Spin!

There are times when I think that the two dogs should be the chocolate and peanut butter of Reese's peanut butter cups -- perfectly complementary. Molly is deaf, and Ginger... well, I'd say Ginger is dumb, but she barks more than Molly (who I think has barked twice in six months) and Ginger's the brain surgeon of the two, so it doesn't really apply. I guess I'll have to go with Molly is deaf and dumb, and Ginger is a little dog.

But my point here is that Ginger doesn't obey because she doesn't want to, and Molly doesn't obey because she can't hear anything. The obvious solution is to train Ginger to get Molly's attention when I want her to come to me. That way it would always be Ginger's fault, no matter what happened.

The only problem is that this relies on me being able to train Ginger, and that might be asking too much. I'll be honest and admit right off the bat that the problem is not with Ginger. Training a dog to do anything requires consistency and timing, and I sometimes have the attention span of a squirrel on meth. It's truly amazing that I can get both dogs to sit at the door when it's time to go for a walk, and sitting is a pretty simple concept.

My only consolation is that at least I haven't trained her to do any bad behaviors, like a coworker of mine who has been working from home lately, and has accidentally trained her dog to bark. We all know how that happens -- the dog barks and she gives him treats to shut him up, and very quickly the dog learns how to get more treats. This coworker is having a baby in the next month, so we'll see how that ends up...

Anyhow, I've decided to take the easy way out and just wait until the dogs do something (anything) and say the command. That way they can do whatever they want, and I get the satisfaction of feeling that they're being obedient.

So far with this new technique I've learned the commands for spin around and snore. Now I'm off to go learn how to tell Ginger that she's barking. Good dog!