I Still Can't Believe It

Here's hoping we all have someone to play ball with in 2007.

I was reading my paternal grandmother's Life Story on Christmas. I didn't have time to read the whole thing without being labeled anti-social, which vexed me because I really wanted to keep reading once I started. I could get away with hiding from the family festivities when I was "at that age" of being an angst-riddled teenager, but apparently, I'm supposed to have grown out of that age. I'm a cranky DINK now, shouldn't that count? (And yes, I do see the irony of wanting to learn more about my grandma from a book than say, sitting down with her and having a conversation. I think my granddaughter of the year award just went to my cousin with the big hair.) Out of many many interesting parts, I keep going back to the part where she is talking about her first job after finishing beauty school and how she had two outfits - "One on my back and one that was probably in the laundry". I imagine my closet and how empty it would look with one outfit on a

...going to Amsterdam next month. This is a picture of the wall art in the funky apartment Surfer Boy and I stayed in when we went there a couple of years ago. This was the bedroom but we didn't sleep in it because the bed was seriously slanted downwards at the head. We tried putting cushions from the couch under the mattress but that was just plain uncomfortable. Actually, we couldn't decide if the bed was jacked or the floor of the apartment was the problem. We were on the third floor of a rickety little place. And it was in the prime part of town too. One night on our way back from the market, we walked by three guys in kilts. One pulled his kilt up and peed on the sidewalk. He didn't stop walking, mind you. Hell yeah. This time, I'll be staying in an apartment...that floats on the canal. Yeah, someone thinks this is a good idea, but I keep envisioning trying to get back on the boat while impaired. Because those are not canals I'd want to fall into.

The evening started like any other. I walked to my car after work and looked up to smile at the lazily dangling shoes. But then I sensed a glitch in the Matrix. What once was a wire covered in 18+ pairs of shoes (and alleged foil-wrapped vegetables) now exists as lonesome wires, indestinguishable from rest. The shoes are gone. Almost all of them. There are still the two original pair, but I think they only survived because they're on different wires than the ones that run along the alley and had accumulated such a nice array of sneakers. I'm a little sad about it too. The daily counting of the shoe pairs, the observation of the placement and the way they hung there so carelessly, are all over. The whimsy has been ripped out of my workday routine and it's a poorer routine for it. I mean, I understand that there was probably a serious fire hazard going on there and no amount of whimsy is worth losing some public property over. But come on! Our wires were fun and deco

Piss & vinegar? Shit? Just what am I full of at the holidays? Well, I'm full of reminders and to-dos, like: buy gifts for lovely family wrap gifts for awesome family mail gifts to kick-ass family that live out of state hang lights on exterior of our humble abode decorate the fabulous fake fir tree (ok, ok, so it's more like an unintentionally hilarious 21st century Charlie Brown-style tree send Christmas cards to stunningly beautiful family and friends Now that the jolly holly-day is less than a week away, I'm basking in the glow of the friendliness of strangers and whittling away my time doing good deeds and keeping up with the laundry. Right? [cue crazy insane cackling laughter] The above to-do list now looks something like this: get something for Mom. try as hard as possible to remember the 400,242 awesome gift ideas i've had for her throughout the year. Ask Surfer Boy to wrap all gifts. Call kick-ass out of state family members to wish them a Merry Christmas and

It's official: I'm going to Beijing. This trip will have many Firsts. For instance: First time needing a visa for entry to a country. One of the questions on the application form: "Purpose of your journey in China." Gooooooood question! To attain enlightenment? To mold a new vision of myself within the greater scheme of life and the world? To be a tourist? First time visiting a communist country. I went to Hong Kong last year, but that doesn't count as a communist country in my book. Why? Because. Don't ask so many questions. They don't like it when you ask so many questions. First time flying on a plane that has a dragon on it. Why does this excite me? It's called DragaonAir for pete's sake, of COURSE it'll have a dragon on it. First time visiting a place where it's pretty much required to enlist the services of a guide/translator because literally nobody there speaks the same language as I do. The prospect of this simult

...you get to bake cookies with three of the coolest women EVER? ...you get to sleep until 2 in the afternoon on a seriously and deliciously squishy bed? ...you pretty much never have to cook because your husband has decided cooking is the coolest thing since Converse Hi-Tops? ...the mountain of paper that sprouted over two years ago finally made it's way into nicely organized file folders with labels and everything? ...the entertainment center you got disgustingly cheap eight years ago looks like a million dollars with a new paint job and a little fabric? ...the online order of a freakin' kilo of Nag Champa comes in? Oh how I love the Champy. ...one of your Christmas gifts is tickets to six Cardinal's games in the SAME awesome seats you had this, the year of The Lord...THE World Series Championship? [cue the angels singing on that one!] ...being literal is the only thing flowing? Yeesh.

