A Dog Named Blitz - Chapter Four, "Dog Training, Sir" Part 6

For background on this serial, please click here. You can also start at the previous section


The time at the tailgate is just what both hunters and dogs needed.  While dogs took in much needed water, hunters did the same, but also passed around a thermos of hot coffee, as well as a box of convenience store doughnuts.  Stories immediately started about who did what (and who didn’t do what) over our previous hunt, and already the tales grew large.  Even though we were all just there and lived them, the stories improved with the embellishments and exaggerations. 
 
A critical part of all of this is giving each other a hard time, and my buddy JT is especially expert in this regard.  This time at the truck was typical, and he quickly moved into a grand story about some recent episode.  As his storytelling grew more animated, so did his gesturing, and in his ranting, none of us noticed that in one of his hands he was waving around a semi-stale but still luscious glazed convenience store doughnut. 
 
The only one that did notice was Blitz, fresh off her stop to the water bowl. 
 
As JT waved and continued his story, Blitz came from behind him, timed her jump perfectly to appropriately lead the delicious pasty in all the flapping, and cleanly picked the entire doughnut from the waving hand in one beautifully athletic, orchestrated move. 
 
This lead to what I can only describe as the “no, no, oh,” moment that occurred any time in which Blitz had acquired some food that she shouldn’t have.  I’d immediately run to her saying “NO,” and hoping to get to her to remove the offending morsel prior to it being devoured.  Blitz, being a speed eater, would note my impending actions and accelerate her pace, which lead to the “uh,” moment as I realized that I was too late and the forbidden food was already down the hatch.  As I moved quickly (but not quickly enough), JT went though the process of counting his digits to ensure that the dog hadn’t taken any extraneous protein in her carbohydrate-based assault.  Indeed her aim was true, and a strong pall of thanks fell over the scene: the hunters thankful for the comedic interruption to JT’s story, JT thankful for having retained all of his fingers, and of course Blitz thankful for the forbidden snack. 
 
Watered and rested, we moved to begin the next phase to our hunt.  We began pressing across a field of thin cover, on our way to a much more promising stand of switch grass in the adjacent field.  While the cover was thin, the dogs worked it hard, quartering out and back, but never showing any signs of quarry in the area. 
 
We ultimately arrived at a border area which was demarked by a barbwire fence.  One by one, we handed guns to each other and safely made our way to the other side, while dogs had the good fortune of simply running underneath the obstacle.  Assembled on the other side, we made a quick plan on our point of approach and started spreading out to cover the next field. 
 
I was taking my place in line, when I noticed that Blitz was no longer messing around with the other dogs.  I quickly looked around, and found her about 20 yards behind me, in an area that I, three other hunters, and two other dogs had just walked past.  She was there; locked completely motionless, staring at a lump of grass no bigger than the size of a backpack.  I immediately wondered if she was on point, but it was a fleeting thought.  Too much activity had passed that spot – both human and canine – for a bird to hold.  Likewise, the area was just too darned small to conceal a pheasant. 
 
“Blitz, what are you doing?” I exclaimed as I turned and headed back to her.  About two steps into my return a rooster pheasant exploded from that small patch of grass immediately in front of Blitz’s nose. 
 
At this point, everything went into slow motion for me:  The bird flushed straight up and immediately began banking to take advantage of the wind to put as much space between him us as he could.  I quickly shouldered my gun, consciously thinking the whole time, “OK, this is Blitz’s first bird.  You’re close.  Take your time and don’t mess this up.” 
 
BAMBAMBAM. 
 
 I messed it up. 
 
I executed my three shots about as quickly as my gun could mechanically process them.  I couldn’t have been any quicker on the trigger, and my heart broke as the cock made the most of his altitude and wind and headed for safety. 
 
His flight path, however, was guarded by my uncle.  The bird was now at about 30,000 feet flying at mach 2, so I wasn’t surprised when the first shot missed, but with the second shot, the bird crumpled into a heap.  With the momentum of the flight, the dead bird sailed across a deep creek to the opposite bank.  The whole time Blitz was on the bird, running on the same line as the bird’s flight, preparing for the fall so she could retrieve it.  Immediately the other guys in the hunting party generously commanded their dogs to return – this was going to be Blitz’s retrieve. 
 
