From Jersey to Nevada and No Points In Between: The Tale of the Woeful Dog That Stole Our Hearts

It happened last Wednesday as I was sitting in my office.  Taking a glance at Facebook, I saw a post from a girl I went to high school with.  She posted a picture of a dog that she found on her porch when she opened her door.

The first thing that struck me was how much it looked like Jersey. The second thing was that it had a rope around its neck that looks like it was chewed.  The third, and saddest, thing was that I could see all of its ribs.  My heart broke and then grew three times its size like in The Grinch.

My friend's friends all discouraged her from finding the owner since the pup was so neglected and encouraged her to keep it since it made its way to her home. She said it was very loving and playful. Also, it never left her porch even when she had to leave to pick up her kids.  She also found that it was immediately protectful of her house.

However, she could not keep it.

I quickly emailed the picture to B and he told me that we could take it before it would go back to its owner.  His heart had grown as well.

In the end, no one claimed the dog, no service would come get the dog, and I got an urgent message from my friend asking me to come get it. And so I did.  I drove to a rather rough part of the city to pick up a dog I knew nothing about.  She was laying on the porch when I got there.

She immediately jumped up, wagged her tail and ran over to me.  We coaxed her in the car and off we went.

Driving home was a trip.  This was not a trained dog and she tried to climb behind me, on me, in front of me, and spent a hell of a long time licking my face.

Once we got home, I made her a bed in the garage as we needed to get her to the vet before she could come into the house.  She was so loving and playful and grateful. I fed her a bit and you could tell she was starving which hurt my heart even more.  B texted me often with updates as he was working that night.  He requested I send him a picture to see what she really looked like, but it was hard since she was constantly climbing on me. Finally, exhausted she laid down for a moment and I captured one:

She immediately became protective of our house barking when strange voices were around, but generally quiet after that. When B came home that night, she ran up to him, tail wagging and full of kisses.

The next day she went to the vet and got a clean bill of health and some shots.  She is about 6-8 months old and about 10 lbs underweight.  She weighed in at a light 32.5 lbs. The vet thought she was a shepherd boxer mix, but who knows.  After that trip, B introduced her to Jersey and that was two of the happiest dogs I have ever seen.

She has since made her way into the house and is making herself right at home.

Although she has not been trained, she is very loving and learns rather quickly.  Mostly.  B and I have had to put on our puppy training hats.  It seems like such a long time ago I had to make sure to let a puppy out every couple of hours to prevent accidents.  However, she sleeps through the night with no accidents and mostly leaves the cats alone.  She is a keeper.

In keeping with tradition, we named her after the street on which she was found, Nevada. Technically it was not the exact street, but one right close by.  The thought was we could call her Neve for short, but it turns out we typically use her full name. I think she is starting to figure it out.

As of yesterday, she was up to 37 pounds and her coat is looking better. She has a lot of energy for a dog that was so lacking and we think she is a great addition to our family.

Welcome home, Nevada.

In My Dreams, I'm Still Insane

Remember last summer when I said my dreams would make a great plot to a movie? Yep, nothing much has changed on that front.  I have kept track of a few of my favorite dreams since then and, well, I will let them speak for themselves.  I will say that I did not change or embellish anything*. These are exactly as I dreamt them, although not all at once. I am not THAT crazy!

I am in an old grocery store that is now a restaurant, but yet still a grocery store. I look over and notice two very large lions lazily lying around outside the front doors.  Suddenly I realize that the lions know how to open the automatic doors and I bolt through the store with them chasing me. As I scream for help I realize that the workers are out back in the alley on a smoke break. I bust through the door yelling "the lions are chasing me." They laugh until I point at the lions. Knowing that the lions can also open doors with knobs, I run down the alley until I find a small indent in the wall and press myself into it. They never find me.

I am being chased. Again. I end up in a bowling alley. I then end up on a beach where there are tons of bugs and fire ants. Jersey is trying to bite them to keep them away from me. I am trying to shoo them with my feet so she doesn't get bit in the mouth. They bite me on my ass.  Right after the sting, I realize that I think there is a tooth in my gum. I pull it out of my mouth and sure enough there is a part of a tooth. I later tell B that I lost part of a tooth and when he asks to see, it turns out I lost three teeth, all in the front!  I vow never to chew gum again.  Especially if it is mint green.

