Socialization 101

Well, Fluffy Fans after a week of coughing, sniffling and general malaise, I am prepared to bring you a fun filled blog with pictures and silly anecdotes.

As you may all remember our intrepid foster Shandy Chance was having some problems with

dogs. My dogs are ok. My neighbor's dogs are ok because they are not living in my house. But big 85# black labs and small, brown puppies are not ok.

The goal this weekend was to be sure that Chance did not make a fatal error and try to eat my brother's dog Jessie. Similarly, should that particular action occur, try to keep Jessie from eating Chance.

When I arrived home from work on Wednesday night, my brother and family were already here. There were four big dogs who greeted me at the door. It looked a little something like this. Ok, maybe not quite like this.

Everyone was getting along! (Insert angel choir sound here!) Everyone continued to get along! They even fought invisible, audio seagulls together that were playing on the radio.

Ahh, but the bliss was not to last. Everybody loves their Mama Time. Chance got his Friday and Jessie tried to horn in on it. I saw it coming cuz' there was a "look" in Chancey's eyes and I was smooshing his cheekies and telling him what a good boy he was to avoid any "noise".

No such luck.

He attempted to advise her like she'd never been advised before. He was shortly thereafter shoved unceremoniously off the bed. She peed on the carpet in the hallway. Insert commercial for little green machine here. aaaaaargh.

There was also an incident involving the food bowl sometime yesterday. Just pick the bowls up after everyone is done is the solution there.

I think that Chancey could go to a family who had another dog. IF that family had had dogs before and paid attention to what was going on. He likes his Mama Time. He's got to get a little bit, or a lot, every day and he's good. He likes his food - don't we all - just keep feeding him and all will be well there. Because if it weren't for those rather important "hot-buttons" (betcha haven't heard that word in a while), he'd get along completely well. Case in point:

Here are Chancey and Jessie playing Ying and Yang in the computer room. This picture was taken after a tag team effort (Jessie and Chancey) to get one of those fat squirrels in my yard.

Here's a pic of Te'a and Jessie. When Te'a was a puppy the kids said she looked a lot like Jess. They were so cute sitting together yesterday, I had to snap this one. Seriously, they could be mother and daughter.

Another weird thing I've noticed about Chance is that his eyes don't glow. Look back over all of the pictures of him and see that even tho I used the flash on all inside shots, his eyes don't have that weird yellow glow. Scott jokingly said that typically for his breed, his eyes don't see daylight, he has all that hair.

He does need a firmer, stronger hand as he is strong and a bit rambunctious. He loves to clown around which is a characteristic of the Beardie breed. He does great with the kids but if he went to a family who had another dog AND kids, I would have to say no go. But if a family were interested in him who had either no kids or older-teen-aged kids and another dog, it might work. I am not the end-all-be-all decision maker on this and we'd have to talk to Lori about it first.

Ok, one more group shot before I go . Here Scott is trying to incite a riot. Oh, I mean, get everybody together for a group shot.

Happy Trails!