The Tragic End of Smokey Twlight-the Bear from Bath and Bodyworks

When it rains, it indeed does pour. Holy cats and dogs of the thunderheads. And I'm the kind of person who gladly frolics in the rain when the opportunity presents itself, but you'd better be packing scuba gear for this kind of storm. We're talking more than cats and dogs falling from the sky, this is a whole zoo and a wildlife sanctuary on top of it. Seriously. We don't have vast windows in our apartment, and due to being at the end of the hall there's this funny little alcove thing that basically keeps our room hidden from everything except the bicycle rack, and it was serious business watching this storm blow in. Bring your poncho and your hip waders, you are going to get wet.

Which brings me to the point where I have to go out in this downpour. [Note: part of the following paragraph with be overly dramatic. Please read accordingly]. Remember the dog sitting gig? Oh yeah, well there's one more pooping party to go for the day, and it's to the point in this storm that I'm thinking, "Hmmm...the benefits of getting drenched.  I could walk over there.. that way it wouldn't matter if I got wet taking the dog out. Or I could drive the block and a half and attempt to save a few square inches of clothing to wipe the rainwater from my eyes by the time I get back. I opted for the drive and a miracle.

This is the point in the story where God took pity on me and said, ok fine, but you'd better be nice. So the rain slowed to a more realistic thunderstorm pace and I took the dog outside. Nothing too exciting there except I still got wet and it's a good thing I wore flip flops instead of real shoes.

Now for the tragic scene. Since there was just no feasible way to get any suitable dog exercise in the house, Rudy did something unforgivable. She slaughtered the closest bear. Not a real bear, but in the imaginations of the children this could have been the most ferocious bear in all of Yellowstone. But alas, this smallish dog really go the better of him this time. I heard this strange noise coming from the sun room. And not sure where the lights were, I looked to see Rudy, in ready-to-play position, stuffed animal between her front paws. Oh. No. Uh.... "Rudy...(warning tone)" and this escalates into me running around the house trying to convince the dog that this bear was not in fact a dog toy, and rather should have belonged to me. Time elapse cameras would show something a long the lines of a blur of two figure running after each other followed by extremely intense staring contests.  After several minutes, I managed to distract her long enough to rescue the now deflated carcass of the once pleasantly huggable bear. Poor Smokey. Just not a good day. I do hope that this hasn't crushed the dreams of the youngins of the household.

The moral of this story is don't leave your shit where it doesn't belong.

Or what I'm going to take from it.

Monday Dullsville

Not that Monday was actually that boring... Other than my half closed eyes in Gaga...  but it happens.

The most eventful part of my day was for sure when I got left in the Vatican. How? Well I'll get to that.

So my Digipho class had intended to go to a photography exhibit.  The funny part is that the museum doesn't open until 4. So instead, we're going to go take pictures at St. Peter's. Ok great.  Pack up, head out to the most prominent cathedral in the world. And basically walked around people watching...  Pretty good time right? So about an hour and half later, I noticed that I couldn't find anyone from my class. Not that it's all that surprising.... I mean, there are probably close to a thousand people within the Colonnades. So I looked around for a while, and by the time the clock said 12:30 I decided that I'd better just go back. But on the way I decided to buy beautiful postcards because they were the cheapest I'd seen. Some of you can now be expecting postcards. Once I get stamps...  So maybe a little bit yet... And low and behold, my class was all back in the room, talking about some stuff that I didn't know, and I awkwardly walked in late. Woof. But the good news is that I was safely in the arms of St. Peter, and I got to people watch for about 2 hours.

Off to lunch with Kate, print off an abstract, go to class, stay mostly awake. Work in the library, stay mostly awake, write postcards, go to class, stay mostly awake. Note: I think it would be easier to say awake in class if my professors taught with the lights on. I mean, I understand when we are looking at slides or powerpoints, but that isn't always the case... and it's just dark. It's practically a nap endorsement. Not good.

Back to the apartment, planning on going to bed early (that could be a really funny joke tomorrow).

See? Mondays have got nothing on Saturdays between 6 and 7. What a shame.