Day Two of Useless Human Mom

SUMMARY: More agility dog abuse with friends.

This morning I could barely walk out to the yard with the dogs. Hobbled in from the parking lot at the agility trial site. Did a little bit of set-up at the score table and confirmed with one friend from yesterday that she'd be willing to try running Boost in Standard and Grand Prix.  I squeegeed off a table covered with morning dew--and realized that I suddenly felt much better. So I walked the Gambler's course, thinking that I'd run her, but just walking around the course a couple of times hurt enough that I changed my mind and enlisted the other friend from yesterday.

Sooooo Gamblers and Standard and Grand Prix went more or less like they had at the end of the day yesterday. Today, Boost was more interactive and happy and comfortable getting riled up by the friends before the runs, and she started out running with each of them, but did only about 5 or 6 obstacles before turning and fleeing for the ring exit. Funny, after one of those runs, after she reached me, she immediately turned around and started looking for the friend to see what she was doing. Dang dog. Too bad I can't be out in the ring, too. (Standing next to the ring didn't work any better.)

Our clearly stated goal was to try to give Boost more experience running with other people, and Qs jus didn't matter at that point, just to try getting her to run and keep her running. Better than yesterday, sure. But a long way to go!

Later in the day, the Snooker course had a ton of tunnels and an Aframe, and I've become SO tired of Snookers that consist pretty much entirely of jumps (with their associated risk of knocked bars), and I was so sad and frustrated earlier in the day that I wasn't able to run with my dog, that I decided to try running her in Snooker. It became apparent during the walkthrough that the Super-Qs would be decided by speed, because pretty much everyone (or a huge percentage thereof) would be doing three 7s in the opening.

I thought about scratching because I didn't want that much pressure, but decided to at least try it. Actually worked pretty nicely, and we got all the way halfway through 6 (out of 7) in the closing and I forgot to do a front cross, tried to rear cross a tunnel and pushed her off it. But I'm pretty sure that, even if we had finished, we'd have still lost the Super-Q on time; DANG there are some fast dogs out there! Still, it was nice, I was able to run some, she did good and kept her bars up. I did hurt a bit more while leaving the field, and I scratched her from the final run of the weekend (Jumpers) because she looked pretty tired when I pulled her out of the x-pen for Snooker.

Oh, right, she did get a Q in Snooker, but no Super-Q.

Chip did NOT stay in the x-pen today. I tried it three times and he was out in a matter of minutes, so he went back into the crate today. Today he did not want to play tug with me at all; I tried 3 or 4 times but my back hurt too much to keep at it, so I just did low-key things with treats.My

Not much else to tell; just how my friends are so accommodating and cheerful and willing to try things with my dog, and how helpful people are in keeping the trial running, and how many nice people asked me how I was doing (and i tried not to grumble about having a crappy back--at least "Back is not good, but the rest of me is pretty good").  Agility community is excellent.

My back doesn't seem to be any worse than it was before the weekend. Just on any given day it's likely to be particularly crappy.  But boy, I'm exhausted again. Off to bed even though it's early. The dogs have all been pretty quiet and sacked out, even though we didn't do much really during the day. Just being at a trial with all the stimulation I think can tire them out mentally. This is a good thing.

Operating in an Entirely Different Frame of Reference

SUMMARY: Just try to get Boost doing agility.

This was one of those weekends where it felt like I was back at square two, and mostly it was OK to be there if only my back/leg didn't hurt so much.

Here's how it went:

• Masters Standard (22" Championship): Knocked a bar early on. Ran past a jump midcourse. Wouldn't do the weaves. Just couldn't get her into them until after we'd been VERY eliminated on refusals. Then she did only a few and popped out, so we just left the ring. I tried very hard to be hearty and cheerful. But it hurt when I walked.
• Masters Gamblers (16" Performance): Got lucky with the opening-- a big straight curve with nuthin' but contacts and tunnels, so we went out and back. And luckily the tunnels were at the outer corners, because I could barely hobble my way through part of the course, and I was able to send her to the tunnels, which gave her momentum to do the contacts in just a lovely way.  Didn't expect to get the gamble and didn't, although our timing was good and we were right where I wanted to be when the buzzer went to start the gamble.
• Masters Snooker (22" Ch): Enlisted a friend with whom we do quite a bit of hiking (Carson's & Hiker's Human Mom) to try running Boost. She ran her in class a few weeks back and Boost looked pretty good then. Today, The Booster was having none of it. Sort of trotted alongside, staring up at her. No actual running from the dog. Trotted past the first jump, then took it. Trotted past the Aframe, then took it. Took the next jump, trotted past the Aframe, then took it. Repeat a 3rd time. So in 50 seconds she did 3 jumps and 3 Aframes. But at least she didn't try to leave the ring. (I hid beforehand so she didn't know where I was.)
• Masters Jumpers (22" Ch): Enlisted another friend with whom we've done a lot and who even dogsat Boost (Human Mom of Bump, Dig, and Styx). Last time she tried, Boost did a few jumps and then raced out to find me. Today the friend worked hard at getting Boost riled up and irritated with generous treats (because Boost wouldn't play with either friend at all), and Boost actually ran half the course--not full-speed, but running rather than trotting. Ran past one jump in there, but continued. Still, as soon as the course turned back towards the starting gate, she ran off and came looking for me.
• Steeplechase (16" Pf): 2nd friend also tried running Boost here, with about the same results as in Jumpers. It's progress, but still she won't do a whole course with someone else outside of class.
• Masters Pairs (16" Perf): I scoped out the easy half of the course and decided that I could get Boost through it even if I were hobbling, and my Pairs partner (who was also limping from a gimpy knee) was game to let me try. We ran second and other than turning the wrong way a couple of times, Boost did great, even did the weaves perfectly. Our partner Eed on refusals on the harder half of the course, but no worries--allowed me to relax on my second half, and it's not like we need Pairs Qs really. But at least we had one decent run. 

But I hurt.

I did take Chip out a couple of times for maybe 15-20 minutes each time and worked on having him look at me when I said his name, trying a little bit of circle work with limited success, worked on getting him to play tug with me and stay on the toy, with fairly decent success.  His nose touch to a target is improving fairly rapidly now that I've been working on it almost daily at least a little.  We worked on his revamped Down (going front-first down rather than sit first), and he's pretty good but I do have to signal it clearly, so we need to wean off that. Practiced the down-stay and the sit-stay with fairly decent results (still not taking my eyes off of him, not getting farther away than I can catch him if he starts to get up). Let him hang out under the score table with me for a while (getting treats for paying attention and also scritches and affection) and he behaved very well.

I even risked putting him in the low x-pen with Boost for the last hour or so of the day (since he was starting to make a mess of Tika's soft crate, and it's the only good one that I have left plus the only teal/purple one left in the world) and he actually stayed in, even when Boost and Tika were away! (I hadn't really thought that he would.)

Tika got to come out with me a couple of times, too. Did some tricks, some exercises to strengthen her back legs, back, and core muscles, and then just hung around the score table getting treats and scritchies. Her cough wasn't too bad today but did show up from time to time. She did sort of perk up and trotted briefly after a frisbee a couple of times, but no actual running. Sigh. Old dogs.

If I hadn't been in pain most of the time, it wouldn't have seemed like too bad a day. Weather was sunnyish, downright balmy with a cooling breeze. Grass surface was lovely. Friends were sympathetic and helpful. Score table work went well. 

I took no photos, perhaps needless to say, as I just didn't want to move around that much.

Will try again tomorrow. Playing it by ear--or by back, I guess.

Can I get a do-over starting last night?

SUMMARY: Not the best 24 hours.

My back has been acting up this week. Loading the van last night, I'm sure, didn't help--lifted in the big x-pen because I wasn't sure whether I'd be able to crate out of the car. And just picking up my folding chair, a gallon of water for the dogs, etc., each one hurt. Feels like something's being pinched again.

