Testing the Waters

Okay, So it's been a Year!

2012-01-03T19:03:00.000-08:00

You might have noticed that I've been missing for a year. I'm here to tell you that I'm alive, kicking... screaming... which inevitably leads to sulking in a dark corner, and not really having too much interest in writing on a blog. I figured I'd better write on this thing again before Google came along, peered at it closely and decided to remove it on principal. That'd be a fine end wouldn't it? Being scraped off the internet like gum off the bottom of a shoe? Complete with all the unknown crispy things embedded in it. Ah... crunchy.

So I suppose I might as well give you a run down on the in and out of whats been going on in my life... Don't worry. It'll be short and to the point.

~WORK~

.... ~More work~....

..... etc.....

Alright, so there were some other things that happened. More aquariums where acquired, in which more fish were placed. My room resembles the fish department at the local pet store... Except they clean their tanks more often. Books were devoured, but not as many as I'd like. Apparently my absence from my blog has rather beggared my ability to spell anything correctly. You'd be stunned how many times I've hit the Spell Checker already. You can make wild guesses if you'd like. Aside from things I've mentioned above, not too much happened. Got sick a couple of times... although I'm not sure that's a real attention grabber. Watched lots of Anime. I might even do a few reviews if I'm awake enough to do some. Most of the time I'm out cold from working. I get home and pass out. Or watch stuff I get from the library... and fall asleep watching it. Yes, I'm sure you've noticed a pattern.

As you may have surmised... I think I need some sleep. Food first, and then sleep.

~Tootles

Short and Random

2010-12-31T00:17:00.000-08:00

I'm not exactly sure when, but Mom found a Statistics page for how many people visit a given blog. For reasons unknown to me I started paying attention to the Stats tab out of curiosity. What I find sort of odd, is that the more often I write, the less people look at the blog. Perhaps I'm frightening people. Sorry about that. It's not really the time of year to write about scary stuff. October is really the month for that, but it's been a weird last 4 months of the year, and I got horribly distracted.

..... perhaps for the next few months I shall write nothing and see what happens? By writing nothing perhaps I shall draw in more people. Everything gets drawn in backwards for me. The minute I start wondering if I should stop writing on this blog, I get a storm of interest. Weird.

Whatever you all decide to do out there I'm wishing you all a Happy New Year!

Here. I'll leave you with this.

This is Mr Blue Bear. For whatever reason he was doing yoga positions on the floor of the laundry room. Later I began to suspect that he was in actuality begging for leniency, due to the fact that Mom was going to toss him into the washing machine. She tossed him in anyway, and then she strung him up outside by the ears with a pair of clothes pins to dry. See full story here.

Note to Self: Do not get so dirty that Mom throws you into the washing machine.

Happy New Year!

Locked Doors

2010-12-20T23:25:00.000-08:00

These last few months have been a veritable roller coaster. Or maybe that should be several roller coasters and so far, none of them have been terribly enjoyable. We've had two deaths in the family. One we were all expecting, and the other was a shock. A total frying pan to the side of the head. Another change has to do with a promotion at work, which erupted rather suddenly. Generally speaking, I'm fairly good at riding these things out; duck the jaw smashers that you can, and roll with the sneaky ass punches that you never see coming. I've become quite good at gathering my feet beneath me after a particularly bad blow, although standing without weaving isn't always possible. Lately, weaving and wobbling has become a norm. Life has more resembled a long line of frying pan wielding psychopaths, dealing mind numbing blows, than one bordered by flowers, singing birds and vast green fields. I suspect everyone gets to this area in their life where everything experienced it uncomfortably inhabited by dark shadows and a distinct lack of clarity.

I find myself wobbling in the doorway of a new job. A full time job. While I should be happy about this, it comes with several price tags. One of which is the job I will soon be inhabiting, is because a good friend is leaving the position and moving on. Which is great for her, and I really do wish her all the best (and yes, I will come loom ... visit you) I'm not sure what I see beyond the doorway is something I can handle. There is also the uncomfortable feeling that if I step through... actually I should say WHEN I step inside the doorway, the door will slam shut and lock. No going back, even though I was told that if I really hate it, I could go back. Seriously though, there IS no going back. Going back to your first home? Visiting the old neighborhood? Running into old friends and enemies? Not fun. Not for me at least. Too many memories good and bad. The bad make me want to curl up in a ball and roll myself into a dusty corner until I forget why I'm there. Good memories that make me want to do the same thing because those days are gone.

I guess what this really comes down to is fear. A fear of being trapped in a job I'm not sure I'll be good at. Fear that I'll screw up badly when everyone is confident that I'll do a great job. Fear that I'll become complacent and will settle for a job that I'm comfortable with, but will never grow as a person in. Fear that I will lose the courage to follow my dreams, because I have doubts that the dream is something I want and more a need for escape. Fear that when I'm in my last days that I'll look back at the here and now, and regret the decisions I made in the moment. Fear of things left undone. And lastly a fear that the reason all of this is weighing so heavily on me, is the fear that I am not who I think I am. I know we all have these fears, but sometimes they are much more real and threatening. The loss of the familiar, the loss of the people that keep your keel even; the self doubt and all the 'what ifs' and 'I can't's"add such vibrant colored outlines to the shadows we create for ourselves.

There is a children's book, "The Little Engine That Could" attributed to Watty Piper, but is actually older in origin. When I was a kid, I really didn't understand all the aspects of this book, because I was a kid. To me the book was cool because the underdog won, and I was always the underdog. At that age I hadn't experienced enough to fully understand that self-confidence is sometimes all you need in order to get an insurmountable task done. Because many of these mountains are actually mole hills, but appear larger due to two words. "I Can't". It wasn't until years later, when I had occasion to meet someone I now consider an extremely good friend (he may think differently. He's an interesting character.), who basically would calmly listen to me blither on for hours (possibly days) about why I couldn't do something. Then he would quietly (not always) suggest that perhaps I was so wrapped up with my excuses that I hadn't actually considered the -fact- that I was indeed capable and able in whatever it was I was back peddling on. I just had placed a convenient life roadblock in my own way out of habit. It's called,"I can't." The instant you think that, you really can't. Because your focus has shifted from the fear of something new, to all the ways you can avoid dealing with that fear. You've just hobbled yourself, and most people never step out of their hobbles under their own power. "I can't" enables them to remain as they are. Whatever that static position might be. Until of course they're pitched into something head first by other people. Then its panic attack time, or they find that they actually can do it. I will always be grateful to him for making me see things for what they were.

The words, "I can." come with their own set of responsibilities. Just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Sometimes it's best to let things go, for the good of yourself and for the good of those around you. In my case, it's more that I need to rediscover my ability to enable those words for myself. Those around me will survive without me. I've been in a comfortable place with my current position for so long, that I almost stopped where I was. Almost, because I was still going to school to complete an AA/AS and ultimately move on with my goals, but on a whole... I was slowing down. Immersing myself in my job, in the people, in my friends... rooting myself. Which I will not allow completely, because I'm not done with what I want to do, and unfortunately that means I can't set down roots yet. A lot of my confusion and 'I can't' comes from uprooting myself. Its necessary if I want to keep going, but I can't say I like it. Leaving familiar territory is definitely not comfortable for me. I don't deal with change well. When I was little, Mom would rearrange the living room, and I'd pitch a total fit of hysteria. As an adult, I still get emotionally distraught, but I keep the majority of it to myself. Hopefully.

So, although I'm on something of an emotional tilt, and am having to relearn how to deal with self-doubt and 'I can't' I'm going to step through the door which I fear will lock behind me. But that's alright, because I can always fashion a key, break a window, or just kick the door down. It'll still be scary at first. I'll be going in wobbling, but armed with the memories of a little locomotive, and a good friend whose spirit still pokes me in the forehead when I waver over an issue saying,

"Try. All you can do is fail, and that's not so bad."

*pause*

"Unless you're a bomb disposal expert. Then it will be bad."

And since it's Christmas... Here's "White Wine in the Sun" by Tim Minchin. Yes, I am on a total Tim Minchin kick. You will all have to deal. Hope you all have the Happiest of Holidays.

Just to Brighten Your Day...

2010-12-05T13:04:00.000-08:00

Mom found Tim Minchin on YouTube one night and made me sit down and watch one of his videos, called "Inflatable You." If you're easily offended, I suggest you don't watch the video, or any of Tim's other performances. Speaking for myself though, if I manage to find him doing a concert nearby I will definitely be going.

I've never seen anyone else like him. With perhaps the exception of Victor Borga in some ways, but very much updated. Anyway, hope you got a laugh. :)

Why You Should Put a Algae Sinking Tablet in AFTER Dark...

2010-12-04T20:10:00.000-08:00

There was the sale at the pet store today, and it was seriously busy. Apparently tropical fish were not the only item on a sale. Dog food was a hot item, and it was sort of difficult to get to the fish department. However, I was able to get myself some more fish. Last Wednesday I had decided on getting 4 more fish; 3 platy for the Hex tank, and one lone Honey Gourami to go in with the Tetra Posse and the Pepper Twins.

Everyone survived the road home and no one appeared to be ill or acting off. Although I did worry about the Honey Gourami, because she (I think it's a she) had pressed herself into a corner of the bag and was just laying there. The worry was unnecessary. She appears to be fine, and she's so damned CUTE. Honeys are supposed to be shy, but she came right out of he hiding spot after about 5 minutes and started feeling up a very confused boss Black Phantom Tetra with her little feelers. I laughed until I cried. The Tetras are totally boggled by their new tank mate, because a.) She keeps touching them and b.) She does not get intimidated when they rush her. She just turns slightly and glares as them until they go away. She's got no qualms about satisfying her curiosity. If it's something new to her, it must be felt up. Watching her set up observation of the Peppers playing in the air bubbles was another crack up. All she needed was binoculars.

I'm beginning to grow quite attached to fish with labyrinth systems. They're like having tiny aquatic dogs. Little Blue is the same way. Curious about everything, and not easily intimidated.

The Platy are tough little bastards and can probably weather just about anything within reason. Don't get me wrong; I like the Platy or I wouldn't keep getting them, but they can be mean little cusses, especially when figuring out a pecking order. Porky now has five girls, but he only seems to be interested in the Red Tuxedos... which makes me scratch my head a bit. He's not Tuxedo... and he's not a Sunburst either (he's a Sunset Wagtail), so I figured he'd like the other colors too, but he's definitely got a preference. He loves the Red Tux Platy; is indifferent to the Sunbursts, and still absolutely despises Wednesday the Red Wag Platy. She's small though, so maybe he sees her as food competition for his more mature girls. Honestly I have no idea. Personally I think Wednesday is lovely with her dark red body, black fines and yellow eyes. She may get some leeway with so many other ladies in the tank though. We shall see where everyone is in the pecking order once it settles down. I may have to take one back... it appears a little crowded in there.

Remember how I said it was impossible to get pictures of the Platy because they never hold still? Well, I got to thinking about how I've managed to take some really good pictures of other things that never hold still, such as squirrels, birds, and extremely frightened deer. I've found that putting out some food will do wonders for getting them to hold relatively still, so I decided to see what would happen if I dropped a sinking algae tablet in for the Corys while the light was still on. I know how much Platy like those things.... So, THIS is what happens when you put a sinking tablet into a tank full of fish that all love algae. Everyone dives for the algae tab at once. It's that little green rock there in the corner. Porky of course has his mouth ON the food. Right above him are the Red Tuxedos, and one Speckled Sunburst, and a plain Sunburst above her. Golden-eye the Julii Cory has actually be shoved aside by the Platy, and the little Bronze doesn't even TRY to get into the crush. Up on the right is Wednesday. Not her best photo, but that's the best I can do.

This also shows why feeding an algae tab with the lights on means that the Corys get no food. Later on tonight I will drop a whole algae tab in the Hex tank for the Corys, and the Platy will finish off whatever it left in the morning. In the 6 Gallon, the Peppers get half a tab, because there are just the two, and they're so laid back that they let the Tetras chase them away from the tab even though the Tetras don't eat it. They try, but they lack the mouth do any damage to it. The Honey might be able to dig into it though, although I'm not sure she'll be active when the lights are off. I know Little Blue sleeps when I turn off the lights and is mighty cranky about being woken up. Full Betta display goes into action and he rushes the front of the tank. Ruffles quite a bit, then grumps back to his sleeping spot.

So, that's my fish update for today. Maybe I'll do a post about water changes next... yes, won't that be exciting! In all honesty, probably not. Anywho, I'm off to watch some Anime, which will be followed closely be sleeping. I hope.

The Sandman and I have not been on good terms lately.

December Crossroads

2010-12-02T21:02:00.000-08:00

The last 6 months have brought about some changes. On the blog, most notably, I've become rather obsessed with aquariums. Honestly, I had no idea I'd like keeping fish this much. Instead of just having one small fish tank, which is all I originally wanted, I now have three tanks, that all combined house a total of 16 fish. ... And given that I'm somewhat insane when fish are involved, I'm going to take advantage of the local pet store's fish sale this weekend and acquire 3 more Platy for the Hex Tank, and one small Gourami for the 6 gallon tank. The Gourami is a maybe keeper. It may not work out, and I may have to take it back. We shall see how things go.

The sale was revealed to me when I went into the pet store to get the Hex Tank water tested. I've got test stuff at home, but I always like to get a second opinion. There is always the possibility that I'm doing the tests wrong. They were fairly busy when I went in, so I cruised the tanks, and asked about Catfish for the Hex Tank. I have exactly two Corydoras Plateus in the 6 gal tank, because all the others died, or became seriously ill on the way home. Given my track record, I was fully prepared for these to kick off the moment I got on the road. However, they remained active and perky even after being housed in their new home. Granted it's only day two, but I am hopeful they won't end up going to the great toilet bowl in the sky. (actually I'm sort of weird in that I bury mine outside. It seemed undignified to toss them into the toilet) Anyway, the above Cats are (from left to right), a Corydoras Julii (a Julii for short), a Corydoras Aeneus (a Bronze Cory) and another Julii, except this one has gold eyes. I could be wrong but the first Julii to the left could be a Leopard Cory... it's tricky trying to tell. Patterning can vary, but you can tell by looking at their snouts. Golden-Eye has a very abruptly down turning snout, while Dark-Eye seems to have a slightly longer variation. There's also the possibility that they're a mixed result. Personally, I could care less. I just want to enjoy watching them trundle around the bottom of the Hex Tank and lead a relatively good life. That's my enjoyment. Watching the fish be ... happy, for lack of a better word.

Here's the little Julii. Some Corys have an iridescent quality to their general pattern. You can see it here on the Julii right under it's eye. The camera doesn't really do it justice. I've seen the same sheen on Hummingbirds, but not so much on fish. Feel free to correct me, if you take a look and think it's a Leopard Cory. They really are difficult to tell apart because of the black and white patterning. The neat thing about the Julii Cory is that they are active during the day. Most Cory like to nap during the day, and become much more active at night. Not so with these guys. They know it's nighttime and will go find a place to sleep until morning. If you leave their light on they'll still find a spot to sack out.

The Platy are the worst fish to try and photograph for two reasons. Either they think you're going to feed them the minute you walk up to their tank, or they see the camera, and flee for safety. The minute you move back, they come racing out,"WAIT! See? We're still here! And we're still hungry!.... but we don't like the camera." This all culminates in not being able to get a picture of them. Well... you get red blurs and that's it. The Bronze Cory is nearly as bad, but only because he NEVER STOPS MOVING. I only got this shot because I took about a billion pictures and managed to do the impossible. I got him when he paused, which generally only lasts a 1/4 of a second. Then he's off again to explore the rest of the tank. Again.

Besides the aquariums, and their inhabitants, I've had other things happen. Some I won't go into, because ... I have trouble sharing. The fact that this blog is still going at all is something of a small miracle. I hate writing about myself. Hate trying to keep diaries... Journals. I've got tons of empty journals that people give me, and I never do anything with them, because it seems pointless to me to write about my daily activities. Boring. Sooooo, boring. And given that this blog has been going for... 3 years(?) and I rarely have comments, I guess it IS boring. Despite that, I find myself back here looking at something of a crossroads. Not an unexpected crossroads, but difficult in choice and possible results. A multiple crossroad actually, with pathways stretched in several directions, and I'm unsure of which way to go. Usually when I reach one of these points in my life, I know exactly which way to go. None feel right this time. So, I'm standing there looking at the choices before me, trying to make a decision of which feels least wrong. And every once in a while, I look at paths that haven't quite reached mine.

College for one, seems close yet inaccessible. Roadblocks made of money, bad economy, and full rosters tend to get in the way. I really detest money. It really IS the root of all evil. Unfortunately, I need it, in order to go the rest of the way through college. The college I want to attend is rather far afield, but I did a lot of research and I like the programs they run for Languages. Getting there... that's going to be a total pain in the ass. It's going to involve a job I'm not entirely sure I want. Yet. I'll only be doing that for a year, but it makes me feel uncomfortable that I'm only there for a year, and then leave the position. Poof. I guess my sense of loyalty is unhappy with decisions that need to be made. ugh...

On that cheery note, I'm going to wander off into Anime land, and try to ignore the discomforting feeling of having partially wedged open opportunities before me, which I'm going to have to smash down before I get to a goal far beyond them.

And for no particular reason...

a Pumpkin.

Somehow or another, I managed to totally miss putting up a Halloween post. Actually it's not too surprising. I've had a lot on my mind.

Red... and Durarara

2010-11-05T21:45:00.000-07:00

Dad and I went to see the movie "Red" on Monday. Neither of us had been to the movies in sometime given Hollywood's ability to produce crappy movies at an astounding rate. Hollywood? Listen up! There is no such thing anymore as a 'sure thing', so get some balls and try something new, because the stuff you've been producing lately doesn't interest me in the slightest. Ehem. That said I'll have to retract slightly, because there were exactly three movies I did like, and actually went back to see twice. I never do this. One was Iron Man 2. Whatever Marvel is doing, they're doing it right. At least with Iron Man movies. The second, was the A-Team, a remake of a TV series from the 80s, which I watched religiously as a kid. Initially I was somewhat taken aback, because I was positive that they were going to totally screw with an old favorite, but I was thrilled to find that they had not only stuck with the character profiles, they'd actually paid attention to detail. I was so happy; I went and saw it a second time.

The third movie, is "Red", which is based on a comic book (you'd be shocked at how many successful movies have been based on comics) currently owned by DC Comics. I think originally it was put out by Homage, but I could be wrong on that. Anyway... Red was wonderful. Let me rephrase. If you like ex-spy movies (think aging Jason Bourne) then this is right up your ally. This was well thought out, well acted, and the filming and FX were just right. Not too many over the top scenes were you're so distracted by the unbelievability of the scene that you miss plot developments. I hate that. Pet peeve I guess. What really made me love this movie though was seeing a lot of old familiar faces. Old familiar faces that make me remember why Hollywood used to be so good. These people are actors. None of this,"I'm pretty to look at." or "Look at all my muscles!" No. This was pure honest acting that carried the film, expertly spliced with new talent who, while can be considered eye-candy, can also carry their roles with their acting skills. AND, it was good honest fun. So well written! Witty repertoire... oh, I do so miss the ease with which I used to be able to find movies like this. And action was definitely part of the recipe, so don't go moaning about how it wasn't there. This was a gem.

Another that was an unexpected find, was an Anime series called "Durarara". I'd seen this on CrunchyRoll, the pictures of it anyway, and finally decided to watch it a few months ago. The first couple of episodes did NOT impress me, but I liked the characters enough to keep watching. Why did I not like the first couple of episodes? Well, mostly because the storyline was all over the place. I had trouble figuring out why a lot of what I was watching was important. Eventually I reached episode 6 and chalked the wildly strobing story to a peculiar slice of life show. However, the deeper you get into this show, the more you realize that everything you see and hear is pertinent, because this show has an astounding amount of twists, turns and switchbacks. A veritable rabbit's warren of plots within plots, histories within histories and surprise turns that make this show damned near addictive. Some things are easy to see coming, some you never see coming, and other things you follow, but never quite catch onto because you haven't gotten all the information you need in order to see the whole picture. In a way this show IS a slice of life, but it is so very well done. I won't tell you exactly why it's a slice of life, because figuring out this show is part of the fun.

And it is funny. There where so many times I found myself laughing out loud, at the unexpected, at outright silliness, at stuff that was supposed to be funny. There were moments that made me gasp, that made me smile, that made me want to choke someone and that made cringe. This truly is one of the best Anime shows I've watched in a long time. They're out there, you just have to dig for them. I'm not one for the fluffy cutesy Anime, nor am I one that likes to sit through really tweaked stuff. I like well rounded stories, and this one is very well rounded it. Just be patient with it and pay attention. If you're unable to sit still for more than 10 minutes, this is NOT the show for you, so do not bother.

Of late the most hated phrase I hear is,"This is stupid." This is generally said by someone with limited attention span, and without the ability to coherently string together the nature of WHY they find 'it' stupid. I've found that "This is stupid." translates to, "I don't understand this, nor do I want to try." And it's immediate after trying something they're not comfortable with. If the person had tried several shows, or several chapters in a book, and then said,"This is stupid. Here's why..." Then I wouldn't be so annoyed. But the phrase,"This is stupid." in my book is the equivalent of a food fussy toddler not wanting to try new foods because NEW isn't in their safety zone. While I understand the toddler; adults .... you have no excuse. Teens have an excuse. Their brains are rewiring themselves, and being accepted is the most important thing on their agenda until they figure out that being confident in themselves, and LIKING themselves will make you a heck of a lot more popular than going with the flow. Unfortunately, most teens need to figure this out on their own, otherwise they never get it.

Adults? You should be past this point. If you've tried the carrots and don't like the carrots, then fine. At least you tried it. If you see the carrots and point at them in horror shrieking,"EWWWW!" without ever trying them... well. ... You're ... a sad piece of ... we won't go there.

... work is sometimes an interesting observation experiment. *sighs*

My other most hated phrase? "It's not MY job!" .... annoying.

The Hex Tank

2010-10-30T21:05:00.000-07:00

There is something very soothing about keeping fish for me. I had no idea I'd love it so much. Originally I wanted the small 3 gallon tank for the selfish reason of just wanting to watch fish swim back and forth. However, I have found that keeping the fish happy, makes me happy. I am assuming that it's like eating chocolate (I'm not a chocolate person. There is no need to gasp in horror. I get by.) for some people. The rotten little fish put a smile on my face more often than not, and it works even if the rest of my day has ridden the fast road to hell in a flaming picnic basket.

I started with a little three gallon Marineland Eclipse system that I got for Christmas several years back. Beginner fish keepers, please note that a 3 gallon tank is NOT the one you want to start with. This was something I found to my sorrow. Initially I wanted a small tank, because I thought it would be the easiest to work with. It was small, easy to clean, pick up, rearrange, etc. However, it also means it gets dirty damned fast, the temperature fluctuations will kill your fish, and keeping all the pH, Alkaline, Ammonia (not something you want unless you're doing a start up tank from scratch. Which means no borrowed tank water from an established aquarium.) and nitrates stable is pretty much impossible. Unless you're on it every damned day. Do yourself a favor and start with at the least, 6 gallon tank. Marineland all in one set ups are a dream. The filtration system is VERY good as long as it doesn't die like mine did. Actually from what I've read, what happened to mine was rare. The higher the amount of water you've got in your tank, the more stable the temperature will be, and you may not even need to get a heater for the tank. For example, the 6 gallon tank doesn't need a heater, but the 3 gallon does.

Anyway, 7 months after the initial set up of the 3 gallon tank finds me with 3 aquariums. The 3 gallon it still up and working, because of my little Betta, Little Blue. Some of you will recall that he was attacked by a supposedly peaceful fish, namely a Sunset Wagtail Platy who we all now refer to as... The Evil One. Again.. if you're going to go out and get buddies to put in with your Betta, make sure you know the quirks of the fish you're getting. Platys are very placid.. unless you get two males and no females. They get persnickety about territory and will get very aggressive. Which is why Little Blue was banished to the 3 gallon Curse Tank. He's hardy. he can take it. He IS in there, I swear. The low light level is because Betta's aren't really big fans of lots of light, so I gave him plenty of shade in which to hide. So much shade that he just drifts in with the landscape. Ah well. He does come rushing out when I walk past because he thinks he's getting food. Generally, I stop to say hi. Little Blue's fin recovery has been a long long involved process. He got fin rot, and I ended up having to nuke his tank. Which means I boiled his silk plant, replaced his gravel, took away his bridge decoration which he LOVES, cleaned his tank, and replaced all the water. The pump in the back got scrubbed as well.

Despite his attempted suicide while I was cleaning his tank (he jumped out of his bowl onto the blue towels... so I couldn't FREAKING SEE HIM!! He's fine though. Bettas have a respiratory organ in their heads called a labyrinth organ that allows them to breath air. As long as they don't dry out they can live for quite a while by gulping air. Don't take your Betta out of his bowl to watch him do that, and I'm saying this because someone who reads this is immediately going to want to try it. It's still not good for him. There are other fish that have this. Gouramis for one) he has been steadily improving. Granted he managed to do yet MORE damage to his fins, but it's healing much faster. The split in his tail healed over night, and his tail is growing out much much faster than before. No sign of fin rot so far. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping I got it all cleaned out. He'll get his bridge back when he's all done too! Incentive!

The 6 gallon is where I've got everybody else, and it's very crowded in there. They were all out in front when I went to take pictures, and they saw the camera, screamed and dove for cover. Ungrateful little wretches. I just cleaned their tank, gave them new water and fed them. You'd think they'd sit still and let me snap a few shots. Actually this should enlarge, and you might be able to see a few shifty smears that denote fish. I've probably got too many decorations in here for a 6 gallon tank too. The water is tinged yellow because of that big piece of drift wood there in the middle. It helps keep the pH out of the rafters. That green tube back there is the air pump hose connected to the air stone. An air stone is basically a diffuser for the air pumped into the tank. It allows the air to escape in small bubbles, rather than in one huge stream of air. For a beginners second attempt at an aquarium, I don't think I did half bad. Everyone is alive. I consider that a very good thing.

Now... Thursday I went down to the pet shop and got myself a 5 gallon Hex tank. Same brand name as the other two tanks. Marineland Eclipse system. Hex, stands for Hexagon, which means 6 sides, and it's just the right size for the top of my dresser. Actually I've got two dressers, but Little Blue is currently occupying the other one. This one you may notice doesn't have a lot of decorations in it, which is because the fish are going to need the space to swim.. and as I said before I think I've got too much in the other tank. In fact the stuff that's in here, is stuff I took out of the 6 gallon tank because it was so crowded in there. This tank will house Porky, my only Platy, once it runs for 24 hours. He's called Porky because he bloody well eats anything I put in the tank even if he's not equipped to freaking EAT it. This means he's got a little pot belly most of the time. Moron. Which is why I don't feed every day. Porky needs time to un-pork, or he's going to look like a Balloon Molly. Which is normal for the Molly, but not a Platy. Putting Porky in a different tank means I will have more control over what he puts in his mouth. I hope.

