F-in Christmas Trees

WTF. That's all I have to say.

Tuesday I was off work because I was feeling massively under the weather. Of course, with me being home, Sophie, is on high alert. Any noises from the outside are met with immediate barking, growling, and racing to the door.

I'm used to her crazy behaviour, so when she acted like a maniac at the front door, I thought nothing of it. Oh noes. I should have gotten out of bed and went to inspect. Some asshole dropped their Christmas tree in our yard. WTF? Dude. Seriously, I have enough yard waste as it is, I don't need anymore crap.

So whatev, right? Ryan put it out for the trash today. All gone.

Or not?

Our REAL FRIEND, who shall remain nameless, after some bantering with my husband, puts our address up to everyone letting them know we are accepting Christmas trees. WTF. I didn't take a picture of the first tree because frankly, I didn't think I'D HAVE MORE FUCKIN CHRISTMAS TREES IN MY YARD. But I was mistaken. Here is a couple pics of what I came home to tonight. rawr.

Needless to say when I pulled up to my house I noticed the trees immediately. And immediately there was screaming and swearing. A lot. Then there was more swearing, and well let's be honest, more swearing.

Sophie really liked the tree.

I do not want anymore trees. I didn't even have one up for the holidays. That's how lazy I am. No more trees. For fucks sake!

People Die

So...just from the title of this post, I'm sure to come off as kind of an asshole. But if you have read my blog before, then you know I am kind of an asshole.

People die. Yup, I totally said it. Edward from the Twilight movies is not going to come save us and turn us into sparkly awesome looking creatures. It's a fact of life. I hope we all get really, really, old before we die.

I'm not very family oriented (thanks mom and dad), so the whole visiting people in the hospital makes me uncomfortable. I didn't really talk to you while you were alive, now all of a sudden I'm going to show up and we're going to reminisce about shit that doesn't matter.

When I am looking down the tunnel of darkness or the tunnel of light in a hospital bed, depending on who you ask, please don't come and visit me. I look like shit in some tiny bed while an artificial light makes my skin washed out. You don't need to say your last goodbyes to me. If we were friends you would have already spent a whole bunch of awesome time with me.

You know what I do when I visit people in the hospital? I stand and stare at them or I sit and stare at them. Kind of boring right? I can already hear the peanut gallery moaning in disbelief at my words. I'm sorry that I feel this way, but hospitals aren't exactly a time for catching up. Don't you think the person in the hospital is thinking, "Shit, I'm a goner, all these people that I haven't seen in forever keep coming to say hello."

Right now both of my grandparents are in the hospital. My grandfather has been dying since my father met my mother (like 35 years ago). At least that's what my dad jokes about when we talk about my grandfather's health. We call him Pappy. Pappy has had several heart attacks, ball cancer, butt cancer, leukemia; the man just will not quit. But at some point there is going to be an end.

I visited him recently while he was at the "Old Folks Home" recuperating from his last venture to the hospital. There I stood around and stared at him, occasionally arguing with one of his nephews about why I don't want to have children. Side note- People really get offended when I tell them I don't want kids. Apparently, people just expect that when you become an adult, have kids that suck all your money up until you're ready to retire. I give them real reasons like, my life is awesome already, or I like to go on  rad vacations with my husband, or I don't like kids. They don't like that and feel the need to argue with me. I've been told I'm missing out on one of the greatest joys ever. Guess, what? I'll pass.

Back to the story where everyone dies....

Pappy has been in this "Old Folks Home" for a couple weeks now. His oxygen levels have really sucked and generally my grandmother cannot take care of him. His oxygen levels have dropped so much that he is now in the hospital. He has been there since Monday. When did I find this out? This morning. Yeah, my family has really bad reporting skills when it comes matters of life and death. I remember when my great grandmother died they didn't tell me until Monday. She died on a Friday. Their excuse, they didn't want to ruin my weekend. O M G.

Another thing about getting information from my family is no one really knows the full story. I get bits and pieces of probably incorrect information. And my family always assumes it's the hospital or rehab place that's killing them. It couldn't possibly be that THEY ARE FUCKIN OLD AND THEIR SHIT IS FUCKED UP. When I went to visit my grandfather my aunt Lisa was convinced that this rehab place was awesome. Now that my grandfather is doing poorly, the rehab place must have caused it. I say to her, well if that's the case maybe you should sue them.

