Teaching weave poles-a primer.

Every day, we do some poles. Like every day you brush your teeth. Walk around in 3 circles and pat the wall 3 times before turning on a light switch. Have the maid whip you up an green chili omelette and a chocolate shake before the gang from Entourage comes around.

It's just what you do.


I didn't know this would be so unflattering. I am going to cry. This is what we look like doing poles? Tim Gunn, where were you when I needed you?


I mean, I really didn't know. I hate you See's Candy. It's your fault. Do you like my swanky training field though? Aka, driveway.


Right? That's what I'm saying. And Benecio Del Toro is meeting me for drinks tonight. This is an educational training guide, right? Note my fancy piece of fleece tug toy and little piece of cheese in my hand. Important training tools!


This is why we practice. I believe in this shot, he is just running down the driveway. Somewhere in his mind, he is either doing weave poles or is on the veranda having a mai tai.

Quick, creative dog training solutions for a rain based time crunch!

In a little break in the rain, I actually got to practice with the dogs for a little bit on the way to work. A miracle! A neccessity, since we are going to Turlock this Sunday and we all feel out of shape and tiredy.

It was damp. It was muddy. It was freezing. We are so tough, me and Team Small Dog.

So how do you get the most bang for your buck when it's about to rain, it's freezing cold, and you have a whole buncha horses needing rides before that rain actually starts and you gotta practice fast?

I made a little gamble of a teeter, poles, jump and tire.

Otterpop STILL NEEDS an Advanced Gamblers Q, please agility gods, just grant us one and let us move on with our lives. Gamblers is hardly ever, ever on a Sunday, and every time it is, it's either got a teeter (paranoia attack unless I am oh-so-near at a dog show), or I make some hair-brained, capital E Error (like, remember the time I body slammed the kindly yet slow moving judge?) and in Turlock there is Advanced Gamblers on Sunday.

Needless to say, you've all heard this old story a million times, when she practices, Otterpop sends out from the moon. Yes, I still can't send her to weave poles from inside a parked car while drunk, but at least I have a goal.

So I set up what would look like a horrible, gnarly gamble, with a teeter and poles, and backchained that until she was flying through with flying colors. If only dog practice Otterpop was dog show Otterpop.

Ruby likes to send out to things. Sometimes too much-if she is feeling spry and sassy, you say out and you get like WAY out. So she was mostly practicing getting these huge rewards for doing her poles fast. When we practice, her poles are still really fast IF I am close by. They are slow if I am sending her out far to them. A new part of the clue! Agility Detective! So I just practiced fast poles with me in there and her fast giving her giant, freakout AWARDS OF JOYFULNESS and frisbee attacking string cheese eating. Oh sorry, goodbye my non agility readers. I just lost you. Really, agility is the new black, it is fun and cool, I really am not lying!

Gustavo, he doesn't even do sequences. He is learning how to run up the teeter super fast and slide into a down on the yellow end and ride down to the bottom eating some cheese, and having it bang around with him holding a down. Disneyland should take note. Kids would love this. Because agility is the new black, just wait and see how popular it is in 5 years from now and everyone is DYING to capitalize on it and you are saying, damn, Laura TOLD US this would happen, and the Teeter ride becomes a theme park hit. Then the kids run off as fast as they can after it's been banging around when they are holding their stays to their target. For some weird reason, I made a target jumping onto a black bucket and laying down like it's a table. I was not drunk. It just happened and it was funny so that's what we did. A black bucket might not be that exciting for kids, how about they can run to a mud pit full of nerf weapons?

Gustavo practiced his Success With One Jump. He ran down the dogwalk a bunch. He is getting it! He also woke us all up at 4am to alert us to the impending danger from a pair of pants hanging over a chair. Remember his pumpkin freakout? Not much freaks out Gustavo except for pumpkins, and apparently, pants. UPS guys and people breaking into my car, you are safe from Gustavo but pants and pumpkins, you look out.

Hey and lookedy, got done quick, everyone got a few turns, and still got to work and horses done before the rain!

Things we did yesterday.

The burning question on my mind, Who Dug the Goddamn Hole? Those are the kinds of questions I have on my day off.


Because I did some gardening when the actual sun was out.


For like 5 minutes. And then I just made sure the pots had enough plastic animals in them to cover the weeds up.


Otterpop is the only dog that got to sit on the big Caterpillar loader in front of the garbage pile. Not all small dogs get to do that.


You can put your dogs on heavy equipment if your husband works at the dump. That's part of the monster machine that does recycling.


Here's the new sign at Lighthouse Field. I understand this to mean that tall, thin guys need to keep their great danes on a short leash. This is clearly not directed at Team Small Dog.

Hey and weave pole practice in the sun for everyone. I didn't take pictures of that. Some day I will master action shot self portraits. You just wait.

Gustavo practices just doing his poles. No more wires! Channels are open just a bit and he is flying thru and hitting entrances like a pro.

Ruby is using the channels too. I am trying to see if she stays fast if we do frenzied tugging/eat food/frenzied tugging, poles, repeat the whole frenzied tugging and treats so she thinks poles are the bomb. Her poles are crazy, insane fast in the driveway doing this. I am really watching her through the poles. Maybe she hurts herself because she is bizarre looking when she weaves. I'm seeing if having the channels open a little makes any difference. What the hell.

Otterpop gets sent to the poles with me in weird places far away. The poles are in the driveway. Can I stand in the street and send to poles? No problem. Behind the gate? No problem. Can I sit in the car and send her? Nope. I bet Hobbes would do that. That's our goal. Not that it will neccessarily help in agility, but kind of a cool party trick when drunk.

Hey now we have Another hobby.

OK. First of all, the Furry Friends are just nice therapy dog volunteer people, and are not Plushies. Or Furries. These are a very different thing than Furry Friends. Don't even ask me about them. Just google it. You'll see. My mom would not approve of Plushies. Probably not your mom either.

So we made the journey over the mountain to the land of San Jose, to a PetCo in a wet, deserted strip mall somewhere in Sunnyvale. Over here on this side of the hill, we are all communist, tofu eating surfers. On that side of the mountain, where a snowplow sat waiting at the summit, it is the Silicon Valley. I used to go there during the dotcom, to big office parks with big parking lots and security badges and stock options. There are a lot of car dealerships and nail places. I get lost there. It freaks me out. Our class was in a dog training pen in the back of the dog food warehouse, taught by a dog trainer who also did the evaluation. The dogs had to be ok with a wheelchair, a walker, socializing with other dogs and humans, and basic obedience skills. Piece of cake. Gustavo who does not habitually pee on contraband, just eat it, tried to pee on a walker. And he tried to jump into the wheelchair. Oops. I was MORTIFIED but no points taken off. The evaluator said he was great.

He was a spaz. She gave a talk first about pet therapy and I had to keep him doing downs and sits and nose touches and tricks and focusing because he was WOUND up. He's never been in a dog class environment, and he just wanted to be a puppy. I used to teach puppy class. I know how it goes. He seemed to be one of the less calm dogs there, but I kept him the most busy. Some of the dogs just layed down and slept through the lecture. I think my dogs of that relaxed sleeping type ended with Timmy. But he passed, we got our pictures taken for our Security Badge (RIGHT-San Jose, man!), and we just wait to get processed by Homeland Security so he can go to the nursing home in Capitola every third Sunday and get petted. He can get away with being a spaz because he weighs 12lbs.

Furry Friends goes to juvenile halls, children's shelters, nursing homes, hospitals, and alzheimers units. Visits from the animals (not just dogs-there was rabbit in the evaluation class and I guess they have all kinds of animals in the program) provide a distraction for kids and adults whose lives revolve around pain, illness and trouble. That's from the manual. I've been reading through the manual and it's just so cool. They gave out a dvd and it made me cry.

It's sort of ironic I have one of the most social and sweet dogs I've ever known, and I have one of the most unsocial and unsweet dogs that I've ever known. Otterpop likes 5 whole people in the whole world. 7 if you count 2 girls at the barn that are winning her over. Gustavo LOVES everyone. Timmy and Ruby fall somewhere in the middle, but I don't think they'd want to do this. Gustavo is made for it. I am not even going to complain about having to wear the t-shirt and use the purple leash and put a scarf on the dog. You'll see. No dog scarf complaints, not a one.

