to do an agility demo at halftime on the ice. Ok, on carpet laid on the
ice. We decided to use small dogs because the ice is hard and the carpet is
small (12 x 40) and offers little impact resistance. So I took novice
keeshond toklat instead of more experienced, more reliable samoyed Kavik.
Daring? Yes. But safer - Kavik is slightly overweight, Toklat's height
weight ratio is EXCELLENT.
We arrived at 6 for a 7:30 performance. Toklat was very well behaved in the
VIP room. He sat quietly and paid wonderful attention to me and my liver
brownies. However at about 7:15 they hustled us to the other side of the
building so we could enter in the zamboni entrance.
Hockey in anchorage may be minor league but the fans are major. Thousands
of screaming fans with cowbells, stomping their feet in the bleachers make a
crapload of noise. The announcer, the foghorn, the clamor was enough to
send even happy, good natured toklat's ears flat to his head. I fed him
liver brownies until he was focusing on me and calmer. He seemed to be fine
when the quarter was over, and they opened up the gates to put the carpet on
the ice.
He took one look at the open expanse of ice and I knew I was in trouble. His
whole body tremored and shook with excitement. I left him with his father
and went to set agility equipment on the rug laid out on the ice. When I
returned he was still vibrating with excitement. I knew I was in for some
wild ride. I went and stood on the carpet runner leading out to the
course, heart pounding, trying to get Tok to focus on me. Fat chance.
there were only five obstacles - chute, jump, tunnel, weave, baby teeter. I
though maybe, since they were close together, I could keep his attention. I
started him about six inches from the opening in the chute - so he couldn't
miss it. He did the chute, the jump and ran straight for the tunnel, which
unfortunately was clear. He hasn't seen one of those before, and he almost
ran into it, and at the last minute veered around the tunnel, taking off at
amazing speed to the far end of the ice rink. I called him - TOK TOK TOK,
HERE! But t he laughter of the crowd was DEAFENING and the little devil was
totally overstimulated, but somehow he heard me. he turned and ran straight
back into my arms. I got him into the tunnel but the weave poles were out
of the question. He has gorgeous, smart weaves but he didn't seem to get
that these were weaves, the crowd roarer again. He got the baby teeter and
I grabbed the devil dog before he took off. I was able to put his leash
back on and get out of there. So he might be a crowd pleaser, but a mommy
pleaser he is not. Luckily, his recall worked ok.
As I typed this the news is on. The sports preview talked about how
apparently 6200 people showed up for the game. "6200 people", I thought. "
I made an ass of myself in front of 6200 people". They went to commercial
and then opened up with the big hockey game. The first shot shown is of
Toklat, racing at breakneck speed across the ice with some comment about the
game going to the dogs. There was no explanation, no clips of well behaved
dogs doing agility obstacles. Just toklat, running. Luckily, you can' see
me. Maybe I will just tell everyone its someone elses Keeshond.
Sadly, I already got two phone calls from admiring fans. Apparently, they
all know its my freaking Keeshond.
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