Look Ma, No Glasses!

I know, I have been absent from the blog world for the past while. Truth is, I have been on holidays for the past week. YAY! First honest to goodness, "I actually purposely booked time off of work", holidays ... um ... ever. But, true to form, I'm didn't actually GO anywhere to enjoy the time off. Rather, I booked an appointment to get laser eye surgery done. Equally thrilling in its own right.

I've had glasses and/or contacts for about the past 12-ish years and I've had enough! Enough fogging up in the winter time, enough speckles of rain, enough Sheltie nose prints. Since the house purchasing experience earlier this year didn't end up digging into the savings I had set aside for a down payment, I decided it was fair to dip into that for laser surgery.

The procedure is really cool ... if you can get past the suctioning your eyeball out of your head, running a sharp blade through your cornea and burning your eye tissue away with a precision laser part. No, really, the description is a million times worse than the actual process! In reality, it's about 10 minutes of minor discomfort followed by 24 hours of REALLY SEXY SUNGLASSES!


I had the surgery early yesterday afternoon, and the remainder of the day was blurry and uncomfortable. But after my prescribed naps (yes, the doctors actually prescribed at least a 2 hour nap after surgery) my vision was much better. And then this morning after a decent nights sleep (during which I had to keep the sunglasses on so as to prevent rubbing my eyes unconsciously) I can see BETTER than I did previously with my glasses on! This is amazing!

So during the past 24 hours that I have spent sitting in the living room wearing my sunglasses with the lights turned down, not allowed to read, watch TV or use the computer (AAAAH!), the boys have been playing Nurse.


They both are taking the job very seriously. My lap has not been empty for longer than the couple of minutes it takes me to replenish my eye drops every couple of hours. Gio is keeping me warm during nap times, and then when I wake up the dogs switch off and Romeo cuddles up on my chest.


A visit to the doctor for my post-op check up this morning discovered that there is a little more blood around the surgery site than they would like to see. Apparently this is present in about 50% of cases, and no you can't actually SEE the blood on my eye so I don't look like a freak or anything (apart from the REALLY SEXY SUNGLASSES being worn 24 hours a day). So I am to continue the rigorous eye drop routine for a couple more days than usual. No biggie ... and it means that the dogs can continue their very important job as fuzzy nurses.

Rewarding Behaviors

I have received a great honor. Casey Lomonaco of Rewarding Behaviors Dog Training has asked me to be a "guest expert" this week on her RBDT Forum. My topic of discussion is building drive for the purposes of dog competition.

If you want to check out the discussion, here is the link.

Even if you do not want to check out the discussion, you should really browse through the forum! Lots of great information there about positive training for all dogs (and non-dogs, too!).

Powdery White Stuff

We had our first snow fall of the year today! A bit earlier than is the norm in this area, but not totally unexpected. I really do enjoy the winter, though I wish we had had more of an autumn this year. But there is still hope. I doubt this first snow fall will stick around long, as we are supposed to be back in the positive temperatures next week.


Best thing about the first snow fall ... Fresh Snow Zoomies!

What makes a hairstyle a scene hairstyle?

What makes a hairstyle a scene hairstyle?
Consider it to be the 80's metal hairstyle with all the complexity at the moment with plenty of quantity. If you are fond of it long, get a lot of uneven layers and have your bang sweep radically to single side and cover your eye. A level iron and lots of style products are definitely must haves. The Spike it up in the reverse and make straight the sides.

Coloring it in different colors like the black, pink, red, orange, blue, green, platinum, or other neon colors with a number of not natural color streaks, particularly in the bangs. Other than you could do tourist attractions, lowlights or equally with burly contrast. You can completely look different by having this hairstyle, which can really give a different look to your face.
This is one of the most popular hairstyle and people from all over the world would love to look like an emo at times the hair style gets the attention because of the hair style which makes it very famous. There are plenty of people all over the world who really want to look different and this hairstyle is the right way to go.



Scene Hairstyle

HCKOC Rally-O Trial

The trial went off without a problem! Thanks to everyone that helped out, and to all the people that participated in the trial. You helped make HCKOC's first CARO Rally-O trial a great success!

The boys were entered in 3 rounds each. Gio in 3 Excellent B rounds, and Romeo in 3 Excellent C Stream rounds.

