Dog Park Death March

I'm getting old and I don't love visiting the doctor. My inclination is to ignore aches and pains as long as they seem like they might be getting better or at least aren't getting worse. Then I noticed a swelling on my Achilles Tendon last weekend, and that triggered my other response-- total hypochondria. I was suddenly convinced they would have to amputate my lower leg. On Tuesday the Doc pronounced sentence: "Achilles Tendonosis; no running for three to six months." Then he asked me questions about my routes because he wanted to start running along the Potomac, the $%*#tard.

I'm not totally bummed, because I had lost a lot of discipline over the past couple of years. I've been eating poorly and forgoing other exercise using the excuse "yes, but I run." So now I have to start exploring other activities-- the Doc has approved biking and walking.

So this weekend I came up with a great idea. My wife could drop me off at the dog park with Pappy, and then leave us to walk home. Seven and a half miles down Sligo Creek Trail after Pappy finishes with his ball chasing seemed like a good idea to me. Saturday it went very well. The weather was comfortable and Pappy seemed a happy camper the whole way home with occasional water stops. Today, Sunday, the same drill was fine up to the last two miles. My wife had walked out from the house to meet us, and Pappy was taking longer and longer breaks in the shade to examine some bit of greenery a little more closely. Finally I had to break out the ultimate incentive; I bounced his ball a few times to get his juices flowing, and hosed him down with ice water from my Camelback. Now we're home and he's happily vegging next to the air conditioning vent-- bliss.

Funny Game

Neighbor dog Molly is about as sweet as they come, and it's easy-as-can-be for Pappy and me to pick her up on the way to the dog park. Her owners say she gets so excited anticipating weekend mornings. With other dogs she's not at all aggressive, and wouldn't hurt a fly-- except for her aim to collide with other dogs like a sandbag fired out of a cannon, but that's not out of meanness. She's great to have along, but for one thing...

Above all other things she craves someone chasing her. I've worked around her stealing Pappy's fetching ball and running away by just bringing a second ball. But then when it's time to go, she's got the ball in her mouth, her tail is wagging away, and she won't come or let anybody corral her. We used to have Molly over in the mornings before work, but had to discontinue that because it took fifteen minutes to get a leash on her. She has always been good at the dog park about coming when it was time to go, but this weekend she played her funny chase-me game both visits. If I take Pappy out to the car she looks a little forlorn for a second, but as soon as I come back she's ready to play. The only way I have had to get her to stop is to give her the hairy eyeball and repeat "bad dog"; she reacts to faces and disapproval more than Pappy. Unfortunately that wasn't working, and I don't enjoy browbeating a dog at the park.

So now I'm reduced to bribery, or training as some would call it. I'll try bringing along a little cheese (aka "Canine Kryptonite") to see if that is a stronger draw, but I have a bad feeling that she's more interested in the game. If it doesn't work, old Molly's going to be mighty sad come weekend mornings when she's staying home.

At the Dog Park

Goin' to the Park

A typical conversation at the dog park goes something like this: "Dogs are so weird..." We had a big Lab at the park today who was standing up on his hind legs for extended periods staring into trees. No birds there. Maybe the leaves? If you lowered the branch he seemed to be straining to reach he didn't seem too interested. Just kept standing there. Weird.

One of the frequent topics discussed among the owners is the reaction of their dogs on the way to the park. "As soon as we turn at [this or that corner], [name goes here] goes nuts" is a common refrain. Even at home, some dogs seem to intuit when it's time to go to the park. Her owners say that neighbor dog Molly always waits at the window for me to pick her up on weekend mornings.

As we turn into the park, Molly doesn't just start whining, she licks the back of my ear-- not as unpleasant as it sounds. When sufficiently excited on the way to the park, Pappy just starts barking loudly at every dog he spots-- every bit as unpleasant as it sounds. What brought this subject to mind was this morning when I was at the park there was this car driving up with its windows open. From a hundred yards away I could hear this constant yowling gradually getting louder, like a perverse off-key siren. Now that would be really fun.

Against Type

At the dog park last weekend there was a Golden Retriever who was growling and chasing off other dogs. The Golden Retriever owner's manual and marketing materials all clearly state that they are "friendly to a fault", but this guy was positively ornery. He wasn't so aggressive to set off my alarm bells, but I wasn't at all clear what his owner thought the dog was getting by being at the dog park.

After getting getting chased away a couple of times, Pappy took up station behind my legs. Let me repeat that... my dog... was hiding... behind... my legs. What's up with that? Pappy can't let some dog push him around, else he'll be bait for every bully on the playground. He just needed to give that goldie a shot in his fat goldie paunch to show him a thing or two. I'm just saying that Pappy needs to stop being a chicken learn to protect himself. Oh look at that, now I've made him cry.

