Chicks' Night Rules

I went ice skating with some girlfriends on Friday night. CHICK NIGHT! Super fun. Turns out I SUCK at skating and it was more like shuffling/walking/waddling. The second part of the evening involved sipping full glasses of Chilean wine and I am VERY good at that so there weren't any 8 year old screaming past me during that part of the evening, was there?

I have a tendency to be a complete and total nerd homebody so last year I started a monthly Girls' Night Extravaganza (this little get together even has a name: event: anything... cuz it can be, you know... anything!). Every month I now have a date with a whole gaggle of girls.

Translation: Every month I get to hang out with a bunch of people who reason through things in a rational, understandable way (i.e. PROPERLY) and would never dream of hanging their clothes up ON THE FLOOR. And they don't think fart jokes are funny. Guys are awesome and all of that, but sometimes a girl just needs to hang out with a bunch of other girls and ogle said girls' jacket.

To satisfy my slightly OCD need for order and protocol there are rules:

• the date is set way ahead of time so there is no back & forth & back & forth with dates and times and day planners and headaches;
• each month a different person is in charge of deciding what we do and organizing whatever needs to be done (making reservations etc), this way one person isn't always saddled with all the "work";
• $20 spend limit so this bit of fun doesn't make anyone poor.

Over the last year (it started in March 2009) we 've done all kinds of fun stuff each month, such as:

• ate icecream and played bocce- I almost hit a duck (I've been honing my aim for next time because I DON'T LIKE TO MISS)
• martini night- Sex & the City theme
• salsa dancing
• Oktoberfest beer
• got all cultured and went to a black & white Italian film (Bicycle Thieves)... we also got cultured on ANOTHER night and went to an art gallery
• more drinking (WHAT? Like you don't go out for drinks with your friends)

It's great because I get to 1) catch up with friends. And they rock 2) take advantage of their WICKED creativity and do things I would probably never get around to doing, and 3) be saved from being that wiggy, too-blonde chick who hardly ever leaves her house and talks about her dogs WAY TOO MUCH.

Already looking forward to next month. There are rumours it will involve cheese. AN EVENING DEVOTED TO CHEESE, PEOPLE. Chicks' night rules.

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Puppies and Paint and 5 Seconds of the Globes

This weekend was a blur. I don't want to be a drama queen, but there was drama and there were Queens (okay, not really, but there WAS Dairy Queen ice cream wonderfulness in there somewhere so THANK GOD for that).

There WAS however, painting. And painting. And painting... and since I'm too damn lazy to write about it right now I am going to share my weekend with you in pictures.

As mentioned, there was painting:

There were also the puppies who had their socks walked off because we felt guilty for being lame Painter Freaks :

A bunch of spicy takeout...

More paint...

A bit of sarcasm:

Me: Oops! I'm not in your way am I?

John: Yeah, actually you are.

Me: I think what you meant was, "Of course not, darling. You could never be in my way."

John: Ha, ha.

.... silence...

John: Seriously, get out of my way.

There was week old red wine in a handmade mug with my name on it. Cuz, when you're walking around with a bunch of dust on your face who cares how your alcohol is served:

A whole bunch more paint:

Five seconds of the Globes:

And now I'm ready for bed.

Good night.

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Happy 2009! Hello 2010!

Happy New Year!

It has been quite a year. Mostly it's been amazing- every year has its ups and downs of course- but on the whole I am entirely thankful for all the sparkly wonderfulness and the many chances I have had to learn a little bit more about myself, my family*, and the complex and glittering people (and critters!) around me.

I've been carving out this little corner of the blog-verse for a little over 6 months now and I just want to say thank you THANK YOU for joining me and sharing your thoughts, experiences and general hilarity with all of us! I think you're WICKED. Every morning I look forward to getting up and checking my inbox to see all the fabulous nuggets you guys have shared!

So, a year in review from Fido & Wino (okay, it's only been 6 months, you know what I mean... saying "6 months in review"... not as catchy...):

1. I wrote A Letter to the Asshole Who Abandoned My Dog because I was so PISSED with the asshat who abandoned my dog, Kayloo, at a dump when she was 3 or 4 weeks old. What kind of toolbox pulls that kind of crap?! And there I go again...

2. We had the chance to enjoy a wonderful summer by the water, crashing out in complete exhaustion and sometimes just smelling the daisies;

3. My dogs wrecked some stuff including a cushion... and some shoes...

5. But every now and then the dogs were almost perfect in every way;

6. ... before coming to their senses and wrecking more of my crap... like another cushion (II);

7. When the Toronto Humane Society story on animal cruelty came out I think we all felt a deep sense of sadness and a certain sense of betrayal. It just shouldn't happen;

9. And before we knew it was Thanksgiving! I wrote this one about my first experience with red wine...

10. ...before I rambled on about not getting kids dogs for Christmas (I ramble sometimes!).

