With the dogs, it was interesting. I knew, from speaking with the foster mom and watching Pisces interact with the other dogs in the foster care that she'd be fine in our house. We have a really interesting dynamic: Mooshu started out as a total alpha and tried to be very dominant until I established myself as his alpha. Jasmine, as a puppy, was dominant to Mooshu, who by this point, was the mellowest dog on the planet (a characteristic of his breed) while Pisces and Jasmine take turns being dominant with each other, but Pisces is definitely submissive to Mooshu.

However, they all recognize me as their pack leader. Or as my sister says, "They're your shadows. Wherever you go, they follow."

Barb is doin' it right!

And Jilli is spot on. Rescue Remedy is an excellent resource and, while I've never used the Feliway plug ins, the pet store I do the doggy lama workshops in sells a good number of them. I hear good things. Covering those bases couldn't hurt, in any case.

Feliway didn't do goof for Devi-the-bitch. But she's hardcore. Really, I think all that will make her not try to beat up Loki is either him finally getting bigger and more aggressive than her or me moving in the next 6 months and totally freaking her out. Not looking forward to that, but maybe she'll chill. She's never been thrilled with being anything other than only and I respect that even if I differ.

Sara, I think Devi and our Byron were separated at birth.

Fwiw, our girl kitty Mia was the most affronted by little boy Seamus at first and would do nothing but growl and hiss at him for weeks. Now they groom each other and wrestle and play and snuggle. Byron wants nothingto do with either of them, though he tolerates their presence.

Barb is doin' it right!

Well, certainly at home it works. However, Jasmine is still a bit of a problem child in that she's a headstrong Lab puppy girl (even though she's nearly two). She's terrible on leash and when she sees new people (or even us if we've been away for anything longer than an hour), she's a complete spazz. The hard part is that 90% of the time, she's actually fairly mellow. It's the 10% which makes life interesting. But we'll get through it. She's the sweetest girl, just... a Lab.

Devi, as much as I adore her, is a case. She's my first cat and is bonded to me but she HATES I got other cat. As in, hates them,not me, luckily.

My two most frequent recommendations for rowdy walkers are:

!) Backpack. Not only can she carry her own water, bags, etc., I have yet to meet a dog who doesn't 'straighten up' when given that job. No idea why. It just works. Extra bonus benefit is that every step taken with a packet of rice (or whatever) on each side, means extra energy is expended. Especially with hyper Labs, a tired dog is a well behaved dog.

2) A very, very short leash. I don't mean this in the negative sense. Bartleby's leash is less than a foot long. My arm is his leash and he does not struggle when it is time to walk seriously. Given that I walk him off leash roughly 80 percent of the time, it's pretty impressive that he takes the "With me" command seriously.

The device I use isn't even actually a leash, it's a short 'car restrraint'.

When we are walking...we are walking. It's not play time. And since he doesn't get any confusing signals from me, there is no problem.

Please remind me to never read comments, ever again. About half of the comments about IsraGaza hell in foreign press I read are confusing legitimate criticism over Israel with antisemitism, which is bloody frightening.

(Not that the comments here have less antisemitism (towards the Arab side) in them, but I know to expect it by now).

confusing legitimate criticism over Israel with antisemitism

This is one of the major problems with US (and to some extent other places -- but I think we're kind of in the forefront here, sadly) discourse about Israel in general, not just in this conflict. Because of certain voices that very quickly take over any discussion on the subject, it's almost impossible to look critically at what goes on there in the way we can and really should do with any ally. If you don't agree with government policy, you're an anti-semite and/or a self-hating Jew. As if things aren't polarized enough over there without the bystanders getting all all-or-nothing about it.

IOW, don't read the comments ever again! What were you thinking?

Never read the comments unless you know you're home.