It was so hot here today that I was feeling like mush. When we can't be as active I'll tend to give Kody a bully stick so he has more to do. When we went outside I was fascinated that he did his usual behavior only more obvious. When I said, "come 'ere" with the leash in my hand, he looked at me and ran to get the bully stick. He then ran back, dropped it, and then the new behavior: he backed up as if to say, "ok, now you take it please". I did and then we went outside. I gave it back when we came back inside. There's something special about feeling like your dog is communicating with you. This interaction was totally created by Kody.
I know that I don't really know what Kody is thinking, but if I am doing him some sort of a favor by protecting his bully stick for him, then I'm really happy to be able to help him out in that way.
It was dark and there were some teenagers outside working on their car. I wouldn't say they were in any way dangerous, but maybe suspicious and Kody picked up on that. Plus he is still nervous about anyone outside when it's dark because we don't encounter that very often. His ears were back and his tail was down. So we went back in to get the hot dog bits. We started off right by our front door and did "look at that" until Kody seemed comfortable and then went down the stairs and continued training both closer and further away from the teenagers. Things went pretty well, I think as well as they could have gone. It was one of those "first time" situations so it's about starting a pattern, not being perfect, and I think we did that successfully.