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So in the spirit of occasional posting, here we are four months later almost exactly when we should have adopted our puppy and the next litter has been announced. The parents this time around are a little more diverse and the lineage of each can be traced back on both sides to the great-great-great-grandparents or something like that, what comes out to be like 50 dogs whose genetics are contributing to this litter.

The site says expecting puppies in March of 2010, so that looks like mid-late May before we’re able to adopt. Fairly ideal in terms of timing for socializing etc. but still 5 months away 🙁

The mother, Usarka (Moya) z Gangu Dlugich has a traditional Polish name for a dog. Usarka is the name that the original breeder gave her. Moya is her “common” name or what she would respond to. Gangu Dlugich would be the name of the original kennel she was from. I’m 90% sure that z means of.. or delineates ownership/belonging.

The father is from the UK and is named in a typical fashion of all english-speaking countries: Mybeards Challenge. So basically his name is Challenge and he’s from Mybeards.

Time to post again! As you all know, Sam and I have been debating and sleeping on whether or not to get a dog. It has a fairly large effect on lifestyle, and especially the first few months are so important for the puppy’s development. Anyway, we decided that it’s something we want to do and so we’ve sent our deposit along.. I guess we need to wait until it’s guaranteed and stuff before we know for sure, but we’re pretty excited, yet still a bit worried of course with how its going to go.

Here are the parents of the litter, due at the end of August, available to leave around the end of October. Lots of learning to do before then!

The sire, Theodore (a CKC 2008 champion, and currently top PON in Canada as awarded by the CKC):

The dam, Zalie from Domlina (the breeder we’re hoping to get a puppy from):

Tonight is paint, I don’t think its going to be perfect, the lower speaker wire was too close to the baseboard to get a real nice feather. But there’ll be stuff along the wall eventually anyway. I’m also too lazy to keep plastering/sanding it. The dust is driving me crazy, and with no proper vacuum.. it’s a real pain to clean up. I need to call the blinds people for final confirmation on some measuring correctly, then I’ll order shades tonight. Really hoping the living room is done before Christmas.. but who knows when the shades will make it here.

Here’s a (dark) photo of where it stands now, after about 3 coats of plaster and sanding. SO much dust. My house is the new dustbowl.

I also installed the Powerbridge.. and ran into problems flushmounting the speakers, so I ended up sticking a bit of wood about 3mm thick on one edge of the existing speaker mounts, so at least they’ll mount a lot less angled than before (should be almost completely flat).

It’s now 1:11am, I’ve spent the past roughly 6 hours doing:

final sanding
wiping down the walls
taping off all the outlets, trim, ceiling, plasma mount
painting the whole living room (edging, then rolling)
waiting for it to dry
removing all tape
reinstalling outlet covers, speaker mounts
mounting tv and speakers
sweeping, mopping, swiffing and now Roomba is doing the final pass

And here we are (both photos taken with the 35f2 on the 5D (notice the lens distortion in the second):

I’m so tired, but will hook everything up (not the rears.. still contemplating how to convert the wire in a less ghetto fashion) just to sit there and be able to see.. cable-less theatre!

teewee and liu picked this up first, and so finally I caved and went ahead and picked it up (via iPhone no less) for $8 on iTunes. All but one of the songs are live versions of songs from her two normal albums and it’s made up of 8 tracks.

PSEUDO-TECHNICAL
Sounds great on the home system, as well as these Sony MDR-7506 cans. Clear, typical reverbed concert sound. Sound stage is spaced out a bit for that binaural feeling. The Sound of Silence stands up above the rest, which might be biased, since it’s also probably my favourite track. In it, the two guitars are quite spaced, so you can really differentiate and pinpoint the different guitars. Brooke’s voice is great as usual, and the recording clarity is pristine enough that you can hear all the annunciations and when she opens and closes her mouth hah. The bass is also quite prominent throughout the album. +1!

ENJOYABILITY
Most of the songs have a little bit of a different intro. You can hear someone yell something at the start of Arithmetic and Brooke chuckling. C.S. Lewis was the start of the set and so has a 2 minute extended intro with the instruments coming in one at a time with a pretty cool guitar/bass riff combo. Definitely one of the highlights of the album. I have a soft spot for well covered classics, and the fact that it’s a “new” track from Brooke, The Sound of Silence probably stands out as my favourite track. It’s very simple, starts out with two guitars and Brooke, then some really deep bass comes in with some keys. It’s a really warm rendition and comfortable to listen to.

Overall, very easy to listen to, mellow and warm throughout.

I will rate it.. arbitrarily 5 out of 5 TProlls.