Good Golly Miss Maggie!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  It was quiet here at our house.  Just hubs and I so we went out to eat.  Spent the weekend watching movies - Seeking a Friend for the End of the World and The Iron Lady.  I had seen "Seeking" at the theater with my sister but hubs wanted to see it.  A real tear  jerker.  The Iron Lady with Meryl Streep was excellent.  Who knew all that was going on in England.  I was too busy with kids and a job to be aware of it all.  At the time I thought someone else should get the Academy Award, but that's because I hadn't seen Meryl become - become - The Iron Lady!  Wow!

The other day I took Maggie to PetSmart to be fitted for a harness.  I bought her one called an Easy Walk.  She has a nice pink tartan harness that matches her collar and leash but, as the trainer explained to me, they just encourage your dog to pull like a sled dog.  That's exactly what Maggie does and she has made me fall - twice!  Ouch!  I can't afford to end of with a broken anything so off to PetSmart we went.  After Super Great Trainer Brenda fitted Maggie and showed me what to do, we went to our local shopping center and walked.  No pulling, no stress, just a great time.  We got lots of smiles and remarks about how cute Maggie is, but the one who made the biggest fuss was a teenage boy!  How cool is that?

I'm taking Maggie back for private lessons after the holidays.  Now that we have the leash problem solved, she just has two other "issues" we want to work on.  One, she jumps on people when they come over.  Most of the time it's just for a little bit and then she leaves them alone.  For some reason, though, she took a liking to hubs' physical therapist and would almost sit on his shoulders while he was trying to do his job.  He didn't mind, as he has dogs at home.  However, for some unknown reason in the universe, not everyone is a dog person, so I have to at least make an attempt to calm her down.

The other issue she has, which is the most serious one, is that if she were to get out she would be in Wyoming or New Mexico before we could catch her.  Boy, does she run fast.  She got out a couple times in California and we were able to catch her.   However, if she were to get out and see a rabbit there would be no stopping her.  So we'll be working on her "sit, down, stay, come" commands.

I don't know if I mentioned that we have a large pet door so she can go in and out on her own.  "On your own, do you hear that, Maggie?"  She'll sit by the door and wait for me to "click" the lock.  Then she'll go out.  Don't ask - I have no idea why.  Other times she'll just stand there with her head out the pet door trying to decide if it's worth her time to go out.

I'm telling you.  Owning a Scottie is an adventure.  A big wonderful fun adventure!

Have a great week!!