Did get to bed fairly eary, 9ish--because I hurt too much to want to do anything else. Boost, on that prednisone, wanted to go out all night on average about every 50 minutes. I did not get much sleep. Alarm was set for 5:00. To top off a splendid night, Chip threw up on the carpet at about 4:40, so I had to clean that up (time consuming).

My leg cramped up Thursday night during the night, and today my calf muscle is stiff, tight, and painful. Between my back and that, walking around was uncomfortable all day today. And I'm going to go do it again tomorrow.

Did spend a little time with Chip and handfuls of hotdog scraps, rewarding every time he looked at me while walking around on leash, doing more target nose touches. He was perfectly good most of the time but about 3 times he went into intense barking/alert mode at the end of the leash at other dogs. Maybe they looked him straght in the eye? He jumped a little when we were at the score table each time the automated timeer said Go! or buzzed, but stayed where he was and didn't panic about it. Lots more people met him and said that he's cute and that he reminds them of Remington.

Did spend some time with Tika just walking around, doing some tricks for treats, hanging out at the score table. I really need to spend more time trying to strengthen her back side again.

Boost didn't get a single weave entry all day and took more than 2 attempts to get it right most times. Not videoed, but I'm sure that I gave her plenty of space. Still, her contacts were all excellent for a change.

Jumpers was very nice, but a bar when I called hard as she was over the jump, and I think that discombobulated her and she missed a jump and it took me a bit to get her to think about doing obstacles again instead of bouncing around in front of me.

Gamblers was good, early thing in the morning, she was very fast, only flaw was that she just ran past th weaves entirely (I didn't go back to fix them, to preserve my carefully timed plan). That was our only Q of 6 runs.

Standard was pretty darned good until the next to the last obstacle--the weaves. Bah.

Pairs, she ran past jump on a lateral lead-out, so wasted time getting back to where we needed to be, and then the danged weave entry. We didn't Q but our partner was good (well, a missed contact). Considering that we combined for I think 15 faults, we were only about a second over time, so they were fast.

Snooker, the wheels fell off (that's right after I found out about Lisa, but I don't think that was really the issue).

Steeplechase the wheels, the chassis, the doors, and the engine fell off. She was behaving oddly beforehand, not focusing on me, grabbing the tug but immediately releasing it, like that. I wonder whether she's sore or needs an adjustment? Wish she could talk.

Trying to remember the positives. The outpouring of offers when I asked my agility club whether someone had a wire crate I could borrow--and I picked one of them up today at the trial.

Weather cooperated--sunny but a chilly breeze to keep us from overheating.

Boost does love doing tunnels full-speed-ahead.

Good friends, good dogs.

Tired, sore, hoping I'll get some sleep tonight. G'night.

Agility Weekend

SUMMARY: Me and Boost

Saturday, lacking sleep again. Sunrise was eh, OK, but not worth stopping, hence just a quick blurry shot with a little Tule fog over the fields. Better than rain or darkness, though! It apparently poured at the trial site on Friday.

I did not enter everything on the two days we were there. I didn't enter Thursday and Friday at all. How far I've drifted from a couple of years ago, when it was two dogs, four days, every.single.class. I don't currently have the energy for it. And not sure whether Boost does; she was looking tired by the end of the two days.

At least we got a couple of Qs, even if it wasn't the Super-Q that I really want/need to complete her championship.

Here's how it went.

Saturday

• Masters Pairs: I couldn't find the person I thought was my partner, so I walked both halves several times. Turns out that the pairs had been rearranged, so my partner was my instructor. I asked for the easy half, and wouldn't you know it--started great, but the place where both first and 2nd half do the same thing, I then continued with the 2nd half, so off course. Doh!
• P3 Gamblers: During the opening, she popped her weaves when I ran to get ahead (didn't go back and fix), and turned back to me before going up the teeter. Seeing that a lot from her lately; odd thing. The gamble was just tough; pretty low percentage on Qs. I didn't expect that she'd do it, and she didn't.
• Masters Snooker: Got through a 4-red opening with just a couple of bobbles, then #2 in the closing was a straight chute going to a jump, and I just couldn't run fast enough to get there, so she turned back to me after the tunnel, ran backwards towards the jump, finally took it but knocked the bar.
• Masters Jumpers: Ran past a jump where I was hoping to rear cross; I might have pushed her off it, but really I think if she were taking obstacles instead of staring at me, she'd have taken it. I didn't see anyone else miss that jump. I think knocked a bar or two, also; forgot already.

Sunday

• P3 Gamblers: Did nicely in the opening until we tried getting into the weaves from the approach she doesn't do well on--turning towards the left. I had to try 3 times to get her into the weaves, so that wasted time didn't allow us to do our planned 2nd set of weaves. But I adjusted my course, we were in the perfect place to get into the gamble on the buzzer, it was basically a send to a tunnel and she did great, so a Q and actually 2nd place. The Q rate was quite high on this one.
• Perf Grand Prix: Nearly perfect. I released her early on all her contacts to keep her moving and excited. Only flaw was my fault, where I tried to push her out but wasn't enough ahead of her so she almost went off course and I had to call her back. Not a fault, though, just a time waster, although we were still 10 seconds under time (although still almost 10 seconds slower than the winner). But a Q! Her first GP of this Qing season.
• Masters Snooker: I picked a very simple course because it was one of those tiny courses with only 3 reds where it looked almost easy to do something with high points, but I thought that lots of people would crash and burn. I picked a 4-5-5 opening, but she knocked the first red, which pretty much put us out of competition for a Super-Q. Then in the closing knocked the #4 bar. So no Q, but I was right; people were Super-Qing with high 30s points and the winning dog in our height group did a 4-5-5 opening, too. 
• Masters Jumpers: Really felt good--no refusals or runouts or blatantly obvious hesitations, only one bar down. Even did a couple of rear crosses (which can be problems for us) and at the end she also kept going over the last jump rather than turning back. It was a nice way to end the weekend even if it wasn't a Q.

Raffle

For a change, I wasn't working score table, and since I didn't enter everything and had only one dog, I had plenty of time between working with Chip and playing with Tika to work in the rings. Which gave me a free lunch and tickets for the raffle, which, as always, I entered under Boost's name.

View from a pole setter's chair.

As usual, Boost was a good girl in the raffle and won something.

Over all, feels like we both need to get in better shape and take off some weight. So much to do, so little time!

Results from Last Weekend

SUMMARY: Yes we went off and did agility.

My new ambitious training plan slid almost to a standstill last week and this. Just the usual, hard to find time and energy to get up and go do what must be done at locations other than my back yard.

Still, there was one class (Steeplechase round 1) where we had to get over a series of jumps straight across the entire width of the field. Normally she'd have turned back to me. This time, she kept going...with a little hesitation, but she did it! So, one small success for womankind.

We added another useless pairs Q and another useless Plain Old Snooker Q to our Q counts, and nothing else out of 11 classes.

Another real heartbreaker (for me) on the 2nd Snooker--had she just gone over one more jump, it would've been our SuperQ. One. Jump. One! But no, she decided it was time to look at me and run past it instead. [pauses now to tear hair and rend clothing].

On the other hand, that's two competition weekends in a row where we've come within an obstacle of completing it, so MAYBE we're making progress.

On the third hand, we had several runs where all the wheels came off, you know, running past jumps left and right until I didn't even know where I was any more.

Weave poles were excellent except for one set of the 2 in the steeplechase, which she missed the entry on and then, after correction, popped out; and one set of the 2 in the gamblers opening, which she missed the entry on...twice!..and then, after correction, popped out. I really have no grasp on why all the other weaves were gorgeous and these weren't. Dang dog brains.

Still--she's a beautiful, sweet, momma's dog whom I love to be around and who loves to work!

And Tika got to hang out again, have hunks of her hair pulled out by her mom (I despair of ever brushing her enough, so it's easier just to grab wads that are sticking out and gentle wiggle them out of her coat,  although she doesn't like that too much).

