Sunday, May 31, 2009
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Friday, May 29, 2009
Friday!
In my original plan Dogger would be nine weeks out from surgery number one and a week out from surgery number two. I was very optimistic. This was then:
I don't think I would do the second surgery right now even if I did have the several hundred dollars sitting around. I don't think Dogger or her new knee is anywhere ready to do it all again on the other side and I'm not sure the surgeon wants to do the other one either. He lurves her, but she's been one headache after another for him ( and me! and Dogger!) and I doubt he's wanting to go back down that road with her again so soon. I do want that surgery for her though, I want her to be whole again. Within the year.
But. Living in the now, Dogger is doing much better. She walks on all fours most of the time and the wound is closed (Thank you baby Jesus!) so she isn't wearing the E-collar anymore (YAY!) , I do wish that I had known that she was going to be wearing it for so long because I would have definitely invested the $20 in getting her a nicer one. It was like living with a take home version of the Very Large Array. The upside to that thing was that I got much better radio reception that I have ever gotten in the house before. All I had to do was position her near the radio and it was Hello Tierra Del Fuego!
She does still hop more than I would like and she resists sitting on command which I don't really understand because that was a command she always could follow. She also avoids standing for long periods and seems to generally be less energetic than she was before the surgery.On the upside though, she is so much more lively than she was in the first few weeks after the procedure and while she is still on antibiotics and she's off all pain meds .
She's getting very tired of her post surgical routine. She's either in her room or in her crate. I'm leery of letting her wander the house because it's a mind field of slippery floors and demon possessed throw rugs that would love to trip her up. I am experimenting with walking around the house with her leashed. It sounds like I'm being too careful, but I read a yahoo group all about dogs with orthopedic problems and I have learned that the average house is a death trap for our dogs in these first few months after their surgeries when their newly knitted bones are so fragile... I may get the crate out of my living room before I go on vacation. In August.
In my original plan Dogger would be nine weeks out from surgery number one and a week out from surgery number two. I was very optimistic. This was then:
And this is now
Okay, granted, its hard to make any comparisons between those pictures because they aren't really alike in anyway, but she really hates being in the box and I couldn't do it to her just for a picture. But look! she's clearly less bald!
I don't think I would do the second surgery right now even if I did have the several hundred dollars sitting around. I don't think Dogger or her new knee is anywhere ready to do it all again on the other side and I'm not sure the surgeon wants to do the other one either. He lurves her, but she's been one headache after another for him ( and me! and Dogger!) and I doubt he's wanting to go back down that road with her again so soon. I do want that surgery for her though, I want her to be whole again. Within the year.
But. Living in the now, Dogger is doing much better. She walks on all fours most of the time and the wound is closed (Thank you baby Jesus!) so she isn't wearing the E-collar anymore (YAY!) , I do wish that I had known that she was going to be wearing it for so long because I would have definitely invested the $20 in getting her a nicer one. It was like living with a take home version of the Very Large Array. The upside to that thing was that I got much better radio reception that I have ever gotten in the house before. All I had to do was position her near the radio and it was Hello Tierra Del Fuego!
She does still hop more than I would like and she resists sitting on command which I don't really understand because that was a command she always could follow. She also avoids standing for long periods and seems to generally be less energetic than she was before the surgery.On the upside though, she is so much more lively than she was in the first few weeks after the procedure and while she is still on antibiotics and she's off all pain meds .
She's getting very tired of her post surgical routine. She's either in her room or in her crate. I'm leery of letting her wander the house because it's a mind field of slippery floors and demon possessed throw rugs that would love to trip her up. I am experimenting with walking around the house with her leashed. It sounds like I'm being too careful, but I read a yahoo group all about dogs with orthopedic problems and I have learned that the average house is a death trap for our dogs in these first few months after their surgeries when their newly knitted bones are so fragile... I may get the crate out of my living room before I go on vacation. In August.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Sleeping Beauty
Tuesday night I was a very good girl, with a mind ahead to my 7:30 am performance review, I went to bed at 10pm with a gardening book and planned to make it an early evening., before I went to bed I asked Dogger if she needed to go outside - she said "no", because she understands the words and the concepts behind "go" and "outside" and "pee". Of course she does! I locked all the doors, turned off the lights and switched on the alarm. And then Dogger started to bark. And bark and bark and bark. You would have thought she morphed into a yappy dog. A 78 pound yappy dog.
And she continued to yap. I don't make it habit of telling her to not bark in the middle of the night because I don't want her to get the idea that I don't want her to bark in the middle of the night. I pay her to bark at bad guys and if the situation calls for it I would pay her extra to eat the bad guys, I have no desire to make her stop barking at night... I just want her to stop barking all night. I mean after a while it loses it specialness. I don't want her barking to lose its edge and if she barks all night it becomes significantly less edgy. She barks once at someone too close to her yard and its The Daily Show she barks all night at nothing and its Jay Leno.
So, when she started barking at 11:00, I said Bark on Big Dog, scare that person and when she barked again at 1:30 I said Whose dog is that? Make it stop. Oh, it's Dogger. Gawd, tell me she's inside. Oh. she is. Okay and then she stopped and I went back to sleep. And then she barked again and I went to see what she wanted.
Nothing she wanted nothing. She wasn't at her door waiting for me to take her out, she wasn't standing guard at her window letting the moonlight reflect off her fangs, she was on her bed, smiling - "Hi Mommy! How nice to see you! You came to visit me!" I told her to shut up and I closed the windows in her room. She can't challenge what she can not hear or smell. I have a feeling she wasn't barking at a bad guy anyway, real bad guys have time constraints and dog issues. My feeling is she was alerting me and the rest of the neighborhood to a a marauding raccoon or possum or something that was messing around in the shrub outside her window and she wanted me to know I needed to call the city and get a live trap. At 3:30 am. Dogger is nothing if not proactive.
I had gotten out of bed and managed the stairs - hard enough in the light and while fully awake. .I wanted to go back to sleep.I had a review that I really wanted to be conscience for in a few hours and I was going to be a wreak. I wanted to be able to defend myself if needed and its really hard to do that effectively when you are face down on a conference table. Supervisors also see it as a mark of poor time management if you spend your entire review face down on their conference table. Poor form. But it didn't matter, I re-managed the stairs and went back to bed but Tiny was also now awake and he wanted to play. With my nose.
Tuesday night I was a very good girl, with a mind ahead to my 7:30 am performance review, I went to bed at 10pm with a gardening book and planned to make it an early evening., before I went to bed I asked Dogger if she needed to go outside - she said "no", because she understands the words and the concepts behind "go" and "outside" and "pee". Of course she does! I locked all the doors, turned off the lights and switched on the alarm. And then Dogger started to bark. And bark and bark and bark. You would have thought she morphed into a yappy dog. A 78 pound yappy dog.
And she continued to yap. I don't make it habit of telling her to not bark in the middle of the night because I don't want her to get the idea that I don't want her to bark in the middle of the night. I pay her to bark at bad guys and if the situation calls for it I would pay her extra to eat the bad guys, I have no desire to make her stop barking at night... I just want her to stop barking all night. I mean after a while it loses it specialness. I don't want her barking to lose its edge and if she barks all night it becomes significantly less edgy. She barks once at someone too close to her yard and its The Daily Show she barks all night at nothing and its Jay Leno.
So, when she started barking at 11:00, I said Bark on Big Dog, scare that person and when she barked again at 1:30 I said Whose dog is that? Make it stop. Oh, it's Dogger. Gawd, tell me she's inside. Oh. she is. Okay and then she stopped and I went back to sleep. And then she barked again and I went to see what she wanted.
Nothing she wanted nothing. She wasn't at her door waiting for me to take her out, she wasn't standing guard at her window letting the moonlight reflect off her fangs, she was on her bed, smiling - "Hi Mommy! How nice to see you! You came to visit me!" I told her to shut up and I closed the windows in her room. She can't challenge what she can not hear or smell. I have a feeling she wasn't barking at a bad guy anyway, real bad guys have time constraints and dog issues. My feeling is she was alerting me and the rest of the neighborhood to a a marauding raccoon or possum or something that was messing around in the shrub outside her window and she wanted me to know I needed to call the city and get a live trap. At 3:30 am. Dogger is nothing if not proactive.
I had gotten out of bed and managed the stairs - hard enough in the light and while fully awake. .I wanted to go back to sleep.I had a review that I really wanted to be conscience for in a few hours and I was going to be a wreak. I wanted to be able to defend myself if needed and its really hard to do that effectively when you are face down on a conference table. Supervisors also see it as a mark of poor time management if you spend your entire review face down on their conference table. Poor form. But it didn't matter, I re-managed the stairs and went back to bed but Tiny was also now awake and he wanted to play. With my nose.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Oh, look its Wednesday
I went and visited my plants and the damage is still there. I would think that once I called them out that "they" would be forced to own their mistake, make amends and maybe give me some candy or something, BASTARDS! They are feasting on my plants and I can't stop them! I poison and I give them almost no privacy and yet they continue to turn my plants into shred's! Today? much to my heart break, I found a gnawed on tomato plant! Someone is going to have to die now and it is not going to be my plant.
The Powers That Be do not want me to be able to poison successfully, they send rain seconds after I get my spray on. I then started to think about more organic or at least less petrochemical means - I mean besides my existing egg shells and marigold method. I did some research on soap poison. Yeah. About that. You can't just spray and go, the only way to make the soap method work is to spray each bug as you see it. You have to be available all the time to use the soap method and if you are going to be out there standing guard with your spray bottle you might as well just stand there and pick the little monsters off one by one.
I'm thinking about re-introducing the lady bugs. Fight bugs with bugs. Let them bond with the the bugs so that I don't have to. The first time there wasn't anything around for them to eat and that might have been a contributing factor to them leaving me - those that didn't die of boredom, the really ambitious bugs left for a better party. But now? Now there is a buffet! also, next time I'll have better beer. Or beer at all, cutting down on my slug population, those few truly psychotic, dedicated self harming ones that are not turned back by my eggshells. BASTARDS.
Speaking of the great outdoors, Broskey fixed my bike. It now rolls like I do, in my car. I was going to ride it at lunch on Tuesday but it rained. Surprise! I was going to, I thought it was going to stop, it looked for a few minutes like it was a much lighter shade of gray - Yes, I am given to magical thinking, sue me - I could have been one of those crazy people out there - I wanted to be out there, just not in the rain. The crazy people are out there riding their bikes in a deluge but I'm not that crazy. I see those people and I'm always thinking Oh. You know there are medications that will chemically enhanced that desire right out of you.. Those people are like turkeys that drown in the rain because they are too stupid to get out of the rain and you know they aren't thinking Oh, how much like a turkey I am! They're thinking I am so hard core! My dedication to awesome. It's pouring rain and I am out in it!.
