TGIF

One of my neighbors said that he saw a "big fat woodchuck" the other day. And I said "really? on this street?" I have never seen one here, once on a walk I saw one downtown and it didn't belong there either,bit at least it most likely lived in the park across the street.

This morning I saw a "big fat" something that was most certainly not a woodchuck. I saw a big, fat raccoon and I and sure that that was what my neighbor saw and misidentified as a woodchuck. Woodchucks can be fat but they are not big. He saw a racoon and I'm almost positive he saw the same one I did. It was big and it was fat and it was most definitely a racoon. Not a woodchuck. Several years ago my coworkers and I wasted a lot of state time and resources researching woodchucks so I should know from woodchucks

Problem solved. Woodchucks don't eat your gardens either, they eat clover.

Anyway, this has been a horrible week, 45 has managed to not get forced from office or face impeachment and little tiny children are in cages and he is not. We had better pray for all those children and their families in Church this Sunday, did you see how they take their rosaries away from them? What kind of anti-Catholic bullshit is that? We should be doing lots of praying for them in Church and setting up vigils and pickets. Get on it Catholic Church! These are your people! Fight for them!


Deep, cleansing breath. I am going to go see the Mr. Rogers documentary and its suppose to be very good.

Here is a picture of Rocket.

Tuesday

Today was very pretty. Very bright, very sunny, very lovely. Cold and windy as it wanted to be. Very bitchy weather. I took the dog for a walk because he didn't get one at all Monday because it was still raining and I could tell he was getting antsy.

 I walked out the office and was shocked to see there had been no change from lunch. So no walk in the morning and no walk at night either. My fitbit is going to be snarky about how many days I exercised this week and there is no way to tell it that it rained. It doesn't cotton to any excuses on your part. It fully expects you to get out there, rain or shine and do your part.

So Tuesday, in the interests of making it up to my fitbit and the dog, we took two walks, one in the morning, when it was still wet, and one after work, thankfully, sans rain. I thought after work because it had managed to get colder and now it was windy - that I would change things up by not wearing the cheap one-size-fits-all knit gloves that I wear every day as they are not very warm and I am tired of cold hands. I went with much warmer mittens, I thought these would improve my  hands warmth.

I discovered why adults don't wear mittens, even though they are warm, much warmer than one-size-fits-all knit gloves. We need our fingers. We need to be able to use our hands and mittens impede use of hands. Kids can really rock flippers, we as adults can not. I mean, I'm sure they are great for making snowballs and riding bikes but they suck for trying to tie up poopy bags. I'm just saying, adults need to adult and mittens don't make it easy.

I also chose the wrong hat, I have the right hand and chose the wrong hat and I ended up with cold ears a hundred yards from the house. Not okay. The slacks I wore to work weren't made for the cold either, I could have changed into much warmer pants, should have, could have, would have. Didn't. Did have cold legs.

So I had cold ears,  my chin wasn't happy about the whole thing, my hands that were warmer than they are normally under the circumstances but were all but useless and I had cold legs. But it wasn't raining, I had to find something to be happy about, at the very least, for the first time since Saturday night, it had stopped raining. It would have really sucked to be out in the cold, driving wind and damp. I mean if it was still raining I would have been where I was all weekend, under a blanket with the dog watching TV, but where are the health benefits there? There are none.

Walking and getting exercise are good for you.  Its good for me, it's good for the dog, its good for us. I tell myself that as I slog home every night and my legs are tingling from the cold and I can't feel my hands or my ears and my nose is running. "This is Good For Us."

Near Total Eclipse

And I'm back.

Just in time for eclipse! It was very exciting,  I thought everybody had a pair of those glasses but as it turned out four of us shared mine - two others had a pair they got from one of the nurses but they weren't the right kind and so they didn't end up useing them . There were the Right kind, that I had and the Not Right kind that apparently were also out there floating around.

The Not Right kind had limits on how long you could use them for looking at the event - maximum amount of time you could look 3 minutes in an hour - verses the Right Kind that set no such limit on how long you could use them.

While I was still on vacation, I had been made aware that an email had been sent out to state employees making it clear that we were  to stay at our desks and not waste state time on this event - but when I came into work this morning there was an email from our Secretary inviting all of us, with permission from our supervisors, to go to the field across from our HQ building to watch the event with her. We watched the early part of the eclipse from a window and we saw several groups of folks making there way to the field, so I know it was well attended.

