I have the only dog stumped by this situation.
Stumped.
April 23rd, 2011Inappropriate Carrot.
April 21st, 2011
Mother Sighs, Hoarders, and Steak > Jesus.
April 9th, 2011
1. Little Filthy and I went to see my parents yesterday. No matter how old you are, you’re still your mom’s kid. We were at the library and I walked out of the bathroom to find my mother looking over her glasses at me. I looked down at my pants and the wet handprints I’d left there instead of drying my hands in the air dryer. You know, like an adult. She didn’t say a word – just went back to reading but I’m pretty sure I saw her sigh.
2. My mother and I were discussing my father’s family. My father has a sister who used to… how shall I say this? She was very…messy and had a hard time throwing things away. This was long before there was a weekly, hour long show to explain the delicate nature of hoarders – when you could still safely refer to such people as the trainwreck that occurs when messy collides with lazy.
I said, “Remember how messy and full her place was? That was before we knew there was a name for it.”
My mother nodded and said solemnly, “White trash.”
I burst out laughing and said, “I meant hoarders.”
She said, “What’s the difference?”
3. My father finished work and we decided that we wanted steak for dinner. I said to my mother, “We decided on what to have for dinner!” My mom said, “Fish?”
Oh that’s right. See, my parents are Catholic. I’m Catholic, too – that is, if you’re allowed to say that when what you really mean, “I had Catholicism once but it cleared up.”
I said, “Ummm… No. We want steak.”
My mother wrinkled her nose a little. Mind you, we’d had lunch together and she ate some beef. But see, that was a mistake. Now we weren’t just going to accidentally eat some meat – we were going to go to a steakhouse and there was no getting around the deliberate intention to eat meat on Friday during lent.
We got to the restaurant and they had a lot of grilled seafood options. I said, “Check it out, Mom! They have lots of seafood.”
She said, “But… we’re at a steakhouse!”
She had a steak.
Just goes to show.
Steak > Jesus.
(Kidding…kidding……….sort of.)
Share ThisGreen Beans: A Dog’s Story
April 7th, 2011Little Filthy has had corn, carrots, watermelon, peanut butter, and banana. Today, he got a green bean. I hadn’t intended it to be a food trying day but … well, he practically insisted.
I made lunch.
I decided to eat while sitting on the couch (I know, I know.)
Within seconds, Little Filthy was at my side.
His face says, “Whatcha got there?”
That’s just pathetic, right? So I showed him some green beans.
Two seconds before he was almost in trouble.
His patience was rewarded.
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Servants v. Chubby kids, Family, and Little Filthy New Condo
April 4th, 2011
1. This is me watching basketball tonight:
“Who is playing?”
“Butler? Seriously? they named a school after a manservant? Well, I can’t say that that makes any sense to me at all. Who are they playing?”
“The Huskies? Isn’t that, like, a clothing line or size for chubby boys? So it’s the servants versus the chubby kids?”
“I gotta go with the servants. The huskies will probably tire by half time or take a break for cookies and juice.”
2. My uncle’s e-mail was hijacked and the entire family received an e-mail from ‘him’ stating that he was stuck in another country and would we mind sending him some money?
My uncle realized what happened and sent a follow up e-mail that said, “Ignore that last e-mail from the hacker. If you want to send money, send it to <his real address.>”
My cousin replied, “The joke is on the hacker. He thought we would send money if you were stuck in another country.”
Welcome to the family.
3. As my condo buying deal is damn near finalized, I thought it was time for me to break the news to the boy. He’s grown up here and has never lived someplace else. We sat down at dinner and I told him I had news for him. I then explained that we’d be walking in a new neighborhood, sleeping in a new room, terrorizing a whole new park full of dogs. And then I showed him a picture of the new place.
And you know what? He just couldn’t care less.
Protected: BravoTV Party.
March 30th, 2011Bumping Animal Balls. New Blog Character: Piggy
March 26th, 2011
Today, for some reason, I wondered if it hurts animals to get a swift kick in the balls as much as it does humans. What if I get attacked by a bear? This kind of information could come in handy.
I asked my friend – her nickname here is Piggy. Not because she’s anything like a pig. In fact, she’s thin and pretty. But her sister likes to say to her, “Eat up, piggy.” when she eats. I realize this sounds remarkably rude but, in fact, it is remarkably funny. Anyway, I decided to ask Piggy what she thought about the animal balls issue.
RE: Do you think it hurts an animal to get kicked in the balls like it hurts a human?
Piggy: <Pause> It seems like the kind of thing you could figure out pretty easily…like, just see how many nerve endings are in a human penis compared to an animal penis.
RE: Really? That’s how you’d do it? Because I was going to suggest just kicking an animal in the balls.
Piggy: You could never do that! You wouldn’t kick an animal in the balls.
RE: Okay, fine, I wouldn’t kick an animal in the balls. Maybe just like bump them in the balls.
Piggy: How do you just bump an animal’s balls?? they are like, down there. You can’t just bump some balls.
RE: I bet on a farm somewhere, someone has bumped an animal’s balls. Like, maybe they were milking away and their hand just jerked out and hit some balls. Wait… that doesn’t make any sense. I just need to find someone with a farm.
Piggy: You think you’re going to find someone on a farm who is going to remember when they once bumped into an animal’s balls and will remember its reaction??
RE: I’m telling you…I’d remember if I bumped into an animal’s balls. I just need to find someone on a farm! This reminds me of another question I had for farmers. Are extra large chickens laying extra large eggs? Or do they all come from the same size chicken?
Piggy: It depends, like,…the color and size of the eggs depend on their feed and the quality of their diet.
RE: Why is there only Large and Extra Large? Do eggs come in Small or Medium?
Piggy: Yeah… Isn’t there also a Jumbo?
RE: Seriously? It’s like the Starbucks of eggs with these sizes. Large, Extra Large and JUMBO.
Piggy: There are a lot of different types of eggs. Omega-3 eggs…
RE: Those are like…those fatty acid eggs – so, where the hell do those things come from? What kind of chicken is laying those?
Piggy: Those chickens are fed a special diet, rich in Omega-3 fatty acids.
RE: <pause> How do you know this?! Are you on a farm right now?!
Piggy: I’m not on a farm! I wrote an article about it once!
RE: Ah ha!! So you know people who have farms!
Piggy: I don’t know anyone who has a farm!
RE: Oh. <pause> Damn. I was going to ask you to do a favor for me.
Wikipedia is useless.
Share ThisClitoris, Lunch, Chapstick, Train Rage and Nightmares
March 24th, 2011
1. The Italian called me and woke me up yesterday to tell me that his son asked him, “Dad? What’s a clitoris?”
Yes, I’m serious.
The Italian responded, “I don’t know but I know where to find it.”
I told him to tell his son that it was a woman’s Staples Easy Button.
2. I went to lunch with Instigator and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Okay, so that’s not entirely how that shit went down – but more or less how it happened. We went to lunch and I told her about an awesome loft I had seen the day before but that someone had already made an offer on it. She said, “let’s just drive by!” We drove by. Next thing you know, I called my realtor and we put in an offer. Then a third party made an offer and suddenly, I was in a bidding war.
I got the loft. And it’s kickass and awesome and perfect.
But maybe next time, I will just meet Instigator for coffee.
3. The other day, Besos and I were in the living room and Little Filthy was no where to be found. It was quiet. Too quiet. We found Little Filthy in the bedroom with a tube of Chapstick between his paws, the top chewed off and half the actual Chapstick clearly eaten.
*sigh*
4. I have train rage lately. To avoid my train rage, 1) don’t put stuff on the seat next to you when there are people standing, 2) let me off the train before you try to get on, 3) stand the hell up and give your seat to pregnant women, 4) don’t ask me for money – for any reason, and 5) on the escalators leaving the station, stand to the right, walk on the left. Is this too much to ask, people?
5. I jerked awake the other night after a nightmare. In it, I was on an upstairs balcony of a home, in a hall that overlooked the living room. A nanny was there, watching a baby crawl. The baby stopped crawling and sat down with his back toward the railing. I asked the nanny, “Can the baby fit through the rails?” She said no. And then I watched as the baby leaned back and his head slipped right between the rails, his legs shot out to get balance and he slowly began to fall back between the rails. I yelled and lept forward to reach for him. That’s when I jerked awake.