It will also allow me to get him some women. I mean girl Platys. Maybe Porky will run off some of his spare tire chasing the ladies. Given his eating addiction, I have suspicions that his obsessions may quickly shift gears to sex addict. Sad, but some things just have to have something to cling to. In this case, Porky needs a crutch. Hopefully within the week, I'll have Porky moved to the Hex tank, and gotten him some girlfriends. The tank is cycling more quickly because I used water from the 6 gallon to start it. This means beneficial bacteria is already present and embedding itself in the tank. It also means I can get fish more quickly than would normally be possible. So, in this tank there will be 4 Platys, 2 Corys, and I'm going to see about getting a Honey Gourami. ONE Honey Gourami, but that will be much further down the line after the Platy have established themselves. Maybe 3 weeks hence. I'm only getting one, because the tank is small, two Gourami will fight, and I'm not entirely sure how the Platy will react to the Gourami. If things go south, the Gourami will be going back to the pet shop... OR, I'll toss him in the 6 gallon with the Tetra Posse.

This is the plan. We shall see how this unfolds. I'll keep you posted. You can ask questions you know. I'll see if I can answer them, although I'm willing to bet the answer will be,"I don't know." a lot of the time. However I may be able to point you in the right direction.

Smirkles.

Impatiently Waiting for One Piece.... leads to monologuing about Corydoras Paleatus

2010-10-16T20:05:00.001-07:00

Soooo, here I am waiting for the masses that just slammed my beloved "One Piece" site to slowly slide back into the seething ocean of Kaizoku fans. I would be in there helping to slow the site down too if I were currently allowing myself to watch the most current episodes of "One Piece", but I am not. Promises were established with myself, that I would not watch current episodes until I managed to get myself accepted into a college. A college I really really want to go to. As of yet, there has been no luck, which is partially my own fault. Ok... mostly my fault. The first application got lost somewhere between here and the college, and it was such a pain in the butt to get all the paperwork together the first time that I haven't done it a second time. :P

Which means no new episodes of OP for me! However, this does not exclude episodes that have watched before... which means I was happily watching OP all the way through for a 7th time, when the new episode was posted and the site got slammed. I can't blame them. There is some really heavy stuff happening with Luffy, and I know this because I stumbled across some damned moron's post conversation in which he gave no warning about spoilers. *grrrrrr* Thus, I have some knowledge of what is taking place. *sighs* I wish I could highlight and delete portions of my memory. Mom can do that. It's impressive.

Instead of sitting on the site and waiting for eons to pass before my page comes up, I have begun staring at my fish again. Specifically, I'm staring at my newer 6 gallon tank that I got several weeks ago. It now houses 5 Black Phantom Tetras, 1 Serpae Tetra, 1 (insane) Red Phantom Tetra, 1 Sunset Wagtail Platy, and 2 Pepper Corys (aka the Pepper Twins, aka The Peppers). There is also of course Little Blue, who is housed in the (cursed) 3 gallon tank, and is still recovering his fins. Which is going well by the way. They're getting longer instead of shorter, but I had to remove most of his fake plant life, as it was plastic and could do further damage. Little Blue is not at ALL pleased with me. Every time he sees me he swims quickly to the front of the tank where he gives me the fishy eyeball of disapproval, which is infinitely worse than the proverbial 'hairy eyeball'.

I know what you aquarists out there are saying. "YOU HAVE 10 FISH IN A 6 GALLON TANK!?" pauses for breath,"ARE YOU NUTS! THEY'RE STARVING FOR OXYGEN!!"

Before you turn blue shouting at your computer screen, please note that they're in a Marineland Eclipse system with biowheel. They have a Whisper air pump in there, and I change out the water (25% to 30%) at least twice a week. More often if I think the water looks even slightly weird. Actually the water looks pretty weird anyway. The pH balance was off the charts, and only had luck at leveling it off by putting driftwood in, so the water is the color of weak tea. BUT the point is, I am compensating for the space crunch until I am able to afford a separate tank for the Tetras. My Sunset Wag is getting the 6 gallon to himself and three ladies of the same species. The Peppers will also be staying because I'm scared to death to move them, or do anything to screw with the tank. I can keep anything else alive except Pepper Corys. Awful, awful luck with Peppers. I'm terrified of getting other species of Corys because I'm afraid I'm going to kill them.

The Peppers are wonderful to watch! Very active, and they keep my tank clean. So, when I started losing them, I tried doing some research on how to get them to stop dropping dead. Apparently I'm an anomaly. Everyone else has theirs for YEARS. Mine are lucky if they last a week. Because everyone has Corys that last for years, apparently keeping them alive hasn't been an issue... which means when you search for them on the net to find out how to keep them alive you get,"Very hardy fish. No extra care necessary." and "Are fine in any tank." and "Great for first time fish keepers." .... yeah... No one took me into account.

SO, here is my little information area for those of you who are having trouble keeping Peppered Corys alive. First off, the scientific name (not that this is necessary for keeping a fish alive) is "Corydoras paleatus". They are extremely peaceful in a community tank, but that doesn't mean other species in the tank will keep that in mind. As some of you will recall, I had a demon possessed Sunset Wagtail Platy that tore up every other fish in the tank. He tore a hunk out of my poor little Pepper, ate most of the tail off Little Blue, and ripped all of the head scales off his fellow Sunset Wag, who is now currently alone because I took the evil one back to the pet store. Where I have been assured that the Gourami have shown him the error of his ways. A lesson to me and everyone. Platys can be vicious, (actually, given the right circumstances any fish can be vicious... although I have a hard time believing that of a Cory) and are NOT always a perfect community tank fish. Most of the sites I visited said,"Platys and Corys make good tank mates!" Keep in mind that what they DON'T say is that if you are going to get Platys, make sure you've got a male for every 3 females. NOT two males and NO females. It makes demon possession possible. You have been warned.

Now, back to the subject at hand. Peppered Corys. ... where was I... Ah yes. No really good information sites. At least not one that I saw. In my case, I wanted to know why I'd find the Peppers playing dead at the top of the tank. They DID look dead, hanging sideways like that, and the others would just be ill by the time I got home. Finally I just started stringing bits and pieces of information together and formed a rough hypothesis. Please understand here, I am a NOVICE at keeping fish and may give incorrect information. ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS double check ANY source of information. Even if the person is said to be an expert! The people at the pet shop in the Aquarium department DO NOT KNOW EVERYTHING! Do your own research!

1.) Almost every site when presented with the floating problem, or tilting problem, immediately said,"Swim Bladder problem!" Uh, your Cory does not HAVE A FREAKING SWIM BLADDER. You may have observed your Cory swim lightening fast to the top, and then back down leaving a bubble in their wake?? Yes? I call the little bubble, the "down bubble." What is actually taking place is the Cory is getting a gulp of air, swallowing it, and running it rapidly through its intestinal tract. Air is captured in the Cory's stomach and perhaps pockets in the intestines that allows it to stay upright, rise, fall, and swim with efficiency. What air it doesn't need is passed out the anal vent as it swims back down. Thus, the 'down bubble'.

2.) If your Cory is spending a lot of time at the top of the tank there could be two reasons. At least two reasons that I've confirmed with mine. These reasons do not include injury or illness due to disease.

**The first being that your tank may not have enough oxygenated water for the Cory to breath comfortably. He's up there hanging/resting in water that has a higher oxygen content. This happens especially with an overloaded tank (like mine. 10 freshwater fish in a 6 gallon tank is not big enough. And don't go pointing at the pet shop aquariums which are loaded with fish. They sell fish every day. They never have a constant number in those tanks. The good pet shops also do daily water changes on those, and work hard to maintain a good balance of beneficial bacteria to combat ammonia loving nastiness.) and can be alleviated in part (until you get another larger tank) with an air pump. Since I got the air pump, and run it for several hours before bedtime, I have not had the 'dead hanging Cory' syndrome.

**The Second reason has to do with diet. Corys eat everything and anything. That means they like a variety in diet, so if you're just letting your Cory eat Tetra flakes, you can expect a constipated Cory. Yes, even fish can get constipated. If a Cory is constipated, he can't pass air effectively through his intestinal tract, which will cause him to be unable to maintain stability. Ie, if you see your Cory floating on the surface, floating in general, tilting to one side, racing up to get a gulp of air and then sputter out on his way back down with NO 'down bubble', then you've got a Cory with intestinal distress. Solution? Cook some peas, shell a pea, smash both sides of what you find inside, and deposit pea in the tank. If your Cory had been constipated for too long, he will have no desire to eat... and then you're sort of out of luck. The best course of action is preventative feeding. Feed a cooked, shelled and smashed pea a least once a week. Make sure your Cory has access to sinking Algae tabs, and feed live food every once in a while if possible. Bloodworms will work fine frozen. Tetra flakes are fine too... just as long as it's not the only thing they're eating.

3.) Sometimes the Cory you get is just sick to begin with, and there is nothing you can do to fix it. Many of the pet shops order from places that breed these little guys in the thousands, and they're poorly bred. Think puppy mills. Lots of fish with genetic issues being bred back to other fish with genetic issues. This makes for a much more fragile Cory than expected. Currently I have two Corys that managed to survive. One is always active, always on the food hunt and hasn't mysteriously died yet. So pessimistic am I. Pepper 2, is not as active, was constipated when I got him, and although he has improved, I will not be surprised if I find him doing the 'hanging dead Cory' and it being a case of fact, rather than resting. All the Corys that have died have had a dark coloration rather than light, and I have to wonder if that is proverbial signal flare that, in my area at least, it is probably not genetically healthy. I am not saying that is a blanket truth, because I'm sure it's not. Corys in your area may be just find with any coloration given.

4.) Now.. this last part is pure speculation on my part. I have brought home 5 Peppered Corys since I started my first (cursed) 3 Gallon aquarium back in June. The first was just fine for 13 days, and for totally unknown reasons died. This may have been due to an ammonia spike, because at the time, I was an ignorant moron where fish keeping was concerned, BECAUSE I HADN'T DONE ENOUGH RESEARCH. Later, when I got the 6 gallon tank, and cycled it, I got 1 Black Phantom Tetra, 1 Serpae Tetra, and 2 Peppered Corys. All fish concerned were just fine at the pet shop, AND in the car outside the pet shop. However, by the time I got home, one of the Peppers was nowhere near as active as his buddy. Four days later I took him back, still alive but unwell, and got 4 Black Phantom Tetras and 2 more Peppered Corys. Both Corys were active at the store, and in the car outside the store... but when we got home, one was barely moving and died later that week. The other was the one that is doing better, but it wouldn't surprise me if he kicked off. Now... The only thing I can think of that is different between the Tetras and the Corys is that Tetras have an air bladder and the Cory does not. Why is this significant? Because I live at 3,000+ feet, and the pet store is slightly below 1,000 ft in elevation. Keep in mind that I'm speculating wildly here. I think part of my problem is that the Corys have a much more difficult time dealing with a rapid change in elevation, while the Tetras can adjust more readily with an air bladder. Same with the Platys. The Peppers act sick because they take longer to acclimate to an elevation change that they'd never encounter in normal conditions. Even the active Cory was sick for about 4 days before snapping out of it. The other... well we'll see if he gets better or not.

Any Cory is get going to be something of a clown. The one I have that isn't doing as well as he could be, likes to stick himself in the weirdest places, and I'll turn on the aquarium light and panic because he looks like he's smashed underneath the driftwood, when in fact he's fine. They don't seem to have the same spacial reality that most fish have, which means they will swim upside down sometimes, especially when they go to get a swallow of air. But this should be very brief, and should not last for more than a few seconds. Keeping Corys healthy and happy is actually a lot more work than some would have you believe. But then I'm willing to bet that not a lot of people have the same circumstances I do. Anywho, hope this helps someone somewhere.

Now... I'm going to go see if my One Piece site is back to working. Perhaps it crashed. I rarely see that site get so sluggish. I guess I will also work on getting another application together for the college I was after. Then... I'll have to figure out how to pay for it. :P

... what a pain.

Grover and Ernie

2010-10-10T22:47:00.000-07:00

Today was a stay home day. No real place to go, at least not a trip that had to happen today. So, while sitting on my duff all day, I watched Torchwood and trawled the Internet for off the wall news reports. Not fake news or anything, just the weird and usual stuff, which is how I came across the spoof Sesame Street did of the Old Spice commercial. I laughed like mad. I haven't watched Sesame Street in years, because it went from being engaging to stupid. They redeemed themselves a bit with this skit. Grover was always one of my favorites, and the sad thing is no one remembers him. In the event that you don't remember or never knew, Grover was the skinny blue monster with the big pink nose who had a low sometimes squeaky voice. His doom was in introducing his nephew to everyone. I'm sure you all know him. His name is Elmo. Everyone loves Elmo. To me he's a bright red eyesore with an atrocious voice that firmly planted Grover's headstone. Talented little bugger.

Here is the video I was laughing at. It helps if you watch the original before watching this, but this is still wildly funny. At least to me. I'm sure many of you will be sitting there staring, wondering why or how I could think it funny.

After watching it a few times, I started thinking about Jim Henson. My family was still camped out in a motor home in the driveway of our earthquake damaged house when they aired the news of Henson's death. I cried on and off all day. Although I'd never met him, I'd grown up listening to his voice on Sesame Street as multiple characters, and on the Muppet show. Sort of felt like I'd lost a family member. In addition, he'd always been someone I would've liked to have met. Well out of reach now. His legacy lives on in Sesame Street for the most part and then there were the movies that he made. The Muppet movies of course, but he was a genius when he made Labyrinth, and the Dark Crystal. Absolute mastery of expressions and direction, in muppets which for the most part have no facial musculature. I'm impressed and always will be.

I think much of what he did was overlooked. Things like hiring Jeff Moss as a song writer for Sesame Street and other things. Jeff Moss wrote what is perhaps my favorite muppet song ever, with Jim Henson singing as Ernie. I remember hearing it when it first ran in an episode in the 80s and then sitting religiously in front of the TV for months after that watching Sesame Street armed with my trusty Fisher Price tape recorder in hopes of capturing the song so I could listen to it whenever I wanted. I did eventually get it, and I probably still have the tape somewhere carefully packed away. Perhaps not.

Here's the song. If I listen to it too much, I end up crying.

I've heard updated versions of this sung in concert with famous artists, but Jim Henson got it right the very first time, and for me his will always be the best.

Pitfalls of House-sitting...

2010-10-10T00:49:00.000-07:00

One thing I absolutely hate doing is house sitting. This particular activity is when one watches over a house, generally full of animals that need care, while the owner(s) have gone on vacation, medical leave, or whatever happens to crop up at any given time. To those I have watched their house for, please note that I bear no grudges, and will watch your houses again if asked. But it makes me damned nervous. Actually I should rephrase that and say that I will be extremely picky about whose house I'll house sit. Some of you will get a yes, and some of you will get a no. The people who will get the 'no' already know who they are. If you don't know my answer, then you're probably safe in your ability to secure me for a weekend... maybe. >:)

The 'why' of how I came to hate house sitting began with a neighbor's excursion, the details of which I no longer recall, in which the entire family clambered onto their motor home and disappeared for a month. OK, so it was 3 weeks, but it seemed like an eternity. They had, at that time, a small menagerie of animals, ranging from chickens to goats. The livestock care was fine, even with the one small panic attack I had when I couldn't find their banty hen, regardless of the fact that the hen was in a very tight enclosure. I still have no idea where the hell she was sleeping at night, but no amount of searching in the dark with a flashlight revealed her sleeping spot. Every morning, she'd show up for food INSIDE THE ENCLOSURE. If someone can explain Houdini Hen, I'd pay a small fee to know her secret. I do mean small. Maybe $5.00. Aside from that, I had no issues with the barnyard.

In the house was a different matter, where I took care of a parakeet, a rat, two cats and the family dog. The dog was a malamute. Beautiful, huge, grey beast who missed his family. A LOT. This dog would pester me every night until I let him out, and then he'd sit in the corner of his run and howl. And.. it wasn't just once a night. It was ALL night. For two weeks I got no sleep. None. I was basically the walking dead. Week three, I begged someone to watch the house and critters for me, so my run of sleep deprivation did end. Thankfully the dog didn't go off his food or anything, but he was a wreck and so was I. I promised myself I would never watch a house again. Especially if animals were involved that missed their owner that much. Honestly I was a little annoyed. They could've taken him with them. The RV was enormous. But that's all in the past and I do try not to dwell on it.

Since then I have found myself watching relatives homes which were inhabited by the dreaded pets. I wasn't so worried about the youthful cat, but was terrified that the elderly dog was going to expire while my relatives were vacationing. Apparently my stars were in the right alignment because the dog is still alive today. The cat and dog both were actually a lot of fun once I calmed down and stopped watching them like a vulture eyes weakening prey. They both seemed to like music a lot, which I played while cooking dinners for the dog. You may think that's spoiling a dog, but the dog is still going strong, and I think she's coming up on 17 years of age. Something is obviously working for her.

In all of these cases I could tell you what went wrong. The miserable dog from my first explanation is fairly obvious. From the second, the cat broke something in the house one night, and we still haven't figured out what it was, but I definitely heard something shatter with great enthusiasm. She also knocked over a lamp, and did several other things that were way out of character for her. Yes, my subtle influence can probably be blamed. Generally though when I do something like this, I expect the worst, so am not too surprised when things like this happen.

Which brings me to my most recent escapade in the wide wide world of house sitting.

Somehow, I got talked into watching a friend's house. I guess she wore me down. Either that or the blatant bribery that was flung upon the table worked. I'm chalking it up to exhaustion personally, but whatever the reason, I found myself in a house with 3 cats. One is Orange, one is a Calico, and the last ... forgive me, but the last is a Fraidy Cat. (The names have been changed to protect the innocent.) Fraidy is terrified of anyone she doesn't know. I couldn't rightly blame her given that I used to hide under tables myself when I was little, and people I didn't know showed up.

The other two are a different story. Mr Orange is quite affectionate and loves being held, petted, hugged, brushed, using you as a pillow, using you as a heating pad... using you to soak up the drool he excretes while you pet him. Basically I think you get the picture. In fact the first night I was there, he was so happy with me that he zipped out the cat door (which I was supposed to have locked the minute I walked in the door, so they could come in, but not out) and was gone for about 20 minutes. Then he was back, and he jumped up on me where I was reading a book, and dumped a small snake onto my lap. He looked quite pleased with himself while I scrambled to catch the small reptile before it disappeared into the depths of the couch, or worse the house. Once I finally caught it, ... it pooped on me, while I attempted to take it outside to let it go.

Perfect. I was off to a roaring start.

Day two wasn't nearly so eventful. In fact it passed by without too much trouble at all. Cats came in. Mr Orange came over for a snuggle, and Ms Calico took up position next to my chair so she could easily whap me with her paw;

"Hey." *whap* *whap* *whap*

"Yes, you. Get up and get me more food." *whap* *whap* *whap*

This was generally accompanied by mrrrowwwing. She's a .... portly kitty and I didn't think she should have more than what she ate that morning. Her owners have said that she does need to drop a bit of weight. So, this would go on for about half an hour before Ms Calico would walk off in a huff and pout in the living room. Mr Orange would eventually wear out my scratching hand and he'd go take up position on the back of the couch. Miss Fraidy wouldn't come in until late. She'd come in, give me a nervous look (You know the look. The one that you get when you say the word Vet in their vicinity and they've already figured out what that means.) and then scurry over to the food bowl. Wolf down a bunch of food, then throw me another furtive glance before hastily rushing across the dining room, down the hall and through the cat door into the garage.

I felt guilty, and I still have no idea why.

... perhaps I was getting a touch clairvoyant.

Day three arrived and I made the mistake of thinking that, "Maybe this House-sitting thing wasn't so bad." and let my guard down. Don't worry. Nothing awful happened... although that may depend on your point of view.

When I woke up, it was raining. Nothing heavy, but enough to get everything good and soaked without being a gully washer. Given the rain I decided that watering would probably be a moot point, but I did get up, to let the cats out. That day I was supposed to be going over to a friend's house to help her make dog beds for a donation to a shelter, so after getting dressed I grabbed my backpack and headed for the stairs. Keep in mind I was somewhat flanked by a feline contingent as I headed for the stairs; Mr Orange following and Ms Calico who decided to go into a different room and lay down. Thus, I reached the top of the stairs and started down.

From my vantage point at the top of the stairs I spotted Miss Fraidy sprawled on the stairs, so I started to pause not wanting to spook her. Which is when my partially braced left knee was taken out by a flying tackle from behind.

Why Mr Orange, I had no idea you played offense for an NFL team. Thank you for sacking the quarterback.

My knee gave way. I inadvertently send my backpack flying into the air as I whirled to catch myself from rolling down the stairs and crushing Miss Fraidy to death. My actions were in vain, as I watched from the corner of my eye, as my backpack sailed into the air and landed on Miss Fraidy. My backpack and Miss Fraidy crashed 4 or 5 steps to the bottom, at which point Miss Fraidy leapt with an indignant howl to her three feet and flew through cat flap and disappeared into the backyard.

The only thing I could think of as I watched her go was that she'd broken her leg, since she'd sped out the cat flap using only three legs. So, out the backdoor I went to see if I could find her, which was a long shot considering how high up I was on her list of favorite people. I was out there for a quite a while in the misty rain, which basically had me soaked through. Finally I started looking through the bushes along the back fence hoping that maybe she was hiding under one. She wasn't.

However, a flock of tiny birds had taken shelter in the bush I was searching. There were probably less than 10 birds in there, but when they're flying at your face and shrieking like a reenactment of Hitchcock's "The Birds" it looks like about a million feathered demons. Thankfully, it was quick. They were gone in a matter of seconds. It was still raining. I had failed to the find the injured cat...

... and now, not only was I soaked, but my head was covered in bird shit.

Slowly I slogged back into the house, and up the stairs to the bathroom where I hoped I would remove my new encrustation, and possibly warm up. Somewhere I found a plastic bag, in which I deposited my newly cristined, soggy clothing. Grabbing a towel I reached into the shower and turned it on. From behind the shower curtain erupts the object of my desperate search, and now she's just as wet as I am... and heading downstairs at speed. On ALL four legs. This actually presented something of a problem, as, if she decided to go through the flap into the garage, she'd get into the litter box and I had no idea if the litter was clumping litter.

Have you ever seen what happens to a wet cat that gets into clumping litter? They turn into a seudo sand sculpture, and its fairly difficult to rectify the problem. Solution?

Make sure soggy kitty never reaches the litter.

I chased the cat around the house for a while, before finally cornering her in the downstairs bathroom, where I trapped her by closing the door. My towel ended up drying a cat. Never fear, I did get my shower... and I removed all the bird crap. Somewhere in there I got a phone call from my friend to find out where I was. Quite honestly I had forgotten about the dog bed thing entirely during my romp upstairs and downstairs and all around the town. Before anything else could happen I left, and wasn't back until evening.

When I came in, I had two kitties in the house. Mr Orange and Ms Calico. Miss Fraidy was nowhere to be seen, and quite frankly I would have run too if I'd been on the receiving end of all that. So, I fed the cats, and waited until Miss Fraidy came in before locking the door completely for the night. No one in, and no one out. She ate, while throwing glances at me to make sure I wasn't sneaking up on her, then scurried into the garage. I did not see or hear her come back in, because I was watching a show on my computer. A very engrossing show.

I sneezed.

Miss Fraidy who had apparently been on the other side of the table where I couldn't see her, panicked and made for the outdoor cat flap at speed. The LOCKED cat flap. There was a loud *thwack!* sound and she bounced back about a foot into the kitchen, where she sat weaving slightly as the world realigned with her own reality. Having learned that this cat does better if totally ignored, I tried very hard not to snicker, and never looked directly at her. After a few moments she got up, drank some water and wandered away.

Thankfully, for certain creatures involved, the next day meant the end of my tour of duty.

And this is why I hate house sitting.

A Slight Obsession

2010-10-08T17:32:00.000-07:00

Actually there might be two slight obsessions. One is most definitely the aquariums. In fact I'm going to see about getting a second larger corner aquarium for my poor little Betta. If you'll recall I had to move him to a back up tank...(which is cursed), because of a certain Platey (yes, it was a Platey not a Molly, and it was a MALE, not a female like I had thought. In short, I ended up with a savaged Betta, a Catfish missing some skin, and the other Sunset Platey missing most of the scales from his head.) had begun making already damaged fins much worse by trying to eat them.

After I put my Betta in the other tank, he developed what appeared to be Fin Rot. Fin Rot is a bacterial infection that basically eats your fish alive from the fins in. Generally it only happens to fish with already savaged fins, and are in water that is dirty. By dirty I mean water that has high ammonia content, without the beneficial bacteria you find in a balanced tank. I'm not sure where or when the Rot started, but I caught it fairly early. From what I'm reading its fairly easy to cure if you clean the tank daily, which means water replacement every day. Also add a bit of aquarium salt (follow the instructions) and get a heater to keep the water at a steady temperature. I don't have a heater for the tank, or aquarium salts, but simply changing the water seems to be working. He's got fin growth coming back in. At least I am really hoping that's what it is. The pictures I'm finding look a lot like it, so I'm hoping its fins being repaired and not a fungus growth. I WILL be getting a heater for both tanks however. With winter coming and the house heating system being a wood stove the temp in the house can fluctuate quite a bit.

If you're wondering what happened to the evil Platey, he went back to the pet shop, where he was put back into a large tank with larger fish who aren't likely to take crap from a Sunset Platey with delusions of grandeur. Personally I was hoping they'd put the little bastard in with an Oscar, but they didn't. It went into a tank with some rather unamused looking Gourami. Large unamused Gourami. The little snot tried attacking them through the bag.

Lesson learned however. Next time I get Plateys, I will observe the pet shop fish tank for a while and see which are mild mannered, AND I'll get at least three females to go with one male. Perhaps I should say IF I ever decide to get more Plateys. My first experience wasn't a nice one.

My second obsession, at least of late, has been Kokeshi Dolls from Japan. I used to see them all over the place and although I thought they were kind of neat, I was reluctant to get one because I didn't know what they signified. Getting something because you think its cool... This is difficult to explain. Hmm. It makes me uncomfortable to have something sitting around in my room as a knickknack, that in another culture would have a much deeper meaning. Or if the item has a belief system somehow related to it. As weird as this may sound to some of you, I try to have respect for other cultures even if they never see my room. It starts with small things you do at home, or in how you behave that can ripple down to cultural relations. Basically I like to know the history behind an object before I go blithely out to get one just because I think it'd be neat to own.

In this case, there was some possible unpleasantness related to the Dolls, but nothing could be proven one way or the other. Whatever the original use for the Kokeshi, it is merely a hand crafted object of art now. Which is fine by me. If you want more info on the possible origins of the Kokeshi, Wiki has a fairly good short explanation, although a Google search will provide you with a much greater spread of speculation. Unfortunately I suspect that what you find may be in part true, and sort of sad.

