Like a Fish Out of Water.

Once upon a time, about 2 weeks ago, a family moved from Philadelphia to the coastal town of Portland.  Since the father’s new work would only pay for a U-Haul (*NOT MOVERS*), the family schlepped all their belongings the best they could in the back of a 26 Ft truck.

uhaul

The youngest daughter’s beloved goldfish were of course making the trip too,

sunnyblackie2

safely snuggled inside the *protective glass cocoon* of their aquarium.

The family’s trip began swimmingly, fueled by gasoline and a dozen Dunkin Donuts. But round about Marlborough Massachusetts, the mother – driving behind the U-Haul in the family car – began to notice water dripping from the back of the truck.  Frantically, she tried calling the father.  But the deafening road noise of the uncomfortable U-Haul thwarted her attempts for MILES.  By the time the father realized what had happened, the family was nearly to Maine.  And soon they were there, opening the back of the truck and confirming their worst fears.  The aquarium had indeed shattered and was completely devoid of water.  The little girl was devastated.

Until Goldfish #1 was found… ALIVE!!!!!!! After two hours without water, being jostled at the bottom of a glass-laden fish tank, Lil’ Blackie was still clinging to life!  The father whisked him TOUT DE SUITE upstairs to the (relative) safety of the only bowl available in the apartment BESIDES THE TOILET.  The dog’s food dish.  Although shaken just this side of the pearly gates and visibly worse for the wear, miracle fish BLACKIE was still gulping for breath and rallying as each moment passed.

BUT. what of the SECOND FISH>??  What about _SUNNY_?!

Do not lose heart, friends.  Despite the fact that Disney did NOT write this one, there still remains a happy ending.  Although the initial search for Sunny proved fruitless, and the family believed they would stumble upon her lifeless body beneath one of the soggy boxes, that’s NOT WHAT HAPPENED>.  No.  B/c as the mother attempted to lift the shattered remains of the aquarium out of the truck, Sunny POPPED out of the inner workings of a DECORATIVE PAGODA!!

pagoda

Everyone GASPED! And the father squealed like a girl as he giddily ran the fish upstairs.  Although Sunny appeared to have survived a blender cycle on Frappe, she was otherwise just fine. After being transferred to the red thermos cooler overnight, by the next afternoon, both fish were pronounced Stunned, but Swimming.  And by the following day, they’d been upgraded to STABLE and safely relocated to their new home.

tank

Not so unlike the rest of the family.

The End.

The Bissell Pet Hair Eraser

Every single upright vacuum I’ve ever owned has SUCKED, and not in the way it should. No matter how many belts I’ve changed, how many clogs I’ve unplugged, how much FREAKING HAIR I’VE UNWOUND, each and every one of them has failed.

You buy a vacuum. It looks good. It works well for a (short) period of time. And then SOMETHING HAPPENS. I do not know what precisely this IT is. But afterward, it will vacuum no more. Sure, the machine will push the dirt around, pretending to vacuum, but we both know it’s not picking anything up. Eventually the burning smell grows too strong to stand and the no-suck sucker gets shoved to the curb.

My parents, and now my own family, have experienced the heartache of crappy vacuums too many times to recall. My folks have sent countless vacuums to the repair shop, to no avail. Two years ago, out of desperation, my husband & I decided to use a shop vac exclusively. On the plus side: it works.  Unfortunately, it’s also freight-train heavy, cumbersome in size and indiscriminate in suction.  The shop vac’s superpower doesn’t wane, but frankly MINE DOES. Which makes cleaning more than once every 2 weeks an impossibility unless I want to be crippled.

But we have a LOT of pets. And we have kids. All of which are dirty. Our dog Max, for instance, has some sort of “seasonal” allergy which lasts roughly 348 days of the year.  This “problem” (for lack of a better word) leaves him an itchy, flaky, balding, stinking mess and our floors looking like a Head & Shoulders/Rogaine user’s most soul-shuddering nightmare. As you can imagine, Max is going through a particularly bad patch right now, leading to my thinking about this cleaning dilemma a lot.  If our vacuum weighed less than 75 pounds and was smaller than a kitchen table, I could use it more frequently.

So yesterday I went to BJs and I picked myself up a vacuum.

HOLY CRAP!!  I thought when I saw it.  THIS is IT.  I barely read the rest of the box; PET HAIR ERASER was enough for me. I looked at the price. Not cheap at $139.99 – but way cheaper than the $500 FREAKING DOLLAR DYSON right beside it. I wasn’t terribly optimistic, knowing how many times I’ve been had by other vacuums. But anything was better than hauling that shop vac up & down the stairs one more time.

