NoodleDog

Ok, there’s something I wanted to talk about today. It’s been weighing on my mind lately, and I have to say, I’m disappointed right to the core of my heart (yeah, yeah, heavy on the melodrama).

I have an ever-increasing number of pets (as you know). I love animals. I feed my pets premium pet food because I like to spoil them and figure they deserve the best because, well, I love animals. Have I mentioned that? Love ‘em. Unconditionally, and all of them around the world. Even animals that other people don’t like, like rats, and basically all of your weird-looking reptiles. I’m scared of two things in this world (sharks and bears), but still, I love those guys, too. I’m not a vegan or anything, and I believe in eating prey animals (cows, deer, chicken, bacon, that sort of thing), but mistreating them is stupid and mean, considering that we have the ability NOT to do so.

Loving animals the way I do, I severely despise the cruel treatment of animals. Yes, once upon a time I did some psych work in a lab with rats, but the rats were always treated very humanely (especially MY rats), so I understand the need for some testing and laboratory work, but I also appreciate that it can be conducted humanely. Animal pain and suffering is not something I can understand a need for at all, under any circumstances.

Now, I saw a news report last week on Rob’s satellite TV feed from Vancouver. There was a PETA protest of the Superdogs show that was going on at the time. The PETA people were protesting the sponsor of the show, Iams. I feed the NoodleDog a different premium brand, but I feed the cats weight-control Iams (or I used to, anyway), and we used to get Iams dog biscuits. This report showed footage of mistreatment that an “undercover” PETA agent had taken in a lab that Iams uses for testing the nutritional value of their pet food. It was disturbing, to say the least, and it totally upset me. What the fuck is wrong with these people? They’re making PET FOOD for Christ’s sake! Did they think no one would find out? Did they think it was OK at all even if no one did? Bloody hell.

Basically, the cats and dogs being fed the food were kept in very small steel cages with nothing (bedding, toys, none of that) and no social interaction at all, and horrible vet care (if any). In order to test the muscle density of the animals, chunks of flesh were cut out of the animals for testing, rather than using a less invasive method, and those animals’ open wounds were left to fester and become infected causing the deaths of those animals. Seriously? It sucked, and it made me very angry. I will never buy Iams brand again as long as I live. And I will tell every single person I know who has pets to avoid Iams like the fucking plague, too.

So, then, this weekend I went to my hairdresser, and told her because she has a dog, and she totally knew about it, and had known about it for quite a while, too. She said that not only is Iams bad, but that PETA had listed a number of pet food companies they didn’t consider “sound” as well. I checked out the PETA website, and sure enough, there’s a whole list. Of course, the “approved” companies are tough to find here in Canada. And I’m not sure I can totally go with the whole PETA thing because they don’t believe in animal testing at all. I say no dangerous or painful animal testing, but if you’re just checking out a food you know is going to be alright to measure performance or taste or whatever, I’m fine with that. And in the event that slightly dangerous or painful animal testing is really absolutely necessary? Serious steps should be taken to minimize or eliminate the animal’s discomfort at all times. A priority should be that the animal be made MORE comfortable than a human patient (because I’m not crazy about the way patients are treated these days, either).

Anyway, fine. I looked on the PETA website, and couldn’t find out exactly what sorts of testing the companies that were on their shit list did, so I’m not going with that. I’m going to operate under the presumption that it’s OK unless I hear otherwise, and I’m going to stick with the NoodleDog’s premium brand until I hear not to. I have sought out other premium brands for the cats, and I’m going to write Iams a little letter here in a few minutes telling them exactly how disappointed I am in their corporate practices. I was an excellent customer of Iams. I would have bought dozens of bags of cat food. And if someone could have told me that the Iams brand dog food was better than the stuff I give the NoodleDog, then I might even have switched. But not on your life, Iams. Not now. Not now that I know what goes on in those laboratories. There’s a website (www.iamscruelty.com) that details the whole undercover thing, and it’s totally sickening. What it does is make me very sad, and there’s enough in the world that can make me sad, I don’t need my PET FOOD COMPANY to do it for me.

What I would like to recommend to Iams, and to all the pet food companies out there that need to test their food for taste and quality, is that they sponsor a local shelter. Create a program for animals that are not-adoptable, or less desirable, and give them a good and loving home (NOT TINY BARREN STEEL CAGES, IAMS, AN ACTUAL SHELTER), and test out the pet food on them. Feed them. Measure their weight, their health, their muscle density (seriously, Iams, you might also want to ensure they’re exercised and treated like our actual pets are treated) using NON-INVASIVE methods. How do we measure muscle density on people without cutting slabs out of their arms and thighs? Do it that way (I don’t know because I’m not a physiotherapist, but if my sister wasn’t out of town, I could probably find out). It would improve the quality of the research because it would be more realistic. If their “test animals” are not treated like our pets, then what is the point, really? How do we know it’s good for our pets? If they tested the pet food on animals in a similar environment to actual conditions, we’d have a better picture of the end results.

And besides, the animals they’re abusing are PETS!! Aauuugg!! I scream in frustration and dismay. They’re cats and dogs, who haven’t done anything to anyone. It’s not their fault, and they would love to be treated with fairness and caring, and they’d give back more than ten times over what you could put in to them. Cats and dogs are not objects. They’re living furry little creatures with all the same attributes as people. They communicate. They interact with us. They are intelligent. They love. They play. They dream. It is unacceptable that they be mistreated. I could rant all day long about how people who mistreat animals should really be shot on sight, but the point of this is that Iams (who make Eukanuba, and their parent company is Proctor & Gamble, if you’re interested) totally sucks and have sorely disappointed me.

Do not buy Iams any more. Try to find an alternative that your pet likes. Feel free to write Iams a letter telling them they are bad, evil people, and that you expect them to make amends or go right out of business. I know I will.

It’s Friday here in the world, and I don’t have much for news at the moment. So instead, I will entertain you with a story from my past.

Once upon a time, The Mac had to move from Grad School in Hamilton down to his PhD Program in the U.S. He wisely packed up all of his belongings and came home for the summer, planning to go back to Hamilton just before the start of the school year to get his things and move them down to the States in a rented U-haul van. It sounded like a good idea at the time, so I agreed to go with him and his then-girlfriend – I in my car, them in his - to assist with the move.

We drove through Winnipeg (where we spent the first night after one long day of driving), dipping just below the Great Lakes. The second day was a lot of rain, which is supposedly typical of the area. At one point, there was so much rain on the road no one could see, and cars were pulling off the road to just wait it out. That was the craziest rainstorm I’ve ever been in (so far, although there have been some close contenders recently). The second night, we planned to get a little further than we did, but we had to stop in Ishpiming because of the rain. We stayed at the Triangle Motel in Ishpiming!

We made our way back into Canada on the third day. The Mac and his girlfriend went their way, and I went to visit friends who had moved to the area. We met back up after the weekend to pack the U-haul and head South. Bright and early Monday morning, we proceeded to the U-haul rental center on James, where they had never heard of us. The Mac consulted his records and determined we were in the wrong U-haul office, so we went to the right one (which wasn’t that far away, so you could sort of see how he might have gotten in wrong). That first bad omen was actually a harbinger of doom. The rest of the day did not go as smoothly.

At the right U-haul office (which was run out of a Petro Canada), the nice man at the counter informed us that unfortunately, the American-licensed van we had rented was “unavailable” because none of the customers having American-licensed vans had returned them yet. We asked politely whether they could be contacted, perhaps, by phone to ask them to bring back the vehicles. The clerk was unamused. He recommended we go “home” and wait for him to call us with a vehicle.

Having no “home” to go to, we opted to wait. In their lobby. Playing card games and variations of “I Spy”. By lunchtime, our patience was wearing thin. I asked whether he thought there would be a vehicle for us soon, and he said he’d talked to one of the customers who was bringing one in. Great! We thought we’d go for lunch, and when we got back, there would be good news.

There wasn’t.

We waited. I chatted with the clerk, hoping to show him with my incessant and fierce niceness that we were people WORTH helping. All to no avail. No vehicle was returned that day. We asked whether there was, perhaps, any U-haul in the GTA that might get us across the border. The clerk tried to find us something by calling ALL of the U-haul offices in the Golden Horseshoe. Five o’clock rolled around, and it didn’t look good.

