Huxley and the reason puppies are worse than babies

So most of you know that we have been having a hard time with the neighbor below us who just moved in. If you didn't know that then you do now! She complained about our dogs barking all day while we were at work. They barked because we had them kenneled or sectioned off in the hallway. Schnauzers don't really do well in confined spaces. So to appease our neighbor we decided, Huxley is doing well with potty training, what could possibly go wrong? Cleaning up pee and poo isn't really that difficult on hardwood floors but chewing on our furniture isn't so nice. Especially when it's *as Jaime would say* Italian Leather Furniture... or as Jaime actually did say "Your dog owes me $12,000". Bummer.
Just so you know the dog didn't chew the leather, he chewed the wood around it which we are still deciding on. I've been sanding and staining back to look like normal, Jaime would rather I hire a wood-crafts-man to re-carve us some furniture. Since we hardly had enough money for groceries I think that the staining might have to work for us for a few years until I can get my own savings account.
Huxley had a doctor's appointment where he patiently got his nails clipped and a needle stuck in his butt. He's a very calm dog in the right circumstances. We explained to our vet what was going on, we can't kennel him because he barks so dad gum much but we can't leave him out because he chews on everything. She then spoke the wise words of wisdom that I am anxious to try... before you leave feed him one tablespoon of Baby Benedryl and put him in his crate in a different room than the other dog so they don't upset each other. Drug him!? Genius! We promptly went to the drug store, bought our benedryl and then got a crate for him. No more hallway for Huxley. Jaime told Huxley while we shopped that it's not that he's a bad dog, it's that he doesn't know any better.
The point, you may ask, of the title is this. Jaime and I both had to leave this evening to run errands or play Gears of War II.. I'll let you figure out who did what. I was going to be gone no more than 45 minutes. Jaime and I decided we should try out the crate! So we put a towel and an old T-shirt in there with some toys and bribed Huxley in. He didn't really have a problem with it. I then shut the door to the walk in closet, turned our TV on in the bedroom and then shut that door. Turned the TV on in the living room and said bye bye to Churchill. Insert grocery shopping. When I got home I didn't hear much over the TV. When I got to the bedroom I could hear his faint pitiful cry. Churchill was super anxious about that. The one thing that really alerted me was the smell of poo... very strong smell of poo.
Babies poo. Everyone poos! But babies wear diapers. And usually babies don't spray poo all over the inside of their crate. Babies also don't tear out of said crate when you open the door and run around your apartment with poo on their feet. But you know what, in a perfect world this would have happened on a night when our water actually worked. Too bad we had no water. I sat for the next hour on the couch with a sheet on it with a poopy dog while the bath tub filled up drip by drip. I also made some cookies and planted some ivy in planters on the porch but mostly I remember the dripping of the faucet and the smelly smelly puppy crying on the couch.
Gross.
Jaime cleaned out the crate because he is my savior and I took a picture of the poo bag just to prove how messy it was. And while I was writing this entire entry my wonderful husband was pacing the apartment saying "It smells like poo" only he used a different more special word. I quite agree.
No matter how innocent he looks it's all a lie.

Anniversary Fever!

So this past week my husband and I celebrated our second year anniversary, and our third year of being together. This is the longest I've ever been with someone but we aren't even close to beating that record for my husband. Eh.. 6 more years, what gives?
Happy Anniversary us!Only we didn't make out.. not really. We had tons of other stuff to do!!! We made up for it later though.. trust me. I don't need to give you the gooey details.
So two years ago we were married. It was a beautiful July day, the 21st, and it was the best decision of my life. Here are a few pictures to take you down memory lane! Our first stop would be the dressing room where we're getting ready. I like this one because it's all behind the scenes and what not, plus Laura and I look fetch.


This next one is just a demonstration of my modeling capabilities, just to show you how photogenic I am. Plus my parents are doting over me and I'm loving it. Aren't my parents the best?!

