Today we were hanging out in the shade on main street when some lady and her two daughters walked up and asked “are those real?” Scherzo was standing and did a great job of ignoring the group of people now 1) Standing in front of us and 2) talking to us about her in an excited voice.

“what?”, I asked, quickly trying to think of pairs of things she could be talking about, my shoes? our coffees?

“her spots”

“well, yeah ofcourse”

“they’re just the most perfect spots, I can’t believe they’re real. Are they sprayed on?”

“no”

“is her name spot?”

“no”

“what is her name?”

“Scherzo”

“Scaredio?”

“Scare-t-zo”

“oh, hi Scherzo!” Scherzo, without a command, lays down at her feet and avoids eye contact. What a good dog, I slip her a treat as they walk away…

This is a little extraordinary for Scherzo, especially the lying down without a command part. But all in all made me decide to make a list of the things Scherzo has improved on in the last 3 months.

Things Scare Can Do That She Couldn’t Do Before We Left Portland:

  1. She flops and falls asleep outside even in busy places
  2. She eats dinner outside
  3. She can go to mat outside
  4. She can target a spot outside from 10 ft away
  5. She can walk loose leash down mainstreet
  6. She can leave a bowl of treats on mainstreet
  7. She can push the cross walk buttons, and wheelchair door opener buttons
  8. She can lay and ignore people as they walk past in groups, with kids, strollers etc. Sometimes when she is in the mood to say hi to people though she lays down further into the middle of the sidewalk and when someone especially appealing walks by she creepy crawls towards them, pretending to stretch, and sometimes this tactic works.
  9. She has been petted about 6 times by strangers and not freaked out, jumped up or tried to lick their face at all. This is all we have allowed, but we will be setting up meetings more so that we can work on this. My feeling is that she can meet almost anyone calmly who doesn’t talk really loud or excitedly at her or stare at her, these are her two weaknesses.
  10. She can do sit stays and down stays on the trail in town while people and bikes go by. (in portland she used to jump on joggers)
  11. She has become a really confident swimmer although Mac did have to jump in and save her the other day. It was a really strong river, she dropped her ball in and went after it, but the current pulled her under this dirt bank. Poor little one was having trouble keeping her head above water and couldn’t fight the current.
  12. When shes in the right mood we can let her walk around downtown offleash
  13. She can target my hand while another dog (calm dog)is laying down 10 ft away.
  14. She can completely ignore other dogs across the street, barking dogs in cars etc. One time there was a dog class out on a walk, they were across the street waiting to cross the street and their owners were all luring them, the dogs were pulling every which way etc. We were across the street, about to cross and Scherzo just layed down and walked loose leash across.