I found out the other day that at CPE nationals, Snooker is judged on time. So the winner is the one who gets to 31 points in the fastest time. I cannot get my mind around this. Every time I try to think about it, I get a headache. What does it mean? What to do?

So I am going to try to write down my thoughts just to test them out. I guess you need to figure out which is the fastest way to get to 31. Of course, you need to attempt the 3 reds first. So you need to figure out if you should go for the smaller and assumably easier numbers and hopefully get thru the closing, or go for all 7's and just get thru 4? in the closing. Ack! And for sure if you do something like that you need to run to the finish as soon as you have racked up enough points. So much to think about! And you better be sure you do the addition right before your run. This is like the game we play at league, which I think they call snooker made easy.

I don't often travel to agility. We have the big event coming up next month, CPE nationals, and this weekend was a great shakedown cruise for that event. We stayed in the luxary of a motel 6. It was a little sketch. I mean, when you drive up and see three cop cars in the parking lot, your mind doesn't say, "oh, nice place". But the rooms were pretty clean, the bed was comfortable and the air conditioner worked. And it was cheap. Unfortunately, they put me close to the pool. Not close enough that it was really annoying while the pool was open, but after it closed, everyone seemed to congregate in the parking lot area in front of my room. And Hannah barked. And barked. I didn't have my crate, I left it in Michele's car, so there was not much I could do. The crowd didn't disperse until about 1:00 AM, so I only slept a few hours Friday night. Not a good thing.

Saturday, I got back to my room fairly early, about 7:00. I brought my crate in. After I walked Hannah, she just curled up in her crate. When the after pool party commenced at 10:00, she started to bark again. I zipped up her crate and she stopped and I didn't hear another peep out of her all night. Weird, huh? So I will definately bring a crate to leave in the hotel for Nationals.

We had a back jump in standard, and one in snooker. I am pretty sure that my lazy handling is the cause. I plan a front cross and its not so much I can't get there during the run and it is my mind says "crap, you don't need to do that, its too much work". So I gotta stop doing that. I can get those front crosses in, I made myself do it on Sunday and the result was much better.

When Hannah went out and got into the weaves in steeplechase final, I know its because I didn't give her a turning cue. If I am going to work to teach her these things (also like verbal left and rights), I need to use them in competition.

For this trial, I entered as part of a Performance Versatility Pairs Team with my friend, Michele and her little sheltie Tango. Tango is a fast little sheltie, but very young. I also entered Championship Grand Prix and Steeplechase.

First off, I want to say I loved the trial. Such a beautiful setting, such nice people, small, one ring and very very well run. The judge was the same as we had at Elma, Becky Dean. She has some fun courses.

First up was Gamblers. Both my partner and I had good runs, so a promising start. Then came standard. It was a tough, tough course. Tango and Hannah both had one back jump so no joy there. Two E's.

Then it was time for Steeplechase. There were only three 16 inch championship dogs at the trial, so it was looking like a pretty darn good chance to get that steeplechase Q that has been eluding us for so long. Hannah and I had one of her best runs ever. Very connected, no real bobbles, no refusals. Her weave entries could have been better, she didn't turn back to me, but I feel like she really hesitated and thought about it both directions. Anyway, the three times were within all within a tenth of a second of each other!!!

Then came team jumpers. I was pretty tired, it was pretty warm and the very end of the day. We did okay, our teammate did great and came in first in her height. So a pretty good day one.

Sunday started with Snooker. Oh snooker. I had a plan, a conservative plan, but no. Hannah backjumped after our second red. My partner also had a mistake early on, so no joy in snooker. Then came Grand Prix. This was probably one of our best runs ever. EXCEPT for that one part where I got lost and missed a jump. But Hannah and I were so connected, like a real team. Just wonderful.

Steeplechase Finals - Hannah went way wide after a jump for some reason (probably because I didn't give her a turning cue) and ended up in the weaves by mistake. Other than that, it was a fast fun run.

Last of all of course was Team Relay. We nailed it. We really were pleased with that, of course with the E's in snooker and standard, it wasn't enough to put us above the line. But we had a really fun time.

This has always been one of my favorite trials. And today was no exception. We had the same format as last weekend, that is JWW started at 9:00 with 16 inch. We were the 8th dog on the line, so a quick start to the day. The course was very wide open, I thought. There was only one place that was even remotely technical, and I just about lost it there. I had been distracted by calling Hannah off an off course jump right when I had planned a front cross. So the front cross didn't happen. I was momentarily lost, but I said to myself, "just keep going, trust the dog". And it worked. She saved my butt.

