I may not be the best driver out there — there was that unlucky streak of speeding tickets a few years ago, and I’ve driven over curbs and had my share flat tires — but at least I can say I’m a friendly driver. I let people in front of me when they’re switching lanes, I wave a thank-you when someone lets me over into their lane, and I often stop in parking lots to let a car back out of their space. (OK, sometimes it’s because I want to park in their space, but still, it’s a nice thing to do, right?)

But from my experiences in the year and a half I’ve lived in Indy, I can’t say I feel the same about many of the other drivers here. People are friendly just about everywhere I go, but the nice person who holds the door open for you as you leave the grocery store isn’t quite as nice once they get behind the wheel of their car in the parking lot.

I see evidence of this every day during my drive home from work. The first challenge is the construction going on in the area around Angie's List. It seems like I have to take a different route each day to avoid roads that are closed, blocked by construction trucks, or aren’t easily accessible because of the medians that have been constructed in the middle of the street. (I’m looking at you, East Washington Street.) It would be challenging enough with no one else on the roads, but there are other drivers to deal with, too. And once I get to my ramp to get on I-65, trying to merge is always a challenge: Cars fly by way too quickly for me to pull onto the highway, and the drivers seem to simply ignore the line of cars waiting for their chance to go.

Once I do finally get on the highway, I immediately have to move over two more lanes in order to stay on 65. However, I feel like drivers are fighting to keep me from changing lanes. Seriously. It seems like the second I turn on my turn signal, the driver right next to me who had almost passed me suddenly slows down, cruising along next to me and making it impossible for me to go anywhere. Or the driver who was far enough behind me for me to move over suddenly floors it and moves up — you guessed it — right next to me, and I’m stuck in my same lane. (I used to think I was imagining this or that it was just a coincidence, but it’s happened too many times.)

On the days traffic is backed up, I drive along with my turn signal on, looking for a friendly face in hopes that someone will slow down and wave to let me over in front of them. It rarely happens. I say a few choice words, especially at the drivers who look at me and keep on driving, unwilling to help me out, as I go with my backup plan of pulling over in front of a semi, which is usually moving slower than the other cars. That usually works. (It has to, or else I’m on I-70, heading toward St. Louis.) Whenever I finally manage to move a lane or two over, I’m still grumbling, but I wave a thank you to the driver, thankful that, for another day, I’ve made it through that particular part of my commute.

A few miles later, traffic has thinned out a little and I’ve managed to make it back in the far right lane, ready to try the merging thing all over again with I-465. But I always come across a driver or two trying to get in my lane. By now, the anger that had built up earlier has usually subsided and, even though a few minutes ago, I swore I wouldn’t, I find myself slowing a little to let people over. But rarely do I see a thank-you wave.

Still, I stay calm and remind myself it’s not a big deal. I don’t want to let road rage get the best of me. Otherwise, I might find myself checking Angie's List for a good body shop — or even worse, a hospital.

My partner, Eliese, has wanted a dog for years. I did my best to dodge this request because I've had little experience with dogs. I think dogs are high maintenance and I'm quite accustomed to my footloose and fancy-free ways. I was hesitant to the thought of being responsible for something that would change my life so dramatically.

I ran out of dodges once Lindsay's dog Clio had her nine pups. Oddly enough, I was the one to suggest adopting a puppy after I met the little lumps of fur when they were only a week old. When I told Eliese about taking in a puppy, her eyes lit up with joy and she said, 'I want the ugly one.' (Eliese has this thing for ugly animals. I'm not sure what that means about me ...)

So we both did a meet and greet with the puppies when they were three weeks old. I had initially thought we'd take one of the unique-looking gray-and-black pups. But when we got there, Eliese and I were drawn to this little black sausage roll who had a wrinkly face and paws that looked like she dipped them in white paint. This pup hung back from the pack a little — she wasn't anti-social, just observant and thoughtful. We'd found our 'ugly one.'

