You will read this and feel like, super wow! I am in the boring pen too!

Let's pretend you have dogs that are used to going on a long, fast run every single morning. And every single night. Maybe sleeping all day in the boring pen at work isn't so bad because they dream of the run they just had and the run that's coming up. And tennis balls and little rubbery plastic bones. And a-frames. And writing songs about whales and banjos. But then you make them spend longer hours in the boring pen. And shuttle them off to boring super early and keep 'em there super late. And they are used to hiking a couple mornings before boring pen and practicing agility which makes the dogs' minds work as well as their muscles and cardios. But instead, you just stuff 'em in boxes in the car and stuff 'em in pens and back in the boxes in the car and you do this for one week.

You're all, muscles, ha HA, be gone and cardios, ha HA, be gone and happy zen minds of nice dog thoughts, ha HA, be gone, and you just stuff 'em in a box because it's boring o'clock and you are LATE.

And when you are home they are running around with the balls but you are all, hypothetically speaking of course, "Knock it OFF! Knuckleheads!"

Only you say it like this. "Knuckle...HEADS!!!"

Only louder. "KNUCKLE HEADZZZZ!!!!"

And then it's night and it's sleeping and then it's awake and the whole boxes and boring pen again and so forth and repeat until night.

And that's just all there is.

Westside is the best side.

Westside Santa Cruz is know for many things. Surfing. Skateboarding. City Council meetings featuring citizens of other realms of space and time. Really expensive real estate. Surfing. Did I mention surfing? Farmer's markets where people wear unusual garments. I may have already mentioned surfing.

So I started counting people on my fingers, and realized that the Westside is now an agility hatchery. Residents of the Westside doing dog agility used to total exactly 2. Me and my dog agility pal who is also a famous professor that writes books that I can't read. Last book she wrote she gave me a copy but told me not to even try to read it until Chapter 8. And I have a Masters Degree. In our whole county there were just a handful of us.

Now, just on the Westside, we have me, Donna, Mary, Kim, Marion, Michael, Deirdre, Deb. Most of us within walking distance of eachother's houses. With all our dogs, 4 DAM teams worth of Westside is the Best Side. Not to mention a little contingent of beginners who are patiently teaching contacts and working on weave poles. We have beaches galore, organic peaches, and hemp lip gloss, yet no one has a backyard big enough for a dogwalk. I believe you are all familiar with the term coined here, Driveway Agility.

And cross the river or drive up through the forest into the valley, holy smokes. Agility folk everywhere. Is Santa Cruz the new hotbed of dog agility? Surf City gone to the dogs?

Just remember. You heard it here first.

The time that the Team's agility got taken over by the ponies.

Usually, you do not hear about work here. Because I like to cultivate the image of a life of leisure, where I just take dogs to the sea and the forest and spend hours and hours and hours training them every single day. And drinking mai tais. How real agility champs are made. When made equals can I have another mai tai?

Ha HA. Did I fool you?

And then the pony campers came this week and the poor team has no life outside of going to work then coming home from work and then going back again. The upside of this is that the pony campers LOVE taking dogs on walks and having dogs sit on their laps during storytime. And it is just pretty darn cute. The downside of this involves glitter glue and there is basically no time for fast running because, hello Martha Stewart horseshoes and hello, glitter glue. Everywhere. And actual work that are actual horses that are not the ponies but which somehow must get done during the time when it is not the ponies.

Whew.

Team Small Dog hopes to regain a life again when pony camp is over. See you then.

Everybody's birthday is complete and they are older and is it ok for dogs to have mai tais?

The one thing I wanted to do for my birthday was take the dogs out on a knock down, drag out forest walk. And go get mai tais at Hulas until I was knocked down and dragged out. Before we went to the forest, which was on the schedule just before the mai tais, I was thinking about this one thing. Since Gustavo has been such a bright shining agility star, in my mind if nowhere else, we haven't been running amuck in the forest quite as much. I was wondering about this. Let me describe how it goes deep in the forest. Ruby is always right there with me. Otterpop, might be running amuck but you holler "OTTERPOP!" and she appears by leaping off cliffs, out of trees, and so forth. Gustavo, sometimes just doesn't appear for a few minutes and when he does, it's sort of with a glazed, somewhat not of this world where humans exist, look on his face. This is a look we in the agility world do not so much enjoy viewing on our dog faces.


