It was USDAA and no dogs caused me to curse quietly under my breath.

So first things first. Here is the deal with little black skorts. The little black dress of dog agility.

Make sure it doesn't almost come off next to the a-frame. Hecklers may continue to point this out to you all day long. Otherwise, hello. Am sold on little skorts. A nice thing for the ladies that is not too ugly for dog agility! But not for the mens. The kilts are a little weird maybe. You just keep wearing your shorts my man friends.

So first of all. Congratulations to Otterpop for trying so hard and holding it together and not doing anything terrible or embarrassing to me. She had a couple bars on Saturday, I think because I was trying to hold her together and she was trying to hold herself together and we just sort of held it together to get around and had a bar in both her runs from too much hand holding out there. But on Sunday, she actually Q'ed in everything and didn't do anything wrong and I know she was actually trying really hard to have a good time and run and relax a little bit. She did drink a bunch of my coffee Sunday morning. So from now on, I give Otterpop her own cup.

And Ruby stayed sound almost the whole time. I guess her drugs wore off and she came up lame again part way through the day Sunday and I scratched her from Steeplechase finals. Her Steeplechase run on Saturday was the bomb and even though she hit a bar, had a smokin' time and was just fired up and the Ruby that I LOVE to run. Whole Reason for Dog Agility Ruby. Startline comedienne and all. She got some Q's, and some 5 faults from some bars. One 5 faulter from a very diva dive from the dogwalk into a tunnel next to it, with total and complete disregard for the yellow. Like so very Mariah Carey leaping onto the kraft services table to bathe herself in the cupcake platter without thinking about anyone else's love for an untouched cupcake. We practice that one. Running to the bottom. Not bathing in cupcake frosting. I'm sure I did some crackhead thing to broadcast to her early to just go ahead and jump ship and get in that tunnel. Such is life.

Perhaps not unlike Hobbes in the Steeplechase finals. I just had this feeling he might do that, seeing as how there is a big fat tunnel just staring you in the face as you're pummeling over the a-frame, and I have just let him blow by a contact like that before. Because I just need that extra whatever hundredth of a second instead of using brakes in Steeplechase finals. And blow by it he did. With a great run but ending up with 5 faults worth of time added. So maybe I won Rob enough money for a pizza for dinner. But maybe just a small cheese pizza. And a couple beers. But not very expensive beer. He had a fabulous standard Q with a happy love table with me and Q'ed in everything all weekend in his runs with Rob his actual dog owner because he is the most genius rockstar of all border collies. Like a non suicidal and still alive Kurt Cobain of border collies. I like sitting in the grass with him and making him bark. As stalkers go, I am easily amused.

Gustavo spent the weekend shoved into one small crate with Ruby and Otterpop. It is like all the clowns in the tiniest volkswagen, shoving in and out with their clown shoes flapping. The horror that the visions of the paranoid schizophrenic are made from. I didn't bring all my dog stuff. I had room to shove one crate under a friend's tent and that's where they stayed and they had a nice, snuggly weekend of Team Small Dog Togetherness. Sorry dogs. Sometimes I'm just mean and lazy like that. They will have plenty of time to get over it because we're taking them up to Booneville for a few days today. To sit around on a sheep ranch and do exciting events such as fetch the stick from the pond. Even Timmy gets to come.

This would be called our vacation and I will be wearing a skort. Because what is a vacation without 4 dogs? Is perhaps like going on a cruise around the Baltic Sea for a week or staying at Oprah's Hawaiian island villa except it is sitting in a little house on an old sheep ranch for 2 days and one of the dogs has alzheimers and one seems to be lame. And this means no internet my friends. I will be looking across the valley from a hammock. Writing pamphlets. I'll be back at the end of the week.

PS-Thanks Eric of Agility Video Service for the videos! They are flattering and don't make us look fat!

You just jump out of the car, grab a dog, and run.

So, I am careening off to work early, and, on a super busy day, leaving my partner with a whole mess of work and horses early so I can drive as fast as I can to the USDAA trial put on by my own club. So I can get there maybe in time to do Standard and Steeplechase. If I'm lucky. And maybe with 2 dogs if Ruby stays sound. And probably without walking the courses. AND, in a cruel yet typical twist of fate, it's a small trial, which means it should run smoothly and quickly and get everyone out of there early! Probably just as I am pulling into the parking lot! In the unseasonably hot heat. Sounds great right!

I learned how to do this from Oprah.

In the spirit of optimistic good attitude:

1. Do you love it when you get to have someone like a World Team Coach with a perfect dog be your pairs partner?

2. It is great to pay buckets of money to inject more joints on a 25 year old horse so she can walk around!

3. Some dogs just love to spend their whole lives on anti-inflammatories so they can run and jump!

4. That $245 spent on one month of gas to drive to work is stimulating the economy!

5. What fun would it be to have a dog who didn't start jumping her dog walk contact out of the blue 2 days before a trial?

6. Eating dinner is highly overrated.

7. Cindy Crawford has a big wart on her face and she is a super model!

8. Only part of my house is unlivable and unplastered and full of boxes, part of it is livable!

9. All the paint falling off the newly painted exterior gives it a neat vintage and spooky look!

10. Some people have to go to Alaska and hunt down wolves to hear loud, piercing howling!

11. A dog that walks super, duper, slow gives one time to stop and look into all the neighbors' living room windows.

12. A $5,000 tooth should be much whiter and shinier and hurt more than the other real teeth that came free because it is special.

13. Looking out for rangers is like a cool new hobby much like bird stalking.

14. No one threw a molotov cocktail into my kitchen as part of an ongoing dispute between 2 families in the Hollywood Gypsy community! That right there, good reason for optimism lucky number 14. I read the LA County homicide blog every morning and I know I will have a day less worse than every single person mentioned in there.

It is easy to just pretend Courtney Love is Laura.

In Marfa, you should have your dogs on a leash only if you are visiting the Marfa Prada. It is on a highway. It is some Art. Even though I believe it may not be on a busy highway, if any of your dogs tend to chase trucks, you might as well leash 'em up there. But everywhere else, I believe it's ok to just let 'em run.

This is what I look like most every morning when I walk around the block. Today it involved the Timmy shuffle backwards and forwards, Ruby sort of 3 legging it, Otterpop REALLY disgruntled about going slow, and Gustavo howling and flying at cats and squirrels. Because you know on a day like this, you will see EVERY cat and EVERY squirrel. And, just when you think it can't get a lot worse than that, a lady with a reactive dog walks up to us. Otterpop, who usually is not reactive to other dogs or leashes, starts to react to her already melting down dog. The lady stops. Right in front of us. Wearing a flowery sun hat with a string around her chin to wedge it tightly on her head. And says, "Oh, is one of your dogs like that TOO?"

I have this insane clown posse of a pack either shuffling, 3 legging it, howling and flinging, or growling and pulling. And hers is lunging towards my whole mess.

I sort of look at her, thinking, well, she is a smart lady no doubt. Just move along, smart lady from around the corner with your own dog problems to take care of. Kind of a no brainer. Bad dog lunging=move away smart lady with your ugly ass hat.

But no. She inches closer. I believe to chat about our dogs. I back up. This is just too much of a circus to have some kind of weird leashy dog fight start. Otterpop has a rockin' Leave It and she does that and comes in to her close position. The lady is staring at me, wanting to chat about bad dogs I guess. I just need to keep this rolling party of freaks moving. I have eye contact of love with Otterpop so she stares at me and not at the bad dog that is calling her out and throwing out some Them is Fighting Words.

Likely, Otterpop is bodyguarding Timmy, a new development we got with Timmy's descent into the decrepit. In a sweetly endearing, yet frightening and pack-like way, Otterpop protects Timmy against all evil these days. If I take Timmy somewhere, I take Otterpop. We had a couple of bad Timmy days this week, horrible panic attacks where something unknown scared the pants off of him and he was literally climbing the walls until I could jam tranquilizers down his gullet and corral him in a padded cell until he jonesed his way down. Otterpop stayed by his side the whole time, his calm in the storm, just me and her waiting it out with him when he didn't know us from the furniture he was bashing into.

Hat lady with the dog finally assumes I am a mute freak with my freak show of black dogs and makes her way down the street, away from me, tugging her own lunging bad dog along behind her.

I really like having lots of limping animals on drugs.

Is this photo smoking gun proof or just a coincidence?

This is just how it goes for me sometimes.

