Dare Dawg

SO, if you've read this blog for more than like five minutes, you know Pippin can be a bit - adventurous. Perhaps a little hyper. Often referred to around here as "wild man". He's not know for his grace or prowess. Or even for being a "good hunting dog". He would never be recruited for drug sniffing, bomb sniffing, or criminal nabbing. And I doubt he'd even come close to passing seeing-eye training courses as he's easily distracted and would prefer to be carried versus leading others.

So yeah, it probably shouldn't have been a big surprise when I got home at 6 tonight (after grocery shopping) and there was blood running down his leg. He was also coated in mud from the big showers we got this afternoon. He was happy as a lark except I was a BIT CONCERNED about the blood running down his leg!!!! Brent and I wrangled the dirty, muddy, hyper dog and after cleaning him up we were able to see he had cut one of the little pad thingies on his foot - the little thumb one that's on the bottom part of their leg, right above the foot. The actual tear wasn't bleeding too much though. I figure he probably tore it running up and down the fence-graceful dog most likely tore it on some limb or root or possibly didn't make a leap over one of my rose bushes in his pursuit of things on the other side of the fence.

We debated going to the emergency pet clinic on 12th - they are GREAT, but decided to keep an eye on it since he was in no pain. It was still oozy and so we kept him inside, at which point he became obsessed with licking it (licking is his fave hobby). I guess that's a natural instinct, so we let him do it some until we started worrying that he wasn't letting it clot. Geniuses that we are we have no first aid kit. We have band aids, ointments, peroxide,etc but no gauze stuff. We tried putting bandaids on it but bandaids don't respond well to Lick. I tried doubling up bandaids, but double bandaids also don't respond to Lick. We went the "distraction" route and gave him a couple of new toys to chew on which did distract him for a while.

It's still sort of open, but I've gotten him curled up on a blanket with me tonight to watch So You Think You Can Dance (I just love Katee and Joshua together!!!! Brent and I are SO going to learn their pasa dobla dance!). It looks better and isn't bleeding, so I don't think he needs stitches. He's not limping or anything, either, so I think I'll just keep it clean and keep and eye on Trouble with Four Legs. He probably won't be happy with me when I don't let him play outside tomorrow morning while I get ready!!

So yeah, that's just another evening in the life here at home with my boys! Never a dull moment..... And buying a true First Aid Kit is now on my "to do" list!

The Universe was talking to me, too.....

There are so many things I love about this neighborhood, and the people are basically #1. I'm sure we're not as pretty and fluffy as all the lovelies in Green Hills and Brentwood, but we are fun and quirky and really HELP each other. And thank goodness we drive less gas guzzling SUVs than those people.

Growing up in Midtown Memphis (ooooh....scary!! =) ) if you didn't want something you put it out on the curb and someone would take it. Easy, breezy, gone. The thing about living middle class is that you share your fortunes and pass things on to people who need it, no hoarding allowed. Brent and I completely furnished our first apartment with things we got from the side of the road and from people's trash piles of stuff that didn't sell following their yard sales.

With the front den reno into a guest room nearing completion, it was time to get rid of the remaining couches. In the past few months this room has consisted of: one old coffee table, one old sofa sleeper couch, one old loveseat, one old futon, one old couch, an old desk and one very cool vintage sofa. None of it in bad shape, most of it just stuff we didn't have a place for in this house. All.in.one.room. At.the.same.time. We gave the loveseat, coffee table and desk to a charity similar to Habitat that helps people get a fresh start. The sleeper sofa went to Salvation Army. The vintage sofa finally has a perfect spot in our spacious dining room. So that left us with a futon and our old couch. We're getting ready for the final touches to this room, which is going to involve scaffolding, drywall, and the resulting drywall dustmess, and since we knew we weren't going to keep this stuff it was time to pay it forward.

