New Facebook URLs

SUMMARY: It all gets more complicated and easier at the same time.

Now that facebook allows usernames (for use only in your facebook URL), I made my decision and people who are not on facebook can now find me easily at facebook.com/ellen.finch. I think. Let me know if you don't see my profile page come up. But there's an additional web site (fbook.me) that allows a facebook user to create an *additional* one that links to the same facebook page, and so I've used TajMutthall for this one. Huzzah.
www.fbook.me/tajmutthall. Should go to exactly the same profile page.

Let me know if you try 'em and they don't work.

Buy These Albums Now!

SUMMARY: In which I attempt to pull the musical wool over your eyes.

In my new career as a music promoter, I'd like to introduce you to these two wonderful new bands and their debut albums!


And now, if you'd like to be in the same business, here's how you do it!

1 - Go to Wikipedia. Hit “random”
or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
The first random Wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.

2 - Go to Quotations Page and select "random quotations"
or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four or five words of the very last quote on the page is the title of your first album. (I did this for 2 albums and the same "random" quotes came up. So if you do it for more than one album, too, use the "10 new random quotes" link at the bottom.)

3 - Go to Flickr and click on “explore the last seven days”
or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days
Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover. (I was disappointed--for the 2nd album, the 1st and 4th photos had dogs in them, but not the 3rd. Ah, well, and I decided not to cheat.)

But I can make up new rules for new people--if you want to go with the dog theme, then you must use the THIRD PHOTO THAT IS DOG-RELATED, no matter what it is. (Just keep clicking RELOAD button.)

4 - Use Photoshop or similar to put it all together. (Doh--This is like the step in the auto repair manual where it says "1. Remove engine.")

5 - Post it! (If you're in Facebook, you can post your new album with these instructions in the "caption" or "comment".)

(View sources for smiley face and girl.)

Ah, Me, Time Goes By

SUMMARY: Remembering Jake courtesy of the postman.

The summer after Jake turned 14, his license and rabies renewal form arrived and I had the choice, as always, of renewing for 1 year or 3 (at a discount). I hesitated for a while--after all, he was 14 and a half at that point, and really how much longer could he go on?--but he was very healthy, very active, still competing (a little bit at CPE's very low heights but still beating the young dogs). What the heck; I renewed for 3 years.

Now here it is two and a half years after he left me so suddenly, and here in my hands sits his license renewal notice. It's interesting, the kick in the gut it gave me to see his name on the paper; but also interesting that my next reaction was to laugh. He was such a great little dog, lived a wonderful, healthy life, and went out quickly without a long deterioration. It was worth the few extra bucks to hope for the best.

But the paper in my hand also makes it feel almost as if he's right here in the room with me; I can see his red-furred face looking up at me, see his feathered tail wagging. He won't be gone until I check the box that says "Animal is deceased." Like it's that simple. Animal. Deceased.

I mean--I could renew it, right? I've still got his collar with his tags, wrapped around all of him that stayed here--his registration cards for USDAA, NADAC, CPE, ASCA, and the Mixed Breed Dog Club, and a few ashes in a cedar box. Do you think they'd ever stop sending me renewals? How long do you think it would take them to realize that he's still being registered? 20 years? 25? Never?

Ah, me, Jakester, I'll check the box and be done with my little Animal for today.

All the News That's Fit To Blog--Plus Clothing

SUMMARY: Boost jumps and dogwalk and weaves, Tika jumps, flying your dogs, Disneyland, Sylvia Trkman, facebook, insurance--whew! Anything else? Oh, yeah, it's all about the clothing!

• In class last night, Boost hit bars like a new 21-year-old on amphetamines. Argh. I was jumping her at 24", not the 22" that we usually do in class (although often use 24 or 26 at home). Will be doing a private with our instructor this weekend to work on bars.
• Also: Contacts! Last week in class Boost left her dogwalk contact early once and I punished her severely ("Oh! My! What happened!" (lean over and grab her as if to pick her up, and in a low voice:) "You have to stick those contacts! Don't be leaving early!") and all of a sudden she wouldn't blast to the end into 2on/2off but instead stopped halfway into the yellow. I immediately put her back on 2 or 3 times until she got the 2o/2o and rewarded lavishly. This week, first dogwalk, stopped halfway into the yellow. OMG have I broken her perfect dogwalk at age 4 and a half?! Dang sensitive dogs! We repeated the down-ramp part 2 or 3 times until she got it, then rewarded lavishly.
• On the other hand, Boost's weaves were perfect all evening! Even the hard ones!
• Jumped Tika at 24". Have been jumping her at 22" lately, too. She knocked several bars. I have to remember before a USDAA trial where she'll be jumping 26" in a couple of runs to get her back up to 26" probably at least a couple of weeks before the trial with plenty of bar-knocking drills at that height. It's always something!
• Southwest airlines is now accepting small pets in the cabin on a trial basis.
• I'm going to Disneyland! Nov 7-8. Staying with my sister & husby at their favorite place, the Candy Cane Inn, which has a convenient shuttle that I almost never use. Which means I won't be doing my club's (Bay Team's) November CPE. Instead I'll do either the Turlock USDAA right before it or the Turlock CPE a couple of weeks later. Nice to have choices! Disneyland, yayyyyy!
• Sylvia Trkman is coming to the Bay Area to do 4 days of seminars! I can't afford all of them, but signed up for a one-day Masters Handling with Boost and two evenings of tricks as an auditor.
• I'm going to try to get onto the FaceBook brand-new choose-your-username-URL land grab at 9:01 this evening to get my choice! I think I'll go for Ellen.Finch if I can get it; if not, maybe TajMuttHall. What do you think? (You have until 8:30 PDT today to tell me what you think. ;-)) The thing is, I'm mostly taking as friends only people that I really already know in one way or another--e.g., local agility folks, relatives, people I've communicated with in blogland--not the world at large. So my own name might be more appropriate. We'll see...
• Still waiting for the final insurance paperwork to arrive for me to sign and send back to finish the settlement on my auto break-in. They said it went into the mail "late last week or early this week." I haven't gotten it yet. Hm. Starting to look into what camera & lens I can really afford on that settlement. And haven't even started looking for a replacement for my Perfect-For-Everything Coat.

