Out of the Study Cave!!

Whew…  It’s been a few days.  I have been in the microbiology study cave for the last few days.  Luckily I’m 95% done with all my studying so I can take a quick break to update Riley’s blog.

I have no pictures today because of said study cave…

I heard back from Riley’s trainer and it looks like we can start class on Monday night.  It’s a drop-in class, so that’s good because we’ll have to miss once or twice a month because of my NAMI meetings.  This is an advanced class so hopefully we’re advanced enough to join in!  The trainer recommended this class for us, so I’m sure it will be fine.

Riley’s been SOOOO good for me while I’ve been studying.  If I tell her to “go lay down” (I know, grammatically incorrect but I’ve already trained her using that phrase) she’ll settle down near me on the couch or bed.  I did have to finally reward her just a few minutes ago by hitting one of her orange balls outside for her with that old racquetball racket.  Now she’s gonna pant herself to death!

Studying Hard

I was very excited to see this morning that Riley won her category of Sugar’s 10sec Trick n Treat Contest!

Riley and I will be starting back up to dog school in another week or two.  We’ll be taking another advanced class, this time at a different training center.

In human school news…I have been having to study hard since I didn’t do ANY studying in St. Louis…  Riley has been trying her best to be good!  Here are some pictures:

Riley and Chloe keeping watch at the top of the stairs.

Riley faking a nap…

I wouldn’t say she’s exactly HELPING me study, but she’s not hurting either…  It also helps that I used that racquetball racket to play ball with her before I started studying.

Study break!  This is my new favorite picture of us.

I Regress

First of all, let me say we survived all the weather yesterday.  It hasn’t rained today, it’s still wet outside though.  A few of the golf courses around here were closed today.  It must be serious if they close the golf courses!

Ready to play in the muck!

I have something bad to admit.  Life has gotten so crazy and the weather was so hot and nasty this summer that I haven’t been taking Riley on walks like I should have.  I thought playing in the backyard would meet her energy needs, and it did, but it didn’t meet her training needs.  Riley was in obedience school for about 10 months.  She used to be a fairly good walker on leash (good enough to get her TDI certification), but now she’s regressed.  If she sees a squirrel, she tries to bolt!  I stopped taking her to school after she got her TDI certification because I didn’t like the way some things were being handled in the class.  There was a big dog that would growl throughout the entire class and would mount Riley or jump on her.  She’s already afraid of bigger dogs and that just wasn’t helping.  So we stopped going.

Let me just suffice it to say that we are signing up for a different school because Riley needs some work…  She did fine on her therapy visit to the nursing home today (we haven’t been in about a month), but I know she can do a lot better too.  She seems to know that when we’re in the nursing home she needs to chill out and behave, so that’s good.  I took her on a walk in the neighborhood yesterday and she basically dragged me down the street.  Luckily she doesn’t do that on therapy visits or I wouldn’t let her go on visits.

She also feels the need to jump on visitors at our house.  She doesn’t jump on the residents at the nursing home (again, I think it’s a sixth sense thing) or people out in public, but if you come into our house, she’ll jump on you at least once.  So we’re going back to school to get trained.  I’m also going to see if we can work on the weekends at the school gym and school yard my mom works at.  That’ll be a place with minimal distractions.

Oh, and several people commented on how soft she was!  I guess this new shampoo with conditioner really works!