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It's a frog, it's a fish, it's Ryan

Ryan and I went for a walk yesterday and we walked by the big pond up at the front of our subdivision. I had him on a retractable leash and I let him walk near the edge of the water and he walked on in and started swimming. He came back out and we walked a little more along the edge and he turned and jumped out into the water and swam a bit until the end of his leash. The last time he jumped in we were close enough to the end of the pond that I let him walk out the edge in front of him. He was dripping wet, but definitely likes the water. He needed a bath anyway, so it was a convenient time to let him jump in. Of course, that meant he wasn't allowed to come in the car when I went to pick Ben up, but you win some you lose some.

Patterdale Terrier

I was checking out at my doctor's office today and they had a little "tear the page off" calendar and it was of dogs. The page on top had a Patterdale Terrier and there was more than a passing resemblance to Ryan. I found this page with a couple of the dogs looking similar to Ryan:
http://www.terrierrescue.co.uk/dogsneedinghomes/Word.htm
Check out Gizmo and also Bob.

The bark heard around the world

I forgot to put this anecdote down:

On Thursday, I was on my morning conference call with our extended team where we do status for the entire project. We have folks on from China, Taiwan, England and all over the US. I was sitting at the dining room table and Ryan was laying on his comforter in the corner of the room near the front windows. It was my turn to give my status and I came off mute and started and all of a sudden, Ryan went crazy barking. I looked up and the cleaning lady was coming in the front door and it freaked him out. Then the phone beeped low battery. I had to switch to another handset and usher Ryan into the back of the house with me while I tried to give status from my charts on my laptop. I got a number of comments about Ryan on Fri.

Ryan will be Ryan

Ryan and I went to my adoption day event at Petco on Saturday and he spent the whole time laying under the table, the chair or the bench. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!

He is doing better sitting for the door (most of the time I have to say sit,but he does it instead of doing circles around me), so that is good. He is a bit higher energy than I thought he was. He can get quite wound up. I would take him running but I have a toe injury. I take him for a walk for about 1.5 miles or more a couple times a day, but I think I need to lengthen that.

I put on the board at the shelter that Ryan should not go to a home with younger kids. We go walking and if he sees kids playing, he tries to go as far away as possible. Kids on bikes really freak him out.

Ryan seems to be coming along

Ryan seems to be coming out of his shell a good bit. He hangs with me wherever I am in the house or the yard. He gets excited about going out for a walk. He is coming over to Ben when Ben calls him even if I am in the room. He loves to get in the car and go for a ride. All good stuff.

This past weekend, I got a couple of things from the shelter to help with the craziness in the crate. I got a spray bottle of DAP (dog appeasing pheromone). I spray it in the crate before leaving. I also got some Rescue Remedy which is an herbal tablet that is supposed to help calm him. The combo seems to be going well. With those and some bones in his crate, he hasn't completely shredded the sheet I threw in for him in the crate (also brought home some extra sheets that were donated to the shelter).

I got a few new pictures of Ryan and added them to his picture section on the wiki. I also changed the static picture of current foster to a slideshow of the pics of the current foster.

I have a Petco adoption day this weekend and of course will take Ryan. The exposure to folks should do him good. Last month, I took him with to my 5th Saturday adoption event and he laid under the table the whole time. Hopefully not this time.

More separation anxiety

Well, I have been crating Ryan whenever I leave the house and the bottom of the crate is all scratched up and one of the riveted clips that holds the window in the side of the crate was chewed up in his crate yesterday. Today I decided to let him be in the house again and see what happened. When I got home, I found that he had knocked some stuff off the top of the microwave on the counter in the kitchen and chewed off the end of a retractable leash. I thought, hmm, not too bad. Later, when I went to the bedroom, I noticed the door open to the front bedroom of the house and the laundry room. They weren't when I left. The door doesn't latch well in the front bedroom (door jam is out of alignment, just had the foundation leveled, but it hasn't adjusted itself) and he jumped on it and it opened. The double window mini blinds on the front window of the house were totally trashed. They were down and he wanted to see out and jumped on it and chewed on it. I had to cut out the bottom 1/4 of the slats just so that it would almost lift up a bit. there are some issues with the strings at the far end of the blind that I need to work on. Same story in the laundry room. He knocked it open, knocked the laundry hamper out of the way and smashed up the blinds. I was able to adjust the door latch in that room so that it appears to close now, but when I leave, he has to go into the crate. Between him and Bubbette, I am now down 4 mini blinds (and 1 more in the back of the family room that got a bit bent up but I didn't have to remove any slats. Oh well, someone at work who fosters dogs said, "you can't be house proud if you are fostering dogs." Too true.

Separation anxiety

Ryan got a bit upset while I was at work yesterday and scratched up the floormat at the front door. He also knocked a squishy ball and a small notepad off the counter near the garage door and chewed up the paper of the notebook. He opened the pantry, but he didn't mess with anything on the floor in there. I decided to bring in the big crate and set it up in my bedroom. I had to run an errand and threw a towel in there for him to lay on and put him in there. When I was back in 20-30 minutes, the towel was shredded. So, no towels/blankets in the crate. It is a total opposite of how he is at the shelter where he wants to get into his crate and hides in the back.

Ryan spent Sunday at the shelter

I had a race Sunday evening that I was working at, so I left Ryan at the shelter earlier on Sunday and picked him up on Monday afternoon. He seemed happy to see me. He has started to like to ride on the floor in the back seat where the vent is blowing the AC. He doesn't get right there, but sits on my lap and also goes into the back but seems to like that back floor spot.