Communication

Communication

Bah, it can get so frustrating when people don't communicate.

Cleaned up my schedule, got coverage for my Saturday job, all in preparation for an out of town event. Have a half day that Friday, which gave me plenty of traveling time(reason I don't do longer than 5 hr trips alone), everything was set, except nobody had heard from the Secretary. And there was a good number of breed people planning on going. So, dropped a note to the sec asking for the premium and get told Oh, we cancelled it, not sure why it's still on the calendar.

HELLO?!?! Why was there not a public announcement. Nobody I'd been conversing with had any idea it was cancelled. To say there are pissed off people is an understatement.

Oh well, already making backup plans, it's just frustrating!

Fall plans

I made Pandora's reservations at the kitty hotel(Vet who boards). With her thyroid meds, it's easier on friends if she goes to the vet's for xmas vs risking her not getting her pills if she decides to hide and pisses off my friends. .so it's eaiser on friends and easier on my friendship with said friends LOL She'll be pissed, but there's a reason she's known as the pissy prissy princess.

Finalizing plans for the fall, trying to figure out if I can head south or west for some racing. . hoping Mr Sammy can come up and visit for some racing in November. Easier for her to travel and her car is much more reliable than the Dinosaur I own(not that I'm complaining with gas the way it is LOL that little dingy white car gets good mileage)

Lining shows up, coursing up, racing up. . .so glad fall is finally here, hard to believe little over a week ago I was complaining about the heat, now we're getting low 50's at night, freeze your butt off going to the movies. .yack!! And today, it's pouring freezing rain. .lovely

Eleven years ago

11 yrs ago, I welcomed my first litter into this world. In that time, I've brought 5 more into this place, each one just as special as the first. Not a lot of breeding in the scheme of things, but I never wanted to be a big name breeder, just a breeder of nice dogs with wonderful temperaments and personalities that people are proud to own and breed to/from. Which has happened since there are now over a dozen kennels with Kyra behind them.

I've learned so much in that time, and met so many wonderful, sweet people who love the breed and are glad to talk to breed, but I've also met a lot of closed and small minded, mean, no nasty people, but I've learned from them too(basically how not to treat newbies and others alike). I continue to learn more and enjoy it, most days.

I have no clue if Ace or Sinbad is alive. . .thanks to the WWofT(Wicked Witch of Texas), but know they both have get out there, and maybe in Ace's case, grandget. . . Rinka lives on in her son Umbra and her grandget. . .Lucy'll be bred next year, hopefully I can point her owner to a nice running European dog that'll broaden my gene pool back ehre, since I get a puppy back :) Brooks lives on in his get, and hopefully there'll be more grandpuppies on the ground next month with his spectacular personality/temperament. . .

There are some days I wonder why the hell I put up with the total complete BS that comes with dogs. I've got enough on my plate, why do I set myself up for more? Then Gossip makes me laugh, and Dei gently headbunts me, or I get a lovely email from Lori or Ann or Agnes or Di or any of my pet homes, telling me how much they love their kids, thanking me for breeding such great dogs, and that reminds me why: the dogs, and the good friends I've made. Thanks to each and every one of them.

Happy birthday Gossip

Gossip turned 4 yesterday, where does time go? Seems like just yesterday I was trying to decide who to keep between Gossip, Rumour & Secret. . .

She spent the day in style LOL: 2 double cheesburgers at McD's(She was only supposed to get one, but I had a sinus migraine and about threw up after I ate one bite :P), and wanted the 3rd I picked up for Grins & Stardust. . .we then went to Petsmart where the Diva got all the attention she could ask for. . .everyone came to pet Miss Gossip. . .and then she picked out a huge fuzzy porcupine, tasted some treats and picked up a box of cookies and a bag of training treats.

We then swung over to Petco, where it was a repeat of pets, and a roll of Natural Balance, a lb of pick your own cookies to share with everyone at home. We then went home, and she got bedrights when I collapsed due to the migraine, and she woke me up a few hours later, having found the squawker. .. which she promptly squawked, in my ear. . .brat LOl At which point I scooted back and she climbed into bed, to soon be joined by Prince Brat, who wouldn't leave her alone, boy he was sooo happy to have his dog in bed with him lOL

Yes, she's spoiled, I admit it. . I love this dog to no end. . .almost as much as I loved her Uncle Obie. She's not Obie, but she's stepped into the huge hole he left in my heart and has tried to fill ti as much as she can. Like him, she has a huge presense, a huge personality. . she's got a zest for life that nobody matches, and is always happy to do anything with me. . out of everything, she's the one thing that's helped me heal most. . .my bouncy baby borzoi girl.

reason 101 that I hate the medical profession

OK, so I got an appointment with an asthma specialist(YEAH!) maybe we can get on a treatment that I can be more active(PLEASE). The weight gain began shortly after the asthma did, because of the inability to do a lot of long hard cardiovascular good type excercise. . .if we can that under control, it should make it easier to lose this damn weight.

