Farewell my dear friend

It is with a heavy heart that I wanted to dedicate a page to my friend Val Kaeppler. 

Val's favorite color was purple. I love that she had on a purple coat in this photo.

Val was a friend through my world of dogs, Salukis in fact. 

Val & her husband, Steven created beautiful dogs out of the kennel name of  Laa Yudaani Salukis.

They weren't as interested in showing dogs as they were in Open Field Coursing - which is where you set the dogs free to test their hunting skills. 

More than that though, Val was an amazing person of amazing strength & preseverence. 

She fought cancer for many years, now the fight is over. 

I truly took it for granted that she'd live forever...

Val, I love you & will miss you dearly. Your soul lives on in my & the hearts of others. 

Val used to work at a nursery, her passion were cactus blooms. She lived in New Mexico with her husband, Steven. I was hoping to take a trip to NM sometime this year to visit. I'm sad that this won't come to be now. 

Below are photos of her & Steven's dogs, along with some cactus blooms that she has taken photos of. All photo credit of the dogs & flowers go to Val. I borrowed them from her facebook page. I hope Steven doesn't mind. I just wanted to take a little time to share Val, to treasure her, to remember her by...

 I especially like this photo.

The Scissortail Flycatcher showed back up yesterday. He brought his mate. I think they are nesting somewhere within feet of my RV! I'd like to think that Val sent them. At any rate, I will think of her each time I see them as I know she'd adore their beauty. 

In Texas, I found out they are called The Bird of Paradise - quite appropriate! Such beautiful little birds.
And they got close enough for me to get decent shots of! 
I did a little more research on them to see how you could tell the difference between the male & female. 
The female's tail is 2'' shorter than the males is. They have REALLY LONG tails!  

 Female Scissortail Flycatcher

Male Scissortail Flycatcher -- note the difference in their tail lengths.

I will think of Val each time I see these beauties. I hope to see little paradise babies someday soon! 

I'm going to go clean out the old bird feeder to fill it. 

But they are known to be invaluable for bug catchers! They'll get plenty of that here.

~As always be kind to your pets, clean up after them on your travels & respect your neighbor~

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Anonymous comments for this page have been disabled. If anyone wishes to comment further, please contact me (salukiz(at)hotmail.com) & I will be very happy to add your comment. Sorry, I had to reset to rid of the anon tab due to way too many spams. :-/ 
This page will stay up forever! 

Ft Worth Texas, Dog shows & Friendship

Welcome Greytlady11 -- glad to have you along! Does your name suggest you have greyhounds?

I've not really had much time to blog the past several days. Have been very busy with friends, this is the first time I've been able to boot up my computer since I left Southeast Texas! 

Now I'm in North Texas, but I plan on returning back to the Southeast Texas area tomorrow. 

I'm at my friend Pam's. 

She has a wonderful place in Euless, Tx on 5 acres of land. It's great here! 

Pam also has & exhibits Saluki dogs, so we have a lot in common. It was years ago when she got her first show dog, a beautiful black & tan colored female Afghan Hound was when we met.

We've been friends since. I'm parked in her driveway while we did errands (including the last post on laundry!). We did 3 days of dog shows, it was a nice time.

My sick friend, Linda that I came to visit with has had it pretty rough. I had a really nice visit with her on Thursday, we took her in for her radiation treatments. While she was getting her treatments, Pam & I had lunch in the hospital cafeteria. I had no idea that they could actually have good food there! Had roasted salmon, mac&cheese & green beans. It was good. 

One of the valet parkers is an artist. He did this amazing painting on the whiteboard. He changes it out each month with a new painting. Seems a shame that it gets erased monthly! 

Linda also has Salukis & also shows them. She hasn't been able to show herself the past few years, but others have been able to show her dogs for her. She used to have a lovely girl from one of my breedings of the past. She's a great home & gave her a wonderful life into Micah's old age.
Linda has cancer, but we're all hoping & praying she can beat this! This is her 4th bout of this dreaded disease. Her's in in her neck. It just doesn't seem fair does it?

She was released from the hospital last Tuesday. I got here on Wednesday & was able to visit with her on Thursday & she came out to the dog show on Friday. Her puppy, Manitou was being exhibited by a handler, he's such a cutie! The puppy that is ;-) 

 This is Manitou, he's in the 9-12 puppy male class. 

Below are typical grooming areas at indoor shows. You can see the show rings on the bottom picture, where the white fencing is. We show the dogs on non-slip mats in the rings. 

