To Dog It May Concern X-posting

I have for the last couple of years written about my dogs on another blog. It's called "To Dog It May Concern" and it began as me writing letters to my dogs (and never naming names) about their strange, rude, comical and outrageous behavior. It has since evolved to be a sort of platform in which I talk about my dogs, share stories about them and even talk about dog culture as a whole from time to time.

The other day I happened to write a piece for the blog inspired by my real life events dealing with an ancient 15 year old dog, Nutsy. I've had Nutsy since he was 8 months old when I adopted him from the shelter. I am now 30 years old. You can do the math on how big a part of my life this dog has been. Literally, half of my life has been spent with him. But now that he's old I find myself in a whole new position as his caretaker. And it occurred to me one morning at 4am as I stood outside in the freezing cold and snow just how far people go for their beloved pets as they age. In my life as a dog trainer I've seen it dozens of times, the owner who makes absurd monetary, time and life sacrifices to care for their old friend. Sometimes to the point of unhealthy extremes, but always with the best of intentions and the most heartfelt desire to make old age easier on both human and dog.

And that sometimes those sacrifices and those sleep deprived nights can feel awfully lonely. Because you think in the back of your mind; "There's no way any sane person would do this..." But the truth is; we all do it. We've all done it. And you and I will probably do it again. So with out further interruption a link to the post, so you too can feel not so alone in the universe when you're standing in the bitter cold at 4am making sure your old dog goes potty.

To Dog It May Concern: When I'm a thousand years old I hope I get to Eat a lot of Red Jello

I know a lot of you who follow my twitter account  (@Dean_Ocean) have already read this. But in case you don't have twitter or facebook (which seems like a really weird thing...) here is the link again. Feel free to spread it around to your friends, family and loved ones struggling with an older pet.

Prozac Nuts, Depressed Squirrels and Mexican Smuggling

The following story is proof positive I have always been weird. This takes place during the years I wasn't drinking.

When I was a Junior in college I was one of the few people around with a reliable car. Due to the death of my paternal grandmother when I was ten, I had an inheritance that allowed me to purchase a decent car and pay for the first couple of years of school. This meant I had a vehicle that wasn't likely to kill you on the long drive between home (Boise) and School (University of Idaho in Moscow, Idaho – pronounced Mos-co, why the fuck there is a W involved is beyond me. Russian conspiracy.)

As such the last day of Thanksgiving break of my Junior year I got a call from a buddy of mine. Robbie was from the town of Lewiston which was a decent 45 minutes south of Moscow, if you drove the exact speed limit the entire way. It was a fairly good sized town right at the junction of the Snake and Columbia Rivers. It's a neat little town at the heart of Lewis and Clark territory blemished by a paper mill that makes the whole area sort of smell like rotting plant matter. But you get over that.

Robbie called saying his ride back to school had bailed and he was wondering if I would come and get him. I was a college student just back in the dorms from a week long vacation and on top of that I was at this point I had just changed my major to English (which is College for Read a Lot of Books and Tell People Why You're Right and They are Wrong.) This means I had copious amounts of time on my hands. So I agreed.

I put on the radio as loud as I could with out giving myself a head ache or a concussion from the bass and drove to his house in Lewiston. The irony is that while Robbie and I met by sheer accident, his father had at one point in my life when I lived with my father in the Moscow area while he attended law school, been my pediatrician. Doctor Robbie's Dad did not remember me until I reminded him I was the kid who dislocated his nurse's knee cap when she tried to give me a vaccine. He asked if I still had problems with needles, I said only when people try to poke me with them.

This is a true statement even today.

Doctor Robbie's Dad loaded us down with food. This as I had already figured out is a staple of any parent with a kid in college. You send them back to school with clean laundry and everything in the house they haven't already eaten while visiting on break. This is because there are two things college kids are bad at: doing their own laundry (mostly because our laundry room in the dorms was haunted by a poltergeist that stole women's underwear and even though I never wore women's underwear I felt my superhero boxers were probably too tempting to resist.) (It was either a poltergeist or the pervy kid from the 3^rd floor.) And the other thing college kids are really bad at is grocery shopping.

If you ever want a college kid to show up for something, tell him there is free food involved. Say free beer and he will bring his friends. To this day Pepper and I will pretty much go anywhere if you tell us free food is involved. Yet again adding to the list of reasons why I am not really an adult.

The ride North to Moscow was uneventful. Full of loud rock music and horrible bouts of geeky laughter. Though Robbie and I hadn't known each other long we had become fast friends. It was the sort of friendship that happens when two like minded people meet and say to one another “you are awesome and so am I.” So while we were busy laughing at bad jokes and puns about the Matrix (because it was cool to do back than, promise) I didn't realize I had accidentally driven up behind The Most Annoying Truck Driver in History.

He was driving a hack job old Ford with a flat bed loaded down with rusted oil drums and wood siding. It was the sort of truck that came straight out of my childhood home town with a whopping population of 375 people, most of whom were probably related and did not have all of their teeth. It was the epitome of Idaho Redneckary (that's a word now.) And the worst part: he could not make up his mind what speed he wanted to go.

When I first came up behind him he was driving close to the speed limit. Which allowed me to drive close to the speed limit. But as time passed he slowed down. Not just a little. A lot. He slowed down so much at one point he was going 45 miles per hour in a 60 mile per hour zone. If that wasn't bad enough, a few miles later (because this was a two line highway and I was unable to pass him legally and it was in fact driving me nuts and I was white knuckling it on the steering wheel inventing ways that velicoraptors would sweep by and just run his god damned truck off the road) he would speed up to around 63 miles per hour. This game repeated over the next 15 miles before the lanes opened up and I had a chance to pass him.

Problem. The passing lane was ¼ of a mile long. And this was when Mr. I Can't Figure Out How the Gas Pedal Works had decided now was a good time to drive 60 miles per hour. So while I was trying to speed around him after going a whole 47 miles per hour, he was speeding up to 60. I was not going to lose out on my chance to pass him, so I cheated.

See, folks, I didn't just have a reliable car: I had a Monte Carlo. One that had been modified by the previous owner for street racing. So when I punched the gas pedal, it was like being in the Fast and the Furious only I didn't have smoking hot Michelle Rodriguez or Vin Diesel beside me. But you get the idea.

I was so done with the ass in the truck that I failed to notice the cop waiting at the side of the road. I breezed past Mr. I'm Inconsiderate of Everyone Else Trying to Drive a Consistent Speed on the Road and the cop, going 75 miles per hour. Whoops.

Insult to injury the Inconsistent Motorist passed me as I pulled over with flashing red and blue lights in my rear view mirror. A bigger man would make a comment about karma and poetic justice. I am not that man.

The real point of this story is not about the fact that giving a college kid with a penchant for adrenaline fueled acts of stupidity a sports car was probably a bad idea, or that speeding will always get you in trouble one way or another. The point of this story is to tell you how I ended up deciding that the reason squirrels on city streets dive under the tires of passing vehicles is because they are suicidal. And it's all because of Mexico.

The cop exits his vehicle and walks up behind my car, pausing to take in my custom licensee plates (which are a reference to a drug song from the 60's even though I don't do drugs, I just happen to like the music of Jefferson Airplane. So much.) He walks with the kind of swagger only a man with a small doughnut belly, a mustache that went out of style before I was born, and a state patrol uniform can muster. He pulls his mirrored aviators off (because he clearly thought CHiPs was the height of television genius) and leaned into my open window asking for my license, proof of insurance and registration.

This is not the first time I've been pulled over in my car (imagine that.) So I have them at the ready and I manage to fish out my license from where it rests in my wallet behind the second most important source of identification: my student ID. I hand him over what he asked for and glance at Robbie. He blessedly waits till the cop is back at his vehicle to make a face at me and I start laughing. Mostly because I'm tired, I'm a stupid kid and I'm fueled by more caffeine than is responsible for any one person to consume (seriously they should do studies on how college kids manage to survive with out their hearts exploding.)

I manage to sober up and put on a some what straight face as the cop comes back. He hands me my information but keeps my license. He stares at us each in turn. His sunglasses are back on his face and I resist pointing out it's actually not that sunny of a day.

“What's in that baggy there?” He asks suspiciously and points to a small plastic sandwich baggy in my center console.

I blink and stare at it, noticing it for the first time. Robbie immediately loses his amused face and we both stare at the baggy together. In all honesty, I had no idea where it came from. There were always people coming and going from my car (this was when gas was cheap so no one thought it weird to have one dude driving all over kingdom come) with various foods, drinks and god knows what else. It was not that unusual to find pieces of trash left over. I pick up the baggy. It's empty.

“Apparently nothing.” I say holding it up.

“Give it to me.” He orders.

I comply. “I think it was a cookie at one point in time. I don't know someone probably left it in here.”

He takes the sandwich bag from my hand and proceeds to open it and sniff the contents. I watch him with my head cocked to one side. “If you're hungry there are some muffins in the trunk.”

Robbie punches me in the arm. “Dude!” He hisses.

I realize in hind sight that this line of thought was one of those moments where I would have been better off keeping my mouth shut (there have been, through out the course of my existence, more than a few of these.) But it's too late, Officer Over Zealous wants to see what's in the trunk. But I can't open the trunk from the interior of my car because it's just not that fancy. So I am forced to get out of the vehicle and walk around behind it, use the key and pop the trunk.

He peers into the impressively sized trunk for a two door car (I could fit a couple of bodies in there – I know because I have done it. They weren't dead or anything. That does not make it sound any better, actually) and asks: “What else is in here?”

“Uhh Cheetos I think. There's some Gatorade. Half of my friend's father's kitchen pantry basically.” In all honestly I was trying to behave myself. But I have innate ability to say all the wrong things from time to time. This was one of those times.

The officer straightens up and makes me face him. “Stand up straight.” He demands.

I do. Rigid spine and everything. I am not very tall. So this left me with a perfect view of his chest. I could see his name plate and badge. For the life of me I can not remember his name because the thing that stuck out the most to me was the little pin under his name that said “25 Years of Service.”

Now, if one has been a cop for 25 years and is even remotely good at their job, I would expect at this point in their career they would have graduated from busting college kids in a speed trap. I would assume with that kind of job experience you would be a detective, or perhaps working the posh gated neighborhoods with the Starbucks on the corner that knows your order because you spend a lingering amount of time there every afternoon. After all, you've put in 25 years on the job, you've earned the right to take it easy in the twilight of your career and enjoy the simple things, like overly sweet coffee beverages smothered in whipped cream. But the next line of questioning would tell me exactly why Officer 25 Years of Service was still busting college kids in a speed trap.

In a serious voice that came straight from the one and only episode of COPS I ever watched he asked: “Where are you headed?”

Readers, keep in mind that I was wearing a University of Idaho sweatshirt. There was a University of Idaho sticker in my back window. On the front driver's side windshield was a University of Idaho student parking permit. When I had handed him my license, in order to do so I had to first remove my University of Idaho student ID. In my trunk, in plain view was a University of Idaho course catalog. It was also the last day of Thanksgiving Break, on the only highway in the entire state of Idaho that leads directly to Moscow. All signs pointed in one direction: North, to the University of Idaho.

But as the cop asked me this question, every fiber in my being at once whispered in a voice only the Devil or the God of Mischief could mimic: “Mexico.”

“What did you say, son?!” He snapped.

“Moscow.” I corrected myself.

“Why are you going there?” He asked with out a hint of irony.

Once again my entire body is seized with the glorious desire to declare the most absurd thing I can think of; and that thing is because I am smuggling squirrels to Mexico. I, thankfully, have learned my lesson from the first two times I just said what I was thinking and keep my mouth shut. This, as it turns out, is also a mistake.

“Hey. Answer me!” He barks.

“I'm going back to school.” Which should have been obvious given that there is really only one reason any one goes to Moscow, Idaho. Hint: it's not for the sheep.

He stares at me suspiciously. He has no reason to be suspicious of me really. Other than being snarky, I am actually at this point in my life living a pretty benign existence. In fact I wasn't even drinking alcohol (even at parties and even though I was attending one of the top ten party schools in the country.) I had tried pot once a year before and it had ended with me hiding in the shower waiting for the Lizard People to come, which effectively put me off the stuff for life (or at least for another year before I tried it again, only this time it ended with me putting guillotine booby traps on the windows of our second story living quarters – I haven't touched it since.) This was pre my days where I name my stronghold Zombie Slayer Central, train dogs to bite people on command and spend my nights obsessing over the Zombie Apocalypse. This was pre the days when I referred to my living quarters as a “stronghold.” So all in all, I am not exactly the Drug Czar of the college campus this guy clearly thought I was.

“Do you know why I pulled you over?”

“No, not really.” This was the truth, because at this point in time I was laboring under the delusion that it wasn't speeding if you just used it to pass someone quickly and get back to driving like a legal citizen.

“You were speeding.”

“I was just passing that guy in the old Ford. He was driving me nuts with the slowing down and the speeding up and the slowing down again. So I just sped up to get around him so I could use cruise control.” Because I had learned after my first speeding ticket that cruise control kept me from being that asshole who drives 80 in a 65.

“You can't do that.” He tells me.

I wasn't exactly the best physics student on the planet, I admit that. Frankly if it didn't involve explosions or dropping GI Joes from the roof I wasn't really that interested. But I did pay enough attention to understand the basic concept that two objects moving at relatively the same speed are not going to be able to sort out a workable single file driving arrangement in the short ¼ mile window afforded them for passing.

“That makes no sense. How else are you supposed to pass someone quickly enough to avoid getting smashed into by oncoming traffic? I mean I had a really small window of opportunity here, so I was always under the impression you just get around the other car and then resume normal speeds once safely out in front so no one dies in a head on collision or because your sports car got run off the road by a guy with a truck from the 70's---” Somewhere inside my brain finally said shut the fuck up, Dean. So I did, silencing myself abruptly and just standing in front of the cop with my lips pressed together like there was glue involved.

“I am going to search your trunk.” He announces. “Stay here.”

Now, just wait one minute. First and foremost he has no probable cause to search my trunk. I am fresh off my Criminal Justice major after realizing working with guys like Officer 25 Years of Service But I'm Still a Traffic Cop were the kind of people I want to punch in the face. But I knew perfectly well he had zero cause to actually search my trunk. And the biggest part of me wanted to reach over and slam my hood down and tell him “Nope! The Squirrel resistance can not be stopped!”

In my head I had a really cool French accent.

I did not do this however. Because while I could have forced him to waste precious time and resources getting a search warrant that would ultimately lead to nothing and get him in trouble for harassing college kids who are harmless, it occurred to me that this is Northern Idaho. I did not want to be the tragic warning of police brutality that gets spread around in hushed whispers on campus and told as ghost stories to incoming, naive freshman. Also, I did not have bail money. So I kept my mouth shut and waved him towards the trunk with the biggest My Parents Were Theater Geeks flourish I could muster.

While the officer searched my trunk I caught sight of Robbie sitting in the passenger side of my car. He looked pale, well more pale than usual because Robbie was a computer science major and that is the major for vampires and guys who remain virgins till they are almost 30. (Robbie was just a vampire, he'd lost his virginity he assured me.) His eyes were wide and his mouth open and he sat backwards in the seat staring at me with a look that said “for the love of god, don't do anything stupid.”

I did not blame him. I am notorious for not being able to stop the snark once it gets started and it was probably apparent to every one present that my Oppositional Personality was raging about inside my head like a bull in a particularly delicate china shop. But I was holding it together, the least he could do was not assume I was going to fail. I grinned at him and gave him a thumbs up. I had this totally under control.

As predicted (by the simple fact there was nothing more interesting in my trunk than a pair of six inch hooker heels used the year before for participation in the Rocky Horror Picture Show) the highway cop found nothing of note in my trunk. Though he did make a point of investigating everything he put his hands on, and even opened Robbie's duffel bag full of freshly cleaned underwear. This appeared to freak him out in that weird way only homophobes can be freaked out by the presence of another man's clean underwear and made me grin ear to ear. I bit my tongue to keep from suggesting Robbie spent his break working as a Rent boy on 5^th avenue. I doubted the cop had the kind of sense of humor one needed to find that joke hilarious (as a side note when I told Robbie what I was thinking later he did the can-can to demonstrate some of his moves. That's why we were friends.)

After breaking open a half eaten bag of Cheetos and spilling them all over the trunk of my car and putting everything that had been very diligently ordered in the chaotic way only I understand into sheer disarray, the cop stood up and closed the trunk. Apparently satisfied I was not, in fact, the college kid Drug Czar of the University of Idaho campus. He wrote me a ticket and warned me if he ever pulled me over again things would be much worse and got into his vehicle and peeled off the side of the road.

Since he was retreating and I was tired of keeping my mouth shut I shouted to the cloud of dirt and dust he spit up while he restored his masculinity by flipping a bitch and heading back towards Lewiston by shouting: “Till all the Squirrels are in Mexico! VIVA LA REVOLUTION!”

It was cathartic.

I got back into the car and stuffed the ticket into the glove box, muttering about what kind of asshole gives a kid a speeding ticket for passing another car.

Robbie was waiting for me with a look that was as much relief as it was confusion. “La Revolution?”

“Yeah. The squirrels in Mexico understand.”

He just stares at me.

“Well that idiot asked me where I was going.” I began.

“The sweatshirt wasn't a clue?” Robbie asked.

“No, apparently neither was all the U of I stuff lurking about. So at first I said Mexico. But real quiet so he apparently didn't hear me and that's why I wasn't arrested.”

“Right, because naturally someone driving North is clearly making a break for the Mexican boarder.”

“That was why I said it, because I felt it matched the absurdity of the question. But then he asked WHY I was going to Moscow. And I mean, come on why does any one go to Moscow?!”

“For the sheep, obviously.”

“Duh.” I say with out missing a beat. “But it got me thinking; Why would someone be driving North on Highway 95 but actually be heading to Mexico? So I decided it was because I was smuggling squirrels out of the country. Not just any squirrels, depressed squirrels. And I had to go North first to throw off the authorities in my smuggling. But the squirrels were depressed because they were living in cities and they keep committing suicide which is why they jump under the tires of your car while you're driving causing you to feel like a real asshole for weeks because you flattened a squirrel. But the squirrels don't have Prozac, so they don't know of any better way to deal with their depression then by committing suicide. But really they are depressed because everyone keeps cutting down their trees.”

“And Mexico is full of trees.” Robbie chimes in.

“Exactly. So now, in my head, I am this great Han Solo revolutionary helping depressed squirrels escape the tyranny of tree-less cities in the trunk of my car.”

“Hey, Dean?”

“Yeah, Robbie?”

“I'm really glad we're friends.”

“Me too. But do me a favor? Next time you need a ride back to school, remind me to clean out my car first.”

“Sure thing.” He agrees as I turn the engine back on in my car. “Maybe we should lace all the nuts in the cities with Prozac? So when the squirrels eat them they won't be depressed. We can make it a nation wide campaign: Prozac nuts for squirrels.”

I pulled out into traffic. “Prozac Nuts sounds like the name of a band. Oh my god we should start a band!”

We never did start a band. But wouldn't it have been a great VH1: Behind the Music origins story if we had?

50 Shades of WTF is wrong with you?!

Today, I am talking about why Fifty Shades of Grey makes me feel sorry for women in America, and why I use it to justify not liking you.

I absolutely judge other people by what they read. And I will judge you harshly if you've read this piece of crap and worse, if you liked it. I feel that judging people by their tastes in books and movies is a perfectly legitimate way to size someone up in a snap shot.

For example my favorite books are the Crucible (by Arthur Miller) and The Courtship of Princess Leia (by Dave Wolverton). This tells you everything you need to know about me. I like classic literature with tons of subtext and tragedy. And space ships. That gives you a fairly accurate representation of what to expect when interacting with me. When one of your Heroes is Han Solo...how can a guy go wrong, really? (Note: He did shoot first, and any one who says differently is a liar. LIAR.)

See? Han shot first.

The same logic (or Real Life Dean!Logic) can be applied to movies. If you tell me your favorite movies are the Twilight Franchise, or Prometheus I can infer you have unrealistic expectations of romance, have never seen Interview with a Vampire (because THAT my friends is a fucking sexy vampire), have a fixation with shiny things and don't care for coherent plots or consistent characterization. On the flip side of that my favorite movies are Lethal Weapon 3, The Terminator and Lilo & Stitch. From this you can deduce that I like exciting movies with strong female characters, delicate but intense romances, lots of snarky dialogue, anything in which a dog saves the day and small blue aliens with speech impediments.

So when people tell me they actually enjoyed something as poorly written and horrifically bad as 50 Shades of Grey... I am forced to wonder if they have a functional IQ, or if they require 24 hour supervision from a nurse so they don't accidentally cut themselves by using a kitchen knife backwards. (On a side note, what post is complete with out mentioning a time when Dean accidentally cut himself by using a pocket knife backwards. True story, bro.)

I have finally after slogging through a dozen or so hilarious recaps (each with excerpts so I can't quite wash the foul taste of the horrible abuse of the English language from my mouth at the fact this thing exists, and worse it's making money) I have come to the conclusion about what REALLY bothers me about this whole thing. It isn't so much that Fifty Shades of Grey is horribly written (it is), it isn't that it's a horrific portrayal of abuse dressed up as romance (it is), it isn't even that I am kind of jealous that this piece of trash and hack writer are making way more money then I will probably ever see while I toil away in obscurity while people say of my writing that it's “beautiful” and that I portray “great, real characters” (because that is part of it, I admit.) What REALLY gets under my skin is not what Fifty Shades of Gray says about anything, it's what the popularity of it says.

The popularity of Fifty Shades says to me not what publishers will do to make a buck (because we all know there are few places they won't go to make the all mighty dollar), but what it says about how women see themselves. This is being touted by people (women in fact) as the key to revitalizing marriages, of awakening your sex goddess with in (which I happen to know some very nice lesbians at the local sex toy store who can help you with that in a completely non-abusive, un-creepy nonjudgmental way).. While being this portrayal of a relationship that bares every classical sign of abuse. This is what women in this country think they are worthy of? Being stalked. Controlled. Manipulated. Taken against their will?

Jesus Christ. What the hell have we done to our children, America? I am not a father (and let's take a moment to all be thankful for that, because seriously I can't boil water with out setting the stove on fire.) But I am a son and brother. I have a mother. I have a sister. I have a sister-in-law, and probably will have another soon. I have friends who are near and dear to me who are women (Pepper in particular.) I have dated women (GASP! But you're gay! Mostly Gay. Not entirely gay. There's a difference.)

Ask this guy, he knows what I mean.

In short there are a lot of women in my life. And as a (mostly) gay man I am part of a marginalized section of society. I can empathize with the plight of women. More importantly I feel strongly about ensuring the women in my life are treated fairly, equally and with out judgment. In short I am a feminist, joining the likes of Joss Whedon in being a male feminist at that.

So when I see this blatant display of abuse portrayed as every girl's fantasy, I wonder if that's what the women in my life feel they deserve. If that's all they feel they are worthy of. Are they worth no more than to be controlled by a man? Manipulated by a boyfriend who with holds affection to get his way? Or worse, do they feel the men in their lives are justified in using violence to frighten and control them as long as it's under the banner of BDSM? It worries me to my very core that that's all women think they are deserving of. Because this book isn't totted as a cautionary tale of what abuse can do to a woman's psyche, or even as a dark and morbid tale of psychological manipulation. No, this piece of shit book is declared erotic, and the label of every woman's fantasies.

Excuse me?!

Pepper if you are reading this and all you think you deserve is a guy who treats you like this and it's okay because it's BDSM (not) and he's rich (which means everything he does is totally forgivable) I will come into the next room and whack you about the head with a copy of Pride and Prejudice until you start thinking sensibly again. I will force feed you Mr. Darcy, Kyle Reese, Atticus Finch and Jean Valjean until you get it. Hell, Tarzan was quite literally raised by apes and STILL managed to treat Jane with more respect than Christian Grey has ever shown Anastasia Steele (also: all of those names have been ruined for me. Forever.)

I suppose it's no wonder the Republicans are pushing through bills and legislator about closing planned parenthood and forced ultrasounds and saying things like “legitimate rape.” Because apparently women in this country feel it's totally necessary, neigh even romantic, for a man to tell her what she can and can not do with her body, her free will and her life.

