Day 2 of UKI

I didn't slept to well Saturday night, my body kept complaining. But I got up anyway and drive back up to the trial.  It was rough. Several times I almost turned around and went home. LOL
But when I got there it was a beautiful sunny day and no humidity.  That's unheard of here in the summer. It was so nice!!! 
It did make filming hard because the sun outside the covered arena plays havoc with the lens.  The new Ipads let you adjust the lens to let more or less light in. Its not perfect but at least you can see what is happening.

The bad thing was I didn't know what I had entered. Usually I take a picture of my entry with my Ipad but for some reason I forgot. So I got there and I wasn't entered in the first two classes. Ugh!!  But no worries, they take day of show entries , so I entered Gamblers and we Qed.    

Sunday was tunnel-palooza day. Some of the courses you did 7 tunnels, Whoohoo, happy dogs.

We had a pretty good day. We Qed in Gamblers and Snooker.

This was the Novice agility course.

We ran pretty good. I tried so hard to watch my dog and make sure she took the tunnel under the a-frame. So that made me a little behind when she came out the other side. But it worked out ok. I thought we Qed. I didn't realize the judge called a fault until I saw the scores posted. Ugh!!.  I looked at the film but I cant see why he called a standard fault.  I went to talk to the judge and asked him why but he couldn't really remember. Then he said he thought she left the last weave pole early. But that would have been an E, with a whistle.  So anyway, no Q for us. What a bummer.





I was really bummed out about this. Darn it!!  We did manage a snooker Q.  We were close with the Master series agility. I made a mistake on cueing her to turn when coming off the dogwalk and then I didn't cue her right, so she knew to take the tunnel. Ugh!!!

But everything else was pretty good. Even 9-11.  From 9-10, kept her on the inside and called her my side ( a side cue that Im using to keep my dog with me so they don't wing off an take something). It worked great and then I rear crossed on the flat over 10. Whoohoo!!



I wanted to go home after snooker but I had signed up for jumpers.  I should have gone home. I was tired and over it all. So of course I messed up and didn't turn into my dog to get the correct tunnel entrance , so we went off course. Ack!!!  I don't know if Ill ever get this stuff right. LOL

It was still a really good and fun weekend.  Not sure I will be going to nationals because I cant get the Qs I need to get there and wont have to many more chances.  Plus the course are really hard.  I had to laugh, the novice courses here were harder then the master AKC courses I ran last weekend.

Another trial weekend, Day 1

Well the weekend was spent doing another trial. This time UKI.  I haven't done any  UKI since November's Nationals.  Its just hard to find the time and there aren't as many trials as  with other venues.  I only entered Java, Miley is still on rest. 
I love UKI.  So many fun courses to run. To bad my friends all do AKC.  If they just tried these other venues, they would see how fun they are.  I did get one person, who has only done AKC, to come but she just entered standard and jumpers.  You can do day of show entries and I tried to get her to do other classes but she wouldn't.

Anyway it was really hot and humid. Luckily it was mostly cloudy which I think helped keep things from becoming miserable.  I did bring my Arctic cooling misting fan. It got lots of attention, people wanted demonstrations and asking where I got it.   It does help when its so hot outside.

This is an older picture. I now have one of those big orange water coolers that I take with me , filled with water.  I sit it on top of it and it works great.

We had multiple storms come through during the day. It would rain and then clear up again.

This was during one of the light rain storms.

This trial was very small but I felt lucky that he was able to rent this arena and its under cover.
We entered Gamblers, Snakes and Ladders. Beginner agility, Beginner jumpers and Master series jumpers.
 Boy these were tough courses. I felt bad that the courses were so hard because my friend is still pretty new to trialing. But mostly I wanted her to come for the training in the ring .  Her dog is having trouble with getting on the contact obstacles. He is great in class and then refuses at trials.


Java is still in beginners but here is the Championship course. Boy it was tough. It didn't look like to many dogs ran clean.

Here was the first class, Gamblers.

UKI  gamblers has two gamble options. The easier one is worth 10 points, the harder one was worth 15.

Java did good but missed the easier gamble (the white circles). She missed the #3 jump when she came out of the tunnel.








I ran Snakes and Ladders for the first time. It was fun and we Qed.

