Hello, Oregon. Hello, Mary. We saw you for a little bit. We drove a long, long ways, everybody in the car, smooshed in with our stuff, driving up through Eureka and Arcata and Pelican Bay State Prison, until we passed the border, and Superfly vodka distillery and fast food joint in an old taco bell with stained cement floors and gourmand burgers, until we passed through Florence and drove up the house on the hill.

We stayed up there, running around the 40 acres and sitting around for a few days. Pretty much the only goal was where should we go walk around right now?

You Oregon folk, maybe you take Oregon for granted, but we find it crazy and mystical and think how awesome it would be to run away there and hide. Up a long dirt road, and into the rain forest, where nobody would ever see us and we would eat special Oregon food you only get in Oregon.

This probably won’t happen and so we tried to just enjoy it up as good as we know how, then we had to come home.

There were mild adventures. The trip to the emergency room! The tire that blew out! Sleeping beneath the biggest cel phone tower in the world, or maybe at least in Oregon, or maybe at least that we’ve ever sleeped under. They were all very Primero Uno Del Mundo Problemas and it was a super time. We made a sport where Gary rides his bike and the dogs chase him and then me and Ruby are back there limping along. And the other dogs are like, OMG!!!!! HA HA HA HA WHERE DID THE OTHER PERSON GO!!! over and over again until their brains’ exploded. That was pretty fun.

There was a lot of beer. Something about Oregon and the tip top of Cali. Everywhere you look is a brewery. In a nice way.

Then we drove home and then I ended up hanging out a couple days at camp Power Paws. I hung out with Tori and many other of my agility pals and it was a swell time. It was like camp where I sleptover in the same musty old Travel Lodge as usual for the empire of Turlock. Wes Anderson canoe based camp, not so much, but there were more post turns and rear crosses at this one. Gustavo hung out ringside and played around on teeter totters and such for a couple days. I probably learned many things.

See, we didn’t give up our agility shoes, not just yet. We are still always picking up the towel from where we threw it in and trying again. Muthaflickah towel throwing in. Agility kicks my ass.

We just came home from a dog show. Gustavo won a round of Steeplechase, and one of the Jumpers. He had a beautiful Grand Prix run until that teeter showed up at the very ending bit, and then that was that. He ran super all the rest, except for the time he weirded out in Jumpers, and the time in Snooker where he broke his start, ran away into a tunnel and just stayed in there for a little while. Until he popped out his head and we saw eachother, and we went “YAAAAY!” and runned out the ring in togetherness.

You know, work is taking it’s toll on me. I am going more gray and more soft and every day I scritch on my head and think, aye yay yay yay aye. Say that slow to yourself. And do a big breathy sigh. And I go to the grocery and do some laundry then fall asleep and have another day. Otterpop follows me around all day and sits on the tractor and on the fence, the other dogs sit in jail and wait for the day to be done. In the dark. And still nobody washed the floor.

So a-ok and righty-o? Do you still love us with all your heart? We are waving at you out the car window, wearing a camouflage hoodie, and even though nobody is champions today, we would like you to know we are doing just fine.