The Dangers of Dictation

SUMMARY: Don't let this happen to you

My comment responding to a friend's comment on FB June 16, 2021

I almost did a terrible, terrible thing. 

Background: 

After I have finished eating something, depending on what the food was and how much is left in my dish or bowl or plate, I might let Zorro know that it is available for him to lick.

Also background: 

I typically dictate into my phone rather than trying to type responses. 

So I was about to respond to your comment here. I had just finished the last of the ice cream.  After I finished scraping as much as I could out of the ice cream container, I set it aside until Zorro should show up at some point. 

Then I sat back to respond to your comment. I hit the write-a-reply spot and clicked the dictation microphone. That was about the time Zorro appeared and looked expectantly at me. So I stood up with the ice cream container and wandered off to set it down someplace for him to enjoy. 

A while later, I wandered back and picked up my phone and saw that there was text waiting for me to send to you; I do this too often: put in an answer and then don't hit Send. So I almost hit send until I realized that the text said--

 “hello do you want to lick my thing”

My head just about exploded thinking: Had I been hacked? Someone playing a crude joke on me?  And then I realized: Yep, forgot that dictation was turned on and started talking to the dog… about my ice cream container.

------------------------------

Technology is a dangerous thing.

I have avoided or not quite avoided similar issues SO VERY MANY TIMES.  There was the time, for example, that I think I actually clicked Send after dictating something like, "I want to wish luck to all my agility friends this weekend" and discovered to my horror that it had turned into "I want to [something that rhymes with luck] all my agility friends..." and fixed it before (I think) anyone noticed.)

Don't Feed Your Dog These Things

SUMMARY: My-word-less Wednesday.

Using someone else's words. From http://dogingtonpost.com/thanksgiving-day-foods-that-can-kill-your-dog/.

On A Serious Note

SUMMARY: Think carefully about medications with dogs in the house.

My agility friends Natalie/Joe's very brief story with an unhappy ending: Riley Oct 26, 2006 - Feb 15, 2011

My agility friend Holly's story with a happier ending: Rimadyl Toxicity – I wish I weren’t an expert…

Miscellany All Over Again

SUMMARY: various subjects--

Sylvia Trkman has a new web site, with discussion pages.

Weather--Monday: Snow on Mount Hamilton and frost warnings. (It was beautiful! And I didn't have my camera with me!) Today: I want to have my screen door open but it's off the track and won't budge! Maybe later this week I'll dink around with it.

June 22 is Take Your Dog To Work Day. Mark your calendars and check with the boss! (My boss says OK! As long as you remember to stay at your desk and work!)

I didn't take a single photo of Tika last week and thus missed 52 Weeks For Dogs *again*. This is the 3rd or 4th time. I just can't keep up. I did so want to push myself to get a great album of Tika shots, but I think this was just one more commitment too many. Will probably have to resign.

My hip is really bothering me. If my MD is right and it's a muscle thing, why does it get worse after 3 days of doing nothing and better after a day of hiking? She said it might *seem* that was but that's not really what's going on. Argh. OK, now back to relying on the miracles of modern chemistry.

8 days of agility in a 16-day period?! Am I nuts? Or what?

San Francisco might be using dog waste to produce energy! Or--has this experiment fizzled? I can't find anything on this later than 2007 on my couple of quick searches.

Earthquakes: 7.2 in Mexico Easter Sunday just south of the California border. Fortunately not much there, not much damage. You can see a cool map of the 30,000+ people who reported online about how strong it felt. On that same site, if you search their archives for your state in the U.S., you might be surprised about how many quakes are recorded for your area, too, and you can see similar maps of responses. Right, Johann The Dog who just moved to Tennessee?

The U.S. Team for the European Open championships have been announced, and four Bay Teamers are in the large dog group (Nancy, Channan, Silvina, Robert (Rob)). Is it no wonder we always have trouble getting blue ribbons around here? :-)

Another local who also trains at Power Paws (as I do) is in the medium dogs: Marcy Mantell, who is a talented photographer in her own right and who is now the first and only U.S. dog (ever, I believe) to  World Agility Champion/ AKC National Agility Champion simultaneously. She has posted some videos from the AKC trial on You Tube:
Finals,  ISC,  Round 1 - Standard  , Round 2 - JWW,   Round 3 - Hybrid




Meanwhile, Ashley and Luka are back in training now that her injury, whatever it was, seems to have healed.

Am I proud of my friends and teammates? You betcha!

Are my dogs eager to be doing something? You betcha!

Updates

SUMMARY: Random things, agility, blog, life, and a Boost shocker.

• Still waiting for my final insurance check from the MUTT MVR break-in. I think they said that they have 60 days to "conclude their investigation" or something like that. THEN I can go camera shopping.
• Boost just gave me quite a shock--because she gave herself one! She was lying there quietly next to my desk, chewing on a stick, when she suddenly yelped and leaped away, tail down, to hide under the desk. I looked--and she had given up on the stick and had switched to the end of my extension cord, for crying out loud! That thing has been there all winter for my heater to plug into. Why now? Isn't that supposed to be a puppy kind of thing, not a 4-year-old dog kind of thing? Jeez, Boost! Well, maybe that taught her--
• I try to keep my "Complete Archive of Posts" (link under Archives on the right side) but sometimes forget. Just updated from May through today.
• I also forget to update my "Complete list of labels" (link at bottom of each post). Just updated for the last year! Ooops!
• Maybe I'll get around to updating the photo album sometime soon, too.
• In this post, I uploaded actual digital versions of the photos rather than scanned from the prints. They look better; thanks again, Erika.
• In this post, I added a couple of other clarifying comments in [square brackets].
• Updated this post with the course map of the course in my yard that I was using last week (just now got my updated CourseDesigner activation code).
• I just realized that Tika has now competed in 7 Performance tournament events (3 each Steeplechase and Grand Prix, 1 DAM Team) and has qualified in every single one of them--AND placed 1st, 2nd, or 3rd in all except one (competing against 10-20 dogs usually)! How amazing is that? She really likes that 22" jump height!
• My knee held up beautifully all weekend despite my pedometer showing about 8.5 miles covered each of the 3 days, 15 courses walked repeatedly (but not obsessively), and 28 runs with my dogs. So it's not just the activity that sometimes aggravates it; it's got to be how I'm moving it, and I'm suspecting more and more that it's certain kinds of twists, turns, torques, pushes, or pulls.
• Tika looked fine all weekend, and I never even gave her any rimadyl! We middle-aged ladies are hanging in there.
• On the other hand, Tika never gets up into the 6 yards per second range any more, even on jumpers courses, so I know that she's slowing down gradually. This weekend's smooth, lovely jumpers was at just 5.2 yps; winner's time (the amazing World Team tryouts winner Icon) came in at 6.12.