a Taj MuttHall Dog Diary: Scully Retires

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Scully Retires

SUMMARY: Scully--Verwende Prinses--treats her friends to ice cream and it's COLD out there plus going nuts with the camera
You'd never guess that Scully is closer to 14 than 13. She's been mostly retired, trying to get just 1 last Q for her lifetime bronze but just not quite fast enough any more most of the time. Plus she's a LITTLE dog. Plus a princess. Scully's class-time retirement party was last night, so we visited the class and took photos of everyone there to celebrate.

OK, maybe they were mostly there for class. But Scully's human dad came up for the mini-party, too; he made awesome ice cream


and it was still excellent but would've been even more excellent had it been 2 days ago and 100 degrees instead of last night at 60 with a brisk and icy wind. Yesterday: Summer. Today: Winter. Gotta love california.


Scully could hardly hold still, she was so excited. This is about the only shot where she's not in full hyper motion-- with her human family, waiting for some ice cream.


Mostly the Little Black Dog looked like this in all the photos.


You would hardly believe that this little active fluffball, multiple agility champion and possibly the most-titled dog in the Mixed Breed Dog Club's history (to be exact: ADCH APD SACH RCH-Bronze SCH-Bronze TM-Bronze AKD-Gold AGD AJD; C-ATCH3 ExSN ExJP ExCL ExFH ExWC ChSN ChST ChJP ChCL ChFH ChWC ChJU U-CD MB-CH MB-CDX MB-RA MB-VM5; EAC EGC EJC CGC), spent the weekend in the hospital being treated for just-discovered kidney disease and a tetch of pancreatitis. She will be getting IV fluids two or three times a week for the rest of her life. I guess if you get ice cream with that, it's not so bad.

Other guests/students:
Sparkle (Scully's Little Black Adopted Sister):


Bernie the Beagle:





MinPin Belle:
 

Porsche the Wonder Corgi:


Savannah who whupped everyone's butts in 22" Masters Gamblers last weekend:


Dylan, who looks perfect in sunset lighting:



Sooner,  the Papillon whose ears drape gracefully down the sides of his head instead of standing upright in a butterflyish manner, and who was curious about everything except what it would be like to hold still for the camera:


Boost and Tika had to wait in MUTT MVR until the 2nd class of the evening. Tika demonstrates that a really good shake, when in a freeze frame, looks pretty dorky:



Still dealing with my little crappy point and shoot, which likes neither motion (great for photographing dogs) nor any kind of darkness (great for photographing around sunset). But as long as I was there and the lighting and sky were beautiful and the nearly full moon was up--what the heck--get artsy and all that.

Waiting their turns.

Walking the course.



No hamming it up for the camera from the instructor demonstrating push-throughs, nope, not at all:


Tunnel. Moon. Agility handler. What could simpler?


Moon. Field light. Instructor. Successfully finishing a course. What could be better?




More photos uploaded here but mostly of interest to class attendees.

9 comments:

  1. I'm having a good laugh at all those people wearing all those layers of clothes and thick fleece for, ummm, 60 degrees? Californians crack me up ;-)

    I was enjoying the same moon and sunset last night at an evening outdoor swim practice-beautiful! Wished I had my camera.

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  2. The Phalène is the drop-eared version of the Papillon.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phal%C3%A8ne

    :)

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  3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phal%C3%A8ne

    The Phalène is the drop-eared version of the Papillon. :)

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  4. Elayne, really, it was the wind. Later in the evening when the wind cut out, it wasn't so bad and I stripped down to a single layer of light fleece. I'm guessing with windchill it was well below 50.

    Althea, yep, know about the Phalene (you can see on the wikipedia page where I edited it--look for "Elf" near the bottom: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Phal%C3%A8ne&action=history :-) but Art calls him a Papillon anyway. Some places they're separate breeds. Dumb but true, since you can have drop-eared or not in the same litter.

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  5. What a wonderful celebration - cold and all! Thanks for the pics!

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  6. Happy retirement to Scully! Looks like a fun class!

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  7. Looks like a GREAT class! Love the lighting..even if you are just using the crappy point and shoot! Sorry to hear about the IV thing though, that has to be hard on the dog and the family!

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  8. I'm sad that Scully is retiring due to illness, but at least it sounds like Scully will still have some fun times with family ahead. (Unlike SO many fur-kids I've been hearing about of late.)

    Yeah, you've got a crappy point-n-shoot to do your shootin' with, but your eye is great, the lighting was (mostly) great, and the results are great. ("Someone" I know couldn't do *nearly* as well with a high-end camera on auto.) Keep kickin' photo-butt!

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  9. Thanks, Steph, for the words of encouragement.

    In fact, Scully's retirement party was planned the preceding week, I gather after less than stellar performances at recent trials. Then last friday night she got very sick "all of a sudden". So the timing just happened to be good.

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