A Few Adventures of The Perfect-For-Everything-Coat

Finding the right replacement coat is crucial because--after all--agility [and everything else] is all about the clothing!

Photo junket at Almaden Quicksilver Park Winter 2009Touristing at Cannery Row Dec 2008Hiking at Big Basin Redwoods Park summer 2008Beterphoto.com seminar at Monterey Bay Aquarium Oct 2008
Flying home from Montreal Sept 2008 (reflected in seat-back TV)

Hiked up Black Mountain Spring 2008
Hunkering down at Grand Canyon May 2008

With Tika, hiking at Truckee March 2008
With Boost at Power Paws Camp 2007 (on back of chair)
With Jake and Top Turkey Team, Nov 2005
Tika's C-ATCH Nov 2005

Ex Pertinacia Victoria

SUMMARY: Agility and the classics.

There are many useful online tools for helping with one's agility. Like this Latin Motto Generator. You have to use their selection of words, but I was able to choose an apt combo for what I have learned about agility training through the years:

From determination comes victory.

Plus it must be significant that "Ex pertinacia victoria" starts with "EXPERT."

I also found this extremely useful site for generating your own Shield with motto and icon and everything, or soda cans or church signs or movie marquees or many valuable display media. So that you can proclaim your love of agility or promote your favorite agility dog. Unfortunately, most of the generators are broken at the moment and have been since late May, and I'm tired of waiting. I wanted to put the whole shield up along with the motto, but, dang, oh well, I might sometimes be determined but I am not always patient.

And that's one of my challenges, I guess. As long as I feel that I'm making progress, I may continue working on an issue. If, however, I'm not getting anywhere--or backsliding--and I've tried a few different things--as long as they're easy things to try--then, ah, crap, faggataboutit. Impatient for results.

Impatient for the shield generator to work. Because, after all, agility is all about the fun stuff you post on your blog.

And speaking of "to work"--off I go, to determinedly earn some $ for more agility.

From persistence comes agility entry fees.

Remembering Weaving Poles, Flowers, Birds, and What Else Anyway?

SUMMARY: A little yardwork, a little practice, new neighbors.

Yesterday I didn't go for a hike, didn't go for a walk, didn't even really practice any agility. I did split, plant, and/or repot some hostas, mondo grass, western bleeding heart, redwood sorrel, impatiens, begonias, lobelia...and some other stuff that I've already forgotten.


Also trimmed dead or rangy bits from some lettuce, pothos, ferns, more mondo grass, irises, mint, and those large white daisy things that come back every year. Plus some other stuff that I've already forgotten.


In between, Boost lay next to The Toy, off on the lawn in the shade somewhere, and waited for me to offer to throw it. So I did, sometimes. And sometimes we played the Find The Weavepole Game. Don't recall where I learned it. Basically, you play with the dog like crazy, get her all het up, then take the toy away and say "Weave!" and let the dog find the weave entry.

You start out easy, in a location close to an easy entry with the dog alongside you and you're both facing it. The you move to various distances and various angles away from it, with the dog maybe facing you when you take the toy away.

The idea is that my job is to identify the obstacle. The dog's job is to find the correct obstacle and correct entry and do it. Boost does OK if it's not too hard. I should do more of that; used to do quite a bit of it but it's just one of lots and lots of clever agility training stuff that over time I've already forgotten.

I'm just tired of Tika having pretty dagnabbed good weave entries--and always has--and Boost just dagnabbed doesn't, and she's well over 4 now, what's her excuse? Plus I'm tired of having raggety looking plants lounging around like reprobate rejects from the plant factory. Plus tired of empty or half-empty pots. It's almost summer, fer crying out loud!


Plus I had to avoid the TWO birds who now think that nesting in my potted plants, which I water regularly, are ideal places to raise a family. The mourning dove conveniently took the apartment that I filled with soil but left unplanted specifically for mourning dove nesting; how clever is that bird? How clever am I?


But until I watered the last litter of finch teenagers (see here and here), I didn't realize that finches had moved in down the hall from the dove. Apparently the complaints about the overzealous shower caused mom to move one pot down the hall this time to raise the next litter. Both pots contain plants. Hope they can go a while without water.


What was I talking about? I'm afraid I've already forgotten.

Gamblin' Tika, Why She Gambles, No One Knows

SUMMARY: She's such a reliable, experienced dog.

Despite my unclear handling techniques, none-the-less, she got the Masters Gamble last weekend. About 1/3 of the dogs got it, so it wasn't undoable, but I'd say maybe half of those used the technique that we did--swing the dog into you and back out, or around you, then send to the correct end of the tunnel.

We just barely made time--you can see how much time we spent getting lined up after the buzzer and then getting Tika onto the Aframe and then into the correct end of the tunnel. And she did it all because she's a good reliable experienced dog! There was a time I never thought I'd be able to say that about her--

A friend, Mary P, just let me know that she videotaped our run and posted it on youtube. Here's the video and the course map with my scribbles about our plan and what actually happened.

We Live In A Fascinating World

SUMMARY: Full of dogs and hills and grass and trees and light and colors and coyote poop.

Wednesday night, rather than join the Sierra Club group for our weekly brisk 5-mile strenuous hike, I struck out on my own closer to home. I wanted to take the dogs. I wanted to be able to stop and browse upon the scenery with my camera. I wanted to prove to myself that I can and will do a strenuous 5-mile hike all on my own. I wanted to sweat.

But not too much.

So, although the day wasn't particularly warm, I waited until 6:00 to head to Santa Teresa County park, a 1700-acre park just a 15-minute drive from home whose open hillside trails on steep terrain can be a bear in any kind of warmth. The bonus would be that I could catch the sunset from up in the hills.