If it's Sunday, it must be Test Day.

Today was going to be class day for the whole team. But it rained, so our lesson with Jim is off. But someone else still has to go to school.

Gustavo is going to be tested to see if he can become a Certified Therapy Dog.

He has to go to San Jose and take some tests and I don't know what else, and if he passes, I guess he's certified by this group called Furry Friends (and I am pretty sure these are not fetish people that put on giant furry animal costumes and do things not approved by baby Jesus, the Furry name frightens me) and we can start visiting old folks homes on the third Sunday of the month. When there's no agility trial that Sunday. With the whole thing of, you know, work, it's hard to go on a lot of the visit dates they offer. But third Sundays of the month, we can do that. Some of the time.

I'm not sure what he has to do to pass exactly.

I think it's sort of modeled in a Canine Good Citizen test, which has a lot of being well behaved walking and sitting and staying and letting others touch you, basic friendly and well behaved dog quiz. He's good at stuff like that. Pretty sure it doesn't include running like a demon for hours at a time at fast speed, which is the other thing he excels at. And tunnels. And chewing on glasses and address books. I am really sure it doesn't include that. I think I probably shouldn't tell them about that one.

Wish us luck!


He's been working on his training skilz too. Which by the way, is going smashingly, thanks for asking. We're making it easy and repeating lessons a lot and he gets it that way. He learns slowly but he learns it well. The weave poles are fast with rocking entrances with the channel still open. He has a great nose touch on a contact trainer or stairs or pretty much anywhere you throw a target out. Even though I'm not dead certain if he's going to be running or 2o/2o but we're starting with this. We're doing very little jumping or anything-especially since it rains like every 5 minutes so we haven't been going to our practice field. He's learning to run close to me, on each side. He's learning a couple cute tricks, rolling and commando raid crawl. They might sound like little things but they're important foundation things and take time, especially for Gustavo.

I'm making his training So Easy so he builds the Confidence of Kim Deal, which is a skill the other small dogs lack. They're more like her sister that once I ran into in a liquor store and I think she was trying to buy heroin. That was a long time ago. I hope you are better now Kelly Deal! We're trying to make agility like a thing that he thinks is So Easy and So Cool so he is So Confident as it starts to get harder. Like it is not like doing taxes or walking through a graveyard at night full of zombies. I'm not letting it get harder yet. He's in no hurry. It's weird to have a dog that learns so differently than my other dogs, but I can tell he's getting things now. Maybe he's just on island time.

Right now though, his agility is secondary to just having a cool little friendly dog that might be able to help some old people have an ok day when maybe the rest of their day maybe wasn't so hot.

Project Runway-The Product Placement Years

Still life with sopping squirrel. All things sopping.

It's still raining. Who wants to go to work when you work on a ranch without an indoors? Luckily, Project Runway might repeat itself when you are dragging your heels to go handwalk the horses that have been locked in way too long. Let's take a closer look.

They start out in their Product Placement Apartment. Victorya thinks Sweet P is Kit. All those blondies look the same to her. Bitch. Have you noticed that Christian's tote keeps growing? It is almost the size of Chris now. Maybe Christian is shrinking under the weight of his pineapple hair and the tote is staying the same size. Maybe it's just from seeing him with the giant ruffle tower last week. We will still be able to hear him though, even if he shrinks to only 4" high. I'm not worried about Christian.

Heidi invites the team to do a model swap and gives them the horrific field trip news. There is a brief shot of Rami with his arm around Sweet PKit's shoulders on the way to the field trip. Was he in the Israeli army? Is that where he learned his powers of the hypnotic mind? What is he doing to Sweet PKit? The designers are fabulous but have to ride in a janky old ford econline van not befitting of their Designer Status. Hopefully Sweet PKit makes it out alive.

The big surprise is they must run (they are horrible to Chris-they know he can't run and this is the second time they've done this) through a filthy warehouse to grab a bunch of jeans. The theme of this week's challenge is Product Placement for Levi's 501 which just isn't cutting it with the kids today. Who have endangered reading brain and no time to buy Levi's. The levi's lady talks flat out about branding. Don't you remember when branding was supposed to be secret unless you were the branding expert and the marketing people? I used to do that and get giant checks because no one knew branding was just tricking people into buying stuff by coming up with a clever idea about why YOUR COMPANY was unique and special and cool. Once it involved a talking pirate parrot. I had to quit. Now everyone knows so maybe we are ready for a post-branded world? Get ahead of the curve and out of the box Project Runway. Sweet PKit gets a dirty foot grabbing her denim. How many times did Tim have to say Levi's?

Jillian is making the same coat again as last week. For me! But I am not sure if I will wear a denim coat. Sorry Jillian. We liked the black one with plaid lining. She will be sewing a lot of crap all over it too. Jillian's whole face is botoxed I think but with the weight of fashion, not actual botox. Every time you see her face it is pained and troubled but in a creepy terminator way. Rami is too european to work with the denim but he will Make it Work. But he does know about cartoon characters because he thinks Christian is the pineapple that sponge bob lives inside.

Victorya is stealing her idea from Jillian. We know one of them will be going down. It could involve blood! Ricky keeps saying the word lingerie, lingerie, lingerie. There's a whole drinking game right there with Ricky and crying and lingerie and hats. Too bad we have to go to work.

Sweet PKit freaks out Tim with her dress! She always does this and he says the actual words, "Happy Hands at Home Granny Circle Hippie Dippie!" Thanks Tim. We still love Tim just because he said that. That's our old Tim of the horrified look. Maybe he will quit working at Liz Clairborne or Donna Karan or wherever that was that made him leave academia for fame and fortune and bigger buckets of money. A talking pirate parrot could be just around the corner Tim Gunn.

Jillian really is bleeding! She is freaking out too. There is just a lot of whining happening with the designers over the branding challenge. The designers look like the little Wal Mart slave children behind their machines, except for that they have a lot more tattoos. Don't you wish they would just show us all their tattoos one morning in their Product Placement Apartment and we could read Ricky's lettering and see the whole Pineapple octopus arm and is there is rhyme or reason to all Sweet PKit's flowers scrolling all over her back and her arm.

The next time they go to Product Placement Apartment, the boys are all spraying themselves with stuff and we can also see that they have all Ikea furniture. Poor designers. We always have to see them in their underwear. And Ricky has another hat, this is the mesh one, I think that it is his dress hat for the firing squad lineup. Maybe is kevlar mesh. It is his branding. Just be done with branding Ricky, or maybe it's just they've done this branding to you and you didn't mean to be the hat wearing crybaby lingerie guy.

They are all glueing their models into their denim. I feel bad for them. Ten Hours! To make outfits. Project Runway is like more evil than 100 grad schools all lumped together. They can do that to you when you are lured into the prizes and the money and the fame. The Saturn car. All the Treseme you can drink! I would have been a bad contestant. Aside from the way I sew, which is completely lame. Also that I shouldn't ever get dressed or shop without a stylist. But also my reaction to stress in an art type environment which causes me to lay on the floor and go to sleep. Sort of like when I go to see a band. For some reason, dog showing does not bring this type of stress to me and I never lay down and sleep at anything dog related. The dogs are so soothing. Too bad they do not have dogs running loose in their studio but then it would be like UCDavis or CalArts and I am pretty sure they don't do that in New York City.

The skinny models trot their skinny gangly limbs down the runway. There's a lot of strapless type dresses that I am not sure how they stay up on all those anorexic little chests? Christian made skin tight size negative jeans out of jacket sleeves that are completely cute if you can wear a negative size. Someone that is in tip top dog agility shape could wear these but that someone is not me. Our demographic means most of us are over 40 and it is the over forty weight which is hard to get all the way down to size negative. Junior handers, take note. Then Nina is so excited because Sweet PKit makes a slimming voodoo dress that makes her model actually disappear off the stage due to becoming a negative waif. But that is a good thing so she will not get voted off. And she just happens to be wearing a non slimming tap dancing costume, and we are not really sure why. Because her husband's name is Sage? Ricky will not get voted off. They are laughing at him, he thinks it is with him, but the Levi's lady likes his hoochie mama dress so they can only send subliminal messages through their sharp shark teeth and wait til next week. He is still crying anyways. Michael Kors just wants to chew him up and spit him out all over the stage and keep his hat as a trophy.