Standard was a tough course. Hard opening, difficult weave entry, hard table position. There was a couple places Hannah got sticky, but she really did run well. I am so pleased right now.

Its a beautiful day, but I am off to a club meeting this afternoon.

We started at 9:15 today with JWW. 16" went first. I was a little worried, there was a mix up at the start. There were two young girls working the gate, I'm guessing 8 or 9 years old. Anyway, young enough that Hannah was totally freaked out. She was totally pulling on the leash, trying to get away. I told girls we were going to wait over to the side, and stepped away. Not far, just a couple steps back. We could hear the girls calling out names of dogs. I heard them say "Hannah on course, Truitt on deck". Um, hello, Hannah is right here. I watched as Truitt went off course and decided I should tell the scribe that they had their shelties mixed up.

So Truitt finishes, we go up to the start and I am pretty sure we can just trash this run. Hannah was really bothered by the two girls. But it turned out to be to our advantage. She totally was not moving until I said, she was so worried about the kids, she forgot about being excited to run. So I got a good leadout, and everything went perfect. It was just so connected.

Standard was another story. Hannah was very wound up by the time we got in the ring and we had no connection at all. She did stick her dogwalk but the a-frame was iffy, so I stopped and marked it and then I lost her, we had a refusal fest.

I am happy with the weekend. Poodle trial is always fun. I hope that someday we can get a MACH at the Poodle trial, they have the prettiest pink MACH poles.

It was weird not starting until 2:00. I almost could have gotten a whole workday in, but I took the day off instead. I actually think 2:00 is a nice time to start.

Standard had a wicked start. It involved a tire and two tunnels. Lots of opportunity for mishaps there. Me and Hannah did great. I wish I had a video of her dogwalk. So rewarding to see her stop and wait. The table was tenuous, I had a hard time getting her to stay on it. The rest was good, still not stopping on the a-frame, but at least getting her contact. I can live with that, as long as its not run down, hit the yellow and then jump straight up into the air. Which she didn't do yesterday.

The only bobble we had was I tried to serp the last three obtacles and I think Hannah was thinking about our distance work we have been doing lately. Because she did the first two jumps and then went off looking for something in the distance. Luckily, I was able to call her back before she found something and got her over the last jump. So a great start and a Q for the day.

JWW was a wide open NADAC style course. Yee Haw. I watched the big dogs run and changed my plan a bit to a rear cross where I knew I would not get the front I had planned in and to run down the opposite side of the row of 4 jumps then I had walked. Fun, fun course. Unfortunately I had a poorly timed front cross after jump 2 and Hannah had a bar. But she had a nice, fast time and was moving quite well. No double Q, but all in all I was pleased with the day.

I did enter two days of this trial. Tommorrow (Friday) is Excellent only, so it will be small. Been having some really great classes lately, hopefully we can apply some of the great stuff we have learned to the courses tomorrow. Hannah has been really bad for the past couple days. Breezy is having another episode and Hannah has been really mean to her. You hear so much lately discounting the whole pack theory in dogs, but sometimes you wonder, when you see something like this. Hannah is definately taking advantage of Breezy's weakness. Breezy's back is really bad, I am at a loss. The only thing I can give her to help with the pain that her stomach can handle is low dose aspirin. Which I know is bad in the long run. I have some herbal stuff, but I don't know really how much that helps. I hate this.

On a happier note, I did decide to go ahead and go to CPE Nationals. Who knows if I'll ever get another chance? We will continue to improve Hannah's distance skills, because that is going to be key to any placements - getting the jackpot, which will be a traditional gamble. I have seen evidence at Andrea's that Hannah can do distance, the test is if we can do it in a trial situation.

Anyway, looking forward to the next two days of AKC with Hannah. I hope she is ready for this one. After that, we have Sno King on Sunday only, then the USDAA trial in Turner, Oregon, and the following week will be Red Hot Rovers at Argus. So quite a bit of agility coming up in the next month!

I took Hannah Lure Coursing yesterday. Such a beautiful day, it was just perfect. We were pretty much in training mode with Hannah, she didn't really get a chance to do a full practice run, but she was turning on to the lure pretty well.