Anyway, have to get a chest xray before my appointment. American Radiologist is a drop in type place for xrays. . .rearranged my schedule, came into work early so I could leave early. .head out there, wait 30 mins, to find out sorry, can't take a chest xray, that part of the machine is broke.

And THIS is why they should take appointments. . .it was still broke as of yesterday. . .if it's still broke Monday morning, I will have to drive even further, in rush hour traffic, to get this done.

I am so frustrated.

Watch my luck tho, I'll get to Dr Randall's, and he'll refer me to an allergist lOL> If I can keep the congestion at bay, I don't have as much problem with the breathing. . .joy oh joy

Secret & Ike

Got a note earlier this week from Secret's mum. .they're ok, got some damage to the house and yard, biggest problem is lack of electricity and worry about finding gas for the generator. . .feel so bad for them, and wish I was closer to help them out. Hope things don't go worse for them. they could be without power for a month, omg, we were out for a handful of days and life was hell

Secret'll be coming back tho, she's worried after two evacuations in 2 wks, about moving a bitch in season with unaltered dogs. She is NOT in a position to deal with an oops litter . .I know that worry. . .so she offered her back instead of just spaying her. A Wonderful lady, and one of my oldest friends in Borzoi, Margaret loves Secret, but also knows how important Secret is (and agrees she's too nice to spay if she can come back home). . she's one of two dogs I regret ever letting go, but not knowing exactly how bad my life was going to go, a good home came along, and I let her go. . .she'll come back, and either just stay with me, or Bonnie may take her. . .I owe Bonnie a replacement pup since Titania didn't turn out, so that's fine with me. . . I'll get to show her, and we'll try her in the front yard to see if she'll run. She did a LGRA practice as a puppy, but was not as promising as her sister, but who knows. Otherwise, I'll show her :)

Other dog, I realised the other day that I regret letting go, is Yanna. . she may not've been the perfect show dog, but she was a sweet little bundle of love & I loved her in return, but had to do what was best for her. . .granted, I couldn't've standed to look at her when I lost Obie, since she was his mini me, but I miss her. . .oh well, hindsight's 20/20

Agility tonite, rented hour tomorrow, and a nice relaxing weekend. . .NOTRA got cancelled, so I'm staying home. .tho I'm kicking myself in the butt for cancelling my day off Saturday, Vanessa's going todwn to NC and she asked if I wanted to go with her to see Pat, oh well :P

Cobra Racing

Blah, what a weekend. . what happened to our nice weather? It was sticky and yuck. . .couldn't go racing Saturday, Gossip's Uncle John had class work to do, and I had work work to do(and to go to DMV and change addy on my license & registration), but was up early o dark thirty Sunday (4:30). As I was packing my car, I kept hearing this strange whine of impatient. . if you know Grins, you'd know why it was such a funny weanie wine. .he's a big boy. . and he knew we were going racing! Loaded up the car and on the road to racing.

Unfortunately the entry I had expected didn't happen. . .probably the weather, but it was still some nice racing. Especially since I brought Bonnie home a GRC pointed girl who will be going out with me the rest of the year. Julia's a nice sane girl on the field, and it was so neat to see the lightbulb click on on her head. I'll be getting her out racing and coursing this fall, she's alot like Reba in personality about not dragging you to the line LOL. Poor Reba's out for awhile due to her bum toe

I was going to take take Kolya or Carrot, but decided with it going to be warm, didn't want to risk a boy fight in the back of my little car. . .theyr'e both feeling their oats. . .but they'll go out next time. They, Tip, First, Bagheria & Focus will be taking turns :) It should be some awesome racing this fall. . tho I do not look forward to trying to box break Bagheria. he makes Eros look tiny lOL I told Bonnie his name should've been Brickhouse, if i put him in the Neon, it'd be just him in the backseat. wowza, big boy, thank heavens, he's a giant pansy.

