Monday, June 16, 2008

This and That

Jim, Jim, Jim! What a special one this pup is already!!
(not a great picture, but it's Cruz and Jim in the same shot!)




Oh the joy of 2 days off in row!! I worked like a crazy person last week and paid for it. I worked 41 hours at work and tried out the plan of staying up when I got home and sleeping in the afternoon. Between the extra hours at work (1 morning OT and working a full shift on 2 of my 3 days off) and trying the new system at home I ran myself into the ground! I was a mess by Saturday. One day off on this shift does not work, but they really needed me, so I said okay.
The last 2 mornings I have gone to bed when I got home and did what I could do in the afternoon. That works so much better. I think staying up from say 3pm (on about 4 hours sleep) until 10-11am, to again only get 4 hours of sleep just wasn't going to work! Coupled with I don't sleep well during the middle of the day. Especially with the kids home. They can only be but so quiet for that long... Today is a day off and I slept until 11:30! Pretty late, (went to bed at 4:30am) but man I needed it! When I heard Dylan get up around 8:30 I asked him to put the sheep up and let the dogs out for me. I was so tired and sleeping so hard I woke myself up snoring a couple times!! LOL!! Yesterday it was 'cool' (used in relative terms) enough to work a few dogs in the afternoon. I played with Clare and Ivy and took videos of each. I'll download them this afternoon while I'm doing some other stuff. They're both such nice girls!

I think I need to look further into what I thought was wrong with Jim, as he seems to be improving. I'm still not ready to "tell the world", but just wanted the readers of my blog know he's still here and he's doing fine. He hasn't clicked on sheep yet, and because he has some problems, I have only let him see sheep a couple times. Now that he's getting bigger and stronger, I may start to expose him more often. He sure is a big, handsome pup- very striking! Temperament wise he is nearly all Cruz. He's unsure for a bit about new human arrivals (but could care less about dogs- like Cruz) and as far as what he does when I interact with him, he is ALL Cruz! His favorite thing to do to me is trot up behind me and shove his face between my legs. Not where some dogs shove their face, but just at his head level- right above my knees. Like Cruz he's a bit annoying to pet because it's never enough and he's never close enough. One touch means I must want him in my lap and it must mean I don't want to ever touch another dog... That is Cruz 110%! He's already showing so many Cruz trademarks!
Our evenings have been cooling off very nicely, so I'm looking forward to working dogs tonight and having dinner with my family! I have an extra 12' gate and an extra 4' gate that I'm going to use to make another chute. Right now I have a fenceline chute made with my 2, 8' panels. I'll use those to make a free standing chute and use the the 12' gate for a fenceline chute and use the 4' gate as an angled wing at one end. I like to do the fenceline chutes in a drive. Having a free standing chute set up keeps the dogs fresh on honest flanks. I have a permanent pen too, but I like to work the chute. My woolie ewes are never gimme's on chutes and pens, and some of them are really slick about squirting by the hole. I have very different sheep to pen pending which ewes I use, which is so nice. I'll get the new chutes set up this afternoon while the boys play in the pool. I tend to not leave panels and obstacles in one place for very long. I have 4 sets of short panels (they were 2 sets of normal size panels that I cut in half, which better suits my smaller area) and several different natural obstacles that I use as panels. I have Ella's and Carol's right now for big spaces, and should have the 30 acres across the road back by October or so. I need to go talk to David and see about leasing it this fall. He had told me this spring it would be fine as long as the man that rents his whole farm would not pass on renewing his lease because he would not have the 1, 30 acre field. (He must lease like 200 or more acres from David)

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