Herding. The anticipation...

Well folks.  Life is great in Nova Scotia.  My human is OFFICIALLY on vacation.  Which means extra long walks, and lots of attention.  Which I command.  Yesterday I got to go for a run with my buddy Jackson, the Labrador from up the road.  Frodo got to go the last couple of times – and I didn’t – all because of those few “incidents” where I took off on my own – and my human didn’t trust me to behave.  But humans have short memories, so I got to go yesterday – sans leash. 

We were just headed up the driveway to meet Jackson and he came around the bend.  I didn’t expect him – so when I saw him, I HIT the ground.  I guess it's a flock-protecting-herding-instinct thing.  I watched him as he approached.  And when I recognized it was him – I jumped up.  My human’s friend asked how my human trained me to do that.  My human just laughed.   She is very interested to see how I am going to do at something called a Herding Instinct Test next month.  She figures that the entertainment I provide will be worth the entry fee.  She entered Frodo too – but she’s not sure she will take both of us.  Juggling double trouble could be a bit challenging.  She says “we’ll see.”  Frodo has seen sheep before.  He thought they were OK.  He DID inform me that they leave delectable morsels as they move around – so I’m curious to see what that will be like.   Frodo had an interesting herding technique.  He would lie in the middle of the round pen and simply “eye” the sheep.  And they would move around the pen as he moved his head.  He WOULD round them up physically if instructed to do so – but he preferred a more serious sedentary approach. My human thinks I will be just the opposite.  No matter what – it WILL be interesting.  If you want to purchase tickets to my performance, let me know!  : )

OK.  I have to go.  It’s time to bug my human to play ball.  Again.  Come on – it’s vacation.  That’s what we do!

©  Linda Wozniak