Barking Mad

A Recipe for Disaster

Here's what you'll need to make a batch of Puppy Chow:

• 2 Teenagers - preferably ones who have had three or four Mountain Dews apiece.
• Enough powdered sugar to coat the Matterhorn
• Chocolate
• Peanut Butter
• Butter
• Rice Chex

Last night when Meg told me she was going to make Puppy Chow, I thought; "how cool, she's finally taking more than a passing interest in Casey and wants to make him something homemade and healthy!"  I was filled with joy.   Then my joy came to a screeching halt when she told me that it was a God-awful sounding concoction of the above ingredients.  I'm not a huge chocolate fan, and to add peanut butter to it only makes me wanna gag.  So anyhow, I told her, ok, whatever, go for it.

Tonight she had Megan T. over and they decided to make the Puppy Chow.   At the time I was in the bedroom, reposed in agony on the bed trying to remove my eyes from my skull so I could dip them in acid in order to get them to stop itching.   I had no plans to interrupt my misery until I heard giggles coming from the kitchen.   What greeted me when I walked into the kitchen made me tell the girls to put on their track shoes and start running because when I caught up with them they were both so dead they'd have to be buried twice!   I immediately wished I had succeeded in blinding myself so that I wasn't witness to the carnage that was my kitchen.   

Words cannot describe the powdered sugar coated chaos, therefore I won't even try.  I'll let the pictures I took (because seriously, once a judge saw the pictures, I'd be acquitted of murder on grounds that my actions were totally reasonable under the circumstances) do the talking.

What I saw when I first walked into the kitchen...

Stainless steel is a real pain the ass to clean and keep clean, so imagine my utter shock to see gobs of powdered sugar all over the fridge!!!!!!!!

Yeah, lets have a Coke on top of all that Mountain Dew! 

Earlier in the evening Meg brought me this pretty purple hanging basket.   I guess she thought that powdered sugar was an ideal fertilizer...

Now, if all that isn't bad enough, here are the two little beauties themselves...

That Megan T., she's a smart one, she'll go far in life!  As for my Meg, at this point, that's debateable!

In the middle of my stroke after discovering the apparent food  fight, the phone rang.  It was my sister. 

A bit later when I went downstairs to talk to my sister and decide which teenager I was going to kill first, Meg decided to capture the cleanup on film...errr memory card that is.  Woulda been nice if she'd used the flash.

And here my luvlies is the finished product, the revolting Puppy Chow, the creation of which is going to have Meg cleaning toilets and weeding my flower beds for a long long long time to come...

Meg doesn't think it was such a big deal seeing as how the counter tops are being replaced with granite, the cabinets are being repainted and the floors are being ripped out in place of wood.   I would have taken the time to explain to her the "big deal" but, at the time, I was too involved licking my Valium necklace to bother.

Busy

My checklist of things to do over the next week is insanely long.  Graduation looms, literally, right around the corner for Meg, my sister is coming out from So Cal for the big event and I'm nowhere near ready for any of it.  I still need to post many promised pics from recent excursions out here, take the dog to the groomer (because we all know I am not plucking those hairs from the inside of it's ears, nor will I cut it's nails, that's just asking for trouble!),  Frontline both the cats,  send out graduation announcements, schedule estimates from handymen, painters, landscapers and refuse removers (this is hard for me, hating to have strangers in the house - strangers who will probably be donning tool belts and jeans that slip down when they bend over to expose too much crack!), do eleven loads of laundry,  and find some time admist all that to have a nervous breakdown.

Heck, right this very instant I should be getting ready for an early morning doctor's appointment.  But not before I leave you with a little something amusing. 

This is what happens when the Little Imp INSISTS (oh and how she INSISTED! LOUDLY!) on dressing herself.  At least she got the capris on the right way...of note, this was the same day she combed her own hair into a glorious 'fro.  No one will ever be able to convince me that this child was not intentionally "posing"...I mean heck, she even knows to stand in front of the china cabinet, which was the place I used to take pics of Meg and her bf's...

I still don't know what cracks me up more, her hair or her fashion statement.

For Mommy Pie...More Than Just a Gratuitous Shout Out!

This post is especially for the brilliance behind Mommy Pie ...the master herself.

What's the impetus?  Well Ms. Pie is considering getting a dog for her little one, MP.  There are certain criteria  the walking fleabag, ball of love and fluff must meet.  For one, it has to be hypoallergenic.

Under normal circumstances, I'd reccommend a Newfie for anyone with kids who wants to get a dog.  Oh sure, they are the size of starter home, and I'm sure they probably eat the same amount as a NFL team, and they shed enough to create 152 king size blankets a year but they are awesome. Seriously.  You could not ask for a better dog with children.   

If it weren't for my own allergies and aversion to shedding animals, we would not have taken our names off of the waiting list in December.

We finally settled on a hybrid (Because you know hybrid "anythings" are all the rage today!) that is hypoalllergenic and doesn't shed and is cute as hell.  The Goldendoodle. It's a Poodle/Golden Retriever cross.

Yes yes I know, I have done little but complain about our furry Goldendoodle baby since we brought him home.  But then, I don't like puppies.   I know, how could anyone not like puppies?  Well, the blood in these veins runs very cold m'dears....very cold indeed.  But I do LOVE adult doodles.  Well behaved, intelligent and loyal.  Not to mention wonderful with kids, especially small kids.  And now that Casey is six months old and not chewing holes into my arms and legs, I'm actually rather fond of him.  More so now that I know he's a perfect little muttleman on long-ass car rides.

I know some people will groom their doodles to look like poodles and in my not-so-humble opinion, I think it makes the dogs look foolish.  We're going to have Casey trimmed around the eyes because of the prevelance of eye-boogers, but they really don't need any extensive grooming, another huge plus.  Oh sure, you can brush their curls out, which we do occasionally...it sorta makes them look like a huge walking cottonball.

As far as size, we have a male and he will probably be pretty big - as he comes from large stock.  Males run anywhere from 70lbs-90lbs.   Females are slightly smaller.  And I already know you prefer your dogs without dangly bits. That reminds me, now that Casey has hit the 6-month mark, we need to schedule him for his nuts-be-gone procedure. We chose a male intentionally as we wanted a larger dog.  But female doodles are every bit as loyal, intelligent and wonderful as males.

Ms. Pie, I present you with a perfect specimen of Goldendoodle...

Even with his dirty little doodle face, he's still cute!

High atop Cadillac Mountain with the hubby.  He's really a breeze to train (now that we're finally getting around to it) and he picks up what we teach him with great ease.  The books are correct when it comes to Goldendoodles, they are eager to please!  That's for sure!

Trying to stand upright in 35MPH winds on top of Cadillac Mountain...

All in all, despite all my belly-aching about Casey, I adore the mutt.   Whilst I am not fond of puppies, at all, I can finally see the great adult dog just looming underneath that annoying puppy surface.  For what it's worth, either a Goldendoodle, or even a Labradoodle (a Labrador/Poodle cross, and another hypoallergenic non-shedding hybrid breed) would be great choices.

Anyhow, that's my plug for Goldendoodles.