Forever in Blue Jeans

SUMMARY: I'm Zorro's Blue Jean Baby

From -- of course--Facebook. My post of April 24 '21 and my followup comments on April 25-26.

Downsizing/Disencumbering Continues. And body and body image and, yes, blue jeans! 

You need to know that I practically live in blue jeans.   Yes, it's true: 16/7/365.   (I don't actually sleep in them. Normally.)

Except--maybe?-- during the pandemic?

Except--maybe--after having Total Joint Replacement surgery?  OK, no, jeans would not work for the swelling, the bandages, the icing, the exercises, constantly getting into and out of bed... so I mostly wore leggings in and out of bed for a few weeks.

So: We arrive at April 24, 2021.

This morning, this section of shelf held 12 pairs of Levi’s that would undoubtedly “fit me again someday." It’s not just my weight, which is close to reasonable. No, it's other stuff. For example, there were several pairs of long -sized ones, which were barely short enough for me several years ago, and now are ridiculous.

Tried them all on this morning, found one that fit today. (Proving my hypothesis that at some point in the future any of them might fit!) But I overcame my don’t - get - rid - of - it Mentality and easily took them off to Plato’s Closet to see whether they would buy any. They did! I’m now $24 richer! And have 5 fewer pairs to dispose of in other ways.

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April 25: Follow up to the original: within an hour after I had posted six pairs for free on NextDoor, I had not only promised them off to people, but I had also promised three pairs that were in my rag/ recycling bag because the woman uses them to make rugs from all the denim! Score! So, really, 15 pairs to better homes!

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April 26: Oh, for.... !!!

Remembered that I had another place for storing jeans, and now I have 5 more pairs to try on and then [probably] dispose of. 

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Discussion on April 26.

The thing that gets to me is that the big stack mostly contained the "I *will* get back to my goal weight and keep it off." So, periodically, I'd get back to my goal weight and keep it off for a while. And many of the jeans would fit. But, then, gained some pounds, took a while to get back down-- But, suddenly, those jeans no longer fit!

Side note: I have never again been anywhere near my top weight from way back. Thank goodness for that! But, you know, 10 lbs or sometimes even 5 makes a difference...

So it's not the weight, per se. I am also (as of a couple of weeks ago at Kaiser), 4.5 inches shorter than I know I was when I moved to this house, and probably was for a long time thereafter. (I *know* that I had started to shrink 5-6 years ago when 2 friends who didn't know each other and in different contexts said, "are you shorter than me now?!" So I had a nurse measure my height--at the time, in a different department, so it didn't make it into my record, but it was something like 2 inches off. I was horrified. I had no idea.

(Becauuuuuuussse decreasing constantly now.)

But my old goal weight at the new height means that there's now too much weight in the wrong areas and I need a new goal weight. And, even then, not certain that most of those would fit any more. Because: Less muscle mass, and fat takes up more space for the same body weight. 🙁

Friend replied:  ah bummer. I had wondered if the BMI is based on shrinking size and then decreasing weight goals over time. Sigh...that is soooo wrong. Now I know.

Well--it mostly works. But it also depends on where one's body stores the--er--extra. Back in the couple of years in the '80s when I weighed over 180 (it was awful--by comparison, my goal weight has been 142 for around 30 years), it seemed to be distributed everywhere, and more in my arms and butt. Now most of it seems to be around my middle while the rest of me is ... kinda ok. BMI supposedly takes that into account ("fat around your belly is bad") as people age because that's a common thing even if you're not overweight. But it never *asks* for things like that.

Anyway, so, add that to DOWNSIZING, and I've decided to stop storing them. Yay me.

How I Have Drastically Altered My Wardrobe During Lockdown

SUMMARY: Just a summary...

From Facebook 4/11/20, in response to a friend, who said: "Someone on Twitter remarked that it’s going to be very difficult to go back to wearing “hard pants” after this is all over. Couldn’t agree more, as I haul on my (in)active wear for yet another day."

I wear jeans no matter what.
Work at a high tech company? Jeans.
Agility? Jeans.
Dickens Faire? Jeans.
Hiking? Jeans.
Disneyland in CA or Disneyworld in FL? Jeans.
Camping? Jeans.
Basic exercises? Jeans.
Travel? Jeans.
Going to the movies? Jeans.
Gardening? Jeans?
Meeting people in person for the first time?
Photo editing? Jeans.
Museums? Jeans.
Walking the dogs? Jeans.
Training the dogs? Jeans.
Out to dinner? Jeans.
When it's really cold? Jeans.
Warm enough so everyone else is wearing shorts?  Jeans.
Everyone else is in their jogging/sports pants for class?  Jeans.
Going out in the driveway in the morning to get the paper? Jea... well, sometimes bathrobe. But then I change into jeans because my legs get cold.
While recovering from hip surgery and knee surgery, when I was spending a lot of time in bed and/or icing my knee and/or physical therapy, I wore "leggings" regularly (don't tell anyone that was really long underwear), and it was kind of nice but, yes, my legs got cold. So--it's jeans.

COVID-19 quarantine where people see my body only above the chest for weeks on end and only because of WebEx? Yep, jeans.

How about the rest of you?

Advice for Joint Replacement Surgery (Knee or Hip)

SUMMARY: Now I've done both. Some of my tips.

(Someone asked on Facebook, March 9)

Learned a bunch from my total hip replacement (THR) aftermath a year ago, and was able to put it into play before my total knee replacement (TKR) this year--and learned more from that, too. So, off the top of my head, herewith a bunch of tips.

Note: If you're living with someone, like a spouse or good friend as a roommate, etc., who's already familiar with the household and will be the one staying with you 24/7 for the first couple of weeks, some things don't apply. But I had to recruit friends & relatives to each stay for a few days/nights, so my list got pretty long.

