Sunday Puppy Humor

This is just a "for fun" post. I enjoy humorous pictures, and have numerous shots of my dogs being silly and funny. In other words, typical dogs. Throw a puppy into the mix, and you have nonstop humor (though often seasonsed with healthy doses of exasperation!).

The Beware of Dog picture shows Asterisk with her head through the porch gate (like a cow at her stanchion, waiting to be milked!). The sign was given to me by my sister, who has my same warped sense of humor.

The next picture shows Asterisk trying to lick peanut butter off her face. She was making such contorted faces and looked so funny, despite the fact her dark, slanted eyebrows always make her look like she's scowling.

The final picture is Asterisk with a plastic water bottle. She far prefers toys that are made of plastic because they make such delightful crackly sounds when crunched.

Asterisk, the Monster Demon Annilhilator Puppy

Just look at that sweet Boxer face on the left. That's Asterisk with her big Doberman sister, Nova. Don't they look cute together? Doesn't Asterisk look innocent?

Don't let that puppy face fool you. She's at it again. Her name's Asterisk, but it should be Destructo. It's actually quite funny. She has learned the joys of ripping things off the clothesline and subjecting them to dirt, dog poop, grass stains, dog slobber, you name it.

Thankfully, today the only things on the clothesline were dog blankets and socks. I can see how she got the blankets off the line--they hung down within reach of curious doggy mouths. But the socks? She must have taken a running jump to get high enough to nab them. And she got 4 of the 5 socks off the line.

Thank goodness she isn't a destructive chewer. She never shreds the stuff she takes off the line. She just drags them around and tosses them in the air.

Time for me to get out the old shock collar. It's imperative she learn that taking things off the clothesline will have shocking consequences. (insert sound of evil laughter) How can something with such a sweet face do such diabolical things? I guess it's all part of being a puppy.

So, what's left on my clothesline? One lonely sock, which she was apparently unable to get at. Doesn't it look forlorn, all by itself?

Spring Flowers

Pat Rice posted a picture of her lovely clematis on her blog site, and lamented the fact commenters couldn't leave pictures of their own in the comments section. I agree. I would love to see other people's flower pictures! I love looking at (and smelling) flowers, so I decided to post a few of my own here. I hope you enjoy them!

The yellow picture is a perennial called Basket O' Gold that is one of the first things to bloom in the spring. It cascades over the railroad ties in my landscaping in wild abandon. Their bright yellow flowers are so cheerful. This is a hardy plant that thrives on neglect.

The purple picture is the clematis of a friend. I love how the ruffled edges of the flower remind me of the ruffle on the hem of a Regency debutante's dress.

The green picture isn't of flowers, but of bracken ferns. I liked the pattern of the ferns as well as the bright green color. In case you couldn't tell, I like doing close-ups. *g*

The single flower in the next picture is a columbine, another cheerful little perennial that is blooming in my whiskey planter tub right now.

And the last picture is yet another hardy and determined little flower, the first harbinger of spring: a primrose. These primroses have survived hail, snow, sleet, and driving rain, and don't seem adversely affected by any of it.

Oh, wait, I have one more picture to post. The pink rose is the only rose plant in my garden. I call it my Rose Stick Plant, because it is just one single stalk that sticks out of the ground and it never branches out, nor does it produce more than one single pink rose each year. Originally, it produced a single blue rose, a hybrid I bought through mail order and which I highly prized for its rarity. Then one year the goat I used to own ate the rose down below the graft point, and now all I get is the pink rose, since the stalk the blue rose was grafted to was for a pink rose. Alas.

So these are just a few of my flower pictures.

Bad Dog, Good Dog

You've heard the old bad-cop-good-cop routine. Well, apply that to dogs, if you will. I have a 4-year-old Doberman bitch that couldn't be more perfect. Nova is so well-behaved and inobtrusive that when I'm invited to visit friends and family, they tell me to bring her along.

And then there's Asterisk, my 7-month-old Boxer pup. For the past several days she has been trying my patience to the limit. If there is something to get into, she's gotten into it with a vengeance. A few days ago she flipped an entire bowl of kibbles with her foot, just like tiddly-winks, and shot kibble all over the kitchen floor. It was like someone dropped a bag of marbles. She has utterly destroyed her very expensive high density foam crate pad & cushy afghan I'd placed on top for extra comfort. That's the picture, above.

She knocked over a potted plant and it smashed to smithereens. Dirt and pottery bits all over the place. Then she had the audacity to steal the little plastic dish thing you put under plants to protect furniture (picture on left).

