Training Schmaining

Meet Charles Beatrice. I rescued Charlie from the school where I worked previously. The vet said she was about 3 years old. She was scrawny and skittish. We brought her inside our home where she was scared of the t.v. and not house trained. We resolved those issues fairly quickly, but there were greater problems down the road. We discovered that she's extremely dog aggressive. You can imagine our neighborhood walks:

Holly: Should we take Charlie for a walk?

Chad: No way.

Holly: But she needs exercise. We have to give her exercise.

Chad: *sigh* Let's go.

So we venture on our walk and try to avoid all other dogs making several u-turns along the way. Things go much better when Chad is along. But sometimes I try to take her by myself. Of course, we didn't really have neighbors when we first rescued her and she was 20 pounds lighter than she is now. Recently, she saw a dog before I did (what is with the little dogs who run without a leash and think they're tough shit?!?) She took me down in the middle of the street. She turns into Cujo. I ended up with bloody knees and elbows and a battle scar to prove my story. I ended up mad and she came home very excited about her adventures.

After the bloody knees incident I finally decided we needed some intervention. I called a Houston man who claims "100% success" with dealing with any type of dog problem. I talked to him and hyperventilated when he quoted his prices. Chad and I decided to go ahead and at least have a consultation. He informed us that we needed to keep her crated as much as possible between now and then (I don't think so). I rationalized the $$ by telling myself "It will make her a better pet in the future, we might be able to have normal walks, and she'll know who's boss around here."

When we came home from dinner tonight, Charlie came prancing to the door with toy-in-mouth as always and we both thought "No way." We like her quirks. We like that she has issues like the rest of us. We've learned to compensate for her idiosyncrasies. For instance, we go for walks at night time now when other dogs are inside. Chad waits outside the vet's office with Charlie while I wait for her name to be called inside. We intend on hiring a pet sitter when we're gone rather than taking her to be boarded. It's fine. It's what we do when we love someone. Anyone out there interested in pet sitting??