We started at 200 feet above sea level at the foot of the hills, passing by the historic Bernal-Gulnac-Joice Ranch, where Tika announced a fierce interest in the chickens in their coop. We decided not to linger. Later in the hike, when a startled California quail directly in our path flapped noisily into a nearby shrub, Tika suddenly became suddenly intrigued by their distinctive clicking call coming from the undergrowth we passed.

I carried only my little point-and-shoot; didn't want the weight of the borrowed SLR, hadn't actually familiarized myself with it yet anyway, and besides, hiking with the dogs and any kind of electronic equipment is always risky. So I have no bird photos to share, and few photos with the dogs (who move too much for the P&S's personal tastes).

Boost bravely streeeeetched wayyyy out to investigate some ancient farm equipment left on the hillside to moulder away. I have no idea why that was classified as one of the many Potentially Scary Evil Things in the world--looked pretty innocuous to me, but then I'm not a sensitive Border Collie.


Most of what I saw on my hike looked pretty much like this.


But I also enjoyed looking at the views of the valley and up to the observatory on Mount Hamilton, the lurking dark peak in the distance--near the right, to the left of the cloud.


Dogs also enjoyed checking out coyote poop.

As the sun sank, everything glowed amazing golden colors, and our shadows threw themselves longer and longer before us.


Plus there was coyote poop.


We passed the Norred Stables, where apparently during the day some REALLY BIG DOGS do some agility in the arena. (My sister has one of those really big kinds of dogs.)


The dogs particularly wanted to analyze Every. Single. Coyote. Poop. On. The Trail.


Human Mom wanted to take pictures of Every. Single. Scenic. View. On. The. Trail.


We accommodated each other. It worked. The highest point on the trail was about 930 feet, but we did quite a bit of upping and downing, so cumulative elevation gain might have approached 1000 feet. Distance covered: Somewhere between 4 and 5 miles. Walked it briskly, trying to emulate the Crazed Wednesday Night Hikers Pace, but stopped often for various reasons human or canine.

We lingered on the last high hillside trail until the sun had vanished from the sky, then dashed down the trail--literally--about 450 foot drop in half a mile. Felt good! Got photos! Sweated! And successfully kept all members of the expedition from rolling in coyote poop.


These are about half the photos I took; you can see the rest of the bunch on my usual photo site (along with these) with captions. I think there are a few particularly nice ones in the bunch. Enjoy. Love your dogs. Love your dear ones. Love life.

Actual Agility Video Footage!

SUMMARY:

Last weekend I promised to post some videos. OK, here ya go. I take my camcorder to every trial with me, but almost never remember to ask anyone to tape us. Last weekend, I finally did--on 4 runs only.

When transferring from my camera to computer, there was this odd jumping thing it was doing, like it was skipping frames or something. Not sure whether camera, tape, recording, playback--and I didn't feel like futzing with it to figure it out.

Round 1 Steeplechase

Tika wins in Performance, Boost Qs in Championship even with a bar down, because she was plenty fast.

Boost's run: Note that, on the first A-frame, I release her quickly, and on the 2nd Aframe, she doesn't bother actually doing 2 on/2 off or waiting for a release. And at the very end, instead of running ahead of me over the last line of jumps, she's kind of waiting for me and looking back a bit.

Tika's Run: Note a huge wide turn after the first Aframe, because I'm trying to get in front of her to make sure she gets a foot in the yellow zone so she thinks we're going straight instead of turning left.

Boost's run:

Grand Prix

Tika takes 2nd place.

Masters Jumpers

Boost and I still have some issues. Like, I'm trying to give her plenty of room to take a jump right in front of her before rear crossing, but she just won't do it, backs around it, and backjumps it. Most of the run isn't awful; she sends out nicely to one jump but, near the end, comes in around a jump I was trying to send her out to. And a bar down. Ah, well. Mostly she's starting to run instead of looking at me all the time.

Insurance Part 2

SUMMARY: Looks like things will turn out as OK as they can under the circumstances.

Following up on my previous post, I must say that my homeowner's insurance company (Traveler's) has been quite responsive and without giving me any grief about my issues and requests.

When I finally understood how the claim worked, I asked to resubmit the claim differently, and I just got a call that it's OK to do so.

Here's the story, if you want it:

• My deductible is $1000.


• When the agent sat down and added everything up, the total loss came to a bit over $2800. [Sigh--so much!]


• So I'd get a check for $1800, right? Nope.


• The fine print says that, if the claim is over $2500, they give me the depreciated value up front (minus deductible), and then I have 6 months where, as I replace things, they give me a check for the difference between depreciated value and replacement value until we reach the full $1800.


• The depreciated total value is about $1600--actually they were generous with this amount, which was nice on the face of it. So, subtract $1000 deductible, they sent me a check for $600ish. [Follow along: $1000 deductible +$600 given me so far +$1200 they haven't sent me yet]


• They estimated my replacement cost for my camera at around $550 and its depreciated value around $400.


• So, if I go out and buy a camera at $550, do I get a check for another $550 of the unpaid $1200? No. I get a check for $150. ($550-400)


• Likewise, one lens replacement around $350 and depreciated around $200. If I buy a new one for $350, I get another $150. ($350-200)


• So now I've spent $950 and received $900 ($600+$150+150). $50 out of my pocket so far, and they still "owe" me $900.


• How do I get the rest of that $900? Answer: I have to buy replacements for EVERYTHING ON THE LIST--which would cost approximately my deductible ($1000) plus $900--that's the definition of their replacement costs--to get $900 back. In other words, $1000 out of my pocket.


• And, guess what--I don't have $1000 available! Which means I'd never get the rest of that $900 back.

So--I can see where this makes sense if you're talking about one large thing--like maybe--uh--I dunno, your back porch was torn off by a tornado and it costs $2800 to replace it. Well, since you can't go out your back door without your porch, you'll probably be spending that $2800. But to lump a whole bunch of small things together--argh.

