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.