But I have a couple things I need to blog before I forget them. The first is a Lucas update, so helpfully provided this week by Fang. Thanks, Honey!
Also, there was this exchange this morning:
Lucas: I squeezed Daddy.
Me: You squeezed Daddy or you hugged him?
Lucas: I squeezed Daddy.
Me: What's the difference between squeezing and hugging?
Lucas: (already wearing his red cape) That's a job for Supe'man!
The second thing I've been meaning to blog about is the new dog. Obi, he is not so easy to deal with. He's got this crazy puppy chewing thing going on that you really must see to believe. He is getting better about jumping up on people (he does it only about 35% of the amount he used to jump), and we just dropped a wad on some private lessons with a trainer as well as 10 group lessons, so he's learning to sit and lie down. Walking on a leash is a whole 'nother problem, and Obi has some serious territorial issues to work through.
But I had a revelation about him. See, when we told the trainer that he's about 14 months old--that the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) told us he was 10 months old when we adopted him--she said the local SPCA tells everyone that any dog under 3 years old is 10 months old. I guess it's a popular age. That's when it dawned on me that Obi is also probably not the mix of breeds that the SPCA claimed him to be. Of course, since Obi was a stray, the SPCA folks couldn't know exactly what breeds he is, so they went with the popular Australian Shepherd x German Shepherd cross. And he does look a little German Shepherdy in that he's black and lanky. But the older he gets, the more he looks like--gulp--a Border Collie.
And since he likes to get soaked, I'm thinking he's a Border Collie x Labrador Retriever cross. A Google images search pretty much confirms this. There are a lot of BC x Lab crosses that look like Obi.
Which means, unfortunately, that we may have a very, very smart dog on our hands. Mr. Trillwing thinks he's dumb as a post, but I suspect Obi is like that kid you knew in high school who seemed a total slacker but then up and earned a perfect score on the SAT. Which means: after several more months of hard work, I suspect we'll have a wonderful dog. But right now. . . not so much.
5 comments:
We had a border collie/terrier mix. Our friends, too, thought she was dumb as a post because she was always doing stupid things. But the things were always waiting till we left to go through the garbage, waiting till we fell asleep to steal the chocolates we'd left on the coffee table, and jumping through window screens to chase deer. She was too smart to follow any kind of rules.
The chewing thing gets better. As a puppy mine chewed EVERYTHING (including a leg off the antique table I had just inherited from my grandmother, but she did grow out of it.
*think it's just coincidence that the word verification for this post is "obey" LOL
I have to confess that Border Collie/Lab crosses are my favourite. My aunt and uncle had one (and now have a purebred Border Collie), and he was completely brilliant. The best part is that they like having challenges to learn (to the point of getting bored if they're not being challenged), and so you can teach them tricks. (My cousin sets up obstacle courses out of her toys in the back yard. Seriously, she gets them jumping through her hula hoop!) I forewarn you that the herding instincts might be strong with Obi; sometimes they try to herd humans around the house.
That dog is dumber than a bag of hammers. If I was a horse we'd put me out of my misery.
Mr. Dr. T.
We had a border collie who lived to be 16 and just died last year. She nipped a lot of heels as a puppy and put holes in all of my socks. She had SO much energy that people thought she was a puppy from a distance until she was 10. We had a good-sized backyard and she herded soccer balls like mad. I also trained her to jump over things and through hula hoops. But mostly she loved to play fetch with balls and squeeky toys. She also once stole our Thanksgiving turkey breast off the kitchen counter when we walked out of the room. A few shenanigans aside, she was a fantastic dog. Have fun!
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