Vern and His Manhood!! Slightly R Rated!

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Four weeks ago, Vern went back to training class. We are in a group class with the same trainer we have worked with before. He is a breeder of Belgian Malinois dogs.  The trainer is a macho kind of guy, loves to tell his “war stories”, and thinks his dogs are the best breed of dog ever produced by man.  Privately, I call them Mallomar Bars, but feel it is not necessary to publicly agitate a man who trains police dogs. 

 

The class has been good for Vern.  This is the first class, besides puppy class, he has taken without Fudge and initially it was hard for him.  Vern takes a lot of his cues from Fudge and is even less brave when she is not there. The first class he went into like a man being led to the gallows and the trainer talked about fearful dogs and went on about Labradoodles and Goldendoodles.  I felt badly that the Doodle representing all of Doodledom was sitting at my feet with buckets of drool hanging off his face.  It was hard to pipe up and say, “Doodles are brave, outgoing dogs!” while I was searching for a Kleenex or some way to rid Vern of the spittle dangling off his chin. 

 

After the first class, I came home slightly wound up and ranted to my husband that this trainer had a lot of opinions that irritated me. I liked and respected all his training techniques, but his opinions about Doodles being designer dogs and breeders that breed Doodles, rankled me enough that I finally asked him after class one day if he thought there were any good Doodle breeders.  He sidestepped the question, and just said he had trained a few with problems this past year.  I guess I could have asked him if he had ever seen a Belgian Malinois with a problem, but I just decided I don’t have to go to dinner with this trainer, or exchange birthday presents with him, or care what dog he prefers, as long as Vern benefits from this class.   So far, the trainer has been great with Vern and for Vern, and he is kind and fair and very knowledgeable and each class, Vern has gained more confidence and that is what counts to me.

 

This does not mean that I don’t feel a little competitive and want Vern to do well and change the trainer’s mind about Doodles, because I do.  For that reason, every week before class I tell Vern that just because he is missing some manly body parts does not mean he cannot man up and show those other dogs a thing or two.  Well, lately it seems like Vern has taken my advice to heart because almost every time we train and I praise him, his “business” makes an appearance and there he sits wagging his tail and smiling and looking like he is thinking, “you said to man up!” I don’t know who remembers Mr. Big from Sex and the City, but for the purposes of this blog and to avoid any confusion, I will refer to Vern’s “business” from here on out as Mr. Red. 

The other day my husband and I were working with the dogs in the park and sure enough Mr. Red showed up and I pointed it out to my husband with an “ewwww,” and my husband patted Vern on the head and proudly said, “that’s my boy!” I certainly didn’t think reinforcing this behavior was the way to go, especially since my husband does not attend classes with Vern and a trainer who already thinks Doodles are genetically inferior.  It is getting embarrassing and the thought of standing across the training room from Vern and his best friend, Mr. Red, and yelling, “Come, Vern!” makes me feel like his name should be Kern and my name should be Kaurie and we should be filming an episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians.

 

On top of that, Vern has gone to the dark side and developed a crush on a cute little female Belgian Malinois in the class.  Vern went from being the dog that sat quietly by my side to the classroom Lothario in a matter of three weeks.  Last class, when we were sitting listening to the instructor, I saw him skooching over to get closer to his girlfriend.  He wags his tail a lot more and watches her every chance he gets.  She likes Vern, too, and play bows to him and I get the feeling they are just biding their time until they can blow this training class and get outside and wrestle. I thought at our next class I would ask my trainer what his opinion was regarding mixing his much loved Belgian Malinois breed with a Doodle and calling it a Belgian WaffleDoodle.  That ought to give him something to think about before he falls asleep at night.

 

Meanwhile, we are out every day doing all kinds of fun new things to open up Vern and Fudge’s minds to new experiences.  The trainer suggested in class everyone look for a small area like a picnic table, etc. and have your dog jump up on that and go through basic commands with your dog confined to that small space.

I figured we might as well try it, in case Vern ever decides to join the circus and work with the clowns, but I am still not sure he is going to be able to fit in a clown car for the finale. 

This week we went to the park and went down a children’s slide and Vern wasn’t scared at all and wanted to go back for seconds. We also found an old construction horse back in the woods and have been trying to get the dogs to jump over it. 

Fudge loves this exercise and is beautiful and graceful to watch.  Vern runs full speed towards the horse and then right UNDER it every time.  He is so proud of himself when he gets to the other side and dances around and nudges Fudge like he is saying, “I did it, too!!”

 

You have my daughter (the one in Oregon) to blame for this blog. I tried to tell her about my dogs and the construction horse and all the fun things we did at the park and when I finished, she pretended like her French Bulldog, Jazz, was speaking and said, “Grandma, this story is boring and stupid.” Can you imagine what Jazz would have said if I told him about Vern and Mr. Red?  Luckily, I have all of you to tell instead.

[Doris, Knox & Flash]

I'm at work and one of my co-workers asked what was so funny.  How do I even begin to explain???

Mr. Red and then the Belgian Waffledoodle got to me....thanks for the laugh....I needed it!