Techno Difficulties

Hi gang,

Sorry for not posting much but Mom's camera is on the fritz again and won't load pics for us! I have stories to tell and nothing to back it up... rats...

Anyway, last weekend I did good for Mom and SHE was the one making mistakes at the agility trials. I qualified in Jumpers on Saturday which made up for her mistakes in Standard that morning. Then on Sunday I decided to go even faster in Standard and ran Mom half to death. We ended up 5th in our class which was a personal best for us! woo hooo!

Josie got her first leg in Open Jumpers on Saturday and then decided the walls had rats in 'em on Sunday, so Mom had to take her out of the ring. Maybe it was that groundhog hole she almost disappeared down on Saturday. Mom had to pull her out by her hind legs, Josie just kept on disappearing down that hole! I was laughin'!...

Yesterday Josie went with Mom and her friend to a lure coursing practice in PA in the late afternoon. She came back and said she ran the WHOLE course twice!! She said Mom was in shock! Darcy the Deerhound who lives with our breeder got to run and did really well, too. I'm jealous but if I run a practice Mom says I'm an idiot in the agility ring. What -- I just love running! I can't help myself!

Here she is jumping at Louisville last month --

Maybe the camera will get over its flu and behave itself -- meanwhile have a good weekend, we'll be doing agility again up near Baltimore and it's going to be HOT weather..... here I am at Louisville last month.



Love,
Rudy

True Colors Thursday -- Lime!

OK, I thought finding a lime color around here would be hard. Mom doesn't even have any of the 'real' limes in the house, other than maybe an old bottle of lime juice..

But we did find a few things --



Ollie wouldn't sit next to this, but at least you can see the grocery shopping bag behind him. Mom's decided she likes this reusable-type bag much better than those pesky plastic bags that break and clutter up the place. I like 'em 'cause they retain those yummy smells when she gets meat from the store!!! mmmmmm....



That's Emmy under a pile of lime-colored toys. She's so lazy!



Ollie found another lime toy --



And here we are with an old towel Mom uses to dry us off. He's still at that teething stage where anything'll do -- old towels, toys, my face, whatever's handy, he'll chew!

Off the subject a little bit, Ollie had a 'beauty' pic done at the breeder's and he's now officially 'cute'! He has 2 more months to fill out before he can go to the dog shows. This is him at 4 months now:



Love,
Rudy

Rainy Earthdog Fun

Hi all --

Mom had this bright idea, why don't we go do some Earthdog practice today, even if it's raining. Well I'm always up for anything involving RATS! Josie needs to get some practice if she's ever going to get that Senior title someday, but the real question mark was little Ollie. Mom wasn't quite sure if she should bring Ollie or not, he's just a baby of 4 months, but he needed an adventure so we brought him too.

It rained, and it rained and it rained. Hmpf - the weatherman promised it would stop! It didn't! He owes us a LOT of nice sunny days now here in the East. Hear that, Weather Channel???

Anyway, I got dirtier than Mom had ever seen me in the Master tunnel (she FORGOT to take my pic so just picture a pig in slop!). Inside the tunnel next to where the rats were was totally wet but I didn't care! Ollie and Josie didn't get near as dirty where they were. (MOM: Yeah!) She found a hose and washed me down; I couldn't get back in the car as filthy as I was. Now that was cold in more ways than one!!!!
(but Mom did dry me off and put a warm coat on me afterward)

Ollie had a good time. He's thinking about the whole scene here ("what are they doing here? What am I doing here???") All the doggies barking got him a little afraid but that didn't last long.


Now he's looking at the lady bringing the rat cage...


It took 3 separate attempts at getting Ollie interested in the rat, but he finally did it!


You can't tell by the pic but he was barking his little puppy bark and following the cage around. That's my little buddy!


Mom didn't take him any further, she just wanted to get him to bark at a rat for now. When Josie was little bitty, she was afraid of that rat. Now she's out there going nuts like everyone else. I was never afraid... (ahem!).


So we dried off and spent a few hours at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Grandma liked him! Ollie met Grandma and they had a great conversation. I think he likes her too!


I had to stay in a separate crate 'cause Ollie was pestering me so bad Mom thought I'd be better off getting some rest by myself. Whew what a relief -- Josie had to put up with him instead....


We'll get to do some more Earthdog practice and games next month in New Jersey. They have some GOOD Earthdog games! I just lose my brains out there!
But for now, Josie and I have back-to-back agility trials this coming weekend and next. By next month I'll be ready to get 'down and dirty' again. Josie and Ollie will come with me for some fun too!

Stay tuned --
Love,
Rudy

True Colors Thursday -- Scarlet

I'm back with the "Scah-lett" edition of True Colors Thursday. (that's the way they pronounce it in one of Mom's favorite movies, Gone With The Wind)
No Scarletts around here, but there's plenty of scarlet!

One of Dennis's ties is about right, so Mom made me model it. I hope you can't tell she never learned to tie a tie...



And no, these aren't my lounging pajamas, but one of Dennis's Hawaiian shirts that's about a thousand times too big on me.



We found a really red Christmas ornament that matches my red collar:


It's a bird -- it's a plane -- noo, it's a fake magnetic cardinal attached to one of the metal tiki torches on the deck railing. It's nice and green in the back yard and garden.



We have several birdhouses with license-type plates for a roof, and one of them is a Marines logo house ("ooo-rah!"). Nobody lives in it right now. Our Dr. Pepper birdhouse is occupied so I don't think the current occupants want us to take pics right now...



Mom even showed me some weird things that live in our garage... this thing helps Dennis pull out car engines!


Guess this thing is red so you can find it under all the junk!


If this weren't red we'd never find this either...


Hey -- it's a car! Wow!


This helps Mom and Dennis keep the dust down while they're working on the kitchen:


One of our favorite couch pillows:


The best for last -- a favorite Christmas card from our breeder!


Thanks to Blue who started this all, can't wait for next week!

Love,
Rudy