Times Square!

Having worked in Times Square for almost two years (Bubba Gump's anyone??), I generally avoid the area unless I absolutely have to go there. But I knew that Times Square would be a great experience for Frito so off we went. Next time I bring a puppy to Times Square I am going to bring another person with me to help with taking pictures. It was hard to get pictures of Frito with the buildings and lights. She has an excellent sit stay or down stay but with all the hustle and bustle of Times Square, I did not want to test her skills and have her dart into traffic. We did our best though.

While I was taking this picture, there were maybe 4 or 5 people in the distance that kept saying "Doggie! Doggie! Hey, Doggie!" My wonderful Frito did not even bat an eyelash and held her sit stay! Good girl!


After I took this next picture, some guy next to me asked if he could take a picture of Frito. At first I thought he was being nice by offering to take a picture of me with Frito, but I was wrong - he wanted a picture of Frito for himself.


Frito posing across the street from the Good Morning America studios.


After approximately 15 minutes, both Frito and I had had enough of Times Square and we hightailed it out of there!

Playtime!

We had another puppy playdate on Saturday, July 24, 2010, in Allison's backyard in Harlem. It was originally just an excuse to have the dogs play, but we ended up saying goodbye to one of our pups who heads in for training this weekend. We wish Taft the best of luck and thanks to Danniela for raising him! Another raiser interviewed Danniela about her puppy raising experience and put together a short film that you can view here.


It was a very hot day so Allison brought out the kiddie pool so the dogs would have somewhere to cool off. Here Persia cools off in the pool and Frito makes her way over while GEB brood Nancy watches from afar.


Persia says hello to Memphis, a German Shepherd who had just arrived in NYC for a puppy sit.


Frito (on the left in the pool) and Taft (on the right) are deep in conversation as Persia wishes there was more room for her.


Dogs milling about...


Love this photo of Persia - she is a beautiful lab.


Memphis and released GEB pup, Sienna (formerly known as Tatiana) played so well together - it was so sweet watching them.


Sisters Poppy and Paloma have a love/hate relationship.


Michelle and Dina - who knew shepherds made such great lap dogs??


Overall it was a wonderful playdate, although it is really sad to believe that our next playdate (scheduled for September) will be a going away party for Frito. :(

Ivory Visits the Big Apple

Ivory is a puppy that was raised in the NYC region by Krissy and who graduated with her visually impaired partner, Alexis in February 2010. Here is their graduation photo:


Alexis and Ivory live in California, but they returned to NYC for a brief visit and stayed with Krissy while they were in the city. It was so wonderful for Krissy to be able to spend some time with Ivory again and also to see Ivory working - they did several touristy things, including Times Square and, according to Krissy, Ivory did an amazing job navigating through crowds and guiding Alexis as needed.

Seeing Ivory work is great, but all work and no play is no fun at all! So, Frito and I and Julia and Paloma headed over to Krissy's apartment for some playtime with Ivory.

Frito doing what she does best - humping. Her poor victim this time is Paloma.


The dogs happily played together while unknown to us a tornado warning had been issued for Manhattan and the surrounding boroughs. Clearly, the pups were not concerned:


Ivory is by far the smallest lab I have seen since getting involved with GEB. She topped out at 45 pounds - five month old Paloma is almost as big as Ivory, who is approximately 2 1/2 years old! Ivory is one gorgeous pup!


Once the playing was finished, Ivory settled in next to Alexis, while proud raiser Krissy looks on.

Life Lesson: Death

Frito and my pet dogs, Dexter & Bailey, have witnessed many "deaths" of toys over the last several months, but none was as tragic as the death of their orange monkey. They gazed longingly at the deceased toy and remembered the best of times and the worst of times. As indicated by the below photo, they just could not believe their precious orange monkey had perished.

Summertime!

Summer is in full swing! Below are some of my favorite Frito pictures from this summer so far:

Taking a dip in the dog park pool.


Frito hanging out with her pal Breezy, another GEB pup on program.


Mmmm, biscuits...


Laughing in the car on the way to puppy massage at the Canine Development Center.


Frito had a playdate with GEB pup on program Jessie and GEB brood Nancy.

Fetch Bar & Grill

On July 18, 2010, the high school puppy class decided to take a field trip to a restaurant instead of our regular class at the Animal Medical Center. As several of our pups are in other regions for the summer, our high school class is quite small (two of the other pups could not make it for other reasons). Present for the class was Frito, Persia (who is on a two-month sit with Visa and Swapan while her raiser is in Hong Kong), and Keats, a Westchester county pup who was on a puppy swap with John and Evelina. A good friend of John's is the owner and head chef at Fetch Bar & Grill, which is a restaurant that was inspired by a released GEB pup. Click here to visit the website for the restaurant.


All three dogs did extremely well inside the restaurant, settling underneath the table with only a few attempts at playing with each other. I think it was Keats' first time in a restaurant (at least his first time with other dogs) and he behaved wonderfully. Not a single dog begged for food or swiped any food off the floor.

Frito finds dining in restaurants to be rather boring - she constantly gazes at me with the, "when do we get to play?" look.


Persia was directly across from Frito and throughout the meal, they both kept stretching closer to one another to say hello. Sweet Persia eventually settled in for a nap, which I disturbed with my extremely bright flash.


Big boy Keats is still working on growing into his giant head. He is already such a beautiful dog who will only look that much more amazing when his body catches up with his head. Here he is with his temporary mother, Evelina.


At the end of a delicious meal, we all posed for a great photograph.


Back row: Rachel (NYC region manager), John, Swapan
Front row: Visa with Persia, me with Frito, Evelina with Keats