Walkin the dog....

You see this? Corbin and Roxy? This is what they do, actually it's what they are. Boxers are known for their high energy level. Little dogs are known for their high energy levels. My dogs don't like to be stereotyped so the buck the system. And sleep. They are like myself, we believe sleeping is an Olympic sport and if there was a gold medal no one would be able to win it out from under us. Given our druthers we'd stay home and sleep. Forever. Why? Because it feels good and woe be the person to wake me when I do not want to be woken. The hubby and kid both know better, mommy is best left alone to wake when she damn well feels like waking.

The dogs? They get that way sometimes too. But mostly really they just get up for food. Given their druthers they'd hop up on the couch, sleep, drool, and then have food served to them on the couch. NO, we are not that liberal a household. They do have their own internal clocks though. 5-6 pm is their normal dinner time and they will start letting you know that the time is coming. At around 3:30 pm. Annoying brats too might I add. Jaynie is the worst, he whines. Like the world is going to end and no one loves him, etc, etc. It's long, drawn out, and dramatic as Hamlet.

Don't get me wrong, the boy likes his sleep too. He just prefers it in our bed. Spoiled? NEVER!



So as for their energy levels, well, Jaynie is the only one that really has one. The other two like things such as walks but only for like 3 blocks. Roxy has some hip issues that we have her treated for (acupuncture) and Corbin is genetically indisposed to any sort of activity whatsoever. Actually most Frenchies are, they can't breathe through the face that we've bred them too and to add insult to injury many times they have hip issues too. In Corbin's case his right hip socket doesn't fit together well. Every 3rd step or so he hops with his right rear leg in the air until it pops back into socket. It doesn't cause him any pain (yet) but it doesn't make for a dog that is going for any log ass walks either. Even if he could breathe. Which he can't. Seriously.

So Jaynie it is. He's a long legged active bugger, runs like a gazelle actually. I try and take him for a mile and a half every single night. Does it happen every night? No but if I try it happens at least 5 nights a week, sometimes 7. I don't run, shin splints are something that I've always had and they hurt. He's good walking though and we do hills so he gets a good bit of exercise. Which is good for his looney tendencies. Like most active dogs he tends to be more even keeled as long as I walk him regularly. And oh yes he reminds me every night around 8pm that we are due to walk (we go out at 9 so he starts reminders early). I started this at least 6 months ago if not longer. I can't actually remember. I slacked off a bit this last month. I initially started our late night walks because I wanted to lose some weight. A mile and a half at night every night, you'd think it'd do something with the weight but no. Not a thing. I was disappointed with the results so I started slaking off.

This week I'm trying round 2 of the weight loss program. It's not my diet, I was born and raised in So Cal, I know how to eat right and with small portions. I had my thyroid checked and my lipid levels done and they were all fine and dandy so I'm left with more exercise. This week we are now walking the same mile and a half in the mornings and then again at the regular evening time. They hubby has also decided he wanted to do something and right before we walk at night he steals Jayne for like 30 minutes and jogs about a mile. I think we might have to increase Jayne's caloric intake if he continues being abused like this. I'm also thinking the boys are going to be losing weight/toning up and I won't see any changes. Ah age, really not pretty is it?

The up side is that I'm pretty sure that even though I don't see any benefits to this abuse on the outside that my cardiac health must be better. I know I'm hitting my target heart rate (yes, I have a monitor) so at least there is some benefit. Other than a really happy dog that is. Which, come to think of it, is totally worth it too.

Not how I was planning on spending my Sunday

After a Friday and Saturday full of child's 8th birthday events (including another child's birthday party we went to on Friday) I was expecting to wake up Sunday morning and not really move until say, 2010. Apparently the hubby had different ideas. Yeah like totally different ideas. Not sure why but I agreed to go along with them. Well it may have been because while I did mop the floors the hubby did 99% of the cleaning of the house in preparation for the party at our pad. I suppose he figured if he didn't then it wasn't getting done. He, of course, supposed correctly. For this I was not so easily conned into going along with his Sunday plans.

