Saturday

I took the dog out with me while I ran errands today. I also wanted to try walking him downtown where there was more people and traffic to distract him. Turns out he's quite well-behaved on leash and he doesn't try to pull out ahead of me. This is good. For a reward, I took him to the local tennis court (because it's fenced and he can't get away) and we played ball for a bit.
As you can see, he's still on his leash, just in case. And on the tennis court, he was a good fetcher. He always brought the ball right back to me and dropped it, and he didn't give me a lick of trouble. Of course he did slip and fall in a puddle and soaked himself, but that was just funny...at least it was when he did it.

Here he is, bringing the ball back. He's got this game down cold.

Afterwards, we drove back home. And here's where the goofiness started. I had to make a stop, and as soon as I got out of my truck, Mr. Wet Dog decided that he'd rather sit up in the front seat instead of waiting in the cargo area where he's supposed to be. So when I came back, I found a wet dog in MY seat. And someone learned a new command: GETINTHEBACKDAMMIT!

So we got back home, and I went around back to let him out the tailgate. When I opened it, however, he bum-rushed me and took off into the woods before I could snag him. And as usual, he totally ignored me as I called for him to come back.

He eventually went down to the road and trotted across to see the neighbor's dog (who was behaving so nicely behind his fence), and when he saw me coming he went next door to that neighbor and began to run around the next neighbor's house, looking back frequently to see if I was coming, of course.

Now I'm not falling for that. Not again. This time I just went up to the neighbor's dog and began petting him. Immediately this dog raced over to get in the mix as I'd figured that he would (because dogs--like women--are jealous creatures by nature), and I was able to grab his leash. I wound up taking a header in the wet, muddy grass when I dove for it, but I got a good grip on it as he darted off and I was rewarded with a loud "URK!" from him as he was suddenly brought up short.

On the way back up to the house, I decided that I might want to name him "Nixon", because this dog can be a real Dick.