Mouse, 1; trap, 0

Good news: I caught a mouse in one of my fancy-schmancy new traps.

Bad news: the mouse was caught by the hind leg and very much alive.

Good news: but the trap held it!

Bad news: but now I was going to have to kill it.

Good news: I'm not bloodthirsty but I'm not horribly squeamish when it comes to mice. I could do this.

Bad news: the mouse would not cooperate.

Good news: mice can't move that fast when they're dragging a trap along behind them.

Bad news: they move faster than I thought.

Good news: I was able to grab the trap before mouse and trap disappeared into a laundry pile (yuck, yuck, yuck).

Bad news: the little SOB tried to bite me.

Good news: I have EXCELLENT reflexes when being attacked by a killer mouse.

Bad news: I have HORRIBLE aim when stomping on a killer mouse.

Good news: I didn't break the trap.

Bad news: I didn't break the mouse, either.

Good news: I got a second chance (the mouse apparently couldn't believe a human could be so clumsy.)

Bad news: I was even clumsier the second time. I stomped the trap instead of the mouse. The trap opened. The mouse bolted.

Crap. Now there's an angry 3-legged mouse running around our basement.

No wonder Phoenix doesn't want to go down there.

10 fun things I did this weekend

1. Ate. A lot. Eating is always fun.

2. Trained with Jill, Kate, Paula and Tracy. UD in spring 2011, here we come!

3. Taught the last session of my Utility class. I am now class-free until January. Wow. What will I do on Thursday nights?

4. Played Frisbee with the dogs on a sunny, 50 degree afternoon. Won't have too many more of those.

5. Drove through a local Chevy dealer and checked out new wheels. I have Equinox envy. More precisely, I have Equinox mileage envy: 34 highway. I want one. Bad.

6. Put up the Christmas tree at home. Okay, it's just a little table top tree but it's pretty. And sparkly. I'm not a real bling-y girl but I love sparkly at Christmas.

7. Played with my houseplants. Gave them showers and trims. It's a gardner thing. If you don't garden, you won't get it.

8. Gave myself permission NOT to write a Christmas letter this year. Every year I am obsessed with condensing the last 12 months into a letter. Not gonna do it this year. I'm simplifying Christmas. Sugar cookies are worth the time. Christmas letters are not.

9. Bought a new crate. There's something I haven't done for a couple of years! Got a tent crate for Phoenix, who has proven himself worthy of one (i.e., has occasionally used Jamie's tent crate over the last year and it still has the same number of doors and windows, no new Malinois designs.) Got 15 percent off and free shipping which made it even more fun.

10. Took the shoe, glove, mitten, slipper, sock that Phoenix brought me about 147 times. I don't know what's going on with him but he's decided I need to have a shoe, glove, mitten, slipper, sock at any given time of the day and is constantly presenting me with one every time I turn around. Maybe he just does it to see me laugh. It works.

What did you do for fun this weekend?

Really giving thanks

The Farmer and I went to my mom's for Thanksgiving yesterday. A good time was had by all. Burp.

We didn't take the Belgians along because Mom was dog-sitting for the weekend for a border collie who belongs to one of the brothers who rents their farm. She said the dog was very shy and we agreed that throwing two strange new people (me and the Farmer) plus Phoenix and Jamie into the mix for the day would probably put it right over the edge.

The dog was pretty much dysfunctional as it was. I felt so sorry for him. Apparently he had zero socialization as a puppy and as a result, had zero coping skills when taken out of his home environment, although I got the impression he wasn't much of a firecracker there, either. "Scottie" spent most of the day laying on his dog bed, about as far away from all of us as he could get.

He wouldn't come to anyone unless coaxed with a treat. If you dropped the treat, he ignored it and fled. He wouldn't follow anyone around the house. He wouldn't go to investigate new smells or sounds. He wouldn't make eye contact. He wouldn't wag his tail.

Wow. I forgot dogs like that existed. Everywhere I go in my happy little universe of performance dogs, I am surrounded by dogs who want to go see people, interact with people, get petted, get cookies, play with toys and just make a general nuisance of themselves. They sleep on our beds. They accompany us to the bathroom. They "help" us with every detail of our daily lives.

Not this one. He had essentially no use for humans. Part of it was fear. Part of it was he didn't think that humans were worth much.

