today, ripley was in a time out in her kennel (surprise) and i took the opportunity to take flan for a walk alone, at her own pace, around the park.
three quarters of the way around we found a new, red, tennis-style ball. flan was definitely interested, but was not picking it up. i went to grab it so we could take it home with us, and she snatched it away from me. fine.
we were by the rosebushes on the southeast corner of the park, where the bocce-court-cum-dog-run starts. the seven badly behaved, frenetic dogs and their totally anemic, underwhelmed owners were in there, and saw us. the dogs started going wild, jumping, frothing, trying to get at flanny. we hadn't even gotten to the beginning of the fence yet and it was just bedlam. of course, not a single dog owner within the run even raised their voice to quiet their own animal. flan was there, with the red ball in her mouth, and i thought she'd probably just want to take off like a shot and get past all the competition.
but no. as soon as we got level with the dog run's fence, flannery slowed down to half the pace at which she'd previously been walking. with the red ball sticking out of her face, and without so much as growling, snuffling or ever even turning her head towards the yelping barking clawing dogs only two feet away from her, she walked, perfectly steady, making sure every one of them saw her, as if to say i KNOW this ball used to belong to one of you. and now, it doesn't. this is flanny's ball. and i'm flanny. suckers.
as soon as we were past the fence she picked up the pace again, trotting and wagging her tail, ball in mouth, until we were home.