Doing It Doggy Style

I’m cheating. But I don’t care. There’s a young lady that is so amazing that I have to spend time with her, even when I’m not getting paid to do it. Her cute face, pretty brindled coat and contagious playful energy make her simply irresistible. That’s why even in my free time, I choose to hang out with this bodacious babe. She attracts a ton of compliments whenever we go out.

So how am I cheating exactly? Well Duchess is not my dog. I’m just her caretaker. Duchess’ owner works a lot of hours. That leaves me with Duchess all to myself most days. Even though I’m more of a cat lover, spending so much time with Duchess has given me great appreciation for her breed...whatever it is.

Growing up I had dogs here and there. In New Jersey there was our big, white fluffy The Neverending Story Falkor look-alike dog. In Washington State there was the chow-chow that my father tried to convince everyone was pure bred to get more money for the pups. But I never was the one responsible for picking up piles of poop. My job was to pet and play with our dogs. Now I get paid to be a human pooper-scooper and playmate.

If you’re anything like me, often times I get tired of humans. It was a beautiful fall day when I had one of my infamous “I can’t do people” days. Duchess was there to be my literal roll dog. So we had a girl’s night out: doggy style. It was my first time taking a dog out on a date.

The night began with an early dinner. I knew Duchess would enjoy eating her favorite food as soon possible. She tends to be quite greedy and loves any time she can get a treat. After eating, it was time to hit the pavement.

I strapped on Duchess’ red harness and clipped on her matching red leash. She always looks very stylish in her crimson ensemble. Whatever she’s mixed with gets accented by the contrasting red against her white patches. The excitement grew in Duchess, as she knew harness + leash = walk. But she didn’t know how memorable this walk would be.

With a sniff sniff here, and a sniff sniff there, here a sniff, there a sniff, everywhere a sniff sniff, we were off. In my Buck Laughlin (played by Fred Willard) voice from Best In Show (a fantabulous mockumentary about dog shows), we were “doing it doggy style!” for the early evening.

The first surprise was Duchess realizing we were heading to my car. It was a road trip, not just a regular walk. And instead of opening the trunk, I opened the front passenger door. Duchess wasted no time jumping into this coveted seat. She’s only sat in the trunk or rear seat before. The slobber and extra heavy panting coming from Duchess showed she felt like a queen riding shotgun for the first time in my SUV. I was a little concerned since I didn’t know how she would behave up front. But she loved every minute of it and loved seeing the neighborhood from this vantage point.

Getting to hang with me while I handled business was the second surprise. Duchess loves riding along when I do product drop offs or get supplies for business. But it doesn’t happen often. This early evening, she got to experience going to the bank for the first time as I made some deposits. Her head was so glued to the window that I let it down for a moment so she could really soak up the experience.

The third surprise for our outing was walking around two of Duchess’ favorite locations. First stop, the elementary school. It has a nice new walking circle around the playground. Four times around equals a mile. But mostly Duchess is interested in the surrounding neighborhood. There is no shortage of birds, deer, rabbits, cats and other dogs to pique her interest. Second stop, the park with a huge lake. Duchess absolutely loves this particular park because there are geese galore, a cool bridge and dogs. I don’t know what it is about parks, but for some reason Duchess always poops exactly two times whenever I take her. Go figure.

I can’t say Duchess was totally tuckered out from our excursion. But she had a great time going new places and driving around in a front row seat. Duchess is a quasi-rescue, so it’s always interesting to see how she will react and behave in different places. Our girl’s night out was a great way to learn more about Duchess and spend time with a lovely being.

Dog-Human Night Out Guide

1. Have a nice dine-in dinner. Feel free to mix it up, both dog and human can have leftovers. I like to make the evening special by adding something extra to Duchess’ dinner. This way she knows something amazing is about to happen. And if not, at least she got a treat! She loves baked sweet potatoes.
2. Prep the mode of transportation. You might decide to hoof it, bike it or drive. Either way, be prepared. Duchess drools a lot. So I always make sure I pack paper towels to wipe the seat, window and myself. If I think Duchess is going to scratch things up, then I borrow the seat cover from her owner.
3. Get dressed. More than likely, you as the human already have on some comfy clothes for the season and walking around. I don’t need to stress the importance of proper footwear for long walks with a pooch. Duchess always knows it’s time to hang when she hears me putting on my shoes and jacket/coat and the jangle of keys. Because she tends to get heat rash easily, I keep her harness off as much as possible. So she knows when I grab the harness and leash we are going for a good walk.
4. Bring libations and poop bags. Even though it was fall during our memorable outing, the early evening still had some warmth to it. So I make sure to bring a water bottle and disposable bowl for her to drink out of. For me, “I’ll have with she’s having” sans the bowl. And what's a walk without a proper bowel movement? Have those poop bags on hand to curb your dog.
5. Take pictures. A picture is worth a thousand words, and technically I have none from that night. Well, there were pictures from our girl’s night out adventure. However, my phone experienced “an unauthorized attempt to factory reset” which was very successful. I’m not going to go into conspiracy facts…I mean theories. But the reality is, I lost all my photos. And before you jump to “didn’t you save them on your drive or the cloud”, I own a consulting business and often get pictures and documents from clients where I must protect their privacy so I can’t use automatic uploading to the cloud and such. So I was able to hodgepodge photos from my social media, new photos and asking her owner to send me pictures I originally texted him. Tada! A mini recreation of me and Duchess doing the night doggy style.

If you want a great example of how to show your dog a good time, I suggest you watch and listen to Jasper Liu’s “You”. Dog lover or not, this is too cute to pass up. Plus, it’s actually a great song. Wondering where you might have heard it before? Yup, Netflix’s Use For My Talent.