I received a huge pounce, a few humps, and a bazillion hugs and kisses. As I mentioned in the previous entry, it's the longest time I've ever been away from Odie. The days that led up to our departure were filled with a panicking me and the horror stories I suddenly recalled. A friend's dog passed away when he went on vacation (I don't know how it happened exactly though). My uncle's dog looked stick thin and was very depressed when they took a two-week vacation, in spite of entrusting the dog to a friend (according to the one who cared for her, Windy refused all her meals and just kept moping around). So even if I was away, I kept Odie in my thoughts the entire time. I really don't know what to do without him, and he's the reason I looked forward to going home.
Day after my return, Odie and I went to Pet Centrics to catch up on the class that he missed last Saturday. I'm panicking internally because of ALL the things he has to learn, and all the videos we have to shoot. It was our first ever makeup class so I was pretty excited to go in spite of having only two hours of sleep and a slight hangover. It was just me, Odie, and Doc Marose using quite a big venue. Odie hasn't had such a big space all to himself ever! We booked a 10AM class which lasted for only an hour, but we learned quite a lot.
Doc Marose mentioned that Odie has grown (he really has, and I still can't deal with it), and asked about the present state of his allergies before proceeding with the lesson proper. Odie may have been excited to be with teacher and aimed straight for her treat container, shoving his face in it even if it was empty. We did well when we reviewed the things from last session. I also admitted to having a bit of difficulty doing impulse control on the floor and blamed it on my reflexes. Odie has stolen treats from the floor more times that I've been able to cover the treat with my hand. Doc Marose tried it out for herself a couple of times before admitting defeat. Odie is officially faster than human reflexes. Frustrating! She thought of a way to modify the exercise to suit human limitations, so now, Odie's floor impulse control (the one that lasts more than 2 seconds) is done with a treat on the floor, and another treat on my hand. I make him look at the treat on the floor without removing my hand entirely, just enough for him to take a peek. Then I deliver the other treat straight to him using my other hand. Well, that's gonna be hard to get on video.
We also reviewed transitions. Odie literally springs up when we do down-sit, which Doc Marose found quite amusing, she had to pause for a bit so she could laugh it all out. I guess Odie really is a bouncy puppy! Check out our Transitions video to know what it's all about.
While doing durations, Odie stopped for a while, tilted his head from side to side, and was looking at the gate with his tail straight up, looking very alert. A garbage truck was collecting... well... garbage. The truck had a pretty loud engine, and an equally loud horn. Worst part was the way it was there for what seemed like five entire minutes! Of course, being a beagle, the truck upstaged both humans in the court and kept looking at the truck until it left.
I'm very happy that we're doing quite well with durations in spite of Odie's breed being susceptible to distractions. We still haven't done 10-second durations successfully, but I'm confident that we'll get there. Before calling it a day, we let Odie run around freely in the court. He enjoyed it so much except he would come back to either teacher or me, perhaps wanting to get some treats. When he was off leash, teacher taught me how to be all excited so that Odie would run back to me on command. I really get to learn a lot from Doc Marose just from observing how she interacts with Odie. They seem to be very sweet to each other and I do admit to getting jealous sometimes, but I keep looking at it as an opportunity to learn how to just happily be with my puppy. I also like observing how people respond to Odie's presence - when I see him interact with people, I really see how their stress goes away through the changes in their faces. Seeing Odie making people happy is also my source of happiness.
Today, we're enjoying the day just reviewing the things from yesterday, because we have regular class again tomorrow! I'll make sure to get LOTS of homework done by tomorrow afternoon. CRUNCH TIME!
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