The bird was a good 80 years away from our party, and with the difficulty of the creek crossing, I felt there was no way that she’d be successful, but I barked out my encouragement as she dove into the think cover on our side of the creek.  Seconds later, up reappears my yellow pup scaling up the steep opposite bank, which elicited immediate cheers and yells of encouragement by the entire group. 
 
Blitz made it to the top and headed into the cover in the general vicinity of the fallen bird.  I was yelling encouragement to her the whole time, but I still believed that her odds of making what those in the industry call a “blind retrieve” were long.  I was about to be surprised by her hunting performance for the first time, and it would repeat itself many times in our days together, as after about thirty seconds of rustling around, Blitz suddenly appeared on the far bank with her first flushed wild bird in her mouth. 
 
A huge cheer went up with the guys who were likewise surprised at the performance.  I began to call her into me for the completion of the retrieve, but as I tried to yell “Here, Blitz!” I could only get about half of it out as I was choking up.  Seeing her run at me, bird in her mouth, after executing perfectly, just got to me.  I had a clear revelation that I was a hunting dog owner, and she was a good dog.  That’s pretty much I that I could want at that moment. 
 
The exuberant pup came right up to me, released the bird without too much of a struggle, and looked up at me as if to say, “OK, boss, what’s next?!” totally obvilious to the huge step that she, I, and we had taken.   
 
*** 
 
One of the best parts of hunting for me is the time after the hunt, sitting around with the guys and a libation, replaying the day just occurred.  That night we happened to be at a small bar in Atlantic, Iowa, when my buddy Pauly cornered me at the end of the bar.  “Mikey,” he said, “I think you’re going to have a hell of a dog.”  “Thanks, Pauly,” I replied.  “I hope you’re right.” 
 
But something deep down inside me knew that he was right.  She was going to be a hell of a dog.  

Chives Restaurant, Green Bay's Finest - Kitchen Table Review

My wife and I recently had dinner at Chives Restaurant - one of Green Bay's finest.  We leveraged a gift certificate that my team had given me for Christmas, and took advantage of Chives' "kitchen table" experience. 

And what an experience it was.  

Basically chef sets you up in a corner of the kitchen (next to his cook books as you can see in the picture) and then proceeds to feed you course after course of small bites. 

For this evening, we were presented with the following: 

• An oyster trio, featuring one raw, one baked with a smoked cheese base, and one fried with a pepper sauce. 
• A plate of poached asparagus in a light lemon sauce and fresh goat cheese. 
• Freshly caught whitefish (from the chef himself!) that were poached perfectly
• An incredibly well prepared seared scallop course with parsnip puree
• A grilled chipotle beef tenderloin with an accompany of French fried blue onion
• Bananas Foster, with homemade cinnamon ice cream 

The dishes were creative yet delicious, complex yet tasty, casual yet formal, all at the same time.  The dinner could not have been any better.  And for someone like me that has never been in a professional kitchen in the middle of service (beyond what I've viewed on Hell's Kitchen), it was as much a learning experience as it was gastronomic nirvana. 

Hat's off to owner/chef J.R. and the rest of the crew.  Our chef's table experience at Chives could not have been any better.  It has our highest endorsement.

Green Bay Delta Waterfowl Event Recap

My wife and I attneded our first conservation event in our new home town, and Green Bay does it up right.  The Delta event had free beer, all you could eat chicken and ribs (which both were outstanding), and a small but friendly crowd.

We dropped some dollars to help the cause, buying more than our share of raffle tickets.  And I'm happy to say we were big winners. 

What did we win?

Let's just say it was a Hollywood ending... 

Google's Recent Algorithm Change Resets Playing Field

As a web marketer, I know the value of ranking high in Google's search rankings.  A simple shift in position can result in the loss or gain of tens of thousands of visitors a month.  Hence, a lot of time is spent by companies to optimize their sites to appear higher in Google search rankings.  This is difficult as Google doesn't share the specifics of their algorithm, and while Search Engine Optimizers know things like number of inbound links will be good for them, they don't know most of the hundreds (thousands?) of variables like the optimal numeric use of keywords on a page, for example. 