Victorya and Jillian have a final smack down and thank god Victorya is finally kicked off.

Can you sort of pretend you are reading a book, then go think about it.

The shelf. It is overflowing with the actual books. For real. Also, can you see it is of a brisk temperature here in the room of books to preserve them to be better accessed by our ancestors of the future? It is just sort of a brisk temperature everywhere. In the house. Out of the house. January, you are trying hard to kick my ass. This is California damnit. By the beach.

So there was this article in the New Yorker a little while back called "Twilight of the Books" and it was sort of about how living in the googled world doesn't give time for concentrated analysis of stuff you read or the motivation to think beyond all the information sort of barfed out there. Sort of like if you read blogs and stuff and junk mostly your mind becomes jello-like and soft. Like maybe if you read blogs like mine. And ones that are even better. Or ones that are even worse. Written by someone of already questionable brain matter. "The digital world is the greatest threat yet to the endangered reading brain as it has developed over the past five thousand years," is what these nice, smart people have decided-one of them is a Professor of Citizenship and Public Service and one is a Director at a Center for Reading.

Now I am going to hell for sure. I am sorry polar bears. I am sorry Heath Ledger. Once again I am doing something that has a dark side when I thought it was all rainbows and marshmallow spewing cats in baskets. I spent some time yesterday living in a googled world and reading some blogs and stuff on the internet. Due to the weather. You saw. I was in my jammies. Mostly I was in dog agility blog world. Us dog agility ladies we sure like to write about our dogs. I could have been reading a book. And doing critical analysis. Here's one right here on my desk that I am even mentioned in the acknowledgements on About Species meeting. We've discussed. I've quoted. But instead I am clicking around on the internet reading about a bunch of dogs. Blogs freak me out.

So here is my question to you. Yes-I am talking to You! Did you read all the way to this sentence? Because you thought I was going to tell you of some magic of how to make some running contacts spectacular and fast and a thing of breathtaking awe and you could wear ballet flats whilst running them? Or you were searching for small asses or dead rat toys and you found this little ditty? Or you just like looking in someone else's living room at dusk when it's light inside but dark outside and you can see all their stuff. Even their antler collection. Or maybe you thought I was going to tell you Project Runway things but I am not today, even though it involves denim. Or you were just ready to wish dog agility was the star of your life but you were just wishing it was happening in a better way because your life just seems to be getting so Specific? Cuz I welcome you! You is my people!

Wet wet wet. Wet.

What I look like in the morning when I'm not walking dogs or going to work on time because of the wet.

What some of the dogs do when they're not going to work or for a walk on time.

This dog got turned into a lamp.

Timmy is a happy dog this week. His picture isn't here because he's outside. Because one of his favorite things to do, besides run at full speed up our driveway and not bash himself into anything, is stand outside in the pouring rain. I don't chalk that one up to dementia, because he has always liked standing outside and getting wet. Just hanging out, sort of meander around, and get really, really wet. The dementia part though, means that he scratches on the door to get let back in, which involves the actual work on my side of drying off his mounds of fur, and then a few minutes later he wants to go out and repeat the whole process because he may have just forgotten he was just out there. If the pouring rain is at 5am, he's there. In the door, out the door, repeat, repeat.

Rain means a lot of stress at work because people want to know can they ride, can they not ride, and it's just always a crapshoot of about 30 variables of which ring if any we can use. And that's with our awesome and well draining footing, it's never a no brainer of life without a covered arena. I lose money in the rain. I have a lot of customers that are sort of, um, fair weather riders. So they're out. The regulars come, and I still get the horses out for the ones that have horses in training, but those pay by the lesson beginner types that don't want to still come out and learn horsemanship skills, or lesson people from long drives away, they kill me this time of year. So more work for less money! I always am smart about the career paths I take.

Dirt Night also became Mud Bowl. Ruby had to stay in the car, something is wrong with her foot. Did it cause slow weave poles on Sunday? I have no idea. I give up. She has an infected foot though that I didn't notice until yesterday morning when she was lame on it. Otterpop and Hobbes were fast and fun and barking and muddy. Thanks Rob for driving all the way back down to Salinas to get Hobbes! He has to go to the dog show on Saturday so he needed to practice. Or I guess just get in shape. Like Hobbes needs to practice anything. We don't get to go. Rob gets to run his own dog all by himself and not have to share him with his stalker. Although had I been a weather genie and could predict what work days would be a total washout, I should have entered and bagged a work day. But then the poor horses would have had to sit all day and I would have felt really, really bad. It's a good show because it's USDAA but all the Masters is Sat. and Starters and Advanced on Sunday. So you only have to go 1 day and get all your runs. But it's the wrong day for my lifestyle.

I worked with my beginner class on some Susan Garrett focus and drive to the jump exersizes during Mud Bowl. I tried to be just like Susan Garrett on her DVD. I used a Canadian accent and everything. I couldn't bring a demonstration dog out though because my ringer dog was lame and Otterpop, she's not so good at this one because it requires a smashing startline stay and since I've started working on this little exersize with them all for the good of Gustavo, I learned she just blows it part of the time from frisbee insanity. Oops. Never really taught her the control freak stay. Gustavo, he's the one learning this but I want to look like a rockstar Susan Garrett if I demonstrate to beginners so they experience shock and awe at my smashing training skills and Gustavo is still at stage one since he has to repeat stuff 600 times til he gets it. Ruby is the only one that can make me look good. And it's all about me right? Uh, ego flaw? I'm already going to hell for not singing to help the dogs but holding a candle for dogs instead of Martin Luther King and Heath Ledger.

Will I go to hell for writing Martin Luther King and civil rights and dog rights in the same paragraph?

Hey there's Laura and friend of Team Small Dog Mary! Holding up candles in the rain. Did someone die, besides Heath Ledger? Are we late for honoring Martin Luther King? Naw. That whole stupid Lighthouse Field thing that just never dies. Yeah, we're still walking the dogs out there and on the beach. No one is writing us tickets yet and like what is this, 6 years later? We are still at Santa Cruz City Council meetings, except this time standing outside holding damn candles like someone died. Thanks Kate for taking this flattering chin photo. It is called a candlelight vigil nice quiet protest. Irritation all around.

OK, so speaking of activism and what have you, here's another little craw catching little snapper. The AKC has a survey about possibly letting dogs who are Not Purebreds joining dogs who are Purebreds in dog sports. But probably in Separate classes, and maybe not at high levels. Separeate, and not equal. Sort of like you can ride the bus but get on the back of the bus and try not to take up too much space but you have to pay the same bus fare as everyone else. So like, civil rights for bigger human issues it ain't but how irritating is that? I'm not going to any candlelight vigils on that, but If you want to take their survey which gives you an opportunity to write in a little comment such as perhaps one about the bus, then here's the link: AKC SURVEY . I don't do AKC and wouldn't even try to "ILP" (indefinite listing privilege-a Privilege where you can say your dog is Probably a purebred with a cunning photo even though you have no Papers and register them so you can compete in agility or obedience shows) my dogs because the whole thing just smacks of getting to the back of the bus. But there you go. Don't we have bigger things to worry about around here?

Also at the dog candlelight thing, they wanted us to sing protest songs with words about dogs frolicking in the fresh air to the tune of These are a Few of My Favorite things. Ya dig? Let's just go stick our heads in a hole right now and scream until it's time for a cookie.

A visit to academia!

We looked for some answers. We need to be smart about this, don't we?

"I said that 'play proposes,' and I argued that people must learn to meet dogs as strangers, as significant others, so that both can learn the corporeal semiosis of cross-species trust and enter the open of risking something new. Agility is an ordinary sport or a game, in which the syncopated dance of rule and invention is the choreography that reshapes players."

