Poor Linus has his seasonal dermatitis, which means he gets a spray from the vet and has to wear the cone for a while.

To make him feel better, we picked him up a little football. It’s pretty funny when he’s playing with it with the cone on- he can’t *quite* reach down to get it off the floor, so he just ends up pushing it further away. We eventually take pity on him and throw it to him. Footballs, by the way, are way better with they’re plushy and have squeak toys inside.

Lucy has a UTI (we think) right now as well, AND our ceiling is leaking into the downstairs bedroom. So yucko stuff happening all around. Still, we had a great day at the farmer’s market, snoozing on the couch and now I am cooking a dinner of beef stir fry with bitter mellon and ricotta stuffed squash blossoms on the grill. I’ve been working Saturdays this month, so Sunday is my only weekend day. Goes by so fast!

Making a run for it:

This is Flea, our neighbor’s cat. She was hanging out in the sunbeam on the railing of our porch when I went out there this morning to water the plants.

She’s a little stand-offish, but sometimes friendly (I believe Earl warmed her up with some Kitty Greenies before). This morning after I saw her and grabbed my phone to catch a shot, Linus loped over to her spot beneath the railing, butt wagging, and attempted to dopily make friends. Flea rebuffed his advances, hissed, and made this speedy exit to a neighbor’s fire escape.

She’s a handsome girl, though… another time I will have to try for a better shot!

Today I worked at the Ranch Rodeo Roundup in Woodside as on-scene standby medical support. The event was hosted by the Woodside Mounted Patrol which is a horse-based Search and Rescue organization.

It was a great time. I spent a large chunk of the afternoon running a list through my head all of the potential injuries that could happen at a rodeo so that I could mentally prepare: Gored by a steer, bitten by a horse, trampled, rope burns, sun burns, falls… fortunately nothing too extreme happened!

Not only was it a fun day out in the sun, but I enjoyed the exposure to a completely new sport and had fun chatting new friends. Who ever knew there was such a strong Western-style contingent this close to San Francicso?! Here are a few pics I snapped with my cell phone. Doesn’t it look like they’re having a great time?
One of the first events- racing around poles and barrels:

One guy ropes the head, another ropes the feet, a third wrestles the cow to the ground and “brands” him with paint:

This is a little crooked because I actually JUMPED BACK from the fence as they pounded by me!

Sorry for the lack of posting lately. Not only am I crazy busy at work (been picking up a lot of hours on the rig and also my first lecture/presentation at the SFPA was two nights ago!), but E and I just got back from a beach week with my family on the Outer Banks of NC. We had a great time fishing, beaching, grilling, reunionizing, building sand castles, and in my case- becoming rather sunburned.

Yesss…..! I did it!

I finally organized our bookshelves and my desk. Took out all the books, sorted them by subject and put them back. Went through my school stuff and cleaned and updated everything. Hurrah

I also went through all of my file folder files and updated and cleaned them out. Emptied out my desk drawers and went through all my files and organized that. Even sorted my old and current taxes.

Exciting Sunday around these parts But… something that HAD to be done, especially before we head to the beach for vacation. I hate coming home to a messy house.

Now, to brush and bathe ze dog!

This morning my friend Andrea and I dragged ourselves out of bed at 7am and met up at the Panhandle for a bike ride. She and I have been going the past couple weeks as we try to ramp up our mileage and get ready for a century ride sometime this fall. We’re both out of shape- it’s almost comical. The hills I have to walk up- they’re so small! It’s sad… and funny. But, I can already feel the improvement. Getting back on the bike is really nice. I even dragged my rollers out of the garage yesterday and used them on our patio. Poor Earl had to come outside and “support” me- physically and emotionally- while I got my groove back on them. I did about 10 minutes yesterday on the rollers- gonna work up to an hour, I hope.

Anyways- today Andrea and I biked over the Golden Gate Bridge, to Sausalito and then around Richardson Bay to Tiberon! We took the ferry back. It was super fun! Sausalito seems like a really cute town- it would be fun to go there and poke around for an afternoon. Andrea and I stole into a little cafe along the waterfront for a while mid-ride to warm up with some hot drinks. It was pretty foggy and cold in the morning.

The whole ride was really nice- lots of bike-only paths and really not much heavy traffic. Here we are waiting for the ferry:

Our total distance today was 27 miles. Andrea rides a hybrid/mountain bike type bike, so she gets extra points for bad-assery. I think we’ll try and add 10 miles per week, with about 2 weekly rides. Pretty chill schedule, but we have the time and I think getting back up to speed is a slow process!

Ps- here is Linus being cute with his tennis ball about 5 minutes ago: