Yes dear, it IS a little dusty in here.

The Human Male had a lab growing up named Shadow. From the stories I've heard, she sounds like quite the handful. Shadow would show up in the back seat of cars, swung from a rope swing they had in their yard, and would lick dishes clean-- despite them already being loaded in the dishwasher. One story that I like in particular is that one day their neighbor found Shadow in her kitchen, happy as a clam and eating all of their food.

The Human Male loved Shadow a lot, and it's apparent that even years later, he still misses her a lot. He lights up when he sees a lab walking around, quick to tell the owner that he had a lab, too. He tells stories of her antics with such sweetness. Even when he talks about the rough last months, when she had hip dysplasia and he had to hold her up while she did her business, he talks about it in a way that never discounts Shadow sense of dignity. It's really sweet.

Over the weekend I discovered the Reserve Online feature on the Redbox. For those of you who aren't familiar with what is arguably the greatest creation of the 21st century, the Redbox is a movie dispenser that lets you check out DVDs for $1 a night. Our local grocery store has one and it's the best, but the Reserve Online option takes the cake. If a box has a movie in, it'll let you check it out from home-- all you have to do is bring your credit card down and pick it up.

Reserve Online has allowed me to take selfish, passive-aggressive laziness to a whole new level. Now I don't have to walk that two whole blocks to the store unnecessarily, and I like to imagine that when I click the reserve button, the person who made me wait six whole days for Quantum of Solace to come back in is in the store, trying to check out the movie I got to first-- AND I'm still in my pj's. Suck it, fellow Daniel Craig Lover!

Today, two movies I wanted to see came out: Slumdog Millionaire and Marley & Me. I reserved them first thing this morning, with big plans to watch them both tonight-- one, though passive-aggressive renting is satisfying, it's not very nice to be keep them for extended periods of time when other people could be renting; and two, I refuse to break down and pay another dollar for a second night. I don't care how many Oscars it's won! I don't care if I love Owen Wilson almost as much as George Clooney! I can't do the dollar.

After the anti-theft encryption on Slumdog Millionaire blocked it from playing on my four-year-old DVD player, we chose to watch Marley & Me. I read the book a few years ago and loved it, and was surprised what a great job they did turning it into a movie-- definitely not the same, but still completely lovable. And as the book made me cry, so too did the movie-- a lot. Maybe it was the story, maybe it was the fact that Alice was curled up in my lap the whole time, maybe it's just because I'm super girly when it comes to movies and cry at the hint of mood music. I don't know. Whatever it was, I turned into a mess. The Human Male, per usual, starts laughing at me.

So it gets to the end, when John and Marley are at the vet's office for the last time, and out of nowhere, the Human Male says, "Boy, it sure is dusty in here."

I look over to him and notice his eyes look a little red and glistening. This, of course, causes me to both laugh and cry harder.

"Dusty?" I ask him.

"Yeah. It's a little dusty in here," he repeats as he rubs his eyes.

Yes, my love. It was a little dusty tonight.