Yay for Q's

It was a pretty good day today at the trial.  Jake had three clear or qualifying rounds (Q's) out of five runs.  He wasn't particularily fast, but 2 Standard Q's and one in Steeplechase.  A 5 fault refusal in Jumpers, and then in Snooker he gave me 'the paw' and said to heck with you lady, I'm taking this tunnel mouth whether you like it or not.  Tweeeeet, and that was the end of our run.

Larry went in his first steeplechase the Luna, and had a bit of trouble with the weaves, and ended up 3 seconds over time.  He did get a Q in gamblers.  It wasn't a pretty run, but pretty doesn't matter in Gamblers.  Luna starts barking at Larry when he gets a bit befuddled and doesn't know where he is going fast enough for her liking. 

Here's a few people walking the gamblers course in the Master's ring.

We had cake! mmmmmm

A great raffle table

I won two raffle prizes.  One of them had a small Furminator comb with it.  I tried it on Calli tonight.  Oh. My. Gawd.  The whole front patio was covered in clumps of hair.  It was pretty impressive, and Calli seemed to enjoy it.  It was cute, Jake kept coming over and nibbling on her neck, maybe he was telling her she looked pretty sweet!

A whole bunch of us went out for supper.  Larry and I were the first to head home, and it had just started to rain, after being a beautiful sunny Fall day.  We ran out of daylight, so there we were, picking flowers for the market tomorrow by flashlight, in the rain.  Yuk:(

It sounds like it might be a miserable day tomorrow.  Another Yuk:(

We are both heading to the market, and then part way through the morning I am going to head back to the trial.  Larry will come later. 

Trial Weekend

Another thing that Pioneer Woman said about being a successful blogger was to post often.  I was going to try post something every day, but I've failed already.  But it's been a really hectic week.

This weekend is our dog club's annual agility trial.  Apparently this is the 20th trial, so we've been around for a while, and we held the first agility trial in Western Canada.

  On Monday morning we got together and dragged all the contact equipment and tunnels out of our storage room and gave them all a scrub and wash.

On Wednesday evening 6 of us got together and wrapped all the raffle prizes.  Our club always has a great raffle table, with up to 60 different prizes offered each day.

Last night 7 of us got together and had a 'paper party'.  That involves printing out all the paper work, organizing the scribe sheets, and glueing the gates lists onto the big gate sheets.  I was the last one to arrive, and didn't have a whole lot to do, but they were glad to see me anyway, as I had offered to bring some supper.

Today we arrived at our building at 1pm and got the rings all set up.  The first dog started at 5:30, and we were done about 8.

I'm happy to say that Jake had two nice clean runs, yay!

Larry and Luna had a couple of really nice runs.  In the first one Larry didn't realize that he had missed a small segment of the course.  Unfortunately the judge did though, so he got eliminated.  What he did do was clean, and Luna nailed the weave poles first attempt.  That is the first time Larry and Luna have succeeded like that on the weave poles in a trial.

The second run was clean, except that Larry knocked a jump over, not Luna.  He was too close to it, and when he turned, he caught it with the side of his leg, and down it came.  I was watching and thought Luna had brought it down.  And they had another successful set of weave poles.  Things are really coming along well for them.

Tomorrow we'll be up about 6 and heading back to the trial.  No Saturday market for us this weekend, but we have to go to the Sunday one, as there are things that won't wait another week.  It'll be a hectic weekend as well as a hectic week.

Blogging Advice from a Pioneer!

Many of you regular bloggers are probably familiar with Pioneer Woman.  Today she gave some advice for bloggers, you can read it here.  I'm going to try and follow that advice. 

The first pointer was to be yourself.  Then she elaborated and said to write like you are talking to your sister.  So I will, or will try at least.  And like when I talk to my sister, I like to have the last word...

And speaking of sisters, my one and only, younger than me (although I never, ever think of her as my little sister, even though she is shorter than me too) is coming for a visit in a few weeks.  Sweet!  It's been two years since we saw each other.

Well actually she will be spending most of her time visiting our mother, but hopefully we'll get some sisterly bonding in there too.  You know, while we whip through the racks in the thrift store, hoping to find that fantastic find before the other one does.

