:No Wine Before Its Time

In the quest to help Dante and Vickie further develop their skills to break through ‘making the cut’ in the group, we met at my grooming shop Friday afternoon. Vickie had prepared Dante’s coat with a fresh bath and proper drying. She wasn’t happy with the way she’s been trimming his feet and coat. She didn’t want me to trim them. She told me it was going to painful for me to watch, but what she needed was for me to teach her, not do it. I am not a teacher, but I try. And I usually need a scissors in one  hand and a comb in the other to answer specific questions. After banding up his long side coat and rear skirts, the two of us bumbled through…me trying to give her step-by-step procedures, developing her eye to ‘see’ what needs to be scissored away. He looked good when she was through. So, I guess we were successful.

After a leisurely late lunch at Creekside Cellars, Vickie came to my house to spend the night. Yes, wine was in the forecast. Pulling several bottles of wine out of her wine bag, Vickie presented me with this awesome magnet..

Some of you know that’s Edmund’s name. Ch. FFT No Wine Before Its Time. It is now stuck in a place of honor on the frig, right next to the It’s Five O’Clock Somewhere magnet Ginny gave me several years ago. How fun! I’m reminded daily of friends and dogs.

Before heading back home Saturday, we spent some time moving Dante. My camera will take 3 minutes of video. I also played around with the continuous shooting, which takes still shots in fast succession. This slideshow starts with the continuous shooting sequence, then Vickie moving Dante, ending with me moving Dante.

An observation I made watching this was the body position of the handler. We were working on a somewhat uneven surface, which doesn’t help. Later, sorting through files and photos (still sorting!! almost done!!!! couldn’t have put these together quickly without *all* the prep work I’ve done these past months), I came upon a photo of Tammy moving Ian. Her body language is excellent, in spite of Ian lagging a bit behind her. The whole picture says ‘here’s my dog’.  Inspired, I put together another slideshow with a number of Apso Aficionados moving Apsos. The body position of the handlers demonstrates a nice combination of body language. Basically from the waist down, the handler is moving forward; from the waist up the handler is slanted a bit towards the dog. The lower half is telling the dog to move forward; the upper half is telling the judge, ‘hey, look at my dog!’

Presentation. Presentation. As Carol says – in reference to food – presentation is everything.