The mornings that make all this worth it.

Having a puppy has been very challenging...mainly with regards to my social life. You just can't bring your dog to enough places...ok you can't bring your spazzed out puppy to a ton of places. I would most likely bring Olive to 80% of the things I do, if it wasn't for my severe mistrust in her...and rightfully so. I mean you wouldn't leave a baby in a bath tub unattentded right....right?

Oops, the phone...now baby, don't do anything while I'm gone....



She's just a baby and still hasn't grasped the fact that I'm her number one most amazing person ever and no dog, shiny ball or lump of excrement could possibly taste any sweeter than recieving my love and praise...I'm gonna need more dog treats! Or maybe I should just freeze dry dog poop, she seems to adore dog poop...and severed seal pup flippers (We found one at the beach and it just jumped directly into Olive's mouth)

If anything has caught her attention, there's no getting her focused...she's also learned an annoying game of "Run Away From Mommy" She's a cheeky bitch sometimes.

Needless to say, some days are better then others. For instance, she didn't get her walk one day which made for an all nighter...up all night chewing, barking, walking all over my face, sitting down on my face, eating her bully stick and then wacking it in my face...etc. I was rediculously over tired the next morning thinking to myself..."hmmm, maybe I'm not cut out to do this." Depressed I put on my jacket and grabbed some treats to coerce her into her Kennel...to my surprise, Olive picked-up to the morning routine, and went directly into her bed un asked....it made my day and I loved her again.

I gotta buy a 15 foot lead to teach her to come. The technique is to let them drag it around behind them, call them once and if they don't come to tug on the leash and physically pull the lead until they are by your side and then reward with a treat...I haven't tried this enough for it to work...I just need one more paycheck.

It was a windy day today. She already doesn't like going for walks, so this was espcially a difficult day. She tricked me by pretending to poop, then ran back in the house, went behind the couch and dropped a bigger duece behind the couch...totally annoying. This is after I was convinced she was properly house trained...she probably is, just being a tart this morning. I would hate her, but then I remember that this morning, I woke up to her barking at her own tummy sounds...she's such a big dumb baby, I just wanna eat her lil face!

Olive Gets Down With Her Bad Self!

SHE LEARNED HOW TO LAY DOWN!!!!!!!

We've been working on "Down" for about a week. Before she wasn't doing it unless she was on a picnic table or a bed, but finally lastnight she learned how to do it on the floor!!!! Yay!!! Now that skill goes in the review pile and on to the next one...Next up..."Stay!" Or maybe "Come"

"Come" seems to sorta work, "Stay" doesn't at all and now maybe I'm thinking "Off" Hmmm...challenging.

Screw Puppy School! My dog is home schooled cause she's a bloody genius!

She's also a model...here's a pic of her in a photoshoot with a hot model named Natasha, exotic hey?


p.s. accident free day yesterday!!!!!

House Breaking Is Breaking My Heart!

I have a smart little dog. This week we started working on "Down" as well as continual work on "Sit." Cesar believes in non-verbal commands, but I can't help myself from talking! So I figured I'd do both at the same time. I've incorporated my delightful hand and arm technique combined with my lovely voice commands 'O' fun (Which probably aren't fun, but it sounds more fun now doesn't it?)

So if I want this little diamond to sit, I grab her attention and motion my arm up to a 90 degree angle to my body (A little lower then a Nazi salut...that comment wasn't to be funny or anti-semetic, but just a point of reference) And she rocked it so hard!!!! So I rewarded her with treats. I make her sit for everything and anything. Anytime I want her attention, she sits, leave the house, sit, everything gets a sit.

So now I'm practicing down. I've decided for "Down" I'll have my 90 degree arm, to then motion back down while saying the magic word "Down." Cesar suggests to put the puppy on a picnic table edge. With no picnic tables around, I've placed her on my bed. I have her sit on the edge of the bed. I let her smell the treat in my hand (cut up turkey dog, as suggested by our new dog friends we made over the past week...hehehe, but I'll tell you about that clan later! They said hot dog, but I couldn't bring myself to give her something I won't even eat...even though I gave her a pig's ear later...but whatever I class that as dog food not people food.) I motioned my arm down and confused she looked at me like "What the ruff?" Appauled by her choice of mental language I had her smell the treat again and motioned my hand down! SHE ROCKED IT AGAIN!!!!!!! Because she's smart like WOAH!!!

I'd just like to point out, she understood this new skill in the half the time of Cesar's dog in the book...just sayin' my dog is great...I had nothing really to do with it...yah I did...well sorta...our combined effort really won the day.