As it got closer and more interesting, a group of us went outside our building and got a great view and got to see the neat shadows the trees made. A good time was had by all. I still had co workers that had no interest in viewing it at all! I don't understand that at all, its beyond me - I mean we didn't have the massive show they had in other places but we did get to see an ECLIPSE, its a  big deal. Embrace it.

It never got even kind of dark, it stayed bright, but it did cool off and the cicadas and crickets did start making noise.

Prior to the whole afternoon fun, I was made aware that there were Eclipse donuts to be had, I was very excited because who isn't excited by donuts? And I really needed a donut. Later on, I went back to get a lunch donut and the donuts were gone! I was shocked! There are a total of no one in this building and the whole box was gone! I had my heart set on a lunch donut.

There are days where a protein bar is just not what you want for lunch, there are days when you really, really want a donut for lunch. I ended up eating my protein bar but I did it with no joy.

Spasibo

When I post partisan entries my hit count goes down. Are many of my readers not good lefties? Why are you here then? Surely it can't be for  the cat blogging. Another question, why so many Russians? More Russian hits than American, many, many more and all recent. I used to get a lot of odd hits from India but now its all Mother Russia all the time. But not today, today we had a blackout from Russia. So I wrote them a note to say Hi. Google Translate helped me out.

Спасибо, что прочитали мой сайт. Я рад, что ты здесь. Я рад, что у меня есть иностранные читатели, я надеюсь, что я дам вам окно в живую каждого американца. Надеюсь, я не слишком раздражаю. Надеюсь, вы знаете, что повседневные американцы не поддерживают Дональда Трампа, мы не последователи его или его политики или его политики. Мы находим его отталкивающим. Я надеюсь, что вы придете на мой сайт, чтобы узнать о счастливых американцах и их домашних животных и их слабостях и их маленьких проблемах. Надеюсь, это заставляет нас казаться больше похожими на вас. Надеюсь, это сближает нас. Еще раз спасибо за то, что вы провели время со мной и моими питомцами.

Spasibo, chto prochitali moy sayt. YA rad, chto ty zdes'. YA rad, chto u menya yest' inostrannyye chitateli, ya nadeyus', chto ya dam vam okno v zhivuyu kazhdogo amerikantsa. Nadeyus', ya ne slishkom razdrazhayu. Nadeyus', vy znayete, chto povsednevnyye amerikantsy ne podderzhivayut Donal'da Trampa, my ne posledovateli yego ili yego politiki ili yego politiki. My nakhodim yego ottalkivayushchim. YA nadeyus', chto vy pridete na moy sayt, chtoby uznat' o schastlivykh amerikantsakh i ikh domashnikh zhivotnykh i ikh slabostyakh i ikh malen'kikh problemakh. Nadeyus', eto zastavlyayet nas kazat'sya bol'she pokhozhimi na vas. Nadeyus', eto sblizhayet nas. Yeshche raz spasibo za to, chto vy proveli vremya so mnoy i moimi pitomtsami.

The English version

Thank you for reading my site, I am happy that you come here. It makes me glad to have international readers, I hope I am giving you a window into the live of an everyday American. I hope I am not too boring. I hope that you know that everyday Americans do not support Donald Trump, we are not followers of him or his policies or his politics. We find him repulsive. I hope that you come to my site to learn about happy Americans and their pets and their foibles and their little issues. I hope it makes us seem more like you. I hope it brings us together. Thank you again for spending time with me and my pets.

Monday.

Saturday, I spoke with window vender #3 and made a choice, which makes me feel good. I made some phone calls - and damn it, had to actually speak to the salesperson in  in person, I had been hoping to give the bad news to their voice mails, but no luck on that. On Monday I'm going to call appointment number four and call that one off.

Window World  won the contract! They gave me a very realistic quote  and a timeline I can work with.

So,  one problem under control.

Other than meeting with the window salesman, I had nothing else scheduled. I slept late both days, it was a great weekend. I still managed to get my weekly shopping done, did my laundry - braved the suddenly scary-to-me basement, mowed both lawns, and made a dreamy pork loin for dinner Sunday night. Oh, and last week I found my glasses!

Last year I spent a lot of time and effort finding just the right frames and I shopped and looked and really expended a lot of time and energy on finding frames. I did find the frames, for almost nothing at Sames - but the lenses are crap and are scratched the hell and  there is nothing I can do about it,I will not be buying from them again, at least not my main, every day glasses - you get what you pay for and I am living that. I wish retailers and insurance would let you buy your frames from point A and you lenses from Point B, it would save the public a lot of money and encourage healthy competition.

