Defying stereotypes

So I was out shoe shopping, as part of my job, of course. I need three new pairs of shoes. One for kickboxing (not job related, but since I was there…), waterproof hiking boots and felt-soled wading boots.

Some sales dude engaged me with “How ya doin’?” while I was looking for a pair of Pumas in a size 9. Same guy asked “How ya doin’?” while I was trying on a pair of $99 hiking boots (would feel guilty expensing these, and hope to find them on sale). I narrated that the 9s were too big and I was going to try the 8.5. He helpfully picked up the white paper that had been stuffed into the toes.

A few minutes later, he tracked me down to the wading boot aisle.

“Oh, there you are!” he said. “These are wading shoes. What are you doing?”

“I’m planning to do some wading,” I said coyly. Fought the urge to tell him I’m an avid duck hunter.

Anyway, I bought those. $64 closer to having a pair of boots for every occasion. Felt soles are necessary for walking across rocks in a river, if you were wondering.

S’been a long time since I wore my knee-high pleather boots…

Strategy

A few weeks ago, I tried taking Isis for a walk before class, to help get her focused, since running her around in the yard only revved her up. I thought to myself, as I had every time I watched the Dog Whisperer, “I should really wake up earlier and take her for a walk every morning.”

I meant to last week, but it didn’t work out. Yesterday, I was too exhausted from scratching my itchy bee sting finger all night to get out of bed, but this morning, finally, I did it. Backpack and all.

A woman in our dog class has told us on more than one occasion that she takes her dog on long walks, with a backpack, and she puts water bottles in the sides to add weight. As if she invented the process. C’mon, lady, I watch the Dog Whisperer too. I don’t use water bottles though. Sprite cans. Which came in handy as a cold compress when I got stung by a bee on Sunday.

I think the morning walks will not only benefit Isis’ training and overall mental fitness (I gave up on the anti-anxiety meds, by the way), but also allow me to continue to eat ice cream three times a day without gaining weight. Oh, also, since I was dressed and everything before our walk, I managed to get to work by 9:10.

Isis was in a super mood after the walk. She positively bounded into her crate.

Itchy typing finger

Yesterday’s bee sting was a bizarre little event. I was walking Isis and swinging my arm with abandon when I felt the sting and looked down to see the little bugger on my hand. It took some shaking, and some squealing, to get it off.

Stung quite a bit, but by the end of the day, I was over it. Except I guess the venom is still working its way around my hand, because my index finger itches. I took a benadryl and fully expect to fall asleep at my desk.

“The Bourne Ultimatum” was pretty good. I would have liked more of a revelation at the end. (Uh, spoiler alert?) Remember the awesome car chase scene in the first one? Well, there’s an endless foot chase in this one, which I have to say got a little tiresome, or maybe I was just distracted by Julia Stiles’ hair, and planning to cut mine just like it.

Strange. I’m not wowed by the movie stills I’m finding online, but I like her hair in this picture, even though it’s shorter than it was in the movie.

Since I last posted

I waded waist-deep in a fast moving river, wearing cotton pants and someone else’s felt-soled boots because I never have the right outfit on. When I discovered that catching fish for their eggs did not involve a boat, I felt like an idiot. A complete idiot. The professionals wore a uniform of polypropylene long-johns under synthetic shorts. I totally have that outfit! But I was wearing khakis. I spent several long minutes going through my entire wardrobe, mentally assembling outfits that would have been better suited for the occasion and wondering why I thought the khakis would be OK.

Then I saw that several of the dozen volunteers were wearing jeans and tennis shoes. And I didn’t feel so bad. Those guys wound up swimming fully dressed in the river by day’s end.

Unlike some of my outdoor excursions in recent years, this one actually became more fun as it went on. I only was waist-deep in the water for a brief time (although that did mean I was wet for the entire day) and managed to stay knee-deep for much of it. I didn’t drop my camera in the river and only fell on my butt once. Love my job.

Also since my last post, I saw “The Bourne Ultimatum” and got stung by a bee. Unrelated events.

Shopgirl

I strenuously object to all negative reviews posted here for Shopgirl. The movie, like the novella, gets it right. Can’t remember the last movie that made me reach for a Kleenex. That’s not why I recommend it though. I don’t know that a scene about a man taking his girlfriend to the shrink after she stops taking antidepressants would make anyone else weep.

Beautiful.

Some things are sacred

Do not underestimate my emotional involvement in So You Think You Can Dance.

We’re now down to the top 8, and last night’s elimination was tough. While there are a couple of dancers I haven’t been as fond of (Neil and Lauren), I recognize that they are better dancers that some of the ones I like (Dominic). Actually, all five of the girls are versatile and fabulous. I didn’t like Jaimie at first, then she grew on me, but I’m OK with seeing her go last night.

But Kameron, sob! I feel like he never got a chance to shine. Still, he never let me down, either. He, like Dominic, was blessed with a fantastic partnership. Sure Lacey outshone him, but he had the chops and the strength to hold his own alongside her. I’ll miss him.

Although, the top 10 do get to go on tour together, so it’s not like anyone who’s getting sent home actually goes home. We’ll see him next week in the audience, I’m sure.

I watched this week’s episode with my mom, and subjected her to some of my favorite dances from earlier episodes. (I can’t delete any of them from my TiVo!) I’d say, “You want to see a really good one?” She’d say, “No.” And I’d play it anyway.

Then if she made a crack like, “They really don’t have any new material for tonight’s show, do they?” or observe that Lacey did some of the same moves in her All that Jazz routine that she did in Hip Hip Chin Chin, I screamed and yelled something like, “Of course they don’t! It’s an elimination show!” or “How is that possible? One’s a Broadway Jazz and the other’s Samba. They had different choreographers!”

