Halloween

OK, so if you know me at all you know I hate Halloween - except the dressing up part. I know, I don't quite get it either.

I totally dig getting all dressed up for work and showing off my costume - this year I was a nun. I think I pulled it off pretty successfully. Apparently we had customers asking if I was a real nun, I even had one little girl stop and gawk at me outside my office until I looked up at her (sternly of course, had to stick with the character).

The thing I hate about Halloween is little and not so little kids dressing up and begging for candy at my front door. Don't get me wrong, I was one of the little beggars when I was a kid to, but I am pretty sure I always said "Trick or Treat" and "Thank you". Anymore the little beggars hold out a bag and stare at you until you drop candy in. Last time I gave out candy was when I lived in Rio. Some too old to be trick or treating kid looked at the candy I gave him and said "That's it?!"So, now I don't give anymore candy out. I hide in a back room with all the lights off in the front of the house waiting for the designated time to be over. Little beggars still ring the bell. I'm a prisoner in my own house!

So proud of my garden, and yet...

From little seedlings first popping out of the dirt this winter to a full grown garden! I'm pretty proud of my first garden, complete with funky sunflowers. And yet, not all is right in the Pope Garden...there is apparently a thief lurking in our midst. Someone who likes tomatoes apparently. So who is the offender? A tortoise clearly you may say. But no, it is not possible because the garden has eight inch walls surrounding it, and these eaten beauties sit higher still. Too tall for an adolescent tortoise. Perhaps Andy you say - not so, would Andy sit IN the garden and eat said tomatoes off the vine, leaving the evidence hanging behind? No, clearly not. And it's not bunnies either. While eating vegetation is their strong suit, the damage done is delicate, and with no bunny teeth marks. Plus, with Scout around, what bunny would come into the yard? So that leave me, and that's clearly not it, and our two lovely Dog-hters, Scout and Maggie.

Well now, Scout does spend a lot of time in the garden, and has destroyed vegetation thru her recklessness and frantic efforts to kill bunnies, she doesn't seem to be our culprit. No, clearly the offender is our own precious Maggie. Evidence! you demand. What more evidence do you need than snorting in the garden followed by tomato breath? None. She is our own little garden thief.

Andy bought himself a boat for his birthday!

Well, it's not a very good picture of the boat per say...but it is a cute photo, no?

Andy sold his boat a few weeks ago because someone made him and offer he couldn't refuse. So, the weekend of his birthday we went up to MN to look at this boat, and it was such a great deal we bought it!

This picture if from the first day of fishing. Maggie and Scout love it. Lots of room to wander and chase lures, there's even a special Maggie cubby where she can nap on hot days.

The only think lacking is a second console, which I think we might need to get installed since this boat goes WAY faster than the last one. Oh yea, and the girls wish it had more pillows.

New Tattoo

Well for all those I told, here it finally is, my birthday present from Andy - a new tattoo. It's bigger than I had originally intended when I started planning, but I am quite happy with it. It took 2 1/2 hours to complete and let me tell you, there were some 'YIKES!' spots. It is healing nicely, hopefully it doesn't itch too badly.

If you can't tell it's a puzzle. The tattoo guy created the drawing and then pulled pieces out of the puzzle to set aside, so if you were to take the random pieces you could fit those in. I only have five of the extra pieces right now, but could get more added later.

Key West Trip - Green Heron

Wow. It's been a while since my last post! Lots of stuff has been happening up here, so I've been a busy bee!

Well here are some pictures from our Keys trip sub-trip to Key West. This little guy was just chillin' in the harbor. Looks like he caught himself some lunch. Andy said he thought it was a green heron - I have no clue. Just a very pretty bird.

Key West was nothing to write home about. It was hot, windy, and crowded. We were there in the late morning to early afternoon, and by noon we had run across people so drunk they were screaming "Whoooooo" at security cameras on the street. I was waiting for this one girl to take her top off and start dancing in front of the camera. No wonder "Girls Gone Wild" has such success. Bunch of idiots.

Really Key West was just a bunch of touristy stuff that we weren't really all that interested in. By 1pm or so I was so sick of it I didn't even want to go see the Hemingway House. Sad.

We did stop at the beach on the return trip. Funny thing, their beaches don't really have sand. It's more like crushed shells. Not great for walking barefoot in. Anyway, there are pictures from that too, but I'm not going to post those!

Key Deer

As promised here are pictures of Key Deer. When we were driving down to Key West we noted that there was an area that is a Key Deer preservation area. We heard that they were little deer, and that we might be able to see them if we drove slowly. So, we decided to go off of the two lane highway onto the two lane road and try to find some. The brush is super thick in this area, and there are signs everywhere about not feeding the deer, so after about 20 minutes driving down a road to nowhere we were just about to turn back when Andy spotted these guys. It almost looks like it's a Zoo, but it isn't, these guys were chillin' in someones front yard. They were kind of mangy looking, but super cute. They are literally about the size of a medium to large sized dog. They had no fear of us at all. They just kept eating. In fact, one of them looked like he was going to ruff us up a bit when we sat there taking pictures of them. Maybe they don't like paparazzi.

