Stubbylee Blog

With Liz away at the Keswick Jazz Festival it was down to Andrew & me to show the dogs at the National, Andrew handling Zorro whilst I had the task of handling Diva. Andrew did an excellent job with Zorro and we were disappointed not to get anything with him either in the breed class or or the PG stakes. Diva was her usual sulky self - fed up that she can’t go in the ring sooner and then fidget her feet as you try to stand her.

Then she switches on.

She knows exactly when the judge is looking at her and poses, then when she moves she really comes into her own. She just adores moving, extending with none of the busyness you see with some borzoi its just effortless drive and float. She probably didn’t need me to handle her, she’d have done it on her own.

It was a total thrill to win the CC, with BOB it was just fantastic. Andrew and I had fun winding Liz up, after the CC we sent her a text saying Diva 2nd followed by one 10 minute later saying CC - there’ll be trouble when she gets home.

The BIS ring was totally new territory for me - its always been Liz handling in the past. The whole organisation was very efficient with well organised and friendly ring stewards. Entering the ring Diva really turned it on - the more she gets to move, with the big ring and with people applauding the better she gets. Being able to move around the full extent of the ring she absolutely floated. Then we got shortlisted in a cut of 9 and, moving again with even more applause,  it was even better - even I was starting to enjoy it. Its surprised me but is actually more nerve wracking watching than actually being in there. As the judge was pulling out the dogs I was concentrating that much on keeping Diva stacked properly it took a few seconds to realise we’d been pulled out 4th.

Afterwards it was off to get photos done for the dog press - it will be unusual to actually see me in the photos I’m normally the one doing the snapping.

We went up to the Hound Association of Scotland show with Diva & Rush. It was a pleasant, sunny day if a bit cold - certainly a big change to last year when it poured down and the ground was a quagmire. Kelso on a sunny day is one of the nicest show venues, between the town & Floors Castle, next to the river; the officials & committee are friendly which adds to the overall enjoyment of the day.

The judging was a complete surprise with Rush taking the Dog CC out of the Open class. Diva was in a mood but still got 2nd in Open. This is the 3rd time we’ve won a CC at HAS with Diva winning BOB last year & Elle winnig BOB under Robin Searle in 2005, when Liz also handled Mike Warr’s Oisen to the RDCC.  It was also at the Kelso showground So Chic won her 2nd CC under Leslie Kershaw so definitely one of our favourite venues.

After the show,  as it was still nice we decided to give the dogs a treat and take them to the beach at Bamburgh. Its the first time either have been to the seaside and they loved the sand, it’s just a pity the tide was in & the beach busy so we couldn’t let them run free. Rush discovered the delights of playing with seaweed, throwing it about and shaking big stalks of kelp. He even did a bit of paddling. Diva also played with the seaweed but refused to get her feet wet, whenever a wave appeared she scuttled rapidly back up the beach.

It was a long drive home afterwards with a couple of very tired dogs sleeping most of the way back after a very enjoyable day.

After a few days to recover its time to reflect on some of the good & bad things about Crufts 2009

• It seemed quieter especially on the 1st day, with fewer overseas visitors. Many regular faces we look forward to meeting each year weren’t there.
• There seemed to be more space for the dogs, perhaps because some of the bigger stands (Pedigree) were missing.
• Health matters were ever present from the KC stands to the leaflets on all the Discover Dogs stands. People also seemed to take every opportunity to stress positive health messages to visitors
• It seemed better around the rings without the, at times, intrusive presence of the BBC camera crews.
• The TV coverage on the Internet was nicely balanced, focusing on the dogs. It was nice to see all the group judging and other main ring events such as the International Junior handling but frustrating to have o pay to view missed coverage.
• Lots of people we’ve spoken to since Crufts were disappointed that the BBC didn’t cover the show
• I didn’t hear as many anti dog stories on TV & radio in the run up to Crufts
• A lot of the hysteria around protests that circulated on the Internet before the show didn’t materialise.

Overall it was a pretty good Crufts it will be interesting to see if it continues next year

it was back to Crufts yesterday for the final day with Andrew showing Leo  whilst we took Zorro & Diva back for Discover Dogs.  It was a lot busier than Thursday with far more overseas visitors in evidence but it still didnt feel as hectic as in previous years. Partly this was because there was a lot more space in Hall 3 with wider walkways preventing overcrowding. Diva & Zorro had a great time on Discover Dogs, especially when we let them out of the pen, throughly enjoying their ‘meet & greet’. It was amazing how the smallest of choldren were fascinated with Zorro, wanting to hug this big black & white thing and how he was so gentle with them. People were a bit confused when Leo was in the pen as well, quite a few asked if he was a baby borzoi.

