Friday, January 2, 2015

It's a VERY Happy New Year indeed!

Wow...a lot going on right now. The house is out of control with the addition of a puppy....it's been 13 years since we had a puppy (well, call it 12...as PG is now 13). Wow...what energy! Three old dogs and the baby....she wants to play nearly all the time (the rest is eating or sleeping)...so far only PG wants to play with her...though her definition of play is not quite puppy play...she's busy TRYING to show her she's in charge. LOTS of barking and growling, though all of it in playful tones...tails wagging...Sophie doesn't back down an inch from PG the queen of all she surveys.

Sophie on the nice chair

Sophie hanging out with Sweet Pea

We still keep a Christmas jingle-bell collar on Sophie so we have an idea of WHERE she is at all times....the house-breaking thing is going ok...no poo in the house for DAYS...it's just the piddle that seems to have her mystified. She does good one day and then the next has 2 or 3 'accidents' (though in all fairness it's still OUR fault...either she's playing and just doesn't yet see the need to go to the door, or we wait too long to get her out between potty's.

Puppy's have rubber bones and can be comfortable in CRAZY positions
 
Here's Sophie hanging out with Sydney

But all in all she's a barrel of fun, chaos, and noisy madness. And she's been a real boon for Sydney (who must have had a small stroke earlier in the year....she doesn't walk so great as the left side isn't under total control). Before Sophie arrived she was quite content to lay back on the bed most of the day, only walking around when something was going on. Now something is ALWAYS going on, and Syd is now out in the mix just due to pure jealousy I think...but no matter...anything that keeps her moving around is a good thing. Had Sophie to the vet this morning (more puppy stuff to get over)....she's up 3 pounds in the last 2 weeks...she's now 4 months old, 26 lbs.

 Here Sophie got hold of the "Kracken smacker" (the Sophie "NO, BAD GIRL" control wand)

And here she is playing with the Christmas Alligator AND the deer antler chew toy.

OK...enough puppy talk. Now it's time for College Football! Got to watch a bunch of bowl games earlier in the week...and totally missed the 2 best games thus far: The Sugar bowl and the Rose bowl! I had dreams and hopes that Oregon and OSU would both win, but if I were betting money I wold have had to say it would be Bama and FSU. OMG!!! NO SEC TEAM IN IN THE BCS BOWL GAME!!! It's a dream come TRUE! Not that I was ROOTING for OSU mind you...that would get my Michigan fan club card revoked and I'd be stoned by the Blue faithful. No...not rooting for them, just wanted them to win over Bama. And HOLY SMOKES, they DID! And then Oregon knocked off the defending Natnl Champs Florida State! GO DUCKS!!!! I'm DYING that I didn't get to see both those games...but very happy!

And now...my prediction is Oregon by 12. I'm still in a daze that neither Bama nor FSU made it...HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY!!! No, Happy isn't the right word....ESTATIC!!!

OK...it's now Jan 2nd, and tomorrow I'll likely be taking down my Christmas lights. I've been busy busy and not getting anything done...only 3 more days and then back to dreaded WORK!! But I won't think about that just now....hope to get a bike ride in....I've only got TWO rides in the last TWO months! Not a good record for me for sure...my fitness is GONE withe the wind (and cold...BOY it's been cold here in the mornings....hovering around freezing, and I am NOT going out in that).

Time to fly...just wanted to say Happy New Year to the Asylum!

Cheers!

13 comments:

  1. Happy New Year everyone! I'm just back to work today, also....was really enjoying the time off. I started my Sara 10-day detox and Rebalance today so I currently have a small headache due to no caffeine...sniff, sniff, love my morning coffee!! Hell, it's only 10 days, surely I can survive that!

    Matt I understand your pain about not cheering for OSU as I'm Penn State, but I would really LOVE to see a Big 10 team win the championships and shut some people up, so I'm cheering for Ohio. My son Conner is a big Duck fan, so it will be fun to watch together and cheer against each other. Lots of the bowl games were really super - I never watched so much football in my life!!

    Lovely day today, isn't it? I might have to turn on a fan, it's getting warm!

