child rearing

Six Months of Molly (Finally Throwing a Bone to the Non-Football Readers)

Posted on by Ross Gariepy

[Editor’s Note: To my non-football fan readers, I realize there have been eight consecutive football-related blog posts over the past three weeks and not a single non-football post. I’m not going to say I’m sorry because I’m really not. I guess I’ll just say “I warned you.” Right now there are only four things I do with my life on a daily basis: watch/read about football, watch a ton of TV, do my school work and take care of my dog. I will probably never write about my school work because it’s just as boring as it sounds. That leaves three topics of expertise, and obviously one of them has been dominating the blog. But today for all the non-football fans out there, I’m giving you a dog post. And if you don’t like football or dogs, then you should probably never click on this blog again.]

So Molly probably turned six months old today! (probably because the insane woman we adopted her from probably pulled a birthdate out of her ass just because we were asking)

In dog years, that means Molly is about three-and-a-half years old. So if she was human, she’d be watching a lot of cartoons, starting to read Dr. Seuss books, probably playing with dolls (or more likely action figures of Boston athletes) and talking a lot (honestly, I have no idea what a three-year-old human does all day long…school? sleeping and eating just like an infant? no idea whatsoever). But she’s not a human. And no matter how many times I think it’s about to happen, she can’t talk to us. So we’re forced to guess what she actually likes and what she’s thinking at any given moment. Her daily routine goes something like this: wake up at 8AM, go out to the bathroom, mill around the apartment looking for a toy to play with for about 30 minutes, eat breakfast, sleep for at least two hours immediately after breakfast, go for a 30-minute walk, annoy me for two hours from about 12PM to 2PM, sleep in the crate because I want her out of my way, play time at the dog park from 3:30PM to 5PM, sleep from whenever we get home from the dog park until she hears us pouring her dinner into her bowl, outside again for the bathroom, 30 minute hyper mode where she almost runs through our sliding glass door, fall asleep by 10PM, sleep for 10 hours.

Sounds simple, easy and predictable right? But there’s so much more going on every day, so let’s take you through only the most interesting parts of Molly at the six month mark:

-Maybe the most interesting thing is her size. When I posted a status update on Molly after we had her for one month, she was 36lbs. That was just over two months ago. She now weighs an alarming 66lbs. At her current growth rate of 15lbs per month, she’ll be over 200lbs by next July. She’ll also be about seven feet tall.

-In the first blog post about us adopting Molly, I joked about the number of times we had wanted to take her to the vet for every little thing that seemed wrong (she didn’t eat all her food, her poop was weird, she looked at me funny). Except it really wasn’t a joke. Now the pendulum’s swung the other way, and it would probably take a bunch of things happening at once for us to be alarmed. She can throw up all she wants now, but I’m not springing into action unless she’s vomiting, breathing funny, walking with a significant limp and bleeding out of her eyes all at once.

-The thing I’m most confused about with Molly has to do with her ability to sleep through some noises but not others. For example, we took her camping for the first time last weekend, and we timed it just perfectly to have to sleep in a tent for two straight nights during torrential downpours. Now you’d think a puppy who’s never experienced camping, sleeping in a tent or even rain for that matter would probably wake up throughout the night and wonder what the hell was going on around her. There were moments when the wind was blowing so hard that our tent was actually starting to cave in on certain sides. And yet this puppy never once woke up during any of it. But then on the other side of the coin, let’s say she’s taking a nap on the couch, and I’m in the kitchen 30 feet away. If I so much as touch one of her bags of treats and it makes a crinkling sound, her head pops up, her ears get erect and she’s immediately locked in on my every movement. The ability to listen for something food-related while she sleeps is just remarkable to me.

-Like I said earlier, since she can’t communicate with words we can only guess her favorite and least favorite things in life. After this past weekend, I’m willing to bet her favorite discovery in life so far is mud:

-And though we don’t have a picture to show for it, I’m certain her least favorite thing in life is going outside to the bathroom at night after she’s already been asleep for a while. If she falls asleep at 9PM and we don’t go to bed until 11, we’ll take her out right before we go to bed. It’s not just that she’s reluctant to go downstairs at this time, it’s that she literally tries to hide in every “safe spot” of the apartment as soon as she sees one of us get the leash ready…behind the couch, on the couch, under the table, in our bedroom, on our bed and even in her crate. She will try out every one of those spots in rapid succession in the hopes that either we won’t find her or that we’ll understand just how badly she doesn’t wanna go anywhere at that particular moment.

-As an unemployed writer raising a dog, you can bet that I’ve been trying to think of different dog-related money-generating schemes since we got Molly. I briefly thought about turning her into a show dog or breeding her, but those options seemed like more work than I was willing to put in. With the amount of people, particularly women, who stop me on the streets to pet Molly and say how cute she is, I thought about starting a service where I rent Molly out by the hour to guys who wanted a conversation starter with random women. But I quickly realized I’d be single the moment Julie found out about it. But Julie’s actually the one who turned me on to my best money-generating idea yet: Black Market Poop Bags (or “BM Bags” for short). Our apartment complex provides free bags at all the exits for dog poop. Usually I grab about 15 at a time and stuff them into my pockets so we never run into a situation where we actually have to pay for these. The other day Julie called me out on being a Poop Bag Hoarder, and I couldn’t agree with her more. So why not capitalize on it? A quick google search shows me that a roll of 400 bags sells for about $40 (10 cents per bag). But I could come in and undercut even the best prices because the raw materials, labor and manufacturing cost me exactly $0.00. My only expenses would be the time it takes me to put all the bags into a larger packaging bag, the cost of the actual packaging bag (though I’m sure I could find a way to just steal a bunch of grocery bags or something), and shipping. What could possibly stop Ross’s BM Bags from being a hit? As far as the legality of it all, I dunno, but I’ll be spending time over Christmas with an accountant and a lawyer who know how to make these things work.

-On a serious note, you remember the “octagon” that we use when Molly’s really acting up? That playpen/gate device we put her in until she calms down? By some act of god, we don’t have to use it anymore. We haven’t used it in probably five or six weeks because suddenly Molly doesn’t go through those terrible behavior moments anymore. What’s our secret? We bring Molly to a dog park almost every day and let her get her ass kicked by a bunch of big, aggressive dogs. We realized if Molly spends one hour a day literally running and fighting for her life, she’s much more likely to chill out at home.

-And finally, I’d like to share something about parenting that I never understood until now: The second and third children always turn out better than the first because of the guinea pig factor. I know the next time we get a dog, whether it’s one year or 12 years from now, we will be better prepared to raise a dog and teach it right from wrong. This is not unlike parents raising a human child…that first kid is always the guinea pig, always the child that causes parents to say, “Well, we fucked that up, but now we know for the next kid how to do it.” The first kid is an experiment, and if he happens to grow up and doesn’t become a serial killer, that’s just a bonus. Kids two, three and beyond are where your perfect parenting techniques really shine.

On that note, I need to run…gotta get Molly back to the shelter so we can get going with dog number two.

Life Lessons in San Francisco: Pie Shakes are Good, Babies are Difficult, Humping Can be Effective

Posted on by Ross Gariepy

Here’s a random list of things I learned over my 53 hours in San Francisco last weekend:

1). You can always count on your friends to give great advice when you’re having a major dilemma. Here’s the problem I approached my friends with on Friday night as we were crushing beers: Recently at the local dog park, our female dog has been approached and mounted by some male dogs. It gets to the point where the male dog’s red rocket is definitely alert and ready to go, but there hasn’t been any penetration yet. Sometimes the male dog’s owner has been quick to correct his dog, and sometimes the owner isn’t paying much attention so no action is taken. When I ran this scenario by my friends, there was an immediate consensus: next time a male dog is trying to hump Molly and the owner just sits by watching, I should slowly inch closer and closer to the owner until I’m close enough to hump his leg. And then, if the person still doesn’t get uncomfortable and start to pay attention to the situation, I’m supposed to start humping his leg and asking him “if he likes that” as I hump over and over until he gets it. I’m sure this won’t get me and my dog ostracized from the park.

2). Pies taste good, milkshakes taste great. Pie Shakes may be the world’s greatest food combination invention. A place called Chile Pies (& Ice Cream) in San Francisco makes homemade pies, and one of the menu options is for them to put a slice of pie into a blender with milkshake ingredients and make a pie shake. Just like it sounds. And because this is the smartest food operation going, they give you a straw that’s thick enough to allow you to suck up chunks of pie crust. Priority one for me when I returned to LA on Monday was doing a google search for “Pie Shakes in Los Angeles.”

3). In THIS POST a while back I discussed how raising a puppy is harder than raising a baby. I’m now willing to admit in some instances I may be wrong. For example, when I want to watch 10 straight hours of football on Sunday, I simply leave the dog in her crate for a few hours at a time, then take her for a super-quick walk so she can go to the bathroom, and then I feed her a couple times by putting food into a bowl and leaving it for her. As I got to experience this past Sunday, a baby can be a bit more complicated: During that 10-hour football-watching period, you may have to change a baby’s diaper four or five times; you probably have to put more effort into feeding it than just leaving food on the ground and letting it eat when it’s hungry. And you probably have to deal with a nap gone poorly where the baby is screaming bloody murder in its crib for 45 minutes. If I need Molly to sleep, I toss her in the crate and she sleeps purely out of boredom. Easy peasy.

4). Drinking heavily two days in a row used to be as easy as this: Drink heavily until I pass out on night one, then wake up and drink heavily until I pass out on night two. Now if I wanna binge, I have to make sure I’m equipped with Advil, Tums, a toilet to puke in and an updated will. Life’s so complicated these days.

5). When you’re at an airport bar watching football & baseball, and you’re surrounded by all guys except for one woman, do NOT be the guy to acknowledge that woman when she awkwardly says to no one in particular, “This is so weird that we’re all sitting here in silence not talking to one another.” I should have been as much of a dick as the guy to her left and turned my chair to face away from her. Unfortunately I took the bait and got stuck in a very strange conversation. It’s a learning experience that taught me to always have headphones in my ears even if I’m not listening to anything.

