Known Knowns

I was telling Josh last night, that ever since we got Roland, I have felt a lot safer. Most know I’m kind of a chicken, and I’ll even admit to be afraid of the dark. Whenever I’m home alone, I turn on every light in the house, plus the TV, to put myself at east. Now that I have a 70 pound German Shepherd, I don’t worry about it. The thing is, Roland has huge ears.  So if I hear something and he doesn’t seem phased, I can immediately put it out of mind. And the other thing is, when he gets huffy about something, he barks a couple of times, or  gives a few under the breath woofs. It’s hard to catch me off guard when he does this, and plus, if I were a criminal and I heard a manly bark the likes of Roland’s, I would be picking another house. Of course, not all criminals are known for their brains, and I honestly don’t know how Roland would react if someone came in the house, but he does “understand” when I’m not so fond of someone. I don’t know how. He just gets it, and refuses to have anything to do with the other person. It’s really strange, but a testament to how sensitive he is. He probably just senses my tension, but I just somehow feel that I can trust his judgement.

I’m done talking about German Shepherds for awhile and will find something else to blog about. Roland had a really bad week last week in terms of behavior. We’re getting him neutered in a week and I’m hoping that will take care of some of the problems. But there’s no doubt he’s an adolescent, the most common time for a dog to end up in the shelter, so I’ve been really focusing on his training to figure out how I can get both of us through this time with at least a modicum of sanity. He seems to be focusing a little more; today I did a 15 minute training session which is pretty good for not being in the actual class. I hope he’s coming around to the training again, but I know we are in for the long haul with his compulsive testing.