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  2. Happy New Year! I finished taking the tree down today -- it is a real one and will be set in the back yard next to the bird feeders, to give the little birds quick cover from the neighborhood hawks.

    I am glad to hear you will be chanting OH-IO next week! Just because...

    No caffeine, Cathy? I could not give up my tea, no, I firmly believe that tea detoxifies. But I probably need rebalancing after eating so many cookies, and stollen, and gingerbread, and...

    I'm off the bike until summer, but I did get out for a 3 mile walk on Monday, taking advantage of the sunshine and the likely high temperature for the week-- 17F. Two wool sweaters over a silk thermal, neck gaiter, topped with my very 80's (think shoulderpads) but very warm wool lined corduroy coat, headband, hat, wool gloves topped with goretex mittens, hand warmers in my sheepskin boots -- I was quite comfortable! Took the dog with me, he loves walking soooo much that he didn't want to stop at 3 miles (it is in summer that he suffers; when it is over 70 he gets very hot and wears out quickly) Today (11 degrees) I was shoveling snow in the same get-up and was too warm!

    Right now it is 6F and will likely be pushing 10 below by morning....I hope this isn't going to be a repeat of last year. If this keeps up through next week I will be pricelining flights to San Diego.

    Rae

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  3. Hey Rae....in the BCS title game, I won't exactly be chanting OH-IO...(though I do agree it would be pretty cool to have a Big 10 team WIN the Natnl-championship...THAT would shut-up some of the "SEC are the best teams" haters). No...I will be cheering on the Ducks...I think THEY have been under-rated and under-appreciated for a few years now...VERY happy to have them in the title game! That said, I can't take anything away from OSU...they earned their way in and should NOT be underestimated. It quite honestly should be quite a game!

    And PLEASE do NOT let YOUR horrid winter eek it's way over the divide to infiltrate us...we are having some WONDERFUL weather right now. Though we REALLY need about 17 more BIG storms to get us out of trouble.

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  4. I just hope the game is a good one - I hate blow outs. So boring. Go OH-IO!!

    Well my detox and rebalance is going great! After less than 2 days of feeling yucky, I turned the corner (day 4 now) and have lost 3 lbs (it isn't a true weight loss plan but my downfalls are glutens, so eliminating them immediately helps me) and really have renewed energy. This morning when I got to work I decided to take the dog for a 10 minute walk - he looked at me in disbelief! I do miss my morning coffee, and for sure I will return to that a week from now, but I'm drinking ginger tea every morning and LOTS of water, so I'm doing ok with it. My husband is doing it too just to make it easier and he's feeling good too. He confessed at lunch that he thought I looked like I'd lost some weight but decided it was too soon and it must just be the pants I'm wearing! haha

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  5. Sadly, we do NOT have ANY channels that the game is being broadcast on! (we, and by "we" I mean "Jeannie", recently dropped our Direct TV package and we no longer have ANY sports channels...I always thought ESPN was a basic channel, but NO. However, I can watch it AFTER the fact on the ESPN replay channel (I think it's something like 1026 on DTV). So I'll be doing my very best to NOT hear anything about the game until I can watch it on Tuesday evening.

    GO DUCKS!!!

    Cathy, glad your detox and rebalance is going well...and say howdy to Sara for me...hope she's doing well up there in CA (Toronto I think?) Her little boy must be getting pretty big...it's been a few years now.

    Later gaters...another busy day!

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  6. Can't chat now but just had to say GO BUCKEYES! (sorry, Matt!)

    And glad to see Sophie's getting along with her sisters! :) :) Lookatthatface! And Sophie & I could be related - that's just how I look when I fall asleep on the sofa watching TV!

    Hope/plan to get back here this week to chat! Later gators!

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  7. OK....I heard the score (hard not to)...rats...so feel free to chat away on the game. Even tho I was rooting for Oregon, I have to admit it's good on OSU...FINALLY a Big Ten champ....THAT should shut-up the SEC elitists for a bit (it should, but I really doubt it). I still hope to watch the game...but it looks like (from the bits I saw on the news) that OSU's sophomore RB was pretty much unstoppable.

