Amendment One - Work with me through this one.

I am an unapologetic social liberal BUT… I am doing my best temper that fact for the purposes of a hopefully diverse audience so that I might appeal to you all.  However, at the same time, I realize that this is not entirely realistic.  That said, let's see if we can marry our perspectives for a moment and see if we can find a common ground because this is important.  I believe in the rights of all men and all women of all races, all colors and all creeds to live their lives as they choose.  I believe in the rights of all people to be free to live and to love in the purest capacity they they possibly can.  I believe that this freedom to pursue a truth of spirit and of soul… that this is the ultimate goal for all of humanity - to be true to our most honest selves.  Many people believe in a more rigid, prescribed code that interprets this ethos differently.  It would be hypocritical for me to condemn those whose beliefs and moral codes are in opposition to mine or to try to force my world view upon them given my previous statement.  While I don't personally subscribe to an interpretation of ethics that can be boiled down to a simple right and wrong or sin and righteousness, I acknowledge that that perspective exists and I know that this chasm is great and my words are more than likely not powerful enough to bridge such a vast divide.

So this is who I am.  These are my values.  They are set in stone for me and I can not imagine a scenario in this life that could possibly change them.  There is little chance, no matter who you are or how long I've known you or what life experiences we have shared that they are exactly the same as yours.  Here's the thing;  THAT'S OKAY.  I have this belief structure and it is so important to me that I feel a soul-wrenching obligation to live a life and to raise a child who, God willing, will share and reflect these things that I hold sacred.  I fully expect and respect your right and responsibility to do the same.  Perhaps, with patience and open hearts and love  we will fortify intelligent discussion and rational arguments that will allow us to grow together to be an increasingly self-realized people.  So this is our mantle and we wear it every single day of our lives.  We do this because it is important, it is critical and it is who we are.  I acknowledge all of this.  What I don't acknowledge and what I hope will give you pause, is a need for political legislation to affirm my belief structure.

This afternoon, I spoke to a dear friend whom I love deeply.  This friend is about as conservative as conservative gets.  I typically dance on pin heads to avoid political discourse with this friend because we are so very diametrically opposed.  Going out on a limb, I said, "I hope you will vote against Amendment One" (for those of you reading not in NC, this is  a very high profile amendment that will eliminate rights of same-sex partners and all civil unions).  I braced myself.  This friend responded with something to the effect of the following "You know, this country was founded by the most brilliant minds that have ever existed and the constitution that they created, founded on Christian values of course, is the most amazing document every created.  It is perfection.   I embrace the Founding Father's ideals and I believe that they were Christian men founding a nation on Christian values and they did a damn good job of it.  I am sick to death of politicians trying to corrupt something that is so inherently pure."  

Politically, this friend and I could not have less in common and that's okay.  We agree to disagree, we have lively debate and we respect each other as intellectuals and human beings.  He lives up to his responsibility to live his life according to his beliefs and I try to do the same.  He will likely be voting against Amendment One. 

Here's my point:  I believe in the rights of human beings to love and to live in the best way they they can and advocate for those rights given any opportunity.  From my perspective, God knows this world needs all of the love it can stand, so I will do everything in my power to raise my daughter, who will grow up in an essentially theocratic state which is as conservative as it gets, to respect and hopefully share those same values; That's really all can do but I don't need legislation to tell me that's right for me; I know it in my heart and in my soul.  I don't need legislation to make me feel more secure about my beliefs and I can honestly tell you, no legislation is going to make me feel less secure or doubt what my heart tells me to be true. 

If you are opposed to same-sex couples sharing the rights of couples who have a traditional marriage, that's obviously where your world view has taken you and its unlikely that any statistic or scenario that I could throw at you is going to change that.  Its also your personal belief and not mine.  Obviously that's fine and its your responsibility to live accordingly, to raise your children accordingly, and to make sure that your actions and your contributions to our society reflect that belief structure.  I champion your right to do so.  It is your God given right to exercise your freedoms in this way.  Utilizing this freedom to further restrict the freedoms of others, however is incredibly counter-intuitive.   Trying legislate morality and legislate belief structures is a basic cry of insecurity and frankly, hysteria.  We have so many crosses to bear as human beings.  There are so many people who suffer from hate and abuse and neglect - lets focus on building each other up instead of wasting our time with personal insecurities to break each other down.  

