Are You There doG? It's Me, Food Lady.

(AKA - Diary of a Regionals competitor)

Day 1: Set Up

Food Lady says:

"Yay! Gas is 15 cents a litre cheaper in Abbotsford!"

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Day 2: First Round of Competition, as narrated by Tweed:

GAMBLERS: The objective is to collect as many points in the opening sequence as possible by doing as many high point obstacles as possible, then to perform a predetermined closing sequence at a distance from the handler within a very short period of time.

Tweed's Interpretation: IT'S THE ALL WEAVES, ALL THE TIME GAME! The Food Lady says "Tunnel!" and I do some weaves! She says "FRAME!" and I do some more weaves! She hollers "Walk it Tweed!" But I prefer to weave! Until she tells me "Weave" - then I opt to stand in the middle of the ring and go:

BARKBARKBARKBARKBARKBARKBARK.

(Editor's note: We were unable to find a photograph of Tweed barking before this issue of 3WAAW went to press, so the following is a reasonable facsimile; AKA, Lars barking)


In the closing sequence, I shoot out of the tunnel, turn on a dime like a rockstar, and shoot back in the tunnel. Yes, I was supposed to do a jump, not go back in the tunnel, but that was the fastest way back to THE WEAVES!!

Total points for Gamblers: Not sure, but I think they must have been tallied in potty mouthed curse words, if The Food Lady was demonstrating correctly.

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JUMPERS: A fast paced game where winners are sometimes defined by 10ths of a second. All jumps and tunnels, this is a tight, quick game of skill and speed.

Tweed's Interpretation: Today, I feel like stopping to smell the roses. What's everyone in such a rush for? It's a beautiful day! The sun is shining, the Food Lady is turning several pretty shades of pink .... I'm having a nice, relaxed Zen afternoon. I'm going to stroll around the course, and I might wander off now and then if something catches my fancy. I'm not worried about "breaking the plane of the jumps" but I am a little bit worried about the Food Lady "breaking my neck" - if I'm hearing her correctly.

Total points for Jumpers: 65 out of 75, but barely squeaking in under the time limit. Two 5 point refusals for breaking the plane of jumps.

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STANDARD: A game that demonstrates the well rounded skill of dog and handler, involving at least one pass of virtually every piece of equipment in the sport.

Tweed's Intepretation: (With apologies to Elisha and Radar) FREESTYLE! I am exhilarated! I'm on fire! I'm racing through the course and taking tunnel entrances on a whim! I'm touching pieces of equipment with one paw if it moves me to do so! I am a free spirit, a pixie, a butterfly in the theory of chaos, a --my goodness!! WHY must the Food Lady be so foul mouthed???

Total Points for Standard: 55 out of 100 possible points. TWO - not one, but TWO - 20-point-faults for off courses (taking obstacles that were NOT EVEN CLOSE TO CORRECT!!!) and a refusal for the going around, rather than over, a jump.

SATURDAY'S FINAL TALLY:

Tweed's Imminent Retirement.
We need at least 175 points per day to get the 350 points necessary for a Nationals Qualifying score. We are nowhere near 175 points. The Food Lady is outraged.

(Editor's note: Piper has kindly agreed to do an artistic interpretation of Tweed's Saturday performance, with a piece titled

'FAiL!')


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Day 3: Final Round of Competition, as narrated by The Food Lady:

"Are you there doG? It's me, Food Lady. I need some help, doG. I need you give me back my Masters Level competition dog, as someone has stolen him and replaced him with a very stupid, slow and disobedient ringer. And if you cannot make this happen, then please grant me the patience necessary to not throttle, eviscerate and then set-on-fire this fat back-talking animal that I am forced to team up with. Thank you doG, and Amen."

JUMPERS: "Holy shit, Tweed is on fire!" - 83.5 points out of 75 possible points (8.5 bonus time points over and above the CLEAN RUN)

STANDARD: "WTF? Where did this dog come from?" 95 out of 100 possible points, for one bobble in the weave poles; otherwise, a precise and FAST round.

GAMBLERS: (Stunned silence) He earned 40 points in the opening sequence alone, and then went on to successfully complete the gamble, scoring a total of almost 80 points.

THE END RESULT:

Tweed qualifies for Nationals with something like 405 points for the weekend.

Tweed takes 2nd place in the 16" Specials Jumpers class on Sunday.

Tweed takes 6th place in the 16" Specials Gamblers class on Sunday.

Tweed gets to live to see another trial.



This is the first year in all our years of competing at Regionals that Tweed has placed in the top 6 of any of his classes, and he did it in not 1 but 2 categories. In the end, his "good" day sort of canceled out his "bad" day and he ended up somewhere in the middle of his class with a 14th place finish. Had he run both days like he ran on Sunday, Tweed would've for sure been on the podium. But I am so proud of him.

I'm mad at all of you though. Clearly, you forgot en masse to send juju and ((((((luck))))) and shit on Saturday, as this is the only possible explanation for his dismal performance that day! ;-)

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I know you all come to the blog to see photos, not listen to me ramble, so here are a few photos from today's celebratory dog beach trip.

Today was an episode of Friends.

We saw Auntie Fiona and her doggies

Tempus (scary):

Toby (sweetie):

and Rogue (gimme!):

And we ran into Cookie Uncle, and Lars and Bear.

Bear makes really good shaking faces. We had no idea until today. It's like he's going "Ouch. OMG. My brain. Ow. This really hurts."

