What a week

It's Sunday night and I'm still recovering from the Bears' loss earlier today. Sheesh. There goes my whole "bears eat fish" shit-talkin' I was doing after Monday Night Football.

Well, at least Beloved's Dolphins won. I'm happy for him. At least one of our teams made it, right? Riiiiiiight. :-)

Seems like life goes into overdrive during the holidays. I sometimes wish there was a magical *pause* button I could push every once in a while so that I can savor a moment during the holidays. If I'm in love with a moment, I have to make it quick and make sure I go on to my next task before something burns on the stove, or a store closes, or someone arrives, etc... Ya know what I mean? *sigh*

Aaaanyway, as usual, my week was full of things I love, not least of which are anipals a.k.a. furbabies a.k.a. the better species. We had our office Christmas party at my boss' house, where Jolie and I were best of friends. She is a sweet Goldendoodle who is about 600 pounds of muscle. I exaggerate. But, she is HUGE.

Here is the dinner table at da boss man's house. I know, right!? Looks like something straight out of a magazine, no? I think I may have made a comment about how incredible the ball trees were. There was a moment, or two, of silence until I realized I said "ball tree". Well!? What else are you supposed to call those things??? AND, there were balls hanging from the chandelier! Jeezaloo people, there were balls EVERYWHERE! Balls, balls, balls, everywhere balls!
Here's a picture of Jolie through the glass dinner table. She sat by me during dinner. Isn't she cute?

Linnea went to Chicago to visit her parents and family for the Christmas holiday, so I was in charge of Phoenix Rascal's safekeeping and daily feeding. Meet Phoenix Rascal ----

I'd go over to Linnea's and check on my cat buddy, and we'd hang out, watch TV, play games, eat some yummy cat food (him, not me), and then play tricks with his treats...

He always knew when I was getting ready to leave, so he'd run over to the door and block it. Doesn't he look menacing? Not. He's a total love. It broke my heart having to leave him every day, but he wouldn't have been happy staying at our place. First, Milo might have wanted a nibble, and second, poor Phoenix Rascal cries at night when he doesn't know where he is.

I'd put his treats in different places and make him hunt for them---

He also knows how to "give paw" for his treats ---



I'm the catsitter whenever Linnea goes out of town. I love that cat! We have a blast together. Linnea's place is also very French and super cool, so it's always nice to hang out there. Plus, she ALWAYS has a fridge full of yuuuuuumy stuff. Her blog is Vastidy on my blogroll, but she also has a new blog that I have to put up there. Linnea is a Cordon Blue chef and she recently opened her own business called "Savvy Cuisine" :

http://savvycuisine.blogspot.com/

It's her own catering business, but she'll also come to your home and show you how to make dishes or prepare your week's meals for you. Pretty neat.

Speaking of amazing chefs, my very own chef/husband made sure to keep our Christmas Eve dinner tradition alive by baking a DELICIOUS chicken enchilada casserole for us:

Oh my God, it was sooooo good. We have it over some steamed rice. It was nice to have our traditional dinner after our annual Christmas Eve lunch of fish tacos at Longboard's was a no-go. We arrived in Pacific Beach, walked up to the restaurant and it was closed! WTF?! No sign, no nothin'. We were both pretty bummed out, but what are you gonna do?

Christmas Eve was also full of preppin' and cookin'. We had 6 friends coming over for Christmas the next day. We spent the evening getting everything together and then we went to midnight mass. It was a beautiful mass, but this year I dealt with the most incredibly painful cramps I have ever had in my whole life. It was horrible. I almost cried from the pain in church. I could not believe the intensity of the pain. It came in waves and made me break out into a sweat. Aaaah, the joys of being a woman, right?

While in the kitchen, I had not one, but TWO helpers...

Due to Ed's Italian heritage, we have a traditional Italian lasagna Christmas dinner. He makes his "man-sagna", complete with homemade meatballs, sausage, pepperoni, and other savory goodies. A recipe from his family. I made a portobello mushroom lasagna with differente sides, like this green bean, broccolini, asparagus, mushroom and sun-dried tomato saute. The shallots really made the dish spectacular. Quite possible my favorite side dish of the dinner----

Christmas Eve would not have been complete without some videos of my little helpers. Pay no attention to the cases of beer....ha!