In the morning before work, I took the dogs to practice. I set up 4 zones with back and forth type drills, one with poles, one with the dog walk, one with the a-frame and one that was just jumps that could be done sort of hard or easy depending on what dog you were.

The dogs were all good. Gustavo had an extra good day, hitting contacts, great fast a-frames, super poles, super focus. Maybe had something to do with meatballs in the ikeaware. I just stick that thing out on the field and he's good to go. Otterpop was great, Ruby was great. We just had a great day. We were in a great mood. Great great great great great. We played some frisbee and called it a day and they went to go have a nice nap in their pen at work while I had to do actual work all the rest of the day.

So. I should tell you. Maybe you didn't know that Ruby has this sordid history. Of not being sound. It is a fun story of irony, usually when she is just doing her best, when she is at her fastest and most focused, she has come up very, very lame. Once it kept her out of agility for about 6 months, other times, maybe not so long but still. Usually right front bicep tendon area. But not always. And I have been thinking how sound she has been looking, and doing so well, and her poles back to nice and fast, since they never really sped all the way up after her most major injury that was, I don't even remember now. A while ago. Before I made her a 12" dog. I thought that was the magic cure, even though she just needed a few more legs towards her ADCh, I moved her into Performance where I thought she would stay sounder jumping lower. Since her jump style is, um, unusual, and at 16" I think she was just flinging herself into early retirement.

But guess who is dead lame, on 3 legs limping tonight? That would be our Ruby. Who had to be carried out of the park, lame as can be. Just like one of my horses who is getting xrays tomorow! Can't jump up on the bed. Dog, not the horse. Maybe somewhere in her left front ankle this time-a new place! I do believe left front has always been a good one! And, guess who has done the difficult orchestration of rigging my day on Saturday so I can leave work early to run the dogs in a couple classes including the elusive Steeplechase, a class of always Saturdays in which we miss out on almost always. A nice close dog show, only 20 minutes from my work! And then we have USDAA the weekend following as well.

Isn't that the way it goes? Not looking so good for the weekend for Ruby. Gave her some drugs. Can't think of anywhere I saw her do anything weird while we were practicing, but then, never have before. So you know. Maybe she just wacked it. I say that when the horses come out janky all the time. Let's just not start freaking out here because she might have just wacked it and be as good as new tomorow.

Cooking With the Team-Smoothie and Meatballs

We've been busy around here and maybe not practicing as much as we'd like. So today I'm going to teach you how to make a delicious, healthy delicacy that is perfect for a nice snack before you do some agility.


You get the smoothie, and the dogs get the meatballs. I get them Mini Party Meatballs from Trader Joe's. Very, very popular with all dogs and fit perfectly into blue ikeaware.


First you need some strawberries. I like to buy them from the lady that sells them sometimes on the corner near my house. I buy a lot. Usually about $10 for a giant box. I like strawberries.


You get to use the blender for this! Is like the power tools of cooking! If you are lucky, your refrigerator makes ice and does NOT shoot it out the ice hole without stopping until you plug it up with a plastic bowl. Pour some ice in the blender.


Add some yogurt. I enjoy vanilla. Put in enough to feed a large cat.


I don't know what I'm doing here. Measuring yogurt for cats?


Here you go. A great tip is-PUT THE LID ON TOP OF THE BLENDER BEFORE YOU TURN IT ON! Just trust me why.


Add some juice. You can use any kind. I used to do graphic design for this kind of juice so I use that because I still like their packaging. It is scarey to add the juice if the blender is still on!


Here is where the fun starts. Peel a banana and throw that baby in while it's blending!


And your strawberries! It is like basketball with a dangerous motor trying to fling stuff around your kitchen! Almost a contact sport!


Mmmmm. It should be pink. And frosty goodness.


Don't forget to wash the blender because Gary gets really, really mad when there is smoothie everywhere. You are ahead of the game if you remembered the whole lid thing on and didn't throw your strawberries in from too far away.


Here's why we like smoothies. Look at that ass. Makes Otterpop look petite and spry. She's going for a meatball.


Ruby going for her meatball. She usually grabs the ikeaware and weaves back through with it in her mouth. I have to confiscate her ikeawares sometimes. Her poles are looking just like they used to, so we are very excited to see if this holds through things like Steeplechase and if Snooker has poles for 7's this weekend. Because we still don't have ANY Super Q's.


Then ya gotta run in and play for a little while. There's Ruby and Otterpop attacking the weird fox stole thing I found hanging in a tree one day.


Gustavo has just been rockin' his poles all the time. The meatballs make him pretty frantic though and can actually cause pole popping to get faster to the ikeaware so I have been staying with him in the poles. They are almost set straight now, just a teensy ways to go. Want all that popping to go away before I close the channels all the way.


There's Gustavo and Otterpop attacking the fox thing. We do meatballs, then tugging. Do you ever notice how Otterpop seems to creep into an awful lot of pictures? Enjoy your recipe!

Proper dog exercise-a primer of sorts.

Oprah has a best friend named Nate. You know who he is. He decorates everyone's house in super tasteful yet distressed finishes and textural personal touches and you are like, not only do I want him to decorate my house if he can incorporate taxidermy and paint by numbers, but he should also be my new best friend. Maybe it's just the editing of editors, but he seems so friendly and nice on tv and would find you these great chairs and would be happy to talk to you when you are stuck in a traffic jam about earthquakes and fundamentalist mormons' prarie dresses. He has all the personal qualities that were my New Years resolution to have, except mine lasted only until about Jan. 8, and his are just part of his personality as portrayed on tv.

But of course Oprah snagged him first. And if Oprah wants you as a best friend, you go with it, because she is richerful and can have anything she wants. So he decorated all her houses and closets and her other best friend Gail's house and he is sometimes a charming sidekick on her show. I am not sure if Oprah is a great best friend. I believe she may be somewhat rude, and intimidates people into being her best friend, although she can make up for it by giving you giant diamonds.

I am not really a great best friend, I am sort of mean and not really warm, with a personality more grating than nice and a tendency to start yelling about off topic items. A charisma more repellant than lovable, perhaps more suited to friend of pet dogs. Had I the power to offer up giant diamonds, I could probably have a best friend. With my little internal toolbox of wrong sized drill bits, I don't really get to have a best friend. Am lucky to have any friends at all. I have friends like Joel Warner who won't speak to me on the phone. I definitely don't get a Nate. I'll just watch him on Oprah and wish he was picking out tiny yet resourceful furniture for my tiny house and it would magically look and feel huge and then he would order cupcakes from this cool shop he knows and we would take the dogs to the beach and not fret about tickets. OF COURSE he would love dog agility and we would hang out at trials together and we would both have cute outfits.

But Nate has bad dogs. Or they used to be bad dogs. Because Oprah used her powers to have Cesar Milan fix them.

I kind of don't get Cesar Millan. I've only seen his show a couple times; he seems to sort of waltz in, wave around his arms and talk about pack leaders and then the dogs are magically good dogs. He lives somewhere in downtown LA in a giant pit filled with horrible fanged pitbulls and dogs with visible tattoos who all get along and rollerskate around skid row with him. I don't know if he beats the dogs or what, but he seems to have hordes of evil dogs that are transformed instantly. So whatever. His show makes it look like all you have to do is put your leash up high by their ears and tell them you are the pack leader and they're lovable angels, so I don't really buy his voodoo method. I tell my dogs all the time I am the pack leader and only Otterpop believes me. Ruby goes and makes a sandwich and Gustavo is too busy running around the backyard with another one of my socks. And Timmy can't hear. But he is a good dog so i don't need to tell him.

But one thing he does say is exercise dogs a lot. I am totally down with that. You might not see my dogs and say, wow those are well behaved dogs. You probably would actually not say that. Unless we are just having a really good day or they are completely exhausted. So, to make them even borderline well behaved, I have to run the pants off of them. So do you see why I can't just stroll around town with them on leashes? Stuff them into a little fenced pen of bark chips with a whole bunch of other dogs? Why they need to go out onto acreage and actually run? Cesar Millan would agree. So would Nate. And probably even Oprah. Although she just hires a dog nanny to run her dogs, or buys them a ranch, or totes them around on a plane where she probably has a dog treadmill.

Hey Nate. Did you even try dog agility?

This is maybe not for the faint of heart.