As I said though, the Kokeshi is now seen as an Art form. So, I started to collect them. They're fairly expensive, so I only get ones that I really like. They sit in the corner of my room (okay, actually their shelving apparatus got moved into the closet because we were painting) on a little free standing shelving unit which can be folded up if need be. Currently they take up the second shelf, right below a little shrine to my cousin who died in 2007. I think she would've liked them. Sadly the bottom shelf is empty because I had to move the plant to sunnier areas. It needs to be re-potted anyway.

Here they are in all their dusty glory. I really should've dusted them off, but they're in an awkward spot, so I just stuck in the camera in and snapped a shot. Some have names I gave them and others remain nameless. From the left side, back row, of the picture we have, Mr Samurai, Miss Red, Little Miss Glitter, and Mr and Mrs Polkadots. Along the front are the rest, but they don't have names... except for the little one in green. Daisy. I tend to like the Kokeshi that are egg shaped rather than the ones that appear to be in two parts like Mr and Mrs Polkadots.

Before anyone asks, no, I don't have a full translation of what the little plaque there in front says. Although I suspect its the name of the Kokeshi, and the artists stamp. The first one I got was the one with the red flowers on an orange background, and I can't remember which one was next. Like I said, I usually have them out where I can see them, and they make me smile.

This concludes the listings of my obsessions... At least the ones that have been most obvious over the last couple of years. I've got other ones that I haven't been goofing around with lately, but will probably doodle around with again at some point.

Tootles. :)

Tough Guys and Maids

2010-10-04T20:51:00.000-07:00

This probably isn't going to be that long of a post, but I figured I should get myself to write about something, or I'm just going to crawl back under my proverbial rock and do.... nothing.

You may have noticed that lovely picture to the left, which shows a picture of a guy and an uncomfortable looking girl. They're the main characters from an Anime that just wrapped up, and I really wish they'd kept going with it, given the vast amounts of unknown story that they never touched. I haven't looked around online to see if there was going to be a follow-up series or not, but the last episode sort of looked final. The funny thing is, I avoided this Anime for a while because the title sort of implied that I'd be watching a series of derogatory shows about girls. This would be due to the show's title "Kaichou wa Maid-sama" which sorta implies things in western cultures. No, I will not be going into that. However, I have to admit that I had this Anime pegged wrong.

One night, in a fit of desperation, I decided to give it a shot, and loved it. The show introduces you to one Misaki Ayuzawa, who has against all odds become the Student Body President at her High School, which up until 2 years before had been an all boys school. This means that only 20% of the students are girls, and the boys would make things difficult if not for Misaki, who spends a great deal of her time whipping the boys into shape. After school her life is further complicated by the fact that she and her family are pretty much destitute, so she's taken a job at a Maid Shop. It's a cafe that has their waitresses dress as maids; basically fan service. I don't really understand the attraction, but it probably has something to do with fantasy tendencies... *shrugs*. Again, culture difference I think... perhaps not...

Into the picture wanders the unwanted Takumi Usui (he'd be the blond) who up to this point has been randomly puttering through life with no particular direction. He's cute, smart and not someone you want to piss off, which of course makes him a girl magnet. Except for Ayuzawa, who basically pegs him for the worst sort of pervert. When Usui discovers Ayuzawa's secret job, things get REALLY fun!

What really makes this show are the characters. Ayuzawa who is determined not to rely on anyone, especially not a guy who she sees as the worst sort of male chauvinist pig. There are reasons for this that get pointed out in the Manga version, that aren't even touched on in the Anime. At the other end of this is Usui, who becomes fascinated with Ayuzawa fairly early on. He's never seen anything like Ayuzawa before, and can't help messing with her. Ayuzawa... well, she's got issues, such as not being terribly familiar with her feelings. Lets just say that Usui knows exactly what he wants, and is having a lot of fun chasing the quarry. Not exactly chasing, more along the lines of presenting her with every opportunity to realize that he loves her, and vice versa.

Usui is... just cool and a great deal more adult in some ways than he should be at that age. Just to turn things on its ear, it's the guy who is in touch with himself and knows what's happening. Ayuzawa knows right from wrong, and stands firm on what she sees as right. She's also a mean fighter, and doesn't always see when she's going to be in trouble. Thankfully Usui is usually there to haul her ass out of the fire.

This was a fun Anime all the way around, made with a lot of humor, seriousness and absurdities galore. My only complaint is that you learn virtually nothing about Usui's background, which is sort of odd in this type of Anime. Usually they show both sides of the relationship, and a lot was implied in the ending sequences that was never touched on. Aside from that, this was such a fun romp, and I really hope they decide to pick up the rest of the story sometime.

So much fun. Must find other shows like this.

... ugghh....

2010-10-03T17:37:00.000-07:00

There are at least 4 things I could write about and have no real inclination to do so. Eventually I'll get around to them I guess, but at the moment I just can't get up enough ... umph? All in all it was sort of a weird day. The weather changed to humid as well as hot, and then it rained. It's coastal weather for a different longitude and latitude and since I'm not there, it makes it a lot more depressing. Most people get homesick because they leave home... I get homesick for a country I only spent 3 months in. Weird but true.

Over the last couple of weeks I got to move my Beta fish to the small back up tank, because one of the Molly fish decided it'd be a good idea to eat him. The Tetra (aka Tetra-loid), who I thought was insane, was actually running interference for the Beta. Beta would get hassled into a corner, the Molly would begin removing more of his fins, and then Tetra-loid would come zooming in and whack the Molly in the side, while the Beta would swim away at speed. The only fish that Molly respects now is the Red Phantom Tetra-loid. She's removed most of the scales off the top of the other Molly's head. He trawls the very top of the tank now, because if he goes any lower, she removes MORE of his scales.

Meanwhile, I got some more Tetras and some more Pepper Cory Cats... One Black Phantom Tetra, one Serpae Tetra and two little corys. This is how I discovered that the Molly is something of a bitch. I haven't had the other fish for long, but I suspect I will be finding a different home for the Molly Hag. Since the pH balance is FINALLY under control, I can get some more Tetras, which is what I wanted in the first place. I'll have to get a few more Corys too, because .... i -know- I put two Pepper Cats in there, but I almost never see them. They're to busy hiding from the Molly Hag. She seems to really hate the Peppers, and I suspect that if there were more of them, they'd be a bit more... comfortable. More friends for the Tetra-loid as well, considering they're all so freaked by the Molly. At least there are lots of places to hide, and the resident Tank Hag can't get to all of them, but it really irritates me to see them all clinging to one side of their home in a cluster you'd normally not see that many species in.

If there is one thing I will not tolerate, it's a Bully, and I do not care if its a different species or not.

The Beta on the other hand is living a solitary life in the 3 gallon tank. He spent the first week looking all over the tank for the other fish. Okay, so there's a lot of speculation on my part, but after a while he went and did what appeared to be pouting in a corner. I'll have to get him some friends, as in a couple of Corys and a few Tetras. Before all that happens though, I have to get the cloudy stuff cleared up in his tank. Not sure what's going on with that, but the enzymes seem to be clearing things up. Slowly. Betas are a bit hardier than the average fish, which makes me hopeful that he'll be alright.

*sighs* We'll see what happens I guess. With my luck, everything is going to kick off.

If you haven't already guessed my luck is awful.

Absentee Camera

2010-09-12T00:11:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while I actually remember to take my camera with me, because I've spotted something on the way to work, or something along the way that I'd like to take a picture of before it's gone. This happens frequently when I'm on the road. They'll be a cloud formation that's just totally unique, or the way the light is slanting through the trees onto dried out grass. Or dawn over the divide, above mountain peaks jutting up from a thick low fog bank. There was the sunset that happened right after a huge storm last September that literally emblazoned the sky with broad sweeps of vivid pinks, yellows, oranges and light blues. It looked liked a shattered stained glass window thrown into the sky.

And I didn't have my damned camera with me in all these instances.

So when I saw this in the small grass area in front of where I park my car at work, I brought my camera the next day. This had also happened last year, and I was about to go outside and snap a shot of them, but before I could, someone plucked them and brought them to me as a gift. I didn't have the heart to tell him that I prefer my flowers alive, and smiled my thanks while inwardly cursing my wonderful luck.

Anyway, I believe these are called Naked Ladies. These are growing wild near my workplace, and I see them every year. This year, there were a lot of them.

There are several more sets of Naked Ladies on either side of this one, and I had a hell of a time getting this picture, because they've nestled themselves comfortably inside a rather unfriendly sticker bush. I have scars to prove it.

I'm glad I took this picture when I did.

Because the next day the county very helpfully parked their umpteen ton tractor on it.

..... i find progress very irritating sometimes.....

*sighs*

The Aquarium Saga

2010-09-07T19:35:00.000-07:00

When I asked for an aquarium a couple of years ago, I don't think I had fully contemplated the difficulty in actually having fish live in it. An aquarium is a wonderful thing when you get it set up just the way you like it, with colored rocks, gravel, sand, ... whathaveyou. Then you turn on the light in the aquarium hood and you admire your handiwork, and think,"Yes, if I were a fish, I'd love to live in there, with the little treasure chest to hide in, and the fake plant life to play in."

You know what? Ignorance really is bliss. Because there are factors that you tend to ignore when you're looking at your handiwork, and patting yourself on the back. Such as... oh, the pH balance of the water (which is freaking high, and it doesn't go down regardless of how much neutralizing agent I dump in there). Or insignificant things like 3 gallon tanks don't have enough water in them to keep a stable temperature to the water (which is also a problem if you have certain types of fish). There is also the possibility that the brand, spanking new pump, that came with the tank, that has a fantastic track record of not dying, does the unthinkable. It dies.

But, let us go back to actually putting fish into your perfectly set up tank. When I started, I put three Red Phantom Tetras into a three gallon tank to "start the tank". Which means introducing enough fishy poop and right types of bacteria to help get the bio-filter going. One tetra died at the end of the first week. That was to be expected, because he was tiny and unfortunately for the tiny, they don't do well in really wacky tap water. Tap water that is actually from a lake higher up on our mountain divide. Tap water that has a pH balance of 7.8, probably higher, given that my tester only goes up that high. It's also hard water, and is treated with... god only knows what. So, when fishy number 1 expired, I was saddened, but not surprised. The other two fish went on happily living in the 3 gallon tank for about 2 months. Then I introduced the Peppered (I got the name!) Cory Cat... who died unexpectedly 13 days later. I have no idea what happened, but I was annoyed.

During all of this, I'd been running water down to the pet-store to have it tested... and tested... and more tested. They kept saying,"You're water is fine. Just need to lower the pH." After a month of trying to lower the pH, and failing with wild abandon, I asked if they have fish that like sky-high pH balanced water. "OH! Sure we do!"

.... why the HELL didn't you say that to begin with?! WHY?!!

Oh, and,"Try changing your filter. It might be a bad filter."

*my eyes roll beseechingly to the heavens*

This is how I found myself standing poised over my 3 gallon fish tank with a bag of new filters clutched in my hand... and realizing that the pump had died. In which case the filters would do me no good whatsoever. Gee... maybe all my problems were from a bad PUMP!! It ran for 2 months and DIED! I peered into the tank at the two little tetras. They peered back. They looked fine. Listing, but fine. I stood up and decided that the two tetras were in fact mutants.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Fish? nah...

Spider-fish? no.

X-Fish?...

Tetra-loids! That'll work.

At this point I took a second look at them and began to wonder if my Cory Cat hadn't been murdered. The tetras appeared innocent, but ... Let's just say my suspicions have been aroused.

The next day I once again made an appearance at the pet-shop, this time with a dead pump. Much exclaiming and shock was tossed about as the pump from an eclipse system was examined, prodded and bashed against a professional hand. Apparently this doesn't happen often. In fact they said something to the effect that this hadn't happened in 6 years. Yes, I'm special. At this point I threw my hands up in disgust and bought a 6 gallon tank, a back up pump/filter, and some more decorations and gravel for the new tank.

I set up the new tank, using the water from the old tank, and waited patiently for a day, for the crap to settle in the new tank. Not literal crap. When you put gravel into a new tank, they tell you to rinse the gravel until it rinses clear. This is in fact bull sh!t. You can rinse your new gravel until doomsday, and it will never rinse clear. Thus when you put water into your new set up, you will have the silt of ages happily fluffing around the tank for, in my case, three days. Yes, I rinsed for hours, and it doesn't help much.

Meanwhile one of the Tetra-loids had begun to swim with a pronounced list. I wasn't too worried because this particular Tetra-loid has been strange since day one. But, he'd been eating, pooping, swimming and bullying his fellow mutant for some time now. His rather tattered buddy wasn't much better. He almost never stays in an standard north position, but I chalked this up to the fact that his eyes are not in the same spot on either side of his head. If your world is askew, then so should you be. However, by the next morning I'd lost another mutant fish... and creepily he was stashed in the same place I'd found the Cory's corpse. Face first down, in the middle of the grass plant. Took me forever to get it out of there. The whole time the last Tetra-loid looked on from afar. Granted that you can't really get far away in a 6 gallon tank, but still, it watched my every move. Although I watched closely he never actually rubbed his fins together in morbid glee.

A few days later I decided to thumb my nose at Fate and bought myself a really nice little Beta fish (aka Japanese Fighting Fish). He lived in a plastic bowl for a day, then I decided I'd pop him into the big tank and see how he'd do. So far, he's just fine, although he managed to get his tippy tip fins on his tail shredded. None of other other fish in there currently are aggressive towards him, and he's not aggressive towards them. I suspect he was sleeping, and got his tail fins caught in a prickly type plastic plant (I'll be removing it soon, as it's tried to kill two fish so far by trapping them between itself and the tank wall) in the tank... Panicked when he realized he was caught, and did the damage himself. But I can't say that for certain.

A few days after I got the Beta, I decided I'd get some of the fish that supposedly do well in high pH balanced water. Anything that bears live young are supposed to be alright with that, which means Guppies, Mollies and Platys. Guppies were out. First... I'm not fond of Guppies, and secondly the Beta, although quite placid with the Tetra-loid, may lose himself to blood-thirsty aspirations when presented with a small bodied fish, dragging a damned banner behind it, in all its fluttery, colorful, delicate glory. This leaves me with Mollies and Platys. I asked about Platys, and was presented with Mollies instead. Quite frankly I can't tell the difference between the two. Anyway, the Mollies, of which I purchased two, are currently living in the tank with a very very placid Beta, and the Tetra-loid. No deaths have occurred yet, but that may change.

Why? Well, because the Tetra-loid has gone insane. He thinks he's a barracuda. He's staked out the middle of the tank and nips anyone either coming into his 'territory' (except the Beta), or showing any sort of display. The Mollies like to display at each other with their colorful little bodies (not that sort of displaying, that's just sick. Shame on you.). Tetra-loid doesn't like this at all. This shameless display must cease IMMEDIATELY! When he's not playing at fish gestapo, he's attempting to school with the Mollies, who given his behavior, want nothing to do with him. He's like a stalker. Nice one minute, evil psycho the next.

In his mind its all about the schooling, and Mollies don't school. "Why won't you school? Stop showing off at each other! This isn't how it's supposed to be! SCHOOL DAMNIT! ITS BEEN SOO LOOOOONG!" If he had hair, I'm sure he would've pulled it all out by now.

This is in part my fault, as I haven't gotten him replacement Tetras... although with the way he's been behaving I'm not sure its such a good idea to introduce naive new fish to the tank. Its like dumping a bunch of teenagers at the camp where Jason resides. Or telling a bunch of cute girls that Norman Bates runs a fine upstanding motel.

*sighs* And the whole reason I wanted an aquarium was because I thought it'd be nice to watch the fish swim around. Relaxing you know?

.... the car accident was more relaxing... sheesh!

Random AZ

2010-08-17T00:12:00.001-07:00

While in AZ (you can petition to stop the Arizona stories if you wish), as I've said before, I had a lot of free time on my hands. Thus I found myself spending a lot of time wandering around downtown Phoenix, and also sitting in the little shopping area across the street from the hotel. There was a little waterfall there that was surrounded by small stone seats. You'd think this would have provided some respite from the heat, but it only made it humid. Despite that, I found myself sitting here quite often thinking deep and quite possibly meaningless thoughts.

There were other places to sit under misters and in the shade, but I tended to end up sitting on a little hot stone seat. Mostly because when I tried relaxing on one of the benches outside a Cold Stone Ice Cream shop, which is where I took this photo:

... it made the patrolmen nervous. Nervous enough to come over and ask me if I needed water... or to go inside to cool off... And to ask why I hadn't taken off my sweater if I was too hot. Then they wanted ID, and asked where I was staying. They also sniffed me. As in, leaned in close and took a deep inhale through the nose. Alrighty then. At a guess, they were worried I was homeless and they didn't want me expiring from heat exhaustion on a bench in their shopping/business district. Paperwork is such a hassle these days when bodies are involved. In reality I was just sitting on the bench with my head tilted as far back as it would go, so I could stretch out the vertebrae in my neck. Traction feels good on a neck with aggravated nerves you know. Apparently it also makes you look drunk.

In reality I was comparing the palm trees of summer Phoenix AZ, to the pine, fur and oak trees where I live, during winter covered in heaps of snow.

In my opinion, the best time to truly appreciate a fresh snowfall is at daybreak when everything looks blue, untouched and is perfection held motionless in silence. Mist is still clinging to the taller branches, the snow remains unbroken pristine. It feels like you're the only thing alive and aware on mornings like this.

For whatever reason, the palm trees drifting slightly in the breeze high above my head, while stretching out my neck reminded me of a morning snowfall. Not the same, and yet... similar in feel and experience.

The New Tenant

2010-08-11T22:43:00.001-07:00

As some of you know, I set up my little 3 gallon aquarium in June and managed to get two fish to survive in there until now. Rest assured that the two little Red Phantom Tetras are doing just fine, despite the abnormally high PH of the water. I've been trying to get it to go down, but haven't had much success even with the PH balancer I bought at the pet shop. Apparently the Tetras I have, have adapted to it which I was told was amazing. Usually they all die. This is what I get for living high on a mountain with water that comes from a dammed lake. Very hard water, with a high PH balance and added chlorine that makes it smell and taste like I've dived into a swimming pool.

All that aside I was told today by the fish guy extraordinaire that the water was fine and I could get some fish today. I could get just about any fresh water fish they had. Except Red Phantom Tetras, or Tetras in general because they're sensitive to high PH. *sag* Well hell... I think he noticed my immediate depression, and suggested I get a Cory Cat. "They're like roaches," (I'm add libbing) he told me,"When I moved up here, I had to give away my Corys. I had 4, but when I went to give them to the person, I could only find 3." So he emptied the tank, loaded it up in his car with all his worldly possessions and drove the 6 hours to his new home. Upon arriving he went to set up his tank, and started filling it. .. and out comes the missing Cory. It was just fine. Now that's a hardy fish. Hopefully I won't kill him. :P

So, I came home with a small Spotted Cory Cat! I'm not sure if that's right though, because all the pictures I find on the Internet don't look like him. Here he is!

There are all kinds you can get, but I liked the spots and the light eye color. It's hard to see, but he also has iridescent blue stripes behind his gills. They're so pretty flashing in the light. Did you know they blink? They don't have eyelids, but they can pull their eye down inside their head to clean foreign material from their eyes. Supposedly they do one eye at a time, but mine has been blinking both at the same time. I hope he's not smashing his brain matter into mush. And I found out they blink because I watched him for an obsessive two hours to make sure he was going to get along with the persnickety Red Phantoms. They have had a love hate relationship with each other since the one died some months back. I can't say I understand the mind of fish, but it would do them a world of good to have another three Red Phantoms in there with them. They're happiest in a small school. They've torn each others fins to splinters. I'd say shreds, but it doesn't look like shreds.

The little Cory has been very active since I put him in the tank. Actually I'm sort of worried he's going to kill himself from sheer exhaustion. The up side is the Red Phantoms are much more active since the Cory is so active. Usually they hide in the little treasure chest all day. Now they're being more adventurous and hiding behind a spindly fake plant. Here's the proof. I can actually take a picture of the little Red without him spooking. The Phantoms have been trying to school with the newcomer and its just not working, because his swimming pattern is too erratic. Makes for some good laughs watching them try and keep up with the Cat as he zooms all over the tank. Up, down, up to the surface to skim, then down again behind the rock... then he goes foraging in the gravel for a while and the Phantoms don't know what to make of that at all.

Now all I have to do is pray he doesn't drop dead on me. I like him too much already!

What Do You Think?

2010-08-10T23:16:00.000-07:00

During my years of trundling up and down the mountainside, to work and back, I have witnessed many off the wall things. A bear being chased by a bunch of dogs do a somersault through a barbwire fence. A wild Tom Turkey doing his best to scare off passing cars, with his sumo-style stomp and feather display, from the center of the road. A car full of morons making a u-turn on a blind corner... veeerrrrrry sloowwwlllyyy. A flasher standing by the side of the road during winter (Not the appropriate time of year dude.) But I have to say that tonight's commute experience was the one that topped it all.

For almost a week now there has been a dead skunk laying in the middle of the road at a particularly bad corner. Normally the Turkey Vultures would have taken care of it by now, but as I said, the corpse is in a bad section of the road, and Vultures however ugly are not stupid. Skunk Corpse smells awful. You have the stench of skunk, mixed with the stench of death, and it makes even me gag. There is no keeping it out of your car, even if you have all the vents closed. We commuters have learned not to breath for the 45-50 seconds (at 55 mph) that it takes you get past the really ripe dead skunk and its aurora of cloying haze.

So, here I am driving home, a little later than usual. Which means I was not surrounded by home seeking commuters who don't really care if they're speeding. This turned out to be a good thing, because as I came up on 'Skunk Way' which is a blind corner I had to slam on the breaks and swerve to the right side of the road, and then swerve back to avoid a parked car. Why you ask? Because there was a man standing in the center of the road leaning over the Skunk Corpse with a spray bottle in his hand. I slowed. What the hell is he doing?! He's going to get himself killed! As I watched in stunned amazement via the rear view mirror this man sprays the skunk corpse with a bottle of Fabreeze. FABREEZE!! The man is risking death to spray roadkill with AIR FRESHENER?!

O.o

.... i drove the rest of the way home in stunned silence. Okay, not exactly true. I was listening to a Lily Allen CD, but usually I'm singing along with it. Good God, man! Yes, the smell is totally offensive, but what got into that pea sized brain of yours to try de-oderizing roadkill???

I think this must be some sort of all time high for freaky instances of Road Hazards R Us. Am I wrong? Do things like this happen to YOU? Am I just special?

What do you think?

Mistakes

2010-08-09T22:01:00.000-07:00

Last night I dreamed. Not that this is unusual, but generally my dreams are a lot more ... zombie-horror flick-ish. Bloodshed, mayhem, violence, screaming, breathing closet walls.... etc. Most of them are in vivid color and are too complex to completely remember. Rarely do I have dreams where it's peaceful enough for me to feel at ease, which is what makes last nights dream so unusual... and weird.

From what I can remember, I was floating, probably without a body, and it was quiet, peaceful. I was just drifting in darkness, looking around me, watching stars, planets, galaxies, and a multitude of other entities of space floating with me. There was no weight to drag me down, no worries to cloud my mind... just drifting.

And a little girl's voice, breathy and light with quiet cheer, next to my ear said,"Why do you think there are so many stars, planets and galaxies out here?"

I thought about it a moment, and replied,"I don't know. Why?"

The voice laughed,"These are all of God's trial runs. His mistakes. He made a lot didn't he?" The little girl voice became a bit more expansive and broader in scope, seeming to encompass everything before us, "He made all this, in order to learn how to make Earth in 7 days."

I laughed. "But God doesn't make mistakes supposedly." I stopped wondering if I should tell her that I wasn't a big believer in an all powerful omnipotent being. And that being the case, I didn't believe that the world was made in seven days. I've found that most people ... get odd when I tell them that. (In fact I'm having reservations now about even posting this.) There were also the implications associated with so many mistakes, and if true, it explains a LOT. In general.

I could hear the smirk in her voice as she answered my unspoken criticism, in a sing-song voice,"That's what YOU think."

And I woke up. Weird WEIRD dream. What did I get out of this? That it's alright to make mistakes. You have to learn somehow. I could go in a completely different direction with it, but essentially she wasn't talking about God. She was talking about actions and results. Made a mistake? That's alright. Just figure out what you did wrong in the given situation, and then move on and try again. Don't freak out because you looked stupid, or you lost your job or whatever. Embrace the mistake, Learn from the mistake, Apply that knowledge to the next similar situation. Its just that simple.

As odd as this sound, I know I'm right because the sleeping hind brain hasn't risen from its slumber to raze me with its caustic wit. ... Yet.

.... and yes, I know. You all think I'm totally nuts now, and are wondering if you should even come back to this blog in the future, and risk contamination through reading it.

Its okay. I understand.

Crunch... crunch... pause ... crunch

2010-08-07T17:51:00.001-07:00

There's a saying that 'when the cats away the mice will play', yes? It does hold some truth. Generally speaking, some of my weirdest experiences have happened while I was home alone. For example, when we were living in a motor home outside our earthquake damaged house, my sister and parents went to a friends house for dinner. I stayed home because I wasn't feeling good. They leave. It got quiet. Then the storm blew in, and the next thing I know there's a bay tree leaning on the motor home, which is up on blocks to keep it level. Visions of the home on wheels going over the side of the embankment with me inside did not fill me with the glee one finds on an amusement park ride. Rest assured the sturdy little box on wheels stayed right were it was, but my parents did get a slightly panicked phone call from me.

There was also the time that the kitchen nearly caught on fire due to someone turning on the wrong burner on a stove. That was NOT me. Someone wanted tea and turned on the burner under a pan full of bacon grease instead of the burner under the tea kettle. Ah... please note that when you do as you were taught by very serious firefighters in grade school "You can use baking soda to put out the fire by dumping the box on it.", that what they do NOT tell you is that when you have a fire shooting three and a half feet into the air, and you dump a box of baking soda on it, that the fire briefly and surprisingly, shoots out three and a half feet to the sides before being extinguished. Yes... That would've been handy to know. Earlier. ehem...

But I think the 'home alone' instance that tops all others (so far, that is) was when my parents were visiting my uncle in AZ. This was the year that we'd had out first trouble with a critter getting at the chickens while in their hen house. Right at the beginning of summer we'd forgotten to close up the door before it got dark, and of course, the one night we forget is the one night something decides it wants chicken for dinner. And of course it isn't something small like a fox or a bobcat. Nooooo. We end up with a yearling black bear in the hen house. We lost two hens to the bear eating them, and one just plain vanished. That's still a mystery. No feathers, no nothing. Bears are messy eaters, and would have left some evidence behind. I'm wondering if the bear had been accompanied by a fox that night. Fox are often seen puttering around near bears. Anyway, that was a first... actually there were a couple of firsts. First time we lost chickens to a predator, first time we forgot to close the metal door on the chicken coop, and the first time I've ever seen my father grimly loading a revolver to go shoot whatever it was that was in the chicken coop. Actually that was the last time I've ever seen that last one.