This year, I went to Lenscrafters at the mall, I looked at the frames, I found a couple I liked, I asked the technician what she thought of them and she agreed with me that the above was the best choice. Done. I have an appointment with my eye doctor on the twenty-fifth and I'll just toddle back to the mall afterwards and get these ordered. Done.

But no, you can't do that and they dun you if you try. Last year I bought the exact same frames from Sams at less than half the price they were selling them at Lenscrafters, the lenses were shockingly cheaper, however, today they are covered in scratches and I never dropped them or put them through any unusual treatment. Lenscrafters would never let this happen, they have a coating they use and if you buy insurance, they will replace scratched lenses. Sams does not.

Friday Cats Blogging

TGIF

I decided to take the trash out to the curb before it got too late as I give my self a gold star for getting that job done 1) not in my pajamas and 2) not at 5am . I wanted to get the cat box cleaned out so I could add that to the trash before I took it out, fine, I was cleaning it out when I became aware of the  oddest noise...

The pouding of rain on the roof. Pounding. Normally, I I can hear it on the metal roof of the carport, this was the roof roof and it sounded like Texas rain. It had been gorgeous when I was out with the dog not  forty minutes before. No signs or symptoms of imminent sky opening up. No wind, no nothing.

 I hurried up and went downstairs and low and behold it was indeed pounding rain. I then remembered that I had the lawn umbrella up and I needed to take it down before it came down on it own. Well, before it was pouding with rain it was gusting with wind because my umbrella was on the ground when I got out there, in the pounding rain. The super best time to try to  unhoist it. Brought it in, dripping rain, and had to put it in the my spaghetti pot to keep it from flooding my entry way.

I tried to get the dog to come out with me into the pounding rain to pee while I was out there, because misery loves company but he wisely refused. Smart dog.

It only rained like that for a brief time but, damn. On the upside, I am soaked, but my basement is not. It is dry.

The trash did get taken out, I was glad I took it out after the rain came, the wind must have been really strong, my neighbors trash was on its side. I didn't hear anything until the rain started and I spent most of the evening my an open window.  Between my reruns and my deeply engrossing Twitter feed, I must have been really distracted - I blame Cheeto.

Wedesday

I sat down to write this and I starting thinking how lousy today was and how high stress and then I thought, you know what I really want to do? I really want to watch Barney Miller reruns, they just started running them on whatever channel it is that runs the M*A*S*H reruns and I started to record them too. There are many fewer of them broadcast ever week, like a total of five, so its not as overwhelming a proposition.

I missed Barney Miller, I used to watch it in reruns after school ever day. It has a great theme, you get to see the towers opening credits and New York is how it exists in everyone's memories, dirty, violent and crime ridden by easily caught bad guys. And the cops are nice. I would suggest skipping the ones with Linda Lavin, her character is way too frantic, she totally ruins the vibe.

When I was really little I was heartbroken to find out that the actor who played Wogahowitzes real last name was Gail - a girls name - I couldn't get over that. I don't know why that bothered me so much at the time, but it just seemed wrong.

I'm going to go watch my TV. I;m also going to suggest that you start reading wonkette.com and if you are on Twitter,  that you begin to follow  John Schindler @20committee as quickly as possible. It would be worth joining Twitter just to follow him, and me, I am @megjac and I re-tweet a lot.

Also spoke to two more window venders, set up one more visit, going to call the other vender tomorrow.

The Tuesday Troubles

The Tuesday evening chaos, which started when Cheeto fired FBI Directer Comey - Comey later said he found out while speaking to agents in the LA Office while watching TV - Not by the letter that the Cheetos office reportedly put into his file.

It ha a gotten a huge amount of press, second only to the hue and cry of the firing of acting AG Sally Yates - which was also  incorrectly  referred to as the "Saturday Night Massacre".

Comey's dismissal was blamed on his release of information prior to the election that was thought to have thrown the election to Cheeto, not so much that he personally through the election to Cheeto - the Russians handled that part, but that what he did was wrong for the head of the FBI to do, worse yet. a few days ago Comey admitted he feels "mildly nauseous" when he thinks back on what he did - as does much of the western world. Comey being fired for being a bad FBI chief is expected, he should have been fired by Obama on the spot, but Obama didn't want to appear to be partisan, a mistake we are paying for now.

