Tuesday, March 31, 2009

It's amazing what Tag will do...

...for a Big Mac...



And don't you love his new blue sweater...?

Monday, March 30, 2009

In case you were wondering...

...we did not run off to Tahiti with Tag and merely say we were in Toronto. We're actually there...


While playing fetch this evening, we met a little dachsund/jack russell mix who was honestly almost as fast as Tag. And that's saying something. He was a little black bullet...


He weighed in at 49.6 lbs. today. Taking full advantage of his new three-meals-a-day.



But don't worry - we're not spoiling him. No. Not one bit...





I can already hear it, how nervous this is making Todd and Angie.  Get over it.  These two are having a blast!

Seneca is back for an evening, we're doing a demo up north about service and therapy dogs.  No time like the present to tear up the backyard and pretend it is a dog park.  At this very moment, Cadence is running in circles trying to herd Butley and Seneca, who are having a wonderful time wrestling with each other.  

Did you know that Butley had ribs and hamstrings?  He's really looking nice.  If you're going to have a pit bull, you really want them to look like a pit bull....

More posts soon, N.


Saturday, March 28, 2009

because I can


It was not my intent to illustrate Senior Butley this morning but the weather has turned frightful, well in less dramatic nomenclature we are getting some snow flurries today and I just don't want to deal with the coldness. To set the stage, I had a dream last night. Went to bed late well after the buzzer had sounded for the last game in March Madness's Sweet 16. 

I was prepared for the night to bring a restless sleep after designing T shirts for an International Walking convention being hosted here in Des Moines in 2011. Designing usually spins my sleep cycles out of control. That is to say without partaking in the controlling with legal but toxic substances like a whiskey drink.

REM was upon me, visions pulsing through my spectacular technicolor thoughts of being part the Donner party. 

We were several days into the fiasco and I decided to write a book. A little black "Survival" book. As I was looking around at my dinner candidate, hell it could have been breakfast for all I cared, an illustration of Butley popped into my head. It was a line illustration of the cuts of meat like those signs that hang behind the deli/meat counter at the local grocery store. I just couldn't for the life of me understand how crossing cultural cuisines played out in the my current life without bacon. I kept staring at the illustration and trying to find the cut that spelled out "BACON". A continuation of my vision panned to the left and down to feet where sat our little Cadence. OK, now picture a tooth pick with Catahula Leopard spots. I had to squint to make out any semblance of the Leopard spots but I did squint for what seemed to be a very long time and wah la! I woke up, got out of bed, drug myself into the office and plopped down in front of the computer where I pulled out my computer pencil and paper and promptly started to illustrate. Ultimately the illustration didn't go where I had envisioned as I didn't feel that it was a kind thing to do. Slicing Butley up into those little dashed lines and slapping a Bacon label in the correct bacon positioning. 

Then I really did wake up.

Welcome to a snap shot into my mind on nothing but design. 

As a foot note: it has been stated in Shumate folklore that we had relatives that had some part in the Donner Party. However, after searching for details on the tragedy I can neither confirm or deny the Shumate folklore.

Tuesday, March 17, 2009





Need I say more?
Dog Swap Merchandise.

What does it mean?

In case you haven't (note: I have) gone to a search engine, typed the searchable item, sat back and waited for the results, then gone to the next search engine, typed in the SAME searchable item, sat back and waited for the results, then gone to another search engine, typed in the EXACT SAME searchable item, sat back and waited for the results and then compared them?

Here's what I've come up with and I don't know why! 

Google Search: Butley


Yahoo Search: Butley



Dog Pile Search: Butley

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Saturday, March 14, 2009

If I hadn't let the humidifier leak out all over my phone...

...I'd have some great shots of Tag for this post. But alas, filling the humidifier late at night isn't always the best option, when you can't see that it's not sitting properly in the base, and thus leaking all over your phone which is sitting right next to it.

But IF I hadn't let the humidifier leak out all over my phone:

- you'd see some fun photos of Tag running up & down a little hill which we discovered in downtown Cleveland, surrounded on all four sides by chain link fencing, a parking garage, and a stone & wood wall, which makes a PERFECT morning fetch spot. After our daily game of Green Bone, we'll often go get a cup of coffee & maybe run an errand or two at CVS.

