Dad's Not Visiting Anymore! : (

Thumbs down. Dad is gone! We had a great time, though. Sunday, we went to see a polo match. From there, we went to Costco where he (and Mom) contributed towards my purchase of an iPod Nano for my birthday. Very exciting.
We went to dinner and then to see "Vantage Point". Once Dad got over (or maybe he never did) the movie's Groundhog Day storytelling, we thought it was quite enjoyable.
Today we went for breakfast at John G's. If you have not yet visited me here in the Sunshine State, then you have not been there and you are missing out in more ways than you know. With bellies full of cinnamon nut french toast, we drove to Ikea. I have never been, so it was quite an experience. Very cool.
We came back, had a small(ish) lunch, ice cream, then I took him to the airport before heading into the office to get some work done before heading to a shoot this evening.
My dad's awesome. I'm glad he's mine and not yours.

I don't know why it was OK for this kid to play in the grass mulch pesticided stuff at the polo match. Ew.

Oliver likes the rug I got for the kitchen at Ikea.

Dad's Visiting!

My Dad's visiting! Yesterday, we went for a very nice brunch at Sailfish Marina. Then, we went over to MacArthur Beach State Park in hopes of renting a kayak. Yesterday was Earth Day however, so the park was all a tizzy with earthy things. So, we watched a flamenco guitarist. He was a bit weird. He kept holding his guitar over his head in a display of his mad skills. At one point, he actually threw the guitar above him head and caught it again in the middle of playing. Huh? Very strange.

The grasshopper that hopped on Dad's shirt at the park.

Dad spotted this funny bumpersticker.


What the bugs look like here. This is a spider.

In the evening we were to Seasons 52. Very good meal. After which we buzzed over the Broward Center for the Performing Arts to see "Wicked"! If you ever have an opportunity to see it, go for it. It is as great as everyone says it is!


More fun today - a possible polo match, some shopping, etc. Weeeee!

Oliver Pictures

Chillin' on the couch for some TV watching last night

Lunging for the post-bath treat today.

More lunging

High Dive

Anyone who knows me well might know that climbing up onto this high diving board to photograph a synchronized swim team yesterday was no small feat.

Passport Time

I went to Walgreens to have a passport photo taken and while at first I didn't mind that I looked like a serial killer, I later thought better of leaving it be and going with it. I will have to look at this picture for the next ten years, after all. So, I had a coworker take one at the office.

Hopefully, my head's not too big and the gov't will accept it just fine.

Bad Night to Choose to go to the Park

It's been a strange day with quite a few people being slightly bitchy to me. I was extra polite and friendly as a test to find out if I was being bitchy and they were being rude right back. No, I think everyone else was just in a bitchy mood today.

I took Oliver to the park tonight. The two very big and beautiful Rhodesian Ridge-backs were there. I don't care much for their owner ever since I watched him take his sweet time in calling them off a man who was in the park looking for his friend's pair of missing glasses. I will point out that the man being cornered was black and the big, fancy expensive dog owner was white (who today I saw was showing off his tazer to another Macho Man at the park). I couldn't help but feel that the Rhodesian owner was trying to make some kind of statement by letting his dogs frighteningly corner this man.

The Macho Man looking at the tazer roughhoused with his dog and the ridge-backs. His dog was a very nice, rather large dog and he was having fun roughhousing with his owner and the other dogs. Oliver is a bit of a wimp. When he heard the others playing, he went over and barked from a safe distance.

I'm not sure what that means. I don't know if he's yelling, "Hey, keep it down over there!", or something more like, "I wanna wrestle too, but I'm afraid I might break a nail!"

Macho Man turned to Oliver, "Hey, you want in, little guy? You wanna play?" He then approaches my dog. My dog which clearly does not want to participate as he is keeping his distance from the fray. The man, who had been physically shoving the other dogs about (which is fine cause they pups dug it) gives Oliver a slight shove on his shoulder. Oliver lets him know with an aggressive bark that he doesn't like that so much.

Macho Man is unimpressed and when Oliver approaches Macho Man's dog to say hello, Macho Man says, "Hey Digger (or whatever asshole's dog was called), Oliver wants to play. Give him a good punch to the side of the face!"

Digger continues playing with the others dogs and Oliver proceeds to do his usual humping thing. As advised by Paul the dog whisperer, I don't involve myself when Oliver does this. The dogs will work it out and they will let Oliver know when he is annoying them.

