The Blog of the Frog

It seems to be when there’s the most to write about that I have the most difficulty doing it!

Club Champ Show…not a lot to comment on really. The Phalene class I thought was quite rushed and I felt rather like the judge wanted to get it over and done with as quickly as possible and was treating it like a novelty rather than a “proper” class. I would have placed them differently also, but there’s a limit to what I can say here 😉

The next Saturday I went down to watch South Western Gundog Club’s show, because I could 😆  I have a soft spot for gundogs and there was nothing else on that weekend! Most enjoyable day, I have quite a few friends with gundogs so was still a very social occasion. Though it did make me laugh as everytime I saw someone I knew they’d say “Hello!” and then you could see a look come over their faces and it would be followed up with “what are you doing here?!” 😆 Literally every single person I saw that I know said that, or something along those lines! Amused me, easily amused that I am 🙂

The weekend just gone was WELKS. The weather was lovely so it was the first show Solei and I have done outside since last August! It was quite hot which never bodes well, not at all conducive for keeping one’s tail up if you’re Solei! He went ok but didn’t feel nearly as good as he has done since Crufts. He wasn’t brilliant on the stand anyway and at the end I managed to lose my liver which really helped! The judge gave him a very hard look for 5th (which isn’t to be sneezed it in a class of 16) but Solei just wasn’t showing well enough and after he’d walked back and forth between Solei and the other dog a couple of times he went for the other! So that was a bit disappointing, but I got to meet up with some people I haven’t seen for months which was brilliant and spent far too much money on the stalls! (which wasn’t so good!)

The other thing which is probably really what’s kept me from posting is I’ve been going through emotional turmoil of late trying to make one of the most difficult decisions I’ve ever had to make.

As I’ve mentioned before (but only once so I’m not being too repetitive :lol:) Solei has had a loose tooth since August 2007. At the time I was told I’d get 12, maybe 18 months more out of it. I’ve been incredibly careful with it since and the 12 month mark came and went. Then, in October 2008, I discovered it was no longer loose but now VERY loose. I was doubtful as to whether it would stay in until January 2009 – which was my next benchmark – but as I counted down the weeks January came and with it the tooth still there. I went ahead and entered Crufts anyway because I wanted him to go regardless….but I was sure he’d have lost it by March. Crufts came with (unbelievably) the tooth still there and a change of judge worked in Solei’s favour, ending with him achieving my ultimate goal for him and getting his Stud Book Number!

For the last few months I’ve been taking one show at a time, waiting as long as possible and then when I’d checked his mouth going ahead and entering right before the closing date. I’d toyed with the idea of retiring him after Crufts but as the closing dates came and he was still ok I carried on entering shows. Then I debated retiring him in April but that was full of “important” shows (two club shows – one open one champ – & a general champ) so again as all his teeth were still there I went ahead and entered…you start believing it’s never going to happen which is obviously not good at all because it will, sooner or later!

I really have been to hell and back with him and all the agonising and upset. But as April came, the closing date for entries for championship shows started to loom near and in larger quantities. I don’t want to stop showing him but he now has his Stud Book Number, so I no longer need to worry about getting that. Champ entries are very expensive and – although there are exceptions – under most judges once they see a missing tooth they’re not going to consider the rest of the dog. I also know if I keep entering him in shows until he loses it it’s going to make it *so* much more difficult to accept than if I’ve called it a day. The tooth is also now very dirty because I can’t clean it and I’m not overly happy about him showing like this. So….I think I’ve decided to retire him this month.

I’m still not totally convinced 😆 but I haven’t entered him in the first champ show that’s closed since I’ve made the decision so that’s a start. I was so, so tempted to enter him and it was incredibly hard not to! The next one closes next week so I expect I shall be agonising again then!

He’s doing an open show this Monday, a club open show on the 16th and Bath champ show on the 22nd…and that will probably be it. I’ve had 21 months out of that tooth thus far, so I really hope he can manage another three weeks!

I’m scared to have another dog now 🙁 I know I couldn’t go through all this again.