My husband put it together last night, and had it working in minutes. I vacuumed one room and watched with pleasure as the canister filled with gray filth. I pushed that beautiful vacuum up and down our floors, gazing as it gobbled detritus like dessert, hairballs spiraling like a cyclone. OH! Pet Hair Eraser, where have you been all my life??

As I vacuumed, my heart filled with joy.  B/c my floors were clean. I could walk across them w/out leaving footprints.  The soles of my shoes were not plastered with hair.  I was FREE.

I vacuumed the whole first floor last night.  NO back-breaking labor.  No hunching over – dragging the damn shop vac throughout the house.  Today I brought my new Pet Hair Eraser upstairs and vacuumed the 2nd and 3rd floors.. WITHOUT BEING ASKED!!!!!  My husband – God Bless him – I know he did not marry me for my cleaning skills.  But he is gonna be LOVING ME MORE THAN EVER!  NOW That our home has been liberated from dander.

THANK YOU Bissell Pet Hair Eraser with Dual Cyclonic Action and extra long cord!!

Thank you for making me so very HAPPY!

Ladies & Gentlemen, may I introduce the greatest pet-hair-sucking-up machine ever: The Bissell Pet Hair Eraser.  Long May It Live. (PS: Click that link. The TV commercial for this thing is seriously funny.)

A washer, a dryer, & a couple of cats.

Good morning all.  Today I need to get some things off my chest.  I know that life seems pretty peaches & cream here at the West Philly palatial estate, but let me tell you.  LIFE IS HARD.  At least when you like to complain.

Back in August we adopted two kittens. These kittens, Ziggy and Pepper, have now entered advanced *FRISKY* stage. So they spend most of each day shredding our leather furniture, hanging from the woodwork, killing countless potted plants and STALKING.  Just look at these photos.

Until recently, these reenactments of WILD KINGDOM had been tame.  But the altercations between Kiwi and the kittens have grown in intensity.  Yesterday I found my ox-pecking appendage of a bird cornered beneath a table on the back porch, the kittens primed for the kill.  Kiwi is so damn feisty and DUMB she actually FLEW DOWN TO THE FLOOR to have it out w/ them.  The bird is ornery.  She is jealous.  She REEAALLLLLLLLLY wants to kick their ass.  But if she doesn’t wise up soon, she’s gonna be 2 bites of meat for one of these cats.

We have tried a dozen different tactics.  Locking Kiwi in her cage – which she HATES.  Locking her in a room.  Which she HATES.  Locking the kittens in a room.  WHICH THEY HATE.  Letting them all range free – which they ALL LOVE but will lead to one or more deaths and/or maimings.  I have to face facts.  If we keep these cats, I will lose my bird.  and it will be ugly.

SO. Several months ago I posted about our dishwasher dying. WELL. Seems all our appliances have a 7-year life cycle, b/c wouldn’t you know? As of 3 weeks ago, our dryer’s done gone dead.  It was working fine – then BLAMMO.  Nada.  The thing just won’t turn on.  John has concluded the motor’s burned out.  And now, 3 wks later, the washer has joined it in solidarity. We’ve all heard of couples, when one partner dies, the other loses all will to live.  Apparently my washer-dryer were a match made in heaven.  No matter how hard I beg/plead/sweet talk to this machine, I trudge down to the basement umpteen times a day to find a tub full of water and half-washed clothes.  I fill the machine, run the sucker, and once it’s “done,” I check it.  Inevitably, the washer has somehow mysteriously completed the cycle w/out emptying.  HOW DOES IT DO THIS??  Go through spin w/out any spinning.  Or draining.  Or ANYTHING.

I know I am a throw-back to the 50s housewives of yore, But I love doing laundry.  LOVE IT. It is the ONE HOUSEHOLD CHORE (besides cooking) I enjoy.  I love the smell of fresh laundry.  The feel of it.  The sense of satisfaction only 5 baskets of neatly-folded clothing can bring.  And I love my laundry room.  Even though it’s down in the filthy basement where most people hate to go, it’s my home away from home – in my home.  I’ve hung the peeling walls w/ pictures drawn by my children.  Scenes of the African plain, animals, signs reading “I LovE you MoMMy, YOUR the BEST!”  It doesn’t get any better than that.  Rather than resent my family while I labor at their behest, I think fondly of them all.  My laundry room.  My happy place.  UNTIL NOW.  Now that both machines have broken.  BREAKING MY REVERIE.  Leaving me neither high, nor dry.

