We rearranged some furniture this week to make room for an event, and I guess it was enough to make someone wonder if the house rules had changed. (Hint: they hadn’t.) I looked up from my computer to see that Undómiel had brought a recreational bone onto the chair with… Continue reading
I’ve raved to friends about this before, but now it’s earned a spot on the blog. And no, I’m not getting any kickback from this! I’ve had Big Shrimpy dog beds for a long time, nearly two decades, and I’ve been consistently impressed with their durability. There are four Big… Continue reading
I’m not supposed to work on my computer in bed (spine) but darn it, the company is better here.
Oh my gosh, you guys. Back in January (it’s early April as I write this), I arrived at ClickerExpo and found that one of my favorite stupid props had not made the journey with me. I have a Batman toy from an old McDonald’s Happy Meal merchandising tie-in which I… Continue reading
You may have heard about the young dog dying after a United flight attendant insisted that it be placed in an overhead bin. And then just a day later, a family flying United went to claim their elderly German Shepherd at their arrival in Kansas — and found only a Great Dane… Continue reading
I made a mistake yesterday. I went to a drawer in the kitchen. Not just any drawer, it’s the not-a-junk drawer, where I keep among other things the dogs’ nail trimmers. As I opened the drawer, two dogs materialized behind me, sitting politely with ears forward and eyes bright. So of… Continue reading
The temperature has been climbing all day and we’ve now broken 0 degrees F! (-18 C) so I thought I’d share some of our cold weather activity and precautions. I don’t keep my dogs inside, as they love to play in the yard, but they definitely get to come inside… Continue reading
My friend Emilia sent me photos of this great PSA at Dragon Con this year. Dragon Con is an enormous pop culture convention annually in Atlanta, GA, with attendance of about 80,000 guests. They have a lot of service dogs working at the convention. Because many people still don’t know… Continue reading
I’ve already seen some chatter on social media about pet safety during the Great American Eclipse of 2017, and some of it has been quite off-base. So let’s talk about safety! First, unless you’ve been living in a cave (perhaps a reasonable choice, given the recent socio-political climate), you’ve probably… Continue reading
When I talk about behavior chains, I talk about the importance of completing the chain. Because in a chain each cue serves as a reinforcer for a previous behavior, dropping cues is actually failing to reinforce — and we know that’s a bad thing. Unreliable reinforcement leads to unreliable behavior. Variable… Continue reading