 The shows were held in Fort Worth, Texas. What a fascinating city Ft Worth is, but I didn't have my camera in hand when we drove around the city looking for certain places. But I did manage a cell phone pic of the court house as we were driving up the road that actually passes by it. But it looks like you are going to drive directly in it when approaching! 

 Isn't it cool how the camera caught the sky colors?

Birdie was exhibited two of the days. She won her class, which was bred by exhibitor both days, but didn't get the ultimate win for the points! Oh well, at least she won Best Bred By at the specialty! 

Unfortunately, a damper was place upon us on Saturday & Sunday as Linda was admitted back into the hospital. We were really scared, as she was placed in ICU. Fortunately, she is improving & may go home tomorrow! So we plan on visiting her tonight & if she is improving, then I need to head back to Houston. I'm so very glad I made this trip. It's always good to reconnect with good friends. Treasure those you love,  you never know. 

And I got to make a new friend, so that's always good too! 

~As always, be kind to your pets, clean up after them on your travels & respect your neighbor~
 

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year Everyone! 

   Best wishes for a wonderful new 2013! 

                        Safe wishes, wonderful travels! 
 
                                         My best to you & yours!

!!!!WARNING!!!!

Don't let this be you tomorrow morning!

I never use this phrase, but it applies  -- LOL! 

~As always, be kind to your pets, clean up after them on your travels & respect your neighbor~

I'm here, I'm sad -- Recap

I'm here, but I must say that this trip has not been a good one. Thank you to everyone for your concerns. Today is the first day I've turned on the computer since I left my campsite in Arkansas. I tried to post from there, but didn't have very good internet. Lost it midpost & wasn't able to get it back. So I gave up. So here's a recap of my events..I've been very saddened & will explain.

May 25, I was DETERMINED to leave that day! And I did. It was a very long day of stuffing preparing items & such for my trip. Around 8:30pm, I finally pulled out of the driveway for my long awaited trip! Yay! I drive, I drive, I drive...I'm tired. No where to pull over. I'm on 59 heading north to Arkansas. Finally, I found a place to pull over around 2:30am. I pull over & go to sleep for the night. Next morning, I get up, take care of the dogs & head on. I pull over at a gas station in Marshall, TX, I get gas. I pull out of the station & head down the road, a kitten darts out in front of me!! I hit it. I cry. I've NEVER hit anything other than a rabbit & a possum in my life!! It devastated me. Poor beautiful little kitten - gone forever. Damn. I cried for days over that. But I get a few blocks from that unfortunate incident AND my Serpetine belt breaks! I hear this noise under my hood. I pull over in a strip mall, cut off the engine, open the hood & see shreds of what looks like thread. Then I realize it's a belt, I look & yep, it's shredded alright. Oh goodie, it's Saturday & a holiday weekend! Thank you to a very kind man that works for the commisioners office in Marshall, he was able to get a mechanic to me. The mechanic changes out my s-belt & my power steering belt as well. So I get back on the road & am on my way to the State Park I like to stay at in Arkansas. After several hours of driving, I arrive to the Iron Mountain State Park in Caddo Valley, ARK. At DeGrey Lake. Nice place. No spots. Oh crap. It never occurred to me that they'd be full. I don't know why it never occurred to me, but it didn't. They offered me a boondocking spot for $10 a night. I have a quarter tank of gas, can't run my genny. Of course, I could leave the park & go get gas, but if I have to pay to run my genny & can't run it after 10pm, I might as well move on & boondock at a Walmart or somewhere. But  go check out the spot anyhow. I pull in & cry more. I'm still very upset over the kitten. And I'm exhausted. The thought of driving on didn't appeal to me, so I debate on whether to take the spot or not. I drive back to the rangers station & the lady meets me at the door. Good news! They just got a cancellation & I got that spot! Man was I thankful! $14 a night. Yipee. I pay for 3 nights. Sat, Sun & Mon. Cool. First day, we just chill, I walk the dogs a lot & try to mentally detox. We're enjoying the sights of the boats on the lake, etc. Monday, I hear this really loud noise. I'm thinking, wow, someone is doing something really loud. Then I realize that the noise is coming from inside of my motorhome!! Uh oh. Not what I planned on. So I rush inside, it's my roof air. I cut it off quickly. Other campers come to help me with advice. We're all thinking the fan motor is going out. And it's a holiday. No places open. One camper gives me a number for an a/c place. I call. They can't do motorhomes or RV's. They only service houses & businesses. So I have no choice but to open windows & put fans on the dogs. It's 95 outside, very still, very hot. Dogs are better kept inside with fans & getting spritzed with water. But I worry. Finally, night falls & it's a little more comfortable for us all. The next morning, we head out. I call SEVERAL RV places, I get friends to help me call as I barely had any cell phone service. NO internet service at all. I drive to a few RV places, nope, all they can tell me is to leave my RV with them & they'd get to it in a few days. Um, not possible. So I decide to keep driving, hitting RV places along the way. Camping World offers to look at it, (Little Rock), they declined on the phone, but when I showed up in person, they said they'd take a look. BUT if it was a motor, then they'd have to order one & have it shipped to me. Cost of looking $129. But I'd still have to pay someone else to install. So I thought maybe it would be better if I moved on, using the dash air to keep us all cool & just keep heading to my destination in Missouri. I get into Mo, I think, OK, I'll stop & walk the dogs at the state forest. I could relax & they can stretch their legs. We're enjoying our walks, until I discover that hoards of ticks are attacking us!!! EEEKS! We're outta there!!!
I drive till I find a convience store & pull over for the night. Head back out the next morning & drive to Beyerle's RV in something Mo, which is not far from where the dog show is. I beg, plead, etc for them to come out & look at my roof air. They come out. I crank on the genny, I turn on the a/c. It's running fine. I told them in a few mins that it will act up & I'll come get them when it does. well, it behaves. So it's like taking a sick dog to the vet. You get there & the dog is fine! As was my a/c. So we decide that a mud dauber nest or something had gotten in the squirrel cage & got dislodged with the rough roads. So far, so good on the a/c! So I'm pleased with that.

Get to the dog shows, we have 4 all breed shows before our saluki nationals starts. We do the all breed shows & I share a booth with a friend of mine. She writes books & has a booth for her books, but wants me to share the booth for my jewelry, so I do. She has 3 of her salukis with her in a pen at the booth. They are really sweet well behaved dogs. I enjoyed being around them. Then finally, our saluki nationals begin. We go down, set up for it. We go to the grocery store & stock up on supplies. We are soooo looking forward to camping out & cooking each evening. Then something horrific happens. My friend decides to take her one year old puppy up to the puppy play area, which is fenced off to play with one of her littermates that comes to the show. So I stay at the campsite & they take off to the play area. Problem, her puppy spooks when they get up there, bolts & gets away!! She's GONE!! She took off totally! We get a sighting on her, but we don't personally see her. So my friend sets up camp where she was last spotted. I went up every day & spent the days with her after I take care of my dogs. Then I come back & take care of my dogs again & go back till the end of the day each day. Finally 4 days after she's gone, she's sighted again. We jump on it & she sees her puppy, eye to eye. Puppy takes off again!! She's scared & has gone feral. Salukis tend to do this when they get spooked. Poor puppy is scared living in the woods days on end, but she keeps moving around so no one can see her. Day 5, my friend calls me & thinks she's going to come to her any minute now. Then we get the devastating news that she's been hit by a car. A really, really super nice married couple are also helping that live on the property near where the puppy had been hiding out. They allow the puppy to be buried on their land. So sad, so very, very sad. We are all still very devastated over all this. And my poor friend had a break down when she went home & entered her home without her puppy, seeing all her toys & things around the house. It's going to take us all a very long time to heal over this, if ever.

So I am now at my Mom's in Pa & am trying to mentally heal. Please take the time to appreciate life today. Hold onto loved ones, let them know you love them.

Sorry that this post was so long. As you can tell, I'm not ready to go back to my daily blogging, but I'll be back to my old self soon.

Loves & hugs to all -- TexCyn

Weather or not & a nice win!

Hi all, hope everything is well for everyone. So, not sure what's up with the weather? Whether or not if it's going to change? Last week started out chilly, which was loverly for a change. Then each day, it's warmed a bit more & more. Right now at 4:50pm, it's 85, not too bad, humidity at 50 something %. But I got tired of melting due to humidity, so I just finally broke down & turned my a/c back on for a bit. The mosquitos are ready to carry us away though? Wow, where did they come from??? No rain for days now, actually, maybe a week & half ago? or more? Now those pesky biting mosquitos? And biting flies! Ugh. Glad I turned on the a/c for awhile!

Took one of the salukis out for lure coursing this weekend, she kicked butt & won breed today! Yay Birdie! Thank you Birdie! Good girl Birdie! Now she's resting & I'm glad to be back at the RV safe from those biting things outside! I coursed her where they have hook ups for RV's, but the roads getting there are sooo rough that I think it's best not to take the motorhome there. I might find my cabinets on my sofa & floor! Yikes, that road is rough. And you have to drive past cattle that may be standing on the road. Blocking it & you just have to wait till they decide to move out of the way. It's a ranch, next time I go out there, I should take pics of the horses that people board & ride there.

Anyhow, not really much else happening. It did look like rain earlier & I was afraid it would rain because I went off, leaving the vents all open & the windows all open on the RV! I don't have vent covers, so that would not have been pleasant to come back to.

OK, before I decided to close today's blog, I decided to go out, take pics of Birdie's ribbons & of course, of her too! Again, good girl Birdie!!

Todays Saluki score sheet

Birdies ribbons. Today was only her 3rd run ever. So far, she's gained two Best of Breed wins! One with ASFA, one with AKC. Way to go Tweeters!! (you can't tell I'm proud can you?)

And here is the sweet girl herself

I also have a coursing video to share of a Borzoi run, but it took me forever just to be able to get pics up, so I'll share the video at a later time.

As always, be kind to your pets, clean up after them on your travels & respect your neighbor.

WalMart parking -- run that dog!

Quite often the subject of WalMart parking comes up on the RV lists. Today was such a day that it once again came up. Have I done that? Why yes I have! Do I ask permission? Why yes, I do. Do I stay for more than one night at any given WalMart? No. Have I stayed elsewhere while traveling? Yes. I've stayed at Cracker Barrell's, with permission. I've stayed at rest areas, some even have security.  I've pulled over in church parking lots to relax for a few hours. Even stayed at one in Ms during one night when I got too tired to go any further, was on a parkway that didn't have businesses, so just had to sleep. Then when I woke up, found it was a wonderful place, that had a point of history & interest to the area, so toured it as well. Really neat place. I've stayed at truck stops where RV's are allowed to park for the night. The idea though is to do this only if you feel comfortable. If your comfort level is not there, then move on. Ideally, you want to stay safe. It's best to take precautions, keep your entry doors in full view of public areas. Keep yourself in view of the security cameras. Sleep with an airhorn (canned air), whistle, mace, whatever makes you feel more comfortable. Get a door alarm that you can switch on when you go to bed at night that will sound off if anyone tries to open your door. Please feel free to leave comments in the comment section to share your ideas as well.

I went to a state park in Ganado Ms, but got there late. It was very dark. I tried to park my rig into one of the campsites, but it was so blasted dark that I could not see a thing around me! So I guess I hit a post or something by trying to back up into a site. No one around to help or spot me, it was much later than I would have preferred to try to pull in for a site, but it was what it was...so I felt I had hit something. Yep, a post, no damage to the post, but damaged a side clearance light. Darn, I had just replaced all those lights too! Oh well, at least that's all the damage I did. But after that, I left the campgrounds (was planning on staying an extra day too, but that plan didn't happen). Went back into town & parked at WalMart instead. I parked in the area that they had set up for RV's & trucks. Being small really was a neat little perk at that place. Got a cool little spot there. Although my entry door did not open to the public side, I had a security camera on that side, so I was still good to go. Before I pulled in there, I parked closer to the store, went in, did some shopping, then came back out & found the perfect spot for the evening.

The nose of my RV against the nose of trucks.

My little spot in the world that night at the WalMart parking lot. See the big ClassA to the left of my little rig? There were two of those parked there that night, along with the big trucks.

Being a small rig does have it's advantages! This is a 22' rig.

It's like this spot was made for us huh?

After Hurricane Ike hit our area, we got stuck in Conroe Tx, trying to make it back to Galveston county. But we were too low on gas. No power for the stations to pump. No gas to be found. So we asked to camp behind the Cracker Barrell there. The management was in the store clearing out foods & such to prevent bad food sitting in the freezers & fridge units. He graciously allowed us to park there, so we were there for 3 days. We did set up chairs, pulled out the awning, but parked sideways to the grass & treed area. We had to pull out the awning to keep the sun from beating the side of the RV & beating us with heat. We were afraid to run the generator for more than an hour a day till we could be sure to get gas. I was sure grateful for their generosity at that trying time! Having an RV really helped save us too, as after Ike, I pretty much moved into the RV as there were damages to my house & I could no longer live inside of my own home. I will always be grateful for Cracker Barrell, plus it was nice & quiet there as well!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

OK, so for what I did today. As you know, I have dogs. One of the events we do with sighthounds is lure coursing, so we went coursing today! Sighthounds hunt by sight rather than scent. Lure coursing is like a mock type of hunting trial where a plastic bag is tied onto a string & the string is ran through a battery operated lure machine. The dogs hunting instinct kicks in & they love chasing that lure! I tested one of my young dogs today, Birdie, & she ran very well for her test! So I might get her certified tomorrow & enter her in the trial if she passes the certification.

