“OK,” he replied with enthusiasm and started opening the package with his teeth.

“Uh, you probably don’t want to put your mouth on that.  Do you know what a bully stick is?” I cautioned.

“No, what is it?”

“It’s a bull’s penis,” I casually informed him.

“Oh,” he pauses to think.  “So, if Maddie saw a bull, would she try to chew on his penis?”

“No, she doesn’t try to eat things that are alive.”

“Then if Maddie found a dead human, would she eat it?”

“Well, yeah, she’d probably would nibble on it.”

[long pause]

Girl vs 12 chimes in concernedly, “But we wouldn’t let her, right Mom!?”

Another topic.  I grew up being taught that FLIES are the most disgusting, disease-carrying insect on the face of the earth.  Food that they touched had to be thrown out.  Objects that they landed on had to be sterilized.  I’m not quite so disgusted by them as my upbringing would indicate, but they are still pretty blucky.

However, you combine our darling 11 month old Maddie with a repulsive half-dead fly and what do you get?  PURE ENTERTAINMENT.

She’s really quite the fierce predator, eh?

Canada and Norway are battling at this moment in the Canada’s men’s hockey team’s first game of the Olympics.  We’re winning.  Of course.

We hadn’t planned on watching the Olympics because we don’t have cable.  But I thought I’d give the good ol’ rabbit ears a try and … woo hoo … we get CTV, which is the main Canadian channel.  I love my rabbit ears.

So, the TV, which usually hides in the basement, rarely used, has been moved to the living room and the whole family is glued to it whenever possible … just like a proper Canadian family

I think I have my Mom to thank for my love of the Olympics.  That woman can scream and cry better than any of the actual athletes’ moms.  Doesn’t matter which sport it is – we love them all.  And the announcers are so good, you learn a lot along the way.

And now I’m trying to pass this fanaticism on to my own children.

There are some interesting goings-ons around here, inspired by the Olympics.

Girl vs12 (yes, she recently underwent an upgrade) has some sort of sliding competition going on amongst her stuffed animals.  A Canadian teddy bear, Swiss ducky, Japanese bunny, and Chinese panda are being flung across the room and judged by their speed and acrobatics.  There were some delays when bunny went missing, but she was discovered (reasonably unharmed) being chewed on by Maddie (the Mexican judge).

Girl vs16 apparently knows a lot about all the sports, but in figure skating, she knows exactly what the judges are looking for … or so she says.  It’s such a delight to have a teenager who knows absolutely everything provide personal commentary through all the sports.  I especially enjoyed her comment, “He has a terrible French accent,” when Garou, a popular Quebecois singer, performed during the opening ceremonies.  And it was particularly insightful when she proclaimed, “He’s going to need to do better than that,” when one of the lugers exploded out of the gate.  What does the clock know?  Yeah, the clock that declared it the fastest start of the games … apparently my teenager knows better.  But it’s nice to see her enjoying the games so much.  She screamed uncontrollably when Canada got their first gold.  Grandma would have been proud.

Boy vs13 is mostly disgusted with the fact that his video game playing has been disrupted.  He still sits glued to the tv, but I think he enjoys the commercials most; commercials are a rare occurrence in his tv deprived life.  When Patrick Chan, a Canadian figure skater, was quoting a Chinese proverb about respecting your parents, he audibly scoffed.  I thought of practising some shotput at that moment, but I refrained.

All-in-all, it’s turned out to be a wonderful family time.  I’m not deterred by the fact that it primarily consists of me sitting on the couch begging everyone to please PLEASE just give me a few moments of peace.

In other sporting news … here’s two athletes from opposing teams … who seem to be enjoying their own little version of the games.

We spent the past week at the parents’ house, in weather that fluctuated between about -20° and -8° Celsius (that’s about 4° to 17° Fahrenheit).  There was enough snow to do a bit of sledding and cross-country skiing, but not really that much.

Maddie (my Chihuahua) isn’t exactly a snow dog, but she survived. She learned to go potty quickly. She’d still try to explore, but when her paws got too cold, she’d freeze in place, making squeaking sounds and alternately lifting paws. We took her for a couple walks … in our coat . We’d put her down for a minute and she’d truck along happily and then all of a sudden freeze in place. We’d then put her in our coat for awhile to warm her up and then she’d do another little walk. So silly.

I’d giggle when we passed people on the trail while Maddie was walking, because I think they were probably wondering if we were nuts for having such a wee little mite out in that weather.

We avoid clothes for her, unless they’re necessary.  Dog boots are ridiculously expensive and we thought they were silly, but after this last week we might have to look into them.  I found some patterns on-line, so I might try and make some.

But this video has me wondering how Maddie will handle them.  She looks almost exactly like this doggy.  I can’t stop watching this – it makes me giggle.