Collared

Another pair of pants ruined. Holes in both knees. Third time this week Bruno pulled Tomiko down the sidewalk, but this really needed to stop. It was costing her too much money for clothes. He didn’t look as guilty as he was, he just sat there with that stupid look on his face like he was waiting for her to get up. His ears pricked up when she finally looked at him. It was almost impossible to stay mad at such a cute face.

He was just the right mix of Boxer and Great Dane. Brindle fur with black boots and muzzle. Bruno tipped the scales just over 110 pounds the same as her. When they went for a walk, it was more of a hang on for dear life than anything else. So, she looked for a solution on the internet.

“Having problems with an unruly dog? Wish she could train them with very little effort? You can do it with our new the high-tech training collar. Log into the collar and select the training routines you want to use. In a short time, your trained dog will be the envy of the neighborhood.”

Sounded too good to be true but it said it was painless so why not. Tomiko paid for overnight shipping to get it quick. Might as well use it while on vacation next week to try it out on him.

The small box arrived the next day. In the box was an adjustable collar, a small manual, and a DVD. It was a normal looking collar except for the clasp which was about two inches on either side and made of metal. One side had a small led screen like an old digital watch and the other had a button.

Installing the software on her laptop was a simple walkthrough, it even connected to the collar on her wireless network. The manual stated that depending on the receptiveness of the dog and what type of training would determine how long it would take to complete the training.

After launching the software, she needed to set up a profile for each dog she wanted to train. It a had two default profiles already installed. One was for male and the other female. Each profile had several groups of training including service, security, obedience, with sub-sections under those having dozens of individual training routines. She could select the top group to take them all or just check the individual boxes to create a customized training routine. The options in each training group and sub-section were overwhelming.

Being the lazy person, she just renamed the male default profile Bruno. Then selected auto button so she could skip the long series of questions about the dog after she entered breed, age, and weight. If she put a check the box, a description would show what that training routine would do. Then she unselected all the boxes to try just one, fetch. The collar adjusted to his neck automatically.

They went out in the backyard to try this fancy collar out. After an hour of playing and unsuccessfully trying to get him to fetch a tennis ball and bring it back, they took a break. Tomiko tried to take off the collar to see if it was still working, but it wouldn’t unlatch. The screen said “Update”.

She looked through the manual to find out what that meant. It stated the collar needed to connect to the software to check for updates to the firmware or update the current training routine before moving to the next selection in the routine. When the routine was complete the collar stopped training and could be unlocked. She could also cancel the current routine which allows it to unlock the collar as well.

After logging back into the software, there was a little red “updates available” icon beside his profile. After clicking on the icon, a pop up asked, “Process all updates?” She selected yes and put the check in the box to don’t ask me again. Bruno bark and seemed strangely happy.

Smiling back at him they went back out to try it again. This time it took about thirty minutes before he did much better. Even brought it close to her once. She looked at his collar and it read “Ongoing”. This training was taking longer than she had hoped for just to fetch a ball, so she went back into the software to see if it could be adjusted further. Under the settings, it had a rate option, “Slow, Normal, Fast, Auto.” She once again to the easy way out by selecting Auto.