ROONEY MARA!

So, those who follow me on Twitter or Facebook or Instagram (in other words, those tools I use to distract me from doing some actual blogging/writing), may already know this, but Joe and I got a new dog!

She is the weirdest dog ever and I love her.

(I’m sure most of my friends and family, upon hearing that we had some “big news,” expected it to be about a baby but nope. Sorry!)

Anyway. She's a year old, some sort of beagle mix, and her name is Mara but she already has some nicknames, including:

Marabelle
Crazy Eyes
Mad Eye Mara
SWEET GIRL PUPPY FACE

and, my favorite...ROONEY MARA.

(Thank you, Billy Eichner. I can’t find a video of Billy Eichner shouting ROONEY MARA but just trust me that it’s hilarious, OK?)

When I started working at an animal shelter, I figured it was only a matter of time before I fell in love with a dog and brought it home. In fact, I soon started coming home at least once a week, regaling Joe with tales of some new dog I was obsessed with. But he never took the bait. Which...in hindsight was a good thing because A) those dogs were awesome, but would have been a disaster in our house and B) then we wouldn’t have gotten Mara.

I met Mara when I took her to an adoption event about a month ago. The point of taking animals to these adoption events is to hopefully get someone to, you know, adopt them, or at least generate some interest in the dog, so maybe someone will see itand, like, go home and think about it for so long that they’ll suddenly realize they simply HAVE to go back and adopt it.

I guess this time, that someone was me. I actually called Joe and told him to come to the event so he could meet her, thinking that if I was being ridiculous (again), he’d talk me out of it, but then he knelt down in front of Mara and she perched her front paws on his knee and licked his hand and BOOM we were DONE. WE ARE SUCH SUCKERS.

Still, I wasn’t sure. I didn’t want to rush into anything, so we decided to wait and see if she was still available in a week. Plus also, you know, introduce her to Max and make sure she didn’t like to eat cats. She passed both tests with flying colors.

Phoebe doesn’t really like her, but then again, Phoebe doesn’t really like anyone. Unfortunately, Mara, so far, has not shown Phoebe the deference that Max does, so there’s been a lot of hissing and “NO MARA”-ing, but I suppose that’s to be expected.

We were prepared for a second dog. It’s something we’d been talking about since we moved into our house. There were things we knew, like that our expenses would double, the dogs might not get along at first, Phoebe might riot and puke and pee on all of our stuff, but we were pretty sure we could deal with it.

However. (There’s always a however.) There were things we did not consider. For instance, it turns out Mara is allergic to grain. So that’s been fun! There were a couple of nights where we didn’t sleep, because Mara was up hacking and LICKING THE DAMN FLOOR, which I don’t think is bad for her but it’s really, really unsettling. Also, there was one night where she was acting like she was going to throw up, so I let her outside and then went to the basement to look out the window at her and was climbing over the couch when I fell and ended up knocking over some water I’d left down there and so there was shattered glass just, everywhere, and I thought maybe Joe was going to murder me.

Anyway! Since that escapade didn’t end in divorce, I feel pretty good about the solidity of our marriage. Whew.

It’s been about two weeks now and I think things are finally starting to get to the new normal. Even Phoebe seems to have accepted yet another interloper in her world. Max was pretty perturbed the first few days that Mara was here, mostly, I think, because of two reasons. One was the aforementioned middle-of-the-night hacking, which disrupted his sleep, and the second is that she doesn’t seem to care if Max is lying somewhere she wants to be, she just jumps up and crowds right into him...which disrupts his sleep. He’s getting used to it, though, and has stopped giving us, “why did you do this to me,” looks.

That’s actually one of my favorite things that Mara does. She just makes herself comfortable, wherever she may be, which then causes her to do one of my other favorite things. She seems to hate falling asleep, I assume because she’s afraid she’ll miss something, so she holds her head up and her eyes just fall slowly closed, until she jerks her head and wakes herself up. IT’S ADORABLE YOU GUYS.

