Pictures from my Phone & Weekly Distractions

Duncan got neutered today and he's sitting next to me completely and totally high. Like, out of his mind high. He's been staring at his bone for 35 minutes without moving or looking away. Also, he seems kind of mad at me. And his eyes look so sad that three angels just lost their wings.

Dropping him off at that place this morning was one of the most traumatic experiences of my life. And now I feel so bad for him that I can't look at him for very long because I start getting teary eyed. I keep wanting to say that today has been harder on me than it has been on him, but then I remember what it means to get neutered.

Duncan wins this one.

And now, your Pictures & Distractions:

People Who Say They Like Spicy Food Might Be Lying

Skylar is delusional when it comes to food.

He swears that he likes really spicy food. And maybe he does. But you wouldn't know it if you watched him try to eat it. Because when he does, he inevitably goes into shock and then spends the rest of the evening searching for effective home remedies and emergency medical care.

Look. I wish I liked spicy food, too. I've wanted to like it for a long time. This is mostly because I hate that I totally fit into this Utah stereotype of not being able to touch anything spicier than a banana.

I legit think people who can eat really spicy food and like it are better than me. That's not hyperbole. I actually think these people are better than me. When I'm out with friends and one of them is like "make that extra spicy" after I asked them to let me pepper it myself, in my head I'm like, "yup. You're going to be more successful than me. And you deserve it. And I'm a weak suckface who doesn't deserve happiness."

And maybe instead of working on trying to like spicy foods I should instead work on loving myself. But I don't even want to love myself as long as I insist on being a 32-year-old man who still buys baby food and cries when he accidentally eats zesty ranch.

Condo Clothes

Last weekend I decided to convert my body into a senior citizen. I did this the best way I know how: eleventy hundred hours of yard work.

Y'all. There are muscles that yard work requires of the human body that literally no other task also requires. The closest any physical activity has ever come to forcing the same kind of exertion out of the body as yard work does is probably Crossfit. But since all of those people are going to be in a coma by 40, it's really kind of a waste anyway.

I don't understand it. Look. I'm not an 18-year-old gymnast. I know that. I didn't even spell "gymnast" correctly on the first try. (I should have just left my initial spelling so you guys could all be like YOU GRAMMARED WRONG YOU IDIOT which is sort of my favorite thing about you. Well, that, and when Awesomesauciness yells at us for not being old. WRITE THE BOOK ALREADY. 1,200 pages of stream-of-conscious writing without punctuation is all I ask.)

The point is, I don't think that I'm the most physically-fit human being to ever live. But I'm not in bad shape either. I mean, I am an Ironman [flexes both biceps, kiss two fingers, and then holds a peace sign up to God].

Pictures from my Phone & Weekly Distractions

There's this wizard-looking man who has been wandering my neighborhood in recent weeks selling jewelry. Actually, I don't know if he's selling it. And I don't know if it's jewelry. He carries this really long stick and that has a bunch of necklaces and ornaments hanging from it. He has a long grey beard and he wears a cloak and although I've never spoken to him, I'm certain his name is Willow.

I've been watching him for a few weeks now, just thinking that he's a small-business owner trying to make it in this dog-eat-dog world. But then today it occurred to me that he may be an actual wizard and what if he's wandering my neighborhood putting curses on everyone and preparing to depart with the souls of our children.

I'm so so tired. Has anyone in the Salt Lake City Sugarhouse area seen this man or have I invented him?

And now, your Pictures & Distractions:

1,000 hours of yard work later, my new tree is planted and the raspberry bush has been cleaned out.

The Nanny

SINCE YOU ASKED, Duncan is doing fine.

I start a lot of conversations this way with people at work. Notice I said "start." As in, nobody said anything before I offer "since you asked" and then follow that up with scrolling through 300 of basically the exact same photo of a dog sleeping on a couch that is only a slightly lighter color than the dog, making it nearly impossible to make out the dog.

The point is, Mr. Duncan Doodle is doing fine. But y'all, he be driving me crazy the last few days.

I had gotten into the habit of bragging about how good of a sleeper he was. Pretty much from the moment I got him, he has slept through the night and just gotten up when I was ready. Some nights he would wake me up around 4:00 to go out and go potty real quick, but even then he would go right back to bed.

I had not expected this. I assumed when I got Mr. Doodle that I was basically not going to sleep for the next year. Because that's how Mr. Pants was. He would wake up at an ungodly hour every day and then relentlessly demand play time.

Pictures from my Phone & Weekly Distractions

Mr. Pants is sleeping over for a few days because Matt is going on a trip. So last night I had two dogs in my bed, which is obviously heavenly, and things were going smoothly until, right around 2:00, both of them sprung into the air like possessed demons and began howling as though our lives were about to be taken from us.

I jumped up in a panic and ran to the window, which I had left open because I do this when the weather is nice so I can tell my granola friends that I sometimes go camping. And creeping through my backyard was a raccoon that I swear to you was the size of a pony.

It was horrifying. I had never seen one in my neighborhood before. So obviously I spent the day today googling raccoons and now I know that there's a really good chance all of us are going to get rabies. So that sucks.