I'm pretty they won't have a cure for death when it's my time to go. When I die I don't want people moping and crying about. In fact, I'd like to take a page from the African American folks. It seems, at least on tv and in movies, that they have a celebration of life after a person passes. It's not this dreary depressing sad service. In my mind it should be a large party talking about the good times we had together. In fact, I don't even want a funeral. All a funeral does is line the pockets of other people. Just cremate the shit out of me and toss me in a vineyard, or off a cliff, or in the trash can. I'm dead, I don't give a shit. I want to have a party at a winery where everyone will eat and get drunk. And please, if you didn't like me in life, don't show up to my "Death Party". You're not fuckin invited. Don't get all high and mighty now that I'm gone and talk about the good times. If you didn't like me, there were no good times.

Ok, back to the whole we dying thing. As I was talking to my aunt and she was filling me in on the events around my grandfather, she then mentions that my grandmother is also in the hospital. What!?! They found out she has blood cancer and they want to send her to a hospice. In my mind, hospice is the last stop. You don't go to hospice to get better. So, now I gotta visit both grandparents in the hospital. Funny thing is at least I don't have to make any special trips to see them. Maybe I'll have hit another button of the elevator.

My aunt of course is vehemently opposed to my grandmother going into hospice. I don't have all the details, because I always get the information from a third party. Someone is always telling someone else to tell me. My aunt believes that my grandmother is functional and can get outpatient treatment. I'm not sure how serious the cancer is, but my family's odd religion prohibits them from accepting blood transfusions. Even to save their life. I don't know about the rest of them, but I like life, and if I need a blood transfusion, damn it, I'm taking it.

I guess I'll end this semi depressing blog by saying this, some say life's a bitch and then you die. But guess what? You choose how awesome your life is going to be. I choose awesomeness. And when I go out in a moderate blaze of glory, do not feel sorry for me. You can't special order awesome.

Bad Manners

The Dude is learning very quickly how to be a member of the Boner household. He's learning about getting up at 5:55 a.m., a clear five minutes before the alarm goes off, cuz he's hungry. He can chase the ball for you, but not nessessarily bring it back. The Dude's got his "I love you eyes, please, please, please, pet me" look down to a science.

While getting ready in the morning before work he will follow me around. I occasionally almost sprain an ankle to miss smashing him with my feet. Sophie and Jada on the other hand, once food time is o-v-e-r , they just lay around. If I accidentally let the door open while getting ready, they'll hop into bed. They pray to the Bed Gods that they will be allowed to lay in bed for eternity.

This morning something changed. My Dude was no longer looking at me with his little cute/sad face, he was in bed with the other dogs.

I am definitely taken a back. First off, please note that the sheets on the bed are almost/mostly pulled off the corners. Ryan and I both flail in our sleep. We both toss and turn all night long. My side of the fitted sheets is coming up before I'm asleep.

Oh, I see everyone is settled in. Awesome.

How exhausted can one dog be? Very exhausted I guess.

The Dude didn't even care when I walked out of the room. He has been totally brainwashed by the other two dogs. He is definitely a full fledged member of the Boner Taj Mahal for dogs.

If you value your life, please stop talking to me.

I am a morning person. Well, maybe not exactly. I can get up, get ready for work, and show up on time. Just don’t fuckin talk to me until 9 a.m. or so. I am very angry in the morning. It could because I haven't won the lottery yet. Please don’t have a conversation with me. I’m not ready to have anything nice to say.

After 9 or so, I'm great. Coffee has been consumed and caffeine is racing through my veins. And for the record, the only person that knows how much of an asshole I am is Ryan. I somehow manage to hide it from the rest of the world.

Ryan will sometimes ask me how I sleep. All I can say is RAWR!!! RAWR!! RAWR!!

We both agree there can be no conversation of substance, because one of us will leave the house pissy because of me.

I come to work early to get shit done without having to talk to anyone or have any interruptions. I need like a half hour of uninterrupted quiet to catch up on stuff.

