Almost As Rare As Unicorns

The pups had a lovely week, even though I wasn’t home for most of it. Last Saturday, they got to stay at the PetHotel overnight. When I called to check on them, I was told that Duncan played hard all day (and then he slept all day Sunday), and that Reyna would play for a bit and then lay down and watch everyone for a while. She’s a smart girl, because she was clearly pacing herself. The PetHotel people said they never saw Reyna limp. The pups got baths Sunday morning, and then I picked them up a bit before noon. Reyna seemed fine Sunday, but the poor girl limped all day Monday. There were times when she couldn’t seem to decide which back leg to keep off the floor. Lucky for her, I can up her pain meds when necessary. By Tuesday, she was back to normal.

Duncan got a special treat Tuesday afternoon – sheep herding! The trainer said he was working so beautifully that it was impossible to tell he hadn’t seen a sheep since July. She kept trying to reward him with hot dogs, but he would just spit them out and stare at the sheep. At one point, I was waving an entire hot dog in front of his face, and he kept looking around it. The expression on his face was very clearly “Mom! You’re blocking my view! Move the hot dog!” Since he was doing so well, we decided to try him on herding ducks. He wasn’t interested them at first (after all, there were sheep nearby), but he finally realized I was asking him to do something. Ducks don’t herd like sheep, so its going to take both of us a bit to figure them out. Duncan got too enthusiastic at one point and picked one up, spit it out almost immediately, and then had to work to get all the feathers out of his mouth. But the funniest moment came when he overran the flock, tripped, and somehow managed to trap a duck under his back leg. Duncan was spinning, trying to figure out what was going on and the duck was frantically quacking and flapping, trying to get free. I’m glad they sorted themselves out, because I was laughing too hard to be of any help. I’m going to try and get Duncan back for herding practice once or twice during our winter break. The poor boy deserves it, considering what he has to put up with every day.

Lucky for us, the weather was beautiful most of the week so I was able to spend a lot of time in the yard with the pups. Reyna would play for a while, and then lie down in the leaves and relax. And Duncan would just find a sunny spot in the yard.



Thanksgiving night, though, something rare and exciting happened. In all the time I’ve had the pups, this has only happened once before, when Reyna was stressed out over a storm. I was on one end of the couch, Duncan was on the other, and Reyna climbed up between the two of us to chew on her bone.