Archive for the ‘Personal’ Category

Our Growly Class trainer Deborah likes to say we should all be “cautiously positive” in how we handle the dogs. That should also apply to our expectations for their performance.

Gianna behaved “OK” in class last night. She was better than the first class, but not as good as the second class. She didn’t bite us (though she got Deborah), but she was more reactive to other dogs, even small dogs, than we hoped. As a result, she was demoted back to the “outer circle.”

Amanda took the reins for the first time during this class, and she was great. It’s a lot of work constantly watching your dog, hearing the trainer’s instructions, staying positive (happy voice!), keeping treats at ready to reward positive responses and being ready to pull your dog back to stop negative responses (lunging, barking, growling).

We were a little more frustrated and tired than we hoped by the end of class. Gianna slept like a rock. I think she’s still sleeping.

Amanda was upset because another dog owner in class was surprised to hear us say that Gianna is actually really great at doggy daycare, dog parks, at home and really any situation when she’s not hooked on a leash. (You make small talk with the other dog owners when you’re in these situations to calm the mood, if anything.) Of course, the other dog owners have only seen her act like a spazz in class, so that’s to be expected. We just don’t like the idea that other people don’t trust Gianna like we do. But trust is earned, and Gianna has work ahead before she displays consistent, good behavior on a leash that earns trust from our acquaintances. That’s why we’re in Growly Class.

I keep telling Amanda (and myself) that we all have bad days and wake up the wrong side of the bed occasionally. We happened to snap at each other earlier that morning over some spilled coffee (spilled milk would have made for an awesome, real-life cliché). Gianna had a bad day, too. I’m optimistic because we’re getting better at anticipating bad reactions and avoiding them. That goes for our dog and each other!

Amanda will be taking the lead for the next couple classes as I’m headed to New Zealand(!!!) with Sergio for a photography gig. I know, huge deal. Watch for photos toward the end of the month along with some obnoxious amount of gushing.

I originally purchased Growly Classes as an admittedly odd birthday present for Amanda because I know it’s important that she be able and confident to hold her own with our 50-pound furball without relying on my brute strength. She already can, and she’ll do great in these upcoming weeks. My wife is a rock like that, and that’s why she rocks!

After a disappointing first Growly Class, we rebounded with tangible progress in our second class. Gianna was able to move from the “outer circle” of misbehaving dogs, to the “inner circle” of on-track dogs! It’s like we got called up to the varsity team!

We were deflated after that first lesson (and I was sore from getting my shins nipped at), but we put in the work last week with Gianna to improve her behavior. She only bit me once in the thigh early in class out of reaction to a dog she was scared of, but after that her “freak outs” subsided. We got paired up with a couple small dogs as she reacts more to dogs her size or larger, and she behaved reasonably well.

I think overall she’s a happier dog because through practice for class we are giving her more “jobs” day-to-day. We’re keeping up the practice and not getting too comfortable with progress because the dogs are continuously faced with new challenges in class, such as meeting other dogs or experiencing new environments. I don’t expect Gianna will react perfectly in every situation, but we’re learning more about what she reacts to and how to anticipate those scenarios so that we minimize her response. Let’s hope for more progress in class #3 this week!

It’s taken me a week to synthesize what happened: Gianna was the worst dog at Growly Class.

We felt good going into classes because we took her to the training facility a week in advance so that she could get familiar with the scene via doggy daycare. Of course, she was fine off leash and hardly wanted to leave.

Our seemingly clever prep work proved ineffective for class, like running a mile to train for a marathon. Gianna outright failed every task put in front of her. Mind you, the “tasks” were simple scenarios where she met the other dogs at a safe distance while on leash. Success was as simple as her not freaking out, but she continually freaked out.

The first task, standing by our car while other dogs and owners did the same, set the pace for the evening. She couldn’t handle it. She lunged and barked at other dogs she saw. When I pulled her back, she would nip at my shins and shoes like I was cattle. I’m planning to wear shinguards for the second class, seriously.

