Rottweilers Ate My Laptop

Rottweilers. Computers. Cameras. World Domination. Not necessarily in that order.

Rottweilers.
Computers. Cameras.
World Domination.
Not necessarily in that order.

Saturday Freya

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One of the reasons I was so concerned about making sure our rally obedience trial entries were for Sunday, and not Saturday, is because I wanted to do Freya’s regular Saturday morning class. I don’t know yet if this was a good idea or a bad one. It did give us one last pre-trial opportunity to work in a training situation indoors with other dogs. Plus even though this is not a rally obedience-specific class, we do practice a lot of rally moves like the circle turns, finishes in both directions, and about turns of all three styles. This was not one of her best-working sessions, but it wasn’t terrible either.

Tomorrow’s trial is at a facility we’ve trained at in the past, located very close to home. It will probably be pretty small unless they get a ton of day-of-show entries. My van is already set up for a one-dog show trip (as in crate, extra folding crate, crate covers for different weather conditions, towels and blankets) and all I should need in the morning is dog, leashes, water and treats.

Best case: we get a new title with placements. Worst case: we fail, but I am right there to turn in a pre-entry for the trials on December 5-6!

(NaBloPoMo | November ’09: 14 of 30 | 75% Challenge: 259 of 274)

Training in our spare time

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As Axel’s departure date gets closer and the days get shorter, I don’t always have the chance to set up our practice rally courses in the yard, especially when the weather does not cooperate. So I am just trying to fit in little bits of practice wherever I can throughout our normal day.

Here’s the back sidewalk between the house and the garage:

backwalk_0189

Not very long as the entire lot from street to alley is only 125 feet long, but a few trips back and forth after each potty break time will allow us to practice heeling at all paces, 1-2-3 steps forward and backwards, all three types of about turns, and 360° turns.

The kitchen is small even after chasing the cat into the living room or dining room:

kitchen_0190

Small as it is, there is still ample room to practice all varieties and combinations of sits, downs, and finishes. Since the dogs are fed in the kitchen, it is a location where they are even more motivated than usual to do what I ask them to.

It all adds up, right?

(NaBloPoMo | October ’09: 14 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 236 of 274)

Counting down the last two weeks

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It seems like Axel just got home from his last road trip and now we’re getting ready to send him back out again. He’s been home since March 16, but it sure doesn’t seem like seven months have gone by.

Since he’s still current on his immunizations and licenses and hasn’t changed handlers, my list of things to do to get ready isn’t that long. I picked up his health record at the vet on Saturday when Freya went in for her nail trim and medicine refills, and I’ve already put it in an envelope with photocopies of his registration, pedigree, microchip information, license, and emergency and non-emergency contact information. I hope I remember the envelope. Not too much shopping to do either: enough food and topical flea preventative for a couple of months, and a couple of new toys that will take a couple of months to destroy.

This may sound silly, but we always practice a few things just before a trip. They normally have warm water and sometimes miscellaneous goodies mixed in with their kibble. I make sure they’re ok with eating it plain and dry, and not just in the kitchen, but in their crates, in the van, or in their crates in the van. They normally have the run of the back yard for potty breaks. Just before a trip, they get some of the potty breaks on leash, and get rewarded for speedier output. After standing in bitter cold with one of “those” females who thinks they can only potty in their yard in their special place while no one is looking, I will never again underestimate the value of teaching a dog to go on command.

Julia will spend a week or two on a show training “refresher course” before Axe’s first time back in the ring. And I have these last two weeks to make sure he’s learned all of the AKC Rally Novice exercises well enough to get through any trials that might be available at the shows he is going to.

Even with the relatively short list of things to do, this will probably still turn out to be a busy couple of weeks!

(NaBloPoMo | October ’09: 11 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 233 of 274)

Still in need of a more effective routine

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Here we are at the end of NaBloPoMo for July 2009. I didn’t write much on the month’s theme of “routine” although the struggle to establish an effective routine is an ongoing concern.

At the beginning of the month, I had hoped to establish some better routines for blogging, dog training and computer maintenance. I think I succeeded in one area only, that of computer maintenance, and particularly if success is equal to having current backups of everything important.

NaBloPoMo has gotten me into the habit of writing daily, but unfortunately I’m having difficulty shifting my writing time from extremely late night to early evening. Early morning was considered and rejected as a good time to write. One must be awake and alert to write. That is not me in the morning.

The dog training routine is now high priority. Freya and Axel both need to be ready for rally obedience trials in October or November. I’ll be training very few totally new exercises to either dog, so the challenge is to keep them (and myself!) from getting bored and sloppy.

(NaBloPoMo | July ’09: 31 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 188 of 274)

Something to do with leftovers

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Something for people: Fried Rice

I am of Japanese ancestry, so there is always rice here. I used to make fried rice from leftovers quite often, especially during my younger and leaner years. The ingredients change depending upon what leftovers are available. The only constants are rice, egg, and soy sauce. The rice absolutely has to be leftover cold rice. If you are making a new pot of rice just for frying, sorry. You are not having fried rice until tomorrow! Freshly cooked rice is too moist and sticky to fry.

I had a taste for fried rice the other day. There were some shredded carrots left over from a pasta salad, some green onion stalks left over from Korean short ribs made earlier in the week, and some of those Korean short ribs. Perfect. The shredded carrots were a bit longer than I prefer, so I took a large handful and chopped them up a little more. I chopped up one green onion stalk, using both green and white portions. Then I chopped up the short rib meat. I didn’t use very much meat, maybe 1/4-1/3 cup. This all went into a frying pan to cook until the carrots and onions were soft and everything was hot. Short rib meat has enough grease, but if I’d used a leaner meat, I would have added a tiny bit of oil to the pan. Then the rice went in (I had about 2 cups) and everything stirred around until the rice was warm and the meat and vegetables were distributed evenly throughout. One raw beaten egg and some soy sauce to taste went in next, and stirred and tossed until the egg was cooked. If I had oyster sauce, I would have used some of that instead.

Yum 🙂

Something for dogs: Training Treats

The short ribs were a little too greasy to use for this, but any leaner leftover beef will work just fine. Cut it into small dice, spread them out on a paper plate, cover with waxed paper and microwave for 1-2 minutes, until they are somewhat dried out. Allow to cool completely before storing. They will last a few days in the refrigerator and a very long time in the freezer. I put just enough for a training class into each zip-lock baggie so I can just grab a baggie out of the freezer before heading to class. The treats thaw out on the way, and my dogs seem to consider them a high-value reward.

(NaBloPoMo | June ‘09: 15 of 30 | 75% Challenge: 142 of 274)