yeah, i’m an awful blogger

so. there’s that.

it’s a habit i’ve fallen out of, that’s for sure. i don’t have as much time to myself as i once did, and the blog suffers like some kind of unloved stepchild. plus, we are once again minus an interweb connection at the house (i’m blaming the brats in particular, and verizon in general) (i’m typing this on my phone. that’s how hardcore i am).

none of this is a valid excuse. bear with me, and i’ll get there. if you’ve got better things to do, i totally understand.

as always, thanks for stopping by.

(sigh)

it’s been that kind of week.

thanks for stopping by.

the quadruped situation

so, i had a cat.

last picture of ophelia thunderpaws

she was an awesome being. seriously, when i think about her personality, and the quirks she had, i smile. she was the only cat i ever met who would burp. and eat crackers. and fetch. and snore. losing her was tough. i had raised her from the tender age of six weeks. she would have been 11 this past june.

i got a tattoo for her.

paws and dirt marks. naturally

not that i need help remembering. but paw prints on my left shoulder (where she was laying where she died), inked three months after her death, seemed appropriate. they are also right in the path of my bra, which made things really uncomfortable for a few weeks.

anyway.

i had thoughts of getting another pet. i didn’t think i could get another cat. just petting neighborhood cats was enough to make me tear up. i really wanted a bunny. i looked into the rabbit rescue, and gave the whole thing serious thought.

then i found out someone who worked at my same hospital was giving up her dog. and was giving him back to the pound.

not a bunny, that’s for sure. but, how could you not love that face?

i took our resident dog, bentley, a few times to the dog park to meet this hansome man. his name is mario. his person was an absolute flake. we’d make plans for the dogs to hang out, to make sure they were okay with one another, and she’d forget. or show up a few hours late. seriously, i’d complain to anyone who would listen, about how this woman was wasting my time. there were a few episodes that made me want to stop thinking about this dog, and just get a bunny.

however.

mario came to live with me just before the fourth of july. he’s mellow. he’s goofy. he’s the alpha dog. he won my black little heart over.

dig that spotted tongue

he’s a bull mastiff mix. also, due to that tongue up there, i also believe him to be of chow descent. plus, he’s a fan of knitting. and oingo boingo.

happy dog

he doesn’t really bark, but he does a lot of grunting. he chases cats, but we’re working on that. he rolls his eyes, and is laying on my leg as i type. so far, he seems to like kung fu movies the best.

it's almost impossible to take a picture of one and not the other

and he’s pretty good with bentley’s spastic ways. he treats him the way an older brother would treat a younger, slightly disabled sibling. which is close enough to reality to make me giggle.

just waiting for the temperature to drop

he won’t allow bentley on the bed. when he sleeps, he snores. loung enough to be heard through the whole house. and with enough force to shake the bed. even when he’s laying on the floor. he gets the hiccups nearly every morning. i’ve successfully scared them out of him, which makes him wag his tail and grunt approvingly.

when he hears the alarm go off, he grunts and sticks him nose in my face. he head butts me until i get up.

he's as cuddly as he looks

he wags his tail in a circular manner.

i have no idea if ophelia would approve of him. she spent her life around various dogs, both canine and human. she dominated all of them. i think she would have dominated mario, but she would have napped with him after.

he’s no kitten, that’s for sure.

interrupting the nap is punishable by head-butting

but he’s the perfect act to follow her.

thanks for stopping by.

technology is awesome. and evil.

hi. i’m still here.

i have no good excuse for not posting in such a long time. other than, there may have been some drinking.

the hooch of choice in triple digit weather

there may have also been some shenanigans.

stealing my sunglasses. and my sippy cup

also, there may have been a new addition to my little army.

mario in the front, bentley in the back

i have missed you, internet.

here’s the thing. i really like the internet. like, as something more than a friend. you can type the most random of phrases into your search engine of choice, and spend a few hours giggling at what is retrieved. i mean, who knew there was a blog dedicated to cakes gone wrong? or a woman that will induce you to scream WOLVERINE!! for no good reason? not to mention all the crazy stuff you can find on youtube. which i’m convinced is its own little internet.

i have met great people through my computer. some of them i have even met in real life. and, so far, most of them have not been creepy stalkers. the internet has this amazing power to connect people and spread factoids. you can send your mom flowers, and then find a strip club. all within five minutes. it’s incredible.

anyway.

life, as they say, is what happens when you’re making other plans. i will try to post more regularly. but there’s knitting to accomplish, alcohol to be consumed with friends, and a dog who grunts and demands i rub his belly. and a heat wave to avoid amidst all that other stuff.

but, as always, thanks for stopping by. and not giving up on me. is appreciated.

