Pal Paranoia

I love dogs.

I love dogs more than most people.

I love dogs so much that I cannot help but accost any that are willing to let me scratch, snorgle and pat them.

I do not love doggie residue.

No, I don’t mean the slimy residue that enthusiastic tongues leave behind, nor the overly familiar jowl excretions of the larger breeds. I mean that slightly oily, tacky feeling that is left on one’s hands after patting a dog that is usually accompanied by a powerful sample of Eau de Chien. It’s like amber resin made of dog.

When I was growing up I had a dog that lived inside and ate, mostly, scraps of our food and raw chicken (he once ate an entire box of peppermint cream chocolates but I’m pretty sure that that is irrelevant).Though he peed on anything that stood still long enough (to the great detriment of our houses I must admit) he himself did not pong at all. I presumed that the doggie residue that I experienced with other dogs was due to size for my puppy was a Chihuahua.

Years later, I had not one, but two medium sized dogs. They were fed ridiculously expensive food and for two and a half years they were not bathed a solitary single time. They did not have the stinky doggie residue. Aha! I thought, it is the country life that keeps them free of the offensive substance despite their size for we lived high in the mountains.

Sure enough, when we moved to the city, my beloved dogs began to stink. If they bedded down (illegally) on the couch, it smelled of dog for a day. If I patted them too vigorously, my hands would smell of dog until I washed them. It must be the city I concluded for we lived under a railway line and the pollution was terrible.

But how to explain the smell-free existence of my first dog, he who had been an urban pup his entire 15 years??

Recently, my remaining dog has re-entered a period of supreme stinkiness. In fact, he goes through seasons of stink. So noticeable are these seasons that I finally struck upon the answer.

Dogs get doggie residue from Pal dog food.

I can’t be sure that it is brand specific and, indeed, it may be any of the supermarket brands but without a doubt when I feed my dog Pal dried food, he excretes doggie residue. Most dog owners feed their charges supermarket brands and most, I think, assume that doggie residue is a fact of doggie life.

It is not! I have lived the pong-free dream!

I love dogs, but I do not love doggie residue so tomorrow I’m going to buy myself a fat bag of Eukanuba, even if it means I don’t get to have pizza this week…

Out to Dinosaur

There is an episode of the 'new' Twilight Zone in which a salesman wakes up one morning to discover that everyone in his life is suddenly speaking an altered version of English. A colleague invites him out to "dinosaur," he overhears someone saying "you can't teach an old dog new trumpets." He descends into a hellish world in which he can't understand a thing anyone says to him. I am that salesman.
For as long as I can remember, people would always say "make a decision." Yet for at least a year I have been hearing people say "take a decision." At first it was only the odd news report, the occasional confused politician. Now, it seems, it is everywhere. I haven't heard a single broadcaster on Radio National say anything other than "take a decision" for months.
The requisite Google search informs me that this is generally considered 'correct' English whereas 'make a decision' is an Americanism. Further, it is considered particularly correct because one only chooses from an existing set of decisions; one does not create or make a decision. Others argue that because there is not yet a "decision-taking process" in common parlance that it is clearly better to say "make a decision." I'm an ol' fashioned gal but I find this hard to adjust to and I am particularly perplexed by its sudden dominance. Surely I'm not the only one?
Narrator: A question trembles in the silence: Why did this remarkable thing happen to this perfectly ordinary man? It may not matter why the world shifted so drastically for him. Existence is slippery at the best of times. What does matter is that Bill Lowery isn't ordinary. He's one of us. A man determined to prevail in the world that was, and the world that is, or the world that will be. In the Twilight Zone.

5 Year Plant

I was on my lunch-break at work the other day, sitting in the rose garden of the botanical gardens and reading the final instalment of a fetching fantasy novel when I was struck by a genuine existential crisis.
The sun was just this side of too glarey, the paper was just that side of too white and the result was that I kept looking up and away and thinking dangerous thoughts.
I realised, as I sat there, that this was now my life.
Working and mothering.
Mothering and working.
For almost thirty years my life has been defined by periods of work and reward, seasons of deliberate and finite exertion.
Suddenly I found myself facing a never-ending block of activity with no particular point except fiscal reward. I panicked.
I figured out in the days that followed that part of the problem was this sudden shift away from the vocation for which I had been training for the better part of a decade. I had no new work goals to replace the 'dream' of acadaemia with; what, after all, did I want from my work-life?
I think this was part of the panic actually, realising that I was embarking on a life unqualified for anything in particular.
As I write this I begin to fear that the problem really lies in the fact that I have no control over my future. That's so predictable.
Bugger bugger bum.

