For those of you who don't know, Fidelco is New England's only guide dog school, Fidelco breeds, trains and places the highest quality German shepherd guide dogs with men and women who are blind. In an effort to help this worthy cause Jeep, Tag, Renegade and I have a goal of $300.00 that we have to reach! Help support this amazing organization. Every dollar helps us get there! To donate to Fidelco through my team you can use this link: http://www.firstgiving.com/hycaliberagility.

I wanted to explain my method a bit clearer. Someone pointed out that Amanda Nelson uses gates, which essentially is the same thing (I think), I just prefer to use jump standards because that's what the dogs see in competition.

My sheltie is a snob. No matter where any other dog (or human) is sitting, she has to be sitting higher. All of my other dogs have doggie sleeping bags made by ABO Gear on the floor... Jeep? She has her Beanbag... which she absolutly refuses to sit on unless it's on my bed. Weird, I know... apparently she's decided she's far too sophisticated for her sleeping bag :) Renegade finds great sport in leaping into the air to grab her tail, however.

On my way up to MA today I was listening to NPR... only because my blasted XM radio cable was severed a few days ago by catching on a low branch... and you try and find a working radio station in the boondocks of MA... anyhow... the Click and Clack Car Talk guys were on (a re-run) and this guy called up about his car and dog. Here's the post word-for-word on the Car Talk website. Can you figure out why Mr. P doesn't like his new car?

I taught a bunch of private lessons today. All, except one, were green dogs with advanced handlers. I used these skill sets with each lesson and they worked out really well. Everyone was a little rusty from not working much this winter. They all did great; despite the snow flakes falling outside! I liked this set-up because there are a million other options besides the ones I have here. I had them work 270’s off the treadle, 180’s, post turns, etc. It was a flexible set-up, so I thought I’d share. The facility I was using was pretty small, so these courses have an 8 ft plank dogwalk. I’m sure it wouldn’t be difficult to tweak it for a large dogwalk, however.

In my opinion, the most honorable thing a person could do, is to represent your country, and all that you stand for. A few weeks ago, in my American Government class, we were asked to come up with words we felt describe the American Flag. Unity, freedom, honor and pride are just a few that came to mind.

The team was leaving Wednesday morning. I was driving down Route 9 (for all of you in Connecticut), on the merging ramp towards 72 West. This is a decent bend, not too extreme though. I was in the left lane, going about 70 (speed limit was 65). My 2 lane on ramp was merging with 4 lanes, Route 72. I remember a red car, going pretty slow, in the right lane, behind my blind spot. There was a large silver SUV about 3 car lengths in front of me. All of a sudden, a black 2 door Volvo FLIES in front of me. The silver SUV SLAMS on the breaks, obviously in an attempt to slow the Volvo down. Stupid move – remember I’m about 3 car lengths behind.

It’s probably safe to assume this has happened to everyone. You have this GREAT run, everything is going just as planned, and suddenly you do something stupid. You turn your shoulder, send your dog off course, pull them off a jump, fall over a jump, maybe you even fell on your face, whatever. The rest of your run is perfect! Besides that one stupid mistake you’re really excited about that stellar contact from 20 feet away, or complicated layer you just rocked. All of a sudden, in the middle of all your rejoicing, one of your friends makes it a point of telling you (and anyone else within ear shot) that “your handling really sucked in that back corner!” or “did you know, you stuck your arm out and caused Fido to take that off course jump?!” Maybe you knew, maybe you didn’t, but some advice for all those quick to point out other’s faults; unless we ask you right away, please leave us alone for a while before you pipe up! I think someone wrote a Clean Run article about this a while back; knowing when to take a hint, and when to keep quiet.