website navigation
The website is best explored via content headings on the left. or made visible by clicking the three horizontal lines in the upper left hand corner, depending on whether you're on a phone, tablet, or desk top.
There is also a search bar, specific to the site, accessed by clicking the magnifying glass icon in the upper right corner.
The text below isn't necessary reading for anyone that finds those methods easy enough, but it does provide an overview of sorts.
The first Olympicdogs website was late to the website party, about a decade behind the curve. But I wasn't inclined to learn HTML, hire a nerd, or even keep abreast the technology that eventually made website construction doable for almost anyone.
My I.T. savvy cousin blew threw town circa 2006 and set me up in about an hour, on Tumbler. He threw an old head of shot of mine he noticed on my laptop in the profile photo, showed me some basics, and wished me luck. The format was less than ideal, but the difference between having a website and not, rocked my bottom line, at the time.
Over the years that followed, photos were gradually replaced with video ( Olympicdogs youtube ) where I had time to document at all. It's easy to make a dog look good or bad with photos, but video is a tool far better suited to revealing reality; temperament, movement etc. Knowing this, it became my preference, so the more recent dogs may only have video, the older dogs only photos, and some in between will have both.
What I had done however, while I waited for Cuz, was what I enjoyed somewhat; write and take photos. I have years worth of photos most never seen, I'll be uploading to instagram @ Olympicdogsig
Having concluded that most of the problems in dogs ( and most things ) could rightly be laid at the feet of an ignorant and effectively undiscerning public. I wanted to do my part to take a bite out of that problem, educationally speaking, so I wrote to that end.
For those interested in extended reading then, The Word of Dog section remains the place to be for all things written. There are essay's in there that the vast majority of the people calling about dogs would do well to read. Most of those essays have stood the test of time, largely unedited. As new topics warrant text, The Word of Dog is where they'll get filed.
Some more recent headings, for those who may have read the old text prior, include
" The Holy Trinity" a detailed look at the three current branches of the program, which is complete.
and.
" Back Stories" Which, but for teasers, remain untold. The Backstories mean to give readers a look behind the curtain at how some of our more significant Dogs were acquired. And hopefully provide some measure of entertainment for us both in the process.
This second coming of an Olympicdogs website is meant to be more user friendly than the first. Which is a pretty low bar, but it also wants to be designed with an eye towards the future so we can avoid a third coming, which lacking biblical reference, sounds precariously pornographic.
What follows below is an overview intended to help you navigate the site. Most of the headings, which can be found by clicking the three horizontal lines in the upper left corner, should be fairly self evident, and easily explored.
Some of the changes in the second coming include
A dedicated "page" for every current breeding dog. And the ability to travel back through the generations and view dedicated pages for specific dogs in their ancestry.
There are a couple notable problems with this.
The first is that a tidy genealogical family tree composed, in hindsight, entirely of winners, from winners, creates an inherently misleading website !!
It looks as if we only ever bred dogs that met our criteria for continuity. It would appear as if every dog owned got bred, every dog bred worked out, and bred forward, etc. Which COULD NOT BE, farther from the truth. And so should it be, for any remotely discerning breeding program.
But if all I'm doing, effectively, is addressing the stand out dogs, the best of the best of the best from years of litters, then yes I'll be lathering those beasts with superlatives. Praise such as "special," "excellent", "exceptional", "remarkable" etc. But there is no cause to mention of all the disappointments, busts, genetic dead ends, if where not also documenting that silent majority.
Moreover it would be easy to confuse such praise with the disingenuous marketing norm for the vast majority of "convenience breeders" who praise every dog they happen to own on policy, never met a dog they wouldn't breed, etc. But To understand our breeding program by looking at a chronology of the evolutionary successes is rather like quantifying the weather here in the Pacific NorthWest by watching Our youtube channel.
We make videos as weather permits. Not in the rain, wind, or even in the cold more than necessity dictates. Warm sunny, wind-less, bird chirpy days, are much preferred. But the impression one might get about the great NorthWest weather then would make a lie of the considerably colder, wetter, windier reality.
Any discerning breeding program, is mostly dead ends, genetic cul-de-sacs, evolutionary busts. "Good Breeders" are cherry picking the gems, but the genetic cast aways will always be the majority. And so I probably should dedicate some sort of heading, ass time, and website space to the busts, eventually. But for now it's all I can do to catch up with documenting the winners.
Or maybe, where we have good photos or video of the genetically departed, we can post those, like epitaphs, on some more visually oriented medium like Instagram. Or whatever other platform has become the must do of the day, by the time I get my marketing bleep together...... if ever that day comes.
And of course right now we're working from the vantage of hindsight. But many of today's winners, will in turn, fall from evolutionary grace as time passes. Whole branches may be broken off the Olympicdogs tree, as new limbs require light. Even if their dedicated pages may remain, the previous hindsight losers will likely never have dedicated pages.
So it is important to understand, that while documenting winners backwards for two decades from 2022 might be a useful first step, in creating a more user friendly website, and proving some background for what remains. It does not begin to tell the whole story.
The second problem is organizational.
How best to arrange all these breeds and potentially infinite mixes ?
It is simple enough with purebreds to create a heading for the chosen breeds, give my take on those breeds, speak to the reasoning, and list the individual dogs thereof in sub pages under that breeds heading. Which I have done.
Our Hybrids will be found in sub headings of the index Link Our Hybrids within which
Half breeds get their own heading and
4 way crosses as equal parts of 4 breeds, also get their own. And
Percentage Hybrids. will contain all other less symmetrically divisible percentages
Filed under the singular breed containing their greatest percentage. Regardless of how many breeds might be in the mix. For example if a cross is 50% Boerboel and the other 50% is six other breeds, in whatever percentages, you'll find that dog in Percentage Hybrids under Boerboel %
In any, and all cases, you should be able to simply click a link on a given dogs page to go forwards or backwards in ancestral time, to see that dogs parents, or that dogs progeny. So long as those dogs are either current or related to dogs that made that cut.
Which, again, please bear in mind, is inherently misleading, as to the greater picture and process of a discerning breeding program.
As I often preach, what separates "breeders" is largely the effort, or lack thereof, made in acquiring exceptional genetics. So I thought it might be worth while pulling back the curtain on the lengths I've gone to that end. Taking the reader to Argentina, Turkey, S. Africa, and around this country... in literary fashion.
The Back stories will be for those old school folks that might still appreciate a good read, as much as I sometimes still enjoy the challenge of a good write. I plan on telling some of those tales, sharing some of those journeys, as time permits.
So reach out if you're interested in reading such stories, or hearing them spoken even, podcast style. Drop me an E, say so, say which. Because the truth is I've got other compelling endeavors in the physical world to attend always, when I'm not putting out fires in the existing empire. Left to me, it may well take winters and broken bones to justify creative writing. But if folks are interested enough in those stories to say so, telling them could move up the to-do list.