In May I said good bye to a dear friend of mine. I was thinking about her when I wrote this and she is the reason I started here in the first place. She was sunshine and sass and I will continue to learn from her through my thoughts and my dreams.

From my family to yours, HAPPY FREAKING NEW YEAR, give your pups and pets a kiss for me and I'll see you in 2010!

* In my world my immediate "family" is defined by John, Mickey, Kayloo & me. We are a family of 4. If you think that is weird... well okay, I don't actually think you think that is weird...


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I DO Love to Cook With Wine!

A quick note to wish you all a very happy christmashanukkahseasonholiday! I hope you've eaten fabulous food, had lots of fun with your loved ones and tore into a bottle or two (or five... or seven...)

My ma and popinlaw got me this... WOW do they ever know me. Perhaps I should be a wee bit more discreet about my extensive, albeit amateurish love of wine?

NAH!!!

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Thanksgiving Wine: I Blame Canada

Thanksgiving is coming up. Food mmm. Wine mmm. The first glass of wine I can remember tasting was in my first year of university. It was Thanksgiving, and one of my friends had organized a potluck.

The cozy (read: cramped) house was filled with the homey aroma of turkey roasting in the oven, stove top dressing warming on the stove top (we were students, GIVE US A BREAK) and the distinctly musty smell of burnt cat hair (the hosts’ cat walked past a beeswax candle and narrowly missed bursting into flames). So much to be thankful for (an important one being NO ROAST CAT).

The first glass of wine I was to enjoy on that Thanksgiving Day, was a blend of red (I am fairly certain “red” and “white” were the only kinds of wine that existed when I was in first year uni)… generously mixed with the fizzy sweet goodness of… I’m sure you will all recognize this name… 7up.

7up. Well, I suppose my VERY first tipple was sans the 7up but I thought it was so disgusting and was THIS close to pouring it out (a deplorable crime for ANY university student to commit), before my almost cat-less friend had the brilliant idea to mix it with something that I DID like. And who doesn’t like 7up? I mean, come on.

To be honest with you, the wine didn’t even taste very good masked by the 7Up. Thinking back on it: OF COURSE IT TASTED HORRIBLE! Wine and 7up?! There were at least a dozen people in that house and NOT ONE person stopped me. Zero. You’d think that in a group of 12 people over the age of 12 there would be at least ONE PERSON who would have the wherewithal to say: “Hey, I think that the combination of soda pop and wine might be a bad plan.” I am from a small town in Northern British Columbia. I can’t possibly be expected to know the finer points of consuming wine, let alone what kind of pop one should mix with it.

Really what I am getting at is this: What on earth is going on in Canadian universities? Do you think this travesty would have occurred in Italy? Chile? France? I am VERY STRONGLY DOUBTING IT.

Chantal: Mais non! Take this vin away, vin is grotesque! Horrible, horrible, horrible (pronounced “horeeeble”)!

Nicholette: Oh mon dieu! Moi can’t believe you do not like wine. What to do, what to do? I know, let’s BASTARDIZE IT BY MIXING IT WITH SOMETHING CARBONATED.

Do you see? I can’t even translate the scenario into half-French because IT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN. It’s not even in the half-French vocabulary. The French have been drinking wine with their croissants since they were 3 years old… and what exactly are the Canadians doing? Drinking maple syrup? Drinking snow? Losing hockey games?

My first experience with wine could have been a beautiful memory. I could have stood out on the balcony to get away from the cat smell, drowned in the intoxicating bouquet of “red” and let that first sip of my true adulthood mingle with the bloated feeling of eating far too much on a very special Thanksgiving Day.

Instead, I had some really bad 7up.

And I blame Canada.

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Paul Bunyan and his Wine

I bought this bottle of Voga Italia purely because of the wicked bottle. And because it was a Pinot Grigio. As far as white wines go, it was very nice. I think I am going to stick with Pinot Griogios (when I even venture down the white path) because, as a Red Wino, there aren't a lot of white wines that turn my crank.

Just for the record, I didn't go and thump that ax into the block for this shot. Paul Bunyan just happened to be chopping wood the day before.

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Blue

Look at the sky, it's PERFECTLY BLUE!

Once upon a time it was summer and I love summer and it was warm and the sun was shining and it was HEAVEN and did I mention that I LOVE summer? and then- OH NO!- it was OVER no, no, no. And then, the end.

I'm not sure if where you are is anything like where I am... but where I am is starting to get a bit cooler. Dang it.

This is a picture I took of the sky about a month ago while I was laying on my back on a blanket in the backyard. I was with my husband and my dogs and I had a mondo-sized latte and I read a of couple magazines and basically life was pretty much incredibly, totally perfect. That day may have also been a good hair day. I'm pretty sure it was.

