Vinnie

Shortly after moving into my new apartment, I finally fulfilled a dream I’ve had for years now, adopting a dog.  I had all these plans on what type of dog that I wanted.  I was dead set on getting a chocolate lab as they have great temperaments and have an activity level that suits me.  Well, all of that went out the door when my horoscope one day was a 9 and said that I should go ahead and splurge.  I knew this meant that I had to go and get a dog right away.

I went around to a few places and looked at the dogs they had.  Though, the dog will ultimately be mine, I couldn’t make a decision without having my roommate there.  So, I took her back to the places that I looked, the last one being the Dane County Humane Society.  There were so many dogs, and it was a busy day there with plenty of perspective adopters.  We skipped over a pair of dogs since it looked like they were both going to homes.  After looking through at a few, we went back to the two dogs, border collie mixes.

One was hiding in the back while the other was closer to the front of the cage.  The one closer to the front looked pretty scared but was also a bit excited.  So excited was he, that he pooped and peed just for us.  That was when we knew we had to look at him.

We got into the room and the volunteer brought him in.  Such a sweet dog.  Terrible name, Brey, pretty shy, but we could see the potential in him despite his timidness.  He was perfect.  Forget getting a purebred chocolate lab that my dad could take hunting, I want a border collie, regarded as the smartest dog breed.  I filled out all of the paperwork, put down a deposit to hold the little guy and the next day, we were back to get him.  We decided on the name, Vinnie for him.

Fast forward two months, and Vinnie is a completely different dog.  He was barely housetrained and now he knows that he needs to go out to go to the bathroom.  He would barely let us touch him, now he is so affectionate around us and is opening up to other people more and more every day.  Where as he used to run and hide behind us whenever a dog would come over to smell him or play, he now runs up to those same dogs and is the one agging them on to play.

Vinnie just started obedience trainging on his way to agility and other skill training.  Look for a lot more of Vinnie as times goes along.

Chicago from above

Today’s picture was taken while I was in Chicago for Pride. After checking out the parade for a while and ingesting some Pride, we made our way over to the Hancock Building to check out the city from above.

Now, I had heard that you can get up almost as high as the Observation Deck by simply going up to the lounge near the top. You get nearly as good a view and don’t have to pay, except for a moderately priced drink. Well, in the confusion of looking for a bathroom, we bought tickets to the observation deck anyway and headed up to the 94th floor. This was the highest up I had been in Chicago, and it was an amazing site to see.

The views were stunning. You can see Indiana, Michigan, Illinois and Wisconsin on a clear day. With the storms that rolled through that day, I don’t think we could see Wisconsin (it’s also the hardest to tell if you can see since you have to guess where Illinois ends and Wisconsin starts). What I noticed immediately about Chicago’s high rises is how many of them have rooftop pools.

A return to action

Well, it’s been a few months, but I’ve started a comeback with a new site and hopefully a reinvigoration of the spirit of Pixelated Imagination that was lost as my site was overrun with spam galore. I just started this up today, so I’m trying to figure everything out as it stands, so I’ll start off by saying, pardon the mess.

In the meantime, here’s a picture I took a few days ago at a friend’s going away party. Oh, the beauty of yoga, and the way that the florescent lights over the pool table drain all color from the skin….Child pose has never been so non-relaxing.

Jessi and Kyle in Child