Tuesday, April 14, 2009

A bit of this, a byte of that



Here's several more recent pictures: The first shows Danny doing what he likes best these days: puttering around the Parakeet. The last two feature his adorable 3yr old niece, Miss Lexi Thompson, of (Buford) Georgia during Easter weekend.

In other news, Baby Bailey Brown is three weeks old already. Gained a whole pound and is doing well. I got to see her on Sunday, hold her, and feed her. She is such a sweet calm little lassie. Her hair is lightening and her dark blue eyes now have some hazel in them. Can't wait until we can, when she is a little older, take her and her parents and stepbrother to the beach in the Parakeet.

Well, tomorrow is that happy income tax filing day. Yeah. All cheer, right? Not! I mailed my exorbitant payment yesterday afternoon. It was my penalty for inheriting my mothers estate last year...the gov gets ya one way or another, never fear. Even though I didn't have to pay an inheritance tax, my paper income went up thanks to the stocks and Certificates of Deposit so I gotta pay more income tax this year. Maybe the fact that the stocks dropped in value so much actually helped...otherwise my tax bill would have been higher. I had to ask for a filing extension since the managers who went bankrupt on some land I own part of out west (inheritance again) never did the tax forms and we are missing a 1099 or something or other. But, I still had to fork over the cash. Sigh.

I finally got over my weird spring cold but Danny can't seem to shake his. He's tired all the time and still coughing. Chili has developed massive allergies and is constantly licking and biting self and scratching. Has developed a lick sore and even worse cut her poor little pawsies jumping into and out of the Parakeet. I gave her enough Benedryl this morning to make her sleepy..which I hate to do...but at least she's not itching herself to madness.

Bad weather is headed our way today: its dark and gloomy out already and its not even nine am. Dog class will probably get rained out which is actually okay with us. We have not learned anything at all in Level Three Agility except that we don't like it. The trainer lady seems to be only concerned about her experienced in show trials people and sets up what she calls "Masters level courses" (whatever that is) that she expects the 5 newbies to do correctly while she screams out numbers and confusing terms at dogs and handlers who have no idea what she's doing. Her terminology might as well be in Latin or Swahili and she wastes fifteen minutes or so yammering on about weekend trial and titles earned by her experienced folk who don't talk to us new folk at all.

As a former teacher of humans and observer of these sessions, I see a mistake here. Danny is getting very discouraged and Ginny senses it. There's no fun in these sessions at all. The other new folk look as confused as Danny. Ginny and Tanner and Finn and Cody and Ozzie all have promise as agility competetors. But if their humans are ignored and discouraged, they might quit. Any sport that doesn't encourage new blood is missing the mark. I have nothing personal against the trainer Lady whose name I never heard, but I believe we have a case of poor teaching here, and I stand by that statement. Of course to be completely fair, mixing five new teams in with a dozen very experienced in trials teams and trying to work with both equally at the same time is probably more than any one person could do. She either has to work and bring along the new blood or concentrate on the advanced and she has chosen the latter. But we are paying for this instruction and it has been a waste of money and time. There was supposed to be two trainers, or so I thought, but after one week we only had one and everything went straight downhill. Thumbs down to Level Three.

Oh well, we are hoping for lots of upcoming weekend trips in the Parakeet with the dogs. There are some dog friendly beaches up around Jacksonville, a couple on the west coast, and several down in the Keys. New fun and experiences for the Mutley Crew await. Won't miss agility and the still leash enforced local dog park at all.

I have successfully avoided using Facebook now for five days except to down load yesterday's Scott/Khoury Easter pictures. Now, if I could only make myself work out and stop eating so many sweets..Don't forget to check my other Blog, Nan Nan and Dan Dan for all the news thats fit to print on our Parakeet adventures.

Live long and prosper.

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