I'll Remember you....My Perfect Nina

Hemangiosarcoma

To Learn More:

http://www.modianolab.org/cancer/cancer_hemangiosarcoma.shtml

Spring 2008 revisited!!!

Wow!!! It's amazing what I find in my picture files....if I just LOOK!! LOL Today is rather rainy one. What a great day to organize some of my pictures from earlier this year. These were taken June 13th, our office was closed due to the flooding in Cedar Rapids. It's sure bizarre, how it was such a beautiful day, "the morning after".

Here's Saphira and Adam enjoying some pasture time. Phira's tail is next to IMPOSSIBLE to keep clean, her bodies not much better. I think I need a solid dirt brown pony!! G

Adam of course had to find out what I was doing on the ground. I was sitting with my photo partner and all around "pain in the arse", Cougar.

Adam has such dark pretty eyes. Dude, where'd you get that dirt above your eye!!

Spring is so nice as the flies aren't terribly bad....yet. In the late summer and fall it's hard to get pictures this close without flies!!! UGH!!



Seeker is a Border Collie and he EXCELS in herding, but only OTHER BORDER COLLIES. He really doesn't pay much attention to our ducks and chickens. If Kruz is outside however, GAME ON!!!

Kruz on the other hand finds him to be an extreme pain in the butt and will occasionally bark and chase Seeker off. Much to Seeker's delight.


The sure enjoy running and playing when we stay home for the day. Mad's telling Seeker to "BRING IT ON!!!". He's taken to biting her hind leg in order to get her to chase him when Kruz gets tired of his "games". Mad seems to enjoy it, most of the time.

New Chicks - First Day Outside

Well, kind of!! The new chicks are 4 weeks old today and it's not getting any warmer, so I decided to try to "encourage" them to come outside. Hindsight, I should have tried this yesterday when their was more sun.

You would think that if you just dropped the door down and let them choose to go outside that they would right? WRONG!!! They will only go if you give them a very good reason too, otherwise they will stay inside where it's SAFE!!! So, next time you buy your "range free" eggs or birds, remember, they must be given access to the great outdoors, it doesn't mean they will go. Trust me when I tell you, they do NOT want those birds outside and they NEVER go!

So, how do you get them outside? You have two options. You can either just pick them up and put them outside, of course you have to catch them first! Herding chickens is pretty comparable to herding cats, they go EVERY WHICH WAY and more often than not, the opposite direction in which you wanted them too go.



Or you can put their food and water just outside the door and hope they are hungry enough to venture out. After a couple days of this they are more than happy to go outside into the free air. The little barred rock above looks like she's thinking about it, shortly there after she's in the feeder and brings a few friends along. The German Spitz below has a little tuff of feathers on it's head. These are my first white egg laying chickens, I wanted something a little different......it will be fun to see what they look like when they are all grown up. There's a Black Australorp in the very back, she's blending into the background.



A little Rhode Island Red decides to join in one the feeding frenzy. You can still see some of her baby feathers.

There are 25 chicks in all, so you can see that the majority of them are choosing to stay safely inside.

Generally once one or two chicks come out, they others feel comfortable enough to join them.....

That is until.....COUGAR (our villain) appears!
Showing a bit too much interest for my taste.



Cougar, don't you even THINK ABOUT IT!!! I chastise him. He doesn't even blink, staring at the young chickens.

I suppose I should explain, for those of you that don't know. Cougar takes great joy in running after and chasing the adult ducks and chickens. He never hurts them, but seems to take great pride in making them scatter! He's such a "naughty" little cat.

This is the same cat that waits along side a jump to pounce on Seeker as he comes over. GEEZ!!!

So I leave the inside of the pen to have a serious discussion with him.


Now, Cougar....are you going to leave these chicks alone? Or do I need to put you in a dog crate???

MEOW!!!!!!

Did he just WINK!!!!

Come on Cougar, you're going in a box....like a dog!! Um, I mean a CAT! G

Water Trial - Overboard PWD - Indiana

We had a GREAT time in Indianapolis over the weekend at the Overboard Portuguese Water Dog Water Trial.
http://www.opwdc.org

Mad got to play in the water twice and passed both times at the Versatility Water Work Level. Versatility is for PWDs that have completed the highest title available in Water Trials, (CWDX - Courier Water Dog Excellent), but still want to partake in all the FUN!

Mad Dog is pictured left, with her HUGE ribbon!! Could they get any bigger? Mad took two of them home, along with a very pretty blue Coaster Tile. Mad of course preferred the "Home Made Cookies" in our gift bag.

I suppose I should "insert" here that today, while I was shopping, Mad did a bit of shopping on her own and shredded above plastic gift bag to look for MORE COOKIES!! None were to be found, but she obviously enjoyed the Smartie Gum and Gummie Eye Ball that were still in the bag.
I guess she earned those too. G

So now for a recap of our trip. Lots of pictures for those of you that don't like to read!

We left bright and early Friday Morning, 5 am to be exact. Bill was excited to put his new best friend and Garmin, "BJ" - "Bill's Jill" to work. Me, I had a Harry Potter book on my IPOD, thanks to Michele, and of course a craft project to keep me busy. The drive wasn't bad at all, only a little over 6 hours. I guess it wasn't too bad, since I didn't have to drive! G

A few miles into our trip we heard someone in the back "singing". No, it wasn't Kruz, Mad or Seeker. This little creature (it later turned out to be three of them) come in a variety of sizes, are all black and seems to love shady areas. Chickens find them totally delicious and some people even buy them for their pet lizards (not the black ones of course). Yes, CRICKETS!!! I'm sure the state of Indiana will thank us for strengthening their gene pool.

We arrived FIRST, as is the norm for us. Well actually, you can blame me for that, as I HATE being late!! I just can't help it.

So we took a look around the park. We would be using the public beach area, which is very nice. I got a kick out of the sign on the front door. It just reminded me of something you'd see in an Iowan town. Indiana's a nice place.

Soon others began to arrive to have a go at a Friday practice. It was a bit on the cool side, but Mad didn't seem to care and once you got in the water it wasn't bad at all. Kruz and Seeker had a go at the water too, as they both love to swim. Kruz's favorite toy is the buoy ball. Seeker isn't picky and will play with whatever you come up with.

We met up with Judy (who we'll be staying with) there along with her PWDs, Porter (Nina's litter brother) and Iggy, who we haven't seen since he spent a week with us when he was 10 weeks old. Iggy is 3 now and cute as a bug!!

Kristi, Mike along with their two PWDs, Ocea and Moby showed up shortly after that. It was a "Kalista" family reunion of sorts as we all had the first "A" litter puppies. You'll see pictures of all of them doing their stuff a bit later.

After practice we loaded up and headed for Judy's house and to meet her husband John. They live in a nice quite neighborhood on a culd-a-sac (AKA - NO TRAFFIC), which is great since I was going to be staying in a tent. We decided the best place to put the tent was along side the house, not in the back yard. This way none of the dogs would pee on it.

Judy and John are GREAT hosts! They should honestly open up a bread and breakfast. We had some delicious snacks, pita bread, crackers, dip and pizza, along with the strongest margarita's you've ever had! OMG!!! They were good, but strong. John, a beer drinker, claimed that they should only be mild, not strong. Let's put it this way, Kristi, Mike and I were afraid to get up from the table!!! In fact, I wasn't sure I'd make it out to my tent without getting arrested for public intox. LOL

The next morning we were off to the water site, with a slight headache - I might add! We picked up the all important COFFEE!! John's is better by the way! AWESOMELY STRONG!

We set up "base camp" and I got ready to take some VERY amateur shots. I'll try to explain some of the exercises along the way, so you can see what we actually do at these things.

We started the Saturday Morning off with Junior Certificate. The young Kalista PWDs, Moby, Iggy and Breaker - who arrived with his "people", Nicole and Mark, along with PWD sister, Stella, have already passed this beginning level.

Apprentice is the first "titling" level of water work. It involves a retrieve underwater, a 50' water retrieve, a 50' placed float line retrieve, a boat ride and a 2 minute swim. The 2 minute swim seems to be the part that most handlers hate. Judy was very hopeful that she would NEVER need to do this exercise again.

Breaker - Nicole (WI)

Breaker and Nicole doing their boat ride. Nicole can not touch her dog during this exercise. The dog needs to sit on the boat and wait to be called off when Nicole gets to shore.

Above - Breaker is being released to Nicole. What a good boy!!
THEY PASSED and have a new AWD Title (Apprentice Water Dog).

Iggy - Judy (IN)

Iggy starts off strong with a good underwater retrieve. Not being a dumb dog he likes to use his feet to kick it closer to shore, unfortunately that's not allowed. He was playing by the rules today however and made a clean pick up without using his feet! Way to use your head IGGY!!

