This post goes a lot of places

My local grocery store had a variety of these "sleepy-eyed" Easter-themed stuffed animals for sale. I think they somehow missed out on the "cute, cuddly" aspect and instead they created a line of stuffed animals that all look high.

Hey kid! Know where I could score some weed?

I regret not taking pictures of the whole Easter High Clan, because the pink duck and yellow chick were really pretty awesome as well. I was surprised to return to the store just a few days later to find all of them gone. I'm thinking this means that 1) someone complained, 2) the store manager realized that these crappily made toys were just too ridiculous to sell next to the spices, or 3) a truckload of people ACTUALLY BOUGHT THEM. Maybe junkies? I just do not know.

If you are out Easter shopping, or shopping for anything other than food, I suggest you NOT stop at the grocery store and instead try stores known for sales of, well, non-food items. If you shop and Kmart, you can get some good coupons and great deals if you look here. We no longer have a Kmart in my immediate area but I just realized that you can actually shop online there (why does this surprise me?). Anyway, I can't say I have a problem with $3 pairs of shoes, so I am all for a trip to Kmart, virtually or otherwise. 

Unfortunately, I know that I will never fit my weird-shaped feet into shoes that I can buy without trying on, so internet shoe shopping is out for me. I have got to try on roughly 478 pairs of shoes before I find a pair that fits and doesn't hurt like crazy. It's one of those cute, quirky things about me that my family loves. Or hates. Yeah, it's probably hates. I swear I would rather go bare foot than wear shoes, except I can't wear orthotics without shoes and if I don't wear my orthotics, my back and hips and knees get all wonky and then.... Wow, I sound old. But I had this problem 10 years ago so I guess parts of me have been old for a long time. 

You know that lazy bunny shops online for all his essentials. But he probably doesn't exert the effort to use coupons and get good deals. He also doesn't appear to wear shoes. Silly rabbit. 

Switched at birth

This story about new evidence that may lead to the recovery of Amelia Earhart's plane is interesting, but mostly I'm just surprised at how much Amelia looks like Uma Thurman.

Right?

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The story of a large jawbreaker

Ambition.

Defeat.

Until tomorrow!

PS. I totally dislike my hands. I think they are my least favorite body part, and that's saying a lot when you consider how fat my butt is. 

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Three is the new four

Payton, my recently injured Whippet, is learning to hobble around on three legs with her fourth dragging. The orthopedic surgeon had good things to say about Payton's chances for a partial, if not full, recovery, but it's going to take time. And that's TIME, as in months and months. And maybe some more months. For the next four weeks, we have to keep her quiet, and not allow her to jump off or on the furniture. That feat seems impossible for a dog that's one quarter paralyzed, but before the vet said to restrict her activities, she had already done this several times. So now my sofa has exercise pen "bed rails" and the Wonder Whippet gets lifted on and off when necessary. She thinks this whole arrangement is shitty. I agree.

I also appreciate the way it makes my family room more white trashy. It goes well with the fact that, due to our current house painting situation, all the stuff that belongs on my back porch is stacked in various places in our yard. It looks great next to the agility equipment. But I digress.

Since the original incident happened in the middle of the night, I had traveled to the emergency vet and back while my kids were still sleeping. When they got up, not very long after I fell back asleep, I told them what happened. The Boy had this to say, and he came up with it just about as quickly as it takes to read it:

Boy: Wow! Poor Payton! But really, there are good things and bad things about this.


Me: Really?


Boy: Yes. Because, you know, it's bad, but on the other hand, she won't be stealing our food for a while. And that's good.

And he's totally right. I can't tell you how fantastic it has been to not have to sequester every food item behind a closed door or jammed in the microwave. Since she's been disabled, my purse hasn't been ransacked, and all the cookies I baked are still in the cookie container on the counter. Does it make up for the difficulty of carrying her around and holding her up when she poops? I'm not sure. But I still have all my cookies.

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Although this catastrophic canine injury had the potential to be expensive, it's oddly been pretty affordable. This is good because of all the money we haven't got. I just recently heard about Mission Tuition, which is a way to save for your children's college education while purchasing stuff you would normally buy online. I was impressed to see that they have so many participating merchants, although I was kind of surprised to learn that people shop online at places like Home Depot. For me, Home Depot is a store that you go to when you've completely mucked something up and need to fix it RIGHT NOW. I guess other people actually plan home improvements and order supplies in advance. I wonder what that's like?