Right little buddy? I run this theory by him before we go, and he's all, "HOLA!" and I guess thinks we're off to the nursing home until we get to our top secret illegal parking place for really good forest walks. When he goes all glazed catatonic monkey scream to GET OUT and INTO FOREST.


Once we're in the forest, he's running with Otterpop. Ruby is with me. If I want to see the dynamic duo, I call them and Otterpop always appears instantly by, like I said, leaping off some cliff or flying out of some giant redwood tree at 100mph, and Gustavo, sometimes comes right in, sometimes not. Sometimes is the detour of up this cliff and across this creek and then back in where everybody else is laying down, Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting.


The theme of forest walk is, HEY GOO STAH VOE!!!!


He was up there on the high log across the creek with Gary. He's too little to spot.


There he is. You can usually find him in water. Actually, he was pretty darn good. Ran hard and came in almost all the time. Just could not sit at all still for any photo ops. If he bats an ear to his name and comes running in, that's fine. Doesn't have to pose on the stupid mossy log with the cool lighting with the trained dogs. I'll take it.

Welcome to Much of Team Small Dog's Birthday.

Some (uh, relatively speaking, because, you know, Universal Healthcare!) important facts about my birthday:


It is also Ruby and Gustavo's birthday. They are respectively, 9 and 3 years old. We are all 3 Leo's. And if that wasn't weird enough, it is also Mick Jagger's and Susan Garrett's birhday. That makes ALL of us Leo's. And me the only one of us 3 humans that doesn't wear spandex. At some point in me and Ruby's and Gustavo's party last night, guests clamored for a dogwalk. These are my kinds of party guests.


Otterpo's dogwalker has pink hair and crocs. That is what all the 7 year olds are wearing right now. Otterpop is the only member of Team Small Dog that doesn't share the same birthday. Her USDAA card says November. I think it's on Thanksgiving.


Mary was a party guest. She did not attend the dogwalk portion.


The first best present ever was Gustavo. Gary got him for me 2 years ago. Something like that. Then the next best present was Maia gave me a whole family of her own personal Breyers from when she was a kid and they all had tiny party hats and little halters. Total OMG gift. So also, just so we have it on the record, Gary said, "I was thinking of getting you a border collie but I thought you would want to pick it out." Total OMG gift of the future.


I was sort of too busy at my party to take many pictures. We had 14 guests, and we have 8 plates, 4 bowls and 9 forks and one knife. Too many dogs. A kitchen the size of a speck and I got home from work just an hour before the guests arrived. But we do have 20 cocktail glasses. You do the math. It was super fun. No place I'd rather be.

Except for maybe the borax mining flatlands of Mojave. Maybe we pack the party up and head out there next year, everybody!

Agility homework exercise, except maybe don't try this at home.

So I am an unapologetic follower of the Greg Derrett agility handling system. I also am an follower of the HBO series Entourage, Canadian heavy metal, and Keanu Reaves. Full disclosure. I use the system to try and be a nice clear and consistent handler so that my dogs don't completely screw up. But for years, and years, I've had this little problem that I haven't been able to fix.

Finally, the other night, my super agility pal and instructor and owner of Hobbes the trained dog who doesn't like handlers to be inconsistent or to screw up, he sort of sighed. After I screwed up again. AGAIN. I was trying to pivot in to CLEARLY EXPLAIN to one of the dogs to pull in towards me and not run out and take a jump I didn't want them to take. He sighed. He once again suggested, perhaps use a little less finger and try to actually pivot.

How many years has he given me this advice? I tried the exercise again. And again. He sort of waves his finger around.


"Not the finger! Don't give the finger."


I am always giving the finger.


"Too much finger, not enough shoulder!"


Finally, Rob is all, "You need to just go home and do this in front of the mirror." He sort of twisty pivots around. Like I thought I was doing, for the last HOW MANY YEARS?


Let me get this straight. I now have agility homework, and that homework is to learn how to get all twisty but twisty in a clear and consistent manner without giving anyone the finger, in front of the mirror.