 

There are now 16 pairs of shoes and one pair of what I think are baked potatoes (probably pre-baked is more accurate) hanging from the electrical wires behind my work. And another observation I made is that they all appear to be men's shoes. Or very large women's hightops. Cassady is one step away from complete incontinence. Yesterday, he only made it two steps out the back door before dropping his load off on the patio. Super. While some bloggers posted every day during the month of November, I went the opposite route and only posted 4 times including this one. I'm contrary like that. Christmas presents bought = 1. So, yes, I'm doomed to repeat the traumatic holiday harassment that is shopping anytime in December. Went to Tar-J on Sunday reminding Surfer Boy and myself that we must not think of ourselves, but of the dear people we want to buy gifts for...and then promptly spent a small fortune on such treasures as anti-fungal foot cream and a rice cooker. There was no

Dexter, a puppy Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, says Happy Thanksgiving! To you! And you over there! And hey, you too! And that guy in the back! And w00t, I'd never forget YOU! Lick lick lick. This is my co-workers dog. He likes the Showtime series by the same name. I don't get Showtime, but he's described it to me in depth. It's got a guy (David from Six Feet Under) who is a blood spatter expert with the forensics dept. by day and by night, he's a serial killer who only kills bad guys. Now, when I named my dog, I wanted him to be a good car dog so I thought of someone who was really into being in cars and I came up with Neal Cassady : The Guy That Drove The Bus For The Merry Pranksters, amongst other things. And it worked too - Cassady traveled with me to Chicago numerous times for Dead shows, California, Colorado (with KEEEM), all over Missouri, Utah, Oregon, Nevada, ad nauseum. I wonder if Dexter will stalk around the house at night looking for offen

Up until right this minute, I've not had a single moment alone with a computer in over a week. I'm going into withdrawal and am convinced I'll soon need to be taking a pill to deal with my addiction. I'm in Palm Desert, CA visiting with Surfer Boy's family. They've got a beautifully-landscaped house, the weather is fucking perfect (78 & sunny) and my in-laws are about the nicest, most accommodating people you'd ever want to meet. It was a bit of a struggle to iron out the logistics of the trip since we're talking about coordinating schedules, lodging, transpo and eating with a group of 11 that includes Mom, Grandma on Mom's side and Stepdad, Dad and Stepmom, my parents and the perenially-decision-making impaired Surfer Boy and me - Stepmom's mom already left to go back home and one sister had to go back to school (UC-San Diego). But now that everyone's here, it's been story after story about everything from that time Dave drove hi

Three cocktails I think are real, real tasty (even though I generally prefer beer over mixed drinks): Limoncello Mojito - I had my first mojito just a few short months ago. It was no ordinary mojito, nay, it was livened up with Italian lemon-flavored liqueur which complimented the fresh mint deliciously. Four yums out of five. Coconut Rum with Pineapple Juice - I'm sure this drink has a proper name, but I can't be bothered to look it up. Suffice it to say, I drank this almost exclusively for an entire summer, foregoing my typical beer preference as shocking proof I liked me some coconutty-pineapple-y goodness. Watermelon Margarita - It seems that all of my fave cocktails are really summery drinks. Maybe I revert back to beer in the winter out of a subconcious need for that comforting lager. Whatever, the watermelon margarita I had at Chebby's was de-fuckin-lish. End of story. Three cocktails I have personally tried and think taste like, well, not something I want to try aga

I have a raging case of stage fright. Earlier this year at the big tradeshow in Montreal, one of the security guys asked me to make an announcement to the exhibit hall because some dumbshit parked their van in a tow away zone. All I had to do was speak into the microphone. No one would even have been able to see me give the announcement, so for all intents and purposes, there was no stage to be afraid of, right? Yeah. I went over to the microphone, tapped it to make sure it was on, but when I opened my mouth to speak all that came out was a tiny little squeak. My heart was pounding and my vision was blurring. It's what I would guess a panic attack feels like. All because I had to speak into a microphone! How lame. So imagine my mortification this weekend when I went up on stage for a costume contest. I was physically pushed through the throng of onlookers to meet up with Surfer Boy (who had already registered himself as a solo because I could NOT be convinced to go up there with hi

I know I'm dreaming because I'm in heaven...Baseball Heaven. The much-maligned St. Louis Cardinals just won the World Mother Fucking Series. All complaints about the "World" part of it aside, (and considering the fact that only teams from the US play in this event, I have to agree that the title is misrepresentative) the national media and majority sentiment gave this team zero chance. I was fortunate enough to go to 9 games this season. I was fortunate enough to watch all but 3 postseason games on TV. And let me tell you, I must be drunk to sayI was "fortunate" considering the obvious bias of the FOX announcers (and not necessarily in favor of Detroit, but more in favor of ANY OTHER team than the Cardinals), their pandering to the larger markets and thinly-veiled contempt of my home team. And I admit, I am a bit pissed. For you Americans, that means drunk in this context. SO, without making even more of an ass of myself, I'll just conclude this post by

