Dear Sammy,

I'm sure most people will probably think this is absolutely silly.  I mean, who writes a letter to their dog?  How pathetic of a person to you have to be to write words to something that can't even comprehend these words?

As I'm writing this, you are sitting on the couch tucked in the crease of cushions next to your Daddy.  A big thunderstorm is moving in and, as always, you are terrified and shaking and I truly think if he'd let you, you crawl up inside of him.  I sometimes wonder, at times like this, what you went through before you came to us to make you so absolutely terrified of a little thunder and lightning.  And then I realize that it breaks my heart to think about it and I force myself to move on.

One year ago today, your Daddy and I went out searching.  We knew we wanted to bring a dog into our lives and we had been searching for months for just the right one.  Daddy is allergic to most types of animals and we lived in apartment, so it wouldn't be very fair to bring a big dog into a 900 square foot space.  So to say we were limited was an understatement.

We ended up at the Doc Williams SPCA in Goose Creek.  I remember being led into the room where all the little dogs were in evenly spaced cages up against the wall and they all were whining and begging for attention.  That, truthfully, was the hardest part.  If I could have scooped every one of them up and taken them home, I would have.

I wasn't the one who saw your first - your Daddy was.  He walked right over to where you sat, all scruffy and wild looking in your cage, and knelt down and as soon as he did, you greeted him by standing on your back paws and licking the finger he stuck in the hole.  He immediately turned to me and said, "I want that one!".

And Sammy, my baby, my precious lovey-dog, I looked right at you and said, "Ewww! No, I want that one!" and pointed to a little Shih Tzu in the cage across from you.  And even to this day, your Daddy doesn't let me live it down but it doesn't matter because I now look at you, with your wild mane and big ears and scruffy "eyebrows", and I truly think that you are the cutest dog in the world.

We weren't sure at first.  We didn't know if we were ready.  We weren't sure if you were the right one.  The ladies at the shelter let us take you out and meet you.  We even got to take you for a walk, where you immediately peed on my foot.  We took that as a sign that you wanted to be ours and within an hour, you were on Daddy's lap in the car with your head out the window and your ears blown back, looking like you had just been released from death row. 

We immediately went to PetSmart and commenced the spoiling and even after a year, that hasn't stopped.  Everytime one of us goes to the store, we always end up coming home with something for you, be it a treat or a new toy.  You are one of the only dogs I know who has an entire doggy bed full of stuffed animals.  If I could just teach you to pick them up after you drag them out then we'd be rich and I'd buy you all the stuffed toys your heart desires.  Who am I kidding?  I already do!

It's been a rough year.  Your cuteness definitely disguised the fact that you were a bit rough around the edges.  We know someone must have treated you bad because you have your moments where you can be awfully mean.  We found out very quickly that you don't like your paws touched.  You don't like to be bothered when sleeping or eating.  And if you're scared, you have a tendency to lash out and snap at us.  This is a behavior we definitely don't like, as you have bitten both myself and your Daddy pretty good, but we are working on that.  We are trying to teach you to love and trust us again and to make you realize that we are there to keep you safe and take care of, not to hurt you.  And it is a long and tiring process but we have seen quite a bit of progress over the year and that gives us hope for the future.

But there are better moments that make me so very grateful we decided to bring you in our lives.  I don't have any babies but you are my baby at the moment.  My heart swells when I come home from a long day at work and you are there to greet me, shaking your tail so fast your butt moves with it and following me around the house until I finally pay attention to you.  Or when you jump up on the couch and snuggle yourself into my lap, staring up at me with those huge brown eyes that make me wonder why you always look so sad when at that very moment, you seem so very happy.  Or how, in the morning, you come out of your bed and climb in ours then find that little crook in my lower back or my belly and snuggle yourself in until you are comfortable and almost laying on top of me.  And if I move even the slightest away from you, you scoot yourself over until your body is touching mine again.

I love when I ask if you want to go "Bye-bye!" and you freak the HELL out, as if your little head is going to explode if we don't go now, right now, Mama, I want to go NOW!  And when you really want attention, you climb up on my chest after being invited and lay with your face in front of mine until I pet you.

You love giving kisses and will lick anyone's face off if they let you.  You will sit and speak for treats and have learned to go down when told.  You have learned so much in the past year and we are so very proud of you.

The greatest thing that has happened is you got your own backyard and boy, have you made it known that the yard is yours. There have been many weekend days where the sun is beating down on the grass and I've poked my head out of the sliding glass door to find you flat on your back, legs splayed and chin stretched out, soaking up the sun.  You'll lay like that for a good half an hour as if all you want to do in life is soak up the sun. 

You killed a mole the other day.  Your Daddy and I were pretty sure that's what had been plaguing our yard but we weren't positive.  You had been digging and digging for days and we will admit that we did yell at you as we had just spent about $200 planting new grass seed in most of the areas you dug in.  Then I came home one day and your Daddy said you were outside and I peeked out because no one had been watching you and lo and behold, I find you standing over something and gray.  From far away, it looked like a bird but as I got closer and you stared up at me panting and smiling, I realized it was a little grey mole, about eight inches long and it was as sure as dead.  And as I called for Daddy to come out and take care of it, you stood there looking at me expectedly, like you were so amazingly proud of what you had caught and I couldn't help but praise you for being such a good boy and getting rid of that pesky mole.

I couldn't be mad at you because, as a terrier, that is in your nature.  And to be painfully honest, that mole was starting to become a nuisance anyway.  And you were so very proud.  I just didn't want to clean it up so I made your Daddy do it and ever since, you've stopped digging and prefer to sun yourself, as if you'd slain the dragon and all was quiet in the kingdom.

Now the thunderstorm has passed and you're contently sprawled between your Daddy and I and as I look at you all curled up near us, close enough to be part of us but far enough away to feel like you have your own space, I can't help but think how grateful I am that your Daddy found you because I can't imagine my life without you!

I love you Sammy-Sam!  Happy Adoption Birthday!

Love,

Mama

(To those of you who read this without shaking your head and thinking I'm crazy dog lady - thank you!)

So I turned twenty-seven yesterday and the world did not end.  Little children did not point and whisper.  Teenagers did not roll their eyes back into their head.  But everyone - EVERYONE, asked me that one single question:

"Do you feel old?"

Or in my kind brother's words, "Happy birthday, old lady!"

Gee, thanks! 

No one asked me that when I turned twenty-six.  Or twenty-five. Trust me, twenty-five was a hard birthday.  I was no longer in my early-twenties, instead I was now a mid-twenties girl.  I had moved in with my boyfriend, I had my second "real world" job.  I couldn't go out and party until all hours every night - mostly because my body couldn't handle it but partly because I didn't want to be the "old chick" at the party.

But twenty-seven? Eh, twenty-seven was fairly easy for me.  I don't feel old but I guess now I'm in my "late-twenties" and on that downward slope to thirty.  I still look around at the house we bought and the dog we adopted and the career I've built and wonder what the hell I'm doing pretending I can handle all of this.  And I don't even have any children! Can you imagine?

But there are times that the years seem to have caught up to me.  I've caught myself wondering about kids these days and how they can do what they do, listen to what they listen to.  I just had a conversation yesterday with my little sister about heartbreak and boyfriends.  I've been out of college for five years.  If we have a ten-year high school reunion it'll be next year.  Friends that I remember staying out all night with and eating cold pizza in our dorms after a night of partying are married and have babies.  

This is not a bad thing, this growing up.  It's just a different thing.

With growing up, though, comes less of a birthday celebration.  In the years before this, I would celebrate the entire month if I could get away with it.  I was one of those annoying people with incessant reminders that went, "Guess what? My birthday is in 23 days!".  This year, not so much.

My (step)dad turned forty-one on April 15th, so last weekend, we decided to have a joint barbeque to celebrate.  Steve and I went over and hung out while they prepared bratwursts and burgers and hot dogs.  We had cake (which is definitely one of my favorite parts) and exchanged presents.  Thank god my dad is a fellow geek because all I had to do was hop on over to Think Geek and get him some kitsch from there.  My parents got me gardening supplies since I've mentioned that I was actually out many weekends in a row, weeding my front garden and was uber-proud of the fact that I actually got grass to grow in my backyard. 

But yesterday, we played it low key, and that's exactly what I wanted.  Birthday wishes started early, before I even rolled out of bed and continued throughout the day.  My coworkers bought me lunch and sang.  And I came home to find my loving, wonderful, amazing boyfriend elbow deep in yellow cake batter, whipping up his first ever homemade cake for me.  He then tossed a pair New York strips he'd had marinating for hours (in yummy Jack Daniel's BBQ marinade) on the grill and put some baked potatoes in the microwave.  Before I knew it, the house smelled amazing and my tummy was full and content.