Next is the 50' retrieve of a dummy. Yes, you CAN have the steward throw the dummy for you and for all of you that think 50' isn't that far, you'd be surprised at how many people can NOT throw it that far. As for Judy, this is a REQUIREMENT as she's the only person I know that can throw a dummy into the air and hit.....HERSELF! VBG (We'll come back to this topic later)

Now the picture below I really like, unfortunately Iggy is a bit out of focus. Judy's butt on the other hand is in perfect focus! SORRY JUDY!!! LOL I'll be able to play and do something "artsy" with this in photoshop. I like the direction and energy Judy is giving her dog on this retrieve and I love the enthusiasm that Iggy is showing as well. WELL DONE!

Moby - Kristi (MN)

Is this guy CUTE or what!! Sorry Jerry, (one of my favorite rowers in the world), I'm talking about that little brown dog on the back of the boat. Yes, that's Moby! Moby is just a baby having turned one year old on June 9th. He's doing a great job!! Unfortunately he already "failed" this exercise when he got the "rips" on the sand with the dummy and Kristi had to do a 50' retrieve of her puppy. He was very cute none the less. As soon as he took that dummy and made that bucking bronco move in the sand, you knew it was not going to be good!

Here he is being that great water dog that we all know is in there!! Doing a flawless float line retrieve. Next year he'll be ready for Apprentice!!! A good experience is always a great thing! You can't get much better than that!

The UNKNOWN MAN!!!

Okay, so during the Courier briefing I got bored and spotted this man in the sand. NO, I did NOT put him there!!! I thought it was rather funny, but felt bad for the kid that's missing his action figure. Hey Judy, at least yours isn't the ONLY butt I got a picture off!!!

Ocea - Kristi (MN)

Ocea in perfect form jumping off the boat to get her fishing net.
Wait, that was MY fishing net!!

Courier Level is probably the most difficult of the three titling levels in water work. The three being Apprentice, Working and Courier. Apprentice is difficult as you usually have a young dog and anything can and does go wrong. Working is a bit easier as all your work is done off the boat, that is, as long as your dog will get OFF the boat. If not, that IS a problem. In Courier you generally have a more seasoned and mature dog. One that is use to the distractions of the trial. The added difficulty for this class however is the required endurance in swimming and the strength required for the net retrieve. One of the most difficult exercises in this class is the buoy ball drop, this requires the dog to take a large buoy ball away from the handler, 50', then go past that marker another 10-15' and drop and leave that buoy and return to the handler. Being natural retrievers, it's hard for them to understand that you don't want the ball brought back to you.

Below - Mike is feeding out the fishing net to Ocea as she drags it back to Kristi. This does actually have a net attached and it's actually quite heavy when you pull it through the water.
GOOD GIRL OCEA!!

Ocea didn't pass either day in Courier, but she had some great moments and next year it's going to be a breeze!!!

Porter - Judy (IN)

Versatility is a non-titling class made up of 5 exercises from the other 3 levels.
One required exercise is the buoy drop from Courier.

Is Porter cute or what!!! I'd want one just like him if I didn't have to keep those white parts WHITE!!!! I know, we have Border Collies, but they have fur and PWDs have hair. Two totally different matters when it comes to staying clean.

Judy and Porter are focusing above on the float line that is being placed for him to retrieve. Porter has his UDX2 in spite of Judy's inability to throw. She has to throw over hand in order not to hit the high jump or the ceiling. She said she always has people lining up outside her open ring to tell her how to throw a dumbbell. She stated, they just don't get it. LOL Luckily, I know enough people that can't throw either, so I'm taking Judy's word on this one!

Below Porter is bring all his gear to the boat. This is the Gear Bag retrieve and the first exercise in the Water Water Dog level.

Tammy - Mad Dog (IA)

Mad Dog and I, as well as Kristi - our rower on the "great open sea" or at least it might as well have been. It was rougher than a cob as the wind kicked up for Mad's turn.

We all survived however and Mad did a great job.

Below is Mad taking her buoy ball to the marker. Now she has to keep going out past it for another 10-15'.

Mad has successfully dropped her buoy ball and is swimming back to us on the boat.

GOOD GIRL MAD DOG!!!!

To CELEBRATE Judy picked up a bottle of MAD DOG wine.

All I could think was, OMG, I hope it's not MORGAN DAVID!! Mike had to laugh as he thought the same thing!! Nope, it was a pretty good wine actually! Not as good as the margarita's of course. G

On Saturday the trial had a relaxing dinner at a near by pavilion. We never miss out on an opportunity to dry out our water gear. Below is Carrie draped in our Courier Net. Yes, this is the same net the dogs pull back 50' to the other boat. It looks like we're finally landed something!

