Falling... I'm fahhhhhhhhhhlling... I'm fahhhhlling in...

SUMMARY: ...my yard...

Backfill: My comment on a friend's Facebook post this morning, May 5 2020


Friend said (in part):

...Falling in the flower bed and landing on a metal tub overturned with a one-inch rim on the bottom will leave a nice curved impression on one's back while also turning one's back black and red...The hardest part is getting out of bed...after that it's easier but not pain free.


My response:

Oh, ouch.

Pretty sure I didn't fall as much when I was younger as I do now, despite trying to pay close attention and doing my balance exercises... er... most of the time.

 I'll join you having fallen yesterday, tripped over I think a rough piece of concrete, having evaded all the obviously out-of-kilter pieces of concrete. I thought I was going to catch myself as my feet tried to stay under me while I was plunging forward, realized that that path would have me tripping over a 12" garden fence and possible whacking my head against a tree, but when I tried to slow or turn, down I went, and all I could think was, "don't fall on that new knee again!". Landed on side on my hip and elbow.

 Yep, finding a comfortable position last night was challenging and I sure feel it today. Sadly, my bruise has no interesting shape whatsoever, so I feel cheated on that score. (On that sore?) And I cannot possibly post a photo of my bruise on my upper thigh for fear of attracting voyeurs. So, instead, here's a picture of the scene of the crime against my humanity.

 I hope your bruises heal even faster than hoped for.

I avoided the piece of wood that's sticking up. I avoided the offset crack in the concrete. I believe that I somehow caught my foot on the next crack, which is not offset. And then fell at the end of the concrete there.  I should've drawn a chalk line around myself to see where exactly I landed, because I can never exactly remember after I get up, and I think it would be helpful in understanding how I go.  Ah, well, at least you get to see some flowers.

P.S. I can't remember any of the lyrics that go with the "I'm faaaaalllling " repeated that I'm thinking of, and of course so there are a zillion songs with "i'm falling in love with you", so you'll just have to imagine.

I have so many things to say to myself that I want to track--

SUMMARY: --and yet they stay in my head.

About my current dogs.

About my past dogs.

About my friends' dogs. Who are getting older as I'm not doing agility and not seeing them and their new dogs whom I don't recognize and whose names I don't know and I don't know what they're like. And

About agility and missing it and not missing it.

About pain and pain and pain, inside and out.  About still finding pleasure in life.

About back surgery being very likely in my very near future. And being very afraid.

About my dad who is gone. And still have no words.

About good friends and good times--I don't have many close friends, and I'm not excellent at staying in touch, but somehow we manage.

About Trail Watch Academy coming up and trying to walk 10,000 steps a day and seldom being able to do so.

About Disneyland! In 4 weeks and very excited because I love going there yet with trepidation because trips in January and May were excruciating.  But still wanting to go.

About truly feeling like I'm working towards being Old, not merely Older Than Before.

About beautiful weather and terrible drought and even with that, the survival of civilization with no zombies at all. So far.

About photography and loving it.

This was supposed to be my daily diary of my life with my dogs. Now it is just rather a personal version of Pinterest.

OK, I have another post to do, so on to that.

About My Back

SUMMARY: Bringing my blog up to date on this topic.

I had not expected my body and life to take a turn in this direction, but they have, so here we go.

I've mentioned my recent back pain over the last year a few times.



I have a bit of history of back issues related to spine problems--bad one back in 2000/2001, when I was on disability and couldn't do much of anything, then using a lot of caution since then or risk sciatic pain creeping quickly in, then the current bout that started early last year, got a bit worse, got a bit better so that I could start doing longer walks again, but up until 3 or 4 months ago it did not interfere with actually doing agility. Got slowly worse again to where I couldn't actually do agility, more than maybe one run a day.

Then abruptly one morning I couldn't stand up, I was in so much pain.

The short story is that my lumbar (lower) spine is suffering the effects from degenerative disk disease and arthritis and probably bad luck and is now so contorted that nerve pain is constant. I have discovered gradually that hobbling downstairs and using the exercycle for 5-10 minutes followed by basic core exercises and stretching allows me to operate in an upright position per my design specs, but the individual parts are wearing out and I can't get replacements. Icing helps temporarily. Heating helps temporarily. Stretching helps temporarily, but only to ease the pain, not make it go away.

I'm out on short-term disability again while investigating whether very serious surgery is my only solution and meanwhile trying to ease the pain a bit. Just being out from work I think helps a bit--not so stressful, no requirement to be on the computer any longer than I feel comfortable doing, and so on. However, I was enjoying my current long-term assignment and it was sad to clear out my cubicle and leave it behind for now. Hoping that's not long term, but still TBD.

There's no way I can do agility at this time. Any kind of training at all is hard when trying to avoid any kind of bending, and sitting hurts, and standing up hurts. Bah, I say.

I'm not trapped at home: Driving is comfortable. Places where I can sit immobile for a while (e.g., movie theaters with good seats) are OK, as are places where I can lean forward onto a table to take the weight off my spine/backside are OK. Hard to work under such restraints.

Also on assorted meds trying to ease the pain, so I spend a lot of time just sleeping.

But I've been in a good state emotionally all spring and into summer, and despite the challenges, I'm still there, just occasionally whining to myself and having a brief self-pity party. Then I'm off and running (figuratively) again, setting up appointments, doing research, gathering data, and so on.

People have been very helpful and understanding. It's amazing how many of my friends have had some kind of back surgery or have avoided it but still have problems.

I might need that deeply involved and complex surgery. We'll see--but if I do, it'll probably be sooner rather than later. Oh, boy, something to look forward to: Being out on disability and in a lot of pain for up to a year. But if it fixes the problem...

Yeah.

Hope all of your backs are doing well.

If It's Not One Thing, It's Two...or Three...

SUMMARY: Where's that youthful body I had JUST the other day, I'm sure it's around here somewhere.