Boost *DID* win a nifty collapsing water bowl in the worker raffle, along with a year's free dog washes at the Turlock dog wash--the latter of which I donated back to the raffle, since I'm in turlock only 3 or 4 times a year and am not likely to spend the time to get my dog washed while there. Although it was tempting. "Gee, it's the weekend and I have nothing to do, guess I'll drive 2 hours out to Turlock to wash my dog."

And, so, we're going to do it all again this weekend, in Morgan Hill, so at least I get a nice short 20 minute drive home in the evening instead of doing a hotel or driving for an hour.

And that's our last trial that I'm planning on for this year, until February, even, so that's our last chance to get that danged SuperQ.  Don't know, if we don't get it but are close, whether I'd change my mind and go up to the north bay for a trial or two, but I'd rather not so I probably won't.

Isn't it nice to have solid plans like that?

Other plans for December include the Dickens Faire, maybe Disneyland again, and, hmm, well, maybe Christmas.

Weekend Results--Hopeful and Not

SUMMARY: Training might be paying off--

Saturday: Generally a  good day.

• Pairs Relay: On a lead-out pivot, Boost ran around the first jump. Reset her and started over and we ran beautifully. No Q, though.
• Standard: On a lead-out pivot, pulled off the 2nd jump and (watching the video) I don't think I had even turned yet. Reset her and started over and we ran beautifully (well, except once where I did a front cross and the jump wasn't where I expected it to be, so a bit of time wasting while I figured it out). No Q, though.
• Gamblers. Went exactly per plan, except for a bit of confusion in the actual gamble part--we got it but were *barely* under time. Thought it was a pretty good run--a Q but ended up with no placement.
• Jumpers: Went really nicely up to the next to the last jump when she turned back to me for a refusal, but the rest was lovely.
• Steeplechase: Wahoo, a lovely, fast run! At least, it felt fast to me. Would never have occurred to me that Boost doing a lovely clean run wouldn't Q, but she didn't. I did notice that she hesitated slightly before a couple of jumps, but thought nothing of it. In watching the video afterwards, I see what I've noticed in other vids-- it might feel fast to me, but she's constantly measuring her strides, taking too many, spending too much time looking at me. That made me very sad--despite how well things have gone all day, this tells me that we have a very long way to go to fix things. (I'll see about posting the video later.)  Plus, well, the fastest dogs are so DANG AMAZINGLY fast.
• Which took us up to Snooker, which is the one Q I really want--the Super-Q variety, that is. We'd had a pretty good day actually. NO (!) bars knocked, no weaves missed, only a couple of runout or refusal things. I could only hope--I scouted out a four-reds, four-7s course but decided that it required skills that we are too weak on, so picked a  nice four-reds, one-four and three-sevens course that I was pretty sure that we could do.
  Sadly, however, we were near the end of the running order, and by that time I knew that, to get a super-Q, I had to do at least a 6 and  three 7s, and four 7s was easier--by that I mean that it wasn't easy (for us) but that it flowed better than the 6. So--the part that I thought would be hard for us? It was. On the 2nd red, she did the "what jump?" thing and then knocked the bar, and I knew it was all over. Went a little longer but my heart wasn't in it and I missed an obstacle, so not even a plain Q.

Sunday: Not as good; reverting.

•  Jumpers: Well, we got through it sort of--two knocked bars and one reallllly wide turn (my late front cross). Still, a reasonably good flow.
• Snooker: Picked a reasonable two-7, one-3, one-5 opening that I thought that we could probably get through--only one long stretch where she had to send ahead of me, and of course she didn't--turned in front of me and started leaping backwards. I had to reset her and move again, wasting time--and then turned back to me instead of taking a teeter, which really surprised me. But we got all the way through the opening, all the way through 6 in the closing, over the first jump of the 3 jumps in #7, and on the second jump of #7--she was so busy watching me that she ran past it instead of taking it. I could've just died. Yes, it would've been that badly desired Super-Q. Crap.  SO much work left to do to try to fix years of deteriorating performance. Still--with 3 days perspective--it was a pretty good run over all. It was a Q, adding to our huge stack of useless plain Snooker Qs.
• Gamblers-- Wheels starting to fall off. Some miscommunications wasted time, two sets of weaves and she didn't make the entry on either of them, so not a lot of opening points. I had a good approach to send her out to a tunnel in the gamble (which lots of dogs had trouble with), but I knew that the part where she had to keep going over a jump after the tunnel would be a problem, and sure enough, she turned back to me before the jump. So no Q.
• Standard: Ran past a jump while looking at me. Turned away from a jump in front of her to look at me. Turned away from the weaves in front of her to look at me. Back to our usual messy style. But at least no bars down.
• Grand Prix: Came in past a jump in front of her while looking at me. Turned back to me on the approach to the weaves. Definitely no Q.

 Looking at me and running past or turning back from obstacles is still a huge problem. I guess I shouldn't expect miracles after only 3 weeks of more concentrated and focused practice. Generally, our runs pleased me, but I admit to feeling a mite discouraged at the work that I need to do.

So--Only 3 bars for the weekend, which is pretty good for us. Two Qs for the weekend, which is definitely better than 0.  I'm not completely discouraged--it does feel like we made progress--but will I have the stamina and determination (and time) to keep on it?  We shall see.

A No-Q Day

SUMMARY: Some highlights and lowlights.

I drove 4 hours today for about 2 minutes of ring time. Pretty crazy, huh? My general rule is that I have to stay at the destination for at least as long as my round-trip time to make it worthwhile going, and we were actually there for right about 8 hours. For 3 runs.

Got there in time to work the first class (not entered in Masters Challenge Standard) to earn a free lunch and raffle tickets.

Gamblers--opening started well and then she pulled off a dogwalk right in front of her, not sure why, then I couldn't get her into a replacement tunnel, but we ended up even so about where I wanted to be when the whistle blew, with her on the A-frame--but she came off the A-frame without being releasd and I had trouble getting her lined up and we in no way came close to getting the actual gamble. Still, she had two awesome sets of weaves.

After that, I got Tika out and we hung out in the shade watching the runs.

The Woodside site is known for being hot. Wasn't as hot as some times when I've been there and the paint is peeling off the roads (well--maybe not, but it should have been). But still, by the time I had finished lunch, it was hot enough an late enough (11:30 already) that I decided that I for sure wasn't going to stick around another couple of hours after Snooker to try a Jumpers run (last class of the day), so scratched Boost from that.

Standard--beautiful run, felt good; she came off the teeter without being released and I made her down for a moment as a reminder (then her dogwalk and Aframe were good and I held them a bit). And, dang, she missed her weave entry. After doing so well on them in gamblers.

Hung out with Tika again, getting hot even in the shade.

Snooker--well, crud, on the 3rd jump, I said "go hup" and she started towards it and I moved to get into front cross position and she pulled off it, then I got frustrated, like really WHAT does it take to get you to go over a jump, really???? and finally she did it but knocked the bar and it was all over.

At least it was a good reason to hop in the car and come home. Took about 20 minutes longer to get home through heavy Sunday-afternoon traffic heading back into the Bay Area than it took to go out thataway between 5:30 and 7:30 in the morning, go figure. Glad I left a couple of hours early; got home after 5:00 as it was.

So, back to the drawing board, or try to find more specific things to focus on. Yes, I should be videotaping everything. Guess I should get out the new/used camera and figure out again how it works.

Back to Normal, Sadly

SUMMARY: A non-Qing day, in which I go into painful detail because it's my blog.

Day 2 of the 3-day USDAA trial.

