Seriously- it is like Christmas for me. Every day I come home and I have more awesomeness.

Today Bruce's custom collar and

leash were delivered, as was

his bed for the crate. According to the UPS tracker, I also have his bed out for delivery. It is 6:30- so I am getting antsy!

WHERE ARE YOU UPS MAN!?!

So, some updates. I signed Bruce up for Puppy Kindergarten at Wylie Wag. For those of you who do not live in my area, Wylie Wagg is a store that has a few locations in NOVA. It is awesome. They focus on good quality items at lower prices. They forever have my business.

Keri Putonen is the teacher for these classes. This is her website.

She is actually going to come to the house September 2nd and do a "Puppy 101" class with me. I already have researched and studied... but I think it would be beneficial. According to said website- here is the description of the Puppy 101 class:

Got a new puppy? First time or been a long time?
Let me help your family get started on the right foot!
All your questions answered...feeding, housebreaking, crate training, teething and more!
Survival strategies for common puppy behaviors.

It's easier to prevent behavior problems now, than it is to correct them

later.

90 minutes

SCORE!! As I was writing this the UPS guy came. Hoorrayy. Now for pictures (bare with me, I know its silly). The carrier, pet bed. and the bed for his crate arrived! Hooraayy! My phone has a terrible camera, apparently.

I have a bunch of new items that are "in transit" so I will post as I get them.

Like I said, I am having serious puppy nesting. Even my fiancee just said "I can't wait until we pick him up."

Is his little bed not the cutest thing you've ever seen? AHH! I could die from the cuteness.

*Random change of topic*

I was talking to my boss today who asked about my dog. She asked if I was thinking of training Bruce. I got all excited and started talking about clicker training, and positive reinforcement, etc. etc. She just laughed at me and said she didn't know why I would bother. There's no way that would work (granted- shes a psychology major... so she could remember operant conditioning, Skinner, Pavlov, etc)

To add to that, I asked a friend of mine where she brought their dog to puppy kindergarten/ training classes. She also laughed and said she didn't believe any of that was necessary.

I don't get it. I can't IMAGINE not training a dog. I have been thinking about this for awhile. I am convinced that people just don't "get it" when it comes to owning an animal. I feel like the respectful and responsible thing is to train the dog. You don't identify the positive behaviors and so the dog will do whatever he wants- and in turn the owner gets frustrated. This is why so many animals are in the shelters.

Don't get me started on that.

On another note, I was reading this very interesting blog entry about positive reinforcement and not using punishment with training dogs. I actually found the link through a forum I visit: chazhound.com/forum

Here is the blog post.

I need to go make dinner, but I shall write more about it later. :)