Finally, a breakthrough!! Someone had returned a vehicle to the Brampton office just before closing, about a 45-minute drive away. We’d take it!! No objections, no problem! The Brampton office was closing (of course), but the staff would leave it unlocked with the keys in it for us under the floormat. Off we went, buoyed by the good news. Dinner was had, stories were told with laughter and great relief, and plans were made for departure.

Our original plans were to travel on Monday and unpack on Tuesday at The Mac’s new residence. These plans were obviously shot since a seven-hour drive wouldn’t be feasible after dark with our crew. The Mac’s girlfriend didn’t really drive all that much, and highway travel with her in my car wouldn’t be that smart. At the time, I didn’t drive a standard, so The Mac would be forced to drive his car (poor Mac). What did that leave me? With the U-haul, of course.

We went to pick it up. In Brampton. In the “bad neighborhood”. We were lucky it was still there, considering, but any thieves who might have approached it with the intention of taking it probably abandoned it due to the offensive and pervasive smell emanating from all surfaces in the cab. The smooth surfaces of the cab were coated in some thin, slimy stuff that smelled like the most potent body odor I have ever smelled. The not-smooth surfaces of the cab had probably soaked it in.

Gagging, with dismay and the horrible smell, we drove the U-haul to the gas station to fill it up. I had to drive with the windows rolled down and my head out the window – it was the only way I could keep my eyes from watering too much to see. At the gas station, I wiped the surfaces with paper towel as much as I could, but it was a losing battle. The Mac and his girlfriend bought some air fresheners for the cab, as well. I’m not sure if this is all of Eastern Canada, but Ontario doesn’t seem to sell pine scented air fresheners. They sell fruit scented air fresheners. No matter, I though, anything is better than this!

We retired to a hotel in Hamilton so we could load the U-haul the following day. When I opened the cab the next morning, the overwhelming smell of rotting sweaty fruit pummeled me in the face. I uttered a cry of sheer frustration and immediately rolled all the windows down. We loaded the vehicle as quickly as we could (taking special care not to cut ourselves on the broken glass the last renters had kindly left for us, thanking U-haul for their fantastic cleaning of the vehicle, but then remembering we could just as easily not have had anything at all…) and hit the road. Dodging semis and other vehicles, we made our way down to The Mac’s new home. We did well, considering. We unpacked rapidly and all fell asleep on whatever we had managed to drag into the apartment.

The first order of business the next day was to return the U-haul. We drove through the town (which is not that great, especially in the bad areas) to the U-haul designated return, which was being run out of a car rental joint. As we waited in the lobby of the joint, a huge African-American man of an unspecified occupation tried to rent a car for cash. He wouldn’t take no for an answer, and I was pretty impressed by the clerk’s ability to resist the pressure of his persuasion and sheer size. Finally, he left (without a car), and it was our turn. The Mac presented his paperwork and the vehicle’s mileage report. Having driven from Brampton, of course, the trip was about 50 km longer than he had applied for. Taking the kilometerage into consideration, the U-haul people kindly charged us an extra $3.00 for our troubles of waiting an entire day (3 educated, working people x $15/hr x 8 hrs = $360), plus travel to Brampton and the mental anguish the state of the vehicle caused (which put my estimation of the damages to us at over $500).

The moral of the story? U-haul, U-Suck!!

You’d think there would be news, but there isn’t. I did not go to see Buzz’s new puppy last night. Because I went to see Rob instead. I think I’m slightly addicted to his presence.

We went and had wings, which was fine. We each ordered 20 wings, which is reasonable because I used to be able to eat a whole ton of wings in an evening. Not so any more. I could not finish the wings at all, and had to leave seven. There were too many of them, for one, and the “medium” ones I had ordered weren’t that tasty, just piquant and kinda bleah. They were OK, mind you, and if I hadn’t had to eat them and concentrate on them, I would have been fine. But I also had teriyaki wings, which were much better, and couldn’t finish them because I had eaten too many of the less-desirable “medium” wings. That was a disappointment. I should really have stuck to 10 wings, total, just teriyaki, and everything would have been aces.

But Rob? Frequents the wing place we went to. So he had exactly what he knew he wanted, which is great for him. He had honey-garlic and lemon-pepper wings, ten of each. He doused the honey-garlic ones with some sort of foul-looking hot sauce, and ate all but one of them. Presumably, he liked the lemon-pepper ones better, because he finished those, and then he slid the last lonely honey-garlic-with-hot-sauce wing onto my place. I originally thought it was in an effort to make life easier for the clearing girl, but as he twirled it in the remaining teriyaki sauce, I caught on. HE WAS DISGUISING IT TO LOOK LIKE A TERIYAKI WING!!! Thus adding to my disgrace of not being able to finish my wings, and augmenting his own prowess at ordering exactly what he could consume. It had to do with honor or something like that.

I pointed it out, let him know I knew. But I gladly took the bullet for him, because I guess I’m expected not to be able to eat 20 wings, and to possibly over-order. And I’m not a regular there, so they’ll just whisper to themselves “that girl Rob brought doesn’t know how to eat wings…” and I’ll never see them again. Not, also, that it matters. If there’s one lesson I’ve learned in my life, it’s that it’s OK not to eat everything on your plate. In today’s world of dangerous obesity, high cholesterol and anti-fat-fanaticism, it should be acceptable to send some food away.

Something else I’ve learned, in spite of my parents’ lessons: It’s OK to throw some things out. You don’t need to save every scrap of everything that comes into the house. I’m all over recycling, but seriously (and this is something The Mac is inflicted with as well), I have struggled with the ability to just toss stuff you don’t immediately need. Like string, twist-ties, bread-bag ties, elastic bands, scraps of paper, plastic bags, paper bags, old shoe-boxes, clothing that no longer fits, broken coat-hangers, empty bottles and jars and lids that don’t fit any of them, USED windshield wipers (thanks for that one, Dad), tiny screws of all sizes, nails, push-pins and tacks, rivets (yes, rivets), take-out chopsticks still in their paper wrappers, plastic cutlery, unused take-out napkins, plastic containers that once contained yogourt or margarine or anything at all really, and pretty much anything else you can reasonably or unreasonably carry into the house. I come from a long line of packrats, and it’s totally understandable why my house is crammed full of stuff.

And the scary thing is that I’m a lot better about it than my parents, whose house is, and I’m not kidding here, completely full. They don’t have room to get any more stuff because the house is full, packed-to-the-rafters, of stuff. Ping-pong table that no one uses? In the basement. Old toys that the kids played with 20 years ago? Over the garage and some in the basement. Magazines it took my father 50 years to collect? ALL crammed into the basement. Spare beds? Everywhere you can think. Lamps that don’t work? In the basement. Old window-covering rods that are no longer needed? In the basement. Their entire wardrobes from 30-50 years ago? In the basement. Their basement is a repository for the history of modern humanity. If it was once useful and good, but has since been improved and replaced, it now resides in the basement.

The Mac has a similar difficulty with divesting himself of now-useless stuff. His ex-girlfriend left a ton of stuff at his house when she inexplicably left TWO YEARS AGO, and most of it is still there. I don’t think it’s because he gets too emotional to deal with it. I think it’s because he thinks it might be needed or wanted one day, and who is he to throw it out and be blamed later?

The only one of us who escaped this affliction unscathed is our sister. The middle child. She can shop like a seasoned pro, and obtains many, many possessions. Somehow, though, she is mysteriously uncluttered and unfettered by them. Her house is clean – showhome clean most of the time – and every thing has a place in her house. I’m not sure if she learned this behaviour out of necessity – because she had so many things that she HAD to keep them insanely organized or they would end up consuming her – or if it’s a genetic malfunction that allows her to just give away, throw out or sell her less favoured items (thus creating room for nice new ones).

One of the hardest things for me to learn was that you can, indeed, throw out food. If you can’t eat it, or you don’t like it, or it’s not “optimal” any more (i.e. fresh), you can pitch it. It’s OK. No one will come and yell at you, or make you take it back. I used to be extremely paranoid about that, to the point where I couldn’t buy anything I wasn’t 100% certain I would immediately consume. It’s hard to get through an entire loaf of bread on your own. It’s virtually impossible for me to get through a jar of pickles before they go bad. In fact, I have two jars of pickles in my refrigerator that have been there for over two years. I haven’t thrown them out, but as soon as I need a pickle, and find out that they’re not good any more, out they’ll go. And I won’t feel bad about it, either.

