your dog goes to them. If so, then they can pet him. If not, walk on. This is just one example of what she teaches, but today she spent most of her time explaining how to use high and low pitched sounds to get a dog to do what you want—low tones for the no-no’s and a really high-pitched ‘good’ immediately when the dog responds. The thing we are having to work so hard on with Shadow is getting him not to jump up on us. He is responding beautifully to the training method, but we do all have to be on the same page. Thus, the classes.
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I took the boys to my house after the training session to give them a treat for successfully completing their first class. I then left Shadow at home to take a nap and returned to Heather and Jed’s with the boys. Heather was still completing the painting of the second upstairs bedroom and Jed as loading things into the van to take to the storage unit. I continued to helped pack things that need to be put in the storage unit, but it had become apparent that the goal of getting all of the downstairs rooms painted before a professional painting crew comes on Wednesday to paint all of the trim in the house was just not going to get done. I left at 5 pm to come home and fix dinner and the rest of the crew arrived a couple of hours later to eat. Heather had bought artichokes as it is the season, and an array of cheeses, a loaf of rustic Italian bread, and raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries to add to the feast. All I had to do was cook the artichokes and get everything on the table. After a wonderful dinner, Heather and Jed returned home to keep painting. Heather has to go to work tomorrow and Jed leaves mid-day with the boys to go for three days of snowboarding at Sunday River near Bethel, Maine. Heather will join them on Wednesday evening. They are coming back here to spend the night and I expected them before now. I can’t wait to find out what the new plan is for proceeding, depending on just how much they got done tonight. Heather still has tomorrow night and I have offered to do what I can tomorrow afternoon. They have accomplished so much this weekend, but the work continues.
