On Sunday afternoon, I took Martha to the dog park and she had to wade into the lake four times because it was just too hot to be running around dry. Well, too hot for her part-chow self. She just doesn’t take heat very well.
Then the front came in on Sunday night and now it’s in the fifties. Last night, we let her out and she just wanted to run around for hours.
I have a cold-weather dog. That’s lucky for me, because I am a cold-weather person.
My skin, on the other hand, is taking its cue from the changing seasons and going apeshit on me. It’s a huge upswing in oily skin that doesn’t really seem to occur during the other times of the year. I had a dermatologist at Johns Hopkins University Hospital tell me to use hand sanitizer gel to cut down on the oil and kill off any acne-causing bacteria, so I have a container on my desk at work of knockoff unscented Purell. It does help a lot, but I’m sure it works for me because I don’t wear makeup.
My new haircut is very nice and I still like it a lot. I’m glad I made a big change. But it did require the purchase of several new hair products AND a flat iron for the little bits under my ears that always flip out. This isn’t a haircut that handles that flipping-out very well, so the flat iron is required. But I haven’t managed to work out where the cutoff is in terms of the hair products. There’s a line between “styled” and “so full of product that it’s limp and nasty”. I think a few more days of attempts might clarify it for me.
The leaves have still not changed here yet. They are in the process, but peak is a few days away. It’s driving me crazy, because I’ve been expecting pretty colors since late September! I am hoping for a pleasant weekend full of early morning photographic expeditions in search of fall color, so I want this new cold front to flip the switch on the trees along the bluffs near the river. I’m talking about you, Easley! And you, Rocheport! Autumnal colors, activate!
And with autumn comes the holidays. I sent out a Christmas list today. I know it seems early, but it was demanded a month ago, and some of us like to shop early. I think we’re going to go with those Victor Schreckengost cards that I vetted last year, but I’m still loving the designs at Saturn Press. (But they don’t seem to carry the ones we sent last year, so I am glad we snapped those up and sent them when we did.) (Update! Never mind, I found them here.) In fact, I should have bought some of those Halloween cards because I just can’t stand any of the ones you can buy at Target this time of year. (Bad puns are the lifeblood of Halloween cards. They ruin way too many otherwise lovely card designs.) But I still haven’t bought any Halloween candy. If I buy it too early, I end up eating it and having to buy more. I did make a bat tree, though. And you thought I wasn’t crafty!
cool bat tree
We went to the dog park here in St. Louis first thing Sunday morning, and even though it was maybe 60 degrees, and we were trying to keep warm with jackets and hot tea, a bunch of dogs kept jumping into a big tub of water near the drinking area (no lake or pond at our dog park). Even our greyhound–with no body fat or fur–tried to get in. You couldn’t have paid me.
Chance the Corgi-Lab is a cold-weather dog too. She goes crazy for it. My easily tensed back and easily numbed fingertips aren’t as impressed.
How was your recent trek over to St. Louis? (I seem to recall a not-long-ago post in which you mentioned that you were headed this way the next day.) Try any more good food?
We went to a Greek restaurant near UMSL for lunch, but it wasn’t vegan-friendly. I have a list of veggie-friendly restaurants in St. Louis, but few of them seem to be in the airport/St. Charles/St. Peters vicinity, which is the area we visit the most. Any suggestions for that?
Hmm… I don’t know. Those areas aren’t exactly Vegan Utopia (like anywhere else in St. Louis *is*). I’d have to do some digging. But B. tells me there’s at least a good Indian place near the airport.