If you look at the clock that I so awesomely drew, you can see it's 7 a.m. That's right, sometimes I'm come into work that early. I have shit to do. And with the amount of days I take off, coming in a little early doesn't bother me.

Instead people think I come in early to chat. NO!!!! It makes me so mad, I just want to scream. But I don’t. I have a huge smile on my face as I nod to whatever you say.

Sometimes, I even put head phones on or I will turn my back to my coworkers in hopes they see that I'm busy. That doesn't thwart them from talking. I usually think to myself, maybe if I fart silently they'll leave.

Super Saturday Part II-Modern Liars & Johnny Joes

FYI, YEAH I KNOW THIS IS LIKE A WEEK LATE. WHATEVER BUDDY.

Since this past Saturday was rather busy for us, I chose to break the blog out in two parts. The first one, dealt with the Farmer's Market and touring wineries. This one will talk about how awesome our friends' band is, The Modern Liars. They played at our favorite bar Johnny Joes.

What you are seeing is correct. I wore feather earrings. I had a lot of reservations about this. I originally bought them for the 70s party that I went to the week before. I determined that they were more 80s than 70s. I tried to gage Ryan's opinion on what he thought of the earrings. I got no response. I assumed the earrings were a score. I got further confirmation about the awesomeness of the earrings by a nearby patron; she told me how much they rocked. Holla for the purple feather earrings. Plus, they went great with my ruffled shirt.

Modern Liars band members Brian Asper on guitar, Toddy P. also on guitar.

They perform an oldie from The Everly Brother, Dream. Todd also gives a nice shout out at the end.

Always water with my beverage. This is so I do not become "That Girl."

Ryan finishing my drink because I wasn't go fast enough!

Our friend Craig beside Ryan found this amusing.

Now he's trying to shove a vodka tonic to make up for him stealing my beer.

No thank you.

Our friend Joe bought us all jaegar bombs before sneaking out with his cute girlfriend.

Our good old friend Jeremy has arrived!

Toddy P., Jeremy, Ryan

Ryan doing Tebowing

Another empty drink

This is what we have left after paying the bill. LOL

Yes, I am one of those people....

Yeah, I bought dog stairs to the bed. You got a problem with that? I don't know if it means I'm more crazy than before, or if it means that I'm just to lazy to lift a small dog into a big bed. I didn't just buy any dog stairs, I bought the kind that requires a drill to put it together. You are welcome Ryan.

Step 1: Get angry, make me assist.

Step 2: Make me hold it all together, do not move.

Step 3: Reread directions because something doesn't seem right. (Insert swear words and sighs.)

Step 4: Drill the shit out of it!

Step 5: Try to teach The Dude how to walk up the stairs. This a definite work in progress. He is def not comfortable with the steps.

Poo Foot-NSFW

I have a Mon-Fri routine. It's worked for me very well over the last ten years or so. So, when things go haywire I tend to act like a crazy person. Monday morning should never be a bad morning. It sets the tone for the day, maybe even the week. But alas, something did go wrong, very wrong.

I stepped in a pile of shit.

That's right a pile of shit. How would I be stepping in a pile of shit you might ask? Well, I tell you how and who I blame in the Shitgate 2011 fiasco.

The Dude as cute as that little bastard might be, has not quite a bathroom issue, but more of he's so excited to come back in the house that he might forget to poop outside issue. We've only encountered this once before, he came potty trained. It was when we had the snow for Halloween. We didn't throw him into the snow we just let him tinkle and come back in. Later, bam! poop on floor. Not his fault. Ryan was the one who let him out that time. (There will be a pattern emerging.)

After that initial accident, we both decided that we have to be more diligent to make sure Dude goes number 2. I can tell you from personal experience, there have been no oopsies on my part.

Ryan has night duty with the dogs, feeding and letting them out the last time before bed. Sunday night Ryan did not let Dude out as long as he should have. And that is how I ended up stepping in a pile of shit right by the door in the dark of the morning.

Below is my version of the events.

There it is. The pile of shit.

