First of all, I want to say thank you so much to all my friends for their kind wishes and suggestion to help my bum ouchie (although I am not so sure about Homer‘s suggestion of wearing ‘granny pants’ 
) – and especially to my blog friends in Belgium - El’bow & Hauwii - who sent me the most gorgeous “get well” cards! *Giggle!* 
Now, you know one of the nice things about having my blog is that it’s helped me make so many new friends since moving to Australia. I get lots of messages coming through the Contact Honey page every week and some of them have been from doggies right here in Brisbane, who have invited me to meet up for a playdate!
That’s how I met my good friend, Lupe the blue Dane…and the other day, I got a message from another blue Dane living in Brisbane.
His name is Earnest and he still only 6 months old. Actually, it was his human pup who helped him write to me. Her name is Zali and I think she is amazing because she is only 10yrs old but she already has her own blog!
She said that she loves reading my blog and would love to meet me – and Earnest would love to have a playdate!
So a couple of weeks ago, my human talked to Zali’s mummy and we arranged to meet up. Hsin-Yi suggested that we meet at the Kedron Brook dog off-leash area but not at the busy afternoon times because she hates it when it gets really crowded with lots of strange doggies and people – so we met just after lunch, when there was hardly anybody there. Luckily it is still winter here - otherwise it would be much too hot to meet at that time of the day!
Hello Earnest! Nice to meet you!
Photo courtesy of Zali's mummy, Hailey Bartholomew (www.youcantbeserious.com.au)
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Earnest had brought his whole family to meet me! There was Zali and her little sister, Poppy…
…and their mummy and daddy, who are both amazing Camera Humans and have their own company, You Can’t Be Serious! They take photos and movies for people and their pictures are not like traditional ones but are really different & fun!
Earnest was really bouncy and excited and kept doing zoomies around me. I think he wanted to play but to be honest, this was usually my ‘nap time’ so I wasn’t feeling very energetic…
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Oh- alright, then! You wanna play? Come and get it!
But when I really started galloping after him, Earnest started looking scared! I could hear Hsin-Yi yelling something at me like “BE GENTLE WITH THE PUPPY!” – but I was too excited by then to slow down…and then – oh no! I smacked into Earnest as I was jumping over a stream after him and rolled him over! He yelped and cried and everybody was very upset. Hsin-Yi was REALLY grumpy with me for being so rough…what does she mean? I always play like that! Anyway, Earnest wasn’t hurt – just a bit stunned – but after that, he was a bit too scared to come near me anymore! 
I tried to get him to play Tug with me but he didn’t seem to dare to grab the other end of the tug toy…
Hsin-Yi said it was all my fault ‘coz I was too rough with him – and this is why nobody ever wants to play with me… She was very grumpy because she has been trying to teach me to play more gently ever since I was a puppy – she says other Danes can play nice and gently – why do I have to thunder around like a drunk rhino? 
Anyway, Zali and her family were very nice about it and said it wasn’t my fault and that when Earnest gets bigger, he will be able to play more roughly with me. Hsin-Yi said it would serve me right if Earnest had doubled in size by the next time we met – so that he could really wallop me (Huh! As if!)
Well, we had a nice walk back to the car anyway and Earnest followed me everywhere like a shadow! 
Hsin-Yi helped Zali’s mummy & daddy with some training advice for Earnest – and I helped by showing the best way to shake your head and throw your drool as far as possible. Hmm…that pup’s got a lot to learn!
When we said goodbye, Zali said that they would love to meet up with us again and Hsin-Yi have me a dirty look and made me promise to play more gently next time!
Well, talking about messages from doggies – I got a really lovely message the other day from Drake the Great Dane. Drake is a regular reader of my blog – he lives with his human family and his doggie sister, Sasha, who is a rescue herding doggie. Drake’s human, Nikki, is really good about doing training with them and she had been trying to help Drake learn how to use a ramp, although they weren’t having much success. Well, do you remember I did a post about me learning to use the ramp a while back? After Nikki watched my video, she decided to start again with Drake – right from the beginning – and take it really slowly in baby steps, ‘coz you know how us Danes just cannot be rushed! She emailed Hsin-Yi for some help and Hsin-Yi gave her lots of tips…and then a few weeks later, I got this message from Drake!
Hi Honey,
Look at me!! I’m Drake and I finally did it. Although, I was a bit scared coming down the first time and still a bit tentative. But look at me!! My human drove the truck half way down the drive so the angle was almost the same as for getting in the back seat! Now we just need to put my crate into the back and on a coolish day, we can all go walking on the trails near Lake Hefner. Anyway, thanks again for all your help with my human!! We are both so incredibly thankful… now I won’t always get left at home when the whole family goes on an outing!! I really don’t like that at all!!
Lots of slobbers and thanks,Drake.Hi Hsin-Yi,I am pretty proud of him! It feels more rewarding because he’s not a “super smart breed”. And next year, I hope to be able to take the dogs with us on vacation and trips instead of boarding. You and Honey have helped us so much! Not just with the emailed advice, it really is nice to talk with someone who has trained a Dane before!! I watch the training videos (just yesterday I was watching the taking a bow training), the dancing videos (you are very brave), and (when I need a good laugh) the first agility and swimming videos. Not to mention getting to see some great pictures of New Zealand and Australia. So thank you very much, and please don’t let those rude people bother you. For everyone of them, there are 10 of the people like me.So thank you very much!!Best Wishes,Nicki
(Shudder) No way!
Hey! When a girl says no, she means no!
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