My Boo

I'm such an animal lover. Dogs are my favorite, but I think birds and rabbits and goats are nice too. I guess I don't love ALL animals, because sharks and grizzly bears and other animals that can tear my flesh off the bone scare me, but I don't put myself in situations where I might encounter them. I try to stick with animals that have sweet, friendly eyes.

I grew up in rural Nebraska so I've had animals as long as I can remember. We had dogs, cats, fish, parakeets, geese, sheep, horses, and - for a week or two - even some baby racoons that my dad rescued from a field that he was plowing. He noticed the young uns in time. But we didn't know how to take care of them properly, so they ended up getting diarrhea from either food or shelter negligence on our part and they all died. I was probably ten at the time but it still haunts me. I can't handle being responsible for the peril of an animal. That's probably why I'm so protective of Sophie (above right). She's my boo. I've always called her that, and then Usher came out with that song and made it sound like I was dating Sophie. I am enamored with her, that much is true.

Sophie is an 8 year old miniature schnauzer. I found the ad for Sophie in the Austin American Statesman one Saturday morning while I was at work at a radio station in Austin in 1996 and I called the owners immediately and told them I would be by right after work. It was one of those 6am-noon shifts which seemed long on a normal day, but knowing that I could go pick up my puppy when it was over made it ten times longer. It finally ended. When I got to the owner's house, Sophie was the only puppy left, and she was hiding underneath a huge coffee table and didn't want to come out. I guess nobody wanted a quiet, shy dog. She was six weeks old, and the cutest thing I had ever seen. She's a salt and pepper schnauzer and she's silver now, but when she was born she was black with a lot of fuzzy blond hair, especially around her ears. And the puppy breath! I love that. She didn't seem too thrilled with me at first, but I picked her up and rubbed my face against her fuzzy blond ears and promised to take good care of her, and that seemed to make me tolerable. Then we went to Petsmart and bought food and toys, and I think that helped her realize that I was friend and not foe. But she whimpered in the car on the way home, and just about every night for the first two weeks. Gradually she came out of her shell.

But oh she used to stress me out! Anytime she saw an open door she would take off like a bolt of lightning, and I would end up chasing her down the block, yellling frantically for her to listen to the voice of reason and come back to mama. I would eventually catch up with her and I would be out of breath and my heart would be in my throat, and she would look at me like, "What? I just needed some air. It was just a harmless little stroll." Whatever. There were speeding cars nearby. One time she stayed with a friend of mine, and after I returned from out of town and picked Sophie up, I found out she had gotten loose and she ran across Brodie Lane in South Austin, which would be the equivalent of Inwood or Midway in Dallas. I can't even stand the thought. But she eventually outgrew the desire to run away, and now she mostly just sprawls out on the floor and chews on her "happy bone."

Sophie is not the only miniature schnauzer we have. Shame on me for going on and on about her and neglecting the other two. Pierre is 9 (far right in the picture of all three), and I gained custody of him after a breakup. He was abused before I met him so he used to be angry, aggressive, and leary of everyone who wanted to pet him, but he has mellowed and now he's a big teddy bear. Marlee Bean is 5 (middle in the picture of all three), and Angela and I got her in Austin after we moved from an apartment to a house and had enough space for three dogs. Beanie is the sassiest and most obnoxious of the three. Unlike Sophie, she was outgoing from the beginning. She wasn't hiding underneath a coffee table when we went to pick her up. Instead, she was standing on her two back legs with her front paws gripping the cardboard ring that the owners had set up, and she said "Brrr" immediately upon seeing us like, "Finally! Take me home dammit." There's not a shy bone in her body. There are lots of bossy ones, but no timid ones.

I love these pups. I would love to have more dogs, but Angela has forbidden it. She's the smart, sensible one and I'm the big pile of schnauzer mush who makes no effort keep them off of my lap while we're watching movies, or keep them off the bed when we sleep. They snuggle up next to me and keep the blankets tight, and I love it. Surely we could handle three more. From left to right here are my boos: Sophie, Marlee Bean, and Pierre. They're not thrilled about the photo opp.