Yesterday I didn't mean to give the impression that I'm always trying to do crazy things in Snooker trying to get a Super-Q. I try to make a guess at what would be needed for a Super-Q and decide whether I can come up with a course for that purpose that we can competently do. I often don't go for 3 (or 4) sevens in the opening, for example, unless they're the simplest thing to do on the course. The problem is not that we can't get to where we need to be, or have off-courses, or don't have the speed. The problem is in knocked bars and refusals. The difference yesterday is that I did not bother trying to figure out what I thought would be necessary for a Super-Q and picked the course based only on what I thought we could possibly get through with the least amount of work on either of our parts and in fact was very close to 100% certain that it would NOT be a Super-Q. And that time, it worked for us (although had that bar she ticked actually fallen, it would've been the same old story).

Today, Boost:

• Snooker:
  Today, I also picked a reasonably easy and flowy course, got through that opening easily, and then running straight at #2 in the closing, she stopped and turned back to me and backed up past it for a refusal.  This is how it usually goes.
• Gamblers: She couldn't have asked for a better sequence of momentum-building jumps before going out to an Aframe in the gamble, and she was headed straight for it and then pulled off and came back to me. At least our opening went according to plan.
• Standard: First 13 obstacles beautiful. Then she came off the table early, darn it. Been a long time since she's done that. Then the last 4 obstacles I kinda messed up.
• Jumpers: Running past jumps.
• Pairs Relay: Refusal and a bar, both of which I can attribute to my handling, plus our partner went off-course.
• Steeplechase: I ran my little heart out. I did everything I needed to do, she did too (other than CONSTANTLY checking in with me before EVERY obstacle). It felt pretty good even though she knocked a bar. But very sad to see that, even if she hadn't knocked the bar, we'd have been too slow to qualify, the top dogs were SO bloody fast. Makes me wonder even more whether she's not feeling her best. Watching videos of our runs from last couple of weekends, she is not opening up and running full out. Or it could just be that she has decided that her running style is to check in with me more and more and more. Sigh.

 Today, Tika:

• Jumpers: Didn't want to lie down at the start, so I let her stay in a sit, which I was pretty sure was Trouble that starts with a T--and sure enough, I had barely gotten halfway to my starting lead-out position when she crashed through the first jump (I suspect she crept forward until she was too close to get over it) and raced by me to take an off-course jump. We did the rest reasonably well, a couple of wrong turns but decent, and she looked happy to be running.
• Veterans pairs relay: Again, this was for fun, not a Qing event. Tika did OK, but the restrictions placed by the judge on who had to run in what order meant that our veteran partner who was entered only in this, and for fun, had to run the side of the course that had obstacles that she didn't want to even attempt to put her dog on, so she didn't. So, technically, our team Eed.  I have things to say about restrictions on who runs which side in Relay--the whole purpose of the relay is supposed to be working stategically as a member of a team, but that takes away any possible strategy that you could ever have. And this time, actually, Tika didn't look so thrilled about being there to run. Who knows what goes through her head.

No Qs, no placements, only one really decent run all day. Back to Normal Boost Agility World.

 One more day tomorrow. At least it is refreshingly cool, even chilly, at the trial site, while it's been up in the 90s here at home.

A Thing That Made Me Cry In Agility

SUMMARY: Because there is crying in agility.

Boost got a Super-Q!

It's one of those things that I'd just about come to accept that would never happen, that we'll never get the 2 more Super-Qs that we need for her USDAA championship. That I might retire her (or anyway move her to performance) and never get that championship.

And today was particularly bad:

• Gamblers, not taking obstacles, several, in fact, and in the opening. And no way, of course, that we'd get the actual gamble.
• Standard, not taking obstacles, knocking bars, a complete melt-down.
• Pairs--we were spot-on perfect. Why can we do 10 obstacles perfectly over and over? But not a complete course?
• Jumpers, not taking obstacles, knocking bars, a complete melt-down.

Once again, Tika ran beautifully--very nicely in pairs for a Q and a 1st**, darn good in Jumpers for a Q and a 1st (some bobbles that were my fault, but she just recovers so nicely!). And it made me even more aware of how nice Tika is to run and what a challenge Boost is. I mean, Boost is happy going into the ring, always. It's just that... sometimes... 

So I wanted to pack it in and head home early, especially since my back is not doing really well.  And talked to Boost about how maybe she'd like to become a herding and nosework dog.

I mean, really, she's 8 and a half. Many, if not most, dogs, move down a height into the Performance group by that age, where the counting for a championship resets and starts all over.

Plus, 112 attempts at Masters Snooker, and out of all of these, we had earned one Super-Q. One. One of 112 attempts. And that one was 2 years ago. (oh, interesting--2 years ago exactly plus 2 days ago.) And she's getting older and it feels like we're getting worse, not better.

And the day had been SO bad, so really very bad, I mean, we did not even come close to completing all the obstacles--let alone successfully--on three of four courses.  But I paid for my entries, plus I'm on score table, so I talked myself into staying and not scratching Boost from Snooker.

But the snooker, yikes. Three or four reds, your choice. A very wide circle of obstacles with a three-part #7. And everything was jumps jumps jumps. Yeah, well, we knock bars and we do refusals at jumps, and I did not have the heart to try to design a course with 4 reds or with very many points, because it was pointless anyway (given all the jumps in the course and given how bad our day had been). I just picked nearly the simplest circle with only 3 reds, not much in the way of high points at all, because at that point in the day today, I needed to have a successful run far more than I needed a Super-Q.

I didn't even bother to watch anyone else's runs or look to see what kinds of scores people were getting, because I had given up on getting a Super-Q today.

So we did our simple run. She ticked the 2nd bar but it stayed up.  She ran past the 3rd red but I was able to get her back to it and over it without knocking it. On the closing, the distance from 2 to 3 to 4 was so wide and so not-obvious to the dog and I was so slow that I called her back to me after 3 and we kind of hobbled our way to #4 before continuing through the rest of the course. I figured that we were going to run out of time, but it didn't matter because I had picked a small, simple, wimpy course that wasn't going to be a Super-Q anyway, so I didn't push things. Took the time to tell her that she was a good girl for holding her A-frame contact near the end (the only thing that wasn't a jump on the whole course).

Got over the last jump and, wow, we had successfully completed an entire course today! It wasn't entirely pretty, but it was legal and it mostly worked, and the buzzer went off just after that, so we just made it in time.

Feeling  happy that we did it, but kinda sad, too, that I had to give up my hopes of a Super-Q just to be able to feel good about doing a very basic course.

But you know what happened. Everyone tried to get four reds and lots of points and crapped out.  So our little piddly simple run left us in 4th place, and there were 4 Super-Qs.  I could hardly believe it when I went to check our score. I thought that I had to be misreading it. But, no, there it was, in black and white!

And I cried. So happy.

But. There's this little thing about operant conditioning--the most successful way to get a creature to continue repeating behaviors to get a reward is with RANDOM rewards. So I've just been randomly rewarded for attemting Snookers by earning a Super-Q, which means now I'm back to thinking, oh, wow, it just *might* be possible for us to get that one last Super-Q and a championship.

Not sure whether to be happy or sad about that random reward. But, for tonight, I'll take it.

Everyone had cheesburgies for dinner.

Both dogs finished their kibble before they finished their cheesburgers. Very strange indeed.

And...

Boost got a Super-Q.

---

** Technically Tika did not Q in pairs because we ran Veterans pairs, which is a just-for-fun competition, no qualifying scores. But our score was plenty good enough to have qualified in the regular divisions, both dogs ran well and clean. And technically we were the ONLY veterans pair, but we earned that first place anyway!

Weekend Results - Sliding off into Obliioun

SUMMARY: Not our best CPE weekend ever.

In the past, CPE has been a pleasant and mostly relaxing way for me to bolster my feelings of inadequacy in the agility ring by bringing home a bunch of Qs and firsts, the benefits of having fast and fairly well-trained dogs.

Not so much this weekend, which makes me think that all of us are sinking ever deeper into agility decrepitude.

