No I did not turn into a rock.
Although Mom may have preferred that at the time.
I must admit to all my furiends that while
confident and brave in most situations (not including thunderstorms),
I have developed a fear of rides.
Yap, there Mom and I were just drivin down the road,
on our way to a park, and BAM! out of nowhere I freaked.
I came out of the back seat area, into the passenger seat,
then down to the floor and did my very best
to squeeze myself under Mom's feet.
:O
Fortunately, for both of us, Mom was able to keep me
on the passenger floor area long enough to pull over and turn off the ignition.
And then we sat there.
For a long time.
Finally, I was calm enough to get back in the back seat area.
Mom drove home with one hand on the steering wheel
and one hand firmly holding me and my collar in the 'down' position.
No park walkie that day. :(
Now my furiends, you are probably wondering
why wasn't I safely restrained in a doggy seat harness? Or a crate?
Well, in Seabiscuit (my truck), the bench seat has to be all
the way down in the cargo position as there's not enough room
for me on the seat or the floor when it's up. And the seat belts,
don't work when the bench is in cargo mode - so a doggy seat harness
wouldn't function right and it's not wide enough even in the cargo mode for my crate.
Now in the Toaster (my Honda Element SUV), I ride on the back seat floor.
I don't like the seats, they are uncomfortable!
So, no doggy seat harness. And my crate doesn't fit here either.
Mom says she has no idea why all of a sudden,
after more than two years of riding calmly in our vehicles,
did I suffer a major freakout.
I don't really know either as nothing bad has ever happened on my rides.
No wrecks, only fun places to go to, nothing had happened that
either of us could point to and say, "Aha! That must have been what triggered it."
So, there would be no rides to anywhere on our bloggy break
until Mom figured out a way to keep me safely in the back seat
and hopefully calm.
After looking at all kinds of seat barriers,
Mom finally found a solution she thought would work for the Toaster.
And good ol' Amazon delivered it forthwith :)
See my tail's a bit blurry? Well that's cause I'm waggin! :D
Not only does this thing keep me safely in the back butt
it created a den like environment too!
And as long as the windows are kept rolled up
(Mom figured out that loud big trucks were causing me some anxiety),
I'm happy as a clam riding on the floor in my Toaster again :D
Hurray! We can go on walkies at the parks now! :D
(I'll tell you about some of my park walkies later.)
First, I have to tell you what Mom came up with for Seabiscuit.
As the Toaster isn't always available when we want to go for walkies,
we needed to find a solution for Seabiscuit too.
Well she searched and searched and searched
and found nothing, zilch, nada on the market that would work.
So she said to me that we were just going to have to make something.
I watched as she pulled out...
an unused section of grate from my crate
a bunch of different sized bungie cords
some clothes pins
an old sheet
and some old towels.
She gathered all these things and went out to the truck.
An hour or so later, she came back and got me.
This is what she made...
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Yes furiends, I now have my very own Redneck Ride Den.
I am such a lucky dog.