Since Oliver doesn't actually touch the other dogs when he's doing his pelvic thrusts, the dogs often don't even notice him there. Once he does this quite a few times and no dogs have barked him or nipped at him to stop, I step in and start telling him to quit it. It's annoying, watching him work on his six-pack in public like that.

I didn't get to that point this evening. "Is your dog fixed?" asks Macho Man. I tell him yes, he is fixed and I was told to leave him be when he does that. That the dogs would work it out. I will point out now that Oliver only does this at the park.

"Yeah, that's not right," he says, "Y'know, that's not a very good way for the dogs to get to know each other. You know, it's just not right socialization." he says. Right, because sniffing ASS is so much more dignified. It's at this point that he attempts, again, to roughhouse with my dog. The dog who just made it clear that he does not want to be messed with. Only this time, the idiot PULLS HIS TAIL! When Oliver turns and give him another aggressive growl, the guy says, "Whoa, chill out. See, that's not right!"

He goes on to tell me that he and his wife have talked to their dog since he was a puppy (this feels to me like he's implying I have been ignoring my dog for years), and now that he's older, people say he has such a great personality and he wonders if he'd have that personality if they hadn't talked to him so much, "You know I don't know what he'd be like if we hadn't socialized him properly." Oliver attempts to hump his dog, his dog tells him no, "Yeah, good job, Digger, see, he's not having any of that. That's not right."

It's at this point that I casually start to walk back to the entrance of the dog park, a good fifty yards away, to leave. When I turn and see that Oliver is still chillin' at the other end where all the dogs and their owners are sitting, I call him with one whistle.

At which point, my untrained, un-socialized "not right" dog lifts his head, sees me, and with zero hesitation, B-lines straight to me.

Note To Self

Dear Self,

Don't watch special report news stories about serial killers before going to bed. It freaks you out and you end up wanting to bring the dog into your bed and force him to stay there (this is not an option ever, let alone when he's shedding enough fur to make one coat a day for the next three months like he is now) while also sleeping with your cellphone set on 911.

Try to be less dumb in the future when choosing evening entertainment, 'k?

Sincerely,
Yourself

Funny Response

I emailed Dad just now to ask him for his flight information. He arrives on Friday for a week-end here and I managed to misplace his flight info. This was the response -

Arriving 4:37pm from Atlanta on Delta 1183. I'm 6'-2" and a little bald.
See you Friday!
Dad

Carlos Santana

Stick to the guitar, dude.

Please.

Unnecessary Weaponry

Dear Neighbor,
I know you are afraid of my ferocious alligator eating fur-ball dog, but is it entirely necessary for you to come through the backyard to do your laundry donning a gold club for protection?

Sincerely,
Confused and slightly annoyed neighbor.

Carlitos

My coworker and friend, Taylor Jones, photographed little Carlitos years ago. I was happy to hear in today's paper that the company responsible for his severe deformities are finally paying up.

Easter Activities

planetfitness.comToday has been a very nice day. Although it was raining cats and dogs this morning, Nirvi and I went to my gym. I found this great Gym, Planet Fitness. It's really affordable, open 24 hours, you can bring a guest for free, and their motto it "Judgement-free zone" which I love. I love that all different kinds of people, able-bodied and not-so-able-bodied, work-out at this gym.

Nirvi and I had fun navigate the treadmills and doing some circuit exercises (thirty seconds on a step, thirty seconds on a arm-toning machine, thirty seconds on a step, thirty seconds on an ab machine, and so on).

Then, we ventured off to Downtown at the Gardens for lunch where, apparently, Toojay's, a kick-ass jewish deli, is the place to be after Easter morning mass. Not willing to wait in line, we went to Paul. I want to eat at Paul every day for the rest of my life.

I have a bit of a t-shirt collecting problem. I have too many. Many of them are solid colors and as such, are really boring shirts. So, today I un-bored this one with some circles.

I dig it.

My Favoritest Easter Cartoon...

w

Sad Doggy Update

I must admit, as I lay in bed last night, I had a hard time getting the face of Sad Doggy out of my head. I kept thinking to myself, Why did I not get the owners name? I don't know for sure that he actually lives there. I was and am also bothered by the fact that I can't remember the sweet dog's name. The owner did tell me it, but I just can't remember. Was it Oscar? Orsen?

