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Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Wordless Wednesday - Handsome Gimli



Things to do for 2011 - March update

An update on my 2011 list

1. Read More, nothing special, just reading.

2. Pay attention to my blog and post more - already started

3. Join BlogHer

4. Attend BlogHer 2011, wherever it is

5. Do what I need to do to get off one of my medications

6. Go to the Zoo - Spoke to a friend, we are going to go once the weather warms up.

7. Make a better attempt at brushing Gimli more than once a week

8. To achieve this, setup a grooming table in the laundry room - Started looking at grooming tables and reached out to a carpenter friend of mine.  Will be able to make a better decision in a few weeks.

9. Start expanding the list of meals that I can cook from memory

10. Start branching out and cooking different things, planning is key and laziness is no excuse

11. Eat more fruits and veggies

12. Cut my hair, and not just a trim either, goodbye long locks. - I did this!  See the post here: Hair today, gone tomorrow.

13. Get a 2nd corgi -Going to put out feelers in a few weeks!  The promise has me excited!

14. Learn to walk two of them properly

15. Improve Gimli’s recall

16. Make a Pooh Bear gingerbread house

17. See The Lion King stage show - bought tickets for June!

18. Continue with the No Complaint experiment - ongoing

19. Take more visits to The Arboretum and see our coyote friend again

20. Get off my butt and be more active -I've totally lapsed on this one.  I plan to pick it up again in a few weeks.

21. Play with Gimli in the snow - went out with him in February when we had snow, had a great time romping and wrestling in the snow.

22. Try to make a snow ‘animal’

23. Get more sleep -Getting better, but not quite to the level I want, still working on it.

24. Read Brene Brown’s book, The Gifts of Imperfection and apply it to myself

25. Woofstock? - Going in June.  YAY!

26. Parasailing @Castaway Cay - not happening as its cost prohibitive.

27. Discover local restaurants in my city

28. See the Tim Burton exhibit - Saw this 2/26.  I found myself wondering what other things Burton would have done if time and space warped and he met Walt Disney himself.

29. Go to the Animal mass with Jeannie

30. Make it to Trinidad to introduce Mike to the rest of my crazy family, hopefully I'll still be married by the time we return.

31. Go to the Winter Walk with your dog - Unfortunately, this was canceled due to a lack of attendees.  I am still on record and they've said they will try to hold it again in Feb/March etc, so we'll see.  If they choose to hold it again, I will definitely attend.

32. Start a new job - started Feb. 1st

33. Eat at a Summerlicious restaurant

34. Write a letter to Queen Elizabeth II for her birthday and include pictures of Gimli. -just realized I'm running out of time.  I need to get something done this weekend.

35. Lose anywhere from 5-10 lbs, I'm 122 lbs now.  Its deliberately vague as I'm really only striving to look better in my clothes.  I'm unsure if 5 or 10 lbs will do it, so starting off small. -working on it with eating better (cutting out a great deal of unhealthy food and doing Wii Fit.) I can already tell something's working, I now HAVE to wear a belt with jeans.

36. See Rammstein again - going to again in May when they return to Ontario!

37. Go to the Dog Jog - Went 3/27, had a great time!  Post coming in the next few days!

38. Stop playing that soul sucking MMO that Mike and I started together, but I've been left in the dust - Officially canceled my account.  Need to tie up some loose ends, but come 4/6 my account will be closed.  Then, uninstall.

39. Do the Toronto Zombie Walk and bring Gimli along with us.  I had aspirations of going in 2010, but it didn't happen.  I feel this year will be different and I'd like to do it!

40. Take a Photography class this year.

41. Speaking of photography, I was looking through my pictures tonight and I was saddened there aren't more pictures of Mike and I.  This needs to be rectified.

Hair today, gone tomorrow

I've had the same hairstyle for the past 10 years, perhaps more.  Black hair parted down the center, sort of like Morticia Addams, in varying lengths.

When I turned 30, it was like a light switch went off in my head.  All of a sudden I wanted to do things that I never did before and I started craving change.  Changing my hair was no different.

I hummed and hawed over the design. With my face shape, I didn't want to do the Pixie hair cut because I'd look like I was all face and no hair.  Not Good.  I didn't want to do a Bob either because my hair has a tendency to frizz and curl and it wouldn't look good with a Bob.  I also didn't want bangs.  I stayed away from them when I was a kid because all the clique-y girls had them and I wasn't going to be one of them.

