Monday, August 29, 2011

Know when to say when

On Thursday of this week, Phoenix and I are going to jump back into the Open/Utility rings after our summer off. We're entered in 3 days of a local 5 day cluster.

I honestly don't expect all of our training issues to have been miraculously resolved in the last two months but I do feel much better about the direction our training is going.

In keeping with my training goal of focusing on what we CAN do this week, not what we CAN'T, here's a list of how to know it's time to end a training session. Yes, I have ended a training session at one time or another because of every single one of these reasons. (Some are while training at home, others while training away from home or at a motel with friends during a trial weekend.)

I didn't say they were GOOD reasons. Well, at the time, they sounded like very good reasons. And some of them were. It's probably a wonder Phoenix has gotten as far as he has.

• Your fingers are bleeding and you need a band-aid(s).

• You have a split lip.

• You ran out of cheese because you ate too much of it yourself.

• Your dumbbell broke.

• The gloves are shredded.

• The toy got ripped in half.

• The toy got stuck in the limb of a tree (really, who threw it up there?)

• The neighbor was walking up the lane.

• The neighbor's dog was walking up the lane.

• A skunk was walking up the lane.

• The Farmer was yelling out the window "YOURMOTHERISONTHEPHONE."

• The wind keeps blowing the ring gates over.

• You were tired of listening to your older dog howling.

• You can't stand getting one more hole in your shirt.

• A lightning strike.

• It started to rain.

• It started to snow.

• There was a tornado on the ground.

• The pizza came.

• Your dog is so obsessed with a nearby cat that he is basically dysfunctional.

• You are so hungry you are basically dysfunctional.

• Friends with margaritas arrived.

• The Farmer is yelling out the window "MICHELEISONTHEPHONE!"

• "NCIS" starts in 3 minutes.

• A new Harry Potter book arrived that afternoon.

• The wind is blowing the jumps across the yard.

• Things were going so well you decided to quit while you were ahead.

• Things were going so badly you decided to quit while you were ahead.

Happy training, everyone!




6 comments:

  1. All are perfectly good reasons to stop what you are doing!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. been there done that

    will add
    chickens started weaving when you were too!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wise decisions! Again, I'm adding a visual here. Too funny. Skunk???

    ReplyDelete
  4. It's a good list. I like the margarita one. Don't forget about the cat eating the treats off the target or tracking path!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Eating all the cheese... been there too many times!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Yep, other dog is going ballistic b/c he wants to work (or the little bitch is going balistic, oh wait, I don't have her with me anymore...).

    Your hands are slimy from the slobber (yes, too many treats!), you just had half your tooth cracked off, someone knocked on the door (darn school students selling their fundraiser stuff)...

    Good list, I laughed and nodded at a number of reasons.

    ReplyDelete