New Year's Resolutions

We kicked off 2011 with our 12th Annual New Year's Eve bonfire and labyrinth walk, with old neighborhood friends and family, only this year it was drizzling so we gathered inside for most of the evening and gourged ourselves on entrees and desserts.  Max and Lucky did their tricks. Everyone wrote down their resolutions on one sheet, their Throw Away's on another sheet, and their material requests on a cabbage leaf.  Miraculously, the drizzling rain abated just long enough for everyone to go outside at 11:30, burn their Throw Aways,  perform the Mayan Meditation Dance, jump the fire line and race into the center of the labyrinth to shoot off our roman candles.  It was great fun. Some folks left shortly after that, while Jonathan, age 13, took charge of the fireworks in the sprinkling rain and did a marvelously mature job of safely managing them til they were all gone. I jumped over the fireline with Maxie, John jumped over with Lucky, then I walked Lucky into the labyrinth "to bring her to the inner circle", then I walked Maxie out "to bring him to the outer limits", symbolically in keeping with my agility resolutions below.  Then the last 6 of us (Laura, Portia, Jonathan, Audrey, John and me) gathered on the front porch, put on Queen,  broke out the champagne and raised our glasses to the New Year and many other toasts. Portia, age 8, had us all laughing after her 1 sip of champagne, which brought out a hilarious side of her I had never seen.  We were rolling. Then out came the dancing ribbons and all us girls twirled around the yard in self-expressive dance for half an hour or so, until nearly 4 a.m. It was energetically liberating and so satisfying to be with good and trusted friends, infusing the air with confident positivity.  It was perfect!

My NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS that pertain to my dogs:

1. Bring Lucky from Novice thru Excellent in one year, repeating what I did with Maxie last year in both Jumpers and Standard.
2. Bring Maxie all the way up to Masters Title in both Jumpers and Standard, in as few trials as possible (6-10).
3. Improve my stamina. Work up to sprinting 100 yards 4 times a day (to simulate doing 4 runs per day at trials).  Make that 6 if I decide to compete in FAST class.
4. Be the BEST agility instructor I can be.
5. Perfect my pre-competition routine.
6. Perfect my course memorization/visualization skills.
7. Perfect my handling skills.
8. Manifest a diesel Coachman Concord motor home that's in great shape, for next to nothing, keep it packed and ready!
9. Help our club move onward and upward, developing at least 3-5 new agility competitors in 2011 for 2012.
10. Learn more about putting on trials.
11. Strengthen my network of agility friends.

On New Year's Day, we slept in then friends came over and we watched our new AVATAR HDDVD, Extended Version, with friends, and ate all the left-overs from everybody's house! 

So now, our cabbage leaves are buried, Jonathan has gone home, parties are over, dishes are washed, most of the gifts given out, and it's time to get crackin'.  I just ran my 100 yards, twice actually, my calves ache and I'm winded.  When I can do that without the ache and panting, I'll know I'm making progress.  I'm giving myself 2 months (til March) to get in shape.

One of the things John and I are doing today is learn how to stream Maxie's YouTube videos on our HD TV.  I also want to see if I can stream videos straight from my Handycam, and how I might improve the quality of my 2011 videos.

Upwards and onward!

Mayan Meditation (repeated with hand and body motions in all 4 directions):

A way opens before me.
All obstacles and impediments are removed.
Only that which is worthy and desirable comes forward with me.

Let it Be!

After each chant, Portia started scooping up wet leaves and throwing them up in the air over our heads like confetti.  It was so festive, I followed suit and so did a few others.  Like Susan Garrett points out in her webinar, the most important quality for success to cultivate is "gratitude" for every blessing received.

Blog Symbols

Blogging inspires deeper contemplation and more thoughtful consideration and analysis of my activities and events, which is probably why I like doing it.  It helps me to live life more consciously and remember things.

I've found some small images to mark categories of thought that come to me while blogging.  I started adding these yesterday and will endeavor to add them to past pages whenever I happen to visit them again, and I may add more symbols as new categories appear.

 

Idea: whenever I get an idea that's new to me.

Rant: whenever I get on my bull horn and go on a rant.







Musings: things I'm ruminating about, reasoning thru, speculating on.

Gift:  Something I am given thru the generousity of another person, or by some divine intervention.  It is important to acknowledge our gifts to keep them flowing.



Other symbols I'm thinking of adding - thoughts, resolutions, prayers, journeys, achievements, milestones, epiphanies, miracles, pointers, keys, messages.

Monday Practice

Before meeting up with Nedra, Georgie, & Michele S at the field at 4 p.m. for an hour's practice on the FCI course set up last week, I dropped by Joy's to train Puddin a bit, and bring Joy a platter of food from our Christmas Party, and the first disk of The Tudors. Joy is getting around, and seems ever cheerful.  I worked in the den with Puddin's Line-Ups, fetches, bring it to me's, post turns, pull throughs, sit/stays, downs, and so forth.  He seems willing to learn, anxious to please.  Joy put most of the other D's outside, which helped Puddin to focus. I quickly retreated from the treadmill as he showed some anxiety

The Fry's Christmas - 2010

L to R:  Michele, Nathan, Allison, Jonathan,
Steven, Dawn, Audrey, John
Maxie and Willow were busy eating crumbs off the floor.

