What the f@#k is a "Puggle"?

When we walked past his kennel at the humane society, I was surprised that Jenny didn't stop. There was an adorable mixed breed dog with floppy ears and a curly tail and she breezed right by. She stopped at the end of the row and asked if i liked any of them. I pointed to the little brown dog and she walked back to his cage. She said, "He's cute. He's actually really cute... wow he's really mellow too..."

And that was that.

We asked to get him out to pet him and see what his personality was like. He was shy, but friendly. Most importantly, he wasn't barking and running in circles like a psycho (i.e. his neighbors in the kennel). We were informed that he had just come in and no one had put a hold on him yet. We were first on the list. The humane society couldn't release him for 72 more hours in case his owners came back for him. The likelihood of this was low as we were told his owners abandoned him at a train station because they couldn't bring him on the train. After 2 days of waiting, some of us (pointing at Jenny) started getting extremely anxious that they would come back from their trip and reclaim him. They didn't and we took him home on Friday night.

He's a 1 year old Pug / Beagle mix. We had mentioned his breed mix to a couple of people and they they immediately replied, “Oh, he's a Puggle.”. A what? “A Puggle.”. What the f**k is a Puggle?

Apparently, we were the only two people on the planet that didn't know that the “Puggle” is the most popular dog in the world right now. We've been told that you can't find one for less than $800. That's eight hundred dollars. When I learned this, I immediately thought two things,

1. Who pays $800 for a f@#king mutt?!?
2. Who leaves that same $800 mutt at the train station?!?

Here in lies the rub; we have a dog that everybody recognizes as an extremely expensive and rare breed. Whenever we take him out, at least 3 people scream, “OMG A PUGGLE!” and race over to pet him. The problem then is trying to shoehorn the fact that we rescued him from the humane society into the conversation. I guess it doesn't matter because anybody that recognizes a “puggle” usually wouldn't care how we got him.

So... we have a new puppy. And apparently, he's a puggle.

Sushi and Rollercoasters

By reading that title, I bet you think i'm going to write about me booting up spicy tuna rolls on the Giant Dipper. Close.

The weekend started out with plans to cash in a $50 gift certificate to Roy's Hawaiian Fusion restaurant in the UTC. The gift card was from the owner of Pee Pants (see below) for letting her turn our apartment into a urine sponge over the Holidays. The reason it's taken us so long to cash it in is because;

A. The restaurant is about 30 minutes away. That doesn't seem far, but if we can't ride our bikes there, it's too far.

B. It's way more upscale than places we normally go (Snooty? Snotty). Its a safe bet that I was the only one in there wearing Spiderman underwear.

C. Still a little bitter about getting a $50 gift card for mopping up piss for 2 weeks.

The wait for a table was about 45 min. We asked about the Sushi Bar and the wait was reduced to about 25min. By the time we got or spots at the bar, we were famished. The kitchen was open in front of us and buzzing with activity. We're big fans of Top Chef, so we immediately began studying the hierarchy of the chefs. After a few minutes, one of the sushi chefs handed two bowls of edamame over the glass partition. We grabbed the bowls and devoured the little pea pods. I don't think i've ever actually finished a bowl of edamame, but this was no time to be wasting food.

At this point we'd been sitting there for at least 35 minutes with nary a greeting from a server. Aside from the edamame, the only person who seemed to notice we were there was the water girl. Clearly something was awry. Eventually, a frazzled looking waitress asked if we'd been helped. Our response elicited a mumbled, "yeah... there was a communication...um... break...what can I get for you?". Having both been servers, we could relate and all was forgiven. We ordered drinks and continued to wait. And wait. Annnd wait. The server came by about 20 min later to take our food order, assuring our drinks were on their way. And we wait. Eventually, the water girl paused and asked us if we wanted some dinner rolls. She was met with a resounding and harmonized, "YES!" She returned a few minutes later with one roll on a plate and four big balls of butter. She explained that was the last roll, but there's more in the oven. Normally, I would have let Jenny have it and just enjoyed my drink, but I was about to start eating the edamame skins and had no drink. The roll was snatched off the plate, ripped in half and inhaled. The fact that she brought more butter than roll was not called into question as we hoped the extra calories would keep us alive until more food arrived.

After what seemed like a full work week, our food, along with our first round of drinks showed up. The food was good, although it could have been pan-seared gopher nuts and we would have wolfed it down just the same. At some point during the feeding, the water girl returned with a second, solitary roll. I think we managed a laugh and thanked her for making good on her promise to eventually bring a second roll.

So that was sushi at Roys. Two hours and $70 on an appetizer and a couple drinks ...oh, and the two rolls.


The next day we rode our bikes to Mission Beach. After a of couple mimosas, Jenny agreed to ride the roller coaster, much to my delight. The video below depicts the ride, but it's important you know why she's laughing.

Moments before I began filming, we climbed into the coaster car and pulled the safety bar down. All of the sudden the bar plunges into my stomach and begins wrenching down harder and harder. I screamed at her, "Stop!! why are you doing this??". She looked at me confused and then at the seat behind me. She immediately burst into laughter. Apparently, the safety bars are connected and the kid behind me had his feet up against the back of my seat and was yanking as hard as he could to get the bar down to his waist. By the time he got the bar locked down as far as he could, i had no feeling in my legs and I couldn't breathe. One of the operators saw my distress and ran over. "Sir, are you ok??" At this point, Jenny's laughing too hard to explain what's happening, so I croaked out, "That depends... how long is this ride?". He said, "uh, bout a minute." I forced a smile on my beet red face and gave him the thumbs up.