Inauguration weekend

I can't believe January is almost over. I'm just now realizing that it's 2009! I can only handle so much change at one time, you know.
Andrew and I drove to Maryland the night of the 16th. It was colder than bone chilling for most of the drive. The kicker was the stop at Midway on the PA turnpike. 0°. It was almost to cold for Raven, but noooo, she's a Canadian dog who was born to swim to shore with a fishnet in her mouth. So, walking we went, across the parking lot, I went pigeon toed, she had 4 paw drive. ..get it? She peed. Victory! And we ran back to the car before my paws froze. I felt a little guilty for not letting have some water at that stop, but I think it woulda been a little dumb to refill her tank, only to have to empty it once again in BRRR chilly weather!

Saturday morning we drove to McLean, VA for a family event. Since we were so close to DC, we stopped there and posed for several Kodak moments while Meredith drove the bus around monuments. We froze, headed home armed with PrObama stuff and we were happy. We came home to play a round of Apples to Apples and I saw a side of Missy I'd never seen before. What a breath of fresh air that was! Short and stout....pffft!

Sunday...Let's just say Go Cardinals! Every living thing in that house was wearing purple to watch the game. But it wasn't enough to take us to the Superbowl. I blame our loss on Jimmie for calling his Steelers fan of a sister and allowing bad ju-ju to seep into the house. Sorry Jimmie. Take one for the team next time and step outside to make that call!

Monday...was a blur. I don't remember Monday. I musta slept through it.

We watched the inauguration on Tuesday and headed west on Wednesday. We made a pit stop in Frederick for some emergency PB&J and playtime with H&K.
Whew. We always cram so much into our trips, and it amazes me everytime that we come out of it alive.

Andrew modeling his Dad's hat. Pretty sharp, I think. Although, it looks a wee bit "Richard Petty-ish" to me.


You're not an American if you can't name this building. Ok, if you're 10 and can't name it. Cutie pies are the only exception.


Anna wondering where her Aunt Manda's eyes are, while I'm trying to show Andrew how to take a picture. And we end up with this.


Yummerific football cake! Thank you Chris and Missy!


Two clowns, I'm married to the purple one.

I have purple hair.

Yes, I had this done on purpose. Yes, Andrew loves it, he thinks it's a tribute to Baltimore. Yes, it's permanent.
Yes, it's awesome and it makes me feel younger than 27. Ugh. I'm in my late twenties. When did that happen?
My natural color is on top and the new color is on the bottom, so no roots will show when it starts to grow out. My hair grows almost an inch a month, so paying to maintain my roots is like throwing money right down the shower drain. Wasteful.











GO RAVENS!!

The New Year's Eve stray pupperoni

Raven's watching you!



Setting the scene:
At about 8pm on December 31st, some teenage girls found a puppy sleeping in the street. Thinking she was already dead, they slowly walked towards her and discovered she was only resting before another long night under the cold Ohio sky. They picked her up and walked to the nearest house. The man there said "Take her to that house with the black Lab statue on the front porch, they'll know what to do."
At this point, Andrew is telling me how much he loves Raven and would eventually love to have a second dog like her, a buddy for her to play with. This is how the rest of the night unfolds...
Andrew and I were setting up for our own New Year's Eve festivities: I was vacuuming the dining room rug, and he was cleaning up in the kitchen. All was quiet as a mouse (except for the vacuum..) until Raven told us there was someone at the door. I peeked outside, and who do I see? A 13 week old pupster, loving eyes peering at me. The 2 girls explained what had happened and how they could not take her for the night. So we swapped phone numbers and they handed the puppy over, we agreed to keep our eyes and ears open for any leads on her owners. She had no collar, she was not spayed. No visible sign that someone was missing her. We set her up with food and water in a spare crate. She whined unless we held her and howled when she had to go outside. New years day, we made posters stating that a puppy was found in our neighborhood on 12/31/08, and to please call our home phone number if you think we might have your new dog. Armed with a tape gun and fear that we might never find her owners, we posted our signs at the 3 major intersections closest to where she'd been found. Our friends at PetsMart also listed her on their lost and found board. I also learned that 3 puppies just like our stray had been dropped of across the highway. It was becoming more and more clear that this sweet dog was a 'dump and run'. Out here, it's not uncommon for people to dump unwanted litters in a neighborhood on the other side of town. This way the pups are not recognized by the homeowners and the dog dumper never gets caught for throwing them away.
I took the pup to the vet on Friday. She needed a rabies shot, and I wanted to see if she had a micro-chip, No such luck. We kept asking neighbors if they knew someone who wanted a puppy. We had some prospects but they all fell through. So we kept the pup all weekend and enjoyed having her around. She played with Raven, didn't seem to care about the cats, and we discovered that she was an excellent snuggler. She was smart too, she brought us her empty food bowl to let us know it needed to be refilled and Raven taught her that to get a treat in this house, a doggy has got to sit.
Our good friend Julie lives across the street. She sent out an email Monday morning asking if someone, ANYONE wanted this little girl. If we didn't get an answer soon, she' have to go to the no-kill shelter that we support. I was not looking forward to doing that! Julie got one lonely reply to her mass email. One woman was interested and she and her fiance were willing to drive down here Monday night to meet (and possibly adopt) the pup. I called her right away, she said her fiance was acting like a 5 year old, jumping up and down, asking when they could get the dog.. So we met, they were amazing and I had no regrets about sending our New Year's Eve stray home with them. See? This wagging tail has a happy ending.

The true story of my life:

Amen.