-Donna Haraway, "When Species Meet (from Chapter 8-Training in the Contact Zone)"


"And I forget
Just what it takes
And yet I guess it makes me smile
I found it hard
Its hard to find
Oh well, whatever, nevermind"

-Kurt Cobain, "Smells Like Teen Spirit"


"Training dogs is hard. Running around with dogs is easy. I like dogs! And also ponies and handbags and Sees candy!"

-Laura Hartwick, Team Small Dog


The reading research list sort of degenerated as I went along. To where I just made up a nice quote without writing a whole book. And I guess a Nirvana song doesn't really count as research? Whatever. Nevermind. Gosh darn it, we just need to get better and make agility even more funner so there is nothing STRESSFUL about it. Like, this weekend I have a lesson with Jim. So I think, what will Jim tell me? Will he see I am doing some weird spastic thing no one else sees before we get to the poles with Ruby? A late front cross with Otterpop and this causes her to have a paranoia attack? Probably not. I think he'll tell me to keep practicing and get better and just make it so the show ring is equal fun to practicing. That's what I think. We'll see if that's what Jim thinks too.

OK. Also, you know we are dealing with a trainer here who spends precious training time screwing around doing lots of other stuff instead and has the attention span of a flea. Can I pull the Generalist card? What did one of my grad school teachers say that one time? It was the critical theory teacher with red hair and uneven lips and giant beaded necklaces that were like borders or boundaries or something I didn't get. Unteachable. Some of us (said looking at me with her uneven lips which were all I could think about when I talked to her and trying to remember what the thing was with the boundaries or borders and her beads) are just unteachable.

Um, something also it's the journey and not the magic castle filled with candy where everyone has a tiara? Life is a big mermaid with legs cut off with razors? Losers live in the past and winners learn from the past and enjoy working in the present toward the future unless they are killed by zombie axe murderers using serrated knives first?

Well, let's try to analyze this mixed bag of a dog show.

OK, so here are some kudos. Maybe the rest of this story will be boring because I believe if i was reading this about someone else's dogs, I may be bored. But maybe there are lessons here for all of us, or maybe you are such an agility star you have some good ideas about things I can do to improve on some, um, issues.

Kudos to Gary for getting up at 5am and making sure my leaky radiator was full so I did not throw an engine rod on my car driving there! And he wore the head flashlight to do this too. How much are we loving that head flashlight?

Kudos for Gustavo for not escaping or screaming and being super well behaved and acting like a well trained puppy and taking walks and playing a lot of tug on his nasty ratty piece of fleece.

Kudos to Ruby for just being so fast and what a good dog. And winning all her classes, except for 2nd in one. It was CPE. So it's not like winning all her classes in USDAA. But I was super happy with all her runs, except for her slowish weave poles, which continues to be disturbing, especially when she is flying around out there and then hits those poles and slows way down. (In CPE, slow poles aren't that weird so she can still win I guess, but that doesn't make them ok.) She got a 2nd in a class where they had to do 3 sets of poles. I avoided them in things like Gamblers and those Wacky CPE Point Hogging classes. Which in one, I hogged more points than I believe anyone else in the whole dog show. I have to recheck that score when they post it online, but I apparently got 83 points when most people were getting 40 or at the most 60. I just used shrewd strategy of ground covering and weave pole avoiding and hogged points like it is the end of the world and I'm the last polar bear trying to collect the last ice cubes. Sorry polar bears. Also rocking, Super Q worthy Snookers. Ruby, you are the best. But your weave poles continue to disturb me and I am not sure if it is me, are you trying to tell me something about my handling skills by slowing down in the poles? Is it you? Does your shoulder hurt, which seems unlikely because you are never lame anymore and so fast? Is it both of us? Is there someone else? I don't want to break up Ruby! But I don't know what your slow weave poles are saying!

Otterpop. I am not giving you Kudos. OK. You won all your classes except for 2 which we need to have a little talk about. She had a good fast first place winning first run. It was a points one and I did the fast point hog thing. In the next class, Standard, the start headed straight down a line right to an old man setting poles. There are a couple guys in like their 80's that do CPE. They rock. They are so cute and I find it amazing they can run around out there with their dogs and they are 80! And there was one of the fellas, sitting in a plastic lawn chair, ready to dash out on his spiderly 80 year old legs each time a dog knocked a rail down. And Otterpop takes one look at him, beelines out to him and starts barking.

Take that Otterpop. I called her in to me, and instead of keeping going, marched her to her leash without a word, put it on, and took her straight to the car, not even picking up BELOVED FRISBEE, and just locking her in the car. Alone. I took the other dogs on an enjoyable walk. Thank god I do not have kids. I would go to jail. I think people probably think I beat her, which I DO NOT! because she was all cowery the whole way there probably because I have not spoken even a word to her this whole time and she thinks I have become the dog Whisperer or abominable Snowman.

Otterpop you are FOUR YEARS OLD!

So her next run, wow! Super speedy! Perfect manners. Not a glance at any old men or photographer or pole setters or judges. Wins class! This pattern followed for a while. Til the last class. It was like she sat there and figured this out to get back at me. I mean, I know this isn't what dogs do, right? There has to be some other reason, I am a bad handler, I did something, but she has never done this. She starts out, not super fast but just fine, fast enough, it is Snookers. She takes a few jumps (I was doing the same aggressive all "7's" course I did with Ruby), and then just stops and gives me the look she gives when she is playing fetch and there are other dogs around and she is not giving up a precious stick because THEY WILL TAKE IT and IT IS HERS. But she is in the dog agility ring and there is no frisbee or stick or tennis ball, she is just supposed to keep on jumping and she has just stopped. And is looking at me like "I am Otterpop the Great and Powerful Ruler of the Universe and Screw You." What did I do Otterpop? Do you want to break up with me too? I thought we had a beautiful relationship and now this.

I just ceased the run and took her to jail again. BecauseI didn't want to signal that behavior like that is going to fly for even a second. I don't know. It was our last run, so I didn't get to test the post jail Perfect Dog On Parole technique. I think my dogs are messed up. Obviously I messed them up. I am trying to give myself objective advice as an agility trainer but I am a little baffled other than I think I am doing something weird to mess my dogs up. We do fun tricks, they seem excited and motivated and happy to go in the ring. They are amazing when we practice. But we have weird patterns here. I don't think I am a bad handler. But I know I'm not the greatest handler, and clearly not the greatest trainer. I have many successes and handlers I respect tell me I am doing a good job. Even let me run their dog. But, I have a new young dog here and if I am doing something completely crazy and lame I want to fix it NOW before I screw up what might end up being a very talented little dog.

Maybe it's just my shoes? Or my accessorizing? Should I start wearing makeup? Get a boob job? Follow everything Susan Garrett says like I am in a cult? Take the pressure off the dogs and just do a bit of a run and leave the ring and play? Is it a customer service issue? Heidi Klum? Aack, the karma is catching up with me for being a mean lady? Damn, it's always something.

Dreams of momosas and valet parking.

Yeah. I am practicing his weave poles wearing clogs and the layered look but not in a good way. It was that kind of day.

If this is Sunday, then I already left the house. At like 5am. To go to Elkgrove, California, for an exciting CPE trial in a covered horse arena in the middle of cow pastures near a prison. You were still asleep when I went through Stockton. Probably you were still asleep when I went creeping down their long dirt road into the facility, found a parking spot, jumped out of the car, walked a course, woke up a dog, did a run, woke up the other dog, did a run, and then probably kept repeating this all day until it was time to turn around and drive home the 2ish hours. Maybe more coming home because it's the same freeway everyone who goes snowboarding in Tahoe uses and we all like to leave at the same time to drive home. We plan it that way. Are you awake right now on Sunday morning? If you slept in, I bet we ran Standard and Fullhouse already. Do you feel tired for me? I don't even love CPE but I love the covered arena and we just need to go start our dog show season again somewhere so this is it.

