FLDD's?

That would stand for Freon Leak Detector Dogs. Are there any? Is it even possible to train one?

I do not ask these questions idly. For SIX YEARS we have been struggling with a/c problems due to freon leaks that somehow our a/c servicing company can never find -- or, if they do find one, another springs up. We are now on our third compressor -- and there is yet another leak. If our service company can't find them, could a detector dog do it (assuming it would be safe for the dog. I have no idea whether or not would be the case.)?

Getting your goat(s)

Yesterday, while browsing in the Tyson's Galleria branch of Eileen Fisher (and, thankfully for my credit card balance, not finding anything I wanted to buy), I saw a poster-sized picture of a woman-owned business that intrigued me. The business was The Goat Patrol, owned by Alix Bowman in Durham, NC, which offers an environmentally friendly way to rid one's yard of plants that are overgrown or otherwise pose a problem. The Goat Patrol's modus operandi is to turn a herd of goats loose on those plants. The goats spend the day quietly grazing, with a trained goatherd to watch over them. At the end of the day, the plants are considerably fewer, if not totally gone. The goatherd loads the goats into a trailer and takes them back to the farm from whence they came.

Why would a clothing store feature such an enterprise? Because each year, Eileen Fisher bestows grants of $10,000 apiece to woman-owned businesses such as The Goat Patrol. The company also operates grant programs to help women and girls improve their images of themselves. More about both of these programs is here.

Yeah, yeah, yeah -- Allie's on page 60 ...

... and both Allie and I appear on pages 82 and 123. But even if we didn't -- and even if the author weren't a good friend of mine -- I'd still say buy. this. book.

I'm talking about Bonding With Your Dog: A Trainer's Secrets for Building A Better Relationship by Victoria Schade (Wiley). In a world where there's a whole lot of deadly serious information about how to train a dog--much of which is actually misinformation--Victoria's 201-page tome revolves about having fun with one's canine companion. And in service of that have-fun theme, she comes up with all kinds of creative ways to build person-pooch partnerships that become win-win situations for all concerned.

For example, suppose Fido sees a squirrel while the two of you are out for a walk. Do you pull back with all your might to prevent Fido from giving chase? Not according to Victoria, who suggests that the owner join Fido in chasing that fluffy-tailed rodent--after Fido performs a sit at the owner's request. The rest of the book contains similarly unorthodox ideas, such as walking at different times and on different routes each day to give your dog some variety, and hiding from your dog while in the dog park so that he'll learn to check in with you while he's romping with his canine buddies.

Of course, Victoria is a passionate proponent of the positive reinforcement training philosophy that I strongly believe builds better human-canine relationships. That philosophy permeates the entire book. But to her credit, Victoria also acknowledges that sometimes the implementation of that philosophy can be a little tricky, such as when she discusses the logistics of handling poop bag plus clicker plus treats plus leash plus dog when teaching the dog to walk nicely on leash. I still find that exercise tricky, but by following Vic's clear directions, I'm at least no longer feeling like the clumsiest kid in P.E. class -- and Allie has become much more mannerly on the leash.

Most of us add dogs to our lives not because we want to show how polite we can teach our dogs to be, but because we want to experience the joys of having a deep relationship with a non-human being. Bonding With Your Dog will show you how to build a partnership that allows you to experience those joys--and to have fun building it.

Just who were they thinking of here?

In today's WaPo is a mostly heartwarming article about the efforts of a rescue group to re-hab and re-home six Foxhounds who were badly burned and more than a little frightened after a fire at Red Hill Farm, owned by Fairfax Hunt, a hunt club in Fairfax County, Virginia.

Unfortunately, one paragraph in that piece stood out in stark contrast to the rest of the article, which lauded the fact that Lost Dog Rescue and Fairfax Hunt have worked together to care for the traumatized hounds. Fairfax Hunt's Master of Hounds, Joseph Keusch, admitted that there'd been some tension with Lost Dog Rescue, in part because "... a national foxhunting association ... wanted the [Fairfax] hunt to retrieve the dogs [from Lost Dog Rescue] to avoid negative publicity from animal rights activists."

IOW, the national organization was putting its own convenience ahead of the welfare of the dogs who were in need of the care and attention that prompted Fairfax Hunt to work with Lost Dog Rescue in the first place.

Nice.

Taking the easy way out

A couple of weeks ago, an uncharacteristically insipid review by WaPo's Jonathan Yardley of Michael Schaffer's new book, One Nation Under Dog, prompted me to get my rant on. I was incensed at Yardley's using the book to get his rant on about what he considers to be excessive spending on companion animals by the pet-owning public--even though he acknowledged having willingly parted with substantial chunks of change to care for his own beloved dogs. Other reviews take a similar tone: that Schaffer's book is a long-overdue indictment of pet owners' misplaced priorities.

Much to my surprise, I received an email the following day from Mr. Schaffer. I'm honoring his request that I not publish that email, but I think it's fair to say his note prompted me to buy the book myself and make my own judgment. I did wince over the back-cover accolades, one of which called the book "a masterwork of comic sociology," while another proclaimed that the book holds "a mirror to our pet-obsessed culture." The author bio on the inside flap didn't help, either: after saying where Mr. Schaffer and his family live, the bio says that the author and his family "insist that their own pets ... are not freakishly pampered."