But, they are sleek in their sopping wet bike togs and I am pudgy in my dry car.Who looks like a turkey now?
I went and visited my plants and the damage is still there. I would think that once I called them out that "they" would be forced to own their mistake, make amends and maybe give me some candy or something, BASTARDS! They are feasting on my plants and I can't stop them! I poison and I give them almost no privacy and yet they continue to turn my plants into shred's! Today? much to my heart break, I found a gnawed on tomato plant! Someone is going to have to die now and it is not going to be my plant.
The Powers That Be do not want me to be able to poison successfully, they send rain seconds after I get my spray on. I then started to think about more organic or at least less petrochemical means - I mean besides my existing egg shells and marigold method. I did some research on soap poison. Yeah. About that. You can't just spray and go, the only way to make the soap method work is to spray each bug as you see it. You have to be available all the time to use the soap method and if you are going to be out there standing guard with your spray bottle you might as well just stand there and pick the little monsters off one by one.
I'm thinking about re-introducing the lady bugs. Fight bugs with bugs. Let them bond with the the bugs so that I don't have to. The first time there wasn't anything around for them to eat and that might have been a contributing factor to them leaving me - those that didn't die of boredom, the really ambitious bugs left for a better party. But now? Now there is a buffet! also, next time I'll have better beer. Or beer at all, cutting down on my slug population, those few truly psychotic, dedicated self harming ones that are not turned back by my eggshells. BASTARDS.
Speaking of the great outdoors, Broskey fixed my bike. It now rolls like I do, in my car. I was going to ride it at lunch on Tuesday but it rained. Surprise! I was going to, I thought it was going to stop, it looked for a few minutes like it was a much lighter shade of gray - Yes, I am given to magical thinking, sue me - I could have been one of those crazy people out there - I wanted to be out there, just not in the rain. The crazy people are out there riding their bikes in a deluge but I'm not that crazy. I see those people and I'm always thinking Oh. You know there are medications that will chemically enhanced that desire right out of you.. Those people are like turkeys that drown in the rain because they are too stupid to get out of the rain and you know they aren't thinking Oh, how much like a turkey I am! They're thinking I am so hard core! My dedication to awesome. It's pouring rain and I am out in it!.
But, they are sleek in their sopping wet bike togs and I am pudgy in my dry car.Who looks like a turkey now?
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Garden Update 5
There weren't many huge changes this time around, everyone is getting taller and if I say so myself, more leggy, a problem I had last year that I thought if I caged them early I might avoid this year... The jolly green tomato, all ready tall has gotten more so and is a now a Rockette and gets closer to joining the line every day, really, by July they will be ready for Radio City. I'm going to have to think about tying back a few of the branches because I'm a little worried about the plant being able to support the length of some of them, I don't want to lose any potential tomatoes because a branch snaps.
My little Rockette may be leggy but it's not wasting all its energy with its greenery. It's finally using some of that grow something other than branches.
There are a lot of flowers out there but all the varieties are on different schedules. We have:
Dogger is doing much better, you can't tell from the picture but the wound has finally closed up and I was able to free her from her E-collar. Ace is just getting bigger and cuter every day.
There weren't many huge changes this time around, everyone is getting taller and if I say so myself, more leggy, a problem I had last year that I thought if I caged them early I might avoid this year... The jolly green tomato, all ready tall has gotten more so and is a now a Rockette and gets closer to joining the line every day, really, by July they will be ready for Radio City. I'm going to have to think about tying back a few of the branches because I'm a little worried about the plant being able to support the length of some of them, I don't want to lose any potential tomatoes because a branch snaps.
My little Rockette may be leggy but it's not wasting all its energy with its greenery. It's finally using some of that grow something other than branches.
There are a lot of flowers out there but all the varieties are on different schedules. We have:
Wee little fetal flowers and at long last we have...
!!!!!
We have wee little tomatoes too! They belong to the Carolina Gold, last in the ground first to produce! Way to go Carolina Gold!, which sounds like a variety of marijuana but is actually a mid-sized golden tomato. The peppers are as always, a leetle behind, but they are working hard. So far, all the varieties are at least trying to form flowers. Two plants have actually come across with blooms:
Very nice. The bean plants got such a good start and then modeled themselves after the tomatoes and seem to concentrate on growing branches. But, like the tomatoes they have seen the light
The only group I'm waiting on now are the broccs but they are a different kind of plant and I'm going to be waiting a while to see anything from them. While I am good about waiting to eat my broccoli, someone is not waiting. What is eating my plants?, first the brocs
And next, what evil has the nerve to be eating my peppers?
Even worse, I don't think they are being eaten by the same thing. Thus far, the tomatoes have been spared.
Oh, as long as I am doing a garden update, how about a Dogger and Kitty update...
Dogger is doing much better, you can't tell from the picture but the wound has finally closed up and I was able to free her from her E-collar. Ace is just getting bigger and cuter every day.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
TGIF
Dick Wolf owes me a cookie. Last week I was the only one watching his show because Lost was on and this week I was the only one watching his show because American Idol was on. I mean, really. I was the only one in America who watched the last two episodes of Law and Order . I think I want Jeremy Sisto to come to my house and mow my lawn.
Today at work someone ate baked spaghetti at their desk and I decided I needed baked spaghetti for dinner. I came home fed everyone else their dinner and then thought about mine. I wanted good ingredients, so I thought about going to Lowe's because they must better than Kroger, which is much better than Food Lion but charges too much. I wanted to gt something good but I didn't want to get over charged. I then treated myself to a Kroger where market research told them the stores target demographic want to have Newman's Own products available. The market research at my Kroger told them them the demographic at that store doesn't know who Paul Newman was and isn't interested in any spaghetti sauce that can not also be used as a frosting.
I ended up with some really good baked spaghetti. Not homemade but really, really good. I tarted it up and little and added some sausage and left it to simmer and it was good. Not my Moms, but still, for something out of a bottle it was not bad. Go Me. I was doing all this and I forgot that it wasn't actually Friday night and that I had other chores to do. Instead I went to a foreign grocery store and took a leisurely tour of the aisles and then I went home and browned the sausage and heated the sauce and made the spaghetti and I was like Oh. Damn. Is it Thursday?. Friday is a better day for leisurely shopping and cooking. Thursday's are better for gathering trash and deciding what I'm going to wear to work tomorrow and being aware that I have to go to work tomorrow. Fridays I can go wild.
I also had this idea that I was going to give Dogger a bath and launder all of her bedding. I'm not sure when I was going to do all this but I gather it was going to be after I mowed the lawn. I think my plans also included taking Dogger for a post-bath walk. I have no idea when all of this was going to get accomplished but I was also watching Studio 60 during all this. That show is very anxiety producing! I had forgotten that. It's good but everyone must have wore bite guards to bed. What ever happened to Rob Codreys brother? He was so cute...
Dick Wolf owes me a cookie. Last week I was the only one watching his show because Lost was on and this week I was the only one watching his show because American Idol was on. I mean, really. I was the only one in America who watched the last two episodes of Law and Order . I think I want Jeremy Sisto to come to my house and mow my lawn.
Today at work someone ate baked spaghetti at their desk and I decided I needed baked spaghetti for dinner. I came home fed everyone else their dinner and then thought about mine. I wanted good ingredients, so I thought about going to Lowe's because they must better than Kroger, which is much better than Food Lion but charges too much. I wanted to gt something good but I didn't want to get over charged. I then treated myself to a Kroger where market research told them the stores target demographic want to have Newman's Own products available. The market research at my Kroger told them them the demographic at that store doesn't know who Paul Newman was and isn't interested in any spaghetti sauce that can not also be used as a frosting.
I ended up with some really good baked spaghetti. Not homemade but really, really good. I tarted it up and little and added some sausage and left it to simmer and it was good. Not my Moms, but still, for something out of a bottle it was not bad. Go Me. I was doing all this and I forgot that it wasn't actually Friday night and that I had other chores to do. Instead I went to a foreign grocery store and took a leisurely tour of the aisles and then I went home and browned the sausage and heated the sauce and made the spaghetti and I was like Oh. Damn. Is it Thursday?. Friday is a better day for leisurely shopping and cooking. Thursday's are better for gathering trash and deciding what I'm going to wear to work tomorrow and being aware that I have to go to work tomorrow. Fridays I can go wild.
I also had this idea that I was going to give Dogger a bath and launder all of her bedding. I'm not sure when I was going to do all this but I gather it was going to be after I mowed the lawn. I think my plans also included taking Dogger for a post-bath walk. I have no idea when all of this was going to get accomplished but I was also watching Studio 60 during all this. That show is very anxiety producing! I had forgotten that. It's good but everyone must have wore bite guards to bed. What ever happened to Rob Codreys brother? He was so cute...
Thursday, May 21, 2009
If It Bleeds It Leads. Truer words were never spoken.
Bad, a collection of cop cars. Really bad, TV trucks. Really, really bad? a collection of cop cars and a TV truck within sight of your house. And helicopters. The sight and sound of helicopters buzzing overhead drowns out the sound your property values make as they plunge.
I saw this as I was approaching my turn off. I took one look at the circus thought to myself Good! They finally busted that house over there with all those shifty, thug- looking guys with their too many loud cars. I knew they were bad news. Now Dogger and I can walk on the street again and not worry about that house anymore. And then I drove past said house and it wasn't busted. I could tell because I was permitted to drive past it .
I tooled on back to my house and pulled into the driveway. I still wanted to know what happened so I decided to go ask. I walked down my street and thought about asking a man washing his car if he knew anything but I didn't want to know about what he thought of what may or may not have happened. I wasn't looking for an opinion piece, I wanted cold, hard facts so I kept going, I stopped into one of the gas stations to see if the clerk knew anything but he was on the phone and ignored me and the other customer in the store. Ass. Hole. I left and moved on to the corner where the cops and TV truck were parked.
I thought about asking one of the cops, as they weren't doing anything at this point, but I decided I didn't to be told to go about my business, which translates as Go Away. I didn't want to go away, because this neighborhood is my business. I live here, everything that happens here is my business. I was dressed like a grown up today and I was in no mood to be told to go away. I wore a blue blazer today damn it and I expect the blazer to be respected. I have questions and I want answers.
My limited experience with talking to cops at crime scenes has taught me that they aren't really chatty and tend to want people like me to go about their business and leave them to there's. Which is fine I guess, but a child can learn about sex from their parents or they can learn about it from their friends and its infinitely more interesting and salacious if your friends tell you how it works. If Mom and Dad want the kiddos to know the facts, they need to get there first. In this case, I preferred Officer A and Officer B needed to give me the facts of life-or-death before I literally learned about it on the streets. I wasn't interested in questioning the neighborhood six year old to tell me what he over heard his Mother telling her friends. If something bad really happened, I wanted it straight.