Google has been active in changing their algorithm in the past, and made a major change last week in an effort to drive better results for their users' searches.  Unfortunately for some sites (The Huffington Post being one of the more higher profile), their SEO activity was penalized in Google's most recent release.  Likewise, two major retailers (JC Penney and Overstock) were found to be acquiring inbound links in a fashion that Google deemed inappropriate and contrary to their Webmaster Guidelines, with both being issued Google's "death penalty," - both have basically been buried in search results. 

This action will literally cost each company millions.  Some in the SEO and business community bemoan Google changing their algorithm, as even slight shifts can have massive impact in website performance.  To them, I say "tough bounce."  The Webmaster Rules are fairly clear, and should you choose to tread into a grey or black area, you'll eventually be found out and punished.  As you're not paying Google for the service of appearing in their natural rankings, they owe you nothing, and you'll be the one that needs to explain to your stockholders what happened (and in JCP's case, blame all of it on their agency while unbelievably disavowing any knowledge of how their SEO rankings got so good so quickly).  Those of us playing the game correctly by building our content appropriately will ultimately leapfrog you in the rankings, and will ultimately reap our rewards.      

Rockford Hideaway

The city of Rockford, IL has taken advantage of their notoriety as the home for coward and negligent politicians and turned it into a great opportunity to talk about their location from a tourism perspective.  And Rick Nielsen steals the show

Summit Brewing Company Beer Dividend

My dad, for a portion of his career, was a very successful investment banker. He helped companies in their merger and acquisition activities, and also helped to take private companies public. Many times, as a form of compensation, dad received equity in these transactions. At times these became worthless, as the companies didn’t thrive and failed, but sometimes things worked out extremely well. 

One such instance was capitalization of Summit Brewery. The stock of this company is now privately held and employee-owned, and dad maintained his stake in his portfolio ever since the initial transaction. Prior to dad’s passing, this stock was transferred to mom, and she’s held it ever since. 

About a year ago, mom let me know that as a stockholder, she has access to two free cases of beer from them every month, as a “beer dividend.” She wanted to know if I was interested. Uh, free beer? Strike that, free Summit beer? Yeah. I’m interested. 

I asked the details behind the whole situation and found out the history. So for years and years our family had access to this benefit, and I just found out about it. Unbelievable. Dad was never a beer drinker, so I’m sure such a dividend meant nothing to him, thus it was easy to forget. Had it been for brandy, Irish whiskey or something like that, he’d have been all over it. Alas, the dividend was also “use or lose,” so there was no option to recover all of the years that we missed. The only thing I could do was to take advantage of it as much as we possibly could. 

I was recently in the Twin Cities for a research project, and my time happened to coincide with a dividend day, so I paid a trip to my favorite brewery.  As it was President's Day, I called ahead to make sure that it was indeed dividend day (their schedule can change due to holidays.)  The nice receptionist informed me that yes, it was that special day, but unfortunately all they had was Pilsener.  You can read the reviews here. 

Only Pilsener, huh?  It will be hard, but I guess I'll be able to make due.  

Thanks, dad.  While you were a decade or so late (hello - your son likes beer) I appreciate the fruits of your hard work nonetheless.

Ever Wanted to Fly Like a Bird?

Check out this incredible footage.  The life that resides here on this planet is remarkable.


 

Revelations from the Battle of Madison

The situation in the capitol of our newly adopted state is totally in flux.  The Battle of Madison is the first skirmish in what will be a war to reign in unsustainable entitlements.  And what have those for continuation of our economic demise shown themselves to be?   

First, hypocrites. 

Second, with the prevalence of the “sick out,” liars. 

Third, abject frauds.



In no other job in the private sector can you have a fully funded pension, a fully funded heath program, job protection via tenure regardless how horrible your performance, and the ability to skip your work, lie about it, and commit a fraud all without fear of reprisal. 

How is this fair?  Anyone in the private sector that did this would be fired in a New York minute. 

Keep it up, unions.  What you’re really about is on display for the whole world to see, and those of us that pay your salaries have had enough.  Soon you will be welcomed back to the real world with the rest of us.