The season has officialy started here. I can't say that the action has started since the action rarely takes a break here in Groenenland, but surely we have more of it now. We run, click and also agility trainings started again. Most of the old fighters are still with me, the rookies look fairly promissing and as an extra bonus I have Shenzi, Sambo's not-so-secret admirer who still loves him, of course, but most of all it seems that she really worked hard during the winter since she's flying over the obstacles and what's even more impressing, she got rid of her 'tunnelophobia'. Good work, Shenzi and hanlder Nuki!

Yesterday we went to our second trial this year. Unfortunately this wasn't as successful as the previous one. Sambo was back to being his old self – hyperneurotic and a stranger to contacts, maybe he managed to do one (by mistake, of course). Apparently I'll have to make the 10 min game of dogdeball an obligatory preventive measure if we are ever to move from our 'status quo', the second level with 2/3 of the requirements. Oh well, at least we had fun – but then again, we always do.

Today we had a completely new type of action. There was a fund raising run/walk for homeless animals and last year I wanted to go but I couldn't, so this year I wouldn't let myself be stopped by anything. And I didn't. I didn't let neither the bad weather nor my hurting hip stop me , I armed myself with my two guys and my running equipment and went to the gathering place. There I met with some doggie friends and soon an agility friend and I pushed our way towards the start line. After a minute or so I had second thoughts about being at the front cause I wasn't sure if behind us a stampede of runners eager to go, full of testosterone and Isostar wouldn't break free. Luckily this wasn't the case; we survived the start in a presentable shape got outrun by a few individual runners and a few runners with dogs, but otherwise we kept our good starting positions right to the end. It was a 2.6 km round and at first I wanted to run two laps but I quickly saw that one would be completely enough. Firstly, we ran on a harder surface than I'm used to and my hip started to complain, but most of all I missed one detail: in order to have my hands free I tied one leash around my waist, put Sambo on a harness and clipped his leash onto the first one. The system worked flawlessly for the first few metres. But then Gregor outpassed us on a bike to take a pic of us and foam came to Sambo's mouth, he started pulling as if he were on the Iditarod and the leash I had around my waist instantly turned into a corset. The more he pulled, the more my silhouette got baroque-like. I suppose you can easily imagine that after two minutes of running like this I saw that I couldn't last more than about 15 min of running without being able to breathe, so we unanimously decided to end our run with the first lap. Nevertheless, the quad Urška/Urška/Sambo/Lu with Gregor as the steersman fought well and ran and cycled across the finish line with our heads held high. It was fun, tough and adrenalin-fulled. We'll definitely repeat it next year, but I have to figure out a new system for around my waist so I won't look like a projectile snapped in half.

Until next time!

The beginning of our action in a torpedo style



A smile for the camera...



Victory! :)

Auctions, shows and triumphs

The last week has been quite vivid in Groenenland (as if that's something new). On Saturday I sacrified this year's first agility trial cause I had to go translate on a wedding. The bride is from abroad and when a foreigner gets married there has to be a translator present to avoid selling someone into slavery or something like that. I was a bit nervous since it was the first time I did it, but we got along so well with the registrar the first minutes I was there that the few pounds of excitement I had melted down and we successfuly sailed through the ceremony; and no, I did not sell the bride by auction among the wedding guests and the passers-by, so the day was, although tiring, a big success.

Sunday was just as interesting as I worked on the dogshow in Celje. As usually I was the ring steward in the shepherd's ring and once again I had a jolly good time, especially thanks to the judge, an older guy with which I got along really well and debated with about the dogs on the show. I impressed him with my knowledge, a keen eye when it comes to evaluating dogs and, definitely not least, with my 'nut grip' – there came a guy with a Beauceron to the ring and his dog would let himself be touched all over, but the good mood as soon as the judge made an attempt to touch him beyond his tale, which was apparently the limit. The judge was a man in the category 60+, so he made an effort twice and backed away swiftly, but he couldn't exactly chase the dog across the ring (in hope that he finishes with his face attached to his head). So I asked the owner if the dog would let me hold him. I offered my hand for him to get a sniff, he smelled it without much interest, and then I started petting him on the neck, shoulders, moved along his ribs and by the was bended my knees and got into a nice squat position. And when I felt that I was well positioned I performed the 'hand under the belly, hand around the neck' grip with which the dog can't turn around to bite the judge or sit down to hide his jewels. The manoeuvre was completely professional, but the situation had to be quite comical I guess – a pigmy seized blonde in jeans and a purple shirt wrestling with a 40 kg Beauceron male probably isn't the most commong sight, but it certainly impressed the judge, who gladly took the opportunity and attacked the dog's nuts, nad of course the public, who started laughing and congratulated me on my professional assistance to both the hanlder and the judge.