So I went to the TV truck and asked what happened.
Two guys got shot over on Fisher Street and one of them ran and made it to the ABC store where he fell out. One of the guys was shot in the leg and one in the arm, no one died. They sent them to Wake Med.
The end. I went online and found the story . It's short. I hear sirens all the time here. Morning, noon and night there are cops rushing down Tarboro and New Bern and I never, ever see the story anywhere of what they are rushing off to with such urgency. I guess there are going somewhere where no one is bleeding, because apparently its not news worthy unless there is some blood loss.
Bad, a collection of cop cars. Really bad, TV trucks. Really, really bad? a collection of cop cars and a TV truck within sight of your house. And helicopters. The sight and sound of helicopters buzzing overhead drowns out the sound your property values make as they plunge.
I saw this as I was approaching my turn off. I took one look at the circus thought to myself Good! They finally busted that house over there with all those shifty, thug- looking guys with their too many loud cars. I knew they were bad news. Now Dogger and I can walk on the street again and not worry about that house anymore. And then I drove past said house and it wasn't busted. I could tell because I was permitted to drive past it .
I tooled on back to my house and pulled into the driveway. I still wanted to know what happened so I decided to go ask. I walked down my street and thought about asking a man washing his car if he knew anything but I didn't want to know about what he thought of what may or may not have happened. I wasn't looking for an opinion piece, I wanted cold, hard facts so I kept going, I stopped into one of the gas stations to see if the clerk knew anything but he was on the phone and ignored me and the other customer in the store. Ass. Hole. I left and moved on to the corner where the cops and TV truck were parked.
I thought about asking one of the cops, as they weren't doing anything at this point, but I decided I didn't to be told to go about my business, which translates as Go Away. I didn't want to go away, because this neighborhood is my business. I live here, everything that happens here is my business. I was dressed like a grown up today and I was in no mood to be told to go away. I wore a blue blazer today damn it and I expect the blazer to be respected. I have questions and I want answers.
My limited experience with talking to cops at crime scenes has taught me that they aren't really chatty and tend to want people like me to go about their business and leave them to there's. Which is fine I guess, but a child can learn about sex from their parents or they can learn about it from their friends and its infinitely more interesting and salacious if your friends tell you how it works. If Mom and Dad want the kiddos to know the facts, they need to get there first. In this case, I preferred Officer A and Officer B needed to give me the facts of life-or-death before I literally learned about it on the streets. I wasn't interested in questioning the neighborhood six year old to tell me what he over heard his Mother telling her friends. If something bad really happened, I wanted it straight.
So I went to the TV truck and asked what happened.
Two guys got shot over on Fisher Street and one of them ran and made it to the ABC store where he fell out. One of the guys was shot in the leg and one in the arm, no one died. They sent them to Wake Med.
The end. I went online and found the story . It's short. I hear sirens all the time here. Morning, noon and night there are cops rushing down Tarboro and New Bern and I never, ever see the story anywhere of what they are rushing off to with such urgency. I guess there are going somewhere where no one is bleeding, because apparently its not news worthy unless there is some blood loss.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Veterama
The other day, maybe last week, I took a look at Doggers still open incision. I don't look at it as often as I should because an open incision no matter how pink is still an open incision. I don't think you should spend that much time looking them, it's bad for your eyes and your appetite. I looked at the incision because it was the day after the last day of her most recent course of antibiotics, we're seven weeks post op and she has been on antibiotics for five of them.
I was looking at the now pinkish hole in her leg - down from the red gash it was before she started her second round of antibiotics - and I saw a "thing" a dark "thing". "Tick" I said. As per doctors orders Dogger and I have been walking and most of this walking has been outside, I would prefer walking her inside but most gyms won't allow dogs in to use their treadmills .Bastard speciesists!
Sometimes when we walk we walk on grass and things smaller and nastier than Dogger live in the grass we walk on, some of those small nasty things don't care for walking and prefer to ride for free and I assumed that she had picked up a hitchhiker. I poured some peroxide on the wound to clean it out and maybe dislodge or annoy Mr. Tick, thinking maybe he would be drowned... He wasn't because there was no "he" because after the peroxide did its job, the "thing" was reveled to be clear plastic. I had been told about internal stitches that would maybe come out... No stitch is that solid or plastic, it was not a stitch it was part of the surgery and it was poking through the wound.
Is this why it won't heal and why she is in a constant state of infection? I called the doctor who when he finally got back to me told me that I wasn't seeing what I was seeing. I told him I sure as hell was seeing what I was seeing and I needed to come in. It didn't help that all weekend it was wet and nasty and Dogger and I didn't walk, I noticed that the "thing" went back inside when she didn't use the knee, this annoyed me. I had made an appointment for Tuesday and I didn't need the "thing" to play hide and seek. I don't want to be "that" Dog Mom.
Monday we took a long walk and like magic the "thing" made an appearance! Dogger seemed a little fatigued and maybe a little sore. Tuesday she was more gimpy than she had been and this upset me, also I saw same signs of infection. Again. We went in and had our appointment and I told the vet about the "thing" and the walking and the gimpy and the pain and the fatigue. He made Dogger lay down and he preceded to pull a half an inch of what appeared to be heavy duty cat gut out of the wound track. He explained he had tied many knots and one had gotten loose. He examined her and and was very happy with the surgery and assured me the rest of the knot was in good shape and that the knee was doing very well. He hooked me up with two more weeks of antibiotics and told me to keep neosporin on the wound and to keep walking her. He wants to see us in three weeks.
The other day, maybe last week, I took a look at Doggers still open incision. I don't look at it as often as I should because an open incision no matter how pink is still an open incision. I don't think you should spend that much time looking them, it's bad for your eyes and your appetite. I looked at the incision because it was the day after the last day of her most recent course of antibiotics, we're seven weeks post op and she has been on antibiotics for five of them.
I was looking at the now pinkish hole in her leg - down from the red gash it was before she started her second round of antibiotics - and I saw a "thing" a dark "thing". "Tick" I said. As per doctors orders Dogger and I have been walking and most of this walking has been outside, I would prefer walking her inside but most gyms won't allow dogs in to use their treadmills .Bastard speciesists!
Sometimes when we walk we walk on grass and things smaller and nastier than Dogger live in the grass we walk on, some of those small nasty things don't care for walking and prefer to ride for free and I assumed that she had picked up a hitchhiker. I poured some peroxide on the wound to clean it out and maybe dislodge or annoy Mr. Tick, thinking maybe he would be drowned... He wasn't because there was no "he" because after the peroxide did its job, the "thing" was reveled to be clear plastic. I had been told about internal stitches that would maybe come out... No stitch is that solid or plastic, it was not a stitch it was part of the surgery and it was poking through the wound.
Is this why it won't heal and why she is in a constant state of infection? I called the doctor who when he finally got back to me told me that I wasn't seeing what I was seeing. I told him I sure as hell was seeing what I was seeing and I needed to come in. It didn't help that all weekend it was wet and nasty and Dogger and I didn't walk, I noticed that the "thing" went back inside when she didn't use the knee, this annoyed me. I had made an appointment for Tuesday and I didn't need the "thing" to play hide and seek. I don't want to be "that" Dog Mom.
Monday we took a long walk and like magic the "thing" made an appearance! Dogger seemed a little fatigued and maybe a little sore. Tuesday she was more gimpy than she had been and this upset me, also I saw same signs of infection. Again. We went in and had our appointment and I told the vet about the "thing" and the walking and the gimpy and the pain and the fatigue. He made Dogger lay down and he preceded to pull a half an inch of what appeared to be heavy duty cat gut out of the wound track. He explained he had tied many knots and one had gotten loose. He examined her and and was very happy with the surgery and assured me the rest of the knot was in good shape and that the knee was doing very well. He hooked me up with two more weeks of antibiotics and told me to keep neosporin on the wound and to keep walking her. He wants to see us in three weeks.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Garden Update 4
Not much time as passed since the last update but there have been changes. The Jolly Green Tomato has gotten even taller!
Not much time as passed since the last update but there have been changes. The Jolly Green Tomato has gotten even taller!
Everyone is perking right along . So far only two plants, one tomato and one pepper have come across with blooms all the peppers have infant blooms waiting to matures. The tomatoes are all taller then the peppers,but they so far with the exception of the curb buster are only sporting fetal future blooms. You can tell they have the potential to be blooms but they aren't anywhere ready yet, I think they need it to stop raining all the time to do their thing and it would help if they could spend more time in the sunlight. I have noticed that this rainy season the tomatoes aren't forming squicky pseudo roots along their stems because of the damp, in last years rainy season they grew them and this year they haven't. a Why? relative age of the plants? timing of the rain in their life cycle? the presence of mulch? the plants were planted deeper than last year? use of soaker hoses instead of traditional watering techniques? Who knows.
This shot shows the tomatoes and a few of the peppers. The peppers, while squaty little plants, are producing flowers and are ready to get to pepper growing. The one tomato plant with flowers is the Carolina Golden variety, a native species that I had to get when my Tangerine Mama plant keeled over. All the tomatoes are cleared for this region but the Carolina is really at home and it shows.
Here we have pictures the rest of the peppers and the beans and broccoli. The seed grown beans have really surprised me. They sprouted with shocked the hell out of me and then they grew. SO far so good with them, they seem a lot more interested in growing leaves than they are in growing beans but I could say the same thing about the other plants too. The beans may be starting tiny bean pods but they also might be teeny leaves. The broccoli's are also perking along. They are much, much more involved with their leaf production but I think they're supposed to do that for a long time. The brocs are also the only plants being chewed on, well. one of the brocs is being chewed on. I keep poisoning but it keeps raining and washing away the poison but not oddly, the bugs.
Family Portrait
Monday, May 18, 2009
Really?
There was just nothing right about the Bush Admins handling of the Iraq War, not one damned thing. Shockingly, Donald Rumsfeld illustrated with photos of soldiers at prayer and bible verses on the covers of the daily war briefings he presented Shrub with: see slide show , as a believer this sickens me and lets me know what low esteem they held my faith. It's disgusting.
There was just nothing right about the Bush Admins handling of the Iraq War, not one damned thing. Shockingly, Donald Rumsfeld illustrated with photos of soldiers at prayer and bible verses on the covers of the daily war briefings he presented Shrub with: see slide show , as a believer this sickens me and lets me know what low esteem they held my faith. It's disgusting.