I know. It's like, is she even DOING dog agility anymore? Rest assured we have 2 weekends of USDAA in a row coming up, and yes. I have barely been practicing. And Gustavo has barely been learning anything new except chew on the couch pillows. Oh wait, not new. Oh wait. And that's my sock. Hold on a minute.

OK. Gustavo has a weird wart thing growing on his nose. And today we go be therapy dogs and visit the nursing home. And he looks ugly.


Here's what his nose looked like a until a few weeks ago.


Here it is with the attractive and giant wart.

I showed it to one of my clients who is a small animal vet. She said, yep, wart. But in better and more complicated vet words. I believe the words were the like dog version of genital warts, a "common" thing puppies can get on their faces. My puppy has common genital warts on his nose.

So my idea was, can I knock him out with Tramadol and just cut it off? This is where the horse folk differ than some of the dog folk. We just sometimes knock out our animals and do stuff to them because, well, that's what we do. We like to keep an arsenal of drugs on hand ourselves. Dog folk seem to generally take them in to dog offices. Luckily I have vets that come to the barn and who understand my Perhaps A Little Bit of Knowledge is Too Much Knowledge Tendencies.

"Um," she said, "I guess you could do that. It might just go away on it's own, too. Maybe you want to bring him in the office if it doesn't?"

"So you can knock him out and cut it off?"

She looks at me. "I guess you can just do it." She'd have to knock him out to lidocaine his nose anyways. He is not an easy patient. Do not even ask how teaching him to do dog fingernails is going. He is freakishly, horribly strong for such a tiny dog and for as friendly and nice as he is, doesn't like to be messed with.

I'm like, "Do you think it's gonna need a stitch? Like if it has a root?" I think I sounded a little too eager.

Laura. Don't lets perform surgery on our own dog, ok? When we're feeling flush again, after this month's tax FIASCO, he can go get his wart sliced off by a pro. Because giant nose warts just aren't that cute. I just hope all our nursing home friends don't care.

I went and broke the law again.

I know, I am just beating that dead horse.


Over and over.


But I'm still walking my dogs in my neighborhood park every day.


Even if it means I am conducting illegal activity.


And just waiting to get my ass busted for real.

Otterpop has powers we are only beginning to understand.

I believe she has the power to persuade others to do her dirty work.


While she enjoys relaxing with a hobby.


When said dirty work has been identified, I am like the sheriff and a culprit must be named in the crime.


Amnesty goes to only one citizen of my house. Everyone else, likely guilty.

Especially you, Otterpop.

Hey they use really long sentences in the New Yorker too.

Do you think when your computer is making a constant clicking sound from inside it's tiny little guts, it is a bad thing? If my blog disappears soon, you may know why. Send help.

I read this on the newyorker.com, "Loading up an empty elevator car with discarded Christmas trees, pressing the button for the top floor, then throwing in a match, so that by the time the car reaches the top it is ablaze with heat so intense that the alloy (called “babbitt”) connecting the cables to the car melts, and the car, a fireball now, plunges into the pit: this practice, apparently popular in New York City housing projects, is inadvisable."

Last night at Dirt Nite I had a little break between teaching my beginner's class and running Ruby, Pop and Hobbes in class. Yes. I run a lot in class. I set jumps a lot too, so I just pretty much am out there run, run, running for an hour and a half. I like running. Only when it involves dogs.

So during the break I took Gustavo out and practiced him on some of the equipment that no one was using. Did some dogwalks, some teeters, that kind of thing. There was a little sequence set up with a straight tunnel that I had used earlier for my class, having them threadle out of the straight tunnel to a jump. So I ran it with Gustavo. He's never done a straight tunnel. Or a threadle. Duh. Oh my god. It was like a teensy, tiny 12" cannonball coming out of the tunnel, and with no threadle, no way to pull him to the jump. He was just blasting away and out somewhere else. And I could tell he thought this was the coolest thing ever.

Like a kid who discovers a diving board. Or how to skateboard down the steepest hill. Or setting fires to Christmas trees in elevators. And he kept sending himself back up to the teeter so he could release off it and into that straight tunnel. I think he would have done it all night. If I was a good dog trainer, I could have used this opportunity to start to teach a threadle arm. But since we only had a few minutes, I was a bad dog trainer and let him keep shooting himself through the straight tunnel because it cracked me up. Perhaps inadvisable.

Maybe if they had some dogs and some tunnels in the New York city housing projects, it would keep the elevators from being turned into fireball pit plunging tubes.

If we are truly irritated, let's just take the irritation out on Starbucks.

So what would you rather hear about? The long conversation I had last night with Ranger J. Burns, that ended with a warning not a ticket, and a promise that he would personally never shoot me with an assault weapon no matter how fast I ran away from him into the bushes? And my theory for him that my dogs are like beer, and my leashes in my hand are like brown paper bags, and how good cops, not bad cops, turn a blind eye at the brown paper bags so they can save their enforcement frying for bigger fish. Which he didn't exactly buy, but I thought I should explain it to him anyways. I did manage to not lose my temper, although I did make him wait for me to count to 10.

Or perhaps you would like to hear how Gustavo had a great practice, was speedy like wind, flying over the big boy a-frame and the remodeled dogwalk and slamming his teeter all by himself with gusto and running through his poles with no training wheels? No slamming on brakes. No bad memories of scarey country dogs. All speedy and wild!

Or perhaps you'd be interested to know my hair is currently wadded into a big fat hair wad and it is still coated with dust. Or that I made Otterpop dance around in my living room with me to the Cure.

No, I think those are all stories you have heard before. They just keep happening over and over again. On a different day and to a different soundtrack. But today I am listening to Willie Nelson singing with Johnny Cash. So I will tell you what leaped out at me from the newspaper in the morning. Because I am mean and that's something I didn't tell you yesterday or the day before. I don't even read the old fashioned paper newspaper anymore, but some guy still throws it out his car window into either our wet plants or under my car every morning at like 4am. I see him sometimes when I'm out there with Timmy. Some members of my family can only read sports things from paper and the internet is not the same no matter how much it is costing us to have the car guy throw it at us.

What the paper says, is how there is a 99% certain chance the Big Huge Quake Certain to Kill us All is happening for sure in the next 30 years. Like not probably. Not likely. Like for sure it is coming and for sure in my lifetime and for sure we are all going to die this time. Just reading that ensures mega heart palpitations on my part and is a great way for me to start my day in a panic. So, to get out of panic, need something else to think about. Because denial is how we live in earthquake country.

How about, since many trees are being butchered already for the sports pages and earthquake news, a pull out, 10x14" full color with varnish print ad from Starbucks tucked into that newspaper that showed their old '80's logo with the spread eagled and busty woodcut mermaid? Except that the mermaid has been de-nippled with different hair. Thank god that is a problem we have sports bras for and don't need to address in dog agility hair issues. Does anyone other than a graphic designer notice the Starbucks logo thing? Like they are pulling the retro thing to be cooler, since their name does not mean cool anymore. So if they harken back to the Olden Days of Starbucks, we think it's a little cooler?

Did you know you were getting a little lesson here in branding? People used to ask me "What is branding?" when I was a designer. Now that I am back in the horse world, people might ask me more when they are looking at a brand on a horse's butt and I am supposed to know, does that mean Zangersheide or Swedish Warmblood. But in graphic design, it is how do you incorporate visuals into twisting a consumer's perception of something so that they will consume it. This was one of the things that the better I got at it, the more it curdled my blood until I wanted to quit designing things for other people. Branding is a good line to be in if you are shrewd and more than a little mean.


I don't even care anything about Starbucks, but I do have this internal logo alarm system that makes me follow logos when they start to shift. Like tectonic plates shifting to our deaths! And now they have this weirdo hybrid logo, that is supposed to mean they are cool and retro, yet, not at the risk of offending anyone afraid of nipples. So it's not really retro, it's just sort of like retro. Which is what retro is anyways.


Only some of you will notice that the print ad used the old mermaid on the unvarnished cup, making it Stand Out Boldly. Some of you won't. Probably very few of you notice that it isn't REALLY the old logo, because her new hair covers her nipples. But those of us that did notice might tell others. Like right now. You might never, ever go to Starbucks. But you might need a coffee one day, say a dog agility trial. And perhaps there will be a choice of coffee places. And because I spent all this time calling to your attention this logo issue, when you think coffee, you might think about the mermaid's nipples, and you might notice the Starbucks current slick and way more sanitized for the '90's one, up there on a sign, right in front of your face. And go buy some.