Kind of a crazy game. You have to run all the contact and weave in the direction away from the start line and you have to do all the tunnel in the direction of coming toward the start line.  If you dog accidently does them in the wrong direction, you are whistled off. You also have to do 6 jumps. All of this has to be done in 55 seconds, I think.    You plan your own course. You can do the obstacles again in the correct direction but you don't get anymore points and you are wasting time.  Java did 9, 11 and then #1dogwalk but missed the contact. If you miss the contact , you don't get the points. So I put her through the #8 tunnel and did the dogwalk again. This time she hit the contact and got the points.   I did the tunnel again to bring us to the weaves.  Doing the tunnel again didn't get us anymore points but I did it in the correct direction and I was just using it to get to the weaves, so we were ok.  We got through the rest of the course and Qed. Whoohoo!!


 I messed up the standard agility run, ugh.
 Right before this jumpers run we had a bad thunderstorm. It was raining when we were walking the course. Then a bad down pour. We had to leave the walk thur and go get the dogs and move all our stuff because the rain was driving in. Most of my stuff was soaked.

After the walk thur, I got Java out of her crate. She was in a plastic crate but still was pretty wet from the rain storm. And she was freaked out. It was thundering and the rain on the metal roof was loud. She refused to move several times while I was warming her up. I told my friend, she isn't going to run, she is to freaked out. Even when we went to walk to the ring, she sat down and refused to move. I had to  pull on the leash. We went into the ring and I was still thinking "she isn't going to run, she is to freaked".  But as soon as I took the leash off, I could tell she was ready. Forget what ever was happening outside the ring, she was fired up.  I needed a bigger lead out but was scared she would break, so I just released her. Whoohoo, we Qed!!






Last up was Master series jumpers.  Man we were so close to a Q.  She cut behind me coming out of the weaves and took the wrong side of  jump #6.  I need a tattoo on my arm that says , "Watch your Dog".  LOL

 I blinded #2 to #3. That was the only way I could think that I could beat her out of that tunnel to get the back side of the #4 jump.  Yes it worked.   This run felt better than it looks on video.





I drove home that night and got home around 8pm.  I was beat.

Its to hot!!

I worked running dogwalks at 7am.  And I was already sweating. Then I took the dogs to the park. Man, it was humid.  How am I going to survive a dog trial outside tomorrow.  I feel like I should drive the RV up there just to have air conditioning but that's a lot of gas money for the day.  I guess Im just going to tough it out.

It was so hot I had put the dogs in the river.  I think Java was glad . She just kept standing there, it was like she was saying "awwww".

Guiness is the really happy one!.  Always telling everyone he is here!

This is my favorite picture. Turned out very cool looking with the mist coming off the water.

This water is freezing cold. It makes my feet hurt , its so cold.  I could barely stand to walk to the middle to take this picture.  I saw this lady earlier this week, standing in a bikini up to her upper thighs fishing in the deep part of the river. I don't know how she stood it.

Wordless Wednesday

Trial weekend

I went to Sanford, NC for an AKC trial.  It was indoors , which was nice because it is now so freaking hot outside!!   On the drive there , it was 105 outside. I had my air conditioner blowing 3 bars and the lowest setting. I was sweating.   A couple of hours later I was shivering.  I look at the outside temperature, now it was 74. Wow!!  A storm had come though but I never saw it.   By the time I got to Sanford, it was hot again. LOL.  My friend was about 45  minutes behind me and she ran into two hail storms. Im glad I didn't hit those.  As soon as I got into Sanford , I stopped at the park. Its a really nice park called San-Lee park.  Except I cant get in because the road to the park is closed and I had to drive several miles around to finally get in.  They are working on the main building. It looks a mess, broken windows everywhere.  But the birds are still in their cages. Poor birds. I hope they get bigger cages when the construction is done.

 

 

 

The bathrooms were closed at this main building so I hiked up the hill to the campground. There were people tent camping up there but the bathrooms were locked. WTH??  So I peed in the woods. I didn't know what else to do.  Why would they have the bathrooms locked and people are camping there??  Where are those people going to the bathroom? 

It was freaking hot outside so we didn't walk around much.

 

 

Our hotel was very nice. I only took Java with me. I had pulled Miley because she was limping at the last trial. She hasn't limped anymore but  she will be on rest for a couple of months.
Ive been to this trial site before. In the past they have had the air conditioner cranking and I usually freeze there.  So I took my fans out of the car. Oops, mistake. It was cold inside in the morning but as the day heated up, the air conditioner couldn't keep up and it became warm inside.  The lady who owns the building had replaced the dirt/sand stuff she use to have in the ring and now it has turf.   The good thing about it, is you no longer smell all musty when you leave the place.   I use to have to go home and wash all my crates because everything smelled like must.  
Java had never run on this turf before and I wasn't sure how it was going to go.  I went to the practice jump but they only had 2 squares of turf under the jump, so it wasn't enough for your dog to practice running and turning.   I fingered our first run would just be practice. 

Its hard to watch people run their dogs at the site.  You cant bring any dogs into the ring area, until its your turn to run.  They use to have you wait outside before your turn. They changed that and now you wait at the top of the steps, inside, then you go to the bottom of the steps, then its your turn to go in.  The one big problem, was some of the  gate stewards liked to walk around with the gate sheet in their hands.  So you never knew when it was your turn to run. We asked several times to put the sheet up on the board, but I guess they didn't want to do that. I know their job was hard, because they couldn't see the ring, so they would have to go into the ring area and see where the dog was running and who was going in next but it was hard on us trying to run our dogs and not knowing how many until you ran.   
Anyway, this looked pretty easy right?  So many of the big dogs went off course after #8, they took #12.  The other problem was , after #13, they took the wrong tunnel entrance.


 So, we did stay on course but she dropped a bar.  I think I was late on the front cross.

Next up was standard.

Easy, right???  I screwed it up. LOL.    I thought she would have more momentum coming off the a-frame and I could send out to jump three. But I had to support jump three more and then I tried to force a front cross after the tire and she missed the tire because I was late. Ugh. I should have just reared #5 but I didn't think that quick. I feel like Im never going to get this. Easy course and I couldn't even do it. Ugh!!




Oh Well, what can you do. Live and learn.

We were done early, like before 3pm.  But it was to freaking  hot outside to go to the park, so I just went back to the hotel.  We went out to dinner at the Iron Pig. It was very good. They  also were the ones who brought the food into the trial for the workers. 

The next day, standard was first.

Another easy course, right?  Ugh, I should have done more of a lead out at the startline. Because when she went off the end of the dogwalk, she wasn't sure which end of the tunnel to go to. I was saying tunnel and she was headed to the right one but  she spun and we got a refusal. So I figured , go for broke now. Leave her at the a-frame and see what happens.  She missed the chute. It never occurred to me she wouldn't come straight off the a-frame and take the chute right in front of her. Ack. LOL


Then Master Jww.

This was all out , just run as fast as you can.  And she did but so did everyone else.  There is another sheltie who's father is  Rush, the dog who has been on the world team multiple times and  won nationals several times.  Anyway in AKC he jumps 16 but USDAA he jumps 18.  He can really run fast and did this course in over 7 yards per second. whoohoo.  Java did it in 6.5 yards per second. And took 2nd place. Yay!!

The Destruction of Saluda Shoals Park.

Its very sad. They are destroying the park.  They have been working recently  and I have no idea what they are doing now. It started out as a nice walk.

 As I walk the path into the park you can hear all the machines working.  They are now taking down the trees right next to the walking path. I felt like crying.

They are taking down the trees next to the walking path. The trees  block the sun and keep the heat out. NOT anymore. Now the sun is coming through. I don't understand why they are doing this. Its very sad.

This is the hill I have my dog walk up and down. I guess they are getting rid of that too.

These pictures really just don't show all the destruction to the animals habitat that they are doing. Im so sad.

Java turns 4 years old

Java is 4 today. Boy is time flying!!  I took the dogs to the river. It looked like it would be low enough to walk through based on yesterdays level. 

Its so pretty and peaceful here. Its hard to show in a picture.

Guiness gets so happy here. Im not sure if its the water noise or if he is happy to be off leash.

I know these pictures aren't great. Its very shady in the early morning. But otherwise its to hot outside to go for a walk.

I finally broke down and bought myself a new laptop. The other one was driving me crazy. It took so long to do anything, I wouldn't get on it. So  I stopped taking a lot of pictures and that's why I haven't been blogging very much. But now I have a new one.  Its funny how much technology keeps changing and how hard it is to keep up.  Poor old people, I cant imagine trying to keep up. 
Anyway, my new laptop has windows 8.1   I know lots of people hate Windows 8.1, but its been ok for me.  Its kind of like having and ipad with a keyboard. You can touch the screen and swipe things, but then you can go into "My PC" and use it just like you use to use a laptop.   But you can also ,at all times, switch between touching the screen or using your mouse. The biggest thing is remembering where things are to get to them because when you open it, it is very different then your usual computer set up. 
There was a dead bird in my yard today.  I didn't want to pick it up, so I made my son pick it up.(Not because of getting sick but its just to sad)  I had two bags, one inside the other, so he didn't touch it. And then had him wash his hands after wards. I remember this guy here in Columbia was working in his yard and picked up a dead bird. He got a really bad illness and now I cant remember what it was.  I hope this bird didn't die of that same illness. Maybe it was West Nile virus.  Anyway, hopefully a cat just got this bird.