As said previously, I couldn't muster the energy to decorate nor take down Maxie's titling ribbons and photos from my mantle this year, so Audrey stepped up and offered her house. She made the sweet potato casserole, her famous oyster dressing and coccoons, salad, and rolls, and I brought a 14 lb spiral ham, loaded mashed potatoes, pecan pies, and chocolate.  And there were other goodies, like the Santa Bread.
  It worked out perfect.  Lots of hearty laughter.  Despite pleas of "no material objects, please,"

Prepping To Teach First Class

In preparation to teach my first agility class (a Beginners class) starting January 3, I've been working these past few days on my Lesson Plan, making a comprehensive list of Handling Skills, trying to prioritize them, visiting websites of other agility instructors, gathering their suggestions, studying their diagrams, watching training videos.

The 3 students Nedra assigned to me are all familiar to me so I know approximately where to begin.  2 were in Kay's Beginners class last session (where I assisted) and 1 has been in Sandy's Advanced Beginners for several sessions but needs some foundation work.  I may need to convince her that she hasn't been "demoted" back to Beginners, that everything I will present needs to be practiced for the life of the dog, anyway.

Beginners, I'm told, is supposed to bring every team up to confident performance on full height contact equipment, then, I'm guessing (in the absence of a syllabus),

Jump Chutes

Learned a new term this week - Jump Chutes!  Seems everybody knows about these except me.  Found a website that describes it, and ordered the book:  Suzanne Clothier's "The Clothier Natural Jumping Method" - $13.95 includes shipping.

http://agilitynerd.com/blog/agility/publications/NaturalJumping.html

This method supposedly teaches your dog to perfect their jumping ability by

Motor Home Drool

Coachman Concord, Exterior view, 2 slide outs

Thursday and Friday, John's days off.  Our weekend.  Running other errands last Friday, we decided to pass by Millerville RV on O'Neal and Florida, and check out the trailers and motor homes.  Just for the hell of it, of course.  No intention to buy.  No ability to buy. We inspected a few dozen trailers and motor homes. I liked some but I fell in love with the Coachman Concord 275S0, an '05 model.  Everything in it including HDTV, surround sound entertainment center, generator, shower, hot water, full kitchen, separate bedroom with queen size bed and end tables, built in drawers and closets, all the options included. Two slide-outs. 28' long. Roomy. Selling for the dirt cheap price of $43,000!!!!!  My jaw hit the floor.

FCI World Championship Course Setup

Sheryl and I met at the field at noon and commenced setting up this 60' x 110' FCI 2010 World Championship Jumpers Course that I had seen Susan Garrett run on a video.  I created the map using my Course Designer Program, from the approximate positions I saw on the video. Nedra joined us around 1 and helped us finalize the course, then we all took turns running it til around 3.  I had both Lucky and Maxie with me, Nedra had Jessie, Sheryl had Charlie. The weather was 50's, clear skies, beautiful day.

This course is different from any other I've run.  The angles are tough, and there is sometimes 25 to 38 feet between obstacles (instead of the usual 15-20'), requiring some strong flat work

Sunday At Joy's

Today Sheryl and I  visited Joy again, shared some delicious Stuffed Bellpepper Stew Sheryl brought, then we walked Joy's dogs, 3 each at a time.  It was my first attempt at walking 3 dogs and I did not particularly enjoy it.  I felt I was always in danger of getting tangled up in the leashes, possibly tripping and injuring myself.  I didn't interact with the dogs much, so busy was I trying to manage them.  From now on no more than 2 dogs at a time.  Afterwards I tried working with Puddin' doing Line Ups on the floor and on the OFF treadmill.  It took some time but he finally started getting the hang of lining up.

Totally different experience than working with my own dogs, who trust me completely and are used to listening to me.  When I tried the "grab the collar" and turn on the treadmill maneuver that worked so well with my dogs, Puddin bolted out of there fast.  Exercise finished.  I'll try this again another day.

Upwards and onward!

December CR Central

With my clean yard and a cool, sunny day, and me VERY SURPRISINGLY no more sore than usual from yesterday's raking, today I set up the CR Central course from the December issue of Clean Run Magazine -- practice with Tunnel/Contact Obstacle Discrimination.  My dog walk being unmovable (hard to move by myself), I had to position the other obstacles in relation to it.  No big problem.  It was nearly in the right place.  Because my yard is 10 feet shorter than the course setup required, and there are a few saplings and a bush in the middle that I don't want to cut down, I had to make some other adjustments as well.  Whatever.  It will still give lots of handling practice. 

A few days back, John had spotted a crack in the underside of the dog walk, so I flipped the board over and sure enough,