Friday, March 11, 2005

Dear Dog…

The following post is written solely for the benefit of my dog. And yes, for all you skeptics out there, he DOES understand the English language and is probably at home surfing the internet at this very moment. Unless he’s sitting patiently to the side while my cat renames all the desktop icons. Again.

But I digress.

Dearest Hastings,

I appreciate your enthusiasm for life, truly, but I believe there is an area we need to discuss. Namely, the middle-of-the-night bursts of energy that seem to have taken over your sanity and my ability to sleep well over the past two nights.
I understand that because you insist on drinking a half gallon of water just before bed, there will be the occasional - OCCASIONAL - time when you will need to rise in the middle of the night to relieve yourself. I can live with that. But aside from those occasional times, the following is a list of life facts that I hope you will take into consideration in the future - if for nothing else, to save yourself some time and me some sleep.

1. If you have gone to the bathroom at approximately 4:00am, I will not believe you when you try to convince me you need to go again at 4:30am.
2. The fact that the cat has just regurgitated an entire day’s worth of food outside the bedroom door is not - and I repeat NOT - a good enough reason for us to get out of bed and open the bedroom door. Trust me, it will still be there in the morning and if we can help it, you won’t get to eat it anyway, even though it is recycled bits of your own food. Learn to be a little more territorial about your food and maybe the cat will stick to his own “sensitive stomach” food.
3. Licking the door doesn’t open it.
4. Whining at the door doesn’t open it.
5. Throwing yourself into the door doesn’t open it.
6. Jumping up on the door and scratching your claws all the way down like fingernails on a chalkboard doesn’t open the door.
7. Licking my hand, my elbow, and/or my nose doesn’t open the door.
8. Standing on my hip does not instill me with the urge to play with your rope toy.
9. Pulling clothes out of the laundry basket may get me out of bed. It may also get you a squirt in the mouth with the bitter spray. BUT IT DOES NOT OPEN THE DOOR.
10. PULL ALL THE COVERS OFF THE BED ONE MORE TIME AND SO HELP ME GOD...

Just so you know, there is a puppy-sized jail cell at Petco with your name on it. And it will go in the far recesses of the house in which no one but the cats will hear your cries for deliverance…

(Insert maniacal laugh here)

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Thursday, March 10, 2005

Tip of the Day

Take the passifier out of your mouth before entering my office to make a sales pitch.  Seriously.

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Dude Where’s My Camera

So if the title of “Best Job Ever” wasn’t already taken (by moi), it would have to go to my dear husband J, who works for a production company… in an office building that looks like a cross between the Vegas Strip Hotel and Disney World.
As he’s strolling into the office the other day, he notices a multitude of Men in Black standing around with those Matrix ear pieces...oh yeah, and AK-47s in their hands.
It’s the Secret Service for the Czech Republic and the President is at his production studio filming for the day.

Just another day in the life of a production company employee.

On a side note, evidently political correctness isn’t required when working for the Czech Republic. All the employees in the building filed into work that morning and the Secret Service stood there and watched. But when the one hispanic guy that works for the company walked through the doors, they stopped him and asked if he had a delivery or something.

Ouch.

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Monday, March 07, 2005

Baby’s First Picture

First Ultrasound 3/7/05

Had my first pre-natal doctor appointment today. It wasn’t nearly as bad as I was expecting. J went with me so he could hold my hand during the needle part but they didn’t even stick me (though I hear that comes later).

And I even got my first sonogram. Not that you can see much from the picture I got to take home, but we did get to see the baby’s heart beating on the screen and got a lesson in detecting which shapless blob was the head and which one was the yolk sac.

Evidently my uterus is shaped like a pork chop and this baby has wedged itself into the narrow tip. Looks like we might be having a shy kid, though I don’t see how if it has J for a father.

The medical world seems to be full of terms that sound worse than they are. Never having been through this before, I got a little nervous when the doctor started talking about the sonogram PROBE. Oh, and the CYST on my right ovary where the egg was released that we can’t do anything about except watch it right now because it’s regulating the progesterone. Apparently that’s pretty normal and it should go away sometime after the placenta takes over. And then they start telling you all about the tests that are available to determine Cleft Palate and Downs and Cystic Fibrosis and all kinds of other scary malformations.

But from all appearances everything seems to be pretty normal and there’s no cause for alarm yet. YET.

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Friday, March 04, 2005

Super-Size My Champagne

Watched Super-Size Me! for the first time. Ewwwwww. It will probably be a little while before I eat at McDonald’s again. I have to admit that it does make me twinge everytime I have to categorize a McDonalds or a Wendy’s expense as “dining out” in Microsoft Money. They should have a different category for “consuming food products that rot your insides.”

Though I doubt the movie has permanently turned me off of fast food, because I am a great believer in moderation, and don’t really see any evidence that my once-a-month or less fast food “dining out” experience is going to kill me.

But I did get an education on those chicken nuggets I’ve always been fond of.

I had a friend in middle school who found a feather in her McDonald’s chicken nugget. At the time, that was as gross as it got. Actually, looking back on it, we should have seen it as a relief. You know, hardcore evidence that the food we were consuming was actually made from meat that used to be real at one time.

The McDonalds’ around here seem to be making a great effort to overcome past reputations. There are a few locations around our house that we refer to as the Petroleum Club McDonalds. Walking into one of these immediately hits one with a sense of disorientation. Marble floors, mahogany wood walls and bookshelves (complete with classic editions), glass chandeliers, fireplaces, and that little sign in the bathroom that says We strive to keep our restrooms upholding to the highest standards of cleanliness. If this restroom does not meet with your approval, please flip this switch to notify the manager.

The whole Petroleum Club McDonald’s experience is a bit surreal. I’m waiting for the day when I order from the dollar menu and get asked if I want champagne with that.

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Wednesday, March 02, 2005

Dreams

Last night was the second night in a row that I dreamed about being chased and bitten by enormous poisonous spiders.
I don’t even want to know what that means.

In addition to scary spiders, I also dreamed that my friend Stephanie and her fiance were trying to buy a new house - 2 doors down from where they are - and Stephanie was using her body to finagle a better price on the house.

If you know Stephanie, you will understand how humorous that thought is. 

Of course, in my dream, it all made sense and I was like “oh, so that’s how people get a lower price on a house.”

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Tuesday, March 01, 2005

Norton Anti-Valium

Norton Anti-Virus and I have a mutal hate-hate relationship.  It seems I can never successfully download a subscription renewal to save my life.  This time I ordered the CD version because at least if I have trouble downloading, I still have the DISK SO I CAN TRY AGAIN.  I seem to have more luck with disks than with internet downloads anyway.
But even when you purchase the disk and pay the $7.95 to have it shipped to you, you still have to download the Personal Firewall part from the internet.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, WE ARE PLEASED TO ANNOUNCE THAT AFTER MUCH PAIN, PERSEVERANCE, LOSING THE COMPUTER’S ABILITY TO RECOGNIZE THE PRINTER, AND A FEW MENACING THREATS LATER…

I HAVE TRIUMPHED!  Personal Firewall successfully installed on my machine.  I think.

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Worst Baby Names en Finale

We have reached the end of our journey on the path of worst baby names in the history of Celtic languages.  Thank you for accompanying us and please pay the cashier on your way out.  Oh, and feel free to suggest your own names, should you be blessed with any that we have left off the list.

Seosaimhthin
Shawndrell
Shunta
Soidhachan
Taggart
Teamhair
Thurl
Tibbot
Tighearnach
Tor
Tuathal
Uaid
Uilleam
Uistean
Ulicia
Ulliam
Ungus
Vevila
Vevina
Zowie

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