She lost.

I was sort of worried that there was no way I could ever love another dog as much as I love Max but it turns out I can and now I love Max even more? Love is so weird. I sometimes think of love as this exhaustible resource, like I should hoard it to myself because I might run out eventually, but duh, obviously this is not the case.

O R they?

One of my best friends had a baby yesterday but, you know, I finally broke in this pair of shoes that have been giving me blisters for months, so I'm not sweating it either.

I woke up yesterday to a text from Nancy, letting me know she was at the hospital about ready to GIVE BIRTH, which she did around 8:30 that same morning. I can't stop thinking about it. Nancy has a baby. A teeny, tiny baby. Nancy is a MOM. How are we old enough for this? I was looking at old pictures the other day, pictures taken right after college and thinking, "who ARE you?" because seriously, who ARE you, Crazypants? Where did you go? Are you hiding in that portapotty? If so, why? I just have so many questions.

My main question is, did you know newborn babies don't HAVE to look like alien gorillas? Because they don't. Nancy had a really cute one. And I'm not just saying that because she's my friend and I love her so I therefore love her baby and have like, ugly-blocking powers. Because no, this baby is just really cute. You'll have to take my word for it because I forgot to take any pictures, so blinded was I by the cuteness.

Once we left the hospital, we were crazy with hunger so we went out to dinner, Heidi, Nicole, Joe and I, and I marveled at how social Joe and I are being this week. We were just over at Nicole's for a Dexter party (Dexter viewing, I mean, we didn't kidnap a serial killer and then stab him in Nicole's kill room...as far as I know, Nicole doesn't even have a kill room), we had a baby visit last night, I'm going out to dinner tonight, AND we have plans for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights this weekend. WHO ARE WE. I think it's because our only other alternative is packing and, you guys, packing blows.

We close on the house this Friday (holy shit) which means soon we'll be really poor, but we'll have a house, so if we can't afford groceries, maybe we can eat some of our siding? That's a thing, right? Sure. We're not moving in right away, though, since we have to paint and clean and hopefully that's ALL because that's enough, really.

That is all of my exciting news. Except for, oh yeah, we also bought Max a hot dog costume.

YOU'RE WELCOME

if my brain could throw up, this is what it would look like

Did you know that you can only listen to 40 hours of Pandora a month? I didn't. Until I apparently reached my limit, which I did today. I thought at first that 40 hours was really impressive but I don't think it is. I have Pandora on most of the time at work, so that's an easy 40 hours right there. In a week, even.

At first I was really worried because WHAT WOULD I DO FOR MUSIC? I found out that we can hear the music from shows in our offices during rehearsals and showtime but there aren't any shows right now. And I always forget my iPod at home, or if I do remember it, it's not charged and don't ask me where my charger is because I DON'T KNOW I DON'T EVER KNOW. But whatever, don't worry (I know you were worried), I paid 99 cents and now I can listen to Pandora for the rest of the month and my limit starts over in September. Can you imagine, though? No music at work? To miss out on the joy that is Part of Your World popping up after, like, Radiohead or something? No thank you.

Anyway, what was I talking about? Who knows. How many times have I typed "what am I talking about?" on my blog might be a better question only probably not really because the answer is DUH A LOT. Guess what we did last night? Guess. I SAID GUESS. No, but seriously, folks, we put an offer on a house last night. I wasn't going to say anything because I was afraid of jinxing it but we didn't say anything LAST time we put an offer on a house and we still didn't get it so I am throwing caution to the wind. Here, wind! Take it! Take all the caution! I don't even want it anyway!

So, yeah, we met our realtor after work to sign all the paperwork and did you know putting on offer on a house is kind of a big deal? Because I guess it is. There's a contract and you have to hand over a check and everything. I signed my name a bunch of times and didn't even hyperventilate once! That will happen when and if we end up getting the house and I then realize we just bought this giant thing where millions of things could go wrong and we won't have a landlord to call anymore. OMG WHAT HAVE WE DONE.

