Friday, November 20, 2009

Friday Morning Thoughts

SUMMARY: Top Ten, bored dogs, nifty dog stuff in nondog catalog, agility class and schedule and training and weaves, dog noses.

Top Tens
  • Why does USDAA have Top Ten Tournament for Championship dogs but not for Performance? I notice this because maybe Tika would have had a chance to be there this year. Maybe.)
Bored dogs
  • I've been finding out what my dogs are like when we're not doing agility. Why? No class Oct 22 (Power Paws Camp preempted it). Class Oct 27. No class Nov 5 (Disneyland). No class Nov 12 (USDAA Nationals.) Class this week. No class next week (Thanksgiving). 
  • We did have agility competition Oct 31-Nov 1. And will have one day Nov 27, then two days Dec 12-13.  Feels like long times between when we're short on classes.
  • Doesn't help that  I've been trying to do an early 6:00 Thursday class; leaving home at 5:00 is still in my normal work day, plus traffic means it's a 45-50 minutes drive instead of 20-30, all of which means I have been getting in 15-30 minutes late, therefore missing class time. Am going to have to switch back to Wednesday 8:15 which means no more Sierra Club hikes until some other later class opens on another day.
  • Meanwhile pesky bored dogs. Walking a couple of miles a day isn't a good substitute for classes & competition, apparently.
Improvements Catalog supplies the well-heeled dog (so to speak)
  • Beautiful folding wooden gates if you don't want to use cheap-looking standard gates to keep your dogs out of certain rooms.
  • Back when I had a Siberian Husky--for 16 years--every year I meant to get around to making a light-up Santa and sleigh display pulled by huskies. Good intentions, not enough time to figure it out. Now I could just buy one! And it's gorgeous, too.
  • Or how about just a light-up doggie holding a gift?
  • Check out their pet listings; a "Paw Plunger" for cleaning dirty paws; an embossed "Potty Rock", beautiful wooden crates, plus several actual useful items.
  • Wish I had implemented click-through payments for this site so that if you went to these locations I'd get 10 cents for it! Ah, well, another opportunity missed. Get in line behind making a husky santa sleigh.
Don't you wish you had a nose like a dog?
  • Boost always knows when one of Tika's  treats has rolled under the closet door at some time earlier in the day.
  • When I sent Boost out to get the paper yesterday morning, she stepped outside and then went into ferocious danger action--hackles up, bouncing on stiff legs while making some serious barking, looking at my porch, my tree, my eaves, my fence--and Tika followed suit, barking up an angry storm.  I saw nothing. It was an hour before I could get Boost out the door without the same reaction. What did I miss?
Agility training
  • My yard is just not big enough for all types of agility practice, for dogs who can cover 18 feet in a single full-speed bounce jump, 60 feet is nothing--not enough space to GET to that kind of striding.
  • Both dogs have been making some nice, tough weave entries in the yard. And in class last night. And then--missing some in the yard. Gah. It never ends.

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4 Comments:

At 10:02 AM, November 20, 2009 , Blogger steph said...

Under "What did [you] miss?": Possibly a stranger had visited your porch, human or other animal-type.

As for finding a hiking group, have you tried checking out meetup.com?

 
At 11:26 AM, November 20, 2009 , Blogger Elf said...

Human or animal type: Well, yeah. Don't you wish you had a dog nose so you'd know what?

Other hiking groups: There are other hiking groups in the area. Not too many that hike weekday nights, most do weekends.

 
At 4:48 PM, November 20, 2009 , Blogger steph said...

You could try starting your own meetup group to hike in your area on a weekday night... Of course, you'd have to show up alone the first few times if nobody signed up for your event in case someone decided to drop in on the spur of the moment.

 
At 4:56 PM, November 20, 2009 , Blogger Elf said...

Sure I could. that requires aforethought & planning. My plan is to show up & follow. Just don't have the time or energy for organizing a group of any kind. It's tough enough for me to get in touch with a friend and say "let's do something now!"

 

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