A few weeks ago, I started having an occasional twinge in my left foot. I'd stop immediately, because that was about how I remember my 1997 stress fracture starting, but then it wouldn't reappear, so I kept going. Before Haute Dawgs (April 5-7), it made itself known more frequently. Seemed OK over the weekend, but Monday morning, walking around the house--quite tender. So, in gradual progression:

• Saw a GP; diagnosis "foot hurts."
• Got x-rays.
• Discussed x-rays, which showed nothing interesting, with my regular GP.  Diagnosis: "foot hurts." Ice, wear stiffer shoes.
• Saw podiatrist yesterday.

Diagnosis is capsulitis of the second metatarsal/phalangeal joint

Short description--there's a membrane (capsule) surrounding the joint between two  bones ( in my case, the metatarsal and phalange (and no, I didn't have to look up either one to know how to spell it) of the 2nd toe). This capsule can become inflamed from overuse or abuse. That's capsulitis.

There's actually an entire article titled Capsulitis of the Second Toe because it's so common.  (The article makes it sound much more dire than the podiatrist did.)

Who knew.

Cure? Six weeks of no use. Practical solution? (Per podiatrist, what my GP said plus more) Stiffer shoes. Better padding (gave me specific recommendation-- Spenco gel something Crosstrainers--and, wow, they do make a difference). Avoid hard or rough surfaces and twisting of foot if possible. Try to reduce activity. NSAID (already taking one--wonder if I'd have noticed it sooner if I hadn't been). Ice.

I mention this because I'm planning on two weekends of USDAA dog agility in a row here, and I'm uninclined to withdraw and lose my entry fees, plus I'm on a team with Boost next weekend so don't want to leave them in the lurch. Plus I'm not too bright sometimes and will run my Human in worse condition than I'd ever run one of my dogs. (But I have a choice and they don't really.)

Before the diagnosis Thursday morning, I went hiking with the Sierra Club Wednesday evening. Didn't bother me much on the uphill, but definitely noticed it on the downhill.

Woke up Thursday morning with one of those sore necks where you can't turn your head to the left without it hurting like crazy. Throb throb throb. Didn't mention that to the podiatrist when I saw him that morning, although it would've been interesting to see what a foot doc had to say about a neck.

To celebrate the capsulitis diagnosis, Thursday evening I went to agility class. Boost and I did mostly OK--I was late as usual on various crosses, more because I'm not moving soon enough. Boost knocked a few bars, refused a couple of incoming jumps on serpentines, missed one weave entry on her *good* side. But the rest felt lovely and fast and pretty smooth.

Knee bothered me a little, foot bothered me a little, but not enough to make it uncomfortable to walk or run as fast as I could manage.

Drove home, sat at the computer for half an hour, stood up, and WHAM both my right knee and my left foot hurt so badly that I could barely move.  Hobbled miserably to bed; so painful I couldn't get comfortable, and the pain in my neck really was...a pain in the neck. Couldn't sleep. Iced all three of them again. Hunted desperately through my cabinets for maybe some Bengay--used to have some around forever that I never used, hmmm, must've gotten rid of it.  Finally fell asleep from exhaustion about 2 a.m.

This morning--remnants of soreness in all three places, but much better than last night.

Do I really want to do this this weekend? Hey, I *am* cutting back on my activity--running only one dog (plus one a day for Tika) instead of 2 dogs.  Guess I won't plan on doing any pole setting or leash running...  and I am scheduled for the score table both weekends, so that involves lots of sitting down, which will be good.

See you all on the other side of Weekend.

The End of a Four--no, Three-Day Weekend

SUMMARY: Some items accomplished, some not.

I have so much to say that it's hard to know where to start. But I want to be concise, too. Been thinking about it for 24 hours now, and my list gets longer, not shorter. I guess I just need to plunge in and blather on. It's just going to be long. Skim and read as the mood strikes you, or just look at the happy photos.

We had some successes and some--well, failures--of one sort or another.

Weather and Camping Out

The weather wasn't bad at all; mostly pretty good agility weather, actually. Every day started with frost on the grass but warmed fairly quickly. Thursday afternoon warmed up enough that, if you were running a dog and in the sun, you wanted to take off your fleece, but the chilly wind made you put it back on quickly as soon as you stopped moving or went into the shade. After we were done for the day, the beautiful puffy white clouds turned into dark ominous clouds and, despite the no-rain forecast, we had maybe half an hour of off-and-on light showers, which made for this:

I was pretty wiped and a little queasy after the usual 4-a.m. rousing and drive out, 6 runs with each dog, and so on. Went out to dinner with friends, which was fun and tasty, but by the time the meal was over, I was drooping so badly that I decided I couldn't face 45 minutes of setting up MUTT MVR for sleeping, so investigated the Best Western where a bunch of others were staying.

They had only some rooms available by 9:30 p.m.: Suites starting at $125 a night and smoking rooms at $85. Plus taxes and $15 pet fee. Since I wanted only to sleep, shower, and leave, the suite seemed stupid. I waffled over the smoking room, though--I've had some pretty bad nights in smoky rooms. The more I waffled, the more she lowered the price, till I paid $70/night plus taxes and the pet fee. So $100 I hadn't budgeted for, but better than the original quote.

The room wasn't too horrible--I've spent  nights in nonsmoking rooms that I thought were as bad. It was spacious, had a comfortable king-sized bed, and all the faucets and lights worked.

Felt much better Friday morning. Still frost in the morning, but warmed up more than Thursday. I set up MUTT MVR and slept VERY soundly Friday night after a spontaneous potluck with generous friends, to which I had nothing to contribute since I'd planned on going out to eat.

