Aaaah...Saturday

It's 7:30 on Saturday morning, and I'm sitting up at Honda North in either Danvers or Topsfield waiting to have my oil changed and my tires rotated. There is a little snack bar here so I ordered a grilled cheese sandwich, which is so good that I wish I had some tomato soup. I used to come up to this neck of the woods all the time, so when I got my car in November, Danvers was very convenient. Now I don't come up here anymore, so it's kind of a pain in the ass. Doesn't matter. Before my current car, I bought my last two Hondas at Herb Chambers, and I'd probably drive to NJ for service before going back there. I like Honda North much better.

Before heading up here this morning, Thor and I went for our ususal walk around the neighborhood. We encountered something that Thor had never seen before, and we can add another item to the list of things that he's afraid of: shopping carts. Some of the other funny things he's afraid of are umbrellas, balloons, tv tables, and those big exercise balls. For a dog that's as big as he is, you'd think he'd be embarrassed to be such a baby. There are three beautiful pointer puppies in my neighborhood that have been out with their owners on walks the last week or two. One is brown, one is black and one is all over gray and white speckled. Their mother is all black as well. Whenever we see them, Thor cries because he wants to go meet them, but I thought it would be wise to wait until they were at least a little bigger before The Moose went over and overwhelmed them. How happy were we this Wednesday when we were able to go say hello?? They are SOOO cute. They are 10 weeks old and their owners are trying to socialize them by having them meet as many dogs and people as possible. Thor is very well socialized w/ other dogs. He goes on walks with his friends every day, and goes to doggie day care one day per week. He did so well with the puppies! He was very gentle and didn't get excited at all. Now if only I could keep him gentle and calm IN the house, I think we'd be on to something.

Next Monday, the 29th, I was scheduled to have the molds done for my Invisalign braces. I would've had my first set of straighteners as soon as I returned from Italy, and in six or seven months, my teeth would've been back in their original locations where they belong. That was the plan. Sadly, I cracked one of my teeth, and I'm about to enter the nightmare zone. I thought I had either chipped a tooth or a filling. I could feel it with my tongue, and it was sensitive to sweet and cold. As time went on (a day or so; not months or years) it became hard to chew on that side, and I have to breathe through my mouth because of the sensitivity to the cold air passing over the tooth. I made an emergency trip to the dentist on Thursday, and was told that I had sheared off part of the tooth and it can't be fixed with a filling. The pain was so bad that they had to turn off the air conditioning so that they could get the x-ray. It turns out that the tooth is cracked and I need another crown. Tuesday morning I'm going in for the prep work on the tooth and the temporary crown. Fun. (Now normally I'd just be annoyed about the situation, pissed about the money and uncomforable and inconvenienced by the sensitivity and pain of the tooth. What's REALLY getting to me is that I can't have my molds done. This pushes back my Invisalign project by at least two months.) At the emergency visit, they put bonder over the defect in the tooth, but it fell off last night when I was brushing my teeth. I guess it's mind over matter until Tuesday at 9AM.

I can see that they just finished my tires, so I think I'm nearly done here. I'll pick this up when I get back home.

So I'm thinking about changing the name/theme of my blog. It's not really about knitting anymore, because I haven't knit anything in months. Until the last couple weeks I hadn't written anything because I was spending so much time with the dog. I'd rather not have it just be about the dog though, either. I don't know. Just a thought. I do have one additional thing to mention about Moose Puppy. Yesterday I stopped by Petco to get the cats a bag of food. I generally grab Thor a chew toy when I'm in there because he goes through them so fast. When I go home, I offered him the new toy, and I plastic milk carton. Which do you think he chose?

Wow. I have Animal Planet playing while I write this, and I just saw the coolest product: an exercise wheel for cats. It seemed like it might be an interesting thing for Munchie and Tubby, so I just checked it out online. Holy Smokes! $800 for a giant hamster wheel. On second thought, no thank you...Tubby will just have to remain tubby.

Hours have gone by since the entry above. Since it didn't rain today, I decided that it was the perfect day for my least favorite thing: working on the house. My front porch faces east. Because Winthrop is a tiny strip of land surrounded by water, it is often damp/humid here. Because the front porch is covered, it doesn't get blasted by the sun like the sides facing south and west, so the paint has grown mildew in some areas. Improving the curb appeal of the porch (excluding the ceiling) is a three step process: bleach and scrub the mildew, paint a coat of Kilz, and then at least one coat of the exterior paint that is on the rest of the house. I did the bleaching, scrubbing, and hosing down today. I'm beat and I smell like Clorox. Hopefully it will be warm and dry for the next few days so that the wood dries out enough to paint. When I paint, I'll be sure to post pictures.

That's it for now...thanks for reading.