Posted on 12/24/2004 8:51:48 AM PST by Mo1
Picture taken Monday January 10, 2005 at Gerberoy, France
Welcome to our parlor little girl.
That's really interesting about the eagles and crows.
There were mud flats like that near the Olympia/Shelton area of Washington, too, at an inlet of Puget Sound. I recall a woman was trapped by the tide and the deep mud and drowned there about 20 years ago.
So am I dial up.........
Cats prove agility trials not just Fido's turf
By REBECCA JONES, Scripps Howard News Service
January 11, 2005
Anything dogs can do, cats can do if and when it suits their purposes and not a second sooner.
Lots of dogs participate in the sport of agility - running through tunnels, bounding over hurdles, leaping through hoops, all for the praise of their master and the yummy treat that surely awaits them at the end. Agility, which made its debut in 1978 in England, is said to be the fastest-growing dog sport in the world.
Put a cat on an agility course and mostly what you get is frantic owners pleading with their pets, shaking sparkly, feathery toys in a futile attempt to coax the cat around the course. The cat may or may not deign to cooperate, depending on its mood.
Scoff, you naysayers and dog-lovers! The International Cat Agility Tournaments launched its first national tour last summer anyway, and a handful of never-say-die cat-lovers are determined to bring the sport of cat agility to the masses.
Cat agility consists of running a cat through a basic, intermediate or advanced-level obstacle course. Cats are given three minutes to negotiate all the obstacles. Their handlers may use toys to entice the cats around the course but must not touch the animals or yell at them in a harsh voice.
"It's a lot of fun because at this point it's just getting off the ground," says Arnold Farley of the High on Cats Cat Club and the guru of cat agility in the Denver, Colo., area. The cat club recently bought a set of cat agility equipment - 11 obstacles in all - and members have been practicing.
More than a few cat-lovers got hooked on the sport when the club set up the agility course at the High on Cats cat show last summer.
"We thought it would add another dimension to our cat shows, beyond being just a beauty pageant," says Farley.
Watching novice feline athletes can be a delight to spectators, even if their handlers find it like, well, like herding cats.
When Linda Knudsen plopped her friend's Ragdoll, Sherman, into the agility ring at the cat show for the first time, Sherman immediately began running - in the wrong direction.
Knudsen finally coaxed Sherman onto the first ramp. He jumped off.
She chased him around the ring, finally caught him and placed him at the opening of the first tunnel. He took off in the other direction to stroll around the ring, to the applause of admirers.
Finally, she got him through the first tunnel, and he came to the second tunnel. Nothing doing. He'd have no part of going in there. But he did jump over a hurdle.
He went through the first weave pole beautifully, then skipped all the rest of the poles, heading directly to Tunnel Four, which he went through the wrong way.
Twenty minutes later, a sweating Knudsen exited the ring with 10-month-old Sherman in her arms. "At least he moved," she said, putting Sherman's less-than-stellar effort into the best possible light. "The cat before us just sat there."
But if Knudsen had a frustrating time of it, cat owner Jeanne Anderson of Golden, Colo., says she and two friends are so enamored of cat agility that they plan on investing in their own equipment.
"We first heard of it at a cat show in Houston last November," Anderson says. "We just laughed. But once we tried it with our cats, it went much better than we anticipated. The ones who like to play just thought it was great fun."
The females, she noted, seemed to perform much better than the males.
"They did real well running through the tubes and the carpeted things," Anderson says. "But that jump and the hoops - those were our stumbling blocks. We have to get them more into that."
Suzanne Jeanmenne brought her Maine coon, Ziggy, all the way to Denver from Chicago just for the agility tournament. "He hates regular cat shows," says Jeanmenne. "He doesn't like to be handled. But he loves agility."
Jeanmenne and Ziggy spend 20 minutes a day training, jumping over chairs and hoops she's set up in her living room. "Now he's so fast I have to use a laser pointer just to keep up with him," she says.
Hi Val!! Remember some months ago when I mentioned the supplement MSM? It honestly works wonders with arthritic pain and as a benefit it makes your hair get thicker and your nails get strong and grow. I cannot believe how my fingernails have grown. They were always soft and would tear (ouch). Now they are weapons LOL It doesn't work overnight but I have been taking it for 18 months now and it is definitely working. I have arthritis in my right shoulder as well. It doesn't heal it but it certainly relieves the pain after a while and it stops the progession of the arthritis. You should be able to purchase it at any pharmacy or health food store!! I take 8,000 mgm a day. They come in 1000 mgm tabs.
You follow my meaning.
That little porker knows it's his last day.
What did they clip your other posts for, Reuters copyrights?
Good morning all. Actually it's afternoon. I LOVE Steve Emerson. He really knows his stuff. So does Douglas Farah. I will certainly read through that site prairiebreeze. Thanks.
No it was not clip I asked it to be deleted because one was not programed right and the other was a duplicated!
My Word (") is different than the one....that is on the posting board so it won't take!
WORD </img src=
POST </img src="
Boy snow or rain, they can ALL do big damage huh? I saw these pictures on the news this morning. It's terrible. I don't think that man and wife need to "assess" the damage to their swimming pool - it's toast!!
That swimming pool things is a mystery in my mind..
I always think MSM means MainStream Media *LOL*
I'll look for it next time I'm in the store.
LOL I forgot that. But THIS MSM is a sulphur preparation. It was developed by Medical Doctors so it's not just some health food or naturopath scam.
Why should I have all the fun?
I know of a high quality and greater consentration...
Andrew Lessmans M.S.M. BENEFITS
delivers a concentrated source of a vital, but often overlooked dietary component - Sulfur. The initials M.S.M. stand for Methylsulfonylmethane, which is a simple organic molecule that is built around the sulfur atom that it readily donates. Sulfur is important to your body because it is a vital structural component in the connective tissues that comprise all our joints, as well as the tissues of our hair, skin and nails. In fact, it is sulfurs unique ability to create disulfide linkages that allows tissues like our joints and skin to retain their structural integrity, along with their youthful, desirable elastic properties....con't
http://www.yourvitamins.com/YVI.Web/(3efdcb55hlja1s45o0jc2155)/Pages/Order/Products/SelectProduct.aspx?pid=268435548
You get more bang and quailty for your buck!
Good heavens is that -44 degrees wind chill? Brrrrrrrrr!
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