Puddin' at 16 weeks

Today Puddin’ is 16 weeks old and it has become increasingly obvious to both Hubby and I that we are dealing with a “girly girl.” Oh, she is full of rambunctious mischief and is sometimes referred to as our “Yorkshire Terror,” but she’s definitely girly, nonetheless.



The first clue was when she looted my makeup bag. At first we thought it was just an example of Yorkie high spirits…these dogs are notorious for being energetic, after all…but the next time I opened the bag, I had to fight her off! She dove into the bag head first as if she were diving for treasure…which I suppose, in her little world, was the case. Her first foray into the bag had left the duvet littered with eye pencils and brushes, and she had even managed to extract a lipstick and get the cap off, quite a feat for someone who has no opposable thumbs!

The next clue was how cooperative she seems to be about wearing clothes. She has a small wardrobe of things both practical and pretty, and while she wriggles in protest at diaper time (a precaution against accidents when she is on the furniture or hardwood floors), she is cooperative when I put her onesies on her (usually for bedtime) and gets excited when I bring one of her dresses. She never fights or chews the clothes…even Hubby remarked that she seems to love them.

Grooming is a bit of a different story, but she seems to like having her face and head brushed, but not so much her legs and thighs. But she will sit and raise her chin for the brush to go over her face and throat, the top and back of her head and her ears, She even allows me to put her tiny little topknot in a pony tail with a minimum of fuss. But we weren’t convinced that she was fully committed to her femininity until the lace arrived…

Here in South Africa, it is a monumental task to find lace trims for sewing projects. In America you just walk into any fabric store and there will be a section in the shop devoted to lace and braid and sequins and ribbons of all descriptions. Not so in South Africa. Here, you have to go to a specialty shop called a “haberdashery”…assuming you can find one. Once you do manage to track one down, don’t expect to be spoiled for choice: the selections are invariably slim and prosaic. And heaven forefend if you are seeking ruffled or pre-gathered lace! It simply does not exist here! Being a person both resourceful and persistent, however, I have come up with a workaround solution: eBay!

I know what the meagre offerings of lace and eyelet trims go for here, so I use that as a baseline for my on-line shopping: trims that, including shipping, approximate the cost of a roughly similar item here, are within budget. So, if a piece of 1” wide lace would cost R25 a metre here, then a piece of lace on eBay costing $2.50 a yard, including shipping, is within my reach. Gathered laces can go for 50% more, since the gather ratio is usually 1.5:1. And so I have a fairly steady stream of small packages arriving from America as there are plenty of suppliers…some even ship free!...to feed my sewing machine.

A few weeks ago I received a packet of pretty pink lace…3 yards of it…and opened the packet on the bed where Puddin’ was taking a nap. I left the room for just a couple of minutes, returning to find her rolled up in it, yards of pretty pink lace wrapped around her like a cat! I took it away from her, but only under protest, and when I put the lace on the bedside table, she took to barking at it! Eventually it ended up trimming a dress and matching undies for her, and I thought nothing more of it…until today.



Yesterday I received a notice from the post office that my latest purchase had arrived and today Hubby and I stopped by to pick it up: 5 yards of gathered eyelet trim, destined to embellish a few more outfits for Miss Puddin’. Winter is coming and I need to get a few flannel pajamas and nightgowns ready. Don’t laugh…these dogs do not have an undercoat to trap air and keep them warm like most dogs do, which is why they do not shed. Also, because of their small size, regulating their body temperatures can be more difficult than for larger dogs, particularly since their energetic metabolism tends to keep them lean and without much fat to insulate them. As a result, they do need some extra measures taken to keep them warm enough in chilly weather. OK…they don’t actually need pretty dresses or nighties, but I can sew, so why not?

So we brought the eyelet home and I sat on the bed and opened the packet, then set it aside on the bedside table. A few minutes later we let Puddin’ up on the bed and, after her enthusiastic greetings were done, she climbed up on top of the pillows and began barking, her nose pointed at the table. After touching several things in an attempt to identify what she was barking at, my hand fell on the eyelet and her ears perked up. When I put the eyelet on the bed, she grabbed it and started unwinding it from the card! It was the pretty lace trim she was after.

She also likes jewellery. She will try to chew the aquamarine I wear on my right ring finger and last night, when we got home with seven pairs of new earrings…the insurance company finally sent us jewellery store vouchers to replace the stuff stolen in our Valentine’s Day robbery…she went for the little jewellery boxes just as soon as they were out of the bag! And speaking of bags…she ignores our briefcases…but if I leave my handbag on the floor, she will stick her head into it and root around.

So, when you add it all up…an attraction to make up, jewellery, designer handbags, hair brushing, pretty clothes plus a penchant for lace…seems like we’ve got ourselves a pretty girly little girl here. Now, if we could just convince her that chewing on other people’s fingers is just not ladylike!

