In July our dear bulldog, Stella, passed away due to an unexpected heart attack. She was only three.
Our other dear pup, Chloe, the reddish-colored French Mastiff, was heartbroken by the loss of her companion. We were not yet ready for another dog. It was too soon - but as time went by we knew that Chloe needed a companion and that we needed a bulldog in our life (doesn't everybody?).
Hank the Tank joined our family on September 10, 2009.
Hank is a joy to have around. He's NOT a replacement, but he's a great companion. He is so sweet and lovable.
I know not every dog is as lucky as Hank or Chloe, just as every human is not as lucky as we are to have the love of great animals. Please consider rescuing a dog or a puppy. The Mid-Atlantic Bulldog Rescue does good work everyday for bulldogs, a breed that many people do not realize needs a lot of care.
Day 1: Sunday, May 25, 2008: Flowers and trees are planted in terracotta pots.
Day 2: Monday, May 26, 2008: Flowers remain intact. Dogs seem to enjoy the backyard ambiance.
Day 3: Tuesday, May 27, 2008: Rain, dogs cannot go out to play.
Day 4: Wednesday, May 28, 2008: Last night's storm seems to have knocked around potted petunias. Plants are repotted, but despite best efforts they look like they're drunk.
Later: We return to backyard. Flower roots lay in clumps of dirt on the patio. 4 petunias are reported missing and assumed deceased.
Day 5: Thursday, May 29, 2008: Another pot has been attacked by the mysterious killer. To this date, no trees or grasses have been harmed. 4 more innocent petunias are missing and presumed dead.
Day 6: Friday, May 30, 2008: Surveillance indicates that the perpetrators have struck again; however, the only visitors (a Dogue de Bordeaux and an English Bulldog) to the scene seem to be lounging lazily in the sun. Clumps of dirt containing petunia roots are left at the bottom of the deck stairs. This is seen as a hostile threat from apparent petunia terrorists. It could even the signature of the Petunia Serial Killer.
So, it's the first day of the workweek after a three-day weekend and I keep having to remind myself that's it's Tuesday. Not exactly rocket science to figure out but it does mess up my week a little bit.
Not to mention, I practically ate myself into a coma this Memorial Day weekend. Pizza (and the fresh mozzarella kind from Goodfellas, with sausage and peppers as toppings), Wendy's (at least it was just a grilled chicken sandwich, oh wait... I had fries too...), rice pudding, chocolate chip mint ice cream, a couple of six-packs of Bacardi Mojitos, macaroni salad, a three bean salad with four beans, barbecue (which I really want to spell as "barbeque," but Firefox pwned me), chicken, sausage, burgers (with ginmormous buns).
Hmm, let's see....
Oh, right. More Mojitos, apple pie, crumb cake, chocolate chip cookies, lemon ice and lime ice, Bottlecaps (the candy) and a pack of FunDip. By 10:00 PM MONday I thought it was over. I wasn't hungry. But I kept eating.
I had more macaroni salad. I had lime Tostitos with salsa. Cheez-its, Vienna Fingers -- all of it scarfed down like I was going to the electric chair.
The moral of the story? Well, there isn't really one. Except that gluttony falls under "The Seven Deadly Sins" and I am feeling pretty awful right about now.
I need to quit overeating. Right after I quit diet cola.
I am not sure why I think so much about commercials. Maybe it's because I used to work in advertising and I really enjoy the field. Maybe it's because I DVR every show I like and find myself actually watching the commercials. Perhaps, it's just because I have always enjoyed them. I mean, I do remember the theme songs from commercials going as far back as 1985. There's the 1987 Oldsmobile commercial where, "Should old acquaintance be forgot," was replaced with the devilishly catchy: "That car you got should be forgot before the year is THROUUUUGHHHH. All '87 Oldsmobiles are now on sale. For. Youuuuu."
Let us not forget the Kudos commercial! "You'll love the first bite, outrageously right, new Kudos granola snack! Freeze it, tease it," (Wait, WHAT?!) "...Kudos, I'm yours, I'M YOURS! Nutty fudge, chocolate chip or peanut butter, Kudos you've won me over any other. Electrifying, Granola-fying! Kudos, I'm yours. I'M YOURS!"
So that brings me to the first commercial I have been thinking about. You would think I would love it since I apparently enjoy songs in my commercials. BUT I HATE IT. Amanda and I started talking about it last week, which was odd, because at the moment she randomly brought it up, I was online reading other people's blogs about it because I had been compelled, upon seeing the commercial for the 2,200th time, I googled, "annoying io digital cable commercial."
