I’m happy to report that Freya qualified and placed in both trials at For Your Canine today to earn the first two legs towards her APDT Rally Obedience Level 1 title!
Freya’s score for the first trial was 201 points (out of 210 possible points, 200 plus a 10-point optional bonus exercise) for third place. Her score for the second trial was 192 points (we totally blew the bonus exercise) for fourth place. We need one more leg to earn the title, and our next trial is in two weeks. It’s possible that we could even earn the title with an Award of Excellence if we can get that third leg with a score of 190 points or better. I just hope we both bring our “A” games to the next trial!
We are both way more tired than we should be, considering that total time in the ring is approximately two minutes per trial. In our defense, the day did start very early, especially since I stupidly didn’t set up the van and crates last night, but I think we are just getting old!
More details sometime in the next few days and possibly video, too!
Now I will switch to eagerly and impatiently waiting for the paper certificate to arrive in the mail.
Those of you who are friends of Axel’s or mine, but who are not psycho dog people yourselves, are probably getting a little bored and wondering why I am obsessing about seeing proof of Axel’s championship. Those of you who are psycho dog people already know how sometimes points do not get recorded, or how you or your handler might miscount points for a particular show, or how you might be like me and just terribly bad at math. You, too, have spent more than you intended to on photos to document each win, in case you need those photos to prove you got points at that show. Anyway. It’s official now, as you can see above, so I can move on and you non-psycho dog people can breathe a sigh of relief.
In other news, Axel earned his Canine Good Citizen (CGC) today! For those of you who have seen him in overbearing or wild child mode: see, I told you he is not a criminal, he is a Good Citizen!
Tomorrow, I hope to have good news about Freya following her first attempt at APDT Rally. Check back!
I’ve written before about a number of incidents in Chicago where dogs fell or jumped into Lake Michigan and had to be rescued, sometimes along with their owners, by firefighters or police officers.
The incidents I’ve written about in the last year all had happy endings, and I really am glad for that, but I also had and still have mixed feelings about what could have happened. The reality is that the owner’s carelessness or irresponsibility that led to the dog being in the lake in the first place could have resulted in injury to or death of the dog, the owner, or a rescuer.
I just finished catching up with the video and stories about the dog saved from the flooded Los Angeles River by the Los Angeles Fire Department. This rescue did result in a dog bite injury to a firefighter, and I’m guessing the rescue in general was quite costly as a helicopter was involved, as well as about 50 firefighters and ambulance transport for the dog. The injured firefighter, who was the one lowered from the helicopter to retrieve the dog, downplayed the extent of his injury and his heroics. (By the way, this is why we love firefighters, real ones, that is. The real ones never refer to themselves as heroes, just that they are doing their job and they are glad they could help someone.)
The Los Angeles Times posed the question to its readers on one of its blogs: Should L.A. firefighters have risked their lives to save a dog? One recurring theme was the same thing that continues to worry me about these situations: what if the rescue of an animal results in injury or death to a rescuer? Some picked the cost as the main issue; it certainly was not insignificant in this case. I’m pretty sure the rescuers themselves have just as wide a range of opinions as the commenters to the article.
One comment hit me, though: the commenter said that the Los Angeles Fire Department is working without a contract. I do not know if that is true. I do know that the Chicago Fire Department, and for that matter, the Chicago Police Department, is working without a contract. As a CFD spouse, I know I am extremely biased. But after watching the video of the dog rescue, and the countless other videos out there of humans being rescued by the brave men and women of our fire departments and police departments, how can anyone think it’s right for these folks to work without a contract?
My husband is great at gifting me with cool gadgets that I didn’t even realize I wanted until I was happily playing with them. His latest pick for me is Polaroid’s ultraportable PoGo Instant Digital Printer. This one is going to be a lot of fun!
This printer is extremely portable. Small and light, it’s not much larger than my smartphone. Standard color is black; red and pink are available for an extra charge. The extra charge for the pink one supports breast cancer research. The extra charge for the red one just goes to make me happy. You all know how much I like the color red for my personal electronics.
There is a nice neoprene case available with a pocket for extra photo paper or a spare battery.
The photo paper is 2″ x 3″ with a peel and stick back. It uses ZINK Imaging’s Zero Ink technology. Heat from the printer activates dye crystals embedded in the paper. The print emerges dry to the touch and is supposedly waterproof and smudgeproof. The printer holds a 10-pack of photo paper and must be empty before you can load another pack.
The photo on the top is from my BlackBerry Curve 8330 smartphone and the photo on the bottom is from my Nikon Coolpix S50 digital camera. Since these are photos of photos, you won’t really be able to get a good idea of photo quality, which is acceptable for prints of this size.
Getting set up to print via Bluetooth from the BlackBerry was very easy, using the BlackBerry’s Bluetooth settings menu to discover and pair with the PoGo. Then it was a matter of selecting a photo, selecting “Send Using Bluetooth,” and selecting the printer.
Printing from the Coolpix camera was even easier, but a little more cumbersome since it uses the USB cable supplied with the camera. Once the two devices were connected, the PictBridge print option was automatically displayed along with on-screen prompts to help select and print a picture.
Sizing of the photo to best fit the 2″ x 3″ print area is automatic. You can print from any device that has Bluetooth transfer capability or that is PictBridge enabled. There is a compatibility guide on the Polaroid website. Sorry, iPhone users: even though you have Bluetooth, you do not have the transfer capability needed to print.