Here's a hint, Ladies: Ana Steele (fuck, Bella Swan, too) is NOT your role model. She is not the woman you want to aspire to be, because she isn't much of a woman at all. She's a shallow, self absorbed abuse victim who's boyfriend uses sex to control her and keep her from seeing the bigger picture (like the fact he's a controlling, manipulative abusive fuckwit.) That is NOT something you want to aspire to. Your role models are: Elizabeth Bennet. Sarah Connor. Ellen Ripley. Karin Murphy. Hermione Granger. Dana Scully. Buffy Summers. River Tam. Zoe Washburn. And if you need me to explain who these women are....you're not reading enough or watching enough awesome television. But my point still stands, if you want to emulate a woman's life and aspire to be like some one; pick someone who doesn't embody the phrase “get me a sandwhich” in every fucking way possible. For the sake of your children and the generations to follow you, please.

Here have some Links to places to read about this tripe with out having to stomach too much of it at once yourself:

Jen Reads 50 Shades of Grey

50 Shades Fried

Something Short and Snappy: 50 Shades of Grey Recap

The Knotty Bride Recap/Weighs in

Man it's amazing what a simple Google search can produce. Please note I searched for "Fifty Shades of Grey Recap" and just about everything on the first page was a parody/snark/angry rant about this book. That tells you something, doesn't it? DOESN'T IT?!! 

Back to our regularly scheduled programing.

I Get Banned from the Kitchen Regularly

Reason I am banned from the kitchen currently: I accidentally set fire to the stove. Again.

First thing you need to know about me is that I can survive for days in the wilderness, alone. With out accompaniment. The second thing you need to know about me is that four days alone in my own house and I am starving.

I am starving mostly because Pepper is out of town, and I am currently banned from the stove. Again. Normally when Pepper goes out of town she sets up a routine with several of our mutual friends, to ensure they stop by periodically, or call to ensure I am still alive. And she would make sure someone brought over food for me, or at least there was enough food in the microwavable category I will be okay.

Pepper left town rather suddenly this go round because of her grandmother's funeral back east (for those not paying attention we live in Idaho, that would be west.) As such she did not make arrangments to ensure there was enough food, someone to bring left overs or otherwise ways to be certain I was going to actually eat food and not wander around the house like a ghost complaining about hunger.

“But, Pine...why don't you just cook for yourself?” You ask.

That's simple. I am banned from the stove. Again. This happens several times a year. I do something that necessitates the use of a fire extinguisher. Or the disconnection of the smoke alarm and Pepper declares me unfit for society and bans me from the stove. This ban will last a few months, then she will slip and forget and I will start using the stove again. This doesn't last long however because sooner or later I set something on fire. Again.

So while Pepper is out of town I've been surviving on cheese sandwhiches and SoBe. Whining about being hungry to the dogs who can't figure out why I don't just eat dog food like they do. It's delicious, they swear.

This most recent stove banishment happened a few weeks ago. I decided I wanted macaroni and cheese. (Because I am still a college kid deep down inside.) (Okay not that deep down.) I put the water on the stove to boil. And because I had nothing better to do, I started washing dog dishes. Pepper and I split the house chores, and she does the human dishes the bulk of the time. I am entirely responsible for washing any dishes used by any animals in the house. We have seven dogs. Three cats and a Hawkeye. This generates a significant amount of pet dishes.

I am standing at the sink, singing along to the radio and washing dishes. I glance up and peer out the kitchen window to the world outside. It was dark out and through the pane I could see a flame dancing. I thought to myself “oh how nice, the neighbors have a fire going.”

Problem: we do not have neighbors.

Actually we do. But it's a cemetery, so if the neighbors have a fire it's probably the zombie apocalypse and the dead are rising.

So following my “oh how nice” thought came the quick realization “wait...we don't have neighbors...”

I turned around quickly to see that the stove in fact on the fire. The delightful flame I had seen was coming up from under the burner where my water supposed to be boiling for noodles. Suddenly it wasn't so delightful. Because there was a fire. Inside my house.

“Ahh!” I shouted. “FIRE! Ahh! There's a fire! There's fire! The stove! FIRE!” I stuttered over my own words.

I grabbed a towel form the counter and pulled the pot from the burner. I began tamping out the towel on the burner. It was around this time Pepper appeared. She entered the kitchen calmly, with both eyebrows raised.

“What did you do now?” She asked in a tone that suggested she had asked the question before. And she has. She asks this same question multiple times a week.

“It is not my fault!” I protest immediately. “There was fire! I put it out though!” Like some how the fact that I put out the flame I was some how responsible for was going to absolve me of the crime of setting the fire in the first place.

Pepper looked at me, then at the stove. And back to me. “That's it. You're banned from the stove.”

“Again?!”

“Again!” She waved her hand at me and turned to head down the hall to her bedroom.

“For how long?!” I called after her. The length of the banishment varies depending on the crime.

“Awhile!” She shouted and closed her door.

I stared blankly at the stove for a minute. And then at my cooling pot of water. “But I'm hungry...” I muttered.

Pepper opened her door and stuck her head out. “I will feed you in a minute! Let me finish what I'm doing.”

I grinned, and turned back to the dishes.

And that is how I was banished from the stove. Again. The moral of the story is that I can not be trusted to survive in a domestic setting with out adult supervision. And that being 30 years old, does not in anyway make me an adult.

Last Week I Behaved Liked a 12 Year Old Girl & All the Cats Were Fired

It started out innocently enough. Pepper (the Roommate) decided she was going to clean out her closet. She was packing for an unfortunate trip back east to bury her grandmother (Rest in Peace, Gram). And decided to deal with the emotions of grief and despair by being productive. Good on her.

Pepper is perpetually disorganized. As opposed to me who exists in a state of semi-chaos but my personal belongings are hyper organized. Everything has a place, just not necessarily where you might expect. Pepper on the other hand tends to shove everything in a corner and deal with it later. As a result of this policy her closet had become a catch all. The floor was covered in stacks upon stacks of paperbacks and DVDs. She was always complaining about not having enough room, and I , the gay roommate, could not figure out how she was running out of closet space. Not only is her closet bigger than mine, she has a fraction of the wardrobe.