So, here we are later that same summer, while my parents are out of town, and I'm left home to take care of the raptors, and the dogs. Not a big deal because I couldn't get out of work anyway. It was hot that night so I had all the windows wide open so we'd get a breeze. No central AC of any kind here in the boonies. I prefer it that way, considering AC dries out my nose something fierce. The dogs were sacked out on the floor, sprawled really and attempting to pretend that panting wasn't a necessity. As for myself, I had plotzed down on the sofa and was watching some show on TV that has obviously done bad things to my brain cells, as I can't recall what it was.

The volume wasn't up high on the set, because the house is a lot quieter with just one human and two dogs in it. This made it easy for me to hear anything going on outside. I'd been half listening to a couple of Western Screech Owls call back and forth to each other, and there was the general faint noise of neighborhood dogs barking.... and there was the...

*Crunch* *Crunch*.. pause.. *Crunch*

...noise of something approaching the house through dried leaves. .... which failed to register completely on my radar until the dogs both sat up with ears perked. Growling ensued. Alrighty then. They don't do that for deer. Being paranoid my first thought was "Sh!t! Someone's going to rob the place." Except the dogs weren't barking in a "There's a HUMAN we don't know out there!" They were growling in a "We're not sure what it is, but its not pleasant." sort of way.

The sleepy part of my brain that only wakes up to tell me I'm being a dolt for not seeing the obvious, clobbered me with a mental pillow before rolling over and going back to sleep, saying,"Its the bear you exquisite fool." Don't ask me why I smiled. The Bear, I thought. Well! Its not getting the rest of my chickens! NOT TO-NIGHT!

Muttering highly unflattering remarks about said bears heritage and upbringing, I went out on the porch and made a lot of racket with two metal dog pans. The bear, (yes it actually was a bear; the sleepy hind brain is rarely wrong), was already in the driveway, halfway between the house and the chicken coop, and it didn't seem to care one wit about me and my noisy shenanigans. It paused in lazy fashion to stare at the strange creature making all the noise, then turned again to pursue its late evening snack.

I was incensed! How DARE he ignore me. So, I threw one of the metal dog pan at him, and of course I missed. He didn't even pause as he looked over his shoulder at me with a grade school smirk as he mosied towards food. I'd been trying to spook him, but now I was pissed. My second throw was hard and aimed with precision... the rim of the dog pan smashed into the bear's head, and made a sound like a gong. The bear stood still for a second, then sat down and weaved a little bit. After a few seconds he got up, shook off, and started for the hens again. This bear was WAY too used to people, and I didn't have anymore dog pans to hurl at him. I ran back in the house and got my car keys. The chickens were locked up, but he'd easily peeled back a couple of sheets of thick plywood the last time he'd visited to get at the chickens. I had no illusions about the wood surrounding the metal door. He'd go through it like butter.

I stormed out of the house and across the driveway to where the car was parked, my hind brain pointing out lazily that the bear could easily run me down before I got to the car. "Shut UP!" I said, and got into the car. My car at that time was an 1981 Oldsmobile Omega. Basically an 80's commute car. It was old, and not terribly pretty to look at, but it made a hell of a lot of noise, and its actually made of metal instead of spiffy, shiny plastic! And I'd learned through experience that cranking it over while little old people were walking past tended to scare the hell out of them. I couldn't see why it'd be any different for a fearless yearling bear. And it wasn't, especially after I chased him all over our 3 acres at speed, with headlights, and horns, and a blasting radio and me behind the wheel laughing like a madman. When I couldn't find him anymore (I lost him in a cloud of dust as I wheeled hard into a magnificent spiral... He must have jumped the fence in a panic) I drove back to the hen house and idled in front of the door for an hour. When I got back in the house the dogs eyed me warily for the rest of the evening. My evil streak was showing that night I guess.

It dawned on me later that my neighbors must have thought someone over here had lost their mind. It turned out that the neighbors who would've had a front row seat weren't home that week, and the other was also away. I had a laugh though. Never had another bear on the property that went after the chickens. Now we don't have any bears to speak of at all thanks to an international poaching ring. Nor do we have cougars, bobcats, otters and most of the fox are gone too. The fact that we've had a fox eating our chickens this spring and summer is a GOOD thing. I'm glad they're not gone completely. I haven't seen a bear up here in two years, and that's just sad.

Simple

2010-08-05T22:12:00.000-07:00

No novel today. Just some pictures I took over the last couple of days.

The first one I took out in the little garden beside the house. Its nice in there, full of little birdbaths, false stream beds and a couple of rose bushes. Actually I'm not sure if this is a rose or not. It may be something that looks like a rose and is masquerading. In any case, I snapped a picture of it as soon as I noticed it. Flowers in that little garden tend to dry up pretty damned fast in the summer.

You can see its already starting to burn in the sun. California sun might be some of the best, but up here in the mountains it tends to fry more than anything else.

And here we have a couple of little critters that I received as a gift while at work. The library has been getting a bunch of books on knitting and crocheting little animals and creatures of all sorts. I would love to be able to knit or crochet, just so I could make some of these creatures. It looks like it'd be a lot of fun. Alas, I am more likely to get tied up in the yarn than create something cute and wonderful like this young lady did. She showed me an entire family she'd made using the mysterious art of crochet. Then she handed me these and said they were for me! I LOVE them!

I'm told that the white one is an alien, from the planet Crochet. He's very cute, and I'm going to have to figure out how to hang him off my backpack. Next to him are a set of cherries. One is happy, and the other is sad, like theatrical masks. The cherries came complete with stems and leaves. I love it. Maybe I can hang them in my car. :)

I really need to learn to crochet. There was an entire book on how to make everything from monkeys to zombies. Looked like a lot of fun. *sighs* Yet another thing to learn before I expire. In due time of course.

Saw and Heard

2010-08-02T14:03:00.000-07:00

Once again, I'm going back to Arizona to tell of a trip to one of the more internationally known museums for Native American history and art. The Heard Museum. Just to give a quick background, the museum was originally built as a mansion for a wealthy couple. The Heards. Actually the husband married into money; is wife being the daughter of the family that opened and still owns Ace Hardware. They moved to Arizona for the husband's health, and ended up becoming a patron of sorts to the native peoples of the region. The Pueblo, Pai, Navajo, Hopi, Apache, and others I'm sure I'm forgetting. Arizona is a desert, and most people are amazed at how many native peoples inhabited this arid and seemingly barren area. I'm not so surprised, but I think that has to do with my own background of being a docent for a Natural History museum. The training for which was intensive, and thorough. My brain is still crammed with knowledge, such as before the Spanish arrived in CA, there were 800 distinct dialects (this means that the languages had diverged and remained separate for several thousand years) spoken by native peoples in CA alone. I can't begin to imagine how many there would be if you factored in for the rest of the country. AZ was obviously no different in diversity.

I digress. The Heards decided to leave their entire estate, and extensive Native American items collection to the Native Americans of Arizona. Inside their mansion is housed one of the finest collections of pottery, arts, dolls and other things of that nature in the world. And having been there, I can tell you that this is not a case of gradeurized boasting. The collection is extensive, especially where pottery is concerned. Much like a car museum, you can see just about every make and model from ancient to recent, from every tribe that had anything to do with carrying something in some form. Other rooms offered exhibits on famous Native American Artists, such as Allan Houser whose work I really enjoyed. I would not mind getting a reproduction of some of his works (best way to see some of his work, is to use Google Images search). Another room was filled to capacity by Hopi Katsina (kahts ee nah) dolls of every type that I'd ever seen, and some I'd never seen before. They're beautiful, whimsical, solemn, frightening, and altogether powerful as they represent benevolent spirits who visit the Hopi twice yearly. Generally they are the spirits that bring the rain, and are given into the care of the little girls until they're around 10 years of age. Please don't take this as gospel, as I'm dragging up possibly misheard information from a tour I took nearly three weeks ago.

On the second floor there is a room dedicated to the American government's attempt to "educate" the Native Peoples. For those of you who don't know, this was the work of a combination of good christian ethics (sighs. Some of the worst events in history have been done because someone thought God wanted them to.) and money/land hungry government and business people. Basically schools were built (they called them schools, but they were more like military boot camp.) for Native American children, which were in many cases ripped from the arms of their family, loaded onto trains like cattle and shipped off to parts unknown. I wish I could say they weren't treated like cattle, but they were. Their clothing was taken from them, their braids were shorn, and then kerosene was poured on them because obviously they must have lice. (never mind that they almost certainly didn't because of the way they cared for their hair) They were also beaten or reprimanded if they spoke their own language. America stopped the practice in 1960s, which in itself is sort of appalling given we're supposed to be one of the most accepting and tolerant of differences, although I still meet extremely small minded people from time to time. Most of these schools are gone, and only two still operate, and only because they're the only school close enough for the kids to get to. Needless to say the curriculum and treatment has changed dramatically. This room really brings it all home though, because the stories of these kids, now grown and elderly, tell of their experiences of being forced from their family, their home, the train ride, the schools... Made me sick, and then angry. I don't have a high tolerance for blatant stupidity.

It's a beautiful museum, and it is a must see if you ever go to Phoenix, AZ. Just don't expect a terribly friendly reception. This was my interpretation at least of going there, but maybe they were just having bad day. All of my museum experiences in Phoenix were strange come to think of it. One was closed. Another was way more money than I was expecting, and not what I would've paid for once I got inside. Too many exhibits were broken, inoperable, or simply closed. It's sad to see museums being run like roadside tourist traps, which is essentially what they were. I must be spoiled. I'd never had that experience before, but then most of the museums I'd been to were in CA, and while CA is NOT doing well by any means, the museums were/are ... fun, inviting.

At the Heard museum I had the unpleasant notion that I was seen as a thief. Leave large backpacks at the door lockers, wear your purse around your front so we can see it, don't take pictures if you intend to use a flash.... By the time they got done with all the rules, I felt guilty just standing in the lobby. And I took maybe 4 pictures inside before I stopped, because one of the staff was there staring at me. "I wasn't using the flash." I said quietly. The woman stared at me for about 15 seconds (trust me, 15 seconds is a LONG time) before saying,"Good." Then she walked off down the hallway. I'm not normally intimidated, but by the time I left I felt like hiding in a corner and crying for a while. My friends didn't seem to have the same feeling, but then again I didn't tell them that we were followed through the whole place by at least one staff member, and not always the same one. The gift shop was nice. I mean Tiffanys nice, and way the hell out of my price range. I didn't get anything, but my friends got a bracelet and some CDs.

So, there are really only two pictures I took. One because I loved the artwork on the pottery, and the other because it got a rare smile out of me on an otherwise nerve wracking experience.

I'll apologize now for the photo, because of the poor quality, but I was shaking a bit when I took it because I had someone drilling holes in my back as soon as I took out my camera. This is Pueblo pottery style, with a painting of who I think is a representation of Koshari the Clown. The Pueblo and Hopi share many of the same spirit legends, so its not unusual to see him on pottery, but Koshari is usually seen as a Hopi Katsina. Koshari was a spirit joker of sorts, like Coyote is in other Native American cultures. He taught social traditions through tricks and humor to keep the peace in the community. I've seen him before, but I hadn't known his name until now. He was always one of my favorite characters in paintings and carvings.

This one had me smiling. If you can't tell what it is, its another piece of pottery by a Pueblo artist and this one must be quite recent. Its a Harry Potter bowl! I guess everyone really DOES love Harry Potter. In it you can see Harry's broom and suitcase. The car that Ron Weasley crashed, Mad-Eye Moody's all seeing eye, and the escapee toad. There was even more chuckling because of 'Potter', pottery, etc. But I thought this was cute, and this made me feel a little better for a while. A really little while, because this was the last picture I took before I put my camera away for the rest of the excursion.

I would love to go back and really look everything over when I'm by myself, and perhaps when the staff isn't quite so... attentive. Everything about this place was beautiful. Balsa wood wraps the walkways, and walls, providing very few hard edges to the place. It is dark though, sort of like the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum in San Jose, Ca. Dark, with well lit exhibits. I used to go there with my grandpa when I was little. We'd go every time my grandmother went to have her hair done while I was visiting, because it generally took her an hour. I can't remember how many times I went through there, but there was always something new to see, and it was quiet. It's another place I'll have to go back to. :)

The Wrong Buttons... (a tale of mistaken identity)

2010-07-24T20:20:00.000-07:00

Come with me back to the week before last, while I was attending the American Council for the Blind conference and AZ. Many tales remain untold, but be reassured that I will get to them. At least the ones worth repeating. Some fall well short of what I deem worth your time, and others, such as this one, are hopefully good for a smile. *crosses fingers*

* Before you read further, let me make note that I do not find people who are blind, or otherwise handicap funny unless they're cracking a joke. I am not making fun of them in any way, and I spent a lot of my time helping people I didn't know find elevators, bathrooms, stores, restaurants and various other places/things while I was there. However, I always ask if they need help with anything before aiding them. Some do need help, others just ask directions. Everyone is different. But I have to admit, I was not expecting to find myself in this situation. ;)

On the last evening before heading back home, I found myself in the lobby of the hotel. This is the new downtown Sheraton which hasn't even been open for a year. Which means its shiny new, and lacks the general homey-ness of an older hotel. The lobby there is huge, and it echoes harshly back just about every sound made in there. Thus the small crowd of people I was with were making a huge racket as we waited for the last few stragglers to show up before we headed out for dinner. Because everyone I was with was blind we had to be very specific about where we were meeting. This time it was the front doors, which we were partially blocking, so I was standing slightly away from everyone and near the door so I could warn people who couldn't see, who were entering the building, wouldn't crash into the group.

We were just about ready to head out when two older ladies came in from outside. Both are blind, and have guide dogs. They came in through the doors, and one immediately heads to her left, and the other heads to her right. I'm watching with some amusement as they figure out they've lost each other and do abrupt about faces and meet back up. Then they head straight at me. Full speed. I back up, and shout, "Someones here!" No reaction. Shouting again, gets no reaction and I see that they have hearing aides. Ah. With all the noise, they can't hear me either. Taking evasive measures, I stepped to the side to allow the dogs to lead them past me.

The dogs followed me. My every move to the side, or backwards, was followed by two furry guide dog missiles. Did I mention they were fast? They had me backed up against a pillar in under 15 seconds. And then came the first lady with her hands straight out. Hands that were heading straight for my boobs.

"HEY!! There's someone here!" I shouted, and the lady has her hands on my boobs. I'm too surprised to say anything, and am making fish out of water noises.

The lady pauses for a few seconds as I tried to formulate a coherent sentence, and then squeezes.. once... twice... I'm still blinking in shock, and coming to grips with a full understanding of Molly Ringwald's humiliation in Sixteen Candles as she gets felt up by her grandmother. At least she didn't tell me they were perky.

"This doesn't feel like the elevator" she says in confusion, squeezing yet again.

"How can you tell?" says her companion in an irritable tone.

And I shout right next to her ear,"You're nowhere NEAR the elevators! You need to go straight forward about 25 yards and to your right!"

"HUH?" she says in response.

"Can you get your hands off my boobs?" I shout trying to dislodge her hands.

She turns to her friend,"There's someone standing here. I'll get directions." No apologies. Just,"Where are the elevators?"

Despite the groping I did take them to the elevators and showed them the RIGHT BUTTONS, and then caught up with my friends who had already started out to the restaurant. I had to laugh.. My friend had warned me that I'd get whacked with canes, run over by guide dogs and other such things, but I hadn't expected the groping.

Still makes me laugh. ;)

Obvious

2010-07-18T01:07:00.000-07:00

As you might have noticed, things changed a bit on my blog. Just the color though. Mom badgered me into it. This is just a quick note to acknowledge that yes, I shall be goofing around with the design of my blog. Feel free to tell me what you think as, I'm sure, some of it will be appalling. I tend to be a no nonsense person, without all the frills most people of the female persuasion tend to go nuts over. Which is why my blog was black. I liked how the posts lit up on the background, but it was time for a change. In fact... it might not stay blue. We'll see how the experiments go.

And I'm back from Phoenix AZ. Its 1 a.m. and I should be sleeping, but I wanted to do a short post before passing out.

Night night. :)

Museum Shock

2010-07-14T09:44:00.000-07:00

Where to begin, that is the question. I suspect that I will not be able to smash everything I want into this post, nor will I get everything I wanted to write about on the blog before the end of the week. So you people out there in Internet land get to enjoy Phoenix longer than I do. I hope you're happy.

Yesterday my friend was in meetings all day, and mine had pretty much wrapped up for the week. Finding myself with a lot of extra time on my hands, I decided to walk down to the Phoenix History museum. My friend asked me if I was insane for wanting to go walking around in 109 degree temps. The sad truth is, I didn't even break a sweat. I got a slight clammy feeling to my skin and that was it. Some might accuse me of wearing a tank top and shorts.... I was in fact wearing a t-shirt, with a long sleeved sweat shirt over it. And jeans. Should I be concerned about my body's ability to regulate temperature? I'm starting to wonder.

A half an hour of walking, getting slightly turned around, and then arriving at my destination had me somewhat disappointed. It was closed. The times on the door stated that they should be open, so I approached the front door only to find a notice on the door informing the general populace that the Phoenix History Museum had lost its funding, and as of June 30th would be closing its doors. The neighboring Science Museum has acquired the building and all its assets and is currently trying to find a sponsor to fund it. I must be living in some hole, or abyss, because I had no idea that Museums weren't funded, at least in part, by the government. Or local county, city or governing entity. Where I'm from, yes, there is a small entrance fee sometimes, but nothing like what I'm finding here... and I have to say that I'm somewhat horrified. The Museums in Arizona don't get any funding through government. They're all paid for through corporate entities like banks, or Pepsi or something along those lines. O.O Excuse me, but if the only money coming in, is from a large company, what assurance do I have that they aren't pulling history make overs? "Re-Write it this way, or we'll yank your funding!" I'm damned alarmed by this.

Getting into the Phoenix Science Museum was also entertaining. Like Movie entertaining. You know when you go to see a movie, you fork over $8.00 for a matinee? Well just switch that to $12. Then go inside the theatre and you smell popcorn and decide to go get a bucket. You get a bucket because they give you no choice in many cases. Then ,maybe, you want some candy, or a soda. This museum was much the same. $12 entrance fee, and then good luck seeing half the exhibits if the entrance fee was all you were expecting to pay. Its cheaper to go see a movie. Granted the museum was under construction, so a lot of things were blocked off, but what was open was in poor shape. Many of the exhibits didn't work, or were visibly worn and in this case, should not have been. 90% of the staff were volunteers, and they did a good job, but wow... scary. I didn't take pictures, because there just wasn't anything in there worth taking a picture of. Thursday we're supposed to go visit the Heard Museum in the morning before the tour groups hit. I really hope things are in considerably better shape.

After hiking around downtown Phoenix for various reasons, I found myself back near the hotel, and treated myself to a salad for lunch at the Greek restaurant, which is right behind the Starbucks. The night before three of us came here for dinner and got Greek Fries to go with dinner, and my it was good. The dining establishment involved is called My Big Fat Greek Restaurant.

The food you see on the right is a Caesar salad, and it was very very good. In fact I've been eating them with abandon. Their Greek Salad is also extremely good. I haven't tried anything off the rest of the menu yet, but I did have a little bit of gyro from someone else's dish, and it was good as well. The gyro I've had before was really greasy and tasted a bit off, but this was near perfect. I've got a picture of the Greek Fries on here too, which is served with feta and another cheese, melted and mixed with a lemon sauce which gets poured over the fries. I don't generally like potatoes, but those were sooo good. I may have to get those again, but to share, because the plates they give you are enormous.

The fingers you see are those of my friends. Sarah would be at the other end of the hand on the left, and Nancy is the owner of the fingers on the right. I didn't eat many, but its was damned hard to abstain. Potatoes don't agree with me, and I'm not going into details. I did discover sweet potato fries at the hotel. Heh. Now those I can eat without troubles. In fact they give them to you in a cut down paper bag so you can take them with you if you don't finish. I took them with me and ate them slowly over the last few days. Soooo very very good.

Several people pointed out after I posted last that I had neglected to put up a picture of the Teddy Bear I made. This was because I hadn't taken a picture of it before I posted last. I've remedied the situation, and here is my bear.

There were three choices for color when we finished the tour off. Turquoise blue, black, and a Holstein cow black and white pattern. And that would've been all the choices, except that one little boy had somehow glommed onto a bright orange bear and that was the one he wanted to stuff... Attempts to dissuade his choice resulted in a pitched fit that was in many ways extremely ineffective. To me at least. So, our wonderful tour guide went into the back again to see what other color bears he could come up with. He came back with White, Honey and some other color that is escaping me at the moment. Obviously I got the Honey colored bear. Other popular choices were the cow pattern and ... actually I'm not sure anyone got the black or turquoise colored bears. There were two orange bears by the time we were done. Several cow bears, and one bright pink bear that wasn't even on the menu, but Stuffington was very accommodating where this tour was concerned. Each bear got their own ribbon set up. You could have gotten clothes for the bear, but that can get expensive. Thus, all the bears left naked except for a bow tie. That sounds oddly X rated....

There was also a request for a better picture of Fargo the Guide Dog (Guide Dogs for the Blind). He's Sarah's Guide Dog, and he's disgustingly cute. He also sleeps on me sometimes at night. Heh. He also doesn't like the camera, so I have to sneak up on him. Even so, he managed to look miserable. Or perhaps sleepy. So here we go:

And since we're doing this now, this is Yancy from Seeing Eye who guides for Nancy. No jokes please. I don't generally like German Shepherds because they tend to whine, but he doesn't. He talks, but doesn't whine:

And yes. Yancy is a gorgeous German Shepherd. Standing, sitting, sleeping, working or otherwise. He's a gentle soul.

I'm going to see another movie this morning, and then... who knows what I'm doing. That is, I'm going to see a movie if its not too crowded in there. I hate crowded theaters. Yesterday I went and saw Despicable Me, which is a kids movie, so it was predictable, and steeped in good morals, but it was fun anyway. :)

New Friends, Old Friends, and Teddy Bears

2010-07-11T15:11:00.000-07:00

Just because I like to torture myself on vacations, I decided to go to the American Council for the Blind convention in Phoenix, AZ. Actually, one of my oldest friends had been talking about going to this convention all year; last year really. It takes a while to save up money for these things. Anywho, in the weeks leading up to the convention the person who she would be sharing a room with backed out on her, leaving her without a roommate and a rather hefty room bill. She was suddenly unsure of whether she would be able to go and was upset. So, I stepped in and said, "You can use me as a roommate. We haven't seen each other in two years." Then in a small panic, because I HAD NOT been saving up for this, I began stuffing money away in order to pay for half the room. All of that aside, I'm here, and have been having a grand ole time with my friend, and all of her friends.

Yesterday was an all day event, in which I got to meet three wonderful little girls who all have partial or no ability to see. Their particular disorder can also cause behavioral issues, which was present, but to a MUCH lesser extent than I've seen in perfectly healthy children. They were great, and we all had a ball. Our small troop of 12 got together in the lobby of our hotel at 9 a.m. where we all climbed into cars and headed out for breakfast at an IHOPS. We got lost for 20 minutes, then pulled into an IHOPs we found at random, and it turned out to be the right one. I could be getting the facts wrong here, but in my defense I was in the back of a large vehicle with a hot Guide Dog, and two little girls who talk a lot. We laughed a lot too. The food was good, and then we left for the Stuffington Bear Factory.

And here's the proof. We all crawled out of the car and hustled inside as fast as possible. Our arrival was slightly after 11 a.m., but it was already 112 outside and some of the girls aren't heat tolerant at all. There was also the guide dogs who were (and still are if we don't put their boots on) burning the heck out of their paws walking from the parking lot to the front door. There was a slight wait for the rest of the party to figure out where the factory was. That ended when we were told that the rest of the party was already there and waiting on US. Um.. ooops.

Right inside the front door the kids quickly discovered the giant bear. This thing made everyone look like they were in miniature. I forgot to ask if it had a name, but I'm guessing he does. He's just too cool not to have a name. Of course the girls were all over the bear in under 2 seconds, laying on his legs, pulling on his arms and they got in trouble for trying to shimmy up onto his head. There are signs to either side that tell you not to crawl on his head. I suspect that kids have been lost to the large crevasse that is the hole between the back of Big Bear's head, and the corner of the room.

This situation was remedied fairly quickly when our tour guide showed up and said,"Okay, if you could follow me this way we'll get this party started." or something to that effect. I didn't take a picture of him. Sorry. But he did give us a wonderful tour of the back room where they stuff all the creatures for orders. There was an order of German Shepherds with collars reading Champ for the Vice Pres. Apparently they are for a program running somewhere, but since my brain is reenacting the last gasps of a beached fish, I can't remember what it was.

They have a rather surprisingly small work staff, but he said that if they get a huge amount of orders, they sometimes double the staff as needed, but apparently the usual number back here is 8 people. They also use old fashioned sewing machines, because they're made of metal components rather than plastic, which can break off easily into a random stuffed toy. Since their goal isn't to maim the general public, they stick to the metal machines. Surprisingly, parts for their machines are still being manufactured in the U.S. and are readily available for order on-line. You can see part of one in the picture to the left.

They had an entire wall devoted to plastic fur. You can see the bolts of fur along the back wall in every shade of color and texture you can think of. I will confess to taking this picture because I swear this Teddy Bear is smiling at me and even if he wasn't, he's just too damned cute. They literally had bears and other stuffed animals of a fake nature piled everywhere on tables, bins and in some cases; floors. Thus we have the teddy bear with half made teddy bears on one side, made teddy bears in his lap, and.... I lost track of everything that was to his right. This company does put a lot of work into these bears though, and they pay some serious attention to the seams and stitching. They showed us the stuffing machine first. It's a large machine that sort of looks like a circus box car, with a tube sticking out one side. You take your stitched, but hollow bear and stick him on the tube, step on a peddle, and the machine starts stuffing the bear for you. All you do is move the bear around to make sure all the limbs and body have filled out. It was damned fast. Stitching up the Bear's back was even faster. Then they use a little vacuum with a comb to suck up stray fuzz, and pull the fur that got suck in the stitches free. Which means you don't see the seams as much. The last step is to give your bear an air bath. They have a pressurized air system that you just run the bear under. It blows away any random fluff left over. The best part of this entire process is that you get to do this all yourself. Yes, I have another Teddy Bear and I MADE this one!!

After we were done, our very kind driver took us all back to the hotel, were we all pretended to be dead for a while, before we met back in the lobby for a dinner run. We went out to a very good Mexican restaurant and had lots of fun telling stories. There was also a walking band that would go from table to table and play different songs in spanish. Really cool experience. It was late when we got back to the hotel and we collapsed in the room.