Saturday started with frost again, but warmed up even more to shirtsleeve weather by midday. By dinnertime, though, when we had pizza brought in for our Bay Team quarterly meeting at 6:00, the chill crept in again. So--hold that point in the calendar--

Tika

Tika seemed pretty happy and healthy most of the time. She did her "hug" stretch before almost every run, where she puts her front feet up on my chest and stretches everything out. If she's hurtin', she won't do that. The last couple of runs on Saturday, she didn't do it right away or fully at first, and I thought, hmmm... but then she did it fully.

We definitely connected better than under the arena at Santa Rosa, but still had enough miscues and oddities that made me more and more aware that I can't expect her to do what she's always done.  I can point to most of them as a hearing and/or vision issue (I'm still not positive one way or the other about the latter). It's frustrating to assume that she'll just do the things she's always done and then she doesn't.

Like Saturday's gamble, which I thought was a complete gimmee for her, and she sent out beautifully but then on the turn to the Aframe, while I yelled "climb! climb!", she just kept coming towards me, not very fast, looking at me uncertainly. It made me sad, and then she didn't grab my shoes afterwards, either, so she wasn't feeling her cheery best. That's just one example.

Sure, we were never perfect in USDAA, but had held a pretty constant 65% Q average for a few years, and that average is just dropping. She Qed 4 out of 6 on Thursday, 3 out of 6 on Friday, and 2 out of 6 on Saturday, so we weren't getting any better with experience. So--hold that point in the calendar--

Tika Performance Team

What also made me sad was that she had four very nice runs in the DAM individual events. I was pleased with all of them, and yet she earned a Q in only one. Part of the problem was that there were only 6 dogs in her height class, so we combined with the 16" dogs. Between Chaps in our height and Epic and Heath in 16" (and a couple of other really awesome younger performance 16" dogs as well), between them usually having not only among the highest scores in Performance but in Championship, too, Tika's very good scores didn't Q. (Individual Qs are based on being within 15% of the average of the top 3.) What was really frustrating was that her scores *would* have been Qing in any of the Championship classes!

So I could pass it off as bad luck that there were only 6 in our class rather than 7 or that all the best Performance dogs happened to be there that weekend, but still, she's not usually had problems Qing in Team individual events before. And, in 5 of the last 11 team events, we have had to combine Tika's height with the 16", so there's every expectation that this experience could happen again.

Chaps had his usual consistently high scores, so as a team we were doing really well.

The club split team into 2 days, which makes me nuts, especially when it's such an important Q (our Platinum Tournament), so I had to sleep on the stress of hoping that we'd finally get that last Team Q needed for that title, after December's disaster, and the next team not until July.

After the first class on Thursday, Chaps and Tika were in 3rd place out of 18 teams. After next class, we moved into 1st place and stayed there after the 3rd and 4th classes, too--but, going into the relay on Friday afternoon, we were a mere 5 points (or 5 seconds) out of about 700 beyond both the 2nd and 3rd place teams--so close out of all those points! We couldn't slack off at all if we wanted to hold our 1st place.

But to me, at that moment, THE most important thing was not Eing so that we would Q. At that point, we probably would've still Qed if either of us had Eed in the relay, but not certain about that--it's a huge penalty in the relay.

One of the two teams had a refusal on the weaves and had to redo, so that moved took them out of contention for the top two spots. Chaps had a clean first half. I wanted to lead out rather than run off the line with Tika to avoid any possible off course or faults, so I walked calmly and quietly to position before releasing Tika. She had a really nice run, but that calm leadout cost us--with our final total score of 896.61 points for the 5 runs, we were 1.5 points (seconds) exactly *behind* the other team. So--

2nd place out of 18 Performance team, which I'm quite pleased about, considering how good & fast the other teams were.

And, most importantly, Tika's Performance platinum tournament! Thank goodness that's out of the way! More fun than that--that was also Chap's Performance gold tournament title! What a combo!

And a relief that last December's disaster was just a fluke due to Tika's hearing in the Santa Rosa arena.

No more team? Less agility?

Still, I'm thinking that if she can't Q in the individual events, there's no reason for me to be running her in team any more. Except that I promised our old partner Brenn to do July team for old time's sake, since Brenn's arthritis seems to have eased a bit.

We had our moments--she placed 2nd in Round 1 Steeplechase even though it had 2 sets of weaves and she looked so slow!, and placed 2nd in the final round also, which ALSO had 2 sets of weaves, but she misread a rear cross (or I was too far behind--I'd been worried about that spot before we ran) and we missed 1st place by 0.5 seconds. But that's because one of the very fast younger dogs scratched, another popped out of the weaves, and Chaps scratched, so just by not Eing we'd have been guaranteed at least 3rd.

She Qed easily in both regular Jumpers rounds, although only placing 4th of 7 and 2nd of 5.

And she won Thursday's Standard and Friday's Gamblers.

But our failures when we didn't Q seemed much larger and much more different than what we'd failed on in the past. Much puzzlement on my part on how to manage this deafened dog and much puzzlement on her part as to why I'm not telling her what she needs to know.

So I'm thinking that we're closer than I thought to not doing much agility.

Boost

On the up side:

• Weaves: We did 20 sets in 18 runs, including Friday's gamble, two in Thursday's Snooker, two sets in Steeplechase, several situations where I wanted to move far away laterally, several challenging entrances, and so on, and she nailed almost every entry and stayed in almost all. Exceptions: Coming out of a chute to a right turn to the weaves, I called her hard and overcalled her; tried a challenging serp in Team Relay and she cut behind me; and then, jeez, the easiest ones: back to back weaves in a gamblers *opening*, where I did NOT cut away and was right with her, she popped out twice in a row(!) but then got them both the next 2 tries. Those great, fast, accurate weaves made me very happy.
• She did all her contacts beautifully! No coming off the side, no leaving early! Yowza!
• Table in standard: Thursday's and Friday's were fast downs and she stayed down; Saturday's was a fast down, one elbow came up briefly but went back down when I reminded her. That's excellent, also.
• Serpentines: I dared two or three since we've been practicing them, and she actually came in! Must keep working on it, though, as they weren't completely smooth.
• Team: Wow, she did not E or crap out on any one of her five team events, which has got to be a first for her! She even earned a Q in the gamblers, and she hardly ever Qs in team events. Furthermore, none of her teammates (Jersey and Rift) Eed or crapped out in anything, either, and much to our delight and amazement, we finished 4th of 20 teams! That's the highest I've ever placed in Championship team (although Tika has placed in the top 3 several times in Performance team). Yowza.
  

