dog days

Rumpole is settling in well. He whines and whimpers a lot when left alone and I guess I would if I'd been abducted two day ago and caged in a place full of new sounds and smells - no matter how much rubbing my belly gets. But he goes to bed well and does not start his howling until it gets light. Lesson du jour (Sunday) was 'you sleep on your cushion while the grown ups eat' and he seemed to get it. After a while. Sally is going to struggle with training more than Rumpole; you can see her cracking under the pressure of not rewarding him when he does something "bad" in an achingly cute manner. Like approach us when eating, exitting from his cushion by rolling backwards in a bundle of fur and ear flaps. God damnit that IS cute. But I must be strong for both of them.

Yesterday he was abandoned fully for a couple of hours as I was at work and Sal at the optomotrist (long sighted but does not look anything worse - thank God.) So I got up a little earlier than normal, at 05:30 to have some quality mans-best-friend time beore Sal awoke. Following on from Sunday I did not give him any play time while I had breakfast; he calmed some, able to see me, but still wanted early morning attention; fair enough after a nights sleep alone in the sunroom. He got attention and playtime once I'd finished my food. He also got his first chicken wing and that made hime very, very happy. He had wee'd on the paper-covered floor overnight, but nothing more than that; he is already learning where to go when he needs to go. Smart little fella. And then I had to go to work and again he had to suffer seperation from his mate. I placed him in his fenced area of garden and headed out.

Sally awoke to find a puppy at the back door; so much for my fencing efforts. She spotted my error - not enough weight on the bottom of the gate - and fixed it so when she left he remained in his designated puppy area. Howling. She got home to find little Rumpole in the area under our back stairs shivering wiht seperation anxiety. Damnit, the way you have to teach him to be alone seems so cruel. Early days yet. He endured two seperate two hour spells alone yeterday and got a lot of loving as his reward. He seemed unenthusiastically happy about my return, but some fetch games and rough-housing seemed to bring him back to hs usual warmth. And, of course, some chewing on anything chewable. Such as owners. He'll learn.