What is Dog Showing?

Dog handlers and dog lovers alike tuned into CNBC last night to watch the ever exciting action of the 135th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show in Madison Square Garden.

Not many people can understand the attraction to such an event. After all its not the Red Sox or Patriots. As a dog handler in 4-H I believe that you can not really appreciate the excitement of the dog showing world until you are immersed in it.

Dog showing is all about the preparation, not only for your dog, but also for yourself. Firstly, the dog needs to be trained. True enough conformation is not an obedience based event, but your dog still needs to be well behaved and responsive to your commands. (esp. since your only leash and collar is a thin showmanship lead). It also needs to tolerate stacking, (setting up your dog in the best position to showcase the breed's qualities) and the judge's inspection. In addition, every dog needs to be ableto free-stack (the dog sets itself up). Then, comes the grooming. The amount of time and difficulty of grooming is specific to each breed. However, even terriers whose coats are meant to be working, hardy coats need hours of grooming. Your doggy's do must be as close to the breed standard as possible (sorry no crazy hair dye) while still showcasing your dog's best qualities. Your dog's coat can make or break you. I take my hat off to Standard Poodle handlers who spend all day on their dogs. Finally, you have to train yourself. A handler's job is to showcase their dog and make sure the judge notices them. In order to do this you must exhibit your dog while staying out of the judge's way. Your dog should be between you and the judge at all times. For example, don't reach over your dog when stacking it. One dog show announcer summed it up, "A good handler should be invisible."

After all that preparation its time to show your stuff in the ring. Once you actually get in the ring the air is full of tension, competition, and excitement. This feeling can even be felt by spectators hoping their favorite breed will win. But win or loose, dog showing is a great way to see all your favorite dogs, learn about dogs, and meet fellow dog lovers.

Being Human: "Where The Wild Things Are"

One of my favorite clips from Being Human.

New Orginal Series?

The beginning of the new year saw some new "original" series added to American television such as Being Human, Skins, and the upcoming X-Factor. While some praised the new shows, others despised and degraded them from almost the minute they premiered. Fierce criticism could be found plastered all over facebook in the form of status posts, page comments, and even flair. What could cause such an intense hatred of a show that had just aired its first episode? The answer is that these shows had in actuality, been on air for years and already had avid fans.

The programs were actually successful British creations that Hollywood had Americanized and brought here. The issue is that with that many Americans were already watching those shows on the Internet or TV stations such as BBC America. After falling in love with the story and picking their favorite characters/actors, the fans took Hollywood's actions as a personal insult. They are outraged because Hollywood calls the new version "originals", rarely, if ever, giving the original actors and writers credit. Furthermore, Hollywood usually edits the scripts to make them more "American" changing characters' backgrounds and names, dialing down some themes, and sometimes even changing the show's name. Di-hard fans consider this blasphemy. When the original scripts were so addictive and amazing, why change them? And come on let's just face it, British accents make everything ten times cooler.

Now, as it is pretty obvious, I have also contracted Anglophenia. My favorite BBC America show is Being Human; a show about a ghost, a vampire, and a werewolf who all live together and struggle to be normal.....to be human. Dynamic characters and suspenseful plots keep myself and thousands of other fans tuned in to BBC America every Supernatural Saturday. Seeing its success in both the UK and US; the syfy channel decided to create their own version. The name of every character was changed as was the background of my favorite character Mitchell, the vampire. Mitchell was a soldier in World War I who allowed himself to be turned as long as his comrades were spared. The US "Aiden" was a Revolutionary War soldier. My question is, "Wasn't the US in World War I as well?" I could barely watch the preview trailer and haven't even tried to watch the show.

In closing, I'd just like to leave you with one thought. The UK has also borrowed a few of our shows (ex: CSI: Miami, the Vampire Diaries, and Glee), but they air the originals. Why don't we do the same?

SEA WORLD!!

I have had the opportunity to visit Sea World Orlando during February vacation in 2007, and I had an amazing time. We had taken the car train down and were staying in a campground in Ocala, Florida. Sea World was amazing. We spent a whole day there, but we still didn't see everything. And what I did see blew my mind. The exhibits were beautifully built, the animals were exceptionally taken care of, and the park grounds were beautifully landscaped and sparkling clean. They even went as far as to ban straws or plastic lids from the park in order to protect the animals! ;) I got to see many different types of marine animals, including manatees, dolphins, giant turtles, flamingos, stingrays, Shamu, walruses, polar bears, and my favorite type of whale, the Beluga whale. I even had my picture taken with one of the clydestales!

I saw two of Sea World's amazing shows while I was there, Blue Horizons and Believe. If I could have, I would have seen all of Sea World's shows, but there are only so many hours in a day. The shows I did see were jaw dropping, mind-boggling, fabulous, stupendous, and any other word that means amazing!Blue Horizons was a dolphin show, but it did far more than have dolphins jump up in the air; it was a play about a girl who imagined about living in the sea. The actors? Well they were dolphins, false killer whales, exotic birds, trainers, and acrobats. When you watch Blue Horizons you feel like you’re at a Broadway musical, only better because there were animals. And, what makes the show more amazing is that the animals act right along with the humans! The acrobats, trainers, and dolphins all perform tricks. The acrobats did high flying stunts that are simply miraculous. Some even dived into the pool from the trapeze, a drop of at least 5o ft. The animals performed tricks that were equally amazing and all perfectly timed. If they ever messed up, no one ever noticed. My favorite trick was when to dolphins would use their noses to push their trainer around the pool. The only word to describe Blue Horizons is astounding!

