In other news, I took my dogs for a walk this morning. Like the good neighbor that I am, I tucked a plastic grocery bag in my pocket so that if one of the dogs took a dump along the way, I could whisk the turds away. Leave only footprints—that’s my motto.
Sure enough, Daisy Mayhem took a gigantic dump on someone’s lawn, which I scooped into the bag and tied off, and we went on our merry way. It’s trash day, which means there are bins along the edges of the lawns. One was open, so I tossed the turd-bag into it.
My husband thinks this is really rude, but I don’t see the problem. I wouldn’t throw un-bagged dog turds into someone’s trash can, but bagged turds—what’s the issue? I don’t get it.
Anyhoo, away we went, but then Daisy Mayhem decided to take ANOTHER ginormous dump—right on someone’s goddamned driveway! This never happens, so I had not prepared for the eventuality of needing TWO bags. (The other dog, Patsy, never shits outside our yard.)
It was very early, just past dawn. No one else was around. I could have easily just kept going and left that pile of turds right where they were. But I wasn’t raised that way, so I was desperately trying to come up with a solution. Should I just take the dogs home and come back in my car to clean up the mess? Root through some stranger’s trash can to find a receptacle for the shit?
There was a bagged newspaper in the driveway. It wasn’t the paid subscription paper but one of those freebies. I skinned the bag off it and used it to pick up the turds, tied off the bag and deposited the bag and the paper in a nearby bin, hoping the homeowners weren’t peering through a window or on their way outside to confront me.
Did I do the right thing? I don’t know. I hope I don’t encounter any more serious and troubling moral quandaries this weekend.
Nope, I’m not dead. But I have been dealing with some old-ladyish health problems, even though I’m not really old. (And some churlish individuals might dispute my claim to being lady-like.)
Anyhoo, chicken update: I moved the critters to the coop. My kid had the genius idea of activating the record feature on her iPhone and propping it against the side of the coop to capture the half-grown chicks in action at their eye level:
They’re all pretty tame, and one flies up and sits on my arm like a parrot. What are you up to this weekend?
We have lots of frogs down here in Florida. I like frogs very much and enjoy encountering them on my own terms, i.e., outside, where they belong, and from a cozy distance.
See, we’ve had boundary issues, frogs and me. It’s been suggested in some quarters that perhaps I take these unexpected frog assaults a little too personally and have become a bit paranoid about their propensity for popping up to surprise me in unlikely places.
I’d like to see how these critics would react to this kind of scenario on their turf. What’s pictured below is the console of a sadly neglected exercise bike that lives on my back porch:
And yes, that’s a goddamned frog coming out of a hole in the exercise bike console:
Are there critters in your neck of the woods who pop out to surprise you? Discuss! Or talk about whatever.
Poor Mrs. Mitt. After 40+ years of back-breaking momming, the woman has earned the right to kick back and take it easy. And she could, too, if it weren’t for her husband’s compulsive need to cross “Be President!” off his bucket list.
So Mrs. Mitt is forced to endure serial humiliations, one of the worst of which must surely be the obligation to interact socially with a vulgar, embarrassing blowhard like Donald Trump. Last night, Mrs. Mitt was obligated to paste on a smile and ride the elevator to the 66th floor of Trump Tower to join Trump, his wife Melanoma and 400 other crass rich people (the only kind willing to share airspace with Trump) to raise $600,000 for the Mitt campaign at a “birthday party” for Mrs. Mitt. (66th floor + $600,000 - $599,994 = 666!)
And, because even though Trump was born rich, he somehow managed to avoid acquiring the good taste and manners that often make our plutocrats seem less overtly monstrous than they actually are, he exposed poor Mrs. Mitt to maximum tackiness, including a sugary image of herself astride a sugary Austrian Warmblood dancing horse, thus inviting unflattering comparisons between Mrs. Mitt and Marie Antoinette.