Yep. As simple as that. Designers and Branding Experts sit around and think this stuff up and try to trick you into buying whatever their client is selling. And it is our duty to deconstruct it all. You can figure out Why Keith Richards Does Louis Vuitton ads. Just like we need to resist the rangers and question their every statement. I guess you wish I just told you about practicing with the dogs instead.

Dog agility hair styles but not for dogs.

I like Sarah a lot. Because even though I give really bad advice, she keeps asking for more! Thank you Sarah! You are my kind of people! Determined, even if it is just barking up the wrong tree! But will bark up wrong tree as long as it takes to get the squirrel out.

Sarah brings up another interesting and crucial dog agility problem. Hairstyle and lack thereof.

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Captain TSD:

A potential follow up [to the useless absolutely fascinating fashion information post] would be one on hair management strategies for Project Runway agility types, esp for those of us that have medium length 'dos that can't do the wadded up pony tail action and have heads that are large and weirdly shaped so that baseball caps don't work unless there is no wind and you aren't running and turning and moving your head a lot. Backwards baseball caps work better but that is just too over-the-top jock for an agility girl, if you ask me. Barettes?

Clearly, the agility world needs your expertise!

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Once again, I feel your pain, Sarah. I too have medium length locks and I actually do the wadded up pony tail action under the belief that if I can't see it, then maybe neither can you. But when I think about it, yep, the guy behind me in line at the liquor store can and if you are waiting to go in the ring after me, so can you. Although you are probably tugging with your dog or having it do little tricks, and the guy in the liquor store line is probably looking at the 25 year old girl that is ahead of me in a really, really short denim skirt. So, we may be safe but probably not.


I have a few hair strategies. One was the cutting it short strategy. Let's take a trip back in time, back to when that pink flowering bush in my yard was still alive. Currently, it is dead. That is me and gardening. This hair cut was fun for like 5 minutes, everyone said "Cute!!" but what I felt was hair in my eyes at all times and then you are doing a front cross and you brush it out of your eyes and there your dog goes into the tunnel thinking you meant flickaway. Don't confuse your serpentine with the flickaway, and certainly don't because you have a new hair cut. I believe I had experimented with some Miss Clairol of the Orange variety at this point in time as well.


So let's fast forward into time. Today for instance. My hair looks like this today. This is not at all a useful hair cut for anything except standing in front of a camera in the bathroom.


So usually I just stick it in a hat. I have a lot. This one is like a warm hat but also like a baseball hat! Could also be combined with the hair wad tail.


This one is actual baseball hat. Which is what I end up wearing at work a lot too. It is our summer look. Let's not forget about shading our delicate eye area from the wrinkling sun rays. I have not had the wind problems Sarah speaks of but perhaps I have a differently weirdly shaped head than she does. Or it's not as windy here.


When it's cold I always enjoy a nice beanie. I have a million of these. Because I lose them. Cold weather is our hair friend because it's hard to go wrong with a beanie.


Here I am about to demonstrate the hair wad pony tail. That is actually really hard to take a picture of without a helper. Am using great concentration.


Aha. Got it. A lady of many talents. But good hair is not one of them. Because I wore a hair wad pony tail all day today!


Let me just stick that hoodie back up. Um. Sarah. Once again, I'm not sure where we've gotten here.

I am not feeling the barettes.

I have tried headbands but I do believe these are a secret weapon of stylists and to look good actually need to be styled and the common, non hairstylist toting plebian should possibly not attempt unless you want to look sort of weirdly foreheady with lumpy hair sticking up at the top.

There is the potential of REALLY short, waify hair but then you have to remember to get it cut a whole bunch and also you need to have a lovely shaped head, not a head shaped at all melony or zuchini like or like anything from the vegetable kingdom. I believe mine to be eggplant!

To sum up. Did I give any advice here? We were supposed to be talking strategy. Once again, it is possible I have come up a little short. We will be sure to start taking notes next dog show we have, in a couple weeks, when we see some good hair, and get back to you with that strategy. In the meantime, just use the hoodie.

Will you send me cookies when I end up in prison?

Yesterday, we took the 3 fast dogs hiking through the meadows and the redwood forest for a couple hours. There's a creek that Gustavo swims in and Ruby tries not to fall in. Good and tired dogs after they run for 2 hours straight on the steep trail through the woods. Santa Cruz has miles and miles of the most beautiful land I've ever seen. It was in the '80's this weekend and it was a nice place to go on a hot day, and in the middle of the day so we didn't have to worry about taking 3 single servings of bobcat snack out during coyote witching hour at dusk.

We went to a spot where it's ok to ride horses and mountain bikes. Because those are super low impact to the environment. But not ok to take dogs. Which are super high impact to the environment. My dogs could easily scare a bunny. Probably even cause global warming, Al Gore. Well, we take 'em anyways. Never see anyone in there but a handful of bikers with lots of tattoos and special bike crash padding because they are gnarly. We have to leave our car on the university campus to get there, because it's illegal to park on any roads around there. And it's also illegal to have dogs on the campus. So have to walk 'em down the hill to where the trail starts, right by a large sign at the entrance to the campus clearly spelling out N-O D-O-G-S. I made very, very sure to drive the speed limit and wear my seatbelt to get there though.

I swear I'm not trying to be a criminal. But I live in one of the most beautiful places in the world, and I just like to walk around on the land that is 5 minutes from my house and run my dogs. That's it. Are dogs a gateway drug? Is the next step embezzeling the elderly and cooking up meth in my garage? Then I start trafficking in sex slaves and stealing copper pipes off construction sites? Do you see the trouble I get in just from staying home from one single dog show?

Hey, not to change the subject, but to change the subject I made a quiz. Called the Which Member of Team Small Dog are You? Quiz. You have to go to here to take it. Come back and tell me if you ended up the Team Member you thought you would be.

Sometimes when you're really submissive, you might start peeing all over the place.

OK. Help me out here. You all have been following the saga of Lighthouse Field.

So I am still walking my dogs out there. Not Timmy, and not as much before work, but I take the 3 fast ones out every evening. Me and hardly anyone else. Except there's a new population in the field now. Not the homeless guys, and drunk teenagers, they've been there for a while, but the new dog people.

The ones that are Obeying the New Rules and Walking Their Dogs on a Leash.

Yeah. They take their dog on a walk, in the field, on a leash. Maybe a flexi leash, or maybe a 6 footer. Tied on to their dog. And these ones, maybe will smile at you, maybe avert their eyes. One lady started whimpering at me the other night about how brave I was and that she is scared of the rangers. I told her I really haven't been seeing them in weeks, especially near sundown. She wasn't swayed. Said she couldn't afford the ticket. I told her she can "work it off" with Friends of Lighthouse Field. And no one has actually gotten a ticket yet, that I've heard of at least. She wasn't swayed. She said they were scary when they had told her to put a leash on the first time. She wished me luck and pulled her dog along in it's pinch collar. It was growling. It's bad on a leash.

Then there's a new type. The ones that are smug, and apparently happy about the leash law, and have the gallbladder to say, "Don't you know your dog is supposed to be on a leash now?" It's happened twice. The first time I just kept moving, thinking I must have imagined they said that. Who would say that? In Lighthouse Field?

Last night, a 50ish couple, in LLBeanwear, sturdy shoes and fleece vests, walked by me. Keep in mind, hardly anyone walks in Lighthouse Field anymore, 33 acres of vacant overnight, where once hundreds of people walked their dogs every single day. And this evening, I had seen a few people with their dogs on a leash, one guy and his kid with their dog free, some hippies that looked mightily stoned off their gourds, and some totally inbred looking guys drinking beer and talking about their baseball hats. They liked Gustavo and offered me a beer. I am in the minority out there now. And I didn't stop to drink with the redneck guys.

The LLBean lady says to me, "They're supposed to be on a leash now."

I stopped. I turned around. I looked her dead in the eye.

"Leash. My. Ass." Maybe I said it kinda loud. With dramatic pauses between each word. Tone rising each word. Maybe a smidgey bidgey not so Nice.

They both just looked kind of googly eyed for a count and then they scurried on. They had a big tan dog.

What has happened here that people are just rolling over, belly up, and taking it? I am so totally not getting it. I'm going down clawing and kicking and screaming. It may be a sinking ship but I'll sink with it. And now, the people that like dogs are split into 2 groups. The ones that Obey and the ones that Don't Obey.

