Random Ramblings - July 30th 2019 Edition

I haven't actually done a proper Tuesday post in a couple of weeks, because I wanted to do that tag I found, and put up the A-Z challenge post too. So this is going to be a post to catch you up on the random goings on from the past few weeks, not necessarily in order.

This post is a relatively long one, so you might want to grab a drink, and maybe a snack too... If you don't already have those things on hand, that is. I'll wait. Just come back and continue reading from this point when you're ready. *wink*

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Happiness is a warm puppy.
~Charles M. Schulz

I saw that quote on Twitter a couple of weeks ago. At the time, I had a puppy curled up against each foot, and the first thing I thought when I read that was, "Yeah... And I've got two of them, so that's twice as much happiness."

We won't talk about the times I can see why people say having dogs is like having toddlers, and I understand why some parents - especially those with two or more children - are always so glad when bed time comes. *wink*

We also won't talk about the nights when they really don't want to settle, and I find myself still awake at 2:00am trying everything in an attempt to get them to sleep, which naturally happens most on days when I need to be up early for some reason.

No. Those times don't happen a lot. But, as I said on Facebook recently, if you ever doubt the saying that having dogs is like having toddlers, you should try having mine for a while, especially during the last half an hour or so before bed time. Tired puppies and tired toddlers are both handfuls. I know it's true of toddlers from my times babysitting, and I'm sure you can guess how I know it's true of puppies. I don't mind though. Not really. I love my pups just the way they are. Even if there are times when I'm glad for the arrival of nap time, or when the only clear thought in my exhausted head is, "Please go to sleep, because then I can."

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We took Logan to Oscars for his first ever outing. We wanted to show him to them, and thought combining his outing with lunch out would give him a positive association for his first walk, since he's extremely food motivated. I'm glad we did, because he definitely needed a positive association... Poor thing was so scared that he just sat down and cried every time I put him on the ground at first, and it took most of the time we were out to get him to even consider actually walking. We've taken him there since, as well as for other walks, and he's improving. He's still a bit unsure of how this walkies thing works, but he's getting there. At least he'll now walk some when he's put down on the ground, rather than just sitting on the spot I put him on and crying, and only whines a little from time to time (and that's mostly when he starts getting tired). He's even climbed a few of our stairs, though he's only tried going up so far, and hasn't attempted to get himself down them yet (he just waits at the top crying until I come rescue him). He sure tires quickly though... Quicker than Lilie and Kero did at his age... But I think it's the difference in the breed, since Westie's are a hardier breed. It's fine though. When I know he's getting tired, I just keep him in my arms, and he happily watches the world go by, and enjoys the feel of the ocean breeze in his fur.

Anyway, they loved getting to meet Logan at Oscars, as I knew they would. They adore Lilie too. We always have people wanting to come say hi to Lilie whenever we're out and about - which is just fine by her - and now we have two dogs everyone wants to greet. At one point I had someone come over and start petting them, and the person suddenly thought about the fact she hadn't asked if I minded her doing so, and said, "I'm sorry madam, but they're just so cute!" We get a lot of that.

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We missed checking out Hastings Pirate Day this year. It was by choice though, and wasn't because of the weather.

We've had a lot of hot weather. This time last week, for example, it was in the high 20s... It got up to 28 degrees C last Tuesday late afternoon, and didn't cool down much that night. It was even hotter on Thursday, and actually reached temperatures above 30 degrees C (I'm told it got up to 34 degrees C here, though thankfully was sleeping during that part of the day). Bearing in mind, those temperatures are the temperatures outside, and our place usually runs a couple of degrees hotter. But, anyway, though we've had some hot days - too many of them, if you ask me - we've also had cooler days, and days somewhere in the middle. We've had some Summer rain showers, and storms of various strengths too.

The Sunday of Hastings Pirate Day was one of the days where it was warm and dry, but not hot. So it would have been a perfect day to be out there enjoying the pirate day events, both from our point of view, and the dogs'. I'm sure those who did go were glad the weather was so perfect.

But Hastings Pirate Day happened two days after Logan's first walk, and we thought it would be too much for him, given how quickly he gets tired, and how confusing the lead concept seems to be to him. Not to mention, the fact just a few people along the seafront on a Friday afternoon was enough to have him frightened, so the huge crowds we get for the pirate day events would be too much so soon. I mean, Hastings currently holds the world record for the most people dressed as pirates in one place, and the numbers listed for the record only include registered pirates, and not the people who come to the area for the events but don't dress up and register themselves. We stay on the edge of the crowds when possible, but even that can be a bit overwhealming at times. Logan is definitely not ready for that. So we skipped it for his sake this year. He should be able to face the crowds better by next year, so hopefully we can all go to at least some of the pirate events next year. It would be too much for even Lilie to do all of it, so we wouldn't even try. Actually, we never tried to go to more than part of the events, even when we were without dogs... There's too much going on to do it all without exhausting yourself. I do hope we can go to part of it next year though, like we've done most years since we moved down here.

