Saturday Stroll

Mom took me for a walk today. I wanted to run, but her butt muscle (she calls it a piriformis muscle, but I know what it is!) is acting up again. So I did my best to pull hard to make her go faster, but she kept saying, "don't pull" and when that didn't work, she pulled out my favorite Natural Balance duck training treats. That got my attention! Forget pulling...man, I am in heeling position now! I don't prance when I heel unless she holds the treat high, but she doesn't seem to worry about the prancing, just that I don't forge ahead or pretend to be heeling by pressing against her left leg so I can look around while I heel but still stay in heel position.
Anyway, I digress. So I did well with that and she gave me some free time until we hit the side road. There she put me on a sit stay because this week at class I broke my stay for the first time ever. I was confused because the instructor had all of us in a line like we get for sits and downs except this time we did recalls one at a time. I wanted to go everytime someone called - heck, I love everybody. Why not? So that kind of ruined the night at dog class when I was doing so well. I could hear all the other trainers talking about how fast I was so it made me proud to show them just how fast I can be.
Since class, all this week, mom has backtracked on the stay and been at the end of the 6 foot lead. Does she think I'm retarded? Today was the first day she dropped the lead and moved away. Anyway, I was holding my sit stay really well when I heard something in the woods. So did mom, so she became alert and got closer. When I broke my stay to go chase what turned out to be a bunch of deer, darn if I didn't get yanked back. Mom is fast! She stepped on my lead just as I took off! Darn if she didn't put my butt right back down where she put me before I broke! I held the stay but really only because the deer were gone.
We also worked on sitting in front from short recalls and long recalls and I'm getting better, but I still like to veer off to the left and pass mom on the dead run just to see if she'll chase me. She never does...no fun! She also made me lie down on the road for a down stay when she knows I hate to lie down on the road!
When we got back home she threw the tennis ball for me until my tongue started hanging out the side of my mouth! What a great way to end!