She has chewed a piece of plywood into oblivion, leaving it hanging in strips. She has pulled the bark off a small decorative log I was using as plant stand on my deck. She is still not housebroken, and must be let out every 15-20 minutes or I'm cleaning up accidents.

My exasperation with her is at an all-time high. And just about the time I wonder why I thought it would be fun to own a puppy again, she comes into my bedroom where I'm working at my craft table, creating cards, and lies down at my feet, just to be near me. And my heart melts as she puts her chin on my foot and sighs happily.

Puppies. They're as bad as children.

Beautiful Bounty of Flowers

This will be a short and sweet post, but I couldn't let the day go by without showing you a picture of my bouquet of lilacs and pink rhododendrens. Isn't it a pretty bouquet? (Even if I did jump the gun and pick the lilacs and rhodies before they were fully open!) I love flowers, and I'm grateful that lilacs bloom so early. This bouquet is sitting on my desk as we speak, and the scent is filling the room. Bliss. Pure bliss!

Once More, With Feeling

Once more, I am off to the paint store for more paint chips. I've decided the previous colors I narrowed my choices down to were depressing. I want something different, something to make my house stand out from the crowd. So I'm going with something radically different. I think I'll look at some powder blues and peaches. I'm leaning toward peach, as I think it will go well with the hideous brown roof. And hey, maybe I'll use powder blue accents! Now there's an idea! Lightness instead of the drab dark colors I'd been experimenting with.

Now, of course, I'll have to use several coats of paint to cover the huge swatches of dark green and brick red that I'd already tested on the house. Maybe I should just do something fun and paint each board a different color. But then the neighbors would complain. Ah well, I guess I'll stay traditional, but hopefully with a little style. No matter what I choose, it'll cost money!

So wish me luck. Here I go . . .

Decisions, Decisions!

What color to paint the house? I've been collecting paint chips from Lowe's and Home Depot for weeks, trying to find something that complements the odd redish-brown color of my new roof. Mind you, when I looked at the small roofing sample, the color looked like it would go well with my taupe house. I couldn't have been more wrong. For one thing, a small sample gives you no idea what an entire roof of the same color will actually look like. What I thought was a subtle neutralish brown with a faint red cast, is now a glaringly redish-brown roof that clashes horridly with taupe. It doesn't help that brown is not my favorite color.

So I've been agonizing over house colors. I so don't want a brown house! Thankfully, there is enough red in the roof that I can lean toward brick colors. I also tried several shades of dark hunter green. I've finally narrowed the choices down to the following:

Green: Charcoal Smoke; Gunmetal Gray, Northwest Green

Brown: Mayan Red, Rich Chocolate; Leatherbound; Wine Barrel

Of the above colors, there is only one truly perfect match: Rich Chocolate, which is a rich dark brown with a red cast to it. I'd almost call it a burgundy. The problem is, I need a second color to go with it, because of the way the house is constructed. That's an old photo above, before I had the new roof installed. As you can see, the upper half of the house has vertical boards. The lower half has horizontal boards. I think it would look weird to paint both the upper and lower parts the same color. I've tried a dark hunter green for the bottom, with Rich Chocolate for the upper part, but it looks weird. Then I tried a lighter shade of Rich Chocolate for the bottom, but it looked orange. Next, I tried a hunter green--upper half, and Rich Chocolate--bottom half. Ugh. Then Charcoal Smoke with Gunmetal Gray. Blah.

And then, of course, I have to choose a color for the trim around the windows. I have no idea what colors I'll go with, but in the meantime, the sample colors I've smeared across the front of the house give it a dilapidated patchwork appearance. And as much as I dislike brown, I'm afraid the overwhelming choice so far is Rich Chocolate. Now, to decide on the complementary colors . . .

If you have any suggestions, I'm all ears!

Ada Lovelace, Inventor of the Computer

I've logged on every single day since my last post, trying to think of something new to post, without luck. Nothing's been happening that is blog-worthy. But today on Twitter I came across this link: http://tinyurl.com/cngrar

It is an utterly delightful comic about Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage, post-Regency inventors of the computer. There are several laugh-out-loud moments. It's a fun and clever and literary comic! So that's my gift to you today. It was a gift to me, and now I'm gi

ving it to you.

Weather report: It has been raining raining raining. That's all it ever does, is rain. When oh when will we ever see some sunshine? I love rain, but this is ridiculous. I don't think I've ever seen a more rainy winter and spring.