Monday, June 05, 2006
Full-To-The-Brim Weekend
Yes, I am just a little bit crazy. And this past weekend is testimony to the fact of it! I went to Snow Camp, NC, on Saturday for a single show, and then drove directly to Pennsylvania for a double on Sunday.
But it was worth it.
The first show was held on a huge farm under tremendous trees in the fresh air. Except for a three-minute rain, it was perfect weather. There were 47 Hollands in open, so, for a picnic show, it was a great turnout.
I was very pleased with my show results. I was able to grand The Nature Trail's Leo with a BOSG. Leo was the buck that placed third at Nationals. He's just about 8 months old, having turned senior a few days after Nationals. That makes him now part of my all-grand-champion-pedigree project. He's already got kits with GC The Nature Trail's Markie.
I also granded The Nature Trail's Panache, with a BOG. She has two BOS awards and now a BOG. Not a bad way to grand. Oh, and she also placed 6th at Nationals. But now she will be semi-retired to production. I hope she's pregnant by Thursday!
I misplaced my comment card, but I do believe that The Nature Trail's Anson, solid junior buck, got his first leg. He's out of Ox and Hilary, both grand champions. If he fulfills the promise he's showing now, he might be one that will become a second generation The Nature Trail's grand champion. I have my fingers crossed.
Congratulations to my dear friend Linda Norris who won the Best of Breed with her solid doe!
I left the show just a few minutes later than I had hoped. I would have loved to stay and visit for much longer. It was so good to see Janice Jones back at the rabbit shows. She braved the lack of a paved surface to attend with her leg in a cast and a wheel chair that couldn't be rolled on the ground.
I'm sure that everyone who attended must have had a grand time. The weather was wonderful, the youth awards were fun (and delicious). The attitude was light and merry. But I had to get on the road.
Apparently, there is no good way to get from Snow Camp, NC, to State College, PA. By way of comparison, I can get from my house to Atlanta, GA, in seven turns, including the one from my driveway. It took about 45 turns to make the trip to State College. And the directions I had did not anticipate a lot of the road construction along the way.
After making about 15 turns in Greensboro, I guess it was, I finally made it through to I-81 and cruised north for 160 miles or so. That's when the "Service Engine Soon" light came on. Drats. It had been on before and we had the car serviced. Replacing a valve (I think that's what it was) was supposed to have fixed this. Now I'm expecting my engine to fall out at any minute. But I trudge on anyway.
By the time we left I-81, Anna, my trusty travel partner, started coughing rather badly. She sounded quite wheezy to me. By the time we hit the really bad construction zone, it started getting dark. And it started raining. By now, Anna is running a fever and feeling a little panicky because she can't breath well.
The cones on the road seemed to indicate that all traffic must exit. We ended up in a little community in the middle of nowhere. Anna gets very nervous when I whip out the map. She's afraid we're lost and she's young enough to believe in her heart that it might be permanent. But we retraced our steps and I realized that the cones would have allowed me to drive on the shoulder for awhile and continue on through the construction zone a bit more.
But then suddenly, we were in a small town with no signs to the next part of the highway. So we stopped at a convenience store. Anna was so sick by then that the store manager gave her a Popsicle. We purchased some medication, too, to try to get her through. The kind woman was much better at sympathy than giving directions, however.
"Go up - I'm going to say six lights (there went my confidence) and turn right. Then after awhile you'll turn left. When there's a choice, fork left and then you'll go by [some name] market. Drive by the stadium and then you'll be close to the highway and there will probably be some signs."
I got as much detail from her as I could wrestle and set off again, in the dark, in the rain, with bad instructions, with a sick child, and a warning light on in my car after nine hours on the road and having shown at a single show that morning, which started out with a two-hour drive of its own.