All I ask is that you think about your own responsibility to be accountable for your own morality before you cop-out in an attempt to legislate it for those who dissent.  Minds and hearts will not change.  People will continue to live their lives as they see fit and when its all said and done all that will have been accomplished is an excess of unnecessary red tape, state legal fees, and an era of divisiveness with less and less hope of resolution and reconciliation.  Less love.  More hate.  Please think before you vote for Amendment One.  As a parting note - if you can't get over the gay marriage things, here are a few other points to ponder:   

Turns out my latte is not pregnant. Whew!

So, I'm back on the road and true to form adventure and hilarity are keeping me company on what would otherwise be a very lonely trek across the United States.  I'm used to the security circus.  Enough loops through the hoops and you get the hang of the monkey dance.  Belt off, liquids appropriately sized, shoes off, hole in sock... cold, dirty floor, don't think about it... just keep moving.   I have even procured the mother of all carry-ons.  This thing is a BEAST.  Its a roller bag that converts into a back pack.  It fits under the seat, in the overhead and down the aisle and I'm pretty sure I can get at least 3 days of travel out of it...maybe more.  It has pockets for kindle, ipod, cell phone, passport, chap stick. It even has a detachable clear bag for the infamous 3oz liquids.  To describe my relationship with this bag as a love affair is an understatement.  To seal the deal... FLIGHT ATTENDANTS drool over this bag.  I. Love. This.  Bag.  So, yes, I have no qualms about zipping up to the "professional traveler" line and yes, I'm that jerk who looks at you with total disdain if you forget to take your change out of your pocket.  I am that person. All that said, I experienced a whole new level of violation and intrusion from the FAA today.

My typical routine leaves me 30 minutes for security, 10 minutes for starbucks, 5 minutes for bathroom, 5 minutes to make absolutely sure I'm in the right place and 10 minutes to breathe before getting on the plane.  This morning, my routine was perfectly executed.  I had just wrapped up my 10 minutes of breathing time and was beginning the boarding process when I was stopped by an absolutely ridiculous FAA agent wearing goggles and what looked like a chemistry set strapped to her back.  Let me tell you something.... An FAA agent who looks like she's moonlighting with the CDC is NOT something you want to see ambling toward you as you're about to board an aircraft.  This rogue lab tech approached me, pulled me out of line, and proceeded to- brace yourself- proceeded to give my triple skinny latte a pregnancy test.  Not kidding.  She whipped a little test strip out of her science kit, hovered it over my coffee, "tested the vapors" and then we waited for the results.  Fortunately, for all of us, my coffee was not pregnant.

Really, FAA?  You didn't violate me enough when I came in?  You have to continue to harass me after I have run your gambit and jumped through all of your ridiculous hoops with flawless execution?  Its bad enough that every time I go to the airport I have to leave a half of a pot of coffee on the counter and wait the dark and dreaded 30 minutes before I can throw myself at the mercy of the corporate machine and wait for them to feed my addiction; now I have to worry about not only the proverbial levels of toxicity in my cup-a-corporate but the literal levels of toxicity as well?  Can't you just hang out behind the line and test the vapors as they come out of the drip?  Lord knows, they could use an extra body back there.  

Once we determined that my latte was only harming my soul (and wallet) and was not an agent of death and destruction.  I was allowed to board the plane and am now in lovely Minneapolis.  What a great and underrated city!  Thanks to a shout out on facebook, I was directed to a truly phenomenal local brew pub and enjoyed some exceptional craft brew as well as a moderately life changing almond butternut squash bisque and the best sweet potato fries I have ever had.  I'm staying in the heart of Minneapolis right next to a tiny little coffee shop called Dunn Brother's coffee located in the basement of a stone building built in 1887.  Granted, I walked 4 blocks out of the way in the absolutely FREEZING Minnesota night air to procure this lovely Americano but in the end, I realized that the theme of today penance.  Penance for subsisting on soulless caffeine.

The good news is, I'm pretty sure I'm square with the house.  Cheers to you!

Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

Sorry its been a while since my last post.  I've been very busy basking in the absence of my flesh-eating-virus.  That's right, ladies and gentleman.... rash free for a week!  You just have no idea.  I will never take for granted having functional skin again.  For a while there, we were contemplating having to raise our daughter in a leper colony... it was traumatic... but we survived.  In order to overcome the rash, however, I ended up having to take a low-dose round of steroids.  You will recall, that BEFORE the rash and steroids my darling bambina kicked so aggressively that she dislocated my rib (on more than one occasion) and earned the name "Bone-crusher Moon-pie Best".  (In my opinion, 'Bone Crusher' is a great compliment to 'Moon Pie' and should keep her out of any trouble on the playground).  So, I will admit, now that she's been subjected to a two week round of Prednisone, I have some concerns about birthing a female version of The Hulk and having to open a separate savings account for anger management classes (and/or bail) in addition to college tuition.  I guess we'll see!