Seven Mile Bridge to No Where

On the second full day of our trip to the Keys we were supposed to go fishing with Bob again, but it was even windier than day one. I believe there were 30 MPH winds! Obviously not ideal for fishing. We decided that we'd drive down to Key West and check it out. It was a long drive down the two lane highway, but it was fun. The driving was more fun than Key West in fact! Pictures here are on the seven mile bridge. Any one who has driven with me over a high bridge knows I have a fear of crashing and plummeting over the side and into the frigid water below. I almost always work out an escape plan in my head - particularly if the kids are in the back of the truck.

Anyway, so the seven mile bridge is long, but it's really pretty to look out over the water and see the different colors of blue. In the one picture you can see the old seven mile bridge to the right. It was pretty worn down and decrepit looking, but the birds seemed to like it. In one section of the old bridge there were two trees growing right out of the middle of the road.

Once in Key West we had lunch, wandered around, saw a huge cruise boat, saw some drunk people. I would likely not go back to Key West. Too much chincy, touristy crap, not enough Jimmy Buffet beach paradise feel.

Next time I'll post pictures of the Key Deer we saw in the protection area! They are like little dog sized deer!

Fishing in the Keys

I did mention that I didn't catch any fish right? Well on our first day out fishing with Bob (which would have been Thursday) Andy did. The fish with the yellow fins is a Jack. Apparently they can get quite large. The other picture he has two snappers. Which we had for dinner that night. Very tasty.

I actually had fish hooked a couple of times, but they got off for a variety of reasons. One must have gone under a rock, because no matter how much I pulled nothing happened, and no matter how much Bob pulled, nothing happened. Finally we just broke the line. Bob said it must have been a Goliath Grouper, but didn't use that name...

Anyway, later we ended up at some mangroves which is where Andy caught dinner. We would flip the little bait fish under the mangrove, and the grouper would swim out and eat it. Wouldn't have been so tough, but the reel was on the wrong side, so I every time I caught one it would take my gimpiness too long to reel in. Oh well, Andy did well. I did have another large Goliath Grouper on, Andy saw it and said it was very large. It almost ripped the pole right out of my hands! I got a bruise on my arm from the dang thing.

While out on Thursday we were also visited by porpoises, sharks, and sea turtles. I just couldn't get my camera out before they disappeared.

All in all a good fishing day, even if Andy was the only one who caught anything.

Vacation Photo's 3

Here are a couple of pictures of Andy from the Keys. Of course, I was carrying the camera most of the time, so must of the pictures are of Andy!

In the one picture he's holding two little bait fish, pilchers, it looks like he ripped one in half and has the tail in one hand and the head int he other, but I assure you it is two fish.

The other picture he is fishing at the end of the pier at the resort we stayed at. Where, you ask, did he get the gear? Well, I say, funny you should ask. There is, of course, a story behind that.

On the first day we were down in the Islamorada we decided to go to the "beach" at the resort and wade in the water. This resort allows pets, so there were a couple of people out with their dogs. One guy came down and was fishing at the end of the pier while his wife tended to their three small dogs. One of whom was an old little poodle that couldn't walk anymore, so they wheeled it around in a little cart. Poor little guy. Hated me though!

Anyway, while we were having a drink, watching this guy fish, and the little cart dog, another guy with his dog came down to the water. There was a bit of a hubbub and at some point a different poodle - not the cart dog - fell or jumped into the water. Someone jumped in after it and there was lots of hoopla. "Mom" took the dogs up to the bungalow, and "dad" continued to fish. Of course, at this point Andy made his move. Time to go out and see what dude was catching. Turns out nothing that night. So we (read Andy) ended up striking up a conversation with Trey about, what else, fishing. Trey was super cool. He showed Andy his rigging, let him fish with it, talked about where he fished, and what he caught.

After a while Andy hooked into a sting ray, a littleish one. It shot out and ran around a couple of pylons and snap. After a while Trey went up to get another beer. When he came back he had a fishing pole that he gave to Andy. He was thrilled. But there's more. The pole came with a story too.

