Mostly Maggie at Doggy Day Care

by Barb Norris

  ~ An Unsound Test ~

  My granddaughter, Rachael, was working on a junior high science project. We both thought it might be interesting to study the camp dogs in action. Rachael would have recordings of various common sounds a dog would hear over a period of time. A fire siren, a train, a train whistle, a car horn, and several other sounds were included. Rachael would stay out of sight and play the recording. I would be in the playroom monitoring the dogs and reporting individual dog reactions to her. This little adventure could create quite a stir with the dogs. Was I crazy to instigate possible bedlam? I told her this was something that would definitely require prior approval of the camp.

  I explained the project to Kate, mentioning that Rachael would like her dog, Bandit, to participate along with all the other dogs. Kate trusted my judgment as to Bandit’s health and temperament. When she gave us the go-ahead I thanked her. Maybe Kate was crazy, too?

  I called Rachael with the good news, and we picked a day when there would most likely be the highest number of dogs in camp. She immediately began collecting her test sounds and creating a chart for each of a possible dozen dogs that would be in the large playroom. These charts would be labeled with type of dog, a list of all the sounds played. For each sound her charts also included a numbering system from one to ten that would indicate the level of response from each dog. She had allowed space for comments as well. She was very organized and very thorough.

  The big day arrived. The test was set for mid-afternoon. I was curious about which dogs would be there to participate in the project. I soon found out.

  Snowball came in. I didn’t know if that would be good or bad. Given her meltdown experience with the roof workers, I wasn’t sure how she would react. These test sounds would be mostly familiar sounds and wouldn’t be nearly as loud as the roof noises. Maybe she would take it all in stride. I hoped so.

  Then Maggie came in. I wasn’t too concerned about her freaking out and she should be just fine. Bonnie and Clyde showed up. In came Cedric and Duchess. I didn’t expect any of them to have much of a reaction to much of anything. Well, maybe Clyde would react a little.

  Lady came in, and I was sure she would be inquisitive about the sounds. She was followed by Scally and Wags. Now these two could prove interesting. As rambunctious as they both were and as vocal as Wags was, these two might set off a chain reaction if the noises struck them just right. Just wrong?

  Boomer was the last to arrive. I expected him to give Rachael the biggest reaction of any of the dogs. He was so curious about everything I figured he’d be running the room perimeter looking for the sounds. Late in the morning in zipped Hotshot. He was another one I thought would react big time.

  Bonnie and Clyde were in a corner ignoring everybody. Duchess went to her post at the door. Cedric meandered around the room, stopping long enough to give Snowball a quick greeting. Snowball greeted Lady. Boomer and Maggie were dashing around in a race.

  Scally gave a thought to pestering Duchess, but thought better of it. He was still miffed at her spurning his earlier advances. Wags was trying to get in on the race and barking full tilt. Speedy little Hotshot was zooming after all the runners and jumping up in their faces at every opportunity. A pretty good group on a pretty normal day. I was confident this would be a great group for Rachael’s science project sound test.

  Noon arrived and we crated up, fed, and watered our furry charges. They all settled down for the two-hour rest time. After standard room cleaning and other nap time chores, I headed home to check on Toby. My daughter, Jenni, Rachael, and my grandson, Anthony, were due to arrive at camp at three o’clock or so. I had plenty of time to get back over there for the big test.

  I headed back to work, arriving about ten minutes before my family showed up. I was happy to see the morning dogs were still at camp, and as a bonus, Hot Shot had come in. We set up it all. There were no dogs in the smaller room. Rachael, Jenni, and Anthony would play the recordings from there, out of sight and silent. They were hiding just inside the Dutch door separating the rooms, the top half of that door open. Kate was with them. If Rachael needed to say anything, Kate’s voice was familiar to the dogs and would not cause an unwanted distraction.

  Three other counselors had graciously volunteered to help and were in with the dogs and me. We had all been assigned specific dogs to watch. It wouldn’t hurt to have extra hands available in case any of the sounds caused a big commotion. Counselors would identify the dog and his reaction and Rachael would record it. Boy, we were ready.