Considering all this you could easily say that last weekend was quite 'bitchy', but appart from the usual walks and runs Sambo didn't get much action. So we made up for it this weekend; first we went for a long walk yesterday and today we attended our first trial this year. The trial was in the equestrian club of Prestranek which we both like very much and apparently it likes us too since we always do well here. This year wasn't an exception! After almost 4 months without a training we came, we see and – well, almost won :). He jumped the second contact on the dogwalk (what a shock…), but otherwise he ran really well! He was fast, easy to handle and accurate, he found the entrance to the weaves without a problem and made turns like only he makes them ;). In the second run he also did really well but unfortunately he knocked down one bar cause I didn't call him on time. However, I'm very proud of Sambo, he did a really very good job (I have to admit I contributed a bit to a smaller degree of neurosis and consequently to an easier handling since I went to blow some steem out of him before we went on the course – with 10 minutes of catching tennis balls, bwahahahaha).

To end, a pic of our third place and the clips from both our runs.



First run

Second run

The last month has been really tough so I was in danger of having my own system shutdown besides our computer (or better said, all technological devices in our house). So Gregor decided to take me and The Waffle for a short break in Bovec. There we wandered around, enjoyed the fresh air and most of all, unburdened from our everyday lives and worries. Sambo got better too – last week Sambo had some digestion problems for a couple of days and didn't want to eat almost anything, so he nearly slimmed to his former body weight – he got to 25,6 kg and was almost as skinny as until three years ago. In Bovec the situation got back to normal again, which meant that his spirits were also high and above again (before it showed that he wasn't his 100% self, even though he was still hyper compared to the majority of the doggie population). Yesterday we went for a slightly uphill walk near water-storage lake and Sambo decided to assimilate to the mountain environment and pose for a chamois. We were walking on a path cca 1m wide, there was a rock wall on our right and on our left… well, nothing for two metres and then a steep slope, half rocky, half with trees. Sambo zoomed back and forth with his twiggly legs and explored the terrain.

When we finally turned back the Geriatric Waffle ran ahead merrily in his TM working trot and I started explaining something to Gregor. Sambo looked back at us right in the moment when I swinged with my arm through the air, which he apparently translated to himself in agility terms, meaning that he should move left. The thing is that we were on a narrow track that about 20 m ahead of us lifted up and joined the above mentioned path, so there was a practically vertical wall a bit over 150 cm high on our left. But he didn't bother too much with it, a dog's gotta do what a dog's gotta do. If you have to go left, you go left. While I was talking I saw Sambo trotting steadily in front of us. Then I saw a piece of moss, flying off from the middle of the wall. Then I saw Sambo, running at the same speed on the walking path above us. Not even 200 m further on a narrow trail appeared on the right of the paved path and lowered onto the slope beneath us. Sambo went down it, of course, finding himself two metres below us and sniffing the ground happily. For a minute or so he was really enjoying it, but then he didn't find it as amusing as before; he wasn't beside us, so he started whining and looking how could he get back to us again. I saw that the slope lifts a bit 20 m further on and that he could get up to us there. So I told him to go (on ahead of us). He interpreted it as if he had to go to us (upwards). This time he wasn't even running – from the same spot, standing on a slope, he pushed off, came with his front feet over the edge and pulled himself up on the path. A shake of the coat, a smile towards us and he was good to go. I don't know why I even wonder anymore…

There you have it, this was our trip to Bovec and now we're off for a walk (and by the way I'll take a look if he's hiding a blue and red cape in his kennel…).

