murphy-slaw's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Swimmin', Runnin', and Shock Therapy So yesterday was fun. D's brother Andy came up to visit and brought his son (the cutest kid on the PLANET) James. I have now started calling James "Jimmy" despite his strange refusal to respond and D and Andy's blatant ignoring of my obviously cute and hilarious name play. Pfffft. Yesterday we all piled into my little Jetta (3 adults, 1 toddler, and 1 Great Dane) and headed for the beach. We somehow made it in a very short time and with little to no slobber stains on anyone. Once at the beach, D lured Lola out into deep water and taught her to swim - which was super cute and also strangely like watching a horse try to swim. Getting her there was no easy feat, since deep water for Lola is deep water for most humans as well. The waters closer to shore where Lola's doggie buddies were all swimming was a mere "aqua jog" for her. At one point D convinced me to submerge myself in the ice cold water and get Lola to follow me and then subsequently start swimming once the bottom dropped out. She wasn't too pleased at that point and promptly grabbed and held onto for dear life, my pants. Thank goodness I was wearing some and not just a swimsuit, else my backside would have been nicely tendorized. James was chillin' checkin' out the doggies. At one point a big one bounded over him and used his back as a starting block. Poor little guy. A dog beach probably isn't the best place for a little kid. Note to self.
Anyway, I got some kind of bubble tea that was made with ice cream, taro root, purple, and coconut. For those that don't know, taro root is that stuff they use to make "poi" in Hawaii, and is essentially the eastern eqquivalent of a turnip. That's right. I had a turnip ice cream smoothie with tapioca balls in it. Mmmmmmmmm tapioca balls.... And it was SO GOOD! I was all "Mine!" when D went in for a sip. Cut to me enveloping my turnip ice cream shake of happiness in a protective cowel of safety and clawing at D and Andy to stay away. And James. And the waitress...maybe. Later in the day we all crashed and took a massive 3 hour nap each. That ruled.. That evening, Lola was sitting in her dog house thinking about what she had done having been caught munching on my dinner left on the table. Now, Lola sometimes wears a **shock collar that D and I use for training and we rarely have to zap her. I can probably count on one hand the number of times we've done it, so shocking for her is a big deal. The collar also has a beep function that she assocaites with the shock, which we use much more often. Anytime she won't do what she is told we "beep" her with the forboding promise of a shock somewhere on the horizon. "The promise" beep usually does the trick. Well...we left the remote to the collar on the coffee table. In a room with James. Alone. Yeah...you can do the math on that one. ....Poor Lola. She started running in circles in her cage and we had no clue what she was doing. Andy was like "Um...does she normally do backflips like that?" Then we heard the beeping and all realized in slow mo-horror was happening.. ----->Cut to James (Jimmy) in the living room giggling and HOLDING DOWN the shock button. (Keep in mind this thing is built for large dogs and at the right setting could take down a bear. Luckily we keep it set to "badger" vs. "bear", though) Poor Lola was all "What?! What is it?! I will stop doing it whatever it is! I'm sorry! Augh! Augh! Augh!"..... I'm a bad dog mom... . And finally, since there is no law that this be in chronological order, I will now describe to you my morning experience pre-8am. I had my longest run of the season - 8 miles. These first few long runs will be the toughest as I get used to them physically and mentally. I have now reached the point where listening to music during my run will only inhibit progress. The more I use it on long runs, the harder it is to run without it. And you aren't allowed to use headphones or anything on race day. So best to stop now while it hurts with or without musical aid. So my run was VERY uncomfortable. My IT-bands were so tight I felt like I was wearing my legs as a hat. Yeah try and picture that one... go on, I'll wait... . So my IT bands were frickin' tight and were pulling on my knees which in turn made my back hurt and I even got a side stich. A side stich! I can't remember the last time I had one of those. The "cool" thing is that, I got to use my water belt again and had a few GUs and salt. I'm back y'all! Sort of. With my side stitch. Afterward I was craving sugar pretty bad, so I must not have done a good balance of GU to salt. Maybe next week during my 10 miler (gag), I can play with them a bit. Note: I will be in Ireland next weekend so getting 10 miles in might be tricky. Guess I can stop by the Guiness factory for a filler up or something. Mmmmmm energy drink.... -MS is conspiring with the IRA. ** A note to all the dog lovers in the house: We only use the collar for extreme situations and the fact that she is a huge dog and absolutely has to be disciplined due to her size. We are very loving parents, and take good care of our pony. We rarely make her wear it and only use it in situations where she might otherwise get hurt/needs extra help focusing.. ***Check out this dude named Matt. He travled the world and danced danced danced.. 4:54 p.m. - 2006-06-25 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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