Next, it is the day of my trial. We are holding it at a dining room table in the office.  My paralegal keeps talking so I tell her to leave. Next my secretary is there to take notes, but she keeps making calls on her cell phone so I tell her to leave.  Meanwhile, we have a break and I leave to use the bathroom and get lost in a sea of buildings and floors trying to find my way back and panicking with every step.  Finally, the judge's clerk finds me and assures me that is okay. However, once I arrive I realize I do not have my file or even one piece of paper that I need for the trial.  I tell the court. The usually mean judge comes in laughing and asks why I didn't notice when I left that morning that I wasn't carrying anything. I have no answer for her.  Then she asks why I didn't think about it when I was reviewing my file last night. I don't bother to tell her that I didnt review it all because I had planned on "winging it."

We then go back to my office to actually review my file and there are these large black flying bugs around. I start screaming and decide we need to leave before they get me.  On our way out, my boss who has inexplicably turned into my uncle assures us that it is okay, that the bugs are harmless. When I tell him that one landed on my head and was stinging me, he tells me I am wrong. The bugs simply need to poop somewhere.

I am called into my office manager's office and told that my outfit is not work appropriate and I will need a whole new wardrobe. I am wearing a skirt, heels, a blouse and a blazer. I sarcastically say "do I get a wardrobe stipend?" and am told in fact I have $1500 and don't worry because the shop will call to appropriately dress me.

I am on my way to work heading up a staircase with apparently every single person in my office building. I am also carrying a child. I run into my former boss and we exchange pleasantries although I really hate her. I then run into my current boss who is wearing a bright yellow ruffled sleevless shirt which makes me think he looks like a clown. He tells me that people think we are "too close." I am tell him that is because we are close, we live near each other. I then realize he is the actor that plays the detective on Dexter.  I still have the baby.  After folding up my bicycle, I realize I have to be somewhere that babies aren't allowed. I find my former boss in her office working on her laptop on her bed and ask her to watch the baby. She says okay halfheartedly and tosses the baby to the side. I scream "Well EXCUSE ME but you are the only one that knows how to care for a baby around here."

On my way out, I drive my car straight into a hotel pool. Luckily it was in the shallow end and I could escape.

Later, I fall in love with the actor that plays Mark Zuckerberg in the Facebook movie. My other boyfriend didn't like that I was in love with two men at once so he made me break up with him. But as actor/Mark guy crossed the street after I dumped him, I could not bear to lose him and chased him down. We then discussed plots to TV shows.

I am at a trial, but again I dont have materials. Turns out I am not trying the case, but I am a witness. Then it turns out I am the defendant. I am accused of hitting a guy with a hamburger. The defense counsel, including Don Draper of Mad Men, tells me that I should tell the jury how much I love hamburgers. I think this is a terrible defense because there was a whole shelf of things I could have hit him with so if I loved hamburgers, naturally I would choose the hamburger. My attorney said "no, you would never waste a good hamburger by throwing it at someone." Good point.

I rest my case.  But not my dreams.

Is it any wonder that I look like this on some nights?

*I started writing this in July of 2010. Upon reading it today, even I think these dreams sound fictional. However, I know they are not as I never lie to myself.**

**That I know of.

Wordless Wednesday: A Future Horror Fan is Born!

And Then My Entire Family Was Nearly Killed By a Possessed Chicken Bone

I let my family cook for me. I am very generous that way. Also, we all know how often I cook. Have you seen my cooking blog?

So I come home from my parents' house every week with various freezer containers full of the usuals - Mom's chicken noodle soup, Mom's potato soup, Mom's spaghetti. Occasionally I will get things from other family members too such as Dad's pea soup, Dad's chili, Dad's stew that I thought was spaghetti sauce because it wasn't labeled that turned out to be a wonderful surprise.  Then I also get my brother's take on things that typically includes chicken soup with too much dill. Although the last one he sent had a note taped to it that said "Less dill. More love." Awww. He's single, ladies.

