The Merands

my midwife and a few friends hold this opinion as well. you see, i have a new interest, and i believe that i have some things to say on the matter that i don’t often hear elsewhere. stay tuned.

…and it was too good for me not to re-post :)
it’s in response to this article: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Feministing/~3/4bajsU_GFtU/018179.html

-D

i understand that college degrees are important and that debt is a serious hardship for some people of my generation because of student loans. this is why i chose to attend an extremely cheap state school and therefore come out of undergrad with two degrees, debt-free thanks to a simple part-time job. i then attended the grad school that gave me a full ride, and i would not have gone at all if no school had given me funding. while i recognize that people who have the goal of being a doctor, for example, NEED to go to grad school before they can make headway into their carrers, i have a lot of trouble feeling sorry for people who are in mountains of debt for having chosen to attend expensive colleges for what one might call less salient reasons. please – and i mean this honestly – help me to better understand the need for our society’s collective sympathy and assistance for people with student loan debt. i feel like if more people prioritized their post-college financial health, then the more expensive schools would be forced to lower costs in order to attract students – at least somewhat. this is a case in which supply and demand really might matter, at least to a degree (no pun intended). trust me, i would definitely have preferred to attend nyu or sarah lawrence; i just didn’t want to be in debt forever. and my goals really have not been hindered as a result. i know that some people go into debt with their eyes wide open, but i can’t feel terribly sorry for people who don’t and then feel surprised later when their art history degrees are not paying off their debts.

Olive’s favorite toy right now is a ten-inch diameter plastic ball. There’s nothing special at all about this ball. It’s made of hard plastic that she can’t bite through, so really all she can do is push it around.

At least, that’s what it seems like to us humans. To Olive, this ball represents the apex of dog toy technology. She is completely mesmerized by the idea of a large object that she can’t chew, upon which a grip is near-impossible, and which is easy enough to roll around the back yard (or inside the house, as we found out one time. Her cries of joy (which sound remarkably like the noise she would make to bite the legs off an intruder) echo through the neighborhood, and she will do anything to please us in return for some time with the red ball.

Initially the game was a bit unfocused – I let her chase the ball around the yard, and would reprimand her (usually by having to physically pick her up and move her) if she chased the ball “out of bounds”. This was a little bit frustrating for both of us, so I’m glad that we’ve moved on from that stage. The stage we’re in now is much more sophisticated. All I need to say is “stop!” and she’ll immediately stop playing and look at me, and (usually) sit down. Also, if she runs the ball into my feet or up to the edge of the yard, she’ll (usually) stop. That’s what I’m talking about!

So the game is slightly different for her than it is for me. For her the rules are: play where you want in bounds, and listen to what Donald wants you to do. The rules for me are: be in the proper location so that instead of having to tug on her leash to keep her out of bounds, you can be “goalie” and catch the ball and kick it out of bounds. Everybody likes playing soccer better than tug-of-war with their dog, I think. So it’s actually fun for both of us, which is rewarding, because so few dog games can really be that way.

I just thought this was a cool picture:

Sara Walking Olive

There’s some new work brewin’ on the tandem. Here’s a preview of what we’re talking about:

Front View

Side View

For those of you who are bicycle-inclined, I’m swapping out the handlebars and stem because the current setup of drop bars and loooong stem puts me too far forward:

Wedding Tandem Ride

That and the VO Porteur Handlebars are sooooo rad. So the old setup was Nitto Technomic 130mm stem and Nitto drop bars (model unknown) with some unknown drop brake levers on there. The new setup is Nitto Technomic 100mm stem (from my road bike, which I swapped for an EVEN SHORTER one), VO Porteur Handlebars, and Tektro Inverse Brake Levers.

One thing to note for those of you thinking about using this particular combination: those brake levers really wedge tightly, so be careful or you’ll get what I got trying to pull them out:

Don't Ask

(Crossposted from the Blogger Blog.

For everybody hating on bike-riding in Dorchester, I just want to let you know that we (and a friend) spent all afternoon and 16 miles riding (slowly) up and down the coast of the ocean on BIKE PATHS in DORCHESTER. It was nice and you’d like it.

I moved over from the blogger blog entirely, so I’m going to cross-post the last couple of entries from that blog to keep everybody up-to-date.

I have a Rivendell Bike Tube (except unfortunately mine’s not the vegan version – I got it before they offered that one) on the front of my bike. I love this bag – it’s exactly like they say (paraphrased): “once you put it on you’ll never find a reason to take it off.” That’s exactly how it’s been for me. I put it on my bike when my bike was some different bike. The bag stayed on the handlebars when the handlebars moved to my new ride – a Raleigh Touring 18. I store my tools, my poncho, granola bars and trail mix, phone, wallet, keys, whatever needs storin’ and accessin’ in that bag. I also usually ride with panniers but I’ve found that the front bag is the one that I use because I love the easy accessibility.