6). I’m mature enough at this point to consider washing my friend’s bedsheets after I stay in his bed for two nights without his knowledge. But only mature enough to consider it, not actually do it.

7). Now that I’m a writer-in-training, there are plenty of people who want to help me generate story ideas. Over the weekend, these ideas ranged from a blatant rip off of Inception called Perception to a story about me staging my own disappearance on an Alaskan cruise and then blogging from a mystery location. With helpful ideas like that, I can’t believe I’m not already a famous writer.

Expanding Our Family: First There Was The Dog, Now Announcing Plans for Our First Child*

Posted on by Ross Gariepy

*I should make it clear that my girlfriend is absolutely not on board with this plan, yet.

Having spent the past two months raising a baby dog (a “puppy” as they call it in the canine industry) and starting to understand what parents have to deal with when it comes to raising a human baby, it would be completely natural for me to say I never want to have kids. How many men in their 20’s don’t daydream of a life without kids? That dream consists of a great social life where I can go out any night of the week and party, or I can take whatever vacation I want for however long I want. It consists of having time to myself, never spending a penny on diapers, tuition or bail, and never having a single Sunday of football-watching disrupted by a fussy baby or by having to take a kid to his soccer game (or God forbid, her ballet class).

I admit it’s pretty harsh and unrealistic to say I never want kids. But how can I meet myself halfway on this one? Well after some serious soul-searching, I finally figured out the perfect crime. When I’m finally ready for a kid, I will adopt a 17-year-old boy.

This plan will satisfy the need to have a child (my eventual need and my girlfriend’s eventual need, which is a long ways away), but allows me to basically continue with life uninterrupted.

Think about it. I get to experience the joy of having my own son, building a family, and watching him grow up (for a year at least, until he’s off to college). But I won’t ever have to change a diaper, explain to a heartbroken kid that Santa Claus isn’t real or talk to a child about masturbation. Better yet, I won’t even have to drive the little shit anywhere since he’ll come fully equipped with a license and (hopefully) his own car. Actually, it sounds like I just found my new designated driver.

This isn’t just a selfish proposition for my advantage. I’m completely unfit to raise a baby that is anywhere between newborn and 13 years old. I don’t remember what it’s like to be in that age range, and I have no idea what that age of human needs to survive. But a teenager? That’s right in my wheelhouse.

Here are my only concerns with this plan:

-Are there even any children that age available for adoption?

-Let’s say I wan this to happen in three years…would someone allow a 32-year-old unemployed writer to adopt a 17-year-old?

-One of the main attractions of having a kid is the chance that he grows up to be super successful in business, athletics, politics or terrorism. When my 17-year-old adopted kid becomes ultra succesful, will he feel enough of a family connection to give me a cut of his success? Should I go with a 14-year-old instead so I have more time to build that relationship?

-Is it gonna be weird if I’m pushing my 17-year-old around in a stroller in public places to try to attract hot women (as other men obviously do with their infants)?

-Will I be fit to raise this teenager by myself when my girlfriend inevitably leaves me after she reads about this plan for the first time?

Why Babies are Easier Than Puppies: Supplement to the Puppy Adoption Blog

Posted on by Ross Gariepy

In my original post about Julie and I adopting a puppy, I completely forgot an entire section I wanted to write. It’s a list of reasons why raising a newborn baby must be easier than raising a puppy. I must have gotten distracted when my puppy started gnawing on my computer, my wine glass and five of my books all at the same time.

Here’s an incomplete list of those reasons:

1). A baby can’t gnaw on anything, let alone a computer, wine glass and stack of books.

2). Wherever you put a baby down, it fucking stays there.

3). When you feed a baby, I assume he doesn’t take his mother’s nipple by his teeth and start squirting milk all around the room (as our beloved Molly likes to do with her water dish and sometimes her food).

4). A baby poops and pees in a diaper, and only in a diaper (I’m thinking my brother and sister-in-law haven’t yet had to clean shit or piss off of their carpets or patio from my nephew’s BMs).

5). I doubt a baby ever transforms into “deranged wild animal mode” and tries to rip out the jugular of its parents.

6). If you’re cleaning a baby because they have a dirty diaper, I don’t think the baby is gonna grab the diaper in his mouth and start marching it around the house for everyone to see…while also trying to eat his own feces.

7). There’s no way a four-month-old baby could crash through a three-foot metal gate, jump up and over a couch and sprint into your bedroom during the seven seconds you turned your back to look through the fridge.

8). Question: Before taking a baby on a car ride, do you have to A) trick her into a crate with treats, peanut butter and a plethora of toys, or B) physically shove her into a crate and try to shut the door before she escapes? No? Didn’t think so.

9). Let’s say you were to leave your baby home alone for a couple hours (which most parenting books highly recommend), and that was thing that upset her most in her tiny little world. If she were to cry for the entire two hours, would your neighbors five houses down be able to hear it? No again?

And it’s puppy difficulties over baby difficulties in a landslide!!