Too much herding fun

Those baaa-studs . . . .

New Info on Middle TN Corgi Fun Day

This will likely be a mostly Pem outing - so I think all of the Cardi folks who can make it should show up and win all the prizes!!

When: April 4, 2009
When: 10am-2pm
Where: Pawsitive Performance
3850 W. Trimble Rd Milton TN 37118 (southeast of Nashville)
Indoor Training Hall available if weather is bad

A Conformation fun match will be held along with competition for:
Longest corgi (Lego won this at the Chattanooga corgi parade - up for a rematch???)
Least Finicky eater
Oldest Corgi
Biggest Ears (Star - can you defend your title?)
Longest Coat
Fastest Recall
Best Trick (Spencer will be ready!!)
Best Costume (no - real dogs don't wear clothes.)
Best Retriever
and whatever else we may think up!

Agility equipment available for use and introduction to agility given to those interested.

******Silent Auction *******
*******Microchip Clinic******

Lunch to be provided but please bring your own drinks

Come visit with old friends and make some new ones all while helping raise
money for a wonderful cause.

All proceeds to be donated to Degenerative Myelopathy Study at Univ. of MO

For more info contact Lynn Goad at goadbark@aol.com 615-337-8120

Corgi Picnic Coming Up!

Looks like we will finally make it to Susie Noel's Corgi Picnic in Kingsport, TN on Sunday, May 17. The picnic is a benefit for CorgiAid and also features an online silent auction. For more info, see http://webpages.charter.net/noelcorgi/tcp9.html.

There is also an upcoming Corgi Fun Day in Milton, TN (near Murphreesboro) to benefit DM research. 100% of the money raised will be donated to the AKC Health Foundation and earmarked for DM research at the Univ of MO. AKC will
match any donation made.

The Fun Day is April 4 from 10:00-2:00 at Pawsitive Performance, 3850 W. Trimble Rd., Milton, TN. There will be a fun match, a silent auction and a microchip clinic, and there will be agility equipment. I have requested more info and will post when received.

Grooming for Group

Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Things to add to the dog bag

How many dog bags do you have? I have two - the grooming bag and the performance bag. The grooming bag has all the stuff that I hardly ever use anymore, since I don't show Scout personally any more. It has all the stuff to pouf out or slick down or cover up. The performance bag has the six foot rally leash, the obedience leash, the agility slip leash, the dumbbell and the treats for the dog and the peppermints for the nervous handler. There is also a smaller bag with the doggie first aid kit - including the vomiting and diarrhea meds that I started carrying after last year's experience previously described. I just move this bag between the grooming and performance bags depending on what we are doing that trip.

However, since Scout was with her handler this weekend and Spencer wasn't in performance while I get over this bum foot injury, no bag came with us this weekend, which means I was completely unprepared for this weekend's experience.

So - obviously I just need a bigger all purpose dog bag (the APDB) that should just stay in the car. The stuff I took a picture of above would also be handy things to have along, as this is what Scout has been living off of. I am not a big fan of Minute Rice for human consumption, but I must admit these little cups are pretty handy for a dog meal.

So - what else are the essentials for the APDB?

Lesson finally learned

Last year, I blogged about our trip to Louisville and about how sick Scout got while she was here. The show vet diagnosed it as hemmoragic gastroenteritis - it had never happened before or since - until we came back to Louisville.

Last night about 10:00 Scout went to the door and started whining to go out. She had diarrhea - yuk. We came back in and she went right to sleep - but woke me up whining to go out 2 hours later. And two hours after that. And two hours after that. When we came back in after the 6 AM run (no pun intended), she threw up.

I got ready to leave to go the the show and went to the store to get pedialyte and chicken broth - but she wanted none of it. I wanted to think that she was feeling better, but by the time it was time for us to show, she was getting sick again on both ends. So we go to the show vet again - the same one who saw us last year.

