{"id":846,"date":"2009-04-29T19:42:01","date_gmt":"2009-04-29T18:42:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.undermybed.co.uk\/archives\/846"},"modified":"2009-04-29T19:42:01","modified_gmt":"2009-04-29T18:42:01","slug":"contacts-and-expectations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/?p=846","title":{"rendered":"Contacts and Expectations"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Hmm, so I spent a lovely half hour watching back Dylan\u2019s agility videos from the weekend. Creeping contacts = definitely my fault. I held his fast contacts for 2s+, but quick released his creepy contacts. I know why I\u2019m doing this, and it\u2019s because I keep thinking it will speed him up. And I know it doesn\u2019t. If he creeps, HOLD THE CONTACT. If he\u2019s fast, quick release. How many times do I need to tell myself?!<\/p>\n

Anyway, I practised by varying the time I held his contacts at training, and also did some experiments based on my positioning. He wasn\u2019t perfect this week as he wasn\u2019t coming down as fast as I would have liked, but a huge improvement from the weekend performance. He also works faster if I\u2019m next to him or behind him – the further in front I get, the more he creeps (anticipating the release, I think?). He also doesn\u2019t like me leaving his toy at the bottom of the contact. Dylan finds this confusing and kind of offensive, he glares at me in a very angry fashion and refuses to touch the toy even when he\u2019s released.<\/p>\n

We also did a dog swap, and I ran Bailey whilst Emma ran Dylan. Really just a bit of fun, but also to see whether it was specifically me who was causing Dylan\u2019s creeping on the contacts (apparently not, he does it with everyone, so at least I know it\u2019s a generalised issue). Bailey is so fab to run, she\u2019s such a little bomb! She\u2019s so much smaller than Kim though so it\u2019s very weird, and she turns much tighter to the wings so I was a bit out on some of my timing!<\/p>\n

I have, of course, spent the last couple of days catching up on all the blog posts and Ruffdogs news from the weekend. It\u2019s amazing how much you guys get up to in two days! This post at brisbeethewhite<\/a> really struck a chord with me; it\u2019s so well written and eloquent! It touches on the way that I feel about my own dogs, and perhaps about why I wasn\u2019t as excited about some of Dylan\u2019s placings as I might otherwise have been. I want my dogs to do well, but not in terms of 1sts and moving up grades, or flyball points and awards \u2014 I just want them to reach the potential that I know they have. This, basically:<\/p>\n

I want to go and do the best we can and have a great time.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

If we – both me and the dogs – fail on any of those counts (going, having fun and being the best we can be), then I worry about why and no matter how many trophies and rosettes we bring home, I want to be better next time. Even if that means a handful of E\u2019s rather than a handful of ribbons.<\/p>\n

I have my camera back, for those who might be interested to know, but it\u2019s going back to the shop again this week. After the switching on\/off problem, they fitted a new lens, but now I can\u2019t zoom in on anything without the camera switching off. Much as I love my camera, it\u2019s been more trouble than it\u2019s worth.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hmm, so I spent a lovely half hour watching back Dylan\u2019s agility videos from the weekend. Creeping contacts = definitely my fault. I held his fast contacts for 2s+, but quick released his creepy contacts. I know why I\u2019m doing this, and it\u2019s because I keep thinking it will speed him up. And I know […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-agility","category-dylan"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5mHz0-dE","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/846"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/846\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thosenoisydogs.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}