In other Moon Pie news, we had an ultrasound a two weeks ago in order to get a more accurate idea of how she's been fairing with the GD Dilemma (for those of you just tuning in, 'GD Dilemma' is code for the diagnosis of Gestational Diabetes).  There are two main concerns with GD: 1) That we'll end up with what is fondly referred to as a 'mega-baby' (as you can imagine, this makes for a complicated and less than fun delivery (and a bit of a complex as well, I would imagine)) 2)  Blood flow will be inadequate to give her what she needs (obviously, decidedly uncool).  Both of these have been pretty stressful concerns as you might imagine.  The latter we check twice a week, and we're all good on that front.  Now, after our most recent ultrasound, she looks like she's right on track in the size department as well.... Somewhere between 5 and 6 lbs with 4-ish weeks to go.  I'll take it!

So, for those of you who have been concerned about the multitude of maladies that have made up trimester 3, (*KNOCK ON WOOD*) things are looking up and I'm enjoying the last week or two before the bell rings for the next round.

As far as preparations are concerned, Now that I'm not writhing in discomfort for the first time in two months, I'm really just kind of hanging out and waiting.  Waiting, anticipation, baited breath, patience, holding my horses.... not so much my thing.  Not really my forte.  I have other strengths.  To put it kindly, waiting makes me a little irritable and unpleasant (of course, being nine months pregnant probably makes me a little irritable and unpleasant as well) But WAITING.... oh, waiting makes me very very Type-A.

So here's how it goes, I'm a little limited when it comes to being able to do things like, mount shelving, install window shades or pull mutant weeds from the back yard.  In fact, I have found that I am most effective at the following:
1) incessant list making:

• Lists of things to get done before Moon Pie arrives (please see above reference to shelving, shades and weeds... because the baby is going to care about the weeds) 
• Lists of things we forgot to get in preparation of Moon Pie's arrival (WE DON'T HAVE BABY NAIL CLIPPERS!  WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO!?!?!)  
• Lists of things that I need to take with me to the hospital (Chapstick - do NOT forget chapstick ... because I'm sure there's a major shortage of Chapstick at the hospital) 
• Lists of things that I want knock out before my mom arrives: (get hair highlighted, touch-up nail polish, get a new tube of lipstick and clean out linen closet....) 
• Lists of things we can do when Hunter's parent's arrive (.... um .... play with the baby? this list needs help) 
• Lists of foods that I plan to eat post delivery (Pie Pizza, Banburry Cross sour cream/sour cream chocolate iced donuts, Hunter's mashed potatoes, Mama's banana pudding, a chai latte with extra chai, a cherry mochaccinno, omg... wine... I almost forgot wine.... and... ) ... I'm willing to delay the post-pregnancy shape up a week or two to celebrate being diabetes free... though watch me end up in a damn sugar coma... 

 You get the idea.  You can see how, with the exception of the last, glorious list, this could make one maybe a twinge loopy.  Especially since I've not really been in much of a position to accomplish anything on any of these lists (okay, that's not entirely true - I did mount shelving and clean the linen closet this weekend).  

2) Incessant laundry

Y'all, I have found true catharsis in laundry.  It started with the flesh eating virus when I went on a mission to drench everything we touched in bleach at least every 24 hours and never really let up.  I have found that laundry is a completely manageable chore in my condition, as all I have to do is waddle around the house with arm fulls of clothes and deposit them from point 'A' to point 'B' with a pit stop on the couch in front of the Food Network for a brief stint of folding..... and the best part..... how awesome is it going to be to come back from the hospital to all clean clothes/sheets/towels/anything else made of fabric?  How long do you think that will last?  2... maybe 3 hours??  What a grand 2-3 hours, though!  No, the point is, it makes me feel productive as I've felt pretty useless of late.

