Hugo the Sheep

There's a surefire way to spot Hugo at the dog park these days. Look for the large group of herding dogs. Now look for the chunky yellow beast they're so diligently herding. That's Hugo.

German Shepherds, Australian Cattle Dogs, English Sheepdogs - for some reason they find Hugo completely irresistible. They follow Hugo closely, nipping his butt, barking directly into his ear and waiting anxiously for him to return to the fold when he strays off into the lake after his ball.

Trash Can Collision

Today a metal trash can got in between Hugo and his ball. The trash can was knocked directly out from underneath its lid. Hugo didn't even stop to shake it off.

Shar Pei Collision

Hugo has many talents, but his most useful talent is that he's indestructible.

He put this talent to excellent use this weekend at Luther Burbank park. Luther Burbank is an excellent place for fetch and has nice access to Lake Washington.

On this particular Saturday, Hugo's ball was out in the lake.

The following obstacles stood directly between Hugo and his ball:
1) a nice flat stretch of grass (useful for accelerating up to full fetching speed)
2) an adorably chunky and unsuspecting shar pei puppy standing at the edge of the dropoff leading to the beach
3) a two foot dropoff leading to the beach
4) four feet of beach comprised mostly of rocks
5) 15' of water.

You can pretty much guess what happened next. At a full-out run, Hugo barrelled into the unsuspecting shar pei. The impact of the collision knocked the shar pei flat and launched Hugo through the air like a chunky, furry projectile. He landed nose first in the gravel and skidded into the lake, leaving a Hugo-shaped groove behind on the gravel beach.

Both dogs were fine and didn't even take a second to shake it off before continuing on with their respective tasks.