clubhouse

oh, my dog is a problem. i love her. she is one of my best and nicest and cutest friends. but she is causing all sorts of trouble. tonight, like every morning and night, i took her for a walk. she has to wear a contraption called a Gentle Leader, so that she won't pull her little self to every interesting thing and damage her spine. she hates that Gentle Leader. does it gently lead her? yes, in fact, it does. does that make it a great walking companion? no, it does not. what it means is that instead of looking forward to her evening trot, emmy runs around the house to avoid the Gentle Leader, paws at it throughout the entire walk, and frequently races over to other people's yards while we're out so that she can rub her face in the grass and get that thing off. i don't exactly blame her. but we used to be able to go for about an hour, and now we're down to about twenty minutes, tops.

but is emmy cutting back how much she eats in relation to her limited exercise, as fitness magazine would advise? no, she certainly is not. she, much like me, knows no moderation when it comes to food (although i'm getting better). i could eat a bucket of ice cream, no problem. emmy is not allowed to have dairy or chocolate, BUT, who cares about that when there's a plum tree in the back yard and YOU CAN EAT ALL THE PLUMS YOU WANT?? and that is exactly what she's been doing, apparently. most evenings emmy spends some time in the back yard by herself under the plum tree. brad and i have started to refer to it as her clubhouse. "where's emmy?" "oh, i think she's out at her clubhouse." fantastic. but today i was dutifully scooping up her poop, and what did i see in it (gross), but millions and billions of plum pits, which she frantically swallowed whole. what did she do the entire time i scooped up her poop? ate plums. unceasingly. what is she doing as i write? prancing back to the tree for more plums. when is she going to die of plum inhalation? any day.

but she's going to do it alone, because mrs. emmy has gotten herself uninvited to my parents' house this weekend. she and my dad became best friends when my parents were here a few weeks ago, and he said we should bring her along when we came for a visit in august. well my friends, that visit is starting friday, and as of tonight, WEDNESDAY, i learned that my mom is oh so uncertain about having a dog in the house. fantastic again. so rather than have an awkward weekend of constantly watching the dog when we'd rather be visiting friends, we're scrambling to find a temporary home for her. anybody want a dog?

well, i need to go get a refreshing diet pepsi and prepare myself for an allison-free project runway. WHYYYYYYY, whyyy allison???

i've got the know-how

one thing that i find particularly silly and wrong is when people say that you don't need to use much math in real life. i love math. i'm not trying to hide it. it makes sense. it's easy. it's logical. you learn some things, memorize a few concepts, and there you have it: you know math. i use math at work all the time. if i didn't understand a few juicy tidbits about the order of operations and how parentheses work, i could be in a lot of trouble. math also allows me to worry alternatively more and less about life - less when i use it to make a budget, plan for the future, blah blah blah, boring, sensible me...and allows me to worry all the more when i see mortgage payments and car payments and vacation payments adding up...because i can add well in my head, thank you, and i can multiply those payments for any number of months with the best of them, and sometimes the sums and products of those amounts make me a little panicky. i've got the know-how, and the results can be frightening. we've got the facts, and we're voting yes. but the worrying isn't math's fault...it's just what i do.

sometimes i hate how responsible i am. i can't stop myself from reading 40 msn money articles before buying a house or hold off on saving for retirement or blow all of my money on trips and shoes and trinkets. i wish a had a little more spontaneity and a little more faith that no matter what i do, things will work out in the end. because ultimately i believe they will. but i tend to plan as if it's all up to me. it's good and bad. it's a mixed bag. it's like 10,000 spoons when all you need is a knife.

it's not really like that - but that really happened to me! on the way back from the pearl jam concerts at the gorge, when my brother looked like an unwashed lunatic and we didn't get home until very late, we also hadn't eaten much because the extreme heat made everything sound oh so unappetizing. except a cherry slurpee-esque thing, which i don't even like under normal circumstances. so we stopped at mcdonalds in moses lake. the drive through line inched along for days and weeks and years. finally we received our orders - mine was an asian chicken salad. i took the bag and asked mcdonalds lady if she had included any forks. she grabbed a bunch and stuffed them in the bag and basically slammed her little mcdonalds window shut. we pulled over to switch drivers and i distributed the food and utensils - AND - she gave me four spoons!! not one single fork!!! as brad drove home to spokane, i ate the mandarin orange slices and edamame and lettuce in the creepy darkness with my bare hands and couldn't help but imagine that the slimy things i was touching were worms and bugs and assorted unsavory items. the second-worst teacher i've ever had was from moses lake; maybe it's just a bad place.

skin-tight tiger tees

i am obsessed with podcasts right now. my top two favorites are the official lost podcast with damon and carlton, and tim gunn's project runway podcast. oh how i love project runway. it's the best reality show ever. and tim gunn gives me so much secret gossipy information in that pocast. he offers all of the behind-the-scenes scoop (kara janx makes him want to take a xanax; no self-respecting gay male could not know who cher is), and he uses the most ridiculous words over and over, like "caucus" and "probe". and his two catchphrases, "carry on" and "make it work" are also funny to me, PARTICULARLY when he uses them in combination, a la last week's episode: "jeffrey and allison are going to have to carry on and, frankly, make it work." AHAHAHA. he really said that. you non-fans out there probably aren't amused. well, watch the show. you'll see. and listen to the podcasts. you'll double see. also, allison is so cute.

the official lost podcast is also hilarious in a different way. there's lots of witty banter, which tim gunn can't exactly offer, and damon and carlton (lost producers) really take full advantage of the fact that we can't actually see them while they're speaking, which frees them to tell us that damon isn't wearing pants, carlton has his legs covered in a shawl, carlton has put a piece of cardboard down on the floor and is doing the worm, etc. little kid things. i take advantage of the fact that i can't see them by inaccurately picturing them as other people. i picture damon as jj abrams, but more importantly, i picture carlton as santino from project runway season two. he sounds just like him! i only wish carlton were so gangly and clothed in skin-tight tiger tees. i've never actually seen him, and i think maybe it's better that way.

piss hell piss

oh my gosh, i'm stupid. brad just told me that he knows why i haven't gotten any comments: because i didn't turn on the settings correctly! boo. piss hell piss. i'm sure that everyone has been trying to post comments left and right and has been so disappointed. well, no more. comments are now available! wheeeeee.

an architect, a cartoonist, and an actor

a few facts:

fact 1: i am completely covered with bug bites. millions on my arms. billions on my legs. a couple on my face. and best of all: i woke up this morning to discover one on my fingertip. it makes typing feel weird.

fact 2: i made "spicy tomato soup" tonight, even though it is about 95 degrees out and i couldn't get the food processor to work. and even though i had to use another sad inorganic plasic carton of tomatoes since mine STILL AREN'T READY. the soup was frighteningly spicy, mostly (we think) because instead of the recommended poblano pepper, i used a jalepeno since that was all brad could find at the store. i got a little bit on my finger (non-bug-bitten) and it's been burning ever since.

fact 3: i love curb your enthusiasm! we watched the first episode of season 5 last night (we do not have hbo, so we have to wait for the dvds) and larry is up to his old tricks. something about seeing ted danson on tv after all this time makes me happy. and i never even watched cheers. it must be because when i was little i watched three men and a little lady every time i was sick. if only every little girl could have an architect, a cartoonist, and an actor for her three hilarious fathers. i seriously think i could quote most of that movie, and i feel like no one else on earth has ever watched it.

if you have watched three men and a little lady, please post a comment to tell me your thoughts on that cinematic wonder.

chocolate pudding

i feel cranky. i wanted to change my picture on myspace and first i couldn't find the one i wanted, then i couldn't browse to it, and then i finally found it and the server is too busy. and emmy ate a chocolate chip cookie and i don't want her to die and/or throw up. and david hasselhoff is singing on tv in the other room and i want to punch him in the face. also i think i'm sleep deprived and dehydrated. does anybody else feel cranky? or fussy? brad should secretly grind up four extra strength asprin and put them in my chocolate pudding.

such a nice little life

i love my dog. she is so cute, and funny, and smart. i've been sitting in our office for the last few minutes watching her play outside. she loves sprinklers. in spokane everybody has sprinkler systems, including us. i used to think that was so weird - why would the inland northwest have sprinklers galore while the ocean-bound side of state does not? i believe it has something to do with the so-called aquifer, which i know nothing about. anyway: sprinklers. emmy loves them. ours are running right now and she is prancing from sprinkler to sprinkler, drinking water, and letting them get her all wound up. she's doing a lot of what brad and i refer to as "her circles", which are intense, ears back, body crouched low laps around the yard at breakneck speeds until she can't take it anymore. she's just a puppy. i always KNEW i was a dog person. i remember wanting a dog when i was little, but somehow i ended up with a cat. but he was a great cat (named "wisker", no 'h' - that was very important to my seven-year-old self), a small orange genius who could turn doorknobs and chased dogs out of our yard.

i had a ramona quimby diary that had spaces where i could fill in facts about myself. i'm not sure what i was thinking at the time, but in the space for "what nickname would you like to be called?", i wrote, "Cat-Lover". but when it comes down to it, i think a lot of cats kind of suck. and some dogs suck too. maybe i just like emmy. call me emmy-lover.

i think a lot of what i like about our dog is that she seems to have such a nice little life. she sleeps a lot, is curious about everything, loves us a lot, eats frantically, gets tons of exercise, and loves to make friends. and every day is full of freetime. i wish i had more freetime. my boss asked me today about what i would like my title to be going forward, and what i want my job description to include, and where do i see myself in five years...and i don't know. but the idea of freetime is the most appealing thing i can think of.