I got tons of cards - the ones from my parents always make me cry - and Steve even broke from character and got me a mushy card, which made my day because he always leans towards the funny ones.  He also got me the Canon 50mm f/2.5 Compact Macro  lens that I desperately wanted.  And he bought Grand Theft Auto IV as well, which I didn't expect but was looking forward to getting.  Now I just have to wait until Tuesday to pick it up.

On Saturday, we're going to spend the day in Myrtle Beach with some friends.  I'm not sure exactly what we're doing yet but it'll just be a chance to get away and have some fun.  I told Steve that was my "big" birthday celebration.  LOL

So overall, it was a very good birthday, despite, you know, the whole getting old thing.  That, apparently, is a bigger deal than I thought. 

It all started Tuesday morning when I came out to go to work. My nice pretty bright blue car had turned a yellowish-green, which to those of who suffer seasonal allergy and sinus problem, knew it that meant one thing: TROUBLE!

The pollen had settled itself on this world and all of my insides began to wreak havoc on me. I swear, within in an hour things were in chaos. I had a cough. My nose was running. The pressure was making it's way from my neck to my temples. I was not a happy girl.

I can handle being flu sick. I hate being sinus sick. It has yet to be determined if I'm allergic to anything but I don't experience the classic "allergy" symptoms - itchy, watery eyes, wheezing, etc. What I do get is sinus symptoms - pressure in my face and my head, congestion and a sore throat. Sometimes, if I'm really lucky, it turns into bronchitis. Two years ago was the first time it did that and let me tell you something: waking up at 3am unable to take a substantial breath is not the most fun thing in the world.

By Thursday, I was miserable. Curled up in my favorite chair, sniffling with my fuzzy blanket around my shoulders miserable. I was pumping myself full of OTC medicine and taking hot showers to try and loosen the congestion in my chest and pressure in my head. I was so sick I actually used that as an excuse for not being able to make dinner, partly because I didn't have the strength to and partly because I told Steve I would get germs all over the food. He, surprisingly, bought it.

About two hours after taking a really hot shower, I had a feeling I should take my temperature. Imagine my surprise when I saw I was a running a fever of 101.5. I haven't had a fever in years so I didn't really expect anything. Steve immediately told me to take some Tylenol (duh!), drink some water (double-duh!) and go to bed (on my way).

I was miserable through out the night. My eyelids and my face were burning but I had the chills. I tossed and turned and couldn't sleep. I took my temp at various parts of the evening and the highest it reached was 102.8. The lowest was 100.5.

I called into work the next day. I had barraged my coworkers enough all week under the premise that it was seasonal and sinus related. It wasn't fair for me to bring my feverish self in. I managed to crawl out of bed, take another shower, take some more medicine and go back to sleep.

Finally, the fever broke around lunchtime and I woke up in a gross sweat. I dragged myself out to the living room and pretty much collapsed onto my chair and sat there in a daze, sniffling and hacking until Steve came home.

I was, however, determined to be better by Saturday morning. See, I had an appointment to get my hair cut. And it was very hard to get that appointment. And my hair was being nothing but a brat lately. I couldn't run a brush through it. It was overpowering my face. It was heavy and hot and uncomfortable and I never felt that more than when there was about ten pounds of hair on my head as I was breaking a fever.

We didn't go anywhere Friday night because, as Steve said, that's the rule. You stay home from work (school), you don't go anywhere. Fine by me because I was in bed early. Still couldn't sleep. I somehow found myself wide awake by 3am, partly because I didn't feel well and partly because I was so excited about getting my hair cut. It was like Christmas morning. I hadn't had a decent hair cut in over a year.

The time finally rolls around and I head out. It was the first set of real clothes and makeup I'd put on in two days. I spent two hours in the salon getting washed and cut and styled and trying to cover my mouth discreetly when I coughed lest anyone there think I personally came to infect them.

I was also genuinely excited because we actually had plans for St. Patrick's Day and while I still wasn't feeling "well" and had a hard time getting up a lot of energy, I was determined that I feel well enough not to ruin our plans and the first night out we'd had in awhile.

So I came home, looking all fly from the beauty salon and excited over the fact that we would be going out and what do I find? The boyfriend, in bed, with the covers pulled up to his ears.

"Oh no," I cried.