No, seriously, it's fine. It'll be really nice if we get it because there's a giant backyard, all for Max, which is great because he refuses to use the litter box, unless he's sneaking into it to steal cat poop. We mentioned the cat-poop-thievery to the vet when she suggested putting Max on a diet (he's packed on a few pounds...don't mention it to him, he's sensitive) and I was all, "I think he's hungry because he got in the litter box the other day and hardly ever does that," and she was like, "Oh, yeah, he's not hungry, he's just stealing Kitty Cookies, lol. Cat poop is like dessert to dogs." It was an informative visit, is what I'm saying.

Anyway, there was an earthquake today, too, so that's weird. I mean, it wasn't IN Ohio but I certainly felt it in Ohio. We don't usually get earthquakes here but this one time when I was in 3rd grade they were worried about some giant earthquake that was supposed to hit (I don't know the details because I was 9, but it probably had something to do with the Hellmouth being in Cleveland) BUT ANYWAY we had to have earthquake drills and that consisted of sitting under our desks, which doesn't really seem that safe but whatever, I don't know about surviving an earthquake, only about surviving tornadoes and MORE IMPORTANTLY zombies. Did you know this entire paragraph was only two sentences? Well, three now. Four. Five. Shit.

You guys, WHAT is this post even about? You know what the problem is? I started it yesterday morning and now it is today evening and guess what I don't even care, I'm posting it anyway, non-sensicalness and all. For what is life without a little non-sensicalness? Besides more sensical and stuff. But who wants that? I can't decide how to end this but I need to go watch some Mad Men reruns until it's time to go to bed so BYE.

The birds, the bees and the monkey babies, Mulder.

You guys, I think Max might have PTSD. See, he's terrified of thunderstorms, right? I feel like this is well-documented...on this blog. But anyway. We didn't have him last year during the July 4th festivities but we assumed that he'd be afraid of fireworks since they make even bigger BOOM FUN noises than thunderstorms.

We discovered that, yes, he is just as terrified of firecracker booms as thunder booms when we were out walking one night (Independence Day Eve Eve or something) and someone set off some amateur fireworks because of course they did. Max stopped for a moment, looked at us in abject terror, and then took off as fast as his little legs could carry him. But he was mostly fine after a bit because they had been far away so they were just little booms.

We decided to walk him around before ten on July 4th, because the real fireworks started at ten and we knew we would never get him outside at that time. We thought we were safe. We were wrong. Because some jackhole in the block of condos next to us set off a huge, esplodey firework just as we had Max to that point. Oh my god, you guys, I thought he was going to reach light speed, such was his haste to get back inside. We couldn't even get him to pee, which was a problem, because we have him on a very strict pee and poo schedule. We talk about Max's poop (or lack thereof) at least five times a day. It's weird. Such is the joy of pet ownership. Anyway.

I tried to take him on another walk that night, after the fireworks were over, but he would barely come out the front door. He went out long enough to pee and then he raced back inside like there were bombs falling outside, which I guess maybe he thought there were? I felt so bad, though! He looked so sad and pathetic so I just gave him extra treats and cuddles.

I thought that would be the end of it, but every night we walk him around nine o'clock, which is the same time he almost got blown up in a firecracker. We try to take him on the usual path, and it happens to be the same path we took him on the night of July 4th. I thought this would be no problem. I mean, dogs don't really have long memories, right? But he won't even go that way! He will during the day, he's fine, but he refuses to walk that way at night. Do you think he thinks there will be another FIRECRACKER BOOM EXPLOSION? But yeah, that's how he got PTSD.

This is (very) slightly related, but I'm trying to convince Joe that we need to get a pet pig. He was all, "we can get a pet pig after we have a baby," but I think he's just saying that because he hopes that if I have a cute baby, I won't want a cute pig but that's not true at all because I'll probably just want a cute pig even MORE because a pig (probably) won't pee and poop on me, PLUS BONUS it will make adorable oinking noises AND will have a curly tail. If I get a baby with a tail, I'm gonna be pissed.