Mama's little helpers again ---



Christmas was F-U-N! I took a boatload of Motrin to try and alleviate some of my pain. I think one of the problems was that I had to be on my feet for so many hours. That doesn't do much for lower back pain, ya know?

Amos & Lynne were with us, and I jus had to get a pic of Lynney's new hiking shoes, a Christmas gift from Katie, her wonderful daughter. What a gal! Seeing Lynney's shoes made me miss hiking Torrey Pines. I want to do that again soon.

The humans weren't the only ones who got presents! My Golden babies were the lucky recipients of Bull Pizzles! Woo--hoo! What's a bull pizzle you ask? Well, it's the bull's "fun thang" after it's been stretched out, smoked, dried, and rolled up. Dogs just go NUTS over them. It a fabulous source of protein for them, even though it doesn't smell like a million bucks. It's actually better for them then rawhide.

Milo's tummy was full from a very large bowl of fresh cooked chicken, rice, carrots, celery, and kibble. He was going to save his pizzle for later, but....

...Achilles was not having any of that! It was hilarious how he stole Milo's bully stick (another name for 'bull pizzle'). He kind of stalked Milo and circled the bully stick, and while Milo looked away for one second, Achilles swooped in and made off with his second pizzle of the day. Needless to say, Achilles had a lot of pizzle poopin' going on the next couple of days. Eeeewwww!

Here's the A-Man enjoying the hell out of his pizzle...

...still enjoying....

....Achilles loooooved Christmas 2008...
He was kept busy for quite some time with his treats...

After a huge breakfast and then two pizzles, Achilles went back to his old man routine of napping while sitting up---

Both Ed and I came down with a nasty bug and by Christmas night we weren't feeling so hot. In fact, we spent the entire weekend together on the couch, coughing, sniffling, drifting in and out of medicine induced sleep, and breaking in and out of fevers. Our poor babies knew we weren't feeling so well, so they stayed right by our side.

Day after Christmas I felt bad for both of them. They'd been cooped up all day and needed to go out, so I took them to the dog park. I felt like shit, but at least I could do for myself and my puppies can't. We got to the park just as the sun was beginning its descent over the ocean. Great view from a dog park, huh?

Achilles kept watch over me while we were at the park. I thought it was maybe because he knew I was sick, but then I surmised that he probably thought I was hiding pizzle in my pocket, and that I wasn't just happy to see him. Get it!? Ha ha ha!!!! I crack myself up sometimes.

Milo bear got to chase his squeaky toy ball for a while. He loves that darned thing, even though it is falling apart. It was Bacchus' ball, but he gave it to Milo.

Shot some little videos while walking to our park...



At the park....



More park video...



So, tomorrow we head back to work. :-( I wish we had this week off as well. There was a lot I wanted to do this weekend that feel by the wayside as we battled our bug. I'm not sure if we have the flu or not. It feels like it, but neither one of us has had the flu in a few years, so we're thinking that maybe it is just a cold. Whatever it is, it SUCKS. One thing's for sure, it is fun being sick with Ed. Weird thing to say, huh? But it is true. No one in the world I'd rather be sick with.

I think we're going to get Wednesday and Friday off again, so maybe I'll catch up with stuff around the house then. All in all, it was a wonderful Christmas. Our dinner with our friends was warm and fun. My furbabies were with us, they are healthy and happy, and Captain Morgan squawked his delight at Christmas goodies he got to share with us. I thought about Mom and my family a lot, but I forcibly made my mind close the door on those thoughts, at least for now. I can't help it if they don't want to be happy for me. My life with Ed is my sanctuary, my bliss. Everyone deserves to hold on to it when they find it. It breaks my heart that my mother doesn't see that, or doesn't want to see that. Maybe she'll come around next year and come over for Christmas. I can only pray, you know?