Dang it! I missed Flashback Friday last week!  I'm sure I was doing something productive and just missed it...hmm...shoot...it was probably the sofa and a trashy romance novel.  Hey-I deserved it after last work week.  Let's just say it involved large sums of money and an insurance company's inability to realize that the patient really did NEED the drug. 

So Flashback Friday for LAST week is today.  Weather permitting I'm heading to the international dog shows this weekend with Dora, so I doubt you will get a FF this week.

This is "Ripley", Ch. Balmoral Believe It Or Not, CD.  He was the biggest clown of the Collies.  Rip was a big dog, topped the standard at 26" and 85lbs in peak condition.  Rip was a true talker, always had something to say.  My favorites about Rip was the way he would dance when you scratched his rear end, the fact that he would back up to a bush to poop and in fact taught that skill to his dog friend Toby, and that he never met a person he didn't love on sight.  When my sister was battling cancer and living with me, Ripley was her favorite.  I think he just knew she needed him around and they were both featured in a Gazette article about cancer patients.  Here are some pics of Ripley.  As a puppy, finishing his Championship at just a year of age, his Canadian group placement and in 2005 at age 8.  Rip died at age 10, way too soon from cancer.  There will never be another blue dog that could match him in my heart.