We did all go out for a while that day, of course. But not to the pirate events. We just went to enjoy the part of the beach near home for a little while, and then headed back home. We waited until early evening though, so there weren't so many people out and about. We aren't right by where this year's pirate themed events were happening, but we're close enough that there were a lot of people out there during the afternoon. So we waited for the crowds to thin a little before taking the dogs out there.

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I worry about the furkids when it get's really hot. Especially Mollie and the dogs, since Joshua handles heat better than the others. Mollie in particular suffers badly on hot days. I did what I could though, and everyone made it through.

One of the things we did was to try setting up some wet towels for the dogs to nap on. It was an idea Kelly had seen on social media, and we thought it was a good one,, so figured we'd try it out. Lilie agreed it was a great idea, and did nap with part of herself on her towel. Logan, however, was having none of it. He's not a fan of getting wet, and didn't think the cooling benifits were a good enough reason to get wet. So he found himself a different napping spot out of the sun... At least he was in a shady spot.

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At the end of last week we had an awesome storm, which I think would be classed as a tropical storm. It's what I'm calling it anyhow. It showed up around dinner time on Thursday, and was still going on - though not so violently - through most of Friday and Saturday. There was a lot of rain, and a fair amount of thunder and lightning. Unfortunately, it didn't cool things down much. At least, not until Saturday evening, and even then it was only enough to put temperatures in the comfortable to me range (like 18 degrees C). That's why I think it would be considered a tropical storm: the heat and humidity.

Anyway, I was worried about how Logan would react to it, but either the heat had him too tired to care as much as usual, or Lilie and I are doing a great job of convincing him storms aren't scary. I'm not sure which. Either way, he got a bit agitated initially, but didn't require more than being able to stay close to me and Lilie throughout the night, which was easy enough to arrange, especially from my point of view. He wasn't even bothered about it any more by the time we were dealing with the milder storms of Friday and Saturday... Probably figured he was safe enough, since he survived Thursday night. It likely helped that they were more rain than anything, though there was some thunder and lightning thrown in across those two days (most of the thunder and lightning was Thursday night and early hours of Friday morning though).

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Here are a couple of photos of Logan at 14 weeks old:


He's growing up so fast!

Sorry, I don't have new photos of Lilie today. We just snapped those of Logan to show how he's growing.

Logan is now almost 15 and a half weeks old. Can you believe it?

He has another vet appointment this Thursday (August 1st 2019). Hopefully the source of his getting upset last time was frustration at Lilie being on the ground and him not, and he won't get so upset this time, especially now he's starting to accept the lead, and not cry so much when he's down on the ground.

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I had asthma clinic on July 18th. I was up for my yearly review, so they wouldn't give me new inhalers if I didn't see the asthma nurse. So I went to see her. It's good for me to be checked from time to time anyhow, and I should have been having yearly reviews all along, so I don't mind. In fact, I was glad to see they were doing what they were meant to... Finally.

My appointment went smoothly. I knew it would. My asthma's been behaving itself since last year, when I got my inhalers back, and they gave me the spacer thingy to help me control my breathing properly when taking them. So, as far as I was concerned, this was merely a necessary formality, and a "just in case" checkup. It did feel good having the asthma nurse tell me she was pleased with how I was doing though, and compliment me on how well I pay attention to what's going on with my body. I didn't tell her I sometimes ignore what my body is telling me. I was too busy enjoying her compliments. Hey, it's not often I get approval from doctors and nurses, after all.

Anyway, I had them weigh me while I was there. My Mam said it looked in the photos taken when we took Logan for his first walk like I might have lost some weight. I had my doubts. I mean, I feel fitter and everything, and did wonder if maybe I'd lost a little. But I've never really had much luck in losing weight, so wasn't counting on it. I figured my asthma clinic appointment was a good time to get a weight update though, especially since I hadn't been weighed in more than six months. Plus, I was curious. So I asked them to weigh me. Turns out I've lost 3 kilos (that's about 6.6 lbs).

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For those who like to know: my Makerly box for July contained a cross stitch kit for a bird. I forget which kind of bird it was, though it was something tropical, since that was the theme of the kit.

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I wanted to do some baking last week, but it was WAY too hot. So I decided to try something I could do in the microwave.