Rediscovering the Blogosphere

Well, in classic 'me' fashion, I'm lured back by gossip and controversy.
I had, in truth, entirely forgotten that I was semi-keeping this web log until The Lark mentioned a drama on her own blog that set me to reading pages and pages of strangers', semi-strangers' and friend's writings. I don't entirely understand why this mode of writing doesn't obsess me more, I think it may be something as simple as the fact that I am a little out of shape with regard to writing (among other things). I started re-working a letter for someone the other day and I accidentally turned it into a scholarly missive. Egads, the horror.
I did manage to make the hoops that so eluded me. The secret was a plumbing super-store and a patient clerk. The biggest problem after hurdling that obstacle was the expense and wrinkliness of tape. It's months since I made a hoop, though I still dance in rings of plastic.

Hoop-la! Failing to Make Hula-Hoops...

Last Saturday, a dear friend and I attended a hooping workshop at Dance Central. I was astounded to learn that apparently my rhythmic hoop-skills are still lurking somewhere in my muscle memory because I found it surprisingly easy to do the hand-tricks. Unfortunately, I was not equally at home with the waist-hooping which is what I was there to learn! Happily I can report that I did manage to do it by the end of the two hours if only for short bursts. Anyhoo, the next day I was so sore (particularly my poor bruised and swollen hands) which really inspired me to continue with the activity. I was loathe to spend seventy odd dollars on two hoops so I decided to make my own. It's actually very simple to do once you have the materials but finding the materials is proving to be nigh on impossible. Here are the original instructions: http://www.jasonunbound.com/hoops.html
First I bought the wrong piping after a man from Bunnings gave me a bum steer on the Kpa to Psi conversion so now I have ten metres of irrigation tubing with no irrigation system.
The next day I returned and bought the correct type, blue-stripe poly pipe. Yay! I thought, I'm only hours away from hooping happiness. I was wrong.
Blue-stripe poly pipe only comes in two sizes that are hoop-able: 20mm and 25mm. These measurements refer to the outside measurement. The problem is that the only internal connectors that are available for joining poly pipe are designed for the weaker pipes and are based on their inside measurement. So 19mm connectors *don't* fit 20mm pipes because they are too big.

See? They are exactly the same size!

The next size down is 15mm which is far too small. Even when I tried to put the 19mm fitting into the 25mm it doesn't work because it is too big:

Wibble wobble wibble wobble...

I have had no luck with any of the professionals who sell these items as they can only see solutions that revolve around the pipe's original use. I have, in desperation, ended up using dowel and glue but I'm not happy with the result. I'm frustrated and disappointed.
And to top it all off, I've probably spent the seventy dollars that two hoops would have cost me in materials - typical...

The Vagaries of Veganism

I have a very dear friend, let's call her The Lark, who is a passionate, ethical vegan. Though a vegetarian for most of her life, this latest escalation is a fairly recent development.

I have been fascinated to hear from her about the intensely antagonistic responses she receives from friends and family when they are faced with her dietary choices. Similarly, whenever I talk about her decision, I get responses ranging from dismissive right through to downright aggressive. Of course, the main reason for this is that most people feel that such choices are tacitly criticising their own omnivorous ways and they get defensive in response. In truth, The Lark has made such choices for herself and, though she would dearly love to see others follow her ways, rarely if ever proselytises on the subject and never pouts when we cook meat in front of her.

I have long struggled with my own choice to continue eating meat when I know far to much about meat production in this country to do so with a clear conscience. The Lark's decision to switch to veganism, despite a passionate love of cheese, pushed all those long-repressed buttons for me. And yet, I made no changes! This finally lead me to examine my resistance and, in the end, I found some peace with my decision to remain an omnivore.

First, a digression: I am somewhat passionate about shrinking my environmental footprint and as such I am a devoted recycler, I restrict the water usage in my house, use low energy light-bulbs, natural cleaning products and cloth nappies on my toddler among other things. I do all this because I feel that I am part of a groundswell; that, when combined with thousands of other individuals world-wide making the same small modifications to my routine, my little actions with result in big changes for the planet.