Magically, I found the turns and saw the stadium. I'm thinking that I'm home free when I realize there's a game on and there's a man standing in front of me with a flash light signaling for me to turn right. But I have to go straight! It's my only chance to see the signs and find the highway again. I don't know the way to the right. So I just sit there, trying to figure out how to get some help. He signals me again. More slowly and more exaggerated. I'm trying not to panic. Now my gasoline gauge is getting low and he's waving me into a neighborhood side street.
But now he is shaking his head "yes" and waving more emphatically as if to say, "Yes, lady, I do mean you. Turn right." So I turn.
I am not sure what happened next except that I realized in the nick of time that the next major intersection only gave stop signs to three of the four approaching roads in a strange tangent of an intersection. I definitely cheated death then. So I wandered for another several minutes before "The Highway" came into sight. A few minute later, we were on a beautiful highway that seemed to say, "Now what was all of that fuss about?"
And then we hit construction again and we were back into two lanes, cones, bumps, and no shoulder for the rest of the trip.
We got into State College after 10:30 that night. I found West College AVenue and followed it out until the business district petered out and we appeared to be leaving town. So I turned around and pulled into a Waffle Shop parking lot to call for directions. The first information I got sounded as if I needed to drive back toward town, which I did. But I pulled over again to be sure. Nope, it was toward town. Then, no, that's not right either. So I headed back out of town again. As it ended up, the motel was within a 1/2 " of being entirely off of the map of State College that I had. After the dead zone we had turned around in, there was another more remote business district. So we finally arrived, in the dark, in the rain, with a sick child, and the engine light on at our motel at 11:15 pm.
And then we got up at 6:00 a.m. Anna was burning with a fever.
So, we got up and I medicated her. I gave her the option of just going home, but she said she wanted to try to make it. So we trotted off to the show.
Luckily, by mid-morning her fever broke and she started feeling somewhat better.
There was a nice group of Holland breeders at the show. I first saw Henry Sabetti, followed by Krys Kolivras, Cass Kinnear, Salena Haas, Mike Calhoun, Jenna Buchenauer, Shari & Sam Albrecht, and several others.
Our first judge was Everett Hopper. I was very pleased since I feel that Everett has strong Holland skills and I rarely ever get to show under him. The second judge was Robert Frizzell, which I was thrilled about. I haven't had him in a long time, except at the PA Convention, and it was too hectic there to hear any comments.
However, the folks in that region had had him something like six times this year, so they asked for a change of judge. I was personally very disappointed, but I so understand the frustration of having the same judges over and over and over again. At least they are lucky to have some strong Holland judges over and over.
So we had Pam Nock for the second judge, still a good choice for Hollands.
I did a bit better under Everett than Pam. I showed in six classes (no broken senior bucks or broken junior does for me this time). The Nature Trail's Quincy, solid junior buck out of two Merlin offspring, Q and Spice, took his class of eleven rabbits. MILK, a black buck out of Merlin and Roxie, came in second and was pronounced "a very correct Holland."
[I have big hopes for that guy because his parents and grandparents are all grand champions. If he grands, he could take me down to the third generation! That would be a great asset for my all-grand-champion pedigree project.]
Then in the solid junior doe class, The Nature Trail's Padme, Picante, and Quinn took first, second, and third, respectively, in a class of ten. Padme and Picante are half-sister through their father Rio. Quinn is Quincy's sister.
You may remember awhile back when May had a litter of six that contained three fuzzy charlies. The fourth rabbit was a broken that died. The fifth rabbit from the litter was a false dwarf buck. And the sixth was Padme. I've been very excited about her. She made the whole litter worth it.
The Nature Trail's Panache took the broken senior doe class, but there were only four, so she didn't get another leg.
The Nature Trail's Myrddin, that little broken buck I took to Nationals at just 3 months who got the "NICE" on his comment card, took his class of seven.
I was very excited when Myrrdin was picked BOG and Padme was chosen BOSG. Myrrdin couldn't beat Mike Calhoun's solid senior buck who took the BOB (congratulations Mike), but Padme was chosen BOS!