Jerry was telling us about all their "friends" that come over and bring "light" beer.
Funny think is, they leave all the light beer and drink all of Jerry's good beer.
Jerry then ends up throwing it away a year later.
I might add here that Jerry brought a whole cooler of that "light" beer to the pavilion for people to enjoy. He took a full cooler back home, I guess you can't fool PWD owners either.

Saturday evening was nice. After John shared with us that the neighbors are all a buzz about the tent out front. He assured them that we weren't quite homeless and that we were fairly normal. For Iowanizens that is. G What the heck, if we can get our neighbors stirred up by rowing a boat on dry land with a dog in the back, we might as well share the joy and give Indiana something to talk about.

Later, we sat around the table and finished off the margaritas. Just one each John promised and they are WEAK!!!! OMG!! Weak my arse!! I'm afraid to know what his strong ones taste like. Sauce off our bums again, we head off to bed.

Here are all the Kalista dogs that were at the Indiana trial. Left to right: Stella (who doesn't like water), Breaker AWD, Mad Dog CWDX V4, Iggy AWD, Porter CWDX V1, Moby (too cute for words) and Ocea WWD. All looking forward to another season of water work.....except Stella of course. She'll pull shore duty and bring the margs!

Bray Park - Indiana

This past weekend we spent some time in the Indianapolis area. The local Portuguese Water Dog Club hosted a Water Trial, so off we went!! (I'll post about that later).

A friend from Iowa, Liz and her sister, recently donated 92 acres to Hamilton County in order to turn it into a park. It's slowly under "construction" or re-struction, might be a better term, as they are going to turn most of it back to the "native plants" of Indiana.

What are the chances that "Liz's Park" is just minutes from the Lake in which we will be doing our water work? So Friday morning we left extra early in order to pay the Bray Park a special visit!!

Bill, Kruz and Seeker head up the path toward the woods at Bray park.

What a beautiful day!

Kruz, Mad Dog and Seeker sitting amongst the fallen apples.

Kruz, Mad and Seeker on the bridge.

Kruz is getting a bit tired of this picture taking business!
Seeker on the other hand is thinking about going OFF the bridge.
Mad just wants a COOKIE!! Don't say it if you DON'T MEAN IT!

I'm not sure what these are, but they sure are PURDY!!! (':

More wild flowers along the creek.

It was a fun visit and we hope to make it an annual visit as the Indiana PWDC continues to offer water trials. Who knows, maybe someday we can camp there?

Celebrating with WINE!!!!

We attended an agility trial in Rochester over the weekend, home of Mayo Clinic and the world's largest vertical corn cob, complete with lights.

It's a nice outside agility site, with a nice little camp area close at hand. One downside - no showers.....on the upside there is a Super 8 just over the fence of the Campgrounds. Luckily, some of our "high class" friends stay at the hotel and allow us to use their showers.
I think this is probably more for their benefit, than for ours.

Kruz, our 10 year old Border Collie finished his MACH2.
Good boy KRUZ!!!!
Kruz is totally in it for the fun and doesn't even understand with a MACH or DQ (Double Q) mean....although, he TOTALLY understands that the RED DQ sign means BABY CONE!!!

Here's Kruz on Monday 9/1/08 photo by Marsha - see her other AWESOME pictures at:
http://www.agilityig.smugmug.com

So, back to our Celebration on Sunday. The upscale crowded decided to order pizza in their air conditioned rooms, leaving us poor white trash folks to grill out. (I might add, we had tents, our neighbors ALL had big arse RV's - we spent less on gas!!!) Carrie surprised me with a bottle of my favorite wine served in white Styrofoam cups. We're talking HIGH CLASS!!!

For those of you interested in what the "other half" drinks, this was a light refreshing dessert wine Moscato D'asti - 2005, a very good year! Too bad this one actually had a cork vs. those normal screw off caps we're use to.

Uh oh!!! Note here - we didn't even think about asking those RV people if they had a wine screwie opener thingie! UGH!!!

Carrie recalled her father saying in the Army that they would use a knife and simply push the cork down into the bottle. Oh, nice thought Carrie, but the bottle is actually tapered in the middle. Maybe we can dig it out, she says?? Hum, with a plastic knife?? I don't think so. (':




Luckily, Marsha (AKA Meme) comes to the rescue! She remembered that we were given a Swiss army knife at the 2002 AKC Nationals in Houston, TX and she has it with her!!