So what have we learned here today? That it’s OK to leave wings on your plate. You don’t have to cover up the evidence. Take pride in just leaving them. It indicates great confidence that you know you’ll have another meal and live another day!

As you may or may not be aware, the NoodleDog and I went “camping” this weekend with The Guy (his name is Rob, for clarification’s sake). It was, in a word, fantastic.

We left town Friday afternoon and met up in Cochrane for a quick bite to eat. The NoodleDog stayed in the Tiny Car and didn’t even complain about it. The top was down because it wasn’t raining, and I made a vow not to put it up until I had to. I was forewarned that we’d be traveling a dusty road by Mark & Jen (some of Rob’s friends who we met in Cochrane), but I remained stubborn and left the top right where it should have been – down.

We headed out to the Waiporous area, and sure enough, the road was REALLY dusty. It was still warm-ish out, though, so I couldn’t very well put the top up. The NoodleDog got covered in dust like you wouldn’t believe – he looked pretty funny. I had bought him some doggles the day before, and tried to put them on him on Friday before we left, but they were of a poor quality and he didn’t like them at all. One of the straps broke very easily so I will have to return them tomorrow. I bet he wished he hadn’t rejected them when we were on that gravel road, though.

We got to the campsite ("Ghost Airstrip"), and first thing, a new dog came to see us. Sancho was his name, and he was a husky type of dog with one ear all bent over – pretty cute. He took kind of a shine to the NoodleDog, which I tried to ignore. The NoodleDog was let out of his harness so he could go and play with the other dogs. He never even looked back at me. Rob set up the camper on some “uneven” ground. He swears it was even, I say it was a little crooked. What do I know? I’ve never been “camping” before.

I tried to help as best I could, handing him things out of the camper, like a table, a barbecue, a propane lamp, pink flamingoes, etc. so he could set it up more easily. Mark & Jen were parked right near us, and his other friends were off a little ways away all around. Once everything was set up, we made our way over to the fire to see who was around. Before it got dark, Rob offered to take me for a quad ride.

Now, I hadn’t really stopped to take a look around before then, but when we got onto the quad, I had an opportunity to really see where we were, and to observe the unrelenting beauty of our surroundings. I mean, this place was fantastic. I guess it’s not technically “The Mountains”, but more foothills, so the landscape is a little more forgiving and less harsh. The Mountains have a kind of cold magnificence to them that you cannot help but respect and be amazed by. The foothills are a little more realistic – forest, hills, streams – and seem just a shade softer and more inviting.

The NoodleDog really liked the quad. So much so that he kept leaping at it, chasing it and barking the whole way. I think Rob called him a “tire-biter”, which is apparently a bad thing. He ran pretty hard, though, and he seemed pretty happy to be doing it. We didn’t go far that evening, just enough to take a look around, and made our way back to the fire afterwards.

I have to say that Rob’s friends are really, really great. There’s Mark & Jen, who are engineers and have a brand-new baby (who they brought camping and we never heard from – she was great!). Jen is really nice, and I spent a lot of time chatting with her. There’s Rob & Lori and their little girl. There’s Joel & Steph, and their little boy. There’s Chris and Paula, who have two kids (Lexis and Zach) who love quadding. They actually live in the same town as I do, which is kind of neat. I talked with Paula a bunch, and she’s terrific. His friends were welcoming, and as soon as I got there, all my nervousness and trepidation disappeared, quickly replaced by excitement and the discovery of new people, with lots of laughter and shouts of “me too!” as we planted ourselves on common ground.

People slowly began to leave the fire as the night went on, and I found myself getting more and more tired. When my eyes started to close on their own, I headed back to the camper to bed. The NoodleDog stayed up late and played, and made friends around the fire.

The next morning we got up and made breakfast. Rob is a big fan of bacon, so he and I will get along just fine. He says it’s not “crispy”, the way he likes it, but I thought it was kind of crispy in my books. He says that “crispy” is when it’s so cooked it breaks if you snap it. I guess he might be right – maybe it was just “chewy”. Either way, he cooked it perfectly. We relaxed, sitting around in the sunshine (while there was sunshine – it was short-lived). We waited for his friend, Nasser, to arrive so we could all go quadding. Apparently, that’s the action of the weekend – quadding. Nasser brought his tiny puppy Murphy, who is a 2-month old chocolate lab and VERY cute, and when they got set up, we all took off. We shut the NoodleDog and Cooter in the camper so they wouldn’t chase us when we left.

Rob got us stuck in the mud pretty early on, which was kind of funny. That was the only time we got stuck, although I understand he was “holding back”, tipped off by the ribbing the other guys gave him. Some of the others got stuck in the mud several times, but since there was a group of us, it was no problem to just pull them out. You get REALLY muddy quadding, but you see lots of territory you wouldn’t otherwise get to. We went up a large hill, and down the other side. My legs were a little sore afterwards, but it was so much fun I didn’t notice.

The afternoon got kind of chilly, and we managed to miss lunch because we were out quadding. We got back to the camper around 4p, and cleaned up a bit. Rob even had a shower (I did not). Then, we made dinner, watched a movie and baked brownies (all at once). The brownies were supposed to be for the communal desert-fest at the fire later on in the evening. We went over to the fire for a while after dinner, but it was early enough in the evening that not many people were there. The NoodleDog was there, though, making friends, eating anything anyone dropped, and generally having a pretty good time. He just loves being told he’s “cute”, and seemed to do very well with the women who were there. He’s kind of a cuddly dog. That’s my fault because I spoil him, but I wouldn’t have him any other way.

Because there was no action on at the fire, we went for a nap and to warm up in the camper. I didn’t get back up, and I guess neither did Rob, because there was plenty of teasing the next morning. I had only planned to stay the one night, but since I was already cozy and warm, and it started to rain, I didn’t bother getting up to leave. I probably should have, in retrospect, left before it started to rain, but I didn’t, and I’m pretty glad I didn’t after all.

I left, instead, at 9a the next morning. I got dressed, hurriedly, packed the NoodleDog and my belongings into the Tiny Car, and made my way back out the not-so-dusty gravel road. I had meant to do some work when I got home, but answered phone calls instead for quite a while. I had a nice long bath, in which Smudge decided to join me briefly, providing everyone with a bit of entertainment. The NoodleDog slept, and slept, and slept, and slept. I guess he had a good time. The cats were glad I was home, and encouraged me to nap on the sofa by lying all over me. I ended the weekend thinking non-stop about Rob, and the camping trip, and how fun his friends are, and how truly fantastic I felt about everything.

And now I’m back to work. Tomorrow – the news will be of Buzz’s new puppy, Harley!

The NoodleDog and I are going camping! Well, sort of.

“Camping” brings to mind a peaceful setting in the remote backwoods, with a small campfire with rough campfire-cooked food, and a neat little tent. A site that you, perhaps, have to walk into, and at the very least is somewhat removed from the other people in the world.

What we’re doing this weekend is we’re driving out about an hour to a site that will be patronized by a large number of other people, and we’ll be sleeping in a camper. So, then, not technically camping, but not anything else, either. I guess it’s sort of camping. Apparently, there will be carousing, drinking and quadding. There will be sitting around a fire chatting and hanging out. There will be cooking, and even baking (because the camper has an oven).

We’re actually going to some sort of Forestry area. So it will have forest there, but there will apparently be cows, as well, which doesn’t exactly suggest “wilderness”. This is, perhaps, a good thing, because I’m bringing the NoodleDog.

When it was first suggested I go camping and bring the NoodleDog, images of him chasing pretty much everything that moves came to mind. They were then accompanied by images of him running away from a bear, or alternatively being too stupid to run away and barking at it instead. Or perhaps just coyotes, which are famous for their ability to lure perfectly happy dogs away from their masters THE BETTER TO EAT THEM!!! Eeek!

So while I was elated that I got invited to go camping, I instantly started to worry about the consequences (see, there’s that balance going on). What if the NoodleDog follows us when we’re quadding, and gets lost? What if the NoodleDog chases a squirrel (a seemingly innocuous activity) and gets lost? What if he hurts himself? What if he barks because he can’t see me at all times (as he has been known to do – he’s kind of a big baby)? What if he can’t stand the camper? What if he jumps up on stuff? What if he jumps up on people? What if he eats people food and gets sick? What if he eats not people food, not animal food, but something else, like a poisonous plant and gets sick? What if the other dogs laugh at him because he’s such a baby and his mom is such a worrier?