I let the dogs out in the dark. Meaning I don't turn the lights on because I am mostly nude. And if for some odd reason my neighbors would be looking right out their back door, I don't want them to see my boobs hanging down to my waist. I opened the door, the dogs went out and then I tried to move back to continue my morning routine. That was when I found the horror on my left foot. I screamed loud, like a blood curdled scream. I can't even repeat this noise that came from my mouth because I would have to step in another pile of shit to recreate it.

Ryan on the other hand, instead of coming to my rescue, just asks me what's a matter from the other end of my house.

I am still making these unearthly noises, telling him to get his ass out here. This was a sticky kind of shit. And it was cold too. It was so gross. It was now stuck between my toes. OMG, so gross.

I had to attempt to hobble/hop/jump to the bathroom. I couldn't even wipe it off, I just got in the shower spraying piping hot water from the detachable shower head.

Needless to say my morning went to shit literally. What is the lesson everyone? Watch the fuckin dog take a shit outside! For the love of God! Out-fuckin-side. Thank you.

Two dogs in a little bed

I've been working on two other posts the last couple days. However, my scanner is not working with my laptop. Therefore, you do not get to read about Shitgate 2011. Hopefully, I'll be able to complete that one by the end of the week. Instead you get two dogs in a little bed.

Enjoy.

The Dude and Jada managed to squeeeeze into the little bed. Then they moved over to the large bad to snuggle down. Sophie, being the biotch that she is, kept trying to ruin my pictures until I took one of her. Can we say jealous?

Super Saturday Part 1- Farmer's Market & Wine Tour

Since my weekend was totally awesome, I am going to break it down into two parts. Friday night Ryan and I went out to Snapper's in Mechanicsburg, PA to hang out with his parents. It was great. I did take some photos, however, my camera phone was acting like a jerk and didn't save the pictures. (Boo)

Saturday morning, after a sneaky hangover, we headed over to the West Shore Farmer's Market in Lemoyne, PA. It's always a great time walking up and down the isle, eating random goodies. Our first stop of course was the ATM. We forgot to pick up cash. We headed upstairs to get some cash, Ryan was accosted by some lady trying to get us to buy her book of poems. Umm...no thank you. She actually shoved the book in Ryan's hand. Luckily, Ryan was swift with his response, "We don't read, sorry." We quickly retreated downstairs to find another ATM. We don't read? That was the best response he could muster? Yikes. We laughed about it. Hi, I'm Ryan, we don't read.

We found some cash and headed right over to our favorite place, Casero Pizza. I did a little write up about them a couple weeks ago. This is where we first learned about the awesomeness of their pizza.

Ryan got a delicious pepperoni roll and a slice. I got a pepperoni slice of Sicilian pizza. It was really tasty. I couldn't even finish my slice. Ryan helped me out of course.

Next up we hit the bread stand. Mussoline's has the softest fresh rolls. Great for sandwich making. We got four wheat seeded rolls.

You can't have a soft delicious roll with out something to eat in the middle of it. We stopped by S. Clyde Weaver's Specialty Meat and Cheese stand. This place is always busy. So busy, they have multiple people helping out to make sure you get your order fast. We ended up getting a pound of thick sliced bacon, a pound of rare London broil, and three quarter of a pound of Colby cheese.

Our final stop at the Farmer's Market was for pretzels. Yummy, yummy pretzels by Zook's. I felt kind of odd taking a picture of this one. The stand is run by Mennonites, or some time of Amish people, and I know they are funny about getting their picture taken.

We ended up getting these little mini wiener pretzel rolls. I had never had these treats before. They were ultra yummy. Who knew you could wrap a mini hot dog in a pretzel and it would rock? We got home and dipped them in spicy mustard. Nom Nom bitches.

Next up, we headed to two different wineries. The Mason Dixon Wine Trail has tickets for $15.00 per person; you get to visit 14 different wineries over a two weekend period. The majority of wineries are out by our way.

Now, originally we were going to go with a bunch of people. I'm really bad at gathering people up. We had some couples to go with, but they all couldn't make it. With my mini-hangover in the morning, I wasn't sure I was even going to bother going.  After chowing down at the Farmer's Market we felt good enough to go to try some new wines.

First winery up was Moon Dancer Vineyards and Winery. This was in Wrightsville, PA. It took us a little over a half hour to get there. In fact, when we pulled up to the place I actually thought we were walking into someone's house. It did not look like a business; just an awesome house overlooking the Susquehanna River.

