My Good Deed For The Day

"Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible."--Francis of Assisi

 Friday morning I woke up bright and early with every intention of going for a great run. My boyfriend and I are pet and house sitting for his Dad. They have 4 dogs of their own and run a pet sitting business, which we would take over for the weekend. Will had gone down first thing so the dogs could get more play time. I had a few appointments before I headed down and I wanted to work out before we left. There's a neighborhood right down the road that is pretty to run in and it's where I take my dog on walks almost every day. I got there, put on my 80s pop radio station on Pandora and started to run around the 1.6 mile loop.

I was pumped up, loving the music, and actually really enjoying my run. All of that was about to change. As I turned the corner I noticed a dog was running around without an owner. As I got closer it was running in the middle of the street as several parents just watched it while they walked their kids to the bus stop. Apparently I was the only one who thought maybe "I should get that Shih Tzu out of the road before it gets his by a car."  It wasn't very fast so I grabbed him and he instantly started wagging his tail and tried to give me kisses. Obviously he was a very happy dog. I brought him back to the corner and started asking if anyone recognized him and knew who he belonged to. One parent said he would watch him if I wanted to go for my run still. I thought he was going to actually take the dog home and do the good citizen thing by putting up found dog flyers, but he set him down on the grass and proceeded to ignore him.

By this time I was fed up with his inability to even watch the poor, cute, lost dog. I grabbed the dog and walked in to the cup-de-sacs near the street to make sure someone wasn't desperately looking for their dog. After 30 minutes of this I decided to take him to the vet. He didn't have a collar so I had no way of knowing where he lived, plus his fur was a bit matted and seemed like he had been lost at least a day. His recent grooming and flowery smell made it seem like he wasn't gone longer too. I decided on the vet in case he was chipped so I could easily find his home.

I drove the 5 minutes to the nearest vet and it turns out little fluff (that's what I named him) LOVES car rides. He was jumping around my back seat in the doggy hammock, jumping to the front seat and sprawling out in all his glory. Unfortunately, he wasn't chipped so we were back to square one. I asked the vet if they looked after lost dogs at all, but they, as a general vet policy, can't do that so they suggested the SPCA. The SPCA near us is phenomenal. We adopted our border collie from there and their facilities are well-staffed, no kill, all the pets get lots of exercise, there's tons of room for pets, and they are well-funded. I thought that was a great place to drop him off so back in the car we went!

Before everyone thinks I'm a monster for not taking him home with me to take care of him until we found his owners... I'm moving to NC in 3 days and we have a dog and 2 cats and have no idea of this dog's history much less how he does with cats or if he could possibly have gotten some illness that might spread to my dog. Not going to risk it. It wouldn't be fair to little fluff either. The SPCA doesn't take strays for one reason. All strays are supposed to go through the intake process at the Animal Control here so if anyone loses a dog there is only one place for them to go so it's easier for them to find. Makes sense. I would lose my mind if Atlas was lost and would call everyone imaginable, so I'm hoping little fluff's owners are as diligent as I would be.

Of course the Animal Control didn't open until 11am. What time did I show up? 930am... Luckily I ran into an elderly woman who volunteered there. She was walking a tiny dog and I walked up and explained that I had just found this dog. I'm not sure what she thought I said, but she went into a rant about how I was a horrible person for surrendering my dog. There was a super awkward pause and then I had to explain why I was not giving away my dog, but trying to do the right thing and find this dog's owner. She got mad at me then for not taking the dog myself and I had to explain that I was moving to a home that would have 5 pets in ANOTHER STATE. I was pretty grumpy with her for accusing me of hating dogs (for those of you who know me you know that I love my pets, especially my puppy, as if they were my own children so she's just ridiculous). I made her take me inside to find someone who could help me. 10 minutes later little fluff was being led to the back to presumably get a nice bed and await his parents!

I went home and immediately posted his story to Facebook to try and spread the word. If anyone knows this dog please let his owners know he is at the Animal Control at 341 S Birdneck Road. I found him in Courthouse Estates on North Landing Road in Virginia Beach. I hope this guy finds his home! He's insanely sweet and deserves a fantastic home.



Moral of the story> Please, please, please get your dogs chipped. There's nothing sadder than knowing your dog got loose and there's no way for anyone to be able to have a chance to contact you. Dogs are the best things to have ever happened to the human race and they are the only creatures on the planet who love us more than they love themselves. Keep the safe and happy. Make sure they have multiple ways of identification so they can make their way home :)


"If opportunity doesn't knock, build a door."--Milton Berle

There's a WHAT in our kitchen?