But as much as I'd *like* to replace everything I lost, there's no way that I can afford to. I'll have to pick and choose. And if I can't get more of the settlement, then I'd be able to pick and choose almost nothing at all.

Sooo... I asked to resubmit the claim, removing one lens from the claim, which brings the total loss under $2500, so they can send me a check for the full--well--$1500 now, not $1800. But that's better than only $900 or so.

OK, sorry, it's complicated. That's why I didn't quite get it when she explained it on the phone. Got the papers she sent, thought about it, and called back to clarify things.

And so that phone call just now saying it's OK to do it and I'll get a check for the whole $1500ish is such a relief. Although it means I'm "giving up" $300 in claims, still, that means that I don't have to spend $1000 out of my pocket to get any more back. And I'm thankful that they didn't make this hard for me to do. Sigh. Now I'm really glad that the loss wasn't a lot higher, because I'd never have been able to make up the difference.

Guess I have to rethink the high deductible. It makes sense for *building* loss--but for personal property... ugh.

Entropy 3: Playground Equipment

SUMMARY: Once I've bought all the agility equipment, it's supposed to last forever. Right? Am I right?

Gathering up all the agility equipment from my yard, cleaning it, dismantling it, hauling it all off the school field, reassembling it, using it, and then reversing the process, was a bit disconcerting. All this equipment is NEARLY NEW, isn't it? Yes? Just bought it RECENTLY?!

(My view of recency might be skewed. I just gave away a stack of 2'x8' lattice panels that have been sitting in my yard unused for a while. Well--OK, I've been in this house since 2001 and they came with me. And I was in the horrid rental house for a year before that, and they came with me. And we bought them when we moved into the previous house intending to put along the top of the fence to keep our escape-artist husky in the yard, until we discovered that she was also going through or under the fence in many different places and ways and gave up on the idea. And that was fairly recent, I guess... Well, it was my 3rd house I owned, anyway, and so how long ago can 1987 really be, anyway? But I digress.)

Actually pretty much everything I have I bought after I moved here, so 2002 or later. So it *is* pretty new, really. It just sits out in the yard forever, through rain and sun and wind and automated sprinklers and marauding squirrels and avian vandals and like that.

I was shocked to note the condition of my short yellow tunnel when I packed it up; I have already tossed one tunnel a couple of years back, the first piece of equipment I bought that was real agility equipment, wayyyy back when (but not as far back as 1987), and I wasn't expecting for another one to die so soon afterwards.


Guess I'll keep using it until one of the dogs goes through it.

At the demo, the PVC base of my tire broke. It'll still work OK, as it's all pretty sturdy--now it's a matched set with the broken-but-sturdy PVC base of my table. And anyway the dang tire itself ALWAYS needs rewrapping; the tape deteriorates quickly, and I didn't feel like rewrapping the whole thing this time around; just got the worst parts.


Also at the demo, some of the bungies that hold the weight onto my tunnels and hold the tire upright broke, but that's to be expected because those things decay almost overnight out in the UV rays. I keep the flea market bungie vendor in business all by myself.

Getting up close and personal to my contact obstacles revealed that the lichen is moving in on my dogwalk and the slats of the Aframe are coming loose. It all ought to be scrubbed, patched, repaired, and repainted. Hopefully I won't have to replace the surfaces; already had to do that 3 years ago with the teeter (the first contact obstacle I got, which was at least 10 years ago) and it was a pain in the pattotie. Dogwalk and Aframe would be even worse.



And of course all the jumps are slowly going to the dogs. Er--well--you know what I mean.

The longer yellow tunnel doesn't look so hot, either, although not quite as bad as the short one. Fortunately for Boost--who loves doing tunnels and does them on her own--and for me--who loves having a way to make the yard twice as long for my running dogs (make a U shape and they run full-tilt in, through, and out again)-- I have a really good, sturdy, double-thick vinyl expensive high-quality 20-foot competition tunnel that I bought probably only 3 or 4 years ago, with no sign of problems at all.

So I was jaw-droppingly stunned Sunday evening when I sent the dogs into the 20' tunnel (yes one immediately after the other) and Tika came out the other end but Boost came AROUND the other end.

Expletive deleted.



It's not torn; there's no sign of glue or adhesive; it looks like it was pressure- or heat-sealed together, and I have no idea how I'm going to fix that. Now I need to find the info on whom I bought it from so I can see whether they can give me a tip on repair. I don't think duct tape will work with the kind of pressure the dogs put on. (For those who don't know, fast crazy insane dogs [not mentioning any names, right Boost? right, younger Tika?] actually run along the BACK of a curved tunnel so that they don't have to slow down. Mass times energy=force plus gravity or something physicsy like that--in other words, there's a LOT of pressure put on the tunnel walls.)

Next time I buy or make equipment, it's going to be permanent, undecomposable, nonrusting, stainless, nondecaying, lichen-resistent, bird-repellent, waterproof, eternal equipment that will last forever. Really.

It's Never What I Expect

SUMMARY: Nor necessarily what I want. USDAA trial results.

I had hoped (quietly) that this weekend maybe I could finish Tika's last Standard Q at 26" (two chances) and get one more of the three 26" Jumpers legs she needs for her Silver ADCH, and then she'd be all in Performance at 22".

Didn't do that. Instead, in the tournaments we had a repeat of the last trial in Performance: Won Steeplechase round 1, came in second in Grand Prix. Would be nice just once in our lives to finish first in Grand Prix to get that bye into the second round at the regionals, but not this time. [I'm getting greedy already--she never won steeplechase in Championship and I don't think ever placed this high in Ch GP.]

Tika also got the P3 gamble--barely--she works so hard to make up for my lack of clarity!--and came in 2nd; ran clean in Pairs (although partner had 2 faults) and she and partner were fast enough to still Q and take 4th of 10 performance teams.