I called Animal Care and Control yesterday with the case number I was given earlier. The officer went to the home very shortly after I made the call to them in the late morning. The owner and dog were, supposedly, not there. The officer gave a construction worker a yellow slip to give the owner, letting them know they had 24 hours to call AC&C.

But, again, for all she knows, she gave the note to the owner who claimed he was just a construction worker. Not to mention, when I called AC&C again this morning for another update, there was no answer. I think they must be closed today. Good Friday not so good.

A Dog's Getting A Star?

Before I clicked on the teaser, "Bassett Gets Star" on our web homepage, I thought to myself, Hollywood's giving a dog a star?

Duh.

Sad Doggy

A while back, I witnessed a woman smacking her kid around in a parking lot and did nothing about it.
I saw abuse again this morning, only this time; I grew a pair and made a phone call.
I was driving to work, just leaving my neighborhood when I passed a dog on the street that hardly looked like a dog anymore. With a sever case of mange; he has virtually no hair on him aside from some sprouting here and there. He looks like a Chinese crested except clearly not healthy and bigger than Oliver. His testicles hang to his knees.

I drive around the block, debating calling Animal Care and Control. I think, they’ll just euthanize it. I'm not sure how I feel about being responsible for that happening. Puppy didn’t have a collar and I thought for sure he was a stray. I go back to where I found him and pull over. He is no longer on the street so I wander into the yard of a home under renovations. Not sure if anyone lives there, I find the dog towards the back kind of meandering through the junk.

A man comes running out from behind the house. “Oh, I’m sorry, I wasn’t sure if someone lived here or not.” I tell him, “Is that your dog?”

“Yeah” he confesses, as the dog walks over to us, “He’s really sick with a thyroid condition. He’s old too. I should really have him put down but I can’t bring myself to do it.”

I get a closer look at the dog. His stench is horrid. He is covered with growths and his skin is crusty and hard looking. He looks up at me. He has beautiful blue eyes. They are clearly infected.

“I haven’t cleaned his eyes yet this morning,” says the man.

“Yeah, he looks extremely sick,” I tell him, “What kind of dog is he?” I ask, even though I think I know.

“He’s a bearded collie”

I leave, get into my car, burst into tears, collect myself, call Animal Care and Control and report him.

To say you can’t bring yourself to put your dog down is not love, putting your dog down when they are no longer living, is loving them.

$10 Off Coupon

So, what is the appropriate thing to do when a recession hits? Buy a microwave, of course.
I have mixed feelings about my recent acquisition. I have lived without a microwave for about fifteen years. My parents have one, but since being at school and then on my own, a stovetop, oven, and toaster oven have truly served me just fine.
I have been thinking about getting one for a while now. Today, when I was reheating some chicken and black beans on my stovetop for a burrito at lunch, I decided it was time. Do I have room in my place for such an appliance? Yes, but just not in my kitchen. I'm hoping too that by disconnecting the microwave after every use, I will feel a bit better about it's power-suckingness.
I headed-out to Target to find one today. I recently got a coupon for $15 off when you spend $100. So, I thought, I'll stock up on some things I need...or at least, WILL need...someday.
Method brand toilet bowl cleaner, batteries, energy saving light-bulbs, a black and white Isaac Mizrahi shirt (yes, it is an essential), some popcorn to go with the new microwave which I also picked up. I wondered though, if I hit the $100 mark. I went to the office department to look for a little calculator.
The calculator was for two reasons. I wanted to count all my items and see if I had hit my goal total, plus, I needed a calculator as mine seems to have disappeared with the matching sox and favorite pens.
I could not find a calculator, so I used my brain to calculate. A very risky move, I realize, but I didn't have a choice.
I felt pretty confident that, although I seemed to be cutting it close, I hit the $100 mark with all my practical items, so I went to check out.
$103. Yes! Awesome.
Then, "Sorry," says the cashier, " but it has to be $100 before taxes"
Mother Father!
She explains I need to spend 3 more dollars. This, my friends, is annoying. So, now that I am in line with someone behind me and all my other items checked and bagged (in the bags I brought myself, thank you very much), I can either collect lots of candy which I am trying so hard to be good about not eating, or grab the brain candy Full of Skinny Ladies Monthly magazine which will serve no purpose aside from making me feel bad about the fact that while I am going to the gym now a couple times a week, it is only causing me to be hungrier and as such, I am losing no weight (I keep telling myself the gym is good for my heart anyway).
It costs me $3.50, and I hit my goal mark. Oh, it's at this point I realize the coupon was $10 off, not 15. In the end, only saving myself about 6 bucks.
At least I have toilet bowl cleaner.