• The result feels great! So much better than the previous status.  Both for hip and knee! Such a relief! The down time is worth it.
• Your recovery time may vary. Apparently I did pretty good both times, but also I might be younger and more active than many patients. And I've worked hard (well, struggled) to keep my weight down because of the effect that any extra pounds puts on my joints and back.  Another woman I know who also just had a new knee but is nearly 20 years older says, fuggid, exercises are too miserable, I'm just going to use a walker for the rest of my life. Makes me sad. 
• You won't be driving for probably 4-6 weeks.
• You won't be going up and down stairs for 2-3 weeks (except maybe a very few steps).
• Try to have your room, or wherever you expect to be spending the most time, ready ahead of time: fresh linen on the bed, fresh towels in the bathroom, floor vacuumed, everything cleaned up & put away so you don't have to stare at unfinished tasks, piles of laundry, etc., while you're trying to relax and recover.
• Set up a bedside table with room to put things that you might not normally put there: water to drink, miscellaneous supplies, list of exercises and pointers from  the hospital or physical therapist, etc.
• Set up bedroom: And because for the first 2 weeks I'd be stuck upstairs (no TV, no popping into the kitchen, etc.) I also tried to make sure I had things in the bedroom for me to do (books, crosswords, paperwork to work on although that fell by the wayside). And I set up a chair and tray table so that I could sit up periodically, and have meals brought up to me there.
  AND an extra chair so my assistant and I could chat together when I was up to it and felt like sitting up.
• I put the dogs in boarding so that when I got home from surgery, and for the first couple of days and nights, neither I nor anyone else had to worry about whether the dogs were causing me any problems. Mine sleep on my bed often, although I had been crating them at night for a couple of weeks before surgery, and ever since. But I don’t have anyone living with me; it was friends and relatives who are staying overnight, and I didn’t want them to have to bother with the dogs. BUT I had to arrange to have them brought home. Luckily the boarding places were willing to do so for an extra charge. 
• Get a walker for each level of your house; you'll need it for probably the first 4 weeks. Some insurance covers a walker. BUT I asked on facebook and got offers from 5 or 6 friends for a free walker that they had stashed away.
• Be prepared to carry things while using the walker: My cousin found nifty bags with pockets online that attach to the front of the walker; very handy. And a cup holder that attaches to one of the legs of the walker. Also used that a lot. Also handy to have: a bag with handles that will slip over your shoulder and preferably even across your neck (So that the bag hangs on the opposite side from your neck). And/or clothing with pockets.
• Use leggings or long underpants: I don't usually wear PJs to bed. When I'm dressed, I usually wear jeans. For this, you'll want something that's gentler than jeans (leg will swell up, repeatedly; also, incision will have dressing or tape on it for a while). Can also just wear back to bed OR around the house with a nice top to greet people. AND can easily ice your knee through it.
• And do the exercises! And do what the physical therapist tells you to do! 
• And ask all the questions that you have; some people are hesitant to do that. I found that having a notepad and a pen at hand helped me to remember the questions; I also used a list on my phone for when I wasn’t near my pad. Because questions popped up all the time. And don't be afraid to call the designated number if you have questions that you feel can't wait for your next scheduled visit or appointment! It's your health and comfort!
• Install raised toilet seat: If the bathroom that you'll mainly be using doesn't already have one, get one and install it beforehand! My friend had to do this for me *after* my surgery because I waffled for too long, and she  ended up making about 5 trips to 3 different places, and working very hard indeed to remove the existing seat,  put the riser in place, and put the seat back on--  because not every part is compatible with every other part! What a challenge! And that raised toilet seat has been SO WONDERFUL TO HAVE after the surgery--and wish actually I had installed it at least a couple of months before my hip surgery, because I had been in so much pain sitting and standing up.
• Shop beforehand and get lots of cash. Because no one lives with me, and relatives & friends would be cycling through, I stocked up on groceries to hopefully last 2-4 weeks so no one would have to go shopping for me. I also took out $300 in cash and left it in the kitchen so if anyone did have to buy anything for me (ran out of milk, picked up a prescription, something broke & had to be replaced, etc.), they could just take the $ with them.
• Icing the knee regularly & ice machine: I already had 4 good largish blue-ice packs (the soft ones) in the freezer. I have used them more and more over the last 6 weeks instead of the ice machine, because at least I can still move around. If they give you an ice machine, that's so excellent! And I didn't really *want* to move around much the first couple of weeks. Freeze 6-8 smaller water bottles and use them in water in the machine instead of trying to keep pouring out ice water and replacing with fresh ice.  And you can always use the ice in the ice machine--but trying to keep a good supply of ice in the house is tough. The first day, my sister bought a couple of large bags and we put it into a cooler, but it had melted within 2 days, long befoer we could use it. If they DON'T send you home with an ice machine, find out where you can rent or borrow one (last time I had work on my knee, a friend loaned me hers).
• Make ice: But I also like my drinks cold, so I made as much ice as my ice keeper could hold ahead of time, so I could have ice water by my bed (I have an insulated large cup with a lid and a straw) all the time, and I drank a lot! 

MORE TO COME  I think...  will make a note here if/when I add.

April 26, 2021:  And, here is more!   How Much Help Will I Need After My Joint Replacement Surgery?

I Have This New Dog

SUMMARY: Working on enthusiasm and basic agility skills.

First, see yesterday's post.

Today, I adopted a new Border Collie. Her name is Boost. She's 7 years plus a month old. She has quite a bit of agility training, but apparently the wrong kind of training, because despite her speed and her drive, she has very little to show for it in the agility ring. F'rinstance, she often gets the highest opening points in Masters Gamblers, but who ever notices when she doesn't get the gamble due to a refusal or a bar down? F'rinstance, she sometimes has close to the fastest time in Jumpers, but who notices when she doesn't get the Q due to refusals or bars? Getting the picture?

So her old handler has decided that she needs a different handler, and it turns out that I'm the only one available. So now she has come to live with me, and I need to figure out how to fix almost 7 years of bad habits.

She's the sweetest dog you could want. Not super-affectionate, but not completely stand-offish, either. She will jump onto my lap and lay her head on my shoulder if i really insist. But only for a moment. She loves to play. She's really smart--rumor has it that she learned how to get into a tiny box simply by watching her previous handler teach Tika how to do it.

Today, we started working on attitude and enthusiasm. First, I encouraged myself to actually put on dog-agility clothes before going out into the yard rather than work clothes (ahem, well, my work clothes are jeans and slip-on walking shoes, but ya don't wanna get those jeans dirty before going in to see the client, and those slip-on shoes aren't the best for running in, although it can be done even at agility trials in a pinch).

Next, I encouraged myself to actually set poles on all the jumps and think about a couple of small courses that we could run. Yes, I'm oversubscribed in work and at home at the moment, but really, what difference could taking 15 minutes out of each day really matter to everything else, when it can probably make a huge difference with my new dog and her new handler.

I picked a couple of things to work on:

Like, the table. I watched videos of her old handler saying "Down" and she always leans into and over her dogs. So I'm going to work with both dogs keeping my shoulders back and my head up and work on the speed of the "down". Tika's table down has gotten to be SO slow in competition, it's nuts. Boost hasn't been bad at it lately, actually going down and staying down rather than gradually elevating, but we want to reinforce that. Keep at least one thing going that her previous handler fixed OK!

And, like, supporting my verbal cues with my body. I watched videos of her old handler, running and making a stab at an obstacle with her hand and then pulling the hand back in. So I practiced running while signallling a jump or tunnel with my arm held firmly in that direction until the dog was completely committed.

It may be tough, and maybe today it was easy because it was such a beautiful day, but for enthusiasm and basic agility skills, yes, I think Boost's new handler can learn them! And maybe the new handler can gradually turn Boost into a really fine agility dog.

Fashion Police, Come Get Me

SUMMARY: Why I do poorly in agility, I'm sure of it.

It came to my attention last year in agility class that I was the only one--The. Only. One.--with my shirt tucked in. A fluke? I started watching the other classes come and go. NOT ONE of the other gals tucked in their shirts.

OK, well, maybe this is a casual thing for agility and I just didn't get the memo.

Except today, well, I was at this party consisting entirely of agility people. Not quite so casual as the agility field yet not too dressy at all. And, yes, you know what I'm going to say: I was THE ONLY ONE with my shirt tucked in among the female types. Many of the mens tucked in thems shirts (not all, but many). But no, I have somehow missed an entire fashion boat.

But wait, there's more: I carefully, as always, picked socks to match my shirt (which was, of course, tucked in). Guess what. Do other ladies's socks match their shirts? No! Because they weren't wearing socks! Not a single female in that whole group. It's not like I'm wearing socks with birkenstocks or anything nerdy like that; I had real shoes on.

