So the weekend wasn't too exciting. We have had my parent's beagle since Thursday evening, and for the first day and evening there were a couple growly moments, but its been great since then. So much so that this morning when I got out of the shower, I noticed I little unsavory pug on beagle on pug action. I didn't take any pictures, I thought that it would just be wrong, and probably illegal to post them on the internet! Anyhow Saturday I really didn't do anything productive at all. Played some video games and maybe did some laundry. The boys did some napping.

Here's a picture of JD, the beagle. JD stands for Jane Doe. She showed up at my parent's door one time with no tags, and she wasn't microchipped. My folks live waaaay out in the country, so how she got there, they don't know. But they were thinking of adopting a bassett and figured JD was such a sweetie, and was in need of a home anyway.
Sunday I took Wilson to the vet to pick up his allergy shots and find out how to give them. Basically he'll be getting a really low concentration of the shot every other day or so, and slowly building up to a higher concentration to be given every 21 days. I gave him the shot Sunday at the vet to make sure I got the hang of it, and he didn't even flinch, but I must say it made me a little quesy. I'm sure I'll get used to it, especially as I'll been giving them pretty frequently. But for now, I defintely don't like giving shots to my baby.


Here's me, thinking about the huge bag of syringes in my cupboard.
My birthday is coming up in a couple Sundays, and I'm trying to decide if I should have a family birthday party at our new house. Aaron's parents and my parents haven't met, technically. Aaron played on my dad's soccer team about 20 years ago, so I'm sure that at least his dad and my dad have met, but again it was 20 years ago, so this would basically be the first meeting of the parents. As if that wouldn't be stressful enough, I would also like to grill, which would mean adding on to our current tiny cement slab and investing in a grill. And preferably a fire pit. Sound like too much of an undertaking for what would be basically one weekend? I don't think so. But Aaron does. So we'll see how it goes. Maybe I'll just have everyone meet at Chuck E Cheese's.

Here's Henry, who just wants as many people over as possible, all the time.

Coachella!

One month from today, I'll be at Coachella. For those of you who don't know, Coachella is a 3 day music festival in Coachella, CA, which is near Palm Springs. Last year I went for all three days and saw (amoung many others) Bjork, Of Montreal, Amy Winehouse, Red Hot Chili Peppers, the Arcade Fire, the Decemberists, the New Pornographers, Regina Spektor, Andrew Bird, Rage Against the Machine, Willie Nelson, and Lily Allen. It was amazing. See pictures below. Its in the desert, so its right around 110+ degrees, but oh so worth it. We generally didn't make it to the festival much before 2 each day, and spent the first several hours in tents, trying to avoid the blistering sun. And honestly, after a couple hours, it really becomes pretty bearable. Its really dry heat, so it just feels like a blanket of heat overwhelming you. Not a wet hot blanket, like what we get here in Iowa. Anyway, this year I'm only going one day, Sunday, to see Roger Waters, of Pink Floyd fame. I can't even begin to describe how ecstatic I am about this. I've been a Pink Floyd fan for years and years, and had really given up hope of ever seeing either the band, or at least Roger Waters or David Gilmour play. So when I saw that Roger Waters was headlining Coachella 08, I was breathless.

Palm Springs, CA. This was outside of our hotel room.

The "food court". I was honestly a little disappointed. I went to Austin City Limits in Austin, TX, the year before, and there was much better food there. But then again, it is Texas! There were these acai smoothies with granola though, that I basically lived on for 3 days.

There were several art displays scattered around, and this was one of them. It's called I.T. and is basically just a huge alien looking metal creature that that loomed over the crowds. There was a laser on one side that rotated around and picked people out. Very War of the Worlds.

This was the entrance - with the mountains and palm trees, and people and blue skies as far as the eye can see. I can't wait to get back there. Can. Not. Wait.

D-Day

Today was dremmel day for the boys. This is a terrible experience for poor Wilson. When he was a pup, I tried to trim his nails and cut way too close into the quick, so after that I took him to the groomers, and the lady there suggested dremmelling. She said that pugs generally react better to that than they do the clippers. He did so well getting his nails dremmelled, no screaming or struggling, so I decided to buy a dremmel and do it at home. Fat chance. He struggles less and screams less than he did if I were trying to actually clip them, but it's still not easy. Henry doesn't mind as much, but still, it's less than pleasant. I wait until they're really sleepy, then snuggle them for awhile and get them nice and relaxed, then pull out the dremmel. And afterwards lots of treats and more snuggles of course. I hate having to do it, but it has to be done so the boys won't scratch each other's eyes out ! Also we're dogsitting for my parent's Beagle for a long weekend, and I wanted to make sure everyone was trimmed in anticipation of rambunctious play.


