January 30, 2013

I am currently owned by two dogs and two cats.

First and foremost by Bear, a chocolate lab/german shepherd mix. Bear was adopted from the Humane Society of South Mississippi. He was a surrender after Katrina; his family's home was damaged and they couldn't find affordable housing that would let them have a dog. He was adopted first by another family who said he didn't get along with children, but having had him for over 6 year now, I am sure it was the children who didn't know how to get along with him. He adores all children and is adored by all the kids in our neighborhood who ask to pet him on every walk we go on. He's traveled with me to/through 23 states and absolutely saved my life when I had a nervous breakdown. We have a mutual adoration society going.


Brand new to the family is Honey, a shepherd mix on the smallish size. She was found nursing 8 puppies on the side of the road in NM about 3 months ago. Puppies were weened about two weeks ago and I adopted her last week. In the span of five days, she's learned to come when called (80% of the time), how to stay on the sidewalk during walkies, "lie down," "stay," "out of the kitchen" and "leave it." She's also well on her way to overcoming her acute fear of getting in cars (about 60% progress in two days). I'm very grateful to have found such an awesome second dog.


Our cats, Izzy and Javier, were left with my boyfriend by his ex who flew them from NY state to CO when she moved out here to live with him but hasn't even asked about them since she moved back 3 years ago. I'm not much of a cat person, but Izzy's pretty sweet (she likes to eat my hair and lick plastic bags). Javi is a PITA, has a meow that sounds like a whiny old Jewish man (a la John Stewart or Billy Chrystal), thinks he's displaced royalty. But he's ours and we love him.

Izzy, tripping out on some awesome catnip


Javi, voguing for the camera


In memorandum:

Ziggy (aka the Ziggster and ZiggyDoodle). This photo was incorporated into a mural in Berthoud, CO. Zig lived only a few years. One of my neighbors fed him some antifreeze-soaked hamburger which killed him. They also killed four other sweet neighborhood dogs. We all knew who did it but we couldn't prove it so that dog-killer is still roaming free while my sweet Zig had his life cut short.


Peaty. Half german shepherd, half great dane (we think, he was HUGE). My son's dog, they grew up together. Peaty was a wanderer, would try to bolt out the door and make for the hills any time he could until the day he was hit by a car. He recovered fine from that at the time, but he had to have both his hips replaced later in life. Peaty lived a full, good life until three years ago when he died at age 14.


Harley, the psycho inbred kitteh I got from a pet store. I knew better but these two horrid people were commenting on how ugly she was. She was a great cat for about 3 days, then we got a second cat. And then the dog arrived and she was never happy again. Unless I sang to her, and then she purred, purred, purred! We lost her about 8 years ago.


Lyle, a lionness among kitties, a phenomenal huntress who spent all of her early years chasing rodents through the meadow of our backyard, and retired at age 10 to an indoor life of leisure when we moved to a slightly less rural area. Gone since 2010.


To our wonderful pets and the joy they bring our lives!

January 28, 2013

Today was Honey's first day at the dog park.

First of all, she HATES going into cars, has to be picked up and put on the seat. Once in the car, she settles down just fine, pretty much just curls up and sleeps. So we got through that hurdle. (Bear delights in car rides, knows they almost always lead some place awesome for dogs. I'm hoping she learns from him.)

Once at the park and off-leash, she was very shy and wary of other dogs, and stayed very close to me and my boyfriend, or Bear. This illustrates what she thought most of the time:



But after a while, even though she still stayed very close to us, she thought some of the doggie play around her was pretty fun.



Especially when Bear was in the midst of it.



This dog park is 10 acres fenced, with another 5 acres of unfenced trail around it. She experienced bot the fenced (unleashed) area and the unfenced (she on leash, Bear off as I know he won't wander off). She met all kinds of dogs, including huge great danes and huskies and a rolly polly little 13-week-old puppy (who wanted to follow my still-lactating female). By the end of our hour there, she was beginning to get the hang of it, even running up to one dog in the unleashed area very playfully, like she plays with Bear in the yard. I think she's showing great promise for growing up to be a very well-adjusted pooch. She just needs to learn she has a safe and stable home. I'm so happy I can provide that for her!

January 26, 2013

Dinner disaster!!

Have tried to make chicken soup today. I know, sounds simple, right? Like I haven't made awesome chicken soup a gazillion times in my life!

Mistake #1
But let me witness to you here and now, brothers and sisters: no matter what the internets say, you CANNOT use Rice-A-Roni in a crock pot soup!!!

Ugh, ugh, hard, nasty, pasty bits. Pffft, pffft, icky, poo! Disgusting! The stock was good (homemade a few days ago from a store-bought rotisserie chicken carcass), so I decided to strain it and pick out all the chicken bits. The leftover veggies I'd put in were a complete loss, but I was able to salvage a goodly amount of chicken, which of course had to be rinsed off of the hard, nasty rice kernels. Transferred stock and chicken into a regular stove-top soup pot.

