Fourth of July Chat

tacran

Sigh.  Good thing this is only a once-a-year holiday!

 

 Lucky us!  We actually get this twice a year.  The second Thursday in May is "Celebrate Davis" Day, complete with fireworks.  The first year they did that (about 5 years ago) there were some really, really PO'd people.  They were prepared to deal with their dogs on the 4th. of July, but nobody was expecting fireworks in the middle of May.  At least in May it's not usually as dry as it is in July.

Joyce

 

My Samoyed was terrified of fireworks, so I've experienced that pacing, frantic situation before. I didn't know anything about how to deal with it, so we just rode it out with her. That might be when I really came to hate 4th of July though.

Watching a recording of the Tour de France and wishing I was in some of the beautiful places they're showing. The Alabaster Coast looked amazing.

Cathy, if Shane isn't showing any fear at fireworks, storms, etc. it's the perfect opportunity to reinforce him for not being afraid of those things. With gun dogs we always did this with dogs from puppyhood on and therefore most dogs were pretty bulletproof for life.  Dogs can still become fearful later on in life due to a very scary experience but it helps a lot to make fireworks and other loud noises signals that something good is coming.  I wish I'd done this with Twister instead of allowing him to be startled and  frightened by gunshots when he was a puppy.  :(  It's so much easier to avoid a problem than to try and overcome it once it happens.  Belle, Rex and Gabby are oblivious.  Well, Rex isn't oblivious he actually gets super excited and barks at fireworks and thunderclaps but not in a fearful way.

Maze loves to watch the fireworks. You can see them from my house, so we'd make popcorn and watch them from our living room. But no fireworks this year for Canada Day...

 I took Luke out his first year and shoved him full of treats. Nobody here cares. I think they just take the cue from him. It was funny last night. The neighbor's dog got upset by some fireworks. We live in a townhouse, so you can hear the other dogs barking. Our dogs slept right through the fireworks, but Luke heard her barking. He didn't even wake up completely, but just sort of grumbled a bit and went back to sleep.

The fair was pretty good, but the parking this year was horrible. It's usually 15 minutes home from where it is held. It always takes longer during the fair, but this was the worst ever. We didn't move in the parking lot for an hour and a half after the fireworks ended. I had actually brought 5 bottles of water with. Not little plastic disposable ones, but two Nalgene bottles, another one the same size, and 2 other  20 oz. bottles. We drank all of those between 3 of us, and we ended up buying some sodas off the people who were walking around the parking lot selling them. When I was little, we used to park down the road and walk up. They also have buses to some parking lots. The past few years we've been parking on site, since my mom can't really walk up the road that far. We've  never tried the buses, but given how bad this was, we might just try it next time. My mom laughed at me bringing all those water bottles, but she was drinking my water while we were sitting there trying to get out.