OMG OMG I CAN DO IT OMG!
Holy shit, I’m doing it!! I’M DOING IT!!
Awwwww CRAP! Not quite.
Hello doG? Are you listening up there? I REALLY want this. Yeah, that guy does too, but I mean I REALLY want this!
WTF? You gave it to THAT guy???!
I am reaching for the moon, mofos!!
Hmmm … maybe I should have tried for something a little more obtainable, like a freaking Q!!
Etc.
Yeah, that’s how our weekend went. Apparently one of us suffers from performance anxiety under stress. That someone is NOT Tweed. Under pressure, I crumble pretty much EXACTLY LIKE MY HOPES AND DREAMS. :sob:
Nah, it wasn’t THAT bad. I made some handling flubs – most specifically in our Gamble runs. We had beautiful openings, so beautiful that it inspired a stand-still-with-your-mouth-agape reaction. Which is pretty much the reaction I had, hence the complete lack of handling when it came to the final actual Gamble, neither of which we completed successfully … because The Food Lady just stood there admiring her dog instead of, you know, handling. Wendy called our first one – “You pulled A Food Lady!”
But we redeemed ourselves with a 1st place in Jumpers 2, clean as a whistle and 13 seconds under time. And then we redeemed ourselves again with a 2nd place in Standard 1, also squeaky clean and a mere 19.5 seconds under time (::chuffed::). Those bonus points were a doGsend, because they made up for The Run That Shall Never Be Mentioned In Front Of Food Lady, otherwise known as Jumpers 1. Ironically Jumpers is our best game because Tweed likes tight and twisty courses … but he crashed a jump in the opening sequence when he slipped on the wet grass on take off, and more or less shot himself into an off course tunnel trying to avoid the falling jump.
In the end we had:
Jumpers 1 – 50/75 (insert sad face here)
Jumpers 2 – 88/75 (1st place ribbon)
Standard 1 – 119.5 / 100 (2nd place ribbon)
Standard 2 – 95/100 (shakes fist at awkward and evil weave pole entry angle)
Gamblers 1 – 47 opening points, no Gamble (so TFL’s fault)
Gamblers 2 – 56 opening points, no Gamble (TFL needs to work on GET THE F*CK OUT!! I SAID OUT TWEED!!!)
Total – 455 or so points.
Placement – 7th overall in 16″ specials.
Points away from podium – FUTHERMUCKING 5 POINTS!!!!!
Udda udda udda
I admit it, I said some nasty swear words and jumped up and down when they called the final placements and we were only 5 points off the podium. In fact, I probably looked exactly like this:
Just one of those final Gambles would have bumped us into 3rd place. Both Gambles would have slammed us into 1st place.
Next year you run, I’ll handle.
But you know what? I am still SO SO proud of my little red dog. He is so freaking full of TRY. He runs his little heart out for me, and he wants so badly to do all the things I ask him to do. This is the best placement we have ever seen at Regionals, and I am completely happy with him and the big efforts he made to be #1 – and to me, he IS #1!!
I owe a big thank you to my trainer, Gerhard “Again. FASTER” Rieger, who is both incredibly sadistic and supportive; to my classmate Mark, because congratulatory hugs feel nice and also I didn’t dehydrate because he fetches water nicely, and to Fiona – because sharing a hotel room with her dog Tempus made me realize that there are scarier things in the world than running agility, and they are borderjack sized.
Next year – PODIUM. Maybe for Piper too – if she gets a real handler ;-)
I came home with my annual, painful, Regionals sunburn, so I wasn’t entirely sad to wake up this morning to rainy Vancouver. The dogs and I had a celebratory trip to the ocean to wind down.
Piper and Mr. Woo were MAD because they spent the whole weekend in crates being ignored.
Mr. Woo took it out on Piper.
Piper took it out on her hockey ball.
I’m stalking some Mad Teeth ™
I’m gonna get me some Mad Teeth(tm)!!
I’M GONNA JUMP ON THE MAD TEETH(tm)!!!
YAY!!
I WON ALL ALL THE MAD TEETH(tm)!!! I am going to suck out her brains and make zombie Mad Teeth(tm)!!
Why do you let him do this to me, Food Lady??
Celebratory Puggle Wrestle
Get away you freak!!
Can we go back to Campbell River, and put these idiots back in crates, and then leave them there this time?
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