Bradys and Bewitched

Well dang it. I got home sooner than I expected today after a staff meeting was cancelled, and now I have three hours before Angela and I have to leave for a meeting. I thought I would just barely have time to come home and change clothes, but this three hour lag means I have time to do cardio on the treadmill after all. Crap. It's so much fun letting myself off the exercise hook on Fridays, but I'm thinking the voice of health and discipline is going to win out today. Perhaps if I blog long enough...

Angela and I went to happy hour last night at Blue Mesa at Beltline and the Tollway. There were some huge office parties taking up all the tables when we got there so we had to sit at the bar, and as soon as we sat down a couple of creepy old guys started checking us out. One of them looked like he could have been part of a Very Brady Trip to Hawaii, complete with the palm tree shirt and the tragically poofy hair. I didn't really look at the other guy much because I didn't want either of them to think I was into their hotness. The Very Brady guy looked at me way too many times--several times while I was in mid-sip with my blue rita and my lips were active (ick!)--but I think he eventually picked up on the fact that Angela and I were not there to hook up with anybody, to say the least. I guess it helped to see that we were completely into the conversation with each other, and when there happened to be a lull in our conversation we both checked out the LPGA action on the TV above the bar. He would have been barking up the wrong Ellen/Portia tree and he knew it. The ritas and quesadillas were tastey though.

After Blue Mesa we went to the Kiss FM premiere of Bewitched. Rich gave Bewitched 3 out of 5 on the Movie First Word this morning so he wasn't crazy about it, but I liked it. I realize it's not Oscar caliber, but Will Ferrell was hilarious under Nicole Kidman's spells, and I was just looking to crack up a few times. Mission accomplished.

Tonight we're going to dinner with friends. I'm in the mood for Mi Cocina, but any place with chips and salsa will do. I could eat mexican food every day of the week, and I feel like something is missing if we go out to dinner and fajitas are not on the menu. I don't know if that's because fajitas themselves are so great, or if it's the margarita/chips and salsa/queso accoutrements that seal the deal. Yum. Crap, I'm hearing the healthy, disciplined voice again. I had better get on the treadmill so I can eat more later. I hope the four of us can fend off the Bradys tonight.

Have a great weekend...

No Longer a Metal Mouth

I got my braces off today! This is a huge thrill for me. Doc Wilson put them on in October of 2003 so they had been on my teeth for about 20 months. I discovered that this was plenty of time to break off several brackets, develop cheek callouses from the constant poking, and grow accustomed to that feeling of having a good portion of the hardware aisle at Lowes in my mouth.
I broke brackets in interesting ways. In fact, I almost set a Wilson Orthodontics record when I went in one Monday to have three brackets repaired after a Sunday afternoon rib-fest featuring my dad's special dry rub. Those ribs were just too good to eat carefully. I broke off two brackets on the top in the front, and one on the bottom on the side. Everyone at the office just laughed at me and glued them all back on. I'm sure they put a black mark in my file for bad behavior. Let's see, other ways that I ruined brackets:

Buffalo wings -- Because I stuck most of the wing into the side of my mouth and gnawed the meat off that way. I hit bone on one ocassion. I guess I don't do well with bones.

Nuts -- Which they tell you not to eat, but I thought I could eat a cashew carefully.

Those little low fat garlic crisps from the Tom Thumb deli -- They broke up in crazy shapes and a control freak just had no control over that.

I think that's it. I avoided caramels and popcorn while I had braces, but I tend to avoid those on a daily basis anyway. I overdosed on popcorn and Pepsi Free once when I was eleven and it made me sick and I haven't been a big popcorn fan since. And the caramels...if I'm going to do sugar I guess I would rather eat chocolate.