Believe is one of Shamu's latest shows and it is utterly breathtaking. The show features huge rotating video screens, beautiful music, and the rest of Shamu's family. The show's choreography is based on the natural behaviors of the Orca. It was truly amazing to see these massive yet agile creatures in action and it gave you insight into how Oraca's behave in the wild. Another awe-inspiring part of the show is that even though the Orca's dwarf their trainers, they are very gentle with their trainers. The trainer's, in turn, are just as gentle to the Orca's. This is one of the goals of the show, to convey that bond between trainer and animal to the audience. At the end, one lucky member form the audience, who is madly in love with animals, gets to stand on a platform, at most 35 feet away from Shamu. They also receive a Believe whale tail necklace from a trainer. (Unfortunately, it was not me, but it was still really cool to see.) I believe that Sea World has done a truly amazing job with Believe.

The highlight of my day, however, came when I got to go behind the scenes of the dolphin nursery with my mom. I had received the tickets for this "animal encounter" as a Christmas present. You can only do this if you have tickets, but trust me it's worth it. The dolphin nursery is the enclosure for mother dolphins with baby calves and adolescent dolphins. Before we went into the nursery, our guide told us a lot of interesting facts about baby dolphins and their mothers. For example, baby dolphins are born with mustaches. Awww! How cute! ;p Then, our big group split into smaller groups and each group got to work with one trainer and two dolphins. We were able to feed the dolphins and have them perform tricks. (We fed the dolphins small fish, but they got the whole fish. This part didn't bother me; I thought it was cool ;p) We had the dolphins lie on their side and we got to pet them. (Their skin is smooth, cool, and soft, but not slimy. It was just awesome to pet them.) Then, we had them do other tricks like back walking and jumping, but my favorite was the handshake. The dolphin would rise up on his hind flippers and you grabbed the front ones. It was a little hard to do, but after a few tries a got it. All in all, my visit Sea World was one of the most fun and enchanting moments of my life!

Links:

Sea World Home:

http://www.seaworld.com/

Sea World Orlando Home:

http://www.seaworld.com/orlando/default.aspx

Sea World and Busch Gardens Conservation Fund:

http://www.swbg-conservationfund.org/

"Snacks and Attacks" Primeval Episode Clip

This is a clip from one of my favorite Primeval episodes. It's from Season 1 and the creature is a raptor.

"It All Starts Here" Primevel Season 2

This is a commercial for Primeval Season 2 to augment to my review of the new season.

Primeval Review Series 2

BBC America's popular Sci-Fi show Primeval recently entered its second season, season three in the U.K., with new episodes every Saturday night. Popular in both the UK and the U.S., Primeval was written as competition for the long running show Dr. Who. Primeval is an interesting show. It's about a team of scientists who work with the government to contain a little problem the UK is having with DINOSAURS! Creatures from both the past and future come through rips in time called anomalies. The team's job is to find, prevent, deal with, and possibly stop the anomalies. The show combines flawless CGI with live action for truly heart racing episodes. The series is full of drama, action, suspense, and of course comedy.
The team is made up of citizens and government officials alike. Helen Cutter, once a professor of paleontology, is the first person to discover these anomalies and has been living in them for the past 10 years. She is assumed to be dead. Her husband Dr. Nick Cutter, also a professor of paleontology, doesn't discover the anomalies until eight years after Helen disappears. He works with Claudia Brown of the Home Office, the U.K.'s equivalent of homeland security, and puts together his team.(Cutter soon falls in love with Claudia). The official boss is James Lester, a Home Office official. Cutter is the head of the people who deal with the anomalies. In his team there is Abby Maitland who is a zookeeper, Conner Temple who is one of Cutter's students and basically the geek, and Stephen Hart who is Cutter's research assistant and the person in charge of weapons. (Abby and Conner might end up going out, and then again they might not. We will have to wait and see ;) )
Primeval always has new drama. In Season One/Season Two (Originally Primeval aired in the UK as two separate seasons. Here in the U.S. Season One and Season Two were combined) Cutter went through an anomaly and came back to a world that had evolved differently. Claudia Brown no longer existed, but in her place there was Jenny Brown a P.R. person hired to cover up the anomalies. The team no longer worked out of the Home Office, but out of the ARC (Anomaly Research Center). There was also a new government agent, Oliver Leak. Leak was secretly working with Helen to establish a zoo of every creature that comes through an anomaly in an attempt to change the future. The team shut it down, but Stephen was killed in the process. This season has barley started and it already has lots of drama. Helen has an army of clones and clones Cutter. The real Cutter finds a way to predict anomalies. He also figures out that myths from other cultures are based on the creatures that came through past anomalies. Dr. Sarah Page, who has a PhD in Archeology and Egyptology, joins the team. Her job is to study myths from ancient cultures that could have possibly been anomalies. Captain Becker also joins the team to replace Stephan Hart as weapons manger. Detective Danny Quinn also tries to join the team, as his brother was killed by an anomaly creature. So far, however, he has not been allowed to join. Meanwhile, Helen has seen a future completely destroyed by an army of future creatures. She is convinced that the ARC has caused this and shoots her ex-husband Cutter in order to prevent it. The real culprit behind the future's destruction is most likely Christine Johnson, a government agent who wants to take over the anomaly operation. She knows everything about the ARC while the ARC knows nothing about her. All this drama in only the fist few episodes; it looks like season two/three is going to be amazing.

Primeval Homepage

http://www.bbcamerica.com/shows/primeval/index.jsp