I'm new too

Hello, I registered here a few weeks ago, but haven't posted until today. I post at www.skatingforums.com under the same username. I also used to post at www.fsworld.com, before they tried to make everyone pay to use the boards.

I'm female, I live in Ontario and I will be turning 21 in a couple weeks. I love dogs and have a gorgeous, lively female Sheltie who is almost two years old. I'm planning to begin university next September.


My all-time favourite skater is Michelle Kwan. I actually came to check out this board when a poster at skatingforums mentioned that a lot of Kwan fans posted here. I also like that this board has more discussion of current skating events than skatingforums.

Some of my other favourite eligible skaters are Cohen, Sandhu, Honda, Shen & Zhao, Langlois & Archetto, and Suguri. I enjoy a lot of others too.

Hi Spark!

I am new too. I just found this site about a week ago, and was so encouraged by the wonderful warm welcome I got here! So...just want to pass that warm welcome along to a fellow "newbie!"

Of course I'm always glad to meet a fellow doggy lover! Shelties are adoreable - what's her name? Will she be able to go with you to university? (or maybe you don't have to move...)

Have you ever been a skater, or just a fan like me? LOL I couldn't crawl around the rink one time on my hands and knees without falling on my face. That makes it a little tough to be critical of these wonderful elite skaters.

I'm right there with you on your favorites list. Look forward to getting to know you better! OH to be 21 again. I will be celebrating the 16th anniversary of my 29th birthday come March.

Doggygirl

Welcome Spark and Doggygirl! And thanks for telling us a little about yourselves. Hope you enjoy GS and feel free to contribute your opinions.

BTW, I'm a Basenji girl myself. I know, they're dead last on that "dog's intelligence" list, but at least with the Basenji, pug, terrier, and who-knows-what mix we had for 12 years, she was the most loving, gentle, personable, and adorable dog we'd ever had--and we'd had about four before her.

BTW, you may see references to Rgirl and Rgal. Rgirl is me and Rgal is Realtorgal. We discovered on GS that we must have been separated at birth, lol. As for my age, I'm 47 going on 48. The last time I was in a regular university was 1985 getting a master's in sports medicine. In '77 I got a Bachelor's of Fine Arts in modern dance with a minor in English and then danced with a professional company based in Salt Lake City called Repertory Dance Theatre. But the most intensive learning experience I had was in the early '90s in a private class in writing prose fiction taught by Gordon Lish. Also took classes in organic chemistry and a couple of levels of physics at SUNY Stony Brook in my early 30s. Although I enjoyed getting my BFA and MS, I really enjoyed going back to school, whether university or privite, in my 30s and 40s. I've also learned an awfully lot from people here. My only point is that I've enjoyed learning all along the way, but especially as I've gotten older.

OTOH, I sure had fun being a wild Rgirl when I was in my early 20s, lol. I've always felt that was just as important as anything else. I hope you're both enjoying being 21. Not that you have to be wild, just enjoy!
Rgirl

Oops...

...guess I'm more mathematically challenged than I thought (or in denial LOL). That will be my 17th anniversary of my 29th birthday in March. LOL RGirl - that makes me almost 46. I'm right there with ya remembering those WILD early 20's days fondly!

It sounds like you've had a very interesting educational adventure through your life. GOOD FOR YOU - we are never too old. It must have been exciting to dance with a real professional company. Do you still dance? What kinds?

It does seem like the IQ on this board is much higher than average. Maybe I was destined to find you all - I think my Statistics teacher must have put a curse on me about 28 years ago LOL! I look forward to learning from everyone here and enjoying life along the way.

I'm not much into astrology myself, but a dear friend of mine is. She always "warns me" when Mercury goes into retrograde. Supposedly that is a time when small but irritating mishaps just abound. Shipping errors, communication related misunderstandings, sort of like Murphy's Law. Mercury went into retrograte on 12/17.

I won't mention the prior day's mishaps, but here's today. The cable downstairs where the bigger screens are went out at 6:30AM. Watching figure skating on TV is literally my ONLY real sports watching passion. Luckily, the bedroom TV is still working. Then about 2/3 of the way through Emanuel's program, which was awesome to watch, in comes the "news break" with the elevated security alert.

I'm still waiting for some Christmas gifts that are being shipped, and LOL I don't even want to think about what's in store there. I don't know about the rest of astrology, but I'm beginning to think there really is something to this whole Mercury / retrograde business.

Mean time Rgirl, it's cool that you are a doggy lover too!!!!

Thanks for the warm welcome!

DG

Well, thank you for the welcome, rgirl and doggygirl.

If all goes according to plan, I'll be hanging out at home during university. My mother actually works for a photography place in the university, so I'll get a discount on my tuition if I go to the university in my hometown. So I'll be able to stay with my doggie.

My dog's name is Shelby. She's big for her breed (30-35 pounds) and she's a "tri-factored sable", meaning she's golden with black overtop.

FYI, Basenji's were actually second to last on the "Obedience Intelligence" ranking. Afghan Hounds were dead last. Stanley Coren, the man who came up with the list, said that the rankings were really a measure of how trainable a dog is, not it's overall intelligence. Some dogs are fast learners, but are just not that attentive to humans or motivated to obey them, and those dogs would be slower to learn new commands and rank low on Coren's list.

I was quite annoyed at the interruption during the GPF today, especially after hearing that other sports being shown at the same time didn't have any such break. :\

Hey Spark, glad you're a GS member now.......hope you become a regular poster.......42

Hi again...

Spark, I hear you on the frustration with that interuption yesterday! I can't believe I had to miss 1/2 of Sandhu and all of Plushy - that's what I missed in my time zone anyway. Not sure if we're in the same zone.

Shelby is a cute name! LOL on your description of obedience v. intelligence. Just for kicks, here's an assessment of my pack:

Greyhound: Very motivated to please his humans. Dumb as a rock in many respects (and limited physical capability for some things like sitting). But easy to be around because he WANTS to please.

Beagle: Motivated to chase squirrels and when outside, shuts ears off to humans. Will grudgingly mind in the house, but gives you that Beagle look like "MOM, you're KILLING me!!"

Mix Mutt: Very smart. Can open doors and do all kinds of things she's figured out. Limited motivation to work for things like treats or most toys. Will work for frisbee tosses. She understands all kinds of commands, but likes to consider it, and make her own decisions. From what I've read about various dog breeds, her personality favors herding dogs where it's desireable to have a smart dog that can think for itself. We have had GREAT success on one important thing - reliably responding to the "come" command from a couple acres away using an electronic collar. I was hesitant to use that, but under the guidance of our trainer she now comes when called, no matter the distance on command. And she's smart enough where she didn't get too many zaps to figure it out.

German Shepherd Pup: She's smart, but it will be up to us as to how obedient she will become. Already a real smarty pants.

I think the GS pup has the highest potential for intelligence AND obedience.

How bout others?

DG

Welcome Spark and Doggygirl!

Spark--Shelties are so intelligent. I met one at a PetSmart who shook my hands without being prompted.

Doggygirl--Yes, based on my short time here, the posters are quite intelligentand helpful. Some boards I wouldn't are post on! Lurking was scary enough.

My Shelby is a real sweetheart. She learns commands very quickly because she pays close attention to me and is very motivated by almost anything: games, food, toys, praise, petting, whatever's available. She'd know dozens of tricks if I had the will to teach them to her. I brought her home when she was eight weeks old and started teaching her to sit for her food almost immediately. In just a couple days, she would walk up to anyone eating a snack in the kitchen, walk around to the front of them, and sit, looking up angelically. My mother could never resist that, which only encouraged her even more. Now she'll do other things for a treat: speak, roll over, shake, give five. If I hold up a treat and ask her "What's one plus one?", she'll bark twice. I can balance food on her nose, and she'll hold still until I tell her okay, when she'll toss the food up into the air and catch it about eighty percent of the time. I had her balancing eggs on her nose (cooked ones) around Easter this year, which was much harder for her because they can roll off. Also, she can't eat them, so I'd have to take them off her nose and just feed her a treat.

I've read that dogs that were bred to work WITH humans tend to be more attentive to what people want from them than breeds that were developed to work seperately from humans. Herding breeds like Shelties and German Shepherds, or Sporting breeds like goldens and labs, are therefore the most trainable. Hounds and terriers, on the other hand, are more "independent". Also, some breeds pay more attention to what's going on around them. Border Collies, who are considered the most trainable breed of all, are also known to be extremely active and excitable. We used to have a Border Collie, and ANYTHING that moved could put him into a frenzy. He was just superalert to everything. A dog like that probably would learn quickly, just because he's not likely to miss very much. My Sheltie's like that too, but not quite to the same extent. Still, it's not difficult to get her worked up. I had her in obedience classes as a pup, and at one thing we practiced was playing with our dog and getting the dog to settle down on command. Some people had trouble getting their dogs engaged in play. Not me! All I had to do was scuffle my feet around a bit, and Shelby would be running around my legs, barking nonstop. The instructor's told me the circling and yapping was the "herding instinct" in her. Herding dogs are bred to be stimulated by movement.

Sometimes her eagerness can get in the way of her figuring something out. For example, I sometimes play a game like hide-and seek with her. I'd have her sit and stay, then go into another room and hide a toy of hers (usually her Kong). Then I'd tell her to find it. She could actually find the Kong faster when she was first learning the game. Now she often gets so excited she'll pace back and forth, sniffing the same areas of the room over and over and whining. I also think I'd have problems teaching her the more "math" tricks. Since she knows one plus one, I've thought of teaching her one plus two, one plus three, etc. But she usually starts barking before I've finished the question. I start to say, "What's o-" and she'll already be going, "RUFF! RUFF!" So I don't know how I could teach her any more tricks like that.

I just want to say welcome to the board Spark!