Not so good:

• Bars. It wasn't a bar-knocking frenzy, but they came down at a fairly regular rate. I might count later, but I'd guess at least 10 bars out of 18 runs.
• Refusals and runouts. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh. Lots.

What we really needed:

• Jumpers: Thursday--knocked the 2nd bar, came in past a jump after a tunnel (I might have called too hard but she just skimmed the edge of it so it would've almost been easier to take it); didn't go forward to a jump that I really needed her to, so Eed on refusals. Friday (team jumpers), two refusals that were mostly my fault--I checked out on a front cross and tried a rear which is her nemesis and she just stopped, then another when I briefly forgot the course. (But she kept up all her bars.) Saturday: I think one bar down, one refusal that I fixed, and another on a rear cross where she just kept looking at me until she was right in front of the jump and stopped. I made her just jump it and then walked off.
• Snooker: Thursday (team): not too bad, got through 7-7-7-3 in the opening and through 5 in the closing but I missed a front cross again and when I tried to rear she ran past the next jump. Friday: Ran past the first red when I tried a lead-out pivot, so bobbling to get back to it. Couldn't have asked for a smoother course on which to do three 7s except that she chose *this* time to go completely straight instead of curving slightly to follow me (and for a change I was way ahead of her, so no excuse!) and went off course right away. Saturday: A twisty ugly course that the smoothest thing I could find with hopes of a superQ involved 10 front crosses. She ran past a couple of jumps anyway that I had to go back and get--mangled our way through the opening four reds and obstacles, but when we had to go around one jump she started paying more attention to me than to the obstacles and we futzed out on several stupid attempts at the next two jumps.

Health

My knee was holding up OK, but feeling worse gradually. I iced it only once--seemed like there was never time when it was convenient to spend 15 minutes doing it. My own speed and agility in the ring is DEFINITELY helped by making sure that I can jog and sprint before I get the dog out to compete, but it was taking more and more steps of each for me to loosen up as the weekend went on. And I still get winded when there's a lot of running.

 By the time I walked the last regular class on Saturday--Jumpers--my legs were so tired that I walked it only a couple of times and then peeled off so I'd have enough energy left to actually run it. Walking the Steeplechase finals (for Tika) after that, I really didn't even want to be walking, I was that tired.  Now hold that point in time...

Friday evening, vet Cindi massaged Tika and Boost--she's worked on them before, so knows them a bit--because I was still concerned about the limps I'd seen the last couple of weeks from Boost, and although tika seemed OK, she's just older and arthritic.  Another $130 that I hadn't budgeted for, didn't know she was going to be there but was glad to be able to use her servies.

Sure enough, she identified Boost's right hip socket as being sore. NOthing that she'd recommend not running Boost, but enough to keep an eye on and maybe do less of everything that we usually do for a while to rest it. And Tika's left side was pretty tight and resisting; her toes were quite stiff but loosened up with the massage (and she showed me how to work on them).

Then by midday Saturday I was detecting a very slight limp on some occasions with Boost, so it was coming and going almost imperceptibly. For that last Jumpers run, Tika started out very slowly on the first four obstacles,  and I thought she was done, but she picked up. I warmed her up a lot more for her final Steeplechase and she looked ok, but oh, she's SOOOO stiff in the weaves these days!

And we arrive at Saturday evening

Everything just added up to this point in time, late afternoon Saturday--overly tired physically, a little discouraged, wondering whether my dogs had reached their saturation point, regretting having entered Sunday also.

Sure, there was another Jumpers and another Snooker, which was the whole reason I entered Sunday, but our performances had been so crapped in all three tries at each so far, there was no reason to think that Sunday would suddenly be THE jumpers and THE snooker we'd been waiting for.

So, late that afternoon, I decided that we were done. It was a great relief once I made the decision, and it gave me the energy to spend 90 minutes packing everything up after the Bay Team meeting, although I wasn't glad to finish packing and then driving the 2 hours home after dark.

Startled my renter, coming in just before 11 p.m.--can't remember when the last time was that I came home early from a trial, but I think it's been years and years. Pottied the dogs and went straight to bed. Didn't regret at all not being there today. Oh, well--except that one other friend who's been trying forever to get a Super-Q got it today. So, well, MAYBE that WOULD have been THE Snooker... But probably not.

Being at home and in my own bed is a nice feeling, and the stress, thrills, spills, and chills of competition are a nice thing to get a break from. Remind me if I ever try to sign up for 4 days of agility again that I've been down this path several times and should know better.

Four-Day Agility Extravadogaganza

SUMMARY: Hopes and fears for the coming weekend.

It's time for the annual four-day insanity of agility. Why anyone wants to schedule multiple-day trials when there isn't a weekend or holiday is beyond me. And yet, I go.

In this case, because I really want to get Tika's last DAM Team Q for her (Performance) Platinum Tournament title, and this time, Team's five events are run across two days--Thursday and Friday.

In several past years, I entered only three of the days, but this time (a) I want to get as many Qs as I can with Tika before we really can't do agility any more and (b) there are additional Jumpers and Snookers on Sunday, and of course I'm hoping against hope that I can pick up Boost's Jumpers Qs and SuperQs.

So, there it is, need to stay all four days.