After lunch we decided to drag out the futon, a shelving unit we don't need and an old TV. After some serious finagling to get the futon out the doors but we made it out and put it on our corner with a big FREE! sign. We were still sweeping and vacuuming from where the futon was when a couple of guys in a PT Cruiser pulled up and starting loading the futon. Did I mention the PT Cruiser??? Brent went out and helped them - the mattress sort of fit in the back and they put the frame on top and held it with one hand each!! It was quite the sight and I can't believe I didn't take a pic. (They live less than a half mile away). About 10 mins later someone else stopped for the shelves and TV. At this point we decided to go ahead and put the couch out and maybe we could get rid of all the furniture in one day! We were having some issues when the original PT Cruiser guy was driving by, saw us, and stopped to help! How nice!!! We ended up taking to him for a while and he actually lives across the street from a couple of our friends. He has a futon mattress, but no futon and said this morning he was really hoping he could a futon frame for cheap - and voila! We were so glad it could find a good home, and glad he stopped to help us! (It's friggin hot outside and this morning as we were walking into church I asked Brent if we could move up North! He said we could have a summer house up North! Yay!)

It took the couch less than 20 minutes to be gobbled up by a guy in a truck, so all our hand-me-downs have happy new homes. And we have a very, very cleaned out front room to finish converting to a bedroom!

I've got loads of pics to download of all the continued construction on the stairwell. There's been a lot more mudding and drywalling and sanding. The hall closet door is up now, and we've bought a lot of wood to start the trimming out of the stairs (the skirt for those of you who know things about building....) Hopefully within the next few days the living room side wall will be all painted and we'll no longer have a cluster of living room furniture huddled in the middle of the floor. There's such a furniture trap in here that Pippin couldn't even figure out how to get to his bed this afternoon!

I've also got some pics of the "interesting" place we ate dinner last night to share. Friday night we had Indian which was AWESOME! It's been ages since we've had Indian. I've been wanting it for a while but when my throat was so sore during my sinus issues I knew it wouldn't go well, so it's been a long time coming. And it was SO.GOOD.

Anyway, that's all the news around here (mostly!). Have a great week!

Dust Factory

Hey everyone! How weird is it that I'm watching Elf on USA-HD, in July??? Maybe the true weirdness is that it's even playing on TV right now? I get so off with my holidays - at work I've been working on Valentines 2009 and also Mother's Day 2009, so I'm already waaay past Christmas this year. So really, watching a Christmas movie suits me. And it's SO INSANELY HOT outside that at least it helps me forget about that!

With it being 5billion degrees I haven't ventured outside for a lunch run in ages. I ran last Thursday, walked on the treadmill Friday (my shins were bothering me), did the elliptical yesterday and then ran today. I really need to get some new Mizunos because I can feel how worn out they are in my shins but I just haven't had time to get down to the running store I prefer. I've got a 5K coming up in a few weeks, and I know it won't be anywhere near a PR, it's just a race I'd like to do.

So now Brent has reclaimed the remote and has it on The Office reruns - which is playing a Christmas episode. Weird. It must be Christmas in July on cable or something.

The new stairwell is coming along well. Brent's got the drywall hung, mudded and dusted - so our entire house is covered in dust. When all these renovations are done I'd love to just move out and hose down this house from all the dust from all the drywall we've done. I'm pretty sure if you shook Pippin you'd get a pile of dust. Brent also put the first coat of primer on the stairwell drywall, so maybe by this time next week the living room side will be all painted.

So has everyone heard about Dean's movie coming out next week??? Sounds like fun! I wish one of the locations were closer to me, but I'll guess we'll be heading out to the 'burbs for a movie night! Sadly the last movie we saw in the theater was the Chicago marathon movie earlier this year!!

Have a great week!

Scenes from the 4th.....

Better late than never.....here's how we spent our 4th (at my parent's annual 4th of July party).

Pippin: Well, bless his heart he wants to be included in the festivities but sweetie pie just doesn't like the heat. So he decided to sit under the tent and watch us all fishing from his shady vantage point. This probably made my parents happy since no one else at all ever sat under the tent.








Nephew caught 6 fish but I only caught one - this one. Not too shabby. The nephew's secret: live crickets (put on the hook by my brother.) In the category of "things you can see coming"....For some reason the little box of crickets was kept inside the house, in my parents laundry room (so they wouldn't "cook" outside). Sunday morning, about 5 mins before we're about to leave for church, my bro catches my nearly 7 yr old nephew in the laundry room - top off the cricket box. He swore only 3 got loose. Before we left that afternoon 4 crickets had been recovered, from various rooms in the house.








I like the expression on niece's face in this one - so much excitement regarding the caught fish!












And in the category of world's smallest fish.....my dad caught this little one which would've made good bait! (On a side note, no fish were harmed at this event, all were tossed back in the pond and one was kicked back in by my brother - earning him the name "scaredy cat" echoed by nephew and niece repeatedly because he didn't want to touch the fish.)