Well the fact it was stuffed with dog stuff, books, movies and a dozen other odds and ends explained it. While she had very little clothing (for a girl), she had a ton of other stuff in the closet.

Our house is small. Painfully so sometimes. And since the living room was converted to the Kennel a few years ago, personal belongings are almost entirely in our individual bedrooms and bathrooms. I had long ago decided being over crowded by my beloved books and movies as unacceptable. So I weeded through my books and donated several boxes worth of books I knew I was never going to read again, and that weren't valuable enough to warrant keeping (I have a collection of first editions and antique books that are valuable.) I boxed up a bunch of other books and put them into storage off site. Deciding only to keep the books I had on my “to read” list, and those I knew I might access sin the future (reference books on the paranormal for example.) (I am an encyclopedia of weird, but even I have limits.)

My DVDs were another problem. Because I happen to watch a lot of movies. And periodically go back and re-watch movies and tv shows that I am fond of, or feel in the mood for. Netflix has sort of dominated my life recently, but I wasn't ready to part with my DVDs. The problem was I had well over 300 DVDs. Not including the box sets and television shows on DVD. So, the solution was obviously. I reserved a single shelf on a book case in my room, and put all my television shows there. I took the rest of my DVDs and pulled them out of their boxes. This allowed me to put the actual disks into sleeves, which were there alphabetized in a storage container. This took my DVD collection from being a large bookcase and then some, down to a small three foot tall by one foot wide container. Awesome.

Pepper had not yet realized this solution. So in the midst of pulling things from her closet, I hear a sudden terrified shriek. I don't mean a scream, I mean a full on girly as hell shriek. Pepper is not a terribly girly woman, she is pretty much a confirmed tom boy, and refuses to give it up. To hear her shriek like a little girl was both startling, and some what disconcerting.

I immediately came to her door. “What the hell?”

“A MOUSE!” She squealed at me, dancing on her feet as she couldn't shake her heebeejeebees. “There's a mouse in my closet! AHH!”

I laugh at her reaction. “It's just a mouse. Widget (one of the aforementioned currently fired cats) caught one the other day. She was very proud of herself.”

“IT'S IN MY CLOSET!” She wails at me. “GET IT OUT!”

I'm not sure when it happened but some where along the line of cohabitation with Pepper I became the “Guy Who Gets Things Done.” Mostly this seems to involve taking out the trash, repairing broken cabinets and occasionally a fence. This is not entirely with out justification, I was raised on a farm and I am quite familiar with reconstruction work and with the right tools can pretty much build almost anything. I do not, however, know how this translates into being responsible for removing unwanted rodents from closets.

Widget, who is now fired.

I entered Pepper's room stating “This sounds like an excellent job for the cats. Go get Widget.”

I felt a cat was an appropriate solution. Field mice are rather quick, and tiny. Widget had already proved earlier in the week she was a productive mouser. And it would be the Circle-of-Life-Lion-King-Mufasa-Scar-Betrays-Everyone-Nature-Taking-Its-Course sort of thing (and yes, I did just spoil the Lion King for you, Sorry.) (Not really.)

Pepper rushes out of the room leaving me to stare at the still cluttered closet with no idea if there really was a mouse, or if Pepper was hallucinating. I never put it past any one to imagine things like mice, and spiders. I do not imagine spiders. If I say there was a spider, there was a damn spider. No matter what the evidence says.

I began to slowly pull things out of the closet, trying to free up some floor space so that Widget has some room to work. I lift up a piece of rumpled clothing that had been laying at the bottom of the space for god knows how long, and low and behold there was a mouse.

Except my reaction wasn't “oh wow there really IS a mouse.”

 Look at those squinty Roid-Rage eyes!

My reaction went more like this: “AHHH A MOUSE JESUS CHRIST!”

And I may, or may not, have shot backwards several feet.

Now, as stated before, I grew up on a farm. Mice were not uncommon. We had them in the barns most of the time, and had two rather predatory barn cats who were very good mousers. In fact the most evidence we ever saw of the mice were their dead bodies stuffed between bales of hay (presumably to be saved for a later snack), and the occasional droppings. Once in a while there would be evidence of a mouse in the house, at which point we would bring the cats inside over night. They would spend the night indoors, and in the morning were put back outside. And there was no more evidence of a mouse. I was never really certain how they did it, but they always did. We usually only had one maybe two mice a year, and generally only in the colder months when they would decide even the barns weren't warm enough, or that the threat of Cat was too severe to continue living in the neighborhood.

You never really saw live mice. The few times I remember stumbling upon live mice, they were being hunted/actively chased by the cats so they weren't long for this world anyway.

I also had pet rats and pet mice growing up. In fact I had a particularly cool pet mouse named Walter through my first two years of college. (He was trained to do tricks for macaroni and cheese.) I am not afraid of rodents, per say. But there is something disturbing about seeing a small dark colored field mouse darting around your house. In the back of my mind my thought is always “You stay away from my cereal you bastard!”

Hey, I love lucky charms. I am assuming this is a universal species wide invariant. Have you tried them? They are delicious.

Rodrigo the gay field mouse with a drug problem
will eat your Lucky Charms, people.

Back to the mouse in the closet.

Pepper returns with Widget, who looks less than pleased. A life time of human's picking her up and snuggling her against her will has made her some what leery of what we plan to do with her. Pepper looks at me, triumphant with cat and knowing that I had actually seen the mouse (and not reacted that much more calmly then she had.)

“See? It's in there!” She thrusts the cat at me.

Like some how I am supposed to be better at putting the cat on the ground near the mouse in the closet than she is. This is another one of those things that happens when you're the “Man of the House” (however tenuous that is, because were this a spider I would be calling in the National Guard at this point.)

I pet Widget and tell her there's a mouse in the closet, not that she has any idea what it means. I set her on the closet floor where the mouse had been spotted last (and since vanished in a tiny furry blur.) I expect her to react the same way as my childhood barn cats would have, catching the scent of the mouse Callie and Cujo (yes I had a cat named Cujo) would have been all about catching it. Widget, not so much. In fact she basically looks up at both of us and gives us the finger. She leaps out of the closet and runs off.

