woof
01.19.03 @ 11:20 a.m.
Gaaah, it's so cold in my house! No fires have been built today because Dad and I went to a dog show and Mom went to church. I kind of feel bad for my dad, he's had a horrible day.
I dragged myself out of bed at 5:45-ish and managed to get out to the van with my discman and Tommy. Fortunately, the show was in Portland so we didn't have far to drive. We were there before seven, though we didn't have to wait too long for them to open up the hall where the German Shepherd ring was. Dad gave me Billy (AKA Hidden Forest's I'm a Believer) to walk, but he thought he'd be too much for me. Ironically, it was his sister, Sassy (AKA Hidden Forest's Saturday's Child, but that's too long and the AKC might reject it) who tried valiently to pull my arm out of its socket. Billy was just a geek and kept slipping on the cement floors. Dad took him away from me after poor Bill took a header in his exhuberance. Billy was great--he has this canine charm and infectious energy that makes him a joy to be around and I felt very up and hyper while I was taking care of Billy. He didn't flake out, though he does have a nasty habit ofjumping up on people that I did nothing to discourage. I like it when the big doggies jump up on me, at least when I know they're going to. Sassy was another story. She was absolutely spastic. She was clawing all over the cement in an attempt to get back to her crate because the voices on the PA system scared her. Then, in the ring, she slipped in the second turn and fell--hard. She limped along the next half circle and then as she was starting to correct herself, she cut in front of Dad, tripping him, and he hit the ground to a collective "oooh!" from the spectators. It reminded me of the football game I went to at Autzen stadium, the way everyone would "oohh" for particularly brutal tackles.
My fingers are going to freeze and fall off before I finish.
But Sassy was the only one in her class and won. Later she took the Reserve, which was a surprise considering her earlier performance, but she has a nice gait and managed to cool it for, ah, Open Bitch I think. Dad decided to get a photo done because this was (I think) the highest win Sassy's gotten so far and he thought we'd mark the occasion.
This is the point where my grandmother was utterly frustrating and has confirmed my suspicions that she's a complete moron.
See, when you get a dog photo done, you (or rather, the photographer) tries to get the dog's attention by throwing a toy off to the side in front of them. The photographer threw the first one and Sassy perked up at it, but was distracted almost immediately. She was going to try again when my grandma picked up the first one, and like an idiot, threw it right into the shot. I retrieved it because I'm much quicker than she is and threw it straight up into the air and caught it, which got Sassy's attention rather well, I thought. Grandma threw the catalog in the air and let it hit the ground. The photographer proceeded to yell at *me* for throwing things on the ground in front of the dog (as it makes the dog look down, not ahead) and it took a bit of self restraint not to say right back "I didn't throw anything on the ground, I'm not a fucking idiot." But that would have hurt Grandma's feelings. Hah. The detatched me retelling this wants to say "Who cares about her feelings?" but I know that my terminal politeness would kick in in the real situation and I have no choice but to maintain the polite facade. I'm really a nasty, sarcastic person, but you wouldn't know it to see me.
I also think I never talked about my realization that almost all my talents are essentially mimicry. I draw well as long as I have something to copy (a photo or something). I don't produce much out of my own mind. Similarly, when I play guitar I can come up with melody lines to songs but I don't ever compose or anything. I can reproduce things very well but I'm afraid I lack originality. Heck, even my NaNovel has dozens of lines of dialogue I can place in the BBC production of P&P or the Gwenyth Paltrow version of Emma. Heck, my favorite line (which is when Beckford leans over to Emma as they're entering a ball and says "Once more into the breach, eh Emma?" and she says "Or close up the walls with our English dead." I think you have to imagine Emma being overly nonchalant with her reply) is probably stolen from the poorly written technically but well written plotwise fanfic Kitty at the Derbyshire Writers' Guild. I'm mid-reread on Kitty and plan to finish it as soon as I'm done here.
And look at that... I'm done here. I hear Dad building a fire and my fingers are very grateful.
Previously
fuck it @ 08.01.05
fanciful imaginary sea voyages to come @ 07.20.05
*dies* @ 07.19.05
more ootp @ 07.17.05
harry potter: driving our children into devil worship @ 07.17.05
