“Yeah, I passed.”

LAFAYETTE, NJ, JUNE 16, 2012 – Olive Pimento Soldavini successfully passed the requirements to earn her AKC-recognized Canine Good Citizenship, it was announced today by her owner. The AKC’s Canine Good Citizen Program is comprised of 10 tests for canines and a pledge for their owners. These tests include: 1. Accepting a friendly stranger. (Olive accepted the evaluator, even asking her out to lunch.) 2. Sitting politely for petting. (Olive sat politely but almost passed out from not being able to lick the evaluator repeatedly while being petted.) 3. Appearance and Grooming. (Olive’s ears were as pink as a baby’s bottom; her nails expertly manicured like a French tart’s and her coat so shiny, you would have thought I bathed her in Turtle Wax.) 4. Out for a walk/Walking on a loose lead. (Since Olive is so used to walking through street fairs and parades, this was a cake walk.) 5. Walking through a crowd. (Ditto.) 6. Sit and Down command and Staying in Place. (Olive is a pro at “sit,” needed some encouragement to “down,” which was shocking since we must have practiced it 60 times in the past week. I can only attribute this to the weimaraner’s classic stubborness. And, believe it or not, she’s pretty much a pro at “Stay” too.) 7. Coming When Called. (She was a little slower on the uptake than she usually is, but she came.) 8. Reaction to another dog. (This was touch and go but she managed to contain her pathological friendliness.) 9. Reaction to distraction. (Olive was alerted to the noise of the chair being dropped, but was non-plussed. You would be too if when you were less than a year old, you’d walk on Main Street and hear the 16-wheelers thunder by and the train come to a screeching halt in front of you on many mornings.) 10. Supervised separation. (As I left Olive with the evaluator and walked outside, out of sight, with a 3-minute timer in my hands, my little pooch just calmly waited for me. It may have been the longest three minutes of my life.) And so when Olive awoke this morning, I poked my head inside her crate and said “Good morning my little canine good citizen. Would you like chicken or turkey for breakfast this morning?”