Pepper and I look at one another. “Well....” I say. “We still have Jack? And at least two dogs that we know will eat mice...”

Cpt. Jack Harkness.
Cat / James Bond of the Future
(may, or may not, be the Face of Boe)

Cpt. Jack Harkness, another cat, had lived for several months feral in the area before eventually deciding he lived here. We were both fairly certain he spent his walk about days hunting for field mice behind the house here at Zombie Slayer Central (the name for our kennel/location.) We both, foolishly it turns out, assumed Jack would fill in the void that Widget had left in our Cats-are-useful-because-they-kill-mice plan.

Pepper left the room again, this time calling for Jack. I returned to gingerly pulling things from the closet. Pepper entered the room with Jack following her, presumably because he thought she had something delicious for him to eat.

“You call him.” She says when Jack stops at the doorway with a suspicious look on his expressive face.

“Jack Jack! Come 'ere.” I say in my sweetest here-kitty-kitty-voice.

Here's the problem with Jack: Jack is a bit of a fucker.

By that I mean, Jack has a tendency to know exactly what you want, and do the opposite. Just because. He's a cat, and he's Cpt. Jack Harkness and he can. Don't get me wrong, I find his antics amusing most of the time. (Including the time he went on some kind of catnip bender and tore apart the laundry area of the house and then slept on his handiwork.) But this was not one of the times I wanted to be amused by Jack, instead I needed Jack to do a job.

Jack said “Piss off.” Turned around and promptly left the room. For a moment Pepper and I stared at one another in shock, though I'm not sure why. It's not as if Jack's attitude was anything new to either of us.

“You go get him, he's your cat.” She tells me.

Her logic is sound. So I leave the room and go find Jack. He is lazily strolling around the kennel area, with no particular destination clear. I scoop him up and he immediately demands I put him down. Jack is an affectionate cat, on his terms only. And he makes this very clear.

I try to sooth him. “Look, this is going to be awesome. You get to eat a mouse. Well I probably won't let you eat it, because that's gross. But I will let you kill it, and let's be honest, that's the fun part.” I firmly believe all cats are serial killers in the making. The only reason they don't go about creating mass panic and slaughtering people by the dozens is size (which is why people who own tigers freak me out.)

I get Jack back to Pepper's room and bring him inside. By this point he is being quite vocal about his disapproval of the man handling. He is indigent and adamant that he put down immediately. I oblige his demands, by putting him in the closet.

Once again operating under the theory that Cats-are-useful-because-they-kill-mice, and with the memories of how quick and eager my childhood barn cats were to hunt mice, I assume Jack will simply catch the scent of the mouse and be too distracted by his instincts to murder and maim to worry about escaping the closet.

I mentioned earlier that the problem with Jack is that he's a bit of a fucker, right? Yeah, I forgot to factor Jack's natural tendency to be a bit of an asshole into the equation. So while he did for a moment catch the scent of the mouse and show temporary interest in pursuing it, the second he realized this was what we wanted. He took off.

He left the room, leaping over the baby gate at the door with what I'm pretty sure was the cat version of “So long, suckers!”

And No Fucks were given that day.

“That's it!” Pepper announces. “Cats are fired!”

“That cat is a bastard.” I declare, mostly because I felt like stating the obvious was necessary at this point.

“He's your cat.” Pepper reminds me, which is her go-to response whenever Jack does something we find annoying. She likes to remind me his existence in this house is due to my bleeding heart.

“Yeah yeah. We still have two dogs. Let's get some more stuff cleared out of the closet and then bring in Sissy.”

She's pretty, and she knows it.

Sissy is my English Shepherd. A retired agility and trick dog she spent the first year(ish) of her life being virtually feral. We figure she survived largely by hunting for her own food. This we have seen backed up by several instances of hunting small animals (and birds) while hiking. Along with Myles, Pepper's golden, as her cohort. The two of them have eaten and/or killed several ground squirrels, gophers, field mice and one very unfortunate desert snake. We know they will hunt and kill this mouse. We are confident the dogs will not fail us where the cats clearly have.

At this point we had underestimated our own excitement level. And as we returned to pulling more things out of the closet, the mouse appeared again. He dashed across an opening on the floor and vanished into a pile of shoes.

Pepper and I in unison shouted “MOUSE!” And then we both screamed. I can tell you that one of us screamed like a girl. And one of us screamed like a little 12 year old girl. I refuse to divulge which is which. To protect the innocent and/or guilty.

And so began a dance with the mouse. Every time we would find him, he would dart out of his hiding space and find another. This would illicit shrieks of terror and we would leap back away from closet. In short we were probably as freaked by the mouse as he was by us. At one point Pepper pointed out the irony of two grown adults being afraid of a tiny field mouse. I in return pointed out the tiny field mouse was fast and clearly was on performance enhancing drugs, and there for capable of anything. And that I had never personally seen a mouse roid-rage attack, but I'm sure it would be bloody and violent and we would be helpless to stop it.

When we had enough space in the closet clear to bring in a dog. Pepper grabbed Sissy. I remained on guard duty with the mouse, humming to myself and trying to recount any movies in which the dude left holding the flash light and keeping watch didn't die a horrible death. Nothing came to mind.

Sissy came into the room with Pepper, looking very confused about what we were doing. We pointed towards the closet and kept telling her to get “Get the mouse, Sissy! Get the mouse!”

She obediently put her head down and sniffed. But immediately looked up at us like we were crazy people.

I decided if she saw the mouse she would hunt it. Remembering a hair raising incident a few years ago in which a friend's parakeet I was watching escaped her cage, and Sissy attempted to eat it mid-air. (She missed, the bird survived.)

So once again we began pulling things out of the closet. One at a time. Gingerly. I picked everything up like it was TNT and going to go off at any second. Pepper held onto Sissy's collar and stood behind me at this point. Some how thinking I would be her human shield.

It didn't take long before we found the mouse again. And while I told myself I was looking for it, and to hold my shit together like a man, the second it went zipping across an open space I shrieked and flung myself backwards. I was not alone in this as Pepper did the same, pointing wildly with a finger and howling at poor confused Sissy to “GET IT GET IT GET IT!”