And now the weather's gone the OTHER extreme, with 50s at night, and it's almost 20 degrees cooler during the day. Go figure!

Plans, Agility & Ike

Wings has a hot date. . .dam to be's sister produced well when bred to a related boy, so I'm looking forward to it. Dam's not of a pedigree I'm too particularly thrilled with, but otoh, ti's not absolutely horrid either. . just worried I'm going to get HUGE. . since I get a stud fee puppy. Robin'll grow them out, which works out for both of us. . .so here's hoping for a decent sized, nice healthy litter and a couple of keen boys for Robin & me.

On that note, I got the nod for the litter of my dreams for Gossip. I am so tickled. It's an outcross for Gossip, but it's a lovely dog, and even tho I'm not keen on part of his pedigree, the rest is yummy. . .I am SOOO EXCITED LOL.

After Gossip's loss of brains last week at our first Agility class, I took a different approach.

1) I stopped and picked up two double cheeseburgers from McD's2) I let Gossip run the pants off of two of her boy friends. She ran so much, I thought she might be useless for agility class. Popped her into the car, and headed off to the agility class.

Tonite was bigger because they had to combine the intermediate and beginners class due to scheduling conflicts. . .there were a total of 8 dogs. Again, we were the oddball breed: two Shep Xs, two toy dogs, one German Shorthaired pointer, one Standard poodle, one weimeraner, and us. Gossip did me proud. . .she did not act up, she behaves, she paid attention to the hand with the hamburger and not the two white fluffy dogs that were barking and zooming. . not at all like last week with the cockerspaniel. . .the GSP was with us last week and she commented on how well behaved Gossip was this week. .i was so tickled. AND she did the weave, it's at the V shape right now, but she did it without me having ot lure her thru, so I was VERY happy

She was soooooo on the hand with the hambuger, she did not see the shep X come out of the tunnel and come barreling at her. I'd been watching this dog all night, as she kept staring at Gossip, and baring her teeth. She wasn't making any noise, and having a Grinnie dog, I was wondering if that's what she was doing. This dog's owner had no control over her, no choke chain, a flimsy lead, the dog was clearly in charge. She went thru the tunnel and came racing towards Gossip, again, baring teeth, I stepped between, treated Gossip and snarled at the dog. .and then made sure the rest of the class that at least half the class was between us and that dog. The GSP owner even mentioned how intent that dog was on Gossip. If it happens again next week, I'm going to stay and talk to the teachers, as this is NOT the learning environment I want. I've BTDT with a dog who had it out for mine, and i was too stressed about that other dog to do my own dog justice.

So, yes, the fairies returned the GOOD Gossip to me LOL

Watching the Ike information just boggles my mind. . why when a hurricane almost as big as Texas is barreling down on you do you stay behind? So many people didn't heed the warnings to run, so glad Secret's owner is not one of those people. I mean, comeon. . it's not like a tornado that can appear above your head and go wham bam thankyou ma'am, they knew it was coming. Pack up those things that are very important to you(animals, kids, the computer and small things, like I couldn't leave Schatzi or Obie's ashes behind) and get the hell out of dodge. Better to leave and have nothing happen,than not to leave and lose everything including you or your families lives. You'd think EVERYONE would've learned from Katrina. I know I have. .if I'm ever in the path of a hurricane that could sink my house, I'll be OUT OF THERE.

Bye Bye Borzoi-l Almost 13 yrs to the date, I pulled the plug on Borzoi-l . .

Almost 13 yrs to the date, I pulled the plug on Borzoi-l . .It's not that it was a lot of work. Approve the occasional post on the one person I had on review, and only reason she was on review was her emails were automatically sent to the round file due to how nasty I felt some of her personal posts to me were, and I just didn't need the added aggrevation in my life . only way to make sure she was playing nicely on the list was review. . .and it's sad I felt the need to round file her posts. . .as sometimes she has something worthwhile to post, instead of just obnoxiously snotty posts.