Ok I shouldn't gloat so much because well, Olive still doesn't understand that we "lay a brick" and "rain a river" outside ONLY. We managed to have two successful days. She started to prefer privacy and poop under bushes. I was excited because for three weeks we've been really...Ok I've been really working hard on getting her outside in time. Everything was great until this morning she overslept and I had to drag her out of bed this morning for a walk. In a sleepy stupor she weed on the porch before I could close the door. She technically was outside and I was going to over look this incident, however after a large steamer and two babling brooks, she still managed to drop a duke in the bathroom 15 minutes after being home!!

OLLLLL-Ive! She feels bad I can tell.

I'm starting to freak a bit because I keep reading and hearing about these crazy robot dogs that get housebroken under three days! Our new special dog friends suggest a bell technique which I'm eager to try and will start to do today and see how that goes.

You place a bell by the door and then everytime you take your dog out you get them to paw the bell, so eventually they paw the bell everytime they wanna drop some news. So I'm buying a bell today. Maybe it'll work? Maybe she'll just ring the bell and shit herself. Only time will tell. Too bad dogs don't sleep more...she's so much better like this sometimes...

Did I Just Buy A Dog?

This is Olive Martini (Olive for short) she's currently a ten week old Jack Russell puppy of greatness. She's pretty much the titz. I've wanted a dog my whole life. My first experience was when at 13, I bought my own shihtzu named Thai Chi. Now normally when a 13 year old gets a dog, it doesn't really belong to the 13 year old, it belongs to the parents or at least every sane person knows this. Except my mom. Thank god I didn't get pregnant 'cause damn.

Thai Chi ended up being a great dog...after, of course our house smelled of dog mess and I had to give her up to my Uncle and Aunt to erase all my neglect I imposed on her...I was 13 and lazy...who would let an indoor kid get a dog??? I mean come on!

So that experience whereas it ended up amazing it still didn't fulfill my desire for the perfect dog.

I'm older now. I'm 26 years old and ready to give it another go, a proper go, a go outside only kinda go. So let's go!
I've decided to blog my trials, tribulations and hopefully god willing triumphs this time round. I've taken a huge interest in the Cesar Millan's teachings of "How To Raise The Perfect Dog-Through Puppyhood and Beyond" so far it's good...and so far I've done everything wrong.

He explains how to choose the dog, how to take the dog home, how to introduce the dog to everything and so far I've done it all completely wrong, but at the moment it seems to be ok.

My only problem with the book is I kinda wish it was called "How To Raise The Perfect Dog Whisperer And Not Completely Fucking Ruin Your Dog" or maybe at least throw in an instructional dvd for the indoor kid.

The problem is that he's the fucking dog whisperer, so all the little puppy things that happen, won't be missed by him and most likely will be corrected before the puppy isn't even completely out of the wrapper...dogs come in wrappers right?

He does touch on everything and anything you need to know is in this book, but you really have to watch his shows in order to understand the stuff that is being explained. I didn't get the whole submission part. When you watch the show, you see Cesar take a physco and in 5 second Tssts it into submission. I did this with Olive and because I'm not the dog whisperer, my Tssting seemed to just egg her on into a full blown biting frenzy, the four dogs Cesar studied? No frenzy, just awesome little burgers or at least that's the impression I read...from a place of frustration.

"Stay calm and assertive." How Cesar HOW!!! My reading comprehension sucks!!!

My first attempt at calm and assertive I think just came of as aloof and lazy, cause it did not work. Over this last two weeks I think I'm finally on my way, but I think it really helps that I have ten years of Drama Training.

I was in a "Dog-ramic" situation (pardon the pun, trust me I hate myself for it)

I've chosen to channel Clint Eastwood. I am Dirty Hairy...ok I actually never watched that movie...Ok I kinda did, but I forget most of it, but I have that picture in my head of his squinty stare, cowboy hat and give-a-fuck chin stubble. Clint Eastwood could submit this angel pie darling, fart face, I'm sure. Look 'atter...she's just a 'widdle baybeeeeeee!

My biggest fear is that I'm gonna ruin this dog. People always say having a dog is like having a baby. NO WAY!!! Having a dog is like having a hyped on sugar 4 year old with ADD and no sense of danger or proper waste managment solutions.

Think this + this:

That is your puppy...mixed in with that little kid from Pet Sematary.

So I'll try my best to blog everyday and keep you updated on what I'm doing and hopefully a year from now, Olive will be on her way to being a wicked smart dog.

So we can avoid this:

and this....