Callie and I were walking through the Lake Arrowhead Village on Sunday. As usual, Callie made lots of friends — both people friends and doggie friends. She even ran into Bub McCloughlin, the cadaver dog, again. Bub is a Golden Doodle, and Callie really likes him. They had a fun time sniffing each other and jousting doggie-style. Here’s Bub’s picture from the first time they met, a few weeks ago.
As we walked closer to the “Center Stage,” Callie created one of those “why did my dog do that?” moments. All of a sudden, she veered off the sidewalk and plopped down on the ground behind a cement wall.
At first, it didn’t seem to make any sense. I couldn’t imagine what she was doing. I assumed that she was sending me some kind of message, but I couldn’t imagine what it was.
So I started through my checklist of things to think about when trying to decipher doggie messages. One item on the checklist is “remember, dogs have very acute senses of hearing and smell.
That was a far as I needed to go. On the other side of the wall where Callie was lying, a rock band was tuning up for a Sunday afternoon concert. And, man, were they loud! The drummer must have been checking to see how loud he could get his drums. It took a minute, but I had broken the code. Callie was saying, “That music is way too loud for my sensitive ears.” She had nestled down behind the wall to protect her ears.
A dog’s behavior can be rich with messages. Sometimes the messages are obvious, but sometimes it takes a little detective work to figure them out.
