Colon Blow And You ... In The Morning!

This type of scatalogical humor ("Colon Blow? Sounds delicious!") went over huge with my brothers and I as kids. Yet somehow, I still find it amusing. You've gotta love the warning ("May cause abdominal distension") and the jingle at the end.

Phil Hartman is certainly missed.

"She's a Great Addition to Our Football Team ..."

Apparently, with only Ned Ginn Jr. in tow, the Dolphins are running short on fragile, overcompensated, overrated former Ohio State wide receivers. That's why Miami is all set to sign the until-now-only-rumored fifth Pointer Sister, Terry Glenn (shown above backstage after opening up for Chaka Kahn). Can Joey Galloway and David Boston be far behind?

For a long time, Glenn was best known as the high first-round draft pick famously referred to as "she" by his coach with the New England Patriots, Bill Parcells. Now, Parcells serves as the czar of player personnel for the 'Fins, meaning that he has now pursued and added a player he called a bitch to three different teams (Patsies, Cowboys, 'Fins).

Perhaps the saddest part of this story is that Miami is in such shape that a 34-year-old, injury-prone transvestite automatically becomes the best receiver on the squad.

When is the 2009 NFL Draft again? *Sigh*

He's a Bud Man -- And a Cubs Fan

With the Cubbies enjoying an amazing season thus far, it's hard not to wonder what Harry Caray would think of all this. Since I can't summon his ghost like Will Ferrell can, I'll just assume that he would be making funny, nonsencial comments like, "How can a Mexican ... lose the ball in the sun?!" It's sad that drinking in the press box is no longer considered quaint and acceptable.

On a side note, I think that I had blocked out the fact that Colin Quinn used to be on SNL. Who knew?

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Limerick Friday LXXXV: Not That There's Anything Wrong With That, LiLo

A new life choice for panty-less Lindsay Lohan
More serious than whether to get a freckled tan
Decided becoming a lesbian was what to do
So she bought a softball bat and a Subaru
Something tells me this'll land her in rehab again

Scott the Fish floated upside down, as all was a hush
His life passed in what seemed like a rush
He had a helluva run for a fish
And he had only one dying wish
Simply wanted a clean toilet for his final flush

Les Miles making cracks about 'Bama and Nick Satan
Urban Meyer's book blasted the Dawgs and their ref baitin'
No love lost throughout the SEC
Fall camp is approaching, as you can see
You know it's college football season when you hear all the hatin'

Trying to put a stop to the Obama train
A headline-stealing tactic by John McCain
Aims to name a running mate as the Olympics start
Who would be best to run with such an old fart?
Maybe dig up Jesse Helms as the Veep for your campaign

The new "Batman" decided to pick a fight
Living up to the example of "Dark Bobby Knight"
He cursed at his wife and sister like a Tourette's 'tard
Then Christian Bale quickly got arrested by Scotland Yard
Even his buddy Heath Ledger thinks that shit ain't right

Last time …

G-Lo Miracle

Take my hand
Can you see
The end of a life
Perched over a railing?
Will grass ever grow green
There again?
The wind blew
The grass rustled
You look up at me
You asked me a question
I pretended not to hear
My heart dropped
Into a different existence
Yet though you changed
The miracle of you
Never wavered
The sound
Of you
Your breathing
Your sighs
Your insights
Will chase me
Until the end of my days
Just like the shadows
And the prances
In my footsteps
Gallant you were
Until the very end
When you waved goodbye
In your very own way
That was always
Like no other
Shouldered me until
You needed
That burden returned
Trade and switch
Life is like that
Better I am
For having breathed
Your presence
Everything good
And pure
You lived in the moment
And though your life
Seemed to last just that long
It was tender
And true
So lift me up
From that other place
Curl around a dream
Where you never stop running
For the right reasons
You always
Licked away the tears
‘Til you were finally filled
The gift of you
Placed in the wind
Where you always pointed
Maybe it was your way
Of showing me the direction
Gentle friend
Brother
Son
Look up at me
From a prettier spot
That will always be green
My mind’s eye
Will always be brown
Gather you up
As you did me once
Break the leash
Open that door
And set you free
But never let you go

Begun These Clone Wars Have

Apparently, this animated version of the "Star Wars" epic hits the theaters on August 18.

