o training note

After nine full months of trial and error with a variety of collars and harnesses - including a front-pull harness, a head collar, a limited-slip martingale, and a sturdy Ruffwear harness - and months of carefully timing our walks to encounter as few cars as possible, a scary encounter with a truck last week convinced me to go against my instincts and try a pinch collar. The transformation has been miraculous. Ondine is terrific with it. She doesn't object at all to having it put on (as she does to every other option we've tried) and it really helps her maintain her composure when cars go by. I'm kicking myself for not trying it months ago. It's not a permanent solution - we're working on correcting a very specific, very dangerous problem - so now the challenge will be to work her back into a regular collar by consistently, patiently reinforcing her when she stays calm. Wish us luck!

In other news, I discovered tonight that she LOVES it when I sing her songs from Hair and Godspell. Hippy.

And this is just a gratuitous grab shot of Fawkes. Note that his cheek is a little slobbery. (No worries. He's a more-than-equal partner in that game.)