You know what he wanted to do? Get this, he wanted to go paintballing (he had a half a case of paint left over, i.e. 1000 rounds) and have me take pictures of him. You can ask why but really, boys just love pictures of themselves playing paintball. It's totally beyond me, you're covered completely in clothing and a mask so really you cant even tell who it is but it floats their boats. Whatever. He says he's only going to go for 2 games and the kid can't possibly get bored in that short time span. Mind you 2 games in real time will span about 45 minutes to an hour since there's lag time and what not. I figure 1) I have a book and I can bring that along and 2)I've been wanting to try out my bigger lens (no, I dunno what it is but if you want to know I can figure it out). I am making the assumption at this point that bigger means distance and I don't want to get shot so this is a good thing. Yes, you get shot on the sidelines all the time and it damn well hurts since you aren't playing with the adrenaline pumping through you. Miraculously I did not get shot even though we stayed for a hell of a lot longer than 2 games. We dang well closed the place down.

Apparently the kid decided that the people in the office (it's like a converted trailer) were the funnest thing since Barbie and spent her entire time in there babbling at her new audience. She did not want to leave. It was kinda nice, she was having a good time and leaving us alone so I didn't mind. Kinda feel bad for the office help but they were teenagers and then the owner's wife who is a special ed teacher, to her my kid was probably awesome. No one complained and I know my kid is well behaved so it was good.

So there I went, taking pictures. Please note with all of these pictures, there are probably 200 more (I believe in take 100 and there is bound to be 1 good one) and none of them have had anything done to them. Almost all of them need at least cropping not to mention all the other garbage that people (other than me) do to photoshop their work. I have yet to install my Elements and really, for the most part, all I ever like doing to my pictures is cropping them. I'm a purist, old school, call it what you will. I come from back in the day of 35mm, most of what you did you did with the camera. Also! When out on the field you must wear goggles, the same ones that are on these boys in the pics. Putting the camera up to them is a pain in the ass and I kept on taking pics that were centered too high, too low, too far left or right. So I had a lot of the same shot repeated just so I could get the person centered correctly. Sometimes they moved to fast for this so there is just a sucky shot. Sports shooting, not yet my forte. Give me a few years though.

I found a lot of photos that I liked after looking at them for reasons that I didn't figure out until then. I took this one because I liked the framing.



Needs cropping though, too much frame not enough subject. BTW, in terms of an actual paintball shot it is less than exciting. I realize this, it was more of a photographer thing for me.
This one is another good framing shot, ok in terms of paintball action too,



I wanted to zoom in a bit more but it was hard with trying to keep up with someone running and zig zagging. Yeah, if they are trying not to get shot out then taking a picture of them is totally easy too. Not. Again, this can be fixed a bit with cropping.

This one was entertaining plus the hubby can figure out that he's wasting energy running by going too vertical. He should just be going low and forward. He's more like a leaping deer...



I took a ton of great ones of other players too. One tends to be limited to one side of the field unless you plan on really getting into it. Which I didn't because you will get shot at. No thanks. So I have a bunch of pictures of people I may or may not know that just looked good from a paintball shoot point.




I did get the email of one of these guys, he ended up being in a lot of good shots and I figured he'd like to see them. The other one (lower down) works at the paint ball store and I'm sending them the Photobucket link (feel free to go and look at the rest, there is a ton of older stuff on there so ignore that) to all the rest of the pics.

This guy is the one who normally takes all the pictures (he's got a camera like mine) and like most photographers, he has no pictures of himself playing. he was peached that I got some of him.



Ever have that problem? I know there are very few pictures of me. Oddly I'm ok with that though. Very rarely do I find one of myself that I like so I've deleted most of the ones the hubby has taken of me.

Soon we'll be the Dursley's...

With the child's impending 8th birthday we've been doing the whole party planning (why does it cost so much to throw a birthday party for a child?) and purchasing of toys that she has requested. We're saving the iPod nano for Christmas if you're wondering. If you watch Cartoon Network or Nikelodeon you've probably seen all the one's she's requested. I swear that's where all products should put their commercials. Kids are so easily swayed by commercials. She could be watching any channel and a commercial for a cable company or paper towels comes up and she has to make sure we are using that one. Yeah sure we are honey, change the channel.



