Mr. Annoying (my dog) struck first blood in the war against "momma driving daddy away" last night.

As posted earlier, the dog dislikes changes in the status quo, and is irked at my husband's four-day business trip. The dog's theory seems to be that, since he is inconvenienced, "momma" will be too, since it is "momma's" fault "daddy" is gone (we left together but only I came back, so clearly I had something to do with the disappearance. It was like this when the rabbit, Bump, passed away--he left the house with me going to the vet for them to handle his body, but only I came back, and the dog hasn't fully trusted me since).

I tried to go to bed at 9:30. Sounds early, but my time as a night-owl has long since passed, and I get up at 4 each morning to walk the dog and go to the gym. So the dog came into the bedroom, and I put down treats on the floor and turned off the light, the usual bedtime routine. (Many of you are wondering, why no crate? Because the dog is evil and screams like a banshee--look up the breed details of the Shiba Inu if you want proof.) Maerlyn was wondering why I would go to bed without "daddy" and proved his displeasure by wandering around the room, randomly scratching at the door, the side of the bed, and the blankets in his closet. (Yes, my dog spends a lot of time in the closet; no, there is no suggestion there.) When I would "shush" him, he would crawl under the bed and whine, those annoying, high-pitched, through-the-nose whines that some dogs have developed a skill for.

It took about an hour and a half for the dog to settle down and for me to go to sleep. Then, I woke up for an unknown reason at about 2 and couldn't go back to sleep (could have been any kind of noise, from mice, to dog flatulence, to trucks downshifting on the highway) for about an hour. When the alarm went off at 4, I mumbled "screw it", turned off the primary alarm and activated the secondary, allowing me another hour and a half of sleep time. This meant I did not have time to go work out before work.

I was punished for my laziness and lack of sleep by a massive traffic jam caused by a three-car accident in a construction zone. We slowed to a crawl, and it took over thirty minutes to travel two miles from one exit to the next, and by the time we got about to the second exit, the tow trucks pulled away and the cars around me accelerated. Yippee. I got to work half an hour later than I am comfortable with (thankfully I get to work half an hour early each day, so technically I was right on time). All morning I have felt rushed and frantic. I guess I'm a little OCD when it comes to my schedule--I don't like deviations. Just like the dog. I guess he gets it from me.

Damnit, this is all my fault, isn't it?

Why do we love our pets so much?

Sometimes I must ask myself this question. Not that I DON'T love my pet, far from it. But there are times when you question your sanity with regards to your pet, and this is one of those times.

The dog is driving me crazy. My husband has gone out of town for four days, and the dog is clearly blaming me for this problem. He hates any variation in his day-to-day schedule. We need to get up at approximately the same time every day, leave for at least part of the day (I'm assuming this is when the dog gets his rest), come home at the same time, and go to bed at the same time. Variations on this theme are not tolerated.

The problem began this morning as my husband began packing. When the suitcase comes out, the dog gets upset. Suitcases mean bad things. We don't take suitcases to the park or the skating rink, which means it may be a trip he's not going on, or (almost as bad) it may be a long trip in the car. Not that he hates trips, but he hates being trapped in the car for that long. Anyway, the dog began following us from room to room, but he dodged out of the way every time one of us reached to pet him. He was pissed.

Packing continued to annoy him. By the time my husband finished, the dog had planted himself at the front door, attempting to block our passage. He sat with his back to us, showing his dislike for the situation. It was to no avail. We brushed him aside, shoved him away from the door (an open door is frequently an escape and subsequent chase around the neighborhood), and left him sulking in the living room as we went off to the airport.

I came back by myself, and so the dog was left with no other option but to blame me for the lack of "Daddy" in the house. He's been walking aimlessly from room to room ever since I got home, yipping forlornly. You'd think with behavior like this that he is normally lovey-dovey and can't stay away from us when we're home, but he's actually very standoffish, much like a Siamese cat. He wants to know where you are, but he doesn't want to be "with" you. It's the fact that his normal routine has been disrupted that is irritating him, and so he's going to take it out on me. I anticipate the behavior will escalate as the evening wears on, and when bedtime comes and there is still no "Daddy", he's likely to be restless all night so I don't expect much sleep. I won't sleep well anyway since my husband isn't here.