"Oh yes," he answered between coughs and wheezes.

"So I guess we're not going out?" I inquire, already knowing the answer to my question.

"What do you think?"

I think, damn it, that I had mustered up enough strength to get cute and to be ready to go out. I think the green St. Patrick's Day shirt and matching socks that I was wearing needed to be seen in public. I think my sparkly St. Patrick's Day top hat needed dusting off.

I said, "Can I get you anything?" and changed back into my pajamas. I wasn't feeling that up to par anyway.

So when people ask me what I did for St. Patrick's Day, I'll tell them I hibernated in the apartment with the boyfriend as we passed the roll of toilet paper back and forth between us to blow our noses and played the suckiest round of video games we'd had because we were both fairly out of it. And I'll tell them how he tried to force me to eat all weekend because the most I had shoved down was peanut butter crackers and had no appetite for anything else and how I forced him to take his temperature and tried to forced him to take cough medicine before I realized his cough was asthma related and the cough medicine wasn't going to do him any good. And how we rented movies that we watched only halfway through because we both got tired and wanted to be in bed at 10:30pm on a Saturday.

And I'll tell them I'd rather have a hangover than feel the way I did this weekend. And how when you live together, neither one of you is safe.

But now it's Monday and we're both feeling better and things are back to normal. And somehow, even though we were crabby and irritable and stubborn, we still managed to tolerate each other and take care of each other enough for it not to seem like a completely wasted weekend.

I know, everything's so blue but frankly, I got sick of the other colors. They made me want to puke. And blue always puts me in a wintery, Christmasy mode. (On a side note, no, I did not do the Rudolph up there. It's from a wallpaper I got from Deviant Art. I loved it so much I thought I'd make a layout out of it.)

On to business.

I'm going to join everybody else in saying that I can't believe it's December. Sometimes, it feels like only yesterday since we moved down here. And I won't even get into the fact that it was almost a year ago that we actually made the decision to move. I guess time flies when you're having fun. *grins*

Regardless, I'm happy the holiday season is here. Next to Halloween and my birthday, Christmas is one of my favorites. I've had all of my decorations, including my tree, up since Thanksgiving and everything is all lit up and sparkly both inside the house and out. I love driving around town and seeing all the lights. It's very festive. On a side note, since we're talking about Christmas decorations, I want to reiterate something that veteran readers to my site may already know.

I despise those blow up yard decorations. DESPISE THEM! I have never liked them and everytime I see one or more of them clustered on people's lawns, I want to get a dart gun and pop them. It's so bad that it's actually become a running joke in my family. Everyone looks at me expectantly when we drive by a yard with them, waiting for me to roll my eyes and make gagging noises. I prefer simple and classic - white lights, green garlands and red bows. Or, on a different note, if you're going to be Clark Griswold, I can handle the sparkling of the many colored lights and being able to see them from down the street. Don't take away from that by adding those hideous blow up decorations. I could ALMOST handle the big, old retro lights in place of them but even that's pushing it.

Other than that, I really have no rants about the Christmas season, aside from not having much money, but isn't that the case for everyone? There's quite a few events approaching that I'm really excited about, partly because they seem fun and partly because they give us something to look forward to.

I'm especially excited to be able to spend Christmas with my family without having to fly home. Of course, on an equally sad note, we unfortunately won't be able to make it back North for Christmas, so we will be missing Steve's family terribly. But we will make it back, so that gives us hope. I think we're going to spend Christmas weekend at my parents so we can go to the Festival of Lights, which has become a yearly tradition for us. I also want to spend Christmas Eve there because I don't know about ya'll, but Santa still comes to visit us and I want to be there Christmas morning to see what he brought. *smiles*

We've got a small road trip to North Carolina in the works for the weekend of the fifteenth. I've got family there that I need to see so it will give us a nice break. We haven't gone any further than Myrtle Beach since we got down here so a change of scenery will be nice. And this coming up weekend, we have a football game and my company holiday party as well as the local holiday parade and tree lighting. A busy, busy month ahead!

Speaking of football, I am very proud to say that not only did my little brother kick complete butt in his regular season, but he made it to All Stars for the town and has spent the last three weeks competing against leagues from across the Charleston area. And they have won all three games. I'm not 100% sure how this works, because we haven't had a chance to talk to the coach, but I think if he wins next weeks game, he goes to the State championship (which, from what I'm gather, would actually be the Lower State championship - I think they split it between upper and lower SC). Regardless, we are so very proud of him! Love you kiddo!