What the bloody hell.
Share ThisFood color, Instigator, and has it stopped moving and does it fit in my mouth?
March 10th, 2011
As a child, Boss went through a phase in which she would only eat white foods. I find this fascinating since my only qualification for if something is edible is 1) if it stopped moving and 2) I can fit it in my mouth.
This prompted a discussion with Instigator on if we could give up a particular color of food. I offered that blue was the obvious choice because so few foods are naturally blue.
“Oh, I couldn’t give up blueberries.”
I said, “Well, that’s pretty much all there is for blue. It’s like, either one thing – the blueberries – or an entire other color. What other color could you give up?”
“Aren’t blueberries really more… violet?”
“No, no, no! I mean, the actually color is in the name of the food! They’re blue! Quit splitting hairs! What color would you give up?”
She thought for a moment and said, “Black.” Apparently someone doesn’t care about blackberries.
I said, “What about coffee? You drink coffee every day!”
Instigator said, “I eat blueberries every spring! And isn’t coffee brown?”
I said, “No. You can’t go changing the color of coffee as if everyone in the world doesn’t refer to is as ‘black coffee’. It’s black. It counts as black. If you’re going to give up black, you have to give up coffee!”
I am passionate about food color, it seems.
We then spent 20 minutes discussing the merits of some food colors.
If you try to eliminate green, you might as well just give yourself a heart attack. I mean, that’s just asking for trouble. Red would be difficult – apples and meat and strawberries… Yellow would mean no more lemons or eggs. Who wants that? We tossed around orange but decided giving up orange juice would be hard. Plus, I like mangoes.
Instigator was steadfast. She was going to give up black and keep her blueberries. No more coffee, black truffle, blackberries – none of it! She loves her blueberries.
I said, “What about… CLEAR things? Could you give up clear things?”
She stared at me, puzzled.
I said, “okay – let me put it this way – would you rather give up alcohol or blueberries?”
She said, “OH. BLUEBERRIES.”
There you have it. The world according to Instigator.
Alcohol > Blueberries > Coffee.
Share ThisGrandma.
March 7th, 2011
My phone rang at 2:30 a.m. on Saturday night. I was half asleep and did not answer. But it rang again and I grabbed it, seeing that it was my cousin. She was crying. She said my grandmother was in the hospital and please try to come as soon as I could… my grandmother was dying.
I jumped out of bed, scrambled to put on clothes and ran to my car. I got on the highway not even knowing how to get there.
I walked into the ER and saw my family there. I know I had a dazed look. Unable to really grasp this. My father took me within the ER where my mother stood next to her mother. I held my grandmother’s hand and stroked her head and wished that her eyes would open and she would see me, see everyone around her.
My grandmother and I have never had a conversation before. Everything I know about my grandmother has been told to me by someone else, even what she may have said just moments before. We don’t speak a common language. Everything that has been said between the two of us has been through touch and sight.
She would hug me. I would hug her. She would make food for me and I would watch. She would see the look on my face when I tasted how good it was. She would hold my hand and I would hold it back. I would get into trouble and put my arms around her waist while she patted my back. She watched me speak, picked up on my tone, and understood so much of what I said. When I was a child, I would rub her feet because I knew she was tired.
I would have liked to ask her many questions about herself. About her life. About her husband who died so young and my mother as a child. About leaving her country and coming to the U.S. I watched her become a citizen and I remember it so clearly because until then, I had never known her first name.
I sometimes wish I could have had those conversations with my grandmother. But I very, very much appreciate the relationship I had with her. It was always sincere, nothing was hidden, always in the moment, and always without explanation. There were no words to color or shade a feeling. No chance to say that you did not want to talk about it. No need to feel that you had to.
My grandmother did not die. She has recovered consciousness. It has been a very long time since she was well enough to speak. But that has not changed anything in our relationship. Because she knows when I am there, and everything that could be said, she knows – when I hold her hand or touch her face.
In some ways, I’ve never been more clearly understood or felt so obviously loved.
I hope she feels the same.
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Just a random attorney writing about daily life with Little Filthy, my rotten dog.