What is it about getting old that requires you to execute a turn in your car at 1 mph? What could the founders of the company "Stinky Fish Poker" have possibly been thinking when they came up with that for a corporate name? Where can I find a pair of gloves that don't have the finger tips? Obviously I could hack up a perfectly good pair of gloves and get the same effect, but since I'll be wearing these while typing, I don't want any of the little strings left from the hacking to get in the way of my lightening fast typing skills. How un-American is it of me to not want to Buy! Buy! Buy! Christmas gifts? How will we ever be able to top our Halloween costume of 2005 (feminine hygiene products for all of you that purged that memory already)? I have exactly 4 days to figure out a costume. Crap. Why are there now 14 pairs of shoes on the telephone/power lines outside of my office? Why am I so fascinated with the shoes on the wires that I count them every. single. day?

Even the freakishly tall Alien in Disguise is rooting for the Cardinals. Come on boys...in the immortal words of Rob Schneider in Waterboy: "You can DO iiiiiiiiiiiiit!"

My Surfer Boy (which is how I'm going to refer to the husband from now on) just made me throw up in my mouth a little. He popped a Banana-flavored Laffy Taffy in his mouth while muttering "Why do they even MAKE banana-flavored?" and then promptly threw in several sliced black olives to create an unholy mixture of Disgusting Flavor Combinations No One Should Ever Attempt. You should smell his breath. N-A-S-T-Y. Oh and the black olives were still sitting in the open can from the previous nights' dinner. And the worst part for me: he liked it. Think he ought to pitch the flavor combo to Willy Wonka?

I mentioned in a previous post that my grandfather has cancer. Prostate cancer with some fun, shady, nodes of it on his lungs added for exclamation. He's 84 or 85 (how horrible am I to not know the exact age of my last remaining grandfather? rhetorical question, shut up!) and aside from the random comment about his urination schedule, he barely made note at family functions about it. I'm almost certain that was done more for my frail grandmother's sake than for his own state of mind, but that's what I witnessed the few times I saw him since the diagnosis. Because of his advanced age, doctors treating the cancer opted for a hormone shot over chemo and radiation. Now, the gory details are too much for my feeble brain to retain, but the results of how the shot affected the prostate cancer have come in and this I do grasp: his prostate function is back to normal. As in, completely normal levels of that prostate hormone that indicates cancerous activity. As in, he pr

...I know Jasoners? will forgive me for being late on his birthday post. Right? Right? Can I use the excuse that I was traveling for 17 hours yesterday and didn't get my luggage and had to file a report and so didn't get home until 8:00 pm after getting up at basically 10:30 pm the night before? Even if my luggage HAD arrived I was so fucking brain-dead, I couldn't be asked to answer the phone much less get online and try to create a worthy birthday post. So instead? Instead he gets this whiny, excuse-laden post! Being the favorite sure has its advantages. And when I say "favorite", of course I'm referring to Mom & Dad's preferences. I love all three of my brothers equally as all good sisters should. But please, don't point out that Big D and BT didn't get their very own birthday posts, ok? If you do, I might have to post a picture of you wearing a wig. I have one. And I'm willing to use it to my own evil advantage, as all good sisters woul

the "front" of the Sagrada Familia Originally uploaded by Corn Dog . This photo is of the main facade of the Sagrada Familia - quite possibly the most insanely beautiful incarnation of a church. Ornate doesn't begin to describe the vision of Antonio Gaudi with regards to this architecture. It's been under construction since the late 1800's and they're "hoping" it will be finalized by 2040. I was there four years ago and aside from some mosaic work, it looked almost exactly the same so I'm thinking the 2040 date might be amibitious, especially with the Spanish Manana work ethic. Go to my Flickr page to see the complete set of pictures from my second visit to this awe-inspiring place. The trip was good. So descriptive and informative, aren't I? Overall, it was a good trip, but it was definitely wracked with a lot of the problems I've been having in my last few trips: loss of appetite, feeling horrid the next day after just a few drinks, pe

He sure does clean up nice. This pic was snapped right after he did one of those little click-your-heels-while-jumping maneuvers - it was so fucking cute. That's me way in the back standing behind the...the...I don't know what you call them other than sheets...with my parents waiting to "walk down the aisle". And you know what? Today's weather is almost exactly like it was that day five years ago. Whoever noted that life is one big cycle was pretty darn smart. We may not be exactly like we were five years ago, but that's what life'll do to you. And trust me when I say I know how lucky I am to have shared these last five years with someone as kind, funny, sweet and cute as my Hundo. If those adjectives seem trite, it's only because there's just too many to list. Well, that and even just thinking about how great I've got it makes me a bit teary-eyed - I just want to deserve it. God, help me deserve it. 

