It’s Sunday morning and I am red-eyed and bleary. My darling hubs was a tad excited last night when his home team, the Oilers, delivered the death knell to the Ducks. As a hockey wife, this means I have at least four more game nights to enjoy my foot rubs and Cheetos…

My new baby, Nixon, is a darling. He hasn’t made a peep. He has the worst puppy breath and man, does his flatulence stink. I have spent the last 24 hours stooped over, kissing, petting and wiping up pee. And let’s not forget the little surprises he likes to leave beside my husband’s side of the bed. But it is official, I am converted. I am a dog lover. I’m on the look out for a puppy purse so I may pretend to be Paris. (Minus the millions and the hair weave.)

So I leave you this ditty. As I am in a particularly festive mood, think of it as my present to you. No refunds. No returns!

Enjoy!

A panda walks into a restaurant, sits down and orders a sandwich. He eats the sandwich, pulls out a gun and shoots the waiter dead. As the panda stands up to go, the manager shouts, “Hey! Where are you going? You just shot my waiter and you didn’t pay for your sandwich!”

The panda yells back at the manager, “Hey man, I’m a PANDA! Look it up!”

The manager opens his dictionary and sees the following definition for panda: “A tree dwelling marsupial of Asian origin, characterized by distinct black and white coloring. Eats shoots and leaves.”

Just a quick post this morning, as I am off to play in the dirt. But before I make my way to the greenhouse, I have to stop and go to the elementary school. My son, Frac, is receiving an award. Whoo hoo! Before you get all excited for him, dear internet, there is something you should know. This school is the type of morale-boosting school which rewards every child at some point in the school year. They reward creativity, punctuality and good behaviour. The child gets called up in front of the entire school audience (students, parents and the odd vagrant) and praised for their good deed. They get to shake hands with the principal and then receive a piece of paper, referred to as a commendation.

As I sit and watch other children receive their praise for various deeds of scholarly improvement, I will hold my breath with anticipation and trepidation, knowing that this in now my only son, a representative of his family. He is the reflection the small town see’s on my ability to parent and cope. Nothing like a little pressure on an eight year old.

Last year he was rewarded for not visiting the principal’s office for three days in a row. Victory! It was a proud moment for me. The year before he was rewarded for finally learning to sit quietly in the library. Do you notice a theme? So I am curious to see what sort of improvement my boy has made this year. Maybe he finally learned to stop chasing the girls and hiding their shoes.

I’m so proud of my boy. He’s best friends with the principal, he knows proper library etiquette and he’s a ladies man, through and through. Just like his daddy.

Things are looking up around here. I have the ability to flush the toilet and start my car. I now sleep with my keys under my pillow and know where my water line is located. See? I have learned something these past few days. Tomorrow night I pick up my pooch. And I have to tell you, the puppy is coming at just the right time. He’s gonna take some of the heat off my dear hubs.

But naming this pooch has been more difficult than naming any of my three kids. With my daughter, I knew I wanted something unique. Something nobody would have. So I gave her a beautiful moniker. And now that she is school aged I have discovered I wasn’t nearly as clever as I thought. There are four of her name in her grade alone. I do believe there are over a dozen with the same name in the school. With only 200 kids in this school. Yes, I am so clever…

I learned with my son. I gave him a name no one had. Except for a character on a now defunct police show. Played by a handsome blonde man. I would tell you but then I’d have to kill you. For this handsome blonde man is really famous and the show was named after his character. But his name has served my son well. There are no duplicates and eight years later no one asks me if I named him after that damn show. Which, by the way, I didn’t. I found it in a name book. No, no, I’m not defensive about this…

My third child, my angel boy, we decided to name after our grandparents. Poor thing. We stuck him with a Norwegian and a Swedish name, both of which were unusual and hard to pronounce. No one could say, spell or understand his name. But it was unique. I’m sure if we lived in Norway however, he would have fit right in. If we had known what was the matter with our son we probably would have just named him Jason or Tom. Something easy. But, like the boy named Sue, if it didn’t kill him, it would make him strong, right??

But my dog, my dog is a different story. The pressure is on for me to give this dog an appropriate yet unique name. Thank you for all your help, dear internet. I narrowed the list down to five: Finnigan (too many syllables), Hoss (my hub’s favorite), Simon (the front-runner), Cletus (my favorite but apparently sounds too much like clitoris. Dirty minded people.) and Otis (the kids loved it.)

Picture me standing outside in my yard yelling out these names. Calling my imaginary dog. Good thing I live out in the sticks. And in the end, none of the five on the short list made the cut. I went a different route.

I went the way of Watergate.

I’ll introduce you to my pup Saturday morning. After the hubs and kids meet little Nixon.