All I can say is... Snooker is weird

Here are four videos from early October of us attempting our first "snooker" course. I still can't say I understand snooker courses well enough to explain them, so I'll see if the internet can do it for me.

From: Wikipedia

Snooker: Loosely based on the billiard game of Snooker. The course has at least three red jumps, each numbered 1, and six other obstacles numbered 2 through 7. The dog accumulates points based on the obstacle's number. This also has two parts, an opening sequence and a closing sequence. In the opening sequence, the dog must complete a 1, then any obstacle numbered 2 to 7, a different 1 and any 2 to 7 obstacle (including the one already performed), and yet another different 1 and another 2-7 obstacle. For example, the dog could perform the red on the left for 1 point, the 7-point obstacle, the red in the middle for 1 point and then the 7-pointer again, then the red on the far side of the course and the 7-pointer one more time, for a total of 24 points in the opening. After successfully completing this, the dog must complete the obstacles 2-7, in order, for an additional possible 27 points. Failure to follow these rules exactly (such as knocking a bar or taking 2 reds in a row) results in the dog and handler being whistled off the course.
Strategy and entertainment value: The dogs might have to negotiate between other obstacles without taking them or make a difficult entry to the obstacle, often combined with a longer distance between the reds and the 7 so that it consumes more time to do the higher-point obstacle in the opening.

The fact that we're running snooker is why Cloudine is counting loudly and talking about buzzing me off course and futzing with her cell phone to time us. All in all, I think it could be fun if you're good at math, course analysis, and running really freaking fast, but it was our first time so go easy on us. :-)

Grete the Ring Bearer

Despite being insanely busy for the last few months, Grete and I have continued to do agility. We've graduated to the morning advanced class that runs more courses, so I have more than a handful of videos from October.

But first, you might ask what we were insanely busy doing. May I present - Grete the Ring Bearer. (Jason and I got married at the end of July, and Grete was our ring bearer. That's my leg in the green dress. :))

What's this? A VIDEO?

Huge thanks to Chad for taking this awesome video of Grete's goofy run today. She really wanted to take the chute instead of the tunnel... backwards. Cracked. ME. UP!

She's 6? Seriously. She's 6.

Too bad I didn't even know agility even existed when I was 6.

HD Video

BTW, those two videos are HD from my new Flip Ultra HD. However, it looks like YouTube has to change the width in that case, so now I need to fix the layout... Erfh!

Twisty Turns and Discrimination Tests

Twisty Turns and Discrimination Tests

Saturday's course contained a discrimination test at the very beginning (the tunnel versus the dog walk) and some twisty serpentine moves.

Grete and I did pretty well on both our runs. The first one I didn't call her to me enough so she blew past the second jump toward the tunnel/dog walk, but she got the really hard part of the jump sequence. (You can hear Cloudine say "Good puppy" right after she gets it.)



On the second run, we tried to work on those first two jumps. I think it was a little stressful for Grete. She hates jumping into me, and I need to work on that. After the stress, she started sniffing around and Cloudine zerberted her a bit and that got her little fire running. She and I missed the hard part of the jump serpentine, but that was due to my timing.

the course from the 16th (part 2)

two weeks ago, cloudine broke out the hard courses. (one week ago she eased up a bit)

this course was super tricky. the turn from 5 to 6 to 7 got me every time.

heck - looking at it now - i'm not sure i labeled it right. (on flickr, i've added notes with the obstacle order numbers.)

good thing i finally broke down and ordered a flip video for future reference!

the course from the 16th (part 1)

the "easy" part -- although grete didn't like starting with the tire

Updates and play dates

So much has changed in the past few months... I've switched jobs so Grete no longer comes to work with me. I had surgery in late October so I was out for a week of agility. Then I hurt my ankle and I was gimpy for a week. Then Grete cut her paw in early December so she was out for two weeks of agility. Then Christmas and New Years... and -BANG- here we are in 2010.

Because of the job change and because of Grete, I tried working a shorter day in the office and tried to work from home more, but that was hard on both of us. She doesn't understand working from home. And she really don't understand why she's not with me 24/7. To be honest, some deep emotional part of me doesn't understand it either.

We've hired a dog walker to give Grete and our neighbor's adorable little puppy some R&R / playtime in the middle of the day.

And the good news for you, my dear reader, is that our dog walker blogs so you can continue to get your Grete fix when I've been slacking!

You can read about Grete and Rusty's play dates here: http://www.little-furry-things.com/grete-and-rusty/.

More on our agility exploits in 2010... I promise.

Video! (08/21/09)

Sorry we've been so silent lately.

Hard to believe we've only been training with Cloudine for 1 year, 3 months, 8 days. It seems much longer because we've come so far.)

Even harder to believe that Grete is 2 years, 4 months, 19 days old. She seems much older and wiser. :-)

(Cloudine had a perspective student stop by class this Saturday, and while we were talking the subject of how long I had been training came up. I totally thought it had been 2 years at the time because I'm terrible with dates.)

Every week I vow to buy a video camera for class OR find my old point and shoot and bring the GorillaPod. I have no idea where my old point and shoot is (and the Nikon D90 doesn't do a good job of focusing on moving targets) and I still haven't bought one... but a couple weeks ago, Cloudine brought her camera and thus we have... wait for it... A VIDEO!

(To be honest, I really, really wish I had a video this last Saturday. The course was harder and we did so much better... IMHO.)

But here you go... A VIDEO!