- you'd see video of Tag greeting folks at the hotel, without his vest, and being very good and focusing on the walk when he does have the vest on.

- you'd see a photo of Tag & his new "uncle" Ben (a violinist & guitarist in the band), who, after a couple walks with us, some trial time with him in his room, and some otherwise getting-to-know-you bonding time, took care of Tag for a night & a day while Angie and I went to Tiffin, OH to visit with her grandmother on our day off. Tag & Ben got along famously, Tag even rode on the company shuttle and went to a dinner party at the home of the parents of Jared Stein, our musical director, who live in Cleveland. The report was that Tag was excited and very curious for about 20 minutes, then mellowed out & hung around the general group for few hours, getting potty walks from various cast members every half hour or so, and playing scoutmaster to "Crackers," our wardrobe supervisor's Jack Russell Terrier, as they explored the house hither & yon. And then, for the last couple hours of the evening, he hung pretty close to Ben, always checking in with him ("Is it OK if I go play with so-and-so?" or "Are we going home soon?"). He was a very pooped pup that evening, and we got him the next day, after he and Ben had been out for a morning walk & fetch, and after helping Ben practice his guitar. Apparently Tag is a very patient music critic...

Tag's doing great. NO potty problems, anymore. We'll see how the adjustment to Toronto goes. But he seems to have figured out the routine. And we'll limit how much he drinks in the evenings. We don't restrict water altogether, but we limit it a bit, after 10p or so, letting him have some drinks, but not just sitting & lapping it up... And Tag was VERY patient for my first time trimming his nails, during which I only took off the sharp edges, but enough to give us both practice with the event. No struggles, no argument - went great.

Tag definitely prefers walks and running on grass to concrete. We take him for plenty of walks on the concrete sidewalks, but he's not pulling so hard forward, as he would in a run, so it's easier on his pads. With time & practice, of course, he'll build up the callouses on his pads, so we're just trying to give him lots of opportunities to do just that by taking him on city walks. But when we go play or run about, we always try to look for grassy spots.

The other day, after a long walk, he held up his right paw, like there might be some pain or sensitivity to it. I checked it out on the street & everything looked fine. When we got back to the hotel room, I laid him on his back and gave all four paws a thorough going over, checking for any kind of reaction to pressure, any cuts or burrs or redness/swelling, and still couldn't find anything except for some mud and street dirt. I left him in his kennel for a couple hours, and when I came back he'd licked both front paws perfectly clean. I actually wonder if he was just complaining that his otherwise perfectly clean coat was marred by dirty feet!

At any rate, I've kept a close watch on him, and I don't see anything like that again, nor do I see any limping or sensitivity. He may have just been bidding for some attention. Which, as you can tell, worked very well...

For a long time, Tag wasn't allowed on the hotel room furniture - the bed or the chair. But because Cleveland's hotel room is a little small, and we have King size bed, we started letting him on the bed ONLY when he's been invited (the two times he's gotten up on his own, we give him the "Off" command and guide him back off the bed, not inviting him up until much later). And that's only in the morning, if we're just waking up, or at night, reading in bed. He doesn't sleep with us - he's usually at the foot of the bed, on the comforter which we take off.

The cast has all been very good about "respecting the vest" and not giving him affection while he's on duty. And we've had very good hospitality from businesses in he area, when he accompanies us with his vest, except for one bowling alley/ restaurant which refused to allow Tag to stay with us. Nicole will give a full account, as she's been walking me through the steps of protest. They called the police, who were very nice, but who also required us to leave, which we did very peacefully. However, letters of complaint have been filed with the US Department of Justice, the Ohio Attorney General's Office, the Ohio Commission on Civil Rights, the Cleveland Better Business Bureau, the Cleveland Police Department, the Cleveland Bowling Association, and City Councilman Joe Cimperman (who met us while playing with Tag out on the lawn near City Hall and was very smitten with him and, had he not had an arm in a sling, would have gladly joined in the games).

