Welcome guys!
What does the R.O.A.R. Squad stand for? Rescue Owners Are Rockin’! Learn more!
That guy at the bottom right is like, AH MAH GAAAAHHHDDD.
How these crazy windsurfer people manage to keep from tangling all up in each other and drowning is something I will never understand.
I can see how this would be fun. But the crashing and the wet and the cold... less fun. Prohibitively so.
… that and any of the Bachelor programs. I will never understand why those shows are allowed on television.
This is my postcard. The "dude" here is Denver's mayor. It's okay. I'm pretty sure he's cool with me calling him "dude."
Have you ever heard of Breed Specifc Legislation (BSL)? It’s pretty lame. According to Canada’s Guide to Dogs, BSL is defined as “efforts used to restrict, ban and/or eliminate certain breeds of dogs, purebred or mixed. It can include anything from requiring special licensing of a breed (breed restriction) to the total bad of certain breeds.”
Ontario instituted pit bull-type bans 5 years ago- dogs lovers rallied over the weekend to have this ban repealed (read more on the rally at thestar.com).
Maggie with her family
Fellow blogger Maggie Marton (check out her R.O.A.R. Squad post!) from Oh My Dog! is campaigning to end BSL in Denver, Colorado, where the upcoming BlogPaws conference is being held from September 9-11, 2010. Denver has a breed ban on pit bulls, which means that Maggie cannot bring her beloved Staffie-mix, Emmett, with her to the conference.
Emmett is a therapy dog who brings a lot of comfort to and support to the kids and adults he visits in Bloomington, Indiana where they live. Emmett is clearly not an evil, rabid killer. From what I understand he is a ridiculous snuggle butt who likes attention and treats.
BSL is lame.*
So, want to help? Maggie’s campaign to end BSL in Denver, Colorado involves the following:
Campaign Goal:
What You Can Do:
BUT HURRY! The BlogPaws conference is in one week so you have to do it ASAP! If you have time to get a postcard to her by, say Friday, that would be peachy.
Thank you very much!
*This is a lighthearted post, but BSL is not a lighthearted issue. BSL doesn’t work because it doesn’t get to the root of the problem, which has to do with owner and non-owner education. Dogs need to be treated and handled like the creatures they are: ANIMALS with teeth. Animals will bite if they feel provoked/scared. Different dogs (as in the actual dog, I don’t mean the breed here) have different thresholds, but at the end of the day WE have decided to bring animals into our homes in close proximity with us, and most importantly with our children. All of us, especially our kids, need to be taught the correct way to approach, treat and work with animals so we can all live and play together safely. Here is some interesting info on BSL from Pit Bull Rescue Central.
The gorgeous, GENTLE y'all, Emmett.
Work it, work it.
On Saturday John and I went lawn bowling with a bunch of his colleagues. Yes, indeedy. John makes it look pretty darn cool, doesn’t he?
It would have been cooler if he got a point/basket/goal with that throw/shot/swing/whatever, but he did not. We were playing boys against girls though, (boyz drool GIRLS RULE!!!) so his lack of mad skillz at this particular juncture was appreciated all around.
The girls won. Because boys drool. And girls rule.
(even though the only reason the girls won was because a superstar female lawn bowling CHAMPION joined the girls team and single-handedly whooped the boys asses… and the girls asses come to think of it… but it was okay that she whooped the girl’s butts because she was on our team and we gladly accepted debilitating, soul crushing humiliation because it meant THE GIRLS WON. Because girl rule.)
And boys drool.
There may have been a certain amount of trash talk on the bowling green that day.
I absolutely LOVE this photo of Jessica with her gorgeous dogs, you can just see how much they all adore eachother, don’t you think? Jessica is going to be speaking at BlogPaws in Denver in September- you should check her out!
Thank you so much for joining the R.O.A.R. Squad, Jessica! You rock!
What does the R.O.A.R. Squad stand for? Rescue Owners Are Rockin’! Learn more!
There aren’t too many glorious summer days left out there, yo. You’re out there enjoying the last of them, right?
Right?