So, 109 days into our long national nightmare, Cheeto and Sessions suddenly decide, in retrospect that Comey did a bad thing and shit can him. It can't possibly have anything to do with the fact that he is supposed to testify on Thursday about the Cheeto administration collusion with Russia?

This highly questionable timing has even the GOP squinting their piggy eyes and pretending to be a little unhappy with Cheeto. Bit of trivia, Comey is only the second FBI chief to ever be fired, they have a ten year term and they normally serve it and move on. William Sessions was fired by Bill Clinton for letting his friends use government airplanes. Clinton told him to step down, Sessions said no and Clinton fired him.

Now, lets got back to the real Saturday Night Massacre. From Wikipedia

The Saturday Night Massacre is the term used by political commentators^[1] to refer to U.S. President Richard Nixon's dismissal of independent special prosecutor Archibald Cox, and as a result the resignations of Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus on October 20, 1973, during the Watergate scandal.^[2][3]

There is some mention there of the public sending in telegrams by the hundreds of thousands after this happened, my Mommy sent one and I remember watching her on the phone doing it, I was 6.

Okay, if you still have questions, you too can go to Wikipedia Saturday Night Massacre and learn in detail, everything ever ever wanted to know about that particular moment in history. And every other moment in Watergate history, in detail. - which I suggest we all do, quickly.

Monday

I was at the book sale for an hour or so yesterday and two moments stood out for me:1) I found Celia Rivenbarks' You Can't Drink All Day If You Don't Start In The Morning in the "Self Help" section and 2) I listened to a woman complain to her friend about the dearth of books at the sale, on Sunday afternoon, after the sale has been going on like gangbusters since Friday morning , her conspiracy-ago-go explanation for all he good titles being gone was that "she has heard that the library hired a company to go through and take out the good titles before the sale started" .

Not that thousands of people had been through there like hyenas with reading glasses and they had taken literally everything, but despite the clear carnage, there were still decent titles to be found if you were to look for them, because I looked and I found some.

I found a couple of Wendy Wasserman plays, Major Barbara, a book of four classic French plays, a book of four great Restoration plays, Click and Clacks book, and many, more! For $3. Even if they are just additions to my library, they are additions to my library

Today was a win because I noticed that my shirt was on backwards before I got to work. Score.

Tuesday I am expecting another window person to come to my house after work and look at my window project and hopefully give me a quote that won't give me agita.

Looking Out

I need a couple of new windows, well, I really need one new window, the window on the other side is aging out and could use replacing but it is in awkward place due to the past owners DIY remodel and replacing it will be difficult - I am willing to forgo that window. I have two additional windows that  I would like to see replaced sooner rather than later and of course there is pretty much every other window in the house.

I saw a random ad for replacement windows online and decided that it was A Sign and I went with it, I called them and they called me, and called me and called me - until I finally picked up and we set up an appointment Saturday afternoon.

Renewal by Anderson, very, very nice. I'm pretty sure that this is not the entry level Anderson replacement window. I don't know why they looked up my address and thought that Renewal was the product line that they should show me? It is not the product line for this neighborhood, that was a bad call. This is a vinyl replacement window kind of place.

I had a long talk with the saleswoman and I showed her the problem windows and explained the issues I was having and she measured the windows and then we sat down and showed me the catalogue.

It was lovely book and the windows featured in it were gorgeous.  So clearly not the vinyl replacement windows I had in mind when I started this project in my mind. The saleswoman dismissed vinyl  replacement windows as "cheap". Well, yes, they are, however, I prefer to think of them as "affordable", which is why I was thinking of them in the first place, and why they are in every single house on my street.

Speaking of affordable. It became time for her to give me my quote, she went on about discounts and sales and blather. The first price for five windows : $24,000 - However, this was not on my final quote, I gather my initial display of shock and dismay was a bit of a turn off to the saleswoman and the final quote for all five windows was listed as 16K and then lowered by additional 3K with sales and discounts. If I only get the upstairs windows it would be $8268.85 for three windows.

Its still a No.

When  she left and I stopped hyperventilating, I called a different vender and we'll see what they can do. I may just end up with a window stuffed with towels.

Sunday, I mowed the lawns and went to the Wake County Book sale, there was nothing left but a handful, but I I scoured the four remaining tables and got 14 books for $3. Can't beat it.