Mistake #2
I needed some veggies. The only fresh veggies I had left were carrots, so I cut up two of those, and also I raided my canned goods pantry, finding only cans of creamed corn (no, I won't put that in my soup, thankyouverymuch), beets (also not a candidate for my chicken soup), and peas. Now, this was a pretty ancient can of peas because I absolutely hate the texture of canned peas. I think my sweetheart brought this can home early in our cohabitation over a year ago and it's languished in the back of the cabinet ever since. But I thought, what the hell, waste not, want not, it's only for soup, I'll throw them in. BIG MISTAKE. Got the soup up to a good boil to cook the carrots and thought, I'll cook up some Rice-A-Roni separate and add it after. Promptly forgot about rolling boil of soup while the R-A-R was cooking. Ended up with basically watery pea soup - perhaps the only pea-based food I hate more than canned peas.

The final nail in the dinner coffin, Mistake #3
But the Rice-A-Roni seemed done - cooked for the full 20 minutes recommended as the longest time to cook on the package - so I decided to throw it in the soup anyway and choke it down in my regular tightwad "waste not, want not" fashion. However, it being done was an optical illusion. I picked up the skillet to empty it into the soup pot and it sloshed out ALL OVER my stove top. Swearing and nearly nauseous from the combined smells of pea soup and burning Rice-A-Roni, I cleaned up the burners and retreated to my computer to share this sad, sad tale of a doomed dinner.

Think I'll order out for pizza.

January 21, 2013

Here are links to four of the first five stories:

Clevealnd (sic) Police are investigating the death of a 6 year old girl after she was shot in the face
http://www.newsnet5.com/dpp/news/local_news/cleveland_metro/clevealnd-police-are-investigating-the-death-of-a-6-year-old-girl-after-she-was-shot-in-the-face

East Anchorage Drive-By Shooting Sends Teenage Girl to Hospital
http://www.ktuu.com/news/crime/east-anchorage-drive-by-shooting-sends-teenage-girl-to-hospital-011913,0,4531781.story

I could not find a link to this story about a 12-year-old in Bainbridge, GA who shot himself while hunting. However, Bainbridge, GA did experience a drive-by shooting this week which resulted in a 23-year-old being hit, so it's not like gun injury was unknown in this town last week:
Drive-by Shooting in Bainbridge, Georgia
http://www.wctv.tv/news/headlines/8536002.html

Richmond man shot by 4-year-old dies
http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/local/city-of-richmond/richmond-man-shot-by--year-old-dies/article_f83ed5ed-1b79-5b73-9b12-e22e210c13c4.html

Police investigating shooting of 2-year-old boy
http://onlineathens.com/local-news/2013-01-14/police-investigating-shooting-2-year-old-boy

I don't have time to google all the incidents listed, but it's off to a good start for internet reporting accuracy when four of the first five stories listed pop up from reputable, local news sites in a simple google search. Feel free to search for the rest yourself and report back to us. I'd like to see the links myself.

January 12, 2013

I had a doctor at a Walgreens wellness clinic tell me once

that people who went to work sick were too ignorant about public health risks. I told her that they couldn't afford the clinic visit and also the loss of wages from taking time off to go to the doctor. She looked skeptical until I told her that her $100 clinic visit was a whole day's pay for me, plus I didn't have paid sick leave - which is why I waited until I was on death's door before going to see her.

January 12, 2013

Wright was NOT controversial

until RW media made him controversial. The UCC hand-picked him to plant a specifically black church with liberal UCC theology to curb the rampant rise of conservative black evangelical churches. The only part that was deemed "controversial" was that he used traditional black preaching techniques in the pulpit - which the white right turned into "angry black man hate speech." The CONTENT of his sermons were pure UCC - overcoming oppression with the transforming power of God's love.

January 12, 2013

Ah, if non-fiction's your thing, let me recommend these titles:

Outliers by (and read by) Malcolm Gladwell.

Drift: The Unmooring of American Military Power by (and read by) Rachel Maddow

The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann

The Wordy Shipmates by (and read by) Sarah Vowell

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach

January 11, 2013

Another wrong-headed Texan at work.

A) Print is not dead. The WSJ had an article this week on the subject.

B) Ebooks availability for libraries is severely limited due to publisher reticence and outrageous pricing.

C) Judge Wolff says this isn't meant to be a replacement for local brick-and-mortar libraries but an enhancement. How about donating all the money you've raised for your bookless libraries and give that to the actual libraries for enhancement of their digital collections? Seriously, why reinvent the wheel when the infrastructure already exists to get ebooks in the hands of those who can afford ereaders?

January 10, 2013

I wish people knew that sell-by dates doesn't mean it goes bad after that date.

In fact, it's good until it isn't, as best judged by looking at the food, smelling it, and using your own best judgement. The USDA needs to be more aggressive in getting this information out.

USDA Fact Sheets: Food Labeling: Food Product Dating

January 9, 2013

Women can only "choose" to have an abortion if

there are safe, available, affordable medical facilities that perform abortions in their area. Rich women will always be able to "choose" to abort because if they can't get an abortion in their hometown, or even if it becomes illegal again, it's legal elsewhere and they have the means to get there. Poor women, not so much. That's what I mean by "choice" being a market-based coinage.