(Just in case you've grown weary, here comes a rant.... continue on at your own peril)

Now, in reading this, I'm sure some of you are thinking.... "Nesting".  Let me tell you a little something about "Nesting."  Maybe its just me, but when someone accuses me of being afflicted by "the nesting instinct", the only overwhelming instinct I have is to punch them in the nose.  I don't know why it makes me so incredibly hostile.... but it does.  Here's the thing... when you're days away from embarking on the biggest, most significant, most anticipated, most terrifying and wonderful event of your life thus far, there is nothing wrong with wanting to be organized and prepared. Also, what better way to take your mind off of things than to scrub your floors with a toothbrush (if you're in to that sort of thing - I prefer the less extreme version: fold laundry in front of Food Network).  Also, after having been extremely restricted due to sheer girth for the past several months, anyone would start go a little stir crazy and let me tell you, the public does not appreciate you going out on the town to blow off some steam in your 9th month of pregnancy!  At this point the world pretty much sees you as a grenade with a loose, dangling clip and does not appreciate the potential that you might explode in their presence.  So, you say "Cute.... she's got the nesting instinct!" (*twitch*) I say "just stand back, she's uncomfortable, nervous, and bored out of her skull.... someone slide her some earth-friendly, all purpose cleanser and offer her a donut".

Nothing exciting... a cold, a dislocated rib and a broken dishwasher... just your average weekend.

Y'all are going to have to forgive me.  I've been a little all over the map lately.  We can blame that on the hormones, the absence of sugar, or whatever, I don't really care what we blame it on... pick an excuse I have plenty!!!!!!!  The end of last week was one for the books, for sure.  I ended up completely overcome with *A-N-O-T-H-E-R* massive cold.  Honestly, with the exception of maybe 4 or 5 days I've been sick since day one of my 3rd trimester.  I so wanted to be one of those women who just totally Zen's out and just "loves being pregnant."  I was all good for trimesters 1&2.  Then I became one of those pregnant women who starts every sentence with "you're not going to believe what this child has done to me now."  Oh-well.  At least we know that I'm not all of a sudden going to decide to birth an entire herd of children.  Back to my cold.  This was the sort of cold where your body pretty much feels okay except for the fact that you might as well not have a nose.  There are no sniffles or sore throat or cough, just a complete absence of one of two very critical breathing options. My sinuses were completely sealed shut.  Occasionally, one of my nostrils would just start dripping liquid but because my face is scaly and raw and numb, this was difficult to predict and catch.  We're really talking about a total absence of grace here.  Because my nose just up and quit my face, there was no sniffing or blowing, just this delightful spontaneous dripping and desperate clamoring for a Kleenex/paper towel/roll of toilet paper/sleeve/whatever.

The most predominant effect of this phenomenon was to piss me off and make me whiny.  Then came the rib situation.  I'm sure most of you have heard me mumbling in protest about my child's foot in my ribs and how uncomfortable said foot placement could be.  Also on Wednesday, this discomfort morphed from a consistent annoyance into full on chronic agony.  I asked our birthing instructor for advice and she told me to go hang from some monkey bars.... Really?  Monkey Bars?  I was so scouting out playgrounds for monkey bars.  I was hanging on door frames, I was hanging on Hunter... whatever, I was game.  It didn't work.  Thursday, I asked my Dr. about it.   She laughed at me and said "tell her to move!".  Cute.  So finally, I did what no pregnant woman should ever do.... I Googled 'how to remove baby's foot from my ribs'.  LOW AND BEHOLD the first 10 things that came up involved physical therapy.

**long pause** 

Duh.    

So by Friday morning, I had not slept since Tuesday and I was confined from the bed until pain became so unbearable that had to pace around the house trying to re-adjust my torso. I called the physical therapist who had helped me with some S.I. joint issues earlier in my pregnancy who specializes in women's therapy and pregnancy.  This woman, Ashely Nelson, is a goddess, a saint, and my personal hero.  I made an emergency appointment to see her Friday afternoon, walked into her office, she looked at me and immediately said "Wow, um, yeah - I'd imagine that hurts, you've got a dislocated rib sticking out of your back.".

My darling little girl dislodged a rib.  God love her.... from what I understand, that's not super easy to do!  She's either really really tall or really really strong.... or both.  So with some serious manipulation (Ashley), banging (Ashley), cussing (Me) and praying (Me), Ashley and I got my rib back in place and tapped up.  If nothing else, our efforts did clear my sinuses for a few minutes!!!  So I kick started my weekend bruised as hell from our efforts to re-align my rib, but you know what, I'll take a little bruising over chronic agony ANY DAY.

