Fifty

2 Comments / Daily Dose, Family Funk, Friends & Family, Holidays /

Oy, this is not the 50th birthday post I thought I’d write back when I didn’t have a PUPPY (or a house full of puppies) but this is pretty much all I have energy (and concentration) for.

It was a very busy day. But also a nice day.

Buster keeps jumping into my lap and grabbing my arm while I type. If you’d told me yesterday that he’d be doing that today, I would not have believed it. I also probably wouldn’t have believed Skeeter would have taught him to counter surf or that Lola would have taught him to dig very deep holes in the backyard. I did, however, expect the vet to say he had worms — which did happen. So yay all of the dogs get to enjoy canned dog food in celebration of my birthday.

I never expected JMP would have finger painted pictures for me, though I suppose I should have — his mother is, after all, my daughter. I can’t wait to have the real things in my hands… good thing I hadn’t done anything with the ones he painted for me last month, now I can frame them all at the same time.

I did expect wonderful birthday wishes from my Facebook friends but it’s always a lot of fun to see them roll in, anyway. I didn’t have nearly enough time to thank everyone, individually, but I really did appreciate all of your good wishes.

I enjoyed my Smashburger dinner with TW and her mom — there’s not enough lime soda in my life, I should change that because my Green River float was awesome, (and the black bean burger was fabulous, too.)

All in all, fifty feels pretty darn good. Now I’m off to collapse into my bed with a pack of wild hounds and a book that I really want to finish tonight.

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Buster’s Progress Report

6 Comments / Animal Issues, Daily Dose, Family Funk, Pets /

Buster (aka Hamlet) was listed as “shy” and that was a serious understatement. Buster wasn’t shy, he was terrified of people. Today, two days later, he is shy with a little bit of scared thrown in.

But, just a little less than 48 hours have passed and he’s made huge progress. Here are some things Buster can do (though not always) now that he could not do on Thursday.

Buster can:
– Take a treat out of a person’s hand.
– Eat a treat while in his crate.
– He can walk from one end of the house to the other, following dogs or people. (Though showing him the red confidence leash speeds up the process.)
– He can walk to his crate, while wearing the red confidence leash.
– He picks toys up off of the floor and plays with him. (He joined a game of fetch, once, by grabbing a toy Lola was retrieving from me — and he kept it, though it helps that Lola did not try to take it away.)
– He can join Skeeter and Lola in roughhousing, for a few minutes.
– He can walk past a person who is standing or sitting still.
– He can go in and out of the back door while a person is standing at the door.
– He can stand in the doorway or on the steps while a person is standing there. (which is why this morning’s photo, above, was such a big deal. He could not even do THAT yesterday.)
– He can approach a person who is standing or sitting still and sniff or lick them. He might even let the person pet him for a few seconds.
– He can wander into the bedroom when people and dogs are in there.
– He can put his front paws on the bed to see what the people and the dogs are doing.
– He can wander in during nap time and decide to nap on Skeeter’s bed while the people and the dogs are napping on the bed.
– He can sniff the prairie dogs.
– He can approach a person who is sitting or standing still, when called. Though he will only go halfway before he turns around to find a safe place to lay down.

Things he cannot do, EVER:

– Hold his spot or approach a person who is walking toward him.

He’s one heck of a cute puppy and once he has some weight on, and some more confidence, he’s really going to be a beauty. Right now he’s just sweet and when he lets you walk by him or stand near him or, gasp, pet him, you kind of feel like you’ve won the lottery.

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Senility Has Set In

2 Comments / Animal Issues, Daily Dose, Family Funk, Holidays, Pets /

I’ll be 50 on Monday and I was feeling just fine with that. But now I’m a little concerned. My mind, my senses, it’s all going. I need someone to THINK because I’m apparently unable to do so, any more.

Obviously.

Since I asked for a puppy for my birthday.

And got him.

This is Buster, formerly known as Hamlet.

So maybe I haven’t completely lost my mind. He needed us to adopt him after the horrible bus accident. Watching him in a crate with his brother, before they’d let people into the tent area to check out the adoptable dogs — it was heartbreaking to see him just lay there. He didn’t move. He didn’t look around. He didn’t even think about barking.

HEARTBREAKING.

He’s very afraid of people. A little shy around the dogs (especially Lola). Did I mention it’s heartbreaking? But there’s a spark in him, you can see it when he’s outside with the dogs. He really, really wants to play with them. He thought he was awesome sauce when he snuck up on Skeeter (who was peeing at the time) and nothing bad happened.

Maybe I’m not senile, just a little softhearted?

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Need More Filters

1 Comment / Community Chest, Daily Dose /

I’ve got a bit of an addiction to surfing real estate listings on Zillow.

About six months ago, I set up some saved searches on my Zillow iPhone app for places I thought we might consider living when we move away from here. I added searches for Beaufort, SC, Savannah, Ga, Brunswick, Ga, St Marys, Ga, Fernandina Beach, Fl. Then, I added Charleston, SC (never gonna happen) and Gainesville, Fl last month.

My filters include:
– $200,000 or less
– House, not condo
– 2 br or more
– 2 baths or more

I often find myself puzzling over the photos included in these listings and often hand the phone to TW while chuckling. There’s a lot of “who thought that was a good idea” and “OMG what is ON THE BED?” and “who are the people who live in this house???” and “OMG those pictures are so not helpful.”

Now that I’ve seen the Terrible Real Estate Agent Photos tumbler, I know, it could be worse.

Which also reminded me that I sometimes wish agents would take photos of things I can’t filter for… things like doggy doors. Do any of these houses already have one installed? That could be the thing that pushes me into choosing THAT house. If you’ve got one, photograph it! Is the yard fenced? I’m always surprised that so few listings actually mention the fencing. Are there a lot of squirrels? I’d rather have trees but few squirrels, thanks. Are the neighbors asshats? If they aren’t, it would be nice if you’d say so because I am sick to death of bad neighbors.

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Stuck in the Middle with You

2013, Books in Bed, Non-Fiction, Queer /

I like Jennifer Boylen and I liked Stuck in the Middle with You but… I also didn’t like it.

Jennifer was a dad, when she was Jim.
And then a mom when she transitioned to Jennifer.
But she was always a parent.

A parent who did change (in some ways) as a parent once she transitioned to being a woman.

The it just muddied the waters about what fatherhood, motherhood, parenthood is (or isn’t) — and why. No clear conclusions except that we’re all different, as people and as parents (and we are often different people or parents as time passes.)

Duh and also murky at the same time. Which is pretty much what life is like (for all of us.)

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Reading in September

2013, Books in Bed, Reading, Reading Lists /

This list is a little (OK a lot) wonky. Some of the kids books were really read in August but since I fell behind, I didn’t blog them in August so they’re being counted here. Which is good since I didn’t get much reading done in September, either.

Blah. I read 19 books….

4 Fiction
2 Non-fiction (one was a book of short stories)
0 YA (has this ever happened to me? I don’t think so!)
12 Children’s fiction (4 of these were Cybils)
1 Audiobooks

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The Potty Mouth at the Table

2013, Books in Bed, short stories /

So, The Potty Mouth at the Table… I laughed out loud, early in the book, much louder and longer than TW did when she was laughing her way through Let’s Not Pretend (The Bloggess). Then I hit a few stories that didn’t really make me laugh. A couple of more that bugged me. And, I never quite fell back into the stories — I think I was always waiting for one to bug me. Which might be my problem with reading a book of short stories cover to cover.

Very funny in spots. Not so much in others (though I suspect the stories that bugged me wouldn’t bother others since one person’s joke is another person’s angst…)

It was well worth reading, if only for the hobos and the problem with puffs.

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The Raven Girl

2013, Books in Bed, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

The Raven Girl is a fairy tale about a postman who falls in love with a raven — they have a raven girl baby (chick?) who has to find her way in the world when she never feels quite right. She looks like a human but she feels like a raven.

Cute story. Good mix of fantasy and scifi. Nice illustrations.

I’m actually more interested in it now that I know it was written to be a ballet. Now that’s interesting. I’m betting it’s a great ballet. Not that it wasn’t a good book. It was. I liked it, though the end felt a little rushed.

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The Mermaid of Brooklyn

2013, Books in Bed, Fiction, Women /

There were a half dozen books on the library cart that needed to go back soon, so I asked TW which of them I should read (as I often do) and she said I should read The Mermaid of Brooklyn. So I did.

I see why she thought I’d like to read it — it had potential. Park Slope mom with a degree in Russian folklore or some such thing and a crummy husband, jumps (I mean falls) off of the Brooklyn Bridge and is saved by a rusalka.

But, I didn’t really like Jenny — not before the rusalka or after or even after that. Not liking her made it very hard to enjoy the story. VERY hard. So I didn’t. Not really.

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