So far, I’ve really had some fun with this printer. Since the print size is so small, it does not replace a desktop photo printer. Unless you use an outside service for all of your photo printing, you’ll still want to have a desktop printer. But the PoGo’s extreme portability makes it a natural to accompany you anywhere. There’s something about having a paper print in hand, and this will be fun to have at parties and other gatherings, just like it was always fun to have a Polaroid camera around back in the old days when all cameras shot film.
I have not received compensation for this review, and I have no connection to Polaroid. The printer was purchased by my husband as a gift for me.
Tonight I received an e-mail update from the Black Nail Brigade on the nail polish killer. For those who are new to this blog, this refers to a fatal crash in May 2009, when Anita Zaffke was killed when her motorcycle was struck from behind by Lora Hunt, who was painting her fingernails as she drove.
A motion to dismiss reckless homicide charges was heard today. The judge’s decision will be heard on February 10, 2010.
Greg Zaffke’s update gave a few highlights from the hearing. I have to say this part totally floored me, especially because the defense attorney was using this statement by Lora Hunt to justify why the crash should be considered negligence rather than reckless homicide:
I was distracted by applying nail polish, [which I contemplated whether or not to do]. I chose to do a very stupid thing.
Wow. Isn’t that the very definition of recklessness, dictionary or legal?
I hope this plays out to the correct conclusion. I can’t say happy ending, nothing happy about it.
As you know, Freya and I are preparing for our first APDT Rally Obedience trial coming up on Sunday. Since Freya is not ready to trial off leash, or maybe that is me that is not ready, I’ve decided to do the novice level titles for all of the organizations that regularly offer trials in our area — UKC, APDT, and AKC — with her before attempting any organization’s advanced level title.
In APDT trials, you can use food rewards after any of the stationary exercises. This differs from AKC and UKC, where you cannot have food in the ring at all. At first I thought this would be a great thing, and it might well be. Except that I am the klutziest handler on the planet, and there are point deductions for dropping food, which sad to say, I do all the time in training. We get a lot of practice on “leave it.” Food rewards also have to be hidden in the handler’s pockets. You cannot use a bait pouch or hold food in your hands or mouth. That alone is a huge adjustment for me, since I always use a bait pouch and hold food in my mouth.
I have probably lost some of you already when I talk about holding dog treats in your mouth. I always feel like I have to apologize to new people in our group class, because I’m always holding treats in my mouth to get Freya’s attention on my face. My dog treats for training classes are all “people food” with the favorite choices for both me and dogs being string cheese and Jewel store brand Homestyle Frozen Meatballs (the President’s Choice meatballs taste better, but they have a higher fat content and don’t hold up as well for a one-hour class). I also use hot dogs, nuked with or without a dash of soy sauce (yes, that would be teriyaki hot dog treats). See? All of that is stuff that you wouldn’t mind holding in your mouth, right?
The one thing that I am not klutzy at is spitting food to my dogs. Most of them have been great at catching treats, either spit or thrown, and only a couple of them have let the food bounce off their faces. I will admit that if a class runs a full hour or longer, I do end up eating some of the string cheese myself.
You can check out all of the videos from Allan Ross’s Saturday morning Rally Obedience class at Best Friends/American Pet Motel on his YouTube channel. While you are here at Rottweilers Ate My Laptop, though, you can only watch Freya and me. We are selfish like that!
The APDT trial at For Your Canine is now less than a week away, so I will be making an extra effort to get to a Wednesday evening rally practice session, as well as working on cleaning up our least successful exercises at home. We are still possibly doomed if faced with my personal nemesis, sign #24: HALT – 90 Degree Pivot Left – HALT. We are entered in two trials on Sunday only.
Here is the course map, using APDT signs (click for a larger view). One of these days I will learn to draw nicer course maps. Today is not that day.
Once again, you can follow along with us:
Start: Again, I would like to get better attention from Freya whether it is required or not. If she starts out too distracted, it doesn’t get better until almost halfway into the run.
1. 19-Slow Pace.
2. 21-Normal Pace. Better than last week, she didn’t try to sit during the slow pace. I think I still need to show more of a change between the different paces.
3. 10-About “U” Turn. Ugh, miscue on my part. Should have been “back” not “fuss.”
4. 5-HALT – Sit – Walk Around. Freya seems to have lost her automatic sit somewhere along the line. Strange, because she hasn’t been in a conformation ring in literally years. Errors here are mostly mine, though. On the walk around, I’m holding the leash way too low, so I gave her an accidental correction when taking off again. Not to mention there would have points off for a tight leash, too.
5. 16- Call Front – Forward Left. Here, too, I’m holding the leash too low, again giving an accidental correction on the call front, with the leash too tight until the finish was completed.
8. 29-Straight Figure 8. I need to pay more attention on the walkthroughs, especially for spots like this where the path between signs is slightly offset for space reasons. Need to work on our pace through the cones. On the bright side, Freya totally ignored the barking from the gallery.
9. 9-About Turn – Right. Slightly sloppy.
10. 20-Fast Pace.
11. 21-Normal Pace. Again, need to work on finding the right pace for us. She almost got away on the fast!
12. 23-HALT – 90 Degree Pivot Right – HALT. Better than last week, only one try needed and she did actually move with me.
13. 7-Right Turn. Sloppy turn.
14. 26-Spiral Left – Dog Inside. Not too bad.
Bonus: Halt, Leave Dog, Call To Heel. That went better than I expected, except for where I almost whacked her in the face when she came to heel!
I still have much more of an issue with holding the leash too tight than I realized. Good thing to have video like this to bring that point home.
Is anyone besides me interested in seeing class notes every week? I can see where it might get boring to anyone who isn’t 1) me, 2) Freya, or 3) our instructor or classmates. And it probably isn’t that exciting to 3) after a while either!