For Boost, would be nice to SOMEDAY get a Jumpers leg to earn our MAD. Didn't do that, either. But she did run clean in Masters pairs, and although partner had an Aframe flyoff, together they were fast enough to make up for that to qualify and place 3rd of 23 teams. Dang fast dogs! And Boost's run was absolutely lovely! No complaints from me at all.

I told my renter--a bit cynically--that if BOTH Tika and Boost qualified in Steeplechase, maybe I'd stay through Sunday morning for the money runoff, and figured I was safe because Boost has Qed only once ever in Steeplechase and it wasn't at the same time as Tika.

So--Boost ALSO qualified in Steeplechase! She knocked a bar and yet was plenty fast enough to squeak under the qualifying course time (just 2 seconds slower than the fastest dog, and I can attribute that to (a) holding her on her 1st Aframe contact and (b) spinning towards me instead of running straight out at the end). She's just so fast--it would be wonderful to be able to really see that come through!

However, in the end, I didn't stay through the night to do round 2: Hopes of monetary return worth the extra night in my van were extremely slim (1st place in Performance around $15, f Tika managed it; Boost was the last of 16 22" dogs to Q, and the odds of her placing in the top 6 or 8 or whatever for checks was about zero) and I was tired and looking forward to sleeping in my own bed.

So, out of 8 runs, Tika Qed 4, Boost Qed 2.

Snooker was a bust mostly because I walked it wrong, combined with issues in the opening. Sigh. My plan was to do three 7s and a 5 in the opening. Well-- Tika did two 7s and then took the 5 due to insufficient handler communication, which put us so far away from the 4th red that I went right into the closing. Boost knocked her first red, so we were able to do only three sevens and then go into the closing.

Problem was that I walked the #4 with the wrong obstacle. So, Tika did 2-3 in the closing and, as I put her over what I THOUGHT was #4, I was surprised to see a red "1" flag on that jump. Doh. With Boost, learning from my mistake, I was able to get her over the #4 correctly, but the angles were sufficiently weird that, without walking it, I couldn't handle getting her into the #5 correctly.

Boost's runs, over all, were starting to feel decent this weekend. We still had the oddball refusals and going past jumps backwards while looking at me and then backjumping, that sort of thing, but not as many as sometimes. And didn't knock an excruciating number of bars, although they still came down.

Boost mostly had lovely contacts; on one Standard run where she already had faults, when she left the dogwalk without a release, I thanked the judge and picked Boost up and carried her off. She got the rest of her contacts, with one exception--end of the day, Steeplechase had 2 Aframes. She did the first one perfectly and I released her much more quickly than is good for training, and then she self-released the 2nd time. On the other hand, if I hadn't release quickly and she hadn't self-released, we wouldn't have made time because of her one knocked bar. So take your pick.

Tika was absolutely delighted to be running after me being sick in bed for 3 days and too weak to do anything with them at all save a couple of pathetic ball tosses in the back yard. So delighted, in fact, that in our first run Friday night, she didn't stick her start line and knocked the first bar (which is what told me that she was heading up behind me), and then flewwwwww off her dogwalk. She calmed down as Saturday wore on and it got quite a bit hotter (at least mid-80s, maybe 90ish).

The best moment of the weekend came during Saturday's standard round; Boost already had at least one fault on the course. We hit the table, she went into a down, and I noticed that BOTH her ears were inside out on top of her head. I hate that! At home and in class, I reach down to flip her ears over all the time. So there she was, there I was, waiting for the judge to count off the 5 seconds, and I couldn't stand it--reached over and flipped her ears over. Which is a 5-point fault for touching my dog. Judge laughed. I realized just as I was doing it that flipping the ears actually counted as touching my dog in the ring. Just glad she already had a fault; would've kicked myself if that had turned out to be one of her few clean runs. OK, we had faults, but at least her ears had dignity.

I actually remembered to have someone videotape the last couple of our runs. Maybe if I have time this week (always the issue) I'll try to post a couple.

As always, it was great to be around friends, although Risk's death gave everyone a gut-punch. Because I had been posting my health status on facebook, many people asked about me and checked up on me frequently to make sure I wasn't overdoing it.

And I did fine, symptoms almost entirely gone today, although I'm very glad I didn't stay for Sunday.

My Browser Life is Complete

SUMMARY: Gotta love my browser's auto-completion feature: Easy access to all things dog agility! And--ahem, yes--important things like work.

Maybe all your browsers have this feature--autocompletion of a URL based on the the first character(s) you type and the frequency of your past accesses. So I can type:

"b" to get Bay Team, my local agility club (where I'm also webmaster).

"e" to get the english-language version of Wikipedia, where I initially signed on so that I could create an article on dog agility, which at the time was sadly absent.

"f" to get facebook, to which I was lured by a bunch of agility friends and bloggers, and where 60% of my FB friends are agility friends.

"fi" to get my own personal calendar of all my weekend plans for the next year or so, primarily agility.

"m" to get mapquest, which tells me how long it will take me to drive to whatever agility event I'm off to this next weekend.

"g" for Google. For everything! For Taj MuttHall, when I talk about how hot or cold it is, for my non-American friends I like to give the C as well as the F. So I can go to google, type "95F in C" in the search bar, and it tells me. Is that so totally rad or what?

"o" for Onelook dictionary search, which peruses a bunch of different dictionaries to find possible meanings for a word.

"p" for Power Paws, where I take agility classes with my dogs.

"r" for Google Reader, where I've subscribed to all my favorite blogs and can see any updates in one page; very convenient! At the moment, includes 13 agility-related blogs and 3 others. (I don't put my favorite LiveJournal blogs in here, although I could, because those I can sign up for permanent email notification as soon as someone posts something.)