Golly, He's Cute!

New Audio Slideshow

Click here to watch The Second Time Around.

That is One BIG Bug

And yes, it is as large as you think it might be. I heard it before I saw it under my porch light.

Fixing the Duvet

My duvet was looking dreary. It's very old and threadbare and the feathers were coming out of it's many holes. When I took it's cover off this morning to wash the cover, it looked like I has killed a bird in my apartment. Feathers went everywhere. So, I decided, with Mom's suggestion, to make a new permanent duvet cover.

I bought some queen sized flat sheets.


Sewed them together then turned the two huge sheets, now essentially a giant pillowcase, inside out. Then I put the old duvet inside, sewing it in place.

The final result!

Nervous Eater

The other evening I let Oliver out into the yard. As I've mentioned in the past, I usually check the yard to make sure P, my neighbor who is afraid of Oliver, is not doing laundry or something. Earlier that day, S was doing laundry. S loves Ollie and doesn't get freaked-out by him.

I thought the noise I heard coming from the laundry was S, but it was P. Oliver spotted him before I could get to him. Oliver gave him a menacing bark. Poor P jumped so high that he landed on the washer, startling Oliver and sending him back into the house where he promptly jammed his head in his food bowl and nervously ate it's contents.

Post-Bath Shenanigans

Dear Anonymous

I actually realized shortly after writing that entry that " They're candelabras, not chandeliers.". I was just too lazy to fix it.

Bootsie Update

There has been some progress with little Miss Bootsie, Indoor Pooper Extraordinaire. Dad was given strict direction from Paul, the dog whisperer (who, by the way, returned the samples of smelly fabric pieces back to my parents last week).
Dad was directed to go out and work on leash training every morning. He is to use a choke collar with nasty, unfriendly but necessary spikes on it to do so. He must use only certain phrases when training the dog…
No, Bootsie!
Bad Girl!
Good Girl!
…or something like those phrases.

So far, she seems to be doing well. I’m told she is getting better at walking on a leash, on the left side. She is still having accidents regularly, but my parents say they knew her pooping issues would not go away overnight.

Talking with my Dad on the phone, Mom too, is always amusing.
My most recent conversation with Dad was peppered with “Bootsie, get off the table. Good girl”
“No, that’s not yours to chew on.”
“Bootsie! NO! Bootsie, get down off the counter!”
“She’s running in circles,” he says, talking to me this time, adding that when she was praised up and down that morning for peeing outside she came inside and raised hell. As though she’d earned it. By afternoon, she was still burning track-marks in the floors with her running around and getting into things.
“Bootsie, what’s gotten into you?” he says to her in a sweet voice, encouraging her to come sit quietly by his feet.
“Good luck with that” I tell him, knowing the little one will not sit still enough to relax at his feet. This is no old lady Tilly.
Then, “Ouch!” follows when little miss piranha teeth chomps down on Dad. This is a new trick of hers. She bites everything. Hard. Seemingly with excitement rather than aggression.

Mom told me that when she comes downstairs in the morning, Miss Bootsie greets her exuberantly. She then follows Mom around the house periodically biting her butt. Right, ‘cause that will put you on someone’s good side first thing in the morning.

Anyway, the pooping chompers and her parents have a ways to go.

That's My Kind of Boyfriend!

My friend, Alex, who is living in Delft, Netherlands right now with her family, sent this funny ad out. She says the "commercials here are so much more risque and funnier than home. And the movie theaters are so nice- big comfy seats and they serve beer, wine, etc."

All Natural Bubbles

I love the method company.

Week-End

It's been an OK week-end. It started with a date on Friday night. That was fun. Saturday, I covered the wedding of an older couple who were remarrying after being divorced from one another for thirty-five years. Great story and really nice people too. In fact, I found that I didn't really want to photograph the event as much as I wanted to just be there.

That's actually never happened to me before - where I'm at a shoot where I'd rather be participating than shooting.

Saturday afternoon I did some shopping. That's when I found this rad candelabras shirt marked down. Really, a long sleeved shirt with candelabras on it - what more could a gal want?




