we --- peg...bud.. and i..---. went to meet with rep hill and senator tarr at the state house yesterday.. we had a long meeting... fortunately they had heard of SDP before and were quite sympathetic with our problems and the fact that bentley has had no pups since last january... certainly far beyond the normal range of the problems visitors come to them with.... they asked us to get together additional information which peg and i will do ?starting today??? peg???
peg is focused.. fortuantely around here we have several people who can stay focused amid all kinds of distrctions.... ann is another... and annie.. the list is endless... fortunately....
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frannie got here and maybe the rest of her family will arrive today-- i have some roofing jobs maybe her boys could solve.... we have a new building with no roof.. an old building which need s a new roof, and a roof leaning against teh shop which needs a new building.
the roof with no building is the most "pressing" we need that for dog fest.... it is where we sold extra shirts, monkey fists and other SDP items..
it has a big label " the whiffle bar" -- but it is only a roof...
problem is... it does not have a rectangle in it... 5 sided... the first year it had walls sloped outward-- with a shelf on each of the 5 sides for the display of items.. pretty successful but the walls lacked uniformity.. so the next person to work on it made walls vertical- perfecdtly straight... a new concept around here... but they lacked the stability of the triangular shape.. and it fell over... leaving the whiffle bart in the state it now is in... roof on the ground... no building for it to be the roof over...
so i had a bunch of 2 x 3's delivered in prep for the arrival of the young men from washington--- let them put something together-- the did fine with the origional tee pee..
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i also had 2 x 6's delivered in prep for roofing the new "shed... "--- which will allow us to expand our donkey operation. -
janine has decided to hold a "donkey derby" at the very exclusive myopia polo club on sept 9th which just might be the event of the year there...... i say "exclusive" but note... for years it has been exclusive of donkeys-- and would only allow the most expensive of thorobreds to perform there in several roles... mostly polo ponies... if she manages to get enough people to come ... it could be i big deal....
i remember....... back when i had many donkeys and needed to find a use for them ( sort of like the 23 great dane pups that prompted me to start SDP...) there was the exclusive myopia driving club-- who's members really did everything right -- with hystorically correct vehicles and attire-
some competed internationally-- now think... internationally was more tha canada a dn mexco... but britain germany and Hungary which meant getting theri horses ... usually 4 of them- plus equipment etc over the atlantic...
this was not for the meek at heart.... they would arrive wherever with the correct, spotlessly clean horses harness even a driving apron.
they practiced ahead of time and were good... big time good.
into this environment , enter me with 32" tall donkeys-- a lot of them...i casually said i was going to drive 8 in a formal hitch... like teh budweisers..
let me be clear... maintaining a herd of 30 donkeys was still much cheaper than one horse.... and it has been said... donkeys are idiot proof-- a claim we went on to prove so many times,,,'' i eventually did get to drive all 8-- in very strange places.. like hotel ballrooms...with antlers... but seeing as it required such an effort to crawl around on your knees to put all hta harness on 8 mini doneys. that we we rarely practiced did it mostly for performaces... because we found a bucket of carrots worked better than hours of training.... if we could get the front 2 going in the right direction the other 6 would have to go with them as they were all tied together with the harness...
an example... we had a parade where we were in front of teh budweiser hitch of perfectly trained clydesdale horses-- each weighing over 2000 pounds... i knew the parade route would be ovresome trolley tracks in boston-- and those always made the donkeys stop a dn look at them fro 5 minutess before crossing.... with 8 tons of horse behind me... we could not stop and live to tell it..... so we took 2 garbage can lids.. 5 pounds of sliced carrots and my kids as "sidewalkers" held teh lids with carrots under the noses of the lead team thus obliterating the vision of teh train tracks from the leaders... so they walked across...
back to my membership in this exclusive driving club-- the last meeting i went to there was a discussion about how perfectly all the members presented the horse and carriage--- and someone in the back said "but carlene is the only one having any fun"
i liked that comment.... perfection has always been a difficult concept for me... my heart is in jerry rigging...
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I wanted to share a short story. Yesterday, we were walking through the hall at school, when I stumbled and started to fall. Clark braced immediately and didn't move a muscle--he did NOT want me to fall--and was so steady and sturdy for me. We managed to save it, and I found my balance again.
It took Clark some time when we were first paired to figure out how I fall and how he can catch me, but he knows immediately now.
From my perspective, that must be one of the hardest skills for a dog to learn. To brace and stay as still as a statue, even though a person's weight is pulling them down. I would say it takes some quick thinking and stubbornness. :) But I am not the one who teaches that skill, so I don't know for sure, but that's what I see. So thank you for my smart, determined dog!
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danes are born trained-- just don't wreck them...