Bird styling VS Spitting cobra

I have to admit that a hairstylist hasn't had the chance to operate on me, but I do get a treatment from my bird stylist every now and then. The last few years I've managed to civilize myself to such an extent that I comb my hair almost every day, but I live my enormous combing ambitions through Sambo. I'm the type of person that can easily spend a few hours a day working with a dog, taking him on walks, teaching him tricks etc, but if I would have to comb him 15 min a day… No way Jose. Except for the month, month and a half when he sheds I can confess that the closest thing that comes to me combing Sambo is when I walk across the living room with a fork in my hand, trip and go through Sambo's coat twice while trying to regain my balance. Anywho, I manage to somehow take care at least of my hair, with which our bird loves to help me, as he likes to go through my hair with his beak when he's on my shoulder. My bird stylist, what can I say. And now that you know all this I'd like to proudly announce that Sambo was comben on Sunday! Don't ask me why, but I felt like combing him and I did. Yes, with bravoury and courage beyond all praise I engaged into this daring activity and successfully dealt with it. And so, 4 min and 27 sec later Sambo was looking fine and as good as new, but even though our spirits were high after such a great success we both needed to relax, so we went to Kurešček, where the black monster ran and ran and yes, you know it, ran some more. Sometimes I look at him and wonder how does he manage to keep his legs attached to him, how come they don't just unbuckle and fall off, I really can't understand how he manages to run around tirelessly for such a long time (and most of all, where does he find the will to do it), not to mention that I haven't seen such a quick paced trot even in Standardbred horses…

Of course he likes to show off with his trot, especially when we go running and I'm ready to be plugged onto a respirator after half an hour. At that time he usually runs to me and runs by my side a few metres, looking at me with the biggest smile possible. Then he figures out that I'm too slow and uninteresting, so he continues his journey, leaving me behind again. The other day I decided to try and variegate my running expeditions; I often see runners with headphones on so I wated to try it out myself. I borrowed an mp3 player from my darling and hoped to have a very pleasant run since I knew he has some Hammerfalls on, so I expected a good portion of metal rock to stimulate me. You can only imagine my face when I raised the volume at the end of our street to figure out which Hammerfall song comes with weird drums and heard a kind of oriental bleating. It is fruitless to argue about different tastes in music (and other things, of course), but the fact is that oriental music is certainly not what I prefer to listen to, whereas Gregor's fascination over Tunis left other, less pleasant side effects for me. One of them is certainly that I expected some Swedish metal rockers and got Turkish serenaders. I was already too far from home to turn back and leave the mp3 player at home and I didn't feel like carrying it without making some use of it, so I let Mr. Turkey carry on with his act. I managed to somehow ignore the music, which served as only a very mild background anyway, and after half an hour it grew upon me so much so that I added some elements of oriental dancing to my running. I tripped over a root when running throgh the woods, so I performed a sequence with the elements Lif your arms up to your side – shake your booty – wave your arms in front of you – spin your head while looking for balance – leap ahead and land in a perfect Telmark with your hands in a Walk like an Egyptian position in the middle of my marathon. In front of a public, what else, because it wouldn't be half as interesting if three runners wouldn't be passing by in that same moment…

Besides the interdisciplinarity and including elements of other sports and arts into my running episodes I have to admit another, less apetising habit that contributes to the second part of today's title. When I run all bodily functions that excrete any kind of facial secret start working with full power from a reason unknown to me. To put it plainly, when I'm running I have to blow my nose and rub my eyes all the time and also spit every now and then. And so it happened that in this session I spat precisely the instant that Sambo was passing me on my right (now you know why you always have to pass people on their left). Luckily the projectile only touched him slightly, but since it was so cold he came home with gel on his hair tips and visible decorative crystals. And that was the beginning of Sambo Swarowski… anyhow, I have to mention that I grew so much attached to my Turkish jingling friends that after half an hour I was almost disappointed to hear Billy and be left out without their pleasant company. Almost! Dancing with myself, Rebel yell and Shock to the system are a wonderful background accompaniment for more dynamic running sessions, I tell you. Thus I came home totally exhausted (it would be wise to change the order next time since the Turkish buddies are quite calmer and slower, much more suitable for the second part of the session, when the batteries aren't as full) and in a kind of pirate state. Because of the before mentioned trip over a root my ankle was hurting, so on the upwards slope right before home I dragged my foot behind me as if it were wooden and because of the wind and the cold my left eye watered so much that I almost washed out the contact lense a few times – towards the end I didn't have to worry about it anymore because it froze to my eye which converted into glass…

