Mood:  caffeinated

Seriously I think it froze over. It is FRIGGIN COLD!!!!! It was 24 degrees this morning when I got up. Luckily Lennie was kind enough to take Potter for his morning walk. He has finally come down with the crude I had weeks ago and I feel so bad for him. He looks miserable.

The weekend was nice except that for some reason my brain didn’t want to function. Orvis was co sponsoring an event with the Neuse River Golden Retriever Rescue where you could bring your dog in and get its picture taken in front of the Christmas tree and fireplace. For some reason I had it in my head that it was Saturday. So we got all dressed up and brushed out Potter and showed up at the store and there was no one there. Apparently the event was Sunday. So we loaded back up and dropped Potter by the house and then headed down the The Nog for the evening. Lennie was presenting at the Whiskey Tasting and I was to meet up with Maria and her family to hear the Belfast Boys. It was a great night but I was glad to get home and curl up in bed.

Sunday morning I woke up to a flat tire. Lennie took it in to get fixed but after looking at all the tires I really need to get them replaced. There goes $300 I don’t really have. The rest of the day Sunday was spent cleaning and doing laundry. Then at 4pm we all loaded back up in the car and headed over to Orvis. There was a big line of people waiting for pictures. Most of them had goldens that they rescued so it was fun talking to everyone and Potter enjoyed it because everyone had treats in their pockets and were happy to give him a few. The pictures were $40 for 2 poses. One of just the dog and then one of you and the dog. I did get a little annoyed with the photographer at one point. She has just given birth to a beautiful little boy. I seriously mean JUST gave birth as in the baby is only a couple of weeks old. She is breastfeeding which is great but the baby started to cry to be fed while she was taking pictures. Instead of having an assistant take over she rushed us through the pictures so she could go off to feed. They sat Potter up on this bed which isn’t the pose I wanted. They all start calling his name and squeaking toys to get his attention so he jumps down off the bed to get to the toys. So we have to keep picking him up and putting him back on the bed. I could tell that they were getting annoyed so I said if you just hold up your hand where you want him to look and say “focus” you won’t have an issue. Once they got a couple of shots of Potter they started to bring in the next dog. I spoke up and said we were to have one of us as well. So they sat us on the bed and Potter on the floor in front of us but he kept walking over to the other dogs. She took a picture and then tried to dismiss us and I spoke up again and said I wanted a better shot with Potter closer to us. She sighed and looked at her husband and the crying baby. I felt bad that she wanted to go feed but at the same time I am spending $40 bucks and deserve to get the same attention as everyone else and have a decent picture. I just know they are going to turn out crappy. We ended up winning one of the raffle prizes which made the evening a little better. It was a large basket of dog toys and treats which Potter drove right into pulling out the big rubber ball.

There was one funny moment in the evening when this yuppie couple walked into the store. They were dogless so wasn’t aware why there was a multitude of dogs running around the store. The woman came up to me and asked what was going on. I told her about the NRGRR and Orvis having a professional photographer here to take pictures of your pets. She went back over to her husband and explained it to him and then said, “Have you noticed something? The dogs are all beige. I have never seen so many beige dogs. I saw one black dog around the corner but the rest of them are beige. You think they could find dogs with other colors.” LOL Hello! Golden Retriever Rescue!!!!

I spent last evening out with Maria. We met up with her friend Michelle at a tapas place called Oliver Twist. Michelle has crush on this musician named Matt who was playing last night. It was an odd evening to say the least. Not sure if Matt is all that into Michelle or if he is just too shy to show her he likes her. I was just brought along so that Maria had someone to talk to. Which I don’t mind because Lennie had class last night so it got me out of the house and I always enjoy hanging out with Maria. She makes me laugh. J

Lennie got tickets for us and Maria and Todd to see the Trans Siberian Orchestra this weekend and I am so excited. I have the parade in the morning which is going to be COLD but I can’t wait to see the show. I have been dying to see them and every year I try to buy tickets but they are always sold out.

I don’t know how much posting I will be doing this week. I have a ton of stuff on my desk and I still have to get things ready for the parade so I hope everyone has a nice week and if you are in Raleigh head down to the parade and get your Frisbee from me. J