Dogs, Dogs, Everywhere

This week I am dog sitting Dudley and Dina while Brandy and John are at the beach. Let's just say it's rather intense. 3 dogs is a lot to handle. First of all, there is really no good way to take 3 dogs outside at one time when one does not have a yard - thus you need to take them individually. Dudley feels the need to pee on every bush or tree or every spot any other dog has peed and thus you can't just take him out, have him do his business, and bring him in, it takes a bit longer. Then you have the situation of the food. Dina is allergic to grain so she has a special food, but the food is super expensive, so Dudley gets Purina like Kaylinn. Dina only wants to eat the Purina, and Dudley and Dina only want to eat the Canidae. Dina also wants to drink any drop of water located in any water bowl. Which means you need to actually make her stop drinking so that the other dogs have water to drink. And then add into this mix the fact that the cats are highly confused, not all that much concerned because they are dogs they know, but confused as to why they are still here. So, I'm going to finish blogging and begin what may end up being a half hour process to take all the dogs out and get them ready for bed...oh, but they are so cute!

Goodbye Harbor Office

The chicken and I said goodbye to the sweet harbor office view yesterday. Maia had to give him a little pep talk that I was only a 5 minute walk away and could come visit.

Today is the first day in the new office...it's not really that bad, I just feel like being dramatic because I can.

ACE Basin Hostel

Well, today is the last day of the ACE Basin hostel, which is what we affectionately call my office as it has transformed from a one person office, to a three person office. When you have three people in any given space originally intended for one you tend to have space limitations. Thankfully I love the two people with whom I'm sharing the space, but it is space limited none the less. Usually at any given point in the day someone has someone visiting, or someone is on a call, or someone gets an e-mail that is funny and reads to to the others, or someone had something happen that morning and comes in late which restarts the normal morning talk all over, or someone is hanging out on the couch, or someone walks by and mentions the fact that there are so many people in the office, or someone asks directions to somewhere because we are at the end of a hall...you get the picture. In essence, there is not a whole lot of productive work going on. And so while I am very excited to have my little cubicle space in which I can actually get a good day's worth of work taken care of, I will miss the coziness of the ACE Basin hostel. And I will miss our view of the harbor, which I can honestly say I never did come to take for granted. And I will miss having Maia downstairs and being able to run down to tell her something funny. And I will miss the afternoon chocolate breaks which generally ended up happening here because there were so many of us already here. Ok, I'm going to stop now or I'm really going to cry.

Dina vs. the Screen

When fireworks started up last weekend Dina seemed to be fine. During a break in the fireworks John went to take Dina into the house where the rest of the dogs were cowering in fear. Unfortunately while they were walking into the house the fireworks started up again, and Dina decided that this time she was afraid of them. Very afraid.

And so, in the war between Dina wanting to get inside and the screen which happened to stand in her way, Dina won.

Filing Methods

So, as I mentioned before I have a bit of an OCD gene in my that I repress to the best of my ability, but it tends to be exhibited in things such as my organized desk and my many lists of things to do. One of the very major ways the OCD gene is expressed is through filing. I file e-mails and papers in a similar manner so that I can find things in a relatively easy fashion at work. One of the problems with this office move that is presently going on is that my files are moved and one of my desk has been transferred to Phil's office, which leaves me with a totally new and completely horrible filing method ...the pile method. I have one pile, upon which all papers are placed. When looking for something I need to go through the pile, if I dont find it I need to determine when it was filed prior to the move and then determine which box that might place it, and then go find that box, and then go through that box. The pile, however, is really what bothers me. I don't do well with one pile, but such is life when you have exactly the size of one piece of paper on your remining desk...oh, the cubicle installation cannot finish soon enough!

Welcome to the Family

This weekend, Sandor and I took another 10 hour trip up the east coast - this time to welcome Helen, Rediet, and Abel to the family. Unfortunately at the last minute my aunt could not travel to Ethiopia to get Helen (she is officially in Ethiopia right now and hopefully the paperwork is finalized because she said someone may need to fly over there and bail her out of jail if not!). But, we did get to meet Rediet and Abel, who I must say are the cutest things in the universe.

As is expected of Walker festivities much fun was had by all...except perhaps the dogs, which were very unhappy that they were being kept in the bottom of the yard.