It's one thing if someone without a dog that is a tattle tale, rule following type says it. That happened down at the beach one night, and I just said, "Over my dead body am I putting my dogs on a leash down here." I think my tone and the glint in my eye was freaky and they just moved away and left me alone. They had kids. I sounded deranged and manic. They were probably happy it's not a dog beach now, except for the few of us that are ignoring the state's decree. I just grabbed a stick and threw it for the dogs for a long time while they watched.

But when the dog people become speaker phones of the bureaucracy, something is weird. Something is off. Something is upside wrong. It feels like the ship starting to go down. Remember in Titanic and Leonardo DeCaprio is holding on to a chunk of wood and he turns blue and I guess he is saving Kate Winslet or Celine Dion and he dies? Did they save anyone? I forget. That ship sunk. But he hung on til the bitter end, all blue making makeup and all. Good thing I have nice claws.

Don't lets make this into a thing.

A weird and disturbing thing happened the other day. Dog training is so hard. Do you hear the sound of my head bashing against the wall?

We were practicing and all of a sudden, the big muscle dogs from down the road came running up to the fence and scared Gustavo. I mean, little weenie that he is, it wasn't really that scarey of an event. The dogs came up to the fence and barked. Gustavo is a tiny little 12lb dog who can run like the wind, but pumpkins can scare the pants off of him. The big dogs don't scare me, but then, neither do pumpkins. And he generally does like to freeze and stare at unknown big dogs he sees from far away when he's running on the beach or in a field. Seems like a smart thing to do when you are a puny little thing. But then he likes to go play with them.

So when the dog posse came running up the lane, big, meatheady, tan country dogs, charging the fence, who woulda thunk he would have been all that phased? I am used to tough and mean little dogs that, had they been over there would have either ignored them (Otterpop, if I had the frisbee) or maybe just given them a look and a quick charge back, then back to business (Ruby, if I had a chunk of cheese). And the big dogs were on the other side of the nice, tall fence. But his bodyguards were parked on the other side of the field, and it was just him out there.

Gusvtavo acted as if his whole little world was coming crashing to a halt. I mean really. Crashing. And, he shut down. Deer in the headlights. Slammed on the brakes. Frozen. Not moving. Stuck.

Here is where we part ways, dog agility friends and non dog agility friends. Dog agility friends all gasped when reading the last paragraph. Non dog agility friends are like, "So the dog stopped running. Sounds like a nice time for a cold beer!"

But It means. Turn off brain. Lose drive. Go slow. Something I thought I would never, ever, ever let happen with this dog. Not once. Not a single time.

I have lived through Ruby who was a MAJOR shut downer for years. She was the first dog I ever trained and hugely challenging and would shut down completely the instant I made any kind of error or a dog walked by or there was a noise or a fly on the field. Screeeech. That is the sound of her old brakes. It took years for me to channel her natural and intense prey drive for the powers of good. And every so often it still goes haywire.

Then I got an Otterpop, a paranoid dog who can run with blinding speed everywhere, except for at a trial which freaks her out. And I tried this and that and Susan Garrett and this and that and I never have quite hit on the magic combination that makes for a dog that has 100%, non distractable, all the time drive. Here is where my dog training skills go weak and buckley. Because the Good Dog Trainers say that "Your Dog Needs To Only Think That Agility is The Best Thing Ever to Do With You At All Times. The Distractions Should Not Be Higher Than The Intensity of Your Dog's Drive to Play With You." Augh. I have to go to work, and to be a good dog trainer I have to teach my dog to PLAY better. Smash head against wall again.

I had my mini border collie dreams for Gustavo. Of full drive, all the time. Which quickly became apparent that border collie, he ain't, not even close. Which is ok. I wouldn't trade Gustavo for even Oprah's ranch if she was going to Big Give it to me. OK. Maybe I would think about it. Don't send self to Sophie's Choice Mental Hell Game. But fast running, he does. And the first time seeing him compute the fact that, Hey, I could stop running now because I got scared, totally freaked me out.

So I had to quick step into what would I do if I was teaching agility class Right Now and this happened to a student? I would say, "Let's not make a big deal about it. Don't make it into a thing. Back up, do something SUPER EASY that he likes for a reward he loves." Which actually happened to a dog when I was teaching the other night and we patched it up lickety split.

What is his best reward? Better even than hot dogs in a tupperware?


Play bitey face frisbee with Otterpop. This is different than Otterpop's version of frisbee. Hers is old school. Someone throws the frisbee and you get it. His involves she chases the frisbee and he attacks her and she attacks back all the way to and from the frisbee and he makes an attempt to get it but really Otterpop owns all frisbees and that is a lot of work to get it. And play over and over and also get a treat sometimes when he actually gets the frisbee away from her. So that's what we did. He snapped out of it and played. And then I'd quick park Otterpop, have him do a couple jumps, chase the frisbee himself, and then get Otterpop out of her parking space and let them chase it together. Repeat, rinse, repeat.


So we didn't really end up doing much agility. Even though I had taken apart the dogwalk to make a mini table dogwalk, dragged tunnels across the field, set up channel weaves, lowered the a-frame, essentially remodeled the whole agility field just for Gustavo basically, who now I am afraid to do anything with except a jump and a frisbee in fear of ruining him.


So we fixed it. But I saw it. And even though the advice I gave as an agility teacher the other night was "Don't lets make this into a THING," I have this seed planted now of the ugly I saw. And I want it to go away. Don't I always try to have an ending on a story, like a HAPPY ending, like a sitcom? Like Laverne and Shirley? Isn't my life a nice sitcom and every episode ends so HAPPY? Thanks Laverne for fixing my dog! Don't lets make this into a THING.


There. Ha. There's a partial frowny ending. Doom and gloom. No more Mrs. Sitcom. Laverne and Dog Screwing Up Lady. You tell 'em Otterpop.

I interview a cool person so we can all take notes.

Today we have a special treat. It is the First Interview of our New Interview Series.

Featuring interviews by cool people who do not do dog agility, and dog agility people who I think are cool. I hope to delve into important subjects like, why do the cool people not like dog agility, how did the dog agility people get so cool, and can we see the inside of their house.

Today's interview is with the fabulous Kelsey Nicholson, a Bay Area artist who has a bunch of dogs and who likes running but who does not do dog agility. And, Kelsey Has Been To Marfa, Texas. She is super cool. Although she wouldn't let me take any pictures inside her house this week. So let's see what we can learn, my dog agility friends.

Kelsey is also currently having an art show at the Bedford Gallery in Walnut Creek, CA through June 8.

Hello and welcome to your interview!

I'm so honored to be interviewed by Team Small Dog. As you know I am way behind on the dogs per square foot ratio and my goal in life is to catch up.


Here's a shot from her installation in Walnut Creek. Kelsey loves wallpaper murals and stuffed birds!


And another one. With pergo floors.

Your art show has the taxidermy factor which I believe there to be a correlation of dog agility people who enjoy taxidermy. Because if there is one of me out there, there are others.


The specimens are on loan from the Lindsay Wildlife Museum in Walnut Creek. They were very very nice to let me use them. They will go back after the show. However, AttaBoyStudios maybe has secret thoughts of a future in taxidermy.

Is the deer sleeping in a dog bed?


Yes, Boy Howdy is without his downstairs dog bed until June as the fawn is using it. I washed it first. Am wondering if Boy Howdy will smell stuffed fawn on his dog bed and wonder where it has been all this time.

Do you think that your art work will ever tackle the culture of dog agility using landscape photo murals and synthetic flooring materials?


Don't you think the re-constructed birch trees could really be weave polls??? I could see that.

OK. How cool would those weave poles look. Maybe we could commission you to build a stunning and non pvc and purple and yellow agility course someday when we have our own ranch.

How did you come to visit Marfa? And was it everything you had hoped for?


Well, like many people I know, Marfa had long been on my list. I once applied to a residency at Chinati (Donald Judd's DEA site there) which I of course did not get. It definitely has an art mecca calling.

Team Small Dog feels so behind the times. We did not love Marfa until this year.


So anyway, my long time pal Joni lives in Austin. I love to visit her. She is really funny. She also wanted to go to Marfa forever. So we planned a trip that was me flying to Austin to hang out for a couple of days and then we drove to Marfa (about 8 hours) in our rental Camry. Two nights and three days in Marfa (which was plenty in mid week in mid May since you can walk the entire town in an hour and since it was a "quiet time" people tend to not open anything even if they say they are going to so you are left looking at the outside of buildings in the hot sun.)


