Random Ramblings

So I need to know why the folks that invented the hot dog chose to make it flesh-colored and phallic-shaped?  Seriously, people.

I assume the same group of people chose to name the crappie, which according to wikipedia is a freshwater fish in the sunfish family.  A sunfish called a crappie.  Nice.

Similarly, I saw a new line of backpacks for sale at Target.  Embroidered across the front is the name-brand: TRANS.  Betting lots of high schoolers will be avoiding that bag like the frigging plague.

In the south, there is a beanbag tossing game that people like to play – and they have named it Cornhole.  Apparently, Cornholin’ can get pretty competitive at parties and such.  When DS was attending summer camp, Cornhole was one of the activities the kids could play outside.  This really, really concerned my husband.

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This house is down a few pets since I last blogged regularly.  Gus, my nemesis dog, is no longer living with us.  Several months ago we “rehomed” him to a childless couple who had 12+ acres and 2 boxers.  Gus had begun snapping and growling at the children in a rather unpredictable fashion.  Man that dog was messed up.  Four trainers we went through, trying to figure out what WE were doing wrong.  Turns out, we were just not the right home for Gus.

Since my recent return to stay-at-home-mom status, I got a wild bug up my butt to rearrange the entire house.  I really want to move my daughter out of her small room and into the playroom, so I basically turned the dining room into one.  In doing so, I brought most of the kids toys downstairs – and realized how much stuff that frigging dog had destroyed.  I found the throw pillows that I had purchased for the leather couch – sassy silk pillows in colors like red and yellow – stuffed into the playroom closet, because Gus kept trying to chew them.  One couch has rips in every cushion and along the skirt because Gus kept trying to chew it.  The kids’ wooden toys – my pride and joy – have all been bitten and chewed.  Stuffed animals had to be hidden because Gus liked to pull the stuffing out of them.  Even the books that were on the bookshelf needed to be relocated because Gus would paw them off the shelf and then shred them.  He was a bad, bad dog.

(There was only one book that Gus completely destroyed, and it was my copy of Eat, Pray, Love.  I was so mad when he did this I actually cried real tears.  I got over it quickly though, because I HATED that book.  I only kept reading it because I was sure I must be missing something – people were raving about it and I kept getting hung up on the fact that she basically pitched the book and got paid to write it, which made her experiences a little less authentic for me.  Also, I thought her writing was indulgent and self-important, and I’m sorry but maybe I need someone to tell me WHY I should give a shit about her?)

Last week one of the guinea pigs died.  The guinea pigs, mind you, traveled with us by car in our cross-country move.  I bought them off of Craig’s list after our foster son expressed a desire to have his own pet, yet when I brought them home he announced that he did not want them or anything to do with them.  Ahhhh, attachment disorder.  My daughter was 2 at the time and called them her “piggy-pigs” which was the cutest thing ever.  My son is the one who named them – Bessie was the black and white one who tolerated handling, and Chomper was the tri-colored one who whistled for food but ran when you tried to pick her up.  Turns out, Chomper actually did do some biting, but not until she was given this name.  Chomper is the one who died.

Her passing was sad, but I have a terrible time with good-byes so maybe a normal person would have said that she died like all guinea pigs die – I don’t know.  She became very skinny quickly, and last week when I went to get something near the cage she came running to the front to whistle, but she was congested and the whistle came out like a hissing puff of air.  I panicked and called the vet, who told me to bring her in.  The vet’s office is what did her in – apparently, rodents get stressed easily and being handled at the vet’s office is quite stressful.  After a few hours they handed her to me in a paper towel – she was still alive but barely.  I paid the $120 bill, brought her home, and held her.  Within 15 minutes of being home she died in my arms, only I didn’t realize it and went to put her down and my husband pointed out that she seemed kind of dead.

After a backyard burial and lots of “Mommy, why are you crying?” questions, I decided that we needed to get rid of Bessie.  I told the kids it was because guinea pigs are social and need to be with other pigs to be happy, and that I did not want to buy another guinea pig.  The truth is I wanted to get rid of that $25 fur-covered heartache before she could drop dead on us, too.

So now we are nearly normal – one dog and 2 cats.  Kinda boring, right?

We might need to spice things up a lil bit around here.  Time to break out the Cornhole!

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