The other day I went searching for something to eat when B disappointingly ignored my SOS text about dinner and ATE WITHOUT ME.  I grabbed a contained marked "Soup for Lonnie" and remembered my Mom sent me chicken soup she had made up for someone else that never got to pick it up. Then I defrosted it, warmed it and ate it.

Then I almost died.

Contained in the soup was a chicken bone. A large one actually, which is how I found it in my mouth.*  I removed it, threw it in the trash, and sent my Mom an email entitled "Were you trying to kill Lonnie?"  She responded by asking me if I was okay, going on to ask if the bone gave it extra flavor, and then blaming my brother. He's still single, ladies.

Fast forward two days later and as I am walking through the kitchen I notice something in Jersey's mouth, I make her give it to me and it is THAT DAMN CHICKEN BONE! What the heck? I KNOW I threw that thing out.  Another email to my mother insisting she was trying to kill my entire family resulted in this response:

Good grief! Is that chicken bone possessed? Put it in a plastic bag and bring it to my house so I can get rid of that devil!

I am not sure what good putting it in a plastic bag would have done. It just gives me visions of Jersey with a plastic bag with a chicken bone in it hanging out of her mouth. I am also not sure what a proper disposal is.  Kind of scared to ask, actually.

I decided not to pass on the possessed chicken bone to another house for the fear that everyone would soon find it in their mouths, or their dog's mouth, or their fish's mouth. Definitely not their chicken's mouths though, people. They are not cannibals!

Only one possession per family, please.

On a side note, after I sent my Mom this blog post about a staple in Jorge's dog's stomach, my Mom sent the me the following email:

See, you could have blogged and showed the chicken bone in Jersey's tummy and made her a star. But, no....you take it away from her and call ME an attempted murderess.

My family has its priorities you know.

*My Mom is a good cook and she never ever has bones in her soup. This was a freak accident.**

**Ditto my brother. Feel free to snap him up, ladies.

Hackers, Robbers and Fires - Who Can Get Any Work Done Around Here?

So it's been a rough time at the office lately.  I will give you one guess as to what's been happening. Yes, all is revealed in the title. Yes, all of those things happened at my office. In the span of a week. Craziness I tell you.

Monday started off with a warning that our network had stopped an attempted hacking.  Some people had to change their logins and passwords and double secret probation security was put on high alert.  Meanwhile, I wandered around asking why someone would ever want to hack the network of a law firm.

BORING.

Seriously. What will you get there? Boring letters to the court. Boring briefs to the court. There would be no smoking gun. Ever. All of this leads me to believe that it was an inside job by an outside person.

I will give you some time to think about that.

Fast forward to Thursday and I am on may way into the office when I get a phone call telling me not to bother hurrying because our building is on lockdown due to a suspicious person.  That suspicious person? He is called a robber.  He broke into a suite in the early morning hours and then ran away with a safe and some cash trailing behind him like a cartoon.  Another inside job from the outside. I think. I really have no idea about that business.  Luckily by the time I got my daily Starbucks a/k/a Sweet Heaven, all was well and I could get inside.

Fast forward to Friday at lunch.  It was unseasonably warm. I left my jacket in someone else's office.  I packed up my briefcase of work to do at home over the weekend. I was enjoying lunch with other like minded colleagues when one got a phone call. As soon as I heard him say "WHAT?", I just knew it.  "ARE WE LOCKED OUT OF THE BUILDING AGAIN?" Kind of.

Our building was on fire.

No worries. Just an ELECTRICAL fire. We were locked out. Our belongings were locked in. The wind picked up. I spent the next hour and a half driving around the parking lot with some colleagues finding other people to talk to about what was happening. I took a client conference call in the car.  Meanwhile other offices passed their time in different ways.  One group prayed. No one was in danger. Did they really want to go back to work that much? Another group played hackeysack.  Does that even exist anymore? Then some guy broke out a guitar and started playing to a crowd while people taped him on their cellphones. Who the hell brings a guitar to an office building? That guy.

Just as those in charged called it a day, a giant "YAY" came forth from the crowd and we were let back in. Why everyone cheered to be let back into an office on a Friday afternoon when the sun was shining is beyond me.

Also? We could go in but there was no plumbing and only half electrical and no heat.

"YAY."