I think I always had this problem of making teachers exasperated.


In grad school, I believe the term, Unteachable, was used more than once.


I believe Karl Ewald thought this was terribly funny, and then just had to start doing all my art for me.


In high school, I believe that preferring to be at the barn instead of the school contributed to a certain amount of academic exasperation.


At least I show up for agility class.

And I am trying. Right? Twisty pivot, right?

Today, Nancy Drew tries to solve the mystery of the furry purse.

The other night, all the dogs were left alone for a couple hours while the humans went out.


When we returned, Gustavo's Special Furry Treat Purse (Exhibit A) had been removed from my normal lady purse (Exhibit B) , and had been decimated, desicated and detonated all over the living room floor.

Now, this was not an expensive or exotic item, I actually found it in a trash can at a dog show. It's just a little nylon bag with white fur attached and a nice, sturdy red strap. It's stinky and the fur shreds, but I can put Gustavo's treats in it and he attacks it like nothing else, especially when I drag it around on the end of a leash. Half of poor furry purse though, had been shredded and and stripped and made bare of all threads. An explosion of red and white and fur all my couch and living room rug. I believe because a little piece of cheese had been left moldering in it, and this is the kind of thing I carry around in my purse, which is not furry or stinky. Just a normal lady purse, when normal ladies carry around stinky fur bags with pieces of rotten string cheese rolling around inside.

Who had the audacity, the stealth, the cojonoes, to carefully remove this item from my purse, on the table, and nothing else, then eat through fur and heavy duty cordora nylon to get at a little piece of cheese?


Suspect No. 1, certainly likes her food, but is weirdly trustworthy around snacks and things belonging to humans. Like she has a code. You know how those codes go. Gangsters and Pirates and Guys have them. But Suspect No. 1 has cojones. That's for sure.


Suspect No. 2, has impeccable manners in most everything except involving food. Also can be extremely stealthy and shrewd, and has the brain power to engineer heists like none other. Is not normally audacious, however stealth and snacks could override that.


Suspect No. 3, is the owner of said purse, but seems highly unlikely to do something like tracking an item and actually locating it. Like is not the rocket scientist of the group. But, you know what? It IS his purse.

So how did Nancy Drew solve this mystery, assuming Nancy Drew did solve the mystery?

Nancy Drew, it turns out, is a pretty crummy detective and just goes for the whole TEAM policy like all for one and one for all and everybody guilty until proven innocent and everybody is equally in trouble and yelling and so forth and stomping around and scowling. Nancy Drew can't figure it out. Nancy Drew said a lot of potty mouth words at the whole guilty team and got out the vacuum and that was just the end of that. Maybe some of YOU are good at mysteries and can solve the crime. Nancy Drew gives up and Gustavo has to play with a zip loc baggie now.

Hola Gustavo!

We caught Gustavo in a rare moment of standing still last night. It happens. Just not much. With his new found interest in entomology, he's learning to quietly stalk the bugs out back under bushes instead of just crashing around the yard like a little rocket all the time with his furry squeaky bone in his mouth. Well, yeah. He still does that too. A lot. But sometimes, rare occasions, he slows down for a few minutes. I decided to take the opportunity for a couple questions.

Laura: Hola Gustavo! The other day at dog agility at Quail Lodge, you were running so so so fast that you came out of a tunnel, hit the table at 100mph and slid across it and off, landed on that perfectly manicured grass, and just disappeared underneath, into the shade, instead of back on top. I mean, you did get right back on top, but that was certainly a creative idea. I loved it how you came leaping out, jumped back on, into your down, then just wagged and wagged your table for that 5 seconds that seemed like 3 hours. No dust left on that table after that 5 seconds.


Gustavo: I see Bugs!

Laura: So we practiced on Monday up at Forest Agility, and yesterday at the practice field. You held your dogwalk contact for so long, no matter where I darted off to, or threw your furry tuggy treat purse. You ran across that dogwalk like a bullet, stopped, then nothing could get you to budge off. Like a big boy! You think you could try that next time we go to a dog show? And are you ok with it that your favorite toy is a ripped up, furry purse?


