The weight of responsibility....

"By now, everybody knows I have an Understudy. My 6th (that's 42nd in dog years) birthday is coming up in March. The Understudy will be 6 months old (or 3 and a half in dog years) by then. It'll probably take him till he's 2  (14 in dog years) to learn to be a gundog proper but by then I shall be 8 (56 in dog years) so he'll have to be fit to work by then to take some of the load of me -- She who must be obeyed tells me this and I suppose I have to believe her since I only know what I know now. Based on today's experience however, I think he's gonna be a serious member of The Bestest Gudog's Team well before that. It's my job to guide him in the right direction to achieve that.

 He's just a few days over 5 months old and till today has never left home territory. However, I had to go to the Vet to have a check-up on my sore paw so we took him along for the ride! Well, he needs worming and for that needed weighing and She thought it was easiest to use the vet's scales to do that.
She was a little worried about his lead behaviour: at home till now he's always wriggled and squiggled and fallen flat on the ground after a few steps. Well, he sat in the back of the car and waited as told till She put his lead on and then he got out and walked beside me (like I told him) all the way to the Vet's in a totally straight line. Then he sat still in the waiting room(beside me like I told him) as if he'd been there boring times before. After being weighed (14.65 kg , - and thanks for asking, my paw claw is healing up nicely as long as I don't go back to work this season... but that's another story) we took him for a walk around the market place and - apart from staring at some strange looking people (well, he's too young to have learned discretion) he behaved (following my example scarily accurately) like a Grown Up Dog. After that he was allowed to go into the animal feed merchant store without me and, again, he behaved (and he found some goody treats someone had dropped on the floor so now he thinks that's the reason for going into the store.....).  He won't carry on learning at this speed - that'd be too scary - but for now She and Me are both optimistic that he's gonna be worth having around for hunting, flushing and 'trieving. The best bit was, cos He was so good, She bought us both a Special Treat (him for behaving so well and me for showing him so clearly). Being a Mentor to the Understudy is a big responsibility but a chap could get used to this.
Meanwhile, he starts proper school next month.... then we'll see what he's really made of...."