In fact, this is basically what we did when we got there.

Fargo gave us all a good example to follow. :)

I'll see about posting again, but considering the hotel is charging an arm and a leg for internet service, my posting will all depend on whether or not I can get to the Starbucks!

The Little Fishies Three... sorta...

2010-06-30T20:40:00.000-07:00

Soooo, as .... whoever reads this blog knows, I set up an aquarium a couple of weeks ago. Its a little three gallon tank, with an eclipse water wheel system. From what I researched this a nice system, that perhaps cleans itself a little too well. For an aquarium to work properly there needs to be a certain amount of biologic activity going on in the tank. It helps provide the water with oxygen, and that in turn helps keep the fish, frogs, crab, or whatever you put in the tank alive and healthy. This means that when you set up the tank you need to let it run for a day or so to let the crap they put in the water evaporate or destabilize enough for the first fish you put in to keep swimming. Considering the water that runs out of our tap smells like a swimming pool at the best of times, and a bottle of chlorine at the worst, I let mine run for a week before attempting to add fish.

I started with three Red Phantom Tetras, because they're easy to take care of and they tend to poop a lot. Face it people. Poop makes the world go round. Actually anything that falls into a cycle of life makes the world go round, but for the sake of this story we'll be talking of fishly poo. It allows bacteria to start the afore mentioned cooking. In fact starting out a new fish tank is called "cycling the tank." For a blissful week, I had three little tetras. Three little extremely SHY tetras. They're supposed to school in a tank, but these guys just hid inside their little treasure chest. It was a trial trying to get them to eat, so I was probably feeding them more than they should have been getting. Don't get me wrong. I was not by any means over-feeding, because the little buggers were too scared to eat everything I put in there. So, I made sure everyone got a mouthful and then stopped for the day. These are small fish, so I was breaking up the flakes so they could eat... except the littlest fish managed to get ahold of the biggest flake. Which caused him get too much air in his system. Which then caused an air bladder problem... which resulted in his untimely demise. Yes. Guilt sits heavy upon my shoulders.

Thus I find myself with the little fishies two, instead of the little fishies three. They're even worse now about swimming around the tank. Time is spent lurking behind the big rock on the right, or inside the treasure chest on the left. If I turn on the light they hide behind the treasure chest next to the intake filter where I can't see them at all, and since I turn the light on to feed them, they totally miss the tiny pieces of munchies I'm attempting to give them. I am told that this will change when I add more fish, but that's another couple of weeks down the road, after the tank finishes cycling. There are worse things than shy fish though, so I will put up with having to find them to make sure they're alive every day until I can add more fish.

On a totally separate note, I got back around to watching Bleach episodes. I'd let them run for a while so I can watch a bunch all at once. Episodes 266 to 272.... O.o WOW!! That's all I'm sayin'. And if you WANT to know what I'm talking about, then watch Bleach from episode 1, and hang on for a good ride. Its not the best series I've ever seen, but I certainly have fun watching it. I'm also letting One Piece run, but I suspect that's going to take longer to finish the specific arc they're on. I'm not entirely sure it'll end well either, but I still love all the characters, so I'll watch anyway.

And.... We're Back!!

2010-06-14T20:34:00.001-07:00

Today, I left home early. Once again, I was driven to run for the sake of my poor eardrums. They can only take so much Banshee singing. Thus I found myself at the pet shop getting dog food. Yes, I was brave enough to go get dog food again. Anyway, after that, I tootled off to my Physical Therapy appointment. That was actually kinda funny. I've really been keeping up on my exercises and it shows. There haven't been any hand tremors since Friday, and even that was slight, and partially due to me using my hand a lot during a pencil drawing class. This results in me getting some strengthening exercises to go with the ones that do a traction type movement with my neck. I was so happy to be able to do the drawing again, without my hand going bonkers that I brought in some of my art to show him. It really meant a lot to me that he got me back to the point where I could draw again. He was totally floored. LOL! Oh, that was funny.

Afterwards, I wandered over to The Big Salad Shop for lunch. BEST SALADS EVER. I eat lunch there a lot. While I ate lunch I sat on the patio, ate lunch and read a book. It was so nice. Free time has been such a rare thing for me over the years. On the down side, I discovered that my feet really need some sandals. The Halflingers are great during Winter, Spring and Fall... but not so good when the temps hit 95+, which led me up the street to the shoe store where I put a pair of sandals on hold until I get my paycheck. Then I suckered myself into looking at type of bicycle I've been eyeballing for about two years. I have a bike, but its a serious mountain bike with a seat built for the numb-of-ass. My posterior is just a tad more delicate, and the position of the handlebars are awkward. I love the bike, but it's just not built for a ride to the grocery store any back. It's built to take you down mountain sides and up the next with extreme efficiency. Don't get me wrong. It's an awesome bike, but ... not so good for cruising around town.

So, I drooled on a bright red bike at the bike shop, and found out that they have lay away. Really... you have lay away? Oh, man. I got myself out of there before I could get myself in more trouble. The brand name and model of the bike left with me on the back of a business card. On the way home, I passed my Dad and Sister heading down the hill... Which meant I was going home to a house with an abandoned Banshee. ... joy. Upon arriving home, he was indeed crying and carrying on. Being one that has a low tolerance for loud noises, (and I do realize the irony of this) I plugged myself into a pair of earphones, jacked it into my ipod and cranked up the volume. Then proceeded to put together my fish tank. Which I got three years ago at Christmas. I figured it was about time to set it up. Procrastination is one of my specialities.

Chickens On The Porch, Where Art Thou?

2010-06-13T19:34:00.000-07:00

Alrighty. If anyone is wondering where Callie is from Chickens On the Porch, she is currently without Internet connection. If everyone is now wondering how I managed to get online if there is no Internet connection, its because I fled the house Saturday after work, and am currently making use of a friends wireless system. With their consent of course. BUT for the near future there may be a small space where there aren't any posts from either of us. Just thought I'd let you know. Never fear. If worse comes to worse, I shall put Mom in the car with my laptop and drive her down to the library where the Internet service is FREE, and on ALL THE TIME. Thus, she may post.

In the meantime, hang in there. We're working on it.

Banshees Really DO Exist!!

2010-06-09T20:02:00.000-07:00

They do! They really do! We've all seen them too, because every human has at one point in their lives been one. We know them as 2 year-olds. My nephew for instance is currently in his banshee stage, with a shriek that can, and quite possibly has, peeled the paint off walls. Sorry to say I have no actual proof of this, but believe me. Its the only thing that can possibly explain his ability to push the decibel reading off the scale. Thankfully he comes with a pacifier. If you plunk him in front of the TV and run Kiki's Delivery Service, he's extremely quiet. Until its over, and then... You'd better be quick on the play button. My dog's brick splitting bark sounds so tame now. That's probably a blessing of sorts. I no longer jump out of my skin when she barks right behind my back. She sneaks up behind me and does that, and I'm fairly sure she laughs about it too. Thank god she can't take pictures.

The shrieking aside, my sister's kids are all good. I keep telling myself that the littlest one is just a baby, and I'm being dumb when I climb walls to escape the noise. So far I've not been terribly effective at convincing myself of that. Ah well.

On Monday I had my second physical therapy appointment. It seemed to go well. The PT wants to keep things very simple because that's what seems to be working for me. I have a suspicion that this thing in my neck may never completely leave and I will be doing these little exercises for a long time to come. At the moment though, they are allowing me to function at about 90% of normal. Unless I forget to do them, and then I'm back to a dying fish for a hand. Always fun for parties and attempting to eat spaghetti. OR I've got an odd wimpy feeling to the arm, and slight numbness down the inside of the arm to the wrist. Either or both can happen, and I'm not always in a position to fix it with the exercises. Its a learning process for now, but at least it's working.

After the appointment, I drove home in the little rental. Nice enough little car. In fact it was nice enough to drive right back down the hill later to see a movie. I decided on Prince of Persia, which wasn't a bad film exactly, but it rang hollow. I really didn't give a crap about any of the characters. The action scenes were fine, the dialogue wasn't bad, and FX were top notch. However this whole thing basically falls into the same category as National Treasure. A movie that has everything I love in a film, but totally fails to pull me into it. Everything fell rather flat, like walking into a very clean glass door. You'd like to be inside the party with everyone else, but something is preventing you from getting to it. I'm not saying this was bad film, because for many people I'm sure it was great, but for me... eh. I should've gone to see Killers.

And! I've got my car back! It looks brand new. The place that did the repairs gave me a detail job on the car too. The only thing that was a little screwy is that there was sap all over the car, so they couldn't give it a wax job. Therefore I get to get it further detailed in the near future, and I get to figure out how its getting sap all over it, given it lives in a carport. Odd. Anyway, I've got my car back!! Soooo happy!!!

ACK!! An AWARD!!

2010-06-06T14:02:00.000-07:00

I am in an extremely foul mood today. There is no real particular reason for it, just that I wanted peace and quiet and instead my sister and her kids are invading for two weeks. Starting at 6pm or so today. I'm not going to say anything else about it because I start moving from merely agitated to outright angry. As bad as this sounds, I greatly dislike having visitors to the house. That includes relatives. I would be exceedingly happy as a hermit. A CLEAN hermit. With chickens, goats, dogs, and at least two mules. I'd be good.

On a brighter note, somehow I got an award from "Little Messy Missy". Thank you Little Messy Missy. This was the last thing I was ever expecting. I didn't think I wrote enough on this thing to ever gain award attention. Definitely a brighter spot in the day though. So, basically I think the rules go that I thank the person who gave it to me. Done. :)

Then tell everyone 7 things that you probably don't know about me, and given that I don't like talking too much about myself, that should be relatively simple. The last one was that I was supposed to pass this award on... Which could be a problem given that I generally don't read a lot of blogs. So, I will hold onto this until I run across people who meet the criteria.

1. I'm afraid I already gave this away. I harbor a deep need for solitude.

2. I still sleep with a little pink plush elephant.

3. I absolutely abhor dresses and skirts. Give me jeans any day.

4. I have a polished stone collection that I keep in a fish bowl. Every once in a while I take the fish bowl and dump the stones on a table, and then look at them for hours.

5. I don't like chocolate, unless you offer me raisinets. Then I can eat an entire bag. Most people get chocolate cravings... I get cravings for Nori (that's the dried seaweed they use for sushi), and eat them like potato chips. Yes, I know. Weird.

6. I want tons of plants in my room, but I've got a black thumb.

7. My favorite movies are from the 40s and 50s. Hollywood lost something when they hit the mid 60s, and they haven't gotten it back.

Lately I've been watching a lot of Anime online. There are a couple of sites that have some really good quality shows, but you have to take a good look around before you find them. About 3 years ago, I came across one at work called Mushi-Shi, and loved it. There are some Animes that have this wonderful soothing feel to them. You can watch them hundreds of times, and the feeling never really fades. Mushi-Shi was one, and Natsume Yuujinchou (translates to Natsume's Book of Friends) is another which I just found. When I'm really stressed out I find myself going back to it to watch. It has a soft melancholy feel to it at first, but as the show progresses and the main character finds that he's not as alone as he thought, you find yourself smiling by the end of the half hour. If you have ever seen "Spirited Away" then you may like this, but its not quite so action packed. This is much quieter, and built around a kind teen who can see spirits and has never quite fit in with whatever relative he was sent to stay with. When he finds himself with the last people willing to take him in, in the country, he makes a real effort to fit in. You can find this Anime on CrunchyRoll, and other places, but I'd suggest the first because of the quality of the media. You'll have to put up with some obnoxious commercials, but its worth it.

On to the shoulder update. I'm not sure what's going on with my shoulder, and neither is the physical therapist. His conclusion was that this was not run of the mill whiplash, and that he'd need some time to pinpoint the issue. Since he's not sure what's going on, except that whatever is causing it is in my neck, not so much in the shoulder, he could only give me one exercise to do. It helps a LOT. This doesn't cure it, because it always comes back, but it just involves a little traction to the neck, and my hand acts normally, my shoulder doesn't hurt much, and I'm pretty much normal. For a while at least. Which is VERY cool! Now... If I can just get my car back. I'll be happy.

I zoomed through another book instead of finishing off the two I'm in the middle of, but I couldn't help it. It was an Ilona Andrews book, and I absolutely LOVE her writing. First book was "Magic Bites" and then she went roaring right through another 3 books. They're so much fun, and I'm constantly cracking up at the images my mind creates from the descriptions. If you want a light read with modern day magic, then this would be for you. They're fun!

After I caught the little Imprezza Speedball, Dad took me out for pizza, and then we went and wandered around Best Buy. I found "The Watcher in the Woods" for $5 roughly, and got it. I hadn't seen it in so long I'd partially forgotten the story, but I remembered liking it. This was one of Disney Studio's oddball creepy movies. Another was "Something Wicked This Way Comes" which is one of my favorite Ray Bradbury books, but the movie adaptation was very well done. Anyway, I finally got to sit down and watch "Watcher in the Woods" today, and it's still good, with probably what is one of the last appearances of Bette Davis before her withdraw from films. Good movie, and I'm glad I got it.

Ah yes... Eat a Cookie!

The Hurricane Named Confusion

2010-05-27T20:18:00.000-07:00

At first, there was no help and now, I'm getting so much help its like standing in a hurricane. Information spills like rushing torrents from both sides now, and my poor rattled little brain is having trouble finding solid ground to stand on. I can't even begin to know their motives, let alone whether they even involve me. Insurance companies are supposed to have your back to some degree right? Granted this has not been my experience in every situation I've had to deal with them. In short, I only know what happens when you get screwed over. I am too damned tired to deal with shenanigans this time around. All I want is my car back. Seriously. I LOVE my Honda.

Currently I am driving a little Chevy provided by an insurance company, so I can actually get to work. And Home... another places I need to get to. Its like driving a tiny sedan... It should handle lighter, but it doesn't. Of course I'm biased. I've been driving a light weight little car for a while now. There's a real difference in how they handle, and its weird. I don't know how long its going to take for the Honda to get fixed. Hopefully not that long. I'd really rather not drive the rental more than I need to.

Ah yes, and then there was the doctor's visit. After the accident, my right hand was flopping around like a dying fish, and my left was steady as a rock. I was concerned, and so was the Sheriff who was on scene first. Enough to call for the EMTs. They said I was alright, but I should get checked out. Thus I found myself perched upon the exam table, while my doctor checked my shoulder over, and came to the conclusion that I've got whiplash.. just not in my neck, and its causing fine motor control issues with my right hand. Which means I can drive and do big things, but if I try to hold a pen or pencil, or use a fork/spoon, my hand falls back to doing the palsy maneuver. Writing is sort of a challenge as my hand jerks to a stop instead of flowing smoothly along like usual.

I was just going to concentrate on doing my job this summer. No need to worry about school in the fall, etc. In fact I had signed up for an Art class I'd been wanting to take for a while now because, gee, I've got some free time. Now I'm sort of concerned I won't be able to use the pencil like I usually do when I draw. I'm on anti-inflammatory medication, and am scheduled to do physical therapy to make sure the muscle heals right. My doctor seemed to think this was temporary, and I think so too, as its not doing the wobble all the time now. Just sometimes.

I've had so many experiences over the years that involve everything going down the crapper, that I'm really not even phased by this. So much so that one of my friends couldn't understand why I was so damned cheery about this. Life is too short to get worked up over this stuff. It really is. Its exhausting when you hang on to all that stress, anger, frustration, and fear. All that does is make you feel worse. I'm not saying don't be vigilant about getting things done right, but I'm saying ... let it go.

Eat a cookie. ;)

When Faced with the Choice of a Macaroon or Dog Food...

2010-05-25T21:04:00.000-07:00

Just a word of warning to those of you who agonize when faced with very little time, and the choice to be selfish or generous... be selfish. Don't get the dog, dog food. Especially if she's not really in need of another bag for some days yet. These were the things on my mind as I left a little later than I expected to today when I left for work. To macaroon, or not to macaroon. There was only time to stop at one place before getting to work on time. Thus I was faced with a choice. Go to the bakery and get fresh squeezed lemonade and freshly baked moist macaroons, or go get my dog her dog food. Being a good owner, and knowing I'd feel guilty while eating and drinking such items, thereby rendering them imperfect, I went and responsibly got my dog her food.

And was rewarded for this by single-handedly catching a small speeding Subaru Imprezza squarely in my car's trunk. I had no idea that such little cars could reach speeds of Mach 1. There was literally 2 seconds for me to say, ".... oh sh!t..." before the little red speed ball whapped into my back end. Oddly, it was the Imprezza with bigger share of the damage. Its been a long weird day, filled with phone calls to insurance companies, parents, co-workers, the boss, and an auto body shop. Seriously though, I really could have done without my car scrunching experience.

Tomorrow will be fun as well. I get to see the doctor. Again. He can look at my shoulder, which is behaving oddly, and tell me,"Yep. You've strained it. Here, let me throw anti-inflammatory medication at you, and strap you into a sling for two weeks while your muscles recover." Personally, I think this man hates his job, because he smiles too much, and is afflicted with the false cheerfulness you find in an overworked Santa stand-in during the Christmas rush. Its like staring at badly installed veneers. I really need to find a different doctor.

After that, I think Dad and I have to go out to the auto-body shop and talk to them about the car. I'm hoping it won't take long to fix, because frankly, I love my little Honda. I was quite impressed with it. It didn't stall out when it got hit, didn't move forward very much, and kept me pretty damned safe. Strangely, I got hit right outside the Honda dealership I bought it from, and they were so nice. They let me sit in their waiting area while I made all the calls I had to, and checked out my car for me to see if it was safe to drive or not. Which it wasn't. The exhaust assembly is screwed up enough that it might fall off if I drive it.

So, do remember... If you have the choice of getting macaroons or dog food.... GO GET THE COOKIE!!!

FINALLY!!!

2010-05-24T18:10:00.001-07:00

It only took me 15 years, but I have managed to get myself an AA degree in Liberal Arts. Most of that time has been used stumbling all over the scholastic chessboard trying to figure out what to focus my attention on. You see, I'm one of these exceedingly disturbed people who would be perfectly happy taking every class I can get my hands on for the rest of my life. Quite honestly I'm wondering if that's possible, because I'd love to have a BA in multiple things. Anthropology, multiple languages, History (and it doesn't matter which. I love it all), and a multitude of other things. I'm still sort of eyeballing Anthropology, or perhaps Archeology as a second choice, but I'm going to go after a BA in Japanese. Took me this long to finally find something that's got my undivided attention... at least for now. Currently I've switched from focusing on school and work, to work and finding a college that has a Japanese language program I like. Not as easy as it sounds.

Since I'm not doing classes all the time now, I've had time to read guilt free! Oh, how I've been reading... and I do apologize for not updating the page as I went, but since I had homework for a dreaded speech class, I was hiding that I was reading too. Silly? Oh yes. But we all have mental quirks, and mine tend to be stranger than average. So, here are the books I read when I shouldn't have been: "On the Edge" by Ilona Andrews, "The Reckoners" by Doranna Durgin (who I thought had quit writing YEARS ago), "Evil Ways" by Justin Gustainis, "Magic in the Shadows" and "Magic on the Storm" by Devon Monk, "Unperfect Souls by Mark del Franco, "Streets of Magic" and "Demon Bound" by Caitlin Kittredge, "Changes" by Jim Butcher, "Fahrenheit 451" Ray Bradbury, "Silver Bourne" by Patricia Briggs and "Tengu: The Mountain Goblin" by John Donohue. I think that does it... I think.... hmm. Okay this list neglects all the Manga series I re-read, and bought... and submerged in to save my sanity this last semester. I hate speech, and I almost literally became someone else in order to deal with it. Sanity saving in the same vein as when I read Piers Anthony's Xanth *trilogy*... hah. I think he's on book 38. But same sort of thing, because back then it was just after a large earthquake, and we were living in a 37 foot motor home in our drive way; our house having been red-tagged. Joyful experience I tell you. Joyful.

Today was sort of a lazy day for me, except for the hour I spent in the dentists chair this morning, where they said,"WOW! You take really good care of your teeth! I barely had to do anything!" This is the part were I beamed from all the praise. Then she said,"Except you'll probably need oral surgery to take care of that pocket near your molar." This is the part where I look like a kicked puppy. "Oh don't worry," she says catching my large fearful eyes,"they'll replace the bone your removed wisdom tooth disintegrated with sterilized pig bone, or cadaver bone." Here's were I stare at the woman in disbelief, while my overly helpful memory provides me with flashbacks to the last time I had surgery in my mouth... which was compounded by the fact that I react badly to certain antibiotics and anti-nausea medication that was prescribed... Lets just say that last June sucked. A lot.

So, in a stupor of resigned panic, I stopped at the local general store and got a nice relaxing horror movie. Yes, I find horror films relaxing. They're so damned predictable. Spooky music, que hero, que companions, que monster/nutcase.... dark setting, blood, gore... loud noises.. more screaming.. etc. No escape. I rented Pandorum, which had a surprisingly good storyline. Well acted, or rather as much as you could expect. I liked it, and would probably watch it again. Sort of like Pitch Black, which I liked as well. In fact I watched that too. Currently, I've switched pace a bit, and am watching a Goofy collection that I bought years ago, but never felt like watching it. It came in a nice silver gift case. I've always liked Goofy.

Curiosity = Octopus

2010-04-20T10:35:00.000-07:00

Came across this on YouTube this morning while avoiding the paper I have to write. Which is dumb, because its a short paper. Its just the content that I have no real interest in writing about. Ah well. Anyway, I figured I'd just put this in for your enjoyment. Made me smile. ;)

I liked the music too. Cracked me up. ^-^ LOL!

If you'd like to watch the video without the side cut off, and all the words intact, click here and you should be able to see the whole thing.

... goofy octopus. LOL!

ps. thank you Mom, for showing me how to embed. Mom is the Grand Master of blogging.

When Teeth Wear Clothes

2010-04-15T22:45:00.000-07:00

Today, I was up early to get to a school councilors appointment. It was not a good scene, as I felt awful when I woke up (the work of the cold-from-hell) and had a difficult time waking up, and staying that way. Luck was with me though, because I made it to school, checked in at the front desk, and got to a table before falling asleep for half an hour. The clock read 9:15 a.m. when I woke up, which was 15 minutes after they should have called me in to see the councilor. It seems their computer system was on the fritz, so the lady I was there to see never got notified that I was waiting for her. At least I was able to nap. There was a happy ending. All my paperwork for getting my AA degree has been turned in. It'll be a while before I get the actual sheet of paper though, because I missed the Spring/Summer deadline. Therefore I get to wait for Fall graduation. That's fine. There is no rush.

Afterwards, I went to a local place for lunch, then went over to the mall, which I haven't been in, in something like 3 years, to see what the remodel looked like. The place is now a rabbit warren, huge, confusing, and oddly more inviting. From there I went to work, and made the mistake of snacking on some almonds. I like almonds. I eat 5 or 6 of them, and I'm not hungry for hours. Which is good, because I'm generally so busy at work, that I don't have time to actually eat anything more substantial. Almonds are good for you anyway.

There is a downside however. Almonds have a little brown skin, which sometimes slides off the nut while you chew. Um... they're very good at getting stuck in between your teeth, in between your teeth and your gum line, and in my case, very good at adhering itself to one of the small front teeth. Not the ones right in front, but to one of the ones to the side. It must have been there for hours, because I ate the almonds right after I got to work. Yes, I feel like crap, but I did a lot of smiling today, and joking and... not one person said,"Uh, you've got a little bit of something stuck to your tooth there." Which would not have been so bad if we hadn't had a Friends of the Library meeting today. These are the people who run book sales to help fund the library. These are the people who volunteer to help shelve when we need help. These are the people who stop in just to say hi. And not on of them told me that one of my teeth was wearing a very becoming brown jumper. Even stranger, was that the Directer (yes, that would be my boss of bosses) was there for said meeting, and yes, I smiled at him too, and did he tell me that I have a little something on my tooth? Nope. I didn't find my little hitchhiker until I went to the bathroom, LONG after everyone had left and I'd closed up for the day. I was already having a bad hair day. You know, one of those days where you stuff your hair into a ponytail because everything else you've tried makes you look like you're wearing a wet rodent, and even the ponytail is a failure? I'm sure I looked like someone who'd stumbled out of the backwoods after having been hold up in a cabin for the winter. Yes, when teeth wear clothes, you know you've really reached your limits. Thank God I've got tomorrow off. I don't get paid, but I don't care at this point.

Maybe Saturday will be better. That's when I go back to work. :)

The Cold From Hell

2010-04-14T23:26:00.001-07:00

I wish I was kidding when I say that. Unfortunately I am not. On the Friday before Easter, about halfway through my workday, I started getting a headache, which was quickly followed by tender skin, achy joints and the distinctly 'oh god, this is going to be bad' fever just to top everything else off. By the time I got home, my headache had flared to the point where I was having trouble thinking, and staying upright. Mom made tacos for dinner, and I ate some even though I was not in the least bit hungry. The next morning... okay, I don't remember much about the next 4 days or so, except that I had a fever, felt awful, and had a severe headache. When I say severe headache, I mean my entire head from the neck up. Ears, nose, entire cranium, and eyeballs all felt as if the nerve endings were aflame It was without a doubt the worst headache I have ever had in my life. You can't sleep, can't move, can't eat, can't drink. Which you eventually find is just fine, because you really haven't the energy anyway. I was positive I had bronchitis or some equally evil form of respiratory infection, and went to the doctor. He looked me over and declared that I had the worst cold he'd ever seen, and put me on some rather heavy duty decongestants to help get all the crap out of my head. (Dad would point out here, with surprise, that he'd though my head had been empty for years! Hah Hah Dad. Hah Hah.) Its working, but slowly. My left ear for instance feels like someone had jammed a disembodied finger into the canal and abandoned it there for unknown reasons. This of course is causing my throat to hurt, but overall, I am better.

Mom isn't. She caught the same thing I did, but she's got a sore throat, along with congestion, headache, probable fever and so on. She's been sleeping a lot, and drinking lots of fluids. This cold from what I've been told lasts for nearly 3 weeks. It creeps in slow and heavy like fog, lulling you into the belief that it'll burn off quickly. In reality it sinks its claws in and throttles you for nearly 3/4's of a month. I thought it was a flu, or some other such thing, but no. Its just a cold gone rogue. Forgive my language, but the damn thing is a real bitch to fight your way through, not to mention the recovery, which is NOT swift in any sense of the word. The cold is reluctant to let go of you, and fights you every step of the way. Thus my rather wimpy status. I come home, and fall asleep for an hour. Monday was really bad. I got home, sat down on the bed, went to check email on my laptop, and woke up 4 hours later. So much for getting school work done. :P

Anyway, I am on the slow road to Mendsville, while Mom is probably slowly getting better. If she's not better by the end of the weekend, I will have to force her into a car, and take her to the doctor. From what I'm hearing, not everyone is able to kick this thing before it turns into something much more ominous, such as a sinus infection, or in some cases, strep throat. Mom does not have a high opinion of doctors, so its always a struggle to make her go when she should.