  I brought Bandit into the room. The one thing that had never occurred to anybody was that Bandit might not be comfortable with the camp dogs. She was a real sociable dog, and we all thought she’d be happy to race around. Naturally all the campers zipped over to welcome the newcomer. Bandit hated it from the get-go. Hoping she would get over the doggy introductions and join in, I tried to get her away from me and interested in playing. It didn’t work. As soon as she had an opportunity, she split away from the regulars and stuck herself to my leg, quite determined to stay there for the duration. The campers decided she wasn’t worth any more of their time and went off to do other things.

  Rachael and her assistants might have been totally out of sight, but Bandit knew exactly where they were and sort of nudged me in the direction of the small room. Because she was so nervous, I went along with her, figuring I could relay information on the other dogs just as well from that point. She quietly whined, wanting to rejoin her people. She eventually did settle down but would not have anything to do with the campers. That was a disappointment.

  The sound tape started rolling. Reactions from the dogs? There weren’t any. At least not enough to be of any value. The taped sounds were not loud enough. They were barely audible, in fact. I knew my hearing wasn’t what it should be, but I certainly should have heard something. I asked the other counselors, and they also had trouble hearing the tapes. Those sounds that they could hear were extremely quiet.

  The dogs, even with their hearing capabilities, didn’t take much notice at all. It was true they were all busy with normal dog games, but the recordings were exceptionally quiet and would have been too quiet even if the dogs had been sleeping.

  At the sound of the fire siren, Boomer tilted his head a fraction. Maggie stood still for about a second at the marching band music, but almost immediately went back to racing with Boomer. Hotshot was totally absorbed in pestering everybody he could and ignored any sounds at all. Duchess was too intrigued with watching the bottom of the door. From his vantage point on top of the bridge, Cedric was only interested in spotting Kate. Bonnie and Clyde were concentrating strictly on each other. Lady was looking for pets from the counselors. Scally was trying to decide if counselors would notice he was about to add water of his own to the drinking dish. Wags was barking his way around the room. Good ol’ Snowball was snoozing in her corner. Bandit was so intent on getting to her people beyond that door we could have fired off a cannon and she would have ignored it.

  Overall, I would have to say the big junior high science project wound up as a bust. The sounds had been so faint they were virtually ignored. At that point there was nothing we could do to improve things. We couldn’t up the volume.

  Rachael was understandably disappointed. The whole camp crew, as well as her mom and I, had been sure the project would be a success. When it wasn’t, we all sympathized with her. Geez, it had been such a flop that even Anthony, her little brother, felt bad for her.

  Rachael gathered up test gear and Bandit. She thanked Kate and crew for allowing her to give it a try. On a bit of a sad and unsuccessful note, my family and I left camp. On a much happier note, Bandit gladly left with us.

  Oh, well. The best-laid plans…

  ~ Where There’s No Smoke. . . ~

  There was no doubt it was going to be a busy, busy morning. We already had eight dogs scheduled for camp. These included Maggie, Boomer, Hotshot, and Sassy, four of the most active of the day campers. I was also expecting S
nowball, Duchess, Cedric, and Lady. This was a good bunch, especially on that day.

  There would a visitor from Corporate Headquarters as well. When a company official came, it was always good to have a fair to large number of dogs in the playroom. It was a good way to impress the big bosses. It was too bad the smaller room was not in use. That would have impressed Corporate even more. Oh, well. It was still an impressive group.

  Maggie was the first to arrive as usual. Snowball and Sassy came in right behind her and the three of them wasted no time getting down to some serious playing. Duchess and Cedric entered and headed to their normal positions. Duchess took guard duty at the bottom of the door and Cedric on top of the bridge. Lady came and joined Maggie and Sassy in a chase around the room.

  In came Annie, a Chocolate Lab. Annie was an avid ball player and would chase a thrown ball as many times as someone would throw it. I didn’t have to worry about puncture wounds when I played ball with Annie. She always stuck to the rules. She also played pretty well with the other dogs. She was very affectionate and well-behaved.