Anyway, you can save for college using Mission Tuition through a 529 plan, which I've read about and might kind of understand. If you have kids and your college tuition savings plan is, like mine, "You better get a scholarship," you might want to check this out.

Piece of Sh!t Day

Today started for me at 1:40am after I had been asleep for about an hour. I heard weird noises from the living room. Payton the Wonder Whippet had lost the ability to use her right hind leg. She was fine an hour before and just like that, her world, and ours, has changed. I got her to the emergency vet before 3am. By 4, I knew that she had suffered a Fibrocartilaginous Embolism, and while she may recover some of her mobility, she'll probably no longer be the fastest dog in the house. She spent the day completely stationary, unable to walk without assistance, or even to go to the bathroom without help. Payton is nearly 11, but a young, healthy not-quite-11. Totally crappy. In fact, the situation is so crappy that I accidentally taught The Girl the word "sucks." Damn it. 

Payton on a better day.

And then I went to the eye doctor and found out I need bifocals. BIFOCALS.* (I'll be getting "monovision" contacts first, with one eye learning to handle the up close work and one eye doing the distance stuff. I'm sure that will go smoothly. Riiiiighht.) Plus I have to make all these changes in my eye care habits. No more swimming with my contacts in unless I wear goggles (which I hate). No more swimming without goggles period, really. Take omega 3 fatty acids (unless those mess up my bladder, which I guess I'll find out the hard way). Use eye drops. Throw away my disposable contacts after two weeks instead of wearing them until they irritate me (what, that wasn't a good plan?). And here's the best one: spend 15 minutes twice a day with a damp washcloth on my closed eyes. I don't get time to close my eyes for 5 minutes twice a day, so I'm sure this will work out well. On day 1 I managed to do this zero times, so I guess I'll have to build up to it.


I'm hoping there will be some sleep for us tonight, because three hours of broken sleep really doesn't cut it.   Tomorrow Payton and I will meet with a specialist who will hopefully teach me exercises to help her recover. And maybe tomorrow will be a better day. Because today totally sucked.**


*First person to make fun of me for being 40 and needing bifocals gets punched in the neck. So does the second person. Third person? Don't press your luck.


**Because I cheated and copied the name of Payton's disorder and pasted it in this entry, it completely effed up the font for the entire page. COULD. NOT. FIX IT. So, that's about right for today. 

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CHEESECAKE!!!

Every so often, I get requests to write about various subjects on this blog. Most of the time, they are ridiculous topics, sometimes things that aren’t even grammatically correct. “Please write about ‘real estate California.’” Sure. No problem. I live in Florida and know nothing about real estate, but I’ll work that in nice and smooth.

Right.

But this time… this time the topic is CHEESECAKE! I can get all kinds of behind cheese cake! My favorite kind of cheesecake used to be the homemade Jello kind, you know, with the graham cracker crust? Yum! (I realize that this barely qualifies as cheesecake but whatever. Clearly I'm no dessert snob.) 

Since my teens I’ve expanded my appreciation of cheesecake into the realm of all. All cheesecake. One year at the Dog Writers of America Association annual writing contest banquet, my cheesecake dessert had icy chunks in it because it was partially frozen. You know want? IT WAS STILL GOOD. Not as good as completely unfrozen cheesecake, but still. STILL.

I’m hungry.

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Walgreens got a new shipment of Zotz...

And now they need more!

In an interesting twist, while I was paying for all the cherry Zotz, another woman came up with all the grape Zotz. She said, "I usually buy all the grape and all the cherry," and I said, "Well, I'm happy I beat you here!"

I'm not the only crazy. 

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Where's my cape?

Being able to sign an email with "Thanks," rather than "You're an idiot" is my super power.

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Thanks. Thanks a LOT.

Dear Kid Who Taught My Son How to Flip People Off,

Right back at ya.

Sincerely,
Brenna

P.S. I'm really going to hate you when The Boy figures out how to do it without using his other hand to help him arrange his fingers correctly.

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