One time when it was getting close to Halloween, Wen was shopping at Petsmart and she noticed that they were going to have a pet Halloween party with treats, prizes, and pet photos the Friday night before Halloween. This was a perfect opportunity to dress up Kirby, so she came up with a costume for him—a fun pirate outfit. He had the attitude to pull off a pirate look and it was a chance to have his picture taken all dressed up.
A few weeks later when they arrived at the party, there was quite an assortment of owners with their dogs dressed up in costumes gathered in the space where they normally held obedience classes. Everyone was invited to bring their dogs into the ring and they gave out a prize to the best dressed dog. Then, they played a game where music was played as everyone walked their dogs around the ring and when the music stopped, they announced an obedience command which the owners had to have their dogs complete. One by one, dogs were eliminated when they didn’t perform the commands correctly until only two were left: a little girl and her mixed breed dog and Kirby.
Wen was fairly confident that Kirby could win since he had recently completed his basic obedience class, so when the music stopped again and the command, “down” was announced and Kirby did an immediate “down,” she was pleased. The little girl’s dog did a “down” also right after Kirby and a Petsmart employee declared her the winner!
Wen was puzzled at first, but then she realized that the employee probably thought that it was nicer if the little girl won. After the prize was awarded, as Wen left the ring with Kirby, a lady who had been watching came up to her and said, “Your dog should have won. Your dog did a “down” first.” Wen shrugged and said, “Oh, well” and took Kirby to have his picture taken.
All she could think was, “They were robbed! Kirby should have won,” but a little girl left the party extremely happy and proud of her dog, so ultimately, it was worth it and Kirby had proved that he actually did learn his obedience commands.
Kirby, the pirate