The topping on the hard-to-digest cake was the final run of the weekend, the sort of jumpers run I've been dying for and missing so much, where the dogs just break loose and run full out in a double loop around the ring (more or less) and we all have a good sprint and a great time. And I failed dismally with both dogs. It does seem to prove two of my working theories:

• What I really need to do with Boost is to go rent a field and run full speed in huge circles around the outside of the ring and stop working so much on handling. She spent, as usual, so much time looking at me that this course, which a couple or 3 years ago I'd swear we've done similar and aced, that she skipped obstacles left and right and I finally just had to sit her halfway through the course and get restarted, and then it fell apart immediately again.
• Tika is having trouble going into tunnels. Still not sure whether that's a confidence in what I'm telling her, or a vision issue, or something else. She used to be your typical blasting tunnel-suckable dog, but she wouldn't go into the tunnels and also kept pulling off or going past jumps.

So sad all around. And watching myself run--I was pretty wiped by then--very pathetic and slow. So maybe it was all me and not the dogs, although I think not.

So, in more detail--

Boost Saturday:

• Colors: Almost perfect, but turned back to me before the last jump, missing our bid to be the fastest of all heights/levels by .6 seconds. I just want to have a completely perfect run from time to time. Still, in CPE, no refusals, so Q and 1st.
•  Wildcard: Odd way of taking an alternate obstacle instead of the one that I wanted. I recovered, but had to bring her around in a figure-8 to do it. We ended up with a Q and a 1st but not a very fast time compared to quite a few other dogs in other hts/levels.
• Standard: Started out OK but I stopped in the middle when a whistle blew--turns out it was on the soccer field behind the ring. We were able to continue, but she ran past a jump that I had to go back for, and then she knocked the last two bars. No Q.
• Snooker: Beautiful opening. Knocked the bar on #3. No Q.
• Jumpers: Knocked a bar. Ran past a jump that I went back for. Refused a jump right in front of her. I have a video, it's just puzzling as always. Maybe will post tomorrow. No Q.

Tika Saturday:

• Colors. Peed in the ring, didn't get to run. (See yesterday's post.)
• Jumpers: Turned the wrong way once, but otherwise pretty good. 2nd and a Q but 3 full seconds slower than the winner.

Boost Sunday:

• Snooker: Beautiful opening. Handling error going into the closing. No Q.
• Gamblers (Jackpot) #1: Started out great, then started running past jumps and weave poles and I actually stopped at one point again to regroup. So instead of doing my beautiful plan with a zillion points (completely doable, a couple of other dogs did something similar), we ended up BARELY Qing.
• Gamblers (Jackpot) #2: Exactly to plan! Wow! Had we been half a second faster, we'd have had one more point but one other dog (Chaps) did have that extra point, dang it, so a Q and 2nd place.
• Full House: Should've been high score of all dogs at  the entire trial by a mile, but (a) a refusal at one jump cost us about 2 seconds and (b) I've been releasing quickly on the contacts so near the end she- self-released from the A-frame and jumped towards me at the exact moment that I needed to be pushing her away from me, so wasted about 2 more seconds, so we missed our last 5-point obstacle by one leap--leaving us with 39 points instead of 44, which put us behind two dogs with 42 and 41 points. But fortunately they weren't in our height/level, so we actually got a 1st and a Q.
• Jumpers: Disaster.

Tika Sunday:

• Full House: To show how much time I had to waste with Boost, I ran almost the same course with my older slower dog and got nearly as many points, 37. Q and a 3rd place (behind Boost and one other dog). Again, looked pretty good until I guess I was late on a deceleration for a turn and she slowed and went wandering off and I had to chase after her to get her running again in the correct direction.
• Jumpers: Disaster.  We did get through it with no errors, but wayyyyyyy over time, which is almost inconceivable for Tika.

Feeling: Discouraged, maybe sad at the rising possibility that all 3 of us really might be done with agility, somewhat happy actually that my dogs have been willing to run with me and have enjoyed doing so all these years, and I rode that feeling to stopping at Taco Bell on the way home and getting tacos for all of us, an extremely rare treat for the Merle Girls.

They've hardly moved since we got home. Me, too, except for sorting through photos and catching up on email and such. Think it's time for bed.

Independence Weekend USDAA - Sunday

SUMMARY: Got some Qs.

Tika:

• Q and first place in Jumpers, no problem.
  She's so good to run, just figures out what she needs to do. She's supposed to lie down at the start line, but she just wouldn't do it this time so I let her sit. I thought that meant that she was tired, but she blasted out of there quickly enough that I was behind her all the way and she adjusted for my puny mortal failings.
  
  
• Q and first place in Standard, no problem.
  Watch for the spin at the green tunnel entrance and where she's looking as she descends the Aframe (didn't catch that I rear crossed)--issues having to do with her hearing.
  
  

We were able to park close and crate out of MUTT MVR this weekend,
which was a dogsend, since my back was absolutely not up to lifting or moving ANYthing.
Mr. Alien hung out with us occasionally.

Mr. Alien ... hung... out with us...

Boost:

• Same Jumpers as Tika, problems.
• Same Standard--whoa, really nice run with nothing to complain about! Q and 5th of 38 dogs.
  
  
• Snooker, yeah, well, knocked one of the reds, which took us out of the running for a Super-Q right away, and then too much dinking around and miscommunication to even be able to finish #7. It's a Q, but your basic useless Q of which we now have 24. It was an entertaining Snooker course, though, with three tunnels in a circle forming the #7 obstacle. A real crowd-pleaser, lots of yelling and cheering and groaning for all the competitors.
  
  
  
  
• Grand Prix, well, oh well. Who needs any stinkin' Grand Prix Qs anyway. They're probably sour.

 Boost flying down the dogwalk, and me... uh, not sure exactly WHAT I'm doing there--

Boost now has 141 lifetime Qs, just short of the 150 needed for the Bronze Lifetime Achievement Award. Except--it requires at least 15 Qs in each of the classes, and we have only 6 Jumpers, and the thought that we could ever earn another 9 Jumpers Qs is slowly fading away to nothing. I mean, she's 8 and a half. Sigh. Let alone getting those two elusive Super-Qs to complete her ADCH.

When I'm at a trial, like this last weekend, I feel actually motivated to go work on some of our issues and try to fix them. And then I get home and realize how much time it really takes, and I go back to just hoping the issues will just magically solve themselves. Huh.

That's about all I have to say about that.

Running our leg of the relay and doing really well.

Lookit that nice two-on, two off. She was good on her contacts all weekend.

Kelpie puppy Batman subdues my scary hat!

Long-time agility friend Debbie and her Porsche do a little warm-up massage. Debbie used to sometimes run Remington back when my foot was broken.

Embarrassing, Mr. Alien, to be abducted by giant inflatable aliens!
At least they're wearing  a seatbelt.
(Inflatable aliens appeared in random places all over the trial site on Sunday. No particular explanation from anyone, but it was entertaining and engendered lots of conversation.)

Awww, Millie practices her school visit skills among a flood of children.

If nothing else, at least Boost continues her awesome skill at winning things in the raffle. A certificate for a day's entry on Saturday, and a bag of Cod Skin Treats on Sunday.

Hmm, something fishy about these cod skin treats.

*Photos of us running by Laurie Cowhig and Lisa Pomerance, thanks, agility friends!

Independence Weekend USDAA - Saturday

SUMMARY: Thank goodness for Tika.

Pretty much a dull post today. No photos. No humor.  Not too much whining.  No juicy gossip.

Here's how the day went.

