Yesterday a friendly and smiling and Hello Ma'am-ing cop showed up at my door to inform me that the house next door had been broken into. "They lost a coupla tvs," he told me. "Didja hear anything?"

(I've noticed, lately, that I'm getting a lot of "Ma'am" from people. I am not sure how I feel about this. I'm not yet old enough to really enjoy my ( Read more... )

Yesterday Riley and I went to the new place to clean the refrigerator. Well. I went to clean the refrigerator. Riley went for moral support and also to play with her softball. I try not to give myself too many things to do at once when I'm hurt****, and cleaning and reassembling a refrigerator (from a closed box with a pile of dead shelves at ( Read more... )

There may be something mildly wrong with me ( Read more... )

A sonic boom will make Riley do the Scooby Doo Scramble. A second one will just make her stare at me somewhat tiredly, as though I am a bad monkey for letting the sounds continue. if this happens when I am dazed and sleepy, I will somehow totally discount the honking big military base right down the street and think that a car drove into a house ( Read more... )

Fun things to do with the dog on a sunny winter's day. Jowls and ears a-flappin'!


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Today I took Riley to the groomer's to get her claws clipped & ears cleaned out. The place was really busy, so Riley was spooked - when the lady took her to the back, she started shivering, put her ears down, and kept looking back at me. I offered to help, so I held her and itched her butt while she was clipped and cleaned ( Read more... )

Riley woke me up with a lot of fuss and bother and saliva around 8AM today. (Today is Saturday, this is so wrong.) I stumbled out of bed and went to pee and put on some pants and found some shoes so I could take her out, because usually when she wakes me like that she wants out ( Read more... )

Riley took on Godzilla the other night. This Godzilla. And Riley won ( Read more... )

I just spent ten minutes in the tub with a soaped-up Riley, rubbing her back and singing Beatles songs at her. As near as I can estimate, ten minutes of Beatles is the first half of 'I Am The Walrus,' and then all of 'With A Little Help From My Friends' and 'Yellow Submarine,' complete with whistling and onomatopoeia for the musical interludes. ( Read more... )

Fifteen minutes ago I was in a small concrete-block room, with a window unit, surrounded by cages. I was on my knees on the floor, bent over something somewhat less than stable. The place was a tiny little dog-groomer's. The less than stable thing was Riley, who very much wanted to properly greet the woman who was trying to trim her nails, and ( Read more... )