I installed the bag over a year ago, and amazingly it only occurred to me last week that I could use something to keep my tools from rattling around, being unwieldy, getting things dirty and occasionally breaking shit in my bag. So I sat down at the ol’ Sailrite sewing machine that we have at work (for some reason) with some heavy-duty cloth and whipped out this marvel of engineering:

I think the bike strap holding it all together is the essence of “hey, like, i’m pretty great because not only did i like make this bag myself but i also like used this strap i had hanging around to hold it together and even the strap is bike-related because that’s the kind of guy i am. the kind of guy who makes things and has bike parts laying around.”

In retrospect, I might have designed in some things like loops to hold the strap, and maybe some velcro. Oh well! Maybe I’ll do that in a hundred years when this one wears out.

They say that a tired dog is a good dog, and an exhausted dog is a great dog. We have determined that they are correct in their estimations. Olive when tired sleeps on the floor, and wants only to be petted. Olive when energetic runs laps around the house, and jumps around like a fish on a hook when we take her for walks. Of all the copious advice that Sara and I have read/heard/seen, this is the most key. It’s much like I surmise it must be to have a child – sometimes (at least once a day) we’re frustrated beyond our capability to cope properly with it, and we still have to act like good parents because she’s constantly learning based on what WE do. But at the end of every day, we still end up liking her. It must be because she’s so good-looking.
Right now, she’s sleeping in her new favorite spot – under the daybed. She found out about it last night when we were watching a movie. We’re training her that furniture isn’t okay to be on, with the eventual goal that it is okay, but only if we invite her up. She gets it, so when it came time to watch Billy Elliot (our first movie in a while), she nestled in under our feet and found her new favorite spot. We think she likes it because it’s warm and the subwoofer is under there and it feels funny.
From the moment that we got home, she claimed the living room as her own, probably because it’s the only room with the carpet (aside from Fuji’s room, which is off-limits for now). All of her toys are neatly placed in a 6-foot area in the living room floor. Occasionally, she decides that my sandal needs to be there too. Just one sandal, and not the other, and she never chews on it or anything. She just neatly places it among her toys.
We had our first weekly training class at MPSCA Angell in JP. It looks like it’s going to be useful – we’ve learned many tricks about what to do to reinforce good behaviors in a dog. This is exceptionally important to us right now, because an unruly 60lb puppy is bad enough, but an unruly 120lb grown-up Mastador is not something that almost anybody can handle. We’re working on socialization right now – she’s pretty good around humans, but other dogs make her flip out entirely.
Also, the house is nice and we’re doing fine. That’s yer damned update.

I decided to work from home on Olive’s first day. I wanted to get a better idea of her temperament, to make sure that she knows that she’s got a family now, and to see if there are any house-training issues that need to be addressed.

When we adopted her from the MSPCA in Jamaica Plain, we read a behavioral analysis and a statement by the previous owner who had “surrendered” her. We learned from the owner’s statement that Olive never successfully house-trained, was unruly, and never “made a connection” with her owner. We learned from the MSPCA behavioral analysis that she was calm around humans in almost all respects, but “mouthy” and exuberant, on account of being a puppy.

A 60-pound puppy.

What we learned immediately (ie before we even decided to adopt her) was that the previous owner has a 90% chance of being full of shit. She bought Olive for $20 off the back of a truck in a Dunkin’ Donuts parking lot. She was probably surprised that a Mastador (!) (Mastiff/Lab mix) would get so large, and needed an excuse to get rid of her. According to the MSPCA people, people who are “surrendering” (aka dumping) animals usually make up any excuse other than “I don’t want her anymore”. Excuses like “we’re not making a connection”.

She was on drugs last night from being spayed in the morning, and let me say this: all puppies should be drugged on their first day at home. She was calm, and just let us lead her around and pet her and make her feel at home. She only threw up on the carpet once, also probably a result of the drugs.

Here’s her right after getting home:

Today she’s been great. We’ve been outside every hour or two as part of the stated goal of “no peeing in the house at all”. Um, starting this morning we’re doing quite well! We went for a long walk that started with taking Sara to the MBTA stop, and then over to Ronan Park, where the first Dorchester dog recreation space will be groundbreaking next weekend! We ran to the top and scoped out the view, then walked home. Olive is a little pull-ey on the leash, and can get VERY distracted by other people and especially other dogs, but she’s been very receptive for the most part to being around Sara and me.

She’s been sleeping on the couch for the rest of the day. She won’t let me out of her sight, though. If I get up and go to another room, she goes with me. Some “attachment issues” she’s got there…

Please welcome Olive Merand, the fifth Merand, and the fourth living (rest in peace, Vega).

We're still working on a middle name.