Now I'm really jealous, I have one of these too....somewhere!!!

Yes, you can check on the web site listed on this handy item as well!!!!

Carrie carefully twists the screw into the cork. We're all holding our white Styrofoam cups in anticipation of the sweet wine!

Well, as they say, the best laid plans........let's just say, it wasn't as easy as we thought. Or at least as easy as Carrie thought!
Marsha, Michelle, Bill and I, on the other hand had a BLAST!!!
At Carrie's expense of course.



Carrie got a good grip on the knife and she pulled!! We cheered louder, she pulled harder....

and harder.....



and harder......



We laughed......she grunted.......



We laughed MORE!!!!



Then came the breathing!!


Now trust me, NONE of us at this table have had ANY experience birthing them two legged babies, but we're all sure Carrie would have made any Lamaze instructor proud with her breathing methods.

Unfortunately, that strategy didn't prove successful for getting the cork out of the bottle. It did however make us all laugh all the harder.


By the way, I'm sure glad she shaved her arm pits!! No Photo Shop was used in the telling of this story!


Finally it comes down to BRUTE STRENGTH!!!


By this time, the natives (that was us) were getting restless. We wanted our wine and we wanted it NOW!!!! Some of us had squeezed our foam cups in all the excitement and we knew they wouldn't be able to handle much more.


PULL CARRIE, PULL CARRIE, YOU CAN DO IT!!!
The chants came from the picnic table!! People from the balcony were now coming outside to see what all the yelling was about.


SHOW THAT BOTTLE WHO'S BOSS!!
Someone else yells with anticipation!

And then.....it HAPPENS!!!!!


With one final tug, the cork comes out of the bottle with a satisfying pop, that all high class wines provide.


Cheers were heard throughout the camp!!! YIPPEE!!!! WAY TO GO!! THAT WAS AWESOME!! WAY TO GIVE IT HELL!!


Of course we don't give her time to recover as we're all grabbing for the bottle and filling our cups. It was delicious!!!

THANKS CARRIE!!!!!

Canine Carcass Shots!! Plus a bonus picture!

I knew that would get your attention!!!!

Saturday when we got back to the hotel at a decent hour and the dogs were EXHAUSTED!!

Let's step back a minute and compare how the Humans and Canines spent there day.

The Humans -

Up at 5:30 am.
Dress and take the canines out to potty.
Feed canines.
Load Van with coolers, dog bags and camcorders.
Head down to the break area where it's NOT ready.
Get coffee.
Drive to the trial site.
Unload coolers, dog bags and camcorders.
Potty dogs, take them inside to their crates (these were hauled in by the humans the day before)
Fill water bucket.
Get running numbers and course maps for the day.
1- Walk courses, watch other heights run the courses, make strategy plans and visualize smooth handling and a fast clean run.
2 - Retrieve dog from crate, take it out to potty.
3 - Walk the dog to warm it up, give it a body massage and some treats.
4 - Run dog, reward dog, cool dog down.
5 - Return dog to crate.
6 - Refill water bucket.
Repeat steps 1-6 twice with each dog.
At the end of the day, pack up coolers, bags, camcorders and dogs and drive them all back to the hotel.
Potty and feed canines.
Haul coolers, dogs bags and camcorders back up the the room.

The Canines

Wake up when the alarm goes off.
Go potty.
Eat.
Go for a car ride.
Go potty.
Drink.
Go into kennel for a nap, it's been a busy morning!!!
1 - Mid morning wake up call.
2 - Go for a walk, go potty.
3 - Get some treats by doing stupid tricks for some human.
4 - Run a course, who cares if it's the right one!
5 - Celebrate with human and go for another walk.
6 - Back to my crate for another nap.
Repeat steps 1-6 twice.

So honestly, who do you think works harder??????

Look at these poor dogs!

So tell me, which would you rather be????

Pauly getting his ears rubbed after a tough day of agility!!! Carrie would move him and his head would just drop back and forth. Total lazy DEAD WEIGHT!!!

Kruz and Mad Dog taking up 1/2 the bed. NO FLOOR for these TWO!!!

Addie and Pauly crashed on the bed. I sure hope Addie doesn't have GAS!!

Seeker takes the floor, next to the air conditioner of course. It's been a tough day!!


Although he had a very long and trying day, Pauly wanted to show off his talents. He not only DQ'ed on Saturday, he wanted to tell the WHOLE world about it with the message below.

Yes, that IS what you think it is!!! VBG