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Yoga time!

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Tyler had his first obedience class with the new teacher. He and I arrived first at the park where class convenes. You should have seen him as cars drove up, and out came PEOPLE! and DOGS! and MORE PEOPLE! with MORE DOGS! He thought it was the best party ever.

All kinds of dog meetings and sniffings and cavortings. And then we got down to business.

Lesson of the night: walking on a leash. The teacher explained that what we needed to do was start walking with our puppies. As the puppies pulled out ahead of the person, we were to let them run out the length of the leash, then suddenly turn in the other direction. Which jolts the pup and makes him pay attention (at least theoretically).

It’s kind of cool and aikido-like. Basically, the pup is jolted back with the same amount of energy he’s using to fly out ahead.

“Let me use Tyler for a demonstration,” she said.

I handed over the leash.

The teacher starts walking along. Tyler walks along with her, looking up to see who she is. She slows down to see if he’ll run ahead. He looks at her and slows down. She speeds up to see if he’ll get excited and bound forward. He glances at her, then trots alongside.

She laughs and stops. Tyler looks up at her, then sits at her feet.

“Tyler’s a genius,” she announces.

Actually, he’s just always been good on a leash. He doesn’t pull ahead and he doesn’t try to stop and dig in his heels. The only thing that kept distracting him was the pinecone we kept passing as we did laps of the walking exercise. He’d slow down and eye it, or try to get a sniff of it. Back and forth, back and forth. He was pretty disciplined about sticking to the exercise and forgoing the highly compelling pinecone.

When we finished class, I grabbed it and stuck it in my purse. Then I forgot about it.

Yesterday morning, as I was checking email, I saw him standing on his hind legs at the counter, trying to get his nose in my purse. Oh yes! The pinecone.

Apparently, they are delicious.