Here are a few pics I took of today.

Entrants getting ready to slip their Afghan Hounds on the Tally Ho!

Two of the Afghans running the lure. Note the happy face on the light colored dog. The black dog wears a muzzle because he gets too nosey with the other dogs & interferes without it.

What? Another plastic bag?? One day, I just know I'll find a bunny instead! I'm sure of it! (not)

Two young Salukis watching the lure. They are brothers & they had a good run off together. The cream one beat the grizzle one by a point, thus winning Best of Breed for Salukis on this day.

It can be quite rewarding to get your dogs out & do events with them! Do what they were bred for, find what they like to do & treat them from time to time. It will make you feel good too. :-)

As always, be kind to your pet, clean up after them on your travels & respect your neighbor.

Hummingbird video, sunrise, planes & Salukis!

It's another new day, although I'm posting later today. Had chores & such this morning, then a video to create & photos to edit. These are things of interest to me & perhaps to others as well. Yesterday evening, I kept hearing planes flying over head, so had to get out to see why so much noise & what was going on. Apparantely, they were army planes flying over, probaby a practice run. But fascinating to watch! Then after that, I noticed activity at the hummingbird feeder. There were actually two hummingbirds having a spat! They kept zooming over my head & it's amazing how much noise they can create when zooming about! The chatter is pretty cute too. So I had to run inside the RV & grab my camera. One day, I will get a better camera. Mine had trouble zooming in with clarity. I could not get it clear. Then this morning, one of the dogs woke me up at sunrise, I had to tend to her, then was able to catch the beautiful pink hues of today's sunrise.
I also need to note that Teri, that I introduced yesterday, does indeed have a blog page --  Http://TerisTravelWorld.blogspot.com/

I also promised to put some photos of my dogs up today, so will do that as well.

So to begin with, here is my hummingbird video:

I hope you enjoyed the bird!

Now to move onto this mornings beautiful sunrise. We get many sunrises like this here. Sunsets are quite lovely here as well.

Lovely isn't it?

And now for the plane photos. My camera did a splendid job of capturing them. It's not the same camera that does the video taping though.

Approaching overhead

Flying overhead

Flying off in an over exposed shot - bye bye planes

Then as the planes flew away, I was able to capture this shot!

Now for the Salukis, feel free to ask any questions you may have about them. They are show dogs, but not only show dogs, but my best friends & companions, which comes first!

This is Feather, my Saluki Club of American National winner in the year of 2006. She won the entire specialty, shown & bred by me! I am very proud of this special girl!SBIS  Ch ReignBeaus Feather In Her Cap, JC   Feather is now 9 years old.

This is Bravo - SBIS Ch Hajji-ReignBeau Int'l Reign, JC

Bravo is a very fun loving dog! He lives life to it's fullest, loves people, loves travel, loves the show ring! He is also a specialty winner & has aquired a merit award at the SCOA Nationals as well.

He is now retired from the show ring at the age of 12 years old.

This is Bandera, aka Bad Dawg. Ch ReignBeaus Texas Pride. Bandera finished his Championship in only 7 shows! He is a litter mate to Feather.

This is Zeus. Not a really great photo of him though. Ch ReignBeau Shahtani TexBless'd, JC

Zeus also has a SCOA national merit award! He is Bravo's buddy, they play & run together.

Zeus is now 7 years old.

This is Houston pretending to be snooty, but he is anything but snooty!

Ch Z'Bee Reignbeau True To Texas, JC. Houston finished his Championship very early on at the age of 13 months. Winning WD at specialties & best puppy at the SCOA nationals over 100 puppies!

He is the sire to Feather & Bandera bred to Ch ReignBeaus Texas MiVida Loca, JC

Houston is now 11 years old.

This is Birdie. ReignBeaus Bird of a Feather. Birdie is the daughter of Bravo & Feather. She is halfway through her championship. I've not shown her much the past two years due to my injury & lifes circumstances. She will gain her Ch once I get her back out into the ring again though.

Birdie is now 3 years old, so we have lots of time still.

This is Roper, ReignBeaus Rope The Moon. Roper has only been shown once, I quickly realized he needed a lot of time to grow up & mature. So he's not been in the show ring since then. Perhaps once I finish Birdie, I'll start to show Roper. He is a littermate to Birdie & a big goofy, happy dog!

Now that my blog reads like a webpage instead of a blog, I will say buh bye for the day!

Happy RVing to all!

And as always, be kind to your pets, clean up after them on your travels, respect your neighbor!