Crazy times, eh? I think the Santa Ana winds are affecting more than just the probability of fires in the desert southwest. Either that or the stars are aligning (for you JoySoy!) so they can each get their respective kicks of my ass in one fell swoop. And I don't think it's just me - a lot of the other blogs I read are reflecting this Drama in their posts as well. Well, to hell with the Drama, I say. Join me, dear readers, in rising up and giving the big finger to Drama. Oh and by the way, JoySoy won the contest I posted here ages ago about how many pairs of shoes were on the wires. She was not 100% correct, but she was the closest. There were actually seven pairs in that pic. Yay JSH! You will now receive a recycled bathroom Elvis from our collection via USPS in 10 - 14 business days.

Man, I should start a blog documenting my bruises. How exciting would that be? The one I'm currently sporting from last Thursday's soccer game pretty much takes up the entire front of my calf/shin. Good thing I don't like wearing skirts and the weather has been such that I can wear pants every day. Because good god almighty, it's an ugly one. Kind of along the same lines as my last post, the title of this post was a "song" we (my brother Jasoners and I) made up when we were kids. This song had a very definite purpose: to instill fear in our younger brother (Big Thirsty/Hungry or BT for short). It worked really well. We'd start chanting it over and over and inevitably BT would start crying. Say he ripped the ass out of his pants - the new pants Mom bought for him to wear to school but he hadn't changed out of - we'd start the chant and he knew we'd be running to Momma to rat on him. Poor BT. After all that emotional abuse, my parents

Kookaburra sits in the ol' gum tree Merry Merry king of the bush is he Laugh Kookaburra, laugh Kookaburra Gay your life must be! - Nursery rhyme I used to sing when I pretended to be my brothers' teacher. I think I was probably the worst little kid teacher EVER since I'm pretty sure I'd smack them if they quit paying attention. Or laughed at me. Or argued with me. Or disregarded my teaching altogether. I had high standards, even then. Luckily, I didn't grow up and become a teacher, so you can all breathe a sigh of relief. Oh and sorry brothers! Love you! Mean it!  

When you're Kim and it's your birthday. Happy birthday to my longtime friend. I hope that you had a fan-fucking-tastic birthday, even with the drama from yesterday.  

I've written of my most awesome friend JoySoy Habanero before . And she's one of the few, the proud, the commenters on this here site. And today? Today is JSH's birthday! It's also Roald Dahl , Mel Torme and FABIO CANNAVARO's birthday today, but none of them, not EVEN Fabio is more fabulous than JoySoy Habanero. No contest. Recently, JSH came along on a family dinner outing, complete with my grandparents and all my brothers and their wives. She sat next to my Grandpa and she had him giggling like a little kid for most of the dinner. My Grandpa was recently diagnosed with prostate and lung cancer and whenever I see him, I know the likelihood is greater that this could be the last time. But that night at dinner, I didn't think about him having cancer once and I dare say that with JoySoy at his side, I don't think he did either. That's what JSH brings to the table and it's just ONE of the reasons I love her so. Here's JoySoy arm-wrestling my Mom a

Earlier this summer, I noticed a pair of shoes thrown over the power line behind my office building. A few of my coworkers commented on it and we postulated what it was all about. I think the first theory put forward said the shoes meant there was a drug dealer in the neighborhood open for business. Other theories were posited: it means you're entering the ghetto or it means people are fucking stupid were my two favorites. Ha ha, days go by and no one thinks anything of it. Cut to last week. On just a few power lines, there are now 12 pairs of shoes dangling in the wind. on various power lines and on street lights (you can see one of those in the picture). What started as a lone pair of sneakers has now developed into a raging case of What The Fuck? Twelve pairs? Who is donating shoes to this cause and who is chucking them up there? The Bleeding Heart ide of me thinks there are plenty of kids that would love to wear any pair of those shoes as they all look worn, but stil

I'm fortunate in that I live really close to work. As in, I can drive home, get some Corn Dog & Cassady time in, make lunch, eat, more dog time, and then drive home in the span of an hour. Oh, and apparently, I now have time to blog on lunch. Yum, french bread pizza... So much has happened in the last few days. To catch up: we went camping with the dogs and NOT to the Piney. Remarkable. Most important thing learned: our dogs are the bad pulling on the leash, barking, whining every time another dog goes by, sounding vicious towards men types of dogs everyone hates. Super. So, time to renew efforts at dog training because the actual camping part was fucking great. Pictures on Flickr soon. What else? Steve "Crikey, She's a Beaut" Irwin died from a stingray through the chest. Shocking and not shocking at the same time - but anyone with an empathetic bone in their body has to feel for Terri, Bindi and Bo. And is Suey still around? It's my brother's birthday tod

...You pull clothes out of your closet that you haven't worn in a few months and you find money in the pocket? And usually it's all crispy and folded funny because it went through the washer and dryer in the pocket. I like crispy clean money I didn't know I had. ...You get text messages? I know I do. This morning I had two: the first was from JP in Hong Kong and said something along the lines of "Woohoo, it's Friday! Hope you can escape to the pub soon". The second message was from Anna and said something along the lines of "The pub you've frequented for the last eight years burned down last night". Such parity with the texts this morning. Coincidence? Who cares! I got two texts!! ...You see your vet at the baseball game and he totally knows your name AND your dogs' names? I mean, granted he's seen Cassady only about 25 times so far this year, but I didn't even hardly recognize him as the vet without his white coat on. And

if you show me yours Originally uploaded by Corn Dog . Ok Kim , I'll play along. And just for the record, you caught me at a low point of cleaning out my purse. It's been a while, as you might have guessed by the looks of it. Click on the picture to go to Flickr and see the notes explaining what the various shit is.