Oh, crap, I'm the only one NOT WEARING SOME KIND OF SANDAL.

At least blue jeans were in ready supply, so I was not completely head to foot wrong.

Maybe if I started dressing right, I'd run my dogs as well as all these other people run theirs. Ya think? Because, remember, in agility, it's all about the clothing.

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I didn't take my camera in, so I borrowed this photo from Barbara S--just some of the gorgeous, charming, and talented women with their shirts not tucked in--Mary, whose aussie always knows what mary wants her to do and usually gets the highest points of anyone in the gamblers opening, Wendy who runs an astonishingly fast border collie AND an astonishingly fast papillon and keeps up with them, one of the Lauras, who has taught half the people in the universe how to do agility and started her own agility organization, and another Laura, who does amazing agility things with a team of small black kick-yer-ass dogs plus has a kick-yer-ass blog. Also, they are not wearing socks.

Dog Butt(on)s

SUMMARY: An amazing collection

One Bay Teamer shows up at trials and events with shirts, notecards, and other things sporting the most beautiful and unique buttons. We ran into each other once, on one of our rare nonagility weekends, doing garage sales. I was in search of inexpensive useful household items; she was in search of rare and unusual buttons.

Here are her agility dogs, which are as cute as (and not much bigger than) buttons:

Anyway, at a trial a year or so ago, we got to talking, and it turns out that she doesn't merely have a few jars of buttons; she is a competitive button collector (who knew you could even do that!) with a house filled to the brim with buttons.

A couple of us begged for a viewing, and when she realized that we were serious, she invited us over wayyy back in August and gave us an hour's tour of a small percentage of her buttons. I tried taking shots with a handheld camera; didn't work out well. I've told her I want to come back and take more photos.

Herewith are just a few of her 10s of thousands--most neatly assembled (by her) on cards in boxes.

Mostly they're assembled by type of material.

They might also be grouped by color.

For competition, the groupings have to have themes--for example, "French things":

I don't even remember all the ways that they were grouped, but she pulled out card after card of amazingly crafted buttons of diverse materials and origins. And showed us her bookcase full of button books, which she's mostly memorized so that she can recognize the good buttons when she finds them at garage or estate sales or antique shops. Here's still more:

She creates attractive displays of related buttons, many of which hang on her walls.

Oh--and you can also collect and compete with studs--you know, those embossed metal things on your blue jeans that you never pay any attention to? Here's a clever display she made of some of hers:

She knows all the art-button crafters in the area, too, and buys their one-of-a-kind buttons (sorry, dogs, had to get this gorgeous cat one in):

Oh, and in case we were wondering about the dozens and dozens of gas lamps all over the house, yep, they collect those, too, and have boxes and boxes of them neatly stored as well. Together, they make some pretty impressive viewing.

And, of course, among all those boxes, there are cards of dog buttons! We looked at a bunch of them, trying to guess some of the uncertain breeds.

The "Victorian Black Glass" on the card above, I pointed out, looked just like recently deceased Scully, who belonged to the friend who went with me on this tour, and to our surprise, our hostess pulled the button off and gave it to my friend! She said that she had some border collie buttons around somewhere but wasn't sure where at the moment.

Now, here it is two and a half months later, and last week, this arrived in the mail:

I am thrilled! These are Fimo (polymer clay) buttons, and it just so happens that I have a friend who got involved in fimo art for a while, so I know a little bit about how these are made. You see how they're the same design front and back (except inverse)? That's because the design goes all the way through. The artist carefully assembles layers of different colors of femo clay into a long roll, then slices through the roll, and if she's done it right, you get little pictures like this. Astounding. Here's a very simple example of how to do this craft.

So now I have some beautiful art border collie buttons. Will have to think what clever thing I can do with them. They look like they have a good sit-stay, anyway.

Part 3 of Packing for an Agility Weekend, Then and Now

SUMMARY: Third in a series comparing my 1996 gear to my 2010 gear, and transitions between.

[Previous parts: Part 1, transportation and others.; Part 2, shade, crate covers, mat.]

(I see at least one more part after this, maybe 2. But today, the most important part, because remember, it's all about the clothing!

Shoes:

• Then--I had perfectly lovely cross-trainers...you know, "tennis shoes." Can't remember for sure, now, but I think I'd already started competing (1996) before I realized how slippery grass could be. I "borrowed" my then-spouse's old soccer cleats, because he wasn't using them anyway, and they sort of fit.
  
  The first time I attended Power Paws Camp--early 2000s--Clean Run had a booth to which they hauled all kinds of goodies, including large stocks of shoes for agility people. I tried a bunch on, found a pair of gray Dita cleats that fit nicely (although, like I did at everything else's price, I gasped at the price for *dog* event shoes), bought them, and wore them happily for a couple or three years. But the leather had started cracking, pieces were coming loose, the cleats were wearing down.
  
  So at USDAA Nationals, maybe 2004 or 2005, Clean Run was again there with a huge store. There was a new manufacturer of shoes specifically for agility, I think Agile Gear? (No, maybe not, Agile or Agility something.) The shoes fit me like a charm, better than the Ditas! I delightedly shelled out the huge money for them. They lasted me exactly 3 months before they started literally falling to pieces. Great concept, huh!
  
• Now--The next year, I bought a pair of the same Ditas I'd had before, and I'm still wearing them. A bit worn around the edges, that's for sure. (And oh, BTW, I still have the OLD pair of Ditas in the garage "just in case"--guess I should check and see which pair is really more worn out now!)
  
  Oh--huh--I see that Dita now has an entire category of dog agility shoes! How cool is that?

Waterproof footwear:

• Then--Ew! Ew! Walking around on the dewy grass early in the morning, shoes and socks and feet got sopping wet! Ew! My then-spouse gifted me with my own pair of rubber Wellies (generic). I could slip my feet in and out pretty easily. Great idea. Used them for two or three years, then carried them around in the car just in case for a couple more years, then they mouldered in the back yard until last winter, when I really needed them for some urgent repair work in the yard in the rain, but they were kaput.
• Now--Pfui, what's a little moisture on one's toes?

Shirts:

• Then--
• Phase 1: Whatever T-shirts I had. Nuthin' with dogs on them.
• Phase 2: Bay Team t-shirts.
• Phase 3: My first USDAA Nationals, in San Diego, 2000--OMG, in the vendor area I was like a kid in FAO Schwartz! I had never seen so much dog-related gear--and clothing! Had to buy a couple of dog-agility-related t-shirts so that I'd have some! 
• Phase 4: Got my first USDAA polo shirts at the 2000 and 2001 Nationals. I think that's what we got just for showing up, rather than t-shirts.
• Phase 5: USDAA put in its Nationals premium (I think 2004) that it preferred exhibitors to wear polo shirts--tucked in. I bought a tie-dye polo shirt to show my contempt for upper-crust dress codes. And our team shirts were polo shirts. So were our team shirts for the next 4 years.

• Now--Mostly polo shirts (I think my neck likes to breathe). Tucked in to absorb the sweat better. (Well, you asked.) Usually dog-related. Or one of my other dozens of dog-related shirts.
  
  Almost never wear non-dog-related shirts to agility events any more.

