Bagel day, Sam’s, and Walmart 3

Today was a doozy! We met our NAMI friends at Bagel Boat for our weekly bagel day. This is where friends from NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) meet and talk about anything and everything.

My friend Tommy was there, and he sat next to me. This is really hard for Tommy, because he is not great at impulse control. He did a really good job! A few times I had to remind him or tell him he was getting too close or bothering Hestia too much, but overall it went really well! We had fun making animal noises together 🙂 Tommy likes to discuss which animal would win if two animals were to fight, so I told him the story about how we unexpectedly encountered a glass cage of lions early on in Sabrina’s career, and how they were trying to eat her and we had to run away! He really enjoyed that story.

I also enjoyed talking with everyone else who was there, too. It is so nice to be able to just hang out with people who understand mental illness.

After Bagel Boat, we headed to Sam’s. It was pretty crowded! We normally don’t go shopping on the weekends because of crowds, but this time we didn’t have a choice. I broke out some treats and reinforced Hestia’s heeling around the store. That made it a really fun outing! Hestia had a great time showing off all her skills to both me and to other people in the aisles with us. Everyone who saw her working commented on how happy and cute she was. She normally does pretty well in Sam’s, but knowing that treats were on offer (even though I probably only gave her like 10 tiny treats total the whole outing) made her really excellent. Plus it made it more fun for everyone (me, her, and others in the store!).

Sam’s doesn’t have plain whole milk yogurt, and Ollie’s chicken is half the price at Walmart, so we headed there next. We really really hate going to Walmart, and weekends, ugh! Luckily we only had to get yogurt and chicken. Hestia did pretty well in Walmart. I had treats again, but the floor in the meat section was VERY interesting apparently… I am guessing someone spilled meat juice on the floor. Other than wanting to sniff the floor in the meat section, Hestia was great.

When it came time to checkout, a woman and her son were in front of us. I got a little annoyed at them. The kid was about 10 years old, and he kept really staring at me and at Brad. And not in a just interested way, in a more mean way, like he was upset to be around us. It was a bit unnerving. Then when it was our turn to check out, the woman wouldn’t move! She just stood there right where I needed to be to pay and bag my groceries, fiddling with her purse. I had to reach way around her to pay, and she wouldn’t move so I could get my groceries. She didn’t move until the person behind me was already like halfway through getting checked out! Ugh! But I survived.

Hestia was also not perfect in the checkout aisle. There was a piece of red onion skin on the floor where we were standing, and she kept trying to paw at it (like how a cat bats at a ball with their paw– Chin are the most catlike of dogs, they say!). I had to tell her to leave it three times! Though now that I’m typing this, maybe she was trying to get me to laugh as she sensed my annoyance?

Anyway, we are now at home and relaxing! We got a lot accomplished today, go us! Sorry no pictures, the stores were simply too crowded to be able to get a camera out and take a pic.