Ellie the PitBull

While we were in Spain last month, our nine-year-old Australian shepherd, Molly, died of a mysterious seizure/paralysis that came on suddenly one morning and ended with her being put to sleep that night. She was the perfect dog, sweet, personable, completely trustworthy and nice to everyone. I'm more of a cat person, but even I cried and cried when she was gone. It was particularly tragic because we couldn't be there with her, and we felt horrible that she went through all of that without her family at her side.

The conventional wisdom seems to be that you should wait before starting a relationship with a new pet, but the house seemed empty without Molly, and Rachel, who was leaving for Brazil, wanted to have a say in the selection process. We all agreed that we wanted to get a dog from the pound, and we were pretty open to any breed, as long as it was bigger than a breadbox.

During my orphanage visit in Russia, my family sent me emails about the pitbull mix they were visiting at the pound. I kept writing back, "I'm not excited about a pitbull...Pitbulls are kind of scary...I don't know about that pitbull..." Nevertheless, when they picked me up at the airport, there she was, Ellie, our new 6-month-old pitbull mix puppy.

The response from friends, relatives, dog trainers, and random people has been wildly divergent, from delight and adoration to uncomfortable silence to sheer horror. My brother introduced her to his golden retriever and 6 of his 8 children, and they played for 9 hours straight. My mother, reserved at first, ended up happily babysitting Ellie for several hours while we went to a reception. A woman at PetSmart quietly moved her daughter to her other side, away from Ellie. And my sister-in-law flatly informed me on the telephone that she is never coming to our house again.

I now find myself in the awkward position of defending pitbulls. That is, defending my pitbull (mix). I feel a huge responsibility to raise her properly, so I spend time with her each day, practicing our lessons from obedience school, anxiously watching for negative behaviors, taking her with me on errands so she is properly socialized. So far, she is sweet, affectionate, almost desperate to please us, quick to learn and very obedient--all traits typical of pitbulls, I'm told. She and our cats are still wary of each other, but she's friendly and curious when she meets a new dog.

I would never leave any dog alone with a small child, and Ellie will never go out in public without a leash. I will probably never trust her as completely as I trusted Molly. But I am starting to wonder if maybe pitbulls don't deserve all the bad press they get. Maybe the vicious ones really are that way because they are mistreated or trained to behave that way. Maybe the vast majority truly are loving, steady, loyal companions. I hope so. Meanwhile, it's another context in which to examine preconceived notions and prejudices, and how scary it is to take a risk and reach out to someone or something new we've only heard about.

District 9

Over the weekend we saw District 9. I loved the premise--aliens who not only arrive on earth, but do not leave; the temporary home provided for them 20 years ago has turned into a slum; they are so weird-looking (and ugly) that it is impossible for them to become integrated. The government official in charge of moving them to a new area does not care much what happens to them until he ingests some alien liquid and starts to turn into an alien himself. Lots of interesting ideas here that are worth pursuing and discussing, but evidently it was too much trouble to come up with a good conclusion and set up for a sequel, because in the last third everyone just grabs a gun and starts shooting. The government official finds some protective armor that makes him look like one of the transformers. The movie is a cross between The Fly, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and The Matrix (another movie with a great premise that only comes to an end when everyone has shot everything else). 6.5 or maybe 7. Enjoy.

Paul Newman

Paul Newman died. http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-me-newman28-2008sep28,0,2676793.story I think the world is a little bit sadder place today because he's not here, but it's also a much better place because he was here. I discovered him when I was 17 and saw The Sting at the BYU Varsity Theatre. I went because Robert Redford was in it, and he was hot. But about halfway through, I started noticing the other guy. He was pretty hot, too, for one thing. He looked like he was always thinking about a really good joke. I've watched the poker scene a million times, but I still love every minute, and it seems like he thoroughly enjoyed every second of it. Off screen he did some amazing things, but he didn't make a big deal about himself--he was married for 50 years, raised 6 children, drove race cars, and founded a successful charity. He lived a full life doing what he wanted to do and being good to people along the way. This week, I'm having a Paul Newman film festival.

Running, or, Not Dying of Boredom While Running

I'm training for the CIM (California International Marathon), which means I can't skip a necessary run. Saturday was one of the rare occasions when none of my running buddies were available and I had to do 10 miles by myself. Listening to music wasn't working for me, but luckily, I had some 1948 Sam Spade radio mysteries on my ipod (doesn't everyone?). Yeah, pretty geeky, but they were so entertaining, it was my easiest 10-mile run ever.

Anyway, when I got home, I added some podcasts for next time, and also found this great website. http://librivox.org/ It's run by volunteers, and their goal is to make all public domain books available as free audio books. They have books in 10 different languages. If you're looking for current literature, this is not the place to go, but for catching up on all the books you wrote papers on in college but never read, or practicing your foreign language skills, it's great. And by the way, if you're interested, you can volunteer as a reader.

Speaking of podcasts, my daughter works for the BYU Writing Center. They have a new weekly podcast about language and composition. http://wordofmouth.byu.edu/ It's still in the "coming soon" stages, but it should start in the next week or two, so check it out.

Bill Simmons again

For some reason, the Bill Simmons link disappeared from my post, so here it is again: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/simmons/index

Batman

I finally saw Dark Knight last weekend. It was very dark and the joker was horrific, but I liked it a lot. Heath Ledger is amazing. I keep wondering what incredible roles he would have created if he had lived a long time. I love that he took so many risks. Christian Bale is great, too, but I still prefer Michael Keaton. He is such a hot Batman. Harvey Dent was perfect. I love superhero movies.

Anyway, thinking about Heath Ledger got me started on a new top 10 list (new for me, anyway)--riveting performances in a movie. This is different from an amazing scene, or from a great ensemble performance. It's a performance by an actor (or actress) where you are mesmerized every time they appear onscreen. The quality of the movie is not relevant, and it doesn't count if they're riveting just because they're so good-looking! So far I've come up with the following, in no particular order, but I'd love to hear some other opinions.

Heath Ledger in Dark Knight
Javier Bardem in No Country for Old Men
Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean
Marlon Brando in Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront, and The Godfather
Roberto Benigni in Life is Beautiful
Vivien Leigh in Gone With the Wind

Bill Simmons

He's a sports columnist and much of what he writes goes right over my head, but I still read him pretty regularly. He loves books and movies and pop culture, he's funny, and I've even learned a few things about sports.