I just got a text message that read "I just sharted for the first time in my life" Of course, my reply is simple to infer "TMI! I'm eating over here!" The reply to the reply..."Twas a short shart" Back to your regularly scheduled programming.

The only evidence I have is last night's episode of Project Runway (well, that and some of those outfits she wears....the hell?). If you don't watch Project Runway avert your eyes, put your blinders on or whatever you do to ignore the best reality show on the telly. And also? Even if you hate fashion shows or whatever, Heidi Klum is freaking hawt. H-O-Double-T hot I tell you. Sometimes her voice gets this really tinny and annoying sound to it (cue that laugh from one of the commercials for the show, egads), but her accent is awesome and she's just too damn sexy. No one should get to be that sexy. How she doesn't have 823 stalkers, I'll never understand. First, I have to profess my love and devotion to Michael Knight. What David Hasselhoff lacked in style clearly ended up in the genes of his Knight Rider namesake. This guy rocks and I am not surprised in the least that he won two challenges in a row. I think he should have won the first challenge as well - I mean co

Here's quite possibly my favorite music video of all time:

The scene: Main Street - a tourist haven with some offices mixed in, old-school brick street, gas lamplight, the whole bit. My office is on the second floor and has a balcony overlooking the street. Some coworkers and I go out there to smoke. Act 1: A white car is driving by. The driver is playing with something and as the car passes right in front of us, we see what the driver is playing with. His dick. A dude drove down a busy street in broad daylight spanking his monkey. Act 2: Cue flabbergastation. The first thought is "I did NOT just see that". Second thought is "Did Cute Cousin Coworker see that too?" We look at each other with our mouths agape. Eye-witness status confirmed - I have someone to back up my story. Act 3: Tell the other co-workers. They are aghast, but oddly, not as surprised as I expect. One tells me she saw that a couple of times when she worked a McDonald's drive-thru. As in, people would pull up to the window as they're pul

Ha! I've outed her. Sunday was not only the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, but was also my BFF's birthday - an equally explosive event, I can tell you that. Proof: And here it was, Anna's birthday and SHE gave ME a gift! She just recently returned from a sojourn to jolly England - London to be exact. And she brought me back something that will change my life: My allegiance is set. Mighty Mighty Liverpool! Now that I have the scarf, will they teach me the naughty chants? Fuck propriety and all that, I want to know the dirty bits.

...you come home with a good buzz and a satiated appetite to discover your air conditioner is seriously on the fritz? So on the fritz, you're afraid it might be ready to "throw a rod" or some other such technical jargon that basically means "you're screwed". ...there's a song on the CD that you love so much, you hardly even hear the songs leading up to it, if you don't skip them in the first place? There's probably some great songs leading up to #4, but I'll never know it because the excitement for #4 is too overpowering to consider waiting another 2.5 minutes to hear it. And if I do listen to it, I'm constantly thinking of #4 anyway and paying zero attention. They could replace their keyboards with a monkey making fart noises and would I notice? Nah, probably not. ...your dog wakes you up at 7 am making the sound that says "I'm puking imminently" and then proceeds to pause and charf at every piece of carpet in the house alo

In the interest of having the most complete list of my obsessions, I went on a mind quest in the Armenian hillside and pondered my love for all things dorky. To wit: Movies (in no particular order) The Outsiders. I made my brothers watch this movie no less than 100 times in one summer. Stand By Me. Ditto True Romance. I went so far as to have a song from the movie in my wedding. Judge me if you will, but I still like that song. The Princess Bride. Anybody want a peanut? And..... a song from this movie was in my wedding. Amadeus. Strangely, no song from this movie in the wedding. Harry Potter. What can I say? I'd love to be a real witch. Here is where I might put Lord of the Rings. But, I am not putting it on my list because of the agregious offense of the hollywoodization of the story. I tried to convince myself it was ok because it was some sort of artistic license, but it was just too cheesy. I can't overcome the cheesy. Albums (wouldn't dare put these in

