You know what they say - a bad day at a dog show is better than a good day at work and Ruby and I had a good day at the Catoctin Kennel Club's Rally Trial today.  In spite of getting a late start, and then hitting a detour in the last few miles that took us 15 minutes out of our way, we managed to get to the trial before our class was over.  They stuck us in at the end and I ran back out to the van to get Ruby.  By the time we got back into the building, everyone else was done and they were waiting for us.  All flustered, we went in the ring without even having a chance to see the course plan.  We had to sight-read the course.  While it was not pretty, there were only two sits in the course and we got both of them.  The last sign before the end was "Sit, fast forward from the sit" and when I gave Ruby the command to heel, she jumped straight up and then rushed across the finish line and then bounced a couple more times.  This was a BIG hit with the gallery.  I'm so lucky that Ruby has fun at everything we do including obedience, she just doesn't take any of it seriously.  We managed to score an 81, which is nicely above the minimum of 70 to qualify.  So we got the third and final leg on Ruby's Rally Novice title, and can now put the letters RN behind her name.  What a great way to finish off the year!  The drive home seemed to pass very quickly.

~~Joanne