Today's Sunshine

Today has turned out better than I dared to hope yesterday. Monster is certainly a bit more tense, he's very alert and reacts to any unexpected noise (we're talking bird song levels here, not car alarms), but it's not the disaster I expected. In fact, on a walk today we met a large man on the road, dressed in a huge jacket and carrying some sort of tool - that's a lot of danger for Monster. I probably should have turned right around and gotten out of there, but I kept an eye on Monster and kept walking instead... He was quite interested in the man, and I could tell he was getting closer to the edge where curiosity would turn into something else, but he was holding it together. When we got close to passing the man I gently steered Monster a little to the side, out on the grass shoulder, and encouraged him to keep walking. No doubt I was very rude to the man as I wouldn't take my focus off Monster for even a second to look up and say hi, but I really needed all my attention on Monster right then. And we did it! Monster walked right past without a single warning sign; no stiff legs, no staring (but certainly a lot of looking, which is a different thing), no tension in his face, nothing!

I earned this carrot, people!

Unfortunately, maybe ten seconds after we'd passed each other the man turned around (forgotten something?) and started following us. This is not good, and I so didn't want to end that success with a miserable failure! After a moments hesitation I decided to turn back with Monster too and pass the man again - better to deal with it quickly than let tension build and make it even worse. (As I'm sure you know people walking dogs (on leash) walk slower than people walking alone, because dogs do a lot of quick pauses along the way, so the man would have caught up with us.) So I turned Monster around in a small circle - winding up with him closer to the man on the road than I was - and started walking back, this time praising him nonstop (I usually keep quiet in most tense situations, since even encouragement can tip Monster over) - his body language was flickering between tense and playful, and I tried to encourage the playful side by using voice and words usually used in high energy training. It was a gamble, but it payed off. Monster walked right past the man again! A day of miracles... Of course, then the man turned back around again!

. . .

No, just kidding! He walked off, and we kept walking the same direction for half a minute or so before we turned back around again and continued our walk. You know, my family is into extreme sports, like scary movies and so on, which I just don't get. They think my life is boring. Hah! My adrenal glands get all the exercise they need, believe me...

Well, you named me Monster...