Number58

Today Harry’s world was turned upside down.

Literally.

The Guide Dog he fell in love with on Valentine’s Day came to stay.

Lacey is a seven year old Collie/Golden Retriever Cross and due to a medical condition is no longer able to work in harness. So she has taken early retirement and come to live with us at Number 58.

Harry and Lacey

This week Harry has been back to a regular routine of training walks in town and travelling by car and public transport. He’s made another couple of car journeys up to the North East with us and even sampled the delights of a motorway service station.

Harry strutting his stuff at the motorway services

Over the last few weeks Harry’s confidence has increased even more – he’s now got to the stage where he can walk past another dog and not turn a hair. Quite a change from the young pup we had that used to lie down and pretend to be invisible if there was another dog within 50 yards. He seems to be much more comfortable in his own skin now and ready to take on any challenge that might come his way. He no longer jumps when a loud motorbike passes him by and roadworks are now seen as to be something to be navigated, rather than fearful of. Harry also now takes himself off to his basket in the evening when he’s tired, rather than wait for us to tell him to go to bed. He’s just so grown up!

All of these things means that our job is coming to an end and Harry is ready to take the next step on his journey to becoming a qualified Guide Dog. And that next step is looming pretty large on the horizon – a few days ago we received that phone call, the one that all puppy walkers dread – Harry’s date for moving on to training school.

Harry will leave during the first week in May, probably on the 5th, which means he now has only a little less than 3 weeks left here with us at Number 58.

Not that he knows, or even understands, he’s just been too busy enjoying the beautiful spring weather.

Harry sitting in the middle of a patch of daffodils

Today the weather was absolutely glorious, so after a walk round town we took Harry for a quick visit to the woods to see the bluebells – only when we got there we discovered we were probably about a week too early as there were only one or two in bloom. Instead were were met with the overpowering odour of wild garlic but Harry didn’t seem to mind, in fact, he seemed to love it and constantly stopped to sniff the air in delight.

After all his posturing in the mirror recently he has finally decided which is his best side and insisted on posing, in fact, he wouldn’t move from this spot until his photograph had been taken.

Harry strikes a pose

While Harry was busy helping us spring clean he stopped to have a good long look at himself in the mirror.

He just really couldn’t decide which was his best side.

Harrys checks himself out in the mirror

Spring cleaning is well and truly under way here at Number 58 and this year we have a special little helper. This particular little helper insists on taking lots of breaks and always in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Guess it’s just going to take longer than normal this year.

Harry lying on the bed cover

Spring has definitely arrived and Harry is taking every opportunity that he can to bask in the warmth of the sun.

Harry among the daffodils

Harry has had another week of turmoil in the house – the builders have been back. Harry was delighted to see them and greeted them at the door like long lost friends.

This time, the work to be done was upstairs, so Harry’s bed in the kitchen was left undisturbed, but Harry wasn’t interested in his bed – he just wanted to help upstairs. He didn’t make a nuisance of himself, was totally unfazed by all the banging noises and was quite happy just to watch, but he had to be where the action was. He was so comfortable with what was going on that we half expected to see him passing tools to the builders when they were needed.

Harry, the builder and their shared tools

This week Harry also got to go on a brief trip to the Lake District where we met up with our previous pup Alfie. The pair of them had a great time together and Harry loved every minute.

Harry and Alfie - both posing for the camera

Although Alfie is still only 2 years old, he is now a fully qualified working Guide Dog and appears to be so grown up. Harry was totally in awe of him and copied everything he did. On our walk in the afternoon Harry carefully watched Alfie cock his leg against a tree and then immediately copied him. This was a major milestone, as up until now Harry has still been curtseying like a girl and we struggled to stifle our cheers and amusement,

As far as Harry was concerned, this trip was definitely the highlight of his week, he even got to go swimming with his hero.

Harry and Alfie swimming together in the lake

While preparing the video of Harry for yesterday’s post he suddenly stopped playing with his toys and came to investigate where the sound of chirping birds was coming from.

Once he realised the laptop was responsible he insisted on getting up close and personal, and that’s when he saw himself frolicking about on the screen. To say he was fascinated would be an understatement. We had to re-play that video at least ten times before he was satisfied.

He was probably checking to make sure we had filmed his best side.

Harry watching the laptop

It may have been the fact that it was someone else’s garden or it may have been the heady scent of spring on the air, but yesterday Harry did a fairly passable impersonation of a spring lamb.

And all because of a tiny piece of twig – he just wasn’t sure if he wanted to chase it, eat it, bury it or toss it on the air.

It wasn’t just Alfie that Harry got to play with on our recent trip to the Lake District, he made a couple of other new Guide Dog friends too.

From left to right – Harry, Maggie, Alfie and Simon.

Harry, Maggie, Alfie and Simon

You can totally see how much Maggie is impressed with the three young bucks all trying to vie for her attention.

She got so fed up with all their attention seeking behaviour that she lay down on the grass and hoped they’d all just go away.