This morning I had a 2.5-hour strategic planning meeting for our local NAMI chapter. I decided to take Felix and see how he does at meetings. He’s been out to eat with me at restaurants for long periods of time, plus the meeting was one where I knew if he was having a hard time, I could leave and take him out for breaks, or even go home early.
He did a pretty good job! When people were coming in, he did try to greet a few people, but I redirected him. He did an OK job with people walking past him to get to their seats and stayed lying about 80% of the time that people walked past him. Everyone was excited to meet Felix, as this was the first time he’s been to anything involving the NAMI board.
We spent the first 30–45 min or so with him on the floor, reinforcing his down on his mat. He needed fairly frequent rewards, but I just gave him a teensy pinch of hot dog about every minute or so.
Then he wanted to be up in my lap for a while. He enjoyed looking around the room a lot!
Then he wanted to be on the floor more, and did a better job of staying on his mat in a down.
For the last 45 min, he wanted to be in my lap and finally settled more into being able to almost fall asleep. I got a picture of him in my lap hanging out.
For his first meeting, he did an excellent job! He wasn’t nervous at all and did a fairly good job of staying on his mat on the floor when he was down there. He also accompanied me to the restroom, which he hasn’t done there before.
It was a good meeting, and I’m glad I took him! He’s shaping up really well!
The picture below shows a tired sable and white Japanese Chin puppy wearing a purple SDIT harness in my lap. You can see my pink dress in the background.