I was informed (through muffled laughter) that there are no bears where we’re going. Yeah, right. I’m sure that’s what the last guy who got eaten by a bear thought. I was also informed that the worst the NoodleDog will experience is perhaps the after-effects of overeating cow shit. Now that, I can believe, and I am not looking forward to dealing with that at all no-way-no-how.

The Mac recommended I get a tie-down for the NoodleDog, so I can install him somewhere with the ability to move around but be limited, without having to hold onto him the whole time, and I did. Those suckers are expensive, but only the best for the NoodleDog. While I was at the pet supply place, I also got him some “doggles”, so he can stick his head out the window getting there without getting bugs or dust in his eyes. See how spoiled he is? He won’t survive in the wilderness. Good thing we’re not going there.

I’m only slightly concerned that it’s been about fifteen years (heh) since I’ve been camping (really camping – it’s only been about ten since I went out to the woods and partied). I’m only going overnight, and I think I can hack it, even if I get rained-on or slightly injured (as long as I don’t, say, break a leg or anything). The real test will be whether I can keep from saying something totally stupid and inane in front of this new guy’s friends. That’s my main concern.

There’s a lot of pressure associated with meeting The Friends. It’s like having a guest spot on the show, Friends, and finding out you’re the liaison of the week that everyone gets to make fun of. As far as I understand it, too, this group is fairly close-knit, which just adds to the worry (because I’ve already got the NoodleDog issues to contend with). My main goal for the trip is to not say anything offensive or stupid, and to be as nice as possible to everyone and not have them hate me. I don’t think they’ll dislike me on principal – they should be fairly nice being this guy’s friends – it’s just that I have been known to make the occasional stupid comment. And I can be naive, let’s face it. I don’t expect the unexpected too often. So there’s the potential for a lot of people to make a lot of fun of me. I’m told I’m already in “trouble” because I’m only staying one night, not both.

So elation, trepidation, flat-out worry, excitement about seeing this guy for an extended period of time, wondering what I’ll forget this time (it better not be my medication), thinking that it would suck if the Tiny Car craps out the way it had been before I scared it by taking it to the dealer, a million scenarios are running through my head. This better be fun.

I’ll let you know.

I had a discussion with The Mac several months ago about luck. He was having a patch of Very Bad Luck, and my contention was that luck balances out, eventually. Not everything can go wrong all the time, and not everything can go right all the time, either. Whether you call it luck, or karma, or fate, or whatever, or if you believe there’s something else out there (like a higher power) that metes out good and bad, or even if you think aliens are in total control of your life as an experiment, it’s all about balance.

I used to keep a little “luck journal” when I was in high school, chronicling the positives and negatives I experienced. It mostly balanced out to neutral, and the best you can hope for is that it balances out slightly positive. If you have too much positive at any one time in any one place, a big negative will come along to cancel it all out, so you don’t want to get up too high. Like Agent Smith says, in the first Matrix movie, people seem to crave conflict, adversity - they rejected the utopia the machines had built for them because it was “too perfect”. Too much positive never sits well – it’s like you’re always waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Lately, I have noticed the balancing effect. For well over a year now, my personal life had been isolative. The romantic aspects of my life, well, let’s admit it, they sucked large. The last relationship I was in was quite awful for reasons too numerous to mention here, and after we broke up, there was nothing for a long time (which I didn’t mind that much). Very, very recently, I met a great guy, and have started seeing him. Well, it seems the Universe has to balance out that positive with a negative somehow, so it attacked my financial status (which was fantastic when I was seeing the last guy) and gave me something to deal with that quite frankly sucks. It also toyed with my car, which may be related to the whole financial status thing, but that problem seems to be “in remission” right now. I took the Tiny Car in to the shop, and they "couldn’t duplicate problem” (it's written on the slip they gave me), so it was returned to me, unaltered. I have no idea whether it will die soon, or if it will be just fine, but I suspect that if I experience another large positive, especially in the near future, the Tiny Car’s fate will be at stake.

Now I haven’t recorded all of this in a “luck journal” or anything, but I’d have to say I think it balances out. I have no idea whether the thing with the guy is as a result of the terrible financial position I’m in, or if it’s the other way around. But if you don’t believe in to coincidence (and of course I do, but I’m just sayin’), it’s easy to say it’s all related.

This balancing thing is kind of difficult to deal with because in a way, it negates the need to do good to achieve good karma, which a lot of people rely on. I can say that it doesn’t seem to matter how much good I do, my life just stays in balance. My observation is that whether you’re a good person or a bad one, you just seem to carry on. Sometimes fate metes out visible good things to some, and obviously bad things to others, but again, there is that neverending balance, and you won’t recognize it until you measure out the whole life’s worth. Life and death balance one another, too. You live a life, and it has to be balanced out by a death at the end of it. Usually, death is fairly painful, from what I can gather. It’s not punishment of any sort – it’s balancing out all the good things in life that were achieved, like life itself. Experience, feeling, emotion, knowledge, perception are pretty positive things that eventually have to get balanced off. Death’ll do that.

Once upon a time, during a conversation about who would be enslaved if aliens conquered the world, I claimed I’d be fine because I’m the most exceptionally average person I know. I don’t excel at any one thing, and I don’t abysmally fail at the things I do either. I maintain. It’s my guess that the aliens would target the strong, and possibly the weak to cull the herd, but they’d leave the average people alone so they could be put to work. Or eaten, if that’s their thing, but hopefully, just put to work. I endeavour to achieve neutrality in most things, achieving neither a positive nor a negative that would require large amounts of balancing. Balancing is hard – it’s adjustment, and change. It can be brutal. After the balancing, a new neutral has to be attained. I say accept the neutral. Be content with neutral.

And I was content with neutral (reasonable work life, nonexistent love life, maintainable home life) up until last weekend, which is when I really started to get more involved with this guy. It raises the question – was this some sort of plan? Was there something plotting my course? Was it, in fact, pre-ordained? Is everything we do just another step along a pathway that has already been laid out for us? Or do we make our own fates, by choosing our actions and creating consequences? How far out do these consequences reach? Is there anything connecting the actions of our past to the actions of our future other than the actions of our present?

How could I know that I’d meet a great guy? Because I would have had to know in order to start myself on the path to poor finances that I’m at now. Or, alternatively, how did my poor finances cause me to meet this guy? I don’t think it’s quite that related. The luck is independent, somehow. It’s just there as an average, a balance.

The Mac, of course, completely disagrees with my theory. He has experienced an extended patch of Very Bad to just Plain Ol’ Bad luck. His house was broken-into, and those fuckers stole a bunch of stuff, including The Mac’s irreplaceable thesis. His car broke down and was VERY expensive to fix. The Mac cannot work in America because he is on a Student Visa, so he can’t just make money. The Mac’s other car’s air conditioning malfunctioned and needed to be fixed for more money. The Mac has no prospects on the go for a romantic liaison, although he is very cool, deserving and a “good catch”.

But The Mac forgets about the good things, like his pets, who are great. The Mac forgets that he has people who love him dearly and would do anything for him (including attempting to buy a door at Lowes, which is a dreadful task). The Mac forgets that he is on the road to Great Respect and a possibly prosperous career (if he can get this new thesis done in time!), something which none of our immediate family has done before. I’m not even sure the other people in the extended family have gotten doctorates, except maybe our cousin, Alan. He might have one, or then again, he might just have several undergrad degrees and a Master or two, and a lot of experience and a lucrative career in something to do with algorithms and computer stuff. Come to think of it, I can’t put my finger on any of the cousins who have doctorates.

Maybe The Mac’s recent bad luck is balancing out the extreme positive of a doctorate degree. Regardless, I believe it will all balance out in the end.

So I recently (over the weekend) started seeing someone. I had been out on a date with him before vacation, and mentioned him briefly. But on Friday, after work, I took the NoodleDog over to his house so we could all go to the park (he has a puppy). I will say that the evening was very enjoyable, and we had a fantastic dinner that he cooked. The NoodleDog got grouchy with the puppy towards the end of the evening, because he kept trying to steal whatever the NoodleDog was playing with at the time so they could “play” chase. But overall? I think the evening went well. I spent the two subsequent evenings with him, so I guess it had to have been alright!