[polldaddy poll=1008910]

[polldaddy poll=1008921]

Does a dog sh*t in the woods?

I am a city dweller. and I have a 150 lb. dog.

Having such a big dog in the city requires due diligence. I have to keep him leashed. I have to watch him. And I have to pick up his crap WITHOUT FAIL. If my dog Max leaves even the barest trace of doodie on the sidewalk, I address the situation. So no unsuspecting soul will fall afoul. City sidewalks – as I have mentioned before – are busy places. People walk on them. Children play on them. And yes, dogs do their business on them. The city sidewalk may be a dog’s toilet. But everyone needs to flush. So, w/out fail, I curb my dog.

Having a big dog in the city requires additional planning when it comes to exercise. Our virtually nonexistent and unfenced yard is simply insufficient to meet Max’s needs. We joined a local dog park to allow for off-leash playtime. But Max likes to walk. Really WALK. So once or twice a week I take him to a local nature refuge for a 4-mile hike through the woods.

Yesterday morning we went to the refuge.  The walk had barely begun when we encountered an older woman coming toward us on the path.  GOOD MORNING! I exclaimed cheerfully.  HOW ARE YOU?  To which she acidly replied, “I’d be better if you’d pick up your dog’s poop.”

Well. Hold the PHONE.

As detailed above, I am fastidious when it comes to feces. NEVER would I leave crap near an unsuspecting foot! But when I take my dog to the woods, we are not on a public street.  We are on a trail. We are not someplace where an infant may pick up a turd and stick it into his or her mouth.  Where someone’s $500 pumps may be ruined. We are surrounded by the natural world. And I do not allow Max to ever dump on the trail itself. Oh no. But I do not see any problem w/ him pooping on the side in the grass and leaves. After which I take whatever large stick is handy and push/scoop/or fling said poop out into the woods – where it will not harm a soul.

I am not talking about letting my dog poop on a playing field.  Where children or lovers – or anyone – would be meandering.  That is just plain gross. But the only meanderers in this case would in fact be deer.  Or groundhogs.  Foxes, snakes, turtles, rats, birds.  YOU GET MY POINT! And no living soul is picking up their scat in plastic baggies to deposit in the trash. As I responded to the woman yesterday, it is natural. Left there, excrement (my dog’s included) will decompose and return to the earth. It is recycling in its most primitive form. Something beautiful in its perfection and simplicity.

She tried to explain to me that the ecological burden on the wildlife refuge is great enough. I have been visiting this refuge for 11 years. The acres are sandwiched between the city, I-95, and the airport. Oil pipelines run beneath it. The burden is great but the burden is ALL MAN-MADE. I simply fail to see how dog poop is going to push this land over the precipice.

There is nothing natural about bagging poop. Nothing. Though I do it, living in the city, w/out fail or hesitation. WHY? Because it is a matter of courtesy and b/c it is the law. But in the woods? No. I will not pick up poop. I will not. B/c it doesn’t make sense. If left to the air, excrement will decompose naturally w/in weeks or days. It is a matter of natural recycling. What is UNNATURAL is picking it up, sealing it into a bag, and placing it into a trash can. Where it will have to be picked up by a waste truck, carried miles to a landfill, to be dumped and sit festering for years to come. Where it will not easily – if ever, decompose. THAT, to me, is insanity.

I may be the only person thinking this, but I do not care. B/c in my heart it makes sense. In my mind, every dog has a right to take a crap on the soil and not feel like he or she is doing something wrong. I for one have pooped right there in the refuge behind a bush and I didn’t blink twice. WHY? B/c I had to go. And when nature calls, I answer.

Monday morning cuteness: ZIGGY & PEPPER

I DARE YOU to BEHOLD THE CUTENESSSSS!!!!!!!!!

ZIGGY and PEPPER. Ziggy’s the fuzzy peach tabby on the left and Pepper’s the lil sleepy gray girl on the right. The blonde one in the middle is of course my older daughter Maddie.

Our good friend Erika found the kittens (along w/ the rest of the litter) about 2 wks ago, abandoned in a park near her home. And…. what sick sonnavabitch can RESIST A KITTEN. NOT ME!!!! OF COURSE NOT. My husband insists we are simply “fostering” them.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHHAHAHAHH!

Who’s he kidding? They’re ours for keeps. no give backs.