Bras (yah, gotta mention it, this is crucial agility clothing for some of us competitors!):

• Then--Whatever sorts of lightweight yet feminine support garments I owned.
• Now--Sports bras, definitely. The kind you could pull your shirt off over your head and wave it to your fans and you'd still be be more modestly (yet still colorfully) dressed than in a typical bathing suit. I have black, white, gray, purple, teal, blue, light blue, navy, and blue/purple tie dye.

Hats:

• Then--I don't really like wearing hats. Never have. (Although they intrigue me, and I have a hat collection.)  But with the sun beating down on you and getting in your eyes, gotta do SOMEthin'.  Around the time I started agility, a vendor at an art & wine festival had these cool visored scarves, basically. So you tied the scarf on your head with the visor over your eyes. I likeed that because it wasn't so hat-like and I could adjust the tightness very easily. Bonus: I could use it as a dog tug toy in an emergency.  Liked my first one so much that I later bought a 2nd one. Then--probably because basically I don't like hats-- I gradually stopped using them. (They're still in my dog gear bag, though.)
  
  Mostly avoided hats for a few years. Had a couple of baseball caps that I used sometimes. But my head likes to be free, even though it knows that it's not a good idea from a skin cancer perspective.
• Now--Maybe 3 years ago, I bought this great "Wag more, bark less" baseball cap at Doggone Good, which I really liked, and it motivated me to start wearing it all the time.
  
  THEN a year or two later, my sister the Disneyland superfan (to my mere fan-ness) gave me an awesome Pluto Unleashed baseball cap, which has now become my full-time baseball agility cap. I love the expression on Pluto's face, sly and ready to go. (Sometimes Wag More Bark Less makes a token appearance. It's good to have 2 hats I like.)

Pants:

• Then--Levi's jeans.
• Now--Levi's jeans. (Nice to know that SOME things stay the same!)

No Dog In The Night (and Other Gratitudes)

SUMMARY: Boost sleeps through the night, and otherwise also a good week.

I hit Boost's not-sleeping-through-the-night issue with a two-pronged attack: shock and awe... (No, wait, that was a different campaign.) ...really, Plan A: 10 days of antibiotics plus Plan B: every time she gets me up, she has to sleep in her crate when we return to bed.

This isn't a tremendous hardship, as she slept there every night for her first year here, and she still sometimes sleeps there voluntarily when maybe Tika or I toss and turn too much.

Before Plan A and Plan B, she got me up 10 out of 25 nights (after I started tracking). That included one stretch of 7 nights where she *never* woke me up, giving me false hope, but NOOooo, then 5 out of the next 10 up.

So we get to Plan A and B. After the first full day of antibiotics, she let me sleep. Then ditto for the next 3 nights. Wow, thought I, it *was* some insidious infection. But NOOoooo again, 4 out of the next 6 nights she got me up. Each time, I zipped her into the crate afterwards. She grumbled some and hit on the door a bit (it's one of those lightweight pop-up nylon crates), but I told her to knock it off and she settled in each time.

I also started Plan C: When *I* was up in the night on my own for any reason (last night: something banging around on the deck. Maybe the wind.), I did NOT let her out just because she asked. She pestered me a bit at first but since then, just accepts it. Because I think that's what started the problem--a bout of insomnia, where I just let her out every night in the middle of the night when I was up and she asked.

So then...looking promising...after the last day of antibiotics, we went 6 nights with no out--ah, ha! it WAS an infection?!-- but wait: then one night of out plus crate, two nights off, one night of out plus crate, and now 5 more nights off. So only two nights of the last 15 has she gotten me up. I can only hope. It's still a little unclear whether it was an infection or behavioral, but I'm leaning towards the latter.

Boost resting up from a hard night of sleeping through. Uzza wuzza cute widdle feeties all gathered up!


I am also grateful that I can now comfortably wear all those pairs of jeans that I haven't been able to wear since October. Thank you, Weight Watchers (no meetings this time, but using their strategies).

I am also grateful that I saved $200 on my auto/house/umbrella insurance yesterday. Thank you, Geico. (Used to have Geico auto insurance for years and loved them, but 7 years ago they couldn't insure my house and now they can. Go figure.)

I am grateful that, on very short notice and at essentially the last minute, I have found excellent DAM teams for both dogs for USDAA Nationals. Thank you, agility friends!

Let's hope that things keep looking up.

Saturday at the Nationals

SUMMARY: Not Jake's Day. Hot. Fun.

Backfill: June 7 5pm
Once again, what with dinner and showering our sweaty bods and all that, we didn't get to bed until after 10:00, but this time I set two alarms, both for before 5:00, so we're up and at 'em in plenty of time to get a prime parking spot at WAG. Halleluia!

This photo of my nationals t-shirt and shorts is after the fact. But now ya know.

The nice thing about midyear events is that it's light at 5:30 a.m. so you can see where the dogs are pottying rather than having to guess or search with a flashlight. The bad thing is that--well--it's summer in the Central Valley. I confidently start out wearing my jeans and a fleece sweater. I abandon the fleece even before the general briefing at 6:45, but the jeans stick with me--not quite literally yet, but they will, they will.

More loot

Yesterday morning I also received my preordered Nationals t-shirt. A lovely bright tealish jadey turquoise (OK, I don't know what the official color is; this is why I'm in software and not interior design) with an embroidered logo. Not that I need another t-shirt to add to my collection of 140; it just had to be done. It felt weird having to pay for a t-shirt to prove I'd been there, since the USDAA nationals provides you automatically with a free shirt. On the other hand, USDAA's entry fees are twice what CPE charged for their nationals, and what USDAA provided for free besides the t-shirt was one bright red umbrella with the USDAA World Cynosports logo blazoned across it. How often do I use an umbrella? How often do I use anything red? And here I got for free those two nice shade cloths with no advertising of any kind. So it's a fair trade.

What I've been ruing is not having ordered a 2006 Nationals pin. Not that I'd wear it--but USDAA gives out pins for Nationals, and I seem to be collecting agility pins for other awards (CATCH, Jake's USDAA Top 10), so I'd have liked to have had it for my display. Interestingly, this morning, the lady who made the pins announced at the briefing that she had two extras if anyone wanted one, so I tackled her on the spot and begged. Walked away from the briefing with a pin and my promised to return later with my Visa card. That is the nice thing about most vendors at agility competitions--and about most competitors: you can trust them.

If you're ever desperate for food and drink, Hospatility can hilp.

I'm scheduled to work only one round, but I'm pretty sure there'll be other opportunities to collect raffle tickets. I'm hoping for more free entries, although so is everyone else west of the Mississippi, but I've also been putting tickets in for another one of those nifty pop-up lightweight crates that I've used so much with Boost and have wished I had another. ($25 plus tax for a Large at Target.) Yesterday I put tickets in for the Large and X-Large, but won neither. For some odd reason, whenever these appear in raffles, they always have the red ones, not the tan ones. Go figure. Who wants red, really? But for free--that's cool.

Obsessing About Jackpot--and Everything Else

We all review the course maps for the day and there is much gnashing of teeth about the Standard course AND the Jumpers course AND the Jackpot (gamble). I think they're all doable although moderately challenging. I'm trying not to get my hopes up about Qing.

Today, I'm up in Standard in the second rotation and Jumpers in the third rotation.

