Meet Cindy Jae

Early yesterday morning the girls and I hopped in the car and headed across town to meet this sweetheart.


For the next 14-20 months, Cindy Jae as her sponsor named her, will be under our care for training, socialization, and fun times.


Cindy Jae belongs to the Southeastern Guide Dogs school and will be returning there when her time with us is up to be trained as a guide dog for the blind. Part of our job is to simply teach her house manners and basic commands so that she has a good foundation for the school to build on. The most fun part of our job is exposure. We have to take her places so that she's comfortable in all kinds of different environments and situations.


When we picked Cindy Jae up, she was visibly exhausted and docile. We brought her home for a bit then decided that we would accept a friend's invitation to Monkey Joe's, a local place full of bounce houses and kids everywhere. Hey, she might as well jump right into the deep end and I figured she'd be pretty easy to handle since she was so tired.

We arrived at Monkey Joe's, took care of business outside, then put on her identification vest to go inside. We had to have a little talk with the manager who was a bit wary, but very nice and eventually let us in. It's amazing how being gracious and accommodating to others will often work in your favor. Do you want to see how our first outing went?

Here's Cindy Jae curled up in my friend's lap. Sleeping.


And here's Cindy Jae a little later stretched out in my friend's lap. Still sleeping.


The puppy did sit in my lap and look around for a little while before heading off to dreamland. All in all, I call it a complete success.

She spent the afternoon napping, then we headed out to replace the pet gate I bought (Cindy Jae fit through the cat door, rendering the gate useless). I put her in the floorboard by K's feet where she promptly...fell asleep. K stayed with her while I exchanged the gate, then we headed over to the SuperTarget to pick up a few groceries. This time, we brought Cindy Jae in. Even though I tried to get her to do her business outside, she waited until we were halfway through the store to pop a squat. So K took her outside, while I handled clean-up on aisle 8. Don't worry, I came prepared for such an emergency.

When we got home, C-Jae (which is what we've pretty much resorted to calling her, making her sound like a rap star) spent the rest of the evening falling asleep whenever she could. We'd wake her up and feed her. Wake her up and drag her outside. Yep, exciting times in the realm of puppydom.


She was still falling over tired when we put her in her crate for the night, but that did not stop her from whining and complaining...loudly...for awhile. I tried the tricks in the manual (both the old and the new) and nothing worked, so I finally just went to bed and she stopped on her own and slept quietly all night.

So what I've learned so far about puppies.

- It can take some time and a little walking before the puppy will actually go potty.
- You have to carry her outside in the morning, quickly, or she'll pee on the floor.
- Puppies will try to eat cigarette butts.
- Just like a baby, she'd rather play with (eat) the box than the chew toys inside.
- She's most active in the morning, which is my least favorite time of day.
- She sleeps the rest of the day. Something she and my cat have in common.

On the whole, C-Jae is very well behaved and is the absolute cutest, lovingest dog around.


And she's been sucking down water all morning, so we'd better head out for another walk.