Now that the metal is gone, my teeth feel slick and slimy and fantastic. Doc Wilson showed me the before and after pictures, and I hadn't realized how deformed my smile had been prior to braces. The right side of my face used to form a long trench-like dimple katywampus near my chin each time I smiled, I suppose because the teeth on that side of my face were in the wrong places and that caused the skin to stretch and crease in ways that only the skin inside your elbow should. But braces fixed this abnormality and now my smile is much hotter. I wouldn't say hot yet. Baby steps. I'm just happy I don't have to have the metal airbrushed out of photos anymore. Now if I could just do something about that huge forehead.

Jenny Time

I'm such a creature of habit. When I look at life objectively, I realize I really don't like routine or structure, but when it comes right down to it I can't seem to stop myself from doing the same dang things every day. I wake up at 3:30am, I'm at work by 4:45 and I stay until 10 or 11 (barring a staff meeting or some other routine buster), then I come home and spend the rest of the day on me. Angela works until 6ish, so I have to find something to do to occupy my time. And she wants me to have my "Jenny time." She knows I need to be alone a lot so I can concentrate on my creative outlets, and heck, just so I can think. That might make me boring, but my mind is constantly moving, stressing, and pondering, and sometimes I just need to retreat to solitude to let it do its thing. I wonder if this makes me nuts. Maybe just contemplative. Because if I'm listening to the Black Eyed Peas all the time I can't be nuts! I love the new Coldplay too. And I just bought Alanis Morrisette's acoustic Jagged Little Pill at Starbucks yesterday. Good stuff. All sane.

Oh, I have altered my routine a little bit recently. I used to do my 45-minute treadmill workout in the late morning right when I got home from work, but I've been getting home later and I'm hungry and I can't get on the treadmill in the hungry, weak state, so I eat a ham sandwich or something and that makes me want a cookie, so I eat a cookie and that makes me want another cookie, and by that time I'm too full to get on the treadmill. I don't want to double over with cramps. So I wait. Angela had a bad foot cramp experience recently while she was on the treadmill, and she ended up falling backward and poking a huge hole in the wall, like way bigger than the size of her heel. The conveyor belt just kept rolling and she couldn't keep her balance, and the next thing she knew there was a crater in the wall and she was downstairs rubbing her skinned up knees and trying to find me saying, "Didn't you hear that?!" Hmm. "Sure didn't. Love you. Does this mean we get to go to Lowes?" So anyway, if I were to get a cramp on the treadmill and lose my balance and become imbedded in the wall somehow, who would be around to hear me? Logistics prevent me from working out early in the day. I usually wait until 4 or 5 because the cookie effects have worn off by then. And that way I can watch Sportscenter too. I love Dan Patrick. And Mike Greenberg if he's filling in.

Thursday nights are always "quality time" nights at home, so after I work out and shower I'll poor some wine and wait. We're going to watch White Noise, The Aviator, or In Good Company. Whichever one we choose, I'm sure I'll fall asleep before it's half over. I suck. But maybe today will be the day I break from that tired routine. I should just put a secret Black Eyed Peas feed in my ear. That would wake me right up. My hump, my hump, my hump...My lovely lady lumps...What? Silly Fergie! Oh, the Peas make me so happy...

Black Eyed Peas

Have you purchased the new Blackeyed Peas CD? Oh my! It's amazing. It makes me so very happy. I think I've listened to it four to five hundred times already. And when I'm not listening to it, the songs are floating around in my head. I bought it last week on the day it was released, which I don't normally do because I'm rarely passionate enough about a CD to own it the minute it hits stores, but after hearing the Peas' new stuff on Kiss FM and Best Buy commercials, the Blackeyed vibe commanded me to go get Monkey Business immediately. The Best Buy in Frisco had it for $9.99. I feel like I should have paid way more and picked it up on the sly in a dark alley or something since it's giving me such a high.

I've said before that I have a silly (and obviously harmless) crush on Snoop and 50 Cent, but now I may have to add Will.i.am to that list. And Fergie. I love it when music carves out it's own style and celebrates its own uniqueness, and nobody sounds like--or moves like--the Black Eyed Peas. Monkey Business is fun. In more than one way.