Me

Ryan

So, the place looks really nice, and the view is really nice, but the worker's there were kind of shitty. This is the part of my blog that I hate writing. I love telling the masses about a great place, but always feel like a dick telling peeps when I didn't have a good experience. I don't want to totally trash a place, but if I didn't have good service, I think I should tell the truth about that as well. We start trying a couple wines and it seemed like the pourers had better things to do. Like standing around? Every time we asked for a different sample I felt like I was inconveniencing them. Sorry I showed up and you have to work. If you don't enjoy your job, that's cool, but can you just pretend that you want to take my money? Pretty pretty please with a freakin cherry on top. Thanks.

I believe we tried a couple of their wines. They were mostly dry to semi-dry wines. Ryan and I are not really big fans of the dry wines. My unsophisticated palette hasn't gotten their yet. Plus, the wines at Moon Dancer were kind of expensive. I truly believe you do NOT need to spend more than $15.00 for a good bottle of wine. Most of the prices here were over $20.00. We didn't even ask that many questions because the woman "helping" us looked like she ate a pile of shit. We did try a blueberry wine that is good to mix with whipped cream vodka. We bought two bottles, one a Riesling and the blueberry stuff.

They were giving tours of the cellars, but we were so over it, we just wanted to get out of there.

Next up was Allegro Vineyards. This winery is in Brogue, PA. It is about twenty minutes from Moon Dancer. It was a very scenic and beautiful drive. However, I realized while driving that I was low on gas. Shit! Why did I not notice this before? The rest of the drive over to Allegro was extremely stressful because I was so worried that we were going to run out of gas in the middle of no-man's land. We made it there thank goodness and Ryan found a gas station close by through the GPS thing.

When we arrived at Allegro the building was very unassuming. It just looked like a regular building, nothing fancy. But what the building lacked on the outside it made up for with it's excellent service on the inside. We walked in and there was several tables of snacks. Yes, I will help myself to your delicious goodies, thanks! After a bunch of people showed up, one of the staff took us to another room, the storage room, to give us a presentation about their winery. I didn't get the man's name, but he gave a great presentation. He told us about a couple different wines and about how PA's ever changing seasons give the wines a different taste each year. We tried two different wines during the presentation, Rose Nouveau and 2010 Chambourcin. They were both too dry for our liking, but it did pair well with the sample turkey stuffing morsel they gave us.

Next we were free to try more samples in the next room over. This room had a chocolate fountain! Holla! They had two stations where there were sweet wines and dry wines. The gentleman pouring the sweet wines was extremely knowledgeable and talked to us about the flavors of the wines we tried. We tried the Susquehanna-White a semi-dry wine. It was good. But we really liked the Vidal Blanc ($12), it tastes like a German Riesling and the Fusion ($12). We ended up buying two bottles of the Vidal. The pourer told us he has a stand over at the Giant store in Enola and if we like he can give us a dollar off of the Fusion on Sundays. Umm...yes thank you! We really liked the Fusion it's more of a spicier wine, but a dollar off is a dollar off.

After we were done with trying the sweeter wines we moved over to the dry wine table. And older gentleman helped us try the 2009 Merlot ($17) and the 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon ($19). Like I said before, we aren't really into dry wines. But what better way to learn about dry wines than to go to a wine tasting! The Merlot again was a bit too dry for our liking, but we did buy the Cabernet. It is supposed to go well with steak and pasta. We ended up chatting with the two pourers for about twenty minutes about different kinds of and why they like working at Allegro. We learned that chilling wine is not something that they recommend. Huh!?! The woman pourer told us that chilling a wine typical hides the taste of the wine and they usually do that to hide a bad wine. Did not know that. Both pourers told us they drink wine at room temperature or slightly cooler. This goes for white and red wines.

This place was freaking awesome. I totally recommend it for anyone that wants to get good information and great tasting wine that isn't going to kill your wallet. Ryan and I were both so impressed by the attitudes of the people that worked there. They love wine and it shows. I would go back to this place again in a heartbeat. They also have a stand at the West Shore Farmer's Market if you don't want to take the trip down to Brogue.