I am happy to report that Zinnia made her debut as a therapy dog (yes, still in training) at the Mansion during my weekly story reading session with the residents there.

I brought her into the activities room and gave her a bone after she went over to several of the residents, tail wagging, and said hello, calmly and affectionately.

I had her on a leash but didn’t need it. I dropped the leash, and she sat at my feet, chewing her bone (a cleaned-up small marrow bone). When she was finished, she sat up quietly and took in the scene, and then lay down and rested.

Everyone at the Mansion was dazzled by her calm and warmth. On some level, she seemed to grasp what was happening, when I pointed to a resident, she went over to say hello, and I could praise her.

Zinnia is about two years ahead of scheduled, I thought it would take that long to train her to be that calm and appropriate in a room full of elderly people. She’s a natural.

I’m showing her that people are the work.  On the way out, she peed on the carpet a bit before I caught her and got her outside. I’m carrying Odor Off and paper towels.

She thinks the carpeting is grass, I guess. At home, she had one accident more than a week ago, and none since. But she is only 11 weeks old; there will be accidents; she doesn’t even quite have full bladder control.

It was a great debut; I was pleased by her calmness and obedience. She is still very much in training, but her socialization and acclimation work are going very well. She is used to people now, and at ease in almost any situation.

Tomorrow, I’m taking her to Bishop Maginn High School to my Writing Workshop, a reporter from an Albany newspaper is coming to interview us. Two students in my class have volunteered to help me train Zinnia to do therapy work in the school.

It should be fun.

___

Note. I went to Wal-Mart tonight to buy 19 $50 gift cards, and my credit cards were all declined. It seems gift cards have become a favorite money laundering outlet, and the banks and credit card companies routinely decline large purchases of them.

After an hour of trying to reach somebody on the phone to let me buy the cards, I gave up. I’ll go to the bank this week and get cash – $50 bills – and present them to the aides in that way. With money, they can do anything they want, and the bank will give me the cash if I show up to get it.

I understand that money laundering is a problem, but I’m sorry it’s so difficult to buy gift cards for people.

It shouldn’t be hard to buy gift cards for aides in an assisted care facility at Christmas, but our world gets more complicated all the time. The cards will cost $900 plus fees. There are now 19 aides at the Mansion, including the new Memory Care Center.

We are also going ahead with our plans for a Mansion Aide Childrens Amazon Wish List. The children of the Mansion aides are being asked what they want, and we hope to get it for them. The aides, many of whom are young and single women with children, could use some support.

We can give them a happy Christmas.

You can watch for the list here. It will go up sometime this week.