Favorite tracks on the new CD:

Pump It
Don't Phunk with My Heart
Don't Lie
Dum Diddly

Infectious I tell ya! The 25 minute drive home flies by and I find myself actually wanting to be in traffic longer. That's nuts. But I guess my mind wanders into la-la land (not the Ashlee Simpson kind) and it makes me not care about some ass (the donkey kind, as we concluded on Kidd Kraddick in the Morning show today) in a dirty black pickup truck who darts ahead of me in an effort to get two car lengths ahead before the stoplight. I just concentrate on Fergie's vocal stylings and the flava that she gives to a boring little phrase like "don't lie," and suddenly asses don't bother me as much. And nothing can phunk with my heart I say.

Peas rule!

Crawfish and other Cajun Craziness

We have friends in town from Baton Rouge right now, so if my voice sounds funny over the next couple of days it's because I'm doped up on caffeine and ginseng trying to keep the lack of sleep from making me a total zombie. My voice cracked once on Kidd's show today, but I plowed through hoping you wouldn't notice, or so you would just think there was something wrong with your radio. But other than that, I'm okay with the three hours of sleep. I'm not a zombie. Just a tad loopy, which I'm sure will become more intense (and entertaining) as the weekend goes on. Sleep just gets in the way when you're bonding with good friends. And when the margaritas tell you that you you're a party animal, and that staying out just a little while longer won't ruin ya. No time for sleep.

The talking margaritas came from Uncle Julios at Keller Springs and the Tollway last night. Mmm mmm good. The fajitas were great too. I think I've had chicken fajitas just about everywhere in Dallas now and I've love them everywhere. These Baton Rouge friends are used to crawfish pies and all sorts of other crazy culinary creations that the peeps in cajun country can't help but grow accustomed to. I love the spice in cajun food, but it's all the little critters in it that I don't care for. Eating critters is way outside my comfort zone. Chicken fajitas on the other hand, well I could easily overdose. A chicken isn't a critter that curls up when it's cooked. Eeww. But since I've become aware that eating crawfish is outside my comfort zone, I'm going to make a much larger effort to make myself eat them. Dang that self-awareness. But I don't have to love 'em.

I'm happy that my cajun friends like mexican food. We've been to the Chipotle in Frisco twice already, Cristina's once, Uncle Julios last night, and Angela and I still want to take them to Mi Cocina. We're going to see Crash at the Angelika in Plano later today, so maybe we'll walk over to that Mi Cocina on Legacy. By that time I will have digested last night's fajitas and I'll be ready for the sunset style fajitas at Mi Cocina. Way better than crawfish.

Have a good weekend ya all!

Chillin' with Cuties

I got to hang out with my nieces yesterday. Jada is almost two and Ciara will be 5 months old on the 11th. They are just too cute. They're bi-racial and I think that helps! Those big brown eyes are just irresistible, and indicative of how hot these gals are going to be when they grow up. But that's the future, and right now they're just concentrating on eating, sleeping, and playing with various things, most of which are breakable or somehow attached to other humans. I'm amazed that I have any hair left after Jada climbed from the floor to my back yesterday to "ride horsey" and used my hair as the reigns. But that's the humiliating price "Aunt Nenny" must pay for bonding time. Jada doesn't have the "j" sound down yet, so when she refers to me it becomes an "n." I've been "Nenny" for the past few weeks, but yesterday she did instruct me to get down on the floor and play with a sweet yet forceful "Nen! Peas?" She can't put the "l" in please yet either. Yes Jada, you're too cute to resist, no matter how much hair I could potentially lose or how much I don't feel like bending over after just eating a few too many smokey barbecue chicken wings at Varsity just down the road in Frisco. Jada seemed to be more concerned with coloring and looking around at all the big screens while we were there (I hope she grows up to be a sports lover like Nen!) than with eating her hot dog. I should learn to become so pleasantly distracted while I'm eating.

So that was yesterday. Today Angela and I are painting an accent wall in the bathroom upstairs after I get off the air. Love those home improvements. And I need to wax my eyebrows. It's an exciting life I lead.