my heaven will have dogs

Nothing beats coming home for the weekend and opening the front door... Im serious! Not only am I opening the door to real food, laundry, and my wonderful family but also to loyalty, excitement, and an extreme amount of tail wagging and toy-squeakers. Knowing someone has missed me that much and is THAT thrilled to see me is very heart-warming. (although it might get pretty obnoxious if people had the same reaction). I love my dog. Life without my main-man Cooper would be less exciting, as would be my phone pictures.

wake up call

There's something about smiling. and laughing. that makes my day a heck of a lot brighter.
I am so blessed with so many people in my life that make me do both. I love it.
So, I thank you.
------
and yes, I did have an amazing weekend with Macy and Cricket!

Did I mention that I had my own personal, furry alarm in the morning? My silent alarm*(see below)  went off, which I didn't hear... but someone else did. Macy woke up, started wagging her tail/butt, which repeatedly hit the bedside table.... this triggered the metal lamp cord to DING DING DING on the lamp. This alarm was one that I couldn't just hit the snooze... her 'snooze' was to let her outside to do her business and serve breakfast. -- Cricket, on the other hand, was leaning more towards sleeping in - She was still sleeping by my side, under the covers.

*silent alarm* - I have a bad habit of hitting the snooze or off button on my alarm without waking up: it gets me in trouble.

dog treats

I'm currently house-sitting where my two *new best friends* live. Their mom and dad went out of town, so all three of us are 'holding down the fort'. Their names are Cricket and Macy. Macy, the golden retriever, loves to show off all her toys and would really love it if I pet her and scratched her ears and belly 24.7. Cricket, the toy fox terrier is a sweetie, chatterbox, and also enjoys accompanying me as a couch potato. Both enjoy a tasty milkbone before bed.

This will be a fun weekend with my new pup-pals, and as usual it will probably go by too quickly. (please note I withheld from using my pun 'DOG-gone good weekend')

SWAT's new? not much.

While sitting behind my apt (shying away from the SWAT team in the neighborhood). I just wanted to mind my own business aka listen to the scanner for updates on the possible gunman. So yet again, I find myself enjoying the beautiful day, while becoming more and more thankful for law enforcement. Suddenly, I found the need to take things into my own hands. I got up. Ran around the garage and yelled, "Knock it off! Someone's going to get hurt.. and I'm not afraid to tell their parents!" They ran away, scared. Problem solved.
... little chumps were throwing rocks over the garage.. and coming a little too close for comfort to my head, cars, windows, MY HEAD!
... mean while, SWAT team is still surrounding a house a few blocks away.

(ps anyone catch on to the title? SWAT's new?... so-what's new? HILARIOUS, i know)

please shine down on me!

Dear mr sun, mr golden sun,
It's March 13th, 2012 and I am propped up against a tree behind my apartment, trying to soak in as much sun as my fair, FAIR skin can handle. 79 degrees is enough said to explain my blessing of the day!
I considered closing my eyes to maybe take a cat nap with the warm breeze as my blanket... But then I remembered the drunken individual with an overflowing shopping cart that passed out back here last week. His arrest deterred me away from closing my eyes.
So for now, I'll just sit... in awe.

warm winter blessing

'Weather' or not it is supposed to be a blustery, cold winter... We've been blessed with an unusually pleasant past few months. Sometimes I think that the increase in temps and decrease in wind chill is because I moved south.. About 3.5 hrs south of Fargo. The fact that I haven't had the need to wear 5 layers of clothing in order to battle Mr Jack Frost says it all (which usually defines my Fargo winters).  I have been proven wrong since Fargo 's winter has been mild as well.

But the more I think about this warm, pleasantly comfortable, blessed winter, the more I think about my Grandma Virginia. It saddens me to know she is gone from the earth, but I know she's still looking out for her family.
Grandma hated the cold. Only good thing about winter was her favorite holiday, Christmas. Otherwise, winter = cold!! You could almost bet your money you could find her hanging out in her tv room, aka the sauna, tucked in with her blanket, nestled in her chair, with the space heater cranked up (and of course a diet coke in hand). Do I believe that this unusual winter has something to do with her disapproval of the cold? Of course! Thanks Grandma! Love you lots and lots.

Photo:  Grandma is in the middle

ralph rogers

It can be difficult to meet people when you move to a different town. College seems to be the best place to meet new friends. After college, the ratio of meeting new people to hang out with to meeting yourself for supper every night is pretty low. Today was different. Today was a blessing!

I had the pleasure of meeting a new friend. His name is Ralph Rogers. I met him while he was galavanting around the yard of my apartment, and I even shared an almond with him.  Ralph may be a squirrel but I already can see similar qualities in him and myself : friendly, but stays at a safe distance, talkative, not too picky about food, short attention span, and spontaneous about where he's going in life.

While walking out the door of my apartment, Ralph and I both noticed each other, stopped in our tracks, and locked eyes. I froze, then grabbed my phone, hoping to capture the moment ( this is what I do every time I meet a new friend...). I ended up snapping my fingers, trying to bribe him with an almond, and making what I thought to be squirrel noises in order to get Ralph to cooperate with the photo shoot. --- While this was happening, a man had been walking on the sidewalk towards me... watching this girl stop dead in her tracks in order to talk to a squirrel. Classy Wednesdays.

survival of the fittest

Operation Dad's Birthday.
Only thing my dad could think of for a birthday gift was a boat.. so I figured a box of beer would suffice. I went for the Bud Light Platinum (vs. his usual Bud Light) just to shake things up a bit.

So this man is my father! I wouldn't just hand him the beer and expect it to be the best of the best... I needed to know it's the best. I needed to weed out the weak. I needed to put all twelve bottles to the test.

I couldn't really come up with a better of a test than the following... While walking into my apartment building, I strategically carried 2 bags of groceries plus the box of 12 beer bottles in my left hand while trying to find my keys to my apartment in my right. The first and only necessary test to prove strength and endurance was to drop the box in the hallway. "Man Down... Man Down!" (You can determine for yourself if I actually did this on purpose or not... ) Needless to say, I was cleaning up glass from the carpet and the hallway has an aroma of "la cerveza".

After wiping off glass and beer from the survivors, I decided they needed some sort of a trophy/protection from any extra glass... I call it "the poor man's koozie". I added a little late-night humor (... sometimes my humor is only funny after midnight). I think his favorite was, "Friends are neat, and so are Buds"

Happy Bud-Day Dad - Hope it's Budtastic. Love you.