i’m pro cebu

and i know you know about cebu. they’re the masterminds of this piece of art:

i am in awe of these guys. and naturally, they are/ were big fans of michael jackson. now, say what you will about mikey, but he was talented before he was a loopy dude that lived in neverland. i’m not slapping this up to discuss michael jackson. he was the schiznit when i was in third grade, and he had that crazy 3-D video thinger in disneyland back in the day. and eventually, we’ll remember his talent over his laundry list of weird.

anyway. cebu has a final jackson dance for us:

thanks for stopping by.

huh.

so, today? i was gonna talk about something kinda funny. but then, farrah fawcett died. and then, michael jackson died.

i’ll be hiding in my room for the rest of the day. because, clearly, death is knocking out the crazy.

how jesus ruined my saturday

yeah. oh, and there will be a little bit of swearing today. just so you know.

so, it’s been kinda hot here in the northwest. z, mr sparkles and myself decided to visit a place called wild waves, located about two-and-a-half hours north of home base. to be more specific, i said, hey, let’s go to a winery. mr sparkles said, i kinda want to get wet. i said, what about that place off I-5 in washington? he looked it up online, and we bought tickets.

now, this is important. i asked mr sparkles, do they have their hours of operation on the site? just check to make sure they’re open and everything. he said, yeah yeah. of course they are.

that’s called foreshadowing.

anyway, we buy three tickets for saturday. we drive up to beautiful federal way, washington. which really is a beautiful area. we get there around three in the afternoon, because it’s freakin’ saturday and, as a group, we decided to sleep in. we manage to get off the freeway and find our way to the entrance. which is no small feat. because, even though you can see the park from the freeway, there are no signs. there’s no real easy way to get from point A to point B. we end up driving through a residential area, with z and mr sparkles in the front seat going, should we just pull over and knock on someone’s door? then there’s me in the back, with my knitting, saying, it’s gotta be a few more blocks that way, and pointing. i’m right, but still. there really should be signs.

so. we get there, we pull up to the parking kiosk. where we’re told the park is closed for a private function.

awesome!

basically, according to the parking dude (who is maybe 16, and acne is fighting world war III on the kid’s face. mean, yes, but i’m still a little bitter about all this), a church organization has rented the entire park for an event, and we have to have special tickets. meaning, we’d have to buy new tickets. we can still come in, but the tickets we’ve already bought are not valid for this special event. parking dude said the event is listed on the calendar on the website.

i reach over and hit mr sparkles. i told you to check, i said.

we’ve come all this way, so we park. we go up to the ticket booth. there’s a lady standing there with a bunch of tickets. she tells me she just has too many, and will gladly sell us three of them. we buy them and head in. our tickets bought online were $35 per. the tickets from the very nice lady – whom i referred to as “a scalper for christ” – were only $20 per. not as bad, but still. we’re still grumbling a little while we walk over to a roller coaster and get in line. we ride the roller coaster, and it’s awesome. as we’re getting off, we notice the ride is shutting down. mr sparkles goes over and asks one of the roller dudes why it’s closing. roller dude says, oh, all the rides are closing in 15 minutes for the bands.

i… we… wait, what? closing the park for jesus time? what?

yeah, he says. the church group brought all these christian bands, and they’re gonna play for the next four hours. so, they’re closing all the rides. he shrugs. the church paid a lot of money to do this, so that’s what they’re doing.

we drove nearly three hours and paid $55 to ride one roller coaster.

upset is too bland a word for how we felt. mr sparkles stalked off to find a smoking area, while z and i headed to guest services. i let her yell at some poor lady behind a desk while i sat outside watching people. the jesus people seemed to have no concept of personal space. they’d walk by, and step on my feet. it’s not like i have super long legs, or i was stretched out across the walkway. i’m pretty much short and visually unobtrusive. and yet… i was trampled.

also? i try really hard not to judge people’s bodies. we have too many body issue-related diseases and disorders in this culture of ours for me to be casually making fun of someone’s thighs, you know? however. i believe there should be some common sense. like, if you can’t see your toes, maybe you shouldn’t be wearing a string bikini.

i’m just saying, is all.

so, z vents her frustrations, and gets free passes for us to come again. no apology, no real refund. on the plus side, z’s buying our passes from us, and taking her kids on another weekend. they’ll totally enjoy it. and while i’d kind of like to go another time, i feel a little burned by the jesus people. and yeah, on the way back to the car, i said, dudes, jesus ruined our saturday.

and yet, that’s not the end of the story.

getting back on the freeway is even more complicated than getting off the freeway. we drive around looking for an onramp going north or south. there is nothing we can see. there are no signs to suggest there are ways of getting on the freeway. we’re driving around a little burg called milton. parallel to the freeway, but not on the freeway. adjacent to and in the vicinity of the freeway, but not actually bisecting the freeway. finally, there are signs when we drive further south and leave the town of milton altogether. we’re sitting at the light, talking about the amazing lack of onramps or even helpful arrows. from the backseat, i say, fuck milton in the ass.

