Me and the 80 Lb. German Shepherd

Today was a great day! That is the only way to describe it. I had a nice, relaxing morning (thank the humidifier for a decent night's sleep), and then I went to work.

I'm being given my own list of dogs to handle, so that's pretty awesome. I learned a new technique in training and I fully intend to use it on Cody. He's being a stubborn, little butt, though I think that's due to stress and too much energy. I also got some tips on using the e-collar even though I think I'll still wait to really start working with it. I want to have lots of practice with it. Then, before lunch, we all learned some really great techniques on how to deal with aggressive dogs...especially if they're younger.

After lunch, I thought we'd be doing more obedience training. Kylie, my instructor, had said it's really good if you can work with the dogs at least twice, so I figured we'd be going through the same 5 or 6 dogs we had this morning. I was wrong!

Instead of obedience, we did bite work. This is where the 80 lb. German Shepherd comes in. I, luckily, was the handler and not the decoy. It was my responsibility to hold back a huge Shepherd and keep him from destroying someone's face. I apparently did a decent job. No one was injured in the process. That is, unless you consider a handful of poopy leash an injury. Yes, dogs can be very dirty. And for all you OCD people out there (you know who you are) I scrubbed quite thoroughly. ICK!

After the day was done, I stuck around for Club. It's basically a protection club where semi-amateur / semi-pro people come to all work with their dogs and get tips from each other. That wasn't quite as exciting for me as I had nothing to do, but it was great to watch how all the dogs worked. I found that I quickly learned if a dog was behaving properly or not. I also found that I really need to learn all the German and Dutch commands. It took me quite a while to figure out what they were asking the dog to do!

Now, I 'm back in my tiny, tiny, little room (It was an itsy bitsy, teeny weeny...). I'm quite pooped out (if not pooped on) and I'm ready for bed. Yay for fun days!