Apparently a couple of years ago Trey was at the same resort (they go a couple times a year) and a dude was there that had literally never fished before. Same thing happened, Trey and dude got to talking, and Trey let him fish with his gear. Dude had some cash so he went to the huge fishing shop down the road and bought a pole and some other gear. The next night he was fishing, and had his pole leaning up against the end of the pier and all of a sudden the pole took off flying into the water. Something big just took it out to sea. He and Trey laughed about it for a bit and the next day dude went home. Well, then Trey and the Mrs. were out kayaking and Mrs. Trey looked down and saw something shiny about 20 yards out from the end of the pier. Turns out it's dudes pole! Trey got it out and cleaned it up and called Dude, who told him to keep it. He did, and finally ended up "paying it forward" by giving the pole to Andy. Hence the picture. I believe just this opening weekend (last weekend) Andy was fishing with the "Keys gear", throwing for pike, and he caught a 40 inch musky! Good karma on that pole I guess.

More vacation photos2

So remember in the last post I mentioned all the pelicans diving around us? Well here are three of the many pictures I took of them. It was hard getting pictures of the moment of impact, but here's a pretty good one, and one of a different pelican taking off after hitting the water. It was really neat to see, but a little like Hitchcock's The Birds, but with bigger birds.

More about the guide Bob. Andy does a really funny impression of him that's spot on. On the first day of fishing, after we've gotten our bait fish, we head out to the first fishing spot to try for Tarpon. Obviously we're going to be in the boat with this guy for a long time - eight hours the first day at least - so he strikes up various conversations. One of the first things he says once we are set up is "I don't really talk about politics", to which I respond "Yeah, me neither". Only I really don't. After 16 hours with Bob, I'm pretty sure he is not a democrat, or he just doesn't like Obama very much. Either way, he was and interesting dude.

More vacation photos

We arrived in the Keys after a drive from Miami. Someone suggested we take Hwy 1 down, which we did, through every stop light, stop sign, bad neighborhood, 30 mile an hour zone in Miami! Anyway, we did finally end up in Islamorada on Wednesday night, got our hotel (see last post), and went out for a relaxing dinner at the Islamorada Fish Company - I had stone crab - way expensive BTW! The next morning, early, we got up to meet our fishing guide Bob. He's been fishing in the keys for 25 or 30 years, with the last 20 or so as a guide. First thing we had to do was go catch bait - pilchers - so that we could catch bigger fish later. So about 7am we arrive at this bait catching spot. Bob gets out a net and tells Andy to drive the boat - I think Andy loved that part! - where he directed him to. Andy almost dumped Bob out a couple of times with the touchy throttle. That was pretty funny. So, anyway, we drive around and around with these pelicans diving after the pilchers all around us, which was pretty cool, and Bob stands on the front of the boat, when he sees a school of these bait fish he tells Andy to stop, throws the net, and then barks "back up, back up, back up" while he fishes in his net. It was pretty cool. Sometimes he'd bring in his net and have one little fish, other times his net would be full. These are two of my favorite pictures from the vacation. Andy driving, and Bob throwing.

First vacation Pictures

Sorry it's taken me so long. I lost my little jump drive thingy for taking pictures from my disk to the computer, so I had to buy a new one last night. Twenty bucks at the big buy!!

Anyway, here are some pictures of the resort we stayed at. The one view is from their pier back towards shore. The other is the view from our room out to the water. It was quite lovely. Their sand though isn't sand. It's little tiny bits of shell and coral that are ground up and look like sand, but are more sharp. It's a little uncomfortable to walk on actually.

You can see in the one picture a white bird sitting on an old pier pylon. Those birds came in every night at the same time and sat on the owners porch - she came out about 5pm or so every night and feed them. It was really funny. They'd see her coming with this big bowl and just go nuts. They weren't afraid of us at all.

More pictures coming in the next few days.

Maggie in a baby carrier

So there's this hilarious comic strip called "Get Fuzzy". It has an ornery Siamese cat named Bucky and a loving mutt named Satchel. These two comic strip characters are the spitting image, personality wise, of our two babies. Maggie is clearly the Bucky personality - ornery, bossy, and always in charge, but loving on the sly - and Scout is the Satchel personality - loving all the time, and kind of a dummy.

In the comic strip the owner carries Bucky around in a baby carrier because he can't be trusted in public. So when a co-worker showed me her baby carrier that was being returned to her yesterday I HAD to borrow it! Strangely Maggie seemed pretty content once we got her into it. I think she'd probably be pretty happy to be carried around most of the time. I mean the only down fall is the peeing, and the beating up of her sister.

Funny girl!

Maggie and Scout Birthday Party

So, yesterday was Scout's and Maggie's birthday. We had a little family birthday party with the girls after dinner - complete with birthday hats and cake!

Mom and Pop didn't have any cake because it's a special peanut butter and carrot puppy cake with lite cream cheese frosting. They loved it though.

Unfortunately I missed the photo of Maggie laying on the deck licking the boards where Scout's crumbs used to be! That would have been a great shot. Instead I have a picture of a satisfied little girl after filling her tummy with cake.

Of course, I have way more pictures on my camera that I can show people later...