Gustavo: Es el azul! Hola bug!

Laura: Well yeah. But your purse is red and white. Hey, I'm not kidding, little buddy. Lately, it's been like you are a real agility dog when we go practice. Turning and watching and sending out and coming in, hitting pole entries, loving that teeter, amazing a-frame, reading the serpentines, not getting scared of anything or sticking your head down the plethora of gopher holes that we sometimes see. What is it? What brought you back on track? Can we have some more runs at the dog show like that Snookers run we had on Sunday?


Gustavo: Mmmph. Tengo bug. Yo la tengo! Is bugs!

Laura: Hey, guess what. I think it's your birthday this week. Same as mine. Even though we actually have absolutely NO IDEA how old you are, on your USDAA card it says July 26, 2006, making you 3 years old this weekend! Old enough for your CMJ measurement where you need to slouch just enough to be under 12" tall. You have lived here with us, on Walk Circle, instead of on the dusty streets of Juarez for exactly 2 years. Two years! We're going to have a birthday party for us this weekend, K?


Gustavo: Aloha because SNAIL.

Practice makes perfect-a primer.

So first of all. I am not sure why I wore this. It was on top of the stack, is all I can guess. It's a slippery slope, and apparently I'm sliding fast.

Anyways. It's been a while since I've imparted any useful information. As if I have in the past imparted useful information. Humor me.

I would like to say I work really hard when I practice. WHO IS LAUGHING? STOP THAT. I do I Do I DO, too!


Well, yeah. Sometimes the light is cool somewhere and maybe I have to stop and do a photo shoot. But I haven't even been bringing a camera with me lately, because I've been trying to really work as hard as I can and make the dogs better, stronger, faster, fancier, and while it's useful and informative to see exactly what I thought was appropriate to wear out of the house into public, sometimes it's just a headache to deal with the camera.

So I have dogs of different levels. Ruby is semi-retired and we think of agility practice for her like low impact water aerobics and she is wearing a bathing cap and can't get her hair wet. Otterpop has been blowing me away with her most excellentness but we need to get it together more. So 5 fault runs CEASE. And Gambles are got. And certain corgis get beat. Gustavo, he just needs to practice and practice and practice and practice. And practice. And practice.

I like to dole out equal amounts of turn. Although if by equal you mean Ruby usually gets a short turn, and those other two, long turns. I also like to dole out equal skills, so if someone is practicing one thing, the others might practice something similar. Although Otterpop needs to practice working away from me way more than Gustavo, who needs to practice working close to me. And he practices much more basic drills in the beginning, building up to harder ones. His jump angles get moved and I vary front crosses and rear crosses and where we're going so he HAS to watch my cues and not just run 100mph to the next thing. Otterpop practices hard things! I like to think of something really hard, set it up, and figure out how to run it with her. Like in a trial, you'd be all eeeww, when you're walking a course and see some ugly ass evilness thunk up by a judge. I try to think these up too and practice practice practice.

Today, I set up 3 main drills specifically for the G-man. Everybody else got to do these too, but he does them a lot a lot a lot to remember remember remember.

Drill One: A long leadout, send to a tunnel into poles.
Drill Two: An even longer long leadout, teeter totter to 2 jumps handled with variable directions to the a-frame and back down the line of three jumps.
Drill Three: Super duper uper long leadout to dogwalk, practicing me leaving him there and walking all over hell and back, then off to either a couple jumps or the poles/tunnel combo.

So 3 dogs times 3 drills times maybe Gustavo does each on 5-10 times and same with Otterpop and Ruby only once or twice is how many?

Equals 66 turns maybe for me? Hell yes.

When the Team visited the super classy, in an understated kind of way, USDAA trial.

On Sunday, off we went for a day of USDAA. This one was a fancy, shmancy, underpantzy day. Not underpantzy. I don't know why I said that. So not classy. No one shows, nor talks about, nor spells underpantz with a Z at the Quail Lodge in Carmel Valley. Ever. No matter what. Sorry Quail Lodge.