Just updating. I'm not sure anyone reads this blog. I so seldom have the time or feel the need to sit down and chronicle my everyday life. But since Mom wasn't positing I figured I'd give everyone an update. And yes, our Buff Orpington is nearly healed. All the big holes are pretty close to being nothing but scars. Her feathers are even growing back in! :)

What Have You Done Now?!

2010-01-05T21:44:00.000-08:00

A couple of days ago, I was passing from the living room to the kitchen and glanced down the hallway. And this is what I see.

Now, I ask you, would you begin thinking that she'd done something wrong? I get suspicious when she does things like this. Its like she turns on the cute switch to distract me from the fact that a couple of weeks ago she got into a garbage bag and ate chicken bones. I was not pleased. She goes and gets things out of Mom's bathroom, and cuddles with them in the hallway. Things such as ... the bar of soap, or a rubber ducky. And she loves used bounce dryer sheets. After finding one, she smuggles them upstairs to roll around on them. I find pieces of them here and there... and in her fur. I've come to the conclusion that her soul was destined for the body and destiny of a suave master British Cat Burglar, what with the absolute

penchant she has for sneaking the most obvious of items past us. She knows I'm not pleased, therefore she pulls things like this. I spend a great deal of time thanking the PTBs (powers that be) that she wasn't born with thumbs. Dear god, it would've been a disaster. Sure, she looks cute, and she'd probably get away with it, if her devilish nature wasn't also glaring at me.

Its January, therefore I'm due for a pick-me-up. For no particular reason I present you with this:

Un-Groovied

2009-12-15T23:30:00.000-08:00

Three days ago, I noticed that on the side of my blog there were video clips which I had not asked for. They feature a guy talking to ... what I think, is another guy. I could be wrong, its hard to tell. Peering at them closely I wondered how they got there where my little cartoon songs had been. I shrugged thinking that I could just reset the cartoons, which I tried unsuccessfully to do for about an hour. I stared at it for a while. Then I went and yelled at YouTube for allowing morons to hijack my search link. And they are Morons. I clicked on the video to see what had replaced JabberJaw, Atom Ant, and My Best Friend Plank. What I got was an earful of the "evils of cartoons". ... I had to take a walk to clear my head, before my beloved laptop took the brunt of my extreme annoyance. Okay, Anger. It was anger. Cartoons aren't evil. Sure, there are people out there who use cartoons to portray horrendous things, but that is not what I had on my blog. I had rather well thought up and presented music shorts with cartoons. Which I enjoy. I do not enjoy, nor condone someone with obvious social issues blaming all the wrongs of society on cartoons such as Dungeons and Dragons, or the Smurfs.

*sighs*

Guys, go get a freaking life and stop screwing with mine.

Which is why there is no video strip on the side of my blog anymore.

... jerks...

I want my Cartoon Network Groovies back.

PS. I should have known. The minute I rant about this, it would work. We'll try this again, and see what happens. If those idiots show up again though... GRRRRRRR...

PSS (12/16/09) I give up. It keeps showing up with other crap. Back to being Groovy-less.

It All Started with that Chicken...

2009-12-05T20:08:00.000-08:00

You remember. That one with the puff-ball head, also known as a Polish? Well, maybe you don't, because I never wrote anything here about the wandering chicken. Mom did though. You can go dig through her blog to find a photo too, because I'm just too darned lazy to go find it for you. However, I do believe that is when it really started. The animal thing while driving that is. That was the day that our neighbor called and asked if we'd seen a small black dog in the area, that looked like an Australian Cattle Dog. Which we hadn't. Apparently the dog of said description had gotten into their chicken yard and gone after their birds with relish. Condiments aside, they managed to avoid having dead chickens, which is actually pretty good, given their track record with their animals lately. In short, their luck has been hovering several miles below the ticking mark for 'bad'. Our chickens weren't out yet, and I was leaving for work early, the reason for which is now escaping me. I was bouncing along to the music in my car, and was almost to the main drag to head down the hill (hill being mountain) when my wandering eyes settled on what I thought was a cat. Until it moved. Cats don't move with William Shatner-esque jerks of the head and body. It was a chicken. A confused, not in a place for a chicken, chicken. And it appeared to be in shock, because when I went back to get it, it just sat down at my feet and didn't protest at all when I scooped it up and deposited it on the seat next to me. I drove back home, called the neighbor who had had the dog attack that morning to ask if she was missing a little polish hen. She wasn't. I needed to leave for work, and didn't have time to go door to door asking,"Excuse me sir/ma'am. Is this your chicken? Here, let me pull back its bouffant hair stylings so you can get a good look at its eyeballs." The neighbor however, would love to have a little polish hen. They're good people, and take good care of their animals. I was not at all worried. The LPH, is still doing very well with the small flock next door.

Well... that was nice for a distraction and all, but it would be nice to go back to not seeing weirdities on my way to and from work. Except I live on a mountain top, surrounded by people, their pets, and wildlife. This means eventually I will come across some other animal under odd circumstances. Probably about a month ago now, I was driving home from work, bouncing along to music once more along a road I'm pretty familiar with since I drive it at least twice a day 6 days a week. There's this curve and then that curve and then a short straight away, and gee, I could probably drive this road blindfolded. So, I will admit to being on auto-pilot to some extent when I came around the bend where the county keeps its boulder supply. Big, medium and small boulders occupy a small recess along side the road, so that the county has easy access to them, and don't have to haul them up the hill to fill in holes when we have a road fallout. Which happens infrequently, but I've got to say it does wonders for your reflexes to come round a bend in the road on a stormy, rainy, windy, foggy night, and find that there is a vast swathe of road missing in your lane. Doesn't that just beat all? Okay, back to the pet rocks. There are three largish sized boulders that stand fairly close to the road, this evening, there were 4. I figured that the county guys just added another one, and paid very little attention to it in the quickly dimming light... until it got up and waddled off into the chaparral. Ah, my brain said, That was a bear!

My brain likes to pull jokes on me. Especially when its late, foggy and raining, and I'm tired from work. Such as the night I was almost home, when I saw something jumping across the road. I slowed to a crawl to better observe the small creature leaping, landing, then pausing before leaping again. And my groggy fore-brain says,"Wow! That's the biggest cricket I've ever seen!" and my hind brain, which has always been the more logical and intelligent of the two replies, laden heavily with acidic rebuke,"You moron! That's a FROG!" At which point my hind-brain rolled over and went back to sleep. It really only wakes up to mentally slap me.

Which brings me to last week. In which I left for work on time, maybe even a little early. You can see where this is going already. I'm doomed if I leave the house early. The thought that I might be able to stop at the big store at the bottom of the long drive down the mountain is usually the cause of such foolishness, but I sadly fall prey to its allure more often than I'd like to admit. Again, it was a sunny, but cold day, and I was going slow. At work I'm something of a bartender. Everyone comes in and tells you their woes while getting a little pick-me-up. In my case I serve books, instead of booze. Lately, everyone had come in to tell me of their car accidents. Not one or two people... this is more along the lines of 10 to 15 people. I don't know whats going on with drivers lately, but I basically was driving with a good dose of paranoia when I rounded the second bend in the road on my way out to the main drag. Two dogs are standing on either side of the road, one is a lightly built brindle color pit-bull, and the other is a neighbors dog that is pretty much terrified of everyone. Terrified dog immediately disappears into the woods in the direction of its abode, and the Brindle just stood there staring at my car as I slowed so as not to hit her if she did something dumb. The next thing I know a small white puppy shoots out of the bushes to my left and races at full speed straight under the front of my car. Being somewhat freaked, I braked hard and stopped. I stayed stopped because I couldn't see the puppy, so I put on the car in park and pulled the emergency brake, then got out. I looked around and couldn't see the puppy, so I looked under the car praying to god, I wasn't going to find it smashed under my tire. Nope, he's not smashed under my tire, but he IS smashed up against the right rear tire. He's not hurt. He's hiding. Took me a good 15 minutes to convince him to come out, and once he did he turned out to be very friendly and good natured. However, every time I tried to get back in the car, he'd go back under it. Which is why I found myself driving around with him in my car trying to figure out who he belonged to for the next 20 minutes. This was becoming an issue, since I need to be to work in like 30 minutes, and it takes me 40 to get there in the first place. Which means I need to find a puppy-sitter. Luckily we've got a nice older couple living nearby, and she took him in and said she'd see if she could find the owner.

The puppy was probably about 6 to 8 weeks old, probably a Pitbull/Labrador mix, and was well cared for, so we didn't think he was a dump. People like to take their unwanted dogs deep into the hills and dump them. I have no idea why they think this is a good idea. We have bears up here. Bears like to eat dog. And if the bears don't get them, the cougars do, and if by some miracle they avoid that, we have the worst predator ever here as well. The hillbilly and their best friend Remington, Winchester or Henry. None too bright sometimes. I cannot count the amount of cats I've come across with pellets in them. Anyway, I believe the neighbor found the owner, and if she didn't, there were several people who said they'd take him. He was a very cute puppy. Did I get pictures? No. No, I didn't. Sue me if you so desire.

This concludes my animal weirdness for today. Please check in again, in the hopes that maybe I will have decided to post something else. Or not. Its fine. Whatever. *sighs*

Well... crap...

2009-11-23T20:32:00.000-08:00

My room has been a total and complete disaster for years now. In fact it was so bad it was sort of embarrassing, with all the furniture, and other crap smashed in there (we will not speak of the prehistoric dust-mammoths). There was a walkway to the bed and to the bathroom, and everything else was covered in books. The books are still stacked up there, but I got a lot of it moved to shelves, and furniture moved out into the loft area outside my room. Now I have a lot of room, in my room. I've got everything squared away into their respective places. The bed against an actual wall, instead of a window, my dresser moved to the opposite short wall, and my TV, VHS player (Yes, I still have a VHS player), and Game Cube tucked into a corner on a desk. Only the DVD player was missing. I've got a monster DVD player that came complete with speaker system and everything, but it was just too damned big for my room. Thus its new living arrangements in the loft.

Today after I got out of class (in which I turned in a paper that should have come with an apology for its lack of coherence) I drove to an electronics store where I got a little Sony DVD player for $45. Not a bad price, and Sony products tend to last a long time. When I got home I went upstairs and started setting everything up again. Putting all the cables back into various sockets and plugs. When I was finished I asked Dad to take a look at the mess of cables to make sure I hadn't put any cords into the wrong receptacles, thereby causing smoke, fire and mayhem when I threw the power switch. We threw the switch anyway, began turning things on, and... my old trusty 35+ year old RCA TV wouldn't turn on. Dad tried to get it to work several times, but its little circuit checker clicked on and then shut the TV down within seconds every time. Dad says it might be the fly-back transformer (the thing that creates the picture on older TVs; it zips back and forth across the screen leaving colored lines in it wake, 120 times a second) in which case he can't fix it. If its just a circuit problem, then its a much simpler matter. *sighs* I don't WANT to save more money to get a freaking flat-screen. I like my old clunker. This is not like the car situation, when it would stop dead in front of speeding UPS trucks and refuse to start. This is my little buddy which I've had for years.

Well... Crap. I guess I'll cross my fingers and hope its just a circuit. Dad has another TV sitting around that I can use (if its working) until he can look at mine. The DVD player was all for not. I guess I have to wait longer to watch Astro Boy, the Complete Collection. Until then, it shall sit by the DVD player until we figure out what's going on with the TV.

And eventually yes, I will change the decorations on my blog. ... but I really LIKE Halloween...

I guess wishing everyone a Happy Thanksgiving wouldn't hurt. Happy Thanksgiving everyone who actually looks at this blog.

... ha ha haa...

Herd Instinct

2009-10-24T22:21:00.000-07:00

While driving to work this morning, I was once again reminded that I should write about a certain topic, but continually forget to by the time I get home. Even though I drive right through the reminder again, and grumble about it all the way home. Perhaps this isn't something that bothers most people, or maybe its something everyone just thinks is normal, but it bothers me somewhat. So I will pose a question. WHY do people on the freeway like bunching up together like frightened African prey animals? Its true. There will be long stretches of zero cars on the freeway, and then clumps of shee... I mean cars, packed so tightly together that they could be passing cookies and coffee through open windows. Hell, who needs cell phones, just roll the bloody windows down and have a chat with the cars' occupants clustered around you. Meet someone new; socially network face to face, glance to glance while you drive on the freeway. Its really no worse than having a Borg implant.

Just remember, if you happen to be a herd animal, that if someone slams on the brakes, you're all going to die in a twisted, burning, wreck of exploding horror. I won't be with you. I'm anti-social. I'm the, I'm sure many times cursed, person who drives at a sane speed and in the gaps between the herds. Sure, I'm probably more likely to get hit by a speeding distracted nitwit, but at least I have room to maneuver. While traveling in packs, unless they are synchronised driving teams who train for stuff like this, you run into someone. For the synchronised driving teams out there, no offense intended.

All annoyance aside, I began wondering if there are scientists out there who study driving patterns, and if so, what are their findings? Is anyone even watching the prey drivers and the social-driver loners? Considering only my Mom reads this blog (or at least she's the only one who comments) I'm not expecting answers. But if someone out there is looking for a place to study flocking patterns of the human animal while driving, then I've got the perfect freeway for you to watch. Let me know. I'll point it out.

And at the end of all this, I feel I should say that normally I'm not this cranky, but I today I have a splitting headache. It makes me irritable, cranky and generally unpleasant company.

... perhaps I should've put that at the top as a fair warning...

Slightly Halloween...

2009-10-09T13:48:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know we're three weeks off from Halloween, and its only the 9th, but I can't help trying to stuff all sorts of Halloween stuff onto my blog... Except it wouldn't all fit. And some of the gifs refused to cooperate with the blog. I suspect that they're not compatible or something. Last time I got around to fixing up my blog for a holiday, I was using my old Dell (man, I should really just go out and get it a new hard drive. Nothing else is really wrong with it.... except the $900 price tag for a new hard drive. ACK!!) and some of them didn't work then either. Now I'm on the Mac, and some of them that didn't work while using the Dell, now work on the mac. Odd coding or something I guess. I have not the know-how to go in and play with all the 1's and 0's, so I shall let sleeping numbers lie.

Well, I have something of a 4 day weekend, in which I get to do nothing, but sit on my duff and practice the lost art of couch potato-ism. I even got myself movies to watch and Dad just supplied me with a thing of popcorn. On the downside its freezing in the house, and I'll have to bundle up under some blankets to watch my shows, otherwise I will be a frozen couch potato. Having experienced this before, it doesn't make for a enjoyable movie watching experience. We do not have a heating system in the house, besides the wood stove, and we don't fire that up (forgive the pun) until its rained... heavily. Although Dad was kind enough to get the old sucker going last week, because it had rained a little, and it was relatively safe to go around lighting fires. You see, I live in what can be construed as a matchbox state. Forest fires start here at the drop of a sewing needle... especially if it hits a rock and sparks. FWOOSH!... yeah, been there, done that, DO NOT REPEAT!

Now, I'm going to go make popcorn, and tea, and plotz on the couch, and enjoy ridiculous TV shows for a while. I hope. Sometimes my plans go awry, like a wolverine on speed. I'm hoping that this isn't going to be one of those days, as I'd like my 5 days of headache to go away. Wouldn't it be wonderful? Like Christmas! A painless head for .... Halloween?

*crosses fingers*

And in the Second Month...

2009-10-05T15:46:00.000-07:00

Last month, it was like wading through a river of loud, obnoxious, smelly, semi-conscious legal adults, (although in many cases I disagree on the legitimacy of their adulthood). This month... its like 2/3's of the people who were on campus for one reason or another... are gone. It no longer takes me 30 minutes to get out of the parking lot. There is no longer a reenactment of the running of the bulls in the cafeteria, but then the cafeteria closes at 2p.m. now instead of 6p.m. due to budget cuts. Now you have to go to the little coffee shop and order stuff... and drink coffee while you wait. And just so you are forewarned, the coffee is appalling. A-P-P-A-L-L-I-N-G. I've come to the conclusion that they must find some sort of roadkill to use as a strainer, then burn the coffee beans, let those sit in water for several days, then make the coffee... and then use the business end of a skunk to stir it. Its the best excuse for the taste that I could come up with. Now I have to be honest here, I don't like coffee to begin with, but dear god, on the occasions when I've had coffee, it was NEVER that bad.

So, its October, my favorite time of year. Okay, so Halloween is my favorite time of year... that makes exactly one day in which I am totally happy. Hmm. Anyway, Favorite TIME OF YEAR! I shall carve pumpkins this year, and not just threaten to do so. There are even drawings this time; that I made over the summer with which to inflict emotions upon the pumpkins. Don't feel sorry for them. They have it coming. When I am finished with the torturous ordeal, I shall post pictures. Hopefully. Unless the pumpkins are fallen upon by the ravenous hoard. Aka... the chickens. They discovered my torture victim last year, and made short work of him. Poor thing didn't even have a mouth to scream with. I hadn't gotten to him yet you see. The blog with probably undergo some changes, decoration wise. I'll still be slow putting up posts, considering I am still have 'I-not-terribly-interested-in-posting-right-now' disease. So, what have I been doing in the meantime? Well, lets see...

I decided to solve a mystery. Its called,"Why the hell is almost every anime nut I meet totally obsessed with One Piece?" (okay, not all of them, but a goodly amount if asked what which anime is the best of the best, 95% of the time, they'll say,"One Piece".) Which baffled me for a long time, because I watched One Piece on Cartoon Network, all the way up to where they pick up Sanji at the Baratie Restaurant, and decided that it really wasn't that good. Now, I did two things wrong right off the bat. ONE - I made the foolish assumption that the dubbed version was actually being honest about the original Japanese. Um. Wrong. There's a whole enormous dump truck (equivalent to those found in open quarries) load of things they leave out, that is extremely detrimental to the entire world/culture of One Piece. Yes, culture, because its definitely got one, and you lose it completely with an English dub. I don't know who makes these decisions, but they need a swift kick to the head. TWO - I stopped watching the show way too early. This show doesn't really take off until they get past Sanji. And then it takes off again once the crew gets into the Grand Line. Holy Crap, does it ever take off. How do I know this? Because I sat down this summer, and watched all of it (including the movies), online and subbed. I've said this before, and I will say it again. The people who do the fan-subs do a fantastic job translating. Granted some are better than others, but they are still head, shoulders and quite possibly chest cavities above the dubs.

I couldn't originally stand the show because of the main character. The Americanized version gave Luffy a really REALLY annoying voice, and they made him out to be a total and complete idiot. Not Luffy's fault. What he's actually saying, was not translated into English correctly, because of unknown reasons. ... okay, I have suspicions, such as, the American population no longer has the attention span, nor the willingness to understand a different culture. Plus, I'm not sure the whole concept of the word 'nakama' translates culturally here. I'm not going to try explaining either, because being an American, I can't say that I fully understand it, but I certainly love what I do understand. Secondly, Luffy's not an idiot. He's just never lost his child-like sensibilities, nor the very basic understanding of what's right and what's wrong. Everyone knows the difference between Justice and Injustice... Luffy's just very direct about how he deals with it. Thirdly, this show was presented as a children's show, and while this is true in some respect, there are totally adult dynamics at play here as well. Its funny, its sad, its heart-breaking, anger-inspiring, and even, at times horrifying, but that's what makes this show so good, and also, I have got to say when I go watch this show, I NEVER know what to expect. Its is only predictable in that you know Luffy and his crew are going to eventually kick the bad guys' ass with extreme efficiency, and that no matter what's happening they will always believe in each other, but aside from that... you never see what's coming. You never know when you're going to laugh so hard you can't breath, or cry like a baby. (That happened on more than one occasion) I guess I've become sick to death of the predictable, because I actively hunt down shows like this. I'm just sorry, I saw the dubbed version first. What a mistake that was. I missed out on Luffy for YEARS. YEARS!!! Anyway sorry to those who have no idea what I'm talking about, but to those who have yet to go watch this show, have fun. A show that's been running for over 10 years and still going strong is not something to ignore because you saw it as a kid and didn't particularly like it. So, mystery solved.

I'll stop now. Promise.

PS... okay, so Luffy is a little bit of an idiot, but he's a good person... character... whatever...

Back In Class

2009-08-31T22:45:00.001-07:00

It was the first day back to school for me, and I have to say it was rather surreal. I've been attending this college for quite a while now, mostly because I can only handle so many classes, work, and driving before I start teetering on the great sea of insanity. But over the last two years, the amount of students going to this very nice junior college has grown ... A LOT. In the future I will have to be sure to leave for class at least an hour and a half early in order to get a parking spot and get to class on time. Otherwise there isn't going to be any hope of the parking spot or arriving at class... ever. Today, I was an hour early and got a parking spot fairly quick. On my way through the cafeteria, it was so thick with students that I had to skirt the walls to get around the lines, and once I got out the other side the entire courtyard was packed with people going in every direction... And not one of them was watching where they were going. Almost everyone was staring at a hand held device of some sort, texting.

Now, maybe I'm getting old... or maybe I've just never really gone with the "new thing", but I was sort of alarmed. I have a cell phone. I hate the damned thing. I don't LIKE being available to everyone 24/7. I'm one of those solitary people who likes being left alone to do their own thing. There are of course exceptions, but for the most part, I never turn the phone on unless I need it. It never gets used for texting, even though its free to do. It doesn't have a camera in it. I like being AWARE of my surroundings! Usually I don't really care what people do as long as they're not going to get me killed, but today... it was a day I wish I had a camera in my phone, because all of these kids are walking around completely oblivious to the fact that there is a flock of wild turkeys trying desperately to get out of the courtyard. They're darting this way, and that way and making turkey noises and not one kid stopped to wonder what that odd warbley noise was. Not one looked down to see what had just run into their leg... Not one looked around to see turkeys running around their legs. No... they were totally glued to their phones. And they've got Borg implants in their ears! Aka, Ipods. Okay, so I have an Ipod too, but I don't generally have it ported into my head while walking on campus. That's called inattention, and paints a big fat target on your back for any loony who wants to have fun at your expense. But I listen to it in my car. There I have doors I can lock; not to mention a gas pedal with which to mow down said predator.

Do they do this while they drive? Do they do this while they're in class? Do they ever put those things down and look at each other face to face? I'm just curious, because it looked like scenes straight out of Wall-E. I know. I've watched Wall-E at least 5 times this past summer. Fat people, in floaty chairs, letting robots tell them what to do. No thinking involved. Holy crap! I've seen it in real life?! Its the beginning isn't it. Pixar saw it coming and tried to warn us... but half the population didn't look up now did they. Oh well, its their loss. It'll really be their loss if the next thing they don't notice are the rattlesnakes that have been seen all over campus.

... yes.. I'm mean. And no, I'm not a fanatic. Point fingers at your own expense.

Miss Me???

2009-08-27T22:16:00.001-07:00

Yes, I know. Its been months, but I seriously haven't felt like writing anything on my blog. In all honesty I was recovering from two semesters of Japanese classes. Can I now speak Japanese? No. Can I watch a movie or anime in Japanese and understand it? No. Can I at least make myself partially understood? Probably, but I would be so damned embarrassed by my attempt I'd have to go hide in a nice dark closet for several days. What was the point you ask? For some hideous reason, I actually like the language, even though I was a total failure at catching on. Which caused a huge amount of stress. I'm rather spoiled in that I usually am able to breeze through classes without too much effort, so when I run into a subject I suck at... I become a human basket case. Two semesters of being a human basket case will do horrible horrible things to you... like make you spend money to have your wisdom teeth removed... (What the hell was I thinking?... okay, I was thinking that the economy sucks right now, and in the near future I might lose my dental insurance ((god forbid)) and I should do it NOW. ) or kick the rather vulnerable ego knees out from under you... or... Well other things that aren't coming to mind right now, but were equally mind numbing.

Thus I decided to ignore everything except summer programs for my job. Except I got tripped up with that... You see, having my wisdom teeth removed also taught me that I have a bad reaction to certain medications. Ugh, that was fun. So once I'd completely destroyed the month of June for myself, I spent the next two months just messing around. Going out to eat, invading bookstore and leveling my bank account in the process, reading said books, and watching Anime online. There's some really good stuff out there! Especially subbed. I have no idea where the hell the big Anime companies get their translators, but my god, they ruin a lot of quality shows dubbing them. *shudder* It still takes me at least 30 episodes into dubbed Bleach to not be extremely irritated with the not only the voices chosen, but the hatchet job they did on the translation.

I did go to see a few movies. "Watchmen" (which Dad and I call "Big Blue". To understand that you'll have to see the movie. I am NOT explaining.) which was one of the most loyal comic adaptations I have -EVER- seen. Well done, if a bit surprising... just because it was so dead on. Others on the list were "Wolverine", which was pretty good, even though I had reservations about seeing it. Marvel has a habit of harping on things, and after a while it gets irritating. Then there was "Star Trek". The first time I saw it, I was so blitzed by the action I couldn't tell if I liked it or not. So, I went to see it again to try and figure out whether I liked it or not... I DO like it. A lot. The characters were so well portrayed and loyal to the original cast that in certain cases it was like they were channeling the original actors. It was almost creepy. Funny as all hell, but creepy. After that I didn't see anything for a LONG time partially because I had my wisdom extracted, and partially because I was so exhausted after work I couldn't even get up the energy to sit in a theater. However, I did go to see "Ponyo" on Monday. I loved it. Its a Ghibli Studio release, and it very much a children's movie, but it was still great. And a couple of weeks back I went to see "The Ugly Truth", which I really ended up loving. Normally romantic comedies are NOT my thing, but I HAD to escape from the house that day, and the theater was my best bet of something to do while down the hill. Ugly Truth is extremely well done, and very funny. I haven't laughed that hard in a theater since I saw "Something's Gotta Give".

I'm sure I did other stuff during the summer, but at the moment I can't remember anything else to mumble about. School starts on Monday, but I've only got one class. And after that I've only got a speech class to take. I cannot fully express my dire hatred of speech classes. Its beyond my ability to explain. If there was a way around this, I would get around it... with all due haste.

I shall possibly post again soon, but don't hold your breath. I'd hate to have your death on my conscience.

Screamer Hen

2009-05-31T20:35:00.000-07:00

Alright, I'm doing this under duress. The post that is. Usually I'm not all that inclined to keep up on my blog, because ... okay, I'm lazy and would much rather be watching Bleach at the moment. No, I'm not going to explain. Mom wants me to write up this story. Sooo....

