Joy In The Journey

I mostly post about agility because that is what we train for.  When I first started to train for agility my goal was to teach Max (at that time) everything he'd need to know (and learn myself).  The training itself wasn't a lot of fun - the fun would come once we learned enough.  I used positive methods and reward based training but I do think that sometimes Max must have felt like I was poking him in the eye with needles.  "I" needed a lot of practice so we drilled a lot (disclaimer - my instructor did warn me not to drill but she has border collies who would do something 15 million times without getting bored so I don't really think I took the advice onboard).

Somewhere along the way I discovered how to be more fun and how to make the training fun for me and the dogs.  We love to train (Rylie will yell at me if I'm on the computer too long in the mornings - a whole different issue I need to train through lol).

I have great instructors and mentors who have helped me see that it's the journey that's important - not the destination.  Also they've helped me to stop taking myself so seriously and allow myself to be silly - I can't lie though Rylie helped a lot with that too.  It's hard to be serious with Rylie around.

Training and a rant

It's cold and snowy this weekend so we decided to forgo the barn.  My main goal for both dogs at the moment is more consistent contacts.  I can do some work on this at home without equipment so that's what we have been doing.   Also playing a lot of indoor games working on our foundation skills .

I am looking for a treadmill (for me) and was browsing kijiji the other day.  Of course that led to browsing pet accessories, which obviously led me to browsing the pets for sale area.  I am not a fan of early spay/neuter for health reasons but it's clear to me why the shelters insist on it before rehoming dogs and why vets even do puppy neuters.  There are some REALLY stupid people out there.

Of course there were the bazillion ads from people with various designer breed (what we used to call mutts) pups for sale.  Sadly I even saw an add for Cavaliers in the area.  What irked me even more though were the ads by people looking for free/cheap pups.


There was the lady who was lonely but couldn't afford or justify the $300 the shelter charges for dogs - REALLY?  Just how do you think you'll afford to feed it and pay for vet bills then - not to mention training?

Then there was the guy who had a 10 week dobie pup with issues.  He thought getting another pup around the same age would solve everything.  Yeah right!

Then the family who were trying to rehome their large shedding 18 month old dog because the baby was starting to crawl.  While I understand and sympathize - you'd think they might have realized this would happen when the got a dog to begin with.

Okay - rant over - carry on with your day.