Not Dead

Hello Beautiful People!

Just wanted to send a quick reminder just in case you thought I had DIED or something.

I'm not dead. I've just moved.

Fido & Wino is now over at Fido & Wino... there's more "fido" stuff and "wino" stuff and "life-o" stuff and "stuff-o" stuff... it's all good.

See ya over there.

Latest News: Moved on Over to fidoandwino.com

Hey Everybody!

The Fido & Wino circus has moved on over to fidoandwino.com so please (please!) update your Blog Rolls and "Favorites" links and RSS feeds and all that good stuff.

Alrighty then. I'll see you over there!

Whoo hoo! I'm excited! Change is good!

Queen Kayloo and the Sparkling Strait of Georgia

I absolutely love walking the dogs down by the water. Look at how it glitters. Love it.

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Rocks Don't Float

Went for a walk with a dear friend of mine on Saturday- we gabbed in the sun for HOURS. You know when you get on a roll and you practically talk your jaw off? Fueled by caffeine, sun rays and estrogen I'm pretty sure were basically the Michael Jordan's of jabbering.

We came across these floating rocks*. The water was perfectly still despite being on the edge of the ocean. Cool, right?

This shot kind of makes me think of this shot... and this one...

*Just kidding about the "floating rocks" thing. Rocks don't float, silly!

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Movie Weekend

This weekend was one of those mind-buzzing weekends. The kind where you walk into rooms, forgot why, walk out, have a flash of brilliance and remember, walk back into the room... and then promptly forget again and do something else entirely.

PLEASE TELL ME I'M NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO HAS DAYS LIKE THAT.

Since my brain wasn't working it was the PERFECT weekend to zone out and watch movies. I am so out of touch when it comes to what is out and what was winning at the Oscars... last night was the first time I had heard of the The Hurt Locker. Where have I been exactly?

John & I watched:

1. The Informant! with Matt Damon- he rocked that fuzzy little mustache like nobody's business;
2. Avatar- I'll admit, a part of me kind of wanted to be all, "Meh" about the whole thing but I TOTALLY got sucked in AND I CRIED. No lie. I'm a sucker for a great big humongous blue head;
3. The Corporation- Umm. Please go watch this movie. It's a documentary so right off the bat you'll be smarter for having gone to the movie store and PASSED OVER the first Matthew McConaughey ab fest flick you could get your grimey paws on... but more importantly it's a great movie. You'll have some ohmygod moments. It'll be good for you.

Here are my dogs waiting patiently for me at the movie store. They hadn't heard of The Hurt Locker either.

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A Dog Walk in the Good Kind of Snow

Mmmm. Cherry blossoms.

I took this picture last Friday while I was taking the dogs for a walk. I love it when a breeze starts to blow and the petals start to fall like snow.

Nice snow that doesn't need to be shoveled.

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I Fell In Love. His Name Was Dexter. My Husband Is Okay With It.

This is me and Dexter. Actually, this is me doing my best not to smother little Dexter because he was just so darn cute he made me want to eat him up (kinda felt like I was cheating on my dogs a wee bit, but it was OKAY cuz he was super cute and cuddly and SOMEBODY had to do it. I mean, come on. High five to ME for taking on the hard jobs). Okay, so you can't see him exactly, he's shy, but imagine a marshmallow and a cartoon baby panda... and a ladybug. All in one.

Dexter is the Handsome Devil in Residence at the Yellow Point Lodge and was rescued from a puppy mill on Vancouver Island. He was a stud dog and his forever owners figure he is about 2 years old now.

I'm not sure if people quite fathom how serious this whole puppy mill situation is. I won't inundate you with sad photos, but I do think we need to be informed when it comes to what is going on out there.

I read a story last week about puppy mills in Pennsylvania's Dutch County (story: Puppies 'Viewed as Livestock' in Amish Community via abc)- call me naive, but... I didn't know. I knew about puppy mills, I knew they were horrible... but it's just starting to really dawn on me how widespread this deplorable and inexcusable problem is.