This is a follow up post to the one about why I became a vegetarian. You may want to read that one first. Maybe not. If not, I have taken the liberty of providing a summary below:
I ate meat. Then I didn’t. Then I did. Dun dun duuunnnnnnn.
You’re welcome.
So, like I said, while I was living in Amsterdam I went on holiday to Barcelona with my friend, Malika. We went out for dinner and I was eating my veggie meal, as per usual, and she was eating this Seafood Dish From Heaven that completely distracted me away from my vegetarian ways. A few short weeks later, after being a vegetarian for a full 10 years, I would dice and spice and chow down on my very first skinless, boneless, everything-less single chicken breast in a very long time.
Right around this time, before I had the great fortune of meeting the studly John who would later become my husband, I went on a date. With a non-vegetarian French dude. I was making a habit of restricting my meat eating adventures to restaurants because I had no confidence in my ability to actually cook meat and I didn’t want to poison myself and die alone in my apartment. If a restaurant poisoned me to death at least there would be people around and I would have someone to sue.
So, on this particular evening I decided that I would order The Fish.
The waiter brings us our food and places our dishes on the table. I am devoting a lot of attention to making sure I am correctly deciphering this guy’s uber refined French accent. But not so much I don’t notice that the fish flopped out in front of me LOOKS EXACTLY LIKE A FISH. This is shocking for someone who likes her meat presented in indistinguishable chunks. I am shaken, but I soldier on. I throw caution to the wind and shovel a forkful of this very fish-looking fish into my mouth.
And I immediately get stabbed in the tongue by 5,000 bendy, albeit razor sharp pointy bones that are now violently accosting my mouth like lego-sized swords with a vendetta.
I freeze mid-chomp. WHAT THE HELL. What do I do? Do I spit my mouthful of half chewed tacks out in front of this guy I hardly know? Do I discreetly pluck the bones out of my mouth one at a time and covertly tuck them into my napkin? Do I excuse myself to the ladies room and spit out my fish flavoured bones somewhere along the way?
Finally, I break into the conversation:
French Guy: Allo. I am French… I am saying French zings…
Me (mouth kind of full): Why in the hell do you people eat this crap that STABS YOU IN THE FACE?
“You people” meaning people who eat stabby fish. Not French people. Just so we’re clear.
French Guy looks at my pinched up face and then down at my plate. There may have been an eye roll in there, but I can’t be sure. He points out evenly:
French Guy: You didn’t take ze bones out.
Me (in my head): Yeah DUH. I also didn’t haul out my canoe for a fishing expedition and club Nemo to death MYSELF, that’s what I come to a RESTAURANT for.
Me (out loud): Oh? Oh yes, right, right. The bones. Ha, ha, heh. I’ll just… with the bones here… hmmm… remove all these silly little suckers… hmmm…
And so I begin removing the bones. One by one by one hundred by one million until finally French Guy figures if he is ever going to get out of there he is going to have to help the uncooth Canadian eat her food. So he picks up his fork with a flourish, reaches over my plate and deftly lifts all 8 trillion offending bones up and off of my meal by the spine (do fish have spines?) revealing a completely edible dish that doesn’t resemble a porcupine at all.
Nothing makes a girl feel classier than having to be shown how to eat her food. Maybe he could have cut it up for me too. And wrapped a ‘kerchief around my neck so I didn’t slop all over myself. Evidently fancy Europe was not rubbing off on the likes of me.
Moral of this story: When you stop being a vegetarian bad things happen.
Consider yourself warned. You’re welcome.
(to be continued…)
None of these are mine.
Nothing like hearing stories about murderous love-sick teens and spooky ghost ships sailing across the horizon to start your weekend off right.
The Scene: John and I, hanging out in our living room.
John: This summer you actually managed to get a tan.
Me: Cool.
John: No, seriously. Your skin is a normal, healthy colour.
Me: K. Thanks.
John was lounging back on the couch. He sits up straighter to really drive his point home…
John: No. It’s a real tan. You don’t just look like your skin is no longer see-through. You should take a picture of this. Your skin is actually darker than normal skin colour- it’s like a REAL tan.
Me: …
John returns to his slouchy lounging on the couch.
John: Make sure you take a picture.