Oh, oh, but I should mention that one night we did go see the Marfa Lights, which you see from a viewing spot just out of town and the lights are far off but are REALLY there. They move around just over the horizon out in the desert. Supposedly no one knows what causes them. That was fun. The band Animal Collective was going to play on Friday night, but we weren't staying that long.

We are pretty sure Animal Collective is a band that cool people enjoy.


We then went to Chinati Hot Springs, which was also during a "quiet time" (two other people there.)


Donald Judd used to own that when he lived in Marfa as his get away place for weekends. That involved driving really slowly for two hours on an unpaved road in the middle of the Chihuahuan desert in our Camry, which was highly memorable. You will need a truck if you are going to live in Marfa with 4 wheel drive. The outskirts happen fast and the roads end.


Then we went to BIG BEND National Park, which I got to say is what you would REALLY love because it is so so beautiful. They have lots of Javelinas.

Those pig things with fangs?


I got to pretend I was one with a Park Ranger for the amusement of an audience.

Hmm...Would that outfit you were javelina-ing in make a good dog agility outfit?

I was wearing sweats. Just a skirt made of sweatshirt material over the sweat pants, and my favorite hat that I have had for ten years and is slowly fading away. Yes, probably good for dog agility, but surely not of the stylish level you aspire to.

Don't let Kelsey fool you. She is always VERY stylish. Perhaps another not doing dog agility clue.

Was Marfa everything you had hoped for?


YES. We stayed in the cool hotel and spent a lot of time in the pool.

Um, what about cattle ranches and running across the desert?


We had coffee at the Brown Recluse Coffee Shop once (because then they didn't open the other days even though the sign says open daily. The galleries are nice and I drank a beer with the owners at one, Gallerie Urbane, where I will have a show in spring of '09.

Guess who has already invited herself along as a "Helper of Artist" if she can figure out how to take off work?


Chinati Foundation and all the Judd stuff is great and everywhere.

Donald Judd is known for minimalism. We learned about him in art school. He likes boxes. I have to say he isn't exactly one of my favorite artists, but minimalism is important to life and look what it did for Marfa.


I bought a lot of books because they have a really fancy big book store in town with a great bathroom. Everyone talks to you I think because there is nothing else to do.

You figured it out by now that Kelsey gave me all these photos of Marfa. She took this one in the bathroom. See, this is why she is an artist and I gave all that up for the life of dog agility. I forget to take pictures of the bathroom.


We had a great meal at a hip restaurant out by the cemetery (nice place to walk on the edge of town) that was open!!! Called the Blue Javelina and I had a blood orange, fresh ginger screwdriver that I then attempted to copy for the rest of the summer.


We were also there when it was not so hot. Only 80's or 90's. I also imagine it is different when it is 112.

Was everyone in Marfa cool?

Of course everyone in Marfa is not cool. I think it's a lot more like, "why are you here??" We did get to listen to good old fashioned teen age gossip at the pizza place, which is called Pizza Foundation, and is in an old gas station, and is well, cool.

Would you ever move to Marfa?


No. Extended visit, yeah probably. It really is too far away from everything. You have to drive to the next town to go to the vet. It's some little college town that doesn't seem to have anything cool that college towns have, although I only drove thru it so am probably not giving it a fair chance. Maybe it would be good for a second home. Supposedly, there are many people who spend half time there which is perhaps not super popular with the people that spend full time there. I dunno, maybe. I would still love to have a residency there. It would be great to spend more time there to see what I really think. So far I think it is just a nice place to visit. A great place to visit.

Kelsey and most people including my husband think that I should find somewhere other than Marfa to move to.


Here's a picture of Sealy and Boy with cows on my Dad's property in Paicines, which is somewhere I do want to move to and I think you would too and is close enough to maybe convince Gary. Well, maybe when he retires.

Kelsey, why don't you do dog agility? You have all these dogs, you can run far distances including actual marathons!

Cause I would never be better then you!!! That, and the fact that I am far too lazy. That, and Walker's baseball and or soccer games already take up all of our weekends. I'm the kind of person who has the ability during the day to think things like waking up really early to drive four hours to a dog agility competition somewhere in the Central Valley would be a great idea, but come four a.m. I would turn off the alarm and go back to sleep. But, would I like to have a team of small (or medium or big) dogs of my own, even if they wreck the house because I don't walk them enough, YES!!!

But you still have a team.


Here's a pic of the three dogs I have so far for the team. Go National! Once I was walking them and some lady said, "Oh, you like those national colours." Then I wondered if the black, brown, tan combination is referred to as "national," and have never found out, but like to call them that now anyway. The dogs are (from back to front) Gabbi, a 10 year old berner, Sealy Bird Jones, a 14 year old Sacramento SPCA mutt, and Boy Howdy, a 3 year old rat terrier mix rescued from Hollister through the Milo Foundation.

Boy Howdy would be REALLY good at agility. This just drives me crazy that Kelsey does not want to do dog agility. And now she even has birch tree weave poles for her driveway.

A couple of years ago I attempted to become a dog walker, since I walk extra dogs anyway and people said they would pay me. But it turns out I am too lazy to invoice and then too embarrassed to bill for 4 months of walks, when the truth is I would be walking the dog anyway.

Kelsey includes this story about the first time we met. Or actually that she met Timmy. I don't know where I was. I guess now you can figure out that my interview subject is an actual friend and not some random person. Why would I want to interview some random person? I believe this is called nepotism and I believe I am a practioner of this.

Laura and I both went to graduate school at UC Davis. I did not really meet Laura until later in Santa Cruz. She graduated just as I was starting. However, I did meet Timmy the very first time I went there. I knocked on the studio building doors and a woman answered (not Laura) to let me in. Timmy ran up to investigate and promptly peed on the leg of the woman. She was pissed and stormed off. I was left to look around the studios and decide if I wanted to go to Davis. Here’s what I thought: Woman, grumpy. Timmy, smart and feisty and cute. Davis, great studio space and dog friendly!!!! Exactly what I was looking for. I started the next fall and promptly adopted Sealy at the Sacramento SPCA. Sealy, like Timmy is the best dog ever. Sealy like Timmy is now old.

This is the only time I ever have heard of Timmy peeing on someone. Kelsey told me who this woman was. I agree she is grumpy and humorless. But still probably did not deserve to be peed on.

If someone was to ask me what my favorite dog is, I would answer, “the one standing in front of me.” I’m a little slutty in that way. Even Sealy slips down the list if we are walking past Maggie’s house (a Norwich Terrier, I think they are like hedgehogs, and although I have never seen a hedgehog, I think I LOVE them,) or if I am obsessing over any number of dogs that need to be adopted. I once tried to be a foster dog parent. I thought it was a good way to get to help more dogs get adopted. That’s how we got Boy Howdy.

I have officially “rescued” numerous dogs from outside of their very own houses. That’s why I put my address and phone number on my dogs’ tags. I would not have taken all those dogs home for baths and meals and to lay on my couch, had they had tags that told me they lived right where I found them wandering in the street. Well, I probably would have just until the owners came home so I could make sure the dog was safely inside again. Once as I was helping a dog into the back of my car, the owner came out of their house and said, “excuse me, can I help you? That’s my dog.” Oops. Tags!!

Glad to provide the dog agility community with all sorts of useful tidbits.

I have a thingy in my internet that tells me what you were searching on that brought you into Team Small Dog. Very creepy, no? It's like it saw you type that thing into your google window and came running back to tattle on you. To me. Little crybaby tattling internet thingy. So apparently I am providing a lot of useful content, because when you searched on this list of stuff, of course the first place the internet sent you was to Team Small Dog.

Smallest dog they're ever was

Attack classes for your pitbull on dvd

I want to cook for my very small dog

Sweatpants for dogs

Small dog tiara

5 horrible qualities in a person

Crack hangover

Dental office remodeling

Hello meth lab marfa

Scoring my clogs

The Important Work we call weave pole training.

So, last time we checked in, Gustavo had sometimes wires on his poles, channels still open, and was flying through like a banshee due to the magic of tupperware.

I am happy to report we have wires off. Although when we go visit unknown poles, I've been putting wires on the entries/exits just because. Because he is Gustavo. But we have our channels at home almost closed and he is fast and low like a tiny little border collie, and when we go visit unknown poles I only visit ones that I can open out a little bit. Just because.

But here is the part we really, really like.