Kent State

Because for some reason I didn't see any reference to it today : May 4, 1970

From Wikipedia, Kent State Shootings

The Kent State shootings (also known as the May 4 massacre or the Kent State massacre)^[3][4][5] were the shootings of unarmed college students protesting the Vietnam War at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio, by burning the campus ROTC building and throwing rocks at the Guardsmen. The shootings were perpetrated by members of the Ohio National Guard on May 4, 1970. Twenty-nine guardsmen fired approximately 67 rounds over a period of 13 seconds, killing four students and wounding nine others, one of whom suffered permanent paralysis.^[6][7]

Some of the students who were shot had been protesting the Cambodian Campaign, which President Richard Nixon announced during a television address on April 30. Other students who were shot had been walking nearby or observing the protest from a distance.^[8][9]

There was a significant national response to the shootings: hundreds of universities, colleges, and high schools closed throughout the United States due to a student strike of 4 million students,^[10] and the event further affected public opinion, at an already socially contentious time, over the role of the United States in the Vietnam War.^[11]

Because I was feeling a lot of rage today I thought I would leave you with  the lyrics to the song that Crosby Stills and Nash wrote.

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,

We're finally on our own.

This summer I hear the drumming,

Four dead in Ohio.

Gotta get down to it

Soldiers are cutting us down

Should have been done long ago.

What if you knew her

And found her dead on the ground

How can you run when you know?

Gotta get down to it

Soldiers are cutting us down

Should have been done long ago.

What if you knew her

And found her dead on the ground

How can you run when you know?

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,

We're finally on our own.

This summer I hear the drumming,

Four dead in Ohio.

Dogs

I was very proud of Rocket yesterday. We met a tiny dog yesterday that looked exactly like one of those stuffed dog toys I used to let him eat, before I stopped letting him eat stuffed dog toys.

It was a cute little thing but it was just the tiny-iest thing  I ever saw that wasn't radio controlled or a cat.  If I was Rocket I would have thanked me for the toy and had at it. But he isn't me and he was a perfect gentleman and limited the meeting to a polite sniff.

Rockets head was about the size of the entire tiny dog, so the "polite sniff" was subject to interpretation . The tiny dog interpreted it to be an invitation to run around a squeak like a toy. It was a good day for tiny dog,  Rocket has never been all that interested by very young dogs. He thinks they are dogs and he respects them as fellow animals but he doesn't find them at all interesting or worthy of playing with.

Fortunately, he will only play with dogs that are more or less in his weight class. He ignores very young, very small dogs. He has better things to play with, like cats.

Cats are also very small and fragile but they move very fast and and are more than able to defend themselves, he knows this and he feels comfortable letting his fur down with them and really playing with them. You can tell he enjoys it and them, they are almost, but not quite equals and he feels comfortable. Tiny dogs are not his thing.

 I'm also afraid he's going to snap and just say "Damn it toy thing! I am going to so eat you now!"

Little dogs are just not as smart as cats. Cats are smart enough to get out of the way, little dogs think they can and should fight back and they just make it worse. They just aren't very bright. That's why they scare me, I avoid, in most cases. little dogs, because they could taunt him and I don't want to see that happen. I mean, Rocket is super chill and is really mellow but there is always the first time, its much easier to cross the street and wave. Its just good policy.

Tuesday

It turns out my $14.99 investment in a lovely, unstated navy blue backpack from Target  was indeed a good buy. I bought it in hopes that it would fit a bag of cat food and it did! Its been sitting around for months being a backpack, and understandably, cats made it their own. Cats are going to turn your things into cat beds. Its what they do, they are either going to break them or sleep on them.

I bought it a long time ago  now,  when I think about it, and in the meantime, since it was being used a as a backpack, it has doubled as a cat bed -  a damn good one at that, Ace has learned it was soft and comfy and not purchased as a cat bed- because God forbid he sleep on a on purpose cat bed!  He pushed it from the top of the table and  moved it under the table to get a better sun patch. He was very put out when I took it away from him to take it for a walk.

I went with Rocket to the cat food store and popped the cat food bag into the backpack and it magically fit and then Rocket and I went on the rest of our walk, the whole 3.5 miles. Perfect.

Normally, I have to carry the awkward thing in my arms and it is very heavy and hard to carry and after a half a mile or so it gets really not very much fun and more and more I have taken to buying it after work and having to pay for parking, which is a giant sin in my mind. Now I can just out on my backpack and walk to the store.

