Tuesday, January 25, 2011

If you are looking for my class post.....

I had to miss my class today again (for the second week in a row) because mom had to WORK! Bummer. I am getting so far behind. Last week they worked on forward and lateral sends and the handler moving downstream for a front cross. I don't know yet what they worked on today.

Tomorrow we are planning to go to practice at our club. Finally I can do some agility!

In the meantime, we've been pretending that it isn't cold and snowy and going out to walk at my favorite park. On Sunday, it was sunny and 17 degrees. But mom bundled up and we went out. We had an awesome time! Apparently even though the city does not plow our neighborhood streets, they do plow the bike path through the park. I got to be off-leash on the bike path (which could never happen during nice weather due to all the joggers and bikers). Believe it or not, there were still some diehard joggers out and I was a good boy and sat and stayed while each one passed. But I also got to run ahead and come back and go ahead and come back - it was FUN! Then we went yesterday too and did much of the same thing except that it was cloudy and 25. Today felt like a heat wave at 38 but I was stuck inside most of the day while mom WORKED!

Mom is studying her Developing Handling Skills book and really enjoying it but it is slow going. She fell into classes with Jenn and the APHS and never taught me that stuff from the beginning so the book is filling in a lot of gaps in her knowledge. But we think it is an excellent system and makes sense - all based on a dog's natural ability to read motion. Some times it seems to mom like there is so much to remember but really it is a lot of common sense. One of the big rules is not to say "Here" or "Come" or use the dog's name as a turning cue. Why not, mom always wondered. Well because if you use verbals to get your dog to turn then it starts to override the dogs ability and desire to watch your motion and negates all you have been trying to do. Put that way makes lots of sense to us!


Gotta zoom!

Ricky

9 comments:

NAK and The Residents of The Khottage Now With KhattleDog! said...

Our 37 degrees today seemed like Spring after yesterday morning's -1!

I'm sure you'll Mom will get the hang of this stuff soon ;-)

Hugz&Khysses,
Khyra

Kiyi Kiyi said...

Running around in the park sounds like fun!

Diana said...

Im so glad you got to get outside. Its been a cold misserable winter here so I cant imagine what ist like there. Thats to funny that they plow the path at the park. We are reading LM's new book too!

Sara said...

We walked the other day when it was 6 degrees. Funny how when there's no humindity & bright sun, 6 really isn't that bad. But, I'm glad that frigid weather is over for now.

That book sounds fascinating. Hope you have fun at your club today!

Arran, Arthur and Mum said...

Sorry you missed class again but off lead walks is always fun right?
~lickies, Ludo

Cowspotdog said...

You have a BRAVE mom going out in the cold, but it was worth it to run off leash. I miss my leash free park, we haven't found one like that around here. You will be fine with your training, even if you miss a couple of weeks, it just means you will be excited when you get back. Hope your mom is feeling better now.

Dawn said...

Glad your Mom is feeling better, but not glad she had to WORK! That worky thing messes with us all doesn't it!

Tell your Mom that the Detroit symphony is still on strike, has been since Oct..so we might not have a season at all. Good thing we still have Ann Arbor...

Have fun at agility later this week!

Unknown said...

Sorry you missed class again. I know that you will catch up real quick though. You're such a smart boy!

I'm so proud of you for being able to do a sit stay with joggers going past. That's no easy task for a sheltie :)

Sagira said...

Your mom sure does a lot to help out with agility huh Ricky? :)