Why are lists dying? Biggest complaint I've heard from people far and wide, is being afraid to post. There are those out there who seem to have a goal in life to argue every damn point posted. But when you remove or muzzle the cyber bullies, nobody still posts. . .so what's the problem? As one poster emailed me "the problems IMO are not with Borzoi-L itself, but with most of the lists...not everyone on the list(s) is your friend and when/if someone dislikes another, it is made very obvious in 'borderline' posts..that is, nothing to get kicked off or put on review, just pleasantly snotty..and there are the self-opinionated 'members' who are always right, no matter what! Doesn't make for a great read! (this is in regard to ALL lists, not just Borzoi-L) I sorta kinda think these people never learned how to argue a case; only attack! "

And it's true. Most internet lists are suffering except for the gossip lists, but there's a never ending supply of gossip for those who want to tear people (or their dogs) apart. And what's sad is, the messages these people have get lost in the nastiness of their posts. There are people constantly looking for something to get their dander up, constantly assuming the worse of the other poster(s). Doesn't matter how much knowledge you have, you treat people like crap, they're not going to gain it from you, because they will tune you out. And then you both lose.

Told one poster that, and unless she's taking her nastiness elsewhere, her posts have been nicer since.

You get more bees with sugar than vinegar, or however that saying goes. lol
Oh well, I have other things to spend my time on, Rally, Agility & racing. . and working on finishing up cleaning up the mess the Ex left me with so I can go back to school. .. don't have time for the BS. A few people want to keep it going, may hand over the reins and see where they go with it.

We survived, LGRA & Agility

Well, Hanna's gone and blown herself out. . .it wasn't anywhere near as bad as was expected, heck, I had worse wind storms in NY. . .lots of rain, winds picked up here and there. . lots of torrential rains, but nothing too bad. Doesn't mean I wasn't glad we kenneled all the dogs for fear of trees coming down. . was nice not to have to worry about them, and made feeding them all so much easier.

Granted, as soon as Hanna was over with, we lost electricity LOL No flickers during the storm, only happened once she was gone. . figures. .told Bonnie that if we were going to be without power for 24 hrs again, I was DEFINITELY going racing.

Unfortunately a number of people didn't show up. . was looking forward to Wizard going head to head with Gossip now that he has his speed, and Orleans & Pia were signed up to come. . oh well, maybe next week. . I did get to see Gossip run against another dog I've been waiting to see: Serrano. Serrano is sired by Kazan, a nice running german bred male, sired by a son of Blaze, Kazan was a force to be reckoned with when he was younger, think he won the BCOA Nationals twice, as well as the LGRA nationals. .I'd wanted to run Gossip against him back in 2006, but that's when my life was in the toilet and the car was undependable. . anyway, Serrano's been running more focus on the plastic, and thus he's come back to LGRA to try it out.

He's grown up nicely, definitely shows his swedish part of the pedigree(short on leg long on body).

He didn't live up to his papa's speed, but he comported himself rather well. . .He'll get some more once he squeezes out of the box like Gossip & Grins do. He still breaks slower. ..but even his owner admitted he didn't have Gossip's speed. . .

I boxed Gossip & Grins the last race, and stepped back to watch. . it's amazing how they come out of the box, Grins came out 1-1 1/5 lengths ahead of Gossip, but she dropped it low to the ground and just set off the afterburners and each stride took her further and further away. It was awesome to watch. . .I usually catch as I can get both off without a problem, but it's so nice to watch them break from the box. Going to have to remember my camera this weekend and video it, it was just aweinspiring to watch her do it. Was like watching a Mustang and Lambergini take off, the Mustang getting off the line first, and the Lambergini dropping it a gear to take off around the other car LOL

Dei told me in no uncertain terms she's had enough of Racing, after running clean despite when other dogs were nasty in the last year, when another dog bumped into her (same dog mentioned above who wasn't running quite clean), she told him off. . oh well. . .she likes to race, in fact, lunged at the bunny yesterday when they bopped it, but oh well . .she can stay home. . next week is Tip or Kolya's turn. Sunday's looking to have a 16 Borzoi entry, wowza! Should be some nice running.

And Grins did well for a 6 yr old boy, coming in 2nd to only Gossip the entire meet for another 1.5 points towards his SGRC. .he's going to get his clock cleaned this coming weekend tho. . with Novel, Pia, Orleans & Wizard

While I was at the meet, was talking to a RR lady about agility, and this basenji person butts in. This woman is annoying, she thinks she knows everything, and it's her way or no way. She started telling me how I needed to train weaves. . told her what I was doing was working, and she kept going. .finally told her that she doesn't understand, training a Basenji to do weaves is TOTALLY different than training a Borzoi. She got indignant, told me she'd put Master Agility titles on dogs, she THINKS she knows what she's doing. Told her good for her, I respect that, but the fact a basenji doesn't have the problems Borzoi do doing weaves means that it's goign to take a different training strategy. Hell, by the time Gossip's tailbone gets to the 1st weave, her head has to be weaving thru the third. And she stomped off. .