Petunia Palin

When I lived in California my mortgage (house bond) payment was about $1500 a month. It was an old mortgage which I inherited from my late husband who had bought the house with his then-wife during the mid Eighties. In Silicon Valley at the beginning of the new millennia, this was considered a low monthly payment for a 3 bed 2 ba ranch style house. So reasonable, in fact, that the people who bought the house in early 2004 had a monthly payment of over $4000 a month for that same house.

Today, the US is in financial crisis and people are losing their homes right and left…even devout Republicans who’ve pinched their pennies to be able to donate a few bucks here or there to their favourite political party. Some of these people are among those who have lost their jobs and are losing their homes but have not yet lost their faith in the Republican Party.

So, I wonder what they think of this : http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14805.html . Will the same people who, in the last election, excoriated John Kerry for a $400 hair cut, find a way to excuse the GOP’s spending $150,000 at Saks and Neiman Marcus to gussy up their favourite lipsticked pig? In a time when people are finding themselves being booted out of their homes, how does McCain explain spending more than $500 in campaign funds on a pair of designer shoes? And who got the benefit of the almost $5000 spent at a high end men’s retailer, Atelier, McCain or Palin’s husband?

Macy’s got almost $10,000, Bloomies got more than $5,000, and the campaign even spent money at a couple of baby stores. All in all, it adds up to more than $150,000…enough to pay my old mortgage for nearly two years…and they managed to disgorge this impressive chunk of money in just one month!

Who knew that getting on the ticket was a ticket to a whole new wardrobe at no personal cost? Is this a precedent set for the future, a way to allow a female VP or Prez to acquire a public wardrobe at a cost not borne by her own pocket? Yah, the article says that the clothes are ultimately destined for charity, but let’s get real here…my clothes are ultimately destined for charitable donation, too…but not until I have worn them…and worn them…and worn them some more. Exactly which charity is going to receive $150,000 worth of barely worn high-end designer labels from top retailers? And when? Cos honey, I want to be first in line on the day that happens!

Interestingly, the Dem’s monthly financial disclosure report doesn’t seem to have an “itemized coordinated expenditures” or “campaign accessories” category in which red leather jackets and Ferragamo shoes can be explained away. In fact, nothing in any of the Dem’s monthly financial statements indicates these kinds of expenditures on the candidates or any of their family members.

So what does this mean? I dunno…but it doesn’t surprise me that Palin is gaining personal advantage without spending a cent of her own money. “ …Palin charged the state for her children to travel with her, including to events where they were not invited, and later amended expense reports to specify that they were on official business…The charges included costs for hotel and commercial flights for three daughters to join Palin to watch their father in a snowmobile race, and a trip to New York, where the governor attended a five-hour conference and stayed with 17-year-old Bristol for five days and four nights in a luxury hotel.” http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081021/ap_on_el_pr/palin_family_travel

I’m not going to go into the ethics of these revelations, but I do have to wonder if Palin can tell the difference between public and private funds and when is the appropriate time to use each one. I once had a sister-in-law who was afflicted with a similar condition: she simply could not draw a line between hers and anybody else’s…if you loaned her something, she took it as a gift and you never got it back. She couldn’t even tell the difference between your name…and credit rating…and her own. She once assumed the identity of a family member and financed a new refrigerator on that person’s credit…which she promptly “forgot” to make payments on. Palin reminds me of this (thankfully) former member of my family…rearranging right, wrong, and reality to her best advantage, regardless of the rules the rest of us play by. What part of the national budget is going to become the hiding place for her personal expenditures if she becomes VP or, heaven forefend, President?

Interestingly, Michelle Obama cuts a stylish figure…she reminds me of Jackie Kennedy when Jack was campaigning…on her own dime. In the same month that RNC forked over 150,000 smackers to drape the pit bull of the tundra, the DNC shows no personal expenditure for either of their candidates or the candidates’ families.

So, I am wondering…how does the RNC justify taking their pet pig to places like Nieman Marcus and Saks 5th Avenue for lipstick? Couldn’t she find decent clothes in places like Sears and JC Penney’s if she couldn’t afford Bloomies et al on her own income? Who dresses Michelle Obama? Where does she buy her clothes and, more importantly, who pays for them?

Most important of all, if you are a person feeling the pinch of today’s failing economy and you managed to squeeze out some money to donate to your favourite political party, how would you feel if your money had been spent to buy designer clothes from stores you can’t even afford to browse in? How would you feel if your party spent, in a single month, more than 100 times your monthly mortgage payment for fancy duds that they say they are going to donate to charity (I’m thinking $150K spent at Walmart would have clothed a lot more of the unfortunate than the same amount spent at luxe department stores)?

The whole thing stinks of elitism and a complete disregard for the sensibilities…and pocketbooks…of the average voter. I would have had a lot more respect for McCain and his entourage and sycophants if they’d told Sarah “You need to hire a stylist and get some new threads…but nothing too ostentatious because people who are worrying about losing their jobs and their houses might be offended if we look like insensitive spendthrifts...oh, and leave the kids at home with Grandma,” and then ignored her outstretched palm.

But that’s not the Republican way, now is it?