Weenies

So apparently all my dog show friends are a bunch of weenies since not one of you sent me a less than flattering win picture.  Or maybe it's that none of you have ever taken a less than flattering win picture?  Because if that is the case, I'm screwed.

Now, to take the post title another direction...  This morning I was thinking about owning a stud dog and what that has meant to me personally.  In the world of dogs, there are people who prefer to own dogs and those who prefer to own bitches.  In most respects, it doesn't really matter to me - I have both - but owning a stud dog seems, to me, to be a little different.

When Sam came to live with me, nearly 10 years ago, it was supposed to be a temporary situation.  As a novice Cardigan owner I had no intention of becoming involved in the conformation or breeding side of owning dogs.  Ginny had come to live with me about 5 months earlier and I had originally thought I would pursue competitive obedience with her (the only dog sport I was aware of at the time) but that wasn't panning out.  Sam came along and things began to change.

I acknowledge that every stud dog is different and what I've experienced with Sam may not be the norm but, here's what I've found:

- Some stud dogs don't like other intact males.  In my first group of Cardigan friends, there were a bunch of intact males.  Some had stood at stud, others hadn't.  None of them liked each other.  We all socialized at agility events but we had to do it from a 6-10 foot distance if we had the dogs with us.

- Intact males can be wonderfully polite around girls in season or real idiots.  Early on, Sam was very polite when his girlfriends would come to stay with us.  As he's aged, he's gotten less polite and more of an idiot.  The whining and tap dancing that accompanied Georgia's last season were ridiculous.

- When you own a stud dog, you sometimes have to take matters into your own hands.  Enough said.

- Taking your stud dog to a good looking, male repro vet to be collected on can seriously impair your sang froid.

- Owning a stud dog causes you to have what most people would think of as completely inappropriate public conversations about testicles, penises, semen, sperm counts, motility and virility.  It also causes the guy at the UPS store to ask if you were the one who shipped a 'whole bucket' of sperm to England.  I was not.

- Owning a stud dog means you don't have to be married or have a boyfriend to experience having a man in your bed who hogs the bed, steals the covers, throws the pillows on the floor, snores, farts and kicks you when he's dreaming.

-Owning a stud dog means you can have lovely friendships all over the country and world with people you've never met because their dog has your stud in its pedigree.  I'm always thrilled to see pictures of members of the Samily and hear about their exploits.

What about the rest of you who own stud dogs?  Anything to add to the list?

Another Dog Show Take Away

I've been meaning to post since the first weekend in February but, I've had a cold and just haven't had the energy.  On February 4, Miss Georgia went Best of Breed at a show in Doswell, VA.  It was a small Cardigan entry, no specials, but I'm still super proud of the little girl who is growing into such a lovely show dog.

In the past I've talked about all the crap you need to show a dog; grooming table, dryer, special shampoo, brushes, combs, chalk, etc.  Then there's the wardrobe considerations for the handler; color coordinating with your dog, making sure the skirt is long enough to cover your lady bits if you bend over, pockets, etc.  Of course there's teaching your dog to be a show dog; hand stacking, free stacking, gaiting, baiting, etc.  Then you go in the ring and hope for a win.  When it happens, it's exhilarating!  And then you get to the win photo....

Traditionally, you have a win photo taken for your first point(s), both majors and when your dog completes its championship.  There is a photographer at the show who will take the picture with or without the judge (with the judge is preferable), in the ring or at a designated photo area.  The photo is mailed to you, in a sealed plastic sleeve, within a week or two of the show.  You can usually see enough of the photo through the printing on the sleeve to determine if you want to keep it.  If not, you send it back and pay nothing.  If you open the sleeve and keep the photo, you have to pay for it.

Sounds pretty simple I mean, we take pictures all the time.  If you have dogs, chances are good you have literally hundreds of pictures of them - candids as well as stacked shots (if they are show dogs).  You've probably been in lots of pictures yourself too.  No big deal, right?  WRONG!

What they don't teach you in handling classes, or anywhere else for that matter, is that the win photo should be practiced as well.  Getting your dog appropriately stacked shouldn't be an issue - you've practiced the hell out of that.  Getting YOURSELF properly posed is an entirely different issue.  Which brings me to Georgia's recent win photo.

Click to biggify.

You'll notice that my face is obscured.  That's because I was so focused on getting G set up properly, making sure the collar didn't make her hair do weird things, making sure the lead wasn't dangling in an odd place, etc. that when the photo was snapped my face was NOT prepared.  I look like a turtle that has been goosed.  My expression is literally so distracting that you don't see the dog.

I'm willing to post an un-retouched photo if my dog show friends out there will share with me their less than flattering win photos too.  Send them to me at dina.delsman *@* gmail.com and I will do a whole post of win photos gone wrong.  I need to know that others have felt my pain.

I Did What to the Cat?

Grace, the cat, doesn't get a lot of time on the blog but she does exist and I do care for her.  She's been around for 14.5 years - predating the dogs by 5 years!

This fall, I took Grace to the vet for a check up and while she was there we cut her claws.  Most people don't think about cutting their cat's claws but, if you have an indoor cat who doesn't use a scratching post it's not a bad idea to do it occasionally.

Today, I cut Grace's claws again.  While I was doing it, several things popped into my head.  In no particular order they are:

- It's a lot easier to cut Grace's claws than any of the dog's toenails.  Her quicks are way back.

- Damn!  Grace's claws are REALLY long!


- It's a lot harder to cut Grace's claws than any of the dogs toenails.  When held on her back, Grace becomes completely boneless and just sort of slides through my hands/arms.


- Where the hell ARE Grace's claws.  Between being retractable and her being long haired, finding her claws can be a challenge.


- Might be a good idea to keep Grace's uncut claws away from my face while I am cutting them.

If you have a cat, take a moment to check out their claws - if he/she will let you - and if they need it, give them a trim. The furniture you save may be your own!

Manscaping

Bogey was starting to look a little shaggy so I decided to do some manscaping on him this weekend.

Making those feet look a little less like a Snowshoe Hare's.

Not being a show dog, he really doesn't appreciate being asked to spend time on the grooming table.  When it was all said and done this is what was left.

Can it really be called manscaping if you remove this much hair?

And this is how the handsome boy looked.

A little less crazy grandpa hair coming out of and around his ears as well as tidier feet.

Dog Shows and Champions

This weekend there was a cluster of dog shows in Fredericksburg, VA.  A cluster means that there are several days of shows, usually sponsored by at least two local kennel clubs.  This was a five day cluster, starting on Wednesday and ending tomorrow, Sunday.  Georgia was entered Friday and Saturday and she did well; garnering two more points toward her championship.

It takes 15 points for a dog to become a champion.  Those points are earned by defeating other dogs at shows.  That sounds pretty simple but it isn't always.  You see, at least 6 of those points have to come from what are called 'majors.'  A major can be worth 3, 4 or 5 points, depending on the number of dogs shown and the region the show takes place in.  The AKC has divided the country into 13 divisions and, based on a rolling 3 year count of entries, they publish a points schedule every May.  You can see the current schedule here.

Dogs that are not yet champions are known as 'class' dogs and the points schedule applies to them.  In each breed the dogs entered are shown first by sex, then by age or special classes like American Bred, Bred by Exhibitor or Amateur Owner/Handler.  The winners of each of the age or special classes go back in to compete for Winners Dog/Bitch - that's where you earn the points.  Then Winners Dog & Bitch go back into the Best of Breed round, with dogs that already have their championships (specials), to compete for Best of Breed, Best of Opposite Sex and, for the class dogs/bitches only, Best of Winners.

