Rottweilers Ate My Laptop

I’ve been away from the blog for quite a while, and I’m trying to decide the best way to catch up. Life hasn’t been super fabulously exciting, but there has been enough going on that I’m not sure where to start.

Freya is still on hiatus from training and trialing. Axe is mostly relaxing out of the spotlight as well. He passed his second and final try at the ATTS temperament test this spring. He earned another V rating, but sadly no placement, at a recent sieger show as well. Those will be more fun to talk about when I have photos ready, though.

It’s been a long busy week at work and I’m not sure how much longer I want to stare into a computer screen, so I don’t think I’m starting tonight.

(NaBloPoMo | November ’11: 3 of 30)

There are still quite a few 1960s signs near my home and office. Here’s one I go past every day. It’s at the CVS drugstore at the corner of Nagle and Higgins on the northwest side of Chicago.

A restaurant and banquet hall called the Golden Flame used to be on that corner, and they kept the old sign. I was trying to remember if there was actually a neon flame on top of the original sign. I never took a picture of it when I moved into the neighborhood, and no one else seems to have taken one either. Among the many, many photographs of vintage signage in Chicago on the internet, I have still not found even one of the original Golden Flame sign.

I have made fun of the people I’ve seen taking pictures of garbage cans. Now I’m not so sure I should ever be making fun of anyone taking pictures of anything they might want to remember, even if I can’t imagine why they’d want to remember it.

And if you have a photo of the old Golden Flame sign? Please, please let me know!

(NaBloPoMo | November ’11: 2 of 30)

Still a few minutes left before November 1 is over. I don’t have ideas or a good strategy for success, and I’m always short on time in the fall months. But I’m in once again for NaBloPoMo after a rather lengthy hiatus from blogging.

I didn’t complete the last few NaBloPoMo months I’ve attempted, but I’m going to give it another try. I want to make time to enjoy reading and writing again.

(NaBloPoMo | November ’11: 1 of 30)

I never did find out where May went. Now June is just minutes away from being gone as well.

I want to say I’ll be back to blog on a regular basis soon, but I wanted to say that at the end of May as well. We’ll see what happens after the holiday weekend.

I’m hoping that one good side effect of a bad economy is that people (as in some of the inconsiderate jagoffs in the neighborhood) are spending less money on fireworks. The resident cats and dogs are not too bad with fireworks, but it gets old really fast since the dogs think we are having the shortest war ever and feel they have to defend the home front. As Axe would say, “if there is not a war going on, then why are things exploding?”

I am looking forward to possibly photographing some fireworks, though. I’ve been waiting to use what I learned in the night photography class I took earlier this year. I haven’t used my DSLR all month, and if I took even five other photos with my point ‘n’ shoot or phone, I’d be surprised. I’m off to take some time to review those techniques!

I seem to be missing a whole month here. I don’t think I had much going on that would be exciting to anyone but me anyway. I never did post the missing stuff from April since sometimes, timeliness does matter.

Since I was last here, Axe got his TT, I switched from BlackBerry to Android, and other even less-exciting things happened.

But I’m writing this with WordPress for Android just to stay within my zone!

I’m taking a rare non-dog related sports break tonight to watch the hockey game. Third period just starting… come on, Blackhawks… don’t break my heart like most of the other Chicago teams!

I’m guest blogging over at Rodney Lee’s Midlife Crisis Hawaii today! Go and see, as I talk about a long-ago time when I thought I was going to grow up to be a journalist.

If you’re of a certain age (as in old enough to vote and/or drink in the ’70s) and if you ever lived in Hawaii, go and check out Rodney’s blog. Even if you aren’t as old as dirt and never came closer to Hawaii than watching “Hawaii 5-0″ – go and check it out!