Happy Anniversary
I missed important anniversaries last week. On Friday, It was my eighth anniversary of working with the state and Tuesday was my eighth anniversary of living in the state. I remembered that November 1 was the anniversary of my last day at the nursing home and October 15 was the anniversary of being called to HR and being told that today they were giving my two weeks notice that they were laying me off. It is cold comfort that the witch in HR doesn't have her job there either.
But anyway One door closes and a window opens - Which has always sounded weird to me. The door is closed but "Hey there's a window!" What are you supposed to do, jump out of it? I bet if I hadn't jumped cross country and I was still living in Dallas I wouldn't be wearing a corduroy shirt right now and I certainly would not have ordered hot chocolate with lunch.
Saturdays' weather was completely different. It was hot, and while it did rain, it stopped every now and then. Today, it just rained all day, the upside being that I was relived of all responsibility towards mowing my lawn - Which I didn't want to do anyway, as it didn't technically "need" to be mowed, but I would have most likely, maybe. Now I'm going to end up doing sometime this week after work no maybe's about it, and by then it really need to be mowed.
pause
I had to stop typing for a while because Tiny was trying to escape by tunneling down my sleeve and it interfered. I had tucked him under my shirt because I was cold and I thought he would like being close to his Mummy and it would be a good Person/Kitty bonding thing. It wasn't. Poor Tiny, his little brain is just not well developed, he could have just left the shirt the way he got in but instead first he tried to escape by crawling out the neck of the shirt, where he was stymied and then he tried to make a break for it by tunneling down my sleeve, where he was again stopped short, I had to unbutton my shirt cuff before he he could get out. I laughed a lot. He didn't. The Kitty would have just blasted his way to freedom. Poor Tex. Sigh.
Speaking of my late cat, I went to the art fair this weekend in hopes of finding him an urn, he's earned one after all and I don't want him to spend eternity in a plastic box. I looked at a lot of pottery but I couldn't find the right peice and then I started to think that maybe a breakable container might not be the right choice, Tex was a life long smasher of crockery, and it would be Karmic justice if Tiny accidentally smashed his urn. Tiny doesn't do things on purpose like Tex did, but he is clumsy. I also think that Tex would like to be in a warmer, more natural environment as he was a real lover of the outdoors, what little of it he got to experence. Okay, I know he's dead and his ashes feel nothing , but still I want his spirit to approve of his lodgings. So, I am now thinking of maybe a wooden container. Wooden vessels also come with lids and that was an issue I had with a lot of the pottery I looked at - No lid. No lid means no go as far as the storage of ashes is concerned and it can't be a permanent lid because I want the opportunity to scatter ashes, I just don't want to scatter him on the carpet.
I missed important anniversaries last week. On Friday, It was my eighth anniversary of working with the state and Tuesday was my eighth anniversary of living in the state. I remembered that November 1 was the anniversary of my last day at the nursing home and October 15 was the anniversary of being called to HR and being told that today they were giving my two weeks notice that they were laying me off. It is cold comfort that the witch in HR doesn't have her job there either.
But anyway One door closes and a window opens - Which has always sounded weird to me. The door is closed but "Hey there's a window!" What are you supposed to do, jump out of it? I bet if I hadn't jumped cross country and I was still living in Dallas I wouldn't be wearing a corduroy shirt right now and I certainly would not have ordered hot chocolate with lunch.
Saturdays' weather was completely different. It was hot, and while it did rain, it stopped every now and then. Today, it just rained all day, the upside being that I was relived of all responsibility towards mowing my lawn - Which I didn't want to do anyway, as it didn't technically "need" to be mowed, but I would have most likely, maybe. Now I'm going to end up doing sometime this week after work no maybe's about it, and by then it really need to be mowed.
pause
I had to stop typing for a while because Tiny was trying to escape by tunneling down my sleeve and it interfered. I had tucked him under my shirt because I was cold and I thought he would like being close to his Mummy and it would be a good Person/Kitty bonding thing. It wasn't. Poor Tiny, his little brain is just not well developed, he could have just left the shirt the way he got in but instead first he tried to escape by crawling out the neck of the shirt, where he was stymied and then he tried to make a break for it by tunneling down my sleeve, where he was again stopped short, I had to unbutton my shirt cuff before he he could get out. I laughed a lot. He didn't. The Kitty would have just blasted his way to freedom. Poor Tex. Sigh.
Speaking of my late cat, I went to the art fair this weekend in hopes of finding him an urn, he's earned one after all and I don't want him to spend eternity in a plastic box. I looked at a lot of pottery but I couldn't find the right peice and then I started to think that maybe a breakable container might not be the right choice, Tex was a life long smasher of crockery, and it would be Karmic justice if Tiny accidentally smashed his urn. Tiny doesn't do things on purpose like Tex did, but he is clumsy. I also think that Tex would like to be in a warmer, more natural environment as he was a real lover of the outdoors, what little of it he got to experence. Okay, I know he's dead and his ashes feel nothing , but still I want his spirit to approve of his lodgings. So, I am now thinking of maybe a wooden container. Wooden vessels also come with lids and that was an issue I had with a lot of the pottery I looked at - No lid. No lid means no go as far as the storage of ashes is concerned and it can't be a permanent lid because I want the opportunity to scatter ashes, I just don't want to scatter him on the carpet.
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Friday, May 15, 2009
Friday!!
I am a very bad person. I think its more interesting to learn that Stephen Fry, a man I've never met, had a good meeting about audio-books and is planning dinner with friends, than the fact that a guy I've known since seventh grade ran 12 miles. I'm shallow and bad. I recognize that. Twitter is Facebook for people you don't know and will never meet. Twitter is Facebook for the very successful. It's also kind of neat challenge to try to be make sense when you only have 140 letters to do it in. It's harder than it looks, it's kind of like writing a ten minute one act, it sounds easy until you realize you have take what would be an hour plus worth of action and dialogue and synthesize into ten minutes beginning, middle, end and it has to make sense.
It;s really cool though and if you aren't there yet, I suggest you go. It's fun. Today for instance, I told Matthew Perry that a good way to survive the next nine months without Lost would be to paint his dog white. I don't even watch Lost! I'm not even sure that regular people are supposed to message the Celebrities at all. I'm hoping that out of his 54,000 followers that I am not the only one who isn't up on their Twitter Etiquette. He hasn't answered back and he won't, But you know, I messaged Mathew Perry! So much cooler than telling Collen Theis that Erasure music takes me back to college in a big way too.
Anyway.
I went on Wednesday to have a cavity filled and the worst part of the whole thing - Worse than that nasty shot they give you to deaden the area, worse that that ICBM they use to give you the Novocaine, worse even than the sound of the drill was the FAUX News! They have TV screens at every station and the last time I was in there for a procedure they gave me a remote and told me to have at, this time they didn't and I had to sit there and think about getting a filling at the same time I was being forced to watch FAUX! It was horrible.
And it gets worse, I got up the nerve to shift the screen away and this was better. When the dentist finally got around to me the first thing he did was move the screen around so couldn't avoind it! This was the first time ever that I looked forward to the drilling because at last I couldn't hear or see the TV. I should have known, while I was in the waiting room the only reading material I could find was The Readers Digest, Golf Digest and Guns and Gardens. Even odder? Prominently displayed was a hard back copy of the Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book.
Doggers surgeon also has copies of Guns and Garden in his office too, I've only opened one issue but I can imagine that they are all full of gorgeously photographed flower gardens next to stories detailing what firearm to use to best kill vols and rabbits and other garden pests. Weird stuff and not available on newstands.
I am a very bad person. I think its more interesting to learn that Stephen Fry, a man I've never met, had a good meeting about audio-books and is planning dinner with friends, than the fact that a guy I've known since seventh grade ran 12 miles. I'm shallow and bad. I recognize that. Twitter is Facebook for people you don't know and will never meet. Twitter is Facebook for the very successful. It's also kind of neat challenge to try to be make sense when you only have 140 letters to do it in. It's harder than it looks, it's kind of like writing a ten minute one act, it sounds easy until you realize you have take what would be an hour plus worth of action and dialogue and synthesize into ten minutes beginning, middle, end and it has to make sense.
It;s really cool though and if you aren't there yet, I suggest you go. It's fun. Today for instance, I told Matthew Perry that a good way to survive the next nine months without Lost would be to paint his dog white. I don't even watch Lost! I'm not even sure that regular people are supposed to message the Celebrities at all. I'm hoping that out of his 54,000 followers that I am not the only one who isn't up on their Twitter Etiquette. He hasn't answered back and he won't, But you know, I messaged Mathew Perry! So much cooler than telling Collen Theis that Erasure music takes me back to college in a big way too.
Anyway.
I went on Wednesday to have a cavity filled and the worst part of the whole thing - Worse than that nasty shot they give you to deaden the area, worse that that ICBM they use to give you the Novocaine, worse even than the sound of the drill was the FAUX News! They have TV screens at every station and the last time I was in there for a procedure they gave me a remote and told me to have at, this time they didn't and I had to sit there and think about getting a filling at the same time I was being forced to watch FAUX! It was horrible.
And it gets worse, I got up the nerve to shift the screen away and this was better. When the dentist finally got around to me the first thing he did was move the screen around so couldn't avoind it! This was the first time ever that I looked forward to the drilling because at last I couldn't hear or see the TV. I should have known, while I was in the waiting room the only reading material I could find was The Readers Digest, Golf Digest and Guns and Gardens. Even odder? Prominently displayed was a hard back copy of the Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book.
Doggers surgeon also has copies of Guns and Garden in his office too, I've only opened one issue but I can imagine that they are all full of gorgeously photographed flower gardens next to stories detailing what firearm to use to best kill vols and rabbits and other garden pests. Weird stuff and not available on newstands.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Theories
I'm itchy. Itchy, itchy, itchy. I'm making myself kind of crazy here. I have four theories of why I am this way.
Theory 1 - I am spending too much time visiting with the garden. There isn't a great deal of work right now, I did a lot of work before so that I wouldn't have to do it now. Since I don't need to work on the garden I get to spend quality time with instead : I visit it. I go out in the morning before I go to work and have conversations with it: Good Morning little plants! How are you? Are you good little plants? Are you Mama's good little plants? How's Mama's good little plants? Are you going to grow today? Are Mama's plants going to grow today? Yes you are! You are going to grow today! Mama has to go to work now, you big good little plants! Bye-Bye!
