Thoughts....

I had class the last two nights. I think its getting to hard for me to do all this.   I was really tired on the way home last night. Then Ive been up since 3am with Fibro pain. Ugh, it sucks.  I did make it through the day at work.  I really  need this school year to end. These kids just keep coming to the nurse for no real illness at all. I just dont understand it. I can do reports in my nursing program . I was trying to see how many hours a certain student has spend in the health room.  So when I ran the report, I pulled up kids that had more than 15 visits to the nurse this year.   A total of 89 kids popped up. They have accounted for 1,977 visits to the nurse this year. And there are just under a 1000 kids at my school. Thats a lot of visits by just those 89 kids, plus seeing kids that really need to come to the nurse.

Back to talking about dog class. I set up these two courses that I pulled off of Lexi and Bentley's blog.

Java didnt get my forward send to #4 at first, so we had to practice that a little bit. But the next time she ran great.  My crosses were late and I think I should have stayed on the inside when running #16-17 instead of front crossing.




Then we set up this course.

 

This one Miley struggled on. She dropped bars several times because I didnt cue the turn before she took off and then tried to turn, or I told her "tight" after she took off. Ugh.  So anyway, there were only a couple of us in class. One person's dog, who's dog runs very nice,  dropped a bar. The dog rarely drops bars. He is very careful. When he dropped the bar the handler said, "No sir, We do not drop bars". (emphasis on "we")  But the inflection in her voice was like, We dont drop bars like that other dog does.  Now remember I was feeling really tired so I probably heard it wrong or took it wrong.  I felt like the handler was harder on the dog then they should have been. The handler wasnt mean to the dog, so I dont want you to think that.  So the next time the dog ran, he lost some of that spring in his step if you know what I mean. He still ran nice but something was lost. (The handler is way better than me and Q's all the time. So maybe she knows something I dont) It still hurt my feelings.  I know Miley drops bars but Im not going to tell her off for doing it. Its usually my fault anyway. Plus I feel like dogs try really hard to do what you want and arent trying to drop bars. Anyway , who is going to remember if Miley dropped a bar in the end.  I want her to come to the line with the joy and excitement she always has. Thats what I want to remember.  Its not that I dont think dogs shouldnt be corrected but you better be darn sure it wasnt your fault. And then that gets me on to something else.  Im tired of people saying their dog is "blowing them off". Dogs dont blow us off. You have to figure out what is the problem. Is you dog not motivated?  Why? Does he not understand what you want? Is  he stressed?  Its your job to figure it out and work through it. 

 

 This week someone else told me they pinched their dogs ear  for being distracted. I didnt say anything but I wanted to say,Holy crap ! Why do they think its ok to do something to their dog when maybe their dog just made a mistake. I was sitting with someone not to long ago at a trial. She was pulling her dog from course all the time. I couldnt figure out why.  So she ran the coruse and she didnt do a big enough lead out. So her dog came out of the chute and didnt know where to go because the handler was right next to the dog. So the dog barked and spun.  Normally she told me she would pull her dog for that behavior. I was kinda shocked. I told her this was just my opinion, but that error was hers. She didnt give the dog information so what was the dog suppose to do. That wasnt the dogs fault.  Then her dog didnt wait to be released off the contact but waited the second time over. She told me usually she would pull her dog for that too.  I told her I could understand that but dogs make mistakes just like we do. She stopped the second time, so she was trying.  Then she told  me she hasnt been able to complete a course at a trial, for a long time, because she keeps pulling the dog.  Her trainer told her if you accept those mistakes at a trial , your dog will always do them. Hmm, "Hows that working for you?"   She didnt pull her dog all day that day.  Her dog ran great, IMO. Was it perfect, no but it looked pretty good to me.