2004-10-25 - 8:50 a.m.
We've all had a cold for the last week. It's always a drag when we get sick. When you work for yourself you can't call in sick. If you can't do your work it just piles up and it will be waiting for you when you get well enough to get back out. There's also no such thing as paid sick leave.
Liz took some of her new pups to their first show this weekend and they did real well. The pup I claim as mine won reserve winners 2 days in a row. Dog showing is a strange buisiness. When I taught cattle showing the judges were pretty consistant from show to show. There might be a little variation in placement but the same top cattle would be up there in the top placements at each show. Dog showing is a completely different matter. A female Staffordshire Bull Terrier was in the ring on Sunday when I went and I noticed it had bad movement and even a slight limp. Sure enough, about half way through the class the judge took the dog and it's handler aside and dismissed them from the ring. The judge marked the dog excused from the class for being lame. The funny thing was that this same dog had won best of winners and best of opposite sex just the day before. I asked Liz if the dog had been limping the day before (I wasn't there) and she said yes. I've seen time and again where a dog will place best of breed under one judge and be at the bottom of the class under another. There is more variation of placement in dog judging than in any other animal judging I've been involved with.
