A long day in dogs!

Aretha, my nearly-two-year-old girl, was entered at the Seattle Kennel Club today. Luck of the draw, we had an 8 AM ring time. Since I live an hour + away, it was an early morning.

We were also invited to participate in Meet the Breed, an educational event put on by the kennel club. The breed club (in our case, the Basset Hound Club of Greater Seattle), is asked to supply 2 to 4 dogs of the breed, and you gather in a ring set up for the purpose so members of the general public can come by and meet the dogs, talk with you about them, and get their questions answered. To fill out the numbers, I took Emmy as well as Aretha, although Emmy was not entered in the show. Another member of the club brought her girl as well.

As far as Aretha was concerned, this was definitely the day's highlight. A lot of families with children come to Meet the Breed, and she spent a happy forty minutes or so kissing babies (she'd make a GREAT political candidate!), having her ears and belly rubbed, and generally being fussed over. I'm sure if she could speak, she'd tell me that she'd like it if the judges took this approach at dog shows also.

Emmy also enjoyed the attention, and in all, the girls had a great day. After all that, we bundled back up in the car, and headed home.

Alas, rest was brief. By 1 PM, I was back on the road again, this time in my rescue mode. Zoe, a sweet eight or nine year old girl, came into the Olympia shelter the other day as a stray. She was microchipped, so the shelter was able to contact her owners. They decided not to come get her, as they say she has been climbing the fence and getting out of the yard. Personally, I'm not sure how an elder Basset girl is climbing fences, but perhaps it's not very tall.

Anyway, she needs a home, so off I went to the Olympia shelter, picked her up, and went straight back to the show to drop her off with her new foster dad. Had I not had such an early morning in the ring, I could have done it all in one trip, but instead, it was another 120 miles round-trip to get her up to Seattle.

Tomorrow looms with another 8 AM ring time. And tonight is the change over to Daylight Savings Time, so I lose an hour. Thank goodness for the 24 hour Starbucks about 20 minutes up the road towards Seattle!