So you have seen my dog agility field driveway. We love it's soft, rubbery surface perfectly manicured grass yeah it's a driveway. But the dog agility field is conveniently located on one side of our back gate, the other side being the other dog agility field back yard known as the nice place to dig up the gophers near the contact trainer. So, when it's time to practice poles, everyone, even Timmy, has to stay behind the back gate and they are VERY SURE I am taking tupperwares out to the Special Tupperware Placing Platforms also known as some bricks on either end of the poles. And the mayhem starts behind the gate.

Usually I let Otterpop come out first and do a couple sets of poles. Because she always nutso anytime you do anything, she is our choice to warm the crowd up. Like one of those manic, bad comedians whose act could involve chainsaws and giant cubes of cheese. You can just wave a frisbee in front of her face and get insane barking. You can do just about anything around Otterpop and you will get insane barking and spinning around and leaping.

Then it's Gustavo's turn. He is already in a frenzy because he BELIEVES in the power of the tupperware, and flies through his poles a few times, back and forth.

Then, Ruby who is probably by now making growling pig noises unique to growling pigs and Ruby, comes out. To get them back behind the gate, at this point, they have to be dragged through it by their tiny little collars because it is MAYHEM! Usually whoever is behind the gate is having a war on a stuffed squirrel too. I run in there and tug on squirrels with them between dogs. Probably I am yelling stuff like GO GO GO and OW and GIMMEE BACK THAT SQUIRREL!

Then we go through the rotation again. Another couple times through for Otterpop. Who is always surprised and delighted to be part of this whole tupperware scheme that originally was just for the puppy. And on through the ranks. At this point, it is like wrestlers attacking the gate. Like that sport where guys with beards and tattoos are attacking each other behind a chain link fence? Is that real sport? Or like old school roller derby. It is scarey and we love it. Gustavo is shrieking and flinging himself at the gate and the neighbors are like What the F*** is the She Doing? I usually vehemently discourage barking in general but for teaching Gustavo, and for bringing Ruby's pole speed back (which seems to be completely back on our dog agility field driveway poles), they can be in complete frenzy insanity for all I care and the neighbors are just going to have to understand I am a Real Dog Trainer and this is Important Work going on over here.

Everyone here can be trained to do stuff with hot dogs.

So the other day, I didn't go to a dog show on a Sunday. Actual friends came over. And friends always bring toddlers and dogs to my house. Because what is a party without dogs running through it chasing down toddlers who just wanted to eat their own hot dog. And because a houseful of dogs that enjoy chasing balls thrown by toddlers means time for another glass of wine. It's a crowd that isn't really thrown by occasional sightings of dogs up on the buffet table. They just fling 'em off and crack open another wine bottle.


It's weird, having actual Sundays off. We are skipping the giant, crazy trial this week called Haute Tracs, a 4 day mega trial with DAM Teams and like a million tries at Standard and Gamblers Q's. All the cool people take off work starting Thursday to go. We are not cool and have to go to actual work instead. And then I decided not even to drive up for Sunday. Because we have a curse at Haute Tracs. I have had Ruby come up horribly lame twice at that one and Otterpop just totally melt down once. So wow. Another whole Sunday of no dog show again.


I already feel a little left out. Maybe I'll have another party.

Today you are getting an advice column from someone that probably should not be giving advice.

Sometimes, I get actual emails that ask me questions. I do love answering questions! I am always concerned that anyone would actually want my advice. But here is a question today from Sarah:

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

OK Captain TSD:

I am writing b/c I need your help. In fact, we *all* need your help. Like a lot. I am a walking agility trial fashion faux pas. What Not To Wear here I come! Not seeing any inspiration at trials, that's for sure. Please blog your thoughts on this! I am 5'8", and an athletic horse girl (but not anorexic) I have lots going for me, but my agility look really sucks ass. Bad wind pants, dog t-shirt, etc. I want to be cool like you and TSD. What do you wear when you trial? I know you have your totally awesome red goretex shoes (but maybe you were being facetious about those?) Please be my role model!

Sarah

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


Oh Sarah. And the *all* you talk about. I am very excited you called me cool but here is the problem. Number one, I am pretty sure the new cool word is not cool. But I am actually not sure what the new cool word is. I always say cool too. Just like saying Cowboy Up to someone who is whining is not cool because what the Cowboys actually say is Buck Up. I just learned this. Number two, I have the same exact problem as you and I am actually not cool and I wish I was. I have a whole bunch of friends that are cool. When I try to study their ways and figure out how I could be more like them, they have all told me the same thing. Dog agility is never going to be cool.

But Sarah. We see the coolness potential in dog agility, right? The fashion end of it is a big part of the whole uncoolness thing is my guess. I do worry someone would select me to be on What Not To Wear too. They are so mean, that Stacy and Clinton. And they would throw away my favorite shirt and make me buy an ugly jacket and skirts with seaming and wide legged trousers. So we just have to unlock the fashion mystery code ourselves.


Let's start with the footwear. I thought those red shoes were cool, too. And I laid out some major dollarage for them. Then people sort of pointed and giggled and I even found out they were possibly not even cool in England, where they were from. So they pass the function text but the reality of them on the feet sort of gives an overall impression of Not Cool. Maybe if they were combined with the right thing. Jeans from the Gap and a dirty polar fleece jacket probably equals Not the Right Thing. A red tennis dress with pockets and piping and a little black hoody thing over it? That is maybe the right thing! If you have nice knees.

Not nice knees equals no tennis dress or sporty little golfing shorts. Including the plaid ones. Because I thought that we could take some fashion Q's from tennis and golf. Ladies do this and it involves running but also looking nice. Wait. Do you run in golf? Maybe if you throw your beer bottle into the giant windmill and they come out to arrest you. There are those nice, big grassy fields in golfing and I am pretty sure I would run if I did golfing. I know my dogs like riding in little electric golf carts.


A lot of times I wear cargo capris or my black sporty pants with a stripe down the leg. They feel at least inoffensive to me, but not very cool. And then Carson I believe once said cargo capris are the devil's work.


Sporty Spice used to look nice in sporty pants but now she looks like this.


Here's a picture of me that was featured in Clean Run magazine a long time ago. I wish I could tell you I was the featured star of an article about my super star dogs, but it was some random article about pointing the right way and I was very surprised to see me in there. At least I was a good example of pointing and not a bad example of pointing. But I had a grass stain on my knee and very old jeans on. But that is one of my favorite shirts. And stripey caps are a good way to hide the gray. Because our demographic, let's face it, involves gray hairs starting to sprout on heads. If you are not there yet, you might be soon. But this is maybe not cool.


Here's a link to some really bad videos on youtube from the DAM team trial in December where I am wearing the all black look. That is black sporty pants and a black sweater and even a black striped hat I think. That look sort of evolved out of the cold weather. Also you can see Otterpop do a teeter bail in one of the videos! So this looks sort of inoffensive and warm but maybe not cool.


Um. Sarah. I feel like I'm not getting anywhere here maybe. I did see you mentioned a dog t-shirt. I think there is a lot of room for improvement in dog t-shirts. Gigantic cartoon dogs, and montages of 3 dogs of a certain breed with that breed's name written in a large script at chest level may not be a good fashion statement. Also wind pants. Are your dog trials in very windy places? If not, you might want to switch to something that is not a wind pant. In the cold, I also tend to just wear a good pair of jeans. Like not the ones from the Gap. Unless you are just so hot even those look good on you. Otherwise, you may have to upgrade to a more better tailored expensive pair.


Accessories? I have this unreasonable attachment to clogs. Possibly not cool. Can accessories override that? Don't underestimate the power of a good accessory. Large purses are in this season and super useful for either a bunch of stuff for dogs or even just shoving your smallest dog in if you want to go into a casino.

OK. To sum it up. I think that I have barely scratched on the surface here. I am pretty sure somewhere out there is someone WAY cooler than me with some good dog agility fashion tips for us. A little help please?

Having a night of glamor without the team.

Last night, the team had to stay home when I went to Karl and Deb's for dinner and hopefully did not howl. I can't even grammarize that right now. Have at it. I taught the dogs that neat and funny trick to all start howling together and sometimes they think, hey, let's do it when there is NO ONE HOME so the neighbors think the green house with the paint falling off of it has been overrun by rabid javelinas. This is led by Otterpop, who always has to have the last word. A loud and long lasting last word.


