23 September 2017

Another puppy romp today, pretty much the same again, Finlay loved it and got tired out. The theory is with these romps is you go from having the dog off lead and under control and say “go play” and they get their socialisation. Then you call them, they come back, and you have a bit of control time again and go around the cycle again. However, Finlay isn’t so good at the recall, fun is just too much fun and he loses his sense of hearing. No amount of chicken or liver treats will get him back. We do get there eventually, but the boy is just having the time of his life. It is good for him, but in a way a bit of an unnatural experience, because you wouldn’t be out on a walk and come across a field full of 30+ puppies.

We also visited dad again, this time we took dad down to the café in the care home and had a coffee and biscuits…..’someone’ might have had a bit of biscuit also! Again Finlay loved it, and because he was still a bit tired from his romp, he sat quietly in dads arms whist he stroked him. It was lovely to see, and probably the first time I’ve seen Finlay relaxed in that scenario.

Finally we decided to bath Finlay, it needed doing because he was a bit smelly from his puppy romp, rolling around in a wet muddy field. But besides that, he is going to have many baths in his lifetime, so it made sense to get one in early to acclimatise him and it gave us the chance to give him a nice gentle one to not freak him out.

Did he enjoy the experience, well no, but he stood stoically through most of it. We didn’t do his head and neck nor was the bath very deep, but it did the trick. One of our previous Tibbies cried and shook most times we bathed him, but not Finlay. He went absolutely mad when we took him out of the bath though, rolling around and charging around the bathroom. He also hated the hairdryer with a passion, so Deb took on the hair-drying task whilst I brushed him, he loves to chew the brush so this was a good distraction. He then forgot about the hairdryer and by the end of the session was fine. I expect this will reset somewhat when we next do him, but hopefully this bath hasn’t put him off.