Sissy was so thrown by our shrieks and shivers she just stood there, staring. Not that I entirely blame her, I'm sure it was a pretty ridiculous sight.

A few more attempts with Sissy yielded the same result; a very confused dog and a mouse still lose in the closet. Taking pity on the confused dog we fired her from the job and put her in my room. Pepper then went to get Myles. Myles is less sensitive compared to Sissy, so we thought he would tolerate our shrieks with more fortitude. Myles is also single-handedly responsible for eating three gophers, four mice, and one dead rodent that may or may not have been a mole at some point in it's life. We thought for sure Myles would catch the mouse and eat it. As an added bonus, Myles was familiar with hunting terms and knew how to find things were asking for (though we had never specifically asked him to hunt down a mouse, or anything living for that matter.)

This photo tells you everything you need
to know about Myles. Everything.

She came in the room with Myles, who was very happy to see me. Myles sort of views me as his absentee step father. He constantly seeks my acknowledgment and approval, like in doing so, some how he will be a man. Because I know this, and because I too am a bit of a fucker, I often tease Myles by refusing to acknowledge his desperate attempts to impress me (usually be bringing me a toy of some sort and offering to show it to me a thousand times.) (I do most of the time give in eventually and acknowledge him, but his desperation is funny.)

I fend Myles off with a dismissive “Yes. I'm happy to see you too. But we have serious business to do here, man.”

Once again we ready ourselves to face the closet. I pick up a small backpack, that I am sure the mouse is hiding under. So certain am I that I tell myself, again, to hold my shit together. To be ready to tell Myles to get it.

Sure enough. The mouse was under the backpack. And with out fail Pepper and I both lose our decorum, shriek like over caffeinated little girls and fling ourselves backwards, safely out of the mouse's path. Myles, who is not the sharpest tool in the shed, panics. Worried about what was worrying us he completely forgets about his command to hunt and comes rushing at us. Trying to offer doggy comfort and aid. This is not what we want. So we try again to get him to just sniff around in the closet. This was the dog we had watched track a gopher underground for twenty yards so he could eat it when it popped out of it's little hidey-hole in the ground (fleeing from Sissy who was digging a trench through the earth to get to him.)

Myles just remains convinced that the world is ending because both of his role models are freaking out. And if the humans are worried, clearly the sky is falling and we're all doomed. I try to compose myself as I look at the closet problem.

“Maybe if we clear it out? Leave the mouse with no where to go to?” I suggest.

“Yeah, we could do that. He couldn't escape Myles then, right?” Pepper says hopefully.

“Right.” I agree, more to convince myself of the plan than because I believed it was actually going to work.

This house from Hoarders looks about right.

While this adventure had begun with Pepper cleaning out her closet. It had now been reduced to a man, well mouse, hunt. And her bedroom had the contents of her entire closet spread across it. Her bed was buried under a pile of books and movies and clothing. Her floor had a small network of patches you could weave through but no space particularly to stand that wasn't directly in front of the closet. The room was so messed up, we couldn't even close the closet doors, too much stuff in the way.

We began to slowly remove everything from the closet. And by we, I mean me. Pepper remained standing back, taking things from me as I handed them to her. But I, as the man of the house (and I use this term loosely, given my actions previously that night my manhood was rightly being called into question) was relegated to the task of directly facing the mouse.

When enough space had been cleared for Myles, he voluntarily got into the closet, staring at us with an expression that clearly said “This is what you want...right?” It was. Sort of. We kept asking him to hunt, and he kept getting confused. He got out of the closet and brought us a toy. Then he brought us a slipper.

It was around this time that the mouse appeared again. Darting from between stacks of books and DVDs. Cue irrational shrieks of terror. Myles was not cool with this, and his brain dissolved. It was okay though, because really he was in good company by this point.

In an active of Mercy, Pepper put Myles back outside to be tormented by my shepherd puppy, Banshee. Trust us, it was far kinder a fate.

“What if we took out everything and then tossed Widget and Jack in there?” I suggested trying to figure out how we were going outsmart the mouse. Really the one suggestion we should have made which was to put down mouse traps, never crossed either of our minds. Were determined that some animal some where would be of use to us, damnit.

Slowly, with a methodical precision, I removed the stacks of books and movies (and promptly deposited them all over Pepper's bed – who needs sleep right?) When the closet was finally clear we had the sudden realization that there was no mouse. He was gone. Vanished. Speedy Gonzalas'd his ass out of there.

Pepper and I looked at one another, and then at the mess around us.

“There is a mouse...in my room...” Pepper whimpered.

“Maybe we should have left him in the closet?” I suggested. “Perhaps he was in the closet for a reason. Maybe he wasn't ready to come out of the closet, and we forced him. Now Rodrigo's going to start doing drugs, and poppers and circuit parties and we've set him up for a life time of addiction and sexual promis--”

“SHUT UP.”

I shut up. I just keep looking around, and finally my eyes land on her open suitcase. “Maybe he's going on vacation?” I offer. “It's like a children's book. The country mouse who travels across the country...”

“He had better not be in my suitcase! How the hell am I going to explain that to air port security?!”

“I dunno. Just say 'AH HA! There is the bastard!' That usually works.”

“For who?”

“I dunno! People! What do you want from me?! I'm a farm kid who just spent the last hour shrieking like my balls were in a vice over a fucking mouse! Clearly my brain is fried!” Not to mention I had named him, Rodrigo.

“I need to go to work tomorrow. I am going to bed.” On cue we both look at her bed which is piled several feet high with stuff.

“Yeah about that...” I say.

We spent the rest of the night trying to recoup our dignity, while moving the stacks of books and movies to the would-be-a-dinning-room-if-we-had-a-table (let's face it, I'm 30 years old and still live like a college kid. Peter Pan Complex Ahoy!) She ended up going to bed around 1am. We never did find the mouse again. And TSA never pulled her aside to ask why there was a mouse in her luggage.

Where the books & DVDs moved.

The moral of the story is that our cats are worthless. And our dogs are pretty close to worthless if the humans can't be trusted to keep it together. It was not my finest, or manliest moment. But it makes for a really funny story.