Standard is designed to be a Jake-killer: It has TWO, count them, two! dogwalks instead of a dogwalk plus Aframe. What are the odds, really, of Jake getting two dogwalks in one round? What are the odds of him getting two in one weekend? Pfah! Write that Q goodbye.

The Jackpot is the worst case; the run from obstacle #2 to #3 is the type of thing that Tika and I don't seem to quite get yet for some reason, but I'm pretty confident about the rest of it. However--my Group F will the last of the 6 groups to run that, and so it'll be our last run of the day. A long time to obsess about it, watch other people run it, replay it over and over in my head, you know, general obsessive sorts of things.

An expensive weekend

Deb's shirt says it all. Who cares about a few extra expenses? Canopy: $200. Video repair: $150. A few clean runs: Priceless

OK, so I broke my sewing machine on Thursday. Yesterday morning, I finally remembered to ask someone to tape my runs! I've been hauling that damfool pricey digital video camera around with me to every trial, and the last time I actually remembered to ask someone to tape me must've been last November at the USDAA Nationals. So--I asked, and had volunteers, BUT when I tried to show them how to use the camera--I kept getting an error code! I tried replacing the tape, and the battery, but noooooo---. I sat down after our Standard round (the lovely one that both dogs ran beautifully) with the instruction book, which said that it might be a moisture problem, so leave it open for at least an hour and try again. No luckie. Other people asked to take a look at it, and they got nuthin', neither. Crap crap crap.

So now I apparently have camera repair to add to my list, and I will end up with absolutely no video record of an absolutely lovely CPE Nationals weekend. Cripeys.

Standard

It's a moderately challenging course but one that I'm comfortable with. Lots of people are muttering about how hard it is. But then, this isn't USDAA. I've seen much harder courses there. I'm not saying that we won't be challenged. There's a long run of 40 feet with a jump and a straight 20-foot tunnel that I'll need somehow to get ahead of Tika on. But it won't kill us if we don't; just have a bobble, no real offcourse opportunities IMHO.

Today, Jake is up first in everything. Once again I manage to stun him into stopping on the first dogwalk with his feet in the yellow by hauling butt to the end and standing in front of him, but the second time around, he was ready for me and just popped off the side above the yellow zone. Crud. Oh, well, it's not like I didn't expect it. The rest of his run is really very nice. He's so good for an ancient dog! I don't think there are any other 14-year-olds competing out there--which is something else that makes me wonder whether his birthdate could have been misguessed, but I'll never know. (Based on his first agility Q, we know that he has to be at least 12, which is still older than almost all agility dogs out there.)

Now, here's the funny thing about CPE scoring. Popping a contact is 15 faults. An offcourse is only 5 faults! So although we have a really nice time (only 5 seconds slower than Tika, which is unusual--of course popping off the dogwalk helped), he ends up placing at the bottom of his class because although many people got 1 or 2 offcourses, they still placed higher than he did. Hmmm. Still, once again I am very pleased with his run. No bobbles other than that.

Tika has slowed down on her contacts today and sticks them all, which I know will slow our total time and might prevent us from placing, but stopping on her contacts is generally a good thing. That long tunnel run indeed is not quite perfect--she turns into me somewhat but again I manage to push her out without a full spin. Same thing elsewhere in the course. But then we're across the finish line and not a single bar has dropped and I realize that we've Qed 4 for 4 so far! Maybe I was hasty about that trophy--

But noooooo...don't start thinking about it! I start this mantra to myself and repeat all day every time it starts occurring to me: "Don't think about it! Don't EVEN think about it! You know what it did to you at the last nationals! Just relax, figure you won't win, enjoy what you do." It's very hard for me, but in fact I am enjoying myself immensely. (Of course, Qs always help. :-) )

At the end of the day, it turns out that our slowish time (for us) doesn't matter, as all the other dogs in our height and level crashed and burned or were quite a bit slower. So it'll be another 1st for the Tika babe! However, if comparing her time to ALL level 4/5/C dogs, there are at least a couple of dozen clean runs with faster times. But that's OK.

Jumpers

The main challenge for both dogs on this course is their on-again, off-again start-line stays. The course opens with three straight jumps aiming at a tunnel, but you don't actually DO the tunnel, you break into a serpentine off to the left.

I'll need to be able to lead out far enough that I can clearly signal the turn before the dogs get to the jump to keep them on course and to prevent Tika from knocking that third bar as she brakes and turns.

In fact, they both stick their startlines. What good animals! And we're off. Jake, although he's moving along at a nice clip, none-the-less mystifies me again by u-turning away from me and heading southeast when I'm clearly heading northwest--not once, but twice on this course. And, since he can't hear me well enough, and because we now have obstacles between us so I can't rush out and get in front of him to turn him, it takes a few seconds each time to get his attention and get him back on track. He stays on course, but I'm worried about the times.

A couple of experienced friends assure me that he was moving fast enough, the detours were short enough, and CPE course times are so generous that we'll make time easily.

They were wrong. The time on this course was exceptionally tight, and Jake is over by 4 full seconds. Another nonQ for the day. A little disappointing after yesterday's 3 Qs, but hey, he really was running nicely and he's so cute and seems to be enjoying himself. So what can I say?

Tika makes the turn from #3 like a charm and blasts through the serpentine like an old hand. We actually loop around and make almost the same approach to the tunnel again, and again it's a calloff, but I'm more worried about it the second time because the sharper angle makes a harder calloff--so I end up overcalling her, and she comes towards me past the jump instead of over it. Fortunately I spin her around quickly and cleanly and we finish the course in a nice time with no off courses--AND NO BARS DOWN! This is pretty astonishing. In USDAA, that runout would have been faulted, but runouts and refusals aren't faulted in CPE, so waaaahoooo, another Q for my merle girl.

Futhermore, enough other dogs wipe out on this course in one way or another AND she's still fast enough despite the bobble that she places 1st again. At a regular CPE trial, I'd kind of expect this (although we don't always manage it), but at the Nationals this is a real bonus.

Hot hot hot

Yeah, yeah, it's hot all right. Again my jeans get soppy and disgusting and I'm forced to resort to shorts. With our nifty canopy setup, I just squeeze into the middle, hidden by assorted shade cloths and crates and x-pens and change right there. And I didn't even need a PhD to figure out that I could do that.

According to Accuweather, it was 90 on Friday, 93 on Saturday, and 87 on Sunday. They don't say what the humidity was, but I can assure you, it was humiditized. At least we don't seem to have mosquitos worth mentioning. And there was usually at least a little breeze all day, picking up in the late afternoon, which helped.

I also slather sun lotion on my pathetic legs. I hate sun lotion on my legs, especially here where everything except the course lawns is so miserably dusty. But they're already a teeny weeny bit pink from yesterday's exposure, despite having scurried from shade to shade yesterday like a little pale vampire. I want to be able to wear long pants come Monday without shrieking in pain. So I grin and bear it.

I'm hosing down the dogs as often as possible, at least before and after each run, trying to cool their body temperature. Their fur is dense enough and/or long enough that it's not going to help much by evaporation, but just think how much it cools you down to take a dip in a cool pool or run the hose over your head. (Yes, I did that a couple of times, too.) They can't grin, but they bear it, especially with the plentiful treats I provide.

