I’m super happy it’s Sunday for many reasons, not the least of which is that today being Sunday means that tomorrow is Monday, and Monday is the day Roxie finally gets her stitches removed so we can put the Cone of Shame away. It’s been a long week and a half. As much as I wanted to give her breaks from her post-surgical collar, she couldn’t last longer than thirty seconds before making attempts to lick where her stitches are. So annoying (for BOTH of us, I get it!). On Friday night I took the collar off and distracted her for a good twenty minutes by giving her a much-needed…
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The Waiting Is The Hardest Part
This girl. Sigh. At the time this post goes up, I’ll be delivering her to our vet for another procedure: today she’s having a cyst removed from her front leg. We’ve visited our vet more frequently in the past eighteen months; that happens as a dog (or anything, really) gets older. It’s hard. She’s ten and a half. My other beagle (the late, great Bijoux) lived to be thirteen. She was my first baby: we brought her home two years before D was born. I spent the last three years of her life panicking over each and every health incident (and in between them!) because I was worried that, each…
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Apple Bread, Apple Cake, Tomay-to, Tomah-to
It’s officially autumn, which means that it’s time for me to make hundreds and hundreds (or at least a dozen) loaves of apple bread. I got the recipe from Judy, an awesome woman with whom I worked at a craft store more than twenty-five years ago. Back then I was a young newlywed who was going to college and working at the craft store as head cashier and eventually custom framer—all of this seems like it didn’t even happen in this life, by the way, because it was so long ago. Judy worked in the floral department and basically spent all day restocking the silk flowers and creating beautiful flower…
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Roxie: Keeping Things Unpredictable Since 2004
Last weekend my sister and I drove down to our parents’ house in Tennessee on a trip that was planned with less than twelve hours’ notice. For various reasons, I decided to bring Roxie along rather than board her as I normally would, and I was not looking forward to that part of the trip in the slightest. Roxie hasn’t been on a road trip since she was a puppy and, at ten and a half years old, she is set in her ways. She barks for the duration of every ride to the vet and every ride to Petsmart, both of which are less than ten minutes from my…
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Pet Names
Alternate names I have for Roxie, in no particular order: 1. Sissy 2. Mama 3. Mamacita (I don’t know; it just came out one day and stuck) 4. Beebs 5. Baby 6. My Baby 7. Babes 8. Sweets 9. Siouxsie (yes, as in “and the Banshees”) 10. Bougie-Bougie (shut up) 11. Mooshie 12. Mooshie-Booshie Alternate names Jim has for Roxie, in no particular order: 1. Nothing I can list here because this is a family blog. He DOES call her those special names with love, which I guess explains why the second he walks in the door, she drops me and my “Bougie-Bougies” like a hot potato and makes a…
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Ten Years Ago #Selfiebration
This year, BlogHer is celebrating the tenth anniversary of its annual conference and in honor of that milestone, there are lots of activities going on around the Selfiebration hashtag. Last week, BlogHer’s Executive Editor Julie Ross Godar asked, “Where were YOU ten years ago?” If that’s not a great blog post prompt, I don’t know what is. Ten years ago, it was 2004. (See? I can do math.) My life was completely different in so many ways from what it is at this moment. Let’s start by talking about me and the internet ten years ago. I used it only for email and…well, I think that’s about it. I had…
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About That Time My Dog’s Life Was In Danger
Oh, it’s all good now, thank goodness, but things were a little bit dicey earlier this week. Let me explain. On Sunday, Jim and I drove the boys back to Wisconsin and to their respective colleges. While we were gone, my mom called the house and left a voicemail. Apparently she and my dad had left a bag at our house before leaving town. The bag, she said, contained the games they brought along with a “cap”. I heard the message when we returned home and didn’t think much about it other than, “We’ll get that bag to them on our next visit,” like she requested. We were exhausted from…
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Roxie’s Rug
We have lived in our current house for thirteen years in December. Though this was not the first house we ever bought–that honor goes to a house in Kenosha, Wisconsin–we did buy this one after renting for three years, so it was very exciting to make plans for a few pieces of new furniture and paint colors other than “Landlord’s Choice White”. When we first starting hunting for new home items, Jim picked out a Prairie-style recliner for the family room. We both adore the chair–if we could afford it, our entire home would look like Frank Lloyd Wright provided the furnishings himself–but I was more excited about a rug…
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We’ll Be Back To Your Regularly Scheduled Blog Posts…Soon.
Probably tomorrow, in fact. Today though, I feel the need to bump the Skydeck Chicago post down since it was a lead-in to a giveaway that is now over (Congrats, Shannon!), yet I don’t feel like writing much of anything. I am in the middle of my pre-empty nester mini-crisis which involves quite possibly the most manic behavior I’ve ever personally experienced. Full disclosure: I’ve been on the verge of tears since last Wednesday or so and did the ugly cry off and on all day Thursday and Friday. Yesterday and today were better. While I’m emotional (understatement), I can totally function in public like usual because that’s how I…
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Roxanne
I spent a couple of minutes chatting with a very sweet woman with whom Roxie and I crossed paths during our walk yesterday. She was (I’d guess) in her sixties and shared stories about the three beagles who were a part of her family over the years. She asked for Roxie’s name and talked to her sweetly as other beagle lovers tend to do, only jumping a little bit when Roxie let out her blood-curdling howl of hello. It was clear she had heard that before, and she wasn’t phased. She scratched behind Roxie’s ears and petted her vigorously as Roxie’s tail wagged so vigorously her entire body swayed back…