Inspired by a post from Tara, I went to go look up my M.... personality style. I've taken this test many times before. I know, however, that, if a person works at it, he can change his personality and mannerisms to express a different personality type. Although I can't walk into a party and work the room the way Ben can, at least I'm not the wallflower I was in high school, and can be fairly comfortable in a crowd.

So, I went to take the personality test to see if indeed, I had changed.

Part of the problem with taking personality tests that ask questions about yourself is that sometimes, depending on how the question is worded, you don't know the answer about yourself. Your friends or family can answer the question immediately and without any consideration, as they know you from the outside. From the inside, things aren't always so clear.

After I finished the test (discovering that I am, at this point, a slightly expressed ENTJ, the first time I'm not fundamentally an INTJ), Kris asked to take the test, too. Since the question was 72 questions long, I handed him my computer and waited for him to take the test.

He, too, had to ask me for help on some questions about how I perceived him, just as I had to ask how he perceived me. At some point, he asked me what I thought his yes/no answer should be to the statement, "You give freely to others asking nothing in return."

I said no, that wasn't necessarily the case. People had to ask him, and, well...

"If I'm doing you a favor, make it easy for me," he commented.

Yup. Exactly.

Kris, Andy and I took the boys and girls to Water Dog Lake in Belmont today. Kris and I had been talking about the hike to Andy, as it both is short and has water for his dogs to play in. Andy wanted a short excursion today, so off we went, the four dogs and three people in my new purse.

When we arrived, Andy looked at the trail marker sign and immediately laughed. Confused, we asked what was so funny. He pointed to the trail sign and said, "It really is called Water Dog Lake. I figured that was your name for it."

Something like Ft. Fun Town! no doubt.

We went up to the lake, which was low, but not the lowest we'd ever seen the lake, and around it.

Twice.

The dogs weren't tired yet after two. We ended up losing Annie somewhere on the second loop, but Kris didn't seem very worried. Both Annie and Bella and wandered off, but Kris kept hiking along the trail. "They know who feeds them. They'll come back," he said, and kept hiking. Bella seemed to realize we were moving away from her, and came running off as I was becoming worried about them.

Annie didn't.

We finished the second loop, and waited around. Bella eventually found the entrance to another trail, and started to go up it. I followed her to see what she would do. To my surprise, she walked along the trail to the top of the hill, paused, sniffed, looked around, and turned around to walk back down the trail back to the lake. I followed, amazed, pleased and humoured at Bella's human-like behaviour.

As Andy threw a ball into the water for Blue to fetch, and Shadow debated the merits of jumping in the lake in an attempt to capture one of the ducks on the water, Kris waited for Annie to return.

Kris and Andy never seem to be as impatient with the dogs as I am, so off I went to find Annie. Again. It seems like I'm always tromping off to find that dog, and it annoys me every time I have to go to find her. One of these times, I'm just going to leave her, and then won't Kris be less willing to let her off leash.

Eventually, I did find her running along the top of a ridge, clearly having a good time and not at all looking like she was going to be done any time soon. I bribed her to come down the hill with a treat (always carry treats with which to bribe your dogs or throw at some attacking bear), leashed her up and nearly dragged her back to the lake loop trail head.

Near the end of the trail, there's a trashcan. As Annie exited the trail, she burst into a run and went bounding off to where Kris and Andy were standing, talking. When I saw her start to run, I took off, running as quickly as I could after her, lest she yank my arm off when the leash ran out.

What I wasn't counting on was the trashcan.

Or rather, the hook on the bottom of the trash can.

Annie rounded the can quickly in her dash to say hello to Kris. I also rounded the can quickly, and only barely realized the leash was behind me as I passed the can before the two of us hit the respective ends of the now taut leash.

"GAH!" was my only word as my arm jerked back, my legs still going forward. I'm not sure if I heard a simultaneous "AROO?" from Annie as she stopped at the same time. I flipped up, but managed to catch myself before crashing into the ground.

I imagine I looked like Kris when he yoinked on the sleds.

