The Expectant Dog

Much is made about being prepared to be parents.  There are thousands of books for mom-to-be's, and good handful for dad-to-be's.  The reality is that it might be helpful for your family pet to have some good reading time. 

Cats are not welcome in my home, but the following can be adapted to most common family pets.  Might not work for a fish, because they are so low-key, but you get the point.

I submit for your dog's sake: The Expectant Dog, a letter to read to your pet about your future.

Dear Only-Child-Dog,
Our time together as a family of three has been wonderful, hasn't it?  I remember fondly our first walk in the park, the first time you woke me up way too early to be fed, and how you snuggled close to me in the storms.  Don't get me wrong, we'll still have fun together, but things are about to change.

Really, things have already begun to change.  You see, the lady of the house has a growing human-child inside.  This is great news for us as a family, I promise.  It does mean, though, that our relationship needs to change.  Here are some things to be aware of:

• Since we have a fenced yard, there will be no more walks.  Not for a long time anyway.
• The smell of the house will change, a lot.  Now you will smell poop indoors as well as outside!  
• For a while all of our attention will be focused on this human-child.  Soon enough, though, attention will turn back to you.  Out of your own safety, but it will be attention.
• You know how you like to eat right at 6 am and 6 pm?  That's going to change, too.  Heck, on occasion you will go to bed without food because I just plain forgot.  Sorry in advance.
• When the human-child is older it will follow you around, and probably pull your tail, poke at your teeth and maybe even bite a little. Be a good dog and don't bite back.
  

You see, friend, change happens.  We are all learning a new way of life, and eventually everything will seem "normal" again because it will be the new normal.  Eventually the human-child will be exciting and nice and take you for walks again.  Hopefully you will still be up for walking then, too!

Sincerely,
Your Friendly Owner

Wordless Wednesday - Blocks Fall

Okay, technically not wordless, but I love this shot!

More pics at www.wordlesswednesday.com

Sometimes it IS Easy Being Green

Remember back to January when I blogged about how easy it is being green? If not, read it HERE.

In the comments of that it can be very expensive and just not worth the cost to benefit to make changes. I disagree with that deeply, but I respect that we all have opinions on the matter.

What you can not deny is that we all get too many catalogs and junk mail. For a long time it has been a fruitless effort to call each company, convince them that you only bought the one thing from them and it was a gift and you really don't want their catalog. I did it with a couple of companies, but got really lazy about it. And lets not forget that sometimes it's just really nice to thumb through the new Crate and Barrell when you're waiting for dinner to be ready.

The reality, though, is that most of us have computers.....okay, all of you reading this have a computer....and if you're looking for Christmas gifts you're really looking online because the selection is greater and the sales hit the web more quickly than the paper copy.

Let me introduce you to Catalog Choice (https://www.catalogchoice.org/). They have streamlined the process of getting off of mailing lists - and it works!

We love LLBean. Love. LLBean. We have been known to cross state lines just to pick up water bottles or some good clothes. We don't love their catalog. Or, more apropriately, we don't love the volume of LLBean catalogs. Take a look HERE to order any of the 16 catalogs for Fall 2008. I believe we were receiving five different catalogs from Bean, at least twice a year. That's a lot of waste.

We registered for Catalog Choice and Bean responded immediately! We still shop for their stuff, just not in paper form.

Companies have realized that they will save money if they print fewer catalogs, but without information from the consumer, i.e. you, they don't know that they should stick to the email and lay off of the paper. CChoice has caught on so well that a lot of companies have given them links straight to their sites, further encouraging you to use their services.

Bottom line is that this is a FREE step that you can do, that we can all do, to cut down on waste.

Married to a Teacher: Back to School

It's that time of year again - Back to School.  The sales have been in major chain stores for about a month already, but mostly for the early colleges.  Today, though, marks Anny's first day of Staff Week at her school.  Fun.

