Rottweilers Ate My Laptop

Rottweilers. Computers. Cameras. World Domination. Not necessarily in that order.

Rottweilers.
Computers. Cameras.
World Domination.
Not necessarily in that order.

Another dog and owner in the big lake

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Last week, Jess Craigie jumped into Lake Michigan to rescue her dog Moxie, who had gone off the pier while chasing seagulls.

Today, a woman jumped into Belmont Harbor to rescue her dog, who had gone into the water while chasing a duck. Woman and dog were not named in the article.

I really hope this is not a trend. Lake Michigan is still extremely cold at this time of year and hypothermia is a real danger. These stories won’t be cute little human interest pieces any longer once they result in serious injury or death of any of the involved parties, or what to me would be even worse, injury or death to a police officer, firefighter or emergency medical personnel who was involved in rescuing someone from an incident probably of their own making.

(NaBloPoMo | May ‘09: 11 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 107 of 274)

My dogs love me. But for sure they don’t like…

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Eric Zorn. Or Jon Katz.

Let me backtrack. On Tuesday, Jess Craigie jumped into Lake Michigan to rescue her 2-year-old mixed breed dog, Moxie, who had gone off the pier chasing seagulls at North Avenue beach in Chicago. Both were rescued by the everyday heroes of the Chicago Police Department and Chicago Fire Department, and everyone is going to be fine.

Arguably, Moxie should not have been off-leash, which basically is what started the entire chain of events. And it would certainly be a much different story if Ms. Craigie or a CPD or CFD rescuer had been injured or killed in the process.

Since everyone is alive and well, though, what exactly is the point in an entire column about why our dogs don’t love us? And worse yet, using Jon Katz as the “expert” to “prove” this? A Good Dog is right up, or should that be down, there with Marley and Me as a dog story that brought me to tears, but not for the usual reasons. More like tears of frustration about these dogs’ lives.

My dogs love me. And your dogs (probably) love you. Yes, they are opportunistic little bastards. The way they scheme and scam makes me smile, because it shows me how they think and solve problems. But I am still absolutely sure they love me and my husband. Whether or not we have food or toys or any other thing that dogs supposedly want on us, they still shower us with love (and since they are Rottweilers, vast quantities of spit).

I have never been a fan of Eric Zorn, and his blog post did nothing to change that. Not that he, or maybe any of you, would care.

But my dogs still love me!

(NaBloPoMo | May ‘09: 7 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 103 of 274)

Time for a museum visit? (29 of 30/95 of 274)

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One thing that I really love about Chicago is its wonderful museums. I also don’t visit them nearly often enough. With life and my own carelessness interfering, I’ve had to kick myself hard over missing two exhibitions that I would have truly enjoyed.

There is a billboard that I see every work day as I get off the highway downtown. It often advertises the current or upcoming special exhibition at the Museum of Science and Industry (MSI). I am slightly puzzled about the special attraction opening tomorrow, Harry Potter: The Exhibition. Being neither scientific nor industrial, nor even real, it doesn’t seem to me to quite fit in the venue. I am sure it will be very popular, though. It does appear to feature many items from the Harry Potter movies, so I guess if it includes such things as the special effects and animatronics used for the mythical creatures, that’s technological enough to be appropriate for MSI.

Understand that despite the worldwide popularity of the Harry Potter books and movies, I have not read a single one of the books, nor have I seen more than a trailers’ worth of any of the movies. Despite the assurances of many people whose taste and judgment I usually agree with that they were worth a look, I just had absolutely no interest. That makes me fairly unusual, though not unique by any means.

So my visit to MSI might be postponed until the next special attraction arrives. But! Remember those exhibitions I missed over the last couple of years? It looks like I am being given a second chance at seeing both of them at museums within easy driving distance!

Titanic: The Artifact Exhibit is at the Milwaukee Public Museum until May 25. That means I’ll have to nail down a date and actually do some non-careless planning pretty quickly. I have always been interested in the Titanic disaster, and even more so in the recovery of artifacts. I had no intention of ever watching the movie, but the underwater scenes at the beginning just sucked me in, and I was shocked to find myself absolutely loving it. The Titanic exhibition was at MSI in 2000 and 2002, so you see I have stupidly missed it not just once, but twice, in Chicago. Milwaukee is only about an hour and a half away, so this is obviously a sign that I definitely have to see it this time.

Indianapolis is about three hours away, and good things don’t seem to happen to me once I cross the state line into Indiana, but it could be worth the trip anyway this time to see Tutankhamun The Golden King and the Great Pharaohs at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis.

Unlike the Titanic exhibition, which I managed to miss totally and completely, I have seen Tutankhamun relics before. I did stupidly miss the current exhibition when it came to the Field Museum in 2006, but I saw the original Treasures of Tutankhamun exhibition, also at the Field Museum, in 1977. That was also probably the last time I willingly waited in a long line for hours, and wasn’t pissed off about it. I was also fortunate enough to get the opportunity to visit it again the following year on a vacation to Seattle. I understand that the gold death mask is no longer allowed out of Egypt and thus not part of the current tour, so I feel very lucky to have been able to see the original exhibition twice.

Again, the relative proximity of this museum is a sign that I must not screw up again!