For this birthday she wants a few things but on the top of her list are Zhu Zhu pets. Basically electronic hamsters. At one point she had asked for a hamster but I nixed that idea. 3 dogs, 1 snake, and 1 chinchilla is about 5 pets past mommy's max. Plus I abhor hamsters. They bite and they eat their own poo. NO. So when this lovely electronic version came out I was very pleased. Me and just about every other parent in the United States. You know how I know this? Because I waited until this week to go out and buy one. HAH! Dream on baby. Getting the set up, wheel, tubes, car, what not, is very easy. You can totally get a hold of those. The hamster proper? Getting your hands on one of those is an Act of God. They are sold at Amazon (for $45), Toys-R-Us (for $9.99), and Walmart (for $8). I went to a Walmart this past weekend and got the set up stuff but they had no hamsters. The hubby stopped at every Walmart and Walmart super store between San Antonio and Beeville (80 miles south of us) and could not find a hamster. Apparently when they come in there are people waiting. Apparently they are now more popular than gun ammo which is what most people are waiting at the Walmart trucks for. WTF? It's an $8 electronic hamster that runs off of AAA batteries.


I called our local Toys-R-Us' and after many many minutes on perpetual hold come to find out that they got a shipment this morning but there was a line so they were all gone within minutes. Um, I'm sorry what? OK there will be another shipment on Friday but they don't know if there will be any hamsters on it for sure but you're welcome to try. UGH. So not what I want to hear. I am a card carrying member of today's instant gratification society. I should be able to go to the store and get it off the shelf. Ya'll need to make bigger orders! Apparently people are buying them in bulk, marking them up, and selling them on Ebay. Go, look, be horrified. I've shown you the stupid prices for them here, compare them with what they are going for on ebay. Oh and while I'm at it why oh why is Amazon selling them for $45? Anyone? Asinine. I even called my friend in Florida to see if she could call her local stores to find one in stock. No such luck. I was going to call my friends in San Diego to have them do the same but it wasn't 10am on the west coast at that point.

So I finally get a hold of 1 more Toys-R-Us this morning. This one isn't even in San Antonio proper, it's over in Selma which is like a north east suburb 20 miles away from my work. They got 80 in this morning (they open at 10am) and when I called at 11 the still had 20 left. Oh and no, they won't hold them for anyone. Bastages. The only person I know that works over there is the Airforce ER doctor that is my neighbor and helped save my life when my brain exploded. I suppose I could have called him up and begged him to drive to get a Zhu Zhu pet from Toys-R-Us during his lunch break (if they even take them) but really, wouldn't you fell a bit silly? Yeah me too. So I jumped in my car and hauled ass (I may have pushed a few speed limits) all the way across town to get a stupid freaking electronic hamster that is more precious than gold this close to Christmas. Really it's the only reason I could figure that these retarded little $8 toys are so back ordered! In October! Worse than Cabbage Patch Kids in the 80's. I didn't get to have one of those, btw.

So for all of you moms and dads out there: If your child wants something specific please do not do like I did and wait until 1 week prior to the date needed. Make damn sure you know you can get a hold of it and if not then tell all of your friends to keep an eye out for you. They wouldn't bother themselves with something you want but if your kid wants it bets have it that they'll find it for you!

Fortunately for me they still had like 15 in stock when I got to the store. Well maybe fortunately for them because after being on the phone all morning if I hadn't gotten the stupid things (I just went ahead and bought all 4 varieties) I may have had to kill someone. Just sayin'...

Do you think 8 yrs old is too young?

It was just this month that I came to the reality check that is what having a child turning 8 is. October seems to be the month for birthdays. Apparently we all seem to get busy at the end of January/beginning of February. Last weekend the kid had a slumber party on Friday night and a costume birthday party Saturday night. Prior to this year (which, if you're keeping track is the second grade for our kid) when birthday parties came along you'd take the kid and stay for the duration of the party. I guess second grade is the delineating year. When you get to this age you take the kid, drop them off at the door, and BYE! Come pick them up at the designated ending time. ROCKIN! I am totally down with that. We are having our party this Saturday (oh and someone else is having a party on Friday that we are attending) with a slightly different lean though. We tend to invite the whole family, which includes the little kids in the family so most likely those parents will be staying. I don't care either way really as long as parents understand that when they are left in my care they will be under my rules. I'm strict and I believe in discipline. You don't know that then you don't know me well enough to leave your child in my loving care. See how that works? Yeah.

