What's in a name?

It takes a while to adjust to family life with a puppy. We're still in that process. It's very much like having small children. Just as you've got used to one stage, they're on to the next. You can never relax and think you've cracked it (though foolishly, you do). For example, Hector's now getting more adventurous, and likes to wander off on walks, and won't come when I call, not even for a little lump of cheese. Not even for cheese! Cheese has always worked up till now. It's lost its magic overnight.

On the positive side, he managed the 400 mile drive to my mother's house, with only one stop at a motorway service station for food, water and pee, in exemplary fashion. He was in his crate in the back of the car, in total silence. I even wondered if we'd left him in the service station car park by accident. The great thing about travelling with a puppy, is that you don't have to listen to endless nursery rhyme CDs, or play I-Spy.

Hector spent three nights with a home boarder while we were away for New Year (cheaper than kennels, actually, before you think I've totally sold out on the dog comforts front). I think it knocked him into shape a little. He was rather subdued for a day when he came home. There was an older, bigger dog there, and it made him realise his place in the pecking order. I've got this dog psychology down, you can tell.

The woman texted me on the first evening, saying that he'd settled well, and that they'd enjoyed a walk, and how good he was on the lead for a puppy. My owner heart swelled with pride. "Good on the lead for a puppy" - yes!  I deliberately didn't get in touch for the next couple of days (he's a dog, not a child), but when I texted to make arrangements for picking him up, she texted back that he'd been doing fine, that they had loved having him, and that he'd been behaving "just as a puppy should". I thought that said it all. Bless her euphemistic heart.

8-yo was chatting to Husband the other day:

"Hector has lots of names, doesn't he? Mum and I call him Hector or Hectie. 12-yo calls him Heckipoo. 15-yo calls him Li'l Buddy. And you call him Foul Beast."

Here's a picture of him, getting on for 6 months old, in (somewhat uncharacteristic) reflective mood.

And here's the sign that hangs above his crate.

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