Saturday we (I, Jodi, Colleen, and Jaenne) went out to work at Janies on setting up the course for the Halloween trial.  It's been blogged about in better places (hayewe) and I won't go over the parts that Doll already covered since I believe the 3 people that read this blog also read her's.  Suffice it to say that normally when a man calls me 'blondie', I'd take a shovel to his head – but I never actually heard it applied to me this weekend, until one time towards the end of the afternoon.   I suspect that it was the Keystone Light and ridiculously tight wranglers talking.  Regardless, I wouldn't have taken anything those guys said or did more seriously than Pat humping my leg a few days prior out at Dianne's house.  Except that it is worth noting that I find Pat much more attractive.  We have more in common. He 'gets' me.

Sunday we went out to Dianne's house to see Pat…uh, I mean take lessons.  Jodi, Jaenne and I.  This time the Tip was for me to perhaps amputate my arms since I apparently can't keep from flailing them around like tenticals on some crazed sea creature, which my dog seemingly deciphers to mean, Play Time, since what else can all that random motion mean?   Scout was laying down for me, she was staying down, with some reminders, and she was slowing down…but we still have cutting in on the stock issues when I send her, which I know is my timing in part…and perhaps my….gesturing.

Its been suggested before that I put my hands in my pockets.  I'm not even aware that I'm doing it.  I gesture, I wave, I scoop.  I need my arms for hugging nuclear children (saw it on a bumper sticker) and I'm sure they'll come in handy later in my stock dog education but for now they seem to be …tentacles of doom.   This week I will attempt to curb my gesturing as well as my vocal outbursts.  Which will not only make me a better handler but please my family in general, I'm sure.