And that's it for today. Sorry.  Oh. I did have a surprise this morning when I was walking the dog. They tore down this house on Tarboro, it was there yesterday and it was fine and now this morning it was a pile of house. I may of shrieked when I saw it. It had been empty for a while but I thought it was a nice enough structure, but it is on a big lot and that, I guess was its death knell. It was a very small house on a largish lot and it was worth a lot less than the lot. So its gone now. They used to do that a lot more often around here than they do now ( they tore down the house behind me!), so I shouldn't be surprised, but I always am. It had newish siding on it too and the people had put a new porch on the side of it and I thought it looked nice but , oh well. Progress. And now I wonder how long the one next door has,  because it is even smaller and more wretched and less well maintained and I have wondered why its still standing, it does have a tenant in it now but I bet that this lights  a fire under the landlord and maybe they start looking at their options, its in an awful location, perhaps better served by a different kind of structure, like someones garage or just part of a yard.

It is not lost on me that I am bothered by the loss of the one house but I am planning the demise of the other.

Dam.

There is a 40% chance I'm going to get woken up by rain tonight.  My basement is still wet and the ground is saturated. There is no need for more rain.

It was suggested that I get myself sandbags and I block off the basement steps. Good Idea. I went to my neighborhood home improvement store and girded myself for the buying of sand bags. Many sandbags. Insurance, self protection. Happiness.  They don't sell sandbags.  Hurricane season starts June 1. and they aren't in the sandbag business?  This doesn't make much sense to me, we get hurricanes here, we get a lot of rain here and flooding is a year round concern and they don't keep sandbags on their shelves. I could buy play sand, but that isn't the right kind. Its "soft sand" and you need "sharp sand" for proper sandbag construction. The sand they had was also in plastic bags. Proper, useful sandbags are filled with sharp sand in burlap bags or some other permeable fabric!

It was suggested that I run down to another hardware store and buy sandbag bags and then fill the bags with sand my own self. This is difficult to by ones self, it is suggested that this be a two person job. I've done some research on this.

I left empty handed and frustrated. Even more frustrated than when I came in. Insecure, and unhappy.

Here is my dam.

There are four plastic! covered bags of dirt, two very heavy plastic bins and two concrete blocks.

Here is why I need a dam

In a heavy rain, or any rain really, all the rain from the roof comes spilling down from there and comes crashing down onto the pad at the top of the stairs ( where it pools) and then goes rushing down the stairs to the drain at the bottom - I assume this was a design decision made lo many years ago and was a good idea in theory, if not in actual practice. Maybe weather was not as harsh back then.  During a heavy rain, it does not go obediently into the rain gutters as you would imagine, it jumps that little fence and crashes down. I have watched it do it.


My research has shown me this marvel, which I think I am going to get for myself :Quick Dams, Sandless Sand Bags  . Have a dry week end.

Wednesday

Today was Administrative Professionals Day. I celebrated by leaving the house at six ayem to drop off my rental pump and then drove cross town to the doggy daycare to drop off the dog and it was off to work for an extra special fun day because today was not on APD it was also our  monthly meeting which means the day will run an hour longer than usual. Yay! I walked in the door almost exactly twelve hours later.

This year, in a departure from a field trip to a lovely restaurant or for several  years, a visit to a country club, we ate in one of our conference rooms and lunch was salad with cold turkey and ham. Cold. There was also a cake from Wal-Mart with THANK YOU written in icing across the top.

We stood there in the doorway looking at the salad on the table wondering when the rest of the luncheon was going to turn up and were we in the way. Last year we ate in the conference room as well, and were also disappointed in the lunch, but  I think it was catered from somewhere. It was at the very least a hot meal.

So that was fun. My boss did give me a gift card for a meal at Chili's, so that was nice.

I picked up the dog from daycare, late, because I had some work to finish up, and took him home and before I picked him up I got gas in the car.  I had been hopeing to get home and be able to sweep the basement but it was still too wet for that, it needs to be pretty dry for sweeping, so at least one more day with the fan for it. I also noticed on the way into the house that I need to mow the yard, I said "I will do that after dinner".

Who am I kidding?

I changed clothes and watched TV and  remembered that Target told me that I could pick up the dogs meds two days ago, do I went to Target - not close by, but I was up for the adventure. I had been watching a show about a guy who turns peoples sheds into  $150 a night rentals, but I got realy over watching him turn SHEDS into rental units, I was a little aghast. I think it helps a lot if you live in Vermont and have rustic out buildings available. I had to leave.