After dremmeling I took a bath. Aaron's a bartender and works most nights, which is nice for me because I can relax and read, or bathe. After the horrors of dremmeling the boys were ready to find solace in biting each others face wrinkles, but occasionally took time to check in on old mom.






My bath buddies



Wilson watching the tub fill thinking "What are doing to yourself?! Baths are evil! Save yourself! Get out! Run!"

So shoot me. I called in today. I had a severe case of the sunny and 64 degrees flu. So rather than sitting at work checking blogs, I'm at home checking blogs! At least at home I've got two pugs at my feet. And in my defense, I do plan on being productive today. Its beautiful outside, so at some point I need to get outside and rake the yard. In the mean time I'm too busy being a chin rest.

In other news...MarioKart comes out in a month! I'm so excited about this. I've had my wii for about a year, and have totally over played the 10ish games that I have now, and am not really interested in anything else. I usually play Zelda now, but I'm thoroughly stuck and no walk through I can find can get me unstuck. So I'm ready for something else. And MarioKart is definitely it. Aaron and I have MarioKart battles on 64 pretty frequently, but I'm not great, and Aaron is amazing. So it will be nice to have a game that we're both new at. Also, you can play online, so if anyone out there is planning on getting it and has a Wii, let me know and we can battle! Or play together against others! I'm so thrilled to get this game. And I'm sure the pugs will be thrilled to have my butt on the sofa for hours at a time so they can nap on me. As long as they don't mind my requisite MarioKart trash talking.



Wilson watching me play Zelda

Pug butt Monday

In true pug fan form - I'm doing a post that can really only be enjoyed by pug lovers.

But if you aren't a fan (and who couldn't be!) There are only two.

Wilson butt

Henry butt

Happy Easter!

This morning I went to Easter brunch with my family, while Aaron stayed home sleeping with the boys. He's a bartender, so most earlier morning (before noon) family actives are Aaron-free. At the table next to ours, the Florida State girls basketball team were also enjoying brunch. My nephew Ryan, who's 3, was pretty impressed with the girls. One reached up and touched the ceiling on the way out, and he shouted "Whoa! She just touched the sky!" He also told them all "good luck" on the way out, so I was happy to hear that they had in fact won their game on Saturday.



Ryan and Henry
Ryan LOVES Henry. He's not so sure about Wilson, but Wilson is fairly large for a pug, 23 lbs, and tends to think that when Ryan runs away, it's because he wants to play.
After lunch Aaron and I went to his grandmother's for a late lunch. We left the boys at home since there were going to be so many people there, but it was nice when everyone was disappointed. We ended the day at my parent's place, and just stayed for a couple hours for a quick visit. By that time, we were ready to get home to our boys.

They were just sleeping - but I'm sure they missed us!

Boys will be boys...

When we first got Henry, we were afraid that we would give him too much attention and Wilson would be neglected and hate us. I don't think that's the case anymore, but we may have overcompensated, as Henry is really independent and not particularly cuddly, but Wilson is SO dependant on me. Anytime anyone else holds him he's very obviously uncomfortable and straining to get back to me, but Henry loves attention from anyone and is totally willing to stick his tongue up anyone's nose.

Henry, when he was Baby Henry. Actually, about 2 months ago.
They do get along very well, and haven't had any dominance issues yet. As Henry gets older and larger, and his boy parts become more man parts, I'm guessing there may be some. But for now, they just play. Very roughly. I wish I had some pictures of this, because I'm honestly amazed that we've still got all 4 puggie eyes, but they seem to survive. Last week Henry bit Wilson's big lip a bit too hard and drew blood, but after an hour of cuddles with Mom, they were back at it.

7 AM Wilson - otherwise known as Yoda Wilson
I assume a lot of the rough play is their difference in age, and once Henry gets fixed and grows up a bit he'll be more laidback. Until then, Mom or Dad are around to play refferree.

