I won this singing James Brown figure at a Christmas party many years ago. My wife made a Santa suit for him and he became the traditional center piece at Christmas dinner. The real godfather of soul is no longer with us, but this one will once again sing ” I feel good” over Christmas dinner. This is the last post for 2007. See you in the New Year.

Talk about the entrpreneurial spirit, a professional shoeshine parlor. I came across this little building yesterday while driving a country road. I doubt he gets a lot of walk-in business off the street. It’s not exactly a busy thoroughfare. Apparently there were enough people with dirty shoes in the area that he saw a need and decided he was the man to fill it.

This was a nice moment between dog and handler. The dog’s official name is “The World Famous Condaleeza Bites”. No kidding. They call her Leeza for short. You can’t say the owner doesn’t have a sense of humor. I didn’t ask if she was republican or democrat (the owner, not the dog). I don’t think dogs much care as long as they get fed.

The handlers move the dogs to the various trials in a truck/trailer filled with pens. Most of them have their own fresh water supply along with everything else they might need, sort of like rolling kennels. I meant one handler who traveled with 14 dogs (only 4 were his), a cat and a wife. This curious golden retriever’s name is Cruise. Maybe he was named after Tom. He looks a little goofy.

As enjoyable as the dogs were to watch, there was a downside. At least for the ducks.

This is one focused retriever. Dog trials consist of progressively more challenging tests, called marks. The first, and easiest, had ducks being downed in succession in three different directions, at 100 yards, 250 yards and 400 yards. The dog has to spot the duck after he hears the shot, remember where the duck lands and retrieve them in the order they were downed. Not an easy task. To complicate things, in water marks the dog has to swim across a lake to retrieve the ducks. Now you understand why this Chesapeake is so focused.

I recently started a story on duck hunting. A sidebar to the story was a dog trial. These dogs were incredibly well trained and a pleasure to watch work. Turns out that there were enough good photos from the dog trial to make it its own story for the Jan/Feb 2008 issue of Virginia Living magazine ( www.virginialiving.com ). I’ll post some outtakes from the shoot over the next few days.