"It's surprising how much memory is built around things unnoticed at the time."--Barbara Kingsolver

Picture this. It's a beautiful day here in Virginia Beach. I've just come home from teaching a gym class this morning and am greeted by my freakishly adorable puppy, Atlas. My cat Natasha has also run up to me to greet me as I walk in. I'm sitting there thinking to myself, man I am having a fabulous day. How could it get any better?

This is the part where life silently chuckled to itself as it thought "let's spice up her morning. It's gotten a little too normal." After greeting my fluffy loves, and thinking about surprising my boyfriend at work with some homemade lunch I walk in to the kitchen to head through the back door to take my dog outside. We have a ritual where I walk in, he sits, and I pet him and rub his belly and give him his favorite...butt rubs. Then he puts his paws on my shoulders for a hug and gives me a quick kiss. After that elaborate, and you have to admit STINKING ADORABLE, greeting I usually take him outside to do his business and to play.

As I walk in to the kitchen I look at the door and wonder what black rope is on the floor and partially propped up against the door. I brush it off as some random piece of a bag one of the cats got in to and then got bored with. Until...

"Okay Atlas, let's go outside! Wait... did that rope just move? OH SH!T NO WAY"

Here's where things start to slow down and move incredibly fast all at once. It's weird how in times of crisis this happens, but for anyone who has ever had something ridiculous like this happen to them you know what I mean.

All of this happened all at once... As my handsome puppy moved towards the door to go outside and play, this what I now realized was a 5 foot long snake had just realized a 55lb fluffy monster was moving toward its new sunning spot in its new kitchen home. What did it do? it CLIMBED UP THE BACK DOOR. At this point my brain just sort of freaked out on the inside, but I went in to super puppy mom mode. My dog LOVES anything and everything. He naturally greets any dog or squirrel or bunny, etc that he meets. He even likes bugs. He has no idea what to do with anything other than people, dogs, and cats. He's caught so many squirrels and just sits there and smiles at them while they tremble thinking they're about to die a violent death. Then he lets them go and moves on to playing with a stick or a ball.

That being said, the second he saw that the super long black thing in the kitchen that the cat had been staring at was actually a living creature he thought "oh I'll greet it and welcome it in to our home. Give me a hug big rope thing!"  He trots over to it as it is showing it prowess in climbing walls, it sees Atlas and begins to freak out while trying to get back under the door where it came from and manages to violently knock its face on the door several times while my dog is trying to step on it. FINALLY it makes its way under the door and in to the laundry room...

What did I do during this? "ATLAS NO OH GOD NO. SNAKE IF YOU BITE MY DOG I'M GOING TO FILET YOU UP FOR DINNER. I KNOW YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I'M YELLING BUT FOR THE LOVE OF GOD GO UNDER THE DOOR. ATLAS COME HERE DAMN IT DOG."

Now after successfully scream scaring the cat from the kitchen and the snake under the door and confusing my dog I was a little proud of myself for getting it out of the main part of the house. The problem was it was still somewhere in my laundry room and the only easy way to get outside was thru that room. I called my boyfriend who was conveniently at work, because why would anything disastrous happen when he's here?   I'm sure he got a good laugh out of my texts of (and I quote)

"THERE IS A SNAKE IN THE HOUSE. A SNAKE WILLIAM. COME HOME."
"Okay it's in the laundry room. I lost it."
"I don't think it's poisonous, but it can climb walls so that's insane."
"I'm going to open the back door and hope it goes out and no more come in."

In the end, I'm 90% sure it left my back porch/laundry room. We haven't seen a snake in there in a while so that's a good sign. Turns out it was a black racer, which are crazy fast, climb trees, but thankfully are not poisonous.

It's been a little hectic here lately and just wait until you here my mouse story next week! If you ever need a snake hilariously and loudly extracted from your house please don't call me. I don't mind snakes at all, but let's just say I've had my fill of snake wrangling. I'll leave that to the professionals.


"The dream is to keep surprising yourself. Never mind the audience."--Tom Hiddleston

Dirty Girl 5k Mud/Obstacle Run

"Exercise to stimulate, not annihilate. The world wasn't formed in a day, and neither were we. Set small goals and build upon them."--Lee Haney



Lets' be honest here. I'm a fitness freak. I teach Zumba and Body Step classes 4 days a week at my local gym; I lift weights several days a week, walk my dog a few miles, ride my bike, and basically adore anything else active. I hate sitting for hours on end. Moving around gets my brain working and keeps me in shape and happy. I've done quite a few fun runs/mud/obstacle runs with my boyfriend and a few friends, but this time I went with my best friend and former college roommate, Ellie. Ellie does not share my passion for fitness, but I've rubbed off on her and she has set small goals for herself and even takes gym classes a few days a week! Awesome!