The weather looks like it'll be good. That's very, very, good, because it was at this 4-day trial in 2006 when it poured for several days before, leaving us walking through ankle-deep mud and ponds on the fields, and my knee swelled up like a grapefruit, and later that year I ended up with knee surgery. We're hoping to avoid a repeat.

Note to self: Need to take lots of ice and ice the knee regularly.

My hopes are:

• Tika's increasing deafness won't be as much of a handicap outdoors.
• Boost and I will somehow click and get Jumpers Qs and Snooker SuperQs. 
• Tika and I and our teammates will all click and get that last Team Q so I can stop fretting about it.
• Tika's body will hold up through 4 days and 22 runs. She's been looking good in the yard here, did some really fast table-downs yesterday that I haven't seen in a while. On the other hand, in class last week, she started out super fast and ended up obviously slower.
• Boost's body will hold up through 4 days and 22 runs. She's been coming up stiff lately after workouts. I can't figure it out myself and I probably ought to have her looked at. But she looks like me: Stiff when she first stands up and for several steps, and then loosens up and is perfectly normal walking and running.
• My knee and energy level will hold up.

I'm now kind of regretting entering everyone in everything. It's too late to scratch and get my money back, but I always have the option of scratching runs while we're there if it looks like it needs to be done. Hate to toss the entry fees like that, though.

Although--I've kinda been tossing entry fees for years trying to get Qs with Boost, so it's not like I'm unfamiliar with the concept.

Team:

• Tika is teamed with oft-mentioned Chaps this time--also, we're doing both Pairs runs together. So it seemed appropriate to have a team name of "Use Chapstik Every Day".  Are you just so jealous of our creativity?
• Boost is teamed with Jersey (who lives just a few blocks from us and I think we've teamed before) and another dog/person whom I don't know who are coming in from out of state--thus our "Western Alliance" team name.

I'll be sleeping in MUTT MVR for all three nights. So I really do hope the weather holds up. In fact, it might get to be almost too warm on Sunday. Well... 72F, which seems warm compared to, say, winter. If it's bright and sunny, could feel very hot running.

Ennyhoo-- not sure whether I'll post again before I go, and I don't think there's wifi there on site, so this might be it until Sunday night or Monday.

More Miscellany

SUMMARY: Shoes, class, serpentines, spring, flowers, wind...

Because most of our class this week is off in Reno for the AKC Nationals, there were only three of us in attendance. So I ran both Merle Girls every run. And we got more runs in, or at least more detailed work on each of the runs, because there were only 4 dogs instead of 7 or 8 or so.

You know some people say, "I don't know which dog I'll be running" when referring to a single dog? Like I used to with Remington--the fast, eager dog, or the turned off dog? Well, my dogs I think don't know what handler they're going to get. Sometimes I poop out in class just running the normal number of runs with the equivalent of only one dog. Sometimes I can run both dogs a whole lot more and still feel like I'm moving and [relatively] agile. That's how I felt tonight. I dunno why. It can vary not only from week to week, but day to day.

Boost still can't do straight-on serpentines, even though we worked on them some this week. We talked in class a little bit about starting from square one, which was a good review. Now I have 6 days in which to fix it before the 4-dayer. Heh. Well, we'll work on it.

Tika started fast and excited, but slowed down fairly quickly, and, yes, is not doing some things that in the old days I could always count on her to do. And then, poof!, just like that, she's running and then she's sniffing the ground with a little displacement/stress action going on. Ah, well, learning to handle "which dog do I have" with Tika is such a change from her normal consistent self through most of her agility career.

I wore my brand-new, actually *shiny* shoes in class tonight.

You think it was time?

I dunno, those Ditas and an identical pair lasted me collectively at least 10 years. That was large amounts of money well spent. If this new 40-buck pair from Big 5 lasts me half as long, I'll be happy.

Meanwhile, speaking of shopping, you really should never let me into the garden center when spring's around the corner. I'm just sayin'.

Although, whoa, I'm rethinking how to decorate my dog's crates in MUTTMVR. This looks pretty good!

But spring is fickle this time of year--March is trying hard to circumvent those old saws and go OUT like a lion:

And speaking of lions--it's not every auto body shop (getting estimates on fixing MUTT MVR's owie) whose lobby contains two life-sized lion guardians.

Roar.

Another Agility Day. Or Two.

SUMMARY: Boost's weaves, class(es), not enough hours, sore.

Boost's weaves

I must be feeling slightly motivated this week, because once again we went out to the yard and practiced weaving poles. Boost's disaster from the previous day did not reappear [making me wonder whether it'll be like this in competition, too--weaves brilliant one day, disaster the next] but she did still miss a veer left into the weaves.

Whereupon I reverted to another old strategy of placing a small piece of green wire garden fence blocking the wrong entry. On her next approach, she stuttered when she saw it (in the old days, sometimes she'd hop over it), then >>whew!<< made the correct entry. We did it like that two more times, then I snuck the wire away, and she was fine the rest of practice. Gads.

The Night of Class

Last night was class night. This is different. We've been in Tuesday night class ever since we were bumped out of Thursday night class (because first it became World Team Night and then was abandoned altogether) which is where we'd been ever since we left Wednesday Night 8:15 Class (tearfully because I loved that group of people but had to switch nights for various reasons).

I've been wanting back into Thursday night because Tuesday nights are ALSO: My monthly Master Composter meetings, my neighborhood's monthly community meetings, and my every-6-weeks-or-so San Jose Repertory Theater season ticket nights.

Tuesday morning, Power Paws sent email asking whether anyone would be interested in a Thursday 8:00 class. Boom, a bunch of us swooped right in. (I think several of us who'd recently been in the Tuesday class for some period of time, after being in the previous thursday night class, who'd previous been in the Wednesday Night 8:15 Class, who... well, ok, sometimes we move around a lot, not always by our own choice.)

So I never even went to a Tuesday night class to say goodbye. Probably just as well. Always sad leaving a group that you've grown accustomed to.