"s" for Snopes, the urban legends reference page, which I check *constantly* to verify those emails about 20 beagle puppies who are about to be put to sleep because they can't find homes, or the parody of My Favorite Things sung by Julie Andrews, or a photo of a tsunami frozen to ice in an instant, or SO many things that come through the mail-- (Have used them for years, and they do display some advertising to pay for their site, which is fine; lately they seem to have some ads that open windows that do crappy things to my browser. Not always, but sometimes. But I haven't found a better reference site for this material.)

I type "t" to get Team Small Dog, my daily dose of dog-and-agility-related laughter or sober thought or brain-twisting set of analogies.

"ta" to get Taj MuttHall (here--although I don't have to type it often because it is also my home page).

"w" for Weatherbug, which is cool because you can see exactly where the station is that's reporting your time and temperature, and (if one is available) choose one closer to you or to the site of your agility trial this coming weekend.

"x" for the company that employs me so that I can do dog agility.

"y" for youtube. (Surprised me when I just checked it--I'd have thought Yahoo, which it was for a long time, but I guess all those agility videos have skewed it a bit...

"z" for my photo site on Smugmug--and the only way I can explain the "z" is because all the galleries are coded with random character-string names, and "z" must be pretty common. Lots of photos from dog agility trials and the nationals there, among other things.

Probably more with 2-letter combos that I'm not thinking of at the moment.

Do you detect certain themes? Perhaps themes starting with the letter "a" or "d"?

Perhaps it's time to get off the computer and go for a long hike with the dogs in Risk's memory.

Hug your dogs, your cats, your children, your siblings, your parents [parents--hope you're enjoying your 50th-anniversary oregon trip; here's your virtual hug: (( ))]. There might not be a tomorrow to do it in. And I don't have to browse the web to know that up close and personal.

A Tragic Loss

SUMMARY: R.I.P. Risk Scannell.

Our achievements and defeats over the last two days pale in comparison to this: That a friend's Border Collie went to the start line friday night eagerly playing tug as usual, basically took two steps and collapsed, and three hours later died at the emergency clinic. Necropsy showed a ruptured tumor on his spleen. The friend didn't say whether they specified the type of tumor, but the symptoms and manifestation are completely typical of hemangiosarcoma, which took my Remington.

They reminded us to hug our dogs and appreciate them, because you just never know what the next moment might hold.

I just sent a response--

I did hug my dogs several times today, thinking about Risk. I so carefully felt the textures of their coats under my hands and the weight and warmth of their bodies next to me. Tika wasn't thrilled about that and took the opportunity to squeeze loose and go run ferociously at a passing dog to ameliorate her the humiliation, reminding me that dogs bring things to our lives in so many ways, so often not what one might want or expect.

Risk was just 8 and a half, only four months older than Tika, and one Steeplechase away from his Gold ADCH (something that Tika will never achieve)--one which he might well have gotten today, as he has become a steady and reliable competitor. And he was a beautiful dog, too. I mourn his passing, but can only just imagine what his human family is going through.

I was lucky enough to have some photos of him from last July, when my dogs and theirs played in the field after a day of agility.

Yes! I'm Going!

SUMMARY: I'm off to Turlock for a day and a bit of agility.

I had enough energy to clean and load the van and not be wiped out by it; nose has stopped running (although still congested), and I think I'm good to go. Plus dogs need to do SOMETHING after 3 days of nothing.

There are 2 classes tonight, 5 tomorrow, and then we're coming home. Sunday is Team and I just wasn't in the mood to sign up for that. That does mean that if either dog Qs in Steeplechase, we'll miss the money run. Ah, well. Tika won last time in Performance and came home with a check for a whole $32 or so.

See you-all readers Sunday or so.

Insurance

SUMMARY: Settlement for car break-in gets complicated.

I will get money from the insurance company for the things stolen from my car, minus my large deductible. But because the total amount is over a certain limit, they pay me up front only the current cash value (not replacement value) minus the deductible, and then I have 6 months to replace the things, send them my receipts, and get the rest of the replacement value.

I tried to make sure I understood it before we hung up, but now I'm not sure and will have to call her back in the morning. So, let's say that my old camera cost me $400 but its depreciated value is $100. So they send me $100 (plus all similar values for everything else) minus my deductible. If I go out and buy a $600 camera, will they send me the additional $300 or do they apply $500 to the deductible and I still have to go out and buy more until I'm over the deductible? This is a little confusing.

But, yes, the good news is that I will get some money back and, if they don't force me to spend the amount of my deductible (which is large) before I start getting more back, then I'm sort of OK. Won't be able to replace everything by any means. It'll be starting all over accruing camera gear. Even basic little stuff like the remote control, polarizing filter, and lens cleaner start adding up pretty quickly. But if I have to spend the whole deductible amount first and THEN spend more beyond that to get $ back--yikes--I don't have that kind of money!

She's sending me more paperwork with the initial check to clarify everything, and I do have her phone # and email.

I really didn't have in mind spending time researching cameras right at the moment. The one I want is still too expensive--unless I just don't get any lenses for it. (That's a joke...) Sigh.

What I really resent about the jerk who probably spent 30 seconds taking my stuff is that he has taken days and days out of my life--finding info on what was missing, trying to track the original stuff down, talking to assorted folks on the phone about it, reporting it, researching replacements, shopping--on top of the money.

I hope they got what they needed out of it.

Bleahhhhhhh Part 2

SUMMARY: Cold? Flu? Aardvarks? And who is that other person in my bed?

By late yesterday afternoon, I felt a bit like I was floating somewhere behind my body and looking out through my eyes from several feet back. Whole body felt odd, numb but not actually numb, just in an achey, removed way. If one of the dogs shifted position, I'd jump in complete surprise, forgetting there were actually dogs in the house. Trying to work on an interesting project for work and I kept thinking it was something else (not entirely sure what).

Dogs were going nuts all day because I had no energy all day to even throw the toy for them. Neither are good about bringing it back--that's all a long story and i keep meaning to videotape it for everyone's entertainment so you can all think "Ha! At least my dog brings the toy for me to throw!"--and when I finally gave in midday to the incessant pissing and moaning, I ended up yelling at both of them for not doing what I wanted and sort of realized that wasn't normal behavior on my part so gave up even trying.

