quitting, poison ivy, and 5 Ks oh my:)

What a day and it wasn't even an agility day!!!! I ran my first 5 K today and it was SO much fun. I am super competitive and have been training hard and trying to reduce my caloric intake (not going so well this past week thanks to birthday cake and beer). I have shed 13 lbs (put on back on 2 this week i think:() and have worked my way up to running almost 3.5 miles 3 x a week. I knew if I entered a race it would make me accountable and boy did it. I started out with probably close to 100 hundred runners and it was an adrenaline rush to say the least. Mostly women running, a few men but lots of mid age women, who I hope to look like when I get their age. I let the pack set my pace which is not good and all the articles I read said DO NOT LET THE PACK SET YOUR PACE, but it was just such a rush taking off with all of those people!!!! I looked at my stopwatch at 1 mile and i had run a 9 minute mile YIKES! My pace is 10 minute miles so I had to ratchet it back and slow down. Ended up finding someone running my pace and pairing up with her (she had a shirt on that said I am a drinker with a running problem;) and ended up passing several people in the end. There were four boards up with people's times and names and I am proud to say that even with hills, pushing my pace, and gassing a little bit, I finished in 31.46 with my name in the second board, second column at the top. I also won a bag of stuff in the raffle and afterwards my loving hubby took me to buy me a fancy watch/stopwatch since I usually run with a stop watch around my neck and it is a pain in the butt. He also got me some new socks since I have been getting ugly blisters on the bottom of my feet and a t-shirt. We had a nice brunch of scrambled eggs and sausage links and I ate half of a yummy waffle with syrup and butter thank you! This was such a rush that I have already signed up for my next 5 K which is the second week in June. Now my schedule consists of dog shows and runs! My hubby is even contemplating doing some of the walks which makes me so happy. He was doing so well with his weight but got off track and we need to get him back on that track.

Uh, this pred makes me so dizzy and icky feeling which brings me to the second part of the blog and how I tie it into the puppy blog. I got poison ivy something terrible out at the farm last weekend. Started out with a small spot on my leg and for whatever reason, morphed to spots on my neck, face, eyelid and in my ears. Finally went to the dr on friday and got put on steroids and they are making me feel very weird. Of course I am super thirsty and have to pee constantly but the dizziness and overall blah feeling sucks. Glad I waited till i got done running today to start taking them. Guess our mission this memorial day weekend is going to be operation hunt down the poison ivy and KILL. We need to do a good mowing as I haven't been using the field as much lately due to all the private clients i have had and teaching at all star. I wish we could afford a little riding mower so I could stay on top of it but we can't right now so will have to just settle for a bush hogging now and then. Ticks have also been super bad this year. OF course we can treat the dogs and I can wear a hat but I am still waking up in the middle of the night with ticks crawling on me, which freaks me out. Just pulled the sheets off the bed today and there were dead ticks in the bed YUCK! I guess that is the price you pay when you let your puppers sleep in the bed with you, you end up sharing ticks :p

So this segways into my third part of my blog which is quitting my private teaching. I think i already talked about this but blogspot is acting up and won't let me go back and look at what I have already written. After alot of thought, decided to let my insurance go and stop teaching under the name Emerald City Canines. I am still teaching for All Star so still teaching two nights a week on agility, but the regular pet manners clients were starting to eat up all my free time and there is yet another dog trainer who has moved into our area, who doesn't have a full time job and can work with clients 24/7. I am a little bitter BUT i LOVE science and could NEVER leave it to do strictly dog training. I had to sit down and cry this week because I had called all of my regulars and took down my signs last week and I got a thank card and the cutest dog mug in the mail from one of my regulars, which is super sweet. She even had a message engraved on the bottom of it and had her dog sign the card. AWWWWW! Just this week, not having clients has given me SO much more time for deuce and so much more flexibility for running. I really, really missed having this. Well anyway, need to get out and train baby-D so ending it here!