After work I go to visit with the garden again after the animals have all been fed and played with. I pull whatever suicidal teeny weedlets are making themselves oblivious and add more egg shells and poison as necessary. There isn't much conversation. The issue is, my backyard is full of mosquitoes. Full, they are like a curtain! It just looks like its screened in but it isn't! Its like the freaking Phillipines back there. The more time I spend out there the more time I spend being itchy. Theory 1: Saturation
Theory 2 : It's dry. Never mind the rain, my world is parched, My house and office are veritable Sahara's. I went to the eye doctor the other day and she announced that my eyes are dry. She told me that a side effect of my advanced years would be a certain amount of dryness and she suggested fish oil pills and KY jelly, Kidding! She suggested eye drops but it was what she meant. I think my eyes were dry because I splashed poison in them ( I got some new and improved poison that is actually supposed to kill things that are exposed to it.And cause blindness. Big change from the last stuff that promised to ecologically neutral and mildly insulting to garden pests. I'm not counting the ladybugs because they died before they had a chance to go lady bugs of war on anything. Pity) and so I held them under running waste for twenty minutes and I think that was why my eyes were dry the next day. Humph. My skin is also dry and I don't drink anywhere near enough water. I drink a hell of a lot of green tea, which is great but its not water. Theory 2: Dehydration.
Theory 3 : I got the vets okay to put Frontline on Dogger and now whatever was on her is on me. This is the least attractive theory. I haven't actually seen any beasties and there weren't any in evidence when I bathed her but she's now covered in flea napalm and I am itchy. Theory 3 : Infestation.
Theory 4 : Detergent Allergy. I've used the same stuff for months and months and nothing happened but all of a sudden I'm allergic to it. Theory 4 - Rationalization.
I'm itchy. Itchy, itchy, itchy. I'm making myself kind of crazy here. I have four theories of why I am this way.
Theory 1 - I am spending too much time visiting with the garden. There isn't a great deal of work right now, I did a lot of work before so that I wouldn't have to do it now. Since I don't need to work on the garden I get to spend quality time with instead : I visit it. I go out in the morning before I go to work and have conversations with it: Good Morning little plants! How are you? Are you good little plants? Are you Mama's good little plants? How's Mama's good little plants? Are you going to grow today? Are Mama's plants going to grow today? Yes you are! You are going to grow today! Mama has to go to work now, you big good little plants! Bye-Bye!
After work I go to visit with the garden again after the animals have all been fed and played with. I pull whatever suicidal teeny weedlets are making themselves oblivious and add more egg shells and poison as necessary. There isn't much conversation. The issue is, my backyard is full of mosquitoes. Full, they are like a curtain! It just looks like its screened in but it isn't! Its like the freaking Phillipines back there. The more time I spend out there the more time I spend being itchy. Theory 1: Saturation
Theory 2 : It's dry. Never mind the rain, my world is parched, My house and office are veritable Sahara's. I went to the eye doctor the other day and she announced that my eyes are dry. She told me that a side effect of my advanced years would be a certain amount of dryness and she suggested fish oil pills and KY jelly, Kidding! She suggested eye drops but it was what she meant. I think my eyes were dry because I splashed poison in them ( I got some new and improved poison that is actually supposed to kill things that are exposed to it.And cause blindness. Big change from the last stuff that promised to ecologically neutral and mildly insulting to garden pests. I'm not counting the ladybugs because they died before they had a chance to go lady bugs of war on anything. Pity) and so I held them under running waste for twenty minutes and I think that was why my eyes were dry the next day. Humph. My skin is also dry and I don't drink anywhere near enough water. I drink a hell of a lot of green tea, which is great but its not water. Theory 2: Dehydration.
Theory 3 : I got the vets okay to put Frontline on Dogger and now whatever was on her is on me. This is the least attractive theory. I haven't actually seen any beasties and there weren't any in evidence when I bathed her but she's now covered in flea napalm and I am itchy. Theory 3 : Infestation.
Theory 4 : Detergent Allergy. I've used the same stuff for months and months and nothing happened but all of a sudden I'm allergic to it. Theory 4 - Rationalization.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Cha, Cha, Changes
I just saw a preview for Land of the Lost. Why GAWD Why! Is it true that Will Ferrell is physically unable of saying No! to money? because I think this was a a really great opportunity to test that theory, because clearly now he has a very real problem and a crap movie. I saw two minutes and I think I may have to cancel my Netflix. What's next Sigmund the Sea Monster ? I mean really. Johnny? Scott? I see one of the boys from Suite Life with Zack and Cody and one of the Jonas Brothers in the Johnny Whittaker part. It would be utter crap, but it would have a bofo opening weekend and possibly spell the end of both Zac and Cody and The Jonas Brothers, so it wouldn't be a total loss.
I'm not going to cancel my Netflix just yet. I'm going to start re-watching Studio Sixty on the Sunset Strip. I follow Matthew Perry on Twitter and he's a genuinely funny guy. I initially tuned into S6otSS when it was on TV for the Chandler Bing and stayed for the Matthew Perry. I wish now he was spending more time working and less time playing video games and going to Ducks hockey games. Someone give the man a job.
Changing the subject. I want everyone to notice that Dogger is voluntarily wandering around her room and she is using all four feet simultaneously.Today she and I took her first real walk since the end of March! We had been taking short, theapeutic walks for the last two weeks but they were short and I wanted to see if Dogger was up to a longer walk - As is turned out those walks were useful and her endurance has really improved. When we started she could only make it a couple of houses down the street before she wanted to go home. It took weeks but those little walks did their job. Today, she and I walked all the way to the rec center and all the way back. I have to disclose that she did want to lay down once we got there but she got right up and walked all the way home. Her gate is much better than it was and she only hopped a couple of times when she was hurrying to make an important pee. I was very heartened.
She is also looking a lot better too, a lot healthier and a lot less lame. She is still bald on her leg and hip and where her IVs were inserted but more importantly she has regained some of the weight she lost and I think her muscle tone is much improved, I mean there is clearly some muscle waste and loss but I think she is starting to slowly make some gains. She still has a long way to go, the vet said up to eight months which is about what the yahoo group people talk about too, but I think we're on the right track at six weeks out from surgery. Everyone think positive thoughts about the wound staying clean, the repair staying strong and secure and we both remember that she has a very long path ahead of her and we don't get over confident and do something stupid and wreak everything.
I just saw a preview for Land of the Lost. Why GAWD Why! Is it true that Will Ferrell is physically unable of saying No! to money? because I think this was a a really great opportunity to test that theory, because clearly now he has a very real problem and a crap movie. I saw two minutes and I think I may have to cancel my Netflix. What's next Sigmund the Sea Monster ? I mean really. Johnny? Scott? I see one of the boys from Suite Life with Zack and Cody and one of the Jonas Brothers in the Johnny Whittaker part. It would be utter crap, but it would have a bofo opening weekend and possibly spell the end of both Zac and Cody and The Jonas Brothers, so it wouldn't be a total loss.
I'm not going to cancel my Netflix just yet. I'm going to start re-watching Studio Sixty on the Sunset Strip. I follow Matthew Perry on Twitter and he's a genuinely funny guy. I initially tuned into S6otSS when it was on TV for the Chandler Bing and stayed for the Matthew Perry. I wish now he was spending more time working and less time playing video games and going to Ducks hockey games. Someone give the man a job.
Changing the subject. I want everyone to notice that Dogger is voluntarily wandering around her room and she is using all four feet simultaneously.Today she and I took her first real walk since the end of March! We had been taking short, theapeutic walks for the last two weeks but they were short and I wanted to see if Dogger was up to a longer walk - As is turned out those walks were useful and her endurance has really improved. When we started she could only make it a couple of houses down the street before she wanted to go home. It took weeks but those little walks did their job. Today, she and I walked all the way to the rec center and all the way back. I have to disclose that she did want to lay down once we got there but she got right up and walked all the way home. Her gate is much better than it was and she only hopped a couple of times when she was hurrying to make an important pee. I was very heartened.
She is also looking a lot better too, a lot healthier and a lot less lame. She is still bald on her leg and hip and where her IVs were inserted but more importantly she has regained some of the weight she lost and I think her muscle tone is much improved, I mean there is clearly some muscle waste and loss but I think she is starting to slowly make some gains. She still has a long way to go, the vet said up to eight months which is about what the yahoo group people talk about too, but I think we're on the right track at six weeks out from surgery. Everyone think positive thoughts about the wound staying clean, the repair staying strong and secure and we both remember that she has a very long path ahead of her and we don't get over confident and do something stupid and wreak everything.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Room Mates
I have a house guest, well, she's been here for three weeks and she'll be here for an additional two weeks so she's really not a guest anymore. She's moved into border territory. I welcomed her into my home and she snarled at me.
And that was on a good day. The rest of the time she's hissed at me while I cleaned her box and told me to go to hell while I brought her her nummies. My Moms' cat is not a nice person.
Sweetie Kitty does not like me. She has never liked me, she wouldn't let me even touch for years, which really hurt because animals like me, they have always liked me. Cows like me, llama's like me, feral cats like me but Sweetie the cat hates me. It's unnatural. It's also unfair because she has the fur of a baby chick, down pillows are jealous of her. Really, my parents keep their TV remotes in there and I lusted just to touch it but she was a selfish beast. She was a nasty, hissing cat beast right up until... She was abandoned in my house and she gave up all hope. Robbed of hope, sad, lonely and deprived of her home and hearth she morphed into really a very nice cat. The last time she stayed with me was right after Tex died and she was so nice to me! He died and she morphed into a new cat. She was furry and fuzzy and sweet! And her fur! Oh my Gawd her fur! Baby ducklings aren't that soft, baby bunnies are like sandpaper compared to her. She gave me full body head butts and cuddled with me and purred like a race car for hours. She was my own little feline grief counselor and thanks to her, I was able to see to go out and get my baby Ace.
Time past. She went home and things went back to normal. She forgot all about our "affair". I didn't. Tiny and I went to her house and I fully believed that we would start up where we finished. Yeah. Not so much. She bit me and then attacked my cat. It was over.
More time past. She came back to my house.
She was a nasty, hissing cat beast right up until... She was abandoned in my house and she gave up all hope. Robbed of hope, sad, lonely and deprived of her home and hearth she morphed into really a very nice cat. Again. . She's even nicer to cuddle than Tiny because she knows how. Tiny doesn't want to cuddle, Tiny wants to play!play!play! and nibble my fingers and bounce off my face. AT the end of a bad day I don't really want to play, I want full body head butts and power purring. I have another two weeks before she hates me again. It's a twist on Flowers for Algernon, instead of growing a brain she grows a heart, it's Cat Toys for Fluffy.
I have a house guest, well, she's been here for three weeks and she'll be here for an additional two weeks so she's really not a guest anymore. She's moved into border territory. I welcomed her into my home and she snarled at me.
And that was on a good day. The rest of the time she's hissed at me while I cleaned her box and told me to go to hell while I brought her her nummies. My Moms' cat is not a nice person.