Then, I was hit with a rare condition - the cleaning condition. We're not talking about vacuuming and doing dishes, we're talking about scrubbing floor boards. They'd gotten disgusting enough.

Today, I went to the gym which I just joined. I'm finding something a bit strange happening though. Usually, when I work out, my sugars drop. I also usually find I need less insulin to do the same amount of work on days when I work out or bike ride. That hasn't been the case lately and it's a bit of a bummer, I must say.

But, I have a shirt with candelabras on it. So everything's fine.

Aloe

Facebook Note

A friend and coworker sent this note to me via Facebook...

Cute story for you:
So today I'm at lunch at my favorite restaurant in Gainesville when this really cute little girl, probably a year-and-a-half old, stands up in her booth, turns around and starts smiling at us. She's clapping her hands on top of the booth, generally being cute, but her mom is worried she's being annoying. Mom: "Cydney Scott, you sit down right now!"
Obviously this made me think of you :)
So hi! Hope you're good. Give Oliver a belly rub from me!

Primates and Mr. Rogers; These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

This may come as a surprise to those who know me, but I find that as I get older, I am far less interested in discussing tragedy. I was at an assignment to photograph a lovely elderly woman while she lead a discussion group with a few members of a local PTO. While waiting for the last member to arrive, the group began to talk about the latest incident of unexplained violence to hit our city. A man walked into a Wendy’s a few days ago and began shooting. He killed a firefighter who was dressed in street clothes, injured some others, shot himself. The group talked about it and I wondered why.

“Well, he was going back into Wendy’s to get his four-year-old a different toy from his meal. I guess the guy came right up behind him and shot him point blank in the back of the head” one said.
“Well, at least he didn’t feel anything” said another
“I guess the ex-wife of the shooter says he has a history of violence”
“Yeah, but there was no record of it”
“The weird thing is there’s just no explanation for why he (the shooter) did it”
“I guess when it’s your time, that’s it”

I’d rather think about the things I heard on NPR’s Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me news quiz show. For example, there was a series of questions related to Fred Roger’s, AKA Mr. Rogers.

Which unlikely friend did Mr. Roger’s make at one time?
A. Kim Jong-I,
B. Koko the Chimp, or
C. Someone else I can’t remember.

The answer was B. And the host went on to explain that Koko, a gorilla who was taught to communicate with sign language, loved Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood and watched it regularly. When he came to visit her one day, she immediately gave him a hug, then crouched-down and took of his shoes for him.
Then there was a which-one-is-true question. There were three options, and the true one was that when it was made public that Mr. Rogers’ car was reported stolen, the car was returned with a note that read, “I never would have taken it if I knew it was yours”.

I think basically I am in a crummy mood today and would just rather talk about happy, loving things like Fred Rogers than anything else at the moment.

Crazy TV Entertainment

I knew it was only a matter of time.
When I saw ads on TV for My Dad's Better Than Your Dad, I thought, oh, crap, this is just asking for trouble. Not only do we have grown men competing against one another in a nationally televised pissing match, we have grown men competing against one another in front of their kids!
In many ways, when I got sucked into it last week, I found it sweet. A little Asian girl squeals with intensity as her dad sends her flying by a harness at a target on which she must toss some giant darts. With her jet black braids flowing from her head, it was hard not to get a kick out of it.
But, there's the down side, of course. Like the dad who made an ass out of himself during the question round when he said the "J" in JK Rowling stood for Joshua. (He and his son were eliminated because they live under a rock).
As much as there are nice moment; kids hugging dads, high-fiving, doing a special hand-shake together, telling each other how highly they think of one another and how proud they are to have them, you also have dads who are trying not to look like a chump in front of their kid. Well, really, they are all trying not to look like a chump in front of their kid.
Well, my concern was realized during tonight's show (keeping in mind it's only been on the air a few weeks). In an effort to keep-up with the Mr. California Dad he was competing against, Mr. Science Teacher Dad was sent to the hospital for heart problems.
He's fine, but you get my point. I can see the Saturday Night Live spoof sketch in my head right now, "My Dad Died While Competing Against Your Dad".
The show kinda makes me nervous.

March Masthead

Saturday

Rachel's response to yesterday's blog (about my dream), "Dude, your subconscious kind of freaks me out".

I got another text message today. It read How do you feel about KD Lang?

read about the first "incedent" here.