From the category archives:

Just sad

You know what’s awesome?  When you’re having a crappy day and the doorbell rings and there’s a guy with a package that you need to sign for and you smile excitedly at him and you’re all “Awesome!  I love getting packages!” and he looks at you weird but you brush it off because Yay! Package! and then you sign for it and you start to reach out for the package and then you realize that the guy looks familiar and that’s because it’s the guy from the pet crematorium and he’s handing you a box full of your dead dog.  That’s awesome.  And by “awesome” I mean that I’m never answering the door again.

Comment of the day: I know exactly what you mean, because I got a package today too. Except mine was full of candy, not beloved cremated pet. If i was a unicorn, I would use my magical powers to turn Barnaby Jones’ remains into candy. I don’t know if you’d want to eat it though… ~ Jamie the Very Worst Missionary

Alternate comment of the day that is technically more of a “noise” than a “comment” but one that I want to remember for next time I have to send someone a sympathy card: [sad trombone] ~ Nanette

Sad trombone, indeed.

Updated:

Worst. Linkage. Ever.

Updated comment of the day: I couldn’t agree more about the inappropriate linkage. If cremating your dog isn’t going to work, then nothing will. ~ kyknoord

Bonus comment of the day because this post is very short and I need to pad it: This is what I like to do (besides black tar heroin) — Halloween time I buy one of those fake UPS or FedEx costumes and when either guy brings me a package I open the door in a rush and go “thanks I’ll take it from here!” and slam the door.  Will also get you a free pizza if you stock up on pizza company costumes. ~ Chris Illuminati

{ 128 comments }

First of all, thank you to everyone for being so supportive about Barnaby Jones.  You made me  cry (in a good way) and I needed to do that.  It’s almost Sunday and I’m supposed to be writing my weekly wrap-up but I’m just not myself right now so I’m going to skip it until next week.  Instead I’m going to paste the emails I exchanged with my sister today because she made me laugh out loud about something I thought I’d never be able to laugh about and I think we could all use a little bit of levity after the single most douche-canoe of a week ever.  Also? Yes, I’m totally phoning it in here.  Stop hassling me.  I’m grieving, you asshole.

Emails from my sister:

Lisa: Barnaby Jones Pickles dies and I have to find out through facebook?!?! What has this world come to??

Me: It is kind of ridiculous that you found out that my dog is dead through facebook.  If you’d been following me on twitter you’d have known days ago.  You are a terrible sister.

Lisa: I think that the foxes in your neighborhood were really drug dealers and got him hooked on heroin and then they gave him some bad stuff. All so they can get closer to the house and rob you blind.  I mean seriously, did you ever teach him “hugs not drugs”?  I bet not.  Better teach the cat how to bark. Now at least I won’t feel so bad when Granny kicks the bucket and I tell you over Facebook.

Me: Don’t be ridiculous.  You know I never read your facebook updates.

Lisa: Next time instead of a dog, get a pet pig.  That way when he overdoses you can have pork chops instead of having to dig a hole in the backyard. The hallucinations from all the heroin he shot up will just be like a bonus.  WAIT A MINUTE! You actually buried him yourself and aren’t injured?  No missing toes from a not-so-well aimed shovel?  No rattlesnake bites?  I’m not buying it.  Barnaby Jones isn’t even dead, is he? This is all a ploy so you can convince Victor to get you a pig isn’t it?  Well played. May I suggest the name ‘Dr. Reverse Kevorkian’, then he can “magically” bring BJP back from the grave.  You can call him RV, because within a year he will be the size of a mobile home.

Me: I broke two nails pulling up rocks to make a deep enough grave but the ground is 95% rock and I guess I didn’t dig deep enough because THOSE FUCKING CRACK FOXES DUG HIM UP.  Then I spent an hour crying and running around my yard with a machete trying to murder vultures.  This is how I spent my Saturday. I called mom and dad to ask what to do and daddy said to dig him back up myself (um…no) and mom said to just let the vultures eat him like some kinda fucked-up circle-of-life Tibetan Air Burial.  WTF? Mom is the worst Atheist ever.

Lisa: Now I can’t get The Lion King’s “Circle of Life” out of my head. Thanks for that.  You have a freezer you know, just push the Toaster Pastries to the side and toss him in there.  The next time Mom and Daddy come down they can take him home with them and Daddy can stuff him.  I think he would look super cute in a tiny leather jacket, riding a motorcycle.  Oh, or Zombie Barnaby Jones!  So there’s my vote.  Oh, and now, I totally need some Toaster Pastries.

Me: I just looked up “how to dispose of a corpse” on the internet so now I’m totally fucked if Victor turns up murdered.  Hey, did you know that quicklime doesn’t actually destroy a body?  Because I do.  Now.

I’ve called 10 animal removal/cremation places and none of them work over the weekend.  This is like when you can’t find a plumber on a Sunday, except worse because my dog is dead.

Lisa: Evidently you aren’t supposed to off your pet on the weekends.  Did you try taking him down to Frank’s Bait and Tacos?  I’m sure they would know what to do with him.  I’m only 1/2 way joking here.

Me: Oh! And the cat knocked over Hailey’s frog tank and killed them all.  So I’ve managed to kill 3 out of 5 pets in 24 hours.  That’s like the worst record ever.

Lisa: So did the fish die because the cat knocked over the tank and ate them, or did they just reverse drown?  They always say that deaths come in 3′s, so you should be good.

