Louie is in the house.

Tiffani's birthday is this month. She wants a puppy - badly. I've wanted another dog for awhile now. We attempted to pick up a new dog on my birthday. After thinking it over for a few hours we decided that we wanted to go pick him up. We were bummed to hear that he had been adopted in the meantime. The sadness we both felt at missing the opportunity to raise that cute puppy affirmed that we were indeed emotionally prepared for the adventure of puppy-hood. So Saturday, we adopted a dachshund/terrier mix. He's adorable. I took him to the vet this morning and all is well. The vet confirmed that he is indeed a dog, and that he is a healthy one at that. He runs and clumsily falls all the time, annoys Gus and shits the size of his head. I'm sort of beginning to think that half of his body is made up of his bowels. I was up every two hours last night to let him out to pee. It was a bit rainy, but every time we went out, he was quick about it. When we got back inside, he laid down in his crate and went right back to sleep. The dachshund in him has him creeping into the darkest corners of the house. Right now he's under the ottoman grumbling in his sleep.

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Gus is nervous. He doesn't know what's happening. He paces and bites harder than usual while playing. I'm really hoping that in the long run, this is good for him. I think he'll get used to it as the routine becomes more, well, rout

ine. In the meantime he's gaining a bit of weight from all the positive reinforcement we're throwing his way. So it goes.

Hello 2010

This year, I decided to skip all of my traditional new years' superstitious activities. I usually keep a few bucks in my pocket overnight, among other things. I almost always have a few resolutions, such as put out a record or ride 2000 miles on my bike. This last year has been a tough one, though and I decided to "wing it" in 2010. No resolutions, no mystical meals, not a single plan.

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So far so good! I woke up feeling less sick than yesterday, and spent 6 hours working on the bathroom. I've been sick for what seems like months, so it was tough to spend that long working, but I accomplished a lot. This project, the bathroom, has changed drastically from the time we started to now. Initially, I was just going to shim the shower so that it drained properly. Upon pulling up a bit of the floor to formulate a game plan, I discovered that the floor was completely rotten. I proceeded to pull the linoleum up, strip out the second layer of linoleum that had been glued to a "subfloor" that was sitting on top of a layer of vinyl tile, probably from 1963. Newsflash! - when you trap a piece of wood between two layers of plastic and introduce warm water, bad things happen. So I pulled the entire floor out, layed down a new subfloor, cut the bottom 6 inches of the wall out and replaced it with mold resistant drywall. I layed down a moisture barrier as well as a layer of hardi backer. Tiff painted the walls and now we're ready to tile. We're doing a subway tile with gray grout. We picked up some new stuff, a new sink and cabinet from Ikea. We're pretty excited to have received some christmas cash which is making the project a lot more fun than it could have been. We flirted with the idea of constructing a tile shower, but we decided that it wasn't realistic since classes start again in a few days. Spring break, we'll start work on that.

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2009 was a rough year, but it was good too. My Mom got cancer AGAIN. She also received a bone marrow transplant and kicked cancer to the curb. Tiffani and I bought a house. Clearly the best thing about 2009 was the addition of Gus to our family. Who knew we could love a dog so much? My school work took a dive, I spent most of the fall with the flu and rode my bike less than I hope to. My youngest sister lived with us for a few months which turned out to be something of a disaster. Now she's 18 yrs old and on her own. Best of luck to her.

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Gotta run to the hardware store for a few supplies. Farewell 2009.

Tuesday is half full

Woke up late. Gus is about out of food, so he and I made a trip to the pet store for some grub. Next, Tabor for some frolicking on the hillside. He seems a little sad. I think he is fed up with the school, work, art schedule that has me leaving the house around 8:30 am and arriving home around 9:45 pm. I'm pretty sure Tiff is fed up too. Luckily she has Gus, and Gus has her. He still gets to go to the dog park nearly every day to play and poop. I'm going to try out the new max line today. It says online that the trip from my place to campus should take 40 minutes which is 5 minutes less than it takes me on my bike; I'm skeptical.