Growing up, I can clearly remember the phrase "The world does NOT revolve around you" being bandied about by my parents. Of course, I also remember hearing "Your butt pumps pond water" but that's beside the point. I've been accused of being selfish and it's only lately when taking stock of my life that I've come to realize that yes, I'm a pretty selfish person. So now what? Is this a shortcoming I should try to resolve? How can I become less selfish? I know! I'll start a blog, name it after my dog and then incessantly talk about myself and my "issues", real or imagined. That should start me on the road to becoming a recovering selfish person, don't you think? Oh. You don't think that'll help too much? Oh well then. Fuck it. Case in point: I've been seeing a lot of these things called "memes" on other blogs I read. I've actually participated in one once . Since then I haven't been invite

 

I bought a bowling ball. Why? Not because I'm any good at bowling - my average hovers somewhere around 110 if I were to guess. No, the main reason has to do with my laziness. Now that BTW has her own ball, I'm left to my own devices to find a 10 lb. ball - we used to share so only one of us had to navigate through the hordes of tongue-kissing teenagers and wife-beater wearing weirdos. I wonder what the weeknight crowd is like? Maybe more Big Lebowski than "If I have to see that girl's thong one more time I might gouge my eyeballs out with a rusty spoon". One can only hope. 

If you mix Canadian Mist with iced tea, it congeals in the cup. My mom handed me her cup and said "What do you think THAT is?" referring to a couple of brown blobs floating around in it. I poured it out only to see two big ol' gelatinous clumps plop into the lake. They were the consistency of boogers which prompted us to start throwing them at each other and then at the boys on the boat. We might have thrown a blob onto the boat that we were subsequently unable to locate. Should be a good story when someone does find it. My brother's dog of 14 years died. My lasting memory of Jasmine will still always be that mischievous look she'd give you right before she a) ran off; b) pissed/shat on the floor; or c) chased Cassady around the yard pretending she wanted the frisbee but really only wanting to torment - my personal favorite. To some that might sound like I'm only remembering the bad, but it's really more like one of those endearing traits...the look

Jump! Originally uploaded by Corn Dog . Results are in and 9 out of 10 veterinarians agree Cassady does NOT have the Big C! His lump was an inflammation of tissue basically, so it's very good news for the Beaner Bean. In celebration of the good news, here's a picture of Cassady in his prime doing what he was born to do. Somewhere I have video of this too - will try to find that to post here. And to think, all the jumping and frisbee catching started with a little squeaky Woodstock chew toy I bought in Connecticut. Most people don't understand that the playing of the frisbee is not just one trick. It's actually four tricks in rapid succession: 1) Jumping for the Frisbee 2) Catching the Frisbee in the mouth (extra points if he tips it with his nose/head and then catches it) 3) Bringing it back 4) Dropping it. In my experience with Cassady, no.'s 1 & 2 came pretty naturally to him. Number 3 was a bit trying - what with the constant sniffing of the leaves/trees/but

...to watch World Cup soccer, I've found it. Or rather, him. But first, congrats to Italy on their win. I started watching the final thinking I wanted France to win entirely because of the nothing short of inspired performance of their marquee player, Zinedane Zidane. For lovers of the letter Z, that's a great name no? So yes, I'm thinking France at first. In the first seven minutes they go up 1-0 on a penalty kick executed expertly by Zidane, so now I start thinking I just want to see a good game. No diving and bullshit yellow cards, maybe a nice draw to go on to penalty kicks, you know - I wanted it to be interesting. And France winning it with a goal in the seventh minute was not going to cut it. So now I'm cheering on Italy. During their game with the US, I didn't pay much attention to how hot the Italian players are. I saw them as dirty diving elbowing assholes mostly. But I did notice there was some potential. I watched the Italy against Germany match and one

Can I just tell y'all how lucky I am? I just happen to have the coolest Mom you could ever hope to have. Why is she so cool you ask? Aside from having a damn cool daughter who has taught her a lot about being cool, there are a couple of other things: BFF - My Mom is my No. 1 Best Friend Forever and always has been. Even when I was a whiny, selfish little brat teenager, she managed to relate to me on a level I could respect. Looking back I appreciate how bloody hard that must have been. In her shoes, I think I would have smacked me back then on a daily basis. And now that I'm older and quite obviously her mental superior, she still manages to engage me in conversation that doesn't bore me too badly. (Can you tell I'm going to be sending her the link to this post?) Encouragement - When I was like 8, I used to say that I didn't want to go to college because I never wanted to leave my parents. My mom gently encouraged me to think about it closer to that time and not be

I scored two goals in last night's soccer game! I totally rock. Just try and tell me I don't. I read today that only 6% of Americans are tuning into the World Cup. That's pathetic! I'm sitting here wondering what to do until Saturday when there's another match - I have absolutely loved watching the games. Those guys make it look so easy and have sick skills. I contribute my recent goal-scoring prowess to watching the games, but it's probably because the goalie had an eye patch and a third leg. I just don't get where soccer is losing mass appeal here. Growing up, at least in this corner of the midwest, almost every grade schooler plays soccer at some point. I mean, they have to or the "Soccer Mom" breed would die out, right? And god knows there's a truckload of soccer mom's piloting their mini-vans to practices and games at all hours. You can spot them with a keen eye - they're the ones with the subtle giant soccer ball sticker