Jackpot--Preamble

So. I don't expect jake to get the jackpot. He just doesn't carry out like he used to, and I used to be able to give him voice directions from straight behind to tell him to keep going. Lots of dogs are veering from the #1 to the #3 jump, and I rather expect that's what he'll do. I'll try to avoid it, but I just don't see him getting this.

Tika can, as I said earlier, I think can do the #1 to #2 easily. I watched tons of fast, long-strided dogs make it easily. The thing is that, after they land from #1, they're already mostly past #3 and looking straight at the tunnel entrance, so it would be hard to miss. And this is a setup that I've had in my yard and use all the time. No, I fully expect her to get #1 to #2.

But in gambles this year, the #2 to #3 sort of thing has eluded us--where she blasts out of the tunnel, she'll be heading towards me, and I have to be able to push her back out enough to avoid running past the #3 jump (which I watched quite a few dogs do).

For the opening, there's a nice, high-point double loop that I think we can do easily and rack up more points than anyone if she sticks with me. They have announced that, for this Jackpot, you don't have to wait for the first whistle to attempt the gamble, so if you want, you can just get your minimum required opening points and then go for it. But I figure that I can easily do the double loop and then hit the gamble before the first whistle anyway, so I can relax and take time getting into position.

There is no obstacle that leads directly towards the 1/2, but what I'm going to do is run her through the weaves before the gamble, then pull her line out slightly to where there's a straight line from her position over 1 to 2 and then run straight at it. While waiting for our run at the end of the day, I see two or three other experienced people do this exact same thing and it works beautifully.

Jackpot--The Movie

I do a modified version of Tika's plan with Jake, and it works nicely, and as we head for the gamble, he runs smoothly and quickly and confidently over #1 and--straight to #3 and the ending table. Oh well--again, it's not unexpected, and it's so much fun to have a fast geriatric dog.

And so, Tika and I are finally up. She executes the first loop perfectly, no bars down. She executes the second loop perfectly. Now we're in the weaves, and she once again makes her weave entrances perfectly. The buzzer hasn't blown, so there's no pressure. I pull her out slightly and start running, and she goes over the jump #1 straight at the tunnel. At that moment, the buzzer sounds--

And she skids to a halt, with her nose what can't be more than 1 or 2 feet from the tunnel opening, and dances left, and dances right, and spins around towards me and away from me. I have no idea what I did or what caused her to stop her forward momentum--I mean, she was hauling through there--but I'm yelling "through! through!" and apparently her obstacle names are not nearly as solid as I'd like to believe, because she finally spies jump #3 and flies right over it, never giving the tunnel another glance.

Thus endeth the Perfect Weekend fantasies.

As I come out, the gate steward says, "That's weird, it's like the buzzer startled her and made her stop." I can't imagine that's it--we've been dancing to buzzers and whistles and horns at every trial for years--but I have no other explanation and no one else I knew appeared to have been watching. So, for the rest of my life, I will never know what I did or what it was that caused her to screech to a halt.

And that's a 25-pont Q loss, too, so that even if we get everything else as Qs, other people with 8 Qs could have 180 or 185 points to our 175. Still, that could still maybe leave us open for High Rescue--

Don't think about it! Don't EVEN think about it!

But her opening was just flawless and I'm very pleased with my gal. Even the 2 teeters we did were very fast, no wasted time at all, and I've been working hard on getting the speed up on those.

Friday's and Saturday's ribbons plus maybe a couple from Sunday morning.

So, as the day winds down, we discover that she had more opening points (40) than any of the other 375 dogs, except one (Erika and Chase), who had 41, and they're not in our height or level, so there. In fact, we manage to place 4th with that set of points, because not that many dogs got that gamble.

But we have 3 more runs tomorrow, with plenty of chances for non-Qs. What happens will happen. (I can say that now--)

Fun and Games and Feeling Good Mostly

That evening is the official trial BBQ. Great food, good friends, hanging around until after 8 just laughing and talking and eating. I'm really pretty much floating despite the lowered Q rate for the day--2 for 6 instead of 6 for 6--but my dogs are running so well and I just don't feel that I'm making stupid mistakes, just normal sort of tweaks or twitches that sometimes happen.

Once again Jackie and I drive back late to the hotel, and for the third day in a row we have a stunning sunset to light our way up 99 towards Sacramento. It's as if the sky decorating gods simply waited for us to appear each evening and painted the sky and clouds with the most amazing and vivid colors just for our benefit.

I'm feeling good, I'll tell ya. Except for more aches and pains than I want to remember.

My knee has been bothering me in past weekends since it got so swollen at Haute Tracs, and I'm planning on babying it this weekend. Oddly enough, it seems to get better and better as the weekend goes on. But my left shoulder, which has been only slightly painful all winter and spring while my right shoulder has cycled on and off from agony to mere gentle jabs and back again, has chosen this weekend to act up. Thursday night I iced it when I got to the hotel thanks to jackie who had an extra baggie for ice. But it still hurt so badly that I had trouble getting to sleep and then it woke me up periodically all night.

At least it was manageable Friday morning, but again through the day got worse and worse and was almost as bad Friday night. Tonight it's not quite even that bad, but when I shower it's still hard to raise my hand high enough to wash my hair.

Furthermore, I am haunted by the mysterious hand-joint shooting pains again. Thursday night I believe it was the base joint of my left index finger--painful, sharp pain every time I moved it or put any pressure on it, throbbing even when holding still. That had subsided by the morning but Friday night it was my right thumb base and I think Saturday night it was my left little finger.

I should be writing these down.

Mostly they're gone by morning. My sister Linda seems to be experiencing similar things. I think I've asked my mom and it sounds somewhat like her arthritis onset at (sigh) about my age. I should confirm again, though. What a nuisance, not to mention slightly debilitating.

But MENTALLY I'm feelin' good! And that's important.

Friday at the Nationals

SUMMARY: Six Qs for six runs--and some placements, too!

Backfill: June 6 3:30pm

In case you're lost first thing in the morning.

Our morning begins blearily around 5:07--which is too bad, because I tried to set the alarm for 5:00 sharp. Jackie and I will carpool to the agility site to save parking spaces (plus it's nice to have someone to talk to). We already moved her two dogs' crates into my car last night, so it's just a matter of getting up and dressed, gathering whatever we need for the day (I decide to take my shorts just in case it's hot enough for me to want to switch out of my jeans), a quick dog potty, then load up and head out.

What with one thing and several others, we don't actually get on the road until nearly 6, so not at the site until almost 6:30. It's a Friday morning in Sacramento and traffic is heavy but flowing close to the speed limit. We have to park out in the boonies but not the terrible boonies--we're near the center walkway that leads between the outer rings over to the arena where we're encamped.

Each morning we have to pick up new running-order number stickers and course maps at registration at 6:30, then there's supposed to be general briefing from 6:45 until 7:00. In fact it doesn't get going until at least 7, and continues for half an hour. To make it easier to schedule the four rings, avoid conflicts, and ensure the availability of workers (we're all volunteers on this bus), we're divided into 6 groups, A through F, who rotate among the three classes for the day.

We're in group F, which has us running in the 2nd round in Wildcard, the 4th round in Full House, and the 5th round in Standard. I work the first round in the Standard ring, so I get to see everything that people might have trouble with on that course. It all looks very doable to me for my dogs, however, so I'm pretty calm about it.

