The day begins well before sunrise.
Tommy wakes me and tries to get me to engage, but it’s still dark out and I go
back to sleep. Next time when I wake up Tommy is over looking out the window.
It’s around 6:00 A.M. and I finally give up around 6:30 and decide to start the
day.
After completing the normal morning
activities, tommy and I work on the Sunday Sudoku online. At one point she
rolls onto the keyboard and suddenly all incomplete squares have the small
possible numbers showing. I take this as a hint that she’s bored and wants me
to be spending my time doing my number one task, petting her.
We spend quite some time making her
feel happy and then she jumps off the desk to explore. When she sits by the
screen door (and appears to be in a good mood) I figure now would be a good
time to try the harness again. After one
poor attempt, Tommy lets me put the harness over her head, but she’s not ready
for the clips to be attached. We try again and although she tries to bite my
hand when it’s clipping the harness together I talk to her calmly and amazingly
she lets me attach everything. I give her a treat and we’re ready to head out
to the balcony.
Tommy gets to the screen door, but
when I open it she doesn’t head out to the balcony. I sit out there for a
little while and hope that she’ll make an attempt. Even putting a treat just
outside the balcony entrance doesn’t work. We’ve made some progress and I’m
happy about that. I come in, unhook her, and give her a treat.
I wasn’t sure how she would be
after the harness incident, so I bring out her new toy, the fabric on the wand.
We play together with it for over 20 minutes until she no longer seems
interested. We start the laundry, but Tommy can’t figure out what happened to
her other toy (the roll of toilet paper) in the guest bathroom. She becomes bored with the laundry and heads
back out to the living room.
While she’s by the dining room
table I realize that there’s been a problem recently with the mother-in-law’s
tongue. Tommy’s been trying to chew the leaves which hadn’t been a problem. I
get out the aluminum foil to create a barrier. Tommy hears the crinkling of the
foil and heads under the table. When I
finish I let her know that I’m all done and inadvertently whistle.
Surprisingly, she comes out from under the table to investigate the sound. I
need to remember this for future reference.
We spend the rest of the morning
with Tommy lounging and seeking an occasional petting, especially the
neck/chest rub that she likes so much. I have time in between pettings to work
on laundry and at the computer. I must be slowly working my way out of the
doghouse because Tommy is back sitting with me in the living room on her
favorite chair. The last few days she
had been sitting in the dining room and wouldn’t venture into the living room
area when I was sitting there…another small step!
Later in the day as I’m talking on
the phone, Tommy finds a new place to nap. I’d put the shorts that need ironing
on the dining room table, and she decided that it was a nice soft place to
snooze. I now have a new excuse to put off the ironing.
Later when she wakes up and before
we head to bed in about an hour, we play with the fleece strip on the wand and
with the laser pointer. Hopefully she gets a good workout and will sleep longer
tonight. We both seem to be figuring out each other and don’t seem to have as
many missteps. She, at times, lets me work on the computer unaided, and I learn
when it’s petting time and when it’s play time. Play time is not a time when I
should to put my hands near her mouth. As I type this Tommy comes in to remind
me that enough is enough and it’s “Tommy time” before we head to bed.
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