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Went to the shala yesterday, for what is usually an Ashtanga “mix” class (i.e., improv). Muscle Man teaches.

A bunch of people showed up and we set off. As Muscle Man was giving me an adjustment in down dog, he said, “Been missing you at Mysore.”

“I always seem to drift back to home practice,” I said. “How’s it been going?”

“The numbers are dropping off,” he said. “And now with the Archangel gone…”

“What do you mean, gone?”

“He’s in Singapore. His wife couldn’t get into this country, so he had to move.”

***

Turns out the mix class has been changed to led primary. Which was fine by me. Appeared to be mostly beginners, because Muscle Man explained modifications for all of the poses as we went along.

He asked me to demonstrate bhujapidasana, then made a point of coming over to adjust me in supta kurmasana. I wondered if it’d irritate my T12, but turns out there was no problem, which is very good news.

Muscle Man also does the samakonasana/hanumanasana addition to standing, and I was happy to find that hanumanasana is totally painless and actually just feels terrific these days. I wonder if it’s unusual, to have poses that get better provided one doesn’t do them too much? I enjoy hanumanasana so much that I get these impulses to do it every practice. If I do, though, I find that the posture devolves pretty quickly.

After urdhva dhanurasana, he told everyone to play around for a few minutes with inversions, then came over and did assisted dropbacks with me. I appreciate the fact that he was so thoughtful.

***

Tyler is kind of on and off with the itching, though slowly seems to be improving. I had a brainstorm the other morning, and decided to try some miconazole nitrate (aka athlete’s foot spray) on his skin.

Seems to be helping, and the vet said it won’t hurt him, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

Only other news is puppy school. I just spoke with The Cop, who is going to be home late from the night shift because there was a taser incident, which requires lots of paperwork. Anyhow, I was telling him about how I don’t really feel happy with puppy school at the local Petsmart.

What I really wanted out of puppy school was for Tyler to be around people and other dogs, so he’s well-socialized. The actual training part wasn’t as important to me. What’s happening in class, though, is that we have a total of 5 dogs — one of whom is Tyler. Then there’s Teddy, who Tyler likes to pal around with. The other three dogs are older dogs (one of them is 6!), and they are snappers and fear biters. I appreciate that their owners want to get them under control, but part of what the teacher wants to do is let them get close to the other dogs, and then the owner is supposed to correct their dog when it snaps or growls or goes into attack mode.

Obviously, the easiest thing to do is to let the cranky dogs do their training with Tyler or Teddy, who don’t react back. Tyler just stands there and looks at the angry dogs with curiosity. Then he looks around to see if he can find Teddy, ’cause he’d rather play.

So, long story short, I don’t think I want to go back to the class. I’ve been practicing all of the commands with Tyler, and he’s got “sit” and “leave it” down cold. “Down” and “come” are at about 85%, and “stay,” which is new, is 50/50. Apparently he is a-okay with the socialization thing (actually, he LOVES meeting new people and dogs), so the next step is “real” obedience training.

I’m going to see if I can find an AKC class. I think he is going to be an excellent obedience dog, and I don’t want to mess it up by having too many classes that are about other dogs’ behavior problems.

***

I leave you with a terrific backbending video. It’s inspired me to use our couch as a prop during tomorrow’s practice.

And here’s a hilarious video of an American bulldog enjoying a car ride. I can’t wait to try this with Tyler when he’s older…

But I have to wrap up now. Maxine and Tyler have driven me off the couch with their wrestling antics. Though, of course, they’re looking very innocent in the subsequent pictures.