Mark Eaton's Story

I have mentioned my dogs in previous posts, but I would like to tell you about Mark Eaton, my mutt.

Mark is my pound puppy. My now husband and I had just started to date and he had to put his Boston Terrier down, so it was a tough time. I was working at Starbucks and going to school and the one day a guy came through the drive thru with the cutest puppy ever. Of course I asked him where this cute puppy came from and he told me the local shelter. So since I knew where to find really cute puppies, I got home and immediately told my now husband that we must go see! He wasn’t too thrilled at the idea at first because he missed Odie but he eventually took me.

So we went to the shelter that the guy at the drive thru said he got his puppy from, but they didn’t have any more left. There was another couple there that was looking for an older dog and overheard us talking and told us that at another shelter down the road, where they just came from, had a bunch of puppies. So off we went!

We got to the other shelter, and to this day, I 100% guarantee I could never get there again. It was in a really odd place and I remember it being in the middle of nowhere. But anyways, there is where we found Mark! He was in a cage that had another cage on top of it. It was just him and his brother, but his brother kept barking. Mark just sat there looking so cute and not barking, crying, anything. I felt so bad for him though because he had some poop on his head because his cage was not the cleanest, so I just had to take him home and give him a bath. (Side note – we made sure his brother got adopted!)

So we adopted Mark, which can I just tell you seems like more paperwork than adopting a child, and my now husband named him Mark Eaton after his favorite hockey player. Mark became an immediate addition to our still fairly new relationship, but he also helped us grow closer. I honestly believe that every couple should have to take care of a puppy before they have a child. You really get to see how each other is going to be with taking care of something else, especially something that poops, pees, cries, gets dirty, needs attention and wants to play when all you want to do is sleep.

Mark has since grown out of his playing days. Sure, he’s a bit overweight, loves to eat (veggies oddly enough) and he acts like an old dog but he is just 4 years old. For Christmas one year, my mother-in-law had a DNA test done on him because we truly did not know what breed he was. Some people would say lab, others – including the vet – said he probably had some pit bull in him, and we knew that he had some sort of pointer in him just because he would point at things in the yard. Turns out he is a crazy mix of Dalmatian (he only has like 15 spots on his chest), German Shepherd (which is mostly what his mom was, we saw her), German Shorthaired Pointer (yup) and Pekinese (ummm…that is a tiny dog. Mark is NOT tiny).

But I don’t care what Mark is. He is my best friend, my baby…my husband knows it too. If I start to think about Mark not being with me, it just gets bad. Like right now, tears. Uhg. I know he won’t live forever, but I am saving up now to clone him.

We all have had special pets, but Mark has beat out any others that I have had (or have). Don’t get me wrong, I love Axel (our other dog) but Mark is mine and he stole my heart the first time I saw the poop on his head!

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The MAD Shitter!

So I’m back from the fabulous land of Las Vegas and it was…AWESOME!  Everything went perfectly.  The trade show went off with a hitch, the weather couldn’t have been more superb and the people I traveled with were a blast!  And for the first time in a long time (on a business trip to Vegas), I had a significant amount of down time and let me tell you…I took full advantage of it.  I even spent six hours poolside one day and that never happens.  At night we went out and enjoyed all of the fun that Vegas has to offer and of course, we gambled.  We gambled a lot!

There was only one bad part to the whole trip…

Saturday I woke up bright and early as I had to be at the airport at 9:30 a.m. and it was a rough wake-up.  I had a wicked hang over (to be expected in sin city) but it’s not like I haven’t been hung over and flying before.  You just get a cocktail on the plane and power through.  Except that everything else about the ride was TERRIBLE!  I had a four hour flight from Vegas to Charlotte.  I had the aisle seat and next to me in the middle seat was an older woman who was slightly larger.  Not obese but big enough where we couldn’t put the arm rest down in between us, so I felt like she was invading my space the entire time.  Across the aisle from me was this guy…oh my!  He was probably in his early 40s and was wearing black skinny jeans with paint all over them, work boats and a Metallica t-shirt with the arms really cut out.  He had this weird ‘70s hairstyle and he wore the most ridiculous sunglasses the entire time.  What made him terrible to sit next too was that it was only his second plane ride and he had absolutely nothing to do to occupy his time for four hours.  So what did he do instead?  He asked me and everyone else that walked passed – flight attendant, passenger – for the time.  Do you have any idea how long that makes a four hour plane ride?   After the sixth time he asked me, I handed him one of my rag mags and told him that he was making the flight longer by needing to know the time every five minutes!  But wait…it gets worse.  About two hours out from Charlotte, we hit a lot of turbulence and it was bad.  Being that I was very hung over, I became quite aware of where my puke bag was.  But being pukey wasn’t what was worse.  The woman next to me, the larger one, started to get sick and she burped and farted for the last two hours, excusing herself every time.  I wanted to DIE!  I couldn’t get off the flight fast enough.

Finally…I’m in Charlotte.  I hall ass to my connecting flight only to get there and find out that there was mechanical issues with our plane and we have to move to another gate.  The new gate was exactly where I just came from.  On the way back to that gate, I’m on the people mover and I’m walking and moving.  There’s an older gentleman directly ahead of me (late 50s early 60s) wearing shorts. 

This is where it’s going to blow your mind…

He starts shitting his pants right on the people mover directly in front of me!!!!

Let that sink in for a minute.

Again, he starts shitting his pants right in front of me.  I’m wearing flip-flops and almost flip-flopped directly into it.  The smell made the woman’s farts on the plane smell like roses.  I mean, this man was sick.  His poo smelled worse than a babies diarrhea.   Needless-to-say, the guy tries to hurry but once on the people mover, you can’t get off.  The poo was running down his leg.  It took everything in me not to vomit (remember…hung over).  Are you still processing this part of the story?  Let me say it one more time…he pooped his shorts on the people mover in the middle of the Charlotte airport!!!!

Finally, I get to the new gate and although the flight was delayed over an hour, we got to board and…wait for it…wait for it…the crazy time guy was sitting directly behind me!  I should have known by the way he was dressed that he was heading to Pittsburgh.  I mean where else in the world could one dress like that and get away with it?  Only in the ‘burgh!

By the time I got home at 1 a.m. I was beat and so glad to be home!

One more time…he shit his pants on the people mover in the Charlotte airport!

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