training

I am trying to let my food settle so I can go for a nice long night run so i thought i would sit down and write. I had to make a big decision this week and I hope it is the right one. I decided to discontinue my training side business. I will still teach for All Star but I am covered under their insurance plans so didn't need my own anymore. I refuse to teach and take money from people without liability insurance. I really have enjoyed working with folks and their issues and (their dogs issues LOL), especially those who have puppies but I was basically working 8 hours a day and then coming home and either heading out to the agility field and teaching or meeting with clients. I was basically not getting much of my own training in at all. I have so many goals with Deuce and really, really need as much of my free time to work with him. I was getting really bad about teaching and then crashing and poor baby-D wasn't getting much more than one jump training in the backyard. I think what really got me was watching regionals this weekend and seeing those super fun, challenging courses and wishing I could have been there to do them. All weekend, we were blessed with beautiful weather so baby-D and I headed out and ran several sequences from the courses (6-8 obstacles at the most). It was hot so I took it easy and did low reps but baby-D worked very well despite the heat. We have alot to work on including sending to back side of jumps when I can't be up there to handle it and tough weave pole entries. While he has made so much progress with weave pole entries, we are still a work in process on anything earlier than 3 on the clock (with 12 being the poles). I think it is a collection issue as he gets the entry but then skips the next pole. He will get it, I am confident of it:) We are having BIG issues with ticks this year. I need to go get some front line as I am picking them off of him and I regularly when we go out and train. I HATE ticks and am really not happy with the over abundance of them this year. Am wondering if there is anything I could do to treat the field? I was so embarrassed, had one in my hair today at work so we put him/her in methanol and looked at it under the scope. Will have to take a picture on my good scope, it was very pretty if you can call a tick pretty. Anyway, am having class this week thank goodness and another weekend off and then thank goodness USDAA FINALLY:)

First USASA nationals for baby-D

Finally rested and done with laundry so I can write. Got baby-D's video done last night and as usual, stupid youtube stripped it of its sound. I love the song, the Beastie Boy's Make Some Noise, which is their newest single. It just fit his runs to a T. If you are on FB, watch it on FB since it has the song still on it. You know, this was the first year I went to aussie nationals with 0 expectations. With miller I just wanted to have fun as it was his last nationals and possibly his last show period and with baby-D, I just wanted to go and have fun since he just got into Excellent A. I was also excited to run on turf as deuce has never run on turf and Miller LOVES turf. Well after a very fun weekend spent with good friends and good beer, here are the usual positives and negatives.

Positives: Okay last time I dominated the negative catagory so this week I get to move up. I only had two runs out of 9 that i had creepy contacts and that was ONLY the a-frame. We train on rubberized teeters and dog walks but this was the first time all the contacts had been rubberized. Let's just say that I didn't baby sit them and baby-D didn't creep. It was crazy to watch his video from the last weekend where I was holding up on every contact and this weekend where I just RAN! Yeah me!!!!!!

This next one goes in both categories. This judge LOVED two jump leads out with a push to the left or right. I had a split where half were good, he collected and respected my cross and was tight and the other half where he ran past me and then came back in and got the jump. We work this so much in practice and apparently need to run it more. Timing is such an issue with the lead out push and I just need to improve as well as he needs to collect. Guess maybe that should go into the negative category, whoops:) All except the last jumpers run was very cool and collective on my part. I don't think I reactive handled all weekend so i get yet another gold star:) And here is another TMI but i am going to tell you anyway, I was not in the bathroom at all this weekend!!!! No nervous stomach YIPPEEEE!!!!! Deuce just doesn't make me nervous and I am thankful for that. He gives me so much confidence every run and even though he is far from perfect and I have a list a mile long of things to work on, i LOVE running this dog. I get off the course and am just so excited with where we are at and where we are headed. Yeah, the wheels fall off every once in a while but that is getting less and less. I really feel like his JWW run was a product of my shitty handling in EX A FAST and that carried over to his JWW run. I don't normal run it and probably won't much more anyway since his contacts are getting so much better. Weaves were alot faster, probably due to the turf and even though we missed a couple of entries, I don't care, he got some really tough ones too. Bars were not an issue, dropped two but not worried about them. He had so much drive this weekend and for the most part listened so I am one proud momma!

