I was home with my two sons today when my wife, Cindy called from work and asked if we could come meet her for lunch. The kids got dressed and we grabbed Joey's coat and went to eat. We picked up Cindy and went to Chili's. With Joey in an under, down, we enjoyed our lunch and discussed some Christmas plans. Cindy told me when we got back home, to take some nice pictures of Joey in front of the Christmas tree with a Santa hat on. Holy Great Expectations, Batman! It can't be done! We can take pictures of Joey, we might get nice pictures of Joey. We might even get nice pictures of Joey in front of the tree. But there in no way on earth that we are going to get any picture of him in a santa hat, let alone a nice one in front of the tree. Even if I would Photo-Shop the restraints out of the picture, the potential damage to the tree and our house prevents me from even trying this ridiculous stunt. But she was insistant on this, so we tried. And tried. And tried some more. Joey would have nothing to do with that crazy hat. I am not going to spend a lot of time trying to condition him to the hat. OK, Joey, relax. I put away the hat and grabbed some reindeer antlers on a headband. I was able to get him to sit, stay with those on just long enough to back out of the frame while my youngest son Colby was snapping pictures as fast as he could.
I am so embarrased.
Yes, Joey, you do look ridiculous, but we still had to have the pictures.
Before we had come home from lunch with mama, we stopped at a Walmart we hadn't been to before. We got Joey back into his coat and walked on in. I was surprised when I heard the greeter behind us trying to catch up with us. She was asking about Joey and I explained he was a guide dog puppy. She was asking me about his collar. She wasn't really making any sense, but was telling me that because they have food in the store, he has to have a special "medical" collar on. After not getting anywhere with her, I asked to speak to the manager. She then "let me off with a warning this time", but I better have the proper collar next time.
I wasn't able to speak to the store manager while we were there, but I did talk to him on the phone later. He assured me that was NOT the store policy. He knew exactly who it was that gave me the hard time. They have had this same problem with her a few times. They train her in proper procedures, but she has her own ideas about service dogs.
Don't worry Joey, that mean little old lady was just confused, it happens to a lot of us when we get old.
No comments:
Post a Comment