Home from PASRBA

[Honorine]

Well made the trek out to Lebanon again this year, and what a icy ugly trek it was. I've been going out friday night, sharing a room with friends, and then the Boy shows on saturday and we scoot home early. This year I decided we were driving out in the morning, made the Hubby drive (he hates rabbits). Took 4 hours for whats normally a little over two hour drive, slid sideways into a ditch and almost took out three mailboxes. The road into Lebanon was littered with disabled vehicles, the ice was so bad, our Chevy van was driving itself down the road, we couldn't have stopped it if we wanted to. Somehow managed to get out of the ditch and to the expo center without hitting someone. And it was a madhouse, they pushed the start of judging back to 10, because so many people were stranded on the ice trying to get there. Last year we had 18 inches of snow to deal with, this year a thin sheet of ice caused more problems than the snow did. Last year, showing the same breeds and more rabbits we were done and left at 1pm to avoid the possibility of more snow, this year it was three thirty and still most of my sons rabbits hadn't gotten on the table yet, had to leave one for a friends daughter to put up. It seemed extra crazy this year, and I'm seriously considering not going next year. For any first timers I'd suggest going on sunday not saturday, lots of people have gone home then and its a much mellower day. One other thing is that the awards vary greatly from year to year, kid may be offered a trophy one year, then have to chose between an apron, a feed bowl or a hand towel the next. What kid wants a hand towel? I really have come to feel that they do not do enough for the youth exhibitors. Last smaller show we were at Boy got BOV, maybe 3-5 rabbits in the class, and he got this really neat double layer fancy flat ribbon. He took BOV again at PASRBA, in a class of about 12, and got just a regular plain flat ribbon. In some breeds, like Mini Rex, BOV is a big deal, its really competitive, some of those kids were winning BOV with 30-40 rabbits in their class. It just doesn't seem right. Granted this is just my opinion, from what I've observed in past years. I know I'm tired, and probably cranky, and definitely stressed, but I've been thinking these same things for years just never said anything. I'm by no means belittling how hard PASRBA's members work to put on this mini-convention, it just seems so haphazard sometimes and geared more towards adults, and I'm all about the kids. Something esle happened that really bothered me too, I'm not going to say breed because then someone may know who they are. I was looking for a buck of XYZ breed, had looked up a certain rabbitry on PASRBA that had this breed. Their a pretty big name, member of PASRBA, in the breeders directory blah blah blah. I'd checked out their website, seemed like upright folks. Looked them up at the show, they had a Jr buck for sale, wanted $35 for him. He looked small, and not thrifty, but I figured I'd check him out, grabbed my rabbit guru buddy and trotted over there. He had a big fat 'potty' belly, mucus dripping out of his anus and snot in his nose. The breeder had showed the rabbit to a youth breeder right before we looked at it, and was obviously eager to sell it. It should have been culled and put out of its misery. Instead it was sitting in a showroom, surrounded by other folks healthy well cared for rabbits, with a $35 price tag on it. And these are big deal PASRBA members, and this guy would not have had a problem taking a young kids money and sending a sick rabbit home to her herd. Been there, done that, had it done to me as a Youth breeder, wiped my herd out. People just really suck sometimes. Maybe I should just blow off PA Convention for a year or two, or don't take the Boy to show, maybe thats the best decision. Once again though folks, its buyer beware out there, no matter how respectable someone appears to be, or how they use a club to make themselves look good some people just are jerks and connivers. Thats my public service message for the day.

 

[MaggieJ]

Glad you got there and home again safely in spite of the ice! I wouldn't try to decide about next year at this point... You're too tired and stressed. And it was a particularly chaotic event, by the sound of it. Hopefully, in a day or two the good things about the adventure will surface and you'll feel better about the whole experience.

 

[pfaubush]

Glad you made it home safely. I agree with Maggie. Get rested up before you make any decisions.

 

[SatinsRule]

You just outlined why winter weather is such a big deal down here. Whatever little bit of snow we get isn't the problem. The sleet and freezing rain is.

I just hope next weekend isn't as bad as this one is. If it is, I won't likely be making the trek to the Magnolia State RBA show in Collins, Mississippi.

 

[Frosted Rabbits]

i wish I could get to a show,period!!!
One thing I noticed when I belonged to a kennel club-- the better the prizes, the better the entry gets-- few clubs are willing to spend the dollars on the trinkets that the competitor can 'show off' afterwards. Now one Irish Setter specialty club I entered shows at -- lots of high quality, one of a kind, home made trophies!!!In one obedience class, every dog washed out, but the trophies were still awarded!!!(no ribbons, just trophies) Nowonder whytheywere ble to make money at their twice yearly, 5 hour long show. people came for the momentoes!!!(sp?)

