Christmas night we were just relaxing and watching a movie. If you like quirky movies like I do, you’ll love Moonrise Kingdom with Bill Murray. Tony lost interest pretty quickly, but I was enjoying the movie when all of a sudden our dog Ed, who was asleep on the couch next to me, jumped down, peed on the carpet, ran around frantic in the living room, and then started to breathe super hard and was foaming at the mouth.
Neither of us had any idea what was going on. We adopted our dog in September of 2001, and we don’t know how old he was when we got him – anywhere from one to three years old, so he could be 14 years old?
This went on for at least 45 minutes, we each thought that we were going to watch him die. I asked Tony if he had ever seen any of his dogs die, and he said no.
Then all of a sudden he was calm, and promptly fell asleep. And he’s been fine ever since then – so weird! Here I was telling him it was okay to leave with tears streaming down my face, and the next thing he’s sleeping like a baby!
My last day off from the long holiday weekend was yesterday, so I slept in until 9:45. 
Tony made me another of his amazeball breakfasts, which turned into my breakfast and lunch. Scrambled eggs, spicy hash browns and sun dried tomato toast with spicy jelly.
The reason my hash browns were spicy? My Aunt Martha sent this to me in our Christmas box:
It has a recipe on there for making pickled shrimp that I cannot wait to try. Have you ever had pickled shrimp before??
After watching the year end show of Real Sports, which I love, I got busy on laundry and going through my clothes. Once everything was folded and sorted, I counted that I have . . . wait for it . . . 51 t-shirts for working out! That’s insane, while most women hoard shoes, I seem to have a problem with t-shirts! I weeded through them, 1/3 of them I was just able to toss because they had stains on them. Yep, I am classy like that, and I put 10 in the Goodwill pile because I’ve never worn them for one reason or another.
Then it was time for the gym! I was actually surprised to see how busy it was. I did 32 minutes on the treadmill – mostly walking on a 15% incline, with some one minute sprints sprinkled in here and there. Then I did upper body for 10 minutes and abs on the ball.
We ended up deciding on pasta, but for the record, Tony almost never wants a red sauce. So we decided on alfredo pasta. It’s not too bad though – I make a basic white sauce – 2 tablespoons butter, 2 tablespoons flour. Melt the butter and add the flour and cook for a few minutes – then slowly add 1 cup of skim milk. Once thickened, I remove from the heat and added 1/2 a cup of grated Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper.
I cooked frozen peas and added that in, and topped with some bacon bits leftover from our Christmas baked potatoes. Delicious!
After I cleaned up the kitchen I started to put my food together for today. Tony found this product when he was looking for something else in my disorganized cupboard, I had forgotten it was there.
Shouldn’t all cleaning products be put in between bagged tea and cocoa nibs?! Anywho, I normally clean out our coffee pot once a month with vinegar. Holy cow – I used 2 tablespoons of this stuff with a full carafe of water, and it is amazing how well it cleaned the coffee pot – it looks brand new on the inside! I am sure you can find that at Wal-mart. I just finished brewing a pot of coffee, and it’s super hot too.
Can I ask a huge favor? My blog friend (and friend in real life!) Mara, from What’s for Dinner, her sister is up for a JAMES BEARD AWARD! Holy shizz! She’s a pastry chef at Café de Architects in Chicago. Her name is Leigh Omilinsky and you can see her bio here.
From Mara’s Facebook:
Please help her achieve this by visiting this link, logging in (they dont’ send spam, I promise!), and voting for Leigh Omilinsky of Cafe des Architectes in Chicago, IL in the Great Lakes region. Please and thank you! http://jamesbeard.starchefs.com/awards/vote/index_2.php
So if you can spend a minute to vote for her today, I would appreciate it!
Alright, off to put the rest of my shit together for the day – make it a great day!
My Bizzy Kitchen 
I just voted for Leigh, it wasn’t too hard after I registered and then read your instructions. I skimmed over them first and didn’t know how to do it but figured it out. Hope she wins!
OMgosh I had tears in my eyes reading about Ed. he’s such a sweetie and you know I have such a soft spot for dogs, I was so afraid for him. I wonder if it’s getting close to the end for him and that was one of the moments to help prepare you for it so you can enjoy the rest of your time with him even more, or if it was something he ate and he’ll be OK for a few more years. You might call the vet to see what he thinks. I just love that happy picture of his sweet head!
You’re making me hungry and I’m up after two hours sleep in order to bake the bread I left rising before I hit the sack. Stop making me want to eat, I’ll never get back to bed if I do. LOL! I’ve never had pickled shrimp but that does sound interesting.
Thanks V – and so happy about your mixer – its about time you had some decent equipment!!
First off…Merry late Christmas Biz! (I’m a little behind and trying to catch up!)
Wow, on your dog. I’m not a dog expert, but I wonder if he had a seizure. Hope it was an isolated incident. I don’t even want to think about when I need to say goodbye to my dog. She is the best and sweetest dog I have ever met!
I’ll pop over and vote! How cool.
And I LOVE that coffee cleaner. It even works at taking the stains out of the pot!
Merry belated Christmas to you too Renee! 😀
That’s actually what I was thinking about Ed, too. I know that seizures are really, really common amongst dogs (we often aren’t home to see the frequency of episodes), but it something that’s easy to diagnose and treat.
Oh Biz, how absolute scary for you & Tony to see Ed go through that. I hope it was just a one time thing and he’s doing better now.
Just voted for Leigh! Keep us posted if she wins!
Thanks for voting Lori!
Oh dear–poor Ed. I hope it wasn’t anything serious. It does sound like some sort of seizure.