This next one is all about my brother and sister in law. I often forget how silly my brother can be. I've always looked up to him and it's easy to remember his accomplishments of Ivy League schools and killer jobs but I like this picture because he's looking a bit silly. Take that Harvard. Plus his wife Lacy always says that she doesn't take good pictures but in this one she looks absolutely gorgeous even though my brother was pushing her into me/catching her. This is one of my favorite pictures.This one is where I threw my bouquet with a bit too much force and practically demolished Chandra and Rachel. They were two of the crowd that definitely did not want to catch it. Sorry ladies, but this makes for an awfully great photo. We all made up in the end anyway :) And neither of them are married yet so.. just saying.


This is where we realized that we weren't officially married since we forgot to sign the marriage certificate. So I was trying to track down our pastor to say.. could we like.. meet up with you and do that whole marriage thing? Sorry about that.

I mean, our bad. We got things squared away after that. Then I had a whole bunch of Lasagna! Jaime likes to refer to this as our party after the party... later we had the party after the party after the party.. and then we went on our honeymoon.

I have a picture from around our anniversary and this is what my love looked like then. Quite the man. I'm happy to say that when I found this picture I got a bit tingly in the hiny if you will. Want to know what we did this year on our anniversay?

This is what we did on our anniversary. Not for it, but for a friend's birthday. It just happened to fall on our 2 year date. We crack ourselves up way too much. It really is wonderful.
Just for the record, I beat him in bowling that evening and he still owes me a back massage. Did you read that Jaime? I love you.. rub my back.

Rappas

I promised that I would update with a picture of the last Rappas meeting I went to. I was super proud of myself at this meeting because it was the first time I played and was pleased with my performance. It's been a long time since I've performed for people and walked away happy about it. Russell Williams also said he thought my piece was one of the best. Thanks Russell, I know you're just saying that but I'm so gullible I just might believe you. So here is a picture of all the people that performed. I wore my Dorothy-Red shoes and I was equally impressed with Walter, to my left in the photo who wore a really unique and nerdy outfit. I asked him to turn my pages for me but he said he didn't have his contacts in so he could hardly see at all and that he was terribly sorry. He's one of my favorites since he thinks its ok to walk around blind and in T-shirts with nerdy phrases on them while everyone else talks about their grand pianos. He's there for the fun of it, not to impress anyone. I should learn a lesson from him. Point is, whenever I go to the Rappas meetings I try to find a seat near him. Time before last he let me hold his music while he played so I could follow along, I liked that. Thanks Walter for being so genuine.
The woman on the left has been playing through Bach's Italian Concerto and I always admire how hard she tries. I don't think she is a very gifted performer but she played the third movement through without using the music which in my opinion is very difficult. She's been working on it for so long, I was pleased to hear the third movment, even if it was a bit boring. The man to her right almost always plays Bach and this time he played the Partita in G and boy did I love it. I thought it wasn't as exciting as it could have been but who doesn't like that opening movement? Nobody! The man in the middle, Mr. Nicholas, hosted the evening and played a rag, about a ghost I think, by a contemporary composer I had never heard of before, Bolcom. Mr. Nicholas also made the Sangria.. thank you. The Bolcom was one of my favorites.

Enough piano talk, we need to get on to other things! I think I'm going to make several entries today to catch up from Anniversary and Vacation!

Donuts

Yesterday was our Anniversary and not only did we work all day long we also went bowling - I won a back massage, and had an Anniversary dinner at the Waffle House, totally the best Anniversary yet! While I'm trying to get my life back together after this crazy week I'll post a short segment on donuts. Because I love donuts.
Where I work the piano tuners come in about every week depending on business. Big Mike and Little Mike. They are actually Father and Son-in-Law and are a heck of a good time to hang out with. For the past few months Mike (Big Mike) would bring food with him from Shipley's a local donut hang out. AKA Heaven. It was one of the first dates my husband and I went on, chocolate milk and donuts from Shipleys... *sigh*. Ok back to the story. So Mike has started bringing in food for us Sheet Music Department people. First it was just... we bought an extra sausage biscuit and a donut, you guys want it? Now it's being hand delivered with lines like "just so you know we still love you" while I know he was thinking... 'even though you sold my humidifier for half price'. (It was an honest mistake on my part and I think we worked things out.) Today I got into work early and was practicing on one of the 'big pianos' in the back when in walked Mike and Mike! Hand delivered chocolate glazed donuts and Bach go together really well in my opinion. Plus David, the guy I work with got his choice of Sausage or Ham this morning and when I opened my bag to get my donut out there was not one, but two! I literally said outloud "Holy Cow!" even though no one heard me.
Our local newspaper did a report on Mike so I snuck a picture of the donut giver onto my blog here:
Now because of this kind man we all look forward to the day the piano tuners are here. And to be honest it's not just the donuts. I actually find the sound of pianos being tuned rather cathartic. It's like taking something unruley and wacked out and making it straight, tuned, and peacefull which to me is a very relaxing thing to listen to. But I also like donuts. A lot.