She had been talking about wanting to do a 5k so I went on the hunt for a super fun one. I found an all female race benefitting breast cancer foundations. Personally, I don't care if it's all female, but it was the next race coming to the area and it looked like a CRAZY amount of fun. They advertised mud, sweat, obstacles, team work, etc. What sealed the deal? I Living Social deal for a half price entry! Heck yes. I love fitness and I love saving money on fitness, so this was perfect.

We both signed up and started counting down the days. Ellie was more nervous because it was her first race. She didn't train too much, but she did her best and that's all that matters. I wasn't nervous at all I just wanted it to be race day! I had been training non stop in the gym, running with my dog, and lifting weights. I wanted to make sure I was prepared.

Race day had finally arrived! We donned our running clothes that we knew we wouldn't care about getting dirty and drove to the Sportsplex where the race was held. There were lots of vendors set up that we briefly checked out. We dropped out change of clothes and towels off and made sure to get pre-race pictures. We knew we'd look like we'd run thru a very muddy hell and back after the race so we wanted to be able to show the crazy difference.

Ellie set the pace and I told her that we could walk whenever she wanted, but I made sure to challenge her. She almost made it through the whole race without complaining about the running, but that last mile really did her in! There were so many obstacles! I couldn't get enough. I ran right up to each one and went all out no matter what. There were tubes we climbed through, balance beams where people launched large inflatable balls at us, army crawls through mud pits, inflatable slides where you bounced off the bottom into a muddy water pit, rope walls, barriers to climb over, we even went down a fire pole!

Needless to say by the time we could see the finish we were COVERED from head to foot in mud. The last obstacle was right before the finish line. It was a gigantic mud pit. We looked at each other and took off running for it. I tackled her right at the end and we both ended up face down in the mud and had to roll around to get out. Priceless. We ran across the finish line together and were given our finisher's medals, which were HUGE. The goodie bags we received also had shampoo and conditioner. They know how to make us feel good after a race!

After we had finished and had collected our bags we set off for the picture stations! After that we decided it would be best if we used their "shower" area to literally hose ourselves down. It honestly looked like a mud bomb had gone off over there. They should've made it the new obstacle for all the mud that was there. The only downside? The water was FREEZING COLD. We washed our legs off and shoes, but it didn't do much good. After heading home, we both gunned it for the two bathrooms in my house. It took quote a while, but we managed to get the mud out of our ears and off of every surface imaginable on our skin.

All in all, it was one of the most fun races I've ever had the pleasure to take part in. I just wish they had had more photographers! Although, if that's my only complaint then I can't even complain! It was such a fantastic day and we had an insane amount of fun. Ellie ROCKED her first 5k and I got to run around with her on lots of obstacles. If you get a chance don't miss the Dirty Girl 5k. Sorry guys. It's a vagina only event. No wieners allowed.

"The reason I exercise is for the quality of life I enjoy."--Kenneth Cooper

Dog Friendly Dining In Virginia Beach!

"The only kind of seafood I trust is the fish stick, a totally featureless fish that doesn't have any eyeballs or fins." --Dave Barry

When you think of dog friendly places most people instantly think of parks, Petsmart, and some other retail stores. After my boyfriend and I adopted the fluffy love of our lives aka Atlas, we have been on a mission to find as many places as we can that are dog friendly where we live in Virginia Beach.

We've found tons of local stores, parks, and beaches, but today we found the ultimate prize. We love going out to eat a few times a month, but we've always wanted to bring Atlas with us. Lots of places around here have outdoor patios where people like to eat in the summer so we thought that was our best bet. We called around and most restaurants only allow service dogs, which is absolutely understandable! After a few Google searches and some more phone calls we learned that Panera Bread and Lucky Oyster were our best bets as they allowed dogs on their patios. We chose Lucky Oyster because we were craving seafood, plus it is one of our favorite local spots to go to for lunch and dinner.

They've got great prices, delicious food, great happy hour specials, and good service. It's a really kitschy place in the best sense. Now we love them even more since we got to enjoy lunch with our pup! We were seated outside and the waitress was super sweet to Atlas as well as us. Everyone kept peeking through the door to the inside to get a look at him. Some people even came out just to say hello.

This absolutely made our day just by the fact that we found a restaurant that not only catered to us, but to our dog as well. Dogs are part of the family. We want to be able to take the fluffy children with us too. Besides, he's much more well-behaved than most human children! All in all, Virginia Beach is full of pleasant surprises for all you dog lovers out there! If you're looking for a delicious local favorite where you can eat with your dog as well as the rest of the family then this place is for you!

