Boundless Joy

If you are a dog owner you have probably noticed that your furry friend loves nothing more than running around wild and untethered, romping with their brethren, getting down to their true roots of being one within a pack.

The best place for our dogs to get this enjoyment?  The dog park!

Unless, of course, you live on multiple acres and have a whole crapload of dogs, then you can just stay home.

A couple of weeks ago I went along with the fam to the dog park Jimmy and Strudel love.  It's nothing fancy... just a large pond in the middle and then grass surrounding it in an oval.  Lots of room for the dogs to stretch their legs and the more aquatically inclined can get their swim on.

Look at the beautiful pit bull puppy.  Aw, they are so cute and innocent looking at this age!

(Please click the photos to enlarge.  It really pisses me off how small the "large" setting is, and how huge the "extra large" setting is.)

I tried my camera's continuous photo setting for the first time and holy crap, I didn't realize it takes a picture like every millisecond!  I had to delete no less than 200 pictures when I got home.  But, it was pretty neat to find this series of pictures, showing Strudel shaking off the water.

I was mesmerized by this one black lab named Duke.  I don't think I've ever seen a dog more in love with the water, or with as much stamina.  For a full hour he did nothing but swim out to get the tennis ball and bring it back to his human.  So well trained and gorgeous.

Mikayla got this quick clip of him.  Look at how intent he is on his human and the ball.  The other dogs are running all over the place and he doesn't even give them a glance.







Gotta love that belly flop!

Strudel has such a great time running with the other dogs. In fact, she tends to run herself into exhaustion, and once in a while she just has to plop her furry ass down and take a breather. Let the other dogs sniff her while she stretches out. It doesn't matter to her that she's stretching out in muddy water, or that it is absolutely frigid.






She reminds me of a gator the way she pulls herself along while still lying down. But then... she's off again!

Remember what she looks like after a romp in the park when Daddy has been too lazy to give her a bath?

Well, when Mommy is there she makes sure we make use the accommodations.  And don't let the picture fool you.  I basically took over from there.  Jimmy is too squeamish to clean Strudel's girly parts.

That water too is completely freezing, but at least it's clean and when she comes home and dries off she looks more like this.

And yes, she does have a leash on while in the house.  It's rarely off of her lately because with it on, when she takes something she's not supposed to, sometimes we get lucky and as she's running away we step on the leash and she's stopped in her tracks.  More times than not though, I'm made to chase her round and round in a circle trying to get whatever it is she's grabbed.  There have been some close calls when I've stuck out my leg to step on the leash and have nearly landed myself in a fat lady split.  

I'll leave you with that delightful imagery. 

Pssst! If you love me, you might love my stupid sister more. Go visit her at Jill's Believe it or Not, and tell her I sent you!

Sunday Scramble

Here I am again, twisted and disconnected thoughts awaiting your perusal.  Let's get started, shall we?

• Thursday was Strudel's 1-year birthday!  We celebrated by doing... nothing.  According to Golden  owners far and wide, a  Golden Retriever stays in the puppy stage for a good 2 years.  Yay me. Not sure I can survive it.  This week?  She ate two pencils, my new-ish throw pillow, the new, $20 remote Jimmy just bought a couple weeks ago, another People magazine and a tennis ball. All dogs love tennis balls, right?  Well, Strudel loves them so much that she tears them into teeny tiny pieces. 

Gotta love this dog.  Or hate her.  I'll leave it up to you.

She looks so innocent, but I promise you, she's not.  In fact, she's not even allowed on the couch!

• Wednesday night I was running late to pick up the girls at CCD (religious education).  I was shoveling spaghetti in my face as quick as I could but even so only had time to eat half of it.  I quickly grabbed my purse and ran out the door.  Halfway there I realized I was wearing my slippers (okay, I'll be honest and say I pick them up wearing my slippers most of the time, and on purpose) and no bra.  Yes, no bra... with the DDs flappin' in the breeze.  I had to walk to their classrooms with my arms crossed over my chest. Not an easy feat considering my boob to arm- length ratio.

• Sinead and her family are here!!!  Not sure when I'll get to see her because they're in a kind of moving-from-Hawaii limbo.  They're here, but all their shit is somewhere on the Pacific ocean.  It could be a month or more before they have any furniture.   While on the phone with Nade yesterday she whined in my ear, "It's cold here!  I don't like it!  I want to go back to Hawaii!"  What a pussy.  This is Florida, she's from NY for cripe's sake, where we used to endure blizzards.  She's crying because it's 65 degrees. She may just wake up on Sunday and start sobbing when she realizes the high for the day is only supposed to be 56 degrees.  Bwaa haa haaaaaaaaaaaa!

• Do your tomatoes wear diapers?  Well, mine do.  But only the ugly ones.  I shit you not, I even took a picture for you. 

Why do they call these ugly tomatoes?  I don't think they're ugly at all.  Nice and red and with just a few puckery wrinkles.  To me, that just gives a tomato character. Sure, this one has a tiny bruise but it's not his fault... someone obviously mishandled him.  Poor thing.

So as I was saying, Publix always seems to have the ugly tomatoes in these foam diapers.  Can't for the life of me figure out why.  And isn't this discrimination against the Romas, the fresh-on-the-vines, the Beefsteaks, etc. etc.?  Why don't they get foam diapers?

• Okay, who here has read Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol?  This is so not my typical kind of read, but after hearing Jimmy nag me for months on end to read it, I either had to actually crack it open and give it a try, or take the book and bash him over the head with it.  Whereas I wish I could say I did the latter, I'm actually glad I did the former.  This book rocked my face off, as Amity would say.

And now I have him reading this series...

 

Frickin' awesome books, but I don't think he's ever read a book with actual sex scenes in it.  I may have traumatized him for life.  Goody!

 

• As I sit here out in my bitch cave in the absolutely freezing 61.5 degree weather, I can hear Mikayla inside, yelling at Jimmy.  She just said, "Daddy! Stop it with the popcorn now!  You're disgusting!"  Jimmy has this thing with eating the un-popped kernels and I can attest that the sound of him crunching them is, in fact, disgusting.

• And now, for my favorite bloggy quote of the week:

This one comes to you from my friend Recia, at The Crazy Train.  The reason this quote had me peeing my pants is because Mikayla just pulled this one on me a few weeks ago.

"If you are the spanking parent..you probably have good kids...but in some places it's frowned upon. CHILDREN KNOW THIS...who the hell told them? SO they might respond to their punishment with "I'll call CPS" and you can respond with..."well they'll have to find your body first" :)"

•  Note to Self:  Please remember Recia's come-back to that particular threat.

Now come on in and link up with Mr. MckLinky!!!  I'll love ya forever if you do!









Pssst! If you love me, you might love my stupid sister more. Go visit her at Jill's Believe it or Not, and tell her I sent you!

I Probably Don't Deserve It, But...

I'd still love it if you joined me for this week's Sunday Scramble!

I feel undeserving because in the past two days I've barely even opened my blog, much less read any of yours.  I'm in a funk, remember?

But come on, the SS kind of flunked last week and that made me sad.  So, put your scrambled, inconsistent thoughts together and come by Saturday night to link up!  These are the kind of posts you don't even have to think about.  Just sit down and let your fingers type whatever the hell you're thinking at the moment, or what's been driving you batty all week.  It's actually kind of fun!



Pssst! If you love me, you might love my stupid sister more. Go visit her at Jill's Believe it or Not, and tell her I sent you!