Cap’n Crunch is a Marathoner’s best friend
My wife, Kathleen, is participating in MM with me. I love her doing this with me. It is always great to have a partner, but even better when that partner is your life partner. However, we have a third partner who is finding it very difficult to follow the restrictions about running that Mark and Robin have given us. He just wants to run! And he gets soooo mad at us when we won’t run. Our third partner’s name is Cap’n Crunch and he is a pure black Pomeranian. We call him Cappy. (and yes, if you are wondering, he likes Cap’n Crunch cereal but that is not why he was named Cap’n Crunch.)
When our kids were little, we used to spell words so they wouldn’t know what we were saying.
Me – “Kathleen, where is the C-A-N-D-Y?”
Kathleen – “In the cabinet above the fridge”
Of course, we continued doing that after they started school and they would put their hands on their hips and say, “Daddy, I can spell, you know!”
Well now we have to do the same thing with the word “Walk.” We can’t say “walk” no matter what. It is amazing the effect that word has on our Pomeranian. Because, ever since he was a baby, we would ask him , “Cappy, you wanna go for a walk?” and we would put the leash on and take him out. He loves going out on walks. Although, to him, “Walk” means “Run.” So we all know that we have to say “W” when we mean walk unless we are prepared to take him out.
It is so funny the way he responds to that word. He might be lying on his bed sleeping (so it appears). I could walk in the room and calmly, with no emotion or intonation, say “Walk.” And he is up, barking and jumping and running to where we keep his harness.
So needless to say, Cappy loves the fact we are walking 3 days a week. (Too bad he can’t come with us on Saturday.) The only problem is, while Mark told us that in MM terms anything is running, to Cappy, running is all there is. While we walk, he is running a zig zag pattern. When he gets bored of that, he will run as far as the leash goes then stop and once we catch up he will take off running to the end of the leash again. He can’t wait until we are able to run!
Being a dog he will often times be distracted and stick his nose in the leaves sniffing God knows what. When we pass him, I will say, “Come on Cappy!” He will jump up and run ahead again. Sometimes when we seem to be too slow for him (most of the time), he will look back at us as if to say, “come on people!”
These days we don’t even have to say “Walk.” All we have to do is change into our walking clothes. When he sees Kathleen or I walk into the living room dressed for walking he gets excited. There is nothing more fun than watching an excited Pomeranian.
Cappy is a wonderful motivator. That is why Cap’n Crunch is a Marathoner’s best friend.
I wonder . . . do they let dogs run in marathons? Just a thought. J
God bless!
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