Why do we put up with pet behavior? Why can't I just have a fish instead? Why did God make animals so darned cute that we keep them around? I don't know. Stay tuned for four nights of annoying dogness...

Much like the garden gnome that inspired Travelocity's "Roaming Gnome", and the Snoopy doll that is photographed all over the world, and that sock puppet from the children's story, I own the fabled Joe Bender (kayaker--www.joebender.com), otherwise referred to by my students as "Rastaman". This bender doll has become the unofficial mascot of the senior class at the school where I teach.


He was first kidnapped two weeks into the school year. The seniors, in retribution for another prank pulled by another grade the year before which framed them for the crime, borrowed my little kayaker toy and photographed him taped to a wall-sized map. Each day I would receive an e-mail with an updated location for the little guy. He was ultimately returned to me, but the game was on.


He then traveled to Kentucky with the seniors when they went on their class retreat.


After that, he went to Washington D.C. as a pro-life marcher in the March for Life.


Most recently, he journeyed out of the country, to France, where he visited several famous locations.


His trip culminated with a daring rubber-band bungee jump off the Eiffel Tower.

Goodness knows where he will go next. Does it seem fair that my toy is better traveled than I am?

I said I'd post a picture of me running Powell Falls on the Locust Fork. It was pretty intense. It doesn't look very big in the picture (and I thought the camera was supposed to add ten pounds--who knew it took off several feet of height?) but it was really intimidating. It was super loud, and going over the top of the drop was pretty scary. But it was fun!

My poor dog. We wore his little hiney out. We decided to get out in the sunshine (which won't last; it's supposed to start raining later and keep raining for several days) and go rollerblade around the lake at the park. Maerlyn loves the lake; he goes and splashes around at the edge of the lake. He doesn't swim; he just plays in the shallows. But he hasn't been out much for physical exercise this winter, and we made him do two laps around the lake, which equals a little over three miles. Poor little guy. He was really excited during the first lap, really tired during the second. He slept the whole way home, only checking things out when we stopped at Wendy's to pick up food. Now he's sleeping. Cute puppy.

Spring Break! Whoo hoo!

You know you've gotten older when the best thing about spring break is the fact that you can sleep in. No partying, no staying out late, no hanging out with friends because most of them aren't on the same schedule as you (this is what I get for hanging out with non-teachers). Just sleeping in. Man, I'm old.

I don't even get to sleep in that much. I'm trying to help motivate my husband to work out in the mornings by getting up with him to swim at the gym. That means I still get to sleep in a little (5:15 a.m. instead of 4:00 a.m.). Yay.

Still sitting in the afterglow of one of my best river trips. We did the Locust Fork of the Warrior River in Alabama over the weekend. I ran a real waterfall! As soon as I get pictures/video, I'll try to post some of it. It was a good day, and went a long way to boosting my confidence.

Ah, spring break. No papers to grade, no assignments to read. This is why I'm a teacher (to heck with the "molding minds" nobility)...

First, Kirby Puckett RIP. Kirby, one of those great non-athletic looking baseball players, like John Kruk and my beloved Tony Gwynn, who could pound the living snot out of the ball. Kirby, pudgy and jovial, with a happy smile that let everyone know he loved the game. Kirby, after whom I named by egg-baby in health my freshman year of high school, because it was a brown chicken egg and it reminded me of him. He will be remembered, and missed.

Now, on to other things. Namely, gym apparel. It fascinates me to look at all the different fashion statements being made at the gym. Many people dress as I do, in baggy shorts or track pants and oversized cotton t-shirts, designed for free movement and fat camouflage. No one can tell where my rolls are if I wear baggy t-shirts. I've just recently downsized--for years now I've bought XL t-shirts so I have drawers full of them, but the past few shirts I've ordered have been larges instead. I've lost 35 pounds, sort of stuck on a plateau right now, but hopefully it will continue.

