Met Dave & Jessica / Riverside Park dog run

Today Hawk met Uncle Dave and Aunt Jessica. They came over to the apartment, commented on how big he was, and then we all got in the car and drove up to Riverside Park. The drive was interesting. Hawk jumped into the front passenger seat, where he uncomfortably fumbled around the whole ride. He much prefers the backseat, but Rachel, Dave, and Jessica were all in the backseat. I was the chauffeur.

We went to the dog run at 71st Street and Riverside Drive. It was covered in mulch and underneath the West Side Highway. The odd thing was that there were no other dogs there. Hawk did his usual thing; he wandered around the perimeter smelling and peeing. We soon left, and walked up, hoping to find the next dog run at 72nd Street. We couldn't find it, but kept walking up the paved path on the west side. The weather was beautiful, and the breeze off the Hudson River provided perfect cooling. We eventually wandered past the house boats and up to the next dog run at 87th Street.

Hawk played there in spurts. Sometimes he'd chase, sometimes he'd wander around the perimeter sniffing and peeing. We have figured out Hawk's modus operandi at the dog runs. Hawk is not as interested in the object of the chase, as he is in every other dog chasing the object. For example, there was a dog with a smooshed water bottle in its mouth. Hawk chased the dog around for awhile, but didn't actually care about getting the water bottle. The other dogs that were involved in the chase, were trying to grab the bottle out of the dog's mouth, but Hawk wasn't interested in that. He just wanted to run around with that dog. If that dog dropped the bottle, Hawk didn't bend down to pick it up like the other dogs would. Hawk just lost interest. He wasn't really chasing the object, but he was chasing the dog that had the object.

Dave walked the dog for some time. And we all enjoyed watching Hawk play. Boy, was Hawk panting heavily. Eventually, Dave and Jessica had to leave to catch a movie. Rachel and I wandered down to the park back towards our car, and stumbled upon the 72nd Street dog run that we were looking (however unsuccessfully) for before. We let him play a little while longer, though he was obviously exhausted and was moving slowly.

Hawk nearly totally fell asleep in the short car ride home, despite the stop-and-go Lincoln Tunnel traffic. He definitely enjoyed Uncle Dave's and Aunt Jessica's company. He also strangely managed to squeeze out a poop in each of the three dog runs that we went to this afternoon.