Let's just say that really a lot of bottles of wine were opened, and then I got into a fight with her. This is pluckyfluff. The nation's foremost handspun yarn spinning yarn spinner and someone you don't really want to reckon with. We had a good reason though. She loved the movie Into the Wild and I think you know how I felt about that movie, right down to those ugly ass film titles that still give me nightmares sometimes to an Eddie Vedder soundtrack.


At some point I think it is possible I started seeing things in doubles.


That's when the fun just begins, right?


Luckily instead of dreaming about those horrible film titles and mountain cam Sean Penn shots, I had dreams of nice things.


Like these.


But then I got woken up by a spitting headache and a dog standing on top of my hair licking my forehead and I believe that I may have invited a whole lot of people over for a garden party today and I have an unplastered office and no garden and dirty things everywhere and the paint is all falling off my house and I believe that I may have said I would cook things. And my car had a sleepover at the dinner party. It is a glamorous lifestyle indeed, but someone's got to do it.

Let's go to the office with the team.

This is my office. There is some work standing in it.


Here is some more work.


This has been the latest work, like I really want to deal with the soap opera of the new feral cats. Scruffles is not a feral cat but apparently he has made friends with ALL of them, who are supposed to stay back in the feedroom and eat potential rats. I do not have time to deal with the cats at work. Can you tell the cats are driving me crazy? I don't really even like cats. But I like it when they eat the rats.


Maybe this is why I am so sensitive to dog agility apparel. Dog agility stuff is what I wear for hobby. It should be cool. Because look at what I wear to the office. Yes, it also involves a hair net. Sort of like a cafeteria lady, we all like our hair neat and tidy.



This is office wear too, shown in a ballerina pose. Not sure if cafeteria ladies wear these. Because we never see their legs, do we?


This is their office. Ruby is somewhere staring at feral cats.


This is only partway through my day. It was sunny in my office and I put on some more sun screen and ate a sandwich and was thinking how nice it would be to be all done with a mai tai and practicing some weave poles. How I thought I could squeeze picture taking into my day, I am not sure. I have a busy office.

This nice moment lasted like 2 seconds then there was some more work to ride and then at noon my lessons start and then I stand in dirt and sit on a fence or a brick wall made of plywood and sometimes pace and wave my arms, yelling and dragging heavy items around and up and down until about 6pm. Many hours of yelling non stop. Probably I have made someone cry. And I may have tied someone's legs onto something with a giant rubber band. And made someone get off their hobby and do some work then let them back on their hobby. Did I mention I do a LOT of yelling at the office? But I think I am pretty lucky to have this office. And when someone finally gets that lead change in the bad direction on their pony, then the whole day at work was all worth it.

Can you identify Team Small Dog?

Today I tried to practice some challenging distance challenges with my dogs.


Boy did we suck. There is no gamblers teeter for Otterpop anywhere in her near future. Let's just leave it at that. Long story of teeter heartbreak. However you can send her to the weaves from bizarre places like relaxing in a lawn chair or a parked car. Very useful for those gamblers Q's. Ruby, little bit more of a wildcard. I thought that I had spent lots of time working on tunnel and contact discriminations with her, like YEARS, but today she proved me wrong. Such is life when you train dogs the team small dog way.

It was just kind of one of those days. You've had them.


But I thought perhaps our distance issues are a problem that could be retrained overlooked by sporty outfits?

We've been down this path before. We liked Jillian's sporty Project Runway coats and sweaters for dog agility wear. But for spring and summer, I saw these golf pictures and I thought, that is the face of dog agility! Lady golfers! They have spikey shoes. With tassels! The ladies looked so nice and friendly with smooth pony tails and this mysterious one glove. There were plaid knee shorts and shirts with collars and little skirts with things to stick your things you balance your golfing balls on. Before you whack it into some bushes or a giant windmill filled with broken beer bottles.

Today we announce some civil disobedience.

You know I've still been out there. Pretty much every day, people are coming back and we just keep our eyes open for the rangers. It's been pretty much ranger free in the later evening out there. Mornings, still see some rangers occassionally.

This is ho hum, but in case you are in Santa Cruz and you didn't get this email, and you don't go to work or to a Fun Match or dog show on Saturday, how about going to Take Back the Park. Take your leash but don't put your dog on it until the rangers show up with their assault rifles. I will actually be at work instead of this event, but maybe you can go:

(this is an edited version of the Friends Of Lighthouse Field email)

Saturday, April 5th - 9am at the center of Lighthouse Field

Listen to what City Council members have to say. Let them know how you feel and what you think!

Beginning at 9:30, we will be continuing our park stewardship activities with a clean-up event.

Many of you have contacted us with reports of a dramatic increase in illegal activities (camping, drug use, fights, vandalism, dumping trash, etc.) Some have reported getting approached and yelled at by people partying in the bushes, running into camp fires and seeing large parties in the bushes and parking lots. Many of you have commented that you feel all alone at the park and, as a result, unsafe.

We must not let State Parks intimidation or criminal elements keep us away from our park. Your presence at this gathering will make the very important statement that “we will not be turned away.” There is strength in numbers -- let's have a BIG turnout to show politicians and press that we care.

It seems to us that the State Parks bureaucrats are more interested in harassing people about leashing their dogs than in managing crime. Come to the community gathering and express your dissatisfaction with the condition of our park and anger at being targeted by the State Parks rangers while so many abuses are being ignored.

Carry signs that express your feeling of loss, disappointment and dismay at the deteriorating condition of the park, reaction by State Parks rangers, and the mistreatment of our community. And you don't have to have a dog to support this rally. The attempted expulsion of most of the ordinary people who visit the park daily has a negative impact on the park and surrounding neighborhoods -- a serious concern for all Santa Cruz residents.

It is the urgency prompted by your letters and emails about this dramatic deterioration of our park and concern within our community that called us to have this rally. We all need to support each other and our community!

Join us Saturday, April 5th at 9am. Ask friends and family to come with you. As always, thanks for all that you do!

Teaching Go-a primer

I took the dogs out to practice before work yesterday. Boy do I wish I had my own big grassy yard.

I am lucky enough though to rent a friend's field so I can practice alone at least once a week with a genuine a-frame, teeter and dogwalk. I am always in a rush because before I can practice I need to move her sheep to another pasture, drag stuff around to set my puppy sequences, lower the a-frame, put wires on the weaves, and drag tunnels everywhere. Then undo that, have the other dogs do some sequences without wires and low stuff, put everything away, including sheep, and somehow get to work on time. My riding students are used to it that I am probably going to come flying down the driveway of the ranch late because I had to "practice with the dogs." Or fly out some nights at the stroke of 5pm because I have to go teach agility. They are indulgent of me. They are, perhaps wisely, concerned their trainer spends a freakish amount of time playing with her dogs, but those who question too deeply may have to ride longer without stirrups.

Most of what I practice is for Gustavo, since he's at a crucial state of his dog agility development. Today we worked the a-frame and teeter into a sequence, poles into the endless loop frenzy with tunnels on both ends, and starting learning Go.


The field is about 80' long. I set up a staggered line of jumps and an empty chute barrel and let 'em at it. There was a magic blue tupperware at the end of the line. I was tired. I decided everyone could practice just racing down a line.


So everyone did this a bunch. It was actually a great exercise for bar knocking Ruby to jump Carefully at Speed. And for Otterpop's distance skills with me layering objects out on the side. Gustavo, just running his ass off, and me running too so he learns I run fast, he runs fast, we all run fast, obstacles straight in front mean run fast, and there's never any not fast at agility.


So each dog ran that thing at least 10 times. That would be up and down. So 20 times per dog. That is 60 times for me. Why I look more like a post-partum pre-rehab Britney Spears on a bad day in the photos and less like a super toned Icon For the Over Forty Set Madonna with all that running is besides me. Let's never, ever buy jeans at the Gap again, ok?

I do agility today so the dogs don't have to.

I started out my training session with a pretty good toy. The little squirrel. Looking GOOD little squirrel!!


I did some fierce tugging. FIERCE, I tell you!


I think my nose touches are getting pretty solid on the end of the contact trainer. Notice that I've faded the target.


The weave poles seemed maybe somewhat sluggish today. I just wasn't feeling the hot dog love in my tupperware. Maybe was too hot for ugg boots.


Because of Hobbes, I try to make every table have a really low down and feel the love there.


I know my obedience skills suck. But I did try to end my session with some nice long down stays that I know will pay off in the future at the start line.