 

[Random Rabbit]

Oh My !!

Early in the week we made reservations for a hotel near there, planning to spend Fri night... walk the show Saturday and come home. Then about Wednesday the forecast changes to a 'little storm'... nothing major...just sn*w , ice, freezing rain... Thursday we cancelled the hotel. Hearing Your report... i'm so glad we did. ! I'm a huge wuss when it comes to winter driving ! Here at home we had heavy wet sn*w...Freezing rain... more heavy wet sn*w. I'm so glad we stayed home !

 

[Honorine]

Well I'm less cranky now, and have rethought everything. I shouldn't have gone, I was nuts, my hub thought I was nuts, he wanted to refuse to take us but did anyway, it was bad out and we could have gotten into an accident. I need to adjust my attitude, I made a poor decision, I will be far more cautious next year. Ice really is so much more dangerous than snow, it was scary, really scary. I did speak with Boy about the awards, he expressed his opinion about the 'hand towel' and we laughed. You know what one of his fav awards is? A glass jar with a lid, with the Club name and best opp of Breed on it. Its not about the expense or largeness of the awards, its about how special they seem and how much thought goes into them. So I'm going to just take it all with a grain of salt and let it go, will perhaps try going next year but only on a sunday, and only if the weather is perfect. Some good points were my son enjoyed himself, and we found a young black Silver doe, so thats something good to think about. Thanks everyone!!

 

[yanni]

Honorine, what breed(s) do you show? I was at PASRBA, too. Both days. Left the house around 6am. got to the show at about 9:50! :evil: Roads were closed. Had to detour twice! The trip should have taken about 1hr and 10 min. Brought 3 daughters. First timers. Hadn't a clue! Sunday was much calmer! Brought all four kids. They all did well and had fun! The best thing about Saturday was the 2 jr does we picked up

 

[Honorine]

We have Mini Rex, Florida Whites, Thriantas and Silvers. My son didn't show Thriantas this year, but had entries for the other three breeds. It was especially insane wasn't it? Rough on new people too, I've been going for 6 years and I still get overwhelmed. I've only gone on sunday once, am thinking it is probably the better day. We were coming from the Pocono Mountains, it was fine until we hit Hamburg on 78, and thats when we started seeing vehicles spun off the road into the snow banks. Reason why I wanted to go on saturday was to look for some new rabbits, friday night is the best time to look, then saturday, by sunday most folks are gone and there's little left for sale. Glad your kids had a great time and you found some nice does, good for you!<br /><br />__________ Sun Feb 06, 2011 9:30 pm __________<br /><br />Yanni, do you do Florida Whites? Ah geez, your the nice lady with the girls that I sold the two does to aren't you? I saw your BOB thread on the bottom of the page and went 'DUH'. It was nice meeting you and your girls, hope the does do really well for you!

 

[Devon's Mom Lauren]

To be honest I didn't realize that was a bad storm.. We just waited at the hotel for the traffic to clear down the road which meant the jackknifed truck was out of the way and we could go. Why don't they just salt the roads?? It wasn't even cold and there wasn't that much ice!! If the roads had been salted earlier when the sleet started, by the morning the roads would have been just wet. At 6;30 am the temp was hovering at the freezing point.
We had Mini Rex there and camped in the back hallway between the main showroom ,the wool room and the Cavy room. We were just outside the door to the food and there was a bathroom around the corner that no one knew about lol. We avoided the main room because of overcrowding and the smell got real bad in there. Small price to pay for walking the carriers to the table for a little less stress on the buns!

 

[Honorine]

Hey we were over there!! Friend was looking at some Mini Rex right next to the cavy door, and there were black Silvers out in the hall there too, I bought a doe. It is a nice sheltered place in that hallway, away from the craziness.

 

[Random Rabbit]

Quick Question... ( no hijacking of the thresd meant)

Just How does one display a 'Towel trophy ' ?? I've ( in years gone by ) had trophies, ribbons and plaques... but a Towel sorta stumps me. RR.

 

[DevonW]

Hey we were over there!! Friend was looking at some Mini Rex right next to the cavy door, and there were black Silvers out in the hall there too, I bought a doe. It is a nice sheltered place in that hallway, away from the craziness.

We were right there :lol: those Mini Rex belonged to a friend of ours.