Today was again going to be a very long one. We went into Portland to work on routes in the morning. Nothing special here. We did stop at a Goodwill and walked around inside. Harold did well here. He is still having a bit of trouble with moving right turns but it is something we are working on.
In the afternoon we split into two groups. I was in the first group so right after lunch we went to the vet for Harold’s last checkup. We also reviewed his medical profile. He is quite the healthy boy. His weight was 68.6 pounds (unchanged from the last time he got weighed). Harold and I then went outside and did overhead work. He had a bit of difficulty with this but admittedly it is the hardest work for guide dogs to master and frankly the routes I take generally are overhead free (most of the time). I am not trying to make excuses but this will come in time and experience.
Then we did a 30 minute clicker session with Sioux and Molly. We taught Harold to find empty chairs. It seems quite the tool to use indeed. He got it down very quickly. The trick in all of this is to make it like a game. We will go out on Wednesday and do more clicker work. This will happen on Wednesday morning.
After this we went back to the lecture room and heard a lecture from the vet. I honestly had a hard time keeping awake. I did record the vet visit earlier in the day, the clicker training and the vet lecture so I have it to review for later. I don’t think I fell asleep completely but my head kept bobbing. I think I need a week just to recover from the hectic schedule. I am glad work is coming, it will be relaxing compared to the very busy schedule here (not that I am complaining).
After dinner we loaded into the busses and went on another night route. Harold did absolutely perfect on it. I took Mobile Geo with me for this one sense we had to do these alone. I really didn’t need it but it was nice to hear the intersection crossings as I approached them. We got home close to 9:00 or so, and man was I ready to crash.