Noki

Noki is Parker's mom's dog. He is a miniature schnauzer like Ando but i think he suffers from giant ism. He is large for a miniature anything. Ando currently weighs in about 10 pounds and Noki i believe is about 23 pounds. Anyways, Parker and his mom went to visit and spend Christmas with Parker's sister who lives in New York City. They left on 12/17 and i think coming back 1/2. It's a long time to have your dog in a boarding kennel so Mike volunteered us to dog sit. Which is fine. I'm happy to help but somehow I'M doing most of the work. Well after trying to get everything ready for Christmas and overall holiday stress i broke down. So now Mike is helping a little more. Its hard having 2 dogs, especially when the one that's not yours is suffering from social anxiety and freaks out when anyone comes in or out of the house. He barks and growls at everything! And right on cue Ando starts barking because Noki is. Its madness i tell you!
Noki is also sort of a wuss. He wont stand up to Ando. Ando is a big dog in a mini body i think. He is mean! One day we thought instead of constantly yelling at them to play nice or separate them , we'd just let them work it out on their own. BAD IDEA! Noki's ear and back were bleeding! So now we keep close watch over them or Noki stays with Mike and Ando with me. It makes it loads easier (and safer) that way! I don't want to see Noki go but it is easier with just your own dog!


Noki



Ando & Noki

Goodbye to The Cone

When Ando got his "snip-snip" the vet said that he would have to not lick down there for 2 weeks, and he desperately was trying to lick himself so we had to buy a cone. So 2 weeks came and went but he still had a scab and i wasn't sure if that was ok or not. So i called the vet and the tech said to keep the cone on another week but i could also put some hydrogen peroxide on it to help it heal and dry it out, so twice a day i soaked a cotton ball with a 50% solution of hydrogen peroxide solution and applied it gently to the area in question. The tech said that she would make me an appointment for Dec 24 in case it wasn't healed by then so we could have Dr. Good look at it. Well Dr Good said that it was just a stitch and he probably would've been ok without the cone after post-op day 7. But he simply cut it off and that was it. I was so mad! I have been dealing with cone dog scratching loudly at the cone, scooping snow into while running, and running into everything (including my legs) for over a week when i really didn't need to! So i showed him what I'd been dealing with: bruises on my calves from this cone ramming my leg several times a day for the past couple weeks!

So needless to say, we are terribly happy to say goodbye to the cone. And for your entertainment purposes, here are pics of my beaten up legs!

My right leg definitely got the worst of with the 2 lines of bruising it but there are smaller bruises on the left as well


this is a closer pic of the right leg, they're almost healed so they aren't very dark anymore but definitely still visible and tender!

The People Downstairs

Mike bought a house in February 2008 and we have lived here ever since. It is a 5 bedroom 3 bath so he decided that it would help financially if we found some room mates. Parker is a friend of ours who use to live with Mike so he was a given. He is a perfect room mate. He's not home a lot, but when he is he cleans up after himself and is cool to hang out with.
Now before i go any further, for those of you who don't know me very well, i am a clean freak. With that said, we also had Jeremy move in. Mike knew him from high school. He is the biggest source of stress in my life. He is by far the messiest person I've ever met. It has been a constant battle for the past year and it is what Mike and I fight most about. Steve is also someone Mike knew from high school and he moved in over the summer sometime, but in his contract it says that if he's messy, he has to move out. They have just month-to-month leases so they can leave whenever. It's gotten bad enough that we have separate freezers because they buy loads of bulk items that never get eaten. I have split the fridge down the middle, tired of up to 8 salsa containers and several pasta sauce jars. They never clean up their spills in the fridge or anywhere. I have to mop almost weekly. At one point Mike took away the garbage can in the kitchen because it always sticks and never gets emptied. They've never cleaned their bathroom. Dishes stay on the counter sometimes for up to a week. They never wipe the counter when they are finished. Once i came home to chunks of cottage cheese on the counter tops. I've resorted to leaving notes, like your mom use to do when you were 7: ("please clean this, please don't leave this out" etc.) because the last time i confronted Jeremy in person he made me cry. And instead of just picking up their shit they turn it around on me. For example, i wrote a note that "the counter tops still weren't getting cleaned. please clean up after yourselves" because the counter tops had chips and salsa mess all over them. The next morning i awoke to the note stuck to a diet coke can that Mike had left out not more than 12 hours earlier. So he took care of the can and i stuck the note to the dishes that had been sitting by the sink for the past 5 days. This morning when i woke up, the dishes were done but they stuck the note to the towels i had drying over the rail from drying the dogs and wiping up all the water that everyone (themselves included) get in the house with wet shoes and had absolutely nothing to do with the counter tops.. It is completely irritating. As if to say that they only leave things out because upon a rare occasion we do too. It makes me so mad that its driven me to hatred. I don't honestly hate anyone, but i am hating them. So much that EVERYTHING they do just pisses me off!
This was maybe for my benefit than that of the readers, but i feel better letting you all know. Mike just gets mad when i complain so this is my new outlet. You may want to not read them in the future, but it really helps to let it all out!

Christmas Craziness!

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday. I usually complain because I'm not a huge fan but it is nice to get to see the relative i don't get to see normally, and to spend more time with the ones i SHOULD see more! I'll tell you all about my Christmas Craziness..