Slam-Dunking Pappy

One of the favorite activities of the denizens of the dog park is to sucker pop Pappy. While everyone else is resting in the shade, Pappy endlessly chasing the ball is often the only action. And Pappy is so relentlessly fixated on the ball and the thrower, it's awfully easy for other dogs to move in for a free shot.

In this photo from today, Pappy is captivated by the ball while Flash is sidling into position. As soon as the ball was in flight, while unsuspecting Pappy was turning to run, Flash would lunge toward him at ramming speed. Being of lightening reflexes, Pappy would occasionally vault his attacker, but more often would get knocked stumbling before he raced on his way. Then Flash would halfheartedly chase and bark at Pappy for a few feet before returning to get into position for the next round. Repeat.

If it wasn't Flash, it would be Kaiser or Molly or Cassie or somebody else. It's a wee bit embarassing being the owner of the dog park's biggest chump.

Bay Dog

Last year when we brought Pappy to the dog beach at Quiet Waters State Park on the Chesapeake Bay (a.k.a. Dog Shangri-La), he had some curiosity about the water and ambled in up to his ankles. We went back today, and he was in up to his eyeballs. I couldn't get him to come out. He kept dropping the ball in a foot of water, as if I was going to join him for fetch.

The beach is pretty shallow, so I never saw him really swimming. But all the same I was most impressed with his water dogging. Afterwards we went with Pappy and Polly to Muddy Paws for coffee-- as I sat there, I kept mumbling to myself that it all could have been mine.

Yo! Montgomery County Dog Park Users!

To: Denizens of Dog Exercise Areas in Montgomery County, Maryland
From: Pappy's Fella

Subject: Yip-yip-yahoo

This Thursday, May 10 the Montgomery County Park Planning Board is meeting and will review a proposal to expand the dog park program and incorporate them into all new park plans. They have collected a great deal of feedback regarding the three current pilot "Dog Exercise Areas" in the county, and seem to consider them a success. I know I do.

I find board meetings to be paralyzingly boring, but I'd be totally psyched to be there. In lieu of attending, I dropped an email to the Chairman of the Planning Board, Royce Hanson, expressing my support-- I hope it doesn't just get sent into a black hole. I am a little leery of the recommended three acre minimum size for new dog parks, since this could be a bit of an impediment to retrofitting them into the more densely populated areas around DC. Our puny little half acre dog park is okay by me, and I'd like to see a lot more of them.

Philosophical Discussions at the Dog Park

This morning at the dog park the discussion took an intellectual turn. We began to discuss pets and the crapper. This may be more than most of you really want to know, but when I am headed into the bathroom Pappy starts wagging his tail furiously. He loves to sit by and watch as we do our business. Why not? We watch him. And he's really fascinated by flushing. Another park regular reported that the full complement of dog and cats like to be in attendance for each such performance. Closing the door is not an option because of the ensuing ruckus from disgruntled fans.

Meanwhile, the warm weather is on and you can't restrain Pappy from the wading pool. When he jumps out of the pool he leaves behind a stream of water around the dog park. You've heard of the Appalachian Trail, the Oregon Trail, the Scopes-Monkey Trail, and now the Pappy Trail.

Lab Analysis

This Sunday at the dog park a black Lab named Lola showed up. Then a second black Lab came, and then Boomer, a third one, appeared. A fourth one came, and then-- who knows? I tried to count, but I couldn't get them all in my field of vision at the same time. And, let's face it, black is black.

I hope everyone left with the right dog.

Sympathy Pains

Today is Jack of the dog park's birthday, but it is rainy and disgusting and I don't know that Pappy and I are going to make the trip. I can't recall the last weekend morning we were in town and didn't go to the dog park.

Part of the reason is that we are on the mend. Yesterday at the park, Pappy limped up to me acting all needy and "kiss my boo boo". I was pretty worried and looked him over, but he seemed to walk it off pretty quickly. I didn't give it too much thought until later when, after lying down, he was limping a bit when he stood up. Keeping an eye on him, I don't think it's anything serious but he needs a little down time. Then last night we went out to a reception at DC's Museum of the American Indian, abandoning our ailing dog. As we were walking from the subway past 3rd and Pennsylvania, I twisted my ankle sharply while focused on making a walk signal-- it was on one of those shallow graduated steps that too-smart-by-half designers sneak into the plans so that building occupants can laugh at the stumbling pedestrians below. After standing around on the ankle for a couple of hours, it hurt quite a lot by the time we got home.

