Violet is a Spokescollie!

So, just a couple of days ago I got a Facebook message from Marilyn, a fellow Indy volunteer for TriState Collie Rescue. She is also the treasurer of the organization, and I've met her a few times for hand-offs while transporting. Very, very nice lady. It just said that she had just left me a voicemail and it was urgent. I'd been lolling around on the couch, dying and doing homework (I have a cold), and the phone was buried in the couch cushions.

So I called her back and it turns out that TSCR was going to do an interview for a local news channel and they needed some Collie representatives. Marilyn was having hand surgery the day before the interviews, so she couldn't handle her dog as far as traveling is concerned, and her dog was also a Collie mix. I moved around a wedding dress fitting a little bit and said sure. Violet got recruited, along with two other Collies owned by a volunteer.

I won't lie, I was nervous. Several reasons, like:

1. Violet is a Collie. I don't know if you've met a Collie, but they bark.
2. Now and then, Violet hates people. 90% of the time she is your normal, happy, loving, gentle, sweet Collie, but occasionally, she meets someone that she just can't stand. Of course she's never aggressive, but she will bark, she will back away if they approach her, and she will not accept treats from them. There is no rhyme or reason to it. She hated the photographer for our engagement pictures, and I can tell you that the photographer was a very, very nice lady. I do not know what her deal is.
3. Violet has anxiety. We've found that melatonin vastly helps her remain at an even keel, but I'd be lying if I said that she didn't have a couple of issues.
4. I hate being on camera.
5. Oh, also I hardly have any voice. I've been sick all week and now I sound like a teenage boy at puberty.

So I said yes with the contingency that I didn't have to speak and that she'd be given a few minutes to acclimate to the room. I cut up a ton of little cocktail weenies and put them in a travel cup, gave her some melatonin and off we went, downtown.

She. Did. Amazingly.

Oh my gosh. I have never been more proud of that dog. We were there for nearly an hour before shooting, and she was calm, focused, working her commands, doing tricks, being sweet and friendly and perfect. She started to spook halfway through filming because a giant camera-thing on wheels (not attached to a person, just a free agent camera thing) started moving right toward the stage, but come on. She's a herding breed. Other than some jitters when we first started - she'd had tons of time to acclimate to the building and people but only about 45 seconds to acclimate to the actual room - she was so perfect.

You'll note that I had absolutely no idea where I was supposed to be looking, so I just looked everywhere, basically. Oh well. It's not an interview about adopting 24 year old social work students, so it's okay. The video:

Tristate Collie Rescue | indystyle.tv

You'd better believe, she got every last cocktail weenie when she was done. I feel like she's come a long way.

The Grinch's heart grew three sizes that day.

We took the Smooth Operator to Martinsville today, and brought Violet along for the ride. This was them all the way there.

When we got home, I took her out to the field to do some low-medium distraction proofing. She did phenomenally on heel. I have little confidence when it comes to heel, so I was very, very happy.

Ringing in 2012 with an overnight guest.

This morning, we got a call from Tri State Collie Rescue. I'd been planning to shoot them an e-mail next week to see if they had anything they needed help with, but they called out of the blue this morning and asked if we were available for a transport today. A litter of 10 week old Collie/mostly Collie pups had been brought to an Ohio shelter and one smooth sable male needed transport that would require the help of four volunteers to get him from his original location to what I assume is his foster home in Martinsville, IN, about an hour south of where we live. The woman who was pulling him from the shelter was waiting around near the shelter, which was an hour and a half from her house, to see if the rest of the transport chain would come together. She couldn't take him to her house for any length of time, she was battling Giardia with her own dogs. The lady after her was a go. We were a go. But the pick-up/foster in Martinsville couldn't do it tonight unless it was urgent. Which is how Smooth Operator, as Eric nicknamed him, ended up with us overnight, until we take him to Martinsville tomorrow afternoon. I'm thrilled that my dog is finally mostly an adult; I'm really not all that much of a puppy person. I enjoy adult dogs more...but it's been very fun having this sweet little guy around. He's underweight and has spent his whole life outdoors, but he is so...unbelievably...sweet. He's cuddly and loving to the point of clingy, he's the biggest kisser on the planet.

The adults are unsure about this interloper.

Violet reluctantly shares her water bowl.

Hungry pup.

His spot, all night.

Or here...between our his-and-hers sheep pjs.

Or here...

Maybe here, too...

And a little bit of here.

He's really, really adorable. I hope he ends up with a very happy home in 2012.

Speaking of which, 2012. It's going to be a really big year. This is the year that I will/intend to...

• Get married.
• Start a family.
• Lose a certain amount of weight, or if nothing else, better health is inevitable with frequent exercise and a revamped cooking plan.
• Compete with Violet for the first time.
• Watch Eric compete with Piper for the first time.
• Get Violet's CGC.
• Maybe give herding a go, if we can find the time.
• Start college.
• Buy a second car.
• Recarpet the house.
• Put up a privacy fence? Maybe/probably.
• Continue to volunteer at the daycare, and continue to do my small part to help Collies with TSCR.

I have never been so excited about a year in my life.

Volunteering and a Violet Video (how often can you use an alliteration with Vs?)

I haven't been updating for a few days because I have a heck of a winter cold. The short updates are these: Violet "gave paw" to my eye a day or two ago while I was laying on the bed with her, so I got a scratched, puffy eye for a while - she's lucky I love her. Ouch. I've started volunteering at the daycare that Mary used to run, and I'm pretty excited about that. I'm through the orientation process and start actually doing stuff on Tuesday. Today is my first assignment with Tri-State Collie Rescue. I'm very excited about that, even though it's actually a (large) Sheltie. We'll be transporting Cena, who's been pretty badly abused, to Seymour, IN, where he'll meet another volunteer for the next leg of his journey. We've got a big wire crate in the backseat, full of soft blankets and a peanut butter Kong. That's in a few hours, and I'll be blowing my nose all the way to Seymour.


In other news, here's a video of Violet's second day working on "Stay." Sorry about the low-quality and sick-voice, haha.

Positive Pamela? (Whoever's the opposite of Negative Nancy.)

So I talked to Sharon with TriState Collie Rescue to get the ball rolling on volunteering - transport, events, phone work - anything that's not fostering, because there is obviously no room in the inn - sign me up. I'm pretty excited about it. I'm pretty excited about everything, actually. I'm volunteering with my grandmother's church today to help set up for an upcoming bazarre. (Neither Collies nor bazarre set-up will do anything for my BSW application. But the hunt for relevant volunteer opportunities keeps taking me down "Oh, I want to do that!" avenues.) Peep and Violet are going to the dog park when Eric gets home from his doctor's appointment. And Thanksgiving is around the corner - which means deep cleaning that I look forward to, and a boatload of baking that I look forward to. Furthermore, my sister is looking at apartments in Greenwood, which would put her 20 minutes away rather than 33 (I don't know why 13 less seems big, but it does), which would be awesome. Also, I got the acceptance form for my scholarship, and yep - it is indeed $1,000 a semester, which is wonderful. Plus: we should be trying out St. John's contemporary service on Sunday, and I'm looking forward to that. I grew up attending traditional Lutheran services, and Eric grew up attending Catholic Mass (which is not unlike a traditional Lutheran service in style and tone), and I'm just intrigued to see how we both feel about a contemporary service. Dog park pictures, inevitably, to follow.

Sleepy Woo.