I went to the Salon a few weeks ago and had a chat with the stylist.  She recommended I keep some length, but put in some layers to give it some shape as opposed to the straight cut across the bottom.  She agreed with me that the Pixie, Bob and bangs wouldn't suit me.

When asked why I had the same hair for so long, I responded that I was lazy, which is the truth.  I own a hair dryer, a comb, a round brush and a regular brush for my hair, scrunchies, alligators, which is my speak for hair clamps, and headbands.  That's it.  I rarely use hair spray or mousse.  I use gel or a frizz gel when I want to keep my fly away hair from moving in a direction.

Finally, the stylist and I decided to put slight layers in, which, unfortunately you cannot see in the after picture below.  Trust me, its there.

However, I still feel like something's missing.  I think when I go back for a trim, I'll talk to her about color.  Not my entire head, but maybe highlights or something.



Monday, March 28, 2011

Gimli's antics

Gimli has been a very busy dog of late, he's updated Twitter on my behalf, he went to the Dog Jog and won a dog bed (!!) and went to the Vet and played a diva.

I have a full post planned for the Dog Jog so that will be sometime this week once the pictures are posted to the Dog Jog website.

In the meantime, back to Gimli's antics.

On Friday night, a short time after I posted about having corgi on the brain, Gimli felt the need to post what was on his brain.  He successfully hijacked my Twitter account by capitalizing on my inattentive behavior towards my BlackBerry.

I was lying on the couch with the BlackBerry next to me, while I played Dragon Age 2. He jumped onto the couch next to me and while I was busy blasting Templars and Qunari, Gimli posted the following.  He jumped off the couch quickly and ran off to gloat with that trademark corgi smile.


Clearly Gimli is trying to make his mark on social media and because he's cuter than I, he has a better chance.

This evening, Mike and I took Gimli to the Vet for his heartworm blood test.  The techs took him to the back to draw blood.  About 15-20 minutes later, they asked us to help put the muzzle on him.  They had been unsuccessful in getting the vein as he was undoubtedly baring his teeth like a little monster.  The muzzle probably didn't go on because he probably continued baring his teeth and moved his head around like the girl from The Exorcist.

Mike and I went into the exam room.  Mike took the muzzle, slipped it on Gimli's head and I supplied the cookies.  We left the room and the little monster corgi was returned to us a few minutes later, a bright yellow bandage on his short little foot.

Don't get me wrong, nothing against the Vet team because we think they are great and Gimli loves them, but Gimli is a drama queen.  He knows how to push buttons and what behaviors will get people to back off and he uses it.  He will curl his lip so fast because he knows it will freak out the person and they will give in to him.

One of the techs told me he started acting out when they swabbed his skin with the cotton.

Clearly this is something we need to work on.

Friday, March 25, 2011

Corgi on the brain

We went to the supermarket tonight and as soon as you walk in, you see the flowers and balloon section.

I got all excited because I saw a balloon that said "Corgi", except it actually said "Congrats".

hrmph, I think that means its time for a second one...

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Because I'm an awesome wife!

Mike's 40th birthday was a couple weeks ago, yes I'm just getting to post about it now, blame Dragon Age II.

For his birthday, he didn't want anything too crazy, just dinner out with friends and then back home to play Rock Band.

I asked him about the sort of cake he wanted and he said he wanted some carrot cake cupcakes.  Now, I despise carrot cake, but I obliged since it was his birthday and all and agreed to make it for him.

About 2 1/2 weeks prior to his birthday, I was looking through my Twitter feed and saw "HensonCompany" tweet about this bakery, Kandy Cakes, that made these awesome Labyrinth inspired cookies.  I stalked around the site and realized the bakery was only about 1/2 hour away in the town where we used to live.  I thought to myself how wonderful it would be to have one of their cakes.

Around that same time, the Disney Parks blog announced some of the Walt Disney World 40th anniversary items on sale.  One of which was a Mickey Ear Hat with various images on it commemorating the 40 years of Walt Disney World.  We're heading there later on this year and we're looking forward to the 40th anniversary merchandise.  I think Mike is more than I am since he can use this as his "Disney thing", being born in the same year as Walt Disney World.

My "Disney thing" is better though.

It was then it hit me!  Why not have them make Mike's cake in the shape of the black Mickey Mouse Ear Hat?

I got in touch with Kandy, how fortuitious!, and we got started planning.

I must tell you, during this time, I became even more secretive and self conscious during this time. During my emails back and forth with Kandy, I told her I worked from home so if she had any questions or needed an answer right away, to call at home.  Our phone has caller id that is spoken.  As you might expect if the phone said, "Kandy" or "Cake" within earshot of Mike, he'd become curious. Then he'd ask me and while I'm good at lying to him, with this cake being so cool and all I was sure I'd start giggling and spill the beans.

