Dirtshoe Blog

As I have mentioned in recent posts, we adopted a new puppy to keep Annie company. Her name is Mya and she has stolen my heart for sure. And, Nathan? Forget about it! He’s in love with her.

I have never adopted a dog from a shelter. However, we do consider Annie to be a rescue dog. Here’s why. Dog’s that grow up on a working ranch environment such as “hunting hogs” — as her brothers a sisters are doing right this very minute — well, their life expectancy isn’t too long. That’s just a fact. The other reason we consider Annie to be a rescue dog is that we are pretty sure that another pet owner would not have tolerated her — thus, she would have ended up in a shelter or worse. So, each day Nathan and I look at each other with eyes that are full of pain and suffering caused from extreme doggie misbehavior, we know that we are saving Annie’s life.

So, we decided to adopt a shelter dog this time. Let me just say that I will never again buy a dog and I will forever be a crusader to encourage those looking for a great pet to GO TO THE SHELTER! There are so many great puppies there. It’s also very inexpensive. Mya cost us $25 (it’s usually $50, but they often run specials) and our vet gave her a free check up since she was from the shelter. And, she was spayed!!

I try not to preach on this blog, but I do encourage you to check out your local shelter. Our shelter in Oklahoma City is open seven days a week (here’s the link) and they have every kind of dog (and cat) imaginable. I was on the hunt for a Border Collie or Heeler mix. I had my eye on a Red Heeler mix from the website and when we saw her, she was acting like Annie’s long-lost twin sister. I sure hope someone adopted her, but I knew that we couldn’t handle two Annie’s. We need balance. Just a few doggie-doors down from the Red Heeler, Nathan found a sweet little puppy who stood still, licked his hand and looked at him with big pleading eyes that seemed to say, “take me home.”

I have always been adamant that I would never own a Rottweiler or Pit Bull. No way! So, I was relieved to see that this puppy named Mya was a Boxer. She and Nathan headed into the play room and I went to talk to the lady up front. She told me there were four other rooms that we had not gone into. I went back to check on Nathan and Mya and they had fallen in love. So, I finished up the paperwork and we left with our new “Boxer” puppy who looks just like a Pit Bull. Yes, I was tricked. About three-quarters into things, the lady mentioned that she was a Pit Bull mix. By that time, we didn’t  even care.

Annie, true to character, acted like a complete jerk for several days. Now they are inseparable. They still fuss, but nothing too bad.

This is Annie complaining about Mya. She was not very happy at first.

The funny part is, we took Mya to the vet and he agrees. She’s not much of a Boxer. But, he does think she is Pit Bull and Border Collie. Either way, I will just think of her as a sweetheart because she is one of the sweetest dogs I’ve ever known. We love Annie, but sweet isn’t really an adjective that could be used to describe her. Mya has brought a little bit of balance to our world.

Here is a great article about why it’s good to adopt from the shelter.

But, this happy face is reason enough for me!

And, if anyone has any of those Cesar Millan dog training books or videos we are in the market for some .

It’s no secret to my close friends that I love Twitter. Recently I found that I can scroll back through all my Twitter pics. Here are a few of my favorites. My Iphone camera is the worst, but I still love to look at where we were and what we were doing.

I like to post pictures of delicious drinks I have.

Or, delicious drinks I may have in the future.

I’ve captured a few rare moments of Annie being nice and relaxed.

I often like to post headlines from my small hometown paper. You just can’t make this stuff up! I look forward to reading the headlines each week. If you read the text, you’ll see that he had some Crown Royal around noon.

And, when you get a chance to take a picture of pink cowboy boots, you gotta take it.

Occasionally, I post pictures of bands I see. I don’t know who most of these guys are, but I know that’s Dustin Welch on the end. Drew Smith is in the middle and he sang a song that said something about Elephants in the room that I loved. Plus, my friend Roy and I took a cab to this show in Austin and the cab driver got lost and we had to give him directions. All those memories from one blurry photo.

And Twitter is a great place to announce you have a new four-legged, sweetheart in the family.

If you follow me on here at all, you may have noticed that I have taken some time off from blogging. I’m not sure why, but I’m calling it a sabbatical. Let’s just say I was doing research. Actually, I’ve been trying to figure out how to go in a different direction on this here blog of mine, so I have been doing some research. You’ll be the first to know if I make any major changes.

And, to be honest, somewhere around July, it was so hot and dry in Oklahoma that I simply did not have the will to write. A few times I tried and the only thing that came out was venomous words about the heat. But hope springs eternal and it’s 75 degrees and raining tonight … and I think I can write again.

So, let’s catch up, shall we?

The summer was hot. Yes. I know I’ve already mentioned this.

Christi, Nathan’s mom, came to stay with us for a month or two while she relocated back to Oklahoma. I really enjoyed having her around though I’m certain that she was ready to move out on her own. Annie was not the perfect hostess. Plus, Nathan and I are quite messy. I must admit that I’m more messy than Nathan, but I’m including him because he’s in charge of the garage and it’s VERY messy.

Our garden burned up this summer.

Here’s a photo of just a sampling of what we harvested from our back yard last year.

Here’s about the sum total of our garden this year … nary a tomato.

Annie is bigger now. And, she’s still a handful. Though, if it’s just me and Nathan, she is totally tolerable most of the time. She is very bossy and is not easy to control around visitors, but she’s no longer chewing our fingers and arms off.

