Thursday, June 19, 2008

Of spills and thrills

Mini Moose and I have been spending a lot of time together. He's not quite ready to have the run of the house but he's getting pretty close. Exercising a dog is, I think, an important part of both bonding with a dog and relieving some of the natural stress that a predator like a dog generates. So I've been a big proponent, when applicable, of using a bike to help get a dog really good and worn out. And it's worked really really well generally speaking.

So yesterday late I decided to give it a try with Mini Moose. And he did pretty well. Stayed right next to me the whole time and kept up. It was amazing to me that he caught on so well. I got a good bike ride in and he got worn out!

And this morning I got up early and decided to repeat the successful bike ride. Unfortunately I didn't get his buy in...

We've been riding for about two minutes and we're on our way down a fairly large hill. Fiona got the Mooselet a harness because she was worried about the cut and since he looks really cute in it, I left it on him. Usually when I'm running a dog on the bike and they're wearing a collar I have a very light grip on the retractable leash. You know, in case of an unexpected telephone pole or mailbox segue. But since this is a harness and he weighs 45lbs I held on like normal.

Guys are strange creatures I've learned. When a guy sees something dropping, we try to catch it. It doesn't matter if it's a knife or a lump of uranium, if we can catch it, we're gonna. Same with something getting pulled out of a guy's hands. We feel a jerk, we clamp down.

I'm traveling down the hill at a fairly good clip and Mini Moose decides to sniff something. Partially behind a mailbox. Mini Moose is stronger than he looks. I felt the leash jerk and grabbed hold. Moose flattened and the leash wrapped partially around the mailbox.

I ate it.

I'm lying there thinking, "Thank God I had the presence of mind to fall in the grass instead of on the concrete when up comes Mr. Moose with this happy grin and the leash dragging behind and I just had to laugh.

Wrenched my neck pretty bad so I'm not 100%.

6 comments:

-J. said...

WOW! Glad you're OK... that's one hyper puppy! Maybe a hamster wheel...

Dermott said...

Yo Moose. Next time, you ride the bike.

Evil Twin's Wife said...

It's great that you get a workout too. Sorry about the spill!

Stew Magoo said...

My dear adoring public. It's Moose here. I just learned to type. And I just learned that my name is Moose. I have to say that I'm really surprised by all this attention. I might just see what else I can do to make people notice me. I'm thinking of eating the couch. Perhaps...

Now that I've learned this typing trick I'll be posting lots of stuff.

And Dermott, you're simply stunning. May I worship you from afar?

Same goes for you ETW you hottie. John, not so much. lol!

brendalove@gmail.com said...

He needs a treadmill. I saw that on the "dog whisperer" show.

Sabra said...

Read this and burst out laughing! Read it again. Just as funny the second time. "Not laughing at you, but with you..." Glad you are okay.

There is NO way in the world I would ever try to ride my bike with either of my two four-legged Kids. The Great Dane would end up getting us both seriously hurt and the standard Poodle would be pulling me at break-neck speeds through bushes after all the stray cats that we have, here. Nope. Not even gonna try it.