Rufus visits the Horns (again)

Yesterday, Rufus and I went out to visit the Horns and Dillan, their 2 year old female RR. Rufus invited Dillan to play, and she obliged him...

Much chasing and wrestling ensued...

Dillon may not have admitted defeat (it was, after all, her yard) but she certainly showed a willingness to get down on Rufus's level...

Rufus's Weekend...

Last weekend, Rufus and I went out out to an area near Mt. Si.  I participated in the Mt. Si Relay, and Rufus made new friends...

Rufus Graduates Puppy I

Rufus attended his last session of Puppy I at SeattleDogs last week.

We worked on "sit stay" and "down stay"...

In between, Rufus got to wrestle with his classmates, which he enjoys enormously...

Finally, after paying close attention to his instructor's closing remarks, Rufus received his diploma.

Rufus and Mosey the Bulldog

Mosey is a one year old bulldog on the floor below us, and Rufus loves stopping by for a post lunch wrestle in a nearby conference room just across the hall from her mommy's office. It was impressive to watch these two battle to a standstill in just 15 minutes...

Homer takes on all comers

Preceeded by the sound of the frantic jingling of his collar tags, Homer burst around the corner into our part of the building today, and challenged both Rufus and Dixie to a game of
Chase & Wrestle...

Rufus managed to corner Homer on the couch and began using him as a chew toy...

Predictably, Homer put up with this for a while, and then handily turned the tables on Rufus...

Homer's dad entered stage left just in time to save Rufus's bacon, and everyone suddenly acted all innocent, as though they had just been discussing the weather...

Rufus visits Razi

I was out of town last weekend, and Larry Serrat and Razi (Rufus's brother from the same litter) were nice enough to keep Rufus for me. They played HARD all weekend as evidenced by the pics below. Rufus had a little learning to do about sharing his toys with others, but Razi helped him with this (Larry posted a video of this here).

However, like any pair of brothers, they quickly settled down and began doing almost everything together, from begging for dinner...



and sharing their food...



...to going for walks (although there was some discussion about which way to go)



All this resulted in two very tired puppies...

Another visit to the Bergenheim's

Last Sunday, Rufus joined a number of RRs and their owners in the beautiful back yard of Yvonne and Steffan Bergenheim. Larry Seratt was brave enough to show up and introduce Razi to this crew. Dispite our best efforts to distract everyone from Larry's attempt to sneak in the back gate, he and Razi were more or less mobbed as everyone strove to see who the new guy was and what he smelled like...

Razi dealt with all attention fairly well (that is him looking pensive by the gate...)

Rufus and Razi quickly paired off and set to wrestling and playing. Jack, Yvonne's 10-month old male, took a special interest in them both.

Later, Yvonne invited us in to watch "Den Mothers", " a documentary exploring the world of purebred Rhodesian Ridgebacks and the humans who love them". Rufus started out on my side of the counch...

..but eventually took the opportunity to go over and cuddle with Yvonne.

Interpreting Ridgeback Body Language

I found this post on the behavior of RR puppies to be hillarious... Makes me thankful that Rufus is soooo mellow.

Saturday, April 08, 2006 - Dixie Comes Out of Her Shell

Dixie the Corgy has been extremely shy and introverted around other dogs since she arrived at the office a month or so ago. In the last few days, this has completely turned around, and movies and pics below illustrate the result. Note that happy grin in the last picture...