After our morning on the stand we said a quick hello to Ola, her mother & father, she’d qualified once again for the International Junior Handler but this year chose a smaller breed to handle than a borzoi. We then wandered round to the Viyo Elite stand to pick up the Top Sire award with glasses of champagne for Liz & Andrew. By then we were that tired we decided to go back to the car without a full look around the show, stopping off at the Border Collie benches for a farewell chat.

We’d parked in the West Car Park so saw no sign of protestors, people said there were around 40 by the main enterance but they were kept well back behind barriers.

Today was the first day of Crufts - the first Crufts under all the new KC initiatives.

On the showing side it was a good one for us with Zorro & Diva both winning their classes. Around the ring it was quite without a lot of spectators. A lot of the overseas visitors you get used to seeing and talking to year after year weren’t there; even some ringside seats were left vacant. The groups of Japanese girls snapping away at dogs left, right & centre were absent. But Thursday always seems to be a lot quiter than the remaining 3 days. perhaps because of this its unfair to judge any impact of the BBC programme and the withdrawl of Pedigree etc may have had. It was strange walking into Hall 3 without the massive Pedigree stand dominating the centre of the hall and the crowds queueing for free samples. Instead we had the KC stand trumpeting their health initiatives. The health message seems very dominant not just with the KC stand but also in the catalogue, announcements and the webcast commentary.

Generally the show seemed a lot more relaxed without the extensive BBC presence but there were lots of other KC backed press interviewing class & BIB winners and trying to portray a positive message. Certainly from our point of view it was good to speak to spectators putting across the real benefits of our breed. Whilst on the subject of the BBC it was interesting that on their breakfast TV & Radio coverage there seemed to be no mention at all of Crufts and perhaps significantly I didn’t hear any of the usual Day 1 news pieces pushing anti pedigree dog messages and providing yet another publicity platform for our detractors.

 When we go back on Sunday for Discover Dogs we’ll be able to have a better look around the show as a whole and get a far better feel for thee overall atmosphere.

It was the Northern Borzoi Limited Show and AGM at the weekend with both events passing off relatively smoothly after a nerve wracking start. On the way to the venue I got a call from the early arrivers saying that the hall wasn’t open yet but that thewre were a lot of people there with Pekingese and a yoga class. Oh God had something gone wrong with the booking - but no it turns out that the Pekingese were in the room downstairs and the yoga club occupied another room.

With Liz judging I tried to keep a bit in the background as I didn’t want to be accused of telling her what to do. BIS was a bit of a surprise to me, Liz & especially the handler - the award going to Adele Conroy with Santerman Songbird. Once again at the end of the show it was nice to have people telling us how much they’d enjoyed the show = even those who hadn’t won anything.

We’d decided to hold the AGM after the show, as we used to, in the hope of encouraging more people to attend but to no avail. I suppose there was little to discuss and there are invariably fewer attendees when there isn’t anything contentious to discuss so the meeting finished inside an hour.

Its been a busy week with trips to Paris & London,well Nanterre and Hayes actually the less than glamourous western parts of the cities but Paris & London sounds a lot more interesting. Arriving at Paris CDG their Passport Control seemed like they were trying to challenge the USA for title of the world’s slowest border control and they were attempting it without visas, fingerprinting and face scans just being painfully slow.

 It’s always a challenge getting from Charles De Gaulle airport to the hotel in Nanterre; taxis invariably get lost usually having to stop and ask for directions and now even with sat nav the taxi took 3 or 4 wrong turns before depositing me & my colleague in a soulless concrete square about 100 metres from the hotel. By the time I’d checked in the hotel restaurant had closed.

After a very productive days work it was back to the airport for the Easyjet flight to Liverpool. CDG is a truely depressing airport. After trekking up and down the terminal a couple of times, asking people for directions the Easyjet check in desk was finally located tucked away round a corner which looked like it was through passport control. The check-in desk was manned by people with all the charm and helpfulness of a dead wombat but eventually I got my hand on the boarding card. Time then to get some food before the flight but no - in this country famed for its cullenary delights the only food available was a pathetic chicken sandwich or a smaller and even sadder looking jambon salad. Once through into the departure area there was nothing other than a machine dispensing crisps and chocolate bars so it was a case of leave it to the flight.

I’d paid extra for the Speedy boarding option with Easyjet which avoids having to join the scrum to board the plane. The one drawback is that you get to board before passengers with small children. This means you don’t have the opportunity to choose a seat furthest away as possible from babies & toddlers. So I had the delight of spending the flight sat across from a family with 2 children of about 18 months and 3 years old. The younger one specialised in spontaneous screaming whilst the older one kept repeating a line from an Abba song so I had the joy of

money money money always funny in a rich man’s world

money money money always funny in a rich man’s world

money money money

Waaaah 

always funny in a rich man’s world

Money Waaah money Waaah money in a rich Waaah Waah mans world

When th eEasy kiosk came round with the food all the sandwicheshad gone so  tead was a Mars bar & coffee. The guy in the row in front asked for some perfume from the ‘duty free’ ……

Have you got that one   No

What about that - I’ll go and check …….. No

That one - No actually all we’ve got is the two on special offer

He then turned to the gift pages

Have you got this ?? No

What about this? I’ll ask a colleague …… No, we’ve got chocolates.