Also, while all of this was happening our dishwasher stopped cleaning our dishes.  Ordinarily this wouldn't bother me all that much but a dear friend reminded me that I would soon be doing lots of dishes and sterilizing lots of...well... everything.  Even so, this has really been a minor irritant of late (in comparison...) until today when I started calling around to have the thing fixed.  I called Sears a total of 3 times and had Hunter call once all in an effort to try and understand our two payment options.  First of all, out of all four phone calls none of our customer service reps spoke English as a primary language.  That's totally fine, unless I am asking open-ended questions that require a legitimate dialogue.  To the best of my understanding there were two payment options, both of which made me feel like I was signing up for some sort of seriously creepy life insurance.  Something inside of me kept saying - "if you sign up for this appointment, you might still have unsterilized baby bottles there's a possibility that they will completely drain your 401-K.... red flag... red flag."   Neither plan allowed me to get a new dishwasher if I changed my mind. Seriously?  How can you tell me 'No' if I want a new dishwasher!?!?!  How does that even work? I'm pregnant.  I'm incapable of making a decision or committing to what shoes I want to wear today.  I need legitimate options.  I NEED to be able to change my mind!

An hour later, I actually found the manual for the dishwasher.  I called the Maytag company.  This time, instead of being transferred over seas, I spent literally (by this point yes - I really am timing) 25 minutes trying playing 20 questions with a computerized voice.  Trying to read off your phone number with no nose to anon-human is just really really challenging.  "Dide.. One.. Dide- etc. etc. (should be 919)"  and then with all of the yes or no questions I'm eventually screaming "Doh!!!!" into the phone thinking, under different circumstances, I'm sure this would be comical.  Finally, the computer gave up on me and put me on the phone with Taylor, a sweetheart with a southern drawl.  I gotta tell you, Taylor was no real help but just hearing his live, human, southern voice really made my day.  Taylor inadvertently reminded me that we were given a 1 year home warranty when we purchased our house and that our dishwasher is covered!!!!  I was so elated by this news that I didn't even care that I had wasted the last 3 hours of my day.

SO if we're keeping pace:
While the size of my baby looks great and she doesn't qualify a 'monster baby' in physique, I have taken to referring to her as 'monster baby' because, well, the child dislocated my freaking rib!  (Hunter gets very upset when I refer to our sweet daughter as monster.  Hunter, however,  has never had a dislocated anything.  Yet...)  However, I have found the best Physical Therapist in the whole wide world so its all good.

Round 17 of the never-ending-head-cold  seems to be wanning.  I've been almost able to breathe out of my left nostril for going on 17 hours now.  There is a light at the end of the tunnel.

Thanks to a very cool Realtor and sweet Taylor from Maytag, our dishwasher should be fixed for the more than reasonable price of $60.00.  No one was injured in the scheduling of this service.

Nursery is almost finished (pics this week!) and we should be able to start working on the yard in the next week or two (its our first honest to goodness yard, I'm excited).

Spring is coming and sometime in the next 5-7 weeks, so is Moon Pie.

Life. Is. Good.

A little rant, A little common courtesy, A little more rant.

Okay – I will be the first to admit, I’ve been a little intense lately.  That said; it’s a controlled intensity.  I was able to keep myself from laying on the horn and screaming at the lady driving in a way that made Ms. Daisy look like Mario Andretti through the cancer center on my way to pick Hunter up from work.   I have enough presence of mind to realize, it’s a cancer center.  The only people who get to cause scenes here are the ones with cancer.  Get a hold of yourself… and a hold of myself was gotten!  See!  Controlled intensity! Beautiful!

HOWEVER!   HOW-ev..errrr…. When it came to the guy “walking his dog”.  Okay, screw it; you can’t call what he was doing “walking his dog”.   I need to rephrase: When it came to the guy “passive aggressively trying to communicate reverse psychology via telepathy to his mongrel of a canine in an effort to maintain a pathetic delusion of evolved human-being/companion animal dominance and FAILING TO THE DETRIMENT OF … WELL … AT A MINIMUM, ME”…. Yes, when it comes to THAT GUY…. I kind of lost my patience.

