Anatomy of a Walk

I walk the dogs during the day five days a week. They are incredibly spoiled dogs. They get (on average) two one hour walks a day with a significant portion of those walks being offleash so they can frolic and roll in gross dead carcasses. Bad, smelly dogs.


Walking the dogs with Will takes a bit of planning. I hook the dogs to a coupler to a leash to a scarf tied around my waist. Then we roll outside with the stroller. It's very important that the dogs be behind me or to my side. I trust Rocky, our older fellow, completely, but our other dog, Tony is still an adolescent and is prone to puppy-brain moments. When we see another dog approaching us or a person or an interesting leaf on the ground I go all Cesar Milan on his ass and grab him by the collar. He's been stellar so far but I can't keep the vision of Will's stroller rolling down the hill without me while the Benny Hill chase-theme plays in my head.

I first get myself ready- shoes on, sunglasses, hat, outerwear, etc. Then one by one I call the dogs to me to be leashed.

We have a couple of routes that are mostly on pavement, this is not nearly as fun as pre-pregnancy walks, which were mostly in the park down the street, but we'll get there. Will needs just a month's more head control before we can put him in the jogging stroller.

Once the dogs are on the coupler, I get the stroller ready, and then Will. He gets a hat and his Mon-Chi-Chi outfit. We have limited time to do this before he starts to fuss.

The weather has been phenomenal lately, sunny and cool without too much wind. If it's windy or too cold we don't walk, but we've been blessed with a mild winter and spring so far. I hope it doesn't mean that it will be a balls hot summer.

The dogs go outside first and I carry the stroller, Will and all down the four little steps from our door to the walkway. I unlock the break, snap the dogs to the leash and away we go!

Tony likes to be slightly in front of Rocky. And Rocky will dive for smell opportunities if he's not between me and Tone. It's very ordered.

My view of Will's view.

Once we get to the offleash area, I ask the dogs to sit and then let them go. Rocky seems to be talking in this picture!



Off they go, whee!

Will enjoys the fresh air.


Water in the desert.

And when we get back to the road, the dogs are put back on the leash.


And home again. Good boys, everyone!