Showing posts sorted by relevance for query poop dog. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query poop dog. Sort by date Show all posts
A Plea to Cronus: Obliterate Daylight Saving Time
Monday morning, I had to use the light from my cell phone -- which prominently displays the time -- to locate my dog's poop so that I could pick it up . . . and, of course, two mornings previous, at the same time, I was able to accurately locate my dog's poop without the aforementioned device . . . Cronus, Greek Titan of Heaven, strike down the mortals who have profaned your domain!
Snow: Good For Shit
If you step in dog poop in the yard (while looking for dog poop in the yard) then old slushy snow piles are a great way to clean your shoes (preferably your neighbor's old slushy snow pile).
Snow: Good For Shit
If you step in dog poop in the yard (while looking for dog poop in the yard) then old slushy snow piles are a great way to clean your shoes (preferably your neighbor's old slushy snow pile).
Running Cost-Benefit Poop Analysis
The more intricate the treads are on your fancy running shoes, the more difficult it is to remove the dog poop.
Dave is in the Shit
The last thing of note that happened to me was this:
Saturday morning, when I was bending over to scoop and bag my dog's poop, a bird shit on my head. Bird crap splattered all over my headphones and my hat.
I was dealing with shit from above and below.
This week, instead of getting shit on, I'm going to get some shit done. My van needs fixin', the dog needs to go to the vet, I need to get an antibody test, and I'd like to close an account at the Credit Union.
I'll tally up my getting-shit-done-rate at the end of the week.
Saturday morning, when I was bending over to scoop and bag my dog's poop, a bird shit on my head. Bird crap splattered all over my headphones and my hat.
I was dealing with shit from above and below.
This week, instead of getting shit on, I'm going to get some shit done. My van needs fixin', the dog needs to go to the vet, I need to get an antibody test, and I'd like to close an account at the Credit Union.
I'll tally up my getting-shit-done-rate at the end of the week.
Delayed Reaction Dave in a Delayed Reaction Olfactory Daze
At work, my colleagues sometimes refer to me as "Delayed Reaction Dave" because I don't process things quickly and I rarely see the future ramifications of new logistical, curricular, or contractual changes . . . so while everyone in the department is getting all worked up, because they CAN see the problems in the foreseeable future, I'll be like: "What's the big deal?" . . . but they know I'm going to get all pissed off later on, when the change actually takes effect-- for example, the new 82 minute periods . . . they are abominable and WAY too long, but several years ago when we discussed the hypothetical new schedule I was like, "that sounds fine, whatever . . ." and the same with teaching six periods and four preps-- it sounded fine in theory, last year when I agreed to do it, but now that I'm doing it, I'm complaining a lot and like "never again"-- so it seems I'm the same way with COVID . . . it took me way too long to actually contract it, and now that I've recovered, I've lost my sense of smell . . . and this seems utterly insane-- I've lost twenty percent of my senses-- but of course lots of people have experienced this throughout the pandemic but I just never really thought about it-- but when I walked outside yesterday morning with the dog, it felt like I was in a dream, not fully awake or even fully human-- I couldn't smell the grass or the flowers in my wife's garden or the damp morning air or the ragweed pollen . . . and here are some of the other things I smelled yesterday that produced no noticeable scent:
my coffee, Lola's poop, a bottle of red wine vinegar, a bottle of apple cider vinegar, an orange, grapes-- and they tasted like crisp balls of water-- hand sanitizer, and my tennis shoes . . .
so this is very fucking weird and now I can now empathize with all the people that told me about this during the course of the pandemic-- suddenly having no sense of smell really does dislodge you from reality.
I Am Mean (But Not Golden)
My friend Stacy and I each both teach Philosophy this year, and we were talking about Aristotle's Golden Mean . . . Aristotle says for every virtue there is a deficiency and an excess (so for the virtue of courage, the deficiency would be fear and the excess would be recklessness) and he says that it is admirable, but very difficult, to find the "golden mean" of each virtue -- the exact right amount of each thing you should be; we challenge our students to choose a virtue and apply this philosophy, and we usually do one ourselves: I decided that I needed to work on the virtue of "patience" -- and I definitely have a deficiency of patience . . . I lack patience when I drive, when I walk the dog and he won't poop, when I walk through the hallways at school, when I am eating, when I go to live music shows, when I go out to dinner, at the theater, when I am ready to leave a party, when I am tying my kids' shoes etc. etc. and Stacy was nice enough to offer to print out a question sheet for this assignment that she had saved from the previous year . . . and as the paper slid from the offic printer, and she tried to hand it to me, I grabbed it out of her hand, and read it . . . and it said "Please return ASAP" and nothing else, and before I could turn my filter on, I asked my friend Stacy this question: "What kind of asshole are you?" and then I realized that this was simply the flip side of a piece of recycled paper, and that the question sheet was on the other side -- but by this time it was too late . . . luckily Stacy has a great sense of humor, and she thought my horribly rude response was very funny, and not only that, she hopes that I do NOT succeed in improving my patience because she gets great enjoyment from my inappropriate spontaneous and ridiculous behavior, and -- of course -- the irony was not lost on either of us that if I can't be patient even while I am designing a lesson about my own patience, then I am probably not going to imrpove it anywhere else in my life either.