I told her that this had not happened since we were here last year, and I admitted that I don't ever bring water from home because it has never seemed to bother my dogs. She said it was very likely that there is just something about the water here that does not agree with Scout. (She also made me feel better by saying that she never takes water from home when she travels either - but she does squirt some lemon juice in the water which appears to neutralize the issue.)

So - I spent another day watching Scout sleep at the dog show. Tonight she appears to be fine. She had a light dinner of rice (which I picked up at the Chinese restaurant down the street), canned chicken and pedialyte. And yes - I picked up a gallon of distilled water for her to drink for the rest of the trip. Lesson learned.

How perfect is this?

I think Spencer and Scout must have inspired Mike McCartney last year after he did their caricatures for me.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Frapping and Wallering

- That's what we love to do in the motel room after the show.

When you do it in the bed - it's called wallering.

P.S. - congrats to Laura on Jill's litter of 3 red brindle boys and 1 black and white girl today!

Welcome Back, Old Friend

Do you know my friend, Gail Garmin? Gail had been my faithful travel companion and indispensable partner while traveling to dog shows. With Gail's help, I was able to find a Starbucks in any town, as well as several little out of the way quilt shops. Many times, I accused her of leading me astray, but more often than not, she knew the way better than I did.

Last fall, on the way to Concord, SC, Gail suddenly had a circulation problem. Laura was able to revive her a few times, but only for a few brief moments, and somewhere between Lawrenceville, GA and the SC state line, it appeared that Gail had passed on the great GPS graveyard. I pulled over at the nearest exit and activated the ATT Navigator on my blackberry, but it just wasn't the same (and way too expensive!)

Over the last few months, I just did without GPS help. Trips just weren't as much fun without my girl Gail. If Laura was along, we took her girl Stella Streetfinder. Then, just as Gail had been afflicted, Stella came down with similar symptoms.

Laura, being more handy than I, began trying to find out what the problem was with Stella and did some internet research. She discovered that Stella may just have needed a fuse transplant in her charging cord. However, she discovered that Stella's cord was damaged, and would need a complete cord transplant via eBay.

Thinking that maybe Gail's fuse may be the problem, she harvested Stella's good fuse from her bad cord, and on Sunday she performed a fuse transplant to Gail. Gail immediately roused from her coma, and started telling us how to get to Concord, SC again. What a good girl.

I am so excited that Gail will once again be my partner in crime again as we head to Louisville this week.

Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Two peas in a pod

Cute from the front:


And the back:

And spooned up together:

Calendar Dogs

I just heard today that Spencer and Scout will be in this 2010 calendar. A friend of a friend does stock photos of dogs. Every spring she invites several folks with dogs to bring them to scenic location for a photo shoot. She gives us all free photos in exchange for the rights to the pictures.

Back home again

Haven't posted much since we returned from NY. I brought something home with me that I really didn't want - a nasty cough and cold that I'm pretty sure came from the kid I sat next to on the plane to NY. On the shuttle van on the return home, I realized I had the beginnings of a sore throat and by the weekend I was completely wiped out. I even stayed home from work on Monday - and I'm usually the one who goes in and spreads the germs around when I have the sniffles.

Scout has been getting used to being a house dog again after her little adventure. Spencer is also back to his old self now that sister is home - he had gotten pretty bored with me while she was gone and was often Mr Grumpy McGrump.

But - just when things seem to settling back into a normal routine, things go all topsy turvy. Mom had been settling in well at her new home in an assisted living situation since right after Christmas, but on Friday morning she suffered several seizures, and was airlifted to a hospital here. I was on my way Friday morning to pick her up to take her for a routine doctor visit, and little did I know that as I was driving north, she was on a helicopter headed south.

Yesterday was a scary day, but today we think that she survived the experience fairly well. As of tonight she is out the ICU and is resting comfortably in a room. She appears to have more left side weakness than she did before, and we may be starting back another stay at the rehab hospital.