This is why I shouldn't wait very long between posts!

So many things to share! I'm all backed up! For good reason though, I've had lots of things to do this week so I'll give you a few highlights :)
First off while we were watching Dance Your Ass Off a cockroach showed up on the far wall. I hate roaches of any kind, especially the kind that are inside my apartment. Because they skitter around so fast it's almost impossible for me to catch them, except that amazing time that I jammed one in the sink drain. I left that one for Jaime to help clean up ;)
So we're watching this horrible TV show and the roach shows up crawling horizontal across the wall! Oh no!! So I tell Jaime, please kill it, find a way. It's like I watch it all over again in slow motion. He reached for one of my flip flops that were near by and while he was standing up threw it all the way across the room and JACK POT! One hit and he got him. I was literally speechless. I've never seen that kind of hand eye coordination before. He obviously didn't get it from the hours of video games he plays each day, maybe it's just natural talent. HR, his dad, says he throws a good punch. Well, I say he also throws a good flip flop.
Naturally I made him reenact this feat of greatness and I got a great picture to show you of what I would like to visualize what he looked like from the front.. the roaches view if you will.And here for your viewing pleasure is the corner on the other side of the room that he threw my flip flop at. Now that I look at that picture of him.. he's looking hot. (We've been lifting!)
This picture not only shows the corner where the roach came from, our lovely leather furniture, but also my oldest puppy Churchill (he's keeping an eye out for another roach) Plus our defective box of Cheerios. Here's the culprit, he dared show his face again, or it was a cousin or something, but before my husband threw another flip flop I clicked my camera.

On to other things. Lately I've taken up gardening and found I must have quite the green thumb. Who knew!? I now have seven pots full of very green things. I've got some ivy, one isn't looking good but the other is flourishing. I also planted transplants of philodendron in two hanging planters and they are really coming to life, even making new baby philodendron for my viewing pleasure! I planted lavender because I love the way it smells and Jaime's mother gave me some tomato plants. Those are still babies so I can't really report on their progress yet. HOWEVER! My greatest feat yet has been to plant some potatoes that we had that sprouted rather green eyes. I figured I'll put them in water and see if something happens. Well something did happen. Then they got their own pot! And this picture below ladies and gentlemen will show you what happens when you plant potatoes.Note the pj's that I was sporting = sexy. Those dear readers are baby potatoes. And there are about three more that I can see sticking out of the dirt. So I'm guessing that there are more out there that I don't know about yet! Those potatoes were getting busy. Well I just tucked those babies back down into the ground until I can get a bigger pot and maybe just maybe I'll be my own self sustaining potato farm. Awesome.

Ok last update for now. Aldous Huxley got his first hair cut and is now initiated into full grown puppy-dom. We're very excited and he really does look precious. The groomer was super impressed too, saying that he was the calmest dog she's groomed and please bring him back all the time and while I'm at it here's my card. I was proud, Huxley you did me proud. So I'll leave you with two thoughts.
One, Jaime and my two year anniversary is this Tuesday and we are celebrating on Saturday. I can't say what I'm getting him because he reads this blog but I think he got me something to do with our bed, pillows? Mattress?! Probably not. Sheets?! A new comforter?! Who knows, all I know is that it has to be made of cotton and I'm not giving any clues as to what I'm getting him but it kicks ass.
Two. I thought you would like to see little Huxley, so here he is in all his hair cut splendor. He's learning to sit right now but wouldn't sit for the camera. We'll work on that part.