Apparently he is tied up all day at home on the back porch (little to no human interaction). He can go outside through a doggie door to do his business (no need for the human to take him outside). He is free-fed (food always available, ho-hum, don't need a human for that either.) He is "dog aggresive," and barks when other dogs come around his house (hmmm, fear, more likely, since he is confined by a chain and can't escape). He gets to go in the house in the evenings sometimes. And sometimes his owner will throw a ball for him. But the dog tends to take the ball and run off. Because he doesn't know how to play with a human and it's more fun to entertain himself.

It was a classic example of "Why do you have a dog in the first place?"

The sadness of this overwhelmed me. Most BCs I know are perpetual problem solving machines who view life with humans as one large puzzle that needs to be figured out. Not this guy. He just existed. Perhaps with time and tremendous effort on the owner's part, he could truly connect to this dog and they both could experience the mutual joy that comes from sharing your life with a dog. I'm not holding my breath.

As soon as we got home, I sat down on the kitchen floor with the Belgians and we had a big ol' hairy dog party with kisses and pokes and fur everywhere. Phoenix chewed on my arm. Jamie brought me a house slipper. There were wagging tails and bright eyes.

Through the evening, I started counting how many different times one or both dogs initiated interaction with me or the Farmer. I totally lost count.

I am truly so thankful for my dogs and the daily joy they bring.

Video and commentary

Here are a couple of our JWW runs from the trials last weekend.

This one goes really well until Phoenix adds a bonus tunnel at the end. He thought it looked like more fun than the silly triple. And of course I was waaaay behind him and sucking wind so not able to give him much direction. So he directed himself. I probably should have rear-crossed the tunnel and called him hard to pull him back toward the triple. Maybe? Who knows.



When I watch video, I ALWAYS see things I could have handled differently. Does that ever end? Probably not. I don't think there's such a thing as the "perfect" way to handle a course. It depends on each individual dog and handler team, their strengths and weaknesses.

This was a Q-ing run. I thought maybe the leash runner was going to join us on the course at the end.



Have a happy and safe Thanksgiving, wherever you may be!

That sound

When I let the dogs out yesterday morning, Jamie must have spent the entire time eating grass because he came in the house, went directly to the living room (carpeted) and barfed up about a half bale of grass.

Sigh. Could he not barf on the vinyl floor in the kitchen?

No. It has to be on the carpet.

But he apparently felt a lot better for his efforts and was all waggy tail and squinty eyes so I forgave him his sins and gave him his breakfast.

Later, while washing dishes, I heard the dreaded sound. You know the one. It is the pre-barfing sound, that horrible retching noise that you know spells doom. It can wake you from a dead sleep at night and send you sprinting through the house in what is usually a futile attempt to MAKE IT STOP. The sound can make you drop whatever you are doing immediately.

The sound makes you start yelling "Noooooooooo!" like that is actually going to make it stop. Once the launch sequence has been initiated, there is no turning back. The best you can hope for is to be able to shove the offending party A) off the carpet and onto the vinyl or B) out the door in time.

I have given up trying to get dogs out of the house in time. That pretty much ended the day I went to yank open the dining room door and the door knob came off in my hand. I stood there and stared in alternating horror at the beautiful turn-of-the-century cut glass door knob that was no longer attached to the door and Connor, who was heaving his guts out all over the dining room carpet.

With the shelties, I was occasionally able to scoop them up and race out of the house. With Jamie at 60 lbs. and Phoenix at 53 lbs., that isn't going to happen. Plus, Phoenix never throws up. Never. He turns 4 next month and I think I've seen that dog barf once in his life. But I digress.

Back to Jamie. He had barfed up some more grass (good grief, I didn't know we had that much grass left in the yard!) and part of his breakfast. He appeared quite happy about the situation. He trotted off, had a drink and started chasing Phoenix around the house.

I cleaned things up. It was on the carpet. Again. Of course.

A little later, I was puttering around when . . . again . . . I heard the sound.

Oh for the love of doG! Noooooooo!

I ran into the dining room. No Jamie.

I ran into the living room. No Jamie.

I checked the bedroom. No Jamie.

WTF?

I followed the sound back to the living room.

Jamie was behind the entertainment center. I have NO FREAKING IDEA how he got back there, but there he was, apparently barfing up his toenails.

Do you know what is behind our entertainment center?

A lot of electrical cords.

A furnace vent.

Carpet.

They were now all covered in dog vomit. Massive amounts of it. How could this much stuff come out of one dog? His one cup of breakfast kibble and hard boiled egg had morphed into about half a gallon of of slimy, gelatinous gunk.

It was dripping into the furnace vent.