Conversely, I fundamentally believe that human beings will never, by choice, give up eating meat. If we lose the space to farm them as we do today, we will simply come up with more horrendous, cruel and efficient ways to farm them and continue to ignore the pleas of the animal welfare warriors. We have already seen this happen to farming methods over the past century. Most people would be truly horrified by the way in which animals are farmed and then killed if they took the time to find out - as they say, "If slaughter-houses had glass walls we would all be vegetarian" - but most don't find out because they genuinely do not want to know.

Combine this with the fact that it is nigh on impossible to live 100% vegan in the modern world. It is perhaps possible if you absent yourself from the rest of society and live a dietarily devout existence of self-sufficiency and whatnot but for most of us it is impossible. Car tyres, for instance, are partly made from horse products. Nearly every wine and beer on the market is filtered using eggs. Vitamin B2 is often animal derived. Cochineal colouring is of animal origin - no more rasperry icy poles for you! These are only a handful of examples and I haven't even mentioned the fact that a city runs on industries and methods of transport that we all passively benefit from and which use animal products willy-nilly.

This latter point makes me wonder, in a way, why vegans bother but, also, when this element is combined with the former point, I am unable to seriously consider the switch. If I thought that my decision to become vegan would make even one animal live a longer life, or at least not die such a painful one, then I would seriously consider it. But, the truth is, I just don't believe that. I also don't believe that there will ever be a revolution in favour of the animals; sadly, quite the opposite.

On top of all this is also the undeniable fact that I love to eat meat. As a foodie, the thought of never eating sukiyaki, pâté or even something simple like a good ol' bacon and egg roll is truly demoralising. I recognise that this is an unsupportable, totally selfish, position but it plays a part in my decision and must therefore be mentioned.

I respect anyone who has the self-discipline and passion to make the sacrifices required of a vegan and I also recognise that the vegan diet is far more varied and exciting than most people recognise. That said, I don't entirely see the point in such an extreme limitation on your diet when 100% adherence is virtually impossible and when vegetarianism achieves many, though not all, of the same ends.

I'd be very interested in hearing from vegans who want to set me straight on this issue!

Who is the ugly sister?

Ok, here's a mystery for you...
Why is it that you can take any pair of sisters and you will always find that the elder of the two is markedly better looking?
A shocking hypothesis, I know, but it's true! It is true of every pair of sisters I ever met and true of every pair of celebrity sisters you can name: think of Paris and Nicky Hilton; Jessica and Ashlee Simpson; Hilary and Haylie Duff; Jodie and Jemma Kidd; Kylie and Dannii Minogue; and the list goes (as they say) on and on.
What is that about???
Is it an inbuilt genetic fail-safe so that parents would bond with their first-born and feel safe to create more babies?
Or is it because first-born babies are far more carefully cared for, better fed, and generally more fawned upon than the siblings that follow?
Or perhaps they just exhude more confidence and therefore seem more attractive?
Any theories out there?

Quarter Life Crisis?

Today I had coffee with one of my oldest friends and we, as usual, spent the better part of our day discussing the minutiae of our lives. A common thread turned out to be the directionless, dismal, depricating lives that most of our friends seem to be living (and that we are skirting on ourselves). What, I wonder, is the cause of this general malaise amongst our peers? Why do we gen-x babies seem so dissatisfied? Chileanchick asserted that it was the natural petering out of our hopes and dreams from childhood; the routine dusting away of stardust from our eyes. Can this be true? Is it possible that wonder and joy in day to day things simply fade away as we get older?
I posited the decidedly untrendy view that, as we move away from traditional roles in our late 20's, we find ourselves with an absence, a hole of some kind. More specifically: if you have a career that you are building, you seem to be ok; if you are still at university, you seem to be ok; if you have a life-partner and all that brings, you seem to be ok. There is something about this period (say 28-35) that cries out for something. You are no longer as young and free as you were in your early twenties but you are not yet ready to leave your wild ways. It is suddenly not acceptable to work in casual jobs, not acceptable to still be holding on to that dream, not acceptable to be all the things you never stopped being.
I am not an advocate for traditional roles. I just notice that those among us who have some deeper connection with the rest of our lives, some sense of purpose, seem to be happier. Our parents, who never had the same choices, seemed to accept their part so readily.
Nearly everyone I know seems to be struggling with the question "What do I want?". It seems so simple but hardly anyone seems to be able to answer it. We could say "I want to be rich, famous, sexy, beautiful, free" but we are also not teenagers anymore and such slight, amorphous aspirations no longer stir us from our apathy. It feels like despair, this absence of desire. And yet, for most, it feels strangely numb.
Perhaps it's the aspartame.