Piano cults and video games

This past Friday I went to a meeting with some fellow pianists. We're in a group called Rappas, but I'm not sure what that name means. My husband calls it the piano cult. I call it the elites. Because all we've played on so far have been Steinways and nothing against Steinway, I'm sure that they are a good piano company and I know they've been around since forever and they are super expensive and stuff but I just don't like them that much. So sue me. Whenever we get to the host's house or destination (Steinway store) the members are ooohhh ing and ahhhhh ing 'What kind do you have?' to which the host answers 'This is a Steinway L'. Well damn! A Steinway L? I mean.. my Yamaha U1 is pretty impressive and you know what I like the best about it? The keys actually press in all the way and it's what I would like to call 'responsive'. Ok so I have beef with Steinway. I get to host in September and you know where we're going to have it? Where I work. And where I work doesn't have any new Steinways. I'm going to show the Elite Rappas Piano Cult what it feels like to play on a Schimmel and you know what? They will probably all be like.. ehh this isn't that great. One man's trash is another man's treasure. Just don't think you'll impress me if you say you own a Steinway. I'll be like... so you spent 50 grand on some neato living room furniture? Cool.
On the other hand I got my nerve up to play for this wonderful group of people. I played the Allemande and Courante of Bach's French Suite No. 6 in E Major. It was pretty good and I think the people were alright impressed. Plus I got to drink two glasses of home made Sangria!

Jaime on the other hand got to go spend the evening with our college friends. They ate out at Ichiban and Jaime, being the wonderful amazing husband that he is, ordered me fried rice and brought it home to me. I ate that at work on Saturday. Yum!
After the Elitist Piano cult meeting I drove over to our friends house where everyone was congregated after the dinner and listened to them all tell those wonderful stories that you love to hear about the good old days. My husband and a friend named Keith and another friend, Austin, tell such funny stories. I sat in my husbands lap on a recliner and laughed and laughed. Honored the whole time to not only be with the most handsome man in the room but the funniest. He's like a god among our college friends, the man, the myth, the legend. I wanted to run home and make sweet hot love to him but we promptly fell asleep :) The happy kind of asleep where you wake up in the morning all wound up in each other's arms and legs all smiley faced and stuff. It was gooey and it was good.

Huxley is a peeing machine. He recently peed all over our leather ottoman. I cleaned it up don't you worry! But wow, it was like a liter of pee. I didn't know puppies had that much pee in them. Recently he's had like 12 different accidents including having to change the sheets twice. It's so weird. He's never peed on the bed before. I'm starting to think he has a problem.

I've been playing Oblivion again, after almost a year's break and I'm really happy about playing it . I'm always so focused on getting something done like housework that I never think I have time to play xBox but lately I've set aside the time. I missed it. But when those Orgs came running out at me in the hidden passageways I freaked out a little and the dogs got upset and Jaime laughed at me. I'm just a little bit sensitive. I don't take suspense well. But I do like to mess around near it.
I'll try to get pictures up of the Rappas evening, they will be posted soon online. Figured you would like an update before those finally showed up though :)

Red Beans and Rice

Today has marked a very important date in Huxley history. He is now too big to run and hide under our chairs, couches, and cedar chest. In his attempt to get away from Chuchill this morning I found Huxley's back end sticking out from the side of the cedar chest with the big dog just staring at it puzzled. I guess he does seem a little bit bigger to me. I got a great picture of them cuddling which they do from time to time.
I also made the mistake of trying to cook for my husband a traditional southern meal. (A mistake I often make at the expense of my humility) This time Jaime asked for 'Red Beans and Rice'. I was like.. please! That's so easy a monkey could do it. We have rice all the time and we both like black beans, so how hard is it to mix in the red beans? I even remembered without writing it down (a huge feet for me, just ask my husband) to buy a can of red beans at the store next time I went. When my husband came home from work he found this waiting on him.