Under Pam Nock, placements really changed a lot, for the most part. Three of my young senior bucks placed in the top five in a class of 18 (only two had under Everett). I'm very pleased with that because of their ages. They are still so young.
She just wasn't impressed with my junior bucks at all. She did pick Padme for her class. That was the one consistent placement, I think, between the two judges.
She placed Sakata as first, noting her body. Sakata was my second place rabbit at Nationals. If I can get that body with a wider crown, I will really have something.
This time, I was assured the BOS because Padme and Sakata were both chosen as BOSGs. Padme once again took the BOS. Congratulations to Jenna and Shaggy for the Best of Breed.
We left the show at about 4:15 p.m. in the rain. The trip home wasn't nearly as eventful once we drove past the bad weather. We did see a huge rainbow behind us as we moved out of the rain.
Anna was feeling better and I had started ignoring the warning light on the car. I had a couple of very rare cups of coffee (my first cups this year, I'm pretty sure). I probably thought about rabbits for 6 of the 8 + hours home. The only somewhat exciting thing that happened was that my gasoline warning light came on just as I left I-77. I passed several closed gas stations and one open one - but there were people in the parking lot setting fires (I do NOT know what that was about), so I figured I'd pass. I'm sure I made it home at 12:30 a.m. on fumes and prayers.
So, I had a great time visiting with friends in District 9, north and south, a little too much excitement, granded three rabbits (numbers 17, 18, and 19 for this fiscal year), earned a herdsman point and two quality points, and picked up three junior legs as well. Not bad for one 42-hour period.
Laurie Stroupe
The Nature Trail Rabbitry
Precious Pet Rabbits
Affordable Web Site Design
¶ 10:36 AM
But it was worth it.
The first show was held on a huge farm under tremendous trees in the fresh air. Except for a three-minute rain, it was perfect weather. There were 47 Hollands in open, so, for a picnic show, it was a great turnout.
I was very pleased with my show results. I was able to grand The Nature Trail's Leo with a BOSG. Leo was the buck that placed third at Nationals. He's just about 8 months old, having turned senior a few days after Nationals. That makes him now part of my all-grand-champion-pedigree project. He's already got kits with GC The Nature Trail's Markie.
I also granded The Nature Trail's Panache, with a BOG. She has two BOS awards and now a BOG. Not a bad way to grand. Oh, and she also placed 6th at Nationals. But now she will be semi-retired to production. I hope she's pregnant by Thursday!
I misplaced my comment card, but I do believe that The Nature Trail's Anson, solid junior buck, got his first leg. He's out of Ox and Hilary, both grand champions. If he fulfills the promise he's showing now, he might be one that will become a second generation The Nature Trail's grand champion. I have my fingers crossed.
Congratulations to my dear friend Linda Norris who won the Best of Breed with her solid doe!
I left the show just a few minutes later than I had hoped. I would have loved to stay and visit for much longer. It was so good to see Janice Jones back at the rabbit shows. She braved the lack of a paved surface to attend with her leg in a cast and a wheel chair that couldn't be rolled on the ground.
I'm sure that everyone who attended must have had a grand time. The weather was wonderful, the youth awards were fun (and delicious). The attitude was light and merry. But I had to get on the road.
Apparently, there is no good way to get from Snow Camp, NC, to State College, PA. By way of comparison, I can get from my house to Atlanta, GA, in seven turns, including the one from my driveway. It took about 45 turns to make the trip to State College. And the directions I had did not anticipate a lot of the road construction along the way.
After making about 15 turns in Greensboro, I guess it was, I finally made it through to I-81 and cruised north for 160 miles or so. That's when the "Service Engine Soon" light came on. Drats. It had been on before and we had the car serviced. Replacing a valve (I think that's what it was) was supposed to have fixed this. Now I'm expecting my engine to fall out at any minute. But I trudge on anyway.
