What's on my mind this morning...

Over the years I have forgotten how fun and rewarding cooking can be. It's been tough to keep cooking in my life when my husband refuses to eat 90% of anything I'm interested in making. I've recently decided to start trying again - just because he doesn't like the recipes for chili and spaghetti that my mom passed down to me, doesn't mean we can't find other favorites to eat together! On Thursday I did some "zen" cooking with pork chops - I used a very basic recipe and improvised from there. I made a simpler version for Eric, and then went very fruity with my share. We swapped bites and he said he liked mine better - there's hope for him yet! :)

Yesterday I made some amazing Cherry Garcia Mini-Muffins from HealthyTastyChow. They are so moist and flavorful, not really like a muffin at all. Eric doesn't like cherries very much, so of course he didn't like them, but I didn't make them for him! :)

While I was out and about searching for cherries now that they're out of season (had to settle for dried cherries), I came across a dog left in a car. It was in the upper 80s at that point in the day, so the owner had left 2 windows cracked by maybe an inch, and the "moon roof" was propped open leaving a crack of 2-3 inches. I come across dogs left in hot cars about three times a year, and I'm always torn. Do I call the emergency hotline now, or wait until I'm done shopping? If the owner comes back before I'm done shopping, the dog will probably be ok. But if I come out and the owner still isn't back, that's a lot of time to have wasted on waiting before doing anything. The dog looked fine - it wasn't even panting - so I did my shopping. I was sooo relieved to come back out and the car was gone! Still, in situations like these, a little schooling may be in order.

I searched online and found these fliers, which I intend to print and keep handy in my car for future interventions. It is so frightening to find dogs like this knowing that, even with the windows cracked, it only takes 10 minutes for a car to go from 85 to 102 degrees. Within a half hour, the car is 120 degrees. We get a lot of mixed-weather days in Seattle, so I think a lot of people here don't think about it much. But lower temperatures can still be just as dangerous - it just adds a few more minutes before your dog has heat stroke. If you Google the topic, you'll find lots of information about how deadly hot cars can be to dogs. MyDogIsCool.com - where I found the fliers - has information on studies done to show how fast a car heats up in different situations.

Now it's time to wrap things up and start packing for my trip on Monday. California here I come! :)