Sigh...

I think this pic of Mickey and this pic of Kayloo about wrap up perfect summer days. Ooooh and then there was camping... and white wine!

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I Suck as a Reviewer (and Bocce and Lightsabers)

So.

I've come to the conclusion that I would never EVER make it as a critic if that was my profession. If I was a critic and depended on people caring about my critiques and I had to wait for a pay cheque to come of it... I would starve. Completely and totally to death.

I had a glass of wine recently and it kind of tasted like juice. Juice with an edge I suppose, but that was just because it had alcohol in it. I'd say what Tang is to juice, this "wine" is to wine.

In any case, as much as I can go on about me thinking it was crap... I can't bring myself to tell you what vineyard the wine comes from because it makes me feel bad to say: And hereto forth, I bequeath, Wine Blah Blah blows (my "reviews" so far: Cono Sur is "good," Barefoot "rocked" and for Lotusland "I liked it").

Let's blame my mother for this one. She's on holiday right now. She won't know.

What else do I suck at?

Bocce apparently. I went to go play last Friday and I came THIS close to hitting a duck and landing my bocce ball in a pond. WELL PLAYED!

Something I don't suck at: those reenactment games where you get all dressed up and play fight with your buddies in parks. I don't suck at it because I don't do it. But I DID see some people playing their game in the park where we were playing bocce! And they were DRESSED UP AND EVERYTHING. One guy even had all the make-up on and they had swords, pardon me, lightsabers and they LIT UP. I'm not sure if they made "whoomp, whoomp" sound because I wasn't close enough (would YOU have gotten very close to people in black capes and knee high army boots... and LIGHTSABERS?), but I could definitely see that they lit up and they were blue and those slow motion action moves were kick ass.

I could never be one of those reenactment game people. There are many reasons really, but a couple of them are 1) I don't think I could pull off slow motion action moves and 2) I hate getting dressed up. Halloween makes me want to pull my eyelashes out.

I hate finding a costume, spending money on crap that I'm only going to wear once, calling my friends to see if anyone ANYONE has a purple, sparkly mullet I can borrow (has to be purple!) because, darn it, I went and threw mine out last week.

Let's blame this on my mother too. Why? Just cuz. She's on holidays.

Back to my point. I suck at reviewing. I'm going to try not to lose any sleep over this one. I will not come on here and say, OMG THIS WINE WAS SO BAD, BLEH, BLECHT, THE HORROR, in the same way that I will not put a collar on the dog and say: Check this out? Ugly, hey? WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?

Ok then. I think I'll go get dressed up and play some bocce.

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Gladiator Biker Chick

I bought this bottle of Cycles Gladiator solely because it was banned by Alabama. Banned in Alabama! Apparently the Alabama Beverage Control Board figured it was "pornographic." I think one would normally see more boob at a Super Bowl halftime show, but whatever. It's a nice table wine and they are getting a bunch of press, so good for them!

In honour of the artwork I took this pic in front of my super tough biker jacket. I do not own a motorcycle. I am not tough. I have no idea what the characters on the back say. Please don't write to me and tell me it says something like "The wearer of this jacket is a bonehead." It won't stop me from wearing it, but I firmly believe that ignorance is bliss with these kinds of things.

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Pinot: A Nice Firm Handshake

After all the hullabaloo (that's right, hullabaloo) of the last post (A Letter to the Asshole Who Abandoned My Dog) I thought I would take this time to address another Very Important Subject:

Wine.

That's right, folks. Hold onto your shorts cuz there's gonna to be controversy.

Now, I am a cabernet sauvignon person, much like I am a dog person, and a jeans person and a Britney Spears person (whatever people, don't judge. Don't even try to tell me you don't do a little shoulder waggle when her songs come on). I decided to give a pinot a try. Obviously I've had pinots before, but this time I wanted to pay attention to the experience a little more. I am a Cono Sur fan so I grabbed their pinot (thank you to Alan from The Amateur Wino for the suggestion!)... and I won't lie, it's going to take a bit of getting used to.

It is exceptionally aromatic... I'm not saying I didn't like it. I'm just saying that between Cono Sur's cab sauv and pinot I might lean towards marrying the cab sauv and having it's children and with the pinot... I'd give it a handshake. Not one of those annoying limp wristed handshakes at all, it would be a nice solid handshake with eye contact and everything... but it would just be a handshake all the same.

I'll keep trying to broaden my horizons.

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1,000? 1,000!!!

Oh. My. Gad.

Over 1,000 people have come to Fido & Wino to check it out! The 1,000 milestone actually came last week and now we're at 1,100 and counting (happy dance... happy dance!)!

