Sunday Dog Walking

I've just came back from a walk with my dog, Zoe. She's a little West Highland Terrier, otherwise known as a Westie. I'm usually the one in my family who takes her for walks, feeds her and plays with her, but she's still the family pet.

For the past month or so, I've been taking her into a nearby field and letting her off the lead to run around and have a bit of freedom. She usually throughly enjoys it, and always comes home in a very relaxed mood and is content for the rest of the day. Today though, she was acting kind've peculiar. To get to the field, I have to walk with her right out of my neighbourhood and along a path on the main road. That then leads me into another small estate with the field just beside it.So I took Zoe here.

As we were entering the field, she kept stopping and tugging on the lead. I ushered her to come but she started to lie down and not budge. Each time I pulled her and commanded her to follow, she stopped and lay down in the field. Nevertheless, I wasn't going to allow her to have her way and control me instead of me being in control of her. So with some difficulty (she's a small dog, but quite strong and very stubborn) I got her to follow me deeper into the field. Once we began to walk further, I felt that she was getting more relaxed and was walking more consistantly. But, I was wrong. She continued to walk intermittedly and was obsessively sniffing every tuft of grass in the field! I kept saying in a firm voice, "Walk on." and she would, but only for another few feet. So I decided to put her lead back on and walk together around the perimeter of the field.

After a few minutes though, she got into the swing of things again, and started walking okay off the lead again. We had almost completed a full circuit of the field when I spotted an abandoned football. So I went over to it and started kicking it around, encouraging Zoe to play with it. She took no interest of it at first, but then, with persistence, she realised I was trying to play with her. I gently kicked the football towards her and she excitedly darted in the opposite direction. She was sprinting like crazy out of the field and towards tha main road. I was freaking out, yelling at her to stop and chasing after her. Before she got out though, I stopped her and clipped her lead on. I guess it wasn't really her fault though, she was just playing.

And then we walked back home. On my our way back I saw I police car stop another motorist. A policeman got out of his car and went over to the driver's window of the other. Didn't really nosy though. Wasn't my business.

I also saw the first bumble bee of the season. Rather early for them to be around I think.