And we all tried out nephew's scooter. I like this pic because once I got on it my little comprade had to come along and make sure nothing bad happened to me. He's my 24-7-365 shadow. We were hoping for some good pics of either my dad or brother falling off the scooter that we could get lots of prints made for our Christmas cards, but everyone managed to stay upright on the scooter. Maybe at Thanksgiving!










There were also fireworks, but I totally missed those. Pippin HATES fireworks, and as soon as Brent started shooting them Pippin was howling, crying, and generally freaking out. Nephew had been amped about the fireworks all day, so in the interest of not spoiling his night and in the interest of "getting the screaming baby out of the restaurant" we went inside where he still cried a little and generally hated the noises going on outside.

So that pretty well brings you back up to now. With the whole sinus thing going on we really didn't go much of anywhere. We watched a movie, did things around the house, had a nap or two. Sat night I was ready to get out of the house and I was dying for spinach dip so we headed over to Green Hills Grille - only to discover that's it totally out of business. YIKES. We went to Bistro 215 next door, total mistake. Yuk and Yuk and overpriced. We ate their once a million years ago before a movie, and I think back then their menu was more cafe and less overpriced crap. They had spinach dip so we stayed, but I make way better spinach dip. Theirs had a huge glob of sour cream in the middle that completely overpowered the actual taste. A little glob is great - I love sour cream on a lotta things - but this was like half a tub. We both got chicken dishes and Brent's just looked gross to me and mine just did not hit the spot. My throat was so sore that it killed to swallow and I just couldn't eat it. Literally all we had were our two chicken dishes, spinach dip and 2 waters and it set us back $48. I make a much better version of the chicken dish I ordered at home, and if we had just stayed in and cooked the stuff ourselves it would've cost us less than $10. I don't mind spending a lot on a GOOD meal - but it should be impressive, or at least edible.

I was so miserable when we left that we stopped by Walgreens to talk to the pharmacist about some good medicines for me to take for my throat. I was over the sinus and drainage point, and mostly over coughing, but my throat was still SO sore - it's like I had really bruised it from having to talk and work so hard all week in Atlanta. Anyway, I got some stuff that's really helped me. My throat is still a little sore, but much better and I can actually eat now! If I get too hot I start coughing again, so yesterday I just did the elliptical and today I ran/walked, slowly. Any time I'd feel the "throat tickle" come back up I'd slow it down and walk a little. I've got a couple of 5Ks coming up over the next few months (one in Aug, one in Oct) so there's nothing really pressing right now that I've set my sights on, so there's no need to press recovering from being sick. I REALLY need to get back in the pool, but the Y pool has been jam packed at lunch recently, what's up with that??? Must be a lot of tri training going on!

In other thoughts, I want to do the Bride of Frankenstein dance from So You Think You Can Dance. And I want Twitch to be my partner. And I really, really think Comfort needs to go home for REAL this time. I am also in love with Josh and Courtney and Katee and Will (and Twitch, my future partner). And why does the tour not come here??? Charlotte?? Really?? It doesn't even go to Atlanta!!!!!!

Have a great night!

Back from Hot-lanta

Hey everyone! I hope you've all had great weeks, full of whatever you want them to be full of! I've been gone all week on a biz trip to Hot-lanta with some of my coworkers for GiftMart. It was so great!!! I went with 4 of the buyers whose $$$ I control to help them with planning next year's spring and summer lines (as well as some brainstorming for next fall). I am SO glad I've had so many great professional opportunities over the past few years to do interesting things as a CPA. Accounting and auditing and financial budgeting are so not for me, and even though I spent years doing boring junk like that I've also been able to work my way into far more interesting niches involving numbers, such as my current gig (for a great company, to boot!). We had a blast, I work with such a great group of people and even though it's been a tough year of streamlining and downsizing we have a great group that's only going to get better. The days were absolutely exhausting - we'd leave our room around 7 am and spend the day in vendor meetings, product showrooms, vendor lunches (while having more product presented while we ate) and then straight to vendor dinners. We'd finally get back to our room around 9 pm, absolutely beat! Going from sitting on your rear all day at a desk to literally walking this massive 18 floor building all day long with hardly any sitting was very hard work, but such a great experience that I feel so fortunate to have had. Our last meeting wasn't over until 5 last night, so after we spent ages in crappy Atlanta rush hour traffic we got home around 11 last night. Another perk of business travel with my company is the "free day" you get off when you come home. They figure since you've been away from your fam you should have a day to sleep in and spend time with them, so I've spent today as a total veg with my pal Pippin taking massive naps, sleeping in and watching TV!