Sweetie Kitty does not like me. She has never liked me, she wouldn't let me even touch for years, which really hurt because animals like me, they have always liked me. Cows like me, llama's like me, feral cats like me but Sweetie the cat hates me. It's unnatural. It's also unfair because she has the fur of a baby chick, down pillows are jealous of her. Really, my parents keep their TV remotes in there and I lusted just to touch it but she was a selfish beast. She was a nasty, hissing cat beast right up until... She was abandoned in my house and she gave up all hope. Robbed of hope, sad, lonely and deprived of her home and hearth she morphed into really a very nice cat. The last time she stayed with me was right after Tex died and she was so nice to me! He died and she morphed into a new cat. She was furry and fuzzy and sweet! And her fur! Oh my Gawd her fur! Baby ducklings aren't that soft, baby bunnies are like sandpaper compared to her. She gave me full body head butts and cuddled with me and purred like a race car for hours. She was my own little feline grief counselor and thanks to her, I was able to see to go out and get my baby Ace.
Time past. She went home and things went back to normal. She forgot all about our "affair". I didn't. Tiny and I went to her house and I fully believed that we would start up where we finished. Yeah. Not so much. She bit me and then attacked my cat. It was over.
More time past. She came back to my house.
She was a nasty, hissing cat beast right up until... She was abandoned in my house and she gave up all hope. Robbed of hope, sad, lonely and deprived of her home and hearth she morphed into really a very nice cat. Again. . She's even nicer to cuddle than Tiny because she knows how. Tiny doesn't want to cuddle, Tiny wants to play!play!play! and nibble my fingers and bounce off my face. AT the end of a bad day I don't really want to play, I want full body head butts and power purring. I have another two weeks before she hates me again. It's a twist on Flowers for Algernon, instead of growing a brain she grows a heart, it's Cat Toys for Fluffy.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Garden Update 3
I'm not sure if it reads well in the picture but one of my tomato plants is clearly offspring of Jacks beanstalk. The others are growing well too, but not like Beanstalk Jr. One of them seems to be getting wider but not taller, it's my surviving Mama variety. I think its the yellow variety and I'm beginning to think that maybe it's a weak sister to the other more butch varieties. A variety called "Italian Ice", which produces small, white fruits is kicking it's ass in the growing and developing portion of the pageant. Maybe the Mama plants are just not as suited to here as the others? My other Mama plant died almost immediately. Yellow Mama is still perking along though its just not growing taller- Maybe its a younger plant? It might just be a function of maturity. I hope so because the one is looking to turn into a shrub.
The peppers are doing well, I'm prepared for them to take longer to really get going, so the fact they seem kind of puny is officially not causing me stress this year. Last year I think it was well into the growing season before they produced anything and I was freaking out .
Oh. I planted more plants. I know, I know. I say I'm finished with planting and I go and plant more. It's a sickness - But the plants I planted this time are flowers so they don't count as "Oh Dear Gawd, not more plants!" in my book. Flowers are pretty and decorative and they are pretty and decorative without anyone's help. Besides, I've known this plants since they were seeds, Alphagal started them herself and has been hand raising them for weeks. I've added black eyed susan vines to my backyard. The front of the house is covered with flowers and I'm really happy with the way it looks. My back yard on the other hand just looks like ass. In addition to the vines, Alphagal gave me some nasturniums that went right into the garden. Nasturtiums are eatable and make very good companion plants in a vegetable garden.
Vines need something to climb and as I was coming home from Broskey and Alphagals' I was thinking maybe I should stop and pick up trellis material so the plants could climb - But then I decided that the trellises I've seen at Poverty Barn aren't really what I had in mind and they were too expensive and clearly cheap at the same time. I hate that. I went home and it was then that I had an epiphany! I did have trellis material, it just wasn't a trellis! Two or three years ago I bought these cheap wire fences to keep Dogger away from some plantings and I still had them - They are terrific trellises! Tall enough, strong enough and all ready in my back yard. I just used a wire clipper to separate the sections and put them to work. I have three of them, two against the back fence and one against the basement bar. Score! And even better? Recycling/Reusing/Repurposing! Pin a green star on me!
I'm not sure if it reads well in the picture but one of my tomato plants is clearly offspring of Jacks beanstalk. The others are growing well too, but not like Beanstalk Jr. One of them seems to be getting wider but not taller, it's my surviving Mama variety. I think its the yellow variety and I'm beginning to think that maybe it's a weak sister to the other more butch varieties. A variety called "Italian Ice", which produces small, white fruits is kicking it's ass in the growing and developing portion of the pageant. Maybe the Mama plants are just not as suited to here as the others? My other Mama plant died almost immediately. Yellow Mama is still perking along though its just not growing taller- Maybe its a younger plant? It might just be a function of maturity. I hope so because the one is looking to turn into a shrub.
The peppers are doing well, I'm prepared for them to take longer to really get going, so the fact they seem kind of puny is officially not causing me stress this year. Last year I think it was well into the growing season before they produced anything and I was freaking out .
Oh. I planted more plants. I know, I know. I say I'm finished with planting and I go and plant more. It's a sickness - But the plants I planted this time are flowers so they don't count as "Oh Dear Gawd, not more plants!" in my book. Flowers are pretty and decorative and they are pretty and decorative without anyone's help. Besides, I've known this plants since they were seeds, Alphagal started them herself and has been hand raising them for weeks. I've added black eyed susan vines to my backyard. The front of the house is covered with flowers and I'm really happy with the way it looks. My back yard on the other hand just looks like ass. In addition to the vines, Alphagal gave me some nasturniums that went right into the garden. Nasturtiums are eatable and make very good companion plants in a vegetable garden.
Vines need something to climb and as I was coming home from Broskey and Alphagals' I was thinking maybe I should stop and pick up trellis material so the plants could climb - But then I decided that the trellises I've seen at Poverty Barn aren't really what I had in mind and they were too expensive and clearly cheap at the same time. I hate that. I went home and it was then that I had an epiphany! I did have trellis material, it just wasn't a trellis! Two or three years ago I bought these cheap wire fences to keep Dogger away from some plantings and I still had them - They are terrific trellises! Tall enough, strong enough and all ready in my back yard. I just used a wire clipper to separate the sections and put them to work. I have three of them, two against the back fence and one against the basement bar. Score! And even better? Recycling/Reusing/Repurposing! Pin a green star on me!
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Friday, May 8, 2009
Blerg
Well. I let loose the ladybugs of war and there was considerable fatalities and a larger number of deserters. I went out and checked on them Thursday morning and they were still around and in great numbers but by the time I got home after work the only ladybugs I could find were dead.
I then poisoned the fuck out of the garden. I tried. I really, really did! I just do not want to have my food eaten by creatures who are not me. I didn't nail everything, just the broccolis and the raspberries because they seem to be taking the brunt of the snacking.
Not one. Not one living ladybug. Out of 1500 ladybugs. Not one stuck around, not one was willing to put in the work. They didn't like me, I understand that now. It's okay, if there were any left I rained enough pesticide down on them to make my very own Bhopal. Maybe next time I'll spring for the ladybugs who are more open and ready for a relationship. Or maybe I'll make them sign contracts or insist they give me their real names and numbers. Bygones.
The good news is that while I was searching for my troops I noticed that two of my pepper plants appear to be working on flowers buds! I'm thrilled. I have to check to see what kinds but I'm not thinking either are of the larger varieties, but still yay! I can figure out what to do with different kinds of peppers, I'm sure that most peppers can be stuffed right? That's what we do with peppers, right? It's what I do with them. After I wash off Bhopal.
Okay, changing the subject, How long does it take for kittens to develop bones? Tiny doesn't have bones yet and I was wondering when they are going to come on. He's still really squishy and he weighs about, nothing. Baby Nephew has outweighed him since birth, The Kitty outweighed Tiny E for months and months! I'm pretty sure that Tiny is made of marshmallow... Tiny is a peep! OMG!
Well. I let loose the ladybugs of war and there was considerable fatalities and a larger number of deserters. I went out and checked on them Thursday morning and they were still around and in great numbers but by the time I got home after work the only ladybugs I could find were dead.
I then poisoned the fuck out of the garden. I tried. I really, really did! I just do not want to have my food eaten by creatures who are not me. I didn't nail everything, just the broccolis and the raspberries because they seem to be taking the brunt of the snacking.
Not one. Not one living ladybug. Out of 1500 ladybugs. Not one stuck around, not one was willing to put in the work. They didn't like me, I understand that now. It's okay, if there were any left I rained enough pesticide down on them to make my very own Bhopal. Maybe next time I'll spring for the ladybugs who are more open and ready for a relationship. Or maybe I'll make them sign contracts or insist they give me their real names and numbers. Bygones.
The good news is that while I was searching for my troops I noticed that two of my pepper plants appear to be working on flowers buds! I'm thrilled. I have to check to see what kinds but I'm not thinking either are of the larger varieties, but still yay! I can figure out what to do with different kinds of peppers, I'm sure that most peppers can be stuffed right? That's what we do with peppers, right? It's what I do with them. After I wash off Bhopal.
Okay, changing the subject, How long does it take for kittens to develop bones? Tiny doesn't have bones yet and I was wondering when they are going to come on. He's still really squishy and he weighs about, nothing. Baby Nephew has outweighed him since birth, The Kitty outweighed Tiny E for months and months! I'm pretty sure that Tiny is made of marshmallow... Tiny is a peep! OMG!
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Dear Fellow Workers...
In honor and recognition of state employees, I join all North Carolinians in celebrating your contributions and service by proclaiming May 3 –9, 2009 as “State Employee Recognition Week,” and May 6 as “State Employee Appreciation Day.”
No work offers more opportunity to make a positive impact in the lives of our fellow citizens than state government service does. No workers have more passion, dedication and commitment than North Carolina state employees. The standards of excellence and quality service that you provide to our citizens everyday help to make North Carolina great. I am very proud of your service and sacrifice.
HA!!!
In honor and recognition of state employees, I join all North Carolinians in celebrating your contributions and service by proclaiming May 3 –9, 2009 as “State Employee Recognition Week,” and May 6 as “State Employee Appreciation Day.”
No work offers more opportunity to make a positive impact in the lives of our fellow citizens than state government service does. No workers have more passion, dedication and commitment than North Carolina state employees. The standards of excellence and quality service that you provide to our citizens everyday help to make North Carolina great. I am very proud of your service and sacrifice.
HA!!!
Big Cheese
Just some quick hits because I had a meeting and didn't get home till later than I had expected. I want to know how I ended up on the Senate District Executive Committee and then, how did I rate being a voting member? Wow. The power of the Precinct Vice Chairmanship.
A few weeks ago Vernon Malone died suddenly. He was our senator from District 14 and he was an institution, an institution who had just been elected to office. I knew they were going to have to name a replacement but I had thought there would be a special election. I had been getting calls and visits from a couple of candidates for the slot. One in particular came to my house three times and called me every day for a week. Al Franken doesn't call me everyday and Al Franken calls me a lot.
I had decided to vote for my stalker because he wore me down and I hadn't heard from any of the others. I didn't know there were any others - Then I went to the meeting and found out there were others, lots of others. I ended up seconding the nomination of one of them at the request of my Chair. The candidate ended up pulling herself from the race, but I did think she was the best speaker of the crowd I wasn;t going to vote for. The guy who was stalking me turned out to be a terrible speaker! Absolutely unelectable. A total disappointment. I ended up voting for the favorite and he won handley. He is a terrific candidate and has the experience, the presences and the looks that will make him will be very easily re-elected-able in 2010.
So, congratulations Dan Blue.
Okay, I asked a question the other day about egg shells and since nobody else seemed to know why I wanted to put them in the garden. Well, it turns out a lot of reasons to put egg shells in your garden! No more throwing them away for me or worrying that I was doing the wrong thing by putting them in the garden. Nope. Good idea.
Speaking of good ideas. I went and picked up my ladybugs and unleashed the ladybugs of war on whatever it is that is daring to munch on my babies. Lets hope it works because I introduced 1500 of them to the environment and they will have an impact.
Speaking of impact, here are the planter pictures I was trying to upload. Thank you Mozilla!
Just some quick hits because I had a meeting and didn't get home till later than I had expected. I want to know how I ended up on the Senate District Executive Committee and then, how did I rate being a voting member? Wow. The power of the Precinct Vice Chairmanship.
A few weeks ago Vernon Malone died suddenly. He was our senator from District 14 and he was an institution, an institution who had just been elected to office. I knew they were going to have to name a replacement but I had thought there would be a special election. I had been getting calls and visits from a couple of candidates for the slot. One in particular came to my house three times and called me every day for a week. Al Franken doesn't call me everyday and Al Franken calls me a lot.
I had decided to vote for my stalker because he wore me down and I hadn't heard from any of the others. I didn't know there were any others - Then I went to the meeting and found out there were others, lots of others. I ended up seconding the nomination of one of them at the request of my Chair. The candidate ended up pulling herself from the race, but I did think she was the best speaker of the crowd I wasn;t going to vote for. The guy who was stalking me turned out to be a terrible speaker! Absolutely unelectable. A total disappointment. I ended up voting for the favorite and he won handley. He is a terrific candidate and has the experience, the presences and the looks that will make him will be very easily re-elected-able in 2010.
So, congratulations Dan Blue.
Okay, I asked a question the other day about egg shells and since nobody else seemed to know why I wanted to put them in the garden. Well, it turns out a lot of reasons to put egg shells in your garden! No more throwing them away for me or worrying that I was doing the wrong thing by putting them in the garden. Nope. Good idea.
Speaking of good ideas. I went and picked up my ladybugs and unleashed the ladybugs of war on whatever it is that is daring to munch on my babies. Lets hope it works because I introduced 1500 of them to the environment and they will have an impact.
Speaking of impact, here are the planter pictures I was trying to upload. Thank you Mozilla!
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Red and Black all over
I am learning things about my rubber mulch. I peeked under the edges and I found weeds! Little bitty weeds but weeds! I put the mulch down to prevent weeds and there they were! All weedy and nutrient sucking. They are little, tiny weeds, more like weedlets. They look like the tiny plants that sprout from bird seed but I was under the impression that the mulch was supposed to stop that. I guess its more about repression than complete suppression.
I have also learned about the difference in the mulches. The fancy, high-tech super cool red mulch is not doing the weed repression that I like to see. I wasn't really all that shocked by the bird seed but there was a damn pecan tree sprouted under there! I don't even have a pecan tree! Some squirrel demon was able to get under there and bury that nut unmolested. I hate that. I checked under the black mulch and while I found bird seed sprouts, I did not find any pecan trees. The red stuff also holds water in mosqueto friendly pools while the black stuff lets the water soak through. Many points to the black mulch.
I am hoping that the fancy stuff causes my tomatoes to produce like gangbusters this year because if it doesn't do something other than provide a good nursery environment for pecan trees? Next year I'm going with the cheap black stuff. The red stuff wasn't cheap.
In the red stuffs favor, most of the tomato plants are larger and more leafy than their pepper peers, but that could be just a difference in the plants and rates of maturation and all that. But. I think all the plants regardless of type , seem larger than last years batch. I did notice that something is munching on my broccali babies though and we can't have that. I want to try ladybugs but it's not like I can set up tiny electric fences and bitty border guards to make sure they stay put in my yard and its' not that I don't want to share the ladybug joy with the neighborhood but... I would see them as my employees and they first priorty would be me, if they want to do outside contract work, well, we could work it out when the time comes. But before the labor neogotions start, I'll also have to see how much it costs to let lose the ladybugs of war, if its the same or cheaper than regular pesticide I'm willing to experiment with the cutesy, warm and fuzzy, green organic-y vibe... but if it's a fortune I'm going to go back to the tried and true skull and crossbones method of pest control. Not warm and fuzzy. Note cute.
Does anyone know why I feel that I should be putting egg shells in my garden? Does this do anything for them or is it rat bait?
I am learning things about my rubber mulch. I peeked under the edges and I found weeds! Little bitty weeds but weeds! I put the mulch down to prevent weeds and there they were! All weedy and nutrient sucking. They are little, tiny weeds, more like weedlets. They look like the tiny plants that sprout from bird seed but I was under the impression that the mulch was supposed to stop that. I guess its more about repression than complete suppression.
I have also learned about the difference in the mulches. The fancy, high-tech super cool red mulch is not doing the weed repression that I like to see. I wasn't really all that shocked by the bird seed but there was a damn pecan tree sprouted under there! I don't even have a pecan tree! Some squirrel demon was able to get under there and bury that nut unmolested. I hate that. I checked under the black mulch and while I found bird seed sprouts, I did not find any pecan trees. The red stuff also holds water in mosqueto friendly pools while the black stuff lets the water soak through. Many points to the black mulch.
I am hoping that the fancy stuff causes my tomatoes to produce like gangbusters this year because if it doesn't do something other than provide a good nursery environment for pecan trees? Next year I'm going with the cheap black stuff. The red stuff wasn't cheap.
In the red stuffs favor, most of the tomato plants are larger and more leafy than their pepper peers, but that could be just a difference in the plants and rates of maturation and all that. But. I think all the plants regardless of type , seem larger than last years batch. I did notice that something is munching on my broccali babies though and we can't have that. I want to try ladybugs but it's not like I can set up tiny electric fences and bitty border guards to make sure they stay put in my yard and its' not that I don't want to share the ladybug joy with the neighborhood but... I would see them as my employees and they first priorty would be me, if they want to do outside contract work, well, we could work it out when the time comes. But before the labor neogotions start, I'll also have to see how much it costs to let lose the ladybugs of war, if its the same or cheaper than regular pesticide I'm willing to experiment with the cutesy, warm and fuzzy, green organic-y vibe... but if it's a fortune I'm going to go back to the tried and true skull and crossbones method of pest control. Not warm and fuzzy. Note cute.
Does anyone know why I feel that I should be putting egg shells in my garden? Does this do anything for them or is it rat bait?
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
I see another round of tea parties, how dare he force the very rich to pay their taxes!
WASHINGTON — President Obama on Monday called for curbing offshore tax havens and corporate tax breaks to collect billions of dollars more from multinational companies and wealthy individuals
Obama Calls for curbs on offshore tax havens
WASHINGTON — President Obama on Monday called for curbing offshore tax havens and corporate tax breaks to collect billions of dollars more from multinational companies and wealthy individuals
Obama Calls for curbs on offshore tax havens
People can be so thoughtless. And bitchy
I wanted to post pictures of my new planter but I'm having some sort of Java driver .do issue and I can't upload anything because computers do not recognize .do and won't play ball with it. Whatever. I spent the last hour and half watching some program that was supposed to fix my little .do problem and it was perking right along until it encountered an error and had to stop so that killed an hour and a half and I still have the .do problem so I still can't upload any images and that makes me sad.
If I can't upload pictures how can I Friday Kitten Blog? I mean life will not be worth living. It will, it will just be sadly Kitten Blogging deficit and that is so very depressing. So this has to get fixed. Does anyone out there know anything about java script and this pesky .do thingy? Because I know nothing and I need to be able to post images. Really, need is not to strong a word. I need to be able to post images.
While the program was still doing its thing, I took Dogger for another therapeutic walk and she did very well, we again walked around the block - Which surprised me because I was afraid that she hadn't worked up the stamina to go that distance two days in a row but she surprised me. Tonight though, she did not want to walk through the empty patch that we use as a short cut to get back to our street, so we had to walk around and go in front of one of the Pirates service stations. While we were trying to decide if we wanted to cut through the parking lot or walk around the station, this very rude woman pulled up at the light and looked at Dogger and screamed at me through her closed window : Put that dog down! Put that dog down! I was like "What?" and she repeated as she was making her turn, Put that dog down!. I don't understand why she said this and she can go directly to hell. Dogger looks really good right now, or at least a whole lot better than she looked before. I think the lady was just a bitch but Dogger and I don't need to hear things like that.
Dogger was limping, but at this point limping is a lot better than hopping and yes her leg is shaved and that can look a little off putting... If the beyotch thought she looked bad now, she should have seen her when her incision was still all stitched up and red and Dogger had lost a lot of wright and was all bony and thin and had razor burn and was wearing the E-collar all the time and was being walked with a sling... She has no idea how good Dogger looks now. But what a bitch! If I had something to throw at her car I would have, I did have something! I had a bag of dog shit! I didn't even think of it as a form of communication! I could of nailed her car with it! But I am too damn nice.
I am too damn nice but there was the matter of the two cop cars pulled into the other pirates station and it may have been a bad time to be testing the language of flying bags of dog shit. She could certainly talk shit I wonder if she wanted to eat shit too? I could have arranged it.
I wanted to post pictures of my new planter but I'm having some sort of Java driver .do issue and I can't upload anything because computers do not recognize .do and won't play ball with it. Whatever. I spent the last hour and half watching some program that was supposed to fix my little .do problem and it was perking right along until it encountered an error and had to stop so that killed an hour and a half and I still have the .do problem so I still can't upload any images and that makes me sad.
If I can't upload pictures how can I Friday Kitten Blog? I mean life will not be worth living. It will, it will just be sadly Kitten Blogging deficit and that is so very depressing. So this has to get fixed. Does anyone out there know anything about java script and this pesky .do thingy? Because I know nothing and I need to be able to post images. Really, need is not to strong a word. I need to be able to post images.