The most dreaded time in any pet owner's life is upon us. Cassady had some tissue/cells drawn from a lump and the results "strongly suggest sarcoma". We'll have a full-on biopsy done this week to determine the type of cancer and hopefully, give us a clearer idea of what stage the cancer is in. I can barely bring myself to consider the options. Each time I start to think about what we'll do or how we'll handle it, I find myself changing the subject in my head. Avoidance! It's my friend. Denial! It's the first stage. Or so they tell me. How in the hell am I supposed to make a decision? I find myself asking how much this or that will cost as if it matters. I don't care how much it costs - I just don't want to put him through the trauma of surgery and chemo and all of that without a guarantee that it will work. And of course there are no guarantees - I know this, but it doesn't help to know it. It's like the price tag is the onl

Bah! I'd have to give the US team a D grade overall. They didn't really show up against the Czech's or Ghana and it was a pretty mediocre attempt all-around. As much as I'd like to complain about some of the calls the refs made, I won't because we still would have needed to score again against Ghana and who knows what might have happened in the second half if we had a tie going into it, but we didn't score again anyway. One lousy goal was all they could manage? Sad! So now, I am firmly a supporter of Mighty Mighty England. Go Lions! I might be rooting for Germany a wee bit considering my heritage is almost 100% German and I was conceived there. But I'm all England, all the time as far as the World Cup goes from here on out. I will root for England, but I will NOT, I repeat NOT eat a full English breakfast. Beans? For breakfast? Whaddya nuts?

Futbol Corn Dog Originally uploaded by Corn Dog . This is our sad attempt at turning Corn Dog into a soccer, I mean football. Why DO Americans call it soccer when the rest of the world calls it football? Could we not concede this one small thing and convert to calling it football? We could call American football something appropriately tough so as not to offend any of the delicate egos. Something like...Pigskinning. You know, they call the football the pigskin and the American Pigskinning League has a nice ring to it. Or maybe something less PETA-offensive. How about we just switch them up - soccer will be Am. football and football will be soccer. We could go with the short and sweet footie. I just don't think that word carries enough testosterone in it for American football players. It'll never fly. Dave suggests Cheeseball. Now that, I could go for. The American Cheeseball League. I think it's rather jingly! I guess we're left on the fringe on this one.

A few of my more loyal readers may remember a story I told a few months ago about The Great Squirrel Attack of 2006 . And either something is very wrong with my karma or I've had a bout of wrong-place-wrong-time situations with animals this year because the story I'm about to tell you is 100% true. Believe it or not. The Scene: I sat in the middle orange chair this Saturday. Minding my own business. Drinking cappucino and smoking cigarettes (man, I need to quit - I despise the habit and am ashamed to smoke sometimes.). Anyway, I was sitting here enjoying the sun and the weekend when I felt something land on the top of my head. Now, I'm sitting under a peach tree. A peach tree that has a LOT of peaches on it. Granted, they're not ripe and you wouldn't expect them to fall, but I've seen some on the ground already. Those that aren't making the grade are already being cut and tossed aside like yesterday's rotten rice. But whatever landed on my head bounced o

I always thought it was "Aux Etats-Unis", but I guess if Babel Fish says it's Les, then fine. So. That was some World Cup game, eh? The positives: we played WAY better than we did against the Czechs and we scored a draw and not a loss. The negatives: what were those ref's thinking? That was, dare I say, an abomination of refereeing. Whatever. Maybe I'm overreacting, but damn, when Beas scored that goal that was wiped off by goalie interference hoo-ha, I jumped out of my seat. That would have been a gem! One sporting event down. Two to go. Go Cards! Go Oilers!

So far today, I've drank approximately 2 oz. of water and eaten four french fries and one bite of chicken sandwich and it's 2:30 in the afternoon. You could say I'm hungover and I would not argue. Blech. I'm sitting there last night, drinking bottle after bottle of wine and suddenly, it occurs to me that I'm drunk. Not just drunk, but if I had to walk very far? I'd be falling over drunk. Had I needed to drive? Uh, no. I'd have been sleeping on Kimblahg's couch - or floor since I'd probably have to fight the Nigerian Night Nurse From Hell for couch space. I guess I haven't been properly wine drunk in a while, so I've got that quota for the year covered. It's just amazing to me that the realization of being way over the loony line was so sudden. If thoughts made noises, that one would have been a thunderclap. Why am I such a moron sometimes? Is anyone else looking forward to a full weekend o' sports? I sure am. There's

