rhapsodic.org is a weblog by Valette Keller

Contrails at Sunrise in Palmer

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Mitzi's First Dog Park Experience

Mitzi got her rabies shot this morning, which means she's now able to enjoy the wonders of the off-leash dog parks. It was pretty much the most exciting hour of her life ever.

As of this morning she weighed 26 pounds, which is twice Olive's weight.

Except for the lake; the lake was Bad News because it is Wet OMG, even though Olive kept bringing sticks out of it that Mitzi wanted.

It was a gorgeous day to be out with the family.

You Gotta Hold the Frame

I have a 4-day weekend this weekend because Tuesday is Alaska Day, one of the fake holidays only the State observes, and I requested today off because I am brilliant.

I started my extra days off by dropping Donovan off at school and hittting the gym at 8:00 am.

I love going to the gym in the morning on normal work days because it's filled with happy old people and I like being surrounded by happiness while I'm sweating.

While I was sweating away on the elliptical, surrounded by happy (and smelly) old people, I saw the gym's trainer walk by with a client and I had this epiphany: my gym's trainer is Johnny Castle in Dirty Dancing.

I never see him training men. Or any women under the age of 50 (although I once saw him with a woman around 50 and her teenage daughter, but the mom was way more interested in the training session than the daughter so it doesn't count).

Now this guy isn't anywhere near as good looking as Patrick Swayze, nor is he all that young. But he's fit and willing to give you some one-on-one hands-on attention and "they're so rich, they're so goddam rich, you think they must know about everything.'

I can't wait to be 50 and hire my very own Johnny as a gym trainer.

The man I married

I don't regret a thing.

Puppy Kindergarten

I want you to imagine the most adorable thing you possibly could, then add puppy breath and butterflies and rainbows and unconditional love.

That's pretty close to the awesomeness of Alaska Dog Sports' Beginning Puppy I obedience class, aka Puppy Kindergarten, for ages 12 weeks to 6 months.

Last weekend was Mitzi's first day, and she was pretty distracted in the OMGOMGOMG kind of way. And then she piddled on the floor. And then they all piddled on the floor. Because PUPPIES OMG.

But we weren't there to play, we were there to work and to learn. Which is hard for Mitzi, but not impossible - especially when Olive isn't there to point and laugh and taunt her.

We rehearsed some of the commands we had practiced all week: Sit, Leave it, Look, and Come. And we pretty much kicked butt at all of those.

Then we learned some new commands, like Let's go and Wait. Which Mitzi got pretty much immediately, but our neighboring lab puppy had a lot of problems. Did you know it's very difficult to Wait behind a stick when you are chewing on the stick?

Mitzi didn't have any problems with any of the commands and in fact was showing everyone else up. I was so proud.

But we couldn't keep the puppies' attention for long, so we broke for recess. Mitzi played on the Small Dog side of the room with a shih tzu, schnauzer, and a fluffy husky while three 4-month-old labs wrestled on the Big Dog side.

Either this week or next we will introduce her to the Big Dogs and see how she handles herself. It will be good to be around bigger dogs that she can't just step on like she does Olive.

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