thanks so much for the e-mail karen
read your article and i agree that attitude and enthusiasm is what makes or breaks you in the ring. the clicker has absolutely changed my entire way of dealing with dogs, and in every aspect of training and showing. from obedience,and agility to conformation. i can pull out the clicker and the dogs immediately get excited and attentive. it has become a routine now when we have guests over to give them a 'show'. they always want to see the dogs run through the agility course(fortunately i have all the equipment in my backyard), and then onto a basic obedience course. then to top it off, we ask them to decide something that they want cutter to do, and we time him to see how long it takes him to do it. his enthusiasm is limitless, and as expected very impressive. in fact, two of my friends daughters have bought clickers in an attempt to train their cats.
we are just about done landscaping the back yard, and i'm ready to begin obedience with whitney and push onward with cutter. let me know what times are available.i'd like to start in two weeks. remember, i need to be back in simi valley by --pm to pick up my kids from school. see ya soon! sue r.

Thank you for bringing my attention to such an articulate and wonderfully written describtion of what dog training should be. If your intentions were to inspire, then you accomplished your goal.Now , if I can just come up with the ways and means to gather more knowledge from you,then maybe ,just possibly, I could experience that elusive goal of perfection. Where there's a will , there's a way. We'll just have to find the way!
You've got yourself a very impressive site there Karen. You should be PROUD!! Thanks for sharing

Hi Karen

Way to go. Your article was great. You are right, until judges start "scoring" for attitude-some things will never change. I guess I don't necessarily mean all dogs will be animated and bouncing all over - a beautifully smooth working dog can be just as happy and have just as much attitude as a bouncy "up" one.

Again, great job.
Sue Brusso