Last night at around 10:30 p.m. I took Morgan out for her nightly rounds of evacuating unwanted materials. Its been hot here, and sort humid, which makes for mild nights, and unpleasant stickiness. As we got out to Morgan's favorite spot for going potty, I heard an odd noise coming from the area of the chicken coop. Those of you who have chickens know that they make a lot of unfathomable noises just for the heck of it. Noises that you wouldn't think a chicken could make. I frowned into the darkness towards the coop, wondering if maybe something got into the coop, then consulted my dog's ears. Dog was... "concentrating" and giving things around her very little attention. Hmm. I moved upwind of the concentrating dog, and wondered if the coop door was even closed and locked.

Once Morgan was done, we headed back across the driveway, towards the house when the weird sound started up again. "EEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeee!" I paused and looked towards the coop again. There was a large black hole were the door should be. Nope, no one had locked up the coop. And,"EEEEEEEEeeeeeEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" filtered down to me again. Alrighty then. Morgan and I got a flashlight and trudged out to the coop, I being more interested in the coop, than Morgan who actually yawned twice before we got there. Once we reached the doorway, I flipped on the flashlight and the beam hits an indignant light brahma trying to be down for the night on top of the nest boxes. There's always one idiot who thinks its a good idea. She lets loose with a much more familiar shriek of egg-theft-rage, then emits the "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" again. Ah. Its "Screamer Hen". This is the hen who reaches astounding decibels while you're innocently reaching for the eggs underneath her. If you are unfortunate enough to have gathered an egg from this hen once, you are probably somewhat deaf for about a day. Seriously, her scream makes your ribs vibrate, and it rivals the air horns on the trains that pass my place of work everyday.

Apparently she didn't appreciate the fact that something was lurking out there in the dark while she was trying to sleep. I wasn't using a flashlight because it was fairly moonlit that night. No need for the artificial torch. Chickens have poor eyesight in the dark, and when she spied two things wandering around out there in the dark and her door was wide open, she objected... quietly, to avoid undue attention. Well, it half worked. Anyway, that's her at the top. Goofball bird. Not sure when you'll hear from me again.

Signing off.

Numb Space

2009-02-07T19:13:00.001-08:00

Its already February, and I seem to be hitting my energy limit. In fact I feel a lot like this shot of "Knuffle Bunny" (its a character from a childrens book by Mo Willems. Highly amusing if you haven't already seen it. For obvious expressions upon the face of Knuffle Bunny, I felt the need to use him as a visual prop.) If you can't figure the expression, its one of stunned overload. Yes, that'd be me. I've reached "Numb Space" which is a catch all phrase for when nothing really touches you, but hovers in an eager satellite swing around my numb field. A feeling that I'm totally loving at the moment. It beats the sheer and all out panic attacks I was suffering last semester. Joy.

On another note a friend emailed to let me know that they had to put their dog, to sleep today. I've been told of the passing of friend's pets before, but this was different. She was a like a person, always there to greet you at the door, always there to sit up and beg you for scratch her, and I'm sure a hundred other little things that are going to be sorely missed by her 'parents'. I too will miss her, very much. Goodnight Topaz, sleep well.

Schooled

2009-01-30T11:10:00.000-08:00

I figured if I didn't post something soon, I'd never get around to it at all. School has started again, and against my better judgement I took the second semester of Japanese. During the first semester I was sure I was going to get either an unpleasant grade, or run wild and insane off into the woods. Oddly neither happened, and all the stuff that never settled to the bottom and made sense during the first semester unexpectedly made sense this semester. I still can't speak Japanese to save my life, but I suspect that it has to do with me being extremely apprehensive about saying the wrong thing. Especially when everyone else doesn't seem to have a problem catching on. I'm just a tinsy bit frustrated with myself. Reading and understanding the language is much easier for me.

What really makes me nuts though is that my teacher, while he doesn't pick specifically on me anymore, he does tend to pause before asking me a question, and then awaiting my answer. Both are given in Japanese... Except he pauses and will ask me something before the question he asked everyone else. Last night it was, 'pause' "Kon'ban wa." Which means good evening, and I replied in kind. I know how to do that much at least. Then he asked what type of car I have, as in what country is it made in. I responded, stuttering a bit because I don't like doing things wrong, and he nodded and moved on. No Kon'ban wa to the next 4 people. I can't figure out what he's trying to do... Make me feel more comfortable? Assess just how miserable I am at speaking his native tongue? Totally throw me off? Or it could just be that I'm unknowingly giving him a beaten puppy expression when he steps up to me desk. The kid who sits in front of me keeps telling me I worry too much. Maybe I am. *sighs*

The second class isn't nearly so dire. Although the time and day of the class sort of makes for long days on Tuesdays and Thursdays because it falls before work, and the Japanese class is after work. This tends to make days that start at 7a.m. and end close to 10pm. Fun! Not! The second class is Western Civilization, and I'm taking it backwards. The second semester first, so on some things I get a little bit lost, but for the most part I love the class. It helps keep my mental platform from tilting too much when I start panicking over Japanese. Oddly, I understand the homework, and I can write now in katakana and hiragana without too many problems. And Kan'ji at the moment is just pure fun. This will probably change later when my brain melts and more grey cells perish before its lava like cascade from my ears.

I keep telling myself that there are only 13 weeks left... only 13.....

CGI

2009-01-11T19:12:00.000-08:00

In the past I have not been a fan of CGI stuff. For instance I have an enormous dislike of the movie Beowulf, simply because I couldn't stand the CGI effects that compose the movie. There's something inherently creepy about it. The mistakes or rather tiny unneeded movements that are the nature of the human being, are totally lacking in something computer generated. It makes my hair stand on end. However all is not lost, for the Japanese who make incredible CGI cuts for their games, have begun using this talent for movies based on the same games. Some of the first ones I wasn't all that enthralled with, like the first Final Fantasy movie they made. Could've done without it. The next one I saw was FF Advent Children. While the storyline was thick with plot holes that you probably wouldn't have worried about if you had played all the games (which I haven't, sorry, not an RPG fan for the most part) the CGI had improved markedly, and they'd added things like wind, skin twitches and... well lets just say my hair got to relax.

So, of course when I saw that they'd done another movie, I snapped it up to see if they'd managed to improve or take a nose dive into computer-perfect-hell. The movie in question? Resident Evil: Degeneration. Now I've played some of the games and enjoyed them immensely, mainly because I get to shoot things indiscriminately in the head. Lowers stress levels for me.. and I like the dark. Heh. Sorry, digressing. This thing was rated R for bloody violence, so I was expecting a blood fest. Um, no. The games are much more caked in crimson. What really surprised me was that not only was the CGI good, but the storyline was tight, with few plot holes and very little side tracking of the sub-plots. The action was fantastic, and quite frankly I would suggest this movie over the live action Resident Evil movies that came out over the last couple of years. Even with voice acting that in some cases could've been a bit improved upon, this was way better. It had characters you recognized from the game and end up liking all the more. New characters were well introduced. And even if you haven't played any of the games, this movie makes it so its enjoyable. Excellent movie, and one I would recommend.

Five Thumbs Up! (I borrowed some, and yes I gave them back)

Post - poned

2009-01-06T19:22:00.000-08:00

You know you're in trouble when the Thank You card from your grandmother (which admittedly is addressed to everyone in the household) thanks everyone for gifts, and then asks if you've come out of your room yet. This has to do with the computer. You see, while I don't spend every waking moment surfing the net, I do tend to spend a lot of time watching Anime online. If I truly wanted to not watch Anime, then I suppose I could drag myself away, but I do so love it. Sometimes I do stop and wonder if its an addiction... I've come to the conclusion that it probably is. But, as far as I know, its not hurting me to watch it during almost every waking moment. That's an overstatement, so don't worry.

What does trouble me is similar to the crap I catch for reading comics. There's this incredible stigma against pictures with words encased in squares. God forbid you should be caught reading one in public. Especially if you're over the age of 20. For reasons unknown, and beyond my ability to fully understand, reading comics is seen as a sign that your intelligence level falls far below the norm. While I am no genius, I would not be someone who could be considered sub-par on the intello-meter. Unfortunately that creeping feeling of wrong doing basically sours my enjoyment of comics, manga and Anime. Which is why I tend to hide in my room for extended periods of time. My laptop works just fine in there, and I hide my ill-gotten comics in there too.

I would like to know -why- I feel like I'm doing something wrong, because I'm not. Does it make people feel uncomfortable to watch me read a Manga? Does it make you squirm inside watching me watch Anime online or on TV? What is it that makes you think I'm being juvenile just because I still absolutely love cartoons? Superheroes? WHY? Seriously I am confused, and quite honestly the air of disapproval that seeps into the atmosphere is most unappreciated. Okay, now everyone can tell me its all in my head and stop being ridiculous.

Lastly and on a totally different topic, I would've had mini rant here up on my blog yesterday, but our Internet service tanked. Usually they're on the ball, but I guess this was a large outage, and since they rarely have outages, I have no real issues with them. Having worked for an Internet service provider in the past on the help desk, I've got a lot of sympathy for them over the last couple of days. People are NOT nice when they're Internet goes out. They call you every name in and out of the books, and god forbid you end up with a lawyer on the phone. They will twist everything you say, no matter what it is you said in the first place. That was fun. Okay, so it really wasn't.

Screwed

2009-01-01T13:43:00.000-08:00

So, I've had my laptop for about a week now, and everything is going great! Except for the memory that I'd like to replace, because it would bump it from 2 gigs of memory to 4 gigs. I've got the new chips right here, and I've got a tiny screwdriver that should work... except the screws on the back of this laptop are in there so damned tight they won't budge. This calls for me taking it down to one of the computer stores and asking them to undo the screws, which I'd really rather avoid. Knowing most of these places would probably try and charge me for the use of a tiny screwdriver and their arm. I wonder what that would add up to... $20? Probably more, they'd consider it manual labor. Whatever happened to good old fashion kindness and customer service. You do realize that sometimes customer service IS kindness right? Well, I can but try and see what happens.

This week, I think I'm going to try and see a movie. Now, the problem with this is that there isn't really anything out there currently that I want to see. I managed to miss the new Bond flick before it disappeared from theaters in my area, and then there was Twilight, which is only at night now and I detest night showings. Too many people in the theater with me. If there were a halfway decent horror film I'd go see that, because most of the populace isn't interested in seeing them at a matinee. What I'd like to see is Gran Torino with Clint Eastwood. He appears to have slipped back into his Dirty Harry persona, which I've always found most amusing, and was last really seen in the Rookie. (Ah, fond memories) Although my guess is that the character will go deeper than that. We shall see.

Today I think I'm just going to watch some stuff on my computer and finish laundry. I mean I'm going to go to this wonderful Anime site I found that streams Anime! And other Asian Dramas. At the moment I'm caught up in MARS (Drama side of the site under Taiwan), and probably will be caught up in Tactics later, which can be found on the Anime portion of the site. Oh, I do love this place, and its practically been home for the last few days. YAY! Anyway, I'm going to go enjoy my day off. Happy New Years to everyone! :)

Snow Dog

2008-12-27T17:48:00.000-08:00

Everyone asks me at work if I got snow. Yeeesss, we got snow. Lots of snow, piles of snow... right around a foot and a half depending upon your location on the property. In some places it was up to my knees and in others it was mid calf. This was all last week though. My dog loved it! The chickens took one dubious look and disappeared into their hen house. They didn't dine to make an appearance again until the sun came out. My dog unfortunately had had surgery to have a lump removed from her chin (something I should've done long ago, but lacked money. When this took place I still didn't have money, but got it done anyway) which was looking kinda nasty. Hair loss, odd color... *shudder*

But enough about my dog's ex 5th appendage and on to the collar which kept her from scratching the hell out of her stitches. When she went out to potty, off came the collar, and out into the snow she went with glee. Behind her I was being towed. She liked springing though the snow like (sorry in advance for the pun) a bunny. Goof ball. Basically she loves the snow and I went and made it so she couldn't go running around in it. Very disappointing for the poor beast.

This morning I got a pleasant surprise when I arrived at work. A friend I hadn't seen for a while was waiting for me there. She tried hiding so it'd be a surprise when she jumped out. Except I recognized her car before I saw her standing up there with her son. So I parked the car leaned out the door and said,"Hi (insert a name)!" At which point she cracked up. That was quite fun and a much appreciated visit. Lots of laughing and catching up. Friends I don't see often are always welcome to show up and say hi. :)

Over the next few days I plan on doing nothing, but sleeping, playing on my computer and... maybe watching a few movies... oh, and maybe seeing if I can get the new memory cards installed on the computer. Oh joy.

Computer Next

2008-12-26T14:52:00.000-08:00

Okay, so I've been gone for a long long time and I'm not apologizing. Once your beloved laptop dies, and you go into computer with-drawl, its very hard to sit down with another computer and start up a relationship. Especially when its not your computer. Thankfully I got a new computer for Christmas, (thank you very much to my Uncle!!) so I continue to completely massacre this blog much to the entertainment of whoever reads this.

Alas there won't immediately be pictures, or maybe there will be. I'll just have to get my hands on the other computer with all the photos on it. I'd put them on here, but Mac in its vast wisdom neglected to put iPhoto into the bundle with Leopard. Somewhere along the lines I will have to find a Mac compatible photo management program, otherwise I can't use my library of wallpaper, or put up pictures from this laptop. *sighs* Don't get me wrong, I am totally thrilled to have my own computer, but why in hell can't computer companies get their act together and put in a decent bundle? As in everything a user might need? Basics man, BASICS!! But no, I have to get a separate bundle ... with only one item I want on it. It'll cost lots of money too. Idiots.

Aside from that my life is been fairly normal. Work is still work, school is still school... Well there is the fact that I got myself a new car. No, you don't get to know what it is. I will say its small and black and brand spanking new. Very fun to drive, and I feel fairly safe in it compared to the purple monster I used to drive. Which attempted to commit suicide by dying in front of a speeding UPS truck. I think that was probably the last straw as far as death defying escapades for me and my purple steed. Sorry oh purple wonder, but as much as I liked you, I was tired of constantly mainlining adrenaline.

For those of you... 'few' who actually read this, it was a wonderful Christmas. Got the computer, got an electric blanket, and got my aquarium, and yes, I'll post pictures as soon as its up and running. And I got some extremely good tea as well. Such good stuff. I find myself swilling it much too fast. Yes, I'll slow down, but its soooooo good. YUM!! Now if only we hadn't forgotten to bring the left over food from dinner last night home. Right now I could be enjoying a ham sandwich, with a side of stuffing and jello salad. But... we forgot the box. Currently its languishing in my second cousins outside fridge. This means the care package will have to be rescued. I think Dad was given this vital job.

Hopefully he will succeed. :)

And THEN....!

2008-07-25T20:25:00.000-07:00

Okay, it's a misleading header. Or rather its going to be something of a let down. Those of you who expected some fantastic post are going to have to go back to chewing on their blanket, staring at the tube, or chasing under-aged humans. You know who you are. Yes, the crooked finger has been pointed in a general direction. The rest of you are going to have to get used to never being told what this all means. Apparently my evil streak has stepped forward this week and taken the wheel, while I found some quiet spot to sit down, look at a comic book and wave a hand vaguely in distress. Uh huh.. yeah...

You might have noticed I haven't said anything about work in months. Or you might not. I don't think anyone reads this except me. Every once in a while I go back to the beginning and marvel at how enthusiastic I was about this whole idea, and wonder what the (cover the under-aged humans eyes, as there is a curse word coming up) hell happened. Maybe its because I had energy back then, or perhaps I was doing something at the time that I actually enjoyed. Right now I'm having trouble figuring out why I want a higher degree of education. On the bright side I have reminders of why I wanted a higher degree of education. They take shapes and forms, such as an oddly colored car. Or a little house which is for sale right next to where I work. Just think of all the money I'd save just walking across the street to work every day. Or maybe a new car would be good... I can't get any of that now, because what little money I've got is going to get funneled straight into a new computer.... so much for saving up. This is not what I'd intended to ramble about. It was work wasn't it?

Back to work. Well, things are going really well with branch operation, summer reading programs, and general checkouts have gone through the roof. Since I root for the glass-is-half-full-team, I chalk up all these wonderful things to extreme heat, unhealthy breathing conditions outside and the results of what happens when gas prices go through the roof. It was a nice roof too. Results? Everyone stayed home this summer. Everyone is stuck indoors, and everyone is freaking BORED, so they all come to the library for relief of said boredom, relief from the heat (we were asked by the county to keep our branches at a balmy 72 degrees F.) and of course... they could breath. Which means this isn't a normal pattern. I fully expect to get darned quiet again. Ah well. It was nice while it lasted. We won't be discussing other aspects, as I think it would be unwise at this point for me to vent online. Okay, I won't ever vent about this online. Sorry. You'll have to dust off those rusty rarely used imaginations. The evil me is cackling at the wheel, the rotten little abomination.

More wonders shower down from above in the form of lice... on my chickens. Chicken Lice. Do you know what this means? That I'm in good company. Nope, sorry. Joking. No, this means that I probably will have to go get nasty medicated powder from the feed store and dowse my chickens with it. Ugh!! And dust the chicken house... and dust the nest boxes. Crap! What a royal pain in the butt. *sighs* This is just not my month. Its better than some months I've had which makes me extremely glad its just lice/mites.. whatever. Its fixable.

Just stick me with a fork already. I'm done.

And yes. I'm cranky.

...bummer...

2008-07-19T19:11:00.000-07:00

Ever have one of those days when you just wish something would go right? A day where your 6-7 year old Dell laptop wasn't pronounced terminal and sent home to die? Where your car didn't cough and sputter at each hill making you wonder at the wisdom of driving home on the freeway amongst the up and coming NASCAR speed demons. Its like running barefoot through a cow pasture. Don't hit a speeding cow, and avoid the messes they leave in their wake. A day where you knew you had a reliable car, in which you could get to your destination, and not chew your nails to the roots about whether or not it'll start when you come back to it. Or a day when you didn't have to start trying to figure out where you're going to find the money for a new laptop once your old friend passes on. I'm really going to miss my laptop.

Its been a repugnant few days. Getting into trouble at work was the start, and I just... *sighs* After the rotten day at work Friday, I decided to take some advice and go to a Spa Party at my gym. The smoking hills have kept me cooped up at home, due to not being able to breath very well, so I haven't been for a while. I guess I was missed. There were many little stations to visit. Personally I took complete advantage of a lady who was giving massages, and then got dragged over to a table where a lady was doing mini manicures. Which is why my nails are now covered in peeling gloss. My nails are generally abused 24/7 at work, home and everywhere in between. Last but not least, I got to sit with a lady who was telling fortunes with runes. Not throwing them, just reaching into a bag, and pulling one out while you think real hard about your question. She tells you what the rune means, and what its most general fortune is... of course mine were pretty damned weird. Heh. I had a good time though, and the lady was nice. For a time there I even forgot about my rotten day. I guess I'm just feeling warn out, and I just need to rest.

Feeling bluer than normal I guess .... is bluer a word?

Under the Kryptonian Sun

2008-07-10T23:42:00.000-07:00

As I drove through smoke filled country roads this morning on my way to work with the windows down (No air conditioning, so to keep myself from becoming a smoked Ham, I have the windows open) I went over the perks of having a world populated with super heroes as opposed to what we have now. A world populated with... well, whatever they are, a good portion aren't super heroes. There are notable exceptions, such as the fire fighters out there battling a blaze in 100+ degree temps, in full protective suits, going 60+ hour shifts without rest, so I can sit here on my but in relative comfort and jabber at you on this blog. However, wouldn't it be nice if Superman could show up, just long enough to help them with the containment? Just for a short burst of time of course, because if he stays any longer god only knows who'd follow him onto our beloved little speck of space rock.

By the time I got to work, I'd pretty much set the entire line of though aside since I had work to pay attention to, and lately I need all my concentration just for that. Smoke clogged brain cells don't work very well. After work, I went out and goofed off with a friend/co-worker. Dinner was had at a place called the Macaroni Grill, and afterwards we sat a talked for a while. On the way back to my car, I happened to look up and see this big fat red orb sitting gravid in the sky. My God! When did Mars get that close?! Then I realized I was looking at the sun filtered through many many layers of smoke and ozone. Its Red. Like the sun on Superman's home world. I couldn't help grinning a bit at this given my earlier train of thought. If Supes charges like a battery under our yellow sun, what effect would a red sun have on us? I can hardly wait to see the results. On a side note, in the Superman mythos I don't believe a red sun does a darn thing for us puny humans, but hey, we're not in the DC universe, so those rules don't apply. Hmm.

So, above is the best picture I could get of Curly. She's awfully camera shy, and it didn't help that my idiot dog was running the chicks around in circles. The other chickens have figured out that if they immediately scatter in every conceivable direction once released from confinement (i.e. The Chicken Coop), my dog (aka the herding dog through and through) doesn't bother them for the most part. Although she does what my Mom refers to as "Exploding a Chicken", in which a certain inattentive hen is stalked, and then nosed violently. Result? A squawking, flying, feather ball of indignant surprise sailing into the air under its own power. I swear to god the dog stands there grinning with undisguised glee when she successfully punches another chicken's button. The new arrivals on the other hand have NOT discovered the usefulness of running solo, or in smaller groups. My dog LOVES the fact that '7' chickens move in a group when she pushes with her presence. She never uses her teeth, but just runs around them trying to move them, which is very successful with our new cast of "the Young and the Ignorant." Someday they'll get a clue. I hope.

Well, once again I've run over the finishing line of midnight, and I'm just plain worn out. So, I will bid you all a goodnight and crash for my appointed sleepy time. Night. :)

Smazy Days of the Blast Furnace

2008-07-09T17:03:00.000-07:00

Its so wonderful to wake up in the morning, stretch, yawn, and then look out into the bright lovely new day. Sun is shining under bright blue skies and you can hear the chickens clucking to be let out. Birds are singing, and the tractor addicted neighbor is outside ripping something to pieces. Sounds nice right? Well forget it. This will be week three of smoke, heat, and the disturbing feeling of sunburned lungs for me. Outside the window next to me is a swirling mass of malignant noxious yellow grey smoke (Thanks to you 10,000 acre fire. I raise my inhaler to you), full of fine particles that would make even the most brave hearted flee the scene. There is no night breeze to cool things down. There is only 100 degree dry heat out there, and it was worse at work. 10 degrees hotter. Imagine cranking up a walk in oven to 300 degrees, leaving all those burnt left overs in there. Now walk in... It literally feels like a blast furnace and smells like a baking experiment gone horribly wrong. So, what you do in fact wake up to are the clouds of Venus, yellow and deadly, swirling the air. Birds choking instead of singing... and my tractor addicted neighbor is still out there ripping something to pieces. Absolutely no worries about his own health I suppose... Eh.

Since its freaking hot, and we have no air conditioning in the house, I've been cooking the dogs given that I can't let them outside in all the smoke for too long. Otherwise they come in coughing and choking just like the birds. To show them just how much I appreciate their dedicated drive to melt, I got them these weird little mats that supposedly give off the feeling of being cool. I may just shove them off those mats and use it myself tonight given my sleep deprived state and my total devotion to being greedy. I jest. Stop eyeballing my blog like that.

I wonder if those mats would work for chickens? Hmm, its a thought. We'll see how well they work.

Speaking of chickens, I finally have pictures of the feather balls. Specifically the chicks with all their feathers in, and looking mighty fine. Except for Super Peeper who appears to have acquired the ire of a fellow chick. Make a wild guess who is denuding said SP? That's right. The insane Cochin, who we call curly. For a while there we thought she was a frizzle because her feathers were curly/twisted. Curly follows SP around and plucks his tail feathers while he's not paying attention. Its like watching siblings. "Hey, pay attention to me. Me! Here! Stop looking for bugs damn it! Look at ME!" Suspicions run high as to whether or not this is the reason for SP's total and complete lack of spine. Hmmm. More things to ponder.

One last note of no particular interest, but my Dad found a little visitor in one of the plastic garbage cans we use to store the chicken feed. Cute as a button. .. To me at least. WARNING: If mice scare you until you are unable to do anything but shriek, drool, and mumble incoherently DO NOT SCROLL DOWN FURTHER. If you must scroll down, please do so quickly to avoid permanent damage to the psyche.

And now... a Deer Mouse for your viewing pleasure. ;)

Hope your lungs all have a better day than mine. :)

PS. The chicken is a Dark Brahma. LOVE the color pattern!

Drawing a Blank...

2008-06-19T22:22:00.000-07:00

Have you ever been assigned to write a paper and sit for hours trying to figure out where to begin? For me diaries and journals are like that. This blog is something like a journal, or diary to me... something which I shunned pretty much all my life. Which means I am just not used to sitting down every day and trying to figure out what to say. Sharing my inner thoughts with even a book just isn't in my nature. So, when people ask me if I have a blog and I say yes, I sort of cringe, because I just don't update it often.

Which is why I'm writing an entry even though I am drawing a total blank. I supposed I could mumble about my incredibly mediocre day. Or how I suspect that I'm getting senile before my time. There's always the possibility of a rant about a subject I really don't care about, such as my hair going grey. But that just sounds like whining. I hate whining.

So, I guess I will say that my dog is doing well, the chickens are all still alive and kicking, and the 27+ year old cat is still attempting suicide by walking directly into your path. On the other hand she might not be able to see us. She's already deaf, and rather out to lunch in the mental faculty department. Its not all that far of a reach. The only reason she knows something is close to her is by the vibrations. People ask me why I haven't put her down, and the simple answer is that she still enjoys a good sun bath, still catches and eats birds, still swats you a good one if you ignore her for too long. I consider that good quality of life. Sure she looks like crap, but she's still doing pretty good.

Here I sit watching Johnny Quest, and before that I watched Thundar the Barbarian.. and before that I was watching Smallville episodes on DVD. You could say I've got peculiar tastes, and that's fine, because most of the world is going to agree with you. I know more about super heroes and cartoons than just about everyone I know... Some of us never grow out of it I guess. Its just annoying that no one I know shares the interest. Okay, let me revise that, no one I want to spend any time around shares the interest. For the most part that whole stereo-type of comic nut is unfortunately true. *sighs*

I think I've rambled about absolutely nothing long enough and should crawl into bed. Not exactly a big day tomorrow, but I'm falling asleep. Maybe tomorrow I will have something less mind numbing to talk about. Night all.

Hiatus

2008-06-18T23:16:00.000-07:00

The statistics class was less forgiving that I had anticipated. Basically it sucked out part of my brain. Those portions of grey matter that I had accused of jumping ship, were actually lost in battle with this form of insidious math. Their little corpses are a continual issue as my normal thought processes attempt to fill in for those that are gone, and tripping over the casualties in due course. Eventually I trust I will have my functional brain back... I cross my fingers every night and hope I wake up normal. All in all it went better than I hoped. In other words I did not sink beneath the waves of numerical gibberish in a flaming wreck, but limped home with a solid 'C'. Currently I'm in dry dock while repairs are made. It was nice having a 4.0 for a while, but now that that's blown all to ribbons, I don't have to worry about it. Wooo Hooo!

