Garden State

The fun continues in the aftermath of Zero's Best of Breed win at The Garden. Congratulations are rolling in and it's been a bit of a whirlwind of people sending their best wishes. There are many people in other breeds who are extolling the virtues of Zero, whom they saw in group on TV, and who believe he should have at least made the cut. I won't disagree! I sincerely appreciate every single acknowledgement of Zero's marvelous and unexpected rise to relative 'fame'. He certainly takes it all in stride as does his owner Erin who I'm sure was pretty confident he could pull off practically the biggest win of a dog's show career.

Right after the Breed win we were required to go to the NY Times photo shoot which until a few minutes ago remained a bit of a mystery. Here is a photo of the shoot which I took while the photographer was busy taking his own photos. You can see the result of this shoot on the NY Times website.

You can also see a cute video they took of the behind-the-scenes of the shoot. Zero's feet are close to the beginning and there is a moment or two of Erin tossing bait to get Zero to perk up. The funniest part, to be honest, is the Basset Hound ... it is hysterical. To see that just head to the Best in Show II video kindly provided by the NY Times.

I am still trying to wrap my head around the whole experience, not just the show and not just the win but the entire trip. It was a great adventure in my life and I'd definitely like to repeat it at some point, including the Breed win(!), but even without that New York definitely did not disappoint. I wasn't going to buy one of those cheesy "I (heart) NY" tacky tourist items but when I was in the airport just before we left I changed my mind. Before Zero's win I would probably have given this little white bag a miss but after the Big Win make no mistake ...