The walk back was easy, with the whole hike being thankfully easy enough for Andy's knees. With the water and the girls running off-leash, we had a few pleasantly tired doggies this afternoon.

One of the songs for Guitar Hero 2 is Possum Kingdom. I know exactly two lines of the song's lyrics. The two lines I know are, "I will treat you well, my sweet angel, so help me Jesus." That's it. That's all I know of the song. That's all I really cared to know of the song.

My lack of lyric knowledge suits me fairly well. It's kinda like my lack of knowledge of Hollywood directors when I worked in the movie industry: it's hard to be intimidated by someone if you don't know who the hell they are. It's hard to dislike a song if you like the rythym and melody and bass line, and you don't know the lyrics.

Before we went to Water Dog Lake with Andy, Kris was humming along to a Guitar Hero song, which I recognized as Possum Kingdom, and immediately belted, in tune, but with crappy tonal quality, the only lyrics to the song I knew, expecting Kris to smile and join in as he normally does when I sing loudly to make up for my lack of finesse.

Instead, he asked, "Do you know the lyrics to that song?"

"No. Well, you've heard all of the words I know."

"Just those lines?"

"Yeah."

"It's not a nice song. I don't know that you want to be singing it."

He then went on to tell me the story of the lyrics, how there were a couple murders at Possum Kingdom Lake in Texas and the song is the telling of how the murders happened from the perspective of the murderers. He quotes a few of the lyrics, and I responded with a strong, "Eewwwww."

We talked about how, maybe, just maybe, I should actually listen to the lyrics of a song before deciding if I liked it or not. Finding out a song you like is about how weak people are, or how retarded someone is, or how a person is supposed to give another person what he wants because the second person is a pathetic little twit woe-is-him, often makes for seriously big disappointments.

We went on to discuss other songs' lyrics when Kris asked me what song's lyrics I actually know and liked. I was stumped. I could list a lot of songs with lyrics I didn't like, but not any with ones I did like. Eventually I gave up and flipped through my iTunes songs to find some.

Shame I couldn't think of any off the top of my head.

I don't think I'll bother learning the rest of Possum Kingdom.

I finished Wuthering Heights last night. I've been reading it for the last three months via DailyLit, which is how I read King Solomon's Mine (which I read because of the movie League of Extraordinary Men's reference to Allan Quartermain).

Wuthering Heights is one of Heather's favorite books. It is also one of Kris' banes from high school. For one class, he read every single word in the book, but didn't seem to register a single one. He didn't know the difference between Catherine and Cathy, though, honestly both are often referred to with either name. As he walked into class to take a test covering the book, he made some reference to "Cathy, Catherine, what's the difference," only to have Matthew Albert mention there were two Catherines.

Kris failed that test.

He was originally reading the book with me, and we would discuss what happened in each day's five minute reading, but he stopped around 55 of 145 entries. I kept reading daily until about 120, when I started getting multiple ones in a day. I gave up last night and finished the book, a physical book I'd had since high school.

I don't know if I'd read Wuthering Heights in high school. I think I did, but wasn't 100% sure when I started reading it. I'm fairly certain I read at least the Cliff Notes in high school, now that I've finished it.

I'm trying to figure out what to read next. I think I was going to read The Woman in White, before Kris interrupted me with reading Wuthering Height with him. Though, Moby Dick sounds like a lot of fun.

As much fun as sticking white hot forks through my eyes.

Yeah.

Maybe I will read The Woman in White instead.

This morning, as I was half asleep, trying deperately to sleep for those extra few minutes, huddled close to Annie for warmth in the early hours, Kris came in and asked me a question.

Not quite waking up, I answered it.

He wandered out of the room, and back in a few minutes later, asking for clarification. Still half asleep, I responded, then drifted back asleep again.

I really shouldn't be answering questions in a half awake state. I never know what I'll get when I do. Especially when those answers involve giving away one of my computer passwords.

When I went to my computer after waking up fully this morning, I looked to find iTunes open. A few clicks, and a hovering-smirking Kris, later, I realized that I'm the proud owner of nearly the entire Guitar Hero 2 playlist.

"I have to practice somehow," was Kris' only response.