Osanpo in our neighbourhood

The major advantage of having a dog is the need to constantly entertain it. Unfortunately for our dog, we're at work for 10+ hours a day. This makes weekends very precious, and we are often loathe to commit to other daytime activities with friends because the dog does need to get out and play with us.

Our favourite activity is just simply walking. Fast, slow, in urban areas, woods, hills, mountains. We just like getting out and having a stroll. But Kirin is still skitty around other animals. We even have a Defcon-style rating for her level of unease and proximity to all-out nuclear war. This pretty much rules out "hiking" on local trails in the Santa Monica mountains where the entire population of LA descends to at the weekends. There are only so many trails where dogs are allowed, and as such, they tend to be quite packed with four-legged furballs, from which our pooch feels a strong need to protect us. And while we enjoyed Griffith Park last weekend, the drive home in ridiculously slow hot weekend midday traffic could not be justified on a weekly basis.

As such, we are continuing the program of long walks around our neighbourhood, hoping it will provide some gradual socialisation and that it will enable her to feel more comfortable being in public with us. It's like having a teenager who is embarrassed to be seen in public with you, fused with an overly protective mother who will punch out everybody on the off-chance that they could be muggers and kidnappers.

Fortunately, we live in the not-so-affluent part of Santa Monica, surrounded by light industry and quiet residential streets. This gives us a huge area in which to roam on quiet weekends, and time to appreciate some of the nicer things around us: