The weather is finally warming up here in Iowa too! Not quite as sunny as yesterday, but hey, I've got a big mug of coffee, I added some organic chocolate milk that my neighbor gave me, and I'm having a fun time webdipping before work. It's good to be alive!

It's a beautiful day, just getting ready to go for a run and HITLER

Yay!

Who's Ler and why do you want to hit her?!

About to go have my first bowl of pipeweed for the year. I had a cigar last night (and a couple last weekend when it got into the low 70s), but this is the first pipe.

@Flem - I have been enjoying SoySlender organic lowfat and lowcarb chocolate soy milk. I get it and the cappucino flaver and blend them into a great mocha flavor.

Just finishing packing before heading up to Stroud for the weekend. I have a relaxing training week to look forward to next week, which means free lunches and late starts every day. Lots of nights out and time to read a good book coming my way.

I'm also toying with the idea of starting a new thread with the word HITLER (inspired by 2WL) and attempting to reverse Gogwin's law it all the way to a profound and deeply meaningful question... But who has the time? :p

Godwin*

My boss and two co-workers are out of town. There are just two of us in the office, drinking tea, listening to the Beach Boys (Pet Sounds), drinking tea (Earl Grey, hot), and catching up on emails and thank-you notes. It's a pretty good day to be alive.

@Draug - I'm pretty sure my chocolate milk isn't fat free :-) But it is organic, local (th the creamery is five miles up the road), and a gift, so I'm drinking it quite cheerfully.

Ahhhhh yes, the delightful warm weather, when the month's long gentle white blanket of snow melts away in the back yard, revealing the already-greening grass beneath...

...and 4 months worth of frozen dog shit, melting into a oozing brown goo, which is now too soft to effectively shovel up, and which, when the temperature is jut right, will begin to release the captive odors that 30 pounds of frozen dog shit contains...such that when teh gentle breeze is jusssst right, and I crack open the windows for a little fresh air, I will instead be knocked off my feet with the vileness of the moment...

Ahhhh...spring...

But at least my dumbass neighbors won't be cutting through the backyard for a while!

North Americas Largest Paddyfest Listy Car City

a lovely pair of puppies with cold wet noses

....sniffing their melting accomplishments in the back yard...

@Flem - I just can't do all the carbs in milk despite loving it. And chocolate milk has so much sugar in it, that it is poison in a bottle for a diabetic like myslef. But please continue to enjoy some for me. I'm stuck with the Soy Slender (regular Soy is also high in sugar cause unsweetened soy is bland) but it is drinkable straight out of the bottle, so I can have my "chocolate milk" and drink it too. :-)

@krellin - We clean up the dog dirt every chance we get during the winter so in between snows or when the snow is done and they have just gone on the surface. Sure, we freeze our buts off, but it makes our backyard nicer come Spring thaw.

re: dogs in spring,
People in my neighborhood clean up after their dogs pretty consistently all winter. People bag it up and follow the "dump your dump" rule pretty consistently. The stray cats, however, are another matter entirely.

Oh, we'll probably go out this weekend and do a massive rake job and get rid of it all at once. But no, I'm not going into a foot of snow to dig out a steamer that sunk six inches deep into the snow and then throw out a bag of frozen poo and snow!

"People in my neighborhood clean up after their dogs pretty consistently all winter. People bag it up and follow the "dump your dump""

This implies people are walking their dogs and letting them shit in your yard...I don't let my dogs shit in people's yards, period. They shit in my yard, or I take them in to the woods, so they don't have to dump in someone else's front yard. I don't care if you *do* clean up your dog's shit, it's just rude to let them dump in someone else's yard, when you can easily let them run around and shit in your own yard before you take them for a walk.

No? They're so much easier to clean up when they're frozen! Then again, we live near a major road, so our dog only goes outside on leash, which means we're always there when he does his business on walks. Usually that means he's going on or near someone else's lawn, so it's only polite to pick it up.

My dog likes to shit on hills so his shit rolls downhill.

Guys, I set up a thread for discussing dog poop. Have fun over there.

In the world of Nice Things, I'm about to go visit my track kids at school - track starts on Monday! - and then have lunch with some friends at a local restaurant.

I think it is nice to derail threads about useless, silly topics.

I hate running on the track at school because inconsiderate people always let their dog poop on the track. Poop get's stuck in the treads of my running shoes, and if I don't catch it, I track dog poop into the kitchen when I get home.

The trails that I run on here are partially shared with horses so I have to step over horse shit all the time. Dogs pooping on a track is just barbaric.

Hecks - yes, frozen is easier, which is why this weekend, with snow gone, but another freeze coming, I can just rake all those crystaline chunks of poo up and throw them away without collecting a garbage bag full of snow.

Can we discuss horse manure in a poop thread? I guess so...good add, 2WL.

Back in mah day, peuple sheeit in the latrines and picked it up demselves.

You mention a couple of perky little puppies sitting up begging to be stroked and people start talking about dog turds, did we lose something in translation here .......

We fenced in about a quarter acre of our back yard so the dogs have lots of room to run a do their business. We just have to walk the yard periodically and clean up. During the spring and summer (lawn mowing months) the wife does that while I mow the front yeard and the other quarter acre of the back yard (what we call the back nine) and then I open the gate and ride the mower into the front nine and mow it. I wouldn't care much about running over dog dirt with the lawn mower except I keep it in the garage near the workbench and any dog dirt on the tire treads would start stinking up the work area and eventually waft into the house (the smell that is).

@Nigee, how old and what breed?

I know it's Friday which is probably trolliday for some of you but when I say puppies I mean 'puppies' if you know what I mean.
I watched 8 Mile last night, I love that film.

Crude. You've been watching too many WWF repeats.

Sorry WW*E* repeats. Forgot the World Wildlife Fund finally forced them to change their initials.

It's comments like that that separate the men from the boys. Don't forget, Nigee's, what, like 14?

Anyway, less poop, more dogs. Dogs are nice. Draug, what kind of dogs have you got? I've got a 7-year-old German Shorthaired Pointer.

Two dachshunds - long hairs, One is 2 (pure red with a red nose indicating a hunting heritage) and the other will be 8 in June (red with black overcoat and a black nose, a slightly more domesticated breading). Long-hair dachshunds were, it si believed, short hars bred with cocker spaniels. Some of the bloodlines kept their hunter traits more dominant while others picked up morte of the cocker traits. All can hold their own against badgers and possums and such, but the hunters look for trouble while the domestics let the trouble come to them then show who is boss. It's an interesting dynamioc with the older dog being the less hunt-aggressive but clearly the alpha male while the younger one is always pushing the boundaries to see what the older one will let him get away with.

Today was a good day. No angry customers even though our wifi at work is down. No work tomorrow and All afternoon to do whatever I want. I couldn't ask for a nicer day.

This has, for the most part, been a very pleasant thread all day, dog poop and the odd Hitler aside.
I might have to start a daily "What are you happy about today?" thread. It sounds a little Pollyana, but it makes a nice break from the name-calling, politics, and trolling that dominate much of the forum.

Pollyana has a festering case of herpes "down there..."

I liked 8 Mile. Brittany Murphy was a nice thing. Now she's a dead nice thing.

http://www.celebs101.com/wallpapers/Brittany_Murphy/717/Brittany_Murphy_Wallpaper_30.jpg

Just for you, THM.