To the ones that are still reading – good news, my webmaster has finally updated the page, welcome to www.sambo.si , where you can find some new pics and links while the latest news are always here anyway.

And to end, here are a few pics of our trip to Kurešček. Take care!

Sambo in the wind



Running through the forest





Marching: left...



... and right



Spriiiiiiiiiiint!







Karate Kid :)

Multitasking

The last few days have been quite variegated here in Groenenland. More for me than the Black Death, I confess. Dad's on a business trip, cut off from civilisation, without a car, a computer… Wait a minute, thinking it well, we're in the same situation??? Yeah, it's true, the system shutdown hasn't ended yet. First his car broke down, then 'mine' (in joint use with my mom), then his computer… Of course this happened now, when there's much to be done about his business and also other stuff, which is on the verge of possibility without a comp and a vehicle. Meanwhile my dear Kia is already safely at home, but the rest is still on hold. So now, besides my regular duties as a student and instructor, I'm functioning also as an economist, a translator, a secretary, a diplomat and a delivery boy, to mention just a few. Bored I am not, that I can say. With all this work I had to give myself a treat – so I did, yesterday my mom and I went to see Champions on ice, an ice-skating show where we cheered for the skaters in person for the first time. yes, for him too. The first minute of the act wasn't that spectacular at all, but then Plushenko got animated and did a really good show. To tell the truth, I think Plushenko could come on the ice with a nail clipper and have his nails done and still get a big applause. To get things straight, he is not my favourite skater, he shares the throne with three other skaters that alternately get to the top position, but one simply cannot deny his talent and incredible achievements.

But enough about my weird taste for sports. Sambo… it still Sambo, still hyper-neurotic, but unlike the last two weeks he spends a little less time in a floating state. But he still spends most of his time with his denture outside, showing it to practically everybody, hopping aorund, running, herding his favourite sheep (his friend Klark) whom he blocks from the front, the back, attacks him from an ambush like a well-trained guerilla, wrestles with him and is all in all so bouncy that one cannot look at him without smiling. Moreover, we made good use of the last week, which was mostly rainy, to start learning three new tricks with which we're making good progress – he already more or less knows two of them so I'm only refining them and we're only shaping the last one, but it's going well too. What else could one expect from such a talented stuednt and such a fine instructor. Speaking of – my second pupil, the neighbour, has successfuly passed the test and avoided a summer school of English. But she managed to give me a good laugh the other day when we were doing some word formation - making different words from a same root. She didn't have any problems with the example 'I value your (friend) very much', she immediately said that the correct answer is 'friendship'. The next example was something like ''This invention contributed to (man) and its future.' She scratched her head for about 15 seconds, then turned to me with a victorious look on her face and said 'MANURE!' At first I managed to contain myself, but then I couldn't help myself anymore and bursted in laughter that lasted for about two minutes. Oh well, I never said we're planning on getting a straight A… (But I sure have to give her credit for originality!).

Belgians, ants and pants

You know how they say that lively, fidgety dogs have ants in the pants? Well, I said a while ago that I would refor that statement a bit, because as far as I'm concerned the really lively ants have Belgians in their pants.
You probably read how I kept Sambo entertained last week. But he still didn't have enough, I think I can honestly say that Sambo spent the last week more time as a biped than a quadruped. Half of the time he was hopping around me, bouncing from me, the furniture, the floor, the walls and the ceiling, not to mention the fact that he was showing off his set of teeth the whole time. With Belgians the thing goes something like this: a look toward your handler – you check if she's watching you and sees you – you move closer, just in case, so that your handler can have an 'up, close & personal' experience – if necessary, you let out a Woof or two to draw her attention to you – when you see that your handler is looking at you it's action time: ears back to your shoulder blades, head a bit down, set of teeth out and then, with such a wonderful personification of the Chupacabra you leap upon your handler's face. The course of events that follow can be different; you can crash into your handler's nose with your teeth, you can experience a head-on collision or, in the best of cases, you handler gets away with just a juicy Belgian kiss (the French don't get even close to the Belgians, yuck – if you are really lucky and have good reflexes you may get away with a Belgian kiss to the nose or the eye). The chance of avoiding the toothed torpedo is equal to zero so to speak, so I won't even mention it between the realistic options.

