Today's Sunshine

I've just come back from walking Monster. Today I walked 1,5 kilometers! It took me an hour... And now my leg is on fire. In fact it was on fire as we were walking too (I take pain meds, but they seem to mostly take the edge off rather than actually keep pain away), but as long as we were moving it was manageable. This led to some conflicts when he wanted to stop and sniff a particularly interesting spot for a while, and unfortunately I have to admit the pain leaves me with a short temper... I find myself alternately berating him and whining at him, which is both unproductive and pathetic. I need to find a way to keep him moving - even though I normally want him to have some time to do things that interest him too - in a more effective way...

In a moment, Mom...

He was very good around cars today! I'd been worried that it would be a problem, since he's quite frustrated from inactivity by now, plus we're moving at a very slow pace (which has always been a problem for him, the faster we're moving the better he is at ignoring triggers). But the cars just driving by he didn't even glance at. One car was a huge pain in the rear, because it drove up to us, stopped, reversed, drove forward again, angled in to a mailbox, reversed again, and then drove past us. I stopped Monster for this, and sat him down. This is a bad idea, since it just creates focus on the trigger, as well as giving him plenty of time to charge up for a lunge, but I had to have him in a position where I could control the angles he would move, since if he pulls the wrong way I'm going to fall over - I have nothing to put against his strength as long as my leg is like this, it's basically like I'm a child walking a horse; what "control" I have depends entirely on cooperation... But, amazingly enough, Monster didn't lunge! He was clearly thinking about it, his butt lifted from the sit a couple of times, but he let me stop him! That was awesome!

That's me: Captain Awesome.

When we were nearly home again, a dog behind a fence suddenly appeared and started a ruckus. Monster really wanted to get to it (he looked like he wanted to greet), and pulled a couple of times toward it. Fortunately I'd seen the dog before him (before it started barking and lunging at the fence), so I'd taken a position bracing against my crutches in the direction of the fence, and managed to hold him and stay upright! Admittedly Monster wasn't really putting much effort into it, but I'm still happy. This can work, people! I hope...