I've been wanting to write this post for a few days now, but damn it's been a busy week all of a sudden. So yes, the birthday brou-haha was festive and fun. Friday, my actual birthday but just the beginning of the "birthday weekend", I skipped out on work, had lunch with my Mom and little brother D and went to the Cardinals-Cubs game. Lunch was interesting - first they sat us in a booth with a picture of a Cubs player hanging on the wall. I promptly covered him up with my placemat. Then as our food was being delivered, the waitress set down my plate and then proceeded to throw my Mom and Little D's food all over the floor in front of us. The poor girl about freaked out, but I told her it was OK because it was MY birthday and I had MY food. She started to cry. Hmmm. The game was a disaster. Not the whole game, just the part where our closer managed to walk the bases loaded and then our perennial gold glove 3rd baseman let a ball GO THROUGH HIS LEGS to send

Because I said so. Just do it. I didn't want anyone to worry so much as just know where I was at that time, I guess. I felt like I needed to explode, metaphorically and literally - I think it's a typical existential crisis that people have from time to time. Whether anything has been solved or not is not important - when does anything really get solved anyway? I mean yeah, the TV is broken and now it's fixed is one thing...my life is living me instead of me living my life is something altogether different and I don't know if any answer is the right one yet. I'm sure it's out there, but maybe I'm not asking the right questions to get to the answer I need. So I'm still learning and figuring things out. I really didn't expect so many people to be so concerned because of that post, but it warms my heart that y'all cared so much. My personal crisis counselors came to the rescue right quick and I appreciate it. Next up, a recap of the Big Bad

How I will celebrate my birthday: sleep in (check) check email (check) pick my nose and fling the boogs wherever I want dress the dogs up like hansel and gretel and make them do tricks for candy dress myself up like Jackie O and pretend to wave have lunch with my Mom Oops, I need to shower before number 6, obviously call the in-laws in California to thank them for the lovely birthday gifts and congratulate them for getting them here on time. show offs. not sure not sure go to the cardinals game in my sassy new jersey! (thanks Hundo!) go to a bar downtown (look at me! hanging out across the river!) pick my nose some more pass out Any ideas on what I should do for numbers 9 & 10? The more outrageous the better.

I have to vent to someone. And since I'm already cheesed off that no one else did a haiku to their pets, I'll just vent right here. My office arrangement is pretty nice. We don't have cubicles; we have a balcony that looks out on the first state capitol and the Missouri river; I've pretty much got my own little area; my co-workers deal with my constant stream of invective; they buy us soda. But the one downfall - the one that I'm focusing on today anyway - is that we don't have actual offices, it's just a bunch of open space. Generally speaking, it's a fine arrangement. Today though? The girl that sits closest to me has been coughing all day. Not like a little clearing of the throat - it's a dry, hacking cough that she sprays about every minute and a half. Actually, let me time it... ... Nope, it's every 53.4 seconds. I know she must be miserable. Nobody coughs that much and enjoys it. But the bitch of it is she's been doing it sin

Corn Dog makes me smile Shiny-coated ball chaser Unmitigated Now, please, your turn - a haiku to your pet(s).

Jokingly, I've referred to many dogs as "mangy". Now, I have the distinct displeasure of being able to call my dog mangy and being accurate. I've been wondering for a while if his coat condition wasn't something like mange. The vet had previously done a skin scrape and didn't find any, but this trip to the vet on Thursday was a different story. When I got back home from Montreal last week, it looked like the hair around Cassady's eyes was almost totally gone. I made yet another appointment in the effort to get him to stop scratching so damn much and he needed his shots anyway. When I pointed out the eye thing to the vet, he said it was a classic symptom of mange, which is basically scabies, which is basically a mite that burrows into the skin - yay! If you've been to my house or been in contact with me or Cassady for the last year, you better go take a bath. You could have the dreaded SCABIES!!! Actually, that is highly unlikely and you would d

Cassady and Travel Cassady Originally uploaded by Corn Dog . I know this picture being out there is probably causing an irreparable rift in the space time continuum, but I'm willing to take that chance. I think Cassady knows what it means when Travel Cassady comes out so I've yet to capture him looking at all enthused when T.C. is in the frame. But look how close their fur color is! If that isn't the perfect mini replica of Cassady, I don't know what is. I could post one of Corn Dog with her Travel alias, but she's so black that I don't think the Travel Corn Dog would even be visible in the picture.

I am so pissed off at myself right now. My life was pretty much going as smoothly as you could want it to go up until last week. I mean, it' s no glamour-filled, celebrity lifestyle and by all accounts it was pretty boring, even to me. But what's wrong with boring? Now that I don't feel like boring is the best description anymore, I want boring back and with the quickness. I can't put my finger on any one thing that did it, but internally, I'm all kinds of fucked up. And I'm pissed off because I have no one to blame but myself. This isn't to say that every single aspect of my life was how I wanted it - who has that? I'd like to meet them. But I think the difference that I'm feeling is that I at least thought I knew what I wanted. And now? Now I'm not even sure of that anymore. I keep thinking "What DO I want out of life?" and the answer is more elusive than ever. I feel like there's a crossroads coming up and the part that is making