What I did want to discuss today was his house. He lives in the South part of the city, and I live North of the city itself, so his house is far from mine. That is not the problem. Not in the least. He has a very nice house, and has done a fair amount of work in it (painting and such) – the kitchen is large and bright and has a window to the back yard (a feature I really love), the living room is large and bright and has a big window to the front yard (which has in it two apple trees!), the bedrooms are all hardwood and seem to be very nice. That is not the problem.

The problem (and this is probably just me, here, the rest of you will think it’s great) is that the house was absolutely immaculate. There was no stuff anywhere. There was no dirt. There were no belongings lying around. The bathroom was spotless, and had nearly nothing on the counters. The kitchen was organized better than, say, a military kitchen (which is the only organized kind of kitchen I can think of to compare it to). The knives were organized and INSIDE a cupboard. The cutting board was INSIDE a cupboard, too. The spices (and yes, he has spices and herbs, even though he’s a guy, and his roommate is a guy) were so neatly organized that I didn’t dare touch them. I had to get him to get them down for me. As we prepared the stuff in the kitchen, each implement that was used got rinsed in the sink and either put in the dishwasher or cleaned more thoroughly and put away. He showed me his “appliance cupboard” in defense that his place wasn’t that neat (he meant to indicate that there was a mixer “just thrown-in haphazard”, but it worked against him) – the cupboard had several appliances like an electric grill, sandwich maker, etc. lined up so that their faces touched the front of the cupboard edge.

Fine, you think, he has to be hiding a mess somewhere. But no, no he isn’t. I looked. When he was outside putting stuff on the grill, I looked around. The living room is clean. There is nowhere to hide stuff. You can’t hide it under the sofa because the hardwood is visible beneath the sofa through the raised legs. There isn’t a closet you can cram things into, either. I checked.

I can see the spare room being empty except for the bed. But his bedroom has a small dresser in it, and a closet, and the closet isn’t full. I didn’t look in his roommate’s room, but the bathroom? You’d think they’d have toothbrushes and soap and stuff. And maybe shaving things? Or hairbrushes? True, he shaves his head, so the hairbrush would be superfluous, but is his roommate shorn as well?

So, I think, maybe he keeps his comfortable living things in the basement. Some people do that. Some people like the cool-in-summer/warm-in-winter thing and don’t mind the dark. It’s better for watching TV, for instance.

No, his basement is organized, too. He has some comics memorabilia, but it is all properly shelved or on display on the wall. The Entertainment area seems fairly organized, as well. The killer is the camping stuff. He has several sleeping bags, and they are all HUNG NEATLY FROM THE CEILING. And his footwear? Just guess where it is. It is neatly organized on shelves behind the stair wall. Each shoe or boot occupying a cubbyhole, pointing in the opposite direction from its mate. Underneath the stairs is a cold storage area, and it’s like this eerie portent that the end is near. So many cans. So many dry goods!

The only remotely “messy” thing in the house was the blanket on the couch in the basement. It was thrown in a heap at the end of the sofa space. It was comforting to see.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not knocking the cleanliness. However, it does make me pretty nervous, because eventually, this guy is going to come over to my house, and see my stuff everywhere, and that’s going to be the end of that. Because:

My kitchen has in it a bar full of glasses and alcohol (of course!), but under the bar is where I store my leftover Christmas chocolate (on the little support bars underneath the glass). My kitchen table is actually a bar-height patio table (with matching chairs). It’s high enough that the cats’ food can be on it and the NoodleDog can’t get it. Under the table? Are the soft drink boxes. Empties go in the empty ones, full ones waiting to be loaded into the fridge, since I can’t have fruit juice any longer. There’s a comfy chair with an afghan on it that the cats sleep on. The NoodleDog’s crate is in the kitchen. There is a large shelf with the microwave on it and some pet supplies, and a plant on the top. The countertop at the end of the counter has the NoodleDog’s snacks and stuff on it. The countertop next to the fridge has my spice rack (which is messy), my cutting board and my breakfast drink-mix. The fridge has some things ON TOP of it, like extra dishtowels, a pitcher for iced-tea, some Tylenol for when I’m too lazy to go upstairs to get it and I have a headache. The counter beside the sink has a cookie tin on it (that has two-year-old cookies in it, no kidding, but they’re still good so I can’t throw them away), some canisters, my clock-radio and cellphone charger. The counter on the other side of the sink has a dish dryer and a dishcloth (lying flat) on it, as well as the NoodleDog’s measuring cup for his food.

The pantry beside that cupboard has in it my dry goods and some paper supplies (like coffee filters, paper towels, etc.), and the NoodleDog’s bag of food, along with empty bottles until they get recycled.

And that is just my kitchen. AFTER I CLEANED IT!!!!!!!

The rest of my house is full of stuff. It’s not necessarily messy (well, at the moment because I cleaned it in case he comes over), but it is full of stuff. It is lived-in. There are signs that I live there and frequent the place. There is footwear all over in various stages of readiness. The front-hall closet has four seasons’ worth of outerwear in it. The living room contains not only the entertainment stuff, but the accoutrements like videotapes, DVDs, remotes, magazines, TV Guide, etc. and a number of animal toys and ancillary components (clippers, trimmers, brushes, combs).
He’s supposed to come by this evening after The NoodleDog’s class. If he makes it past the front hall, I’ll let you know.

It’s Friday, and I’m pretty glad about that. It’s also very nice out today (+30C), so I was a little sad to still be stuck in the office. But I talked with my co-worker about the kittens she is looking at to get for her daughter, and that was cheering, and I talked with Buzz about her pet options. I think she should get a kitten, and she says she’s going to get a dog. I think she should have both. Why not? Pets need homes.

So I have a date tonight, too, with that guy who has the border collie cross puppy. We are, again, taking the dogs for a walk in the big dog park. I have no other real plans for the weekend, but will probably wash the Tiny Car at some point. Usually, I’d just spin it through the no-touch car wash at the gas station nearby, but am experiencing the fallout of money-related problems from my recent vacation (i.e. I spent way too much and am not making enough to replace it).

Because I have no real news, I’d like to take this opportunity to reveal a weakness. I have several fears, and probably a few different weaknesses, and today, I’m going to talk to you a bit about my biggest food weakness, The Cheezie.

The Cheezie is sold under the brand-name Cheetos, which is a product of Frito-Lay, which is a sub-company of Hostess. The Cheezie comes in different forms: crunchy, puffs and (most recently), twists. My favourite incarnation is the puff.

Delicious, golden, buttery, cheese-flavouring-coated, the Cheezie is a joy to eat. I’m sure some of you will say you prefer the crunchy cheezie, but maybe that’s because you haven’t had a truly perfect cheezie puff.

I’d also like to mention the differences I have noted between the Canadian Cheezie (puff) and the American Cheezie (puff & twist). Twists should be similar in form & flavour to the puffs, but just twisted, but I have to say that I’m disappointed with them. The twists are too tight, for one, and due to the tight, twisty nature, the orange cheezie flavouring does not get applied in an even coat on the entire surface of the cheezie – there are pockets of un-flavoured corn-puff left exposed between the twists. This affects the overall flavour of the cheezie in that it is not cheesy enough. There is not enough flavouring to balance the corn puff.

The Canadian Cheezie is a delight, a true delight. It’s light, puffy, crispy, and flavoured just so. The American Cheezie, while very similar is quite different. First of all, it’s not flavoured quite right. It’s nice, don’t get me wrong, but it doesn’t have that buttery, melt-in-your-mouth cheezie flavour. Also, the American Cheezies don’t seem to be as crispy as the puffs in Canada. I have also noted that the plastic bag is heavier in the U.S. – is that due to our environmentally friendly packaging laws here in Canada?