We visited her as much as we could over the following weeks. When she was a little more than 8 weeks old, we brought Boo Radley home. Since then, our lives have changed a lot — much for the better, I think.

In college, I adopted two mixed-breed dogs from the Monroe County Humane Association in Bloomington, Indiana. I named the sisters Aja and Diva, and I thought I knew what I was doing while raising and teaching them. Eight years later I finally realize they weren't the only ones who had a lot to learn.

I grew up with a menagerie of domestic animals: cats, dogs, birds, little mammals, reptiles and amphibians. But when it came time to raise two wee ones on my own, I seemed to have forgotten a lot of what growing up with animals had taught me. I didn't socialize Aja and Diva very well: sure, I took them to dog parks once in awhile, but after the wonder twins nipped at a dog or two for trying to join their dynamic duo, I thought it best to keep them away from unknown dogs as much as possible.

My bad. Their lack of socialization has led to some interesting reactions when we walk by other dogs on the street, especially from Diva: though she's a good-sized dog, she yips like a little tiny poodle and twirls around on her hind feet when we pass another dog on the street. She's not very well behaved, and Aja has had her fair share issues as well.

Several years ago, I took them to a one-on-one training class led by a nice gentleman who had a successful career as a military K9 trainer. He taught me how to use a choke collar, a few treats and the word 'no' to get my dogs to do what I wanted them to do. The classes kind of taught my dogs that I'm the boss, but unfortunately it's still nearly impossible to walk without them pulling full speed ahead, even when they're wearing those vicious-looking pinch collars.

So after talking with a local trainer, my wife and I decided to take Aja and Diva to a very different training course at Doggone Connection. The class is based on positive reinforcement: if the dogs do what we want them to, we reward with treats, petting, play, whatever works. If they do what we don't want them to do, we ignore their behavior rather than yelling 'NO!' I always thought rewarding my dogs with treats for good behavior was somewhat of a cheat: they should do what I want them to do simply because I'm the alpha, right? Not true. Sure, they should listen to me, but only because they WANT to listen, not because they fear a quick, harsh yank on their choke chain.

Though I was very skeptical of the positive reinforcement method at first, I've been quite impressed with my girls' progress, enough to stop using their prong collars (I've moved to Easy Walk harnesses). I bring a little bag of treats wherever we go, reward good behavior, and look forward to learning more tricks. During last night's class, Diva was the teacher's pet: our instructor Wes took her in the middle of the room and had her practice a few exercises requiring intense patience and concentration, and she executed them flawlessly. Afterward, I had her lay down and stay still with a treat resting on her paw for several seconds, after which I rewarded her by handing her the treat. She did this several times, and I was amazed that she learned it in just one class. When we got home later that night, our Yellow Lab Pixie performed the same trick for us (she's not attending the classes because she's already well socialized.)

So if you have a dog, young or old, I highly recommend this kind of training. Find a good animal trainer on Angie's List, let them know what difficulties you and your dog have, and you might be surprised with the results a little education and practice can yield. I tell my wife how happy I am with Aja and Diva's (and my own) progress, and she's seen that positive reinforcement truly works. Maybe now she'll have fresh-baked cookies waiting for me every time I finish mowing the lawn (and cleaning up after our dogs.)

As you, the observant and frequent reader of the Blue House Blog, may know, the Angie's List campus offers the excellent benefit of an on-site, fully equipped gym, replete with personal trainer. In an effort to improve my overall health, as of late I've been taking full advantage of this benefit by working out about three times a week. To tell the truth, I'm not really doing it to improve my health. I'm not even working out on a regular basis to get big, rippled muscles. Truth is, I want to be the guy who kicks sand in the face of the minuscule weeny on the beach.

