The Petty Schemers

I was quite glad that Jenn had a little outing last night while I stayed home with Nathan. She does a great job with him all day, but sometimes you just need to go hang out with other adults. And their dogs.

Yes, Jenn made her long-awaited return to dog handling last night, taking Ripley to her weekly agility class. Rip has been extremely focused lately -- let's see if that translates to competition. We did over a dozen events last year, and so far we have two meets scheduled for May and June. The only difference this year is that I get to run Maverick, and Jenn will run Ripley (she handled them both last year). That allows us to go on separate days of an event, with the other one staying home with Nathan. Of course, if it's a fair-weather day, he can be brought to the meet, but he doesn't have to be there all day, which is nice.

The dogs are hilarious. They recognize class nights (Ripley on Tuesdays, Maverick on Thursdays) by the ceremonial cooking of the hot dog, and they both plead and whine and jump around, like we're making the decision on who gets to go to class based on which dog makes the more compelling argument. So I got to watch Mavi mope and pace after Jenn and Ripley left, pondering what he could have done differently. Jump higher? No, that's not it. More whining? Nah, they just don't seem to go for that. A written essay? Good idea, but I have no thumbs, and my fur would smear the ink...

On Thursday nights, I'm guessing Ripley doesn't pace or whine nearly as obviously, and her ponderings take a different form. A dog with broken legs couldn't possibly go to class, right? And they paid in advance, so they have to take somebody, right? So if I can just get Mavi close to the basement stairs when they open the door...