"You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty." --Mahatma Gandhi

Cloud9 Trampoline Park: We're All Jumping Fanatics Here

"Always remember that you are absolutely unique, just like everyone else."--Margaret Mead


Jumping fiends hear ye hear ye! There's a place where you can jiggle, wiggle, jump, flip, flop, cartwheel, and much more! Fitness over the years has taken a rather odd turn with runs where you throw color at each other, climb military inspired obstacles, jump into mud pits, and even
run in total darkness. While I love all of these, one of my favorites are trampoline parks.

We have one near me called Cloud9. I've been there 3 times now and absolutely love it. The military discount doesn't hurt either ;-)  We've always had to sign up hours in advance because they all sell out! Luckily this place is enormous so you can jump as crazily as you want without fear of round housing a kid across the room. At least their fall would be cushioned if the worst case scenario happened to you.

That being said, the whole floor is a criss cross of different sized trampolines with little cushioned walkways in between so you can maneuver without flopping around. Whatever you do DO NOT land on one. They look like they have some give, but my ankles and butt will tell you they feel like smashing on to cement after the soft, flexible wonderfulness that is the trampoline itself.

If simply jumping for 30 min or an hour depending on which session you chose is not your cup of tea never fear! There are foam pits you can jump into from varying heights and perform super amazing stunts on your way in. I'm pretty sure I looked slightly like I was flailing around while fighting off an army of bugs whenever I tried to do stunts, but it's the experience that counts. There is also a trapeze you can launch yourself into the pits with. They are surprisingly slippery, especially when you have no idea how sweaty you actually were until you're halfway through the air and falling. It might sound like I had a horrifying experience, but honestly it is fun beyond compare.

They even recently added a "parkour" esque like attraction where you can climb walls, heave yourself across rope walls and swing from tires across more foam pits. There's even a slack line!  I've gone with several friends and my boyfriend and we had a BLAST. I almost forgot! They have basketball "courts" where you can play extra bounce basketball, and you can also sign up for a dodgeball league. You really can't beat this place.

 The last time I went, I was with my former college roommate, Ellie. She was a closet trampoline expert and showed me up 1000% with all her fancy flips and donkey kicks. All the early times were sold out that day so we did a 9pm flight. We lucked out because it was the first adult only session of the night! They turned off all the lights and played essentially club music so we jumped around like crazies for an hour and had one of our favorite nights together this year!




 "I'm an idealist. I don't know where I'm going, but I'm on my way."--Carl Sandberg

Hiking First Landing State Park

"I am unbore-able in the great outdoors." --P.J O'Rourke

When you think of Virginia Beach no one has ever said "Oh my goodness that's such a fantastic place to hike!" If someone had said that to me a few weeks ago I would've thought they had a few screws loose. A week ago my boyfriend, puppy (Atlas) and I discovered the glorious, beautiful, and slightly confusing First Landing State Park.

First Landing is located near the Oceanfront area, but away from the insanity of the tourist attractions near the boardwalk. How I have never been there before still blows my mind, but I am beyond happy we discovered it recently. My dog Atlas is 50% border collie, 25% lab, and 25% miniature pinscher. Needless to say he is one insanely cute, smart, hyper, goofy boy. He is also born for walkies. We walk in a lot in neighborhoods near us, at Mt Trashmore and on the beach when it's not too hot, but none of those places are scenic.

Will and I were cruising around the internet one day and came across the website for First Landing State Park. We realized we had never been there before so we decided to take Atlas hiking on our day off. It was one of the best things we've done as a family. There are about a dozen trails you can take depending on what you want to see and the length you want to go. Many of them meet up so if you get tired of one you can switch another!

We took Long Creek Trail, which we thought was a 4 mile loop. Turns out we read the super tiny map they gave us wrong so it was not a loop, but could be if we transferred to another trail...which we had already passed 2 miles ago by the time we realized what had happened. Moving on.

The trails aren't marked too well as far as knowing which trail you're taking, but it's pretty easy to find your way around, plus there's bound to be a fellow hiker you can ask along the way. Back to Long Creek Trail. We started out walking up a small road to the entrance and began our hike in a very wooded area. Atlas had never really seen much forest so he was a sniffing fiend. He just trotted along like he was the happiest puppy ever, which it's pretty safe to say that he was.

I have a feeling this trail is going to be our absolute favorite. Some trails only see the beach or forest. This trail took us through swamp, wetlands, beaches, forest, and even a small meadow. We got to see tons of wildlife while we were out there and met a lot of nice hikers who let their dogs meet ours. By the end of it all even Atlas was tired, which is a feat in itself.