I'm alternately feeling, "Holy crap!", intermixed with the sense that it is slightly a rip-off. But mostly "Holy crap!"

ACC Finds Newest Ref In Belarus

Commissioner Jim Swofford search for the world’s worst referees is never-ending and carries him all over the globe. After “Cheatin’” Larry Rose was booted off of ACC games, Swofford saw a need to add another drunken ref to the league, so, understandably, he stopped hiring from Foot Locker and instead focused his eyes on the game of … soccer.

That’s where he found 43-year-old Sergei Shmolik (that name is perfect for this story). A year ago, Shmolik was voted the best soccer referee in Belarus. This year, Shmolik was suspended for life after going on a vodka binge and then trying to referee a match while soused. He said he had a back injury, but when he was "blowing his whistle for no reason" and “gesturing like a clown” on the pitch, the gig was up. Fans applauded as he slowly, crookedly meandered off the field, escorted by dry-heaving, contact-buzzed fellow refs.



[*slow clap*]

Well-played, Mr. Schmolik. And welcome to the ACC.

"Tutu" Taylor Heads To D.C.

Last night, the 'Fins finally traded disgruntled, bitch-ish defensive end Jason Taylor to the Washington Redskins, receiving a second-round draft pick in 2009 and a sixth-rounder in 2010 in return.

This Dolfan was more than ready for this wannabe movie star to take his act (click on the image) to another stage.

Limerick Friday LXXXIV: Madonna and A-Rod, Sitting in a Spaceship …

Is there a bigger phony around than A-Rod?
Adultery sponsored by the scientology “god”?
He called Madonna his freaking soulmate
Someone tell him that this ain’t 1988
She’s a busted, Botox-ridden ho—but maybe you’re two peas in a pod

She tried every color pantsuit with no luck
Obama helping Hillary cover the debt with which she’s stuck?
She paid out of her own purse for personal gain
To attack him with a slimy campaign
You would think Barack would tell her to go take a flying fuck

More hidden info that Katrina trailers were dangerous as hell
Too many passing out while thinking, “What is that smell?”
45 times the safe level of formaldehyde is too much to take
No regulations put even more lives at stake
If this government cares about its own country, it’s hard to tell

We all know that the Dolphins ain’t good
As Herb Sendek said, they have to keep chopping wood
But chainsawing firewood in the Texas July
Is no way to become Miami’s #1 QB guy
But if anyone could improve minus one finger, Josh McCown could

Carrying a sign that said “McCain=Bush”
Got a 60-year-old librarian thrown out on her tush
Tells you about how bad this administration has lost
When the more mention of W’s name gets you tossed
Who will McCain turn to when his wheelchair needs a push?

Last time …

Action News Hard Liquor at 6 … 40!

I imagine this is mostly how Regis operates …

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Manuel’s Metsies Try To Quiet the Flushing in Flushing

It’s always comical to follow the one-extreme-to-another coverage approach used by the New York media. One day, pundits are wondering whether a certain team is the worst to ever put on a uniform. The next, after a win, those same hacks are gauging the chances of the same team to win every game the rest of the way and take home the crown. It’s simply a part of what makes the Big Apple the Big Apple, and if you have the ability to take a step back and accept it for what it’s worth, it can offer quite a few laughs.

This year’s treatment of the New York Mets has been more humorous than ever. Following the cataclysmic collapse down the stretch last year, when the Metsies gift-wrapped the division title for the Philadelphia Phillies and caused more gray hair in New Jersey than Three Mile Island, the team was public enemy #1 this season. When Willie Randolph’s squad played more like the Bad News Bears than one of the highest-paid clubs in the majors, both barrels were unloaded in the Mets direction—and deservedly so. Then, when Randolph decided to try to make himself a martyr, poorly play the race card and align himself with one Isaiah Thomas … well, let’s just say the writing was on the wall.

Enter laid-back Jerry Manuel, whose one-of-the-guys approach has helped build a little more team chemistry and get the squad clicking. Propelled by four shutouts in six games and five straight games of holding teams to three hits or less, New York entered the All-Star break on a nine-game winning streak. The streak is the longest since the World Series year of 2000 and just two shy of the team record of 11 in a row. Manuel has gotten through to borderline head cases like Carlos Beltran and Jose Reyes, and he somehow has even gotten Shea boo victim Carlos Delgado hitting (six homers, 17 RBI in last 17 games).

The Mets have outscored teams by a whopping 54-19 during the winning streak, spurring optimism for the second half, where once there was just depression. Predictably, the media hordes are now falling all over themselves in an attempt to climb aboard the Mets bandwagon (isn’t this the ideal column title: “On second thought, Mets look like winners”).

Will the All-Star break bring a halt to his momentum? Not if Manuel has anything to say about it. “It’s not a period, it’s a comma,” he told the New York press, when asked about the upcoming interruption for All-Star festivities.

The Mets still have a ton of questions to answer, of course. Can Pedro Martinez stay healthy long enough? Can the club provide Johan Santana with some run support? Can Fernando Tatis continue to fill the shoes of Moises Alou—and then some? Can Billy Wagner stop his metamorphosis into Armando Benitez? Can Delgado and Beltran find the consistency needed to support the steady David Wright? Can Reyes keep from taking swings at Keith Hernandez long enough to find more ways to get on base?

And of course, a nine-game winning streak usually just means that the Metsies are biding time to come up with more creative ways to break fans’ hearts. But for now, I’m just grateful that the music coming from Flushing currently involves more cheers—instead of just the sounds of flushing toilets.

Fuckin' "The Dark Bobby Knight" Full Of By-God Sentimentality

This lightly goddam marketed sequel to fuckin' "Hoosiers" has received little christin' fanfare, but it certainly tugs at the bullshittin' heartstrings.

No truth to the rumor that Knight choked Heath Ledger to death during filming.

Fuckin' A.

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

10 Good Things About the LPGA’s Paula Creamer

1. She shot a 60 in one of her rounds at the Jamie Farr Classic, dropping seven birdies on the front nine.

2. She went on to win the Jamie Farr Classic for her fifth career win. “Klinger” would be so proud.

3. Her nickname is the “Pink Panther.” No comment.

4. On a not-completely-unrelated note, she has a ready-made porn name already built in for her post-golf career.

5. She’s earned more than $5 million already in career earnings.

6. She looks a bit like L.C. from “The Hills.” This is a good thing.

7. She is one of the top five women’s golfers in the world.

8. She is 21 years old (this may not, in fact, be a good thing. I don't know these things anymore).

9. She is not unattractive.

10. She likes golf. A lot.

Limerick Friday LXXXIII: Brett Fahv-ruh Ain’t No Short Round

Threatening to retire for five years
He walked away a few times in tears
His love of the numbness of Vicadin
Eclipsed only by that of John Madden
It’s time for Brett Favre to quit disrespecting his peers

I once worked for a midget who couldn’t see me
He was called “Blindy” by a dead-ringer for Mimi
It was a blunder that led to her firing
Of her sadomasochistic tendencies I’m not inquiring
But apparently men in dog cages make her dreamy

Another blog for the Asian ‘stache we clowned
Went anonymous after burning his reputation to the ground
Of dating, couldn’t imagine anyone knowing less
Secretly dreams of a semi-retarded EZU fan to caress
Bitter because Spielberg never called about him being Short Round

More layoffs by a joke of a company in pharma
Those left fire off resumes in alarm-a
You treat people like shit it comes back in the end
Leaves you with a bad reputation and without a friend
Pretty soon they’ll find out what a bitch is that kharma

To another great comic we bid adieu
George Carlin was a genius, ‘tis true
Of politics and religion he wasn’t scared
Treaded on ground where no one else dared
In his honor, I counted curse words numbering 72

Last time ...

Jesse Helms Died.

Or maybe he’s been dead for 20 years and someone just got around to telling his slave wife.

Either way, there’s not a whole lot more I can say about this development that doesn’t involve the words “fish-faced,” “wall-eyed,” “communist” or “KKK.” In fact, any epitaph for Jesse Helms should borrow heavily from Chevy Chase’s epic blast in “Christmas Vacation.”

I think the last time I heard Jesse Helms’s name uttered was probably two years ago, when I was down in New Orleans. We were sitting on a bench, admiring the Mississippi and thinking of ol’ Huck Finn, when “Doc Saxtrum,” a busker of some local renown, walked up to us and began playing his saxophone. During a break, he asked us where we were from. When we replied “North Carolina,” he paused, shook his head imperceptibly and put on a sardonic smile. “Aah …,” he replied, “Jesse Helms.”

We rushed to assure him that we didn’t claim Helms for North Carolina at all, but I couldn’t help but think the damage was done. Once again, an ignorant, narrow-minded racist without the creative capacity to light a light bulb had made me embarrassed to live in North Carolina.

I imagine Jesse Helms and Strom Thurmond spent their final days together on some plantation veranda, throwing rocks at little black kids who were making chalk murals on the sidewalk. Hopefully, there’s a special place in Hades for buttnuggets like them.

Good riddance.

ScarCruz Coming To Theaters Near You

In case you wanted an update on the already-infamous, much-talked-about Scarlett-Penelope-fill-in-whoever-you-want cinematic threesome, the trailer for Vicki Cristina Barcelona has been released. Scarlett's recent engagement has made her dead to me, but I thought this was still worth updating.

Good times ...

New "X-Files" Movie Brings Out My Inner Ex-Nerd

I found out today (apparently, I’ve been pretty much out of the loop between moving, switching jobs and other events) that a new “X-Files” movie comes out later this month. “X-Files: I Want To Believe” wrapped filming in Vancouver in mid-March and will be released on July 25 in the United States. The original stars of the show, David Duchovny (Fox Mulder) and Gillian Anderson (Dana Scully) are back for more, a decade after the first movie, “X-Files: Fight the Future,” appeared. I am irrationally excited about this development.

Though the “X-Files” initially had more of a cult following, in the six years since the series ended, it has come to be more understood and appreciated. In fact, Entertainnment Weekly recently tabbed “X-Files” as the fourth-best show of the past quarter-century. On a personal level, I’m a rather cynical dude, so the idea of government cover-ups and blatant mistrust of the highest levels of bureaucracy sort of played right into my belief system. Of course, it didn’t hurt that I was briefly in love with Gillian Anderson, who I’m guessing represented some type of post-adolescent Princess Leia for me.

These days, it’s difficult to find smart, compelling TV to watch, which has led me to latch on to intelligent shows like “Lost,” “Heroes” and “Bones.” In fact, “Bones” is basically the “X-Files” with a lab component; the relationship between Booth and Brennan is eerily similar to the one between Mulder and Scully, although aspects of it have been taken to caricature level.

In this difficult time between the end of college basketball season and the beginning of NFL training camps, many of us needed something worthwhile to come along to fight the boredom. Well, hello, “X-Files” … you’ve been missed.

"The Wicker Man": Terrible Enough To Reach Cult Status?

Cheesy music, an after-school special-feeling, a bug-eyed Nicolas Cage running around the forest looking drugged … “The Wicker Man” had it all. Especially, if by “all,” you mean “every unintentional comedy aspect a movie needs to eventually become a possible cult classic in the future.”

The initial scene is very strange, and the choice of director Neil LaBute to film it in such a confusing manner—and then return to it multiple times without every truly explaining what happened—sets the tone for a movie with more holes than the Dean Dome during a UNC-Dook game. With a woman and her child (or not) struck by an 18-wheeler (or not), this is too pivotal scene for LaBute to choose to gloss over.

Yet initially at least, Cage is goofy, awkward and odd enough to pull off his role as California highway patrol cop Edward Malus. As a loner who is devastated over the accident involving the woman and child, he is pitiful. But then he receives a letter from a long-lost love who begs for his help in finding her lost daughter on an island in the Puget Sound. When he arrives and attempts to enter the secretive, strange commune of Summersisle, his efforts to locate the child are thwarted at every turn. In this village populated by several sets of twins and citizens with crazy eyes, Malus keeps hearing hissing shadows and blurs of a child running away. After she leaves him a mysterious note, Malus finds his former fiancé, Willow (a pretty, troubled Kate Beahan), but she doesn’t tell him that the girl, Rowan, is his daughter until 45 minutes into the movie. With some not-so-subtle stutters, stammering and tortured faces, Willow immediately calls into question whether or not she is somehow involved in Rowan’s disappearance.

When Malus is provided with some mead, we are left to wonder if it is poisoned, since everyone makes an unexplained, strange face when he drinks it. Then he kills a bee by smashing it with the mead glass, and the horrified reaction by the townsfolk tip us off that bees and honey hold lofty status within this commune. The omnipresence of bees and beekeepers is made more of a major plot point due to the fact that Cage happens to be extremely allergic, even carrying vials of adrenalin with him everywhere he goes.

Among the numerous not-so-believable, troublesome aspects of the film and its plot points are the fact that Malus and Willow keep making references to how many years it’s been since Willow ended their relationship and returned to the commune of her youth … yet if Rowan is only five or six years old, it couldn’t have been too, too long ago. The perception is that we are supposed to believe that they have been apart for quite a long time, but the presence of Rowan and the reality of her age destroy that idea quickly. Malus acts drugged (I figger Cage must have been drugged to not only act in this one, but produce it) and hallucinatory throughout much of the movie, but it is never detailed whether or not he is seeing or imagining things at times or whether some of the strange events are actually taking place. There are too many other odd occurrences and unexplained events for me to detail, but suffice it to say that this flick sort of goes off the track at several different times.

Ellen Burstyn (“I am the spiritual heart of this colony”) is very good as Sister Summersisle, and the scene in the classroom in the middle of the woods strikes the desired chord of horror and creepiness. The actual legend of the Wicker Man; finding the crow in Rowan’s desk; the "neo-pagan," female-dominated nature of the commune; the shivers-inducing twin harpies; the beauty of the landscape transposed against the awful secrets of its inhabitants; the references to ancient rituals and roots in Salem witchdom; and the jarring nature of some of the accident scenes and visions all play well in the horror theme of this film. However, when the highlight of the flick is when Malus punches a woman directly in the face, you know that you’ve found a movie with some head-shaking issues and obstacles that are hard to overcome.

This is a movie without a true identity—it is as if LaBute decided to put “Stepford Wives,” “Pleasantville” and “Children of the Corn” in a blender, added a dash of Nathaniel Hawthorne, sprinkled a bit of M. Night Shyamalan on top and wanted to see what came out at the end. Begrudgingly, I admit that Malus’s final scene was creepy, echoing similar revelations as the ones that accompanied “Planet of the Apes” at the end. Yet the question becomes and remains whether you can take movies that range from “Planet of the Apes” to “Scarlet Letter” to “Children of the Corn” to “Pleasantville” to “The Village” to “Stepford Wives” and expect anything coherent or satisfying to emerge.

Even the final scene, involving Willow and Sister Honey (a naturally creepy LeeLee Sobieski), leaves some questions up in the air. Is Sister Honey continuing the horrific tradition of the commune? Or do the tears in her eyes and the sweat on her brow indicate that she is trying to break free?

This is one of those flicks where the preview is better than the movie, as evidenced by the popularity of the 35-year-old original, British version of the film as a cult classic. I wasn’t aware that this was a remake until after I watched it (apparently, there was a rather humorous and memorable scene involving Britt Ekland that was sadly not replicated by Beahan in this one), but after seeing the potential this movie had to be a good fit in the horror genre, I wasn’t all that surprised. In fact, a sequel to the 1973 version had been slated to begin shooting in Scotland this spring, but was scrapped in April.

The credits were kicked off with the line, “For Johnny Ramone.” I’m not sure what message it sends that such a crappy flick would be dedicated to the legendary guitarist of the Ramones (reportedly, Cage and Johnny were good friends), but I do know that Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam wrote the song “Life Wasted” while returning from Ramone’s funeral. And that makes sense to me in a full-circle kind of way, because when “The Wicker Man” ended, I found myself humming, “Time wasted …”

F’ing Matt Harding Stole My Dream Job

Matt Harding might be my hero.

Here’s a guy who basically was a drifter who decided to take the last of his money and see how far around the world it would take him. Then he said, “How cool would it be if I could film myself dancing in various parts of the planet?” After he posted such a video, he began getting more than 20,000 hits per day on his server, and his original video became the #30 most-watched in its channel on YouTube.

It didn’t long for someone to notice that this viral marketing concept was an insanely clever idea. Stride Gum got involved, and began sponsoring and paying for Matt’s trips around the Earth. The popularity of the concept even gave Matt the opportunity to lecture on the videos and his subsequent fame at Champlain College in Burlington, Vt. (predictably, he was then filmed dancing with the students afterward).

His site, Where the Hell is Matt, posted a countdown to his third video (above), which was released on June 20. For comparison’s sake, his original is below.

He’s been nearly overrun by elephants, got jiggy with it in zero-gravity, taunted death by popping out a modified Cabbage Patch in a demilitarized zone in Korea, swam-danced near large-ish sea creatures without grumping his pants and was nearly crushed by a wave in Tonga. The third video includes a bit more audience participation, has some variation in dance styles (the flourish in India freaking killed me) and features some places that I’ve been recently. He filmed it over 14 months, in 42 different countries ... for free.

So now this guy gets someone to pay (a gum company, no less) so he can travel the world, embrace various cultures and dance like a jackleg. All while avoiding any aspect of work.

Ferris Bueller was once my hero. But now it’s Matt Harding. God bless America.

R.I.P. Gallo ... July 18, 2001-June 17, 2008

It is harder than I ever thought it would be to write the words that we had to put Gallo to sleep last night.

Hopefully, in a day or a week or a month, I’ll be able to write something a little more poignant and emotional about my boy. But right now I just don’t have it. For now, as those of you know who’ve followed our struggles along here, I’ll lean on my habit of trying to content myself with writing about it in an effort to find some peace and solace in relating what happened.

G’Lo had gotten sick after work, but we chalked it up to him running around outside in the heat, drinking too much water too quickly and being over-excited. He went on a walk, played in the backyard and had plenty of energy through the evening. However, something seemed to be nagging at me in the middle of the night, and I woke up to Gallo panting somewhat heavily. I walked with him into the kitchen to see if he wanted any water, but he went past the bowl and to the back door, wanting to be let out.

As I normally do, I let him out on the back deck and into the backyard and waited for him in the kitchen. When he didn’t come back for a long time, I went outside to see what was going on. I looked over the deck railing and saw him just laying in the grass, a breeze blowing around him. He looked up at me and the bottom of my heart fell out. Not only was it unlike G to just lay on the ground like that, but he would normally come racing up the steps to me when he saw me. I had to call him a couple of times to get him to come up the stairs and inside.

