oceandoggy.com

Look Ma, I have a header now. Nice header.

Secondly, I’ve added a link to the Volvo Ocean Race. I know most people consider sailboat racing about as interesting as their aunt’s meatloaf, but for some reason or another it just appeals to me. And not just because I sail. Or used to. Or did at one time. 

I think it appeals to me on some purely adventurous, romantic, level. It is both elegant and dangerous. One of the very first websites (they weren’t called blogs back then) that I visited on a regular basis some 15 years ago followed the Around Alone sailors on their single-handed race around the planet.

At that time the race was called the BOC Challenge and for the first time each of the captains checked in daily via e-mail to the website so that you could follow what they were enduring real-time. It was Armchair Adventure. So check it out- you too may get hooked. 

Another thing I did is activate the wordpress snow on my blog. I know it’s really nerdy but for some reason it just makes me laugh every time I see it. Stupid Snow. In fact, just thinking about it makes me laugh.

And lastly, I have finally posted a doggy treat and some doggy diarrhea is on it’s way.

The fun never ends.

Daily, twicet, I walk the boys.

Ours is not an evening stroll, nor a gentle  morning constitutional.

Instead, it’s a twice daily wrestling match between me and 150 lbs. of lively Lab puppiedom. It’s fun in a going-to-the-dentist kinda way. Sometimes I wonder if Tug hears his name as a command.

But we do it, a mile each morning and every night, no matter the weather ’cause it’s the highlight of their day.

And their want melts me.

Hey, tomorrow, Miss Carol’s gonna be out of town so I’m making my Sausage and Beans. I’ll finally have a post for doggy treats. 

I can almost hear the thundering clicky-clack of excited typing.

There is a delicious melancholy to rain and fog.

Even though I prefer nice sunny  warm days chock full of bikini babes and beer I have to admit there is something eerily embracing about rainy and foggy. It’s like Mother Nature is muzzled.

So you would tend to think I was one happy camper today. But nope. I still bitched and moaned walking the dogs, cursing the rain and Cutter and Tug’s simple headed straightforwardness. And their need to urinate EVERYWHERE.

But then I got home and got dried out and relented.

As threatened last week I’ve changed everything. Wanting to look and feel like a big blogger I yearned for additional pages to soak up my suppurative creative dribbles. And I wanted a blogroll to return favors to others.

I’m pretty sure they’ll appreciate the additional reader.

So on Saturday I planted myself in my Me Only Chair in my Me Only Room, took a deep breath, and started the process. An hour later I had previewed most, if not all, of the WordPress themes, selected one, and pulled the trigger. 

Feeling pretty full of myself as Master Of The Internet I leaned back basking in the glory that is me, admiring my new look, cuddling my new baby blog, reveling in it’s freshiness.

But as I scrolled through I realized that all was not happy in happyville. The photos had not re-sized, new pages meant new work, and a blogroll doesn’t happen by itself.

Sonsabitches.

I ended up spending most of Saturday and a goodly part of Sunday working on me to make me presentable. And I’m close. I know the black page is a turn-off to some. It was to me. In the past, whenever I came across a black page blog I was always like, ooh you’re too cool for words. Get a grip, dude.

But ya know what? I really like my new black look. Call me Mr. Lame.

So check it out. The new blogroll has links to people way smarter and creative and better looking than me and the new pages will soon be oozing with new and better stuff, I’m pretty sure.

Soon baby.

If everything goes according to plan and I stay sober enough and WordPress doesn’t keep changing things so that I can’t find them things I’m wantin’ to change the way I want, well then, oceandoggy .com will have a nice, new facelift come Monday.

Or maybe Tuesday.

I’ve felt the need to morph into something different for awhile so’s that I can add things like a blogroll and return favors to others. 

Besides.

Maybe, just maybe, I can try and look a tad more like I know something about what I’m doing here.

HOHOHOHEHEHEHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!! Now THAT’S a good’un.

Anyway, that’s the plan. Mumble in your sleep for me and hope for the best.

If for no other reason than relief from the hideous photograph of my previous post I need to post something. Anything.

How about a seagull instead?