Ok I’ll have those.

Then over the tannoy  - The EasyShop has a wide selection of perfumes and gifts avaiable ask a stewardess.

Oh the joys of travel

Newark Showground on a glorious summers day doesn’t make it into my top 10 favourite show venues, on a freezing cold January day its a place to avoid. Even so we attended the Boston & DCS Championship show where they’d scheduled Borzoi classes and with a breed specialist in Gary Peskett. Its the first time we’ve been to this show but I’ve got to say that despite the weather it was an enjoyable day. The show had a nice, relaxed atmosphere with a friendly welcoming committee; the free coffee and mince pies at the end were much appreciated.

Let’s hope they schedule the breed again next year - its one I’d recommend more borzoi people attend.

Happy New Year to everyone; let’s hope its a more positive year than 2008.

For us the run up to Christmas was chaos. Firstly Liz was involved in the rescue of 2 borzoi, a long drawn out saga that culminated in her driving to Scotland for 10 o’clock at night to collect 2 dogs. Fortunately these are now rehomed and settling in, she will add something to the NBA website later on. Then on the Monday before Christmas we were hit by the power failure in East Lancashire losing gas & electricity, the electric going off when Liz was halfway through clipping a dog - she had to drive to a friends house with her gear and a dog looking like a before & after commercial - one half shaggy one half neat & tidy to finish it off. Electricity was restored at around 5pm ( just after we’d bought some candles) but no gas. Many of you will have heard about the power failure on the BBC News and how National Grid had to visit every home to switch the gas back on. Sorry but its a load of rubbish they never visited our house - someone was in all the time, nor was there a note through the door to say someone had called. Even now no-one has been, in the end we just turned the gas back on ourselves late on Christmas Eve. We were not the only ones, I know of several other people who never had a visit. I suppose we were lucky as all we lost was the heating, we still had hot water and cooking. Earlier this year our bolier was replaced; the first plumber to give us an estimate insisted he would remove the immersion heater as it was unnecessary as the gas never fails - we insisted we must retain our hot water cistern which as it turns out was a wise decision so yah boo sucks to that arrogant, ignorant, smart alec plumber who was so full of his own self importance.

Christmas was pretty well a non event, for the first time ever we didn’t even have a Christmas tree. No one was particularly bothered about presents - and you know with less stress and hassle we had quite an enjoyable Christmas & New Year. It was certainly less eventful than last year when we had puppies popping out on the day itself - so Happy Birthday to Magic.

At LKA on the Saturday a lot of people were discussing the BBC’s decision not to televise Crufts in 2009. The general opinion seemed to be good - perhaps we can get the show back to what it used to be rather than everything being dictated by the requirements of television. Best in Show can be scheduled for the benefit of the dogs rather than the TV  schedulers; no more inane pontifications from presenters who are chosen for the job because they own a dog, rather than any love or detailed knowledge of dogs and the show world; no more pieces about things you can buy at Crufts rather than all the different events - its like Match of the Day spending 20 minutes each week discussing the half time pies and beer or the contents of the club shop.

For once well done to the KC they’ve chosen to stand up to the BBC rather than refusing to exclude 12 ‘problem’ breeds - 12 out of nearly 190 scheduled breeds plus, agility, flyball, obedience and all the other events. The world of pedigree dogs cannot be as bad as some are painting if there are less than 10% of breeds seen as a problem. Yes there are problems, there’s no denying that, but the BBC have missed a golden opportunity to help highlight & educate in a constructive way, it may well turn out to be a loss for the BBC rather than dogs in the long term. Still this is an organisation that’s not even competent to organise a dancing competition without changing the rules because they can’t understand simple maths. An organisation that was renowned worldwide for the standard of its programming but which now offers people (sorry celebs) trying to contort thenselves to fit through holes in polystyrene whilst dressed like oven ready turkeys as quality TV. We shouldn’t have expected anything else.

So what should the KC do about televising Crufts? How about entering the 21st century and following the example of business, the Internet is a massively powerful global tool that can be used to influence & inform.  As an example consider how it was used to promote Rick Astley as a pop music great - Rick Rolling is now a recognised way of businesses promoting theit products. Youtube provides a platform for many businesses to advertise - often in preference to traditional TV. Lets see highlights of BIS, Groups and each breed’s judging along with the agility etc posted on Youtube, perhaps with the judges comments on their choices.  Support this with other videos presenting health issues within the breed, whats being done to tackle it and the breed standard explained by a breed expert and we can educate a wider audience.