Interestingly, my bad ankle is on the same side as Pappy's. Anyway, the two of us are taking a break today.

Rough Day at the Dog Park

I took Pappy and neighbor dog Molly to the dog park this morning, and events turned very disturbing. Dog park regular, Jack, snapped up a ball that was being used by a big dog I didn't recognize. The stranger dog had played well with other dogs, but had snarled when they had shown an interest in his ball. In this case he locked onto the scruff of Jack's neck and three full grown men couldn't get him to release. I ran and got my bottle of water to dump on them, but he was completely unphased. It seemed like forever, but I guess after a minute or two we got them separated.

Jack wasn't wounded, and seemed fine in a couple of minutes. His owner was extremely upset, but was very conciliatory with the other dog's owners. She said that she thought it was just a case that the stranger dog had gotten caught on Jack's collar, but this was putting it kindly. She was going to take Jack to the vet just to make sure he was well.

That takes me back to the time that Pappy was injured in the dog park. I still tell myself that it was a play accident rather than an act of aggression. But the truth is I really don't know what happened. Even with my dog being the victim, I was pretty desperate to rationalize the whole situation as something that wasn't going to implicate the safety of the dog park. Because if the dog park isn't safe, what am I doing taking my dog there?

Of course this rationalization is less dangerous than the one that an erratically aggressive dog can be trusted at a dog park, no matter how much someone loves him. I hope I don't see the stranger dog again, because neighbor dog Molly plays keepaway just like Jack was doing. When you think about it, it's a pretty thin fabric of faith and good sense that holds the dog park situation together.

Captain Cruncher

Last weekend at the dog park, I had the great good fortune to be present for Cruncher's coming out party. Cruncher is the six month old black pug that Crusher's family got following his sad demise. We miss Crusher at the park, but Cruncher is pretty adorable-- though he's still kind of skinny to fit my mental image of a pug. He was instigating with Molly Basset Hound by pulling on her huge ears; I've never really seen that Molly playing before.

I forgot to bring my camera to the park this weekend, so here's a mug shot of my best recollection of the pug perp. I expect we'll be seeing more of him.

Greetings From New York

We've popped up for a visit to NYC this weekend, staying with my brother-in-law in Chelsea. After a late arrival we raced by cab to make a dinner reservation in Soho, listening to the story on the news radio of a family who was burglarized and had their Yorkie stolen-- "They took our money and jewelry, but we didn't care about that stuff. Just give us back our dog."

We did a lot of wandering today, and saw a few dogs including a cute Rat Terrier in the Fluevog shoe store and a Lab in Bloomingdales. But from what little I have read, no-nonsense New Yorker attitudes don't lend themselves to peace in the dog parks. Manhattan Chien just put up a snarky post about the misanthropes at the city dog runs, making it sound like owners are inches from murdering each other. Thank goodness for the relative good will of our little suburban Maryland dog park-- there's no place like home.

Rumble in the Parking Lot

Tensions have been high in the parking lot at the dog park. Evil looks are exchanged, tempers flare. This is between the humans, not the dogs.

The parking lot is at the end of a long driveway, and is shared between the dog park and an outdoor skating rink. Whenever there is a hockey game, suddenly the lot is packed and there is no overflow parking... and some doofus in an oversized SUV has parked across two spaces. Bunches of hockey dads high on adrenaline and testosterone are milling about looking for pencil-necked dog park regulars to thump-- well, not really, but it could happen.

Last weekend, the park maintenance guys left a huge pile of bark mulch in the parking lot, compounding the shortage of spaces. I thought there was going to be a war. At least there was a bunch of grumbling amongst us nerds in the dog enclosure. After all, it's our lot.

Crazy Weekend at the Dog Park

This weekend at the dog park was a tough one for all involved. Saturday the temperature was down to 22 degrees... yes, that's Fahrenheit, not Celsius. All you Canadians and northerners can stop laughing now, because for us that's pretty cold when you're just standing around. Molly and Honey's owner was wearing not one but two pairs of gloves.

Then, today all of the dogs were bonkers for some reason. As we were getting ready to enter, Pappy just went off at these two strange dogs through the fence. He was getting bad enough that I was prepping to leave. I've seen a few owners walk their dogs around the perimeter of the fence to settle down all the dogs before entering, so I tried that after a little cool-off walk. I tried him again, but Pappy and those two dogs were just bound to have trouble. Their owner said they were headed out, so we just switched places and Pappy seemed fine. Truman and owner returned from a walk around the park, and it turns out Truman was having trouble with the same dogs earlier. Then Cisco showed up, decked a Border Collie, and left almost immediately. Then this big German Shepherd showed up and ran yelping in terror all around the enclosure-- I didn't see anything happen to her that caused that. We had a full moon last week, but who knows what was going on. Not a banner day at the dog park.

Back to Normal

I'm happy to report that, after greatly depleted attendance over the Thanksgiving holidays, this past weekend the dog park was back to normal. Jack (getting creamed on the left) and Jojo were paroled from the kennel for good behavior. Pappy continues to wear his body armor, which two different people described as looking like a diving flag. Truman was storming around, thankfully keeping away from the poo. And new star, Sammy the Bull Terrier puppy, was racing around like a wild thing. What do other people do on weekend mornings?

At The Dog Park

When we went to the dog park this morning, the mood was a little contemplative as everyone recalled Crusher. He was at the park last weekend, and died after being hit by a car Thursday. Later on Crusher's mom came by for a visit and to talk with everyone, and it was good to see her.

For all of us it's hard not to let thoughts drift to the unspoken truths; we can't protect our dogs from everything, and, no matter what, they aren't going to live as long as we want them to. We just have to depend on good luck, and that's not always going to hold. Several people had experiences similar to Crusher's mom's, and it's pretty devastating. I've never had to go through this, but I'm the type of person who can't keep from dwelling on the thought that someday I'll wake up and Pappy won't be there.

Meanwhile, as the owners were having these conversations, it was business as usual for the dogs. Jack was hauling Pappy around by the collar of his new coat (which held up very nicely), and Truman was smearing poo across his shoulder and back. The latter event allowed the rest of us to coin the phrase: "Yes, my dog is filthy, but at least he's not 'Truman dirty'."

Pappy's Rules of Engagement

At one time when we first got Pappy, I had visions of preparing a list of local dog parks and going on a tour. At that time, Pappy was a year old and seemed game to play with any dog in any circumstances. As he approaches his second birthday, Pappy seems seems most comfortable meeting them at his dog park, Wheaton Regional Park.

Pappy loves to wrestle, and doesn't seem to be overly discriminating about the size of his opponent. But he won't wrestle just anybody, and I'm always trying to figure out his rules of engagement:

• He seems to favor dogs two years or younger-- maybe beating on each other is a young dog's game.
• He likes puppies of any size, and plays down to their level. It's interesting to see dogs negotiate the terms of play, the small dog playing bigger and the big dog playing smaller.
• He doesn't mind heavier dogs (he doesn't have much of a choice since he's a skinny puke), but not too big. The exception is if they are young and goofy.
• He doesn't mess with dogs that have big hair, even if they aren't much heavier. He doesn't get it that they just look big.
• He likes to box mano a mano, chest to chest. I think this is because he is lanky and has better leverage for this style of wrangling. When Bosco, a massive Pit, was whalloping Pappy around with his butt, it was clear to me that Pappy is at a disadvantage when all four feet are on the ground.
• Pappy's uses a lot of teeth at play. I'm always a little horrified to see dogs hauling on each other's loose skin, ears, and appendages, but none of them seem to mind. Of course horseplay don't pay, as Pappy learned last weekend.
• If another dog tries to horn in while he's wrestling someone else, Pappy will turn and run him off before getting back to business. Jack, the Rottie-Lab mix, never seems to mind multiple attackers, but with Pappy it is one dog at a time.
• Pappy doesn't like that nippy Border Collie. Too bossy.

Poor Little Guy

Pappy and I went to the dog park this morning, as usual. What wasn't usual is that we were meeting up with geocaching dog blogger, 3dogcache (motto: "dogs go with geocaching like pickles with peanut butter; no, really, it's good"), and her three pooches, Maggie, Ellie, and Andy.

Pappy was playing feverishly with all comers, and at one point I thought I saw a flash of red on his side. I looked him over but didn't find anything. An hour's play later I saw it again, but this time I found it-- a rather ugly gash behind his shoulder. Everybody at the dog park was really helpful, and one guy was apologetic and really worried that his dog had caused it (but my first glimpse came long before he arrived). We went straight to the vet. She said because of the way the skin was pulled apart, it wasn't going to heal without sutures. So Pappy's getting sedated and stitched up as I write this.

Pappy has this incredible pain tolerance, and it really worries me at times. He got his chip implanted without a sound, had a cordless phone dropped on his head without noticing, and I'm always finding scratches and cuts. He's a skinny twerp playing rough with much bigger dogs, and it doesn't seem like he knows when to ease up. One of these days I'm afraid he's going to snap a leg and still be trying to wrestle Jack.

No dog park for Pappy tomorrow, but we'll be back next weekend.