Mark, Bacon, and I headed to Canfield to a dog show for the day. I was lucky, Weimaraners didn't show until 4pm so I could sleep in and leisurely drive the 3+ hours up to Canfield. Mark came along, and it was a nice outing for us. I didn't expect much as it was a 5 point major in bitches, and I was pretty correct. Bacon didn't get anything other than a compliment from the judge on how nice she was. She showed pretty well, and was her usual confident, happy self. I kind of knew it would be a waste of time driving more than 6 hours round trip for 2 minutes in the ring, but we can't win a major if we don't actually show, right? I don't know of any other majors coming up in the area the rest of the year, so her show career may be halted at 9 single points. I am working on convincing myself to be OK with that. I am actually trying to convince myself to be OK with a lot of things, as I feel things in my life are spiraling downward quickly. It was difficult, but I tried to push that aside and enjoy the day out with Mark.

I confess that I had a breakdown day all day yesterday. And by all day, I mean ALL day. I think I have been working so hard for months now to try and act positive and put out a positive, happy front, that it finally became too much to squash down. So I allowed myself to have this one day yesterday where I just let it hang. Did it scare one of my friends away? Probably. But it is what it is, and it was necessary for me to go on.

Today I have it a lot more together. The trick is to not look into the future AT ALL. Nothing past next week. I am not allowing myself to even plan for a possible trip to Florida in October, because I don't know what our situation will be by then. I am living week to week, if that is realistic.

I took Noodle and Pizza to field train with my friend this morning. Man, it got hot FAST! After last week's debacle in training, today was a 180 degree turnaround. Noodle hit a beautiful slam-on-brakes honor in the field, and also had some nearly perfect birdwork and retrieve. Pizza, of course, was an honoring machine. I found I had to constantly keep her moving pointed away from the other dog so she wouldn't keep stopping and pausing every 5 feet to honor if the other dog paused. Her birdwork was spot on, and her retrieves (we did two) were great! Her first one was perfect straight to hand. Second one (same bird, just threw and shot again) was not as perfect but still to hand. I rewarded her for bringing it to hand with some treats and lots and lots of praise. I have to remember that she is my dog that craves the verbal praise and needs to always know that I am happy with her.

It looks like the next week and a half will be too hot to train in the field, so hopefully the girls will retain their improvements until the next time.

Mark and I headed to Oberlin, Ohio with Dolphin and Bacon in tow...headed to the dog show! I haven't been to this show in years. Not much has changed - still a complete mudhole with just a little bit of rain. We had a great time all weekend, just like "old times"! Bacon showed really well, ended up reserve Winners on Saturday and nothing on Sunday. The judge on Saturday complimented my training, as he said she was well-behaved and stacked so nicely. Yay!

Dolphin showed pretty good both days. The judge REALLY liked him on Saturday, he ended up select behind the #1 dog in the country, so can't fault that! We got select and NOHS best of breed both days, and Dolphin showed winderful in the group on Sunday and earned a nice NOHS sporting group 3! It was blazing hot, and he melted on Saturday, but I was smarter on Sunday and got him out of the air-conditioned van just moments before we went in the ring so he was much fresher.

This week was a hellish one. We had a massive storm Tuesday morning (which was later determined by the National Weather Service to be an F1 tornado) and it knocked down the majority of several trees, hitting our fences and hitting the back of my camper van. The damage was so depressing to look at. Just one more thing on our plate that we don't really need right now! The reduced Mark's chemo slightly this week to help keep the neuropathy at bay. It's such a hard thing - you want the full dose of chemo to fight the cancer, but the full dose will cause permanent neuropathy that could hinder his ability to walk or use his hands, so we have to balance that out.

I took Noodle and Bacon to a rally trial today. Neither have done rally since May. I entered Noodle in Choice, Master, Excellent, and Advanced. Normally I wouldn't enter her in 3 classes, but it's been so long, I figured why not? I am glad I did, Noodle was fantastic! I had a big handler error in Choice, and then Noodle had an error, so our choice score was mediocre. However, she came back super strong with nice scores in the other 3 classes. I loved the fact that even by the 4th class where I would expect her to be bored and tired, she was still pretty sparky and responsive. What a good girl!

Originally I had only entered Bacon in Intermediate. However, in rally runthroughs (that I go to almost every Wednesday morning), she has been doing wonderfully off leash, so I decided to throw her in Advanced A also. Advanced was first. She did pretty good - a decent score and 3rd place in the class. She seemed a little intimidated when we went in, so it took her a while to find her groove. The course had many sits, and she was getting pretty balky by the end of the course. However, she stayed with me the whole time and never left...yay! We came back for Intermediate, which was back on leash. She was MUCH more animated and focused in this class. However, her sits got even more balky. I will have to work on that. Overall it was a very good day for both dogs!