A dog by any other name...

My parents gave one of their Australian shepherds to my grandparents today. Seamus (that's the dog) will love it there; they always have company, and he has already bonded with everyone who lives at the house and those who justed stopped by! It was almost like seeing a new dog today.

I mean, Seamus has always been a good-natured, slightly ditzy dog -- if he were human, he'd be the friendly California surfer who'd been hit on the head by his surfboard one too many times -- sweet, but not the brightest bulb. But he just blossomed with all the focused attention he got today. He's so used to our other Australian shepherd, Teagan, taking over everything -- butting in when Seamus wants to be petted, getting to the toys first, stealing Seamus's treats, etc. If Seamus were the laid-back surfer, Teagan would be that guy -- you know that guy, right? The one who always has to be the leader, and if someone else is chosen as the leader, he'll still act like he's the one in charge? That's Teagan.

Guess which dog I prefer? Yeah, I know, there's always going to be a dominant dog and the follower, blah-dee-blah, but I'm always rooting for the underdog. Except in baseball. The Cubs just need to give up now. It was sad at 50 years, tragic at 80. Now it's just pathetic and exasperating.

Whoa, sorry, my train of thought switched tracks. Where was I? Oh, yeah, dogs. Dogs are great. The end.

Inaugural post...

So here's the thing ... I wanted to create a blog, but I wasn't entirely sure what I would blog about. I was invited to join a private blog as a co-author, and I completed my first blog post today and realized, "Huh, this isn't that difficult." It's not as if every blogged word has to be gold. At this point, no one else is even reading it!

A rundown of my day so far -- I awoke, fed the dogs and cat, and then turned to the coffee maker. No coffee. Not a problem for most people, right? Well, my coffee tends to be either strong enough to float a horseshoe or so weak that you wonder if a little dirt was mixed in with your water -- not appetizing. So I called the common-sense hotline: my mom's cellphone. She explained that it's one scoop per two cups of coffee. Even I can do that. Of course, we'll see if I remember the ratio correctly next time.

Then I gathered all my stuff and headed for work ... after backing the car into a patch of sunlight so the film of ice would melt. I refuse to scrape my windshield in late March!

Above is a photo of a card I did for a recent team challenge on The Greeting Farm blog. I made this card while my nephews colored in some stamps. I actually (...dramatic pause ...) let them use my Copic markers. They were suitably impressed by the quality and were very responsible with them.

Tonight is "party night," so they'll be coming over for a sleepover/movie-watching/popcorn-eating/but-NO-Mountain-Dew extravaganza.

I learned my lesson last time. We finished off an entire 2-liter of Mt. Dew (admittedly, I drank most of it), and Nephew 1 totally tattled on me. No more Dew for him! They were bouncing off the walls. Of course, the candy, ice cream, pizza and popcorn probably didn't help. We'll stick with root beer this time, and maybe taper off on the rest. But it is supposed to be a party. Well, I'll compromise. They get candy or ice cream, not both. That's responsible and adult of me, right?