Do you think we just leap in the car and go? Sort of. When that alarm goes off at 4:45, I am perfectly trained to leap out of bed and make coffee and grab dogs and brush teeth. I am fast as greased up pigs running from the bacon man. Because I have to drive through San Jose, head out east over Altamont Pass of Windmills Hells Angels Killed someone at a Rolling Stones Concert there during hippies, up 1-5 through Stockton and head east again towards prisons and cows. But we get really packed and set up the night before. What do you need to do to go to a dog show? A low maintenance, one day, not even taking a canopy because I am mean and just keeping my dogs likely in the car most of the time, minimalist dog show?

Pack up: xpen, shady cloth, frisbee, folding chair, folding crate. That'll contain those little monsters all day. Throw 'em in the car. Find the cooler. Clean clothes! Do not forget to wash some clothes you would like to be wearing all day at a dog show. I have very few at the moment I can actually squeeze into due to the previously alluded to Sees Candy fiascos at Christmas time. They are all in the wash right now. It might be hella cold up there in Elkgrove so I'm wearing jeans and many shirts (layered look!) and many jackets. I threw a bunch in the car already. It is important to get the clothes ready and leave them in the bathroom including your socks. Just trust me on that. Some people might have lucky socks or underwear. I don't have any lucky clothes. I just don't want to look like a frumpy old ranch lady is my goal. Did you hear that Tim Gunn?

Find some food. No food in the house. Go to the store. Main item we MUST have-some hot dogs! For the dogs as an award for going fast! Or in Otterpop's case, not having a paranoia barking attack in the ring. A hot dog to look forward to. Like I would look forward to pizza and ho ho cake. Which I do not bring because that's just too complicated. I take some apples and bananas and I'll make a sandwich the night before and some nice drinks and a bag of chips and I have my coffee stuff set out on the counter. There is usually not so good food at dog shows, so it is useful to pack your own healthy lunch is what I like to do.

The coffee thing is really key here. I am not legally allowed to drive if I have not had enough coffee. It even says so on my drivers license. So Elkgrove=2 Large Travel mugs full. This is after consuming one large cup as FAST AS I CAN whilst frantically grabbing items for leaving such as actual dog agility dogs before I am allowed to start the car. Do not start car and drive until ONE FULL CUP of coffee is drank is just a good rule of thumb if it is dark and you need to remember which freeway to take is a good rule of thumb to follow. Just trust me on that. Yes and all that coffee might make you have to go to the bathroom and then you have to deal with that when all you want to do is drive 80mph and listen to the ipod which now works in the CAR! Maybe it is possible to hold it. Is that too much information? You wanted to know about underwear the other day so I am just trying offer Detailed and Useful Information to you here.

Is the glamour of my lifestyle killing you here? Like you cannot STAND the glamour? Maybe you are getting ready to head out to Sunday brunch in West Hollywood with a somewhat washed up pop and country singing star at the place you always see people on tv and how little and teensy they are in real life eating a leaf for brucnh. Well good for you. I will dream of your momosa and you can wish you were me out there with a damn speedy and hot dog awarding clean run.

Ooh la la.

So I found this. Kaki seems to be a glamorous french super model opera singer living on a beautiful tropical island in some kind of villa and is training Silvia Trkman style running contacts in a sun dress! She is our inspiration for today. Let me just repeat. Beautiful model in tropical island villa with border collies that have perfect running dogwalk contacts. Do you think I am making this up? She has a website and a lot of videos on youtube. I don't speak french, but when she is cooing out "Slalom, slalom, Tre Bien!!" to her perfect fast weave poles, you get the gist of it all.

Youtube Video of her running contact training session on tropical island villa steps

The running dogwalk contact ones are very, very interesting. I have been pondering them as I train Gustavo. Right now, he is planned to have a 2o/2o on the dogwalk, a sliding down on the teeter, and a running a-frame. Ruby has running everything but they aren't 100% trustworthy because they were modified from a 2o/2o in a half assed fashion. Otterpop has a quick release 4 on the floor for dogwalk and a-frame, and a sliding down on the teeter. Her contacts have proven extremely trustworthy, but she did have the whole teeter paranoia issue in the ring. So I've covered a lot of contact territory is what I feel like.

Maybe what I'm going to do is learn to sing songs in french and just get him to run real, real fast and when he does it I will trill in delight "Tre bien, mon chien, mon dieu, Je taime!" Because it sure sounds like a lot of fun and looks great in french. On the tropical villa garden island. I just have to make hitting contacts as fun and exciting as chasing birds on big sunny low tide beach on a perfect clear morning with no one else out there.

Tim Gunn, you have just forsaken me.

Allright. I give up Tim Gunn. I give up Carson. Neither of you has been any help. To me or the remaining Project Runway designers or to the nude Lifetime channel ladies who all seek your help. We are all on our own. And you both used to be so important to me. I'm working without a net here. I may not be a specialist, and styling hasn't been my strong point in life, but I can say with conviction I am a generalist and I'm just going to dive right in here and tackle the problem like it's something I do all the time. I have faked it through worse. How do you think I learned to drive the horse trailer when I was 15 or just marched into that graphic design meeting with the fancy guys from a retail empire at the expensive Italian restaurant with all the weird forks and scared their old man pants off about porn on the internet? All in a days work for Team Small Dog.

Here is likely a common problem for many ladies like me in the Clean Run Magazine demographic. You work all day in the dust and dirt. Before work you ran your ass off with your dogs and it was cold yet you got sweaty because you just kept going, going, going because it was that kind of day and the dogs felt speedy and ready to go and no one was knocking bars or blowing dogwalk contacts. Perhaps even doing the teeter at far distances away flawlessly. Maybe you body clipped part of a horse during your day. You likely sat on some horses. You probably spent some time sitting on a fence yelling and making someone cry and carrying bags of feed and moving heavy jumps around. And then you are supposed to go out to dinner at 7pm and Watsonville is a whole world away from Santa Cruz not to mention it is after 6pm and you just finished checking to make sure everyone had on their blankets. You need an ensemble that goes from day to evening in a flash!

Hi! Run in the house, hug Timmy. Hi Timmy! He always recognizes me. He has to stay home all day without the rest of the team. I don't know what goes through his mind anymore but I feel VERY popular when I get home with Timmy. He is my biggest fan. When's the last time I washed this dirty old barn jacket? Left the boots at the door. No visible stains on the jeans. No one seems to have bled or drooled on a basic navy long sleeve t-shirt. There are some other shirts on under it. It is cold. You can't go wrong with 3-4 shirts. I believe it is called the layered look? Do we still say that? Oh wait, Carson you are not even listening. Let's just say we can call it that.

Add a sweater. Add the good shoes-Fluevogs! -note height difference! A good shoe with some height, that just smells like evening right? Even if everything else smells horse and dog. Add a sweater. Just wrap another sweater over your head. It is possible a husband is giving you a weird look but if Tim Damn Gunn isn't here then we're just going to have to live with this Damnit. Grab actual purse made by Dawn down the street and toss those small dogs a treat so that you do not come home to SOMEONE HAS GONE THROUGH YOUR BIG BIKE MESSENGER BAG TO FIND AN ANCIENT DOG TREAT AND EATEN THROUGH A TUPPERWARE AND DEMON SPAWN SMALL DOG BASTARDS HAVE STREWN ITEMS GALORE THROUGH THE HOUSE. Why do some dogs eat things like hats? Clearly because they are bastard children of zombies and have been born of zombie loins, all of them, to torment me and our troops in Iraq and the little Brownies selling cookies without trans fats.

If I had a million giant organza ruffles to wrap around my head, I would be happy to apply this to my head. If I had equestrian style jodphurs (doesn't this seem like something I should have?) and the best black fitted coat with genuine vampire collar ever, then that's what I would wear. If Christian could come over and show me how to stand better when I take my own picture to look more stunning and photogenic then that would help. If I had little sparkle hair things I would maybe not wear them in my hair because Kit Pistol is not age appropriate for me, but I would also not barf them up all over the front of an ugly dress just because I have the hypnotic power that works on Heidi and chickens and perhaps even donkeys that you want to teach to quit smoking. I just have my favorite sweater and shoes and I have the gall to throw them on over dirty old work clothes and stroll out the door to dinner.

Is this a problem? At least it is not a 30 billion dollar deficit. That is worse.

