Thirsty Marlin: Quasi Meeting!

This will be a nearly wordless post.  Our regularly scheduled meeting had to be canceled due to inclement weather.  However, there were many who just wanted to get together for companionship and food and drinks.  The Thirsty Marlin was nearby, the waitstaff was willing and the puppies were good.

What more needs to be said?! Since I can't tell by looking who many of the puppies are, I may not be able to caption all of the photos or rather caption them correctly.  What's that saying about all black cats at night....  I'm sorry.

Feel free to add a correction in the comments and I'll fix the caption!  I would like to thank Michele for sharing her photos as Fred and I were on vacation and not able to be at the quasi meeting.

Stephanie and Coastie, Susan with Jam and Sue.

I think this may be Liz.

Perhaps Gail and Tabina?

Coastie under the table.

Liz, black lab down under a chair.

Katy, a golden, eying some children throwing rocks in a pond (off camera).

I think this is Jam, Liz and Gail mixing it up.

Jam letting the server know that you cannot pet a coated dog. 

Liz?

Message from Carolyn

Hi Puppy Raisers, 

Carolyn and Sunny. Carolyn is on Sunny's right side and Sunny is sitting. Sunny is a yellow lab.

I'm Carolyn and I’m excited about taking over the Area Coordinator position for North Pinellas.  I have some really, really big shoes to feel and hope that 2012 is filled with many positive puppy raising experiences.  I know most of you, but in case you don't know who I am, our family has been raising for a little over three years.  Our first pup, JC is a Collie and he’s working guide dog in Georgia.  We got our second pup, Tyler, when he was about 10 months old.  He was immediately career changed due to hips.  We only “raised” him for about 3 weeks, so I don’t really count him in the number of pups we’ve had (but we did adopt him).  

Our 3^rd dog is Kenny.  Kenny is in perpetual IFT.  He went back the first week of March and has decided that getting a PhD at Southeastern might be the way to go.  I guess there’s still hope for him because they haven't career changed him and he just recently was in the news.  Our 4^th pup, Stewart, we picked up at  11 months old.  He was career changed in November and Tampa Police Department picked him up: he’s now training as a drug sniffing dog.  Sunny is our 5^th dog. She’s the pup that the Suncoast Puppy Raisers sponsored this year.  You’ll be seeing a lot of her.  I can’t imagine NOT raising. 

I’ve put together a 2012 calendar.  I’d say it’s not likely to change.  The only changes I’d foresee would be for  exposures that come up as a once-a-year opportunity (a parade, a ball game, or something like that). 

We will take some of the meetings that we’ve done in the years past that are wonderful exposures, like Celebration Station, the Threshers baseball game, and a Jolly Trolly ride and build on those.  If you, your friends, or family could “expose” us to something we haven’t thought about before, I’d love to hear those suggestions.  We are also going to open this blog up for people to add their own cool exposures in case we are out and about.  For instance I was at the International Mall today and they have a two story stair steps with glass walls.  The glass walls were fascinating enough, but adding the stairs and people walking downstairs toward us, was awesome for Sunny to navigate.  I don’t typically go over there, and almost didn’t take Sunny with me, but if I’d have known that there was this neat exposure, I wouldn’t have hesitated taking her.

Let’s do this together.  We are all in this for the same end result.  To change a life.

Carolyn and Sunny