Naturally, the week Kandy was making and decorating the cake, Mike worked from home all week because he was sick with his Karma sickness.  So there is my BlackBerry going off all throughout the day with Kandy and I conversing.  Of course this coincided with my Facebook notifications malfunctioning on the BlackBerry, which leaves only the text messages 'dinging' every time I got a new one.  He did ask if my Facebook notifications were working again and I did lie and say they were, but only because I started at my work computer screen and pretended to type away so he wouldn't press the matter.

Then I grabbed the BlackBerry like a thief and typed in my response to it.

Finally Saturday came and Mike drove my brother and I to the bakery to pick up the cake. During the car ride over, he asked, "Hey, how come you didn't make a cake?"

To which I replied trying to kill the smile that was slowly appearing on my face, "I had too many things to do and figured I'd get it made."  Then, I fumbled with the BlackBerry again hoping he'd stop asking.

When I saw our cake on the shelf, I got the biggest smile!  As we were putting the cake into the box, which needed to be kept open due to those big ears, Kandy said the following:

"The best part for the cake is to go into the trunk or on the floor to minimize any shaking.  Don't do any hard turns or hard stops either."

"Ok, sounds good!"

Little did I know we would hit what seemed like EVERY. STINKING. POTHOLE. on the way back home.  We had to stop so I could put the cake on the floor in the front passenger seat but angled away from Mike so he couldn't see.

The cake made it home mostly unscathed, except for the little yellow bits at the top from the shaking from the potholes.  But, what can you do, I was glad it was all in one piece still as I was expecting it to have fallen apart!

Needless to say, Mike was thoroughly surprised.  The cake was yummy, even though the fondant turned everyone's teeth black... tee hee.





Kandy was great throughout the entire process!  I was very impressed with the workmanship and care put into our cake.  And she's got a great name, what can I say?

The only unhappy part is that I live too far away to frequent the bakery on a regular basis to sample all the other goodies they have.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Kirkwall

I've been in Kirkwall the past day and I'm going to head back into it soon.  This traveling is seriously going to affect my blogging time.

Kirkwall is the fictional city in Dragon Age II.  I am a huge fan of Dragon Age I and when Bioware announced Dragon Age II, I was very excited!

One of the things I like about this game is you can import your character's file from Dragon Age I so that there will be subtle references to your first file.  This is very cool and I find myself paying more attention to the game's background and "talkable" characters so that I can find those references.  It makes a game so much more than hacking and slashing!

I can't wait to see if any past characters make an appearance!

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Wordless Wednesday - Memories of Snow




Static

The good news: I'm still roughly 121 lbs.

The bad news: I'm still roughly 121 lbs and a little pudgy.

And I'm going to a place where I have to wear a bathing suit in just under 4 weeks.

Oy vey.

Karma

Remember how I was sick at the beginning of January, because Mike made me sick, but he didn't get sick himself?

Guess who's been sick for the past week and a half?  Karma is a bitch indeed!

Monday, March 14, 2011

message to da faeries

hewo again,

this is Gimli riting again.

da oder day i heard on the news there was a big earthquake in this place called japan.  Candy and Mike have been watching on tv.  it was a bery large earthquake, i member the one we had last year but i think this one was much bigger.

i neber been to japan but i think its a nice place becus the peple der like corgis bery much.  and we corgis lub our peple.  i also herd der was all this water and peple were lost and i was sad to hear that.

Candy was bery sad today becus she saw this pictur and it made her cry.  she came to me to give me some hugs and kisses and i snuggled with her becus thats what i do.

i don't understand many things becus i'm just a short hungry corgi but i know i'm a faery steed and i have a connection to the faeries and the power of da fluff and so i send a message to the faeries to send some magic ober der to help those peple and their corgis and other doggies.

if any hoomans want to help, they can donat to the Red Cross.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

They're coming to get you Candy

Ok, so my name isn't Barbara, but that's the only zombie quote I could think of.

Today was cold, rainy and foggy.  By the time I finished work and took Gimli for a walk, it was very foggy, so much so it made me nervous when crossing the street and I looked back and forth about 4 times before starting across the street.

We went over to the park and was walking and bouncing on the snow.  Gimli was having a grand old time pouncing around with the leash in his mouth.

We made it to the portion of the park about 20 feet away from with small hill and then Gimli stopped.  He looked over to the hill with his ears perked up, his body rigid, but he didn't make a sound.  At first I thought it was another dog, but I looked to the hill and there was no dog.

I looked to the ground where my foot just ended up in a puddle, back to Gimli, who was still rigid, then back to the hill, where I saw a figure emerge from the fog.

He wore a gray hoodie, pulled up over his head, blue jeans and boots.  The way he was walking, I swore it was a zombie.  His arms were stretched out in front of him, his feet a little unsteady coming down the water logged hill.

I half wondered if he was a slow meandering zombie and if I'd have time to turn around and run home or if he was one of the fast moving ones and Gimli would have to nip at his feet and rip them off while I ran away.

Luckily he turned down the path and went through the park.

We continued on and then back home.

I'm glad I have a dog that will protect me from the Zombie Apocalypse.

Monday, March 7, 2011

The Oatmeal made me do it

I did have a post that I was going to use for today, but instead I was side tracked by the lovely site, theoatmeal.com.

It started off on the musings of Sriracha, the rooster sauce found in a variety of Asian restaurants and then I clicked and clicked until I got to the page about "8 Ways to Prepare Your Pets for War".  Then, spent about 8 minutes roaming around other images on this site and chuckling to myself, before I hit the Back button to return to the Pet-War page.

Right, back again, I went to check on a point on the Pet-War page and was distracted by "17 things Worth Knowing About Your Cat".  I don't know why I went there, I don't even own a cat nor do I particularly like cats, but I clicked it anyway.

Ok, so on the Pet-War page, one of the points states to disguise your dog as a Panzer tank.  This got me thinking...

With a Pembroke Welsh Corgi, it might be possible to disguise it as a Panzer tank, however it would be a touch shorter than the other dog-Panzers running around.  Therefore, its plausible to line up the corgis and other 10-12 inch tall dogs in the front of the line.  Then, behind them the taller dogs roughly the same size as Retrievers and Shepherds et al who would be similarly disguised, yet their gun would be considerably taller than the corgis.  Rounding out the last row would be those tall dogs like the Scottish Deerhound and the Irish Wolfhounds whose guns would be taller still so as to create a long firing line capable of hitting various targets.

However, would it be wise to shackle the corgis to masquerading as tanks when their strength lies in herding and frapping?  Both of which, when combined properly results in a low to the ground dog running around with reckless abandon in a manner, which to the uninformed eye seems random, but is actually quick enough to dodge table legs, laundry baskets, chair legs and dog beds and still squeeze through a small space at a very high rate of speed.  The corgi could be used to frap-herd the enemy to an area where the rest of the dog-Panzers could fire away.

Yup yup, one must think of these things when planning for the Zombie apocalypse, where corgis are also the recommended dog breed.  Yes, one day, Gimli will save my life.

Saturday, March 5, 2011

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Wordless Wednesday - The Gimli Worm


Pirates of the Corgi-bbean - The Fluffer of The Black Pearl

We are big fans of making 3D puzzles.  We have all of the Lord of The Rings puzzles and I've created 2 of them so far.

Orthanc - we tried this one and it hurt our heads because the pieces were mostly black with little white/gray/silver slits in them.  One day when I'm really bored and the Internet is having a slow day and none of the people I follow on Twitter/Blogs are posting anything exciting and I don't have to organize my closet, I'll come back to it.
Hobbiton - completed
Meduseld aka The Golden Hall of Edoras - completed
The Citadel of Minas Tirith - have never opened this one, but I might soon, I want to start it.


I picked up The Curse of the Black Pearl 3D puzzle for Mike a few years ago, but it took me to start and finish it, except with Mike hovering around trying to sneak in a piece and take credit for it.

Gimli was not impressed when I spent a great deal of time fussing over pieces instead of playing "I-throw-the-toy-Gimli-grabs-it-but-doesn't-give-it-back-to-me."

Instead, when I showed Gimli my hard work, this is what he did.

Can you imagine a corgi-monster?  Think of the appetite it would have!




Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Spring?

Its now the first day of March and a great deal of the snow in our yard has melted away.  However its still cold outside in the evenings once the sun has set, which means any of the melted snow turns to ice quite quickly.

Because of this, over the past couple days I've been unable to walk Gimli because its been far too treacherous for a clumsy person like me to walk an excited corgi.

Gimli's been uber hyper of late because of this and when he's hyper, he's ornery and cranky and bratty.  We've been passing the time by playing fetch down the hallway and working on some obedience.

All I can say is I can't wait for the ice to go away!