Trail Rides

(Taken by Angela on her iPhone)

Lately we've discovered a whole new world of trails back up in Santiago Canyon. We ride through the golden scrub grass and skeletal trees to climb to the canyon ridge. After crossing a fallen barbed-wire fence there are miles of access roads.

Praise the Dog

I got a bird. In the traditional Female Stevens Family fashion, I acquired an animal without thinking of the consequences.

I can't help myself. Whenever any hapless critter comes within a galaxy reach of my fingertips, my ovaries send a direct message to my brain reading, "PUPPY BABY BIRDIE KITTY CUDDLE SNUGGLE PONY FEED CARE BABY ANIMAL NEED NEED NEED NEED NEED!"

Or something like that, anyway. It's genetic. I won't even go into mom and grandma, seeing as they were going into that bird store looking for a fourth canary.

So this is where I was, sitting in the bird shop, holding a tiny conure. Petting its tiny feathers. Watching it turn its tiny head up at me. Meeting eye to tiny eye.

... When an insistent voice of reason sat in my gut started whispering: you have roommates, you need money, it's gonna live for 30 years, what about school, you move a lot, life is too complicated ... pain and misery shall rain upon you ..... you will spend the rest of your days in a world without Johnny Depp movies or Starbucks Passion Tea or Michael Phelps' abs ...

That was when my ovaries kicked my voice of reason in the balls.

But, as it flailed away, the voice managed one last pained whisper to my reproductive organs before collapsing completely: you have ... you have ... a bird dog .......

Ah, yes, my ovaries replied, the dog. Yes, well ... well ... yes .... I'm sure ... I'm sure something will, you know, work out ..... awwwww look how cute it's nibbling my finger!

But, the truth is, I don't just have a bird dog. I don't even have The Bird Dog. I have a Brittany.

I have the Chase Anything That Moves Dog. Worst nightmare for anything smaller than a breadbox. She is The Warrioress, The Hunter, The Exterminator.

As a family friend once put it, she kind of reminds you of, you know,

a velociraptor.

So, naturally, I bought the bird. Meanwhile, my voice of reason was writhing somewhere near my toenails.

He's been around for about a week now. I named him Salsa Pissanya (because when we were running through potential names, at hearing the name Anya my grandma shouted, "PISSONYA!").

Most of the time when I get him out, I lock Aspen in the back room. To keep her from drowning in a pool of her own saliva.

If I do get him out with her around, I hold him to my chest in a death grip or keep him wrapped in a blanket and tell her "no no". She can't even really see him as she sits next to me and shakes.

But this morning, as I was holding him and talking to mom next to the slider, I did something utterly, supremely stupid. I relaxed one hand. I got distracted. And he got loose.

His wings are clipped, he couldn't go anywhere, really. He just sort of fluttered to the ground with a little thud where Aspen was sitting. She froze. He froze. I leaped toward him. But not before I noticed her looking from him, and then to me, then back again. She didn't move. She knew. The dog that has spent the past seven years of her life in a desperate attempt to catch one had a bird handed to her on a silver platter and she didn't move.

She wasn't shaking. She wasn't drooling (okay, maybe she was, but it was a smaller lake ) ...

As I straightened up, she shifted her gaze from me, to my mom, to the treat cupboard.

Salsa Pissanya

Stupid First World Conversations

Dooce made a list the other day of stupid first world conversations. I realized I had one to add ...


Mom: "Al, 'cause you speak Spanish, you've GOT to talk to the housekeeper."

Me: "What about?"

Mom: "She waxed the wood floors too well. We're slipping all over the place."

Conversations with Clay

Today in the car:

"Allison, wanna hear a joke?"
"Sure."
"Mychal's a dad."


"Clay, wanna hear another joke?"
"Yah."
"Dad's a grandpa."

Hehehehe ... It SO never gets old.

Mmmm cheese toes

... now belong to a tiny human being named Dominique Nicole.

I got the news in a car wash yesterday. My mother refused to tell me just to watch my reaction ... So I hit her on the arm and gave her a stare normally reserved by border collies for use on unusually stubborn cattle.

It's a good thing she gave in fast and cried "DOMINIQUE" or I would have been forced to nip her ankles.

Mykie Made a Shrimp

4 pounds 6 ounces.

Still named Baby.



My brother comes out of the operating room-- blue scrubs on the bottom, red polo, and those squared-off Clark Kent glasses.

"Where have you guys been?" He smirks. "You missed all the action!"

After we fling ourselves on him (okay, physically speaking, that was mostly me), he pulls out his cell phone pictures.

I imagine my brother watching an operation-- you know, that thing he's been doing for years at 10 pm on Discovery Health-- on his girlfriend. At this point, pesky med school degree aside, he could probably do the surgery himself. All the while narrating in a calm, metered voice for a squeamish audience. And then he could advise the hospital on what to do with Siamese triplet stone babies.

We have to wait for Baby to be stabilized before we can go in. Standing in the hallway, talking, taking pictures. This Is The Moment Before The Moment That We See The Baby.

Ashley is recovering. And, man, if I were her, after making a few good, solid demands to see my baby right now, I would request (calmly and politely) that they knock me out for a week. Also, a million bars of dark chocolate figure in there somewhere.

At the Natal Intensive Care Unit (eh, the nicky), we all mill about, wash our hands twice, and periodically get kicked out for being too many people in the room. Think of it this way. Baby, she is cheese. Really tasty cheese. And we are mice. On steroids.

When we get kicked out we are mice on steroids staring at the cheese through a window.

I leave you with my brother's favorite picture. The Stink-Eye:



Welcome to the world baby Baby.