And now, your Pictures & Distractions:

Why I May Never Call The Gas Company Again

I opened a cupboard in the basement and smelled gas and my friends and family all told me that I needed to call the mayor himself to get this resolved right away because "responsibility" and "chance of dying" and "you have a puppy now" and "where are your pants."

So today I called the gas company, because gas. They descended upon my home twenty minutes later. Two of them. Two guys. One who appeared to just be starting puberty and another who swaggered so much walking up to the front door that it actually caused Earthquakes in Germany.

They joined the circus that was already happening, because Tim the Contractor and his two sidekicks were also in the basement hitting stuff with hammers and playing mariachi music so loudly that Salt Lake City is now technically considered part of Central America.

I wandered back and forth between the gas company people and the Tim the Contractor crew, holding Mr. Doodle the entire time because he now thinks that the basement is the same thing as a toilet and he finds a way to poop down there if I set him down even though he just pooped enough to cover the globe twice out in the backyard. But he can get away with it because:

Episode 14: Strangerville Live

Today is your lucky day. We are releasing our February Strangerville Live Show as Episode 14 of Strangerville.

We'll have details out to you in the coming weeks about our May show. In the meantime, please do go follow @strangervillepodcast on the Instas. It's the only Instagram account I've ever suggested to you that isn't completely filled with pictures of puppies. But it has a lot of pictures of Jolyn in it, so it's still got something to gawk at.

Thanks again to all of you who came out to our show, to all of you who have done an amazing job supporting Strangerville, and to all of you who occasionally tell me that it's not ok to joke about slapping other people's children at the grocery store.

I love you all. AND I DON'T EVEN SAY Y'ALL. Oh wait . . .

Pictures from my Phone & Weekly Distractions

I told some people at work today that I had a court hearing this morning at 9:00, which was true, but what I forgot to mention was that I was able to appear telephonically, which means that I could attend this wearing a t-shirt that I legit slept in. So when I had to run to a meeting literally 5 minutes after it ended, there was general confusion about my choices. And so I tried to explain to them that I attended the hearing telephonically "so that's why I'm still wearing the t-shirt I slept in last night." And then I remembered that actually I have worn a t-shirt to real court because it was an emergency once, but by the time I was finished explaining this, everyone was still focusing on the fact that I slept in the shirt I was still wearing and that I didn't bother to change out of it, regardless of whether or not I needed to go to court. So I made a very responsible choice and did NOT inform them that I had actually slept in this t-shirt for two nights in a row.

So maybe don't take anything I have to say today seriously.

And now, your Pictures & Distractions:

Skylar helped Mr. Doodle get his first puppuccinno from Starbucks. 

Today or Tomorrow or Soon

A couple of weeks ago we announced that we were going to do a raffle and gift a 1+1=furrrever Snuggie to one lucky person who was kind enough to leave Strangerville a review on what the kids are calling the iTunes. Well, last night Jolyn sent me the video she made, announcing the raffle winner.

Even if you didn't enter the raffle, you should just watch this video. Because Jolyn.

In other news, the bathroom renovation is taking one and a half full eternities. Y'all. I've been without a washer and dryer now for SIX. WEEKS. 

I Cleaned Out My Car

Yesterday I got up and I said to myself I said "Eli. You look great today. And you're finally going to clean out your car."

I've been putting it off for a while because my Tetanus shot wasn't up to date. But then last month I reached into the cup holder in the center console of my vehicle to fish out two quarters for something I don't really remember now and as I type this it seems weird that I needed quarters because it's 2017 and the last time I needed quarters was to do laundry in Palau where Daniel and I one time accidentally brought home a red pair of lacy women's underwear that we named "Jasmine."

And when I reach for the two quarters, and dug through the six inches of straw wrappers, stale french fries, receipts, and then a really dark layer that I don't care to revisit right now, I finally got to the coins. But I couldn't retrieve them because they were caked in something very hard that obviously used to be very soft but then solidified and now looked and felt like tree sap that had preserved insects containing dinosaur DNA that Chris Pratt will probably teach how to love one day.

I tried with all my might to get the two quarters out. I used sticks I found in the backseat. I rolled up a Runners World magazine from 2005 that I found under the driver's seat. I poured water into the cup holder from a nalgene bottle I took camping in September. I tried to break it up with one of the pens I was able to pry loose from it.

Pictures from my Phone & Weekly Distractions

I've been working from home most mornings lately because I feel bad leaving Mr. Doodle alone for an entire work day. Sometimes Matt or Skylar work from home and whenever they do, they gather all of the puppies in Salt Lake Valley and keep them for the day. But when this doesn't happen, the onus is on me because I'm a single parent now and I know exactly how Brianne feels in every way possible even if she won't admit it.

So this morning I was working from home. Mr. Doodle and I were doing our daily routine: I work at the kitchen table while he lies on a blanket by my feet, completely dead to the world, as though he didn't just sleep in a bed for ten straight hours. Then we get up and go for a walk and throw some sticks and do tickle bums which where I tickle his little bum and yell "tickle bums!" as he tries to run away from me trustmeitsnormal. And then we come back inside and I give him a treat.

Well this morning, after I gave him the treat, I heard him start hacking. I ran to him and instinctively put my hand under his mouth and caught all of his vomit. It didn't even gross me out at all. It was just what I needed to do. SO I GUESS I'M A MOM NOW.

And now, your Pictures & Distractions: