Made in Richmond

to prove to Ross that my laptop is crazy and loves to randomly pop up some search, “find” as it calls itself, whenever it wants. Of course, it’s not happening when he looks.

The tomatoes being put on the club sandwiches at Joe’s ARE AMAZING. They are sweet like candy. I’ve had two sandwiches there in the last 3 days. AND I have a lunch date tomorrow. Ohhhhh, just to think about it.

There’s no other reason for that title than that I’ve got the song in my head.

I think I may have a summer cold coming on. Or I just need to clean up all the dust in my house. It’s probably the latter.

I got my $0.99 jeans today and I must say, I am a satisfied customer. They are already broken in for me which is awesome. It’s weird though because they are the same type of jean, same size, but one pair is longer than the other. Not a problem, just weird. I know have a bid on some khaki pants on ebay. We’ll see how that works out. Pretty soon I’ll be buying groceries off of there.

So, we sold Ross’s car. RIP Honda Civic Si. But now we get to pay off my car, have some left over, and not have a car payment every month anymore. Having one car is working out fine now, but we haven’t had a rainy day yet. We shall see.

I sat on, I mean *for* Remus today. We played on the floor, practiced his sitting up skills, he chewed on his hand a lot because he finally cut his first tooth, and we danced around a lot. Then he started screaming, I fed him, and he passed out. I’m going to start calling myself “The Baby Whisperer.”

I’m starting to hate the children who live next door to me. They yell and scream all day long. All. Day. Long. And they lose their dog all the time and are constantly calling her name. From this post you all know that I don’t like it when such things happen. The worst part is, her name is “Mocha Cappuccino Jones.” Seriously. And they call her entire name when she runs off, I guess so she won’t get confused, what with all of the other Mocha Cappuccinos out there. I don’t know how to spell Cappuccino. Fortunately I *can* spell Mocha and Jones.

I get to see my good friend Abby from UR tomorrow. She and her fiance are in town. I love love love Abby, but haven’t seen her since my wedding. She was the only English major who I didn’t want to punch in the face. As an English major myself, I wanted to punch myself in the face, because I was a really lousy/dumb/lazy/Cliff’s notes reading English major (to clarfiy: I read the Cliff’s notes because I didn’t read the books, not because I didn’t understand things. I’m *sure* I would have completely have grasped any and all material, because, after all, I was an English major). Anyway, Abby is crazy smart but not the kind of smart where she’s a jerk. I’m very excited to see her.

Ok, time to go what a movie with my husband.

xoxo

I watched the beginning of City of Angels today (Nicolas Cage at his most attractive, I think, and Meg Ryan pre-collagen). I just saw the part where as Seth is taking the little girl to heaven, he asks her what she liked best. She said pajamas with feet.

What would you say you liked best?

I just got two pairs of jeans off of ebay for $0.99 each. The shipping is $6.95 each, bringing to just over $13.00. For jeans that are normally $58.00, I think that’s pretty damn good. AND I woke up to 6 emails from people wanting to buy Ross’s car. I’m going to have MILLIONS, I tell you, MILLIONS!

I have to go back to the school where I work on the 28th. We have a new Assistant Principal. She’s actually the LD teacher for the 5th grade kids the whole time I’ve been there, so I know her really well. I’m super excited for her and for the kids because she’s awesome.

I go back to *school* starting the week of the 21st. Recertification time is coming up. I was going to take a workshop this summer to get my credits out of the way, but the timeline for registration and me getting reimbursed for it got screwed up, so that idea was out. So, I’ll be taking a class at J. Sargeant Reynolds on Oceanography. I can take this because I teach Science. The lecture is every Thursday night, and there’s online stuff, too. I haven’t been to school in a while, so we’ll see how I do. I’ve already started getting excited about getting to take notes, because I’m a loser. And I want to know how I’m supposed to get my books. Do they have books there? What if I don’t want to read the books? I’m sure everything will be on the Internet anyway.

Here’s to more pencils, more books, and lots and lots of teachers’ dirty looks. From me, not at me.

Setting: Bejamin Franklin Craft Store, Richmond VA. Early afternoon.

Sassy lady: (yelling across three checkout lanes) Are those your eyelashes?!?!?

Me: Me?

Sassy lady: Yes, you. Are those your eyelashes?

Me: Yes.

Sassy lady: Dammit. (walks out of the door in a huff, shaking her head)

Me: (blink. blink.)

-Fin-

Thank you, Sassy lady?

Didn’t shower.

Sat on a baby. Not really. Rolled around on the floor with a baby.

Had my sister come to visit me on *her* birthday.

Had a wicked headache.

Skipped Bible study to nap.

Woke up from nap choking on my own spit.

Was thankful for gag reflex.

Texted Ross to find out where he and my dinner were.

Ate my dinner.

Talked to Ross on IM from down the hall.

Wondered if Lauren from Laguna Beach was mad that Kristin’s (her rival for Stephen’s affections on the first season) recent break up was higher up on the People.com “Latest News” column AND included a picture, while hers was a few lines down and only text.

Goodnight, friends.

The following is an email from my good friend from UR, Anna. She calls herself “Fat Anna.” Fat Anna lives in Reno which is far too far away. I often tell people that Anna is the funniest person I know. Now I have proof. Please read the email below and then comment on how she should have a blog so her humor can be shared with all.

So, if I was Dave Barry, I would have an excellent topic to write an article on right now…my dog. I have two dogs, actually. They have an unbelievable ability to entertain me. And by entertain, I mean cause me to want to return them to the pound where they came from. No, not really. I love them like they are my children but Spider came close to roaming the desert of Northern Nevada, looking for a herd of wild springer spaniels to join the other day.

I am an excellent dog owner. If I don’t provide opportunity for my dogs to get ample exercise each and every day, I am riddled with guilt. We have a backyard where they can run around but that is not good enough. Not for a dedicated pet owner such as myself. Oh no. We must go to the dog park in order for me to have a clear head and feel as though I will not be arrested by animal control for abusing my animals. Perhaps I should seek help…

The dog park here in Reno is nothing short of amazing. It’s about the size of 4 football fields and if you don’t obey the laws, there are many trails you can hike on with the dogs off the leash. So, this is where we go on a regular basis to get our exercise. Now the idea behind the park is that other people also bring their dogs and maybe you walk around for a little while but in the end, the dogs exercise each other by chasing each other around at top speed for hours on end.

Ralph gets this idea. He is a champion at finding a dog who is as dopey as he and will run in circles, chasing him around and around, until they actually fall over from diziness. He runs and drools and falls down and all I have to do is stand there and feel really good that I am providing such a nice opportunity for my dog.

Spider, however, is different. He does not play. He does not run. He does not jump. He does nothing but sniff a butt or two if a butt or two happens to pass by his nose. He does not go out of his way even to sniff a butt. Oh no. When Spider goes to the dog park, he sits. He sits completely still and watches. He watches the other dogs run around. Now, if the other dogs happen to get close to him and appear to be having fun, this is when Spider leaps into action. At this point, he stands and barks wildly at these filthy beasts who dare come near him and disturb his sitting.

So, you can see how this poses a problem for me. I devote over an hour of everyday trying to ensure that my dogs get the exercise they need but simply taking Spider to the dog park does not ensure this. No no. More is required. So, when we get to the dog park, we must go on a lengthy walk so that Spider is forced to exercise. Please note that this requires me to also exercise because if I’m not moving, Spider is not moving.

So, we walk. During these walks, Spider actually emulates a real dog by running up ahead with Ralph and pretending to enjoy himself. They stick their heads in bushes (there are no bushes in Nevada, only sagebrush) and roll in any and all poop they happen to come across. It’s nice. I used to think that rolling in poop was pretty much the worst trouble they could get into at the dog park. I was wrong.

One day last week, we were walking along and the dogs were showing a particular interest in some sagebrush along the path. I ignored them and continued to walk along. When they didn’t follow, I turned to see what they were doing. Turns out, Ralph had caught a mouse. Well, I told him “RALPHIE, OUT!” and wouldn’t you know, he dropped it!

Well, I hadn’t thought far enough ahead because as soon as Ralph dropped it, Spider snatched it up. As I outlined earlier, Spider is a different sort of dog. I, of course, at this point shouted “SPIDER, OUT!” which caused Spider to “run” in the opposite direction, with the mouse in his mouth (I put run in quotations because Spider is the only dog I’ve ever met that I can actually run faster than).

So, Spider “ran” about 12 steps in the opposite direction and then got tired so he turned and began to walk back towards me. I grabbed him by the neck and tried to convince him to drop the mouse by shaking his head. This did not work. I twisted his head to the point where it almost popped off, still he held onto the mouse. (The mouse was quite dead by this point, so don’t worry). I grabbed his jaw and tried to pry it open. Spider gave me the look like “you can puncture my teeth through my lips and I’m not dropping this mouse”.

I didn’t know what to do so we continued on our walk. It was pretty hot out so I figured that if we walked for long enough, Spider would have to drop the mouse in order to open his mouth to pant. Turns out, Spider’s will is strong than the need to pant. So we walked, and walked, and walked…

Still the mouse hung out of Spider’s mouth, dangling there, swinging back and forth…

At several points during the rest of our walk, I attempted to convince Spider to drop the mouse. I did the head twisting, the shaking, the jaw grabbing. I talked nicely to him. I yelled at him. He didn’t give a crap.

I was running out of ideas, it was getting dark and I wanted to go home. My final idea was to bring Spider near the other dogs and maybe one of them could convince him to drop the mouse. Of course, going near the other dogs means going near their owners as well. So up we walk, mouse swinging in the breeze and people looking at me like I’m some kind of freak who allows their dog to not only catch mice but then keep them as a toy.

One lady took pity on me and tried to help me get it away from him. She offers him water. He sits down. The sight of the mouse at this point, is not worth mentioning because it will cause you to throw up on your computer screen as you read this. I know this because myself and this other woman were literally gagging as we tried to get the mouse away from Spider. I was pretty sure that I was going throw up right there at the dog park. That didn’t happen though because right then, a dog came up to Spider, sniffed the mouse and Spider, to show that dog who was boss, swallowed the mouse. Yup, he just gulped down the entire mouse. And that ended that.

I think for my next pet I’ll get a goldfish.