I made a flapjack, which consisted of oats, coconut milk, maple syrrup, and raisins, so was not just vegetarian friendly, but also vegan friendly. I just threw them all in a bowl, cooked them up in the microwave, and then put most of the mixture in a cake tin to cool. Several hours later - when it was cool enough to do so - I put it in the fridge. After it had set, I removed it from the tin, and put it on a plate. It won't win prizes for anything, least of all presentation, but here's a photo anyhow:


I cut it in to slices - like you would a cake - after the photo was taken.

It was pretty good. Stickier than it should have been (I think I used too much coconut milk) but pretty good, like I said. Especially considering I was just experimenting, and didn't measure quantities or anything. Not to mention the fact it was a microwaved flapjack, rather than one done in the oven. I'd kept some aside for breakfast though - hence only putting most of the mixture in the cake tin - and ate it still slightly warm, and that way was delicious. So, awesome as a breakfast option, but could use some work to make it a good flapjack.

I had better success with the vegan friendly apple-berry cake and banana-peanut cookies I made on Sunday, after the rain had cooled things down here a little, so I could actually do the baking I wanted to do. I think they turned out pretty well. Here are photos, for anyone who wants to see them:


The cake and cookies were both very tasty, if I do say so myself. Since there was nothing in them they couldn't have, I offered Lilie and Logan a bit of each, and they seemed to approve too. I wasn't surprised with Logan, since he eats just about anything, but I took it as a compliment from Lilie, since she's a picky eater.

Brownies were baked on the weekend too. But those were for Kelly, and I didn't take photos.

No. The pups didn't get any of those, because they're chocolate, and dogs aren't allowed chocolate. Just mentioning that, for anyone who might have been concerned. They were disappointed - especially Logan - but soon got over it when they saw I was willing to share my snacks.

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My Mam got me a new smoothie maker.

I kept meaning to get one, but not getting around to it. Anyway, she got me one, so now I don't need to. It arrived on Sunday, because she ordered it on Saturday and has Amazon Prime.

I tried it out yesterday (Monday) morning. I made a smoothie involving coconut water, a banana, some raspberries, some blueberries, and a bit of spinach. That last for extra vitamins. It was really tasty, and since the berries and spinach were frozen, lovely and cool.

As an added bonus, I actually drank a decent amount of liquid yesterday morning, because of having the smoothie, which is something I need to work on, since I generally don't drink enough.

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If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook - or both - you might already know this, but I've made a big lifestyle choice recently.

After more than a decade of being vegetarian, I've decided to take the next step, and have switched to a vegan diet.

Yeah, that's why I was doing the vegan friendly stuff when I was baking. I wanted to make snacks, rather than buying them. It's cheaper, and makes knowing exactly what's in my food easier. I'm not saying I won't buy the ready-made vegan friendly snacks sometimes. I just want to mostly make my own.

There are a few reasons for my decision to become vegan, including the ethical and environmental ones you'll hear from many people making such a switch. After all, animal product free doesn't always mean cruelty free, and a vegan diet reduces your carbon footprint. But I have other reasons too, like the fact I'm lactos intollerent, so really should have switched out my dairy products to either lactos free or plant based alternatives ages ago, and since cheese was the thing making me reluctant to make the switch to veganism, if I'm going to switch my cheese anyhow, there's nothing holding me back any more. I mean, I used to think the upset stomach I got from eating it was worth it. I no longer feel that way. Especially after I finally won the battle for a hysterectomy. I wanted that for a chance at a better future. How can I celebrate that when I'm also letting my body suffer needlessly just for something that will be gone in a few minutes? I don't want anyone to suffer for what I eat, and that includes myself.

No. This is not a spur of the moment decision. It's something I've been thinking about for some time. But I didn't mention to anyone that I was considering it, because I didn't want the comments and opinions of others influencing my decision.

Anyway, I usually post about things on my blog first, but this time I posted on Twitter and Facebook first, because my posting slots were filled until today, and I wanted to ask a few vegan friends I have for tips and recipes at once. I was completely blown away by the response. Everyone I tagged on Facebook, plus some I hadn't, was immediately there with tips, recipes, and resources. As for my Twitter post... Well, I've quite literally never had that many people interact with one of my posts. I had people I didn't know coming from all over the place with tips, websites and YouTube channels I could check out, etc. People were liking and retweeting my tweet like crazy too... I've never had that many likes on a post, ever. It was just amazing, and I'm incredibly grateful to all those people for all the support, tips, etc.

Of course, I know there might be vegans reading this who either didn't see my tweet or Facebook post, or aren't even on those social media platforms. If either of those is the case for you, feel free to share tips, recipes, and resources in the comments. I'm especially looking for ideas for quick and easy meals with minimum cooking, for busy or hot days. Thank you in advance.