Henry has "forgotten" how to sit.
Well, not the mechanics part. He's really good at the physical act of sitting. He still sits for treats, he sits for petting, and he sits when the camera comes out...
(usually)
But his understanding of the verbal cue seems to have been dumped like last night's garbage. Gone. Poof! Here no more. I said "Sit", and he looked up at me in total confusion. You could tell that he knew that there was something he was supposed to do upon hearing that "Sit" sound, but for the life of him, he couldn't remember what it was.
And so he stood there.
And stood there.
And stood there some more.
It was impressive. It was amazing. It was so not what I wanted.
I wanted him to sit, right next to the cabinet door, if you please, so I could try Yet Another Ridiculous Triangle Pose picture.
"Down" was even worse. At least with "Sit" you could see a glimmer of recognition. When I said "Down" he wandered off and chewed on Uncle Zachary's ear.
(Needless to say, neither I nor Zachary were impressed.)
And, of course, tomorrow we begin Family Dog class. Oh, yeah. That's going to be fun. Wendy, if there was every a night for it a rain out, this is going to be it. (sigh)
Tonight we began a crash course in sits and downs... we'll see if it helps.
If next week's Trick of the Week turns out to be "Sit" I don't want to hear a word from anyone!
Finally, The Daily Shoot:
Make a photograph featuring a path, road, or trail that leads the eye through the photograph.
I was never quite able to capture the picture I had in my head (and only had about 15 minutes to work on it) but it was certainly easier than yesterday's Terrible Triangles (and required no sitting!)
Out of far too many shots, I picked this one because (a) I liked the "wall" (b) it actually had a dog in it and (c) I managed to not get either the hose nor the sprinkler riser, who made guest appearances in at least half the shots.
It sounds like Henry has hit that plateau that we warn all our 4H kids about when we teach dog class. That point where the information has to transfer to from short term memory to long term, I guess I have to use this for the rest of my life memory often seems like for about two weeks they completely forget everything they know. I bet Henry will turn out to be the star of his class, and that he'll have an excellent sit for next week's trick!
ReplyDeleteHow right you were! Of course, next week he could be back to staring at me stupidly. :)
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