Turkey's

We went up north on Sunday. Saw these beasts. I think I'll take aim at the big 'un if I can get a tag this year!

Happy Birthday Girls

This is the most recent picture I have of the girls. Andy set up a bunch of their toys in the doorway about a month ago. It's supposed to look like an invading army of toys. We figured since the girls were outside, when they came in they'd go berserk attacking the toys. They did not. The toys sat there for several days until one by one they were picked off and played with. Don't they kind of look like toys themselves?

Anyway, today is Scout's 7th birthday, and Maggie's 5th. My babies are growing up! Who would have guessed with Scout's early years of running away as much as possible that she'd make it to seven! We joke that we're living with bonus time since we weren't sure she'd make it to five! Maggie of course is soft, so she's still in her infancy really. She's never very far from her sister, her Pop, or even her Mom if no one else is available.

Tomorrow I'll have birthday party pictures! And if I remember baby pictures too!

Cool sunset

Thought this was a really cool sunset. When I was driving home late last week the sun was really pink and hid behind the clouds a bit. I tried to speed home and get it just like it was, but the it sets surprisingly fast right at the end of the day. Still pretty cool looking though.

Scout's Nose

Andy has a picture of a close up of a pigs nose that he got a long time ago. I think it's a really funny picture, and I thought it's be fun to do with Scout's nose.

I love this picture. Look at all the little freckles she has on her nose! So cute.

So a few years ago, Andy and I were up north grouse hunting. We were staying at Kerls place, so it was before the cabin was built. Anyway, we were nearing the end of the day of hunting and decided to go down one last path. No birds, but Scout did find a mean porcupine who gave her a good smack to the face. She ended up with quills in her nose, lips, tongue, and soft pallet of her mouth. We pulled some of the quills out, but had to take her to the vet because some were so deep. It was a Saturday night in Ladysmith WI, but we found someone at a gas station who knew the local vet, whom they called, who met us at his clinic. Poor Scout. They sedated her, and even with her passed out she just screamed when the vet was pulling the quills out of her jaw and soft pallet. One quill had to be cut out of the top of her mouth, because when he tried pulling it out he just pulled her across the table. Poor Scout. They reversed the sedation and she spent the next 20 minutes walking in circles in the vet office. Man was she stoned! That part was funny. Of course, this whole time poor Maggie is in the back of the truck freaking out because she can see and hear Scout for part of it, and then when we were at the vets she could hear Scout screaming. She was totally freaked out, and once we got back to Kerls she was very solicitous to her sister. The vet wasn't able to get all the quills out, so a few months later a quill poked out of the tip of her little brown nose. One of those little freckles is really a scar from the quill!

How Maggie feels about grooming?

I took Maggie to the PetCo groomers and on my way out picked up a "Spa Services" brochure. They offer lots of stuff! Everything form nail trimming and normal grooming to special shampoos and nail polish. I looked thru it, joked with Andy about getting Maggie smelling pretty with pretty toes, and then put the brochure away. Some time in the next few days it ended up on the ground. I came home from work to this. Apparently now we know how Maggie feels about the pretty nails...

By the way, there were no additional pieces of paper, they were simply gone. I guess she was hungry too.

Fishing for Maggie

Winter in Wisconsin. There's no fishing except thru holes in the ice, and Maggie and Scout get really restless. A couple years ago Andy started this winter game with the girls, and now Maggie is addicted. She will go to the closet where Andy keeps the fishing pole and stare at it intently, and then look longingly at her Pop.

So, the game is basically, a moose-ball (tennis ball with moose skin) is tied to a fishing pole. Andy will cast it out into the yard and the girls will chase it. He'll also spin it around in a circle, on the deck or in the livingroom, and they'll give chase. When we first started the game Scout would chase until she was dizzy! Too bad we didn't have video back then!!

X-Country Skiing

So we take Scout and Maggie cross country skiing in the winter months when the snow looks good and the girls are restless. We go to Buena Vista which is about 5 minutes from the house and a huge expanse of open area and roads that aren't maintained in the winter - perfect for skiing with our runners.

We had some really cold days and ice over the snow this year, so we had a limited number of good days to ski. Last weekend couple of weekends though the weather was really good, and the snow was OK. This picture is from a couple of weekends ago when it was still a little cold out - you can tell by the stud wearing snow pants in the picture.

Maggie loves it when the snow is not as deep - easier to run and catch her sister. Scout of course is nowhere to be seen in this picture. She's probably off looking for birds in one of the many fields near there.

Inaugural Post

Greetings family and friends. This is my personal blog, and will be my place to display pictures and fun stuff I want to share. We'll kick it off with one of my favorite pictures of the girls. This is the day in May 2004 when we brought our little Maggie home. Look how cute she is with her big sister. Who knew back then that she'd end up beating her sister up as often as possible?