The Cake Boss dude, who constructed the monstrosity, chose to surround the horse and rider with stumps. Why? A subtle protest of Trump’s desire to clear-cut ancient Scottish trees to build vulgar golf resorts? It’s a mystery. And an open thread.
I’m hauling myself out of the phlegmy slough of a joyful spring dose of 24-hour flu here and desperately playing catch-up on work and breathing and stuff like that, so consider yourselves apologized to for the lack of bloggy goings-on. Anyway, I decide to check out what’s eating the blogosphere at the moment, and yup—it’s that dog again.
The old adage goes, “When you’re in a hole, stop digging.” But it seems Mitt and Ann Romney just can’t stop doubling down on that infamous dog on roof incident from way back in 1983. I’ve known a few Irish setters in my time, and they’ve by and large been soft old things, albeit bonkers. Judging by the Romneys’ response when ABC’s Diane Sawyer used an “exclusive” interview to raise the issue yet again, that may be a family trait:
Mitt Romney told Sawyer that the Seamus attacks were the most wounding of the campaign “so far” ...
Well, Mitt, it’s only April. Buckle up.
“The dog loved it,” Ann Romney said. “He would see that crate and, you know, he would, like, go crazy because he was going with us on vacation.”
Yeah, so you’ve both been saying since the story first emerged. Look, it’s an Irish setter—its threshold for “loving it” is pretty damn low. As for “going crazy,” from my experience with the breed, how the heck could you tell?
And here comes the usual TMI:
Adding to the left’s narrative that Romney had little compassion for the animal is a detail from the 1983 trip that Ann Romney confirmed to Sawyer. The dog became sick, defecating all over itself and the windshield of the car, leading Romney to hose them both off before they continued on the drive to Canada.
“Once, he—we traveled all the time—and he ate the turkey on the counter. I mean, he had the runs,” Ann Romney said, laughing as she explained how the dog got diarrhea.
In a 2007 blog written during Romney’s first campaign for the presidency, Ann Romney said the dog rode “in an enclosed kennel, not in the open air” and compared the experience with a person riding on a motorcycle or roller coaster.
Remind me never to visit Disney World when the Romneys are there.
Mitt Romney, when asked by Sawyer if he would do such a thing again, said “Certainly not…,” which would have been a fantastic answer had he not been compelled to add a totally narcissistic qualifier, “...with all the attention its received.”
I repeat: “Certainly not with all the attention its received.”
Well, kind of. This facility—with the darling little Poulet Chalet surrounded by a spacious, well-protected and partially shaded chicken run—is the future home of my seven hens:
Right now, they are living in my office. Until their feathers come in. And you know what? Animals are gross!
Whoever it was who said when my adorable little chicks got older, they’d suddenly exude clouds of dust and feathers? You were right, my friend. There ain’t enough canned air at Staples to blow all the crap out of my electronics. And speaking of crap, when I went in to check on the chickens awhile ago, I noticed one of them had taken a fresh dump right on the feeder.
After delivering a short lecture on etiquette and basic table manners, I whisked the offending barnyard equipment out of the room to wash it. The chicken turd was fresh enough to slide off the plastic surface, and my two boxer dogs leapt over to lick it up the moment it hit the floor.
Jesus H. Christ, I’m catatonic with disgust. Can dogs get salmonella? This isn’t as bad as the present Tunch gave John last night, but fuck, animals are gross…
pictured: a dumb hairy animal suffering from lameness and his dog
Funny story! Actually multiple intertwined funny stories, except for the one about Parker’s (second) torn ACL, which is only funny insofar as I spent last Sunday convinced he was playing an April Fool’s joke (“check out the look on his face when he sees me limping, he just finished paying off the interest on my last orthopedic surgery,” is what I imagined him saying to the cats). Those stories shall be told once I can type sans agony* again, but I wanted to check in so’s to let everyone know I’m not gone for good. Wouldn’t want the haters to get their hopes up only to have them cruelly dashed (just go with me here—the only thing that bothers me more than the word “haters” is the near-certainty that I don’t merit any).
