Working out

Today it was very hot and its going to be hot for the next while. Not "hot" like I remember it being in Dallas, because that kind of heat is rude, but hot for Raleigh hot - I am real heat weenie now, it gets much about 90 and I am about to faint from the heat! I used to be much less sensitive to the heat and I could stand a lot hotter temps than I can now. I blame the humidity! Dry heat is much preferable and easier to live with.

It was 99 degrees! I can't take the dog out in that! he was born here, he doesn't have the heat training that I have or had. He's not built for this kind of stuff and he suffers from it. What kind of dog person takes their dog out in that? Not this one. Its just too hot and I don't enjoy it much  either anymore. The dog still needs to get his little work out, and if I can't work out his body, thanks to Dognition,  I can work out his mind - its equally exhausting for the dog.

Enter Dognition, and not because it was on TV  either. I've known about it from the Behaviorist months ago and I have been mulling it over. The heat made the decision easier. So, tonight we worked out his mind in the air conditioning.

I had been hoping that Rocket would sail through the "tests" and be the Poster Dog for Dog Brilliance. And no, he isn't. In their words he is an "independent thinker" and "knows the treats are there and doesn't need to check with me to eat them". He wasn't really interested in doing what I told him to. But, we just started and there is a lot of time to build his brain muscle. He will get mentally stronger, his physical strength took time and I need to give him the time to work on his mental strength. Patience.

This is the nice way of saying that right now  he doesn't follow subtle directions or care about my preferences. He also didn't yawn when I yawned! some dogs do.. not all, but about 20% of canines  will yawn with you, Rocket is not one of  "those" dogs . He does seem to prefer his left side and that was interesting to me. I think he also seemed better going to his left when we in agility too. So my dog is left handed and now I'm pretty sure I know that for sure now. So I learned that. He did very well on the Pointing with My Foot exercise, he did better with my foot pointing than with my hand pointed.

The site said that it meant he learned new things quickly. And he does, he does learn new things pretty quickly. I would have gone on to do more tests but he was getting tired so we retired for the night. Tired is good.

It would be easier if the instructions were for a single person and the dog. They can be easily done alone but it would be nicer if they illustrated the "tests" with just one person instead of giving all the directions with the presumption of two people taking part.