Time For A Puppy Fix

Not much time for posting as Jess will arrive soon to load the car and we are off to St. Louis. It will be tough to equal last year when Argus won both Specialties and Pauli picked up a Specialty major, a Specialty Reserve and Best In Sweeps. Judges aren't nearly as promising for us this year, but hopefully we have a good time at least. Our departure will be by way of the Repro Vet where Argus will make his second "contribution". So much easier to use shipped chilled semen than to entertain a visiting lady, especially with me laid up for now. Well, guess I am not exactly "laid up" since the cast is certainly not keeping me home! Just keeps me from walking as much as I would like.

Here's a great place to get your puppy fix. These are the Argus/Tess pup at about 4 weeks. http://tramacpup.blogspot.com/

See you next week! Unless I can find a computer and do an update. I am buying a new phone though, as I hate being "unconnected".

Too Much To Do

I shouldn't be blogging, but will miss the next few days so I will enjoy a few minutes of writing while savoring my first cup of coffee.

Things are going to be so crazy at work as one the people in our group retired yesterday after 40+ years. The state never fills a position before someone leaves, so two of us are learning his job for the time being, paying construction contracts that are a mix of federal, state & stimulus funds. The coding is NOT easy but it is pretty interesting. Just wish I had had a bit more time to work on these before he left, and I hope the job gets filled soon - but of course the new person will have to learn the job too. Although the stimulus money is useful, it really makes things so much more complex from the account perspective, and the only other person in our unit who can make these payments is going to Hawaii for two weeks later this month. ARGH!

As if things weren't crazy enough here already, Argus has to make a "donation" today and again tomorrow (before we leave for St. Louis) for a chilled semen breeding. The bitch has missed twice before, so this is a now or never, a surgical insemination followed by a transcervical two days later. They are using the best reproductive specialist available, so hopefully this works. We would normally just give one repeat, but are giving a second one this time as we really would like to see what this bitch and Argus produce. His sperm count is high and his semen packs and ships well, so we hope the third try is the charm. Some dogs, like some people, are infertile however, so fingers are crossed all around. Sometimes a bitch will even conceive, but just be unable to carry a pregnancy to term.


I got this nice note a few weeks ago and thought I would share it. The Dal pictured on this blog entry is Frigga.

Hi Sue,
We love our dal Frigga, who was your Shandi, daughter of Coral. She has been
a delight over the past years. We take her with us whenever we can, weather
permitting, in our Ford 150 which we have equipped with a crate in the back
seat to house the dog when we are away from the pickup. It's not that we
don't trust her, it's that someone might see her in the pickup and steal
her. Our favorite passtime at home is riding around on our John Deere Gator.
Frigga loves it and will not be denied a ride when I have it out of the
shed. She kept falling off the seat, so I fashioned a board for her to sit
on when we ride around. We had her in Puppy Kindergarten when she was
little; we went twice because I (David) did not quite master the course the
first time. She also loves to go to the farmers markets in our area during
the season. The vendors forget her name, so there, so they call her Spot.
Frigga has a kink in her tail and may not be anatomically correct in every place,
but if dog shows were held to determine best disposition and personality, we
have no doubt that our "Friggie" would win best of show every time. She did
win the tail wagging contest at her Kindergarten class and received a
stuffed toy as a prize. She likes stuffed toys but tend to "gut them out"
after playing with them for a time.The picture we're sending is of Frigga
and our cat Izzy snuggling together on Frigga's bed. Izzy loves Frigga, and
Frigga endures. We enjoy your blog.

So Much To Tell, So Little Time . . .

Joan Murphy took this lovely picture of Penny at Chicago. Would have been better had Penny's tail been up a bit more, but she carried it perfectly when moving thank goodness. It must have been what we call "cold tail" a bruised tail that tends to hang limp for a few days. Jess says it looks much better now. Penny was such a good girl and learned so much on our trip. She showed very well for her first weekend in the ring, and worked just as nicely when Karen & Ginger took her back in for Jess. Hope the show win pictures look as good as they appeared to be from ringside.

Argus was an absolute Butthead for Jess the first day, but they got it together for the second and third shows and looked terrific, but all for naught. Judging was so weird. One judge even bragged that although he "might" have made an error or two, his dogs "all matched" at the end. ARGH! Judging is about finding the best dogs, not about finding the dogs with similar faults. It was bad enough that he did that, but worse that he actually bragged about it. To me that shows disrespect for a breed. Very weird.

Many tales from the weekend but no time expand on them. The power outage at the motel - no lights or heat at 5:00 AM when we needed to get ready for the dog show, the incredibly bad roads in Minnesota & Wisconsin, but better in Illinois which says something about the usefulness of tollways, the overcharging at the food stands in McCormick Place - I was overcharged two out of three times, how grateful we were that Purina Pro Plan had an area for exhibitors where you could get excellent coffee & sweet rolls, and sit down to rest away from the crowds, the "unclubby" luncheons in the Chicagoland Dal Club benching area - you were either part of this group, that group or no group, my frustration at not being in the ring, the outstanding quality in most of the groups (wow! did we ever love the Boxer bitch), the intense competition in the Standard Poodle ring, the gorgeous Tibetan Terrier boy (I could own one if he looked like Luigi), the incredible distance between parking & the show rings (advertised as "just a level up" from parking - hah! - they neglected all the hallways and lack of directions), all the vendors, and so it goes. Truly a fun-filled weekend, and on Thursday we can start all over again and leave for St. Louis.

Home Safe & Sound

We made it, and my ankle survived. I hated sitting at ringside! Can't wait to be back in the ring. Had a very good time, but was not nearly as successful as the Indy weekend. Saw some amazingly bad judging and a lot of really good judging and gorgeous dogs in many breeds. See you tomorrow.