The Quail Lodge in Carmel Valley is all about classy, and they said we could have a dog show there. So on the flawless, level polo field by the mountains and golf courses and Lexuses and Clint Eastwood, we had a day of dog agility. I think they wear diamond tennis bracelets at Quail Lodge. But keep them hidden under cashmere sleeves. There are parking attendants and golf villas and chefs. And somehow it all got arranged that they would also have dog agility.

You ever been to Carmel Valley? It's by Carmel, where *cough* older *cough* people enjoy strolling and eating sandwiches in thatched roof cafes with names like Hog's Knees and taking their dogs to the beach and buying sweaters at Burberry. Some people, maybe even some people's moms and dads, might enjoy visiting their children who live in Santa Cruz by actually visiting Carmel instead because it is free of tattoos and street sleepers and has the thatched roofs and all. Just down the 17 mile drive from Pebble Beach, which is all about golf and horse shows, both sports where you ante up big time to play. Carmel Valley, a beautiful drive away from the beach, is a place where people don't shout, cool breezes keep temperatures down and cool millions buy you a tidy little shack on a hillside.

Usually dog agility is near cattle. Freeways. Big trucks and trains and bmx and rodeos. Foreclosed homes. Not villas with personal vineyards and golf carts. Holy smokes. I could get used to this. Can we switch ALL our dog agility to Quail Lodge? No gophers, no divots, no long car trip to the Central Valley. I heard tales of many absentee dog agility husbands attending because of golf. Some people even stayed in the lodge, where the rooms are $200 or $400 or $800 bucks a night. Not sure. But they give you leather and down dog beds in them and I think you can turn your dogs loose on the links by the light of the full moon while you drink your champagne and Elvis Costello croons jazz ditties to you from the hot tub.

Quail Lodge offered events like Test Drive the Giant Sparkly Range Rover. The 4 star BBQ. Pet adoptions. Booths of tastefully branded shwag. Spectators. Lure Coursing.

Have you ever seen the lure coursing? A furry tail on a remote control string inside a long track with tunnels and speed bumps. Show your dog that thing, and they're off.

Ruby got to do this. She wasn't entered in dog agility, due to the little problem I like to call Crashes Herself Thru 12" jumps. So I paid my money for a single lure course, took her over there, showed her the squirrel, and thought she'd be off in a flash.

But instead, she looks at me like, You're Joking? At Dog Agility, You Are Telling Me To GET The Squirrel? It's a Trick.

I'm like, "Go! It's ok! Get the squirrel!!"

She looks at me. I can tell she's thinking, Trick. Dogs Are Not Supposed to Get Squirrels. Especially Not At Dog Agility And I Will Go To Hell.

The little furry thing wiggles and jiggles and finally, good manners dog just goes SCREW IT and off she goes around the track after the fur. In the blink of an eye, at the finish line but clearly very fun for her. I didn't let any other dogs do that. Ruby is Special.

I tried to interview Ruby about her lure coursing adventure, but she demured. I don't think she likes interviews.

I did interview Gustavo about his day. Verbatim:

I am staying I am staying I am staying then OK I am running I am running I am running it is climb it is contact it is just running running running tunnel tunnel TUNNEL running running and I hits table and I slide right off so I get under I get under I get under it is funny funny funny and laughing laughing laughing on table counting to a MILLION then running running running TEETER TOTTER HOLA HOLA HOLA HOLA I LOVE YOU running running running some poles some more poles more poles do ALL the poles running running running climb running running running running running running HOLA HOLA HOLA I LOVE YOU HOLA..."

It just sort of kept going like that. I think he was describing his manic standard run which did have contacts, poles, a stunning teeter but also was just manic with circles and crowd applause and laughter and a horde of kids descending on him afterwards because they all loved him. I don't know where all these kids appeared from, they just were there waiting for him at the finish to pet the cute little fast doggy. I don't think there was a Q in there. Dunno. It was sort of nuts. Like I was running the lure course piece of fur, hopelessly trying to keep up with it. He wiggles and jiggles and the steering is haphazard and you just hang on and RUN.

He was able to channel all that into a stunning Snookers that I am incredibly proud of and felt like handling a genuine, trained, lightning fast dog. Loved it. That was his whole day.