When he walked directly to his dog blankets and laid down, still panting, I knew something was severely wrong. Yet inside, I knew that calling the vet would likely mean ending his life, for we had been told that if another tumor attacked Gallo, there was basically nothing left that we could do. But he was slow to respond and lethargic, and we had no choice but to call our vet. We were told that there was no one on staff that late at night, so we were recommended to the NC State Vet School Emergency Hospital, and our vet would call ahead to alert them of our arrival.


On the drive there, I sat in the back seat with G’Lo, and he put his head on my leg and tried to sleep. His breathing slowed so severely that there was one point when I wondered if he had passed. But when we got to the vet school, he jumped out of the car, got on the leash and walked with us to the locked door to the emergency area. He laid down on the pavement, however, as we waited to be let inside, a sure sign that his energy was flagging alarmingly.

After filling out some papers and letting G be taken back for examination, a doctor came out to let us know that they had found some fluid in his chest cavity. They had every reason to believe it was blood, but pending calling in a radiologist, they couldn’t be positive. If we called in a radiologist, that would be setting us on a decision course to allow another emergency surgery on Gallo. But we agreed that we couldn’t put our little guy through yet another surgery, and it was simply his time. We had done all we could do for him, and as hard as it was for us to give up the fight we had waged with him for four months, there was no other choice to make.

While they put a catheter in Gallo to boost his energy somewhat, they placed us in a “quiet room” to wait for him and say our goodbyes. He came in and immediately laid down on the cold floor, so we sat near him and held his head and petted him and whispered in his ear and covered him with love. After a few minutes, the doctor came in to administer the overdose that would stop his heart, and she told us during each step of the process exactly what she was doing and what his reaction would be. G’Lo wagged his tail a final few times as we petted him again, and as the drug was flushed through his tube, we could feel his breathing slow, and then the moment when his spirit left his body. It was at about 1:15 in the morning, and it had been almost exactly four months since the day when he was diagnosed with hemangiosarcoma and a little more than five weeks after his last emergency surgery, when we took him off chemotherapy. We were told that we could pay a little extra to have G cremated, so we could spread his ashes wherever we would like, and we elected to do that.

We left and walked down the quiet, antiseptic hallways and drove home in near-silence, numb. It was like a bad dream, and even though it was a moment we knew was inevitable and had been trying our best to prepare for for months, it still didn’t seem real. On the way home, I drove us by the home where Gallo (and I, in many ways) grew up, gazing upon it in the middle of the night and reliving some memories. We then drove on and went inside our own house, stood around for a while and wondered what we were supposed to do next. We said a brief prayer for Gallo to join his friends Cleo and Foster and Dudley and Lucy in the great open field in the sky, we took a couple of shots and toasted the “Miracle Dog,” and we laughed and cried as we remembered certain moments. We especially spoke fondly of our recent journey to the Outer Banks, and how our decision to have the last emergency surgery had allowed us to enjoy one last great trip with our little big boy, and how that had made it all worthwhile ... to see him with his nose in the air, smelling the salt drifting all around him, framed by the glow of a sunset.


We went to bed and stared at the ceiling for hours. And for the first time in seven years, I woke up without G-boy licking my hand, staring at me and wagging his tail … my own personal alarm clock was truly gone. Reality set in hard when I had to make calls to my family that Gallo had passed.

That numb feeling is still there, and I’m still not sure what I’m supposed to do next. Being a writer, it’s rare that I’m out of words, but that’s where I am. I miss him already and I’m sure I’ll spend a lot of time in the near future thinking I saw his shadow. He was the best part of me for several years, and he helped me become what I hope is a better person in the course of our seven years together.

Thank you as always for all of you who have sent your kind thoughts and words our way. They helped and they will forever be remembered.

"The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long ... and you have burned so very, very brightly ..."