I Knew There Was Something Weird About My Left Shoe
Stepping in dog poop no fun unless you don't notice until you've walked all the way across the house.
A Three Anecdote Week
Sometimes life has no narrative arc. Things don't connect. There is no theme. This was one of those weeks. Stuff certainly happened, but with no particular pattern. It was existential and absurd. Moving at times, but also fragmented and ridiculous.
The week began wonderfully. It snowed Sunday night into Monday and school was canceled. My nemesis-- the goose poop in Donaldson Park-- was covered by a thick blanket of the white stuff. So I bundled up and headed down the hill to the river with our dog Lola. She enjoyed the snow enormously. It was early enough that no other dogs were around, so she was off-leash, sprinting and bounding and bouncing through the snow. She's only a little over a year, and it didn't snow much this winter, so this was a real treat. We wandered to the far corner of the park, where someone had built a snowman. Lola had never seen a snowman before and she did NOT like it. She charged toward it, stopped twenty feet away, barked like mad, and then retreated.
She did this several times. She though the snowman was alive and possibly dangerous.
To assuage her anxiety, I walked over to the snowman and stood next to it.
"Look, Lola it's fine . . . it's not alive . . . it's a snowman!"
I patted the snowman's head, to show her it was inanimate. Lola took a couple tentative steps in our direction, so I continued the patting. But I patted a bit too hard (I was wearing gloves so it was hard to judge the force of my patting). The head fell off the snowman. Decapitated.
Lola yelped and ran like hell.
The next day it was back to the grind. I had to finish grading the college writing essays, enter grades into the computer for progress reports and start teaching The Crucible (which I hadn't read in years). My seniors were acting like seniors and my sophomores were acting like sophomores. The winter doldrums.
But then one of my students inspired me. She told a story I'm sure I'll repeat for the rest of my teaching days. This student is a super-swimmer. She got a full ride to Rutgers for swimming. Her day goes like this: she gets up at 4 AM and swims hundred and hundreds of laps, goes home, does her homework, and then she swims some more in the evening. 10,000 meters a day. I barely drive that much.
She brought her computer to my desk and showed me a preliminary thesis for her final paper. I told her it looked pretty good. She said she had thought of it that morning, at 5 AM, while she was swimming. I told her that it was awesome. Great use of her time. What else are you going to think about while you swim back and forth?
So she was swimming away, thinking about horizontal and vertical identity traits and how they connect to feedback loops and algorithms and the dynamic between natural and sexual selection, and then she had an idea. But she was worried she would forget about it. So she got out of the pool and went over to the whiteboard, where they write the times and workouts for the swimmers, and she started writing.
"You got out of the pool and starting writing your thesis?"
"I didn't want to forget my idea!"
"Did the coach and the other kids think you were insane?"
"Pretty much."
When practice was over, she took a picture of the whiteboard with her phone, thus preserving her idea. I was really impressed with her. I congratulated her on her dedication and resourcefulness. It was one of those moments when you feel great about being a teacher. You realize that some kids are actually thinking about stuff from class outside of class, getting smarter on their own time. And the image of her dripping wet in her racing suit, writing a complicated synthesis thesis on a whiteboard next to a pool full of elite swimmers doing laps, it's something out of Good Will Hunting or A Beautiful Mind. There's a mad scientist quality to it.
The week began wonderfully. It snowed Sunday night into Monday and school was canceled. My nemesis-- the goose poop in Donaldson Park-- was covered by a thick blanket of the white stuff. So I bundled up and headed down the hill to the river with our dog Lola. She enjoyed the snow enormously. It was early enough that no other dogs were around, so she was off-leash, sprinting and bounding and bouncing through the snow. She's only a little over a year, and it didn't snow much this winter, so this was a real treat. We wandered to the far corner of the park, where someone had built a snowman. Lola had never seen a snowman before and she did NOT like it. She charged toward it, stopped twenty feet away, barked like mad, and then retreated.
She did this several times. She though the snowman was alive and possibly dangerous.
To assuage her anxiety, I walked over to the snowman and stood next to it.
"Look, Lola it's fine . . . it's not alive . . . it's a snowman!"
I patted the snowman's head, to show her it was inanimate. Lola took a couple tentative steps in our direction, so I continued the patting. But I patted a bit too hard (I was wearing gloves so it was hard to judge the force of my patting). The head fell off the snowman. Decapitated.
Lola yelped and ran like hell.
The next day it was back to the grind. I had to finish grading the college writing essays, enter grades into the computer for progress reports and start teaching The Crucible (which I hadn't read in years). My seniors were acting like seniors and my sophomores were acting like sophomores. The winter doldrums.
But then one of my students inspired me. She told a story I'm sure I'll repeat for the rest of my teaching days. This student is a super-swimmer. She got a full ride to Rutgers for swimming. Her day goes like this: she gets up at 4 AM and swims hundred and hundreds of laps, goes home, does her homework, and then she swims some more in the evening. 10,000 meters a day. I barely drive that much.