This woman drives me nuts. She had a fit at one meet because someone's dogs were howling, and OMG, my dogs cant' run if someone's HOWLING! She also has to tell you hwo to do EVERYTHING. I was running the box at a meet earlier this year and as soon as she came up she started telling me how to do it. If she told me once she told me a dozen times in the 90 seconds before I put the dogs in the box, that i HAD to shake the lure for her old fart of a dog, as he got confused and needed to hear the sound to know which way to go. . .by the time I had them in the box, I as ready to throttle her, and I reached for the box mechanism before I realised it and before I could stop, she was protesting that I HAD to shake the bunny, I turned around and told her I knew that, but I couldn't THINK with all her damn yapping. The foul judge about fell out of his chair laughing, as he has the same opinion I do. . .GODS!!!!

Onto tormenting your borzoi LOLAfter Gossip's idiocy at Agilty class last week, with her refusing to do the tunnel, I set one up in the hallway to my bedroom. . so she has to do the tunnel to go to bed and to get up in the morning. .and now i have her jackalure on the lunge whip. . that'll make her do it even faster and I can rip it out from under her nose and make her come back thru LOL

Where's the week gone?

wowza. .just recover from 1st weekend back on the road, and here comes the 2nd. .this week has gone FAST!

Last weekend was survival Sighthound style
1-Saturday, Reba hurt her toe coming out of a box. . so she's down and out for awhile. Dei came out of the box wrong and her rear end gave out from under her. .thank heavens didn't hurt her, good news is she got up and kept going, and did NOT try to run anyone off the track like she did the last time she got hurt

2. Monday- Grins tore off a dew claw, Brightness burnt some pads, the entire greyhound contigency blew at least one pad, some of them ALL four feet, the Saluki entry was pulled down to one dog due to injuries. Gossip scared the beejeezus out of me after doing a practice run in NOTRA PERFECT, she ran for real and bulldozed her way thru the snow fence. I had my heart in my throat afraid she'd get a toe stuck in the fencing or put a fiberglass pole thru her heart/head. Good news is, she got up and kept going, and even tho she was OC, she did NOT interfere. . i'll practice her a few more times, but not sure if i'll bother, plastic is not her thing, even with bunny ears attached LOL

Chantilly had a couple of promising practices, but when I ran her for a cert run, she was a baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad girl. . .her sister had a nice NOTRA practice run, and will get out in a few weeks with me for real.

Grins passed the torch on to Wizard this time. .was it his injury? Don't know. . it didn't seem to bother him, but I noticed a difference in the 2nd run and the 3rd when I wrapped his dewclaws(ahd to do both, or he'd refuse to walk on the wrapped paw lOL). . .we'll see once he heals. .but he is 6 today. .gulp, is he that old? Where does time go? Wizard looked good, and in fact, finished his FC on Saturday with another 5 point BOB win, such a pretty, fasty, keen happy boy LOl

I bought Gossip a used jackalure(to support the club's two new ones, which were then killed by the greyhounds the first weekend on the string LOL OOPS!) Well, not just for her, going to use it in training, see if Kani will chase it with some confidence building. Gossip's REALLY happy with her toy, in fact, so happy I found her on the hood of the Neon in an attempt to get the bunny. . oops. . LOl

Umbra got thru his dental ok. After Sera's heart stopped beating when she was under to be spayed, I've been paranoid about having anything done to my guys. . now he's got white pearly teeth. .. see how long that lasts. . :P Wish that dog would chew on Bones, Touchet's are really nice for an almost 10 yr old girl. . but she may have genetically good teeth to begin with.

And Gossip was a dork at our first agility class. . .she was like OMG OMG!! Other dogs, can i PLAY!!!?!?!?! Refused the tunnel, which she usually does well for me. Showed off on the aframe(launching herself over the apex at full speed), unlike the other dogs, she has to work on contacts going up, they have to work on them going down LOL. And she's GETTING the weaves, finally. . .instructor released her to me, and she went thru them, I was so tickled. .and she zoomed over the jumps. We were both beat by the end of class.

Was sooo looking forward to Gossip going ehad to head with Serrano and Wizard today, but we've got that tropical storm heading our way, so Saturday got cancelled, darn! Spent three hours battening down the hatches here, moving dogs into the kennel, moving loose stuff onto the porch, moving the cars out from under the trees. . it's overcast and drizzly, but it's heading our way. . oh joy!