So, if you believe in such things, send happy healing thoughts her way.

Dining in New York

How we spent our food money:

Lindy's - home of the $20 patty melt, exploding margarita glasses**, and the best onion rings EVUH! Lindy's claims to be the originator of the New York style cheesecake, but the 2009 version was just ok in my opinion. (**Almost forgot about the glass - I accidentally hit my margarita glass - just a brushing glance really - and it literally exploded. Craziest thing I have ever seen.)

Nathan's - late night hotdog run. Ok, but not as good as . . . .

Madison Square Garden Concession Stand - hotdog with kraut about 4:00 Monday afternoon. Best hotdog ever, but I was possibly swayed by being so hungry.

Blarney Stone Pub - bar food Monday night after manning the bench all day. Meeh.

Cafe Mo Mo (or something like that) - Tuesday brunch. Nice little deli and grill around the corner from Hotel Penn. I had a great BLT and a black and white cookie. Laura had a good looking omelet. Folks who sat near us had some very tasty-looking burgers.

And then - quite possibly the high point of the trip - we had dinner Tuesday evening at Perilla, the restaurant owned by Top Chef Season One winner Harold Dieterle. It is a small place in Greenwich Village, only about 2 miles from the Garden.



We had checked out the menu ahead of time, and decided to do our own tasting menu of appetizers and sides. Our waiter was charming and helpful, finding a wine that Laura really liked and arranging our menu into courses.

First course was a Lady Apple & Red Romaine Salad with maytag blue cheese & a spiced walnut vinaigrette and Seared Diver Sea Scallops with parsnip puree, pumpkin seed pralines & orange-hearts of palm salad.

Next we had Spicy Duck Meatballs with mint cavatelli, water spinach, and a quail egg, Farro Risotto with artichoke confit, parmesan & chili-grape salad, and Sauteed Spaghetti Squash with garlic chives & marcona almonds.

For dessert, we had the recommended Vanilla Scented Doughnuts with maple custard & chocolate chantilly and my favorite, Sticky Toffee Pudding with pomegranates & vanilla ice cream, and a wonderful cup of coffee that reminded me of the freshly roasted coffee I buy when we go to central Mexico.

Every part of the dinner was wonderful. The food, the ambience, excellent service - I hope I get to back there next year!

Last Pics from Westminster

Back home again - we had a noneventful (the best kind) trip today. Good to be home.

As soon as we got home, my first task was to crank up the DVR and see Scout's national television debut, because, I didn't admit this before - I missed it on Monday night when it aired. Cheryl called up from her room all excited and told us about it. So today I queued it up and took a picture:

Here's the scene outside the Hotel Pennsylvania Sunday afternoon. Madison Square Garden is just across Seventh Avenue.

This is actress Julie White (who, as Judy Witwicky in Transformers, uttered these classic words: "You hurt my dog, I'll kick your ass!"). She had watched the cardi judging, and the first thing she said to me was along the lines of "that judge really doesn't like red dogs, does he?" She is a fan of the breed and said that she hopes to own one someday. She talked a bit about filming the Transformers sequel and said there is a scene where she has to run out of the house holding the chihuahua and the pug, and that the pug was so heavy that it wore her out having to shoot the scene over and over again.

The Empire State Building is lit up in Westminster purple and gold during the show. When you walk out of the Garden, this is the first thing you see. I was really pleased that the moon was in the perfect place for the shot.

Just a shot of my pretty girl in the ring:

Greetings from the nosebleed section

We're watching the Sporting Group from the rafters of the Garden. Laura and I just had a fabulous dinner at Perilla, the restaurant owned by Harold Dieterle, the winner of Top Chef Season 1. More on the meal later.

Scout on TV!

Did you see her? After the Non Sporting group, when they announced the Herding Group was next, that was Scout on top of her crate!

Scout and Showfrog are pooped

Back on the bench

Judging

Scout at the Big Show!