About the Awards

In every CPE trial, including this weekend, you can earn all the regular Qs and placements in each class, height, and level, so in that sense it's just like a regular CPE trial. Typically Tika earns a lot of Qs and several first places; typically Jake earns 3 or 4 Qs in his semiretired 4 runs a day but nowadays hardly ever places. There will be a lot more dogs here than at most trials, however, including many hotshots from around the country who feel that it's worth their effort to trek to CA to try to earn the high-in-trial awards provided at the Nationals.

The High Rescue trophy that my club, The Bay Team, is sponsoring, that both my dogs are eligible for, and that neither of them will probably earn. Sigh.

The high-in-trial awards are based on various things. We specifically could be eligible for:
*Perfect Weekend award (9 Qs of 9 runs)--but we've never ever had a perfect weekend so this seems unlikely, plus at the 2004 nationals, we choked so badly we couldn't even get a Q for nuthin', let alone a placement. So I've pretty much figured we're not going to get this.
*High Rescue dog: There are, I think, about 60 rescue dogs registered for this award, my two among them. Jake's entered just for fun, since he's semiretired, and I figure that I'll pull him if he shows any signs of arthritic pain or disinterest, so I can write him off.
*High Mixed-Breed: I'm listing Tika as a full Australian Shepherd, so she's not eligible; see previous comment for Jake.
*High Standard or runner-up Standard: Best score for the 3 Standard runs across the weekend. (Awarded for each jump height and level.)
*High Games 1st thru 5th: Best score for the 6 other classes across the weekend. (Awarded for each jump height.)
*High in trial regular, high in trial veteran: Tika eligible for the first, Jake for the 2nd, but most likely the winners will have perfect weekends, so forget these.

Now, I talked earlier about how scores are calculated at the nationals for these awards. Each Q that you earn is worth a certain number of points--25 for a clean Standard run, a gamble, or a snooker; 20 for a clean jumpers, full house, or clean wildcard; 15 for clean colors. The Standard, Jumpers, Wildcard, and Snooker Qs are worth less if you earn faults--but at Tika and Jake's level (C, the top level), you can earn a Q *only* if you're clean, so that won't affect us: we'll either get the full points or nothing.

So a perfect weekend would be 200 points. A perfect set of 3 standards would be 75 points. A perfect set of 6 games would be 125 points.

The tricky bit here is that, in the three point-accruing games (Snooker, Jackpot, and Full House), points count towards placements but they do not count towards high in trial! They're using only your run time as a percentage of the standard course time (SCT) to break ties, so faster runs will beat higher-scoring runs. This means that, for example, a really novice dog who can barely get through the minimum required obstacles and then exits the ring will beat an experienced dog who uses the entire SCT to earn a fabulous number of points in a well-strategized, well-executed course plan. Since Tika is one of the latter type--and Jake was in his heyday--this goes against my grain.

There is much discussion about whether the top dogs will be going for placements in individual runs or skip the placements in favor of lower scores and lower times in the hopes of beating out others who might have the same Q points at the end of the weekend.

In the final analysis, however, it seems that the top dogs mostly felt that playing the games competitively for placements was the much more interesting thing--plus, if the others are anything like me, we weren't figuring on getting a perfect weekend, so I'd rather go for 6 or 7 or 8 blue ribbons for the classes that we do manage to Q in and enjoy that, because we'd never get those 9 Qs.

Wildcard

Wildcard is a slightly shorter than usual numbered course with 3 places where you have to pick either obstacle A or obstacle B, with B usually the more challenging obstacle or path. At our level, we must do two Bs and one A. Sometimes my choices are obvious the moment that I walk onto the course for the walkthrough. This one, however, presents challenges for Tika and Jake no matter how I cut it, and I try walking it with every dang combination of As and Bs (that would be 3 different paths). I'm still trying to decide for sure when they clear the course and I have to go fetch Tika for her run.

So this is our first run of the Nationals, and if they're all going to present challenges for me, then it'll be an interesting weekend indeed.

So the choices are:
* 2a: To make the turn to #3, I either have to lead out far enough on the right of the tunnel to be able to push the dog forward before they turn in and miss #3, or far enough on the left to pull the dog slightly (but not too much) towards me and flip them to the jump--which might work OK but then I either have to pull the dog tightly into the 4a tunnel, which could knock the bar on #3, or get across to the weaves for 4b... And neither dog has had completely reliable startline stays lately. Good, but not perfect. Jake might wait forever or might not wait at all. Tika might wait forever or take off as soon as it looks like I'm turning towards her. On the other hand, if I take 2b, the jumps around the outside, I don't have to lead out as far, but it's a sharp angle over #1 which could be a bar-knocking opportunity for Tika, and for Tika, she'll be hauling when she goes over #3 and if I want to get her into 4a (not certain), I'll have to pull her up clearly enough that she doesn't knock the bar.

#10b is the easier jump from #9 but then you have to pull a bit to #11, so could risk knocking 10-- I dunno. I decide on 2b/4a/10b with Jake, and 2a/4b/10b with Tika. In fact--everything goes swimmingly with both dogs! Hardly a twitch to be improved, although I run up the left side of 2a and Tika pulls away from 3 just a little more than I would've liked, but still makes the flip nicely without spinning. So--piece of cake! Jake even made his weave pole entry very nicely--in fact, did so all weekend--despite a recent history this spring of missing the poles entirely or missing the entry and going in late.

I feel that we did pretty good and had good running times, although Tika's course probably would have been faster with only one set of weaves and the jumps around the outside, but I'm not sure it would have been clean.

Carlene finds her scribe sheet copy in one of the little results boxes at the awards table. If it's a Q, you get a lovely giant Q ribbon on the spot.

Finding Results

We can find out whether we Qed usually within 10 or 15 minutes by picking up the NCR copy of our scribe sheet at the awards table. All the scribe sheets here are 2-parters, so as soon as the score is entered at the score table, the 2nd part is dispatched to one of the boxes way out back (e.g., for Group F, there's a box for each of the 4 rings). You can pick up your Q ribbon immediately--an innovation this year from Haute Dawgs. In years past, you had to wait until the end of the day, and then they'd find you on a list and check you off, so with a Q rate of (usally at CPE trials) better than 50%, there'd have been over 500 ribbons to hand out at the end of the day.

Instead, you just have to wait til the end of the day for the placements, after the classes have finished in all the rings.

But--our Wildcard scribe sheets finally come up, and both dogs have Qed with very respectable times! Jake is 17 seconds under SCT; Tika is 21 under.

Working at the Nationals--and the Raffle

Some of the many raffle items offered; just drop your tickies into the little containers and keep your fingers crossed.

Years ago the Bay Team started a WAG raffle (Workers Appreciation Gift--long before WAG agility existed in Elk Grove) that was usually one large item for which all workers earned a ticket for each round that they worked. The regular raffle, with many larger and smaller items, you had to pay to enter. However, gradually we evolved to having only a worker's raffle, and everyone else followed suit--or someone else led the charge after we started it, or maybe we took the initial idea but I came up with the WAG name--it's a bit murky-- anyway, most clubs hereabouts nowadays offer pretty spectacular workers raffles. The daily raffles here had something like 80 or 90 items you could drop your tickets into, from baskets of toys and treats to agility equipment, crates, and free entries.

