A Day At The Races

Day 1:

• It drizzled most of the day except for a few brief hours midday where the sun actually almost came out. But the dogs prefer overcast days, and a light drizzle is bearable.


• No tornadoes spotted.


• Tika got the up contacts on her dogwalks (by a nose on a hair) and finally got that last annoying novice standard leg!


• Jake gave me a bit of a scare when I got him out of his crate for his final run of the day and gave him a big rub-down: He yelped loudly, shoved his tail between his legs, and plonked his backside to the ground and refused to get up. When I tried hugging him and petting him and saying "are you OK?", he was trembling horribly. Taking a different tack, I whipped out some doggie junk food and offered him some. Oh--OK--feeling just fine now! He ran nicely. He jumped nicely.


• Jake got his gamble this morning! Only one gamble to go!


• Tika stayed at the start line every run. She didn't even stand up!


• Ellen was awake and didn't make too many stupid handler errors but boy was she tired.


• NEITHER dog qualified in the Grand Prix. Sigh. Tika's run was gorgeous all the way through until nearly the end when her overconfident handler sent her through an incorrect tunnel. Jake was just so fast that he got ahead of me early on and took an incorrect obstacle that I hadn't even considered would be a problem. Let that be a lesson to me.


• No word from USDAA on where the Nationals will be.


• We haven't done Jumpers yet. Tomorrow.


• Jake got 2 Qs today. (So did Tika. Better than 2 weekends ago where each got only 1 the whole weekend.) That's probably not enough to push him into the top 200.


• Ellen remembered to take her lunch, but almost forgot to eat it. Feeling weak and near death around 1:30, she finally remembered. Tuna salad never tasted so good.

Back again tomorrow!

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