Boost:

• Jumpers: 2 bars, a runout, two or three turns the wrong way, spins before jumps--wow.
• Snooker: She did her parts perfectly, but I incorrectly took my eyes off her to look ahead during a turn and she went off course.
• Standard: I front crossed in the wrong place, NOT taking my eyes off her but eyes off the course and so, figures, put her onto the wrong obstacle for an off course. The opposite of Snooker. But obstacles 1-3 and 6-19 were beautiful.
• Gamblers: Beautiful opening for 25 seconds, but the time was 30 seconds and the wheels started to come off as she ran past a tire and then ran under the tire and then we were out of position for the gamble and, bleah.
• Pairs Relay: Just absolutely lovely. But no Q because our partner had issues. That's OK because I knew what I was possibly getting into when I signed up. 
• Steeplechase: Missed her weave entry and I had to go back for it, and a bar down, combining to mean (along with the blazing speeds of the top dogs) no Q. But I felt pretty good about the run otherwise, really tried pushing her and me and releasing early from the Aframe and all that, and we both did well at it.

Tika:

• Jumpers. Lovely. Same course and (I think) handling as for Boost, and WHAT a pleasure it was to run her! She is so good, so forgiving, just GETS it. Q and 1st place (of 3 veteran dogs).
• Snooker: I tried to work the tunnels hard, but she was having trouble getting into them anyway, 3 tunnels. Still, we got through #5 in the closing before I forgot to do a front cross for some stupid reason and she VERY EASILY went into the off-course tunnel (4th on the course). Doesn't that just figure? Still, nice to run her even if it wasn't a Q.

Today, legs are more tired but I still felt able to move comfortably around the courses. Jogging here and there between classes was fine. This is in *such* contrast to the last couple of trials where the knees hurt so much doing even that.  Foot feels mostly OK, just sometimes I step wrong and *ouch*.

Good friends, good times, good judges, interesting courses that flowed reasonably well from all the judges so far, nothing that I felt was too herky-jerky or overly technical. Challenging, yes, but fun to run. Love when that happens.

One more day, just 4 classes for us tomorrow but there are Masters Challenge classes between the 1st and last classes of the day in both Masters rings that we didn't enter, so might not be a super-early end to the weekend.

It's only 7:45--is it too early to go to bed?

Independence Weekend USDAA - Friday

SUMMARY: Team day, in which we don't completely suck.

Well, Boost actually had a decent day:

• Clean and mostly really nice Standard run (one bobble my fault where I forgot a front cross, one dogwalk contact where she stopped halfway through the yellow and I had to keep prompting her to get her to the end, wasting time but no faults). Those time-wasters kept us from Qing, but still a decent score in DAM team terms.
• Got most of the way through the snooker except the last obstacle, enough for a Q; we did four reds in the opening with an Aframe and three weaves, and she didn't get the entry on two of those weaves. In the closing, ran past the entry to the weaves at #7 on a U-turn, not sure what that was about. But I'll definitely take the Q!
• Gamblers opening lovely but too much wasted time in closing to get points; turned wrong way out of tunnel as whistle blew, came too far out of a tunnel in the middle, and turned back to me as she approached the last jump, and that's when the whistle blew, darn.
• Jumpers we didn't E (2 bars and a refusal on a rear X before the broad jump, which didn't surprise me).
• Relay 2 bars--out of 11 obstacles! And her teammate had already knocked a bar that was two of those obstacles, so, wow. But she was already tired and a little sore, doesn't bode well for the rest of the weekend. I could tell by the way she stood up before the last two of our five runs for the day, not good, and this is new.

Teammates, if I remember correctly, one Eed in Jumpers, the other Eed in relay, two had not good snooker scores,  one like us had good gamble opening pts but didn't get the gamble points, so we were a longggggg way below the leading teams, who did *not* E in relay, so no team Q. Ah, well, but they were good people to run with.

Chris (Human Mom of the late great Kelpie Tika) and puppyyyyyyyy!

Gave Boost a piece of rimadyl and will give her a little massage to night and see how she is in the morning. She had no problem at all running after a frisbee at the end of the day, so even if she is stiff, it seems to evaporate quickly.  Will have to watch her carefully the next two days to decide whether to scratch some runs.

Uncle Agility Sam Wants YOU

Tika had no runs today. Got her out a few times to do some practice tricks and hang out with me. Two runs for her each of the next 2 days.

Another good old agility dog, Millie!

Oh, and what a pleasure for it to be chilly and me wanting to wear a fleece all day. The last week here has been miserably hot, over 100 F (37.8 C), and humid, not dry. After all that, actually today it felt weird not to be sweating constantly. That's the benefit of this agility site, Manzanita Park in Prunedale, out near the coast so it seldom gets all that warm.

From last Saturday--self-portrait with thermometer--

So, although things felt fairly good for today, some of it is because it's OK to have bars and refusals in team, probably won't disqualify you or hurt your team. The rest of the weekend, though, normal rules are in play. I at least felt good today--knees haven't bothered me, sore foot is still sore but I'm not noticing it much, back didn't even bother me much (except for when I first got up this morning and walked bent forward at the waist until it eased up a bit). Didn't feel like I was flying on course, but didn't feel draggy, either.

A typical agility judge (Eric Quirouet) and his fans.
Judge Carol Voelker makes a quick exit stage left but not quick enough, ha!
Note people wearing sweatshirts. Chilly!

Guess I should go have some dinner and get psyched up for tomorrow.

Just One Little Thing

SUMMARY: Another weekend with pretty much no colorful fabric items to hang on my wall.

Here's a quick note about this weekend.

Ha ha! Just kidding, no it isn't.

I really hate having the alarm go off 3 or 4 hours before my normal wakie-wakie time. Groaaan.

Worst thing this time was how much my lower back hurt. One muscle on one side had been bothering me, but probably loading the car Friday evening put the finishing touches on it. Walking very very gingerly as I got ready and headed out.

But, as always, once I'm on the road--and especially at that certain hour of the morning--it all faded away and the excitement of being on the road crept in. I love going places, and moving along the highways at this early hour when so few people are out makes it feel special and almost magical, wondering what's just a little farther down the pike.  I think i got that from all the years of traveling with my parents, who took us to so many interesting and entertaining places.

About 90 minutes later, arrived at the fairgrounds. This sat in the parking lot, blaring recorded loop messages over and over about being kind to the rest of the world. Don't know what this was really about, but it's pretty cool (love the "STOP" flag on the side) and it's a good message.

And then, well, agility. Gah.  Tika had 3 runs, Boost had 10. Out of those, i came home with one Qualifying round that I was happy with, one Q that I accepted but wasn't what I wanted, wayyyy too many near misses, and a couple of disasters.

Like this:

Award for Best Run of the Weekend:

• Tika's Saturday's Snooker course: She ran my 50-point plan perfectly, and so few dogs of any height or level managed to do it. First place, a Q, and proof that she's as fast and as happy and as expert on the course as ever.

Nominations for Just One Little Thing:

• Boost's Sat Snooker: Some bobbles during the opening that wasted time, but no faults (same course I ran with Tika). Closing perfect, perfect, perfect, but near the end I got worried about running out of time because of the bobbles and started pushing hard... and she knocked the next to the last jump, augh! Maybe she would've anyway even if I'd stayed relaxed, and turns out that we did have time (not much, but enough).  But I'll take the blame for that one. (A Q, but not a Super-Q.)
• Tika's Sat. Jumpers: I forget that now, even in class and at home, when I send her to a tunnel, she often pulls away or veers past it. Not sure what that's all about, confidence or hearing or vision, but whatever--I still forgot. First half of run: Fast and perfect. Last half of run: Perfect. But right in the wee little middle there, I sent her to a tunnel and turned and burned... and she went past it on the outside for a runout fault. 
• Boost's Sat. Jumpers: She was PERFECT! But I forgot the course in one spot, hesitated, and she ran past a jump while I looked around to find my position. My fault again, and wasted a perfect Boost run!
• Boost's Sat. Pairs Relay: Only 9 obstacles; 1st 8 were spot-on perfect and fast, then she popped out of the weaves at #10.
• Boost's Sun. Grand Prix: Another almost perfect run on a very difficult course where very few dogs Qed. But. Knocked one bar (the 3rd one). One crappy bar.
• Tika's Sun. Jumpers: Crashed the first bar, the rest perfect and fast and delightful. 
• Boost's Sun Jumpers: Fast and beautiful and kept all her bars up but I moved for a front cross just a little too soon and pulled her off a jump for a refusal. Crap crap crap! (Of course it WAS right in front of her and she WAS running straight towards it...)
• Boost's Sun Snooker: Another gorgeous completed opening, then knocked #4 in the closing, so not even a useless Q.