This also means that Abby goes back to school today!  She took a little bit of coaxing to get out of sleepiness, but once she has some grub she was excited to be up!  I think she has my genes in that department.  Here's the girls this morning:



But, and there is almost always a but...

Now is also the time of big transition for our little household, and for many other households across the nation.  Now is the time that things have to be planned for and done differently.  Everything from laundry to house cleaning; from dinner to alarm clocks.

I can no longer assume that all of the poopy diapers will be changed by mama.  I can no longer look forward to empty laundry hampers when I get home from work. 

This year will be a harder transition for the house than in years past.  I think that individually each of us will just keep on doing our thing - Abby playing at school with her friends and us parent-types will do our jobs, hopefully well.  I think that the real change will be in how we operate together. 

Different from last year is that Abby is now a little person, not just an infant.  She has preferences, and lets you know what they are.  She even has shoes that have been deemed better than others!  (thank goodness, from my pespective!)

We have to try and guess if she will eat certain things, but we're not sure what will work until we do some trial and error.  During the summer it was easy - if she won't eat a quesadilla, give her a cheese stick.  We'll play a new guessing game for a while.

It's going to take a few weeks to get into a groove.  I wish I could say that we're used to this, but I think it's going to be a bit different this year.

Wordless Wednesday

64/365 Up for a Dunk!
Originally uploaded by armonroe

More at http://www.wordlesswednesday.com/

(Okay, this makes it not wordless, but....)

We're doing a whole set - one a day - for the duration of the Olympics. This and other pics can be found HERE.

20 Worst Songs Ever?

Article this is from is from Spinner Magazine, and can be found HERE with descriptions of the songs. It's a pain to click through each one, so I've listed them below.

#20 'The Final Countdown'--Europe (1986)*
'What's Up'--4 Non Blondes (1993)**
'Gettin' Jiggy Wit It'--Will Smith (1998)*
'Achy Breaky Heart'--Billy Ray Cyrus (1992)
'Thong Song'--Sisqo (2000)*
#15 'Hollaback Girl'--Gwen Stefani (2005)**
'Rico Suave'--Gerardo (1991)
'Convoy'--C.W. McCall (1975)
'With Arms Wide Open'--Creed (2000)
'Wannabe'--Spice Girls (1996)***
#10 'My Heart Will Go On'--Celine Dion (1997)*
'Macarena'--Los Del Rio (1995)***
'Ebony and Ivory'--Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder (1982)*
'I'm Too Sexy'--Right Said Fred (1991)**
'I Am Woman'--Helen Reddy (1972)
#5 'U Can't Touch This'--MC Hammer (1990)*
#4 'Barbie Girl'--Aqua (1997)*
#3 'She Bangs'--Ricky Martin (2000)
#2 'Ice, Ice Baby'--Vanilla Ice (1990)*
#1 'Who Let the Dogs Out?'--Baha Men (2000)

Okay, I can agree with numbers 1 and 3, and would probably have put them as 1 and 2. But if you notice the asterisks above, here is the key:
One * means that I own it and have it on my iPod
Two ** means that I own it, have it on the iPod, and it's on multiple playlists so I hear it often
Three *** means that I do not own it, but would like to have it!

Doing a quick count that means that I own half (10) of the Top 20 WORST songs ever. Am I wrong to like these songs? Do you own/listen to/like some of these? Please tell me I'm not the only one!

Wordless Wednesday

(okay, a couple of words - This is from our local National Night Out celebration.)

Edited at 4:15 pm: For the record - that is my daughter, who is a doll in our eyes, but she is very real.
More WW at http://www.wordlesswednesday.com/

Election Season: On Energy

I try to ignore all that is happening in the race for President, I really do. One problem is that it's everywhere. Every. Where. Making it worse, I think (hope) is that we live in the middle of it. We are inside the infamous beltway. I spend a lot of time on it every morning and afternoon.

There are a lot of things that will be argued and debated in the coming months, and I think that discussion and debate is healthy. I don't think that many minds will be changed, and I honestly think that 90% or more of voters have already decided who they will vote for. No amount of campaigning is going to make me vote for McCain, and no amount of campaigning will make my father vote for Obama. With that in mind, I am choosing to believe that it's a time of great discussion, and that's okay.

Today my annoyance is Energy and Oil. (yeah, start small, eh?)

Yes, gas prices are high. It's not nearly as bad here as it is in other places. Apparently Norway is the worst place to pay for gas. I remember being repulsed at the idea of paying $1 for a gallon and how important that $10 was to my dating life. (yeah, right) Now that I'm paying almost four times that I realize how good it was back then, but also realize that we were living the good life and we will never get back there again.

One option is to drill off the coasts of the nation, and in the forests of Alaska. ANWR, I believe it is. If it would make a difference now, or anytime soon, I might be a little more inclined to support it, but it will take years for them to figure out exactly where the oil IS, and years after that to get it out of the ground, refined and into our cars and planes. There is no reliable information to even suggest that it would be worth our time and energy to drill in ANWR because we don't know how much there is in the ground.

If drilling is PART of the solution, then explore that, but it can not be the only thing on the table.

I am a supporter of the new movement being led by T. Boone Pickens and his Pickens Plan. Pickens is a former oil executive who has seen all of the facts and been on the inside of the industry. He is proposing moving forward with alternative energy sources. The video below lines out part of his plan:



My bottom line is that in order to get out of our energy "crisis" we need to be investing in things other than gasoline as we know it. Hybrids are a good idea, but there are too few on the roads to make a long-term difference so far. Solar energy is fairly expensive to get up and running (in a home) but the long term benefits and savings are incredible from everything I've heard.

I guess I want you to think about this the next time the "scare" ad comes on that says "Obama voted no to drilling in ANWR while you suffer." The reality is that we're in a jam right now that is not easy to get out of.

What we really need - and should demand - is a long-term plan from whoever ends up in office.

Follow Up: A Little Weird-ER!

Following up from my grass-cutting confusion back in May (post is HERE.)

Thanks for all for suggestions - but we never bridged the language barrier, mostly because we have literally not seen the neighbor himself since before the lawn-cutting incident. I never thanked him face-to-face or even through his daughter.

The bottom line is that I ran out of time. I think an acceptable time frame for such thanks is fairly narrow - maybe two weeks, probably one. I was willing to give myself an extra week (three) but just never got around to it. I decided that I would just cut his grass when it got to be long.

The thing is that he has good grass for summers in our area - low to the ground and uses water to the best of its' ability. (read: doesn't get long, but stays green!) We, on the other hand, have a collection of different grasses. There must be three kinds of grass, and four kinds of weeds. 90% of the grass is less than 3 inches and we will get a strip that shoots up to over 12 inches in the course of a week!

So two weeks into June I cut my lawn - but his had hardly grown.

Two weeks after that there was FINALLY enough growth to cut his lawn - and mine again - so I had at it! After getting over the jealousy about how much greater his lawn is than mine, I felt like we were set - eye for an eye on the side of being good neighbors.

I never got a thank you, but I have no problem with that. My act was in response to his, it was my "thanks" and nothing more.

Until yesterday. It happened again. We went to a pool party and came home to the grass being cut again. What gives? I know that the one strip was getting long, but I was planning to cut it this afternoon.

Lucky for me, Mr. Neighbor, Mrs. Neighbor and their daughter were outside! They had just gotten daughter a new bike and all three were quite excited. I asked if he had cut our lawn, and he said yes. I shouted out a big "Thank You!" back.

Are we even?
He cut twice.
I cut once.
I thanked for the second cut.

I am a nice guy, but I don't think that I can keep up with a Battle of the Niceness for much longer. We don't get enough snow to count on two snow-shoveling jobs this winter, either!!

Maybe I should be preparing to hang his Christmas lights....