I'll take two Advil and an icepack....

Well, things didn't go well but I did have a great time at the herding trial. I have determined that we pushed Tori too far too fast, and she has picked up some pretty bad habits because she's figured out that I can't "get" her. The first day she got through most of the course (it wasn't pretty, but we were there), and then coming out of the cross-drive the sheep darted for the draw, Tori couldn't cover them, so she got all worked up and split sheep everywhere and we ended up getting the big "Thank You" for gripping. I was thankful that she does have a good "That'll do" and I was easily able to call her off the sheep while the stock handlers let the sheep back in the pen.

The second day, we had the most awesome judge, Tracy Miller from South Dakota. I knew of Tracy through the email lists, and she turned out to be SO awesome! Even though things kinda went to hell with my run, starting with Tori overflanking, to her gripping at the Z-chute, and ended with me on my backside after tripping over a sheep (which actually had nothing to do with Tori), Tracy had really nice comments about Tori. She said we just need to work on control, but Tori had the heart and intensity to always keep trying. She guessed correctly that Tori was a fun dog to live with, always making me laugh and doing silly things. I bruised my tail bone pretty badly, and will probably end up going to the doctor to make sure nothing is really hurt. I told everyone that I saw the sheep plotting this after Tori ran them through the Z-chute...it was like the prank where someone kneels down behind you and someone else pushes you over.

The coolest thing about the herding trial was that I still had a great time, even though my dog was clearly not ready to be trialing. My friend Casey won 1st and 2nd place in Started, and Reserve High in Trial on Saturady, and then pulled off 1st and 3rd in Started with her 1st place dog Jade (the rockstar) going High in Trial with a 97/100! See the High in Trial winning run on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EwTkEqcAFY. We had Casey over on Saturday night for beer, awesome bratwursts, and a long night of talking about dogs and whatever else came up. We were both a little blurry eyed Sunday morning! Luckily there were donuts, and breakfast burritos for a little morning pick me up.

Shortly after we got home, our new roommates started to move in. They have two dogs, bringing the total to 6. More on that later....

"I'll meet you behind the barn with two buckets of grain after the trial..."

OK, so it's been forever since I posted, because I didn't think anyone was reading...but I was informed by Ellie that this was incorrect, and so I am going to get my act together and actually post something here now and again.

It's 9am and I have a herding trial to go to today...but thanks to Mother Nature, the trial was pushed back to 12pm, so I got a wonderful opportunity to sleep in. Tori and I will be competing in Started A Course, more about that after the trial, mostly because I have no clue how she will do.

My plan is to ignore my dog as much as possible and focus on the sheep, and just. keep. walking. I've been contemplating how I could bribe the sheep to just stay with me no matter what that black and white blur is doing out there. I know where their feed shed is and they know it (I just spent a week taking care of them while Val was in Cancun!) "If you guys just stick with me, I'll meet you behind the barn with two buckets of grain after the trial...yes, I know the black and white thing is nuts, just ignore her"

We are having a barbecue tonight, hopefully with lots of friends, lots of dogs, lots of food and lots of beer....beer can always ease the pain....