Read in case of sadness

Dogs with their heads out of a car window.

That is all!

April's Hate/Love List

I'm hating:

• This weather! It's April.  Good-bye winter.  Get lost.  It snowed on April 11, like a lot! I'm so over winter this year.  This winter made me question how and why First Nations people lived here in the first place.  How did they live without a furnace, water-proof boots, windshield wiper fluid, and hot chocolate?  Anyways, I am ready for some sun and warmth.  Very ready...
• My computer.  It's a 3 1/2 years old laptop that is just done.  It randomly shuts off, it has zero battery life so when the power cord falls out, it dies, and it's getting crazy slow.  I also only have 1.07 GBs of memory left.  I don't have the money to get a new one and I am terrible at making big purchases.  I can't make a decision.  If anyone has computer suggestions (under $700), I'm all ears!

I'm loving:

• Being appointed a bridesmaid! My best friend Lauren is getting married in Melbourne on January 11, 2014 and she just asked me to be a bridesmaid.  I loved planning my wedding so I am inundating her with wedding ideas and clearly overstepping my role as a bridesmaid.  Kurtis has already yelled at me for planning Rachel's Wedding 2.0.  I'll stop doing that sooner or later, but I am so excited to be a bridesmaid.  I've never done it before and I am pumped!  Also exciting? Going back to Australia! 

• Coachella Live Feeds. Coachella is on my bucket list and we were going to go this year.  After booking accommodations, the line-up was released and we thought it was pretty shit.  There are some amazing bands on it, but we were disappointed with the headliners.  Red Hot Chilli Peppers are not Coachella headliners.  Same with Blue and Stone Roses.  Just no.  So we're going to try this again next year.  In the meantime, we watched the show from the comfort of our couch and it looked amazing, as always.  I'm sure we would have had a good time if we went this year but if we're going to spend $2,500 on one weekend of music, we're going to wait for an amazing one.  Major Lazer and Phoenix were my highlights on the feeds.  The Daft Punk promos played at the show made me watch this and you should too:

      Also, it looks like I'm going to have to make a trip to Michael's for this year's summer shows:

         

I'm only 50% joking...

Cooper's Haiku and My Response

Making Mommy chase
Me through the park is funny!
She will never catch me.




You embarrass me
You are an enormous jerk
Drop that stupid ball

Cooper's Haiku

When Dexter's owner

Picked up his poop before I

Ate it, I teared up

Ides of March/Hate/Love List

I'm hating:

• Work drama.  I can't disclose anything further.  Already was busted for "sharing" on social media. Enough said!

• Group work.  UGGGGGGHHHH!  I hate group work.  I was always the person in the group who was rolling her eyes while idiots discussed how they wanted to do things (incorrectly and inefficiently, I should add) and then just ended up doing the whole thing herself because I didn't want to put up with those idiots for a second longer.  I am taking an online course and we have a group work assignment. WTF? Why does group work exist beyond high school?  It shouldn't.  Anyways, I have a looney-bin group member who wants to meet up (uh, hello? We are taking an online course for a reason.  Most likely because we don't want to have to shower needlessly/we want to do everything last minute).  She says she wants to meet because she works better by "feeling" the vibe of the group in person.  Gross. I imagine her to be Tracy Flick a la Election.  Don't want to deal with her.  I got out of meeting, but she isn't happy.  I'm not happy that she has my email address...

• People who don't pick up their dog's shit.  So Cooper has developed this really endearing behaviour of eating dog poo.  It's wonderful!  He'll eat it frozen, cold, dried, or hot off the presses!  Besides the gross factor, he can pick up parasites from doing this.  So I officially hate people who don't pick up their dog's poo.  The problem is these people's dogs seem to poo in the middle of the night.  I have never seen someone leave their dog's poo unpicked.  If I do, however, ... Also, it looks gross.  Like, have some pride in the grass right outside your apartment door.

• Being poor.  Still sucks.  We were going to go shopping in Buffalo for a night over the March Break or go to Blue Mountain for two nights, but Cooper's butt infection literally shit all over that plan.  In the witty words of my friend Audrey, "What an asshole!" 

I'm loving:

• March Break! Hello? No teenagers, no work, sleeping in, wearing pjs all day, making non-teachers jealous, and time with hubby!  What's not to love? Plus, daylight savings was last weekend so I had a whole extra week to get "adjusted" to the time change.  Lulz. 

• Morning cuzzles.  We swore Cooper would not come in our room.  We also swore that he would not get in our bed.  This week has definitely challenged both of these ideas.  I forget who's idea it was, but Cooper has ended up in bed with us, cuzzling, watching the Price is Right as we wake up. And if that's wrong, I don't want to know what is right.  

Please enjoy watching a Price is Right contestant that is high on shrooms and drunk.

• Cleaning and getting organized.  Time off means time to get stuff done!  I cleaned my night table, make-up table, bookshelf, front closet, and dresser.  AND I think I found my new computer!  AND I researched new dog food for Cooper (methinks he has a wheat allergy) AND bought it! AND we put up a new shelf for our cook books.  We did work, son!

Look at my make-up table! PRISTINE!

• More daylight! I just realized that all of my love items are related to the March Break.  Thank God for March Break.  Anyways, more daylight rocks.  I can stop wearing my brass knuckles as I walk Cooper in the morning because there is actually daylight at 7:15 am!  More sun just means more happiness.  Am I right?

Kurtchel Dictionary 

Cuzzles - a higher form of cuddling, often incorporating snuggling.  

Regrets/Things you can't regret

I regret adding Cooper to our family.

I can't regret adding Cooper to our family.