Do your friends know that the adorable, cheeky Boston Terrier at the local petstore was most likely weened too early, irresponsibly bred and quite possibly plagued with a host of health problems? Does your family know that the pretty shitzu they found online probably has a mother who will know nothing other than her chicken wire cage and when she can no longer produce will just be discarded like any other unloved, useless inanimate object?

There is bad stuff. A lot of bad stuff. But there is good stuff too. Like handsome, curly Dexter. And Forever homes.

And the fact that Dexter liked me better than John and the reason I know this is because when I put him on John's lap Dexter jumped back on to my lap, and out loud I was like, "Aww, sweet Dexter, it's probably that he recognizes my smell now and he's shy" but on the inside I was like "I WON!!! Dexter likes ME and that means that in the Dexter Derby of Cuteness I won!" but again, on the outside I was way more mature than that. Every now and then I keep it together.

PS- And, yes, my hair is frizzy. I was on holiday. Gimme a break.

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Awesome Book: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

An important part of the holiday process: Devouring delectable books.

Have you read The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time? You need to read this book. I read this fabulous skip-and-jump of a novel long before I was freakishly into dogs. It's not really about dogs anyway. The dog in the title is dead when the book starts and this is NOT A SPOILER because, again, it is clear the dog is dead IN THE FIRST LINE OF THE BOOK.

Don't freak out at me.

I started reading it for the second time on Friday and I was finished by Monday. At the risk of sounding like a tremendous underachiever, it is a very nice sense of accomplishment to quickly finish off a book you just love. You're sad it's over, but you have this kind of Ta-da!!! feeling too.

It's nice.

Read it. Lemme know what you think.

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Freaking Heaven

Did I mention we went away for the weekend in FREAKING HEAVEN? Umyeahyeah. We did:

Sigh.

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Divine Days of Awww

John and I went away for a couple of days. I'll write a more complete post about the Divine Days of Awww, but in the meantime: Oh. My. God. Heaven. We slept. We ate. We walked around.... we slept, we ate... and after all of that we looked around and sighed:

Well, well. This is what the world looks like after a whole entire 8 hours of sleep, fresh salty air swirling around our care-free heads and a belly stuffed full of scrumptuous food SOMEONE ELSE MADE.

Did you catch that? I showed up in a room and deLICious food magically appeared on a plate before me. It was culinary wonderfulness that appeared out of thin air and, get this: THE DISHES CLEANED THEMSELVES. Love it. LOVE. It. I NEED ME ONE OF THOSE FAIRIES.

It was a pup-free few days, and although we missed them... I think they missed us for about as long as it took them to high-tail it around the corner to their own personal version of canine heaven: Doggie Daycare.

Here we have Mickey at the gate. As you can see, he is looking decidedly unsure. And it looks like his tail is broken (I can ASSURE you his tail is perfectly UN-broken. We just happen to have a dog with a red-headed mustache attached to his butt):

And Kayloo is PUMPED. She is ready to ROCK this daycare, get all up in some fancy chihuahua's grill and flop all around in a steaming pile of crap or two. Good times.

So, the dogs got to slop around in fields of mud all day long and we got to... not have a schedule.

Good deal!

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Fuzzy Cushions

Sometimes the only way to deal with a thing is to wedge your whole face in between two fuzzy cushions and wait for things to improve:

This is something I can appreciate. Kayloo is a smart dog.

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The New Yorker Has Gone to the Dogs

99.99% of the time I have no idea what in the hell is going on with the front cover of the New Yorker. Waaaaaaaaaaay over my head. Way. They are all cerebral and smart and clever... and I don't get them (yes, I do realize what this says about me). This one, however, I think I get:

It's cold! And there's snow everywhere! And even our dogs are cold!

... Or maybe it's some kind of commentary on the state of our society spending precious cash-ola on dog cloths in this economy...? Is the New Yorker making fun?

Okay, once again completely in the dark where I suppose I should be when it comes to the New Yorker.

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Your Mother Is Not Impressed, Playgirl

So, this whole thing about Mike Vick posing for Playgirl with the proceeds going to PETA (read the Life & Style article). In case you haven't heard: Playgirl offered to donate $1 million to PETA if Michael Vick poses for it's magazine.

ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?

