Diet Goosie: Same Pup, Fewer Calories

As today is a bank holiday in observance of Veteran's Day, G and I are parked on the couch trying to catch up on some of the work we missed when Sandy blew through. All in all, G's a pretty good work from home buddy. She takes up residence on the other end of the couch from me and snores through a solid 5-6 hours of me typing away before she's ready for her first potty break.

I snapped this shot of G curled up into a little ball next to me. In the interest of full disclosure, I've been trying to get G to lose a little weight recently as she used to be about 46 lbs. and has spiked to 50 - whoops! In addition to reducing strain on her joints and knees that extra weight adds, when our vet commented that she's starting to look a bit like a square coffee table from the top, I decided it was probably time to go on a diet.

That being said, despite what this picture shows, we've been pretty successful so far. She's lost probably 2 pounds (although we have to go to the vet to confirm this) through reducing the amount of food she gets per feeding (by no more than a quarter cup) and replacing traditional doggy treats with baby carrots in a Kong (she LOVES them).

Slowly, I'm start to see the outline of waist and G even seems a little more game to take long walks.

Any other diet tricks for your pups?

And Now a Word from the Cats: VOTE!

P and M want to remind everyone to vote today!

G Makes her Concerned Face at Sandy Aftermath

Well, things are slowly getting back to normal on the island of Manhattan. Transit is running, trees and other damage are getting cleaned up and power has been restored for most. We are praying for people in New Jersey and the outer boroughs of the city who were not as fortunate as we were. It was a devastating storm that has put a lot of things in perspective and I just hope that everyone stays safe and can get things back to normal as soon as possible.

This past week, I took G out for several walks to burn some of the energy she built up spending hours on end inside during the height of the storm. G was making a 'concerned' face while I snapped some pictures of her in front of some of the damage in Riverside Park - seems weird the way animals know when things aren't quite right! That being said, a few downed trees are nothing compared to what most are dealing with and we truly, truly know how lucky we were to have no major issues.

A downed tree already being cut up and removed on Thursday afternoon.

A tree snapped in multiple pieces due to high winds near 90th Street.

And on the way to get my wisdom teeth out on Friday (fun), I passed by the precariously dangling crane on 57th/7th. Scary!

Our 200th (!) Post: G remains unimpressed

Wow. I simply cannot believe that I have posted 200 times about little old G and our lives together in NYC. This blog is such a great reminder of all the things I've experienced over the past year and a half with my prettie little pittie and I am so glad to be a part of a close-knit group of bloggers who love their pups just as much as I do.

I started blogging after reading a USA Today article that mentioned our favorite Two Pitties in the City and now I've learned so much from blogging and can't imagine not doing this. The chronicle of G's, my kittles and my experiences are priceless.

Thanks to all of you who read and comment - it means so much! :)

Happy Howl-o-ween!!

We're ready for the trick or treaters (even though I secretly think G wants to nose dive into the Reese's herself and P.Kitty could care less!).

Hope everyone has a safe and happy Halloween!

We Survived!

...but our thoughts and prayers are with those who lost their lives, homes or sustained massive damage due to the storm.

G and I ventured out to Riverside this afternoon, and walked along the promenade (not in the park, they're technically still closed!). It was sad to see several historic, large trees did not survive the storm. You can see on the right in the below picture the street lamp that was essentially beheaded.

So scary, but I'm so glad everything is okay - though the destruction can see daunting, the loss of life could have been much, much worse.

When Backup and Restore Literally Saves Your Sanity - an essay by Goosie Mama

All of my photos of my G and my life in general are taken on my iPhone. I think I own a digital camera, but I haven't touched it in years, and frankly, I'm not sure I could find it if you asked me to!

Now, for those techies out there, you'll know that the new iPhone comes with a 29MP camera. This is pretty impressive, especially considering the first digital camera my family owned was a 25 lb. Kodak number with a whopping 1.2MP that cost more than a monthly mortgage payment.

Naturally, since my AT&T contract was up for renewal in September, the same month (conveniently) that the iPhone 5 came out, I ordered my new phone 4 weeks ago and happily (and impatiently) awaited its arrival.

This Tuesday (gahhhh, 21 business days later), my gorgeous new white iPhone5 arrived at my apartment; and after some chasing down and choice words with the UPS man, I couldn't wait to start using it.

To ensure everything was easy, peasy during the transfer from one device to the other, I decided I should update my old iPhone4 to the new iOS6 operating system prior to transferring my number. No problem, right?

Wrong. iOS6 caused my iPhone 4 to crash and I was getting an error that the phone was unable to restore. I spent almost 3 hours on Tuesday night trying to fix this with no luck and I had no phone service to boot. That being said, I wasn't in full panic mode yet, because I could clearly see that the last iCloud back-up and restore had occurred on Oct. 22nd. All was (still) good.

So in order to continue troubleshooting, I got to work super early on Wednesday morning with my Mac, iPhone4 and iPhone5 in tow (and my Kindle for good measure - thank goodness I didn't get mugged!). After another 3 hours of troubleshooting (with zero help from Apple, might I add, uninstalling every antivirus program I have), I finally successfully restored my phone. The bad news? The backed-up version of my phone from October 22nd was nowhere to be found. Thus, none of my pictures transferred over.

Well, even I had to admit that a working device is better than a dead one, so, I grudgingly decided that I would just have to transfer over to my iPhone5 and be really sad that I'd lost a year and half of G pictures (things were getting really emotional at my desk).

I started the process of moving to the iPhone5 and - GASP - a back-up and restore message asked me if I wanted to restore from 9am 10/24 or from 8pm 10/22 - OCTOBER 22nd?! That's the one I needed!!

I pressed the button and voila! Everything, down to the exact way I had my apps, music, pictures, screensavers, emails and alarms was back in action on my new phone!!

I can safely say back-up and restore saved my sanity and my photo library :)

Proof that my phone has all of its' photos back - here's G passed out 2 years ago!