Damn, she beat me too it I'll be thinking when I spot some gem in her basket. 

I told her that I was going to try and lose 20 lbs before she got here, and she said she was hoping I'd gain 10 lbs.  Yep, there's always that eyeing each other up so see if the other sister is up or down in weight since you last saw them.

And then there's the 'projects' around here that have been ongoing, or more like on the back burner, what seems like forever.  I'd love to have them all done, but I am realistic, and am just hoping that the current project of replacing the deck will be done before she gets here.

Oh, and we'd better dig out the spare bedroom, as my sister is spending the first night at our place.  There's a family joke around here about horizontal surfaces and how they are just crying out to be covered in 'things'.  So the only room that could qualify as the guest bedroom is kind of a store room.  The parts of the shower waiting to be used in the 'on the back burner' bathroom renovation are in there.  The recycling is in there, the pile waiting to be dropped off at the thrift store is on the bed.  Jammed between the bed and the chest of drawers is another bed, on edge.

Hopefully it will all look lovely by the time she arrives.  If all else fails she can share the futon with Luna!

And Luna said   pffffft! to that idea.

And yes, that IS a hole in the corner of the pillow right above her head, and it WAS Luna that did it, so I think she has lost all rights to an opinion in the matter of futon sharing.

The PNE Superdogs

Here's some video of the Superdogs at the PNE, to go with my previous post.  No  editing, just a whole bunch of clips stuck together.  Some of the audio isn't good, not sure why, but I left in the original audio so that you can get a sense of the audience participation.  Different parts of the audience were recruited to cheer for different teams.

Just like the real Hollywood stars, some of the dog's names have been changed to make them more appealing to the audience.  Now who really would name their dog Lady Gaga?  Maybe she was really named Lady?

Win a house, win a car....

If you have ever been to the Pacific National Exhibition (PNE) here in Vancouver, you will have heard that refrain more times than you care to count.  There are ticket hawkers everywhere, selling raffle tickets to the prize home, and they also give a car away a day.  This year was the 100th anniversary of the PNE, which runs for 17 days, the last one being today. (Okay, yesterday.  I was having trouble loading pictures last night) 

It originally had a big agricultural section, but over the years that has got smaller and smaller.  There is still a bit of a horse show, and a large 4H component at the beginning of the fair, but other than that the agricultural part is mostly displays now. 

Animals both fake and real

In my late teens and early twenties I spent a fair bit of time at the PNE watching the horse show, and found out if you got there early enough in the morning, there was no one around to collect a parking or admission fee.

In the past 30 years or so we certainly haven't been there a lot, but I felt the urge to go again this year, so we went last Wednesday.  Wow, two field trips in one week!

The highlight of the fair for me now is the Superdogs.  A glitzy, hollywood style show, but fun to watch, and even more fun when you recognize half the dogs and handlers from agility trials.

One of the big things with the PNE is getting parking.  It is held in the middle of the big city, so parking is at a premium, and at $20 (so I heard) to park in one of the close lots if you are lucky enough to find a spot seems a bit steep.  All the streets close by are posted with 'resident only' parking signs, but we parked just beyond where they ended, and walked in, about a 15 minute walk.  Free parking and some free exercise!

The first thing we hit was the Super dog show, and then after that we lined up to view the prize home.  Thankfully the line up was quite short.  The weather was perfect, not hot, but sunny.

The prize home was nice, really liked the downstairs, but not so thrilled about the upstairs.  Huge master ensuite, with large glass shower and separate tub.  What I didn't like, and I've seen this in other homes too, is that the toilet isn't separate.  Come on, don't most people like some privacy while sitting on the loo?  I mean, the bathroom was so big, it was meant to share, but.... Well I certainly wouldn't want to be in there if someone was using it, and there was a TV that could be turned so that loo user could 'view on the loo'. I'll bet that was a man's idea.  Granted though, you could swivel the screen and watch from the soaker tub, but it was a small screen and the tub was a long way away.
 Then there was a fireplace at the other end.  The weird thing was that the fireplace wasn't really viewable from the actual bedroom, where, at that end of it, there was a sitting area with a wine fridge.  Wouldn't it have made more sense to have the fireplace there rather than in the bathroom?