By the time we left I-81, Anna, my trusty travel partner, started coughing rather badly. She sounded quite wheezy to me. By the time we hit the really bad construction zone, it started getting dark. And it started raining. By now, Anna is running a fever and feeling a little panicky because she can't breath well.
The cones on the road seemed to indicate that all traffic must exit. We ended up in a little community in the middle of nowhere. Anna gets very nervous when I whip out the map. She's afraid we're lost and she's young enough to believe in her heart that it might be permanent. But we retraced our steps and I realized that the cones would have allowed me to drive on the shoulder for awhile and continue on through the construction zone a bit more.
But then suddenly, we were in a small town with no signs to the next part of the highway. So we stopped at a convenience store. Anna was so sick by then that the store manager gave her a Popsicle. We purchased some medication, too, to try to get her through. The kind woman was much better at sympathy than giving directions, however.
"Go up - I'm going to say six lights (there went my confidence) and turn right. Then after awhile you'll turn left. When there's a choice, fork left and then you'll go by [some name] market. Drive by the stadium and then you'll be close to the highway and there will probably be some signs."
I got as much detail from her as I could wrestle and set off again, in the dark, in the rain, with bad instructions, with a sick child, and a warning light on in my car after nine hours on the road and having shown at a single show that morning, which started out with a two-hour drive of its own.
Magically, I found the turns and saw the stadium. I'm thinking that I'm home free when I realize there's a game on and there's a man standing in front of me with a flash light signaling for me to turn right. But I have to go straight! It's my only chance to see the signs and find the highway again. I don't know the way to the right. So I just sit there, trying to figure out how to get some help. He signals me again. More slowly and more exaggerated. I'm trying not to panic. Now my gasoline gauge is getting low and he's waving me into a neighborhood side street.
But now he is shaking his head "yes" and waving more emphatically as if to say, "Yes, lady, I do mean you. Turn right." So I turn.
I am not sure what happened next except that I realized in the nick of time that the next major intersection only gave stop signs to three of the four approaching roads in a strange tangent of an intersection. I definitely cheated death then. So I wandered for another several minutes before "The Highway" came into sight. A few minute later, we were on a beautiful highway that seemed to say, "Now what was all of that fuss about?"
And then we hit construction again and we were back into two lanes, cones, bumps, and no shoulder for the rest of the trip.
We got into State College after 10:30 that night. I found West College AVenue and followed it out until the business district petered out and we appeared to be leaving town. So I turned around and pulled into a Waffle Shop parking lot to call for directions. The first information I got sounded as if I needed to drive back toward town, which I did. But I pulled over again to be sure. Nope, it was toward town. Then, no, that's not right either. So I headed back out of town again. As it ended up, the motel was within a 1/2 " of being entirely off of the map of State College that I had. After the dead zone we had turned around in, there was another more remote business district. So we finally arrived, in the dark, in the rain, with a sick child, and the engine light on at our motel at 11:15 pm.
And then we got up at 6:00 a.m. Anna was burning with a fever.
So, we got up and I medicated her. I gave her the option of just going home, but she said she wanted to try to make it. So we trotted off to the show.
Luckily, by mid-morning her fever broke and she started feeling somewhat better.
There was a nice group of Holland breeders at the show. I first saw Henry Sabetti, followed by Krys Kolivras, Cass Kinnear, Salena Haas, Mike Calhoun, Jenna Buchenauer, Shari & Sam Albrecht, and several others.
Our first judge was Everett Hopper. I was very pleased since I feel that Everett has strong Holland skills and I rarely ever get to show under him. The second judge was Robert Frizzell, which I was thrilled about. I haven't had him in a long time, except at the PA Convention, and it was too hectic there to hear any comments.
However, the folks in that region had had him something like six times this year, so they asked for a change of judge. I was personally very disappointed, but I so understand the frustration of having the same judges over and over and over again. At least they are lucky to have some strong Holland judges over and over.
So we had Pam Nock for the second judge, still a good choice for Hollands.