CHRISTMAS EVE
Christmas eve dinner is a tradition, for as long as i can remember, where we go to my Aunt Kathy's house (my dad's sister). She lives in the far away town of Riverton, so i should see her more often but i know at least for Christmas Eve i will be seeing her! My Uncle Mike, Aunt Kerrie, and cousin Josh came from Ephraim, they are the ones i really only get to see once a year. My cousin Mitchell and his wife Kelly were there and my immediate family, (Dad, Cyn, Angela, Cody & Amiee, Tori) who also brought Vivian who is from Brazil and lives with them currently. Aunt Kathy always has fun little games for us to play, she really goes all out! I can honestly say that its what i most look forward to at Christmas time!
Here are some pics:


My niece and me


Mike, Me & Tori (i think the scarf is creating an optical illusion, i swear my neck isn't super long!)


CHRISTMAS DAY
Christmas morning Mike went to work a 6 hour shift for KBUL93 (6am-noon). So i was woken up at about 530am by dogs jumping on my bed! But i did get a few more hours sleep after that.
930am
Breakfast and opening presents with my mom, Todd, Cody, Amiee, Uncle Rob, Cousin Shane, Jaime, Pete, & Brooke.
100pm
Over to Grandma Pat's house (Todd's mom) they were already done with breakfast and gifts but we hung out with them for a little bit. Then i ran home to pick up Mike and Ando for the next stop.
230pm
Off to my Dad's. He lives on 6400west in west jordan and he had about 4-6 inches of snow in his neighborhood, which i guess NEVER gets plowed. This was interesting trying to get my little car there, but we did make it! We had a lunch here (turkey, ham, mashed tatos, etc). My step mom, Cynthia, makes the best pecan pie, and bless her heart, she made 2! I ate more than one person should eat! Then we opened presents and hung out a bit and visited. Then we ran home to drop off Ando to head to the last Christmas stop.
600pm
Mike's parents had a prime rib dinner waiting for us. (I was stuffed already when we got there) But we ate and opened presents then Mike's dad made us Creme Brulee. It was SO yummy. I was to the point of pain since i had consumed so much food that day! It was fun to get to spend time with Mike's brother, Braden, and his new wife, Meg, we played some games and hung out.
I think it was about 1100 before we made it home in all the snow.

It was an exhausting day, but a good Christmas. I am use to the several families in one day, my parents have been divorced for about 16 years now, so I've learned to split and share holidays for most of my life, I think Mike was a little overwhelmed though! But now that it's over, I'm glad it's over! Time to get ready for the new year, and bowl games! :) Go UTES!

Surgery for Ando

Yesterday Ando got neutered, had 2 baby teeth pulled, and had a microchip placed. I was planning on neutering him since we got him because I didn't have any intention to breed him. Recently i was thinking of putting it off but his adult teeth were growing in and his baby teeth weren't coming out on their own, the vet warned me that this could be the case and suggested that we wait to neuter him until 5-6 months old and if they were a problem, we would just pull them while he was under anesthesia for the neutering. So we did it. Now I am completely regretting it! I feel like it was an unnecessary surgery (except for the teeth). He has to wear this ridiculous cone. He cant run for 2 weeks so i have to leash him all the time, which is particularly fun in the middle of the night when i try to get bundled up to keep warm and have Ando pull me through the dark in my poo-filled back yard! It's seriously a landmine. Don't worry, i bought a pooper scooper today so i can try to keep as few piles as possible out there. But it is seriously going to be a long 2 weeks! And at the end of that 2 weeks i am dog sitting another dog for 2 and a half weeks. As if Christmas season wasn't crazy enough on its own!

I have a Christmas Tree!

Mike let me decorate for Halloween and put some fallish things in the house but he was hell bent on no Christmas decorations. He HATES Christmas! I'm not a huge fan myself but I LOVE decorating! So Mike's parents showed up to our house Saturday to take us to a jazz game and his mom hauls in a Christmas tree for me! Mike agreed that i could have one as long as it was shorter than the lamps in our living room (like 2 feet) but his mom thought it just had to be shorter than the lamp and table together so she got one that was 4 feet tall. And because it's from his parents, he can't say no! The best part about it is that its pre-lit! I seriously took it out of the box and it was done! Hooray for Christmas decorations! (in moderation anyway)

This Morning

Last week i woke up by 5:30am each morning and ran 2 miles on the treadmill trying to make it a habit. We are going to Cancun in January and wanted to look less chubby in my bikini ya know? Well this week I've not done any getting up early or working out. This morning i woke up really late, well actually Mike had to wake me up. Then I made him wait to shower so I could and this had a domino effect on our morning. I missed the turn to the shortcut to the trax station so he jumped out on the corner and ran the rest of the way to avoid missing the train, then i hit a construction cone. Yeah, I'm one of the retards that can't figure out which side of the cones I'm suppose to be on. State street and 7800 South is currently the worst intersection ever, I have to deal with it at least twice a day and i wish they'd hurry the construction along! It's awful. The worst part about oversleeping is the rushing around that you have to do after that ruins the morning! I was dreaming about UTI's and sinking ships and was surrounded by people who i knew but don't know in real life. It was pretty crazy.
Well that was my day. But I got a really nice thank you letter in the mail today from a patient so it helped my mood! Work usually lightens my mood. Its filled with people who need me, it gives me purpose, so i feel like I'm helping people and its a good feeling!