I said a lot of very bad words.

Jamie looked repentant. He wagged his tail.

I put him outdoors.

I moved the entertainment center, which thank heaven is on wheels.

I got a pair of pliers and pulled the furnace vent out of the floor, took it to the shower and washed it off. Then I cleaned dog barf out of the furnace duct. In an entire lifetime spent with dogs, I have never cleaned dog barf out of a furnace duct. I am not sure this is something I would list on a resumé.

I cleaned off all the power cords and scrubbed the carpet. By the way, I recommend Resolve spray carpet cleaner.

Occasionally I checked out the window to see what Jamie was doing. Apparently he felt fine. He was dancing from paw to paw on the patio, staring at the back door in hopes of coming back in.

That was 24 hours ago. No more barfing has ensued. Jamie had a small meal of hamburger and rice last night and another this morning. I have not seen either one reappear. It is a very good day.

Is it wrong . . .

. . . to get excited about a mousetrap?

At our house, NO!

Thanks to the fact we live in an old house in the middle of a cornfield, mice are a seasonal nuisance. I run a trap line in the basement through the fall and early winter and average a couple of catches a week until A) I catch all the stupid ones and/or B) the rest of them find a place to spend the winter that is not inside our house where they would be tempted by the Peanut Butter Lure of Death.

Apparently I had worn out our previous traps by too many successful trapping seasons. (That is very, very wrong on so many levels.) The mice were eating the peanut butter right off them without springing them. Great. The only way they were going to set off the old traps was if they ate so much peanut butter they got fat enough to spring the lever when they sat on it.

So today on the way home from the Muscatine agility trial (which has so far brought varying degrees of brilliance and train wreck-age), I stopped at the new Thiesen's in Coralville.

It was a religious experience.

If you don't have a Thiesen's where you live, it's a farm store. But it's more. It's the ultimate farm store. They have everything. This new store is huge. It has more of everything.

Seriously, that's the store motto: We have more of everything.

You'd better believe it, too. (But sorry, Rilda, they didn't have 2" orange vetwrap. So I guess they lied.)

They have mousetraps.

They have BETTER mousetraps as evidenced here.

This was too cool. I am all about mousetraps that are easy to set. And these said so right on the package. So of course it had to be true.

I had to try them out.

Right there in the store.

The manufacturer had cleverly packaged the traps so you could do this.

I did. WOW! That was super easy. I got so excited I must have shaken the cardboard they were attached to.

SNAP! SNAP!

Holy crap! Glad my fingers weren't in there! 

I looked around to see if anyone was watching.

Nobody was.

So I did it again.

COOL!

I was fascinated.

I bought them and brought them home. (I also bought cat food. Is that an oxymoron, to buy mousetraps AND cat food? If the cats were doing their job, I wouldn't need the mousetraps. But that would mean the cats would have to be in the house. And the only one happy about THAT would be Phoenix.)

Here is one of the new traps, all set up with the tasty Peanut Butter Lure of Death. I'll let you know how it works. (No pics, I promise.)

Seriously, only people who have had to trap mice will fully appreciate this. If you live in a mouse-free zone, count your blessings. Start now.

Excuses!

This week has not been conducive to creative, funny, thought-provoking blogging. I seem to be doing good just getting from one day to the next without damaging myself.

In a fit of panicked desk-cleaning at work, looking for something I never did find, I found this, which is just as funny now as it was 10 years ago, which was the date stamped on it. Maybe if I cleaned off my desk more often than once every 10 years I wouldn't be losing stuff, huh?

EXCUSES
I cannot train my dog today,
the sky is overcast and gray,
the air's too damp, I've got a cramp,
and the dog's just eaten anyway.

Can't find the leash, got home too late,
I'm due somewhere tonight at eight.
I've got a rash, a gash and bumps,
Too tired now to get the jumps.

Traffic's made me tense and strained,
I have to lose this weight I've gained.
How can we work when it's just rained?

The dog's too hyper, my mood is blue,
I must be coming down with the flu,
I cough, I sneeze and wheeze and choke,
Darn! My only dumbbell broke!

Too cold outside - my feet are numb.
There's a sliver in my thumb.
The house needs cleaning, it's a sight.
I have to work overtime tonight.

I had a nap. Had company.
Lawrence Welk is on TV.
My toe is sore - it might be gout,
I think my hair is falling out.

I ate too much. My day's been rough.
I think my dog has had enough
Of this daily training grind,
we need some time off to unwind.

Author Unknown