Eric as Barge

In the 1800's, when trains were new and there were no trucks, coal and other bulk cargo was transported on barges pulled by mules. The barges floated in canals while the mules walked on adjacent towpaths, towing the barges with long ropes (see http://www.coe.ilstu.edu/iga/IMCanal/IMCanal/PhotoJ.jpg ). Railroads took over much of the cargo traffic in the early 1900's, and today, canals and towpaths are used for scenery and recreation ( http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/09/AR2005060900643.html ).

We took Eric to the dog pool on Saturday. He refused to get in the water on his own, so we put him on the first step where the water just covered his feet and he hated it! Nonetheless, we decided that he should swim - after all, we had paid $10 (5.54 GBP, 8.13 Euros) for the privilege - so we put two leashes on him and tossed him in the single-lane pool. Deb and I acted as mules for a little Eric-barge, and towed him the length of the pool. He still hated it, so we tried it again, expecting a different result. No luck - he paddled like Dash in The Incredibles while we towed him, but he still hated it. The only hope is that Eric & Natasha's dog, Max, didn't seem to like the dog pool either, but back home, he hopped in their neighbor's swimming pool on his own. Not that we want Eric to hop in neighbor's pools, but it would be nice if he liked to swim in something other than the cow's water tub.

No Cairn Terrier Left Behind

Eric's training is going pretty well. He heels and responds to "come!" on-leash, and occasionally, off-leash. I think he'll get it eventually. Other areas that I'm working on are:

A) Jumping up on people - I sympathize with the desire of someone Eric's size to act taller, but I'm trying to convince him otherwise. I do this conventionally, using the Voice-of-God ("No!) followed by the Voice-of-SpongeBob ("Good Boy!") when he behaves.

B) Lackadasical eating - Eric's style of nibbling at his food whenever the mood strikes him is ineffective when Findlay finds Eric's food dish unattended. Of the various strategies we have tried to get Eric to eat more enthusiastically, competition seems to be the best bet. He will defend his food from Findlay and the cats, to be sure, but he also perks up when a human shows interest (see photographic evidence).

C) Limited ability to reason verbally - I'm planning to teach Eric the names of three toys he likes - hamburger, ball and bowtie-ish squeaky thing (I may need a pithier term for the latter). I'll teach him to fetch them by name, then introduce a fourth toy, say, a salamander. I'll say "Fetch Salamander", and Eric will reason out that "Salamander" must be the toy that is neither the hamburger, ball nor bowtie (see footnote 1). Thus, he will learn to perform well on standardized academic tests. We may have to work on his dexterity with a #2 pencil, however (see footnote 2).


Footnote 1: This can work! See http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31130-2004Jun10.html for proof (it's worth signing up for WaPo; it's free, no spam so far).

Footnote 2: In our country, the directions for standardized tests place such an emphasis on #2 pencils that one fears for one's academic future should one a different pencil grade (see http://www.pencilpages.com/articles/grades.htm ).

Happy Birthday(s)!

Fin and Eric say to Liam
Have some cake and have ice cream.

They say to Keir, oh by the way,
You have a happy 12th birthday!

(13th! I know, but it was neater
to say the "12th" to fit the meter)

Deb says Happy Birthday, too,
and she'll accept H.B. from you.

Have you ever seen Eric and Robin in the same room?

Sometimes I think of Eric as Findlay's sidekick. When they bark at incoming cars, I imagine they think they are fighting crime, or keeping our homeland safe from threats to our way of life.

Food science

Vince, the blacksmith, came today to shoe the horses. Knowing the crowd he would encounter, he brought a 20 pound bag of dog treats (1.429 stone), each about the size of Eric. "Horse hooves and dog treats - it doesn't get much better than that" - I think Nigella Lawson first made that observation. In any case, we had to flag Eric (and Fin) after half a dozen treats and who knows how many hooves.

Later, in the interest of science but still on the subject of food, we did an experiment. We measured the width of both dogs' tongues (Fin: 5.378 inches (13.66 centimeters); Eric: 0.275 inches (0.699 centimeters)). Fin's is 19.556 times as wide as Eric's. Then, we gave each a yogurt container to lick. Elapsed time for each: Fin, 4.875 seconds; Eric, 23 minutes and 17 seconds. Based on tongue width alone, one would conclude that Eric should have finished in 95.3 seconds. Hence, Eric is 14.6 times as thorough as Fin.

Eric's inner troll

This morning, Cloudy, the grey cat, ran out the door and all the way to the end of the deck, then started batting at something beneath. I heard a low growl and, like a troll, Eric appeared from below the deck. He spends much of the day there; he is strange, but harmless.

Dog vs. Cow

Right now, you're probably wondering how Eric and the cows are getting along. In the paddock, they're fine. Eric paddles about in the cow's drinking water, the cows sniff at him half-heartedly, and all is well. When we (dogs and I) cut through the pasture on our daily walk to the meadow, it was a somewhat different matter. In a cow's mind, Eric-in-the-pasture is a different creature from Eric-in-the-paddock. Five cows charged down the hill in hot pursuit of Eric. He stood his ground. He barked them into submission. One brave Guernsey did not remain cowed, however, and again closed in on Eric. The result this time was inter-species butt-sniffing (cow-to-Eric, not the other way around), so I suppose it's all in good fun.