Me: I think they reverse drowned.  The cat’s not hungry, just…sort of evil.  I found one of the frogs my bathroom and it was desiccated but intact.  God knows where the other one is.  I’m sure the cat is probably saving it to put on Hailey’s pillow because this week just hasn’t been shitty enough.

PS.  Now I’ll never eat toaster pasteries again.  Awesome.

Lisa: More Toaster Pastries for meeeeeeeeeeee! Also, without the ‘Pickles’ at the end, his initials were BJ, and I just now figured that out.

me: This is all getting blogged.

Lisa: Cool. It’ll be kind of like an obituary, but with more frozen goodness.  (For the record, I’m referring to the Toaster Pastries, not Barnaby Jones.)

Me: Noted.

{ 150 comments }

I didn’t want to write this but it feels wrong not to since I share so much of my life here.  This isn’t a funny or entertaining post and you have my full permission to skip it.

Yesterday Barnaby Jones died.  I left him outside on his dog run when I went to pick up Hailey from daycare and when I came back he was dead.  His face was swollen and it looked like he’d had a seizure but there were no puncture wounds so we suspect he had an allergic reaction from a bee or wasp sting.  I hope he died quickly and painlessly and I’ll never forgive myself for not being here.  Victor is out of town so I put a movie on for Hailey so she wouldn’t notice and then I carried him down to the valley on our property and I buried him and cried until I couldn’t cry anymore.  Victor said I should have waited until he was back home so he could do it but I just needed it to be over.  We debated on the phone about what to tell Hailey and finally decided to tell her the truth.  We cried and slept together on the couch and every few hours she’d wake me up to ask me if it was just a bad dream.  Then she cried and asked if we could go buy another pug and call him Barnaby Jones and just pretend he never died.  I told her that maybe one day we could get another dog but the truth is that I can’t handle this again.  I will never own another dog.

This morning we went for a walk and I reminded Hailey that Barnaby was still with us in our hearts and was probably running around in dog heaven.  Then she looked up at the clouds and said quite seriously that whenever it rained it would probably be Barnaby Jones peeing.  Then she yelled “MOMMY!  I FELT A DROP!  I THINK BARNABY JONES JUST PEED ON ME!” and she smiled for the first time since it happened.  And I smiled too.  And it was good.

I'll miss your rabbity face.

PS.  If you have a pet, please go hug them extra tight today.

{ 563 comments }

Last week my family came down to visit and we took all the kids to the community pool.

me:  Have you swum to the end of the pool yet?

Lisa: “Swum?” What are you, some kinda hillbilly?

me:  You can totally say “swum”.  Swum is a word.  Swim, swam, swum.

Lisa:  Like bring, brang, brung?

me:  No. Like…climb, climbed…clumb?  Fuck.

mom:  Like ding, dang, dung.

me:  Stop helping.

Lisa:  I think mom just called you “dung”.

Mom: I’m not getting involved in this.

me:  Whatever.  Swum is totally a real word.  Who’s the writer in this damn family?

Then they both just looked at me with their eyebrows raised because apparently real writers don’t have fights about whether “swum” is a word but then as soon as we got back to the house I googled it and swum totally came up as a real word in the dictionary and I was just about to yell “HA!  I FUCKING TOLD YOU SO!” but then I stopped myself because I’m a gracious winner.  And also because the dictionary is a tremendous asshole:

I've just been insulted by the dictionary. Awesome.

Comment of the day: All of them.  For real.  You need to read them all.  As usual, my commenters are way funnier than me.  The bastards.

{ 200 comments }

So last week Victor installed Netflix on our Wii and I don’t understand how that works so I just stared at him blankly when he tried to explain it and the entire time I’m like “You are wasting money” but he did it anyway and now I can’t stop watching movies about serial killers.  And then this morning I woke up and Netflix is all “Hey, you like dark biographical documentaries…here’s a movie about cremation” and I was all “Well, okay, Netflix, if you say so” and then I totally did like it and Victor came in and was all “Aren’t you supposed to be working?” and I was like “No.  I’m taking a break because Netflix gave me an assignment.  You started this” and then he was all “IS THAT A DEAD BODY?!  Why are you watching that?  WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU?” and I was all “I happen to like ‘dark, intellectual biographical documentaries‘ so stop judging me” and he just stared at me and so I flipped back to the menu to show him that I wasn’t just making this shit up and he was all “It doesn’t actually say ‘intellectual’ anywhere” and I was all “Well, it’s implied” and then Victor flipped through the other “I bet you’d like this” movie suggestions and all the suggestions were about serial killers and Jesus and he was like “Really? You are going to get the cops called on us” and I’m all “How did the hell did Jesus get in there?” and what’s really unsettling is that I HAVE NO IDEA HOW JESUS GOT IN THERE.  I don’t know if it’s a sign from God or if the Netflix people trying to convert us.  Either way it feels kind of inappropriate and a little pushy.

PS.  Oh.  Wait.  Turns out Netflix thinks I need Jesus because Hailey keeps watching these vaguely Christian Veggie-Tale movies.  Awesome. Netflix is sending The Passion of the Christ to my 5-year-old.

PPS.  Okay, true story?  Netflix was just like “Hey, you know what you should watch?  Grey Gardens. Here it is.  I got it for you” and I was all “OH MY GOD, I LOVE GREY GARDENS” and then Victor was all “Grey what?  It’s 2:00 in the afternoon.  Why are you still in bed?

Netflix officially understands me more than my husband.

{ 144 comments }