Other dogs progressed to a new trial where they were to walk down the parking lot aisle, something like a Soul Train dance line, while we struggled to keep her attention behind our car where other dogs were out of sight. The trainer took us inside to try a harness that provided better control and quarantined us in a corner of the room so that the other dogs could come inside without confrontation.

We remained in that corner of the room, near two other misbehaving dogs, for the rest of the evening. All that was missing was a dunce hat.

Gianna’s fundamental problem is that she struggles with “proximity anxiety” (she doesn’t like the distance limitations of a leash) and she “resource guards” (wants to protect us). That translates into behaviors where she lunges and barks and gets defensive of us when there are other dogs around. To help desensitize the leash trials, we’re supposed to pop treats in her mouth when she feels anxious as a way of saying “It’s OK.” At first, that worked, but the treats got old after the first 20 minutes. Hell, I can only take eating human candy for so long.

By the end of the hour class, I was exhausted from trying to keep Gianna in place and using a “happy voice,” Gianna was way stressed out and Amanda was on the verge of tears. We so wanted a glimmer of success in that first class but knew we had more work to do. Work continues at class tonight. Wish us luck!

Last night, we attended our first “Growly Class.”

We were already acquainted with the trainer, Deborah, through our private lesson, but this was the big meet-and-greet with our classmates. To minimize owner anxiety, this first meeting was “humans only.” It’s a smart tactic considering everyone in the class has dogs with medium to severe behavioral issues, and it’s easy to get defensive about your dog when it misbehaves. By meeting people first, you get on the same page in case your dogs are less friendly toward each other.

The meeting felt like a hybrid of dog training and group therapy.

To begin, we all took turns talking showing pictures and introducing our dogs. Many people had rescued their dogs so the histories, ages and breeds were guesswork.

Our turn: “Hi, my name is Paolo and this is my wife Amanda. Our dog is Gianna, and she’s a 6-year-old Collie.”

After reviewing some definitions of behavior issues and talking about cognitive psychology and B.F. Skinner, we got into another round of introductions about our dogs’ behavior issues. Amanda went after the guy whose Husky has bitten him hard twice.

“Well, Gianna is a really sweet little girl and didn’t care much about other dogs after we first got her. She plays well with other dogs that she knows, but she gets aggressive when she’s on a leash and sees dogs she doesn’t know. She lunges and growls and barks at them.”

I cut in, “She’s a couch hog.” Not my finest moment.

I’d like to think Gianna was on the lower end of behavioral issues, but she sounded fairly common compared to others’ stories. There are a couple dogs in the group that have gotten into major fights before, but that didn’t concern me. I went to Stadium High School, so I know what it’s like going to school where people get into fights daily.

During the rest of the session we learned about the importance of rich rewards, breaking up bad dog interactions, dog “zen” (basically getting the dog to relax and focus — dog-version of meditating) and masking or losing our own anxieties.

That last bit about anxiety was why we were all there dogless. This training session was for the humans. We all have good intentions for our dogs with issues. Unless we have confidence, our dogs won’t heed to us and build confidence.

So, we listened, reflected and built our own confidence as handlers, not much different from “sit” and “stay.” Next week, the dogs meet and we’ll get tested in our ability to take command.

The irony of it all is the high expectation we put on our dogs. They’re not people and people misbehave far more often without notice. How often do you swear or skip a chore? As much as this series of lessons will be about calibrating Gianna’s behavior, it will also be about resetting our expectations.

According to the Washington Trails Association, Green Mountain is the second highest peak on the Kitsap Peninsula. That’s not saying much as it tops out at just 1,639 feet, but over our 5 mile round-trip hike and 1,000-foot elevation gain, we broke a sweat.

We drove about an hour from Tacoma to the peninsula to the trailhead. Though rain has been light, mud was on the Gold Creek Trail that we took to the top. On the way down, we took Plummer trail, which was more dry and offered some great views of the Olympics. Enjoy the pictures!

