For to be free . . .: TOLT

. . . is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.
–Nelson Mandela

Today I’m still Thinking Out Loud animals. I know, shocking right? It’s so easy to get consumed with our own troubles. Lauren wrote a great blog post, Beating Running Burnout, that advises one of the best ways to keep running fun is to share your love of running with other people.

You should check it out!

I keep burn out to a minimum by taking off seasons, chasing my goal to run a half in every state, and running with friends when I can.

I’m also thinking about freedom. Nelson Mandela’s quote definitely spoke to me — that’s what we need to teach Bandit.

 

Finally a reCaptcha I enjoyed!
reCaptcha is usually so totally annoying. Especially the ones where they make you keep choosing images until you’ve chosen all of them, but even the ones that make you choose three or four are often quite annoying.

The one with waterfalls was quite lovely though — I actually enjoyed it! Could I have that one more often, please?

You don’t look so fierce here, Bandit

Are all male dogs protective of female humans?
Or is that just me?

Chester is the only male I had for a long time. But there was Chekov, the trial adoption we had before him. And now Bandit. I seem to bring out the guarding instinct in male dogs.

It’s not because I let them get away with anything, or am not a good leader (at least I don’t think so). Chester always listened to me and he knew when he was in the doghouse. We didn’t have Chekov long enough to figure him out, and we definitely haven’t had Bandit long enough to figure him out, even though we’ve had him significantly longer than we had Chekov.

I’m sure there are male dogs out there who aren’t the least bit interested in protecting their humans, right?

This girl was worth the work

Let’s talk a little about visceral again
I did have a visceral reaction to Lola. Mr. Judy was on a business trip. I was surfing the Web one night, looking at rescue sites. We weren’t planning to get a second dog. Chester already cost enough and was enough work!

And then I saw Lola’s photo.

I had an overwhelming feeling she was meant to be our dog. It was really weird. And when we adopted her, she was such a mess — not house trained, not crate trained, reactive to other dogs on leash (except Chester).

Mr. Judy spent quite a few weeks walking around grumbling “I didn’t sign up for this“.  It turned out well in the end, obviously, through a lot of hard work. It’s definitely how I feel about Bandit — I definitely didn’t sign up for this.

Relaxing inside again

We are trying to give Gizmo some freedom again
We met with the trainer again last night to learn how to train Bandit to wear a muzzle. Just when I think I’m overreacting, Bandit really went after Lola while he was in his crate yesterday.

Granted, he was in his crate and he couldn’t actually do anything to her.He didn’t have any treats in there (not any more) and it was way more than growling.

Anyway, no one was bitten (the time he bit the vet she was trying to muzzle him). He’s doing well, but we’re still fairly far away from being able to actually muzzle him. He’ll stick his nose in for treats. Slow and steady.

The trainer also suggested that we ought to try walking Bandit and Lola together, that if we want to adopt him he needs to be kept up on his socialization. The same trainer who last week suggested we continue to keep them all separate.

So we did walk them a bit together this morning — we won’t be able to to do it every morning, and I’m not ready to walk the both of them together yet, so Mr. Judy will continue to get his exercise. Lola was a little nervous, but Bandit seemed to really enjoy it, and we had no incidents despite the fact I forgot the cheese (a high value treat).

And I didn’t feed Gizmo in the laundry room or lock him in there — yet. I’m hoping he goes out at some point in the afternoon so I can relax a bit later on when I’m sure to be more tired without having to be vigilant.It’s giving me the chance to actually do some laundry right now. And it’s going to be interesting when I go up in a little while and gate Bandit into the kitchen with me and do some baking.

 

Gnome app

Gnome was a bust
Unless I’m missing something. I couldn’t really hear it/feel it while running on the treadmill. And it doesn’t run with the running app on my Vivoactive. So sad. So I can run the running app (which tells me things like pace and elapsed time and distance), or I can run Gnome, which helps me run a certain cadence.

Could you guys make it so it could be a data field?

Why is it so hard to get into your clothes after swimming?
Well, I googled it, of course. Let’s just say all sorts of interesting subjects, most not even remotely related to that question pop up.

I finally got this answer from Yahoo:

The water is absorbed by the clothing and the fabric shrinks temporarily

Except why would absorbing water cause clothes to shrink? I mean, a soggy shirt is actually bigger. Sort of. Right?I guess we can chalk it up to some of those weird, unsolved annoying problems, unless you have an answer for me.

Nuff said

Talk to me. Tell me in the comments:

How do you keep from getting burned out on running?

Are your male dogs protective of you?

Do you ever wish that you knew how to create your own apps?

I’m linking up with Amanda at Running with Spoons for her: