Stripping

(Woodinville, WA) Today was an interesting day for us. Even though we're very involved in dog sports we sure learned today that there is a whole dog world out there we know nothing about.

Our three big dogs are just "wash and wear" dogs. They don't need grooming - heck they rarely need a bath and I don't think any of them have ever been brushed.

Boogie on the other hand has to be stripped every three months or maybe four months. He was looking like Chewbacca (so Mike said) so it was definitely time for him to be stripped.

So we made arrangements to get this done by some very kind Border Terrier folks here in Washington. The days that were convenient for us they just happened to be up at Marymoor Park in Redmond at a large combination confirmation/agility trial.

We're lucky to get people to come watch agility trials and here everyone had to pay just to park! It was packed. There were rows and rows of RV's. We were so lucky when we arrived. It just so happened the very first row we walked down we found the trailer we were looking for. We were pretty sure we were at the right place as there were 14 Border Terriers there. Now that's a lot of dogs! I guess four isn't so many after all!

Charlotte and Robin were so very nice to us. They had a little 13 week old puppy there for Boogie to play with. Boy did they ever play hard. Boogie was a little scared at first but after a few minutes he really got into it. This little girl was only three weeks younger than Boogie yet she was only about 1/4 his size! They played for quite some time - she was still going strong when Boogie came to the side of the pen and started jumping up and down wanting to be saved! When I took him out he was panting so hard and she was still in there doing laps. Girls are tough!

With Boogie a little worn out it seemed like a good time to start his grooming. Charlotte started working on Boogie while trying to teach Mike how to do the task. I watched for a bit but then needed to walk around. So Mike stayed to learn about stripping while Wazzu and I went for a walk.

Much to our surprise there were LOTS of vendors there. There was so much stuff there and the prices were generally better than what you can get in the stores. But we didn't get to look around too much as we kept seeing all these people we know. I guess today was terrier day. There were 78 bull terriers of various kinds entered so we got to see a lot of Slugger-type dogs, many of who we knew. They are just way too cute!

Long story short, we were there about three hours. Boogie looks so much better - although a bit lopsided. They did the left side of Boogie and Mike did the right side. But who says being symmetrical is good anyway. Guess this stripping stuff takes a LOT of practice.

Charlotte walked us over to one of the vendors and showed us all the tools we needed to buy. So now we have tools - I sure hope Mike can remember what to do with all these different tools!

The rest of the day was spent getting back home! It took us two hours to get there yet about five hours to get home as the freeway was closed for a time due to a bad accident. At least we weren't in the accident!

Debbie
8/25/07