So with all the positives, I have decided to not do a negative category this time:) Enjoy the video, minus the damn song!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ca2ZfhGq_qc

Bellvue weekend 2011

Back from Bellvue, getting ready to go teach in the heat. Wow, went from winter straight to summer. Good old Kansas weather:) Once again I am very pleased with our weekend. Deuce finished his open JWW title and got his first leg in excellent A standard. We would have been 100% but he knocked one bar in both excellent A JWW and standard. I think both bars were my fault:( I did a very tight front cross and he went wide and I crowded him when he came back in and i just don't think he could collect enough to get it. The other bar was the triple going straight into the tunnel. I think i said go tunnel and he just saw it and forgot jumping. When I slow down the video, he might have taken off to early but not sure. Doesn't matter, a bar is a bar but so close to a perfect weekend!!!!! We had so much fun camping although deuce was very restless friday night. He seems to know that change is coming (the new puppy) and he is being very clingy. He slept on top of me all weekend which he sometimes does when we travel, and he barked alot when I left him in his crate, even when we were visiting some friends. He got to watch the lady Gaga concert with us because he just wouldn't stop so i guess he got his way. He was perfectly content just laying next to me while we watched though.

Here is the time for the positives and negatives.

Positives: The lead out in standard on saturday from the table. YES YES y'all:) Wanted to be up the line and had to run to get there. It worked nicely, didn't have to do any crazy rears or fronts like alot of people were doing. I am so glad I can trust his start line and table. It basically was a straight line into the weaves so i had to decclerate to make sure he didn't run into them full speed and he READ my decel. Yeah baby-D. Super nice start to JWW on saturday. Was going to baby sit it and try a post turn but decided not to and try to turn him basically across my body and send him. It made for a very nice line and the turn kept him tight. It also took the off course weaves out of the entire picture. Finished the course nicely but it was reactive handling again. Lead out in JWW ex A was also nice although I needed to move a little earlier. It is funny, it takes one time of something not working to make me baby sit it. I had previously done this lead out and he had disregarded it and ran past to the off course jump. That was what stuck in my mind and I guess it made me hold up until i had his head and then go instead of making it smooth and just moving as he was with me. The course was weird, was a huge box drill and he didn't take any of the off course options and there was a ton of them. He was with me but I did say here about a thousand times. Need to keep my mouth shut:) Standard was a nice run too, just creepy contacts again and that dang bar but was my fault. Great weave poles and great drive although Miller had a kick ass run and beat him time wise. Pretty bad that a 12 year old beat him but miller has a running a-frame and runs tight tight tight. Deuce had some wide turns especially out of the chute to the weaves. Overall, very happy with the weekend on his end, need to make some changes on my end.


Negatives: This catagory is so on me. I am baby sitting the contacts yet again. Would some one please smack the crap out of me? I know he is going to get them, he knows his 2 on 2 off like the back of his paw so why am I not trusting it? I had one dog walk where he was driving to the bottom and miller had busted his on the course and I went into baby sit mode for no reason, which slowed him down. He is not miller, he is not miller, oh yeah, he is not miller. I mishandled a line where I thought I needed to go out to the end of the chute and then turn back. In hindsight, I needed to be on the landing side of the next jump and just called him to me. Still learning lines with him. Was out of position on the saturday JWW course because I baby sat the weaves and had to do an emergency rear and then a bad front. Thank goodness he listened and didn't jump the off course jump but it cost us several places in the ribbons. Once again, I am babysitting things so BAD ME! He is not miller, say it with me, he is not miller. I can trust this dog so why am I not? I need to run him more when I don't run miller to see if that affects me at all. I also need to run his contacts like I do in class. He does seem to be getting better at not pouncing on the a-frame but still not getting driving to the bottom and it is costing us seconds which kills us in the ribbons, especially when we get into B.

I am a little scared, we are in excellent A in all classes for aussie nationals and lori won't be there to smack me when I walk things wrong or try stupid things. I know I have to take the training wheels off at some point but I am really enjoying having her input. She'd better keep her phone close so I can send her course maps next weekend:) He is so much fun to run and I don't even get nervous before I run him. I know this is TMI but I don't think I was in the bathroom once this weekend with a nervous stomach. It is so nice to go to the line and be confident. Now I just need to stop baby sitting and just run him like I know I can!!!!!!

Link to video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7OWX3wsU7k