Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

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Get Your Sh*t Together – Barks and Bytes

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First I want to apologize for everyone who tried to hook up to Barks and Bytes blog hop last week. Apparently Mr. Linky’s server decided to upgrade some things and the result was it brought the whole linky system down. Linda told me that the broken code was slowing her site down, so I just completely removed it from my site too. Hopefully this week it goes without a hitch.

So what’s up with the title of that blog post?

Well sometimes you just need a little help to get your shit together.

Now I don’t know about you, but I need to write things down. Lists are very important to me, and help keep me on task. The trouble is I’ve gotten away from writing lists and I feel like my life is sometimes spiraling out of control.

I have SO much to do, but don’t accomplish nearly as much as I should/could. Without a list I find myself mindlessly wasting time on Facebook, or checking my e-mail 500 times a day.

This dilemma is not just in my personal life, but in my blogging life as well. Sometimes I feel like I have nothing left to say, and then suddenly I remember four topics that I’ve been wanting to write about for quite some time.

Last year I was super excited to make an Editorial Calendar/Scheduler for my blog. I took ideas from two or three different people with their own schedulers, and I made my own.

It had everything I wanted in it. A 30-day calendar for each month, a page in the front of each month for notes, and a page for each week of the month. I printed it off on nice paper, then I went to Staples and purchased some dividers and placed them in front of each month. Then I paid Staples to have them bind it. All told it cost me about $20.

Initially I used it diligently, and then after a time it was too heavy, and too bulky. (I stopped using it. And now, well let’s just say I’m not even sure where it is. 🙁

Here, look at this picture of the beautiful sunset I took, while I go look for the planner.

East Coast Sunset

Thanks for waiting, I found it in a cabinet in my room. But it’s still too awkward for me to use.

I have the editorial plug in installed on the blog, but it’s not the same as writing it down. Despite all the conveniences of smart phones, and calendar schedulers, I still like the feel of good old fashioned paper.

SO this year I’m planning my new planner. It will probably only have three pages for each month. A calendar page, and maybe a couple of notes pages.

Any post ideas I haven’t implemented from the old scheduler will be moved to the new. At the end of each month I’ll go back and check my list and move anything I haven’t written about into the next month.

I can also schedule any special blog hops or important dates that I want to post on into the planner and make adjustments as needed.

Do you use a planner? Are you of the electronic or paper kind?

Heart Like a Dog

This is the Thursday Barks and Bytes Blog Hop hosted by 2 Brown Dawgs and Heart Like a Dog. Grab the badge and the linky code and join us! Please only link up blog posts and as a courtesy to the other hoppers, please add the linky to your post and/or link back to the hosts’ blogs.



Four Gifts for Pets Blog Hop

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Today we’re participating in the Four Gifts for Pets Blog Hop, hosted by Kol’s Notes.

I guess the basis for this hop is something Ellen DeGeneres does, unless I’m totally not understanding Jodi correctly, (which is of course a distinct possibility.) The way I understand it, parents are to buy four gifts for their children at Christmas, something they want, something they need, something to wear and something to read. It’s an admirable endeavor because speaking only from my point of view, MOST kids I know these days get entirely too much. I mean really…does an 8-year old need a smart phone?

Sorry, I digress.

 

4 Gifts for Pets - Read

I thought it’d be fun to approach this blog hop from my perspective and then I’ll tackle each of the dogs as well.

So something I WANT is to be able to walk my dogs without worrying about dumb ass dog owners. (Hey, it doesn’t HAVE to be a material thing, does it?)

Something I NEED is a private session with a good/positive dog trainer. (Yes, I’m actually working on this one. You can give these things to yourself, yes?)

Something to WEAR would be a dog walker’s vest.  You know, the one with every feature a dog walker could POSSIBLY want! (Believe it or not, I’ve designed one myself, I just haven’t put the work into it to get it into production.)

Something to READ would be a my own book in print. (HELL YES, sign me up for that shit.)

4 Gifts for Pets - EAT

Now for the dogs.  Jodi gave us the choice or want/wear/need/read or want/wear/need/eat. So for the dogs I choose eat, because their dogs. Duh and they like to eat.

Of course, it’s ENTIRELY my point of view and if they could actually talk, they might say something different, but they can’t so HAH.

Sampson says,

I WANT walks, lots and lots of walks. I want walks around people, people who will pay attention to me and love on me. Walks in the woods, without a leash, walks on trails, walks in parks. I want walks.

I NEED belly rubs. Lots and lots of belly rubs. And ear rubs too. And pets on the head, basically I just want you to sit and pet me all day long.

I don’t need anything to WEAR. I’m a dog damn it, dogs aren’t supposed to wear clothes. Dogs aren’t supposed to WEAR anything. God wanted us to WEAR fur and that’s what we WEAR, we don’t need anything else.

For EATs I want steak. Lots of steak, big, fat, juicy steaks cooked medium rare. I’d say give it to me raw and wriggling but that would squeam my mom out.

I don’t think that’s too much for a dog to ask for, is it?

