8 State Hurricane Kate

Luck (or chance) would have it that Bandit injured himself on Sunday evening when we were out for a walk and play time. He went after the ball alongside the field fence, then turned back toward me, shaking his head. I thought that maybe he had been stung by an insect, but when I went closer to brush a perceived insect off of his face, it was attached. He had caught the skin just above his eye on a fence wire and peeled the skin back, leaving a piece of skin hanging loose. Yikes! He had a bald and bleeding patch of skin just above his eye. I guess we were lucky that his eye was ok, but I couldn’t imagine how he could have his face photographed the next day. After shaking his head a couple of times and letting me look at it, he went back to playing ball. His forehead was still bleeding and the loose flap of skin seemed to annoy him, but it didn’t seem like an emergency. I thought that if the loose skin was bothering him and making him scratch at the wound, I might trim it back once we got back to the house. But later I decided that maybe it could be stitched back together, so I put some antibiotic cream on it and otherwise left it alone. I couldn’t believe that he had taken this wound without making a peep. I’m sure I would have screamed if the skin over my eye had been peeled back, but he’s pretty tough! 

I called Barb that night to let her know about the wound. She asked me to send her a photo, but I decided to take Bandit to the vet in the morning to find out if the wound could be stitched back up. Barb told me that the Cargill shoot had been delayed until Tuesday, and that worked better for us. I dropped Bandit off with our vet on my way to work on Monday morning. The vet called me to tell me that he could stitch the wound closed, and I was glad that I hadn’t tried to trim the skin. When I picked Bandit up Monday afternoon, I could hardly see the wound. The vet had used stitches the same color as Bandit’s hair and the stitches looked like long eyelashes. Bandit was his usual happy self. He looked fine and we went home with some antibiotic cream to put in his eye. 

Monday night I sent photos to Barb and she said they were fine. We were still on for Tuesday. 

The photo shoot was outside and it was a nice, yet chilly, day. Chase went along with us (Barb said they might like to take a look at him too) and we ran into his friend Buddha at the photo shoot. Chase knows Buddha from dog day care at All Breed Obedience. Buddha was being photographed the same way Bandit was. The dog being photographed had to sit and look up at the camera while Barb held a delicious treat over his head. Bandit thought that was a great job! 🙂 He did very well, making their job fairly easy. He got invited back to do a video shoot on Wednesday after work. 

Wednesday evening we went to a studio in Minneapolis for the photo shoot. This would be a video for the Cargill website. Bandit had to sit, walk toward the camera when called, then sit looking up at the camera. I had to practice with him the night before since he has been trained to do the drop on recall for open obedience. I was able to teach him to sit when stopping, not lie down. I think it helped that we were calling him from a shorter distance. At the studio, we practiced once, then Barb decided to take over with Bandit. She had roast beef and Bandit thought that coming when called, then sitting and looking up with great interest at some roast beef was a great job! The challenge was to sit still and keep looking up in front of the camera for a while without trying to jump up and grab the roast beef before being released. Bandit did a great job and even took the treats gently. He enjoyed the star treatment under the lights while I lounged in the background. I was proud of him and how well he took direction. The crew liked him a lot and thought he was fun and easy to work with. What a good dog! 

This evening I tried to give Chase some extra attention since Bandit has been spending so much time with me. I sat on the floor and Chase sat in my lap. He was growly because Cay was doing “drive-by” approaches to my lap and Chase wanted to relax. Cay is clumsy and doesn’t always have control over what she crashes into. But by watching Chase, Cay learned how to lay down with her head on one side of my lap and be petted. She never sat still and let me pet her for that long before. 

Cay has to watch the other dogs to learn how to behave sometimes. I can see her really paying attention to mimic their behavior. Chase is used to hogging my whole lap, so I had to make sure he had his space too. Cay is starting to enjoy interacting with me and receiving affection more. Maybe that’s part of her growing up process. That wild look is starting to leave her eyes.