We took Tag to the vet for his pre-border-crossing exam, and he did very well. Weighed in at 44. 2 lbs., about the same as when we got him in St. Louis 3 weeks ago, so as per Nicole's instruction, we're upping his food intake from 2 cups a day to 3. Although he's got a teenager's long, lanky legs, his grace and fluidity of movement seem to be improving. And his testing the boundaries has abated a bit, during training. It's 85-90% reliable that any particular behavior will be performed on command. It's also probably 30% reliable that, especially at the beginning of a training session, he'll gladly perform a spin or a backing up without a command as well, however. But his self-discipline, that way, does seem to be improving.

We're working on getting him to follow my hand and eyes toward the blue dot, to go tap it & return, wherever he is, putting the dot further and further away. Today, we'll start working him out in the hall at distances greater than the room can afford. Just to see where he's at in terms of understanding the concept, I've occasionally tried tucking the blue dot so that it's hanging out of the bottom drawer in a chest, or hanging out from between the mattress & the box spring. I'm not making a habit of it, but just to see - and he gets the idea right away.

He had learned the idea of putting the ball or bone directly in my hand, while playing fetch, but he seems to have forgotten that, lately. I'll need to go back to practicing that inside for awhile, and then try to move the lesson outside. And hand-targeting is on our to-do list as well....

So - in the absence of any fun photos or video, I hope this little narrative will help everyone get a better sense of how the boy is doing. Oh- and we've also been working on Tag's voice. Of late, he has started to sound like Forest Gump, I don't really know why. But, in a good Tom Hanks-esque bayou drawl, try it for yourself, "My name's Tag. People call me Tag. Sometimes we play Tag, but I'm always have to be It. Thass just how it is...'Cause o' my name an' all..."

It's a work in progress, anyway...

Thursday, March 12, 2009

The Holy Butley


In my passive search for the Holy Grail I have over-turned a stone with an inscribed image of what I deem to be Sir Butley at alter of the Holy Grail. We can not quite make it out but he may be sitting on it!

Look closely and you can see the refracted light gleaning around his presence and emanating his majestic godly splendor. The sight of it all is nearly blinding....oh, oh, oh, don't look into the light. Ahhhhhhhh! We drop and bow to thee!

All Hail, Sir Butley! Hail, Sir Butley! Hail, Sir Butley. Ah, hell.

Tag's sister, Jessica!


Different litter, same parents.  Jessica is four :)

Dinwoodie Janis


What's a law student to do?  How do you make good use of the books that you pay hundreds of dollars to peruse after the semester ends?  Well, here is what you do with Trademarks and Unfair Competition by Dinwoodie.

Remember Gloria?  Vixen's owner?  Well, she leads our Rally Obedience class and, after some long, thoughtful conversation....the type which could only be appreciated by dog trainers who strongly believe that behavior can be shaped, not forced...the type of conversation which could only happen between dog trainers and not dog owners or between a trainer and an owner...the type of conversation in which nobody had to wear a different mask, we made a decision.  

We decided it would be great fun to teach Butley to walk backwards in a circle, counter-clockwise.  Why?  Well, why not?  Actually, because it is an impressive move that looks impressive and is equally hard to train (as opposed to some stuff that looks great but is not difficult at all to train.)  

How to get this done?  We are starting by teaching Butley that he must keep his hands in one place:  on top of the rag covered (to capture his drool) Dinwoodie Janis book.  Then, he must use his back feet, somewhat sidestepping, to circle the book...the whole time keeping his front paws on Dinwoodie Janis.  

I'm sure at this point you're thinking: I KNOW YOU HAVE BETTER THINGS TO DO.   And you are correct.  However, it would make for a really nice addition to the Hokey Pokey.  The "turn yourself around" could be done by walking backwards in a counter-clockwise circle instead of a spin or a twirl.  

And here is where the difference between, say....professional actors and professional dog trainers...starts to show.  The dog trainers can think of a zillion things to do with the actors' dog.  The key will be transferring all that knowledge back to the actors.  

