Thanksgiving trip to Chicago

Much to my surprise, the trip we took to Chicago last Wednesday through Friday went really well!  As we were packing the truck for our departure, Conker alerted us that is was time to use the grass outside.  Little did he know that it was pouring like mad outside and he didn't like it one bit.  That was the quickest potty run I'd ever seen him do.  We have now figured out that Conker isn't very fond of rain.

Conker was amazing for the drive.  He almost instantly fell asleep and stayed that way for most of the trip, excluding rest breaks, bumps in the road and the stop we made to visit the guys at Napbirt.  The temperature hovered around 32 degrees with constant rain the entire drive, meaning that the road was a tad slippery.  The front of the truck was covered with ice.  There was nearly an inch of ice around the antenna and the driver's side wiper was frozen straight so we had to stop and break the ice so it would work.  Despite the weather, we made it to Chicago unscathed.

Fred (boyfriend) found out that upon our arrival to his Aunt's house that no one was home so we had to wait for someone to get back before we introduced Conker to Riley, the resident dog of the house.  Riley is nearing 11 years old and is a big, fluffy white mutt of some sort.

The introduction went well and Conker loved having another dog around.  He was still quite shy and wouldn't come up to the relatives when they were trying to get him to at first but he was soon fine being around them and even began to lick their hands while sitting on the couch with me.  He was still a bit shy when everyone was moving around and would only go up to them if they offered him treats.  Conker would follow Riley around whenever he was on the ground and would try to play with him.  Riley would get a bit annoyed when Conker would constantly pester him to play so I'd step in and tell Conker to leave Riley alone for a bit.  Conker didn't like me getting between him and the other dog but understood after a short while.

Riley always has food available but with Conker in the house his food had to be moved.  Since his food was gone Riley was more hungry than usual and waited patiently for scraps of turkey to fall to the floor.  Conker on the other hand wasn't allowed to receive free gifts of turkey and only got a few scraps after everyone was done eating.  He enjoyed those few tasty bits and thankfully didn't begin to bark for more.

There were a few times when Conker was having too much fun running around the house ignoring us but he was generally a good puppy.  He LOVED the backyard and sometimes wouldn't potty out there and had to be taken to the front.  He was only allowed to run around off-leash in the yard a few times since there were a couple questionable holes in the fence.

It was quite cold in Chicago so I made Fred take Conker out most of the time.  When the temperature is 20 something but it feels like 9, there's not much that will make me go outside.  Conker on the other hand seemed to love the freezing weather and got bored while inside.

The trip overall was quite fun.  We are hoping that Riley and Fred's relatives helped Conker get over a bit of his people shyness.  He seemed to like the trip as well, even the boring 5+ hour drives.