Not Enough Hours

But another agility friend's post about another nosework class starting up on Sundays got me thinking: I've been very curious about the nosework stuff. Lots of people around here are involved in that, and it sounds like tons of fun. Plus something I can practice easily at home. Buuutttt... started thinking about my schedule and everything I'd LIKE to do:

• Monday: Boot camp
• Tuesday: See above
• Wed: Hiking w/sierra club singles
• Thurs: Agility class, boot camp (obviously not both)
• Fri: I don't schedule anything recurring on friday night
• Weekends: Agility about 1 out of 4 weekends currently. Boot camp Sunday mornings otherwise. Could be nosework on Sundays, instead.

I'm not thinkin' I'm ready for that additional commitment and conflict.

Class Revelations

So last night in class, the focus was on discrimination (we had no trouble doing the correct choice of tunnel or contact) and on getting to the back side of jumps. My dogs did OK on the latter if *I* was in the right place. Which was a problem--more in a moment.

But Boost: Knocks bars like crazy! Who'd have ever thought it! Sigh.

And can't follow me around a circle of four jumps! (Hate it when the instructor says in kind of a stunned voice, "Wow.")

And easily pushes off of jumps when I'm trying to rear cross!

And we're competing this weekend?! Why do I not work on these issues, whyyyyyyyyyy???

Did have a discussion with a friend there about how you can't really work on this stuff at home--the yard isn't big enough to get the kind of drive and obstacle distraction that you can get in a big field filled with agility equipment. And just finding the extra two hours here and there to go up to power paws to use their field...[see "Not Enough Hours"].

My back yard via Google Maps (weird--when did they take this, that there's no visible agility equipment?!):

Power Paws field, same zoom scale:

Sore Revelations

I have been using acetaminophen the last 10 days instead of my prescription indomethacin. Annnnnnd that is so not working for me. I could barely move around the course last night. Lower back sore. Hip sore. Knee sore. Legs felt like they weighed 100 pounds, with big vises screwed onto all the joints. I don't realize what a difference it makes. Doesn't affect me just walking, or even hiking, even briskly. But trying to sprint into position for a good serp or front cross--gah. Might have to slip in a trip to the pharmacy today. Either way, could be an interesting weekend of competition.

Good News/Bad News

SUMMARY: To start the year running, I've got good news and bad news. And more good news. Etc.

Gratuitous dog photo: Dogs love riding in the car around the neighborhood when they don't have to be in crates.

• Good news: My house appraised for much more than I thought it might in this market.
• Bad news: That means my property taxes will keep going up, not down like so many other people's.
• Good news: That might mean that it's a shoo-in for my refi application to go through. Just waiting to hear when closing should be--I think--

• Good news: Paid off the last 73 cents on MUTT MVR last week!
• Bad news: It's wayyyy overdue for its xxx,000 mile check-up.
• Good news: Passed its smog check again.

• Good news: Tika has been running around like a lunatic without her bootie and no signs of a sore foot. Ran her two runs (jumpers courses with weaves) and she was fine. Haven't tried contacts again yet.
  
• Bad news: She continues to look, every once in a while, like she's sore for a few minutes or more.
• Good news: It goes away again. But I wish I knew--our next trial is in just under 2 weeks, and she's signed up for a day of agility.

• Good news: Boost loves doing agility.
• Bad news: In class last week, after we've done virtually no agility for 3 weeks, she popped out of the weaves EVERY time at the 10th pole as I moved away from her. Instructor said, well, I had to support in in N following ways, and I was maybe rude and said, no, I don't have to, this is why we practice weave distractions down to the bone at home until I can't get her to pop for any reason.
• Good news: When I finally just picked her up, carried her off the field, and put her away until the next run--then the next time, she did the weaves all the way through.

• Bad news: Shattered tooth down into the root. Happy New Year! The dental surgeon I had to go to to get it excavated said I didn't *quite* win the prize for the most pieces of tooth to be dug out.
• Good news: Didn't hurt before, hurt afterward more than I had hoped but less than I had feared, and only for that first evening, and it's been fine ever since.
• Bad news: I dread finding out how much an implant is going to cost. No dental insurance.

• Good news: Doctor says, Those things? They're harmless. They're called ruby spots (cherry angiomas).
• Bad news: Yeah, you'll probably keep getting more. Yeah, they can get bigger.
• Good news: Can burn them off with liquid nitrogen. [Like warts, I guess.]
• Bad news: THAT's not a fun procedure. And it can scar. Either way, I'm going to end up looking like a giant polkadot by the time I'm 100.
• Good news: Remind myself: they're harmless.
  

Tika sees another dog while on leash:

Of Mice and Women

SUMMARY: Boost finds a mouse but we can't catch it. Plums are pretty much gone and I'm glad. In a barely related story, menopause is now hip.

Three evenings ago, while I was (as usual) at the computer, Boost started her "Alert! Something is weird and out of place!" bark, except this time it was in the kitchen, not the yard, and she was staring at the microwave. I couldn't figure out what it might be. There was nothing out of place--the cover was off the toaster, but it often is; there was a loaf of bread on the counter but it had been there for a week; the lid was off the teakettle but I doubted that she could even see that.

So I went back to work and, a couple of minutes later, the alarm-barker went off again. I walked along the counter, touching stuff, to see whether she seemed particularly interested in anything, but nooo--as soon as I came into the room, she just went into "Hi, mom!" mode instead of helping me figure out what her britches were in a bunch about, which is what she usually does on an alarm-bark.

Back to the computer. Another alarm-bark. This time I picked her up and walked her along next to the counter so that she could see what was there. She seemed intrigued at the idea of being able to see what was there and felt inclined for a real close look, but nothing along the lines of cautious worry that she exhibits for other causes of alarm.