I was scheduled to work 2 rounds of the 6, and they were giving 6 or 8 tickets per round. I ended up volunteering for about 6 different rounds, the way the ring orders fell on Friday, so I put lots of tickets into a variety of things. I was lucky enough on Friday to win a day's free entry to a trial (that's 2 workers raffles in a row in which I did so--I must be using up all my luck on these!).

Full House

But back to the daily grind. We're next up in Full House, whose purpose as near as I can figure it is to see whether you can actually manage to take all of the obstacles twice within your 30-second point-accumulation period and thereby earn a zillion points more than everyone else. At least, that's how Tika and I play it. There are some basic requirements, though--at some point you have to take at least 3 single jumps, 2 tunnels or tires, and 1 high-point obstacle--in this case, there are 2 double jumps and a set of weaves, each worth 5 points.

This is the last time during the weekend in which I wrestle with the agony of going for minimum points and a fast time or using all the time and earning a ton of points in hoping for a blue ribbon. I finally convince myself thoroughly that there is still not a chance in heck of us earning 9 Qs for the weekend and that I really am, indeed, going to go for the blues. So I pick really nice flowing courses for both dogs that'll earn a ton of points.

Now, this course is set up so that you can easily loop around getting single jumps and tunnels, OR you can easily loop around getting tunnels and 5-pointers, but if you get too greedy and forget to venture to the low-point side of the course for those 3 single jumps, you don't earn a Q.

With Tika's run, I plan for four single jumps right in the beginning--actually 3 jumps with one taken going out and again coming back. And what does she do? Knocks that bar going out, so I can't take it coming back, either, so I have to veer aside, wasting some seconds, to make sure I get that third single jump. Then we race to the high-point side of the course, where I figure that Tika can make 3 loops and pick up a squillion points and stop the clock right at the SCT (it's OK to go over by up to 5 seconds, but after that, they start subtracting points). However, after the 2nd time around--I forget which loop I'm on, and suddenly realize that I'm stuck in the middle of a loop that I can't get out of, except by back-jumping a double that's worth no points or taking a tunnel that I've already taken twice and so wont' be worth any points. So while I'm standing there looking around and pulling Tika with me, she backjumps the double, putting me even further from the finish line. So we end up making the loop that we were going to make, but the whistle blows partway through and we don't get the last 8 (!) points and we barely make it to the clock-stopping table before we start to lose points.

Sigh. So I know I won't get a blue ribbon, and we also used maximum time so it won't help us even if we DO earn 9 Qs but so do other people.

With Jake, I lose him on a similar loop going out of a long tunnel and he doesn't see me and it takes forever to pull him back to me, then he's trotting instead of running, looking a little confused, and goes around the last two obstacles instead of taking them, ALSO leaving 8 points unearned. Dang dang dang.

But at least both have sufficient points to Q (and Tika has 11 points more than Jake, which isn't unusual). So, shortly thereafter, we pick up two more Q scribe sheets and ribbons.

Betsy engaged in a popular pastime

Hot hot hot

Meanwhile--it is getting dang hot. I realize that I cannot possibly wear my jeans a minute longer when they become so soaked with sweat that even the thick denim sticks to my legs with every step. It is also quite humid, making it worse. We're all trying to drink a lot, hose down the dogs with cold water often, and stay in the shade.

I switch to my shorts--not quite a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence, but probably not more than once every year or two. You can tell, because complete strangers come out of the woodwork to agree that my legs are so pale that they make white look dark, or that "you know that it's hot when Ellen wears shorts."

Standard Day 1

The course has some challenges, requiring plenty of front crosses and a couple of pulls. Jake works best with front crosses these days, and the course has no long runaways where I can't communicate clearly to Tika, so I think it'll be fine for us. The final major turn is over a double and then left into a set of weaves about 15 feet to its left. There is a tremendous amount of room to make that turn from the double into the weaves without either calling sharply over the double or missing the weave entrance. And yet, many of the dogs I watched indeed miss the weave entrance or knock the double. I don't foresee it as a problem for either of my dogs. For Tika, this course is just a matter of me remaining calm and signaling lead-changes over jumps in plenty of time so that she doesn't knock them, and for Jake it's a matter of getting the Aframe and particularly the dang dogwalk contacts.


This is our last run of the day, and it's not even 1:00 yet! I know that some of the other rings will be going on for quite a while longer, but our rotation lucked out. In fact, our group is up in Full House and Standard at the same time due to the way the rings ran, and hmmm it seems to me that I actually ran our two Standard runs before I ran the Full Houses--but in any event, we'll end up finished at 1:15, and then just have to wait forever for the placements to be posted.

So Tika runs the Standard course and I'm calm and collected now that I'm at peace with the idea that we can't possibly win high in trial. My timing is good on calling her, and she keeps all her bars up. She doesn't stick her contacts well at all, but I'm prepared for it and so we blast around the course at top speed. She nails that weave entry that so many dogs had trouble with--and we're over and done with it with a beautiful, smooth, clean run.

With Jake, I plan an aggressive front cross after the dogwalk, so all I have to do is beat him to the other end and make the cross by getting directly in front of him. It works again (like it did at the USDAA Nationals last November) and he stops dead in the yellow zone--and then we continue, and he flows smoothly through the course with no real bobbles or runouts of any kind. Sure looks like two more Qs to me! Now all we have to do is wait. And--sure enough, the scribe sheets come up with Qs.

Gail and her dog demonstrate eagerly checking the posted results for placements.

End of the Day

It's getting on towards dinnertime before they post the results. To my satisfaction, Tika earned first places in both Standard and Wildcard, although with our bobble in Full House, we're only in 5th place! Very low for her in this class--and this also demonstrates that my fellow 24-inch C-level competitors are NOT going for minimum points/minimum time any more than we are.

But even more to my delight, Jake--who has had trouble Qing among smaller groups of dogs at smaller local trials--smokes'em with a 4th out of 16 in Standard and 2nd of 15 in Wildcard! Dang good for a guy whom I keep trying to retire! What a guy!

What a day! After waiting half an hour after the results are posted to allow for corrections, we can get in line for our placement ribbons and take them back to our canopy to hang with the Qs. Six runs: six Qs, five placement ribbons! Wowie, Batman, I'm happy!

Friday's ribbons. I'm feelin' good! Try to remember this later in the weekend when I just know I'll start crashing and burning. But today was fine!

Furthermore, Tika's Wildcard run is the third-fastest run out of 205 levels 4/5/C dogs all heights, and her Standard run is the fastest level C of 53 dogs and 4th fastest of all 216 4/5/C dogs. Whatta gal. I'm so lucky with her.

Then, finally, Jackie and Arlene and Jennifer and Carlene and Donna and I head out to Logan's Roadhouse for a nice dinner in an air-conditioned building and suck down tons of ice water along with our dinners. We discuss advanced degrees among agility competitors, and in this crowd there are in fact two Masters degrees and a PhD, and having a PhD becomes the running gag of the weekend. ("Of course Jennifer figured out that handling maneuver--she has a PhD!" "Of course you calculated that score wrong--you don't have a PhD!")