Kunoichi: Doggie Ninja

Huntsville is on it’s 3rd straight day of snow on the ground. It melts, then it snows a little again. I think most is actually melted this time but the sunny skies have turned all snow-cloud again. Most of us are really unhappy about it as it’s just 1/2 an inch to an inch every time. Just enough to be dangerous, not enough to play in. Even the weatherman sounded sad last night.

But I thought I would share some pictures of the latest bout and Ichi finding out why the Shiba 500 is not a good idea in snow and ice. You can’t tell from the pictures, but the patio was like a big sheet of ice as was the side walks. Even Ichi is getting tired of the snow, I think. She wanted to come inside and sleep in the nice warm house.

No video yet (although it’s loaded, just not in a very convienent form). But here is Ichi around the time she started SHIVERING. That’s what happens when you decide to lick all the snow off the ground (pictures offered as proof of my weirdo dog).

She did indeed have fun and despite the record low temperatures, demanded to go outside with siginificantly irregular frequency. And then I would have to bribe her to come back in. She particularly enjoyed running back and forth across the patio because it kicked up snow as she turned. No snowball fight this time. It was too cold for me to stay outside much.

I do have more frozen pipes (laundry room) and I figured out why (they are exposed!). Ichi has thoroughly enjoyed being an exclusively inside dog this week due to the freezing temperatures. We are supposed to go up to 47 degrees today! Yesterday we got barely above freezing for the first time all year.

There is still snow in my driveway and the pool is still frozen over (or at least it was this morning). When I drove to work there were still patches of snow on the edges of the road. So, it’s been an adventure. Didn’t get as much snow as we though but did get plenty of icy roads.

Since we are supposed to get 2-4 inches of snow tomorrow, flurrying through Saturday, I was reminded that I never posted the pictures from the LAST time it snowed. It was the weekend before my birthday and I awoke to snow, so Ichi and I went out and played.

For all your northern folk, though I was able to get out on the roads by noon to go grocery shopping, this was enough to close the interstate and other major roads (like Memorial Parkway). Needless to say, they are already prepping those two to be closed for the rest of the week.

And if you are wondering how Ichi did on her first instance of snow sans leash, she had a great time. First there was the attacking, then the investigating. All day she tried to figure out what the wet stuff was. ANd I threw snowballs at her which she quickly learned to duck (and then eat). So I look forward to my pup getting to really enjoy the snow this time. I’ll remember to video tape it.

In other wintery news: I dealt with my first instance of pipes freezing on Sunday. Luckily they never burst and I got them working about 3 hours after I discovered it. It’s been below freezing for the entire week so far, so my pipes since then have been dripping. Ichi’s been very much so an inside dog all week.

In true Alabama Snow style, I already have bread and disliking milk, I opted for Coca-Cola. I can snuggle up to Ichi for warmth.

Lastly, HOOK ‘EM HORNS!

In case you were wondering what I might like, I made you some lists. These work for Christmas too (afterall, there’s all of a 2 week delay on that).

Christmas/Birthday list

Buy My Love (I’ll explain the name momentarily)

Blu-rays

And if you just want to get Ichi something, I made her a list too. Be forewarned, I’m probably getting the bubble machine for her this year along with a set of bubbles. And she actually already has the sushi set, but I left it there because it’s awesome and people should see how awesome it is. (And she’s so cute playing with it.

So…the buy my love wishlist. It’s a bit different than the other two you’ll note. It’s mostly toys. See, I figure, who ever in my life screws up bad enough to warrant flowers, well, buy me flowers and a toy. WHY? Because I’m just a wee bit ADD at times, so I’m likely to be all “what did you do…OOOOOO…YOU GOT ME AN OOD!” I might come back to your mistake eventually, but I might be too busy playing with my new Ood toy and taking pictures to make a comic where the Ood and my Cylon discuss being slaves. But I figured, it’s not a bad thing to get toys at Christmas, right? I swear I’m turning 28, not 10. I promise, even though I totally wanted a bouncy house birthday party (I decided to start celebrating my birthday as if it was the birthday that the digits add up to next year). This year: VEGAS BABY. And Huntsvegas and Hotlanta. Yes, I’m having 3 parties and it shall be amazing.

Finally, I took a bunch of Christmas pics of Ichi when I went to take pictures of the new house all gussied up. She did a great job of lying down and sitting on command, but I had a bit of trouble (as we always do) with “stay”. And then I figured out the secret to taking pictures of her and getting her to look in the correct direction: put a treat in the hand with the camera. She’ll look the camera all day long.

So, for years I’ve been proclaiming “Baby It’s Cold Outside” to be the creepiest Christmas song. When you take away the lovely voice of Dean Martin or the cuteness of Elf, you get a song about a girl on a date who wants to leave. She’s making every excuse she can to leave. “My mother will start to worry.” Meanwhile, the man in the song is continuously trying to get her to just have another drink. All the while he’s telling her how pretty she is. The lyrics include “the answer is no”. (Anyone else get a “no means no” feeling from that line.)

Take the lyrics and attach them to a pretty girl and a creepy guy who keeps edging closer and closer (”mind if I move in closer”), making awkward comments about her hair. Then she says the line “hey what’s in this drink?”. I can absolutely imagine a stalker saying “how could you do this thing to me”.

With that in mind, do you still think it’s a romantic song? Yeah, me neither. Under the cut I’ll discuss the song I realize this year is not being used appropriately: Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.

Read the rest of this entry »

Sort of a followup, apparently people are actually getting off their couches (or at least grabbing their laptops) and emailing their congressmen in such huge numbers that they crashed the server! I’m so proud!

