Walkin' the dog

Drama on the Boardwalk today.
A small woman is taking her dog for a walk and the dog is absolutely huge!  He looks to be young and somewhat high strung.
I'm walking behind them.  I see an elderly lady walking slowly toward us.  She is wearing a pull-over-the-head touque that has ears.  And a pair of bright red gloves.
As the elder lady approaches the dog, she stops to ask the owner a question.  The dog is immediately upset and starts barking and moving around a lot.  The owner tries to settle him down.  He's having none of it, and continues to move about a lot, especially in the direction of the questioner.  This animal is as high as the owner's waist ! While trying to answer the lady's question, she is also instructing the dog to sit! to lie! to be still!  Finally, she gets him into a lying down mode, and this works well for a minute, but he's still aroused.  I figure I better keep moving.  The last thing I hear is the dog owner saying that she thinks her dog is afraid of the red gloves.
I turn to look back more than once. The poor girl seems to be in a kneeling condition most of the time, trying to control the dog.  Pretty well everyone is now watching this.  Even after 5 minutes, when I look around again, the dog owner still seems to be having a bad time, and the elderly lady is still standing there!  Talking!
When I get to end of the boardwalk, and turn to go back, I see the dog owner walking far away across the field with the enormous dog now appearing to be perfectly happy.  I'm glad her ordeal is over.  I wonder whether it really is her dog after all, or if she were walking it for a friend.
As I approach the other end of the boardwalk and finish my walk, I see the questioner ahead, walking slowly.  I decide to ask her how her adventure went.  I realized immediately that she can't hear very well.  "Did the dog settle down?" I ask her several times before she hears.  "It was the hat, I think" she said.  "She said it was the gloves".
I felt sorry for the dog, and the owner.  He was too young to be out there, and too big for her to handle.  I thought the questioner was a bit to blame, as well.  If she had quickly walked away, the poor dog owner may have been able to settle things down.
So much for dog control.