Random Fun in France

There have been a lot of things going on over here. I finally accompanied my children on a class trip, proving that there is some hope of redemption for every mother.

Each year the town hall organizes a cross country race and requires invites the children from all of the schools to participate.  

I was proud of my children because they chose to run for the longest amount of time for their age category. 15 minutes for my Young Lady (instead of 11 or 13) …

and 10 minutes for Young Knight (instead of 8 or 6).

They both ran really fast too!

Remember Young Lady’s “amoreux”? The one that has been faithful to her for two years and is already figuring out how he can support her in style?

Meet this cutie patootie – Viktor. Whenever he would run in front of Young Lady (because they ran in different categories), he sped up as he went by. I’m dyin’ over here about how cute that is.

Yesterday I went into Paris to see the dentist. And this is the courtyard in front of his office. If I have to go to the dentist, let it at least be in Paris. 

Then I met Amina for lunch in La Defense, where I used to live and where she still lives. Do you know La Defense?

I love it here. I’ll tell you about it one day. But they have cool stuff like swing sets for adults. Fun, huh?

And since she was making me lunch, of course I had to bring her favorite: Grande Mocha Blanc for some sweet encouragement. I’m sorry, but chic Parisian cafés have nothing on coffee at Starbucks – they just don’t make you feel at home in quite the same way. (I had already soaked in Paris enough at the dentist).

Today we took Hunter for training in the nearby forests. At first we let him roam free, playing with the kids and doing what he loves best – to run and sniff.

We were glad to get him started on his training because he had bitten Young Lady again. We were impatient to see the benefits of the pronged collar, and no longer had any qualms about the “cinema” (as the trainer put it) that Hunter would display when things weren’t going his way.

The plan was for the trainer to remind us of how it worked by demonstrating for 10 minutes before letting us take over. But Hunter didn’t submit in 10 minutes. In fact, he yelped and pulled and cried and resisted and remained stubborn for an entire hour rather than submit.

Our trainer, who we trust completely, not only because he comes highly recommended, but also because we can see that he has a way with dogs – that he loves them and that they seem to want to submit to him – was dismayed. He said Hunter seemed to have a stone in place of a brain. He wasn’t stupid or insane. He wasn’t mean, but he just plain didn’t want to do what he was told. We saw it with our own eyes. He resisted every single time.

So the trainer told us that we’ll give it a rest for a week, and then next week he won’t touch the dog himself, but will let Sir try the training to see if there is any complicity between Master and Dog that will inspire him to submit.

But if, after the second lesson, he remains stubborn, the trainer suggested that perhaps he’s not the dog for our family of young children – something we had been guiltily wondering ourselves. And that seems like such a tragically random thing after all the emotions engaged in adopting a new member of the family …

and not at all fun.

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