Allow me to expound.  (Like you have a choice at this juncture).  I mentioned Monday that we (I) have a renewed commitment to making our yard a pleasant space that will, one day, hopefully, be somewhat child friendly.   (I think the term frequently being whispered behind my back when referring to this latest crusade is actually ‘nesting’.) We (I) have decided that step one in this process is to transition the primary function of our yard being an unsanitary sewage pit for our two golden retrievers, Dharma and Bodhi.  No more stench of ammonia wafting up in the hot dry summer sun as we sit on our patio table and no more monthly expeditions in hazmat suits to remove all of the piles of poo.  Two 60-80 lb dogs produce a lot of poo.  It’s gross.  God love ‘em.  Also, something we learned the hard way, when there is no humidity and no rain, dog poo doesn’t just break down and “fertilize” like it does down south.  No, it petrifies instead.  If it’s winter, it freezes and then petrifies.  SO my solution to this is 3-4 short walks of a block or 2 or 3 or more (depending on how much time we have and how shy Bodhi is about going on a tandem leash with Dharma at his side - I’m finding he’s pretty shy).  Operation no-poo (I’ll come up with a better name when I’m not so pissed off) started today.  I’m finding I’m digging this new endeavor because it also forces me to take a break, stretch my legs, and get a breath of fresh air.  I’m down with it. 

To set the scene, I have to tell you we live in what is often referred to as a “mixed use” neighborhood and a “walkable community.”  It’s a neighborhood with an urban feel to it.  While it is primarily historic/residential homes a lot of these old buildings have been turned into  art galleries, coffee shops, café’s, bakeries, laundromats, grocery stores, ski shops, you name it, interspersed with the houses on every block.  It’s laid out in a way that really encourages social living, getting out and walking, lots of sidewalks and bike lanes, etc. etc.  It’s also INCREDIBLY dog friendly.  Dogs are almost required to live here.  It’s nothing for me to see a little old lady with her yippy, white, fluff ball strolling down the aisle in the produce section of the neighborhood grocery store or chilling in her purse in a near-by restaurant.  

For the most part, I find dog owners are pretty conscientious.  Most dog owners are in the same boat we are, the lots are very small in this part of town and in order to keep your yard from being flagged by the CDC, you have to walk your dogs often.  We all make sure we bag the business and toss accordingly.  We have understood off leash areas – for example; the cemetery one block up.  Not technically off leash, but if you are conscientious about your dog’s behavior, personality and when you go, its all good.   Also,…. Drum roll please… theres THE DOG PARK in the middle of the neighborhood – even though it’s not fenced in… which is kind of strange for a dog park in the middle of an urban neighborhood…. FINALLY if your dog really needs to get some energy out of its system there is a dog friendly hiking trail at the edge of the neighborhood that goes for about 5 miles through the woods AND INCLUDES A CREEK FOR ADDITIONAL DOG DELIGHT!!!! What more could you ask for?  So the rules are, bag your business and keep your dog on a leash unless you are in one of the understood leash optional areas.

Now, I am willing to grant exception to this decree.  For example, our neighbor’s dog, Beau is really and truly the reincarnated soul of some heavenly saint sent down to provide dignified, well mannered, love and companionship to his family.  Beau is perfect.  Beau does not require a leash.  I will be the FIRST to tell you  with absolute certainty… my dogs are nothing like Beau.  Dharma is a somewhat unpredictable, neurotic, psychologically faulty, spaz.  She has three modes: Hide, eat, run.  She doesn’t have an aggressive bone in her body and is beta to a fault, but she’s stubborn and when she’s walking, she really just wants to run, hide, or both.    Therefore, I don’t let her off of the leash.   Bodhi, on the other hand is a huge, bumbling, blond, exhibition of love.  Really.  He’s three dimensional love.  He loves everything and everybody and has so much love that he can’t control himself.  When he encounters something new he just showers it with and explosion love and kisses and… well urine.   Shockingly, some folks find this trait annoying.  Therefore, I don’t let him off of the leash.  At the end of the day, both of my dogs are pretty well behaved, well trained, and listen fairly well.  However, you never know when you’re going to encounter another aggressive dog or someone running a stop sign, or whatever.  Because I love my dogs, I don’t let them off of the leash.

(Below is Bodhi.  He's experiencing explosive euphoria because his all time favorite person in the world, our neighbor, Ron, is telling him good morning through the fence.  This state of extreme, full bodied bliss is pretty much perpetual)

(Above is Dharma.  She's hiding from the voices.  We've been able to determine that the voices only stop when she's fed, therefore, if she's not hiding, she's stalking the kitchen.)