  Tawny, a Golden Retriever and Annie’s housemate, came in with her. Tawny loved everybody. Once inside the playroom, she ran around to greet all her buddies. Tawny loved to play, loved to jump up on the bridge, and jump right back down again. Greetings out of the way, she was up on the bridge, down off the bridge, up on the bridge, down off the bridge. She was obviously happy to be at camp.

  Oh-oh. First clean-up of the day.

  In came Boomer. He zipped over to greet me, ran over to Maggie, zoomed across to Sassy, and dashed over to Duchess, moving so fast that Duchess didn‘t even have time to give him a grumpy growl. He galloped over to Annie, got right in Cedric‘s face, rushed over to Lady, and checked in with Tawny. Tawny jumped up on the bridge, displacing Cedric, who trotted over to Duchess. Boomer jumped up on the bridge, displacing Tawny. Then he jumped off the bridge, giving my arm a sloppy slurp in greeting as he raced past.

  All the dogs were extremely busy, and Maggie was the first to notice that Spike Weimaraner had arrived. She greeted him before anyone else even knew he was there. Spike W. was always full of energy. The rest of the big dogs spotted him, and he got a group welcome. There were dogs running all over the room.

  What a fun bunch this was. Our Corporate visitor would be happy to see all these dogs and all the activity. Even when we weren’t expecting visitors, I liked it when we were as busy as we were that day. There was never a dull moment on days like that. Then, this day turned out to be a wild one. It was about get even wilder. Hotshot came zipping in.

  Hotshot truly had no concept of size. He ran after Maggie, jumping up at her and barking in her face. Then he zipped away and went zigging and zagging in and out under the bridge. Sassy tried to follow him, but couldn’t keep up. Hotshot charged Boomer and Lady and Annie and Tawny. He feared nothing. Not one of the big dogs could keep up with him. He was so quick and so small, he could get anywhere faster than anyone else. He absolutely could not be still for a minute.

  Things were moving right along. All the dogs were active and were getting along well. It was a good time for me to head out for my break. As I walked through the store, I got a whiff of a peculiar odor that hadn‘t been noticeable in the camp area. I didn’t give it much thought.

  After my break I headed back. At the door to the camp area, I met a customer with a dog to be groomed and a baby in a stroller. I volunteered to hold her dog and the door. We were about half way through the entry when Kate came up behind us. She very calmly and very quietly informed the customer and me that we were evacuating the building. There seemed to be a fire somewhere in the store. That explained the smell. The customer wheeled the stroller around, took her dog, and left the building. Customers were quickly and quietly being evacuated.

  Kate and I hustled into the playroom and informed the counselors the fire department was on its way. There was no smoke visible. We couldn’t see any flames, but the smell was stronger now and definitely identifiable as something burning. It had reached the playrooms and was getting stronger by the minute. We had to get all the dogs, eleven from day camp and three from grooming, out of the building, and we had to do it calmly. There was no panic.

  It was quickly decided that the best route would not be through the emergency door in the smaller room that Snowball had tested for us early on. “Why not?” you might ask and rightfully so. There were a couple of reasons it made more sense for us to take the dogs out the front doors, a slightly longer path to safety.

  While we did have to evacuate the dogs quickly, there were no flames and there was no smoke. We were moving the dogs out based on a smell only. The dogs had sensed something was going on and had gathered together in anticipation of they-didn’t-know-what so they were already a little excited. Taking them out by a route that was familiar to all of them would cause the least amount of confusion. Those staff members not assigned to evacuating customers had also gathered in the camp lobby so dogs and people were in one area.

  We counselors put leads on all the dogs and handed them off to whoever was available. Camp counselors, groomers, and floor employees all pitched in. There was no discussion about who would take which dog. You took the one, in some cases two, handed to you and led him through the store and out to the front parking lot.