Can it be done?  Can actors pretend that they are not really dog owners but, in fact, dog trainers long enough to be tolerated by the dog trainers themselves?  We're gonna find out!


Monday, March 9, 2009

Cadence 1, MIA 1, KIA 2

Cadence has absolutely no intention of allowing Butley to have the All Rattle No Squeak toys.  None.  She has hoarded, growled, intimidated and prevented Butley from being anywhere within a 5 foot radius.  I'm not exactly sure what is sooooo special about the toys.

At least Butley is learning appropriate signals.  Cadence hasn't gone after him, just half closes her eyes (as shown) and emits a very quiet growl.  Butley's getting the message, too.  He turns around and leaves.

Good Boy!  

Sunday, March 8, 2009

Cleveland


They grow 'em big here in Ohio...

Four hungry dogs makes for great training opportunity!


Dearest Todd:  despite your expressed frustration, your reservations, your complete and total assurance that if YOU didn't understand what it was that somebody wanted while standing quietly holding a clicker and food....YOUR dog wouldn't understand it either.  Well, you're wrong.  Your dog, it appears, is absolutely, positively capable of being clicker trained.  In fact, he offered three brand new behaviors today, stayed in the game for fifteen minutes and really gave some of this thought.  Bona fide, standing still, thinking about what might earn the next treat THOUGHT.  Butley has learned that static is boring and dynamic is exciting.  And dynamic earns food.  Not only that, but he can determine when he gets fed by actually offering new behaviors....Butley NOW CONTROLS PART OF THE GAME.  An exciting thing....to the degree that Butley knows how to express that he is excited by all of this.

So, with glee, I am enjoying "Project Dog."  It is giving me a break from writing papers for law school.  It is allowing me to passively ignore other more pressing and important issues and deadlines.  It is also reinforcing that dogs are much, much, much easier to train than their owners.  

Thanks for sharing Butley :)  

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Two weeks already?!?

No pictures...Eric was busy making a header for the Blog. That being said, tonight's accomplishments include:

Left about turn (which looks far fancier than it really is but proves that Butley is starting to understand the sleight of hand idea);
U turn;
About turn;
Go through front;
Go through back;
Front;
Find heel.

And, when frustrated, wave (thanks, Todd, for that one...that is really.....not a helpful default behavior...but it remains nonetheless...he is still your dog.)

The funniest thing is that Butley knows when he's done something right. Then he opens his mouth like a walrus, waiting for you to drop food in. And the view, looking down into that maw is something hilarious. He'll just wait there...hoping you're going to fling a carp or something in. Maybe a piece of kibble?!?

Butley slept most of the day but not one to let an entire day pass without progress, progress we made.

Now these people are getting it!

You're supposed to sleep all day!  And you can't sleep ALL day unless you start in the morning. Seeing as how it's raining and all, there isn't likely to be a bunch of activity around here other than CLEANING THE HOUSE.  So long as nobody decides to do the linens on the bed, it should be a great, lay-around-all-day-and-sleep experience.

Thanks for letting me stay with people who understand me.  Who expect much, but reward much and indulge my idiosyncrasies.

Friday, March 6, 2009

Eric's Parents

are coming to town at the end of this week to ruin the dogs, I'm sure.  To undo all the training that we've put into them.  To let them beg in the kitchen, do as they please, run amuck.  To assure Butley that he can get food from any source he so desires, why limit himself to having to work for me?!?

Thankfully, you have Tag.  And you're keeping all of his wonderful training intact.  He is protected from the 'rents!  A safe harbor in the storm.  

Thanks for keeping him out in public.  It will pay off well in the end.

Landmark Day

The three of us went for a long walk this morning, followed by a game of fetch with the green bone, the air dog squeaky tennis ball, AND the tennis ball with the rope through it. Right downtown, on a big lawn by City Hall. And passing by was Joe Cimperman, the Cleveland City Councilman from the 13th Ward, who commented on how great Tag looked and how much fun we were having. So Tag is now officially sanctioned by the city of Cleveland. (He even gave us his City Councilman's pin, oddly enough, because he's such a fan of SPRING AWAKENING.)