Dogs really got pissy and annoying as the early evening wore on and my patience was pretty much nonexistent; eventually realized that I hadn't given them dinner. Poor dogs with Human Mom's mind not functioning on all pistons.

Finally occurred to me to take my temperature, and sure enough, running a low-grade fever (not over 100, but my normal is in the 97.6 range). I haven't had a fever in so long I hardly remember what it's like. Don't remember feeling halfway hallucinatory ever, though. My mom says that my dad used to start having hallucinations if his temperature went up by just a degree or two. So I crawled up to bed way early and lay there, sort of wide awake but couldn't concentrate even on reading, and I love reading. Although I was able to do a couple of "difficult" sudokus eventually, in record time, go figure.

I'll tell ya, though, I was very careful every time of the many times I half woke up all night to cough or blow my nose not to disturb my sister who was sleeping on the other side of my bed. I kept hoping I wasn't keeping her awake; it must be miserable sleeping with a sickie, not to mention possibly contagious. When I had to get up to visit the loo, I realized with a shock that I hadn't closed the door even though there was someone else in the room, even though it was dark and she was probably still asleep, and then I couldn't remember whether it was Ann or Linda sleeping there, and then finally I realized that I was still feverish and it was only the dogs on the other side of the bed.

Very very odd experience.

Thermometer said no fever this morning but I still feel almost the same, though not quite so disconnected. Nose still running around like a nutcase. Dogs are very unhappy with me. Apparently I can type and string sentences together at the moment (by late yesterday afternoon that wasn't happening very well).

But I'm thinkin' no agility class tonight.

And I'm wondering about tomorrow--the Turlock USDAA trial starts Friday at 5 p.m. (or 6?) and I'm scheduled for score table and I'd have to load everything into the car in the morning, leave by 1 probably to avoid goshawful traffic-- Not feeling confident about ability to do that at the moment. Certainly couldn't do it today.

I can't remember that I've ever missed an agility trial due to my own illness since I started in 1996--210 trials or so-- And I hate to lose the entry fees or cert's.

OK, feeding the dogs (yay! I'm remembering), crawling back to bleaaaahhhh bed.

P.S. I must point out that not only have I not ever to my recollection slept in the same bed with any of my sisters, I also haven't slept in the same room since 1966 and not even in the same building since 1977 or so, with only occasional shared hotel rooms with significant others (and separate beds). In case you were wondering.

Bleahhhhhhh

SUMMARY: By dose is all stuffed up.

I thick I wore byself out so thoroughly this weekedd that by resistetce wet wayyy dowd ad dow I have ad awful code id by head. Bleahhh. The dogs still wat to play id the yard. Bleaaahhh. I am so tired. By braid is so dub. Dub. Dagdabbit I'b tryig to say "dub" oh dabbit.

Dogs will dot be happy today. Huban bob doeset have edergy to eved throw the ball. Hubad bob also will dot be goig hikig todite. Baybe we will be doig a lot of dappig id by cosy bed upstairs. Baybe we will have to go buy bore kleenex.

I will try to stick with words that are usable with a stuffy head. This is hard to do. Especially with a stuffy head. Avoid ebs & eds. Bleahhhh. Agility hiatus is the phrase for today. Possibly thursday, too. Hope it's better quickly, because friday/saturday is USDAA agility at Turlock. Will require health. Bleaahhhhhhhhhh.

Dabbed ems ad eds.

Stretching...or Not

SUMMARY: Cramps, stretching, fruit in my very own yard.

Last night as I dozed off in bed and changed position, the muscle inside my right thigh and halfway down the side of my calf started to spasm/cramp like crazy. Man, those things really hurt. Tried to massage it and keep the leg stretched to make it go away. Sometimes my lower spine compresses the nerves and I get some of that, but usually in the sciatic nerve, and usually if I can get to a position where I can do some relaxing stretches, it eases off. This time, every time I moved, it went again.

I finally got onto the floor to try to do some stretching, and it went again. Repeatedly. Then, as that eased, it shifted to the top of my thigh. I'm sure the dogs thought I must be rabid, rolling on the floor and moaning and cursing and begging for it to stop. I think they were looking for the shotgun already. Then, after it taunted me with several repeats and then eased off and I moved slightly, it started on the inner thigh in my other leg. When that finally eased, it moved on down to the shin and foot of my first leg. Every time it would start to ease, I'd move, and it would start up again. Over and over.

That was 20 minutes of abject pain. I was ready to tell anyone where the treasure was and betray all my fellow double agents to make it stop.

When it all finally decided to quit, and I was able to do some stretching of the spine (hard to tell which came first), I hobbled downstairs to research about leg cramps. Yeah, I worked very hard the last 2 days, hauled a lot of agility equipment that I don't usually haul, sweated a lot when I don't usually sweat. Could've been the weight on my spine. Could be mild heat stroke--I did feel unnaturally cool in the evening before bed. Could be dehydration--I drank 4 sodas, a glass of milk, a bottle of water, and had a bowl of ice cream and some fruit between getting home and going to bed 5 hours later. Could have been I lost salt and potassium. Could've just been the unusual type of exercise. OK, so much for research. But everything said, drink more. And some said, bananas and orange juice are good sources of potassium. And some said add a tsp of salt per quart of water and drink that.

I was still thirsty, so grabbed another soda. (These are all diets, BTW, no calories.) Having had my fill of bananas for the day (2 already), I stood there in the kitchen at midnight peeling oranges (fortunately I had a huge bowl sittign on my table from the tree in my yard). Couldn't deal with drinking salty water, so I had a couple handfuls of salty pretzels instead. I'm sure that's VERY healthy.

And then I slept just fine, thenk yew. But the muscles that cramped *hurt* today--not ache from the work they did, but like they were yanked in the wrong directions. Bleah.