I am excited, ecstatic and so incredibly pleased that you guys are coming by the site... and then coming back for more (all together you've visited over 2,000 times and viewed 4,000 pages in 2 months and 2 days)!

So, THANK YOU!

Thank you for bookmarking the site, coming back each day and sharing it with your friends. Sorry to gush, but I love doing this and it makes me happy that you like to come along for the ride!

Here are a few posts of note:

1. Most viewed: Stuff My Dogs Have Wrecked: Cushion
2. Post that got the most comments: Secret Hiding Place for My Winter Underwear
3. Most popular Mickey post: Camping: Mickey Crashing Out I
   
4. Most popular Kayloo post: Camping: Kayloo and the Thong
5. Most popular wine post: Dodgy Little Penguin
   
6. Most commented on wine post: Connoisseur Only Different
7. My favourite Fido post: 16lbs of Holy Terror
8. My favourite Wino post (cuz I like the photo): A Gold Medal White
9. My favourite "other" post (again, like the photo): Tough Little Purple Flowers
   
10. First post: Our Carpet Would Never Be the Same Again

You have made my DAY... actually SUMMER. Holy crap this is exciting!

I've got a good feeling about this folks. I'll let ya know when we hit 10,000...

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Camping: It Totally Rocked

Not sure if I've made it clear, but all in all, camping rocked.

We drank.

We slept.
We went for long walks...

And on the drive home we found THE ONE AND ONLY NON-DISGUSTING OUTHOUSE in all of British Columbia THANK GOD oh my GOD I thought I was going to DIE if I had to wait one more SECOND I SWEAR to GOD I would have peed all over the JEEP like ALL OVER IT that is how close I was to DYING of too much pee.

So I took a picture of it for your viewing pleasure.


You're welcome.

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Camping: Connoisseur Only Different

Ok. So I would definitely recommend this wine- it's organic, it's Chilean... it's all good.

I also like it's name: Cono Sur. Like "connoisseur" only different and easier to spell. Get it? I did, which might have been part of the reason I bought the bottle in the first place.

But the real reason I am posting this photo is that I am so excited that my camera can do the whole "blurry in the background, focused in the front" thing. That is some fun stuff. I have a (grabbing a camera and copying, copying) Canon Digital IXUS 850IS. Yup. Turns out the IXUS can do the blurry thang.

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Camping: Flushing Toilets ROCK

We went for a long weekend camping trip last week. Camping is wicked. I'm NOT talking about roughin' it in the wild with only a loin cloth, gun and strip of burlap to get us through. No, no. I'm talking about a cabin, running water, electricity and a cushy bed to cuddle into after a nice glass of wine and a full belly. Oh yeah. That's my kind of camping. The toilets flushed. There were showers. Hell, we even had lasagna for dinner one of the nights.

But we still had a camp fire to serve the VERY IMPORTANT PURPOSE of roasting marshmallows. So, as you can can very plainly see it WAS real camping.

More pics to come...

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A Beer Good Enough for Prince George

I mentioned the other day that John and I went to an Organic Festival. One of the first signs that greeted us was for lemonade and we smiled and nodded and murmured, "Oh, what a nice pretty sign, it's so pretty, (sigh) so cute. Oooh. Ahhh."

And then angels started singing and THE CLOUDS PARTED AND OUR PRAYERS WERE ANSWERED BECAUSE WE WEREN'T GOING TO BE ASKED TO GET THROUGH THE ENTIRE DAY ON LEMONADE ALONE - IT WAS DECREED!!!

That's right. This wicked Organic Fest had a Green Drinkery. Yessireebob. We were at a dang good festival.

My first "taste" was the Lotusland 2002 Pinot Noir (above). I liked it. I was a happy camper. Granted, I was sitting in the sun, downing a generous glass of wine and everyone was practically BEGGING me to feel all high and mighty as I was supporting the organic wine industry... but still, I think that Pinot did it's part to brighten my day.

The discerning wine drinker will note that the picture above is not of a glass of red wine and a glass of white wine. No, no. The glass on the right is a glass full of BEER. Beer? Beer! There is a good reason for the departure from the pure "Wino" side of "Fido & Wino" however as this is a very special glass of beer. Oh yes.

Drum roll please.

Let me introduce you to... NATURELAND!!!

John tasted NatureLand's Organic Lager and said it rocked. This is all lovely and good but the real kicker in all of this is that the Pacific Western Brewing Company- which brews NatureLand- is based in PRINCE GEORGE!!! I grew up in Prince George! This is amazing because Prince George has also voted, year after year, to keep a giant wooden man (Mr. PG if you will) as the mascot for the city (I'm not kidding, google it). Who knew good 'ol PG had it in 'er to whip up some tasty organic brew?

Pacific Western: If you're reading this, call me! (nudge, nudge, wink, wink)