Then, this afternoon, Tag and I went TO THE MOVIES! We saw "The Watchmen," and except for one bathroom break about 2/3 through the film, he sat happy as you please, by my feet. (Much quieter than several other audience members, who thought the movie theater was just an extension of their living room, so they talked through half the film...) So, 20 min. of trailers, 163 min. of film, waiting in line, walking through the mall - a 3 1/2 hour adventure, basically!

He was tired afterwards, too. I left him back in the hotel afterwards in his kennel, and when I came back an hour later from running in the gym & opened it back up, he just stayed inside. Too pooped!

'houla, 'houla, Pit Bull

Look at some of the scary stairs I've been climbing!



I'm getting real good at 'em... xo TAG

Tag on the drive...


hi MoM, HiGH daD!



iTz me. bUTT-lEe. yA No, BuTtleee!

Thursday, March 5, 2009

There can be only one....

We went for a rather muddy hike in Brown's Woods today.  Butley says it hasn't been this nice since his stay in Texas.  Roggen joined in on some of the fun, teaching Butley how to chase deer for short distances, roll in the mud until you're filthy and then swim in the river (no...no river swimming for Butley...but he enjoyed running along the river bank.)

Roggen and Butley make for good hiking partners.   

N.

AB

This is not a food scoop.  Is it?!?

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

How much Butley ...






How much Butley does a Butley butt?

Enough to set off the passenger seat belt signal!

A muse?

Only in Iowa do dog toys come in the shape of pigs :)  A stand-in muse, but a very real Butley.  

Have a great day, N.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Got a meal in a bowl!

Even waited very nicely for his release!  Good dog!

I figured, at this point, 10 days in, we BOTH needed a break from training.  Just needed to enjoy a normal meal together.  And we did.  Butley more than I, but I'm not much for kibble.

We owe a HUGE thanks to Eric for taking Butley to training tomorrow night.   Life got a bit over-booked and, no exaggeration, we have four dogs that need to be in four uniquely distinct places at almost the exact same times and only two handlers.  Don't question how these things happen, just know that they do.  So, Eric will be taking Butley to Rally where he will be covering the following:  Front, Finish around right and Finish around left.  Eric is beside himself (really) with how it is he managed to get wrangled into this.  That which doesn't kill him (or me) will make us stronger.

So, after a long evening as follows:

1.  Roggen to ChildServe;
2.  Seneca to City of Urbandale Board of Adjustment meeting with Katie and Ryan;
3.  Butley to Rally at Canine Craze;
4.  Seneca and Cadence to the Angel Farm for a quick playdate;
5.  DIXIE!

Whew!


Monday, March 2, 2009

Do I?



dO i? sHouLd I? HmMMm ... cAnt be LEvE tHay LeFt dA keeS in duh copTer.

Kud taKe et fur a qUik spIn ... wAt wouLD Dad dO? ShuR he'D Be prOUD duhVe me.

Naaa, i'd RathUr be SLeeeiN. Ya, A nAP wud BE goooD.

The difference a week makes!

WOW!  Butley can now earn a whole meal in five minutes or less, having learned at least the following (which won't mean much to you) but means something to him:

Spin
Twirl
Around, finish right
Finish right
Go through right
Go through left
Finish left

That would be seven (7!) new things and, by golly, he is happy to do them and eat!  Quickly!  Training time has been reduced from some un-Godly amount of time to mere minutes.

Butley also got his allergy shot last night.  A bit confusing, the notes about left and right and different dosages and two different (but exactly the same) vials started.  Anyway, he got one dose, between the shoulder blades, .65 (or whatever the instructions said) of the blue stuff.  Neither left, nor right, SQ, not IM or IV.  He's still alive and hungry, so I guess all is good.   

Coming soon:  the arrival of Dixie B (I'll post pictures) on Wednesday?!?  I dunno, I'll have to get in touch with Andy.  Then we will have the following:  Catahoula, Catahoula, Pit Bull and Labrador Retriever.  For 10 days or so as Dixie B returns to her home just before Spring Break and all the fun that will be :)  And in case you are wondering what the B stands for...well, one good guess should answer that.