The AKC actually has a pretty good explanation of how to count points here.  I'm referring you there because trying to explain some of those scenarios can get a little hairy!  Best of Winners was important to us this weekend because Georgia was the only class bitch entered - therefore, there weren't any points available to her because she didn't defeat any other girls.  By going Best of Winners, she was able to get the points that applied to the dog entry for the day.  Winners Dog still got a point but, because Georgia did too since, in essence, she was judged to be the best of all the non-champion dogs entered.  It's called "crossing over" and in areas where the points schedule hasn't caught up with what actual entries are like, it can save your bacon - allowing you to win points when normally there wouldn't be any.

If all this didn't make sense, read it again :)  Then, don't worry about it.  It took me at least a couple years just to understand the concept of crossing over.  I still don't completely understand scenarios where class dogs/bitches go Best of Breed over specials.

Georgia is entered in another show on January 28th in Doswell, VA.  There are 2 class dogs entered and Georgia is the only class bitch again.  Under the current schedule, that means she won't get any points for going Winners Bitch but, if she goes Best of Winners she would get another single point.  The other interesting part of this entry is that she also has the opportunity to go Best of Breed which buys her a turn in the group ring.  Oops, I didn't explain the groups did I?  Well, we'll save that for another post......

Only Six Left

Well, after tomorrow that is.  Tomorrow, when I fly to Alabama for a job interview, I will only have six states out of fifty that I haven't visited.  The remaining six are; Alaska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi and Vermont.  When you move around a lot, you keep track of things like that.

I can also tell you all the states I've shown dogs in (conformation, agility and herding); Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Kansas, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Georgia, Kentucky, Maine and Connecticut.  Not too bad, I say.

I had two phone interviews last week, one last night, and received an email to set up a time for another phone interview in the next week.  Things are picking up....

Stick a Needle in My Eye

Wow!  I can't believe it's already 2012.  Time really does go faster the older you get.

For Christmas last year (2011) Georgia gave us the gift of coming into season; seems the girl is on a 7 month cycle.  That means that this week she is in standing heat and her father, Sam, is a wreck.  Fortunately, we don't allow the two to spend much time together anyway so we aren't also dealing with having to separate them.  Poor Sam knows she's here though and he paces around the house quietly whining.  It really only gets annoying when you are trying to sleep.  He's also spending a lot of time checking out Ginny & Moira to see if, just possibly, they might be interested in a little hanky panky.  Poor old man.

On and off for the last several years I've had Sam treated with acupuncture to help relieve his arthritis pain.  I've always been impressed with the results however, I'd never had acupuncture myself so I didn't have a good sense of what it actually felt like.

About a month ago, I started having pain in my right elbow.  It was annoying but not too terribly bad so I ignored it, as I often do when plagued by minor pain.  The pain got progressively worse though and I suddenly realized I was suffering from tendinitis in that elbow.  I have no idea how that happened but, there it was.

I tried all the usual treatments; alternating cold and heat, anti-inflammatories (Traumeel and Arnica), pain relief (Tylenol) and whining.  None were really working so I thought I'd give acupuncture a try.  Hey, it's worked for Sam!

During the actual treatments I've been surprised at some of the things that have happened; odd sensations in parts of my body that have no apparent connection to my elbow (burning in my left heel), waves of energy that feel almost like a chill passing over my entire body and yesterday, while I was concentrating on breathing correctly, I burst into uncontrollable sobs.  It makes me wonder how Sam feels when he has the needles in, especially when they are hooked up to electro-stimulation to enhance the effects!

I've had two acupuncture treatments so far and, while the elbow still hurts, the pain does seem to be getting better.  What I've really been impressed with though are the side effects.  I sleep better for at least two nights after a treatment, Moira is more relaxed for a couple days after I am treated, and my overall mood seems to be better too.  Basically, I'm just finding that I feel more balanced and calm.

I have another appointment next week - I hope we can scale back the frequency of appointments soon since they aren't inexpensive - and am looking forward to it.  Now that I have a personal understanding of how acupuncture feels and works I will be much more likely to use it for the dogs.