I’m having a hard time because I’m really trying not to eat as many cheezies. I kind of snapped last winter and started eating them after a long cheezie-scarcity in the house. I realized they were a problem as I started to gain weight, and have been trying to stay away from them since the spring. I haven’t done too badly, but there’s a little left in the last bag I bought before I went on vacation at home. The NoodleDog likes cheezies, too, although he’s not allowed to have them. Earlier this spring, when I identified the cheezie addiction and was taking steps to wean myself off them, I had been slowly consuming a bag – about an eighth to a quarter of the bag each evening. I left the bag with about a quarter in it on the shelf in my living room (hey, I’m lazy and the kitchen is, well, not far, but not IN my living room, alright?), and when I got home from work the next day, the NoodleDog didn’t run out to greet me like he usually does. I inquired as to where he was (“Hey! Where are you?!! Why is no one coming to meet me??!!”), and went into the house. As I went into the front hall, I could see into the living room, and there was the cheezie bag, torn to shreds, lying in the middle of the living room floor. DAMN YOU NOODLEDOG!!! I was saving those cheezies for ME! He knew it was wrong, too, and put his ears down like the guilty animal he was. And I, of course, looked at him and instantly forgave him, but now store the cheezies on a much higher shelf.

I suppose I should have thanked him for saving me from eating them, but still. I had been really looking forward to a cheezie that evening.

I have to tell you all about the NoodleDog and his seemingly perverse wish to displease me. We went on a walk yesterday, which is routine, and just great if it’s nice out. About ¾ of the way through, he managed to find something dead and decaying in the middle of the off-leash area in a field. And he went straight over to it and rolled in it, of course, which is what I should expect because he’s a dog. However, when I noticed this and called him over, he had REALLY rolled in it, because he smelled awful – like putrified death rot. Whatever it was must have really been in the last stages of existence, because he was covered in a kind of oily residue that smelled worse than pretty much anything I’ve ever smelled in person. I’m told skunk is pretty bad, and can believe it, but this was worse because I was right up close to it and it was really powerful. I can totally stand skunk smell when I’m driving – it’s not that bad, and probably because it’s mostly dissipated, it’s even kind of familiar and reminds me of the countryside, so I don’t mind it at all. But this smell? Gah.

I got him home, of course, and called my mother.
“Hello?”
“Aaaa!! My dog rolled in something dead and now he stinks. Stinks, stinks, stinks!!”
(laughter) “OK, the thing you do, according to Dr. Stanley, is wipe him down with a soapy facecloth.”
“…” as I contemplated using one of my good facecloths on my ever-so-smelly dog.
“Or any kind of cloth, really, just wipe him down, and you should be able to get it off.”
“What kind of soap can I use?”
“Oh, any kind. Dish soap should do the trick.”
“OK, great. Thanks!”

So I did. I filled the sink with warm soapy water, and found a dead tea-towel to use on him, and proceeded to wipe him down. A lot. Over and over. He didn’t seem to mind too much, except when I started using a bit of force on him, he started trying to move around too much. When he was fairly well-saturated from the wetting down, I let him go to move about the house freely.

However, when I was sitting on my sofa later, trying to read a book, he came over to see me, and still smelled completely rancid. “Ick!” I yelled at him. “You totally stink… get away from me!” So he looked at me with very, very sad eyes, curled up across the room from me, and gave a huge, forlorn sigh.

I caved. I went over to him, holding my breath, and said “it’s not your fault, you totally inept animal. But we’re gonna have to take a bath!! Yay bath!!” and then I got him all wound up to go into the tub. He was pretty excited, wagging his tail, going up to the tub, and then away because he can’t get into the tub (his legs are pretty short, remember). He woofed once, and then realized that I was going to make him get into the tub, and that he probably didn’t actually want to do this.

So I had to drag him over and sort of lift/push him into the tub. It wasn’t pretty, but I got him in there. Then I turned on the water (because if you’re going to wash a dog in the tub, you’re supposed to put the water in when he’s already in it, rather than trying to chuck a dog into an already filled tub), and he started to look worried. He backed away from the tap, but I wouldn’t let him out of the tub. I put in more Palmolive Springtime Bouquet “Basket of Lemons” dish soap, and started scrubbing. I scrubbed until I couldn’t smell the stench of death any more, the NoodleDog looking more and more desperate as we went on. Finally, I started rinsing with clean water. I couldn’t get clean water to his feet, since he was partially immersed, and I wasn’t about to try and drain the tub with him in it, so I just used a cup and poured clean fresh water over him.

The NoodleDog had had enough at that point. He made a break for it, ever so slowly and determinedly, putting one foot on the edge, and then another, and then kind of sliding down the other side to the floor, and when he hit the linoleum, he was off and running. He looked back at me (because I was standing there, in shock that he would contemplate such action when I wasn’t quite finished rinsing, damnit!), and that was that. He got as far as the hallway before I tackled him with the two towels I had at the ready. I dragged him back into the bathroom, thinking he needed to be properly rinsed, but when I saw I’d have to lug him over to the bathtub and force him back in, I realized that this was as good as it got, and just dried him off with the towels.

Smudge, who was observing the entire proceeding from her perch on the bathroom sink, thought it was absolutely hilarious, and got into the tub as soon as it was empty to see what all the commotion was about and to chase the suds. Rumble, on the other hand, who has endured several baths in his lifetime and knows exactly what they’re all about, meowed mournfully throughout the entire drying procedure, as if to say “Buddy, I feel your pain…”. Even though Rumble really dislikes the NoodleDog, he can sympathize and probably thinks no one deserves such a horrible fate as a bath.

The NoodleDog has Agility class tonight. He has missed two weeks, and I’m fairly sure the rest of the class will be pretty far ahead of him. Plus, I think we’re going to have to work on the dreaded teeter-totter… it should be a fun evening!

Alright, I’m back to work here, and it looks like I have accepted my fate. I think that’s the stage I’m in – acceptance… since my dreams are dead!! Kidding.

I don’t mind my job, really I don’t. I wish it was more exciting, sure, and I wish it was more interesting, too. However, what I really really wish at this time is that I had a bit more to do that had to do with work. See, I’ve just spent about three hours surfing the ‘net, reading blogs, checking my bank balance, staring endlessly at the screen, and it’s making my head hurt. If I had more work to do (and really, I’m a pretty good property manager – most of my properties at the bad place were doing great when I left), I wouldn’t be tempted to fill the empty hours with surfing the ‘net.

I’m also a little worried because I think that if I don’t bring in a little more business, or start to be a little more productive, they’ll take me out back where the smokers hang out and have me shot. And that’s just not cool, not how I want to end up.

On another note, I had a strange series of dreams last night. I say “series”, because at one point, I was dreaming that I was dreaming. In this dream I was dreaming, I dreamt that I was on the run with several other people from a huge and bloodthirsty bear. Now, I know what you’re thinking – bears are nice, peaceful creatures and they’re all good as long as you don’t put silly hats on them and try to take close-ups – but remember, this is a dream, and I’m mortally afraid of bears. I dreamt that several other people and I were fleeing this bear, or maybe not the bear, but this demented individual who looked sort of bear-like. We were fleeing, to be sure, though, and we ran across a bridge, down a small hill, turned right and ran into the woods, where the demented savage guy was. He was bent over, naked to the waist, probably about 40 years old, covered in coarse black hair, and he ran using his hands in a sort of loping, clumpy stride, so he kind of looked like a bear. As we ran by, he caught sight of us and started chasing us around and around, and somehow, the other people and I ended up caught in between several trees in a row. As the demented savage guy was about to kill us in a horribly savage fashion, the real bear that we had been running from in the first place came barreling out of the woods and smack into the savage guy, ripping him to pieces. Then, all of a sudden, there were several bears all around, aiming to kill us and eat us, but they all had opposable thumbs, so it was kind of even stranger than usual. Just as I was about to die, I woke up in my old bed at my parents’ house in the basement. It was dark, and I was lying very, very still, caught in that dark place between sleep and awake, where you’re not sure your dreams aren’t reality.

I moved my arm very, very slowly over to the lamp at the side and touched it (it’s the kind of lamp you can touch and it turns on), only it wouldn’t turn on, and I started to get more afraid again, and there was an eerie red light coming in from outside my room through the cracks in the door and the ceiling (since the room in the basemen wasn’t quite “finished”). I heard my father’s voice and realized I was at home, and that I had been dreaming. I tried to turn on the light several more times with no success, and although I was reluctant to get out of bed in case there was really a bear somewhere, I finally got up and turned on the overhead fluorescent light, which didn’t work either.

I made my way out of my room in the darkened house, lit by the eerie red glow, and up the stairs into an equally eerily lit kitchen, only the light up there was kind of yellow. I started sorting the pots and pans in the kitchen, and that’s when I woke up for real. I had been dreaming I was dreaming, see, and that’s where I had gotten confused.

