Home again and clean

I picked up Sandy after her day at the shelter yesterday. The person who visited with her found her to be very sweet, but didn't think she would be a good match with his 3 dogs. No problem, we expected to be keeping her for more than 3 weeks, so she's back home.


I took Sandy to Mudpuppies today for a bath. I had been noting that she could use a bath recently but she doesn't seem to like the tub at home because of the lack of traction (need to use a mat) and because I close the bathroom door. With the self-service dog wash just up the street about 1/2 mile, it seemed like a good distance for a walk. I put on Sandy's Gentle Leader and grabbed the retractable leash and away we went. On the way up the street, we ran into Jordan's parents and I stopped to chat about driving school for Ben/Jordan and Sandy wandered over to the dry grass next to the parking lot and rolled around in the haylike grass. I just looked at her and thought to myself, "get it out of the way now, because on the way home you will be nice and clean." We resumed our walk and in a couple of minutes we crossed the road and were at the dog wash. I signed her up and took a seat on the futon couch in the waiting area. There was a woman there with an Aerdale and another dog, a man with a black lab and us. Another man showed up with his son and their lab/rottweiler mix and they decided to hang around mostly outside because their was a wait and the room already had a number of dogs. Sandy seemed happy enough to just sit by me or lay down. She looked like she wanted to go over and checkout the lab, but she didn't pull at the leash so I didn't have to restrain her. Sandy was fine around all these people and other dogs with the exception of the boy who was skating around the shop on his Heelys. She growled and barked at him until I calmed her down about it and then she was fine with him too.

After a while, our tub freed up and it was time for us to head to the back to the bath. Sandy didn't like the looks of going down the little hall and I had to scoop her up and take her in there. I deposited her into the tub, put on the loop attached to the wall and took offer her leash/Gentle Leader. This was my first time to a self-serve dog wash and I kind of liked it. The tubs are just the right height to work at, they have mesh in the drains to collect up the dog hair, they water temp is pre-set and comes out of a sprayer and they provide shampoo, brushes and towels AND there is no cleanup for the customer to do. I washed Sandy which she tolerated pretty well, but when I grabbed the air hose to dry her and turned on the pump, the sound made her strain at the wall chain to run away. Of course she couldn't, but I had to put my arm around her to get her into the right position for blow drying and after a towelling and some blow drying, I decided she had had enough. I let her go out of the tub and down the ramp and we were off. Once we got outside, there was a profusion of shaking off the wetness and then we crossed the streeet and ran most of the way home to avoid the rolling in grass and to aid in the drying. I must say, Sandy is more pleasant to be with now that she is well bathed. I took a wet dog picture or 2 with my cellphone and if I can manage to get them off the phone, I will add them here to this posting.