Oy.

I'm not disputing that pet-keeping takes on some extreme forms. How could I: I've lost count of the number of newspaper and magazine articles, in addition to book reviews, that screech about such excesses. And for the record, I:

-- do not dress Allie in any clothing. I even take off the kerchief and occasional hair bows that her groomer bestows on her. If I didn't, she would try to.

-- do take Allie to that groomer every six weeks or so. Given that Allie weighs 70 muscular pounds, and that I weigh only about 30 not-s0-muscular pounds more than she does (especially since I've been recovering from this adventure), paying for a monthly doggie spa date seems to me to be a prudent investment. That said, I brush her several times a week, clean her ears weekly, and do all the other maintenance stuff that good canine stewardship requires.

-- get Allie's food from this company and pay a hefty price for doing so. But I'd rather pay that money to keep my golden girl healthy than to treat near-continuous ear infections brought on by her allergies to common dog food ingredients such as chicken, beef, wheat and corn (the latter can also be difficult for dogs to digest and may affect dogs' behavior, as this article by trainer Robin Bennett points out).

My foregoing disclaimers, not to mention the one that ends Mr. Schaffer's book-flap bio, probably seem a little defensive. And no wonder: all those cultural scolds who criticize animal-related financial outlays cause many of us to feel that we have to defend those outlays. But to laud or criticize One Nation Under Dog on the basis of those excesses is to miss the book's essential point. Unfortunately, that point doesn't begin to emerge till page 250, when the author reflects on why he finds himself returning to a pet bereavement group long after he'd completed his research on that group for the book:

"I'd started doing my research on the new pet world--way back when--feeling mainly bemused about how I'd been sucked into the universe of dog walkers and pet hotels and veterinary antidepressants. I thought of it as a chronicle of absurdities, albeit absurdities in which I was a participant ... My early expectations of the pet bereavement group, in particular, had involved crazy cat ladies rather than sophisticated grievers ... [But] I realized after a while that I was coming back again and again as a sort of communion ... talking about pet mourning turned out to provide rare moments of genuine, thoughtful sharing."

By the end of the book, the author concludes that "pets and how we treat them, are a public reflection of our deepest human values" -- in other words, something far more important than what drives all those rants and ravings about pet lovers' fiscal and other choices. But in choosing to use One Nation Under Dog as a springboard for such criticism, reviewers have done the book a disservice. In the end, to my surprise, the book's a far more thoughtful and balanced treatise than those reviewers indicate. Those reviewers took the easy way out: they went for surface instead of searching for what the author was really saying. The author may bear some responsibility for the path that those reviewers took, particularly if he was the person who crafted his back-flap bio. In any case, though, I wouldn't have bothered to read the book if the author hadn't found a way to almost guilt me into doing so. And that would have been a shame.

Medical update: I saw my neurosurgeon this past Friday, who said I'm doing great and told me to "go live your life" -- which I fully intend to do (starting with a long overdue date with my hairdresser. Yo, Maryam: call me back. Please.)

Dear Mrs. Obama:

I'm sorry that Bo, your new puppy, is keeping you and the POTUS awake at night with his nocturnal antics. Certainly hearing a bouncy Portuguese Water Dog playing with his ball just outside your bedroom door is not conducive to getting a good night's sleep. And I can totally relate to your husband's adamant declaration last week that the Bo would not be sleeping in his bed. My husband feels the same way.

But my husband also understands that a dog, especially a puppy, is a social animal, and needs to be with his pack, especially at night. That means that the best place for Bo to be at night is in your bedroom. That said, he need not be on your bed. Talk to your hubby. Suggest that you bring Bo and his crate (you have one, don't you?) into your bedroom at bedtime. Put Bo in his crate with a chew toy. If he whines, dangle your fingers in front of the crate so he can sniff them. In short, give him the opportunity to share some space with you. You'll all sleep better.

Sincerely,

Susan McCullough

P.S. And if you and the POTUS feel a little frisky before bedtime or in the middle of the night, don't worry. Dogs are extremely discreet. Bo won't tell anyone what you guys were doing.

The Amazing ... Retrievers

I'm a big fan of CBS's The Amazing Race, the 14-seasons-strong reality show in which 10 or 11 teams of two contestants each have to negotiate various challenges in a race around the world. The incentive: $1 million for the winning team.

Last night's installment found the teams in China. During one challenge there, teams had to go by raft to the middle of a small bay, where one person from each team had to throw fish into the water for trained birds to retrieve. Yes, you read that correctly: birds. As one contestant noted, "If someone put filet mignon in my mouth, I would eat it, not hand it back."

Here is the clip. I don't know how those birds were trained (maybe I don't want to know), but I thought the challenge was very cool.

P.S. I totally thought that Keisha and Jen were playing dirty with Luke. Way dirty -- and not in a good way.