Brave Eric barked at the herd again when he was safely on the other side of the fence, so it's unclear what the final score in the Eric vs. cow contest was.

Bike on through

Little Eric now goes to the meadow straight down the hill without all that gate-opening I described last time. He follows us when we either walk to the meadow, or when we ride our mountain bike. "What mountain bike?" you ask? Why, the bike I got last weekend and have been learning to ride ever since. Contrary to folklore, it doesn't come back like riding a bicycle. But I digress from the Eric story - he tags along beside the bike, sometimes close enough that I think he's going to end up like a baseball card in the spokes. Did he run close to y'all when you rode your bikes around the driveway and yard? I claim you can teach a dog anything (see footnote 1), so I suppose I can teach him to put a little distance between him and the bike.

1. Herbert Allen, president of the investment banking firm of Allen & Co. Inc., famously noted <http://houston.bizjournals.com/houston/stories/1997/12/01/editorial1.html> that "over a long weekend, I could teach my dog to be an investment banker."

Break on through

On my most recent trip to the meadow with Fin, Eric looked like he really wanted to go, but something was holding him back. I opened the gate at the top of our pasture and managed to get him through it despite his reluctance to go so near the wooden fence. Once he was in the pasture, he took off like a gazelle (a very short gazelle, maybe a gazelline)! He ran all the way down the hill, but again, I had to open a gate to get him out of the pasture. And again, he took off when he hit the open spaces of the meadow. He and Fin romped through the woods, but yet again, I had to open gates to get him back up the hill through the pasture. When he was a puppy, someone must have beaten him with fence boards, or maybe after they bathed him, they hung him out to dry on a fence like ours. In any case, we can now take him on our meadow "walks" (with dogs, there's not much walking!) so he can experience the full range of Far Arden doggy experience.

Fear of fence

Whenever we had Eric in the past, and for the first two weeks this time, he did not leave the yard. Even when Fin and I went to the meadow, Eric would follow until he reached the pasture fence, then he would stop. I thought it was just because of his size - he took as many steps to get to the fence as Fin did to get to the meadow - but I now believe I was mistaken. He apparently was afraid of the wooden fence!

The sound of one butt slapping

Eric made his first seemingly-permanent progress in dog obedience (a.k.a. "doggy-O", or in Italian, "doggio"). In each previous session, he learned to sit when we stopped after "heel", but had to be retaught the next session. The last two days, when I stop, I'll bet you could hear his butt hit the ground from your old house!

Dog vs. Man

Eric (the man), Natasha, Max and Annabella visited the last two days. If I had a picture of Eric (the dog) licking Annabella's face and vice-versa, I would win all photo contests forever. Eric-the-dog and Max weren't as compatible - nothing serious, but Max wasn't here long enough to get used to Eric, as Findlay now is.

Ralph should get his own blog

Add Sadie to the list of Eric's possible friends. Or something. Sadie chased Eric for a while, Eric chased Sadie for a while. I think Eric was quite surprised when Sadie followed him under the deck, something Fin has never done. I hope Sadie doesn't influence Eric to expand his food choices, if you know what I mean.

Eric has a new favorite spot - in front of our refrigerator. I suppose the warm air blowing out the vent keeps him warm in this 90 degree weather. He is strange, but harmless.

While Deb was away this morning, she opened Ralph's stall but kept the other two horses in. Ralph liberated Tiger, got into his stall and chewed the cord to his stall fan (fortunately, not plugged in!). That's funny, he doesn't look chewish.

Side street on roadmap to peace

Eric is (probably) making friends with our cats. Eric plays with the gray cat, Cloudy, and, to a lesser extent, the black cat, Hagrid! At least, I think it's play. I'm pretty sure it's not fighting. I could be proven wrong.

Strange, but harmless

There may be an element of exaggeration in some other entries, but this one is totally true. Eric relaxes by lying on the Jolly Ball! (as depicted in in the 8/1 entry). He does this for ten or more minutes at a time. He is strange, but harmless.

Roadmap to peace

Fin and Eric have reached a new level of friendship (or at least, tolerance). When I throw the Jolly Ball for Fin, he no longer shies away when Eric scampers after the ball. Could the next step be that they play together?

Only Eric can prevent forest fires

Ralph and Tiger had a brief kicking incident (no contact) which apparently was the high point of Eric's life. He ran so fast to bark at the horses that the grass in his wake actually caught fire. It rained the next day, so the fire didn't spread too far.

Drop-kick dog (in the best sense)

I was worried that I couldn't train a little dog like Eric because I'm used to pushing Fin or Eli's back end down with my hand to force them to sit. I discovered during this evening's lesson that I don't have to bend over to push Eric's butt down - I can use my foot! It's like kick-starting a motorcycle, or like doing the Bristol Stomp (for those of you old enough and American enough to remember the Bristol Stomp).

Coolest form of transportation ever

It's very hot here, so we no longer take Findlay on our errands in the car. Our "new" Saab has a refrigerated cubby box (called glove box or glove compartment in USA), so we can take Eric!

New tricks

Formal training has begun. He learned (or relearned?) to heel and sit when we stop. I'm still figuring out how to train a dog smaller than Fin and Eli - I yanked his collar off twice (true), and flipped him over my shoulder once (not as true).

You can't spell "exercise" without "eric"

Eric has begun his own exercise program, working his abs.



Between his exercises and eating lots of table scraps, I think he's getting bigger - what do you think?