Gio, the wonderful dog that he is, worked his little heart out, but wasn't quite able to pull off any qualifying legs. Excellent level in CARO is quite tricky to get, as it should be, and while Gio is a fantastic worker, we have trouble putting it all together when the judge is watching. On Saturday, he would have pulled off a perfect 200/200 score had it not been for one station that resulted in an NQ. He loves working so much, so I can't make myself be disheartened. He had a great time and pulled off some really nice stuff. So we will keep playing and eventually get that elusive Excellent title.

Romeo pulled off another stunning weekend of performances, finishing up the last two Excellent legs of his CRB (CARO Rally Bronze) championship title with scores of 197 and 198. Also earned the first leg of his CRS (CARO Rally Silver) championship title with a perfect 200/200 run. This dog is blowing my socks off!

The trial was held at Sondog Agility, out some backroads Northwest of Saskatoon. The facility is surrounded by lovely fields that we just couldn't pass up.

A great weekend, all in all. The dogs and I are exhausted and quite ready for life to get back to normal ... whatever that is.

For Sam

SAMSON

It is with extreme sadness that I write this.

A good friend lost her best friend today. For those of you that have had multiple dogs, you know that each one holds a special place in your memories, never to be forgotten, impacts you in some way. But you also know that there will be those rare few dogs that not only hold a spot in our memories, but also in our hearts. These are Heart Dogs, and they are truly marvelous animals.


Sam is a Heart Dog. Forever staking claim to a small piece of his owners heart.


Very recently, Samson, an 11 year old Border Collie, was diagnosed with hemangiosarcoma. A large tumor had formed on his heart. He spent a number of happy days at home with his family after the diagnosis, but collapsed today and was helped to The Bridge.


My heart breaks for his "mom". Know that, as much as Sam has taught you and touched your life, your efforts and dedication to him matched step for step. Heart Dogs have no past-tense. They live as long as the heart they have touched continues. Sam is an amazing dog.

Delegator Dilemmas

I have learned something about myself in the past couple of weeks ... I really suck at delegating!

Hub City Kennel and Obedience Club is hosting their first CARO Rally-O trial in Saskatoon this weekend. Last year some time (or maybe it was only earlier in the spring of this year ...) I had agreed to look up the information needed for hosting a CARO trial. And, while I was at it, I decided to check into judges, and book our judge, and check into buildings, and book our building. And, just because I had all the information at hand, I wrote up the premiums and entry forms, advertised them online, and stupidly put my own name down as trial secretary to accept the entries. With that, comes the task of doing all the paperwork required to deal with the entries. So really, I've essentially organized this whole trial! No, that is not bragging, that is me beating my head against the wall. There are many fabulous, talented, and very capable people in the club that have all offered to help out in any way possible. But somehow, in my mind, it is easier for me to just do the job myself than to hand it off to someone else to do. STUPID! So, as a result, I am absolutely exhausted and just want this trial to be over with NOW.

My excuse (read: what I am telling myself so that I will feel better about being an idiot), is that now I know exactly what needs to be done. So I will be able to confidently delegate NEXT time, without worrying about overlooking anything. I can't very well lead a project when I don't know what has to be done, right? Right?! Okay, I will stick with that explanation.

In the mean time, the dogs are getting dusty with their Rally-O. We've had the past couple weeks off since my classes ended for the summer, and I really haven't been doing much with them. Some people have noted that Gio has been absent from the blog for a while. And he has been ... no denying it. Gio is doing wonderfully health-wise. No more seizures, and his pancreas seems to be holding up well after our scare a couple months back. He is back onto 100% raw diet, which he much prefers to the veggie crud or, even worse, the canned yuck. He's adding weight on again, so not looking quite so emaciated. He's still been going on his therapy dog visits, but I've been too busy to take him tracking as much as he would like. Romeo's agility adventures and this darned CARO trial have been eating up all my time.

If anyone is wanting to come out and check out some CARO Rally-O, our trial is being held out at SonDog Agility on October 3 and 4, 2009. Take highway 16 Northwest of Saskatoon. Swing a left on Lutheran Rd., then left again on 3070. Take your 4th driveway on your left and you are there. It's about 15 minutes out of the city, not too bad. Spectators are welcome, though please leave dogs at home that are not entered in the trial.