Well I am not alone. Have you seen this? The music is awful. The lead singer guy is a fat Hispanic man, or at least he is pretending to be Hispanic, rapping or whatever you call it over some generic reggaeton beat. I am not sure if it's even reggaeton, just every one else says it qualifies. He's so gross, that they can't even show him on the beach unless he is covered by sand. He's so inventive though! "I-O digital cable, watch a lot of TV whenever you're able!" SO CLEVER.
You might also wonder what the hell the red lobster dragon person doing some weird rap and urging you to call with his two human hands.
But hey, if the Loch Ness Monster doesn't sell your cable product, why not try sex? It's the no-fail remedy for any slow sales. And for that, you get the mermaid/bikini/wet suit chicks with the crazy mermaid tails swinging all over, or some inappropriate-for-any-TV-air-time-except-late-night hip thrusting dance move that makes me cringe. Except, their big part in the song DOES make me remember the stupid phone number. Which makes me mad at myself. These ladies are taking the rest of us back to 1919. You know, when we couldn't vote. What does it take to get smart women on TV? The sad news is, there's a lot of women in advertising. So who approves this crap?
I get so irritated every time I see it come on TV. I think, "IS THIS FOR REAL?" The commercial's only saving grace is that there are pirates, and I think they're trying to take down the rapping guys.
So, what other commercials drive me nuts? There's been the now defunct Quiznos commercials with the talking baby that sounded like a chain smoking lumberjack. That was BEYOND creepy.
All of the commercials urging you to text message for any reason are annoying. I don't want a ring tone, thanks. No I don't want to meet gay-Latin-black-hot-sexy singles in my area. Getting on those phone lines with complete strangers sounds like a good way to get stalked, kidnapped and murdered. Kind of like meeting people at their house when you only know them from the internet!
And if you're not in NY, you're not like to see the Gallagher's 2000 commercials. Let's call it like it is. This is not a "Gentleman's Club." Let's just call it a strip club. Anyway, the commercials are gross and annoying. It's bad enough you have to see the billboards on the BQE. Now I can't even watch TV at night without seeing these mail order brides with their twisted faces or the dumb alien commercials.
Another late night one is "Interactive Male." These guys who are supposed to be gay just jump around and appear to talk on the phone with each other. It's just weird, and reinforces negative stereotypes!
I can't handle this one, but I am still going to post it for you:
More to come. I have about twenty commercials swirling in my head, but right now I am hungry.
Friday, May 16, 2008
Reading. Ah, yes. Reading.
Maybe it's a simple joy, but nothing really compares to spending some time alone with a good - er, great - book, article, journal, newspaper, magazine.
Oh yeah, and maybe a great blog. (There are a few out there.) Although I still love the feel of paper beneath my fingers when I want to read, I must confess that most of my writing is done via keyboard, my errors and inferior thoughts wiped out by the backspace button - never to be seen again (once I hit "Save" anyway).
I love to read almost as much as I love to write. I will read almost anything. Sometimes, I read something amazing.
Like Joan Didion's, The Year of Magical Thinking.
Warning: Don't pick this book up unless you're planning on staying up all night to finish it. Her flaw prose and moving story is addicting. Without being a spoiler, it details the year after her husband's sudden and tragic death in New York City, just after Christmas of 2003.
I needed to read more. Searching Amazon.com returned many titles, but I was struck and intrigued by Slouching Towards Bethlehem.
A reference to a Yeats poem, "The Second Coming."
Didion's Slouching Towards Bethlehem is a collection of essays about the author's experiences living in California in the 1960s.
In he preface, she wrote, "I went to San Francisco because I had not been able to work in some months, had been paralyzed by the conviction that writing was an irrelevant act, that the world as I had understood it no longer existed. If I was to work again at all, it would be necessary for me to come to terms with disorder."
Perhaps Joan Didion and I think alike? (Ah, perhaps not, although we're both Sagittarians.) Maybe I think like Didion? No, that's just wishful thinking. Who can claim to be first to be drawn to Yeats? Or to Didion, for that matter?
All writers, perhaps, look to see a bit of themselves in someone who came before them.
When the book had first arrived, I cracked open the pages - fresh pages that have never been touched by human hands. I wondered what I could learn from this book, this prose, from this writer? There I saw she included that poem by W.B. Yeats:
The Second Coming
"Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spritus Mundi Troubles my sight: somewhere in the sands of the desert.
A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?"