Constantly having to call IT to add more hardware makes us hard to ignore! Tell those load balanced servers to shove it! Keep emailing. And if that fails, call. And if that fails, it’s a recess, go track them down in your hometown. Tell them how you feel! They represent you afterall!

At first, Ichi seemed to really love her yard. Picture to the left as proof. Much running was done along with much fetching. There’s still fetch, there’s still running…but we’ve now begun to really find our nemesis: rain.

I should mention…Ichi is not scared of thunder or lightning. Or fireworks as we moved in shortly before the 4th. But, like most Shibas, we’re not exactly okay with water. Rain is just a lot of water that’s not really predictable.

Ichi has thus stayed almost always on the patio. It’s like she thinks of the grass as a very large bathroom, instead of a play pen. You have no idea how much begging I had to do to get her into the grass for the picture. If the ball goes into the grass, she hesitates and often decides not to go get it.

Well it’s been particularly rainy this week. Like every day, flash flood warnings, whole shebang. Naturally, this meant a lot of howling. Because Ichi must think that howling at the rain as it falls from the sky will stop it (she looks up as she does it). So we’ve worn our no-bark collar a LOT more. And we’ve been brought inside more (probably the real reason for the howling).

Last night I knew that I would have to bring her inside for the night or risk angry neighbors as the weather man said major storms. So at 11pm, I went to get her, figuring there would be some tv/petting time first. NOPE. She ran STRAIGHT to my room and under my bed, no-bark collar still on (what do you call a dog that is a scaredy cat?). Normally she comes out when she realizes I’m not trying to get her out. Not this time. When I realized that she probably would not come out before I wanted to sleep, I cleared the floor (easy in a new house) and made sure each door was securely closed.

Sure enough, I was awakened at 5am to a little scuffle sound that was Ichi waking up and getting out of “bed”. I patted the top of my bed and up she came (although from the other side, she’s quick!). I put an arm securely over her and held onto her until she was comfortable. Then I rolled over and went back to sleep. Imagine my surprise to find Ichi still on the bed when the alarm went off.

So now that we have a yard and don’t have to sleep in the house, we are well behaved enough to actually fall asleep and somewhat stay asleep on the bed next to me. This will not be an every night thing, but it’s nice to know that if I’m feeling a little depressed I can now fall asleep next to something cute, soft and furry. To be awakened to a lick in the face (yep that happened…a lot).

I may not always be the best at taking an active role in my own life. But I’m getting quite tired of all the pick-a-little, talk-a-little about our government. People, listen to me: it does not matter how many times you tell your friends how much you despise the current political climate and how you feel it’s just digging a deeper hole. I have no more authority than you do and neither do most of your friends. Therefore, I emplore you: stop complaining and DO SOMETHING. Tell someone that can do something about it.

Dislike universal health care: tell your congressman or senator! We have evolved into a culture with almost instant access to our elected officials. Most of them have twitter now. Yes, the president has twitter.

So, I did some digging for you. I’m making this really easy for you. Here’s how to get in touch with anyone from the state of Alabama on up. Read the rest of this entry »

Moving is going okay. Ichi has developed a new love of cardboard. She already liked it, but now she feels compelled to eat it. HOWEVER, she does the cutest thing now. I gave her an empty roll from packing tape to play with (it’s cardboard) and now whenever I’m packing, she’s got the roll in her mouth. I think she thinks she’s helping. And she is (by staying out of the way).

Movers are hired, fridge is bought, fans are bought, light kits are bought, paint is picked out (and a sample bought), utilities are transferred, inspection is done and my closing appointment is set.

Expect a picture of me opening the door, but then no other input for a while as I will be very busy.

Things have gone about like this: I’m standing in Lowe’s and it occurs to me that the fans I’ve picked out, one is not an outdoor fan, so I find one but it has no light kit. So then I’m standing at the light kits trying to decide for like 30 minutes (there are only like 20 of them) and the Lowe’s guy is probably bewildered as to why it’s taking me so long. Why did it take me so long? I was trying to remember if flies and mosquitos are repelled by yellow light (or at least not attracted to it). I bit the bullet, buy the teastained light fixture and am on my way. I checked this morning, they are indeed not attracted to yellow light. The closer the light gets to ultraviolet the more attracted they are to it and I’m about as far as you’re gonna get without being dark.

Plus I figure, yellow light will be all “hey look, it’s night and we can see” but white light would be “hey look, it’s night, we can see, and EVERYONE in the neighborhood knows we’re out here”.

Many boxes are packed. I numbered the ones that are newly packed, but my closests are already  deep chasms of rubbermaid tubs. Hopefully everything will get in quickly. And then I can unpack, see what I need and go see folks in ATL for costume fittings and an Ikea trip sometime in July.

And finally, yes, I ordered a new phone. Not becuase it was a new release, but because my screen is doing some wacky things. It’s like it knows. It hasn’t shipped yet (because there’s no way I’m standing in line at 7am, no).

Cause that’s totally how she’s gonna view it. Her yard. And for that matter, her house. Closing should be on or before June 30. I anticipate it being more exciting after I get out of the financial stages.

Pictures

And because I was asked to: Registry. The bed bath and beyond registry gun was heavier than I expected. If you want to get something off there, but find it somewhere cheaper, by all means get it there. Consider it more a list of suggestions.  I’m tempted to make Ichi one on like Petsmart.com if they offer that. A couple of people have expressed wanting to get her a more outside oriented toy.

More to come soon, including trying to move with a dog that doesn’t like strangers. At least in the new house she hopefully won’t be as possessive as it won’t instantly be recognized as “hers”.