He and Lars are getting along fabulously.

And their friends Tippy and Cooper were along as well. Cooper is Piper's Doppelganger, except he is a smidge taller, his ears go floppy, and he doesn't do Devil Spins. Otherwise, he's the same as her:


This is my favourite photo from today, of a "Puggle" and a Boston Terrier:

They were so cute! Until they started having Secksy Time all over the beach. It was positively pornographic. The shame!

"This sucks donkeys"

Tweed has a soft tissue injury of the knee.

It's GOOD because he does not have an ACL tear.

It's BAD because he has been downgraded to on-leash exercise only for 10 days. He thinks this sucks, and is not shy about making his feelings known to all. Poor Tweed.

He should shut up though. It's not like he was abandoned in a Costco Parking lot or anything. Poor, poor Lars.

And he is taking it out on Dusty. He thinks Dusty should leave now and borrowed Piper's Mad Teeth (tm) to get the message across. Poor Dusty.

Although Dusty doesn't just sit there and take it either. He's growing up.

Dusty says NO!

Besides, Dusty has other friends. Like this 'puggle'

(You may not know this, but 'puggles' are notoriously difficult to photograph. We were at the beach with a 'puggle' named Dupris (this is Cookie Uncle's fault. I never show up at the dog beach with a 'puggle.' I don't know why he thinks it's okay for him to do that.). Then there was another 'puggle' that appeared randomly and I tried to get a photograph of them together. C'est Impossible.)

The 'Puggle' Out-takes

So anyway Tweed's lack of activity is making him a little paranoid:


I feel for Tweed. I'm not saying Dusty is wearing out his welcome or anything, but you know, he doesn't need to be everywhere, all the time. You know?

I mean, really. Is this necessary?


Ha ha. My dogs are so emo.

WOOsh.

"Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better ...

...I can do anything better than you."

Ryan has some stylin' Fifa (tm) moves:

But Wootie's moves are better.
(Actually Ryan's are better, but Woo is currently fat, so we're being kind)

So, thanks for introducing yourselves! That was fun. There are so many of you! We know 3WAAW is no Daily Coyote, but looks like we do alright. It's hard to compete with a pet coyote. Even when you have a Woo.

I'm just kidding. Even I like the Daily Coyote better than my own blog!

Since you all introduced yourselves, I guess I should too. This is me:
I'm The Food Lady. I'm 35, I'm single (again), my camera will one day need to be surgically removed from my body, and I have a really effin' cool parka. This is all you need to know about me. Oh that, and I am planning a photo tour of Dogs of the West Coast in May of this year.

I am sorry for starting the Grammar Wars, even though it was actually Rossiebug's fault and not mine at all. But after "watching" (reading) you argue, I asked one of the smartest people I know, who will be referred to only as Naughty Teacher, for clarification. Naughty Teacher is a highschool English teacher (and, for the record, he is also a real smartass - but he knows his grammar) and he said:

"James' = elegant
James's = tacky

Choose your poison."

I've been called many things, but tacky is NOT one of them. So it's James' log, definitively, and we won't speak of it again. And we can all remain friends.

And while we are introducing ourselves, let me introduce Lars' (<-- !!!) new brother The Dog Currently Known As Bear:
He looks quite a bit like Dusty, doesn't he? Cookie Uncle is trying to out-foster-dog me.

TDCKAB is doing whatever Dusty does, but better, as Cookie Uncle shows a strong inclination toward TDCKAB that he does not show toward Dusty. Allegedly, TDCKAB is still Cookie Uncle's foster dog, but we all think he's going to go legit any minute now.

But he needs a new name. Bear won't do. What should we call TDCKAB?

And speaking of dogs who look like one another, and to help out "anonymous" who asked for another Lars-and-Tweed comparison, here's a photo of the two red devils:

Can you tell them apart?

One is mentally challenged, and the other one is ... a 3 day old corpse.
Who's who?


Here's a photo of Woo playing with a random puppy.

PSYCH! That's the Un-Wootie. That's a dog trying to do whatever Woo can do, but better. But he FAILED.

Wootie:


Not Wootie

Weird huh?


"Remember the last blog entry, where you called me an asshole? Yeah, well, I'm goin' all Matrix on your ass now."

This is not a very good photo in terms of quality, but Ryan wanted to outdo Dusty and kick some Abby ass (look at his arms!)

But anything Ryan can do, Dusty can do better:

Wootie may be fat, but NO ONE can hurl himself in the ocean like The Woo!

Was there a point to this?? (sorry!)

James' Log (or: Ignoring Rossiebug the Grammar Nazi)

Apparently.


That's fine. James can have the log.

Tweed and Piper have the whole beach.


Does Ryan look worried to you?

Maybe because The Pale Man is coming?
(If you get this reference, you win ... Tweed)

Wootie's not scared of the Pale Man

"Shut up!" "YOU shut up!" "I hate you!" "You're dead meat, asshole!" Etc.

For real, Dusty's pretty eyes are just fine, and still in his head.

As are Daz's eyes:

Ryan ...

Wants to be Lars.

Tweed wants to be dry

Piper wants to be misunderstood (she's so emo)

WTF?

I put a counter on this site yesterday. In 24 hours, 3WAAW has been viewed over 250 times. How come ya'll don't take a moment to say hi and introduce yourselves?

Woo loves his fans!