I asked Otterpop why she was uncharacteristically speedy and well behaved and in good spirits the whole time. Two little handling errors of mine flubbed up her SuperQ and turned a smashing Grand Prix into a 5 faulter. What a surprise. Her Standard run, lovely and fast. All day, no judge stuff, no freakies, no slows, no nothing. Just My Otterpop!

Otterpop says, "OTTERPOP DOES NOT TELL!"

I'm like, "But Otterpop. All the time you get so WEIRD at dog shows. Then this one, you are Normal! There's got to be a reason?"

I'm thinking, the allure of diamond tennis bracelets? Requires laser leveled manicured polo fields for running on now? Likes seeing white gloved parking attendants who wave and smile without showing teeth or gums? Well, anyways, Thanks Otterpop!

Does this Otterpop show up at the next couple trials, including Regionals?

Otterpop says, "Ha HA." And leaves the room with all the dog toys.

I couldn't interview Hobbes. He had to go home. We won his Grand Prix though and also had a beautiful Standard. Usually when I talk to Hobbes he just barks at me really loud. So I'm pretty sure how that interview would have gone. He's a big, tall border collie. He barks loud. I bark back at him. He runs fast. I run fast. I love Hobbes.

At the end of the day, fog rolled in and motorhomes rolled out. Packed up the rings, packed up the dogs. One final game of frisbee on the grass that little elves with Hermes helmets hand carried every single blade in on a silver platter and tapped in to the dirt with their little Tiffany hammers. The clean dirt. Drive by the white, not fluorescent orange, traffic cones and artfully lettered, in the tasteful, branded typeface, signs that murmur, No Parking PLEASE. Wind down the oak studded lane, back up to the road, and realize, I'm jonesing here for a golf course. How creepy is that?

And then, aw, SCREW IT. Maybe even get a polo shirt with a collar. Some shoes with fringey tassles. A bag of clubs, whack balls out there on the greens for dogs? Hell YEAH.

Q and A with Ruby, we think.

Laura: Ruby, you are a complicated and mysterious dog. A dog of great beauty, and bravery, and noble in citizenship. Yet also stealthy, crafty and shrewd in your ways. You totally proved the power of dog training by going from a weird, feral thing that wanted to eat other dogs to my super star of white glove manners. Plus you have the fastest a-frame of all the small dogs, and you love riding patiently in Timmy's bike basket while the other dogs have to run in the street. And you always. ALWAYS. Without fail. Bring back the tennis ball.

Ruby: Alas, I am but a demure servant of your words. You are too kind. Also, I need to make sure, this is an Otterpop sanctioned interview?

Otterpop: This interview is with Otterpop.

Ruby: I grow weary sometimes.

Laura: Do you ever wish Otterpop would find other hobbies that don't include you?

Ruby: Hark. Is but beneath me, beneath this vary chair, lie in wait a beast of tremdous spirit, who possibly can kick my ass should I speak in candor?


Otterpop: Everyone talks only to Otterpop. TO OTTERPOP.

Laura: But you guys are essentially, one big happy family? TEAM Small Dog. Every night, everyone on the couch together. All day, laying in your big kennel together. Just last night, tennis ball game with 3, count them 3, tennis balls. Uh, Ruby? Ruby? You in there? Hello? Are the witches speaking to you right now?

Laura: Uh, Ruby?

Laura: So sometimes Ruby goes off to another place. This is when the witches crawl in and whisper to her. Flies also speak to her and can take her there. She'll come back.


Ruby: Dogs do not speak. Nor grant interviews. So I may speak with the witches, but you either take generous liberties with the truth or perhaps it is you who speaketh with the witches. Just saying.

Guess who went to Dirt Nite?

Someone ran courses with a teeter totter and poles in them. Like just totally ran them all fast and stuff and didn't mess up or freak out and so forth. Like had actual handling and just flying over the teeter totter and through the poles and over the dogwalk and a-frame. Like everybody else.

I'm not naming any names, unless your name happens to begin with a G. And ends with ustavo.

And maybe you're the littlest one. And maybe sometimes freaks out and so forth.

But not anymore.

When once again, Laura proves to be somewhat of a crummy citizen.

You know, I try to be a good citizen.