OK, Fates, I don't mind a couple of near misses, but really, 8 of 13 in one weekend with only one thing?? Why couldn't we convert *some* of them? Jeez--

On the other hand, on the spur of the moment I decided to get Boost tested for the [nonagility] Canine Good Citizen title (Remington, Jake, and Tika all took it and passed it years ago). And she passed! Woot! So I'll probably send away for the official certificate and title. 

Plus, as always, Boost is just fabulous at winning raffles. Here's what she won for me on Saturday:

It was, indeed, hot on Saturday. Not Super Hot, but plenty hot enough. I wanted to try to give the dogs some grass to lie on instead of being zipped into their crates.

This spring I bought and started using a low x-pen (instead of the 42" one I've had since I started agility)--so much easier to carry around and move and get things into and out of, and the dogs stay in it anyway although they could perfectly well hop right over it. (Boost is lying in the crate, you can just see her through the mesh.)

So, the other things of note that happened this weekend in agility:

• Boost's weaves were broken all day Saturday. We attempted 4 whole sets of weaves that day, and of those four:
• As noted above, popped out at #10 in Relay.
• Sat Standard: Popped out at #10. 
• Sat Steeplechase: Popped out at #10
• Sat Gamblers opening: Ran past weave entry, then after she went in, yes, popped out at #10.
• Gah! What's with that???
• Boost's weaves were superb on Sunday. We attempted 2 whole sets of weaves:
• In Standard, at a very sharp angle on her weak side, she worked hard to make the entry and, although she bounced slightly against pole #2, made it in with little help from me.
• In Grand Prix, blasting out of a tunnel and needed to make a sharp turn to the left to the weaves, I was behind and just yelled "Left weave!" and, Lo!, she did. Perfectly.
• Funny dog and her weave poles.
  
•  Some meltdowns:
• Saturday standard: Pulled off a jump, popped out of weaves, left Aframe early, turned back at last jump instead of continuing.
•  Saturday Steeplechase. Instead of doing a 180, came through the middle and backjumped, popped out of the weaves, a bar. (But DID carry out over 5 jumps all the way to the end very nicely.)
• Sunday Standard: Ran past the first jump and it went downhill from there, not sure HOW many jumps she ended up missing in various places. I think that's where I stopped in the middle and said to her, "You know, you have to take SOME jumps, that's what this is all about!" before continuing. (But her weaves and contacts were all good.)

Oh, but then she won something else that I dropped a ticket in in the raffle-- a replacement for one I used to have that broke:

Wasn't nearly as hot on Sunday, although it remained shirtsleeve weather all day.  While I tore down my set-up, sllloooowwwwwwllllllyyyy, trying to save my poor back, they hung out in the shade but let me know what it was that they'd really wanted all along. That purple thing lying there. Yes, that.

Then, the drive home. I had high hopes as the first hour went by without a single slowdown, but then as we hit Berkeley--complete standstill, just little movements here and there.

Things to take photos of while at a standstill in traffic:

What is that a statue of? Angry villagers with rakes and hoes, and a dog with a frisbee? Couldn't quite make it out. Maybe people with kites?

Other end of the same bridge. Obviously Berkeley protesters, with the UC Berkeley Campanile and someone in a wheelchair? Is that The Thinker with a protest sign, too?

Ohhhhhhh noooo, this can't be good: 54 minutes to the Oakland Airport, which is only 14 miles ahead?!?!?

Hum de dum de dummmm... The Oakland Fire Dept. can set this tower aflame and practice their high-rise rescues alongside the Oakland marina.

Whew, it really took only 20 minutes to get to the airport exit, and I did hear on the traffic news that they had cleared away two big accidents in the meantime. Glad I decided to stay an extra hour at the end of the day to hang out and talk with various friends, or it surely would've taken me 54 minutes.

Still, took me over 2 hours to complete the trip that was only 90 minutes on Saturday morning. And my lower back is just a mess. It overshadowed even my sore foot (which felt better sunday than it had on saturday) and my knees (which were--well, not great, but not as bad as they'd been a couple of days before). Always something, dangit.

Fortunately, I found some chocolate chip mint ice cream in the freezer when I got home. Thanks for stocking that for me, Ellen.

-----------------
For further reading:

• That bus: onemillionactsofkindness.com
- A mission to save kids' lives
• SongsForPeace.net (mentioned on the side of the bus)
- A Rotary Club project 
• AKC Canine Good Citizen program
• Statues on bridge
• Oakland Fire Department Training Tower

Temperatures and Emotions Going Every Which Way

SUMMARY: So, in other words, probably a typical agility weekend.

Saturday was hot--at least, in terms of weather. I never wore my fleece at all; short sleeves all the way even at 4:30 in the morning. Probably didn't reach 94F, but most likely 90F anyway. Fortunately, a sweet little breeze kept us all from boiling away. A shower in an air-conditioned hotel room felt SO GOOD that evening! Sunday was cool--at least, in terms of weather. Wore my thick fleece until after lunch, when it finally became warm enough to shed a layer. Cool, sweet, gentle breeze all day today, too, with a couple of sudden unexpected gusts that tore several canopies from their moorings.

Saturday didn't go all that well agility-wise-speaking for us.

Tika's one run, Jumpers, was perfect up to the end, when she ran past the last jump for an NQ. But again she seemed happy, grabbed my foot to demonstrate her enthusiasm.

Boost had 6 runs:

• Gamblers: Opening was mostly nice except missed her weave entry; the gamble itself, I didn't get a front cross in that I meant to and she wouldn't take a jump right in front of her. No Q, not even very high opening points.
• Standard: Just not taking obstacles, so we left the field. No Q.
• Grand Prix: Nice parts except a bar down and ran past one jump. No Q.
• Snooker: Dagnabbit, I forgot the course, whistled off quickly. No Q.
• Jumpers: Beautiful except ran past one jump. No Q.
• Steeplechase: Ran past the broad jump and something else. No Q.

Sunday didn't go all that well...until...
well... hang on to your hats...

Sunday was Team day. Three dogs to a team, all dogs do four individual events and then a relay at the end of the day. Qualification is based on cumulative scores from all those runs compared to the average of the top three teams. You have to be within 15% of that average to Q.

Our team, Dogs Gone Wild, had some nice fast dogs, but you also have to be accurate.

Jumpers: Boost and I E'ed on too many refusals (running past jumps). Another teammate Eed. Not good. But one other team also had two Es, and our 3rd dog was faster than their third dog, so, OK, so we could at least say "We're not in last place!" (By one whole point.) We assured each other that we can make it up easily later, although the top three teams were so far ahead of everyone else that they were the only ones in Qing range so far. Mood: Frustrated.

Then Snooker. OK, we did not completely crash and burn: Two of us got all the way through a high-scoring opening and partway through the closing. But Boost was again whistled off because she was too busy looking at me to bother taking a jump, gah. And, oh yeah, that was after running past two obstacles in the opening, wasting time, so doubt we'd have gotten a lot more points anyway. Our third teammate had an excellent score, thank goodness. Still, a LOT of dogs got much farther through the closing than we two did, so we moved up... one position.   Still nowhere near Qing range. Mood: Very frustrated.

Then Gamblers, and what a disaster. Boost ran past two obstacles in the opening again, probably my fault but still wasted time, and that's probably why my carefully timed closing was over time, causing us to lose all our gamble points. One teammate also didn't get gamble points. So, even though our 3rd teammate had a very nice run, we could no longer say that we weren't in last place. 