When we finally found the trail head again we were exhausted. We had explored new places, Atlas had the best walk ever, we were starving, and Atlas didn't even want to walk anymore. Will decided to give our poor dog a break since we gave him the longest walk he's ever had and carried him partway down the hill. Atlas definitely has us trained well ;-)

First Landing is also super cheap! As a Virginia resident it's only $5. I think for out of owners it's $10 and there's also campgrounds! It's a super neat place that I can't wait to explore more!

"Marry an outdoors woman. Then if you throw her out into the yard on a cold night, she can still survive."--W.C Fields

Bathing Our Cat

Natasha is our very fluffy, very opinionated, mostly super sweet long hair domestic cat. She's 11 years old and knows EXACTLY what she likes and doesn't like. Her list of likes is much shorter than the dislikes, but she's a cat so that's pretty much expected.

Natasha likes:
Food
Belly rubs (a set amount..the number changes daily so watch out)
Food
Snuggling with your hip at night (only at night)
Food
Chewing on plastic bags
Food
Taking naps
Looking glorious

Natasha painstakingly grooms herself all the time. She looks like a fluffy princess 90% of the day, with the exception of when she wakes up from a nap looking like she went through a wind storm. She also hates it when you call her scraggly. She's a proud woman of color and doesn't like her imperfections being pointed out. I guess when you're 65 years old in cat years you can loudly state your opinion on whatever you want.

That being said, Natasha was not originally adopted by Will and me. She came to us via Will's aunt, then Will's mother. She was never abused, but she is a one family kind of cat and got super sad at being moved from one house to another. Will's mom had 2 dogs, one of which Natasha would always snuggle with and nap on, and 2 other cats as well. One cat weighs about as much as a horse and obviously he's pretty complacent and doesn't care about much, but food. They got along just fine. Sam on the other hand was a complete @$$ hat. He would bully her and she would spend all her days underneath one bed in one room. Not exactly the life of luxury cats deserve/are entitled to.

We adopted her into our pet free home.. which now has 1 other cat and the best puppy ever, but that's a different story. Long story short, she's been extremely happy ever since. That was only the beginning...

A few weeks ago we noticed she wasn't feeling well. As a result, she didn't really bathe herself for about 3 days. After checking with the vet we decided it was time to give her a bath. If you regularly bathe yourself about 3 times a day to 0 times in 3 days...well you have one greasy looking kitty.

Will and I had both seen horror clips from youtube videos of other suckers bathing their cats who then turned into raging monster ball of fluff, teeth, and nails. We knew she did okay when we clipped her nails, but she has a pretty mean growl that we didn't want her to actually act upon.

This is pretty much how it went:

W&E: Nataaaasha! Where are you pretty lady? We've got treats!
N: No response
W&E:  *shakes treat bag*
N: No response
W&E: Dang it! I think she's under the bed. You grab her. No you do it.

Will eventually caved and grabbed her from the bed. The yelling that could only possibly have said "you hate me. why do you hate me. what did I ever do to you. Please don't take me to my death" started shortly after that.

We took her into the bathroom, locked the overly curious dog out, and made sure she couldn't get out. We then, being the awesome pet parents we are, ran her a luxurious, warm bath just for her. Did she appreciate it? No.

When we take her to the vet in her crate we usually have to trick her or chase her down and do some pretty impressive acrobatics in order to grab her and not get scratched and then actually get her in the cage when she has all 4 paws outside the opening and is pushing with all her furry might. We thought this was exactly how the bath would go.

She went fully in the opposite direction. Natasha went full deer in the headlights and stood absolutely still. I'm pretty sure she thought we couldn't see her if she stood still. We always make fun of how much she eats since she is constantly screaming for more food even though her bowl is full. We didn't realize just how big her gut was until we washed her.

Cats are super pitiful looking when you get them wet no matter what, especially when they are really fluffy to begin with. Natasha has extremely skinny limbs, tail and face. Her tummy....not so skinny. It looks like a very skinny cat swallowed a softball.

During her bath she made weird chirping noises that sounded like Beeker from the Muppets.. we were expecting incessant screams of protest and grumpiness like we get on the way to the vet, but we were pleasantly surprised. She did really really well. After the bath was over we dried her off and pampered her to her delight and even gave her treats.

Just remember, bathing your cat might not be the safest idea you've ever had, but your cats might decide to just sit there and be nice...for once. Or it's a tactic to lull you into a false sense of security so they can further their plans of world domination. Either one.