Both of these things are true.  I guess it's like saying you regret having kids.  You're not allowed to actually say that because you love your kids and you can't imagine life without them and they are awesome.  This is how I feel about Cooper.

You're not allowed to say you regret getting your dog.  No one admits to it, but I know I can't be the only one.  I love Cooper with all my heart but I know it was a dumb decision.

He is so much work, he costs so much money, I worry about him all the time and sometimes I feel like the payoff isn't worth it.

But, he gives me the warmest greeting I have ever gotten everyday when I get home.  And when I hug him after a stressful day, all my stress and worry literally melts into the floor.  And sometimes when I look at him I just want to eat him because he is so cute.  And he makes me laugh from time to time.  And when he crawls up onto the couch and lays his head on my lap and sighs a big doggy sigh, I am crazy happy.

I'm sure my facebook friends think I'm obsessed with him.  I post ad nauseum about him and have a whole album with just pictures of him that I update all the time.  And we are obsessed in a way.  But he is a lot of work. A typical day with him looks like this:

Kurtis wakes up at 6:15 and takes him out for a pee and feeds him.
I walk him at 7:15-7:45 and then coax him into his room.
One of us comes home right at 3pm to take him on at least an hours walk/play.
The other walks him for half an hour after dinner.
The afternoon walker takes him out for a pee before bed and then coaxes him into his room to sleep.

So what right?  But this is everyday! We can't just disappear for hours after work to go grocery shopping or go to the mall or out for dinner.  We can't go away for a weekend or out all day long without finding dog sitters.  We can't stay inside when it's piss raining or a snow storm or Hurricane Sandy. We can't come home after work and drop on the couch and have a nap.

We also have clean his feet off every time he comes inside and when he plays in the afternoon he is often covered in sand/mud so we have to hose him off in the bath and dry him which takes at least half an hour, if all goes smoothly.

And walks with him at the moment aren't a piece of cake.  He has started to lunge at people/dogs when he is on leash or bark at dogs he can't meet.  It's super embarrassing and we are trying to deal with it but it adds so much time and stress to our walks.   And he tries to eat everything we pass on the street.  It's so annoying.

Don't even get me started on the money issue.

The last thing that I hate about owning a dog is the guilt.  I constantly feel like I don't spend enough time with him, or that he is unhappy in his life with us, or when we move, he won't have the same access to the beach and off-leash play and his friends here, or when we have kids, he will be ignored, or that we leave him alone too much, etc.  It's constant. I KNOW he has a great life.  I KNOW he is happy.  But I always have that nagging voice in the back of my head.

But, when I even think about giving him away, for even a split second, I get so sick, my heart breaks and I know I can't.  He is a member of our family.  He loves us and we love him.  We're stuck together.

And maybe I don't regret him, but maybe I regret the loss of freedom and the increase of responsibility that he represents.  Maybe we are just two people who don't want to be tied down.

It doesn't matter.  He is here, we love him.  But I know I'm not the only person who thinks this.  Maybe just the only person who will publicly admit it!

PS He just farted...

Hate/Love List - February 2012

One of my biggest character flaws (or so people tell me) is that I am a big time hater.  I love to hate.  It's so easy and love doing it.

But since my husband (and my mom) hates that I hate, I thought that I would work on it.  I was originally going to post things I hate each month, but I thought to make it even and to silence my critics, I would include things I am loving (because I do love things as well).

I'm hating:

• inconsiderate neighbours.  The lady upstairs that is stupid loud with her singing, and her fat cats running around at 2 am, and throwing food out of her window that ends up on our window sill and starts to mold or on the grass and then Cooper goes nuts trying to eat it.  Or the one who blasts terrible rap from six years ago out of his windows for three hours straight.  Or the one who's guests park in our spot, that we pay for. JERKS!  Apartment living sucks sometimes. 

• not having money.  Kurtis and I are trying to save for a house (see above) and we are on a TIGHT budget.  We kinda blew it over Christmas and then neutering Cooper and then on an AQ course I am taking and then again on Valentine's Day, so I'm feeling very guilty AND poor.

• the weather.  It's February.  Enough said.

• online courses.  I'm taking an ESL course so I can get bumped up on the pay scale.  The course itself isn't terrible, but we have to do three tasks a session and each session lasts about three days so it's a crap load of busy work.  And some of the responses from my classmates make me want to vomit on my keyboard because they are so convoluted. And the assignments are such a waste of time.  One assignment was to reflect on my posts so far and give myself a level 1, 2, 3, or 4.  Gag me.  I'll write a post on hating rubrics and levels 1-4 next time.

I'm loving:

• that my favourite TV show, The Block, is back on! It is a renovation show from Australia and it makes us feel like we are back living in Australia.  My little dose of summer and warmth in February!  I stream the episodes here. 

• chocolate chip cookies.  It's my number one comfort food.  I eat one a day, at least, unless we run out.  And cookie-less days are terrible days. My mom makes the best, but I usually buy mine from the Loblaws' bakery. 

• Pinterest.  I used to hate Pinterest.  That was before I gave in and actually tried it. I heard about Pinterest after my wedding and I was over wedding planning and I thought Pinterest sounded like something dumb girls did when they wanted to overexpose their dreams and blah blah blah.  I tried it over the summer and I am an addict.  This was one thing I hated for no reason.  You can check my Pinterest here. 

• sheets.  I used to only sleep with my comforter and my husband is a sheet + comforter person.  We have these amazingly comfortable jersey sheets that I enjoy through the drop sheet and pillow cases, but I never bought into the sheet + comforter thing, that is until a few nights ago.  It was really cold and I was really tired and I added a sheet into the mix and man it was awesome! But I have to be in the mood.