I’m sure this has something to do with the fact that The Matrix was on TBS the other day and I happened to see parts of it while I was unpacking and cleaning. Also, since I recently saw The Village, there’s fear lurking in my mind, too, and maybe it just manifested itself as a bear, since those Village creepies are kind of bear-like if you catch a glimpse of their claws in a certain light. Additionally, I watched the episode of The Dead Zone I taped while I was away, and it was all about Johnny Smith saving the people who had saved his life by donating blood, so he could see through their eyes, and maybe my brain interpreted that as some sort of waking dream, or dreamed-dream, or something. Regardless, it was pretty crazy, and kind of disturbing.

You can probably see where this is going… if I can dream I’m dreaming, then how do I know I’m awake? I mean, I’m sure I’ve dreamt that I’ve been asleep, but not necessarily dreaming in my dreams, so the line has suddenly gotten very blurry. The only support I have that this isn’t actually some dream is that this day has been exceptionally boring.

Another dream I had on the last night of vacation, while staying in the TraveLodge in Swift Current (not the best motel decision, as I've probably said before) was this: I was with my family at some sort of country club resort type thing, and we were going to get ready for dinner (it was VERY fancy). I was wearing a very nice long red linen dress (which should be a clear indication that it was a dream, because I don't generally tend to wear red of any sort at all). However, because the country club had some sort of problem, there were teachers protesting at it and they were a pretty rabbly crowd. Michael Moore was leading them, and as they approached, my family scattered. I hid under the furniture rather than run, though, and Michael Moore came right into the room with his throng of protesting teachers all around him chanting anti-establishment slogans and whatnot. I thought I'd get out of the room by just standing up slowly, and making my way to the door, chanting along with the teachers as camouflage. Michael Moore, however, spotted me and started looking for my Teacher's Union badge. In doing so, he kind of groped me, and I looked him straight in the eye and said "Excuse me!". He apologized, and I said "You can make it up to me by taking me for dinner!"

So there I was, standing there with Michael Moore, forcing him into asking me to dinner. He said I'd have to coordinate it with his social secretary, because he didn't have control of his schedule since he became famous. His social secretary was very displeased with giving me a dinner appointment, and I think he was gay, and kind of jealous because he might have been in love with Michael Moore, but nonetheless, I got the dinner appointment. I walked outside the building into the alley with Michael Moore, and he noticed I was wearing the red dress. He tackled me and said "You tricked me!" and I replied "Of course I tricked you. But I've still got it!"

Then he asked me why I'd want to go to dinner with him if I wasn't one of them (presumably, the protesting teachers, I guess), and I said because he was an interesting man, he'd probably be pretty interesting at dinner. And besides, I felt sorry for him. He asked me why I felt sorry for him, and I told him that I just felt so bad for him because he was always listening to the little guy's story, but when he felt sad and lonely, who listened to him? No one.

[editorial note: I don't really even like Michael Moore]

So I leave, to go and find my family at dinner, and get to the building where we're supposed to be. I have to cross underneath the building, which seems to be made of glass, and there are a bunch of guys standing under it, looking up women's skirts and shouting like they're strippers, which they do indeed seem to be when I look up too, so I book through there as fast as I can. I get to the restaurant, and find that my family minus The Mac are all in the bar, and my sister is being pretty loud. I tell them I'm going to find The Mac, and leave.

When I leave, I walk out onto the street, and find The Mac, who is running. He tells me to run, too, and we run to his house, which although it is in the same neighbourhood as his real house, it is not his house at all. Somehow, the NoodleDog is with us, and we're being chased by a leopard. An all-black leopard that had mutating properties, so it can shape-shift into whoever it wants. We lock the door, after getting the NoodleDog inside, and then the leopard starts flinging itself against the door. I say "that door's not gonna last long..." and The Mac agrees, so we go to check the other doors in the house. The back door isn't much better, and it seems there's a sun room or something and the leopard has gotten in there. It's trying to find a way out when we get to the room and close all the glass doors (they look like french doors, but the glass comes out, so they're pretty unstable). The leopard morphs into a blonde woman (wearing, coincidentally, a red dress similar to the one I had on earlier), and she starts flinging herself against the glass, which predictably enough comes right out again. So then she's in the house and The Mac and I have no choice but to be forced back room by room, closing and trying to lock doors as we go, but each room the leopard-woman gets to, she flings herself at the door until it breaks. Inside doors are a lot less sturdy than outside doors.

Finally, we're approaching the front hall, and I remember the NoodleDog is still inside, so I'm running around the house the other way to try and get him out, and the leopard is growling viciously at me, and I'm pretty worried at this point that she's either going to get me or the NoodleDog, and I'm sort of woken up to hear the Grumpaw snoring away on the other side of the room, which sounds a lot like the leopard growling. It was all his fault. He laughed when I told him about it the next morning.

And with that, I’m going to leave. Yes, it’s not quite 4p yet, and I probably could find something productive to do, but I just can’t stand it any more, and I want to go home. I want to give the NoodleDog and the cats huge hugs, take the NoodleDog for a walk with his favourite ball, and then cook something really fantastic for dinner. Hopefully, I have something really fantastic in the fridge or cupboard…

Well, that's the end of my vacation. The NoodleDog and I got home yesterday around lunchtime, and although I'm very glad to be home and not driving in the rain any more, I'm quite sad to be back to work today.

We left The Mac’s place on Friday morning, and drove to St. Cloud, which is just outside of Minneapolis. I was kind of hoping we could have gotten further, but we didn’t. I had a rousing discussion with The Grumpaw about whether people should just stay out there in the left lane, driving along just over the speed limit like everything is fine, while people like ME come up behind them, ticking along at close to 100 mph (160 km/hr) and have to slam on the binders and scream bloody murder. He thinks it’s fine, because he’ll “just have to pull back out anyway to pass in a few minutes…” so why not? Because it gums up the works, is why. If you’re going to drive in the “fast lane”, you have to be going fast. I think if you want to reside in the fast lane, you have to be going at least 130 km/hr (uh… something like 75 mph, I think?), and preferably, you’ll pull over into the right hand lane and let people who are going faster than you pass.

When I drive, I kind of make it a goal to keep to the right lane as much as possible, and only go into the left lane to pass. It makes it a lot better because usually, I’m going a lot faster than the rest of the traffic, but in the event that someone even faster comes along, I’m not in his way. Plus, when he does zing by, I can zip out behind him and follow him, using him as a radar shield. Yes, I do that, and I’m not at all ashamed. I can’t tell you how many times people have done the same to me, thinking that I must have some secret powerful laser/radar-detection device that allows me to speed with impunity. Not so, my friends, not so. I’m just chancing it.

Anyway, we left St. Cloud the next day at an ungodly hour, and everything was just fantastic until we hit the Saskatchewan border, where the friendly Canadian border guard told us to have a nice day, and to watch the weather, eh? Because there had been a tornado through there just a little while ago. Greeeaaaat. There were ominous black clouds all along the Eastern horizon, and less ominous but very tricky rain-laden grey-brown clouds approaching from the West. I had the top down for about an hour, and then it started to rain. My mother came over the radio after a while and asked if I’d like to stop. “That'd be great…” I replied, as the NoodleDog glared balefully at me, his wet whiskers vibrating. Just after I put the top up, and while we were still on the two-lane not-so-highway, the skies opened up and poured. Seriously, poured. There was so much rain that when the big semis passed us, we couldn’t see a thing. The Tiny Car, which is usually fairly reliably water-tight unless I take it through the Co-Op car wash on the right (which has more powerful jets than the one on the left), leaked. The NoodleDog was alright because he was sitting on the right hand side of the car (which usually leaks more than the left side but was on the far side of the trucks, of course), but I got rained on inside the car whenever a big truck would pass, covering us in a wake of water. Needless to say, I wasn’t too happy about the whole rain situation, and when it was proposed that we stop in Swift Current overnight, I didn’t fight it.

The best thing about Swift Current was that it had a Tim Horton’s right beside the motel, and I was able to get a French Vanilla Cappuccino. The worst thing was that it appeared to be mostly built on SAND, and I got sand in my shoes and the NoodleDog tracked sand into the motel room on his feet. That, and the people who were having a domestic dispute outside the motel room from 2-3a didn’t help. The NoodleDog didn’t think that was very funny, either, and barked at them twice, which was a bad thing, because we didn’t stay at a “pet friendly” motel, we just snuck him in.