There were crafts, trampoline jumping, a very impressive soccer game between the boys and two adults who were fairly beaten, swimming, bike riding, eating of all sorts of delicious items, a fire after dark, and of course, since it was 4th of July after all, some fireworks. The boys had more energy than I think the rest of us combined, so they sailed through each of these activities with flying colors and still had energy at the end!

Dina looking longingly towards the pool. I swear the dogs were pathetic.

headed off on the bike ride

Ordering at the snowball/ice cream store, which was the goal of the bike ride. It makes you feel not nearly as bad eating a snowball with marshmallow on top when you biked 5 miles to get there! (and I don't want to hear anything about the snowball and marshmallow - don't knock it until you try it! And snowballs are not those hard packed ice things people think of as snowcones, these are FAR superior!)

mmm...delicious!

smores and a fire to finish off the night

It really was such a fun weekend. While my body on Monday morning felt like I had done a 20 hour trip in the span of 3 1/2 days, I really didn't feel like I was all that rushed when I was there. Rediet and Abel were so adorable taking in everything new and meeting everyone. When they were watching fireworks they screamed 'I like that' after every single firework. It was hilarious. I can't wait to meet Helen when she gets back from Ethiopia. We just got three awesome additions to our family!

Have dog, will travel

The pup was all about a second bed in the hotel room which she claimed as her own.

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Simple Addition

The jury is back. We know what the Kaylinn dog is made of. We got this Wisdom panel thing done on Kaylinn to find out what breeds she is. I know it sounds superfluous, but we don't have kids so we don't have much to dote on, and it didn't take that long to save up for an answer to the 'oh she is so cute, what kind of dog is she'. So, without further ado...

This

plus this

plus this

equals this

Yes it seems that Kaylinn's black mask and need to protect us may be a result of a Belgium Malinois Shepard, her playfulness and energy from a boxer and her fuzziness from a miniature poodle. All I have to say is thank God for those miniature poodle genes, otherwise we would have one very large dog - shepards and boxers are big! Unfortunatly the poodle may also be the reason for the barking!

Now we need to get Brandy and John to test Dudley and we can determine what was from their mom and what was from their dads. I'm betting the poodle was on the dad side seeing as how Dudley is far from fuzzy. At first I didn't think he was the shepard either until I came across this picture of a Belgium Malinois mixed with a Rhodesian Ridgeback. It's Dudley right down to the eyeliner...

random dog

Dudley dog

Ok, I need to stop looking up dog pictures and go pay bills...

Glorious Pandora

I would highly recommend making a Pandora station for Michael Jackson. For those of you who are not aware of Pandora, you need to check it out, because it's great. You put in an artist or song and they have a program that finds similar songs/artists and makes you a 'radio station'. We have been trying to find my Thriller CD all weekend, and finally gave up and just put MJ into Pandora. The beauty is that beyond getting Michael Jackson music, we also now have Prince, Stevie Wonder, and Marvin Gaye based on Pandora's determining of similar music styles. It's spectacular!

More questions

Since we are in the testing kind of mood, we have another question for you. Our last question was from the logic portion of the SAT. This one is more of a reading comprehension.

Reading Passage:
John and Brandy went for a "romantic" walk on the Folly Beach pier while waiting for their table for dinner. A lightning storm had just passed through, thus making their wait longer because there was no outdoor seating. While on the pier, Brandy took a few pictures of the two of them together. After looking in the viewfinder of the "romantic pier" photos (click on picture for more detail) below the following conversation took place.

Brandy: I can't use this picture in my scrapbook. It looks like the wind is blowing my hair all over the place.

John: No it doesn't. We aren't taking another picture. I'm tired of living my life for your scrapbooks. Sometimes I just want to have events in my life that I think back on and think God, we had a fun time even though there is no record of it.

Q1: Why does Brandy seem to think the wind caused her hair to do this when it really wasn't that windy outside and her hair was tied back in a bun?

Q2: Why did John not notice this new hairstyle for the previous 10 minute before the picture?

Q3: Why did no one else on the pier comment on her ridiculous hair?

Q4: What is likely to happen next?


A1: I guess she wasn't paying attention.

A2: I guess he wasn't paying attention.

A3: I guess they weren't paying attention.

A4: Brandy's hair indicates that she is statically charged, and most likely about to be struck by lightning. It is not safe to assume that just because no one else's hair looks like this she is safe. In fact, she is less so, because she is the only one that is statically charged.

[Information thanks to the "Safety: Be Lightning Wise" website]