CharlieGodammit

Every evening CGD finds and brings me his leash so he can take me for a walk and visit with all the neighborhood kids. If I ignore him, he starts slinging that sucker around, banging the hasp on the furniture and my forehead. I've tried hiding it from him and sometimes I'm successful, but then he sits at the fucking door, 6 inches away from it and starts howling.
He's actually pretty good on a leash, although I never could get him to heel. He's got to be ahead of me. There's slack in the leash, but he's in front. Maybe he's protecting me, maybe he's still trying to dominate me a little bit, I don't know.
The one thing I insist on is for him to sit when either I stop or give him the command to stop. I want his ass on the ground and not fighting me in case I need both hands for something. And he's good about that, too - as long as he's leashed.
But tonight when I got in he did something that absolutely amazed the fuck out of me. He was patrolling his perimeter and I was watching from the back door 50 feet away munching on a pickle and for some reason I said "Stop". Not only did he immediately stop, but he sat and stayed until I gave him his release word.
Man, I couldn't believe it, so I did it over and over again until he got tired of it and came in the house.
I do believe the motherfucker is finally settling down. He's come a long way in the past year, from being feral to responding to voice commands and hand signals.
Now if he'll just stop burying his nose in the crotch of female company.......