Note the water splatters on my shirt, I was cooking hard. And I obviously missed the point of Red Beans and Rice. Apparently it isn't just rice and red beans. Who knew? According to a recipe you have to have junk like garlic and other veggies, and even chicken stock. Sheesh, these southern people really need to get things straight. Shrimp and Grits? It's not as simple as you think it sounds. Red Beans and Rice? Get a life. Well let me tell you that we did have red beans and rice, only it was just red beans and rice.. and some really nice asparagus that Jaime thought was "too salty!". Right before we ate I got a shot of this adorable family. It's a pity that their eyes look like little lasers.
In other news I not only did the dishes, one and a half loads of laundry, vacuumed but I also washed the hardwoods. Our apartment couldn't feel any cleaner, unless I changed the sheets on the bed. There is always something to clean. And for those of you who are curious, I had yogurt tonight instead of ice cream and I've got a little tupperware container ready to freeze over night. Frozen. Yogurt?! Woah.

Upper Body Champ!

Just wanted to drop in and say, yesterday I bench pressed the bar for the first time ever. Two sets of 12 too. That's 45 pounds that my measly arms lifted a total o 24 times. Go. Me!

Working out does wonders for optimism!

I woke up at an ungodly hour this morning. 5:15 am to be precise but I'm in such a good mood because of it. Who knew? I got to the gym early and did a one mile run to warm up before Yoga. I've done that once before and don't know why I don't make it a weekly habit. My time was closer to 11 minutes per mile which is fast for me. (I'm totally happy to be called the world's slowest runner) Yoga was about average this morning, I was trying not to push myself too far since I want to do weights tonight. My arms get really tired when I hold them up too long, gee I'm so weak! Then after Yoga I did 1.5 miles very slowly, like 12:30 pace with five minutes to walk afterward and lots of stretching. Stretching being my favorite and the bane of my husband's existence.
Since earlier this week I did 2.5 miles I figured doing another 2.5 would help even things out. Five miles so far this week? Way better than last week already! Looks like ten miles is totally do-able for the week. I wish it was easier to get my endurance up, what I wouldn't give to run 3 or 4 miles a few times a week, my weekly mileage would shoot through the roof!
So I ran, did my Yoga, and here I am at work and I've already practiced for about 30 minutes. Take that Beethoven. You won't be the master of me! Because of this crazy endorphin based good mood of mine I'm an invincible pianist. An invincible pianist who wants a milk shake.

I've had this obsession with ice cream lately that I really need to nip in the bud. Today my rule is, you want ice cream? Here's some yogurt. Oh and because I'm the blond that I am, driving home from working out this morning I put two and two together. Frozen Yogurt... Frozen. Yogurt. I can do that at home? Is it really just frozen yogurt? Is that what it would taste like if I froze my Yoplait? Holy cow why didn't someone break this down for me earlier?!

In other news I'm trying to figure out new hair do's while growing out my own. Today is the hot curler look which not only gives me amazing volume but according to my adorable wonderful husband makes me look like a 1940's movie star! Sweet!

The fourth of July wasn't as climactic as I would have hoped but we did get some good firework time in on Friday night. We spent the weekend with Jaime's mother in Nauvoo, Alabama (wow Nauvoo) is there anything else I need to say? I got some pictures of Jaime grilling out, cutting up watermelon, and Huxley trying to eat the watermelon. I also think there is a good shot of Dixie, Jaime's mother's dog, who I figure is possessed. Such unnatural sounds come from that little dog that she can't be normal.On another note we threw away four trash bags of my old stuff that was cluttering up the closet. I guess it was finally time to let go of some stuff. The longer we are married the less stuff from my past I end up holding onto which I guess is how it should be. I mean, you can't take it with you and really it's not that important anymore. Like my Easter dress from 1993? We don't really need that now, even though my mom did make it. And all my journals from when I was an angsty teenager? Well.. we kept those although I don't know what the heck we're going to do with them.