Meanwhile, back at the dog training arena: I've been working for many months to try to get the dogs to stretch on command. Susan Garrett says it's easy, just have a clicker and treats with you when you get up in the morning and are doing your morning rituals. So mostly the dogs have learned to stretch in my upstairs bathroom. Every time I go in there, night or day, for any reason, the dogs show up to stretch. But only their front ends; I can't catch them stretching their back legs out often enough for it to have registered, although I'm thinking that Boost is starting to do it more often.

Boost has also converted her front end stretch into more like a play bow, although her elbows are straight and it's better than nothing. Tika does actually get the shoulder and neck muscles stretched when she does it. Obviously I didn't hold my criteria well enough with Boost.

I've been putting a command to it, and they've responded really well...in my upstairs bathroom. Have recently been experimenting with it in other locales. Was just out in my side yard, thinking about how much the muscle in my inner thigh hurts, when the dogs wandered over. I had no treats or clickers, but I did have my camera, so thought I'd give it a try. Tika did a perfect front-end stretch, but danged pocket camera wouldn't focus fast enough to take the shot. And she wouldn't do it again when she realized there were no treats.

Boost, however, did it after my 3rd or 4th request... VERY quickly.... and then had to be coaxed to try again, and DID! Long enough for a photo.

And the reason I was in the side yard was to scout out my absolutely favorite yard-grown fruit:

Blackberries! This is apparently the season, RIGHT NOW! Got to get out and start pickin'. I'm SURE they're jam-packed (ha ha?) with potassium and salt and electrolytes and muscle relaxants and all like that. I can just tell!

A Memorial Day to Remember

SUMMARY: Agility demo and complete exhaustion. A good time was had by all.

We did an agility demo today for our neighborhood association's Memorial Day parade and fair. (We didn't do the parade.) We used my agility equipment rather than trying to find a driver and bring up a trailer from wherever they're currently located--Salinas or some such place. And here is all my agility equipment (save the dogwalk): three tunnels, Aframe, teeter, 7 jumps, chute, table, weaves (partly borrowed), broad jump, tire, fence posts (some borrowed). [Remember that you can click photos here to see a much larger view for details.]


I have never done so much equipment hauling and cleaning and mending in my life. Hours yesterday, hours today. I'se all wored out. Fortunately, BAS, who also lives in the neighborhood, came early with her strong-backed spouse and helped me set up and then helped me haul everything home at the end of the day. Here she is talking to interested parties, while interested Jersey puzzles me out.

I vowed to take a photo of the whole group of us and our dogs together for posterity, but... it got busy, I got tired, I just forgot.

We started setting up at 8 because they wanted us done by 11 for the parade to arrive at 11:30, and there were only 2 of us, so it took a while. When the parade arrived, so did a bunch of interesting vehicles. Like the Sharks fire engine.
And these vehicles. Holy Achilles Tendon, look at how skinny those ankles are! How do they hold up those huge beasts? (I mean the horses of course.)

The fair included the main "stage" (canopies over part of the pavement), one burger stand with a huuuuuuge line, one drink stand, a few crafts stands, half a dozen games booths, and a central volunteers booth at which to buy tickets for food and games.

Looked like there might have been a thousand people there (I'm not convinced...maybe 500? A lot, anyway.

They had a long program of sequential entertainments. Frankly, everyone came, ate, checked out the games, and left. We were supposed to be after the high school jazz band and by the time the band played, the crowd was down to maybe 50 people scattered around. Then they stuck in the Tae Kwon Do exhibition. Quite a few people stopped by from time to time to ask when we were going to do our demo, and some said they couldn't wait and sorry.

So--the parade arrived at 11:30, the main Memorial Day ceremonies and parade awards took less than an hour, and within an hour after that, pretty much everyone was gone.

We were finally on around 2:30, and the 30 or 40 people who were left came over and were a very good audience. Nothing like the hundreds we'd been expecting.

If we do this event again, we won't do it under those circumstances. It had gotten quite warm by then, and three of our dogs didn't want to be out in the heat doing agility. And while I understand that they have a program and everyone wants their turn to do their stage bit, they'd be much better off running parallel programs, which would give everyone their turn but also allow the audience choices of things to do AND maybe therefore get them to stay around longer to WATCH the things. And I can assure you that, if I'd thought the audience would be only 30 people, I wouldn't have volunteered to show up.

But, even given all that, it's always a blast to get to run your dogs on a fun course, away from home, not in class, not in competition, and for free! (Except for the time involved.) Everyone did a bit of practicing here and there while waiting our turn. We also talked to a lot of people who had come over and were hanging around waiting for the official demo to start, and we talked to them about our dogs, demonstrated some tricks and some training methods, showed some individual obstacle performances, and like that. Then maybe 15-20 minutes of demo, including explaining the equipment and then running a course. Then, after the demo was over and everyone had run, the audience vanished from the site POOF! and we all ran it again and did little sequences and things with our dogs.

Boost is SO FAST! Man, she hauls! Got tremendous OOoohs from the audience when she slammed into the weave entry and continued correctly at her lightning speed... but then, dang, popped out at #8. More than once. And she was knocking bars. But her contacts were excellent, we didn't have any runouts or refusals, although we did have a little confusion and I just couldn't keep up with her! She loved it! Tika was her usual fast-enough consistent self and enjoyed schmoozing with the audience and getting treats for tricks (backing up to "beep beep beep" like trucks do was a crowd pleaser).


I met a couple of new agility people and got to see a couple of folks whose dogs have retired from agility so I don't see them at trials any more, but they were willing to come out and do this and jump at a nice easy low height. And for sure I burned a tremendous number of calories! I should sleep well tonight! Bring on the ibuprofen!

And I learned this valuable lesson: When you clear EVERYTHING out of the van to try to fit in all the agility equipment, don't remove the bag with the sun lotion!

Looking in the mirror after a long hard sunny day.