OK. Did you guys know I have just hired Mary as a consultant? Basically, she can just write this blog for me now! She also does photo research. Thanks Mary! If you can also body clip horses and wash them so they actually get clean and not forget to make the supplements, you may have a full time job!

Yes. This is the perfect dog agility wear and goes from day to evening in a second because you just throw the coat on over dirty barn clothes! You can wear ANY underwear with it because the pants are baggy and the top is flattering. I may have to experiment with running in the little '80's boots but I think I used to have those and run in them just fine. I may have been drunk though. A faux hauk is a risky look for me, but I think I could manage it if I had that coat! Madonna would wear this! So would Gwen Stefani! So would Kurt Cobain! So would Puff Diddly P Daddy! Thanks Jillian and Mary. We will assume Victorya (banned) had nothing to do with it.

A mini van is a personal choice.

Today is the decrepid morning after dirt night. Even though I only ran the small dogs, who were great I do add. Hobbes had to stay home because of the actual invconvenience of Rob's work and picking up dogs on the wrong side of another county. I always feel like I'm hit by a truck on Thursday morning but since I've been taking slow, shuffling, demented Timmy with us everywhere I am out of shape. Because I walk real slow and shuffling and likely even demented when I have Timmy with us. Who cares, it's Timmy! What's some extra fat and no muscles. And not carrying enormous heavy things like a-frames and pieces of dog walks for a few weeks takes a toll when you start doing it again. I guess I need to start getting up at 5am to add exersizing without Timmy to my list of things to do. Ha!

At least Tash has found us a nice plastic surgeon that seems to have a new agey twist on plastic surgery for ladies. Thanks Tash! Since the dog agility demographic seems to be (I took this from Clean Run Magazine's demographics. That is THE magazine for dog agility. It is kind of boring but has helpful training articles if you are a dog agility trainer or just like reading that kind of stuff) people who are maybe going to get some knife work at some point. Nothin' wrong with a little nip and tuck is what I say, right? Subtle. Little.

Over 94% of the subscribers are women.

Over 38% are between 41 and 50 years of age, 30% are between the ages of 51 and 60 years, and over 23% are between 51 and 60 years.

Our typical reader attends 12-18 agility trials each year and spends over $4,000 annually on this hobby.

I'll have to add up my receipts and get back to you. Although creative accounting lets many dog related things be a business expense for me due to my "Animal Training" business. Thanks accountant! I just entered their demographic! I subscribed for a long time before this but I wasn't even on their advertising radar because I was too young.

Clean Run has a store that sells stuff you might like to buy to roll into your $4000. Or maybe that is seperate. They are a crafty bunch there at the enterprise that is Clean Run. The magazine is actually nicely designed, so that makes it at least viewable, but the articles are just DRY except when you need help in like making those contacts work right. I am asking you here, what kind of articles would YOU want to read in an agility magazine that are not really training instructions? Like about good agility underwear? Once they had an article about good mini vans for dogs and it made me want to cry and quit agility. But because I am sick and now in their demographic I actually read it but the whole time with conviction. Should I ever want to get my own mini van just shoot me dead to the ground and then run over me in Joel Warner's Millionaire Car. A mini van is no way to live. Missy Elliot wouldn't be seen in one. Gwen Stefani? Only ever to HIDE from the paparazzi. Even if you can fit a foldable teeter and 4 crates in it.

Let's all just read Donna Haraway's new History of Conciousness Critical Theory Cyber Animal book instead, "When Species Meet." I'll give you a book review of it someday if Gustavo doesn't eat my glasses and I can make it through. Donna says start with Chapter 8, which means there is some stuff in there you can understand without a PhD. I have a Masters Degree, so I know I can at least do Chapter 8 and I bet a lot of other chapters too. Thanks Donna! I know you drive a mini van but you write cool books so that gives you way extra points!

Even though the song says to I never smack my bitches up.

It certainly was a black mood day yesterday but it was also sunny at work and the horses were all good and except for a clipper blade fiasco, I forgot about the bacteria and polar bears for a while. I also got to practice with the dogs in the morning.

It was House of Pain day at dog practice. Whatever happened to those guys? I think some of them became Limp Bizcit. Oh well. So sorry. The theme was Jump Around. I set up grids and that was all we worked on. Ruby, she of the mos def stay, was all a twitter to GO and when I'd walk up the grid* (*here, let's define grid for you skimmers, wake up Joel Warner! A grid is just a series of jumps that I customly space apart so that, in this case, there was one stride between them all but some one strides longer and shorter than the others. Makes the dogs think and balance themselves to, ahem, avoid knocking a rail). Yeah so I'd turn my back, walk up the line to put out a toy for her to drive to, and badabing. She is up the grid, swimmer turn and back down it to the stay place, 10 jumps all together, in a flash, like-HEY you don't see me RIGHT but i JUST Want to JUMP AROUND JUMP AROUND.

Otterpop, IN THE HOWSE, she has a less than mos def stay. Mos Weak. She wiggles here and there and lays down and likes to start from this weird I am a Lounge chair position. But eventually LOVE for the frisbee overcomes her need to not stay and she barreled up and down her jumps fantastico when she figures out the frisbee vanishes if you split the start early. She didn't hit anything. Did I mention on Ruby's turn she was wacking jumps right and left until she got it that she couldn't have a treat til she went thru without wacking stuff? That worked.

Gustavo is just learning to stay and drive down a line. You know that B.I.G. song "biggie biggie biggie can't you see, sometimes your words just hypnotize me?" He is little but he is learning the hypnotic spell of the WAIT W-A-I-T WAIT so I can walk down the grid and put a frisbee out. Even though Susan Garrett says I shouldn't need to do this. Sorry Susan Garrett! My training is flawed. We spent a lot of time at just a single jump too, driving out to a toy from a stay (Hello Success with One Jump-Say Hello To Success!) and then down the gymnastic, which he got fast and easy and good. I study the technique of Rami Droopy Turban of dresses too, because this is how he has become the powerful winner of ugly dresses-the hypnosis of Heidi and Nina and Tim! These are the new ways I find to train a Mexican Pet.

Yeah, in a perfect world we would all start out day like this. With old school hip hop and morning jump grids with everyone holding their stay followed by a run in the mountains and a wholesome breakfast I guess. In a perfect world those guys aren't all singing about ho's and smacking bitches up either and the polar bears have a big chunk of ice to sit on, not just a tiny ice cube they are balancing on one paw until it melts and they swim to their death.

Crusty.

I already had one of those moments where I actually looked at the paper and had to see about the lethal new bacteria and they were talking about climate change and everyone got murdered the other night and you know, how can I top that? OH yeah, we're all avoiding that! Ha HA! Just because I am truly wrong at heart and why should I try to hide that with all my lying about customer service, here you go. So you can be in a black mood too!

Lethal New Bacteria is Spreading! Watch Out! It is Lethal and it Could Spread to YOU!

Climate Change! Hopefully we will all be Dead before it starts to Kill Us All! But you will Always BE Thinking about the Polar BEARS!

Many People Were Murdered Recently but Also Died Random and Sad Deaths.

There are Not Enough Police to Take Care of the Horrible Crime!

Not enough Nurses to Help you with the Lethal Bacteria!

Housing Prices Actually are Rising Unless you are the Ones Getting Foreclosed on! And have the TAX BURDEN of the Short Sale!

See? Now don't you feel crummy too? This is why we have the dog agility. Total denial of our Real Universe! I'm going to go practice right now.

Cookin' With Team Small Dog

Would you wear Crusty Jammy Bottoms?

So in today's episode, we're in the kitchen with the team making some birthday crackcakes for Atom Smasher's 2nd Bday! This is a big event. Yes, the birthday, but also Laura making something in the kitchen! And using the oven! And ingredients. Because it just isn't done very much around here. Aside from slicing up some hot dogs for the team. And some sandwiches.

So I've learned some things. When using an oven, turn it on nice and early and don't forget to do this! After you have actually located it in your kitchen. And hopefully it is not full of whatever last thing happened to explode in it if you used it another time.