It was my week for jury duty. Always a pain in the ass, probably just as much for people with regular jobs as for the self employed, but it's our civic duty, righty-o?. For some weird reason, I've never, ever been picked to actually be on a jury. They always chase me right out of the courtroom and "Thanks for Playing and See You Again in a Couple Years!"


So off I went again this time. First you go sit and wait in the modular outside our County Building Courthouse. Our county, spares no expense. Offers airport plastic seating and all of us shoved in there like little sardines in a can. Everyone has a book and you wait and you wait and you wait and you wait. A lady explains how it all works very, very slowly. As if we are all very, very stupid. Also there are little signs, printed from MSWord on pink paper posted all around saying the exact same thing in big bold allcaps that she just told us. Slowly. Speaking in allcaps.


Until a crabby faced deputy comes and shuttles us up the stairs to Homeland Security, where you go through disgruntly staffed metal detectors into the court building. Our county, in the middle of humungous layoffs and no one in there looks cheerful and happy to be at work. SLAM goes your stuff on the metal detector conveyor belt, and SLAM it comes off and Hiya and Thanks, Security Guys!

All the prospective jurors are walking around without belts on. There's no place by the metal detector to re-strap them on and the prospective jurors shuffle around, trying to rebelt without looking too stupid. Ha HA and take that, Security guys. I wore a skirt.


We all sit outside Department 3. Once again, packed in like sardines in a can, on hot sweaty benches in the hallway. Looky out there-my exact wedding site, right in view! Everyone pulls out their book again. The bald guy in sweats is reading Tom Clancy. There's a monk in red, flowing robes with a Kipling backpack, who hides his book cover when I am totally busted stealing a glance. He's writing down little notes in the margins in blue pen. Didn't know monks did that. The lady next to me is reading something called Loving One Another that looks like it was printed in the 70's. She has a big dreamcatchery type tattoo on her arm and giant feather earrings, also from the '70's. We all sit there, together, on the long benches and wait.


Until a new deputy pokes her head out of the massive courtroom doorway, and admonishes us in. And guess who it is? The scarey lady bailiff from our very own Courtroom Drama in November! We totally know her, but not in a good way! Boy oh boy, her frown is never going to turn upside down. The evil bailiff lady's face is frozen like this forever, but you can bet nobody going to put a foot wrong in her courtroom. Because something about her expression, or maybe it's just her bangs, seems to say, "I'll shoot you dead, asshole." We file in, the judge is ready and everyone sits, packed in once again like sardines in a can.

He introduces the cast. The Bailiff. She glowers. The Court Reporter and the Clerk. They don't look up. The DA. He's the dapper guy in the bow tie who was squinting at all of us when we walked in. I hate his bow tie and I hate his haircut and I hate his squinty little eyes on me. He squints at me, and I squint back. His suit pants are just too short. The defense attorney stands for a minute, smiles weakly, and sits back down. She has bad posture and an unfortunate tweed suit. Terrible orthopedic style pumps and hose and makes me wonder, THIS is how attorneys dress? She's plaid, with a stoop, and her hair is possibly worse than mine.

So then the judge introduces the defendant, that we're going to be queried on whether or not we are suitable as his jury. He has to turn and say his name. He's stuffed into a wrinkly, striped shirt, has a big scar and something about him right away gives me the creepy willies. He looks at us all, and sort of smirks for a moment. His neck is the size of a ham and his shaved head has skin folds that shove their way into that wrinkled, cheap shirt. And then the judge tells us that the case is for felony child molestation. He's the accused, and accused for crimes too heinous to type. If I did, you'd cry. There's sort of a collective vacuum as all the air in the stuffy courtroom gets sucked up, because I'm pretty sure everybody thinks the exact same thing. All at the same time. That the guy is a slimeball and let's just string him up right now.

I guess? Or maybe they're better, more fair American citizens than me and I just imagined that. The judge said we were supposed to be impartial and wait for the evidence to be presented.

The overweight lady in the cat t-shirt next to me stops playing solitaire on her Blackberry and shoves it into her faded Hello Kitty tote.

The hunchy attorney in tweed is trying to get him off. Squinty eyes bowtie wants to prosecute. Bailiff glares and the judge says it again. Jurors need to remain impartial and base their decisions on the evidence that will be presented.