When Wilson was a puppy, we noticed a rash on his inner thigh and took him to the vet. She tested for mites, amoung other things, but couldn't figure out what it was, so she sent us home with antibiotics and steroids. A few weeks later it was gone, but a month or two later, it returned. After another round of tests with no results and another round of antibiotics and steriods, Wilson started biting his paws and rubbing his face into anything he could find. Clearly, he had allergies, and the vet said the rash was most likely related. At this point it was springtime, so we decided to get through with Benadryl and see if the allergies were seasonal. By winter, the rash was back and his nose was runny as ever. Not seasonal. So we gave him Science Diet's hypoallergenic food and treats, in hopes that it was just food allergies. Not the case. So finally, this past weekend, we had blood work done to see what exactly he was allergic to. Turns out - 21 different things. 21! Poor boy! The biggest was mold, but also dust mites, fleas, and several types of greenery. Also human dander - which means he's allergic to us! So now he has to have allergy shots, but until then, I've been giving him more Benadryl and baths in some medicating shampoo.

But he's not crazy about the baths. Hopefully the shots will be easy, and solve the allergy problems. Does anyone else have to give their dogs allergy shots?

Movie Quote MeMe

I stole this from - pretty much everyone at this point, but it looks fun!



Here are the rules:

1. Pick 10 of your favorite movies.

2. Go to IMDb and find a quote from each movie.

3. Post them here for everyone to guess.

4. Strike it out when someone guesses correctly, and put who guessed it and the movie.

5. No Googling or IMDb-ing. That’s cheating and that’s no fun. Here is my list:



1. Alright, give your mother a kiss, or I'll kick your teeth in.

2. Sometimes I got so bored of trying to touch her breast that I would try to touch her between her legs. It was like trying to borrow a dollar, getting turned down, and asking for 50 grand instead.

3. I do not know any women who are taller than me. The women who *are* taller than me are lesbians, for whom 1969 was a very momentous year.

4. You mean I'm gonna STAY this color?!

5. If you wanna smear mud on your ass, smear mud on your ass, just be honest about it. Look Gene, I've never told anyone this before, but I can suck my own dick, and I do it a lot.

6. Maybe you can find yourself a nice antique rocking chair to die in.

7. Okay, now girls... I want you to concentrate. Failure is not an option. And Bethany, if you feel the need to vomit up there... just swallow it.

8. Maybe you don't realize it, but this a major day for me, because... well, maybe you don't realize it, but this is the day I've become... a watchdog!

9. Behind every good man there is a woman, and that woman was Martha Washington, man, and everyday George would come home, she would have a big fat bowl waiting for him, man, when he come in the door, man, she was a hip, hip, hip lady, man.

10. Your life, as you know it... is gone. Never to return. But they learn how to walk, and they learn how to talk... and you want to be with them. And they turn out to be the most delightful people you will ever meet in your life.

The pugs

I meant to start this blog over a month ago, after being inspired on Delurking Day. I had just gotten a new puppy, and had gobs of things to write about. But as it happens, I also moved that same month, and found that between the new puppy and unpacking, my blogging time was limited. So here I am, several weeks later, finally getting around to blogging and finding that I have nothing to say.

So instead I'll post some pictures.



Here's Wilson, my first pug. He's about 1 1/2, and enjoys napping, barking at the college kids in my neighborhood, looking out the window, and terrorizing his little brother. Which brings me to Henry.




Henry is 4 months old. After many months of deliberation after getting Wilson, my boyfriend Aaron and I finally decided we needed another one. Well, maybe not "needed". Wilson needed one - and we just really wanted one.

The first couple of weeks were pretty crazy. Wilson was confused, Henry was tiny and looked so easily damaged. After lots of butt sniffing - they've now become fast friends.



They watch tv.



Play tug of war.




And of course, nap.

Tip Your Waiter!

Today, a client of mine took the time to call and let my boss know how happy she was with the level of service I provided. I work in the mortgage industry, and lately, I don't always have good news to tell people regarding their homes. But this one woman, who was appreciative enough to take time to compliment me, really impressed me. Its so unfortunate that when we receive poor service, we tell everyone we know and send complaints to anyone we can find within the organization, but when we receive good service, we keep our mouth shut. Why are we so willing to bitch yet hold back when its time to be grateful? It seems to me that when we're recognized for our goodness, more goodness is created.