Merry Christmas to all our dear blog friends!

See I got Gail to wear the silly hat!

Maybe she's not so bad after all.


PS from Gail - this blog will be quiet for a week or two over the festive season. Bertie and I will be down in Nottingham, concentrating on taking good care of HGD and HGY.  Looking forward to being in touch again in 2013. 

Christmas wish ...

Dear Santa,

I know you're busy etc., and this letter is rather late and my request is, I admit, unconventional and in all honesty I can if necessary wait till New Year (like most of the folk who receive so-called 'Christmas' gifts from Gail have to anyway).

Oh but please, please, PLEASE can you send me a handler who will enable me to fulfil my true potential as an agility dog?

In case you doubt what I am up against at the moment, please watch carefully this video of Gail and me, filmed by my dear friend Alison during one of the 'fun' party games at the Deeside Dog Agility Club Christmas Party last night. For clarity, I have added some subtitles, although even without these, I think that Gail's shortcomings as a handler will be all too obvious...

Amongst the current club membership there are, in my opinion, several promising candidates for the position of replacement handler. Perhaps you could make some discreet enquiries at the next training session? (Probably best to park the sleigh and reindeer behind the barn and out of sight of the other dogs).

I'm sure you will agree that my request is an entirely reasonable one, and so I am happy to leave the matter in your capable and hopefully not too frost-bitten hands.

Yours optimistically,
Bouncing Bertie (frustrated would-be agility star),
Aberdeen,
Scotland.

Keeping your human in order

Us pups are creatures of habit, right?

We know exactly what should happen when, and find it most disturbing when our humans forget the rules.

Take my morning walk, for example.

I know the drill, every step of the way.

Gail gets out of bed, has a shower, comes down to the kitchen, stops by my bed to say hello and give me a wee tummy tickle, then consumes her bowl of muesli and precisely and one and a half mugs of tea. After which she puts on her coat (and hat, and scarf and gloves, at this time of year), clips on my lead, and we're out the front door. Turn left and five minutes later we reach the park entrance and only then I am allowed off my lead and we complete our anti-clockwise circuit round the park, pausing now and then to greet all the other early morning regulars.

But sometimes Gail gets things terribly wrong.

Yesterday morning for example. We were only about half way to the park and Gail dropped hold of my lead. Incredible. It was as if she didn't realise where we were.

Well I can tell you, I stopped dead in my tracks and looked up at her, to let her know that she had made a serious error, and that she was still supposed to be attached to me at this point, whatever was she thinking of?

I am pleased to report that, on recognising her mistake, Gail immediately picked up my lead and from then on things proceeded according to plan.

I do hope nothing irregular happens today.

Overconfidence - a trait shared with HGD?

You know how I told you a few days ago that I was sure I had won the agility competition, and found it hard to understand why the judges decided otherwise?

Well Gail is saying that my problem is "over-confidence".

What's more, she claims that this trait has been evident from the start. For example when I was a wee pup I would go up to big and aggressive looking dogs and bounce all over them, confident that they would want to be my friends, even when their body language indicated just the opposite.

So I was thrilled to learn that Human Grandad has also long been seen as over-confident. Recently, when Gail was trying to dissuade him from attempting to walk further than his aged muscles would permit, he replied, in a rare moment of verbal fluency, by telling her how, when he was training to be an RAF pilot in Oklahoma, his flying instructor would tick him off for failing to recognise the limits of his ability and for attempting manoeuvres that were unwise and even dangerous.

I am so proud and happy to have HGD as a role model!

Or should that be roll model?