Poodie Moves on from Spleen Surgery

Well, Carbon got lucky during a routine ultrasound; we were looking for a cause for her pancreatitis and other digestive issues. The doc found a tumor on her spleen, even though the spleen was not on our worry list -- but there it was, a nice big tumor, lurking there. So two weeks ago she underwent a splenectomy as well as 5 intestinal biopsies. She did fine with the exception of a couple of scary pain and bleeding incidents....and I did fine once the 'feed tiny bits every hour 8am-8pm' schedule, and the 'wake up to give the dog pills at midnight and then take her for a walk in your bathrobe' regime lightened up a bit. . Today she goes in to have her belly staples removed (see her showing them off in the photo above), and we can begin to resume normal activity, and eventually, agility (maybe 2-3 months, I am guessing). Whew!! another crisis averted.

California Pood

Well, the Curly One is back in California, having flown in from Singapore with us and her dog, Cody a couple of weeks ago. There's a spring in her step, thanks to the cool weather, and she's been at the dog park every day, stretching her looooonnng legs and trying to get back into shape after many weeks of inactivity. Between her being sick, and with our travel, it's been about 4 or 5 weeks of idleness....time to get back to work, back to our Susan Garrett Recall training, and finding some agility folks to train with!

For some reason, I just suddenly had to share this picture of Carbon at 6 months, in her puppy coat. She was sooooooo cute. She's still cute now, but in a different way....

Jeanne and Carbon Embark on a New Training Adventure!

Carbon and I have signed up for Susan Garrett's online Recallers Course. I'm hoping that we can harness some little tiny itty bitty piece of the excitement and focus Carbon has for other dogs, and maybe some of the incredible warp speed she shows when running loose, and translate it into speed on the agility course. She is SOOOO FAST it is unreal, but you would never know it on the agility field!

Carbon Jumps Her Way to a Singapore Title!

OK, I know, I know -- it's been too long since I posted anything. This blog has become a blob. Now that we've gotten that out of the way...

This past Saturday Carbon finished her Singapore Kennel Club Jumper title. I had decided to only enter Jumpers classes this time because our contacts are still so unreliable. It was a good decision -- I had more fun and I think she did too -- much less stress. Besides, in this heat she can only do 2 runs before she falls apart. As it turned out, we were lucky; Saturday was not too hot and there was a good breeze well into the afternoon.

There were really 2 trials that day -- one in the morning and one in the afternoon. In her morning class she really did fine but knocked a bar, which she rarely does. Oh, well, a lovely run otherwise.

In the afternoon class she ran clean and with good speed, easily qualifying and earning her final Q for her Novice title. The bonus was that she also placed second out of 17, behind my trainer Lucas Bong and his really talented young BC, Roxie. So, a good day and a nice thing to finally finish a Singapore title.