December 12

We’re still feeling out this business of the Sisters being separated. It’s not like we haven’t ever been apart before, but for the last ten years, we’ve been together more than nine hours a day, five days a week. And then we’d talk at night and all weekend. Now, Ava’s trying to figure out if she can actually work in an office again, and Amylynn has been trying to navigate the world without a wingman. It’s been rocky. First of all, no one thinks we’re funny, and that’s a tragedy. Second, we have to eat BY OURSELVES or with strangers. The only thing that perks Amylynn up is that her Chipolte consumption is way down. Also, it’s really good that our cellphone company doesn’t charge us by the text or we’d be selling a kidney to pay for that. We’ve wiped away a tear and found some funny stuff to share. At least there’s that.

1. Snake House. Somewhere in Saskatchewan, Canada 310 garter snakes were removed from a family’s home. They were everywhere–the kitchen, basement, and even the upstairs rooms. Now get this, the family had rounded up 221 snakes on their own before they called snake experts. The Sisters live in snake country and you’d think that would make us used to it, but we want to assure you that if one snake slithers through our kitchen there is going to be trouble. If another one wanders into our bedroom, shit is going to fly. The experts had better show up with guns a blazin’. Our favorite part of this story is that the family has asked to remain anonymous so that people could visit without fear. Our recommendation is that if ANYONE in Saskatchewan invites you to visit, you stay the hell away. Better safe than sorry.

2. Flurry of furries. This is one of those stories that you’re going to think we made up.  We swear we didn’t. Seriously. Ok, here we go. A hotel in Chicago that was hosting a Furries convention–hold on, do you know what a furry is? They are adult people who enjoy dressing up in cartoonish animal costumes. You’ve seen them. Amylynn was traumatized by an episode of CSI that centered around furries.  Anyway, this Chicago hotel was hosting the Furfest annual convention when emergency workers evacuated the hotel due to a toxic chlorine gas issue. “Where did they evacuate the furries to?” you ask. To the dog show next door. Because of course they did. Can you imagine the look on the Pekinese owner’s faces when the 6-foot-tall rabbits, foxes and dragons poured into the arena?  Good times!

3. Lion on the run. We talked about this before. The forest service down here keeps trying to reintroduce big horn sheep to our area. The mountain lions keep gobbling them up. First let us state that we disapprove of eating the sheep. The sheep are probably very nice, but lets face it–they don’t seem very cuddly. The Sisters will always side for the cuddlier animal. Or maybe it’s the fuzzier animal. There’s probably a chart we could put together for reference.  We suspect this affinity is our fatal flaw. Most likely it will get us killed one day. Nevertheless, we’re rooting for the latest mountain lion to escape with his full belly.

4. Our favorite Nobel Laureate. Nothing funny here. We’d like to say we’d be brave enough to do what Malala Yousafzai did, but we fear that we’re closet cowards. She also makes us feel ungrateful, but we strive to live a life that is worthy of the Malala Yousafzai’s out there who don’t have our conveniences. We’ve had conversations with our daughters about what Malala means to all women, but we doubt they’ve really grasped her importance. We’ll keep at

The burnt dog bed

it. She’s a wonder. At the risk of sounding stupid, we’ll raise a cupcake in your honor today, Malala. We recommend you do the same, Internet.

5. Dog trouble. Coming full circle, we head back to Canada for our final thing. In the Yukon some crazy dog set his owner’s house on fire when he was playing with matches. Yes, the dog was playing with matches. There is a serious lapse in details in the article we read as we don’t know what kind of dog this was. One of those juvenile delinquent breeds, most likely. Apparently, said dog was lounging on his bed and chewing on a box of “strike anywhere” matches. No animals or people were harmed in the fire, but it did cause extensive smoke damage to the house. We’re wondering if there wasn’t more to this story. Like maybe did he see a snake? If there was a snake then burning down the house may have been the only solution, something those people in Saskatchewan should look into.