Mood: Depressed.

Don't know how my teammates felt, but I knew at that point that we weren't going to Q and I wondered why on earth I even bothered to enter team when Boost and I do so consistently poorly. It was all over, nothing to do but try to relax and enjoy the remaining two classes, although it was tempting to pack up and go home.

Then Standard. Standard has the 2nd-highest weighting of the 5 classes. Much to our delight, all three of us got through the course without E-ing! And apparently enough other dogs E'ed that, slam-bang, all of a sudden we were not only not last any more, but at the very bottom of actual Qing range! Which mean that, if we could all three avoid Eing in the relay, we might actually Q!

Mood: Almost hopeful but very stressed.

The heaviest weighting, though, is on the 3-dog relay. And now the pressure was on--we were so close to NOT Qing that a couple of faults, even if we didn't E, could possibly knock us out. And the way we'd been running, someone was probably going to E. I tried not to get my hopes up. We were almost the last team to run, and we saw quite a few teams go off course as we waited. Not a good sign.

But then something very interesting happened: Not only did we all not E, but we all had no faults, AND we all ran fast with no bobbles, and WOW we won the RELAY!  I've never been on a team fast enough and accurate enough to win the relay portion of the Championship Team event.  It wasn't by much--just a second faster than the next team, but yes indeed in this one class we beat all those teams who'd been at the top of the rankings most of the way. Wow. Just wow.

And so-- not only did we Q, but we ended up 5th overall! It was a very good way to end the weekend. Mood: Happy.

Dogs Gone Wild: Drover, Boost, and Betty, and their Humans.

And Here's How Saturday Went

SUMMARY: Beautiful day but not so much in the agility ring.

Alarm didn't go off. Actually figured it out this evening--alarm did go off but somehow the volume had been turned to zero.

Barely made it in time for briefing and walkthroughs, thank goodness, but took most of the first class to haul all my stuff and set it up. Didn't get a morning frisbee session in with the Merle Girls.

Jumpers: Boost knocked the first bar, so it was all over for Qing. Ran past 2 other jumps in various places but I kept going and she had actually a really nice time and the rest felt good.

Jumpers still: Tika's only run of the day. Ran PAST the first jump--what was it about the first jump? And it was all over for Qing. Had some other bobbles, but she was very happy, grabbed my foot with great enthusiasm and growling but BEFORE the last jump instead of after it. OK, she was happy.

Steeplechase: Tried to have Boost run with friend Karey whom she knows fairly well. Actually got four trotting jumps out of her before she beelined back to me.

Snooker: Almost everyone crapped out. *Almost* everyone who even Qed got a SuperQ; one superQ in 26" was left unclaimed. We couldn't even do 1-5-1-5-1-5 to the closing successfully -- knocked one of the reds, knocked a bar on one of the 5s, refusal on #2 in the closing so whistled off, oh and several refusals during the opening, too, just wasting a lot of time. We were not alone. Actually anyone who even GOT to the closing was often cheered.

Grand Prix: Wheels fell off. I'm not sure that we  successfully did even half the obstacles.

Standard: A really gorgeous run on an tough course where fewer than 20% qualified... until the very last jump, where the leash runner had dropped Boost's leash off to the side, and she drove forward to the leash, PAST the last jump. The rest of it was just about perfect, dad rat it.

Gamblers: Decent opening although one jump she repeatedly wouldn't go over both times we got to it, so wasted a lot of time and hence points weren't super high. Wouldn't send out to the gamble jump on a wrap around me.

Pairs: Ran UNDER the tire, what the hey?, and hit the dogwalk before I could bring her back, so an E for that, too.

0 for 8 Qs for the day. OK, the weather cooperated beautifully--sunny and shirt sleeves but not too warm. Friends all fun to hang with. Lots of successes among the competitors. But, really, sigh, 0 for 8.

Knee and foot held up OK although I did walk carefully and not too fast most of the day. It didn't *feel* as though running aggravated them. After being home for almost 3 hours and sitting at the computer, they don't seem any worse, not like Thursday night after much less activity.

Soooooooo on we'll go, tomorrow morning, for another full day.

One of our members makes these amazing photo backdrops, a different one for every trial! Here's this weekend's, with you know whozzz. Thanks, Erika, for taking the shot.

tap--tap--Is This Thing On?

SUMMARY: I dunno, guess I've been busy with stuff other than agility lately.

Feels somewhat as if I'm working towards easing out of dog agility. I don't have much lately to say that's related to dog agility, and the whole purpose of this blog was to capture my training work, my competition experiences, my failures and successes and dogs dogs dogs. So somehow it feels odd to just ramble on about unrelated things or post photos of random topics.

Random topics around downtown San Jose

And, in case those weren't random enough--

I couldn't actually bear to wait two months between trials, so at the last minute, I entered both dogs in *one* day of a CPE trial out in Turlock. I had two goals:

• Practice just RUNNING with Boost, not stopping, not going back for stuff that we missed or trying to Q.
• Run Tika in a couple of classes at 16" and see how she looks and whether she likes it.

Mixed success on the first count--once, I forgot my goal and as usual stopped when she ran by a jump; on a couple of occasions, she ended up in front of me facing me, so it's hard to keep running full-speed in that case. She actually had a lovely Full House run, high scoring, but she knocked the wrong bar in my plan and I forgot to go back and take a critical obstacle, so tons of points but no Q.

For Full House with Tika, I just picked a course that didn't have tight turns, weaves, or the dogwalk in it, didn't bother counting points, just wanted to run and have a good time. Turns out that we accidentally had just enough points to Q, which was our collective only Q of the entire day-- 1 out of 7 runs. That has got to be my lowest-Qing CPE trial Ev-Er but since that wasn't my goal, I didn't mind so much.

Tika indeed ran nicely--obvious still that she doesn't hear me clearly or trust to get ahead of me where she can't see what I'm doing (turns back to check), but her eyes were bright and she was fast and she grabbed my feet at the end, which is a sure sign of Tika pleasure.

So I've started running her in class a couple of runs a night at 16" after 3 months of no runs.

And I've entered her in one class at day in Veterans 16" at the next USDAA trial.

So funny to have my big girl who used to jump 26" jumping only 16",  but I think it's much better for her than the 20-22" she's been jumping for the last 3 1/2 years, and she has looked like she wanted to participate when I've run Boost, so now she can. She sure looked comfortable and natural doing it.

Photo by Carlene Chandler

Her stamina is low, but then, so is mine--I'm just not getting out much or doing much. Sometimes I'm really tired. The counter to that is that I've got a contract that I'm really enjoying for work, but with one thing and another, it's taking more of my time and attention.  Have done 6-mile hikes in the hills the last 2 weekends, but with so little keeping in shape, they were quite hard for me. And for Tika, too, I think.

Hiking at Almaden Quicksilver

Hounds Tongue (seems appropriate)

 Foundations of the old pump house for the mines

Hiking at Santa Teresa

A peek at San Jose over the edge of the hill--
there were deer, too, but they didn't stick around for 5 dogs.

 Mount Umunhum with Cold War radar tower in the distance

Photo by Lisa Williams

 Coyote Valley section of San Jose, with Santa Teresa Golf Course below us

 California poppies and California gilia

We've walked over to the park to do frisbee on occasion, but less often than we had been for a little while.
Boost waits for us to catch up.

At the park.

Rambling on.  Not sure that I even have solid goals now in agility. I'd really still like to eventually get Boost's two Snooker Super-Qs for her ADCH, but except for occasional spurts of enthusiasm, I mostly have gotten to where I don't feel that I care that much any more. Mostly in the yard we play *around* the agility equipment, although I keep making Boost do jumps to get the toy instead of running around them all the time.


So--on I go, doing whatever it is that I do, and the dogs are bored a lot. Poor suffering dogs.

Bored-est Collie Boost's artistic output using cardboard and pinecones.

Ahhhh, retirement.