Okay, back to hammering out these his-and-smaller-his breastplates, ‘cause the arrows of outrageous fortune can’t be far behind.
*no, I mean once I can type without causing myself agony, my writing style hasn’t changed any
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Last week, I showed off one of my Australorp chicks. This week’s pullet is a Rhode Island Red:
As you can see, she’s sprouting tail feathers, and her wing feathers have developed sufficiently to allow her to briefly achieve liftoff.
In other news, incredibly, it turns out the late Andrew Breitbart really was the brains of his eponymous outfit. His lackeys continued their “Vetting the Bed”* series yesterday with a piece about how President Obama once scandalously colluded with Chicago Cardinal Bernardin to promote universal healthcare:
The law, had it passed, would have forced the state to enact a plan that, in the Orwellian words of the Chicago Tribune, “permits everyone in Illinois to obtain decent health care on a regular basis by 2002.”
Pictured: Parker, with hood up in solidarity, contemplating whether stenciled admonitions are trumped by his state’s controversial “Squat and Poop on Your Ground” law.
BTW, that’s not a “grill,” he just has a lot of tartar build-up.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 03/31/12 at 08:27 PM
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Ours is currently examining the inside of his eyeballs in a Ninja stylee, in preparation for another Saturday night stalking punters hanging round outside the pub down the hill.
Remember that backyard chicken project I mentioned awhile back? Yeah, well, look who’s on my writing desk:
She’s an Australorp chick. We have three of them and four Rhode Island Reds. They are living in my home office until they get big enough to reside outdoors in the magnificent coop my husband constructed for them, which I call the Taj MaHen.
The chicks are in a huge plastic tub with a heat lamp right next to my desk. Despite the 95-degree heat and constant rustling and chirping, I’ve got to say they are the most delightful co-workers I’ve ever had.
It’s a good thing this poorly camouflaged critter lives in my oak tree instead of the fictional setting of the Hunger Games, where he might have fallen under the pitiless gaze of movie huntress Katniss Everdeen. She would have put an arrow right through his little eyeball.
Speaking of those who are hard on the little things—the gentle, helpless creatures—it appears Herman Cain is still pretending to be relevant in the public arena (possibly as an excuse to get out of the house and escape the baleful gaze of Mrs. Cain). He has ads out that depict an adorable bunny being hurled upward and shot-gunned out of the sky and a fish being slowly suffocated to death to protest the stimulus. It’s such a pressing issue these days, you know.
Also, according to a CNN breaking news alert, a CNN/ORC poll finds that “nearly 75% of Americans” think George Zimmerman should be arrested for shooting unarmed teen Trayvon Martin to death. I’m guessing the precise number will turn out to be 73%. Maybe the 27% are the Orcs who were polled?
Last night I took a pack of screechy teens to see “The Hunger Games.” Meh. I had read the book, and I kept wondering how much sense it would have made to someone who hadn’t read it. Fortunately, it seems most in the packed theater had read it, so the lack of character development wasn’t an issue. Plus, there were hawttt boys.
Today I’ve got to take the kiddo to the ball field for team pictures, then to an away game, where I must keep score. I’m getting pretty good at it, though there are some who question my tentativeness about assigning errors. I say unless it’s a really boneheaded play, the kid doesn’t get an error. Those who disagree are free to keep their own scorecards.
Jesus God, Newt Gingrich is a despicable motherfucker. If I were Queen of the World, I would order him lightly scored with rusty pitchforks, dipped in sulfuric acid, rolled in a bed of broken light bulbs, stuffed into a cannon and fired into a toxic waste dump.
"[W]e wholeheartedly endorse the excellent Rumproast blog" -- Jim Newell, Wonkette
"Mind you, don’t let yourself be trapped dialoging with these guys: truth is their enemy; pyschological warfare and misinformation dissemination is their profession." -- TeaParty.org
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