Because of the delicate nature of the case, and the questioning, we're once again sent to the hallway to be packed and sweltered and led back to the courtroom one by one for questioning. This takes a long time. I go home on the lunch break, and come back for more packing and sweltering and waiting for my turn. I sit next to the monk again and he keeps scooting away from me, sliding down the remaining millimeters on the bench, finally grabbing his backpack from between us and wedging it firmly onto his lap with an exasperated little hiss. Do I look like a monk robber? Never did see what he was reading. Good citizens don't talk in the hallway there, and for hours you can hear a pin drop as everyone waits their turn to go in for questioning.

When it's my turn, I only last a second up there, on the stand. Which is just a red rolling office chair, adjusted a little bit too high. My feet sort of swing and don't touch the floor. I sneak a look over at the guy, and when asked about my ability to remain impartial, apparently something about the ugly daggers shooting out my eyeballs at the attorney and at fatty scarface guy are enough, combined with whatever it is I spit out at the judge, that I'm excused within moments. I KNOW he's innocent til proven guilty, but it was not all I could do to yell out at him, "I hate you, evil, ham necked child molester and your evidence twisting tweed wearing attorney!" and ask to please just have him shot by the bailiff asap.

Like I said. I am a bad citizen. And a bad liar. So when asked whether I could be impartial, something about him just made me all seether and that was that.

I thought about it, the whole time waiting in the hallway, wedged onto the bench. I was just listening to the radio about Justice Sotomayor on the way there, who is always fair and in good temper. Try to be unbiased and hear him out and make an informed good citizen decision, if selected onto his jury. I know how I felt in court. But being innocent for walking dogs vs. being accused of child molesting, we're not talking apples vs. oranges here. Apples vs. a stinking, hulking, damaging ogre more like it.

So that was that. Don't know who, of my peers sitting out there on the sweaty, sunny bench in the hallway, will have to make that judgement. The monk? Lady with the giant Balenciaga bag that is totally a knock off? Guy that looked like Lurch in all leather ensemble? Some of those khaki wearing bluetooth ear guys standing by the window? Didn't hang around to find out.

I just walked away.

Ask Otterpop. Which is always a scarey proposition.

Laura: Hello Otterpop. Today we walked to the beach at low tide, where you ran and ran and ran. We then drove up to Forest Agility where you practiced a million hard gambles including turning out of a serpentine to a jump 100 miles away. And then you ran next to the bike all the way to the soccer field where you chased the tennis ball and glowered at the other dogs chasing their tennis balls on the other side of the field and then ran next to the bike all the way home. Yet you seem to be so not tired? Otterpop, do you ever get tired?

Otterpop: Is someone cooking burritos in the house?


Laura: Did you know Scott Chamberlin is coming to judge the August trial and the Regionals the weekend after? He is going to be watching, staring, and running after you on your dogwalk contact which you are actually in an occasional missing of phase at the moment. Are you aware of this, Otterpop? Scott Chamberlin, 2 weeks in a row?

Otterpop: I hate these stupid succulents. They are ugly and Otterpop doesn't need them.


Laura: Otterpop, your distance work today was so incredible. Your turns away from me so precise, never a waver on your out. I kept setting harder and harder gamble ideas, along the lines of "Hobbes could do this but Otterpop can't" and you just kept knocking them out. One after another. The other dogs were getting hot and tired and wanted to lay in the shade and all you could do was more. More. MORE. MORE!!!! So Otterpop. Could you do this at the next few dog shows and get those stupid 3 Gamblers Q's to finish your ADCh?

Otterpop: Otterpop cannot hear your words because Otterpop is humming a brain tune right now.


Laura: Otterpop, I could write something really embarrassing here about you right now. Like how you totally like to sit in my lap and that you want your name changed to Butterscotch. But I suspect you would rather have me write about how you scare off the mailman whenever you can and keep naughty horses in line and are learning how to explode things via telekinesis. Anything that you want to add to the end of your interview?

Otterpop: Otterpop is not listening to you because if Otterpop can make the camera lense explode Otterop won't be stayed anymore in the succulents and can have all the burritos.