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I've been very busy, the sculpture club budget was due last week. I wrote it up, submitted it and it was accepted! That's pretty exciting news. We've already had our first event of the year, and now it's time for our first meeting, a bowling party. I'm trying to organize a team sculpture competition for the Spring. I'm not sure if I've bitten off more than I can chew here, but it seems daunting.

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I'm going to start mixing my own clay. It's expensive to buy premixed clay. I can easily throw more than I can afford. Plus, I'm not super excited about our options at school. Georgies has a few bodies that I've tried and liked, but I think I'm paying mostly for water, and I've got plenty of that falling outside. . . First up will be a very simple mix of Fireclay and Ball clay. It's a combination that Peter Voulkos used at the Bray. He threw big and his forms are spectacular. I hope that the clay body will inspire me, or at least enable me to step it up a bit.

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Fall is here, it's cold in Portland. Its raining and very windy. I'm already looking forward to Spring.

All the leaves are brown, leaves are brown

It's a beautiful sunny day in Portland and I'm about to climb into an allergy pill. Sunny and warm and windy as hell. It seems like all of the musty summer goodness has been unearthed and is being shuttled around town by the pesky winds.

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Unexpectedly got the day off work. Woke up at 7am to feed Gus and then went back to bed. Slept until 9:45! It's been a nice little morning. So far my duties have included: Pet the dog, drink the coffee, play the guitar and search the internet for information on casting basalt - in order of most to least important.

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First day of ceramics was last night. Made a few things, including a tea pot that is part of a group project. This is a first in Kowkie's class. She had us make the parts, and then we'll pick different pieces from different peoples pots and assemble them. I think it's a pretty cool idea. Whatever I end up with, I think I'll try to recreate it for a real project.

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This week is the last week of summer before the term starts at PSU. I'm excited to start classes, and a little nervous too. This seasonal transition always hits me a little harder than the others. I remember most vividly this transition when I was a kid. I was always bummed that the light didn't last as long and that the air began to encourage layers. Meh. I'm glad that it's hot this week. One more week of driving in the jeep with the top and doors off, in relative comfort. This week also will see the sculpture club installing our first show at the MK Gallery on campus. I have a piece to include and as the date approaches, I'm noticing that I'm feeling nervous about my contribution. The word "anachronistic" keeps swimming around in my head. I've never shown a piece of sculpture outside of a classroom setting. I'm sure it will be fine. The chances of somebody looking at my work and then hitting or shooting me is pretty slim. It's not that good.

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Oh! I think I just heard something. . . yep, it was the dog park calling Gus. I'd better help him out with that.

Sunny Friday Homework Avoidance

I'm presenting a powerpoint Tuesday on clay formation and geological history of the area surrounding Helena, Montana. I'm working on it now, which seems a little paradoxical since I'm blogging. I feel so sleepy when I try to do school work. I wish I was an exercise and movement sciences student. Isn't all of their homework, running in place and punching the air while shouting "YOU CAN DO IT!"?

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Tiffani and I looked at a couple homes today. We're in the market. We've made offers on a few houses and none of out offers have been accepted. After only 6 weeks of looking seriously, we're getting to the point where we don't get our hopes up just because we make an offer. I'm trying not to picture the house with the new colors on the walls and our furniture. I'm not imagining my pottery studio out back in the pole barn I intend to build, or deciding which southeast corner of the yard I'm going to build my catenary arch kiln. No, I'm just sitting here avoiding my homework, wondering why Gus insists on sprinting into the laurel out back every time a squirrel runs across a telephone wire. There aren't any telephone wires in the backyard of the house we just made an offer on. There isn't any laurel either. Luckily the person that is flipping the house planted a dead asian pear tree. . . weird, I know. I'll dig it up, first thing. But I'm not doing that this time, imagining all the great memories we'll make in our new home. No, I'm just chillin, waiting until it's late enough to start drinking; cause it's friday!

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Gonna kayak the middle fork of the White Salmon river tomorrow. It's solid class III boating. It will be a step up in both Todd's and my paddling skill level, assuming we make it successfully down the river. I'm very excited, the weather should be great and the river is running at runnable levels. Maybe we'll even shoot the waterfall.

