Some time on my hands...

I could rant about how hard it is to find a job in your chosen field, but I am not feeling enough ire at the moment. I have to confess, I kinda like the whole not running around all the time, not being tired all the time feeling. This week will be the first week that I have spent an entire week at home in, well....ever. We moved into this apartment in September and there has never been a time when I have been in it for more than a few days before running off to work 3 hours away in another state. I actually feel rested and up to the challenges that I face this week at home - which are basically just mundane things like hanging curtains, organizing CDs & fileboxes, and general picking up/cleaning. Those things can seem very daunting though when you are exhausted. I feel rested for the first time in a long time.

Geno, Theo and I went to visit his parents and their two soft-coated wheaten terriers this past weekend. It was great fun. We got together with friends to play some games, went on a romantic dinner at an awesome italian restaurant, and went to a very rousing hockey game. We spent Sunday just chillin out, we had brunch and then took a nice long walk in the park.

Of course I have to add some great pictures taken over this weekend and over the recent holidays...in no particular order...

Princess Amber

My god-daughter, Roxie, trying to take a nap while I meanly keep her awake with my camera.

Roxie doing to George Bush what we would all like to do...chew his head off!

My best friends Ken & Lidia wrapping gifts.

Theo with his toy gingerbread house stuck on his head.

Theo got along with Maggie really well...

It's not as easy as it looks! Our walk in the park...

A cool picture Geno took in the park.

Theo & Noel napping on the backseat.

Long time, no post...

Life has been busy lately. A bit overwhelming in the not-getting-enough-sleep department. I was going to post about a month ago about the new puppy that my mom got that she then handed over to me when she realized she didn't have the time to take care of him. And then I was going to post about how I am getting too attached to him and am afraid of when the time comes that I will have to give him back. And now...

Well, Christmas with my family in North Carolina was pretty crazy, for a couple of reasons, only one of which that I will go into right now because I don't have the energy to go into any of the others. One of those reasons is that my mother had yet another surprise for me when I showed up in VA on Saturday morning...another new puppy, this one a little girl named Noel. Noel is about 6 weeks younger than Theo. My mother thought that Theo needed a companion. The two puppies do get along well with each other, but they are three times the work and my mother still does not have the time to take care of a puppy. I don't think I will ever be able to sleep in again.

I just got Theo potty-trained, but now that he sees Noel pee everywhere because she hasn't learned yet, he has reverted back to going in the house again. The two of them get each other riled up, and my mother thinks that Noel is this sweet little girl when in fact she is a little Lolita that teases Theo mercilessly and will grab him by his ear or his fur on his face when he isn't paying attention to her. Noel's high-pitched squealing reminds me of my Nana's shrill whine when she doesn't get what she wants. The whole thing is just exhausting. Anyway, here are the pictures:

This is Theo when we first got him...


This is Noel...


And this is Theo on Christmas...



You can't tell so much from the pictures, but Theo has grown a lot!

Argggggggghhhhhhh....

Okay, so I was all ready to post about how annoyingly ignorant my cousin has been this week. He has been bugging me to make his boyfriend a separate "no carb" cheesecake for Thanksgiving. I have been replying that while I can make it "low carb", I can't do "no carb" because there are carbs in cheese and I refuse to make something from tofu and call it a "cheesecake" when there is neither cheese nor cake in it. Unfortunately though, he doesn't seem to hear anything I say!

But then I got a call from my mother last night. She came home yesterday to find out that her beloved Gizmo had passed away while she was at work. It was kinda expected, but still, so soon after Nicki passed in August and then Boris...

Gizmo has had a heart murmur since birth, he was the runt of his litter. In the past year his heart murmur has gone from a 3 to a 5 (a 5 is as bad as it gets). In the past couple of months he has made frequent trips to the vet because the murmur has caused his lungs to fill with fluid and naturally this means that he had a hard time breathing.

My mother took him to the vet last night to have him cremated. I am heading down to VA a day early so that I can be there for her. The thing that I am hoping and praying more than anything else is that she doesn't take this and turn it into part of the conspiracy theory in her mind. I don't think I could handle that without saying things to her that I am sure I would regret later. Things that this is not the best time to say anyway.

On the bright side of things, I do get to see my best friend and his wonderful family tomorrow night. Keep on hanging on, as they say...



Goodbye Gizmo...

My First Rant

Well, here goes nothing...

I decided to start this blog on the advice of a very dear friend of mine. Supposedly this could help me get some of my conflicting emotions out of my head and onto paper...where I am sure they will do little good to anyone else, but hey, maybe I will get at least a little peace from having written them down. Where do I begin?

I have noticed over the past year or two that I am angry too often. I have just in the last week been angry for the following reasons:

• At the universe for taking away souls that I feel like I have only just began to know
• At my fellow humans for increasingly being self-obsessed (this includes but is certainly not limited to many of my fellow drivers)
• At George Bush and pretty much all politicians with the exception of Barack Obama
• At my S.O. for not thinking that some things are as important as I think they are (even though I know that he absolutely does his best to try to read my mind - and often times he succeeds)
• At my mother for increasingly being mentally unstable at times and thereby scaring the bejesus out of me
• At my body for being sick these past two weeks and at times rendering me a useless lump on the couch
  
• At the universe for not providing me with the job that I want, when I want it, where I want it (speaking of self-obsessed people...lol!)

I guess what all of these things come down to is the lack of control that I feel. I am stuck and there is nothing that I can do about it. Not that I am unhappy with my life - I really am not. I am happy with the things that I can choose - for instance where I live and with whom I live (though I would be happier if my friends were closer). But there are some choice things that I want to change so badly and I can't. And that is where the anger comes in.

I am sure that other humans have their anger too...so what do they do about it? Probably most of them just bury it or shrug it off. Which is my problem I think, I have just been burying it or shrugging it off for years and now it feels like I just don't care to do that anymore. Something in me just doesn't want to let it go. And underlying all of this anger is a deep sadness...a feeling like the world (and the U.S. in particular) is headed for certain doom and there is absolutely nothing that I can do about it.

Well, on that light note, I will now end by posting a picture of the cake I made for a wedding two weeks ago. It is a white chocolate cheesecake with a dark chocolate crust decorated with white chocolate roses and curls:


I just have to keep remembering what makes me happy. A few others that make me happy: