I can't keep it all together

[kelpiegirl]

Okay, so want the dog to start right on the outrun. Concentrate on that. Concentrate so much that I forget to watch her lift. Then, I concentrate on her lift (next run) and I forget to concentrate on her fetch. OH. MY. GOD. How do I remember all of this??? It is making me insane. Then, she will pull the " I know how to do everything JUST right" routine and I am left gobsmacked. This training stuff is hard work. I was told that this dog would make me a better trainer- yes, I agree- I think by that thinking I am ready to run in the international.

[1sheepdoggal]

If thats the case, I'll go with ya! Gobsmacked! Now thats a great word! I have a friend in Scotland that taught me that one. Hadnt seen it used except by her. I tried it out a few times here in the south, and they looked at me like I had two heads! I wonder where the word originated.

[DeltaBluez Tess]

OK here is what you need to do.

 

Get a large cup of coffee and fill the cup to the brim. Make sure it is really hot and you do not want to spill it.

 

Send the dog. Now start walking with *full to the brim coffee cup* and you will be so intent on NOT SPILLING the HOT coffee that your dog will bring the sheep perfectly and your panic strickened thoughts are not happening because you were too busy thinking about not spilling the coffee.

 

Now the dog has the sheep at your feet and you can drink the coffee.

 

Then your dog will look up at you and smile as if to say "What a wonderful trainer" (aka mom kept her mouth shut)...I am sure that is what Tess says to me!!!

 

Diane

[Rebecca, Irena Farm]

Karen keeps telling me I should take up smoking.

 

I do so much alternate between wanting to fiddle and journeying off into la-la land. My favorite one is this: "Oh wow, lookit my dog. That's my dog out there who just [did a perfect outrun/is fetching beautifully/held that line with no help.]"

 

Then while I'm thinking about that, my wonderful dog will do something not so much admirable which will not register in my befuddled brain until it's far too late to help fix it.

 

I measured my progress in trialing, in phases. First I could only concentrate for as long as it took to get the sheep to my feet. Then it took until the first panel for my attention to waver. Then I could make it across the cross drive (all this meaning on the open sized course). Then I could hold it steady right back to the pen/shedding ring in practice. Once the sheep are at my feet I'm good - I'm back to something I'm used to. Most likely because I've been out of it for years now, I'll be right back to square one when I get going again this spring.

 

My pastor was Scottish but grew up in Australia and said "gobsmacked." I always thought gobsmacked came from Australia. I never picked it up, however, because it sounds vaguely profane and I went to a high school where we weren't even allowed to say "Gosh" or "Golly." It is not, however - gob has nothing to do with God. It just means the state of being taken aback, as you'd feel if someone smacked you in the gob - Scots for "mouth."

 

From Michael Quinion:

 

It comes from northern dialect, most probably popularised through television programmes set in Liverpool, where it was common. It’s an obvious derivation of an existing term, since gob, originally from Scotland and the north of England, has been a dialect and slang term for the mouth for four hundred years (often in insulting phrases like “shut your gob!” to tell somebody to be quiet). It possibly goes back to the Scottish Gaelic word meaning a beak or a mouth, which has also bequeathed us the verb to gob, meaning to spit. Another form of the word is gab, from which we get gift of the gab.