While the program was still doing its thing, I took Dogger for another therapeutic walk and she did very well, we again walked around the block - Which surprised me because I was afraid that she hadn't worked up the stamina to go that distance two days in a row but she surprised me. Tonight though, she did not want to walk through the empty patch that we use as a short cut to get back to our street, so we had to walk around and go in front of one of the Pirates service stations. While we were trying to decide if we wanted to cut through the parking lot or walk around the station, this very rude woman pulled up at the light and looked at Dogger and screamed at me through her closed window : Put that dog down! Put that dog down! I was like "What?" and she repeated as she was making her turn, Put that dog down!. I don't understand why she said this and she can go directly to hell. Dogger looks really good right now, or at least a whole lot better than she looked before. I think the lady was just a bitch but Dogger and I don't need to hear things like that.
Dogger was limping, but at this point limping is a lot better than hopping and yes her leg is shaved and that can look a little off putting... If the beyotch thought she looked bad now, she should have seen her when her incision was still all stitched up and red and Dogger had lost a lot of wright and was all bony and thin and had razor burn and was wearing the E-collar all the time and was being walked with a sling... She has no idea how good Dogger looks now. But what a bitch! If I had something to throw at her car I would have, I did have something! I had a bag of dog shit! I didn't even think of it as a form of communication! I could of nailed her car with it! But I am too damn nice.
I am too damn nice but there was the matter of the two cop cars pulled into the other pirates station and it may have been a bad time to be testing the language of flying bags of dog shit. She could certainly talk shit I wonder if she wanted to eat shit too? I could have arranged it.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Flowering
That was a weekend well spent. I got a lot of things done but I also spent a lot of time watching TV. Do a little yard work, watch a couple of hours of Rescue Me, do some gardening, watch a couple of hours of T-Fauxed Divine Design. I also found time to go to a boutique garden store.
Don’t you have enough plants to deal with now? Why are you shopping for more? Don’t be daft . Yes, you said that out loud. I needed a new plant because I found myself with a planter and I needed something to go in it. I could have gone to Wally World, I choose not to. This whole saga started out because I wanted some tea and I thought if I was making some tea I could also make more tea. Two weeks ago we got a couple of Tetley tea bags in our Sunday paper and I wanted to use them. I followed the instructions, which including boiling X number of cups of water until it boils and then adding the tea bags and then adding X number of more cups of water and letting sit.
I boiled the water in a pot that could hold X cups of water but when it came time to add an addition X cups of water the pot wasn’t larger enough so I moved the tea and the water to the next largest container I had available. The tea could not live in a mixing bowl. People all over the world make tea all the time and I do not think their tea lives in a mixing bowl and then I thought of my sun tea container! This would be perfect! It holds at least twice X number of cups of water and it has a spigot on the side and it would be perfect and it was recently clean. So Yay. Problem solved. Go me.
Well, the water was still hot. I assumed that if something was designed to sit in the sun for hours that it would also be designed to hold hot water. I put the sun tea container in the sink and began to pour the tea into it and it seemed fine until it seemed to be getting very full very fast and kind of maybe, shrinking. This was because it was melting into a puddle, where fortunately for my sink and myself, it didn’t choose to become one with the sink.
I left the rest of the tea in the bowl and tried to see if my new piece of sculpture was maybe recyclable - My parents kept a melted coffee maker in our garage for years because they thought they could use it again or sell it for parts or whatever and I decided I needed this thing out of my life quickly. .. But as I was taking it out to the recycling, I started to look at it and it looked like a planter! I quickly called Alphagal to confer with her and she suggested adding rocks to the base to allow for drainage. The container still had a functioning spigot and I thought that it would also help out. Yay! Reuse, Re-purpose! Recycle! Pin a green star on me.
And then I started to really look at it, if I put rocks in the bottom it wouldn’t leave enough room for adequate dirt to plant ratio. I drilled the bottom out and then went to the store looking for something that would flow prettily out of a tilted planter. I decided that Wally World wouldn’t have anything appropriate because everything at Wally World is “inside the box” and I needed a place that was more in-tune with my outside-the-box thinking vis-a-vis my planter. I needed somewhere that knew what vis-a-vis meant. I needed somewhere that would charge me three or even four times what Wally-World would for the same product. I needed a store with Obama bumper stickers in their parking lot.
I found my plant, Cabana Trailing Blue and a net to keep the birds off my raspberries . I found so many plants I wanted. What I really need is for Curb Appeal to give me their first annual Yard Improvement Scholarship ( full ride, books and board) and come to my front yard and transform it into an English Country Garden with lots and lots of gorgeous flowering plants in all the colors of the rainbow all the time. I have Earl Gray taste on a Tetley budget.
That was a weekend well spent. I got a lot of things done but I also spent a lot of time watching TV. Do a little yard work, watch a couple of hours of Rescue Me, do some gardening, watch a couple of hours of T-Fauxed Divine Design. I also found time to go to a boutique garden store.
Don’t you have enough plants to deal with now? Why are you shopping for more? Don’t be daft . Yes, you said that out loud. I needed a new plant because I found myself with a planter and I needed something to go in it. I could have gone to Wally World, I choose not to. This whole saga started out because I wanted some tea and I thought if I was making some tea I could also make more tea. Two weeks ago we got a couple of Tetley tea bags in our Sunday paper and I wanted to use them. I followed the instructions, which including boiling X number of cups of water until it boils and then adding the tea bags and then adding X number of more cups of water and letting sit.
I boiled the water in a pot that could hold X cups of water but when it came time to add an addition X cups of water the pot wasn’t larger enough so I moved the tea and the water to the next largest container I had available. The tea could not live in a mixing bowl. People all over the world make tea all the time and I do not think their tea lives in a mixing bowl and then I thought of my sun tea container! This would be perfect! It holds at least twice X number of cups of water and it has a spigot on the side and it would be perfect and it was recently clean. So Yay. Problem solved. Go me.
Well, the water was still hot. I assumed that if something was designed to sit in the sun for hours that it would also be designed to hold hot water. I put the sun tea container in the sink and began to pour the tea into it and it seemed fine until it seemed to be getting very full very fast and kind of maybe, shrinking. This was because it was melting into a puddle, where fortunately for my sink and myself, it didn’t choose to become one with the sink.
I left the rest of the tea in the bowl and tried to see if my new piece of sculpture was maybe recyclable - My parents kept a melted coffee maker in our garage for years because they thought they could use it again or sell it for parts or whatever and I decided I needed this thing out of my life quickly. .. But as I was taking it out to the recycling, I started to look at it and it looked like a planter! I quickly called Alphagal to confer with her and she suggested adding rocks to the base to allow for drainage. The container still had a functioning spigot and I thought that it would also help out. Yay! Reuse, Re-purpose! Recycle! Pin a green star on me.
And then I started to really look at it, if I put rocks in the bottom it wouldn’t leave enough room for adequate dirt to plant ratio. I drilled the bottom out and then went to the store looking for something that would flow prettily out of a tilted planter. I decided that Wally World wouldn’t have anything appropriate because everything at Wally World is “inside the box” and I needed a place that was more in-tune with my outside-the-box thinking vis-a-vis my planter. I needed somewhere that knew what vis-a-vis meant. I needed somewhere that would charge me three or even four times what Wally-World would for the same product. I needed a store with Obama bumper stickers in their parking lot.
I found my plant, Cabana Trailing Blue and a net to keep the birds off my raspberries . I found so many plants I wanted. What I really need is for Curb Appeal to give me their first annual Yard Improvement Scholarship ( full ride, books and board) and come to my front yard and transform it into an English Country Garden with lots and lots of gorgeous flowering plants in all the colors of the rainbow all the time. I have Earl Gray taste on a Tetley budget.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Friday, May 1, 2009
There was a reason those people flocked to the Jesus chainsaw movie
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.
Maybe they should go to a different church less often?
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.
Maybe they should go to a different church less often?
Garden Update 1
Now that everything is in the ground and growing I decided it was time for an update. it's 26 days in and the garden has grown. Yay! , not to mention my raspberries in the front yard. My flowers are also doing well. I'm getting cocky, I can feel it setting in. I need to bring it down a notch. It's early yet, something bad could move in and eat everything. I need to go get a couple of boxes of ladybugs and maybe a couple of bottles of insecticide. But not both, that would be wasteful and murder.
At last, according to my master plan I have tomatoes, peppers, broccoli and green beans as well as African Marigolds and two kinds of Morning Glories in the ground. I was really worried about the green beans because I had to start those from seeds and I don't have much faith in my ability to grow from seeds. I am not Alphagal.
Baby green beans
Those just appeared Thursday morning . I had given up hope that any of them were going to germinate. I hadn't seen any signs of anything happening, I accidentally stepped on one plant all ready. I'm pretty sure that one is not going to be viable. The good news is that I planted three or four seeds in each hole and my hope is that I will be able to separate the seedlings and plant them in their own spaces. I'm not sure if that is a possibility . I'll ask Alpha Gal, she knows from seedlings and replanting.My tomatoes are doing very well. Some seem to be growing taller faster than others but that might be attributable to their variety. I'm hoping its not that some are getting more or better sunlight or nourishment from the soil. I did cut back some shrubs that I thought might be throwing too much shade.
The tallest tomato.
I think it would probably look better if I covered the rubber mulch with some natural mulch but I'm not sure if I want to do that much work for something I would be doing purely for cosmetic reasons. It would keep the soil more moist though and as the summer heats up I might start to see it differently, at present I'm happy with how it looks and how its working. I could pin down some of the mulch a little more securely in places but I think that way lies madness and I could easily spend most of my time and all of my clothes hangers to that battle.Please note Frankenhose. I have the two soaker hoses attached to two separate ten foot hoses that are hooked to a separator that is hooked to yet another ten foot hose that is hooked to a timer . It's clunky but it doesn't leak and its' working the way I thought it would work, but with more hoses. No waste though, previous less Franken versions of were wasting a lot of water and that was unacceptable.
Today, I'm watering for less time more frequently than I had thought I was going to. I finally settled on two minutes every twelve hours, down from ten minutes ever other day once a day from a high of fifteen minutes twice a day but that was way, way, way too much too often. I was creating a bog. I came home one day and someone been doing Google searches for "life jackets, tomatoes, flood insurance". I got the hint.
Look at those broccoli! They aren't doing as well as the tomatoes and peppers - who are perking along but nots a perky as the tomatoes- No one is as perky as they are. Anyway, thus far I don't notice any munching going on yet but there is most certainly either lady bugs or pesticides in the future. But not both because that would be murder.
Everyone all together
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