Here was the highlight of the day. After our "run" the coach told us to go off to the side and Hannah should watch some of the other dogs run. We did, but of course this set Hannah off barking (well, really, what doesn't?). I was trying to make her stop when one of the coursing people came over and said, "oh no, its really good when they bark while their watching". Sounds like a perfect sport for Hannah.

I will definately try it again, it is so fun for the dogs. Pure joy when they get to run flat out chasing.

I am going to withdraw from the CPE Nationals. With my need to watch the spending of agility $$, I just can't justify the additional expense of going down to Oregon in June and possibly 4 nights of hotel for a venue I have lost interest in.

I do think CPE is really fun. I do. And I will continue to secretary for the winter trial. I just don't think it matches up with my personal agility goals. I think part of my problem is that I just don't focus on one thing and stick with it. From now on, we do AKC/USDAA.

Starting out on Friday, (Friday the 13th), I woke up in the morning and finished doing our taxes. Pretty bleak outlook for us. We ended up owing a lot of $$ and and was with using Tyler as a deduction and all of his schooling. Which is done now and we won't be able to take those deductions next year. So we really have to tighten our belts and pay more each paycheck in taxes or else.....

After I got done with the taxes, I went down to pick up my new cell phone. Unfortunately, I left my debit card by my computer where I had used it to pay my taxes. Ugh. Stupid. So I had to drive all the way back home, get the card drive back to pick up my phone again. So an errand that should have taken 30 minutes, took over an hour.

Head down to Elma, get to the hotel, no reservation. Ack. What is happening? I totally remember looking at my reservation confirmation right before I left work. Ha Ha. Anyway luckily they had a room available for me. (Got back to work today, look at my reservation, it was from LAST year). I am an idiot.

Things started to pick up after that. Nice dinner out with some friends, got good sleep on Friday, Hannah only barked once about 3:30, when someone was out in the hall.

Okay, now for the trial. Started out with Standard on Saturday. I think we were doing okay, had a bit of the problem on the table as Hannah did go down, but the judge wasn't counting. I guess she was a little up on her elbows. So took longer on the table than we should have. The dogwalk was near the end, and Hannah did a really nice dogwalk with a stop!!! I got so excited I sent her over the wrong jump after! This was to be the theme for the weekend.

Next up was Steeplechase. As we were getting ready to run, they started the car racing at the race track next to the arena. It was pretty loud and Hannah just got wired. She was all over the place, barking and jumping and just general craziness. She was really stressing up. I almost chose to not run.

She actually started out okay. Then I sent her over an off course jump, and I must have gotten upset, because she just melted. She stopped, turned toward me and just barked non stop. I just picked her up and took her off. I didn't know what else to do. Looking back, I think I just should have ran her out, because it was partially or totally my fault.

Gamblers was the last run of the day. Everyone said it was a very difficult gamble. I thought maybe we could do it. But we couldn't. I was happy, though. Hannah had settled and was running great. She did another perfect dogwalk. Which once again caused me to forget my whole plan.

We went out for dinner again on Saturday, so much fun.

Sunday, I was ready for great dogwalks and vowed not to become disoriented by them. Standard went pretty well, a refusal at the weaves. But she did go down on the table again and another great dogwalk. Strangely, she was still having issues with the A-frame.... she was hitting the yellow, but no criteria.

On to Grand Prix. She ran great! The only bobbles, were at the A-frame, she stoppped above the yellow, and I really sucked it up and made her walk down to the 2o2o. It took a LONG time, but well worth it. She slipped behind me after the a frame and it took everthing I had not to try to fix it which I knew would have cause a refusal at the next jump. Yay! we made it. The ending sequence went dogwalk to the backside of a jump that was parallel to the end of the dogwalk to the tunnel. The judge said if your dog went very far past the plane of the jump which was the end of the dogwalk, you would get a runout. This was where you really needed a good directional at the end of the DW, or a stop. Hannah did her best stop yet. I even was able to get up there with her and do my front cross before releasing her. Yay! We Q'd on Grand Prix, so that was great.

Snooker.... I had a medium conservative plan, 2 7's, a 2 and a 4. (4 reds). The opening went well, but I messed up during the closing and she had a refusal at 3. But she was still moving well and listening well, it was good. So not a fantastic weeked, we had our ups and downs, but really fun.