I reduced balsamic vinegar and glazed it over baked tilapia. The salad was cherry tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, avocado and red pepper tossed with olive oil, garlic and light seasoning.

You know what sucks? Being a sixth grader and having a stranger tell you to start over with third grade math.

I couldn’t swallow the diagnosis at the time, and I cried about it on the car ride home. I felt embarrassed. I was attending a private school and told by those teachers that my learning was advanced compared to kids in public schools (which proved to be true). My parents literally paid for me to get ahead.

They also paid for Nina and I to attend a Kumon Learning Center for a short time to supplement and ensure academic success. For our first visit, the Kumon staff administered a timed test to place us in the program. I didn’t realize that the number of questions completed was part of the testing criteria, so I took my time rechecking each answer for accuracy. Based upon my slow performance, those bastards at Kumon told me to start over at third grade math. Nina received a similar demotion for her grade level, but I think she only cried about it to mimic my reaction.

I don’t remember how long we continued the Kumon program, not too long, but it helped me better master fundamental math and with speed. I continued with success on the math track from there — all the way up through calculus my senior year of high school — until public school culture influenced my decision to drop the math for “Independent Study – Jazz” (i.e. extra-long lunch hour). I rounded out math completing business calculus as an undergrad.

I give a lot of credit to all the teachers I now know as adults — Aunt Rhonda, Nina, Jeff, Keeley, etc. In my world, “multitasking” is responding to people on Facebook while taking a conference all and eating lunch. In their world, multitasking is keeping the order of their classrooms while figuring out how to get food for the kids whose parents didn’t get the reduced lunch form in on time. It’s encouraging the engaged students while disciplining the students who flipped them off.

The systematic failure of standardized academia continues to take the backburner while at the front of our minds and in the front lines on Wall Street people question why jobs aren’t available and leadership sucks. The answer is simple: We don’t have flexible education systems in place to develop the best minds and most capable leaders. I gave George W. Bush a bunch of crap when he was in office for a variety of reasons, but I credit his priority for addressing educational reform during his term. Of course, the system he installed went the opposite direction that education reform needed to go — more standardization. No Child Left Behind works as well as putting out a fire with gasoline, but at least he tried.

Enter Khan Academy. WATCH THIS VIDEO.

Anyone who gets Bill Gates’ approval gets mine.

If you have a child struggling with basic or advanced math, sciences or humanities, get them plugged in with that free educational platform. NOW.

In essence, Khan Academy appears to be similar to what I experienced with Kumon — do not pass until you’ve demonstrated mastery — except Khan Academy is scalable for any teacher, tutor or district to adopt and more convenient to access. At minimum, Khan Academy can serve as an education supplement like a Flinstone pill for the mind.

Broader adoption by school districts could be even more promising. As Salman Khan says in the video, the program can flip learning on its head. Instead of learning in the classroom and taking homework on solo, students can watch videos at home in advance or in the classroom at their own pace, as often as they need to, and work on the problem solving in the classroom with teachers and peers available for assistance. It’s all self-paced learning at a pace faster than programmatic lecturing and testing can produce.

At this point in the GOP primaries, I’m counting on Obama getting re-elected. I’m hoping that in his second term, Obama’s long-term economic plan is an educational reform that produces a generation of Americans that ask not what they’re country can do for them, but what they can do for their country. We don’t need policies. We need people who can invent, innovate and lead and develop their own companies and jobs rather than rely on government to do the work for them.

And I’m not talking about everyone becoming MBAs or Ph.D.’s. I’m talking about the college drop-outs like Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg who developed their minds outside the standard paths of learning and produced American economies around them as tangible as Bellevue and Palo Alto.

Long-term economic recovery won’t come from stimulus packages or tax breaks. It will come from brilliant minds fostered in classrooms and homes today. We’ve got to stabilize the foundation or the structure will continue to shake and fall.