Dogs at School

Got a call from Shannon and she wanted to know if I could go get Blake as Sonny was asleep. So Pippin and I went to Blake's school which is behind my house. As Pippin and I are walking up I see a woman with her two kids sitting on the bench in front of the school where I am to meet Blake. Now that would normally not be something I wouldn't pay much attention to except she also had 2 dogs. One a very large pit bull mix and the other a Shepard mix. As I drew closer of course the pit bull lunges toward Pippin. As I had anticipated this action I had positioned Pippin behind me. The women said "I am so sorry she normally doesn't do this" except that both dogs did the same thing lunge for Pippin. Not only lunged put pulled the woman and her child who was holding the lease off the bench. The daughter screaming "Mom I can't stop her". Pippin was really good he stayed right by my side where his is supposed and totally ignored the other two dogs.

Just then the Principle walks out and says "You can't have any dogs on campus" and the woman goes oh I didn't know. So she gets up and leaves dragging her two dogs with her. Pippin was able to stay as he is a service dog.

I talked with the Principle for a few moments while waiting for Blake and she remarked how well behaved Pippin was.

It is really sad that people do not train their dogs to be out in public. They may be quite and dociel at home, but most of the time they are not in public or around other dogs, cats etc.

When a dog pulls you off a bench and drags you 3 or 4 feet it is not under your control. Or runs around the neighbor hood attacking other pets as what happen to Brad's cat Cozmo.

I had a nice walk with Blake to his house and Pippin really enjoyed the walk especially since it is 20 degrees cooler today. Blake really enjoys walking with Pippin.

The first two weeks

Pippin has now been living here for just over two weeks. Here is an update on some of our activities.

We have been walking 2 times a day between 2 to 4 miles for the day. Pippin is doing very well on his walks and get so excited when I start putting on my walking shoes. He sits calmly while I put is harness on and off we go.

Dawn has been getting up in the mornings with us. Pippin likes to have her on the side of him while we walk. If Dawn gets ahead of us he wants to speed up until we catch her. He is learning his way around his neighbor hood and I thinks he know his way home now. He likes the back yard with all of the fountains.

He has his Service Dog license and we have been going to Walmart and other stores. He is so very good in the stores. He ignors 99% of the people even though a lot of them want to pet him. They are told that he is working and is not allow to be petted. However we are going to have to go the dog stores more often. We went in to Petsmart and he was just so very excited by all of the food, chews, dogs, dog smells etc. So we will have to work on that issue.

Bed time is really fun. He gets into his bed on the floor and waits for me to fall asleep. Once he hears me start to snoor he gets up on the bed and snuggles in. Waits for Dawn to get home and settles down with both of us. I never thought that Dawn would ever let Pippin sleep on the bed. Now she brings him up on the bed by her while she is reading and strokes and pets him. His snoring is much better here that in Virginia I think the climate is good for him here.

He goes potty on command while on lease (working on the off lease part) sits and stays most of the time. Overall doing very well for the first two weeks.

The Flight Home from JFK Airport.

The Flight home from JFK was just fine. Pippin did exceptionally well. Better than most of the kids that where on the fight. Especially the little brat that sat next to us. After about 2 hours in the air the kid next to me finally went to sleep. He kept wanting to get to Pippin in his bag and pull and poke him. His mother thought it was cute and had no control over her child.

After the kid fell asleep I was able to bring Pippin's travel cage up on to my lap and let him stick out his head for awhile. Most of the time he just slept. We got seated in the very back row on the window, which is an ok place on JetBlue. So we where the last one's off. The flight crew all remarked on how well Pippin traveled and wanted to know how many time's he has flown. They we all very surprised that this was his first trip on an airplane. Several of them said he was one of the best dog's that had traveled with them.

Once we got in Sacramento Airport and off the plane. We headed for the dog relief area. Oh wait Sac Airport doesn't have one yet. So it was outside to find some grass and a place for Pippin to relive himself. After that was done we went to the JB ticket counter to be greated by Dawn. After a big hug and kiss for me, she grabbed up Pippin gave him a big hug and took him to go see the other girls at the counter. He was a big hit.

Pippin and I went to claim our baggage and then settled in to wait for Dawn to get off work. Pippin sat or layed under my seat and went back to sleep. Totally bored by all the people at the airport.

Dawn got off work and Pippin and I went and got the car picked up Dawn and went home.

All in All a very good trip.

A New member of the Family

Hi All.

I wanted to introduce the newest member of my family. Pippin. He is a 3 year old male Pug. My son Shane and his wife Liz had to make a very hard decision to let Pippin go. They just moved to Farmville, Virginia and Pippin was having a very hard time with the humidity. So they called me and asked if I would take Pippin and move him to Northern California. That started the grand adventure.

I flew out of Sacramento Sat July 25, 2009 with a short stop in Long Beach Ca to visit my brother Jim and attend his granddaughter's wedding reception. Then on to Richmond Va by way of New York. The original plan was that I would meet up with Dawn in NY on Thursday July 30th and we would fly home together. But oh no the weather gods decided that I needed to stay in Farmville for a little longer. Wed night the JFK to SMF flight was canceled due to weather concerns. That took approximately 150 off that flight and rolled them over to the next days flights. We you fly standby like I do that is not a good situation. Several other flights where canceled and the saga begins. Finally I was able to fly out on Sat Aug 8th and made it home.

Pippin did very well for his first flight. I had be training him the whole time to go into his flight carrier and go to sleep. I really paid off as he traveled very well.

After the short flight from Richmond to JFK Pippin spend around 7 hours waiting for the flight to Sacramento. We went to the Dog area at T5 walked around for a while, took a nap, walked around some more and then went for a ride on the Airtrain. Pippin did very well with the elevatiors and the moving sidewalks. He was not to sure about the moving sidewalks, but after several times on them he was ok. He didn't like the noise on the airtrain but other than that he was just fine. Laid down at my feet and slept or sat at my side as we rode around the airport.