Then you gotta get your stuff out. After you actually go to the store with a list and buy it all. This recipe for crackcakes included one bucket of butter, a lot of boxes of sugar, chocolate that you see cookin' on the stove, buttermilk, wine, dog glucosamine, and the computer because that's where I got this recipe for crackcakes. They were called cupcakes on the recipe, but little did we know.

So put the stuff in a bowl, find the mixer that I think was a xmas gift like 100 years ago, clean the crud off of it, and you mix after CAREFULLY READING the directions from the internet so you know it is actually 4 eggs, not 1, and 50 cups of sugar, not 1. Wow does that stuff go everywhere in the kitchen and soon you will have batter flinging itself all over all your stuff and possibly in your eye!

Then you'll bake it and be sure to thank me for reminding you to turn that oven on. And repeat all of the above with the other recipe to make the frosting. Kick some dogs out of the way to make some more room.

Feed the crackcakes to the kids. Wonder what is wrong with them a few minutes later when they are flying off the walls and start hallucinating and are having trouble focusing on words. Taste a crackcake. Damn those are good. How much sugar was in those things? The batter was to die for but you eat half a baked one it is like Hamsterdam and for the kids we start wondering, was that safe? To feed them those? Cupcakes are kid things right but damn these ones are crazy.

Everyone starts melting down. The kids are cracked out. The ups are fast, the lows go far down deep. The adults are dropping like zombies in a paintball match with meatballs. I tried to run Gustavo through his weave poles and he took off into the bushes and just started running around down the side of the house. Timmy's got his head stuck somewhere but he actually did not eat any crackcakes. That's just what Timmy does now.

Damn there are dogs on the table again consuming crack crumbs and who even thought of this whole thing in the first place and I just thought this was what a good blogger did. I'm just going to go have me another cupcake is what I'm saying.

Yesterday I went to a memorial service for an old friend that passed away before xmas time. It was sad. It was huge, all the people that came to remember him. There was no one else like Gary Kendell. That's just all I can say about him. One of a kind, and boy oh boy do we miss you. I found this on youtube, one of his many friends made it for him.

Project Runway, we might have to break up.

All right. I sort of don't get it anymore. Project Runway was THE BEST. THE BEST thing of all. Like a close second to dog agility, Project Runway was. Santino, I love you and your ruffles everywhere! Jay you are practically amish and you had the ear muffs and now you are a plasma donor! Jeffrey all big swirly neck tattoo which was a true miracle since you have no neck, but you could work the stripiness of fancy dresses. Then it was now.

This is the deal. It is on after Dog Agility Dirt Night. You have a long day at work, outside, in the cold and wind and mud and rain. Probably you forgot to give some horse a shot. You rush through that last lesson to get in the car in time. You get to run the dogs! Even Hobbes! Even though your dogs have been locked in a swamp jail all day long. Except Hobbes. You have your nice dog agility students who don't seem to care that you are just like 2 steps ahead of them in the training of their dogs. And even if they do they keep their traps shut about the fact and just soldier on. You drive home really, really fast on the freeway where there is construction and you are thinking, if I was drunk and driving really fast right here I would likely go slamming into the white cement wall now! But it is to get home by Project Runway. It's just how we do things.

And there was a glimmer of hope. All these New Jersey Catholic School Girls Coming in to get PROM DRESSES! Hello! You had me right there producers! I've never been to New Jersey or Catholic School but I've been to a damn prom and this is fantastic! And we have the old prom pictures of all the designers! The trauma and horror of the prom as reflected in advance by Project Runway. And then what do they do. Just make a mess.

So Rami first of all, you wouldn't catch me dead in that weird old green sloppy turban on a boob thing. All his dresses have this vibe but it is fully revealed now. Except his candy dress was actually ok-actually sort of would have been the best prom dress. And Victoria, the leading dog agility designer at the beginning due to the arm holders, who I have already blacklisted, just like did this weird bedazzled thing but Delia's would sell it so I guess it was prom. Everything else so HORRIBLE! Like horrible, awful dresses. I can barely stand it. I guess I would have worn Christian's because it's brown and brown is the new black just like dog agility and also it is a known fact I just have bad taste all by myself if I am not working with a volunteer stylist medic so what do I know. I wore white strapless vintage to my horrible, terrible awful prom with bright red hose and white plastic shoes (yeah socal in the 80's and kroq and all that) and a drug addict 23 year old prom date and sat at a table full of 17 year olds and their 23 year old drug addict dates and let's just say what a HOOT. Barrels of monkey laughs at that prom.

And these girls all are acting like they are ok with their dresses, except for Maddie who had Christian and they had a little personality conflict, a little disagreement of opinions, and Christian retaliated by making a horrible dress in which he hoped to get voted off except for a rousing little Tim Gunn speech about soldiering on, chin up buckaroo and all that. He almost got voted off but instead it was the ugly dress of Keith who had a prom picture of him covered in bright orange fake tan and am I remembering this right, no girlfriend date just him? He's the one always making a big deal about how not gay he is. With his ugly red halter dress? Well he's gone now. Just a bad memory. Sorry Keith. Like I could have been outside in the dark working on Gustavo's weave poles. Or clicking training him to do something cool and neato but here I was, watching this on a couch with all the dogs on the couch.

Yeah, and by the way, can you see that? Yeah, it's a rat. That's what Gustavo was playing with yesterday. Nice dead, damp rat from outside. In the house. Brought it in, in his mouth. You ever seen me around rats? I have this thing. I can deal with a lot of things but not rats. Not in my feedroom, my backyard, my attic. Dead or alive. Involves screaming and carrying on. Tried to get the dog to take it back outside, ala "Good boy, go get your toy! What a gooood boy!!! Please goddamnit get the foul horrible RAT TOY OFF THE FILTHY YET STILL ONCE EXPENSIVE RUG AND OUT OF THE HOUSE!" But the dead rat toy was over and he moved on to squirrel hut. Other dogs, just looked aghast.

So I had to get a plastic bag and try to scoop it into it without touching or feeling it's rat weight or tail which was impossible and run FAST to the garbage without TRIPPING on dogs and clogs and falling down the stairs and run to OPEN garbage lid while still in running motion thus missing and rat on ground and quickly grabbing some piece of ghetto yard trash from my dog agility training speck and in the trash and there you go. Happy Saturday.

When agility also includes a trip to the eye doctor.

Like I would take her to a dogpthamologist? And make her wear prescription doggles?

I know. I bitch because I'm too busy to train the dogs, then 5 minutes later I'll tell you about training the dogs. I just want more time to train the dogs. See one thing of dog agility is, you meet some retired folks. They are genuinely, positively, retired. With enough money somehow to take their rv somewhere like a vacaton, train the dogs, go out to lunch, pretty much whatever they want and not go to work. This is the lifestyle I aspire to! The retired person lifestyle! Except for the little issue of, being self employed and all, I might be working my fingers down to milkbones like forever til I kick it. With my boots on.

I would be a very busy retired person, just would not have to constantly ensure that people are writing me checks on time and for ideally large amounts of money. I would actually probably do all the things I do now except with way different hours and proportions of time allotted to things. Like my ranch would be at my house and I wouldn't have to have a gazillion customers, just a few that are nice. And dog agility would be at my house so I could practice whenever I wanted. And the art studio is at my house and clean so I can go in there and work on projects and always find the fresh xacto blades. And so on. And so forth. I just didn't do the right prep work to be a retired wealthy person, like I am picturing here. Let me go watch the Secret again.

But I did practice with the dogs some today. And 2 of the dogs kept hitting a double jump, from wherever we were jumping it. Otterpop is bad with spread jumps, aka oxers for you horse folk. She is just not scopey. Ruby just leaves long and exuberantly to cause her bar knocking. Otterpop is just plain old not built to jump. If she were a car, she'd have big fat hotrod tires in back and little teensy tiny ones up front and purple fur on her dash and little pompoms jingling and candy apple red glittersparkle paint and a shiney chrome chain steering wheel better for her hippity hop otterpop down the road. Yeah, you make that clear those spread jumps without knocking a rail every time. A scopey horse feels aethletic, and has an arc and a great hind end push off the ground. Otterpop is just a solid little tank built for low to the ground for speed but not really jump style. I'll speak to my breeder about that.