I went all the way to Target, this is my second trip all the way to Target and again I came up empty. The last time they wouldn't give it to me because I was two days shy of the refill, this time they didn't have the whole scrip on site but they would have it tomorrow. They are lucky I am so tired and frankly, a little depressed right now or I would have gotten really upset about having to make two trips up there for NOTHING. I went to McDonalds to make myself feel better. It worked.

I drove home and managed to miss my driveway. I took a trip around the hood and saw two dogs out for a stroll by themselves. I parked in the street for a while watching them wander around, they had collars on and seemed to be together, they seemed to know where there were. I drove on and looked for open gates or people looking for them but didn't see any.

Got home, unloaded the dog, ate my dinner. I started to loose my McDonalds buzz. What about those dogs? What if I missed my driveway because I was supposed to help those dogs and I blew it? What if God Forbid, my dog got out?, would I want someone to just sit in their car and think about helping or would I want them to help? I failed those people and their dogs. I suck and whatever happens to those dogs happens on my head. Or in my head, which is worse.

I went back out and retraced my steps in the car and didn't see them. I drove around the hood looking for them and never saw them, I also never saw anyone looking for them. I checked Next Door for anything about them being missing and didn't see anything. There is a good chance a neighbor saw them out and either took them in or put them back, or their people saw they were out and out and put them back. I am not hearing dogs barking, which would be a give way that other dogs were around. I need to not go to a bad place.

Maybe by stopping in the street for as long as I did, that was how I helped. I don't know. We don't know how we are useful, or when we are used. That is not ours to know. I know I wish I had done more when I was there and I can know that the next time I will be more proactive when faced with the same problem because the next time it might be not me with my dog.

After the Floodette

And so it rained for a couple of three days and that sucks under normal circumstances, but it really sucks when they have built a behemoth behind your house and it has taken up the entire lot and there is no more actual ground left and thus, there is nowhere for the rain to go and now it has to go into my basement, and my neighbors yards - pretty much everywhere except the yard of the behemoth.

 I'm sure they weren't pumping water out all day today like we were.

My new best friend

It weighs more than I do and its the size of a spaghetti  pot . The hose is also heavy. They didn't mention how heavy they were at the rental space, the pump looked so small I thought it was "small", I thought it was be light and easy to work with. It was easy to work with but its made of led.

It worked miracles though, it along with my sump pump got all the water out.

If those are the After pictures, we need the Before

#ScienceMarch

Saturday I, along with Alphagal, Broskey and their kids and many, many, many don't-let-the-lame-stream-media-tell-you-otherwise-looking-at-you-News-and-Observer- "500 people"- bull shit.

I know it was odd to march for "science", it was odd, but the Cheeto administration has shown a shocking lack of respect for facts and truth and sometimes you have to stand up for them. And sometimes that means boots on the ground and an old fashioned show of force. Also, when we wrote signs, we spell them correctly.

Because that is exactly what it is: a show of force: We're here, we're real, and we are out here in great numbers.  You can't steal this, you can't misrepresent this' I am here. He is here, she is here. They brought their kids. And we all took pictures. And we are posting them everywhere. You walk away feeling rejuvenated,  stronger and again, not alone. It doesn't matter how many Face Book groups you join, how many Twitter Gawds you worship, how many post cards you send, how often you call your senators and representatives there is nothing like being in a crowd of people who think like you think, feel like you feel and are disgusted by the exact same things that disgust you .

The constant tippy toeing around you must do even now, even after everything we have learned, after everything we have seen - its shocking. At this point we shouldn't be the ones having to be polite about where we stand. We should be loud and proud with our truth, but no we are forced by years of being taught by the FAUX news cockservitives that we should be ashamed of our beliefs and we must always be careful of offending our cockservitive brethren because , well, why? again? Really? Have they ever been careful of offending us?! Has any cockservative ever apologized for spewing their "truth" at you? Nope! Because they would never think of it, because they don't care about offending us, because we are beneath them, we are "snowflakes or libtards" and if we take offence , they take it as a sign of weakness.

But Gawd forbid you offend them! Jeebus!

 Have they ever tried to be not offensive to us? Never. They never try to be non-offensive to us? NO! They continue to hurl  creatures like Anne Coulter at us and now just about every slime eater in the Cheeto Administration at us and we're supposed to watch what we say? Bastards.  If you have the opportunity to march, MARCH. Be a public Liberal, let your Blue Flag Fly.