Nathan has been playing shows with Evin Brady. It’s great music and we’ve had a lot of fun and met lots of new people. It’s always interesting because they seem to play a wide range of venues. Some are quiet lounge-type places and some are pretty rowdy. Here’s a link to a video of them.

Here’s an outdoor gig that’s quite civilized.

Then, we went to Woody’s in Altus, Oklahoma and I’m not sure what happened.

We met some great folks — the bar owner and staff were a lot of fun. We also found out that Nathan’s first cousin is a drummer in a band that also plays this venue and they have one of his broken cymbals on the wall.

And, sometime around 3 a.m., Evin was invited to mix drinks for everyone.

There’s no really easy way to transition from one thing to another in this case.

Most recently, my Nanny had a stroke. She’s doing pretty well now, but watching her struggle to move, walk and talk has really been difficult. She’s still not able to live independently, but we are hopeful that she will again someday.

Here she is years ago working cattle.

And, here she is more recently …

Through it all, her sense of humor has prevailed. The first morning at the hospital in OKC (where she had been flown the night before) she told me this, “I can’t believe you guys have me in a hospital where none of the doctors and nurses even know what month it is or day it is.”

It took me a minute, but then I realized … she had a stroke … they are asking her basic questions to see if her memory is okay. Then she giggled. She has the keenest sense of humor I’ve ever known.

I’ve got some new recipes in the works and some guests lined up for some recipes too. So, I hope to see you all here now that the weather is a little better … does that make me a fair-weather blogger? Don’t answer that.

This weekend, my college roommates descended upon OKC for a long-overdue visit. There are four of us. However, Monica did not make it because of some prior commitment like a wedding anniversary or something. So, it was just me, Heather and Lisa. Monica started calling our group “The Chickens” way back when we were in college and it stuck.

I’m kicking myself because I didn’t take more pictures.

On Friday night Heather arrived at our house. She drove from Dallas. We were talking on the phone on her way up and I was giving her a hard time about driving here instead of flying. She said, “I flew the last time and you and Lisa made fun of me!”

I answered back with, “And now we are making fun of you for driving. Either way, we are making fun of you. Get used to it”

That’s just the kind of friends we are.

Lisa couldn’t join us until Saturday morning, so Nathan cooked dinner for Heather and I. He grilled steak, shrimp, and all sorts of vegetables. It was delish! He also roasted sliced plum tomatoes in the oven at 200 degrees for about eight hours. He used them to make a vinaigrette to dip our veggies into.

We ended up staying up until 3 a.m., and laughing until our sides hurt. The shrimp was also missing in my photos because we almost forgot to put them on the plate.

Then, Lisa arrived Saturday morning all sunny and cheerful to find two slightly-grumpy-from-too-much-wine-and-not -enough-sleep friends. We went to breakfast and then did a “house tour” which means we drove around and looked at pretty houses just like we did in back in college. And, we laughed and ate cookies. We may be older, but nothing much has changed. Lisa is the friendliest person I have ever had the pleasure of knowing. She meets and talks to almost everyone we see. It’s so fun to watch her win people over immediately.

We ended up going to dinner at a raw food restaurant that used to be called 105 Degrees. I guess it had an identity crisis and now the name is Matthew Kenney. Here is the website. It was one of the best meals I’ve had at a restaurant in a long time. This was the Classic Summer Tomato Lasagna. It was amazing. Sorry for the Iphone pic. I’m so timid about using my big camera in a restaurant.

We ordered too many dishes, but thankfully, Lisa had a Groupon — so we got a pretty good deal!

We also ate the Tiramisu so quickly that I didn’t even get a picture! Now, I’m obsessed with raw food and Nathan is just shaking his head.

After dinner, we took our box of wine and headed to one of my favorite places — The Blue Door.

It’s a great listening room for live music. They were screening a film about Red Dirt Music so we thought it would be a pretty good show. We got to see Oklahoma artist Greg Jacobs sing about needing a little rain — and had to smile at just how true it really is in Oklahoma right now. We also enjoyed listening to Lata Gouveia who was joined by Rocky Frisco (J. J. Cale band) and Dustin Pittsley from Tulsa. In the end, we watched a screening of the film, Red Dirt … Songs from the Dust. We really enjoyed it. Made us feel pretty proud to be Okies.

Here are Heather and Lisa during one of the breaks.

We stayed up too late again — and The Chickens got  up early this morning … and Heather headed to Dallas and Lisa made her  way back to Tulsa. We had a great visit.

Me, I’m sad the Chicken Reunion Weekend is over, but at least I have 100+ degree weather and a very mis-behaved dog to keep my mind off of the sadness.

I should mention that we spent a large part of the weekend saying, “Annie, get down!” We also laughed uncontrollably as we watched her spin out on the wood floors. Poor thing can’t get much traction when she’s excited. Nathan was our dog-handler this weekend and thankfully I can report no blood was shed.

Many of my pictures of Annie look like this:

She is airborne A LOT of the time.

She enjoys playing MOST of the time.

She loves her man ALL of the time.

And, I don’t blame her one bit.

Confession: I post dog photos when I’m too lazy to post a recipe.

Oh well.

One of the nicest things you can do for a salad is add some roasted pecans and grilled pears. I swear by it! It takes a simple salad to a new level and it looks pretty too!

You will fall in love.

And, since you love your salad and you already have the grill going … go ahead and top it with a grilled steak. All that salad and fruit underneath will make you feel a lot better about eating red meat. Trust me.