I think trading in those old things I don't keep up with now for more space to walk around in the closet is fair. And although we had a good timeish in Nauvoo I still missed my family gatherings in Wisconsin and to be completely honest I am sad that we didn't get together with more people. But I did get to drink horribly large amounts of Coke!Things that only happen in Nauvoo
1. You get to fish for catfish in any of four different catfish ponds (large enough to need a rowboat) in the safety of your back yard!!
2. The only restaurant in town is called 'The Slick Lizard'. Too bad it's closed on the 4th of July.
3. Your grandfather is constantly trying to sucker people down at the Dollar General into selling him their land including their trailer that is on said land.
4. The above grandfather keeps an average of 15 old luxury cars around just so one will always be running. We think he's finally found Honda and realized what 1970's Mercedes just can't offer him.
5. You can pick a whole bucket of Blackberries by walking down your driveway.
6. Rumor has it that kids burned down the highschool since they were tired of going. Now to be completely honest that was in Carbon Hill Alabama.. Nauvoo doesn't have a school system.. who needs a school system anyway.
7. Across your catfish ponds lives a real live bootlegger. Rumor has it that he has a sign on his driveway that says anyone caught tresspassing will be shot on the spot.. I'd believe it.
8. It's a dry county.
9. I got a really good shot of a larger lady's side boob in the checkout line of Bill and Son's grocery. I'm not sure if it was that she wasn't wearing a bra, or that the top was just too dad gum small.
10. That lady bought over $100 of ground beef, wrapped in plastic and dumped in cardboard bags. I wonder if she was expecting company.

The Alma Mater

Today after much hemming and hawing Jaime and I took the boys down to our Alma Mater for a good run around. Huxley ate leaves and Churchill drank fountain water. Such civilized little creatures.We went out for mexican food and there were what seemed like hundreds of little children running all over the place. These were the kind of kids that you don't like in multiples of one much less tens of them. I think I've decided that I am the kind of person who doesn't like other peoples kids. Everything that they did annoyed me and every word out of their tiny dirty food covered mouths sounded like they were talking through a megaphone. Bleh. I mean, don't get me wrong, I look forward to having our own child someday but these kids were horrible. I hope I don't hate my friend's kids (Sorry Pregnant-Lindsey!). I'm pretty sure that they will be ok. Which also made me think of the kids at church on Sundays. Every female child under the age of five had a bow in her hair. EVERY. ONE. OF. THEM. Gross. I will seriously have to contemplate our church desicion if we are going there when we are pregnant.
Enough baby talk.
So today is a moody weird bad day. I think it's because I haven't run in a long time. I haven't lifted since the weekend and because this weekend is a holiday it looks like I won't lift then either. I'm going to have some major running to do on Sunday evening and trust me, I'm looking forward to it.
Since I'm in a bad mood I'll post something that really bugs me. The online journal's I've read about runners sounds like they just put on their gear and go. Me? I have to drive for fifteen minutes to find a safe rather non hilly place. I'm so jealous I could spit. If I did run straight from our apartment I would have three rather detrimental hills to conquor plus I'll have to run through little mexico and we all know how liberal those hispanics are with their come hither whistling. Not what I want to hear around mile two. So poo on you fellow online bloggers who can just walk outside your front door and take off.

Another one seriously?

First I started out with Xanga... then too many people infiltrated it and someone actually tried to witness to me by posting comments to my entries. Even if I wasn't already 'saved' posting comments on my blog isn't going to do it for me so, no thanks. Then I decided that I would get smart and get a Wordpress account because hey, that sounds nifty and smartish. Well it's actually really nice but I started writing really deep things.. and I figured that if I was going to start a blog that other people would actually read it might need to be along the lines of PG-emotionally. Not that emotions are a bad thing, just saying. Plus I'm a blog whore and I've read countless blogs while *at work* and the majority of them are blogspot.com blogs. This way I can have my own, leave some cute comments, and the people I stalk can now stalk me.
The title of my blog is Here We Go Go Go because I once had a student who wrote me a "book of pomes", pretty sure that was supposed to be poems but hey, she was a first grader. Several of the poems ended in 'Go go go!' so I figured it fit. Plus, I'm what I call a novice runner so I really do try to 'go go go' and I'm about to finish up my second year of marriage in a town I didn't grow up in so both of those things do fall under the category of my life go go going if you will.
Enjoy. I'll update as often as I can.
I recently read a blog of someone who updates almost everyday and included pictures and I really liked that idea so I'm going to do it too! I don't know how yet but I'm going to do it.
So this is me and Aldous Huxley who always looks a little down in the dumps. This picture could also be titled "Check out my BLING!"