So I put her down, and she's looking at me cheerily, and Tika is buzzing around noisily at all the commotion, and I'm standing there, leaning on the counter, asking The Booster what on earth she's going on about, when of a sudden I think I hear something in the cabinet next to me. Just the tiniest of whispery sounds, and gone again. I managed to get the dogs into down-stays so that their jangling and toenails didn't interfere, and stood there and listened. After a minute, there it was again, a teeny whisper. Mouse in the wall? With all the rodents we've had around lately, it could be. And then came the distinct (but very quiet) sound of tiny toothers chewing cellophane.

I stepped to the front of the cabinet (the one over the microwave, which on the counter) and yanked open the door. Silence. I scanned the shelves. There was a package of spaghetti on the bottom shelf, in cellophane. I reached in and started to move it, and Zam Zoom! A little furry body plunged past me out of the cabinet, across the microwave, onto the counter, across the stove, and down the gap next to the fridge, all in the time I was still trying to form the thought "Eek!" and coming down out of the air.

Now, I am not an eeky person and I am not afraid of rodents. But from a still, silent cabinet, having a creature launch itself at you abruptly is more than startling.

Meanwhile, the dogs are watching me curiously (my body having hidden the cabinet from their view and the rest of the activity up out of their sight). I told Boost she was a good girl and went exploring. Sure enough, mouse droppings under the sink. (There seems to be some unwritten mousey law that, when invading a kitchen, you must deposit droppings beneath the sink.) I cleaned all that out and put mousetraps there and between the fridge and the stove. To no avail, apparently.

Which brings us to plums.

It has been plum season for about the last 3 weeks.I've harvested and eaten as many as I could, gave quite a few away, made two separate batches of plum sorbet (mmmMMM! but it still uses only a handful of plums), and picked up zillions from the ground day after day and tossed their squashed bodies into the compost bins.

This, however, is where I keenly feel Jake's absence. He was a profligate plum eater, and as you might imagine, this worked wonders for loosening up his intestinal fortitude. And he had the most luxurious petticoats on his back legs and long silky hair on his tail, and in plum season I spent a prodigious amount of time hosing him down and letting him out in the middle of night to answer the call of the bowels.

This year, there's no Jake, and the current dogs seem far less enamoured of the purple fruit. Except that in the last few days, Boost seems to have discovered the joys of decaying plummage. So now I've been letting *her* out in the middle of the night.

Last night, it was twice, and the second time, I couldn't get back to sleep. Lying there comfortably, thinking about nothing in particular, but wide awake. (With the occasional hot flash to keep me entertained kicking off the sheets and pulling them back up again.) I finally got up and went downstairs to settle at my favorite putting-my-brain-to-sleep station at the kitchen table. Made myself a nice hot chocolate and started a crossword puzzle. The dogs, of course, had gone back upstairs to bed and by all accounts were quite comfy there.

Then, out of my peripheral vision, I detected motion. Glanced to one side just fast enough to see a mouse vanish under the fridge. I cursed silently and went back to my crossword. A few minutes later, the dang thing skittered from the fridge to under the stove. A few minutes later, it skittered from there back along the wall.

OK, this was NOT relaxing. And why wasn't the dang thing kindly throwing himself upon the mercy of the mousetraps? And what could I do about it in the meantime? I debated getting the dogs and trying to chase the mouse out from under something, but who knows where he'd be by the time I came downstairs, and even if I could convince the dogs to take part and I could flush him out, I figured that my renter/housemate might not appreciate my efforts at 3 in the morning. So, unrelaxed, I returned to bed.

I did, eventually, fall asleep, along about dawn. The dogs let me sleep til 9, which is very late for me (but there's the warped benefit of letting them out in the middle of the night--they were prepared to hold anything further until much later in the day). At which point I got up, enjoyed a liesurely breakfast while reading the paper, and was amused to see (just a few days after posting my Cold Flashes blog) an article saying that it's now apparently the cool factor to be in menopause and suffering from hot flashes. And how, even 5 years ago, no one ever talked about them in public (well, I know that's not strictly true), but now women yak about them to anyone and turn them into social clubs, so that nonmenopausal women feel left out in the cold (so to speak). And, perish the thought, hot flashing women even BLOG PUBLICLY about these previously very personal issues! The nerve!

But, if those left-out-feeling women are looking for something else to do with their time while us in the In crowd are putting on our fleece sweater, taking it off, putting it on, taking it off, they're welcome to come by and clean up old rotting plums from my garden and herd the mice out of my kitchen so I can have a good night's sleep.

Weaves, Pushing the Envelope, and Getting Old

SUMMARY: Boost's weaves--huh? Tika and me--how far can we go? Getting old: Me and Jake.

Boost's Weaves

At our last 2 weekends of trials, Boost got all of her weave entries (except once where she didn't see them at all and went past the whole thing), and stayed in all of them except twice when I tried to get ahead & she popped out at last pole. At home, I've been working on fixing that last issue by getting farther ahead, racing her to the end, doing distractions, etc. And have been working on weave entrances with a short set of poles from various tough angles, sometimes just across the lawn but more often from a tunnel or over a jump.

Today in class she couldn't do weaves worth beans. She hit the first pole entry every time but then just started skipping randomly, often the 2nd pole but just as often staying in for a few poles & then skipping here and there. Jeez! I'd even just load her in manually to the first pole and still she'd skip. I wasn't racing her or anything. Finally towards the end on one troubled attempt, Nancy had us just go to the other end and weave back towards where we came from, and she did it fine. Then she was OK going the right way if I loaded her in carefully.

Then, after class was all over and Nancy "left the building," telling us all to do the exercise one more time, Boost not only made a difficult entry in flow, full speed, but stayed in the weaves all the way through very nicely, thank you very much.

So I blame it all on Nancy.

But seriously--what a frustrating experience! Hope it doesn't remanifest itself at a trial.