Cold coffee means summer is coming

Just strained a batch of cold press coffee. It's delicious, I'm having some now. First math test of the term is tomorrow and I'm about half way to being ready for it. Luckily, it's raining so I'm not working, which means I've got 4 extra hours to study today.

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I was thinking about changing my course of study to Bachelor of Science, rather than art. The difference would be that I'd take science courses rather than language courses. I would need to take 20 credits of lab science in sequence. If I stay on the BA path, I'm looking at 24 credits of Spanish. I think it's really good for the brain and the world to know other languages, but I'm really having a hard time getting excited about the class. I need to buckle down and do the work, then see how I feel about it.

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Leisa and I are taking a whitewater kayaking seminar together. It starts next week. I'm a little bummed that it conflicts with a bronze pour, especially as I just took over responsibilities as "event coordinator" for the sculpture club. I should be there. I'm going to see if I can farm some of the responsibility out for the next couple events. The seminar, however, is guaranteed to be a blast and we get to float two rivers(not sure which).

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Gus is doing great. Better each day, with the occasional thick headed naughtiness that makes him such a good all around dog. Lots of personality, good natured and lots of fun. I took him to Delta Park last week. That place is huge. Just fields and fields and paths and streams for him to explore. He made it as far away as 75 yards, but always made sure I was within eyesight.

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Tiff and I are looking into buying a house here in Portland. We're pre-qualified for whatever that's worth. Been looking at houses in the 160-180 range, which surprisingly offers quite a variety of homes.

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better get to the studying.

A day at the park

Gus and I just walked all over the neighborhood, had coffee and hiked up Mt. Tabor. We also spent 45 minutes at the dog park where he did an excellent job of playing nicely and coming when I called him.

Gus and I are definitely figuring some things out about one another. I know that he hasn't had the opportunity to meet a lot of dogs, and because of this, he tends to freak out when he sees dogs across the street. It's been embarrassing to have to restrain my dog on the side of the road while he barks and jumps and whelps, but I can't just let him go. If I were to let him go when he's like that he would probably be injured by the passing cars. The funny thing is, he isn't aggressive towards other dogs. It's like he just can't believe that he's seeing these dogs and absolutely MUST say hello.

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We got him from a friend of Leisa's. The previous owner didn't have the time to take him for walks or to socialize him. I'm not even sure how long he was with them. On easter, we were sitting at the table having brunch with some friends and Leisa was talking about how they wished he would run away, and about how they kicked him and threw his food on the floor. They had even locked him out of the house hoping he would leave. I couldn't believe it. I called the guy up immediately and said I'd like to meet this poor dog. I picked him up and brought him to the house. He explored the back yard and I introduced him to our home. Next I walked him to Mt. Tabor dog park and met up with Kelly A. and his dog Harlan. Harlan showed Gus the ropes and they ran around the dog park together, saying hello and sniffing a lot of ass. Surprisingly, Gus wasn't timid. I was concerned that his lack of socialization would have made him fearful of other dogs. Not the case, he wasn't aggressive either. He did really well. I was so surprised and concerned when later, he freaked out when a dog across the street walked past.

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He is a bit of a leash puller. I have been pretty serious about making sure he walks beside me and not in front. I bought a gentle leader head harness. It wraps around the base of his skull and has a loop that goes over his nose. When he pulls, it takes all of the pressure off of his chest and places it on his head, which means he stops pulling. I can't believe the difference it makes. Rather than just pulling on the lead, he actually looks around now and seems to enjoy the walks.

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He can sit, lay down and shake now. He's so smart, and a bit naughty. Now if I can just keep him off of the couch at night. . .

Gus

This is our new pal GUS. Full name is Gustav Jesus Jensen-Davis. He was an easter miracle. He's mostly black lab. Might have some pointer in him. . . He's a good dog that hasn't been in the best situation up 'til now. We're hoping he'll be happy with us, and we're hoping we'll get used to the allergies soon. He doesn't poop or pee in the house! He is a squirrel chaser, but I think we can deal with that. If anybody wants to help me patch holes in the fence out back, lemme know. Cheers!

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