One Month Later...

We haven't blogged in a month!!! See, the past few weeks have been really busy for me since I had to spend early mornings til late nights attending to Odie's needs. I'm just happy that April is finally back from vacation so I'm not the only one doing the feeding, bathing, playing, walking, and training. I've also become more thankful that work for that entire month was home-based. Imagine if I still worked in Makati! I would have brought him in the office or checked him in a boarding facility and even then I'd keep worrying. Imagine as well if/when we move to a different country with zero house help. Well, at least I was given a sneak peek into that kind of life. And I guess it was good that we were left to our own devices for a while - it was an opportunity to grow.

Over the past month, Odie turned 10 months old! In five days, he'll be eleven, then it's his first birthday in July!!! I can't believe it!

10-month old Odie, photo taken at Pet Centrics

I vow to spend the 12th of June until the 11th of July making plans and preparations for the birthday boy. I've actually started some research on baking a cake for dogs. Let's see how that turns out. I'm also going to formulate a wish list (well, there's already one here, I'll just organize it) for posting on Facebook to see who among the family, friends, and godparents would be nice enough to gift. Yes, I'm excited.

We spent the past month sitting in at Pet Centrics' Basic Obedience class for beginners. I originally envisioned it as having us do just a bit of the exercises and mostly helping out the other students. When we went there the first time, Odie ended up doing the exercises along with the others so I thought we couldn't do our part efficiently if I kept bringing Odie because how could that be of help? I should have enrolled as well! Turns out, Doc Marose wanted Odie to be there and be demo dog. Guess they didn't need ME! Haha, I kid. But yeah, we had fun, and Doc taught us a new trick!

Odie Learns to Fly from Pauline Gaerlan on Vimeo.

I've already attached the "fly" cue so that's what we're practicing now. I first saw this trick when I watched Legally Blonde: The Musical so when we were presented with the opportunity to learn it, I spent no idle time! In the show though, the actors were chihuahuas and mini pinschers so that would have been a lot easier to work with. It's quite difficult to have 20+ lbs of dog flying towards me, expecting to be caught. It's a really enjoyable trick nonetheless. So enjoyable, that during discussions at the class in which we were sit-ins, Odie would suddenly hop towards my lap, get off, then hop on again, while waiting for the humans to finish talking. Just like before, the puppy made sure that each session we attended would have an "Odie Moment," in which he would do something to stop the discussion and get everyone's attention, milking his audience for laughs. Sigh. Drama King!

The other students in the Basic Obedience class were actually quite good! Some exercises went really smoothly, some sessions ended earlier than expected. The only down side was that play time only happened after graduation, and the setup was very controlled. Apart from having varying sizes of dogs, some of them lacked socialization during puppyhood so it was a bit difficult to introduce the dogs and see who might be good friends. The advantage of our class is that 3 out of the 5 dogs were classmates since puppy class, and 3 are littermates so we had play sessions early on. Bernard also quickly caught on and became good friends with Odie (at least I'd like to think they're good friends, haha). What I liked about the other Basic Obedience class though is that the parents were very focused on getting their dogs to follow verbal cues in class, and they had really good equipment. I guess that's why they weren't too keen on submitting homework videos :D They still got prizes for being very good in class, and Odie also got treats for being very active as a sit-in.

Petz Woofery Peanut Butter treats!
For inquiries, contact 932-3078, 0915-8795253,
or email petzwoofery@gmail.com

The Puppy Class is currently ongoing and sadly, we can't sit in. Odie is quite the bully when there are new puppies around. His confidence might be a bit too intimidating to the babies. The past few Saturdays have been pretty boring as we're limited to taking walks outside and occasional home training. 

Odie during one of the recall drills we did at home.
I love how he looks so fierce here, flapping ears and all.

I'm really looking forward to the advanced course or informal training we might take with Boo, Bon, Brix, Buzz, and Bernard. I hope that happens! If not, I hope we could also sit in at the Basic Obedience class in July! Enrollment has just opened and since the turnout of Puppy Class is pretty good, I'm positive that the turnout for Basic Obedience would be even better!