And while we're on a proud note, I just wanted to say that part of the reason I was gone most of November is because I was participating in NaNoWriMo. For those of you new to the game, it's something that's been going on for quite a few years and basically, the goal is to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days, from November 1st to the 30th. You don't win anything except a cool little icon and a certificate but you get the satisfaction of pushing yourself to write and reaching that goal. And ladies and gentleman, I reached the goal. The story's not completely finished but I'm working on the ending and will have it finished soon. But I'm just so proud of myself for doing it because I really, really thought it was going to be something that I just let fall to the wayside, like I've had the tendency to do with a bunch of other projects. But I didn't. I stated focused and determined and I completed it and I can't tell you how good that feels.

But now I'm sitting on a goldmine of stuff that I want to write about here. It's been building and building and I think one of my next goals is going to be to try and get at least fifteen posts completed this month. That's one every other day. It's doable. I was going to do one every day but I'm already a little late for that.

So keep checking back. Now that I have a facelift here and the NaNo project lifted, I'll definitely be using this as an outlet for all the holiday stress that I'm sure will build up.

Because that's really what it's for, right?

Sometimes I can't believe how time flies. And sometimes it seems to creep by.

My ankle is doing much better. I'm still wearing the compression wrap and can do without the air cast. I hobble a bit and it gets stiff and sore, particularly when it rains or when its cold. But overall, it's doing ok. It was a pretty bad sprain and since I'm such a veteran at this, I'm well aware that it will take a while to heal. For now, it's just a matter of doing the exercises and pumping the Ibuprofen on bad days.

A few months ago, I posted an entry about the problems I've been having with my eyes. Well, I'm glad to say they're pretty much back to normal. After two visits to the eye doctor and a good month straight in my glasses, I actually worked my way back into the Focus Dailies and they helped immensely. The doctor told me I had an immense amount of neovascularization, which I knew and is caused by lack of oxygen to the eyes, and I also had epithelial keratitis, which was caused by me wearing the same lenses every day. I switched myself back over to the Dailies and haven't had any major problems since. I was also taking some pills called BioTears which are a natural supplement for tears and eye film and they helped me immensely with the dryness of my eyes. So now I am a happy girl because I'm back in my lenses and don't feel like I'm walking around with windshields on my face.

In the same week that I started getting around on my sprained ankle without the crutches, I contracted a pretty bad cold and am still fighting it off. The weekend before last, I slept all day. I was pretty miserable and let Steve dope me up with NyQuil on the Saturday morning that they went fishing. I ended up sleeping until 2pm but rest always helps cure a cold. But it took it's natural progression from my face and my sinuses into my chest and I alternated between NyQuil, DayQuil, cough syrup and Tylenol. I was a very unhappy and miserable person.

The entire time I was laid up and unable to walk and then was laid up with the cold, my absolutely amazing boyfriend did everything he could to take care of me. From delivering what I asked for when I couldn't even hobble to the kitchen to buying me orange juice and cough syrup and bringing the pills to me in bed and just letting me sleep and be miserable. He didn't even freak out about getting sick and crawled into bed with me every night admist my coughing and hacking.

The worst part was that Steve's little brother was in visiting all last week and between my ankle and the cold, I wasn't really up to par. But we did get to spend a lot of time with him and show him all sorts of new sights around the Charleston area. And him and Steve got to spend a lot of mono y mono time together while I wallowed around trying to make myself better. I just wish I could've been a little more up to things.

So the holidays are coming and I'm really excited. I've already bought Christmas cards! Yes, I'm preparing early. Not that I planned to but I was in CVS and they were on sale and pretty so I figured I'd pick them up now instead of rushing around come December. But it'll be our first Christmas together and here in Charleston, so I'm definitely looking forward to it. Come Thanksgiving - Christmas music, 24/7! And we'll put tree up and go to the Festival of Lights (because it a family tradition). So so excited!

Before that, I'm going to be killing myself. I signed up to participate in Nanowrimo and I've been writing more than ever lately. I'm a bit behind so I need to get cracking because I've got 30 days to write 50,000 words.

That's about it for now. Just wanted to do a simple update. I'm going to try write here more (because I should've been smart like other people and signed up for NaBloPoMo like other) but I'm not sure how much will happen because of NaNoWriMo.

We shall see!