But my point is (I guess) that it should go: Dog, Pig, Baby. Like, obviously, you get a dog before you have a baby because you have to make sure you can keep another living thing (besides yourself) alive. But I think you should get a pig between the dog and the baby because a pig is a pet like a dog but it's pink and hairless like a baby so it's the perfect transition between a dog and baby. I mean, it's practically a baby. It's a practice baby! Anyway, I think Joe's just worried that if I get a pig, why would I want a baby? Actually, that's a really valid point.

Whatever. Did you know you can adopt pigs from Petfinder? Don't tell Joe.

this blog is about to reach a new low

Last night, while Joe and I were sleeping, Max woke up, went to the living room, threw up, and then dragged his bed over the puke. Like he was hiding it.

WHAT.

Mr. Darcy is the hit of my pants*

I woke up early this morning to Max crawling ACROSS JOE'S FACE so he could hide his face between our pillows. Normally these kinds of shenanigans would get Max kicked off the bed POST HASTE but it was thunderstorming and he was scared and COME ON, how could I possibly force him off the bed when his sad little scared face was trembling nose-to-nose with mine. Joe and I tried to go back to sleep, but it didn't really work because Joe was pretty much forced to the very edge of the bed and the only way I could make myself comfortable was to spoon Max but he kept hitting me in the chin with his head whenever there was thunder and OW.

So my point is, I'm tired today. I mean, I had already stayed up past my bedtime because I wanted to watch Mr. Darcy win an Oscar, so I wasn't planning on waking up an hour and a half earlier than my alarm. YAWN.

In other news, I got this love letter the other day:

Dear Beloved,

This letter may come to you as a surprise due to the fact that we have not yet met. Firstly, I have to say that I have no intentions of causing you any pain. My name is Mr. Moore Edwards, a European merchant. I have been diagnosed with Prostate and Esophageal cancer that was discovered very late due to lack of caring for my health. It has defiled all form of medicine and right now, I have only about a few months to live according to medical experts. I have not particularly lived my life so well, as I never really cared for anyone not even myself but my business.Though I am very rich, I was never generous, I was always hostile to people and only focus on my business as that was the only thing I cared for. But now I regret all this as I now know that there is more to life than just wanting to have or make all the money in the world. I use to say to my self that if God should give me a second chance I would live differently from how I have lived. I was meditating on my hospital bed and something told me that Go

Hence, I do not trust them anymore, as they seem not to be content with what I have left for them.The last of my money which is a huge cash deposit that I have with a security firm will be put in your care if only you will agree and are capable of seeing this through. I want you to help me collect this deposit and dispatched it to charity organizations of your choice and let them know that it is I Mr.Moore Edwards that is making this generous donation. I am writing this from my laptop computer in my hospital bed where I wait for my time to come. I pray for you to support and assist me with a good heart. I hope we can build a relationship based on trust because I want to do this by all means possible before I die.But the choice is yours Please you can contact me through this email address: mooreedwards1@aol.co.uk

Be blessed my beloved,
Mr.Moore Edwards

For some reason, it was delivered to my spam folder. Which is weird because why would my beloved send me spam? In any case, feel free to email him. It sounds like he could use a pick-me-up.

*When my friend Amy and I were but wee little college freshman, we read Bridget Jones's Dairy and Pride & Prejudice, like, a million times, and then saw BJD in the theater, like, a million times, and went on an epic journey to, like, a million stores just to find the P&P mini-series that made Colin Firth such an object of DEEP, DEEP DESIRE. To say we were merely obsessed with Mr. Darcy is an insult to our level of obsession.

Anyway, one night, after drinking too much, we sent emails to practically everyone we knew (drunk emailing is way more entertaining than drunk dialing, trust me) and in one email, we said both "Mr. Darcy is a hearthrap," and "Mr. Darcy is the hit of my pants." Thank you, Stephanie, for reminding me of this. GOOD TIMES.