Missed it—by THAT much!

Ah, Abby. My little blonde girlie dog.

All in all, she had a pretty good day at the AVID agility trial, running in Starters Gamblers, Starters Standard and Starters Snooker.

She ran a fine Gamblers run (actually beating her brother Zack in terms of the number of points she racked up before the final gamble), but alas she missed that final gamble. But a good run, nonetheless. In her Standard run, she had two of those "stop and stall" moments — i.e. she just stops dead in her tracks and looks at you like you're from another planet when you try to get her moving again. She did it the first time just after completing an excellent set of weave poles. I got her revved up and moving again (and when she's in gear, she can really fly!) and she did fine until she brought the teeter down to the ground. Then she just stood there on the end of the teeter and wouldn't budge...oh my. I backtracked to get her to follow me, she kicked it back in gear and flew through the remaining course elements. Her time: just 0.74 seconds over the time allowed. We've got to figure out why she stalls like that. (The judge later told me that that last manouver—Abby's just standing at the end of the teeter—made her laugh.)

And then there was Abby's last run of the day (and she was the last dog of the day, for that matter). This was her very first Snooker run. She took the first red jump, then her first obstacle of choice (the tunnel), then I sent her out over the second red jump...and that was that. She wouldn't come back around it to go to the next obstacle of choice. Just stared me down. Took a few stutter steps as if to go around the jump, then scooted back the other way, stood and considered her options for a while, and then came back over the same jump. Whistle blows...and we're done! Mind you, while she's making her mind up and just standing there, I say to her "having a blonde moment, are we?"— with the judge (a blonde) standing right there. Brilliant.

As for brother Zack...well, he had a pretty good Advanced Gamblers run but, like his sister, missed the final gamble. His Advanced Standard run...he was doing just great—and then he popped out of a tunnel for no apparent reason. He had a great run time-wise though. His final run of the day: his first go at Snooker. And he nailed it. Atta boy, Zack! Now we just have to get one more Q in Snooker, and Zack will have his AGDC title to go along with his ADC title. Of couse the bad news in all this is that it means that we have to keep moving up to the Advanced level of competition...which, of course, is harder. Be careful what you wish for, eh?