Bessie celebrates her first Halloween with unexpected results.

As previously mentioned, Bessie has been acting like a miniature guard dog lately whenever I took her out front on her leash. And our normally quiet, dead-end street always gets invaded on Halloween by hundreds of kids from surrounding neighborhoods going door-to-door trick or treating. This posed a serious problem. By the time the kids started ringing our doorbell tonight at 6 o'clock Bessie was in a frantic state barking at everything so I couldn't even let her watch from inside the door because she was jumping up against the glass storm door. Ruff and Axl stayed with me out of curiosity and stuck their heads out while I dispensed the candy treats but Bessie was tied up where she couldn't see what was going on. Then during a lull in the traffic I decided to take the boys out along with Bess on her long leash. When the crowds of people began to move up and down the block Bessie didn't know which way to look to begin barking and the biggest surprise came when the first group of kids walked across our lawn right up to the three dogs. Bessie greeted them with excitement but didn't bark at anyone.

Ruff, as usual, became the center of attention as one youngster after another came over to pet him. When he was inside and just stuck his huge head out the door he managed to give a few kisses to some little ones but he really becomes a clown outside when he is surrounded by older girls. And Bessie managed to get a large dose of instant socialization when she found herself meeting so many people at once. Not once did she bark at anyone for the rest of the night.

I decided to stay outside with the three Rottweilers until the trick or treat period ended at 8 o'clock instead of running inside to grab some candy every time we had a visitor. Daylight Savings Time doesn't start until Sunday morning so by 7 PM it was already very dark and we have no street lights. It must have been a big surprise to Bessie to see the outlines of people walking up and down the street past the porch lights on the other houses and to hear all the talking coming from every direction. In the end I think she handled herself very well.