we all laugh.

if i were inclined to find a silver lining in all this – and i sorta am – then i’d have to say that i got some great one liners out of the whole escapade. and i got some knitting done. as i’m sitting here, i’m fighting the urge to head over to zazzle and make shirts that say,’ jesus ruined my saturday’ (the graphic would have to be a little cartoon puppy with sad eyes), and ‘fuck milton in the ass’ (as long as i’m going to hell here, this one would have to have a giant fist on it. maybe a fist with a freeway sign).

and that’s how jesus ruined my saturday. thanks for stopping by.

(snort)

so, i’ve been knitting and sweating. and crocheting little robots. oh, and having awful experiences which you’ll hear about in another day or two. right now, this is making me giggle.

this is totally something kitten would have done.

thanks for stopping by.

srsly?

have you ever actually read the product reviews at amazon? sometimes they’re helpful, sometimes they’re whiny.

sometimes they make you think, is this for real?

case in point – i was getting my gossip on over at dlisted. one post featured this photo (saved to my own compy, because i’m not a dumbass):

i howl at the moon, if you catch my drift

wolf shirt. being sold on amazon. with the most amazing product reviews. as i was reading, i kept thinking, is this a joke? did i just get hyperlinked to the onion’s website? i laughed so loud i snorted. i may have peed a little.

a sample:

So, when wearing this shirt, I noticed that I immediately received all powers of the planeteers, superspeed, invisibility, flight, and the ability to turn woodchucks into gold.

The problem is the powers only occur when I think about happy thoughts. I later found out that Peter Pan made the shirt so it makes a lot of sense. I think that the manufacturer would specify this.

-1 star cause it fades easily in the wash.

go read all the crazy goodness over there. i’m really glad that amazon doesn’t really monitor the product reviews too closely.

thanks for stopping by. be on the lookout for golden woodchucks.

waiting for the west coast takeover

here’s the thing. i love living in the portland area. there is so much lunacy to be had. there are drag queens, yarn shops, and strange eateries scattered all about the area code.

but, what we don’t have? erik’s deli.

during my high school years, i lived in santa cruz, california. a lovely pocket of nuttiness, where i’m still convinced all the hippies go to die. i’m not being mean, i’m just saying. it’s a very mellow area, and it’s a beautiful pocket of landscape. also, they have these signs at the city limits that say “santa cruz is a nuclear-free zone”.

i wish i had pictures to prove it.

one of the great things about santa cruz – i mean, besides living so close to the ocean that i could hear the waves crashing at night in my bedroom – were the delis. there were a fair few awesome delis. we had togo’s, dharma’s cafe (which used to be called mcdharma’s, but they changed it because of that other mc-place giving them the serious side eye), and that little place around the corner from our house, to name a few. as an aside, the place around the corner from our house? really good food. but one of the guys in the back? gave me the straight-up creeps. he always wore his apron. even while waiting for the bus. and he would stare you down. i’m sure he was a nice guy who treated his pets really well, but he freaked my teenage self out.

anyway.

erik’s is awesome. they have amazing food. their menu items have amazing names (seriously, you can order a knuckle sandwich there. it’s cream cheese, salami and sprouts on dark russian rye. sooooo good). it was all healthy. they had the best brownies in the universe. and if you ate there, your drink came in a mason jar. i don’t think erik’s could have happened anywhere else. although, technically, their first place was in scott’s valley. but that’s right up the freeway from santa cruz, and it totally counts.

i bring this up because tonight i was at my yoga class. and the instructor and i were talking about favorite sandwiches. she mentioned this amazing-sounding concoction she’d sweet-talked a bar cook into making her. there was bacon, cheese, avocado and tomato in a pita pocket. it sounded so good. and it made me think of my favorite sandwich at erik’s, the natural high. when i told her about this sandwich, she asked, where do they make that? it sounds fabulous. i sighed and said, at erik’s. in santa cruz. i’d love a natural high, with a berry calistoga to drink.

portland has failed me. and through no fault of its own. there’s nothing that comes close to that here, at least in my opinion. i was even looking around on their website. thinking, please let them have a deli in yreka (pronounced why-reek-a). that’s just across the oregon-california border. i can go there on friday. sadly, they haven’t left the bay area.

my point is this. if you live in the vicinity of an erik’s… dude, you’re so lucky. if you have no idea what i’m talking about… dude, you’re missing out. if you’re looking for a franchise to start in oregon… dude, give erik a call. he’ll hook you up.

basically, i’m just hungry. thanks for stopping by.