And how does the moment before the attack look like? Check it out:



Yes, it's true, it's difficult to escape a hyper Belgian and you can consider yourselves lucky if you manage to get away without any injuries most of the time. to be honest, I rarely do. The last such case was two days ago when we took a frisbee to our doggie walk after a long while. Because there's no real action and adrenalin in only throwing the frisbee I wanted to expand our repertoire with a jump over my leg. Big mistake. When the black monster was about 5 m away I called him, put my right foot into position and waved the frisbee at him. I could have known by now that if I show him the frisbee (or anything else that I can throw and he can catch), he will see the frisbee. And only the frisbee. He threw himself at it as the best rugby players there are, without remembering, of course, that it might be a good idea ti lift his legs. So he didn't. Now I have a nice bruise the size of a baseball over my right knee… But I'm sure it'll get better, maybe someday I get to the point that I'll be aware at least most of the time that I have a Belgian and what that means. If nothing else, I'm never bored :). Oh, and while youtubing a few days ago I found out that Bryan Adams is probably never bored either! I knew the guy had a good taste…

ps: and here's the link to Saturday's hikeing : http://myspace.agility-slo.net/

It's a well-known fact that technology clearly doesn't like me. But that's ok, I don't care much about it either. But what's been going on the last week has really been too much. First the internet resigned its cooperation with me for two days; the next to break down was the webcam, through which Sambek and I waved to Gregor, who went skiing for a week. To top it all, the keyboard failed on me too. Ok, actually… well, this time the keyboard itself wasn't really the one to blame, truth me told it was sabotaged. How and by whom you can read in my previous post.

Besides technology my main interest these days is sweating. Since Gregor is not around I have a considerable surplus of time and energy (which I otherwise spend with different artistic, acting, Ukranian-singing and other acts) and what better than sport activities to spend this energy. So Sambo and I went running 5 times this week, I did weight-lifting every day and to finish myself off I went on a hike with some agility buddies yesterday. And the result? Well, I did burn some energy, but most of all I gained myself a superiorly strained latissimus (the upper back muscle) and the muscle on my, well, behind. You can imagine by its dimensions that the pain cannot possibly be negligible. But it's slowly wearing off so it shouldn't take long before I can sit on the whole surface of my, khm, toosh again. And Sambo? I don't even know what to say. I think that growing up near a nuclear power station left some longrange consequences on him that will obviously mark him for life. Maybe I can lay some of the blame to the full moon, but the fact is that this week he has been totally hyper. In spite of all the running, walking, tricks and obedience he came to me every day, putting his head on my lap and looked me with a 'mom-why-aren't-you-doing-anything-with-me' look, brought me toys, woofed towards the door to show me how it is absolutely urgent and necessary for us to go outside and butn some energy… Anyways, on Saturday we had a 10 min break after two hours of hiking (the last hour of which was through relatively deep snow); two dogs started wrestling with each other, Sambo started herding them and in the moment we moved forward he galloped uphill (through whole snow, of course), saw the little snowballs that started rolling downhill after him, chased them for about 200m, set out uphill again, repeated the chasing action… If anyone has a clue how a geriatric dog can go on a hike, walk for two hours and still find the energy to chase around snowballs after a whole week of running and action, please let me know. For the time being let's say that I still have the energy, I'm in enough good shape myself and I most of all can afford to take the time and run around like this, but I fear that the years will catch up on me sooner than Sambo… The other option is that I'll simply be the fittest 100-year-old the world has ever seen :).

We wish you happy and active days!