Tika Pushing the Envelope

I've said before how much I like my current class. In particular, Ken with Apache the Terv and Jenn with Kye the Aussie, all of us jumping 26", and Ash with Luka at 16", and all of us pushing the limits of our handling skills. Of course, Ashley and Luka are rapidly working their way into being in the top teams in the entire country in both USDAA and AKC, and I just can't compete with his vast stores of energy and long legs, but I can feed off of that drive to succeed. We talk about "The Cool Factor" in class a lot. That's one of Jim's seminar jokes--why would you choose one handling option over another? The Cool Factor! Because everyone will think you're totally cool if you can pull it off! What it really is, is stretching what we think we're capable of. All one of us has to say is, "I'm going to try it!" and the others of us are right in there, not wanting to be uncool. :-)

I'm finding that it's hard for me to pull up a lot of energy or to move my legs and arms really fast, though. Some of it, I'm sure, is just being out of shape from the months of knee issues and post-surgery. And I'm not doing much about it, either. Like--hmmm--I could've been doing the exercycle instead of typing this blog entry. But what fun is that? (Not.)

Getting older

And some of it is just getting older. Things just don't work the way they used to. Things come up sore that not only didn't used to be sore but that I didn't even know existed. How can I be feeling the effects of aging when I don't THINK I'm getting older? It's just not right!

My knee isn't perfectly better yet. After I've been sitting for a while--say, driving to/from class or at the computer--when I first stand up, if I try to take a good step immediately, the knee half the time collapses under me with a small bit of pain. I have to stand for a moment and let the knee loosen. I'm hoping that this is a transitory phase in its healing.

The original Border Terrorist (Terrier), Bobbi, who was quite the competitor when I started agility but who has been retired for quite a while now, celebrated her 15th birthday just last November, same time as Jake. We just got word now that she's passed away. It's always too soon! And Jake's been doing pretty well, just the usual complaints from me that sometimes he just won't come out in the yard and play fetch. (But annoying me immensely because if I take it into the living room, he'll run forever as I bounce his toys off collectibles, priceless heirlooms, glass cabinets, and windows.) So sometimes I just insist. Yesterday afternoon, of 2 days of him looking at me eagerly but then trotting back into the house, I wouldn't let him go past me, and of course then he turned around, got his toy, and plunged full-heartedly into an enthused, tail-wagging all-out game of fetch. And then suddenly, after not really all that much running, he dropped his toy in the middle of the lawn (*never* does that) and just came over and stood next to me, panting and wagging his tail. Usually he wanders off with his toy to take a dunk in the pond or wander through the shady shrubs or something. It struck me as a little odd.

Then he trotted up the stairs to the porch, turned around, and just about fell right back down the steps. He started after Boost, blaming her, I guess, but when I came over, his back legs kept falling out from under him. Still, he managed to go back up the steps, but as I stroked his back, he started staggering, then would stand OK, then stagger off to the side again like he was losing his balance. Almost fell into the water bowl the couple of times he started to take a drink. But didn't want to lie down. So I just balanced him against my leg, stroking him gently, and in a minute or so he was fine again.

But it was scary; thought I'd be spending the evening at the emergency room. He's been fine ever since. People in class last night, who've had old dogs, said it sounded like a ministroke and that there could be more. So I guess at some point I'll take him in and talk to the vet about it. Argh. I'm just not ready for this.

Notes

SUMMARY: Just thinking.

• It's been SO dry here this winter. Not just in terms of rain (which we're quite low on), but the air. My fingers have been cracking since December. I use moisturizing hand lotion all the time. But I wash my hands so often, too, with being out with the dogs and (the last week or so) a cold and doing stuff in the yard, it's hard to keep up. Now my lips are chapping, my whole face is flaking. I think I'm starting to go hoarse--cold/cough or dry air? Ack.
• The lilac bush is going going...hopefully soon gone! Blog commenters are good at making me put my money where my mouth is. I offered it on Freecycle.org, thinking that no one could really possibly want an 8' tall/wide shrub, but I was swamped with replies. This is apparently the ideal time to remove it. So after 5 years in this house, it's finally going^*. But this means I'm having to dig up all the plants around it that I want to keep and move elsehwere. This is why I found/bought/stole/created dozens of pots and potting soil all summer, to do this, and then it just seemed like SO much work. But with shovels impending, I've made good progress today (yessss---less billable work again) and hopefully can finish tomorrow.
• Tip for the brain dead: When you're lifting something really heavy and you're out of condition and you want to set it on a platform (read "agility table") that's next to you, turn, don't twist at the waist. Owwwies. I knew that. OK, now I have a sore back muscle on one side. Hope it doesn't stiffen up before the weekend.
• For 2 days straight, Jake wouldn't play fetch no matter what I tried. Would finally go and get the toy and then skirt around me at the edges of the yard to dart back into the house. Yesterday he was coaxable, but I had to coax a lot. Then he fetched forever. Today I wasn't in the mood for coaxing, and he lay on the deck watching me toss a toy for the others for about 20 minutes between uprooting irises and narcissi, then he came down and asked me to to play fetch! I was thrilled. Did it a long time, too, like yesterday. Sucks getting old.
• My mom's closest cousin--my clever, funny, "aunt"--has been writing incoherent letters from her home in New York. Senility/alzheimers/whatever is setting in big time. I think that's the curse & the fear of the woodward family women: Live a long life with your body and a shorter one with your mind. It's scary. My mom's doing good so far but we all know from her stories of her grandmother and from the way her mom deteriorated that we all could be next in line...and now the cousin... Argh even more. I'll just assume that doing agility will preserve my mind forever. Or, the way I sometimes run courses, no one will know the difference anyway. That's probably a better strategy--just be incomprehensible all the time so you and everyone else just get used to it.

^*Oops, that would be an unclear pronoun reference. The lilac shrub has not, in fact, EVER been in this house to my knowledge, but *I* have been.