Something in the air?

Warm weather = grilling season!  A couple people came over yesterday afternoon to partake in smoked ribs and tenderloin.  Also on the menu - smoked beets, apple-watermelon radish-carrot slaw with "Asian" dressing (if it's got sesame and ginger, it MUST be Asian), and roasted root veggies - finishing up the winter rutabaga, celeriac, parsnips, and carrots.  And Mexican chocolate tofu mousse/pudding for dessert.


Friends arrived at the house before Tobasco and I returned from our walk and he met them in the backyard.  He seemed relax and happy, good tail wags, eager to get fed but not pushy.  Deciding not to push our luck, I put him back in the house after eating half a bag of turkey.  I gave him a frozen Kong and set him up in the living room, behind his play pen barrier... I didn't want to muzzle him since he was still panting from the walk and figured he would just go lie down and work on his Kong.  He seemed to just want to come outside and hang out with us, which was great!  So after letting him cool down, I muzzled him and he got to hang out at the table (everyone was seated).  He was fed a bit by a friend but then he became rude and jumped on the guy.  =(  Down hill from there.  I put him back inside but he was no longer the happy calm dog.  When guests came into the house to get stuff or use the bathroom, they tossed him treats, but he was tense.  What happened to the dog that came in the door initially?  


Maybe I should have left him outside with our guests longer upon returning... 
Maybe I shouldn't have left him inside by himself while everyone was outside...


Of course dinner conversation goes back to dogs and Tobasco's aggression and liability and of course DOMINANCE.  


For a while, I thought Tobasco does better with women because the women we've been around generally love him and are calm and less afraid.  I think men are in some ways more fearful.  But yesterday, dinner conversation led me to my current theory:


Men generally think in terms of dominance and fixing the symptoms while women are more open to the idea that his "symptoms" can be fear-based and we need to fix the fear and the "symptoms" will clear.  It became clear to me that most people don't get it - they are still stuck in this force-based method of training/leadership/dominance.  I just don't see how exerting pain on a dog that is scared of you will make the dog better.  Maybe he won't attack his punisher in the short-term, but it most likely reinforces the suspicion.
I think Tobasco gets it when someone thinks he needs to be dominated and reacts more suspiciously and aggressively towards them.  


I think the stress of company spilled over to today, he was tense with our hopefully new vet-tech friend.  Even jumping on her, lunging a bit, and growling - which he did not do the previous 2 meetings (not even the first meeting!!!).  It felt like a total setback after a really good training session on Saturday morning that had lots of touch and back aways from people and a decent acceptance (at least initially) of new people in our house last night.