Lazy blogger

Been really naughty and not updated by blog for ages my excuse is that there is no internet at Dad's where I've been over Christmas.

Had a very quiet time and just been walking the dogs and chilling out. Took them to the South Downs on Friday to walk with a friend who has 4 border terriers, it was really windy but not very muddy except in a few places and we were out for 2 hours walking up and down steep hills and admiring great views. Dudley was on on the go for the whole walk and for a lot of it we could only hear his bell to tell us where he was. Tom and Suzi were much more sedate and mainly stayed with me although Tom did have a good run round but keeping me in view all the time.

Yesterday I took him to on a Balance and Coordination course run by Hannah Banks. It was really interesting as we were doing very low impact things. The point was to help the dogs realise where their feet are and to learn to turn round things without knocking them and really use their back legs when turning. To do this we got them walking through ladders and over very low, light jumps (made with cones) and wobble boards. The wobble boards were brilliant but Thomas was having none of it and would only go on them if I was holding them still which defeated the whole object but we did start to learn the elephant trick. I can get him to stand on a box with his front feet when I say 'elephant' and he will bow but I can't get him to go round yet. The bowing wasn't intentional but happened because of my crap sense of timing but it looks quite good.

He's really funny as he doesn't seem to like anything if it moves under his feet such as the wobble board, this doesn't bode well for the seesaw but now I know I can work on it.

Christmas Eve and I'm at work with nothing to do except wait for phone calls to come and and to be honest I can't really see many of them happening. Looks like I'll be here til 5.30 as no one has said anything about leaving any earlier and as I haven't been here very long I don't know what usually happens.

Decided to make a video to put on here showing that it's not all work and no play for Tom but only seem to manage to get shots of him and Dudley piddling up every blade of grass and tree stump although I did manage to record Dudley rolling in something unsavoury but only the sound as the camera was pointing at Thomas who was doing nothing other than look at me. I'll try and edit something together and maybe I'll get something good over Christmas.

They spent an hour and a half pottering about at the stables yesterday while I mucked out and chatted. Tom was fascinated by the chickens and watched them for ages but only barked at them once, I'm not convinced that he wouldn't chase them if he could get in with them but their run is pretty secure. Duds takes no notice of them at all after trying to chase them as a pup and getting a clout with their owners hat.

Dudley is so jealous of my pony and will stand and bark at her for ages if he sees me paying any attention to her. She doesn't care and just looks at him which I'm sure makes his blood boil. Initially I thought Tom was going to be a chaser but he now takes no notice of the horses at all except to try and steal their feed from under their noses.

Hope you all have a very Merry Christmas, eat too much, watch too much telly and enjoy the company of friends and family.

Well Done Leah

Just been looking at the results of the Olympia Kennel Club Agility Finals and Leah came 6th with Herbie and was 4th in the semis this morning.

I'm really pleased for her as she's had so much to worry about with Link's poor broken toes.

I'm a bit bored so I've added a new counter to my blog so I can see if it's just the mad English that visit the site or if I get some from other countries.

I have shamelessly pinched the idea from the Obay site!

Well no one else seems to be updating their blogs, anyone would think something important like Olympia or something was going on.

Last night was great fun and as usual well organised by Mac with some good courses by Wendy. Thomas' class ran 'not for competition' and were meant to use the runs to carry on the training which all the others did but even though Mac told me it was training just as I was about to start and I said 'Yes of course' the read mist came down and I just ran but Thomas was a star and even when I forgot to give directions he did what I asked with only a bit of sniffing. When we did the Helter Skelter I asked that he was timed, red mist again, and he was only just over 3 seconds slower than the fastest big dog and I know where he lost time so I'm chuffed to bits and really encouraged.

Suzi came 2nd in the agility and Dudley was 5th in the jumping so a good evening all round.

Another Tom!!!

Have been on the Agility Forum and someone else has a Tom, well he's a Barney really but looks so like him it's uncanny. He looks a little more ginger but has the same 'Who me' expression when caught doing something wrong.

If they get any more common I'll have to trade him in for a different model!!!

Now I've managed to work out how to post videos I'll make sure I get some more at training!!

We've got our Christmas party at Sevenoaks tomorrow, we usually have a little competition with the dogs of the same level competing against each other and I'm looking forward to running all three. Thomas' class will be doing the courses but just for the experience which I think will be great for us all to see how they've come on. I'm going to get them to time Tom so I can see how he compares to Dudley's and Suzi's times.

Just to be going along with here's a clip of Dudley at the weekend.