Then there are the athletic types. These are people in shape who choose to flaunt it. The women wear the close fitting bra-in athletic sports tops, the tanktop kind which show off their artificially tanned shoulders. They wear spandex shorts so short that my mother would scold me for wearing them. Previously I had only seen these spandex shorts on volleyball players in games (we called them "bungees" in high school for some obscure reason); apparently they are vogue now. The men wear jogging shorts, the short-short kind with the little upside-down v-shaped vent on the sides. They also wear expensive Nike or Under Armor "dry fit" shirts that wick the sweat away from your body instead of getting soggy (which is what MY t-shirt does).

There are the seriously bulky weightlifters, who wear cut-away tank-tops that look like what Hulk Hogan always chose to rip from his body before a wrestling event, and Zubaz, those terrible baggy pants, somewhat MC Hammer-ish, whose wearing is only justifiable at the gym or a professional sporting event (Troll and Hoff come to mind with their Chargers' Zubaz). I would laugh at these people, except they could break me in half.

And there are the freaks. These are the people who just dress, well, weird. For the gym, anyway. The people who get on the treadmill still wearing their work clothes in the afternoon, or wearing them early in the morning before embarking for the day. Some of them bother to change their shoes at least; others do not. There are women in power suits and sneakers, men in khakis and button-downs with loafers, punk kids in flannel and denim with Birkenstocks. There's the infamous sorority girl I witnessed (the one who fell off the treadmill) who was in a miniskirt.

I'm always curious why people choose to wear what they wear. I bet if I were to look at their CD players or mp3 players, I could get some insight into their minds. [For example, the last five songs I heard on my mp3 player this morning were "The King of Bedside Manor" by Barenaked Ladies, "I'm the Man" by Anthrax, "I Need a Hero" by Frou Frou, "Video Killed the Radio Star" by The Presidents of the United States of America, and "The Other Side" by Aerosmith. What does this say about me? I don't know.]

I'M ALIVE! And coming back from research paper hell...

Sorry for the long delay between posts, but I had 86 9th grade research papers to grade, and they were *UGLY*. More F's than I've ever had, combined, the last three years of teaching. Nightmarish. Usually it takes me about 20 minutes per paper to grade; this time it took over an hour per paper. Hence the serious delay in posting.

That combined with the hectic end of my swim season made for no spare time. The research papers are done, the swim season is over, and now all I've got left is to grade regular assignments (which have been piling up during this research paper onslaught) and to coach lacrosse. Whew.

In the meantime, life continues as usual. We've been overrun by rodents in our house as spring approacheth. At first it was just a token rustling/chewing sound from inside the walls, something we've dealt with off and on the whole time we've lived in this particular house. But things got steadily worse. More noise, little nibbles taken out of items around the house, mouse poopies in corners and on various surfaces, stuff like that. So we escalated our efforts, placing those sticky-traps in various locations around the house (I can't load real traps--inevitably I snap my fingers in them--and they are unpleasant to remove when the occupant has assumed room temperature).

Well, I heard thunking from under the sink, and opened the cabinet door to find A RAT with his butt stuck to the trap. He was unhappy about his apparent fate, and I was unwilling to extricate an unfriendly occupant who still had fight left in him, so I left him thumping around under the sink for the night. The next morning, rat and trap were gone. I suspect he fell through the hole around the pipes in his attempts to free himself, and is probably going funky under the house. Eew.

A day later, more thumping under the sink revealed several mice (when they fell out as the door was opened). So we escalated again. We loaded the cabinets with DeCon. The little buggers have eaten through two full boxes of poison and are working on a third. I haven't heard much more in the way of noise in the house, so I assume we've sufficiently culled the herd.

The dog is no help. We have to wire the cabinets shut to keep him from getting into the DeCon. And he's no help at all with the rodents. They've literally walked right past the dog on the way to his food bowl, and he just waves them through. Twit.

Anyway, nothing much has happened in my reality the past few weeks, since I've just been grading. But Spring Break starts next Friday, so maybe life will get more exciting...