We love Cafe de Architects and go often on Sunday for brunch. In fact, the host/hostess now remembers where we like to sit if the table is available. Have also been three times for dinner as well and it was great. I’m going over to vote right now.
Best,
Bonnie
Next time I am in the city with my daughter, I am going to have to check it out – brunch is more my price point too! 😀
Poor doggie.
I only have three workout tshirts that fit. We have one 6 drawer dresser. We each get 3 drawers, except for right now when I have three and hubby has two and baby has one.
I have a huge tub of “this shit’s not gonna fit until after i lose the baby weight” in the shed. My MIL thankfully bought me 4 shirts for Christmas. My favorite one is too small…she bought a medium, probably because it looked big, but it doesn’t fit across the “girls”. But still that’s three new shirts. I was getting tired of the same few shirts at work.
Once you stop breast feeding the “girls” will shrink down again – that was nice of your MIL though! 😀
Poor Ed – I’m with the others on a seizure, and hopefully it was just a one time thing. Awful to watch, I’m sure.
We loved Moonrise Kingdom. Quirky and so charming!
Holy moly that was a lot of T-shirts! So now we know your collections – snowmen and t-shirts, lol!
Hannah would have gone crazy if she realized I had so many!!
Voting complete:) Keep us posted.
Oh my…I do hope ED will be okay. I cannot imagine watching that. Give him lots of extra hugs.
I’m curious… how many work out shirts have snowmen on them?
Would you believe NONE Kym! 😀
Merry Christmas Biz! Did you post the recipe to the new revised Cheesy Popcorn? I really want to try and make it and was watching for you to post, but I might have missed it.
You haven’t missed it Wendy, I kept making the popcorn at night and my pictures came out looking like shit – I plan on making some over the weekend and I’ll post it then, I’ll let you know!
Thanks so much for posting that Biz!! So fun to see that people know the restaurant and my sister’s work 🙂
SO glad Ed seems ok… are you going to get him checked out?
No problem Mara – I hope she wins! He seems totally fine now, so we’ll play it by ear – maybe it was just something he ate that got stuck and has moved on now??
Im soooo glad he is ok!! How scary!! Glad you enjoyed your last day off. Good food and a great workout=a good day. How exciting for maras sister
OMG, I soooooo glad Ed is OK! Wow, that had to of been crazy scary. Has he been ok since??
Yep – just one or two wheezes, but other than that, he’s the same dog – so weird!
Scary stuff with Ed–glad to know he seems okay now. I’ll definitely go put my vote in for Mara’s sister!
Biz, I’m so glad he’s okay! And hope he stays that way!
that is so scary about Ed!! But glad he is OK!
Hope you feel better Jenn!
Hi Biz…glad Ed is okay now….sounds to me like he had a seizure too. I had a shepherd that suffered from seizures….so hard to watch, like she didn’t know where she was after it. At the time we lived out in the country. One day she walked into the woods, and never came back. We figured she died there.
We just lost our Hyko this month, it is so very hard to lose a dog cause they are so much a part of the family. I know how you must have felt watching your dog suffer. Hurts, bunches.
I am off to vote, have a great day.
Thanks Louise – sorry about your pup though. Saw the pictures of your holiday though – good eats!
Aww…the part about Ed made me cry. I hope he’s younger than 14 and that you still have a few years to enjoy him. That is strange what happened though. I tried a recipe for pickled shrimp and hated it, so I hope yours turns out good so you can sure 🙂
Well, with the spicy oil, we’ll just see how it turns out! I’ve always wanted to try a pickled hard boiled egg – my store even sells pickled beet eggs – they are in a brine and the eggs are all pink!
I agree about Ed and the seizure. Better get him checked out. My elderly cat had a few of those and they were very scary to witness.
I have that official cleaning stuff for our espresso machine and it just does the best job. Vinegar is great for some things, but there are those times when you need the good stuff.
If I keep up with the vinegar once a week, I may get away with using that stuff for just a monthly clean – it was amazing to see though!
Sounds like a seizure! I hope Ed is o.k now.
Never had pickled shrimp now you’ve got me curious!
You are doing so great in the Skinny Snowman challenge Suzi!! 😀
My guess is a seizure – that must have been so scary! Poor Ed! My dad has seizures and it’s definitely an event that causes him to sleep, sleep, sleep afterwards.
I’m glad your dog is ok! That is super scary!
Oh Vat!!! First of all, happy Holidays to you, Tony, Hannah and the rest of the gang. OMG…poor Ed, and poor you! That’s AWFUL. So glad he’s doing better. AWWW. Other than that scary incident, hope all is well in your neck of the woods. Big hugs from me to you my blog friend!!! And cheers to a great 2013 for us all!
good luck back at work today!
sorry about your dog – that IS strange what happened. i hope he is ok going forward!
LOVED LOVED moonrise kingdom, too, as i ADORE quirky films!! so glad you got to watch it!
me=queen of tshirts, too. would love to see your collection! i have never thrown out a race tshirt….never wear some, but cannot part with them!
’tis the season for gyms to start getting busy again!…
I would have been so scared if my dog started doing that. I am glad he is okay. Animals do the strangest things.
That pasta looks great. My kids prefer a white sauce over red. The baby likes red. I can’t win..LOL
We had a black lab growing up and she would do the same thing. The vet said it was like an allergy/asthma attack, which made no sense to me b/c she always peed too! My cousin’s dog has similar happen, but her vet said it was a seizure and made her change the pup’s food! Poor Ed, I hope it was just an isolated incident and he feels better soon!!
We absolutely loved Moonrise Kingdom. I love the Cohen brother’s films! And the font in that movie is my favorite thing in the world. I actually just painted a sign for our front porch using that font as a “template.”