Princess ... le sigh

Princess was bad. If you may remember, shortly after we adopted Princess in the fall, she was startled by a boy on a bike. This time, she was excited by a neighbour. We don't let her off-leash, but we'll make exceptions when we're coming in from the car. (When we get home from a car-ride, especially when we have food, she's thrilled to follow us in the house.) I was carrying in her dog food and some human food, and she was trotting behind me.

Well, she was distracted by a rabbit and she charged away. I ran after her. She lost the rabbit and stopped running. As I got close to her, she noticed there was a dog being walked by the house. Princess was about 20 feet from the dog and his owner, and the neighbour was excitingly yelling at my dog to "go home". As the neighbour kept repeating this phrase, the voice got louder, higher pitched, and more excited. Not all people know this, but dogs respond to human's emotional responses, so a loud, excited voice creates an excited dog. Princess stood about 20 feet away watching the neighbour and other dog for a good 10 seconds (several minutes in dog time), as I ran closer. As I got closer, the neighbour's voice was extremely excited, and my dog ran after the neighbour's dog.

If it wasn't so upseting, it would be quite funny. The scene was out of a sit-com, except there was nothing funny about it for either of us. The neighbour and I ran around each other in a circle, as the two dogs ran around each other in a circle. The neighbour kept yelling comments about how could I be such a bad person and have such a bad dog. (Seriously.) Her voice was, understandably, excited, which fed both of the dog's excitement. I was yelling at Princess to "stop" in my firm, listen-to-me voice. (Stop is a command she knows. Well, she knows the command when she's calm, but an excited dog sometimes has selective hearing.) It felt like every time I got close to catching my dog, the neighbour stepped in front of me (to protect the other dog), causing Princess to change direction, and therefore preventing me from getting to Princess. The neighbour and I continued to run around circling each other (as the neighbour continued to repeatedly yell about how I was such a bad person and I yelled at Princess to "stop") for a good 30 seconds. (Hours in dog time.)

As the neighbour was walking away, I was subduing Princess to teach her that was bad. I apologized. The neighbour ignored me and kept walking away. Several seconds later, the neighbour looked back, then gave me a funny look, a very "taken aback" look. I don't know if the neighbour was surprised that I apologized or surprised I remembered the neighbour's name. (We've only met once. Perhaps the neighbour didn't remember we'd met. Or maybe I remembered the name wrong? But I don't think so, I'm pretty sure I remembered it correctly.)

This dog bit Princess. I think Princess may haved nipped the dog. (Princess doesn't bite, but rather nips, meaning the skin is not broken and therefore no diseases can be transmitted.) Princess's shots were all updated three weeks ago, so I won't go ask her if the other dog's shots are up-to-date. (I don't think I'd have the nerve. In fact, I'm currently holed up in my house, almost hiding, because I'm so upset.) The neighbour has every right to be upset, too. An off-leash dog ran at her dog, followed by a crazy owner who was only yelling "stop".

My heart has been thumping out of my chest the past hour, since it happened. I'm starting to calm down. I think I need a bath and some peppermint tea now.

Sigh.

Not exactly what I want to deal with. Pretty soon, the neighbours are going to start hating us. (Maybe I'm being melodramatic.)

"I felt the Earth move under my feet"

I could have easily titled this "Shakin' All Over".

Now get that song out of your head now :)

Here in southeastern Ontario, we had an earthquake on Wednesday. Although not a large earthquake (reports range from 5.0 to 5.6 on the richter scale), it was unusual for two reasons: first, we don't get many noticeable earthquakes, and second, it could be felt in a 1000 km (600+ mile) radius. The large radius was due to the cooler rocks being a better conductor of vibrations than the warmer rockers of many earthquake regions, such as California.

We have construction out front of our building, so occasional compacting and demolition has been shaking us. At first, my co-worker and I thought it was an oddly long demolition. Then we got a call that it was an earthquake.

I admit, I was a little figuratively shook up, plus I was worried about how my dog took it. Some animals were reportedly upset. Everyone around the office was buzzing, and other office occupants who we'd never seen before "popped by" our office to see how we felt. I wasn't getting any work done, so I went home.

Princess was fine. She was just happy to see me, the exact same way she is every day when I get home from work.

Wipe Out

Have you seen the show Wipeout? Wade and I love it. I heard that Wipeout is the American answer to Most Extreme Elimination Challenge (MXC), which is itself a dubbing of a 1980s game show called Takeshi's Castle. (For the records, MXC is far more funny than Wipeout, but that's because MXC dubbing is clearly not what the people were originally saying.

Here's a video of MXC if you haven't seen it.

Wipeout is coming to Canada, but (oddly enoughly), Wipeout Canada will be filmed in Argentina. (According to wikipedia, my source of way-too-much, the American version of Wipeout is filmed in California, which is obviously much closer than Argentina. Go figure.)

Wade and I are thinking of "auditioning" for it. (Auditioning = filling out a really long form.) The crazier you are in your "audition", the more likely you are to get picked. I'm not sure how to be "crazy" in the audition!

Here are just a few of the many questions "asked" in the "audition":
Have you ever won any academic prizes?
Does your job require you to wear a uniform? Would you be prepared to wear a version of that uniform on the course?
If you were a superhero, what would your superhero power be?
What is the coolest thing about you?

Crazy, non? (Both the form and the idea of auditioning for it!)

On an unrelated note, I still can't post pictures from my slow internet. Grr. I'm not totally sure it's the slow internet. Anyway, I'll make an effort to post more frequently. I know how annoying it is when you visit a blog that only updates itself once a week.

Essay (or is it an essay?) on Twitter

Posting pictures is still slow ... painfully slow. We have "high speed" satellite internet, but satellite internet is not nearly as fast as other forms of high speed internet access.

So I shall now devote this blog to essays.

No / few pictures (for now), but (hopefully) still interesting.

Today's theme: twitter

I recently read that young people don't twitter. (Apparently, young now means under 20, possibly younger.) Young people find twitter is a lame old-person thing.

I'll admit, I'm on twitter. My twitter name is lame. Well, not literally. Literally, it's "kristawantswork". I created it last fall when unemployed and was using it to follow employers, and lo and behold, real people - either people I know or bloggers I read - started to follow me.

This was a flattering revelation, but then I was left trying to find cool things to say. At first, I documented being unemployed. Later, I documented my feeling about the Olympics. And then ... I couldn't think of anything to say.

Tonight, I tweeted for the first time in three months. It wasn't very interesting. Sometimes I think of things to say, but I wonder if twitter is just an ego-fulfilling tool for me. Other tweeters I follow post interesting comments about the state of social justice, thoughts on the meaning of humanity, or post comments about their latest project.

I tweet on why so many businesses are following me.

Yep, three months of thinking of something to write, and that's the best I could come up with. Maybe I'm not as creative as I like to think I am.

Do you tweet? If so, what themes do you tweet about? Do you find this social media to be particularly useful?

One year ago ...

A year ... a year? Really? I must be "grown up" because I'm marvelling how quickly a year can pass.




I'd post more pics, but for some reason it takes forever-and-a-day to upload pictures to blogger.

Hello? Is this thing on?

Still having trouble posting pictures of my gardening / pool opening.

So in the meantime, here is a re-print of a singles ad reported to have been listed in a newspaper (allegedly the Atland Journal).

SINGLE BLACK FEMALE seeks male companionship, ethnicity unimportant. I'm a very good girl who LOVES to play. I love long walks in the woods, riding in your pickup truck, hunting, camping and fishing trips, cozy winter nights lying by the fire. Candlelight dinners will have me eating out of your hand. I'll be at the front door when you get home from work, wearing only what nature gave me... Call (XXX)XXX-XXXX and ask for Annie, I'll be waiting.....

Apparently over 150 men found themselves talking to the Humane Society.

(This may or may not be true according to Truth or Fiction and Snopes. But it's a great story. The phone # changes in different versions to be the phone # of actual Humane Societies!)