And of course I spent the whole week sick. At the end of last week my allergies really started kicking it up, and the weekend outside fishing at my parents farm for their annual July 4th festivities made it even worse. So I spent the whole week coughing and hacking (horribly), hardly sleeping from the coughing, and now my throat is completely raw. Having to talk all day long all week made it so much worse, I'm already feeling so much better today from just spending the day being quiet and resting. I really don't feel bad now - it just hurts like razor blades to swallow, so I don't want to eat much although I know I need to. It totally stank to be sick for my first Market experience. But you make the most of it and I didn't want to miss a thing so you just keep chugging on.

Brent had dropped me off at work on Monday (we left from work) so he picked me back up at work when we made it back last night. I walked in to a clean house (yay!) with fresh, homemade cookies - the no bake peanut butter oatmeal kind that are my faves! Do I have the best hubby or what??? So I literally had nothing to do today except rest on the couch with Pips and watch some TV. The perfect day!

Anyway, I took lots of pics and I'm sure we have some fun ones from July4th to share too. (I literally haven't even seen those - I went from our weekend suitcase to the business suitcase). Have a great weekend!!!

5K for Fatherhood Race Report

Good evening everyone! There just seems to be little time for blogging lately, but I do finally have a race report for a change to talk about!

Last weekend I laced up for the 5K for Fatherhood, put on by a local charity called the Family Foundation Fund here in Nashville. This agency is truly remarkable - they're committed to doing positive things for boys with no male influences in their life.

Here are some stats from their website:

Fatherless children represent:

• 63% of teen suicide
• 70% of juveniles in state-operated institutions
• 71% of high school dropouts
• 75% of children in chemical abuse centers
• 80% of rapists
• 85% of youths in prison
• 85% of children with exhibit behavioral disorders
• 90% of homeless and runaway children

Since 1993 the Family Foundation Fund has served the Metro Nashville and Middle Tennessee areas by providing a mentoring program to fatherless and disadvantaged boys, ages ten years old and older. Through this unique and effective ministry, these boys are nurtured by local Christian men who volunteer their time as surrogate dads to provide leadership, discipline and unconditional love.

God is using Family Foundation Fund to make a difference. Since 1993:

• 42 boys have been mentored
• 13 have completed program
• 100% have made commitment to Christ
• 100% are continuing their education after high school or working full time
• 12 are presently being mentored
• None using drugs
• No children born out of wedlock

Pretty powerful stuff, huh? Instead of treating them like lost causes and clutching their purses tighter when passes on the streets, this organization is making a positive difference in Nashville.

I first got involved with them 4 years ago - this was my first ever race back in 2004. I'd been running about 2 whole weeks with a friend + Brent and we saw this race online and decided to sign up. Back then we didn't even know where Shelby Park was - now we live less than a half a mile away! I had no clue when I ran that race that a running "career" was starting! Even though I haven't been consistently running as much lately, I wanted to do this race for a lot of reasons. I support this organization as often as I can, and I always look forward to the race and seeing the young men, their mothers, and their mentors out there running and walking, full of joy. Races are really a lot more than just running.

It was a warm morning, but really I was just there for a "jog", to support the race, and keep up my streak with this race! Yay for my only 5-peat! A coworker of mine (J) also ran, and I started out with him. I took my time and just enjoyed the day. I hate racing 5Ks (running at vomit threshold is not my thing) so I just ran what I felt. And UGH was it humid and sunny! The big celebrity chair this year was Vince Gill. He didn't run it, he shot the gun off for the start, and then performed a few songs before the awards. And of course I had my pic made with him. =)
And of course they had ChickFila chicken biscuits afterward - Brent's fave which I am ALWAYS happy to give to him since I can't eat stuff like that after running!

Anyway, it was a great day, a great race, a great cause and of course a great reason to have a pic made with a celeb!!!

Vince with the starting gun:








About halfway through the race:








Vince Gill & I:








Performing a few songs before the awards:









Happy Running!!!