Delilah’s thoughts:

I WANT food. This rationed shit Mama has us on is for the birds. You should see the tiny bits of food she gives us, I thought I was in the land of milk and honey, but NO. I landed in the Stone soup pot.

I NEED food. Shit, a dog has to have food to survive, how else am I going to keep doing things to write about if I’m wasting away to nothing. She expects me to perform like a trained monkey, but what do I get? Rations. Food that could barely sustain a Malti-poo, never mind a curvy dog like myself. I NEED food.

I agree with Sampson that dogs shouldn’t WEAR anything, but I’ll make an exception and WEAR a sausage link necklace, I think wearable food is something every dog should have. Besides which, when she hands me out those skimpy rations, I can always eat my necklace.  Can I change the above answer to I NEED unlimited wearable food?

I’ll EAT anything. Anything you give me (and even stuff you won’t give me) I’ll eat. You know what they say, if it looks like food and smells like food, it’s probably food.

READ, I know, I know, I’ve already gone above and beyond with my answers, but I know the Mama would like you to think I’m just a simple dog with simple tastes but that’s not entirely true. I can be a refined when I have to and I’m not above rising to the challenge, so I’ll take READ for $400 Alex. And the answer for the book I’d like to READ is “Eat, Pray, Love.”

Chocolate Labrador

I said it was a book, I didn’t say it wouldn’t be food related. I’m a lab after-all.

Have you done the four gifts? How would you/your dog answer?

Please join us tomorrow for Barks and Bytes Blog Hop hosted by 2 Brown Dawgs and yours truly. Hopefully the linky tool will be working this week.

Thank you so much to Kol’s Notes for this fun hop.

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There Goes Delilah

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I may have mentioned a time or two, that we do not live in a very friendly neighborhood. We do know our neighbors on either side of us but for the most part, the neighbors keep to themselves. Maybe we get a wave here or there, but mostly they stick to themselves.

We have met one lovely neighbor who lives across the street from us. We met her when a branch from her tree fell, and brushed Hubby’s Jeep as he was coming home from the park with Sampson in the car. Hubby and I went over to help clean up the tree and that’s when we met Ms. Erika.

She is an older woman who lives with MS and she is truly one of those remarkable people. Even though she has bad days, most days you’ll see her slowly making her way down her driveway with her walker in order to get her mail. In fact, the very first time we met her, she was outside picking up small bits of branches and carrying them to the trash using her walker.

Miss Erika is originally from Sweden and she lives alone. Her husband passed away before we met her and she recently lost her furry companion, her kitty Molly.  Miss Erika absolutely LOVES Sampson and Delilah and they love her in return!

Every time we walk past her house, Sampson and Delilah look up at it, hoping to see her. If she’s at the window and calls to us, we have to go see her. She’ll come out and sit on her steps and then the dogs go over to say hello.

If I run into Miss Erika without the dogs, like in the grocery store…she always asks after Simon and Delilah. LOL, sometimes she forgets and calls Sampson, Simon. But when she sees him, she remembers his name.

Miss Erika has a friend that brings her to the grocery store every Sunday. She pulls up to the store and lets Miss Erika out, then they both do their grocery shopping.

Sunday, the dogs and I were just coming back from our afternoon walk when Miss Erika and her friend Denise passed us. They both waved excitedly and since we were almost home anyway, and Miss Erika’s house was just one house up, I thought I’d take the dogs over to say hello.

Miss Erika was sitting in the car when we got to her driveway, while Denise was setting up the walker. Sampson quickly said hello to Miss Erika and then started ‘chatting’ with Denise. I was paying attention to Sampson and Denise, while Delilah was saying hello to Miss Erika.

Suddenly Miss Erika said, “And there goes Delilah.”

I turned in time to see Delilah pushing her way past Miss Erika’s legs as she climbed into the front floor of the car. Before you could say, “DELILAH” she was over the front seat and into the back one, inspecting the groceries.

I had to drop her leash, run around the car and extract her via the rear passenger door. Yeah. You read that right. My dog climbs OVER a disabled woman to try and eat her groceries. There goes my hopes for the Canine Companion certificate.

No! Of course, I didn’t pull out the camera to snap her picture. Can you imagine? “Um, excuse me Denise? Would you mind holding Sampson’s leash while I take a photo of Delilah scavenging through your groceries?”

Because clearly, Delilah is so food motivated that she is fearless in her attempts to find food.

Need proof?

This was Delilah checking out an empty crate after one of our training classes. Note, the crates are stacked on top of each other and she’s working on the top one.

I'm sure someone was getting fed treats in here. If I could just reach a little further back.

I’m sure someone was getting fed treats in here. If I could just reach a little further back.

Or how about the time Delilah decided to ‘inspect’ our trainers car trunk?

Excuse, I need to inspect this trunk for any crumbs of food.

Excuse, I need to inspect this trunk for any crumbs of food.

Just a little bit further, we can't take the chance of missing something.

Just a little bit further, we can’t take the chance of missing something.

Labrador in car trunk

Sadly, you’re clean. Really, what’s a dog got to do to get some food?

Yup, there goes Delilah.

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