I did a bit better under Everett than Pam. I showed in six classes (no broken senior bucks or broken junior does for me this time). The Nature Trail's Quincy, solid junior buck out of two Merlin offspring, Q and Spice, took his class of eleven rabbits. MILK, a black buck out of Merlin and Roxie, came in second and was pronounced "a very correct Holland."
[I have big hopes for that guy because his parents and grandparents are all grand champions. If he grands, he could take me down to the third generation! That would be a great asset for my all-grand-champion pedigree project.]
Then in the solid junior doe class, The Nature Trail's Padme, Picante, and Quinn took first, second, and third, respectively, in a class of ten. Padme and Picante are half-sister through their father Rio. Quinn is Quincy's sister.
You may remember awhile back when May had a litter of six that contained three fuzzy charlies. The fourth rabbit was a broken that died. The fifth rabbit from the litter was a false dwarf buck. And the sixth was Padme. I've been very excited about her. She made the whole litter worth it.
The Nature Trail's Panache took the broken senior doe class, but there were only four, so she didn't get another leg.
The Nature Trail's Myrddin, that little broken buck I took to Nationals at just 3 months who got the "NICE" on his comment card, took his class of seven.
I was very excited when Myrrdin was picked BOG and Padme was chosen BOSG. Myrrdin couldn't beat Mike Calhoun's solid senior buck who took the BOB (congratulations Mike), but Padme was chosen BOS!
Under Pam Nock, placements really changed a lot, for the most part. Three of my young senior bucks placed in the top five in a class of 18 (only two had under Everett). I'm very pleased with that because of their ages. They are still so young.
She just wasn't impressed with my junior bucks at all. She did pick Padme for her class. That was the one consistent placement, I think, between the two judges.
She placed Sakata as first, noting her body. Sakata was my second place rabbit at Nationals. If I can get that body with a wider crown, I will really have something.
This time, I was assured the BOS because Padme and Sakata were both chosen as BOSGs. Padme once again took the BOS. Congratulations to Jenna and Shaggy for the Best of Breed.
We left the show at about 4:15 p.m. in the rain. The trip home wasn't nearly as eventful once we drove past the bad weather. We did see a huge rainbow behind us as we moved out of the rain.
Anna was feeling better and I had started ignoring the warning light on the car. I had a couple of very rare cups of coffee (my first cups this year, I'm pretty sure). I probably thought about rabbits for 6 of the 8 + hours home. The only somewhat exciting thing that happened was that my gasoline warning light came on just as I left I-77. I passed several closed gas stations and one open one - but there were people in the parking lot setting fires (I do NOT know what that was about), so I figured I'd pass. I'm sure I made it home at 12:30 a.m. on fumes and prayers.
So, I had a great time visiting with friends in District 9, north and south, a little too much excitement, granded three rabbits (numbers 17, 18, and 19 for this fiscal year), earned a herdsman point and two quality points, and picked up three junior legs as well. Not bad for one 42-hour period.
Laurie Stroupe
The Nature Trail Rabbitry
Precious Pet Rabbits
Affordable Web Site Design
¶ 10:36 AM
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Laurie..
Just so you know, when Laura and I stayed at your house after nationals, and we were going over litters of May and Roxie. The TWO babies that I had as pick of the litter of who would really bloom were both MILK and PADME! It looks like your hollands really did turn out how expected! I wish I could have been at State College but Lifeguarding Class prevented that. :(
CONGRATS though!
Your friend
Peter
Just so you know, when Laura and I stayed at your house after nationals, and we were going over litters of May and Roxie. The TWO babies that I had as pick of the litter of who would really bloom were both MILK and PADME! It looks like your hollands really did turn out how expected! I wish I could have been at State College but Lifeguarding Class prevented that. :(
CONGRATS though!
Your friend
Peter
My gosh Laurie! I got anxious just reading about your weekend. LOL Glad Anna is feeling better.
Alison
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Alison
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