Jaws

There's a cartoon joke that a buddy (BL) and I like about a dog with a homeless guy. She's staring up at him going through a garbage can in the pouring rain. The caption reads: You know I could have done this by myself?

On a good day, I say to myself, the dog is (at least) being cared for and it gives the homeless guy some company. On a bad day, I say to myself, how could this lazy fucker ever get a job? Will he bring the dog? Is he using it for sympathy? Does the dog get any healthcare, vaccinations, nail trims?

SWMBO and I have had four dogs since she moved in. I kept a sporadic spreadsheet for each one ("Of course you did Mitch") and they had been running right around five grand each. That's not food, that gets hidden with my beer in our grocery bill. That's buying it, getting it fixed, the annual cash grab from the vet, major procedures and killing it humanely. How does a homeless guy do any of that?

Milo is different. We paid three. Spent a grand on the giardia infection he came home with. A grand for the spay and five grand for dental work to remove baby teeth that they determined were not going to fall out on their own. My number one blog fan was over (T) and she wanted him. I told her the first payment would be ten grand and that just got me even. Nothing for the dog yet. Why so much? Well, this is doggie dental surgery from a specialist and after you get the creature assessed and sleeping under anesthetic (that;s a grand), he charges $200 a tooth. He pulled nineteen teeth out of the little monster. He works out of a crappy little strip mall of on Fife and I assume lives in a gen million dollar mansion? Having said that, what he gives you post op, in terms of a report, is nothing short of remarkable. Imagine turning on a light in a dark room and having this staring at you?

The x-ray is actually scarier than the actual picture?

... and the finished product (you can see a tiny stitch on the left!

Now, when a little rock gets stuck in the tread on my boots and I find Milo playing with it on the kitchen floor ... I know it won't get stuck in his teeth!

So, back to my rant (SC). I see a homeless guy with a dog and I think ... that's just not right. In fact, my daughter in law gets a third cat and I think, what for? Or a niece? New relationship, new apartment, new dog? Why? You don't want to go out to bars? Concerts? Fireworks? BBQ's? To beaches in the caribbean? Hey I did it. Bridget and I, newly married, apartment on Kennedy ... border collie. Great call Mitch. A border collie in a one bedroom apartment! You could see my Dad rolling his eyes as we came up the driveway. And he got the dog. First he got me, back in my old bedroom for a couple of years, but when I moved back out, he got Toby.

The moral of the story? There are two windows (in my not so humble opinion) where dogs make more sense than the rest of our lives when us dog lovers still want a dog no matter what the cost. Young children, just old enough to not hurt the puppy, say 4, 5, 6, get a medium sized pure breed mix. You put the dog down abouthe time those kids discover sex. They won't notice. You can go to Punta Canna with a clear conscious and leave them home to have house parties. The other window is about five years after you retire. Travelling is just no fun when they have already cut a foot off, have you on seven meds and you need a walker. But those first five years? Get the bucket list out and do it. When you get tired of that (they all do), get a dog, get two. Play with it. Walk it. Train it. Spoil it. We get more joy out of those $5000 dogs than just about anything else in our lives. In the meantime, try to be that surrogate parent for the young people in your lives with no common sense. Get your dog fix that way? Take it for walks, take it when they want to go see Oasis before they break up again. Take it on weekends. Take it when they want to go and get shit faced on a beach somewhere. I read somewhere that the decision to have a child (if you consciously made one), signs you up for a twenty year $500,000 commitment. A dog is a fifteen year $10,000 commitment. They say the major difference between a dog and a child was that dog's don't talk back. They obviously never met Milo.

Our Optimum Week

I snagged a Spend $60 for 20K in points but other than that, it was a quiet shopping week. I am trying to massage my blown up July budget into August. That turnover date is the 26th when my PC Insiders Mastercard rolls over and I clear it. I had to pitch a bag of freezer fried shrimp ... so I am rededicated to clearing out both freezers. Even at that , I got back over 100K in points. Offers were very substandard but the flyer was OK with some new fresh veggies and fruit (from Canada) coming online. Ever make your own bacon? Pork bellies on on for $6.50, so I am going to give it a shot. An old friend (HF) used to make bacon out of them, so am am tracking him down for some recipe ideas. I'll let you know if SWMBO will eat it! Here is your list:

What I'm Reading

I guess the big news on this front is that Goodreads has finally done it and triggered a mass exodus. I have long complained about the focus that corporate North America has on phone supported apps while ignoring desktops and laptops. I am not a follower of Ludd, but certain things (SWMBO!), are just a lot easier when you can put things in "windows", drag and drop without scrolling through fifty screens and you don't have to be an eagle to read the instructions. Google bought Goodreads in 2013 and has largely ignored it. They just did an update (focused on smart phone users) and totally screwed up the home page view of My Books for laptops and desktops. So, new hosting site. I am currently importing the 124 books I have read since retiring and I will give you an update next week.

We Are Watching

Disclosure Day on Plex - Big whoop and it sure has that Spielberg feel, but I had a couple of suspending disbelief moments. When 80 FBI agents have surrounded the farmhouse you are hiding in and you are standing in the field beside the farmhouse, one of those 80 trained agents (looking for you), is going to turn their head ten degrees and see you? Sneaking up on them with a cedar rail fence for cover, then stealing one of their vehicles is just not going to work for me. Having said that ... four stars. Let's face it, Spielberg has been doing this for a while now. The man can tell a story. He wrote it, directed and produced. Colin Firth is great after that disastrous performance in Young Sherlock Holmes. John Krasinski is a very lucky man.

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022) on Plex - Beautifully filmed remake of the original anti-war film. Daniel Bruhl (from the Alienist) is brilliant as the chief German negotiator as is the young cast of unknowns who play our eager (to begin with) young soldiers. Germany has lost the war. Everyone knows it, but 40,000 of their young men continue to die each month while aristocratic generals, living in luxury, slowly hash out peace terms. The irony is that the unreasonable demands made by the allies, terms that Germany eventually HAD to sign to stop the slaughter, would cripple Germany for decades. That would lead directly to the rise of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei. I'll translate: The National Socialist German Workers Party. Run by Hitler. Bad idea.

World Cup on TSN - There IS a god of soccer. Kane couldn't dive his way into the final and Team Argentina has been shown to be what they really are. A racist, entitled group of spoiled little boys with zero class. They never got a shot on goal and embarrassed themselves pushing and shoving the celebrating Spanish players after the game. FIFA should impose harsh penalties. They won't.

... and finally

A tough week all around. Getting on prednisone is kind of easy. They started me at 60 mg which I am reading is the maximum dose, and I immediately started to get better. Eight weeks later, they want me off it. Getting off prednisone is a horror show. Brain fog. I mean it's hard to function with my monkey brain at the best of times, but I walk right past the fridge and look for the cream in the cupboard. Then, I walk back with the creamand can't find my steaming cup of coffee. Then I get distracted. Two hours later I find cold coffee and warm cream sitting beside each other in my office? I spent Sunday morning in emerg after trying to cut off the end of two fingers with an exacto knife. Tuesday I probably should have gone to emerg after taking a header off my back landing! I saved my face but landed on my own fist and perhaps broke a rib or two? It is slightly better this morning. My sister commented : "Are we going to have to put you in a home?" SWMBO was less cryptic: "You are grounded". Trapped in paradise. That's me this week. Oh and Sun Life cut me off my blood sugar sensors. You are not on insulin. Thanks for piling on Sun Life. I sold one motorcycle. Had to say goodbye to the Valkyrie. My week was like that. A least it rained.

Mitch & Maddie