crisis time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ugh, i dont know what to do i dont know what to do, i dont know what to DOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

rescue contacted ME, they contacted ME, about a litter of bluuuuuuueeeeeeeee puppieeeeessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss



focus kim focus focus focus.

last night rah had open only.

rah was acting very ... special... prior to class. lydia had him all sorts of worked up (that took oh all of about 2 seconds) when she knocked his chuckit down from its throne on the wall and waved it around and rah instantly went ballistic (no pun intended) - YES I HAVE A CHUCKIT THAT LIVES ATTACHED TO THE WALL JUST LIKE I HAVE A DUMBELL PROUDLY DISPLAYED HIGHER THAN RAH CAN REACH IN THE LIVING ROOM - then i took them all outside. and i think rah thought we were going to play in the field and he was torn. he had his e-collar on, he saw the chuck it, lydia had teased him with it - but i was asking him to get in the car. you know those patterns of action - i had done everything we normally do that involves GOING INTO THE FIELD TO PLAY, but then ... just not completed the actions that he loves so much. you could see he was so conflicted - he was coming towards the car, giving me the look, but then kept running back into the yard and wanting to go to the OTHER gate that leads to the field. so i kept calling him back and he got the prancy "i understand what you are asking of me, but i simply cannot comply with your request" feet - rah had a crisis of convictions.

rah's alliances simply lie with the chuckit, not with me.

le sigh.

he would get all the way to the crate door, but just wouldnt jump in. he just looked so forlorn. so yes, i had to pick him up and PUT his front feet in the car, at which time i think he heaved the saddest sigh a blue doberman has ever heaved, and accepted that were not, in fact, going to be playing chuck it IN THE DARK, IN THE FREEZING COLD, (may i repeat, in the pitch black dark?), and heaved his balding blue ass into the car.

so we get to class, and rah then decides that once again, we dont want to enter that crate either. now, unlike berlin who used to have to squish into a 300 crate (before you call the humane society on me, i have upgraded her to a bigger better crate there - and the 300 is now inhabited by leo the alien french bulldog at class!), rah has a gigantor crate at training class that is his, all his. it has always been his. its huge. it smells like him. it has a nice comfy bed in it. no one else uses this crate - it is a somjen crate, like berlins - we are priveledged to be able to leave our crates there as permanent testaments to the fact that i spend the equivalent to half a mortgage payment there a month, or something like that.

but no - tonight that was not a crate. it was a doberman eating MONSTER THAT RAH WOULD NOT GO IN. clearly rah must have grown and he would not fit. he would go up to it stand near it sniff it, but could not pass the door. he would melt, he would die.

my dog. has. lost. his. mind.

with a sigh, i platz him, put the GOOD DOG IN HER CRATE (she enters willingly like the wonderfully trained little girl she is, turns around and plops down, waiting for me to do something fun so she can scream her head off) and turn to address BBD (bad blue dawg).

we commence 2 quick minutes of somjen crate games (an adulterated rip off version of susan garrett's crate games in which rah goes in, gets cookies and immediately runs out and then back in because as we all know rah knows no duration to anything unless repeatedly told to wait and will repeat any behavior ad nauseum if there are cookies present).

in the end i think it was truly all just a method to get me to feed him more cookies before we actually started class. im somehow left feeling like im the one that didn't learn something here...


anyway... class... yeah. out of sight sits and downs were informal since were were looking at pictures and gabbing about work (kathy who does wed classes is a vet tech at one of my competitor clinics HA down the road so we gab about clients and shit) but rah id perfectly.

we didn't do official heeling but we worked on set ups, heeling, fronts and finishes all on our own for about 15 minutes while kathy and other people tried to distract us - set ups while she walked right up to us, heeling directly past someone else 1 foot away etc. did retrieves and she RAN UP to rah to offer him cheese and he gladly complied the first time but realized quickly that it was set up.

we realized that rah is simply too fast for flexi's - thats why i am so bad at them - he runs faster than they retract, so i cant use them effectively. so im off to buy ANOTHER one - and i cant use the ones meant for his size because they are unweidly - hes too big. but his fronts were better. ive also been using a few other methods and combining them all -a nd today im also going to break out pivot books and click that for straightness.

brought out the jumps, etc and worked. she did an exercises with the db where she did the judge and we had to give up and get the db and keep the dogs attention on us heel away, and come back without loosing the dog. rah did well. worked his ROF and ROH on the flexis to bring him in, and it enabled me to cut out all the extra commands and keep him straighter and hopefully eliminated some of the stress he feels that causes the mouthing now at the very end.

DOR was perfect, he loves it. fig8 was nice, rachael the little girl that belongs to mulder the lab likes to be posts and help out so we worked with that. need to straighten him out again hes getting a little sloppy. but he absolutely doesn't care if al ittle kid is a post, which is nice since pat scully did use a child as a post at the tappen zee trial.

broad jump - RAH BROKE THE BROAD JUMP. yes rah is breaker of wooden broad jumps. (he also broke the weave poles in the back yard).

i think thats mostly it.
tonight we have novice (berlin) and utility (rah) and i think im working mercury in open since lydia has to work today for someone else and wont be able to make it to class. should be fun and very tiring. hopefully mercury wont pee on me.

rah - destroyer of worlds.