Marshmallows & Merlot

On the way to the vet... On the way back from the vet (check out the body language)... What happened in between... Day one of having a puppy called for a trip to the vet. I had a puppy wearing a borrowed collar and lead from my mom. I needed to get her everything she needed and maybe one or two things she wanted. What girl doesn't enjoy a little retail therapy? Besides, spoiling her a little was a small price to pay for the fact that I knew that she was going to face needles, lots of needles, and a thermometer up her bum (yip, how awful does that sound?) Anyway, at 15h00 she strutted into the vet's office – tail wagging, cute little paws bouncing on the linoleum floor. Poor little creature had no idea what was about to happen. She sat on the vet's table (tail still wagging) while the less invasive checks were done... then her expression changed.  As the thermometer went up her usually perky ears went down and she gave me the 'Why mommy, why?!?' look. She  sw

I can excuse my lack of blog posts over the past few weeks in one sentence – I got a puppy . Yip, On Sunday 11 April an 8-week old puppy (90% Daschund, 10% Pavement Special) was thrust into my arms and ten-zillion licks  (and a warp speed wagging tail) later she was mine. Hubby and I were in puppy love all over again and Ellie had found a home. I've always maintained that often the best decisions are made with the heart and not the head. I'm not saying that one should act on every impulse but sometimes you've gotta stop making excuses and move forward. Sure, a puppy is hardly as big a commitment as deciding to have a baby but I would argue that it's very good training – I'm an 8-hours of sleep a night kinda girl and the first week of puppyhood saw me averaging 3 or 4 hours. The shocker? I didn't just cope, I did so with a smile on my face and a warm fuzzy feeling that comes from seeing a 1.8kg puppy bounce through the park like a hyperactive bunny with little

The only area of my life that I don't mind being described as beige in is my boring, responsible, nerdy dedication to vehicle-related admin. I log on to pay my fines  monthly to make sure that my record remains untarnished even though I don't get many speeding fines. Let me just state that often it's not for lack of trying – you see, I drive a 1.2 Fiat Palio that sounds like an angry mosquito when it manages to haul itself over the 100km per hour threshold on a good day. Needless to say, I'm not in much danger of being caught going 140km p/h in a 120km p/h zone. So you'd think that being met by a surprise roadblock at 9am on a Monday morning wouldn't do much to my just-showered-looking-ultra-fresh-and-sparkly composure, right? Wrong!  Until the powers that be invent a way for us mere mortals to renew our license discs online, once a year I will feel like a fugitive in my own suburb. Yip, I will cower in fear as I approach roadblocks and say a million little