Well, don't have to worry about it, as we didn't buy a ticket.
Later though, visiting the hot tub vendor, we almost got ourselves talked into buying a two person hot tub like the one that came with the prize home.  They were called Tublicious and it was tempting.  I don't know, if we got a hot tub, I don't think our daughter will ever leave home!

After that we headed to the Peking Acrobats, which were really quite good.  We killed a bit of time and then went back to catch the evening show of Superdogs, which was more entertaining than the afternoon one.  I have lots of video of that I might try to post later.  There's a different view of the Superdogs here

After that show was over we hung around and watched Jesse Cook for a while.  I had never heard of him, but he was a fantastic guitar player, and I felt like banging my feet on the floor and clicking my castanets, and flipping my flamenco dress.  Well, in my mind anyway...

By this time it was dark, and we saw an Elvis impersonator and then went through a mostly weird art exhibition, well other than a couple of things like this, a really cool water fountain.

  We wandered up the midway, probably a couple of the older people in that section of the fair...:(  I had been on the lookout all day for a fake hair visor, which I had never heard of, but had been introduced to by Suzanne in California, here and here (you have to scroll down a long way, and then read the comments as well). 

No luck.  In fact I don't think I saw a visor of any sort, haired or hairless, and even ball caps were in short supply.  We went past a booth called California Activewear, but nothing to be seen there.  The only thing that came anywhere close to weird head gear was this, and I didn't want one. 

I was quite fascinated watching a booth where people attempted to climb up this rope ladder that was more horizontal than vertical.  Everyone lost their balance and the ladder swung around and they were dumped off.  We did see the operator make a successful climb, and tried to take note of where he put his feet and hands, but he was too fast.  The prize at the top of the ladder was an I-Pad, but I don't think they had to give many of those away in a day.

By this time it was quite cold.  We got ourselves seats for the Kaboom show that was a mixture of pyrotechnics, dancers, and video clips on a screen.  It was really good, and the best part were the balls of flame blasting out now and again.  They sent a waft of warm air over our way every time, much appreciated:)

By the time we had hiked back to the other end of the fairgrounds, and then the 15 minutes to our car we were all warmed up, and were home by midnight.

Mmmmm, peanut butter!

Instead of washing the peanut butter container out before tossing it in the recycling bin, we just give it to one of the dogs.

Mmmmm, I love peanut butter.....

 

Did I get it all?

Oooo, I see a couple of bits on the bottom still....

I think my tongue is just long enough to get them!

Dahlia Delight

After reading other blogs and seeing pictures of their dahlias, I thought I should take some pictures of my own, especially of the ones that I bought this spring, that had actually come with a name attached.  I diligently wrote out labels for them and stuck them in next to the dahlia tuber when I planted them.  Obviously the pen wasn't as permanent as it stated, as the labels are now just blank.  So I am trying to match the dahlias up with the sheet I got with them, which also has pictures of dahlias on it that I didn't order.  Some of them are pretty obvious, like this one, called Taiheiyo.  Not sure why I got it, as I use the dahlias to put in the flower bouquets, and this is one of those dinner plate sized ones, which is just about a bouquet on it's own.

  

Then there is this one, which doesn't match any of the dahlias on the sheet, never mind the one's I ordered.

Or this one

This one and the one below it are two that I bought at my favourite nursery when they were clearing out their potted dahlias.

On Monday Larry and I stopped in at Ferncliff Gardens, a dahlia lovers paradise on the east side of Mission. 

It was a lovely spot, and a great view of the Westminster Abbey.  We'll have to take a field trip there one day.

At the gardens they give you a clipboard and catalogue and you can wander around the display garden and check off the dahlias you like.

Larry was my 'check off' guy.

 

They also grow peonies, which is what that dead looking foliage is in the field below

And here's a few of the dahlias that we liked.

April Heather

Ferncliff Showoff

Ferncliff Lemon Kiss

Oreti Lass

Mingus Tony

This one was so intense, and against it's dark green foliage...striking!

Ferncliff Lemon Kiss

Worton Blue Streak

And the one with the best name.....although it really doesn't sound appealing.

Dog's Breakfast!