Speaking of seagulls, I’ve had this rant churning within for awhile. We, and I mean we as a people, a group, love seagulls. LOVE THEM. We take pictures of them, we paint paintings of them, we write about them, we feed them on the beach like retards with nothing better to do with bread. Some kinda way they seem to scream the free spiritness or beachiness of the beach.

Are you with me here so far?

So then you go to the dump. And swirling about, wafting on thermals, perched on mounds of garbage are, well, seagulls. Lots of ’em. Same bird, but nobody’s setting an easel and painting a picture of them or writing poems about dump-gulls. Sullen and pissed off, they eat trash all day.

Sometimes I feel like they got the shit end of the stick.

Or maybe bad directions.

This is the last of the the silly sailboat whining. I promise.

The other day, on my way to somewhere else, I went by the marina where we kept Black Magic. I don’t know why or what I was looking for. Maybe meet the new owner? Maybe make sure Black Magic was being cared for? Maybe just see her one more time? Don’t know, maybe all of the above.

What I found was an empty slip. Black Magic was gone.

And as I stood on the floating dock, bobbing in the wake of a passing boat, staring at that empty hole in the water, I realized that she was well and truly mine no longer.

I thought back on the countless weekends working on her, the too few times sailing her, the times that Miss Carol and I spent weekends on her dreaming our dreams of endless voyages.

I think that some little part of me felt that if I could just see her, keep track of her, that I could somehow keep that dream alive. But, with her, it’s gone.

And, really, I’m fine with that.

But as I turned and walked back up the dock for the last time, feeling, for the first time, like an interloper, a trespasser, I couldn’t help but wonder what would fill the void.

What’s next?

So anyway.

This is Tug and Cutter on their first full day with us and the reason that we did not eat them. Cute as dreams. This photo was taken by a very good friend of ours on their first morning with us when they were basking in the we’re-puppies-aren’t-we-scrumptious-and-why-not-cuddle-us mindset that is puppiedom.

Conveniently forgetting, of course, the night before.

When we got home from NC we had a cocktail, fist-bumped each other and played with little Tug and littler Cutter. Puppies are FUN. We made dinner, cleaned up, relaxed, and got ready for bed. 

Thinking that Cutter and Tug would be good in a box with a ticking clock to keep them company (honestly, I read this shit somewhere) we, um, boxed them up and went to bed. 

HOHOHO,HAHAHA,HEHEHEHE, Not so fast, Junior.

Listening to a puppy spill his guts about being removed from his home is a little like hearing your kid sister get her arm torn off. Times two.

After fighting it for an hour or so, we ended up sleeping on the couch with the boys curled up amongst us until they had to pee. Which was hourly. Every hour. Did I mention that it was, um, every hour? All night?

Thank god they were cute the next day.

This is what oceandoggys house looked like last night. 

Usually when the lights go out all over the island like this it’s because someone knocked over a power pole on the main drag headed in.

You curse. You scream for fatalities- people should pay for making you miss your TV special on Einstein. Damn homers. Probably drunk Tourons ruining more of your life. You curse and stomp. The dogs flee and Miss Carol hisses at you.

But then you settle down and grab a coldie and build up the fire in the fireplace ’cause its gonna be a long night and you sit in the dark and muse.

Maybe too seldom we are forced to take the time to just sit. And think. And stare at the darkness and the flickering logs and settle in the quiet.

Its nice.

It rained for about 15 days straight this week. It was like rainrainrainrainrainrain and then, just when you couldn’t stand it anymore, guess what? You got it. More rain.

Which means the surprised grass in our yard has started growing again. In NOV.EM.BER. 

Which means Carol gets to mow the lawn again. In NOV.EM.BER. 

FINALLY, though, the sun came out this morning. And with it came the news that Jack is doing better than expected.

While his prognosis still isn’t the greatest, (it is brain cancer after all), it’s much less dire than it was a couple of days ago. Turns out it was a Stage One rather than a Stage Four tumor (don’t know exactly what that means but it sounds hopeful). During the operation the docs were able to remove most of the tumor and then implanted a chemo disk (whatever that is) to kill the rest. According to Tim, Jack is in good spirits and resting comfortably.

Oceandoggy thinks its time for a coldie.