[guide.chat] episode 19 the adventures of Mary Jane

From: "Jenny Mock" <r.mock356@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Guide Chat List" <guide.chat@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2012 17:56:27 +0100
Brett received a letter from TSW telling us that the first part of the 
programme would be filmed at Cleve House the guide dog training centre at 
Exeter,they had booked us in at the Rugemont Hotel in Exeter for one night,
we duly went to the hotel first as instructed to leave our belongings there and 
a taxi had been put on to take us to the training centre, being as we have no 
children we had to borrow a child for the programme  she was called Diana and 
was the daughter of one of the puppy walkers, 
there was also another guide dog owner who was competing with us,he was Mike 
with guide dog Ambie
when we got to the training centre we had to take our dogs to have their photo 
taken as we were given a framed photo of our dog at the end of the programme, 
first there was the maze with a bowl of food in the middle of it the idea was 
for the dog to get through the maze as fast as he could and hope that it would 
not be distracted by the food,at first TSW wanted to do away with the maze for 
us but Lofty suggested that the dogs took their owners through the maze while 
the husband or wife of the people taking part would call the dog from the exit 
and hope they would get it right and go right through, well we gave it a trial 
run and it worked perfectly so they decided to leave the maze there,
of course Brett being Collie Retriever    cross was very smart and got me 
through the maze in 13 seconds,then it was Ambie's turn and he took 17 seconds 
as he tried to look over the side and wasted time, then we had to go through an 
obstacle  course  
this we did in the pouring rain as the weather was awful that day,both guide 
dogs had a clear run through the obstacles  because the colour for our team was 
yellow I could not wear a raincoat as it would have been the wrong colour, but 
Mike's team being blue he had a blue raincoat so did not get wet,when Brett and 
I had finished they wrapped me into a blanket to warm me up and gave me a hot 
drink,I had to go through the obstacles  quite a few times as Brett was such an 
unusual dog colour wise they wanted to take lots of pictures of him, at the end 
of the day we went back to the hotel and they were still filming other 
families'  that were taking part in the series, after we got back home we were 
told we would be informed when they were going to do the second part of the 
programme,but we had to sign a paper to say we would not tell any one the 
outcome of the programme after filming as they didn't know then when they were 
going to show it,
a month later we went down to Plymouth to the TSW studio's to do the second 
part of the programme which was questions plus a couple of tests done by the 
vet,we had been booked into the Copthorn hotel for a couple of nights,as the 
first day was just a practice run,the next day it was for real,we had to have 
make up done and our hair done before we went before the camera's  I was very 
nervous but all went well and Brett didn't let me down when we did the tests 
for the vet,the outcome was that Brett won by 11 points but of course they gave 
us £500 and the other team £500 so that made a thousand which would sponsor a 
guide dog in those days, the fund raising manager came on at the end with his 
dog and a guide dog puppy which TSW were sponsoring we also met the mystery  
guest with his dogs he was Peter Purvis.    
so a good day was had by all,
kind regards from Jenny Ray and  doggies skype name jenny.mock97
[guide.chat] episode 19 the adventures of Mary Jane

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