So I’m waddling down the sidewalk, minding my own business, trying desperately to talk Bodhi into getting over his bathroom shyness when I see dude walking down the street in front of me about 15 feet behind his little black Scotty/Yorkie/thingy, which is not on a leash.  It was a super cute little dog, lots of energy, I’m guessing a puppy.  I wave to the guy and slow down to give him time to call his dog back and leash her up.  He does nothing.  Nothing.  I stop.  Little dog runs over to us and starts bouncing and trying to play.  Dharma wants no part of this and starts trying to hide and Bodhi can’t contain himself and starts trying to wrestle with the dog.  I’m now in the middle of a pack of 3 dogs going in three different directions all in various stages of insanity and I’m 7 months pregnant.   Needless to say, I held that leash for about 30 seconds before I was over powered by the chaos of 150 pounds worth of dog and let them all go.  Now, keep in mind it’s also about 5:30 in the afternoon.   We’re at an intersection.  This is just uncool.  So I look at the guy, who is now strolling towards me (strolling) causally calling his dog “Cricket.”, and I say “SERIOUSLY!?!?!?  Man, this is uncool”. 

AREN’T YOU PROUD OF ME!?!?!  I DIDN’T USE A SINGLE CUSS WORD!  THAT IS A SERIOUSLY LOW KEY EXPRESSION OF FRUSTRATION!!!!!!!!  So the guy… says… NOTHING.  Not. A.  Word.   Not, ‘OH MY GOD I’M SORRY!’  Not, ‘Are you okay?!?’  Not, ‘my dog is out of control and I’m a pathetic human being with no respect for my fellow man’.  Not, ‘lady why don’t you just roll your pregnant butt out of here’.  Nothing.  He just ignores me, keeps casually strolling towards me passively stating his dog’s name, “Cricket.”.   I’ve got news for you; Cricket had left the reservation by this point.  Cricket was flying so high she didn’t hear anything but a thousand euphoric trumpets blasting ‘freedom’ in her little puppy dog ears.

I decide to take a different approach.  Maybe the guy is embarrassed at his obvious impotence when it comes to his dog.  I say “ha ha… I’ve been there… she’s actually a really cute dog.”  Still nothing.  I’ve given up that the guy is ever going to get control of his dog and mine are sensing that I’m really not happy and are starting to calm down and dial back into what’s going on with me.  I gather up their leash, they calm down, we start walking.  Effing Cricket starts following.  She follows us to the end of the block, she bolts across the intersection, she’s yard hopping, she’s out of this stratosphere!  The guy starts strolling in her general direction causally calling her name like it’s just no big deal, he’s yet to acknowledge me or our obviously unpleasant predicament, he’s just strolling and I can’t stand it anymore.  I just can’t. So I turn around and say, “I hate to state the obvious here, but you obviously have zero control over your dog and therefore have absolutely no business walking her off leash.  Not only is it dangerous for her to be playing in 5:00 traffic, but its unbelievable rude and inconsiderate and I really really don’t appreciate being put in this situation while I’m walking my dogs minding my own damn business”.  You guessed it.  He said nothing.  I stormed off in a huff, put Dharma and Bodhi back in the house, and came out on the front porch with my hands on my hips to glare at him with my most humiliating glare while he spent the next 15 minutes following his insane little monster around my block.   He finally turned around and left her, which she finally realized and followed in his general direction.  Nothing like some passive aggressive reverse psychology to really show your little dog who’s boss.  Way to handle the situation.

I just don’t understand people sometimes.  In my world, and I like this little world, you go out of your way to be kind and conscientious.  You cross the street to help someone struggling; you don’t look the other way.  You are accountable for your actions and claim responsibility if you have caused discomfort to another person.  This could be as simple as accidentally bumping someone with your grocery cart or almost causing a pregnant woman to land flat on her face amidst a pile of insane dogs.  Anyway, you get the point, no need for me to get all high and mighty.  Just remember, you have nothing lost by making an extra effort to interact with your fellow man.  Worst case scenario is they ignore you and you’re no worse off than you would have been if you had ignored them.  I think it’s easy to get out of the habit if physical interaction and common courtesy when it’s so much easier to text, tweet, email, or chat.  I love all of these functions, but let’s face it, they are a little soulless and I always say, there is nothing in this world like hearing the sound of your sweet voice.   

On that happy note, I must get ready to go to birthing class.  And I'd also like to end by saying... Screw you, Cricket's Owner!  And your little dog too!!!  HA!