She brought her computer to my desk and showed me a preliminary thesis for her final paper. I told her it looked pretty good. She said she had thought of it that morning, at 5 AM, while she was swimming. I told her that it was awesome. Great use of her time. What else are you going to think about while you swim back and forth?
So she was swimming away, thinking about horizontal and vertical identity traits and how they connect to feedback loops and algorithms and the dynamic between natural and sexual selection, and then she had an idea. But she was worried she would forget about it. So she got out of the pool and went over to the whiteboard, where they write the times and workouts for the swimmers, and she started writing.
"You got out of the pool and starting writing your thesis?"
"I didn't want to forget my idea!"
"Did the coach and the other kids think you were insane?"
"Pretty much."
When practice was over, she took a picture of the whiteboard with her phone, thus preserving her idea. I was really impressed with her. I congratulated her on her dedication and resourcefulness. It was one of those moments when you feel great about being a teacher. You realize that some kids are actually thinking about stuff from class outside of class, getting smarter on their own time. And the image of her dripping wet in her racing suit, writing a complicated synthesis thesis on a whiteboard next to a pool full of elite swimmers doing laps, it's something out of Good Will Hunting or A Beautiful Mind. There's a mad scientist quality to it.
The next day, Wednesday, my phone started blowing up during class. Calls and texts. It was Phil-- the guy I coach with-- and he had bad news. One of our player's father had passed away from pancreatic cancer. Franco had been in remission for many many years, but the cancer returned and in a matter of weeks, it was all over. I coach his son on the middle school team and the travel team and so I had gotten to know the family a bit-- Franco was a real beloved figure in town. He was a major advocate for pancreatic cancer awareness, and after he survived the first bout, he went to seminary school. He then served as a chaplain at the Reformed Church up the street from my house.
They were having a vigil in his honor at his church that night, and I wanted to bring my younger son and a couple other soccer players from the team. I was getting organized to go pick them up when my older son Alex walked into the house. He had just returned from tennis practice, tired and scattered. I tried to explain the situation.
"You know Noah? From Ian's soccer team?"
"What? No . . . maybe? I don't know."
"Well, his dad passed away, Ian and I are going to the vigil. You're going to have to make yourself dinner. There's taco meat in the fridge. Okay? We're leaving and then I'm driving Ian and Ben to soccer practice. Mommy's at Zumba. Okay?"
Alex looked at me and said, "Today at practice, Chun Lee gave me this Mexican candy and I ate too much and it was really SALTY!"
"What? Alex, look at me. A man died! We are going to a vigil! I can't talk about Chun Lee's Mexican candy right now."
"Oh, okay . . . what?"
They were having a vigil in his honor at his church that night, and I wanted to bring my younger son and a couple other soccer players from the team. I was getting organized to go pick them up when my older son Alex walked into the house. He had just returned from tennis practice, tired and scattered. I tried to explain the situation.
"You know Noah? From Ian's soccer team?"
"What? No . . . maybe? I don't know."
"Well, his dad passed away, Ian and I are going to the vigil. You're going to have to make yourself dinner. There's taco meat in the fridge. Okay? We're leaving and then I'm driving Ian and Ben to soccer practice. Mommy's at Zumba. Okay?"
Alex looked at me and said, "Today at practice, Chun Lee gave me this Mexican candy and I ate too much and it was really SALTY!"
"What? Alex, look at me. A man died! We are going to a vigil! I can't talk about Chun Lee's Mexican candy right now."
"Oh, okay . . . what?"
Alan Moore: Predictable and Amusing (Just Like Me)
DC Comics is planning to release a seven comic book mini-series prequel to the unparalleled comic masterpiece Watchmen, and (according to The New York Times) creator Alan Moore is-- you guessed it!-- outraged and calls the new venture "completely shameless" and the article reports on Moore's typical pompous grouchiness, and explains that he has "completely disassociated himself from DC comics and the industry at large," and this sounds like a lot of fun-- to completely disassociate oneself from something, so here are a few things that I am now involved in that I plan to completely and indignantly disassociate myself from in the future:
1) doing the dishes
2) picking up dog poop
3) tying my children's shoes
4) wearing underwear
5) flossing
6) blogging
7) canker sores
8) Boardwalk Empire
9) driving
10) Canada.
1) doing the dishes
2) picking up dog poop
3) tying my children's shoes
4) wearing underwear
5) flossing
6) blogging
7) canker sores
8) Boardwalk Empire
9) driving
10) Canada.
A Stupid Discussion That Was Still Compelling
In the English office last week, a novice runner asked a question that had never occurred to me: "When you go out for a run, when do you start running?" and it turns out that many people have "starting points," such as the end of the driveway, where they begin and end their run . . . I tend to start running as I am going out the door, I jog down the steps and cut across the lawn . . . and maybe this is because of all the preparation I do before the run-- iPod, sunglasses, hands-free-dog leash/belt, poop bag, hat, orthotic inserts, etcetera . . . so that by the time I get out the door, I am impatient and fully "in the mode," but now I know that this isn't always the case . . . when and where do you start running when you go out for a run?
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