    I'm sad that NCAA FB season is over tho. But that means that it's CYCLING SEASON...HOORAY!! Going to be getting some big races right quick now...and before we know it, it'll be Spring Classics time!

    OK...gotta scoot.

    Cheers to OSU!

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  8. It started out as a good game and then got so close....but then Zeke Elliott went to work again and blew out the score. That kid was unstoppable and only a Sophomore!! Happy for the B1G. Get sick of hearing the SEC toot their own horn, like constantly!!!

    As the wife of a Penn State grad, I've long been a PSU and Joe Paterno football fan and see that chances are good now that the NCAA will be restoring JoePa's 111 wins pretty soon - super happy about that. If you haven't followed the story since the original sanctions in 2012, basically NCAA has been sued and some of their emails released in discovery period show they knew they were not within their authority to sanction as they did and just wanted to be a bully as they knew PSU was eager to put the story behind them and would agree to anything. They were right. The board of trustees blindly agreed to everything. In order to avoid more discovery they have now entered into settlement talks. They are such a corrupt bunch of crooks at the NCAA - they are the ones who need to be overhauled (much like the UCI did).

    And in closing I will say that April 12 is a day to mark on your calendars: Paris-Roubaix in the morning and Game of Thrones Season 5 at night!

    Matt, how can you live without a sports channel????? and HBO!! ha

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  9. Hey Cathy....glad to hear Penn State will be getting their good name back (and JoPa's as well...he was a LEGEND, and they pretty much killed him). Somewhere in my stuff I have an old special JoPa edition of a bottle of Coke...my first wife was from PA (up near the northern NY border) and I have driven in/ thru the state a LOT (long ago I even had a PA drivers license for a time). I agree that what the NCAA did to the school was a horrible knee-jerk reaction and went way beyond what was reasonable.

    We currently have HBO as we are both fans of Game of Thrones....Jeannie isn't a sports fan whatsoever tho so if I want any sports channels I have to pay for those extra...and for the moment I seem to have so little time to sit and watch anything like that anyway that it's not a big deal. However I WILL have NBC Sports come July...that I can assure you!

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  10. And today the wins are restored - hooray! The Paterno Family lawsuit does not go away, however, and it's my hope that more of the NCAA bs and Board of Trustees errors are brought to light, especially the way he was fired and the way the NCAA created the firestorm of bad publicity by adopting the flawed Freeh report. One of the main NCAA guys has even admitted he didn't even read the Freeh report before agreeing to the original sanctions. These people should not be in charge of college sports.

    Hey Matt, your bottle of Coke is a collectors item! I have an autographed football in a case that sits on my piano. Everyone in my family knows to evacuate it each time we have a fire!

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  11. The road cycling season is ON! The Tour Down Under started Monday evening, and for (I think) the first time there are livestreams to watch via cyclingfans. It is nice to be able to watch a race live in the evening and get a glimpse of summer while doing so! Added benefit -- Robbie McEwan is part of the commentary team with P&P. He looks sooo uncomfortable when on camera, but doesn't sound so.

    Of course I am hoping that Cadel Evans will be able to pull off a great result for his last big race, and I am trying to watch daily since it is my last chance to see him in action. Remember his beautiful descent to win stage 7 last year in the Tour of Utah?

    Rae

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  12. Hey Rae...I've been following the TdU only by reading about the stages the next day (which is how I follow the VAST majority of bike-races) on Velo News. Evenings at home have been much busier lately with the Kracken now living in our house...I can't even recall what it was like going home and being able to kick back and relax/do whatever I want...and we've only had her just coming up on a month now.

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  13. Just posted this link over at Rants...but it's something everybody should read...a Velo News piece on the organized systematic team sponsored doping program at Rabobank during the 2000's...

    http://velonews.competitor.com/2015/01/news/testimony-sheds-light-leinders-rabobanks-systematic-doping_359008

    Gee...so I guess Lance (and team) WEREN'T the only ones doing it? Who would have guessed! We've been led to believe (by Wada and USADA) that ONLY Lance and team were doing it.

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