  I had two dogs on leads—Annie, the quiet Chocolate Lab, and the always lively Boomer. The General Manager came in and was ready to take a dog. For a split second, I actually thought about handing wild and crazy Boomer over to him. Before that thought was even fully formulated in my head, I came to my senses. That just wouldn’t be right. The manager was not at all familiar with wild and crazy Boomer. I was. I gave him quiet Annie, and I kept Boomer, who gave one quick tug on his lead. This got him an immediate reprimand, and he calmed down instantly. We headed out. Boomer behaved extremely well all the way.

  All of us cleared the building in organized short order. No panic. No confusion. No problems whatsoever. While these dogs were well behaved, they were all pretty rambunctious under normal circumstances. On this day they were all calm and obedient. They exceeded everyone’s expectations under highly unusual circumstances. Every single one of them was fully cooperating. Must have been The Tone.

  You would most likely recognize The Tone. It’s the one adults, mostly moms, use in emergencies, the voice that is never questioned, the voice that says, “This is serious, don’t give me any flack, just give me immediate response.” All of that is conveyed solely through The Tone Words beyond a spoken name are totally unnecessary to get instant attention and that attention stays focused until further instructions are given. It’s not something that can be pulled up at will. If there is not a true emergency in progress, The Tone simply doesn’t exist. A possible fire in the building qualified as a true emergency. It quickly became obvious that The Tone has the same effect on dogs as it does on children.

  We ended up on a grassy island in the parking lot. Kate, our manager, was always cheerful, calm, and efficient. She made the best of any situation. She was a gem. This particular morning was no different. Kate announced that we were on a field trip. She made everyone laugh and effectively got rid of any tension in both dogs and people. So we took advantage of being outside on our field trip in the sunshine for however long we would be out there.

  The fire trucks arrived almost immediately and the firemen went inside. Counselors, groomers, and floor staff were all out in front of the store, waiting to find out if we would be going back inside or if we would be out of work soon. We all wondered, too, if the evacuation plan for all the other animals in the store would have to be implemented. This decision would have to come from Corporate.

  The fire couldn’t have been too bad because the firemen allowed our General Manager and the visiting Corporate lady to go back inside almost immediately. That was good to hear. It meant the small animals, birds, and fish still inside the store were not in any danger. Word filtered down that we would be going back inside soon.


  A prospective customer pulled into the parking lot. He spotted the fire trucks and the group of dogs and people standing outside. He pulled over and stopped next to our furry group, rolled down his window.

  “Hey,” he hollered. “What are you selling, hot dogs?” He laughed like crazy at his own joke as he drove off. That made everybody chuckle.

  After forty-five minutes or so under the trees, we were allowed back inside. There had been a bit of a smolder going on in the overhead wiring but everything had been handled. The fire department left, and we all went back inside, high-fiving along the way.

  When we got everybody back into the playroom, it was right back to normal doggy bedlam. I took a minute to sit on the bridge with Tawny. Boomer zoomed up behind me, gave my ear a mighty slurp, and zoomed back down without dislodging either Tawny or me. Maggie came over and got a water bottle drink. Lady got a requested pet, Spike Weimaraner was running rampant, Sassy was trying to hide behind my knees again, Annie was after a ball, and both Duchess and Cedric were now studying the door. Hotshot was everywhere, and Snowball was sprawled out in her favorite lounge spot.

  Yep, it was back to normal.

  Corporate had to have been impressed with all of us, dogs and staff alike.

  ~ Small Room Happenings ~

  Polly, a Basset Hound, came into the smaller playroom. She was a very curious older dog and checked out the entire room with her Basset nose and her distinct Basset gait. She loved attention from the counselors, and we always obliged her. Polly wasn’t tremendously playful but she did get along well with other quiet dogs. Cedric and Duchess, given their choice of rooms that morning, had elected to join Polly and me. Bonnie and Clyde rounded out our quiet little pack.

  Duchess was doing her normal bottom-of-any-door sentinel duty. Cedric was surveying all he could see from the top level of the playhouse. From his perch in this room it was almost impossible for him to spot Kate as she went about the business of managing pet services. Cedric didn’t seem to realize that. He kept a watchful eye anyhow. Bonnie and Clyde were wrestling around a little with each other, and Polly was watching from her spot along the wall.