Ruby is now and always has been a chronic bar knocker. I did a lot with groundpoles and spread jumps in our younger days and nothing really helped except moving her down to Performance. The switch from being the tiniest 16" dog to an average size 12" performance dog helped, and my ego is pretty much over that switch. Let's just say it all together. There is nothing to be ashamed of having a Performance Dog. She is a lot happier with lower jump height and rarely knocks bars (but sometimes does). She just always has left long-like there is another stride left in there and she doesn't take it. That's what I'd say if she were a horse. Jim never could figure it out. He always asks how her eyesight is. Damned if I know. Like I'm going to get her glasses? If I remember to regulate her pace (ie, slow her down-sucks) I can sort of get that stride in, like when it is Very Important to Get Out of the Ring Clean. But if she is just hauling ass and I sorta forget this, chance of bar. But way less chance as 12". And in Performance, no triple bar!

The horse trainer has the dogs that jump bad. Fantastic!

I can't really say much about Gustavo's jump style. I keep the bars really low right now and he either does little grids, learning to look forward and balance himself (my little pony) or is learning to focus ahead and hold a start line stay then DRIVE at a single jump that he has actually looked at. That's all he's doing. We go REAL SLOW with my special ed pup. It will work, and he will be fantastic but just have to pick one thing and work that til he gets it before moving on. And I guess you could say I have a bit of a bar knocking paranoia now so this fella is going to have a little bit more attention to how he jumps.

In this episode, we sense that there is some running out of time.

So if you are self employed, but you work tons and tons and drive far to get to where you work (sort of like it's a commute!), then is it a job or you are just doin' what you love? Even if you find yourself muttering about goddamn horses a lot of the time?

And your dogs are in jail the whole time and you are not training them, do the agility police find out? And then, you get reported to Susan Garrett or what?

Also what is the dirt threshold on dirt inside a house before the IRS comes and audits the piles of papers that someday have to be curated into "taxes"?

And grammarians do their ruling on where the puncuation goes, either inside the quotes or out and when you are just typing in the internet, you can't even specify the smart quotes?

And is ANY of that going to save the polar bears or is it just making it a whole lot worse?

Just some questions to leave you pondering today.

Did you ever know a dog that was afraid of the dark?

I'm not being all goth girly or wicca here, why would I want to highlight those eye bags and creases, warm glow of candle light my ass. It's just damn winter and the power is out again.

So I was able to get some dog practice in yesterday morning, even though it meant I didn't get a couple of horses done before it got too wet and rainy in the afternoon. Sorry horses! I did work all day on my last day off. With horses and no covered arena, work schedule kind of goes away and I work as much as I can when there is dry and work less when there is wet.

Since their dog run at the ranch turned into a horrible murky swamp, the dogs are currently living in one big dog crate all day under a tarp. They have the door open and a little xpen around it so there is a little more room, but they all just huddle in there in one little black 6 beady eyed heap and stay warm and sleep. This may just be how they spend the rest of the rain season until they get a dog run back. Sorry dogs!

It's all about compromise.

Practice yesterday, quick practice because rain was coming and horses were waiting, was teeter day. Otterpop worked on doing her teeter all by her lonesome, far, far, far away from me. She will do anything I ask when we practice. A teeter at 30' away in the big scarey dog show ring with the Judge Who Clearly is a Dog Slasher nearby and terrible things like Photographers and Spectators who could be armed and dangerous robots, that is too much to ask. But someday, she is going to get that Gamble with a Teeter. She still needs that ONE Advanced Gamblers Q to move to Masters Gamblers. But we are a little cursed in that department. We rarely get to do Gamblers on Sundays. And one time, the time with the nice tunnel to a-frame, was the time I ran into the judge. Sorry Jim HIbbard but you were standing Right in Front of the Jump EVERYONE was using to head into the gamble! And one time I just messed up my opening timing, that time had a nice set of jumps and tunnels in the gamble. And one time, a teeter, no dice. But today, I was sending her out to speedy nice teeters and onto hard pole entrances from almost miles away. Kudos to Otterpop!

Ruby worked on nice fast teeters and just nice fast things sequences with lots of tugging or getting the toy. Far distance with toy thrown out, and close tight turns in and getting the toy. I am trying to get her less food frantic during practice and keep her motivation up with toys and see if we can somehow skew that into faster runs when she is bored out of her little skull from sitting all day at a trial or whatever causes her to slow down by the end of the day. Thus eventually becoming faster weave poles. So goes my theory. So she is just practicing having fun.

Gustavo is learning to run speedy fast up the teeter and flip into his down while I set it down slow. That is all he has to do for a long time. He just needs to learn to fly up that board and not get scared and always hit his down. So that's what he does. He needs to do everything a lot of times before he gets it. That is how he learns. I get it! So that's what we do. I am doing lots more clicker tricks with him, lots of fast, fast, fast repetitions and he is getting things. I can't ask him to do too many things or let him go to Spring Break in Puerto Vallarta of the Mind. So now he is learning a little through the legs move to my right and revisiting hand touches. Easy. Right? Your dog learned it in 5 minutes. My other dogs in a couple sessions. Gustavo, few weeks. He is fast, he is talented, he just learns more slowly so I get this now! We gots no hurry vato. We got all the time he needs.

And we got to practice in the light. At our house, we had no power last night. Tiresome. But who would have thought dogs notice? It's just nighttime and dark right? Not for little Gustavo. Power goes out, he runs to a crate and hides and won't come out. Power on? Out of crate, a-ok. Power out? Panic, scrambles off to crate. He's a fraidy cat! I'm getting him his own flashlight.

I don't even know what to call this except let's just say it's cranky.

In times like this, we just have to smile and take a nice cleansing breath.

It is possible that the whole team has an issue of boundaries. Curious. Whilst I was at the STORE last night (those allcaps connote HINT OF IRRITATION, right?) one of my dogs climbed up on the kitchen table and was meandering around, dirty feet on the tablecloth. Looking for important paperwork to toothily shred no doubt. In full view of a human adult. Who is very capable of using the Voice of Non Benevolent Dictatorship which did indeed cause this small dog to instantly leap off of the table. But it was reported when I got home that it has no boundaries. This is possibly the same dog that, the other morning, whilst visiting our friends, crawled through some kind of rat crack in their fence, escaping to a neighbor's house. And pleaded the case starving stray dog to the nice neighbor, causing her to feed him 2 whole bowls of dog food before calling my number off his dog tag to have him rescued, one house away after an absence of 5 or so minutes. All the other dogs were happy to hang out in their lush and grassy backyard, but not Gustavo. No boundaries, no borders. It is all a frat party of joy and sloppy beer sloshing under the big lucite feet of the strippers.

So at the STORE last night, it was perfect to work on Boundaries. I was a customer, so I worked on customer service from the customer point of view. You know sometimes, it is crowded at the store, it is a tiny store, full of expensive foods with omega-3 flax and hemp and your grocery bag will total $40 no matter what you do? And in the crowds, perhaps the power is going off, causing cash registers to die. And in the crowds, perhaps they do not open extra cash registers in such a way that moves you up to a more great and powerful position in a shopping line. And in the crowds, perhaps a lady with bright pink hair except her bleachy roots and purple stripey leggings all a-sag has all her groceries in a jogging stroller fit for the hugest walrus baby ever even though she looks like an ancient haggard witch with a tie dyed head and has 2 rail thin teenagers with her that look as if their arms and were sewn on by blind crazy plastic surgeons and their necks are on weird angles? And no giant walrus baby. And in the crowds are hippie girls with flowing, molting thrift store coats and giant skirts with their little faces not yet grown to show any wrinkles of frowning framed by their fluffy snow hats? And they are all too close and yammering about the delicious pears and having patience and I am thinking bad, black thoughts to them then remember the customer service.

So to offer good customer service, from a customer point of view no less, I have to pretend I am not here in this tiny store where really all I needed was some salsa and the boundaries and borders are pressing on me too tight. Think about the good customer service how I coul