Just kidding: I don't have horrible self-esteem problems that would lead me to openly humiliate others in an ocean-side setting. The real reason is my fiancee. Those of you who are married, or soon to be married, are most likely familiar with the dieting and physical fitness phase of the engagement. I'm not making generalizations, this is only based on my observations. I don't blame my fiancee – our wedding photos are (hopefully) a once-in-a-lifetime event, and she wants to look her best. Although she doesn't have the benefit of a personal trainer or a fitness center (there's a certain company that can help you find highly rated companies that offer those services), she's been working her butt off at the gym to look her best for those wedding shots.

To make a short story short, I work out to keep up with her. I lack the motivation to do it myself. But the added benefits of improved well being and generally overall better health are great, too.

I'm one month into riding my bike to work and already the reviews are pouring in:

'We laughed. We cried. Two thumbs up,' say Ebert & Roeper, mistaking my commute for the Italian neorealist drama, 'The Bicycle Thief.'

'Keep it short and you'll limit the helmet hair,' says my barber.

'Um, could you bring an extra change of clothes on humid days?' say my co-workers.

I took my bike back to Indy Cycle Specialist for a free one-month checkup and once again, the folks there treated me right. They tightened. They lubed. I tried to buy more crap for my bike and they told me I didn't need it. Nice people. They've earned my loyalty and future bike dollars.

So I'm good to go for the rest of the summer. Just me and my bike, cruising the streets of downtown and near eastside Indianapolis.

I shop at the Marsh grocery on New Jersey Street, sip mochas at the Starbucks on Mass Avenue and browse the downtown Luna Music, Borders and Circle Centre Mall. I'm saving money. Losing weight. Shrinking my carbon footprint. Preserving my 263,000-mile car (the subject of a future blog entry).

Life is sweet.

My fiancé and I can go anywhere in the world for our destination wedding next year. Sounds nice coming from our destination wedding travel agent, but the truth is, like most people, we (and our guests) have a budget.

We're in the stages of narrowing down our location. This is, we’ve been told, the hardest part of a destination wedding. I hope so, because I want my wedding to be as easy as possible for me.

I like planning parties and I like seeing end results, even if that means stress, but for our wedding, I want only to have to make simple decisions, like choosing a wedding dress or having a DJ or a steel band (if we choose Jamaica). Oh, it won’t be easy, but I think I can manage just fine drinking a cocktail and sitting by the pool during the days prior to becoming a Mrs. Who’d want to have it any other way?

My wife and I recently made the decision to move. Actually, we made the decision a long time ago, not long after we moved into our current apartment. While we feel relatively safe in our neighborhood, there have been some things we don't like about it. Like Mike, we had to deal with a break-in not long after we moved in, and although the damage was relatively minor — enjoy that non-working PlayStation, punks! — anytime someone comes into your home uninvited it's a little disconcerting. We also returned from our honeymoon to find graffiti scrawled across parts of our building and the others in our complex, although it was quickly cleaned up.

But neither of those things are why we decided to move. We want to get a little closer to downtown Indianapolis, and, like Josh, we want to downsize to save money. When we moved in, we thought, 'oh, we'll need two bedrooms and two bathrooms, since we'll probably have guests over often.' Well, that hasn't been the case. The spare bedroom has come in handy, and I love having separate bathrooms, but the convenience doesn't justify the cost anymore.

Curious guy that I am, however, I've started looking past apartments and into the housing market. There are several affordable houses in the town we're looking to move to, and I can't help but think I could own my own little piece of property for close to what I would end up paying in rent. So, downsizing may end up leading to an upgrade.

The good news is we've got close to two months before we absolutely have to move, so there's time to weigh the options. The other good news is that if I need to find a good real estate agent, I've got Angie's List to show me the way.

I’m putting a lot of thought into getting a dog, but I don’t want just any puppy. It’s got to be a companion, a real man’s best friend. That means poodles, the most selfish of all dogs, are out. I thought about a Weimaraner, except people might mistake me as being artsy, which would mean I’d have to start wearing berets. No thanks.

A lot of soul searching (and the fact that I watched 'I Am Legend' the night before) brought me to a decision: I want a German Shepherd. Besides the fact that German Shepherds are loyal and loving, they’re also practical. They're the type of dog you’d want during doomsday or a hostage situation. Don’t believe me? According to Wikipedia, the authority on such matters, German shepherds are an optimal breed for explosives detection and cadaver searching. Enough said.

Actually, one more thing: Rin Tin Tin.

I blame my co-workers (in part, at least) for my newfound canine craving. Lindsay's dog Clio had an entire litter of puppies who've visited the Blue House; Tristan has an adoption website; Kristy has Rottweilers; Jackie has Great Danes. The list (no, not “the List”) goes on.

Around here, we have an open-door policy for animals: you can bring your pet, as long as no one else is allergic or has complaints. No one to my knowledge is allergic in the Blue House, for we make it aware that such weaknesses are considered a mortal sin during interviews.

But in all seriousness, adopting a dog is a huge responsibility, one that I’ve put a lot of thought into. If I get a dog, I’ll use Angie’s List to choose the vet, but I’ll have to make some other decisions on my own. Do I get my dog from a breeder, a shelter, a rescue organization? Do I choose a puppy or an adult? Male or female?

Most important of all, after which Indiana Jones character should I name the dog?

Spurred by the torrential rainstorms that have recently plagued Indiana and the number of responses we've received from Angie's List members concerning our Green Living Issue — both positive and negative — I’ve been giving global warming some thought…

I’ve decided that, regardless of which side of the global warming camp you’re on, or if you’re camping at all, there should be no denying that something is causing the earth’s weather patterns to go absolutely haywire. All you need to do is turn on the news for five minutes and you’re inundated with stories of natural disasters sweeping their way across the globe. Or worse, you’re living those stories.

From flooding of apocalyptic proportions to tornadoes, cyclones and earthquakes, the start of Summer ’08 has been, at best, a rocky one. And, whether you’re sitting resolutely in your 5,000 square foot home, with all the lights on and the A/C pumping full blast while your F-450 sits idling in the driveway, or if you’re sweating it out in your newly LEED-certified condo, toting reusable grocery bags and declaring every day ‘national bike-to-work-day,’ chances are you’re going to be affected by the global warming debate as everyone reacts to it in their own way. (Nonbeliever – your truck is going to require a new diet of biodiesel sometime in the near future. And, for the environmentalist — Puma just released a new bike, the Stealth Visibility, for your daily commute. It glows in the dark! You can check the List for a highly rated local bicycle store where you can get yours.)

The thing is, while there is a handful of people who point to the roller coaster pattern of climate change that has occurred over the past thousand years or so, the majority of people now believe that our daily activities are playing a hand in our dramatically changing climate. Among those people are leaders of major corporations, whose decisions to change their practices are going to ultimately affect you. Even if they don’t believe we have anything to do with the declining polar bear population, they're rethinking their business practices anyway due to factors like heightened fuel prices and the need to 'hop on the green bandwagon' to draw in environmentally conscious clients.

So, what this seems to ultimately mean for the consumer is that we’re faced with a whole new array of product choices and responsibilities (e.g. your new glow-in-the-dark bike and another pump at the gas station). But we’re also faced with a new array of marketing tactics to draw in green-minded buyers. By throwing a few buzz words into product advertisements, some companies are trying to give the consumer a false sense of responsible decision making (it’s called greenwashing). My local café can tout their green practices they want, but when it’s 85 degrees outside and I have to wear a parka to be comfortable sitting inside with the A/C on, something is amiss — particularly when you take into account the fact that buildings are responsible for 38% of the greenhouse gases being absorbed by our earth’s atmosphere.

I guess what this means, for me anyway, is that it’s not enough to buy a drink because of its cool new environmentally friendly design — I have to find out what the production process was that went into making that little hand-friendly bottle. If it required ten extra steps of carbon-emitting production, the fact that it uses five-percent less plastic seems to be a moot point.