More short and squatty

Sean and I recently saw Ratatouille, which we felt Pixar finally delivered what its dedicated fans have been waiting for (and, unfortunately, did not get in Cars). Thanks to Brad Byrd, who directed The Incredibles (a big fave in the Madden household) you can be sure to get the laughs you'd expect from his witty directing.

What stole the spotlight from the beginning was the traditional Pixar short, the brief animated spot right before the movie begins. You remember the old man playing chess and my personal favorite, the birds on a wire...all cute and funny, but it is nothing close to the hilarity of their most recent creation, Lifted.

I was in tears at the movie theater because of how insanely funny it is. Perhaps it's due to the inclusion of really, really short and squatty characters or perhaps I was just in the right mood. But I recommend you take a look for yourselves. I guarantee it's worth the $10 admission price.

Or, if you're cheap like Sean is at times, you can find it here. However, the quality of animation is completely lost so hopefully you'll still enjoy it.

There are 52 states, right?

This is probably a stretch, but I'd like to think I can name all 50 states. What I'm definitely sure of, however, is that I wouldn't be able to tell you where all of those states are on a map. For instance, New Hampshire. All of those small states just blur together for me and the southern states all seem to be the same shape and size. But then I came across Statetris, a tetris-like came that challenges you to drop all the states according to geographic location into this U.S. outline. There are three levels: easy, medium, and hard. Click on the link above and try it out. And let's be honest, we should all be able to do the "hard" level.

Hooray!

Sad but true

Yesterday at work, we had a bit of a lull in the afternoon. Patients were quiet, the alarms were quiet and the docs and nurses were all just kind of sitting around the nurses station. Somehow we got to talking about dogs. Well, puppies to be exact, googling picture after picture and melting ourselves with cute. Then I piped up and said, "I really like kittens." So off we went, another Google image search to find the cutest kitten possible. My friend, Jess, typed in 'kitten' and hit enter and the picture on this website is what came up first.

I leave it up to you, dear readers, to click on this link as it should be up to your discretion whether or not to indulge your curiosity. I'll just say this pic became the topic of conversation for the rest of the day. And if you're wondering what the technical term is for what you're about to see, one of our docs enlightened us by blurting out, "Holoprosencephaly!" Nerd.

Poor Porter

Porter had a rough day yesterday.

We had a play date with his brother, Addison (yes, his true litter mate) at Fort Funston, the massive doggie play place at the beach. We were there for no longer than 10 minutes when Porter launched into a violent sneezing frenzy. It looked painful and he didn't look like he was stopping anytime soon.

Addison's padre quickly looked our direction and said, "That doesn't look too good. It's probably a foxtail."

Oh the dreaded foxtail. They don't mention this in the doggie user manual when you adopt a pup, but apparently it's doggie cryptonite.

Wikipedia says, "...foxtails can become irreversibly lodged [and] can also enter the nostrils and ear canals of many mammals. In all these cases, the foxtail can physically enter the body. Muscular movements (or air flow, in the case of nostrils) can cause the foxtails to continue to burrow through soft tissues and organs, causing infection and physical disruption, which in some cases can result in death."

Death? Great. Not only was Porter on his way to dislocating his skull from the wicked sneezing fit, this lethal grass was working its way to who-knows-where.

A six hour vet visit and $450 later, Porter came back to us sleepy, shaven, definitely a bit loopy...but foxtail-free.

Back in SF

My apologies to my faithful readers out there for not having posted much more since the beginning of my Berlin adventure with Sean. We were just having too much fun and the following pictures can explain:

Because it's July and summer can be pretty hot and humid in Berlin and Prague, we felt in necessary to stay hydrated and sacrifice blogging for awhile. You understand, right?

But all in all, I can tell you that my time with Sean was incredible.

More stories to come...