Sweet fit

Someone sent us a perfectly fitted red Outward Hound raincoat. Spike, not impressed one way or the other, tolerates the protection. I appreciate cutting down on wet-dirty-stinky dog hair, too. Instead of paying a fortune for dog coats to warm our recently groomed Spike, I cut leg slits into a fleece blanket ($3.99 at Grocery Outlet). Spike loves the added protection and puts his legs up to fit the fleece before we go for walks.

Plus he's awfully cute in fleecy black and white! People stop us all the time to remark on his little coat and how nice he looks. He ignores them, but I like to hear it.

We went to the dog park at Marymoor today, working on dog socialization. Spike's taken to growling at men the last 3 weeks, and rumbles at other dogs sometimes. A dog tried to bite him (both leashed, on our neighborhood walk = a friendly exploration gone wrong.) The other owner said her full-sized mutt had been attacked in the last week. He was dominating and unfriendly to Spike. We got out of reach in a hurry. Sooo, now we're working hard on eliminating undesirable domination stuff in Spikester.

Lots of room to run at Marymoor. LOTS of dogs to sniff and chase. Spike was herded by a little Maltese mix, and stood up to tell a Great Dane he was irritated with his attention. Funny, and friendly.

Seriously cute!

watch these dogs go!

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/home_blog/2010/10/ok-go-white-knuckles-ikea.html

Car ride

It must be confusing to be a dog. The owner straps you into a backpack, puts you in the car where you can peek over the top of the restraints, rides you around for a while, then takes you out, and you are back home.

Or, like today, the owner straps you in, puts you in the car..., gets out and puts your backpack into a shopping cart at Dunn Lumber, and rides you around for a while. People swarm the crate, pet you on the head, and coo at you.

If you're really lucky, you get some Mexican food scraps after doing your business in the back of a parking lot, too. Then you ride around for a while, the owner takes you out, and you are back home.

"What just happened here?" asks Spike. "Though I prefer this to staying home in my crate."

What he doesn't know is we'll do it all again tomorrow. I'll give him a bath first thing, let him dry, and then he''s off to Petco for a haircut!