She works hard for the Ribbon

If you know my brother Geoff you know he loves to hunt, he loves his dog and he does not like mayonnaise. So this weekend we participated in a Hunt Test. Let me explain. There are three levels of the Hunt Test...Junior, Senior and Master. Men and women work hard all year with their hunting dogs to make them pass these tests. You can make a lot more money on puppies and stick your chest out a lot further if your AKC registered dog has one of these titles behind them. Last year Elli (Geoff's dog) passed 4 Junior tests and now has a JH behind her name. This is like getting your degree, and a Masters pass is like a PhD. It is pretty impressive what these dogs can do. Anyway, Geoff asked me if I wanted to run Elli in one and I did, but I didn't want to do it when it counted. (When she was trying to pass 4 to get her Junior title). So this spring Geoff and I went to the farm and tried throwing some ducks for her and every time she would go for it and run it over to Geoff. I decided maybe it wasn't a good idea for me to run her. Anyway Fall arrived and I decided maybe I would try and run her. I love Elli to death, she is my niece, but sometimes she is a little spastic. I am allowed to say this because I am her aunt, I love her, I am on Team Elli, and because she tried to pull me down and kill me in the swamp.:) Geoff and I show up at 8am and listen to the judges tell us the course and what we have to do so we don't fail. (On a side note: the cool thing about the hunt test is that you are not judged against the other dogs, so everyone cheers for everyone.) So I watch most of the dogs go and some pass and we clap and some fail and we all moan. Yet, everyone got up to the start line without a problem. Yeah, until Elli and I get there. There are two blinds you stand behind until it is your turn. Elli doesn't like to heel for me and I don't like to yank on her leash...it is a vicious cycle. Elli gets uber excited to retrieve...I mean UBER. She is born to do this. So we get to the first blind and I am rubbing her and asking her for the love of god to come back to me. She can't see Geoff, but I can hiding in the bushes with the camera. Elli PULLS me to the second blind when it is our turn. With that the judge looks at me and says, "Great, I know she is excited, but could you walk back up here and show me that she can walk on all four feet." See she was dragging and I was pulling so she walked on two feet up there. We walked back...pep talked...walked on all four feet...sorta, but enough to get to run her. She made both retrieves no problem and we got lunch. The second run was in water and this is Elli's thing. We got to the line with a better heel and I sent her after the first duck. She spotted Geoff. Shit. Straight out to the duck, better than anyone else, straight back to Geoff. He hid behind the chair and prayed she would come back to me. She did, a lot of coaxing, but she came back. Elli and I got a ribbon and headed home to watch football. The second day is Geoff running her in Senior. He was nervous, I was nervous, Elli was UBER excited again. Yet, she does listen to him and heel. Amazing. There were a few nervous times on the first run but they called her back and she got to run the second part. Again Geoff and I go and get lunch. We had just had this big discussion on why when you buy a box lunch do they automatically put mayo and mustard on the sandwich? We got our box lunches and were very excited they were dry. They gave us packs of mustard and mayo however. Geoff gave me his mayo and I gave him my mustard. I love mayo...Geoff does not. I put it on my sandwich and made sure there wasn't a piece left uncovered. Geoff took one look, got out of the car and yuked everywhere! I couldn't stop laughing, and thinking about the sweet revenge of when he made me puke because of curdled milk. Maybe is wasn't the mayo, maybe it was nerves because of the second run with Elli, but I am pretty sure it was the mayo. Anyway, Geoff got to the second part of his test and Elli broke early...like I said she gets UBER excited. But I think she did great anyway. I am a proud aunt. Enjoy the pics. GO TEAM ELLI!