arf

I have been commissioned to get a dog for my mother. My father, who has vehemently, and in my opinion, somewhat unreasonably, opposed the acquisition of a dog for many years, seems to be folding a bit.

Mother has set the following parameters:

small to medium-small
nice
not poodle
female
not pekingese
young-ish
preferably black

Essentially, she wants to replace the dog we had from ~1980-1993 with a reasonable facsimile. My first instinct is to subcontract tiny_chicken to help locate a suitable wiener dog. Unfortunately, my mother is not especially fond of those. No accounting for taste. saturniidae specializes in the placement of canines too large for this application.

I must find out which of the local shelters are highly regarded. sadira, armed with a book borrowed from eeyrg, will help me assess the psychological health of potential adoptees.

conditioning

Fluffy has trained sadira to stand on a chair and hand-feed her pellets at the water's surface. Fluffy rewards her with an amusing spectacle of slurping, burbling, and splashing, which reinforces the behavior very effectively.