4th Groaner

In 1873, a team of German explorers and their three dogs decided to penetrate the heart of the South American jungle.

After twelve years, they had set up a fort in an Incan town, the centerpiece of which was a large idol with a huge ruby for an eye.

The German church had sent out their best man, Friar Wilhelm Werks, three times to check on the progress of the fort, and each time the appearance of the idol had sent him into fits of screaming, complete with shouts, curses, and rending of garments. Each time, he screamed so loudly that he sent the dogs running for cover. And each time, he left with a warning that the next time he visited, the idol had better be torn down.

The commander of the fort, Hans Brickner, received a message that Friar Werks would be coming to visit again in a fortnight. He quickly called a meeting with his top commanders. All five agreed that the friar would explode when he saw the idol still standing.

"But," said Commander Brickner, "there's nothing to be done.

If we take down the idol, we will anger the local tribe, and without their cooperation, we're dead."

His second-in-command, Herr Kommandant Wagner, said, "In that case, we'd better make sure we put the dogs away."

"Why?"

 

"You know how scared the dogs get when Friar Werks goes off on the Fort of Jewel Eye."

Rehatch

Remember today is the day we celebrate overthrowing a dictatorial monarch and embracing individual freedom and constitutional government.

Snowden

Oldie

On the outskirts of a small town, there was a big, old pecan tree just inside the cemetery fence.

One day, two boys filled up a bucketful of nuts and sat down by the tree, out of sight, and began dividing the nuts.

“One for you, one for me, one for you, one for me,” said one boy. Several dropped and rolled down toward the fence.

Another boy came riding along the road on his bicycle.

As he passed, he heard voices from inside the cemetery. He slowed down to investigate.

Sure enough, he heard, “One for you, one for me, one for you, one for me.”

He jumped back on his bike and rode off. Just around the bend he met an old man with a cane, hobbling along.

“Come here quick,” said the boy. “You won’t believe what I heard! Satan and the Lord are down at the cemetery dividing up the souls!”

The man said, “Beat it kid, can’t you see it’s hard for me to walk.”

When the boy insisted, the man hobbled slowly to the cemetery.

Standing by the fence they heard, “One for you, one for me. One for you, one for me.”

The old man whispered, “Boy, you’ve been tellin’ me the truth. Let’s see if we can see the Lord.”

Shaking with fear, they peered through the fence, yet were still unable to see anything. The old man and the boy gripped the wrought iron bars of the fence tighter and tighter as they tried to get a glimpse of the Lord.

At last they heard, “One for you, one for me. That’s all. Now let’s go get those nuts by the fence and we’ll be done.”

They say the old man had the lead for a good half-mile before the kid on the bike passed him.

Cry Me a River

It seems things are tough all over.

Obama said she loved her job and found it liberating in some respects, but confining in others.

“There are some prison elements to it,” she joked. “But it’s a really nice prison.”

Former first lady Laura Bush reminded the crowd that First Ladies had a chef.

“You can’t complain,” Michelle Obama admitted. “But there is definitely elements that are confining.”

Exactly which prisons make sure the inmates get to take several multimillion dollar taxpayer funded vacations each year?

Puppy Love

Anyone who has known me for any amount of time knows my feelings for the German Wirehaired Pointer, AKA the greatest dog ever.  Part of the reason I'm so attached to this breed is because I love bird hunting.  The other part of the reason is that they are just plain good dogs.  They are smart and they love the people that they adopt.  That isn't just my anthropomorphizing, they really do adopt their human families. 

Combine the great personality traits with a great love for hunting and you get a dog that is hard to beat, at least for a hunter.  For a non hunter or someone who doesn't like a high energy dog, the GWP would be a bad fit. 

I'm a boy!  Somebody rub my belly!!!

For the last 16 years I had one or more GWP's around.  After putting down my last two GWP's I thought that maybe we could get by without a dog for awhile.  (This is what the wife wanted).  I researched getting another dog of similar quality to my last one.  There was no way I could afford that right now.  Then I thought that I could get a rescue dog that wasn't a hunter but that would be a pet for the kids.  The more I looked into that, the more I liked the idea, but the more impractical it seemed.  Most dogs are in rescue for a reason, and all those reasons aren't always given up front.

One night I was surf'n the puppy pages on the net and found an ad.  The guy mentioned that he was expecting a litter in July.  He also did something most breeders neglect, he posted nearly 25 years worth of his dog's pedigree on line.  I like to read pedigrees just to see which dogs I recognize.  The good news is that I recognized about 8 of the dogs.  The bad news was that one of the dogs was SGR's Silent Running.  I shouldn't say that's bad news, its great news, it just seems to be expensive news.  Gail Richardson is a top breeder.  She selects dogs the same way I would if I was a professional breeder.  In fact I had tried about a year before to buy a dog from her, only to learn that she is basically retired. 

Silent Running was my Abby's grandfather.  Abby was the most intense and talented bird hunting dog I've ever seen.  She was the one I was offered $5,000 for when she was just six months old.  The problem, as it often is with fine cigars, whisky, women and hunting dogs, was money.  The last breeder who I found with this dog in the back line wanted $2,500 for a male and $3,500 for a female with no breeding rights.  In other words more money than I could spend.   I called anyway.  We talked.  We talked hunting.  We talked about the GWP being the best dog ever.  We talked about my Abby and how much I missed her.  Then he told me, if I made the drive down, I could have any dog I wanted for $500.  I called my boss at home and asked for the next day off from work and drove like a mad man.

It just so happens that the wife and kids were out of town at Grandma and Papa's that week, so there was no unnecessary input form anyone.  i.e. the wife didn't get to try to veto the project.

I had made up my mind that I would choose the best female out of the bunch and breed her and thus keep the line alive.  I met the pups and their parents and grand parents.  They were all good dogs.  They just started some wing work that morning and they all were pointing.  They all were solid friendly dogs with good temperament.  I started eliminating dogs.  We were down to 6 then to 4 and then to the last 2.  One female and one male.

My son had been wanting a boy dog (he doesn't know about how you get puppies yet).  I wanted a female.  (I do know about puppies).  There was a problem.  The female I wanted had no interest in me at all.  Sure she was a good dog.  She had a real nice point.  She was aggressive and probably the alpha female in the litter.  She just wasn't into me.  Her brother was.  He kept hanging around being goofy, trying to get my attention.  He even bit his grandfather on the nuts right in front of me.  He had the good sense to immediately submit to the old man before he got killed. 

One thing I learned from my Abby, was that sometimes its better to let the dog pick the human.  That's what Abby did with me.  She picked her people and she never stopped loving me or hunting with me.

In the end I got a boy dog.

Boy dogs are immeasurably harder to develop a line from.  Can you imagine this guy getting a date on his own?