Dog's Mind

It's hard to imagine what a dog is thinking - but I guess if I could put it into 1 word thoughts - like "Bacon!!!" (Funny that a friend just came by my desk and said "coffee!?!" but I was distracted so he had to say it again "coffee!!??") Some may be phrases and we could include the words/phrases we teach them to their "vocabulary". So what words might be in my dogs' vocabularies?

First there's the words we taught them that I could think of:

• Sit
• Stay
• Lay down
• Shake
• Whoa
• Heel
• Mine
• No, uh uh, anch, or stop
• Water
• Dinner
• Prize
• Inside
• Outside
• Go on or get
• Go get it
• Where is it
• Drop it
• Good or good dog
• Bad or bad dog
• Get out of there
• Don't eat that
• Get down
• Sweet dog
• I love you
• Go to bed
• "Oh boy" which means 'you're getting a new toy'

I'm sure they also have a pretty good idea on many words we didn't mean to teach them. Maybe even a couple of bad ones.

And then here's some that are my own made-up, respresentative words for what I guess to be their thoughts:

• Mom!
• Dad!
• The Park!
• Somebody at the door!
• What was that?
• Look, a bird! (they are pointers)
• Can I have this?
• Can you let me out?
• Play fetch?
• Another dog
• Look what she's doing (this thought seems to be only Obie's - he tells on her)
• Thirsty
• Hunger
• Tired
• Bored
• Anxious

I really have no idea how they think - I'm writing this to help me figure out my theory. Maybe their thoughts are more basal like emotions are to us. But I do know their logic is pretty involved. I've seen them solve problems in pretty clever ways.

When we got Obie at 6 weeks old he loved to bite at everything that was in front of his face, including your fingers if that's what was there. Dick Russell, our dog trainer told us to fill up a little water gun with straight vinegar and spray him in the mouth (and only in the mouth) when he goes to bite. This definitely worked.

The worst time he had with getting out of the habbit was when we came home from being away - he was just so excited to see us. So, in order to break his habbit of biting us - he started a new habbit (has this dog been reading Franklink-Covey books?) - he started grabbing a toy and greating us with a toy in his mouth. He likes to get as many as he can, sometimes 3 all in his mouth. It's hillarious. I can't figure out any other reason he started that except to solve his problem of wanting to bite at us in excitement - he just bites the toy instead.

When Lanie came along, she would never play bite like that at all, but she did see Obie great us with the toys so she does it too, although 1 is enough for her. Lanie's greeting is a riot because for some reason she squints her eyes at you when she does it, her whole back half wags back and forth real big and she looks up at you with the toy in her mouth and her eyes almost shut they're so squinted. She does this same thing when either she gets in trouble for something, or Obie does, or our conversation turns any at all heated - she does not want to hear Mom and Daddy fight.

I'll keep my eye out for more kinds of logic they use and maybe one day have enough to put together a theory on what's different and the same about the way we think. It may even interest me enough to look around and see what the real scientists are saying about it.

Where a dog's personality comes from

Bear was my Australian Shepard mix - he was with me from 1992 till 2004. He was so incredibly good and everyone who met him noticed he was something special. I'm grateful my wife (in picture) got to know him; her and I met in 1999 and lived together shortly after. It wasn't long before she loved him as much as I did. There were so many peculiarities to him that would make us laugh. We talk about him still and laugh a lot.

He passed away in '04 and we were totally crushed. It was extremely hard to say the least but we stayed positive, which mainly means remembering to be grateful to have had him instead dwelling on the loss. When you get a dog, you know you're going to go through that so you have to decide if it's worth it and it certainly is.

But even so, it took us 2 years to get another one. Enter this little one:


His name is Oberon or we call him "Obie". He's just totally awesome.

Obie is so much like Bear it's unreal...it's just uncanny. So many little habits that are the same and so many of those peculiarities. We've said he is Bear reincarnated but in all seriousness I don't believe in that. But I do think there's something going on there and it's given me a lot of food for thought.

But there are also major differences - obviously there are parts of a dog's personality that are a product of the breed while there are also aspects that develop as a result of being around us. Bear was a herding dog while Obie is a bird dog and those 2 distinctions are obvious mainly in their favorite play. It's like these aspects that are different only come out when they are at their full-out play/work mode. When they are/were just sitting around and socializing they act the same.

I think it's fascinating to consider. We have a female now too - Lanie and she is very different personality-wise. I wonder how much of the difference in her is being female and how much is being the 2nd dog in the house. We had Obie for a few months by himself and I think that's the biggest difference in their personalities - when she came into the house, he was already there which made her different.