I’m telling you, I am deadly serious about this show. There will be no mocking.

For my next 133,000 miles…

Presenting the Honda Fit. My first non-red car.

Isis likes it. When I got home last night, she jumped right in.

Rob was asleep and couldn’t be roused. We’ll see who gets to ride in it first. Not that I’m so excited about having dog hair on the black upholstery already.

Have you heard?

This is probably news to a lot of you, but there’s a movie coming out this weekend about Hairspray. And some book about a boy wizard…?

Ha, just kidding. Those Hairspray ads are all over the place, and evidently, the major media outlets are all very concerned about whether Harry Potter will die at the end of the series.

I don’t really know where that comes from. There must be some clue I missed. I mean, I didn’t lose sleep over whether Neo was going to die at the end of the Matrix trilogy. Or Frodo at the end of The Lord of the Rings. I accept the fact that sometimes they die, sometimes they live…

Maybe Harry will die, but that’s not the big question that plagues me as I anticipate reading the last book. I’m more worried about whether I’ll remember what happened in the previous one.

I believe I bought the last one at Target, doing my part to make sure that the publishers don’t make any money on the best seller. And yes, once I start reading them, I find them hard to put down. In the sense that I spend several consecutive hours reading, not that I stay up all night finishing them in one sitting.

I started with book 2, which I found on sale at a bookstore in Scotland, I believe. But I don’t have a huge need to go get the new one at 12:01 a.m. Saturday. I’ll just buy the first copy I see for 40 percent off or more.

Still, the more articles I read about obsessed fans, the more I think I need to read the book right away. It’s not just the hype. Part of me wants to get through it before some website or news show gives something away. And when book reviewers lightly summarize plot points, I remember how much I enjoyed the first 6 parts (I went back and got the first one after reading the second one).

Now let’s talk about Hairspray, which I am, at this point, dying to see. When I first saw the trailer, I was like, “Whaaat? They made a movie from the musical they made based on the John Waters film? Whatever for? The movie just came out.”

Of course the Broadway show had new songs, so there’s one explanation. But also, how old am I exactly? The first movie came out almost 20 years ago! I saw it in the theatre. (Oy. I’m still confused. Just now I thought, “That can’t be right, I’d have been 10. But no, since it came out in 1988, and I’m actually almost 32, not still 30. I would have been 13. Or, 12 going on 13, rather.)

So I’m like, John Travolta in a dress, whatever. But then the cast keep coming on the Today show, and the director is a guest judge on So You Think You Can Dance, and Kelly Preston (who should know) said it’s the best movie she’s ever seen. Better than Battlefield Earth? Sign me up.

Sedating Isis

I took Isis to the vet last week to get a heart worm preventative pill, cus they have heart worm in Calif., but not here. She had some patches of dry skin on her legs, so I used that opportunity to ask the vet about them. He was very concerned and certain it was mange. (This was not my usual vet, and I will be requesting someone else in the future.)

He took several scrapings, couldn’t find mange, took several more, still couldn’t find mange, then said it looked just like mange, and still could be mange, but this kind of mange sometimes cures itself, so maybe she had mange, but is better now.

Later, I discovered in my Dog Bible that the not-contagious form of mange is very hard to find under the microscope, no matter how many scrapings you take. Her sores from the scrapings have gotten better, and I haven’t seen her chew on her legs lately, so I’m unconcerned about mange.

However. The vet said that if it wasn’t mange, it could be nervousness and I could give her an anti-anxiety med. Wondering if this magic pill could resolve some of her other issues, I took home a bottle, and then decided not to give it to her.

We resisted the homeopathic sedative recommended by her trainer, figuring she’s a puppy and she’s not that hyper. She’s mellowed out considerably at doggie class and has become quite trainable.

Drugs for dogs should be a last resort. She’s not such a problem child that she needs medication. I just have to make sure she gets enough exercise/stimulation that she doesn’t nervously chew her legs. Or chase her tail. Or bark at me while I try to watch TV. Or lunge at the submissive poodle in dog class. Still, those are normal dog behaviors, no?

The last couple of days, though, she’s had moments where she looked anxious to me. Am I projecting? She’s whining more than usual and when I sit her down and tell her to chill out, she looks back with anxiety in her eyes.

She’s bumped up the time she wants breakfast from 6:30 to 5:30, and while I made the concession from 7 a.m. to 6:30, I will not feed her before 6 a.m. She whines and barks and makes it impossible to sleep til 7. Last night she pretty well went nuts while Rob worked out in the garage.

But what finally pushed me over the edge and made me put the first pill in her mouth was that she tore apart the bed while I was in the shower. Tore. Apart. Ripped the sheets apart and even made a tear in the memory foam underneath.

I felt guilty afterward. Am I really going to do this? Medicate my dog, rather than give her the boundaries, rules and limitations the Dog Whisperer has taught me so much about?

While I tossed the soccer ball to Isis a few times, I came up with the following rationalization:

  • I am only giving her the meds to get her through this little phase. I am not abandoning her training and exercise regime. I have enough pills for 25 days and I don’t need to medicate her for the rest of her life.
  • At the very least, it should ease my mother’s impending visit, as I think my mother is afraid to be left in the house alone with a 65-pound German shepherd who likes to kiss with her teeth.
  • No matter what I do, I can’t give her the kind of life that she is genetically predisposed to. Maybe she needs this medication to live happily in the modern world as a Latch-Key Dog.

Then, when I got to work, I googled amitriptyline some more and discovered that it’s an effective antihistamine, sometimes used to alleviate discomfort caused by allergies. You know, the kind of discomfort that might cause a dog to chew on her legs? So I don’t feel so bad anymore.