So it’s nice to be off the road and home. But it’s another work day, and it’s as though I never left. I even have a familiar feeling headache to keep me company. I’m not used to this staring at a computer screen for hours on end, sitting still, being inside all day. It’s no good, I tell you. I need to find a career where I can be outside most of the time when it’s nice out and inside when it’s not nice out, at my discretion, and still earn enough money to do fun things when I’m not working. Does anyone know what job this is? If you do, let me know.

I survived the trip with The Mac and my father. We went to Meadowbrook Hall and saw cars. I know to most of you that doesn’t sound like much, but we saw over 200 cars that were each worth well over what most of us will ever amass in our lifetimes. These cars were works of art. We saw vintage, classics, Italian sports cars, cars of the American Golden Era, Packards, Pierce Arrows, Ferraris, Bugattis, Bizzarinis, Rolls Royces, Cadillacs, and the list goes on and on.

The Concourso Italiano was on Saturday, and we left The Mac’s place around 8:30a. We took “the long way”, because my father didn’t listen to The Mac’s interpretations of the map. We drove slowly, and it took a lot longer than anticipated. The trip was enjoyable, though, because The Mac and I had an extended conversation about Johnny Cash and music, and lots of inane topics that irritated the driver (our father). As I was the only one who had had the foresight to bring CDs on the drive, it was my stuff we had to listen to, further irritating the driver. By the time we arrived at Meadowbrook Hall, the driver was irritated enough not to listen to any of the instructions we were periodically yelling at him. ”Turn Left here! No, get in the left lane. Your OTHER LEFT!!! AAaaaaaaa!!!” (as the exit went whizzing by)
“Look, you’re gonna want the other lane eventually… no, not that turning lane, NOT THE TURNING LANE!!”
“Pontiac. Yes, Pontiac. We’re going to turn on Squirrel Road. The one we just went by. Yep.”
“THIS IS THE OUT LANE, NOT THE IN LANE!! Aaaaaaaa!!”
And some of me just yelling “we’re all gonna die!” at various junctures, as we cut out various vehicles, or were cut off by various vehicles.

We made it to the parking lot. The Mac and I were hungry, it was after 1p, but because we were late having taken the longer route and having missed exits and stuff, The Grumpaw refused to even consider the prospect of lunch. NO LUNCH!! There was no stopping along the way, there was no drive-through, so we got to the concourso without having eaten for many hours. The burning hot sun beat down on us as our father led us on what would have been a death march were it not for the extremely insightful folks selling horrendously expensive sandwiches, which The Mac and I scarfed down as fast as humanly possible.

The Concourso was beautiful. Shiny, glistening Italian beauties everywhere. The Grumpaw's main goal at these events is to get pictures of every single car (unless it has been previously photographed, because he has promised my mother not to take pictures of cars he knows he already has…), so he set off to do exactly that as The Mac and I obtained our expensive sandwiches. We followed, slowly, taking in the sights. It was great!

After the show, we headed out to find a room. We tried the Holiday Inn Select, The Hampshire Inn, and then The Grumpaw spotted the Motel 6. We tried to convince him that The Motel 6 was not the way to go, but he wouldn’t be dissuaded. He said he’d go in “just to check if they had vacancies”, but when he didn’t come back right away, we knew we were done-for. Checked-in and everything. The next logical order of business was to find dinner.

My father consulted the phone book. He selected the most expensive looking ad, and tried to find it on the map. I suggested we try for something close, and not too pricey, and we set out on the road. As we were driving, I caught sight of Mountain Jack’s, and convinced the driver to make a series of choreographed turns and park it. Right next to the motel. Mere steps away from our room door. And yea, it was a fantastic dinner. It was marvelous. We laughed, we ate, we stuffed ourselves completely. I ate so much that I was actually giddy with the over-nutrition. Of course, it was not that late by the time we finished, and we were back at the motel by around 8:30p. Twelve hours from where we started. And with that, The Grumpaw declared a lights-out.

The next day was the real concourse – the 250 cars from mostly the pre-war era. The cars were fantastic. The weather was fantastic. The entire day was pretty much just great overall. Amidst the great-looking cars, I spotted a great-looking guy who appeared to be about 28 or so, tall, dark, handsome and all that. As it turned out, he was an exhibitor of a Rolls Royce (or attached thereto, the car probably belonged to his father who was decked-out in a fantastic hawaiian print shirt). I didn’t talk to him, but mention him because he was just as good-looking as most of the cars.

We made our way VERY slowly through the cars. I have discovered that although I can walk all day, I cannot stand still. It’s not the heat or the walking that’ll kill me – it’s standing around, not doing anything at all. That’s terrible. If I’m looking at something, I can stand for a few minutes, but time has no meaning in The Grumpaw's universe. He can stand stock still for up to ten minutes waiting for people to move and clear the view of the car he wants to photograph, camera aimed and at the ready. He’s quick, I’ll grant him that – he can snap a photo as soon as the view clears – but he’s also tenacious and has the patience of Job.

The cars were all eventually photographed, and some of us were suffering from dehydration because the guy who sold ice cream and water was OUT of WATER when that’s his entire raison-d’etre… (don’t worry, I got some water after all, and managed to survive the end of our excursion). The car show people were doing a “proper concours” – which entailed a fashion show to accompany the cars, all period dress. Don’t get me wrong, it was nice, and they should probably make a better stab at doing that properly, but there weren’t many models, the cars moved slowly, and you couldn’t really see them after all. The commentators on the cars and the fashions were a little strange, too. We left, and my brother and father then proceeded to check out the cars in the parking lot. FOR TWENTY MORE MINUTES. With me sitting in the car, roasting.

The drive home was relatively uneventful. I brought two-way radios on the trip so I could communicate with my parents in their vehicle from mine, and there was one in the van. I turned it on to “scan” when we hit the Ohio Toll Road exit traffic jam, and listened in on another group’s conversation.
“DoSKK yRSSSK work tomorrow?”
“What?””Does your wife have to work tomorrow?”
“Yeah.”
“Well I don’t, because I’m on VAAACAAAAAAAATION!” Heh.
“This traffic is unberarable. We’ve been here forever!”
“Yeah, fucking Ohians!”

We sped home. We got back well in time for dinner, although I was still stuffed from the previous feasting. I declared the next day, which was today, the Outlet Mall Day.

As I write this, the NoodleDog capers about my feet, amongst the many items I bought at the Outlet Mall. Yes, today we went to the Outlet Mall, and it was good. It wasn’t quite as good as the shopping trip The Mac and I went on last year, which I think was better because it was the Labor Day sale, but it was pretty good. I knew the Eddie Bauer Outlet Store was there, so it was only a matter of finding the best bargains and neatest stuff therein.

We went early, and stayed late. The trip started out auspiciously, with The Mac driving us the 35 mile distance to Capital City. The Grumpaw had been complaining bitterly up until The Mac approached a yellow light, saying “I don’t think I’m going to stop at that light. Well, I probably have time. Goodbye light!” as the light turned red, and I think Pete suffered an apoplectic fit depriving him of the power of speech. He was quite from that point on. We saw the Riverboat casino, because in Indiana, the casinos can’t be on dry land. They recently changed the laws so that the casino boat can stay docked all the time, because as the Mac related, the strict governor died, and the vice-governor who took over was a little friendlier to gambling. The Mac and I have been to the Riverboat casino, but that was a sad tale and we’d prefer not to relive it.

The shopping was great. There was stuff everywhere. We came, we saw, we conquered. I’m not a typical woman in that I have a very small collection of footwear, but it’s getting larger, and I’m working on it. I managed to find a couple of pairs of sandals to add to the collection, and a bunch of clothing I probably don’t really NEED, but today wasn’t about need. It was about getting stuff for a deal. It was great fun. The Mac got a fantastic yellow sweater. I found some nice linen pants, and a fleece vest, and on and on.

However, tragedy struck when we got back to the car. We had managed to lose a set of car keys. My parents’ overcautiousness paid off, and we were OK, we got home with the other set, but we’re down a set of car keys. The Mac tried to find them in the stores where he had tried on pants and such, since he was the last one to have had them, but no luck. The only black mark on an otherwise great and successful day.

Tomorrow, my parents plan to talk to The Mac about his finances and “the future”. I plan on making myself scarce!!