This is the worst idea ever:

1. Guy tortures animals (he started his dogfighting operation, "Bad Newz Kennels" in 2001)
2. Guy is sentenced to 23 months followed by 2 months in home confinement
3. Guy strips for a skin mag
4. Skin mag makes a bunch of money

I'm going to throw this out there again: ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?

Yeah sure, they say they are going to give a donation to PETA, but that does not make any of this okay (whatever you happen to think of PETA). My issue here is with a publication wanting to profit off of what Vick has done. I have the sneaking suspicion the magazine stands to make a bunch of  money off of this and is doing this for a bunch of free press (yes, I do realize that I am giving said publication free press by writing this post, which is totally annoying but the whole thing really pisses me off so I am going to keep going).

Somebody woke up and thought: Hmmm. How can we get a bunch of press focused onto Playgirl and hopefully make a bunch of money in the process? I KNOW! Let's get someone who hurt voiceless animals... and then let's turn it around to make it sound like WE are the good guys by turning part of that income into a donation.

To that somebody: Not a nice idea. Your mom would not be proud.

I don't know about you guys, but for some reason I am not turned on by animal torturers ("former" yeah, yeah, yeah). I am also not turned on by magazines that seek to benefit/make light of former animal torturers.

As far as I've read PETA has nothing to do with this. Playgirl came up with this one all on their own.

WOW, what a downer! Okay. Here is a cute/bored picture of Mickey in an attempt to lighten things up after all that griping. Ta da!

My Happy Place

That is my husband. Those are my dogs. The sun is shining.

Things are good.

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Good Bye to Daddy Millan

On Friday, February 19th Daddy, Cesar Millan's loyal sidekick and Canine Assistant Extraordinaire passed away at the age of 16 years (you can post your condolences on Daddy's Memorium page here).

I didn't know Daddy, I don't know the Millan's, but I am sitting here bawling my eyes out because I can't imagine what they are going through right now. My heart truly goes out to them.

There is a section on saying good bye to your best buddy in "Be the Pack Leader." And it made me cry. I tried to cry quietly so I wouldn't wake John up, who was sound asleep beside me, and have to explain the reason I was snotting all over the sheets. Because I was crying for a whole bunch of reasons and it felt too dismal to explain.

I was crying because the thought of saying good bye was sad. Because sometimes saying good bye is the only right thing to do and sometimes doing the right thing is HARD. Because sometimes things happen that change you forever and most of the time you don't have control over those things.

Loving friends is amazing. Losing friends is impossible. Both inevitably happen... and your only option, really, is to hug harder, laugh more... and let your dogs cuddle with you on the couch every now and then even if they're not allowed. Kind of another "life is shit/life is amazing" thing, I guess.

I'd say my dogs will be allowed on the couch and the bed and everything else today.

To the Millans: I am so very sorry for your loss. Take care.

Vancouver Photo Medley

I mentioned in my horoscope post that I headed over to Vancouver a couple of weeks ago. Here's a bunch of pics cuz, yet again, my brain is too dang mushy to get it together and be properly witty for y'all.

It was before the Olympics started but ooooh the Olympics buzz was in the air! Lots of "I Heart Canada" stuff to spend your cash-ola on:

I'm not sure if these were put up before all the Olympics started, but these eagles are pretty westcoast-ish:

I took the ferry over and hanging over the side of the ferry to take photos frickin' frickin' FRICK frick scares the crap out of me because of the WATER and the DARK CHURNING WATER and the HAIRY HUNGRY WATER BEASTS WAITING TO CHEW MY SHOES OFF:

... and a close up of a wall... just cuz...

... and more Olympics...

Happy Friday! Have a blast this weekend!

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An Olympic Leap For Noodle Head

Here we have Kayloo on Rock #1:

And here we have Kayloo on Rock #2:

These photos probably don't seem ALL that interesting, but I had to share them with you guys because it took a BLOODY LONG TIME to get these shots. And NOT because I had to snap so many photos.

Oh no.

It's because Kayloo thinks she is as wee as a can of tomato soup and that her little ol' four-left-pawed self was embarking on an epic leap across the English Channel.

She seemed quite pleased with her feat. Well done, Noodle Head (that is one of her nicknames. Nope. Dunno why).

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