What else have I been doing since March 1st? Well, basically work. Isn't that exciting? I did manage to cobble together a list of Anime for Assistant Director, because it is she who orders our DVDs. At some point I also wrote up a list of Sci-Fi movies and TV shows that would be a boon to the library system. That also went over fairly well, but I haven't seen any of the ones I suggested come through. Yet. I trust they will trickle in eventually. And.... wow, my life has been exceedingly uneventful. Which is a good thing. Eventful has almost always come with the unpleasant moniker of "MY GOD, THAT SUCKED!" and then continues on that particular path of listing madness until my mental inner ear adjusts for the distortion. Given my track record with this phenomenon, I no longer panic, just roll with it and get back up after its over, and keep walking.

A case in point. My second day back from a two week vacation (yes, I '*me*' took a vacation. Before you ask, no, I am not sick. I just wanted to visit a very good friend I hadn't seen in a while) started uneventfully (always a good sign), until I arrived at work... which was difficult in and of itself. Why? Well, there was this thick cloud of smoke obscuring a good portion of the town. Think pea soup... Burned pea soup. Visibility was not an option, so I guessed where to park for the most part. Fifteen seconds later I found I'd guessed correctly as the wind shifted, and the smoke went elsewhere. That was the good news. The bad news was that the wind was gusting up to 60mph in any given direction at any given time. While calling in to the main office to let them know that the 12 libraries they started out with that morning might have dwindled to 11 by closing time, I noted that I could see flames leaping merrily from behind nearby houses. My bosses were much more concerned than I was with this set of circumstances. They wanted to know if we'd been contacted by fire personal yet, which we hadn't. I had the impression that they thought I wanted to go home... In reality I was just calling them to make them aware of the situation, and was fully intending to open the branch. Which I did. We had a really busy day too... They called back later to see how things were going. They were fine. Fire was out... etc. This really didn't phase me all that much. Been through worse things I guess.

How are the animals? Pretty good. Those chicks I got in March? They're all grown up for the most part. As I suspected, "Super Peeper" is a rooster. For a while there I was convinced that they were ALL roosters... Ah, did I mention I ended up going back the next day and got three more chicks? Two I paid for, and they thru in a runt free.. mainly before they didn't think it'd live. IT LIVES! Granted she's not very big, but I still have hope she'll catch up. All in all, I ended up with two roosters and 5 hens. 3 Dark Brahmas, 3 Buff Brahmas and 1 Buff Cochin... and like all the Cochins I've met before, she's something of a wild hare. Pick her up, and she makes sounds like you're killing her, then lays there in your hands like she is in fact dead. Little Drama Queen.. eeesh. I suspect her of going for a chicken emmy.

My clock is telling me the time went by way faster than I thought it would, and I need to get some sleep. Midnight approaches, and I was falling asleep in my chair at around 9pm. Not a good sign, so I bid you all a good night. I'm also crossing my fingers that I actually get back to this blog before another 4 months whiz by on rocket powered rollar skates. Night.

Super Peeper

2008-03-01T20:05:00.000-08:00

The week before last I stopped by the local feed store to ask if it was possible to order some Dark Brahma chicks, because they're not a usual request. The lady took my name and number and said she'd see about doing that. Now to be completely clear here, I only inquired as to availability on the chicks, not order them. Guess what. She ordered them. So, here I sit in the kitchen at the sudo-bar listening to the chicks I picked up today. Normally I would be having fun with this, but it was rushed. I hate rushed. Plus it took something like twenty minutes for two girls who worked there, two chicken aficionados and myself to figure out which ones were the Dark Brahmas. Once we had them singled out we weren't sure they were the right ones because they were mixed in with Cochins, Buff Brahmas and Patridge Brahmas.

They ALL LOOK THE SAME!!! This means that I brought home two chicks which we were reasonably sure are the correct ones... and another which looks like something else entirely... and one that we're reasonably sure is a Buff Brahma. The Buff was on purpose, because the 4th maybe-Brahma was.... extremely aggressive for a Brahma, let alone a chick. So I asked to switch it out. Of the two Dark 'for-sure' Brahmas, they're on the small side, and one of them stumbles a lot when it tries to walk, as well as displays saggy wings. NOT A GOOD SIGN! This chick might as well be waving red flags. If its still that messed up tomorrow morning, I'm taking it back and just getting something else.

Then there's the Buff Brahma. This chick will live out its foreseeable future with the monicur "Super Peeper". This chick has the lungs and vocal cords of an opera singer. I had to make one stop before heading home at the pet store to get vitamins for my dog. As I stepped out of the shop on my way to the car, I could hear Super Peeper from the doorway of the store. This means that this tiny chick has the ability to pierce the walls of a 1981 Oldsmobile tank, fling its voice across 50 to 60 yards of parking lot, and through two glass doors of a noisy pet shop, because I heard it well before I opened the doors to exit the premises. Currently Super Peeper is residing with its 3 new buddies in a make shift brooder, and I am praying it eventually falls asleep because if it doesn't I'm looking at a very long sleepless night. *mumble mumble mumble*

On a brighter note, the feed store had a ton of chickens of all sizes and breeds, so it was fun to see all the different fuzzies. I have to say that the Polish chicks were really cute with their little fuzzy pompom on their heads, representing the afro they will have later in life. The little BB Reds were also extremely cute. I will not be getting small breeds even though I like them, since they have a hard time with cold climate. Finding birds frozen to perches is just not an enjoyable experience. Ugh. I have nightmares. *shudder*

R. I. P.

2008-02-21T19:37:00.001-08:00

Knowing the luck I normally have when I actually state my plans, and having 20/20 hindsight views, I can see now that saying I would spend time with my chickens over the weekend was foolish indeed. There is some truth to me having some time to spend with the chickens, but not in the way I would have wished. Sunday morning, the day I was planning on sitting outside for a while and feeding the silly birds, we had a visitor of the four legged variety. There is still some confusion as to whether it was a fox or a coyote (the neighbors say it was a fox, and what I saw looked like a coyote to me) that got into the yard and ended the lives of one unnamed Buff Orpington, and then later in the day... Brutus. My poor goofy rooster. I miss him and I am heartily tired of losing one person or pet after another. Needless to say what's left of the girls have been 'cooped' up for their own good. How often do YOU get to use a saying in its original context? I couldn't resist.

In the meantime, I am looking into getting some Dark Brahma chickens this year, and maybe few pairs of Pilgrim Geese, but I'm not sure about the geese yet. The webby foot creatures need more research before I go getting them. I'll put some pictures of the Dark Brahmas and the Pilgrim Geese. Dark Brahma chickens are just like the ones I have, except they have extensive penciling (see picture) and have almost no white on them at all. All the better for hiding from the big bad wolf's smaller sneakier cousins. The geese were something I wanted to get as an early warning alarm since we've had trouble with bears before and now the canids. These particular geese are one of the oldest breeds of geese in the states and originated here as an all around type of bird. The results were calm friendly birds, with quiet natures unless startled and the added bonus of auto-sexing. That means you can tell if they're boys or girls just by the color or color patterns. Males are white, or mostly white, while their female counterparts are grey with a little white here and there. I may or may not get them. We'll have to see.

Turning our attention to the work front, this has been an amazingly busy week! Tuesday was insane, but Wednesday really took the cake with a total of 23 people showing up for storytime. We had a blast. I'm not sure if this is going to become a regular event, or if this was a one time deal. If this becomes a regular step in their day, then I sure hope they give me some warning like they did this last time. Apparently a local preschool was doing some remodeling, and the power was being shut off for the day. Alice the Camel was a big hit, as was a book by Marc Brown called Pickle Things. They loved that too. I'll have to read that again, or find other books along those lines. It was all good... I hope. I didn't hear anyone complain about anything I did. The wait and see game again comes into play. My stomach is grumbling, so I'd better go eat something. Talk to you later. :)

Where Did I Leave My Waders....

2008-02-15T21:22:00.000-08:00

It took longer than I thought to get back to my blog! I've been hip deep in Statistics for what seems like forever. In reality I've only got about 8 more weeks of the class. Color me shocked. Never has math or anything to do with numerical devices been a friend to me, and this is no exception. I find myself dredging up long forgotten habits learned in algebra class many moons ago. That I am remembering these things at all is a testament to the teachers from my last college (a huge thank you to them by the way, not that they're ever going to read this since they have no idea this exists) and their prowess at beating equations into my thick skull until I got it... and still remember it. Again... shocking! The first homework and test have passed me by and somehow I survived, although I am still awaiting replies from certain portions of my gray matter. I suspect those respective groups of jumping ship. The traitors.

On other fronts, work is good. I've been having fun with flannel boards during storytime and the kids love it. A real favorite seems to be Alice the Camel, in which a tale is told of a camel with three humps instead of one or two. Of course the validity of her actually belonging to the family Camelidae is called into question as she runs from town to town, and in each case, loses a hump along the way. Its great fun. My next project is going to be a flannel story for Russell the Sheep. Comical storyline with an equally amusing set of illustrations make for a fun flannel board. We'll see how that goes as it took me an extremely long time to get Alice up and running... no pun intended.

In a continuing project, the search for Anime to add to the system goes on, however this is drawing up a bit short since in order to suggest Anime, I have to watch it. Which means I have to buy it, watch it, and then suggest it, if it seems like something that would go over well. The same goes for the Manga list. There seems to be some sort of stall with quality Manga for some reason. I know what's going on with the Anime field, but am not sure if the same reasons pertain to Manga as well. Given the close linkage between the two fields, its entirely possible. Anyway, Anime is on the expensive side, so I tend to go straight for the boxed sets. I've also found a surprisingly large amount of series available for sale by episode on iTunes. Who knew?! Eventually I will get these lists done and hopefully they can be used as guides for what to get over the next few years. I cross my fingers in hopes that that will be the case.

Pet wise everyone is doing alright to my knowledge. The chickens are laying an astonishingly high number of eggs even though its snowing , and cold. On every site I've looked at, and every book I've looked in, they say that hens will slow down in that department during the winter. I guess someone forgot to tell my girls that. Either that or Brutus secretly stands over them all day cracking the whip. Seriously doubt that. He's a very kind, if klutzy rooster. We also gained a little friend. More specifically a little black and white friend with body odor issues. I've seen the little fellow as he waddles quickly along out buildings at night. Its a nervous little skunk for some reason.

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone. I didn't get to say it yesterday for reasons of being cranky and busy. Ah yes, and I'm still getting over a really nasty head cold, which is trying to survive by heading into my lungs. Its going to meet with some resistance since I am not terribly welcoming of broncitis. It can go get its sticky self all over someone else's lungs this year. So, anyway, hope everyone had a nice Valentine's day. It stopped snowing and its been nice, and hopefully tomorrow it will stay that way, so I can spend some time with my chickens. I've missed sitting with them and feeding them. Dad has been doing that while I've been at work and school. I'd better call it a night for now. Hopefully I'll get back here with some pictures at some point before the end of the month. Heh, we'll see how that goes. Bye for now! :)

Just Inside the New Year...

2008-01-13T16:22:00.000-08:00

Alright. I'm back. I got a little side tracked with a couple of nasty storms, the death of another cat, and a chicken. Then there was the running around necessary to make sure all my grades were right, and logs of my internship was turned in on time. Oh yes, then there was the signing up for a class and coming to the conclusion that I really have no idea what to get a BA in. I'm very tempted to go for Anthropology since I really like the field. I.E. I enjoy learning about the field. Actually working in it is another story. After all of that I was exhausted, and just didn't have the energy to work on the blog... which is going to keep going although probably less frequently. Honestly I'm sort of shocked that I'm still working on it. But I've got a couple of people who like to check in and see what I've got going. And thank you to those who made comments. :)

So, first up, Happy New Year! Thank god '07 is behind me considering it was the year from hell. Thank you for days yet unused. To kick off the new year, mother nature gave us a doozy of a storm, and then watched in glee as most of us lost power, trees and other things. Quite frankly I don't blame her. I don't have pictures of the actual storm, because I was one of those fools who went to work instead of staying home where it was if not safe, at least warm and dry and the percentages on my death were greatly lowered. After the storm? Another storm came in and snowed on us. Now that I do have pictures of and I'll stick them on here in no particular order. Also have pictures of the sky the day before the storm. Not the best picture quality, but you can still see some of the cloud formation that looks like canyon walls along parts of the Grand Canyon. The camera doesn't do them justice.

Lastly we have chickens in the snow. My were they confused. They didn't get to go out on the storm day, but I let them out the next day. I've got pictures of them before the storm standing on our picnic table, and then after... standing in snow looking for interesting things to eat. I can say that nearly a week later with the sun out they're very happy, running up and down the driveway flapping their wings and clucking loudly. Freaks out Brutus something fierce when they do that. He always thinks there's something chasing them. Poor Brutus. Nicest, friendliest rooster I've ever met, with the added bonus of a goofy nature. If you pick him up and walk, he bobs his head as if he's the one walking. *laughs* Cracks me up every time.

So, enjoy the pictures and have a good day. I'll post again at some point. I'm aiming at twice a week, but we'll see what happens. Maybe more, maybe less... I'm taking a statistics class. We'll see if I survive it. Ugh. I'll write later. :)

PS. The orange colored hens are called Buff Orpingtons, and the black hen is an Austrolorpe.
I figured there might be some chicken buffs out there who'd like to know. The buffs are great for kids and anyone who wants a friendly group of little ladies. ;)

Post Class Jitters...

2007-12-19T20:07:00.000-08:00

Granted I lied a little. My internship doesn't end until this Friday, but my other classes are done, and I'm already signed up for a class in the spring. The least favorite classes are yet to come. Speech has never been a favorite, but that's one I will have to take, and a bunch of English courses if I decide to do a BA in English. Although I'm not entirely sure I want to do that. I'm also looking at a BA in Liberal Arts, which is generally taken for teachers and librarians. Who knows. This will take some looking into I suspect, and there is still time as I need to take pre-reqs for any college I want to get into ... assuming that is that they'll have me. I'm starting to wonder if I didn't miss out in waiting this long before going after a BA and a Masters.

Somewhere I missed out on the college experience. Being able to just concentrate on the classes and not worry about anything else would've been nice. Looking back on that area of time when that could've happened though, I wasn't ready for that. Now though, I think I would be. At the root of this is the fact that I'm slow to do anything. Everyone else went racing through this period in their life already and I'm just now thinking about it. Heh. ;) Typical me. I like to think all these things through before I do something. Maybe its too late to do it now. I'm already buried in a job and other responsibilities. Not that I couldn't just walk away from it all. I could, but I don't want to.

Here it is 6 days before Christmas... and I'm starting to get tired of the entire season already. Heh. Christmas carols were dropping from my mouth at work while I wasn't paying much attention. So, maybe I'm not totally out of the loop yet. Its been a totally crappy year so far, but what I'm hoping for is a better new year. Just two more weeks or so and then things will get better. Please.... get better. I wonder if that's a possible new years resolution... Anyway, I'm just babbling at this point. If I don't get around to posting before Christmas, *crosses fingers*Merry Christmas to everyone who bothers looking at this. Night. :)

Pre-Christmas Parking Lot Fights...

2007-12-11T19:54:00.001-08:00

When I was little I used to love the feel of Christmas. Everything was warm, and bright and everything smelled so good. As I got older I guess I got more jaded and some of the magic left the holiday. No longer do I wonder what I'm getting for Christmas, because a list is extracted from me every year which basically ensures that I know what I'm getting. That's good and bad at the same time in that there are generally no mad rushes to a certain store so I can exchange or return things, but there's also no ... How do I put this without sounding like one the poutey children who isn't happy unless they're the one opening the presents, and throwing a fit when what they open isn't what they wanted. That's not it at all. When someone gets you something for Christmas that you didn't ask for, but absolutely love it sort of shows that there is at least one person out there who goes through the trouble to know what you like and dislike. What you'll love and what you'll hate. I miss that. It doesn't really happen anymore and that makes it sad.

And then of course there's the other side of it. I love getting to know someone well enough to walk through a mall and see something that I know they'll like. There's not wondering what to get, no stress about that at all. Biggest reward is seeing them light up when they open the box and I know I guessed right. However, I've become one of those people who hates going out around the most wonderful time of the year. Why? Take the parking lot outside Gottschalks where two drivers got into a screaming, shrieking, hate filled altercation over a parking space. Inside I got elbowed by little old ladies with the gleam of greed in their eyes and glared at by people who nearly mowed me down because I was in their way. Shopping really sucks to begin with, but when its compounded by frustrated, angry, hell-bent, irrational individuals, it's difficult to tell the difference between an anchor store and the 7th ring of a fiery pit we all know and love. Where exactly did this become about grab the best gift or they won't love you anymore?

So, I guess I still like the holiday, but I certainly don't appreciate the reception I get when out and about. Therefore I make good use of the internet and shop a lot more online that I used to. Its quieter and more peaceful and sometimes I can feel what it used to be like when I was little. Sure, I still have to venture into the thick of the shopping mosh pit, but tend to retreat straight back to my humble abode. Its nice here.

This concludes my thoughts on Christmas and its ability to bring forth everyone's inner green-eyed creature. So, I'm not all that fond of the human species during certain times of the year. Yes, there are generous individuals out there, unless you're in a shopping mall... Just be prepared to do battle. I'm off to watch tv, and enjoy the fact that I have no more homework to do for a while. YAY!! Night. :)

And Now a Last Ha-rah...

2007-12-06T18:41:00.000-08:00

And so it was that we came to the last class assigned blog posting in which I am to give "Words of Wisdom" as well as to whether or not this class would be beneficial to someone in the Library Certificate program. With all I've learned in this class I have to give it a thumbs up. While the class may not deal directly with working a library, librarians themselves deal with information 24-7. In short his class had us not only learning to find, examine, and dissect vessels of information, but it taught us the vehicles for that information. In a day and age when there are so many ways to gain information be it true or not, it gives you a leg up on where and how to look online. We were introduced to blogs (an online journals of sorts), Wiki Space (in which you can have a chat), and many other forms of communication. Ah, you say, but what do those have to do with getting a Library Certificate? Almost every day I get a question that I can't answer with the books I have in my branch, therefore I turn to the net with all its twists and turns and hop to extract an answer. It greatly helps to understand how these sites work, what information is probably going to be there, and whether or not you can expect it to be skewed to support an add. Understanding how information is presented and why is also a key element of searching through information. This class basically tells you how to do all of it, and has you work and explore those areas or at the least gives you the basics.

This is the class I wish I had taken before I ever took an online course, because I know so much more now about what to expect of an online course teacher as well as the class itself. As for the Words of Wisdom aspect, I'm honestly not sure what to say, except to relax and have fun with all the new things you'll do! :) And keep in mind that if you ARE going for the Library Tech Certificate really pay attention, but the knowledge you gain in here is going to help you in information searches. Its also going to teach you how to present knowledge you have gained in whatever specialty you have to the public. Everything I learned had practical uses which is a huge plus in my book. Okay, I think I've gone on and on enough. ;) I'll stop.

Hah! You thought I'd gone! Well, you're half right. Dinner is ready, and I'm hungry, so while I'd like to stay and blab more at everyone I'm going to get food and try and watch a movie with Dad. I managed to get myself a copy of Wild Hogs from the library, and I figured Dad would like it. So, I'll talk later. Hopefully I wasn't too annoying with the post. Night. :)

The Foggy Road Home...

2007-12-05T16:45:00.001-08:00

Several days ago, I found myself lamenting my days in Sydney, and figured I'd never be around anything from there again. Well, I was wrong. Yesterday evening about 15 minutes to closing I had a woman with a little boy come in and along with them came a little taste of Australia. Apparently the little boy was visiting from down under, so I got a little smidge of the politeness I remember so well. Trust me when I say that boys from the states don't tend to say thank you unless prompted, or ask if you need help putting something away, or offering to carry a stack of books for you. They also don't tend to be as quick witted. So, I feel safe in saying that I got a rather nice unexpected Christmas present. It made me a little homesick. ;)

Then there was the road home. What a joy that was. Anyone who's tried going across a very high bridge in the dark with visibility ranging from 2 to 4 feet in front of the car raise their hand. Yes, I'm raising my hand too. Let me tell you now that its not fun doing that, especially on a windy road surrounded by two types of idiots. The first is the type that likes speeding no matter what, and will try and kill themselves and you trying to around you do they can speed up to 75 mph in the wrong lane. Idiot number two, are the ones that are freaked out by not being able to see, and cling to your bumper like a limpet with a tube of super glue. Thereby totally blinding the lead driver with their high beams making that lead driver (in this case myself) slow down to a dangerous crawl. Then idiot type two honks at you for going too slow. Personally, I'd rather not go that slow because idiot type one could come roaring out of the fog behind my Bunny Hop line and cause quite the pile-up. I've never been fond of pile ups. I'm also not fond of tail gaiters, so I pulled over.... and they pulled over with me. *sighs* Eventually they figured out that I wasn't going to be the leader. Yes, I refused to play a Peter Pan game. Obviously I got home safe and sound.

And last but not least, I was sent a link in an email to a YouTube clip. Its called the 12 Days of Christmas. Except its not what we all remember with fond memories. I'll see if I can't put it up on my blog somewhere. If you're easily offended by things don't watch it. Personally I thought it was cute and funny. Anyway, its been a quiet week, except for trying to get my final project emailed into my teacher. Its a little big, so I'll have to figure out how to turn it in. Maybe load it on a thumb drive and take it down there so she can view it. That's all for now! Night. :)

Another Month Stares Me in the Face...

2007-12-02T23:53:00.000-08:00

This time last year I was in Australia contemplating a plane ride home, and the fact that I was going to miss my new home more than I thought. Being able to run down to the market for anything I wanted, or stopping in at the local corner restaurants was something I really enjoyed being able to do on foot. You could get anywhere on foot without ever having to own a car. If I needed a book, I could just jump on the train or ferry if the local bookstore didn't have what I was looking for. Libraries, doctors, shopping and anything else right at your fingertips, but you could also get away from it. Nothing was cluttered. No one was standing all over each other. Everyone for the most part was polite, kind and I never felt out of place.

And then I was home where driving is a means to an end. I suppose I could move nearer to a city, but here, things are different. Everything seems a little tainted here. Even if you find a peaceful spot to rest your weary head, others also see it as a peaceful spot and suddenly that peace is gone. Instead you're surrounded with people who are loud, unpleasant and don't really care about you or what you were looking for. I guess I miss the respect for peace and quiet that everyone seemed to have in Australia. Perhaps I was misreading it, but I never felt pushed, or disapproved of.... then again everyone thought I was from Canada. Conversations were generally interspersed with, "So, what part of Canada are you from?" and I had to tell them that I was from the States. A brief surprised look would cross their face, and then they'd apologize immediately, but even then they wouldn't try verbally scraping me off like some sort of mold. Its a courtesy I don't often run across here.

I guess as another December stares me in the face I find myself missing that time I had in Sydney. Perhaps it was because for the first time in a long time I didn't have so much weight on me. It was nice to be able to have not a care in the world for a while and from time to time I wish I where back there. I guess December makes me melancholy. But don't worry. I'll be on the rebound pretty quick. Hope everyone has a good time this month. Night.

Hiding at Home...

2007-11-25T19:16:00.000-08:00

There have been some years when I get up at the crack of morning the day after Thanksgiving to go see if I could find anything down at the stores worth damaging my credit over. Looking back on that foolhardy activity there was nothing worth losing precious sleep to acquire. This Thanksgiving, I ventured from my hovel but once to visit family and to help them eat a lot of food, since half the people who said they were coming canceled because they'd gotten the flu, or colds, or whatever the latest rhinovirus out there is. So, I basically stuffed myself until I was nearly sick, and even three days later I still think I've got stuffing in the nooks and crannies of my head. Too much food is bad. Even if it is turkey with cranberry sauce. I have a weakness for cranberries. I like the juice too. Anyway, I managed to scarf up most of the left overs on my own, while the dog looked on in hopeful anticipation. Sorry dog. None for you. Where is my sharing nature? I don't feed my dog human food. There's too many things that can hurt her. Onions, grapes and other innocuous seeming food substances can hurt of kill a dog. Yes, I'm justifying my selfishness.

For the rest of the weekend, I pretty much spent my time hiding, doing homework and watching my newly coveted Smallville seasons. Once again my obsession with superheroes is shining through. Hopefully no one forgot to wear their sunglasses. Its nice to have some down time, although not enough downtime to get to read anything from the pile of books next to my bed. Maybe during winter break? I guess time shall tell. Or, its just going to hoard its information and keep me guessing. What else have I been doing? Well, eating way too many See's Molasses Chips, which I love. I don't get a chance to have them very often. Aside from that I've been remarkably lazy. There was the fight with the laptop, and the realization that's probably about time to reformat the hard drive again... Ugh. Never a fun project. I'll have to do that over winter break. Periodically I do that to keep things from getting too cluttered. Its just really... involved. At least for me.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! At the moment, I'm off to sit in front of the TV and watch Smallville. Yes, its on DVD, but I'm on a roll. Plus there's also the fact that there's ice cream and bananas with my name on it. Yum. Banana split, here I come. Possibly. Unless it... splits. *sighs* Apologies. Bad joke on my part. Night! :)

Thanks for....

2007-11-21T20:06:00.000-08:00

Yet another class assigned post (not that I'm complaining) in which we are to tell what we are thankful for on this day before Thanksgiving. Actually I could've posted this later or earlier, it just happened to be the day before Turkey Day. Generally I am given to slightly sarcastic witty remarks, at least that's what I'd like to think. However I find myself giving this question some heavy duty thought, because this past year has been uncharacteristically harsh in terms of family and friends. Last spring semester I had an 8am class twice a week, and was starting a new job and that was a long haul down the hill. To help me out my great aunt and second cousin offered me a room since they live on 10 minutes away from school. Being there twice a week needless to say I got a chance to know them. More so than I had in the past. My cousin passed away before the end of the semester. So although its bittersweet I am glad that I got to get to know her and that she got to know me. I will miss her kindness, her gentleness, and most of all her laugh.

My guess is this post is going to be fairly short, given that I'm having trouble coming up with something to babble about. There's always the boring.. such as, I've got a sinus infection. How's that? Boring, I know. However there have been some amusing side affects to the sinus infection. Such as, my left eye has been leaking tears for several weeks now and the doctor couldn't figure out why. Now we know. In between all that though I was sitting at the internship or at work with a constantly tearing eye, and people were always asking if I was alright. Today, both eyes were tearing to the point it looked like I was crying. A patron would walk in, and say,"Hi! Listen, I was wond... Oh my god! Are you alright? What's wrong?" thinking I was crying about something. At the internship, everyone was asking what was wrong as well. By now they all know I just had a faulty eyeball, but it was sort of funny as well. I guess I'm also thankful that I work with such nice people, and have such instantly concerned patrons. ;)

Since its the day before Thanksgiving, I wish you all a wonderful holiday with friends and/or family. Even if you're not fond of the holiday, its still a chance to hang out with those you care about. Don't toss that for anything. So, Happy Thanksgiving! Night. :)