So this year is also a big turning point in presents. The kid has decided she wants a camera. She is very good when using my camera (the older one, not the Rebel, it's too heavy with the lenses on) so I'd love to get her a point and shoot. For her birthday though I think we'll get her toys. Christmas is when we'll go for the camera thing. Now mind you the hubby got a wild and crazy idea. If she wants a camera wouldn't she just adore video i.e. iPod nano? Which is where the question of do you think she's too young comes in. I asked her if she'd like something like that and showed her one of them at Costco. She was like "Oh yeah then I can download video off the internet!" and I was like "What?". Where the hell do they get these ideas in the second grade?

I initially thought 8 would be too young for a iPod. Then I thought a bit more about it. Why? I think she's old enough for a camera and the nano is about the same price and about as delicate. Plus it's Apple, she's going to have to get used to Apple stuff, it's a societal thing right? The more I think about it the better I am with it. Plus you know, we both have iPhones, this is like the Apple 'gateway drug'. A few more years and by the time she's in middle school she'll have something more kick ass than the iPhone. And we had what at her age, knickers? Mrs. Potato head? that we are even able to drive cars much less use our cell phones in this day and age is a mystery.....

He's going to start changing all of his passwords if I keep this up

You know that problem with being too close to someone? You know, like your spouse. Like too close as in we know all of each others passwords? OK he doesn't actually know all mine and I'm sure there are a few of his I don't know. He can't get into our bank accounts but I gave him the passwords, he just doesn't remember them. I know almost all of his, the only one I don't is his atm card code. Of course it's the same bank account as mine so that's neither here nor there. We both have passwords onto the various on line forums though and since most people (including us) re-use a smattering of passwords over and over it's pretty easy to figure out how to get into his stuff.

We rarely belong to the same forums so over lap is not a problem. Except for the few we do both belong to. PBNation was one of those but I'm not on it anymore. I'm not sure he is either, maybe sometimes. City Data forums too, and I accidentally posted a response up when it was logged in as him. To this day he still gets an occasional IM for more info on water softener systems and a really inexpensive plumber. He tells me that his doppelganger has to get on and answer that email for him. On occasion we'll also have Facebook problems. I'll go on and it looks like I'm logged in but that's only because most of his friends are my friends too. And then I don't notice until I've done gone and posted up as him. Both of our profile pictures have both of us in them so it throws me for a loop for a second but then I have to go in and change it. Or ignore it, we're married so the info that comes from one of us might a well be the same as the other right?

Now on occasion I'll also get on to some of his stuff to help him out. Say if he's at work (he has no internet access there or cell phone) and needs something sent out I'll log on to his email (yes I know that password and it connects me to his blog too) and mail it for him. I also know his FB, iTunes, and I'm sure a smattering of other log ons and have been known to, on occasion, go in and make some alterations.

Today I found a picture on one of our friend's FB uploads of them playing paintball last weekend. I thought one of them would make a good profile pic for him so I changed it. Yes I logged into his account and proceeded to modify at will. It's one of my rights as a wife, read the fine print. Funny that though, I had an ex boyfriend who was a little...obsessive? He would read my emails and chats and I couldn't get on the phone and talk to anyone with out him asking for the whole conversation to be repeated to him. Odd man. Now him I did not share passwords with. That man was nutters. Oddly though I don't mind the hubby getting into any of the websites and having at it if he felt so inclined. Of course it helps that he doesn't normally feel so inclined. Someday though I'm going to push his buttons and post up a pic he doesn't like though and you watch, he's going to have to go in and make up whole new passwords huh? That'll be an ugly day and then I'll have to go out of my way and get myself a hacker. What a bother!

College all nighter flash backs and the "O" face

Yeah so we're parents and as such we are responsible for getting the kid's home work done right? Yeah we can say that the kid has to do it but lets be realistic here, we work just as hard on this shit as they do. This week the kid had a project due that she was supposed to have worked on for oh, about a week or 2 now. The Olive/Oliver project, similar to the Stanley project only not nearly as fun (IMHO). With Stanley you mailed him to some one far away and they send back pictures of where they went with him. Kinda like that gnome thing only with a person you know. Ours was awesome since we sent him to Mumbai India with my friend Summer. The Oliver thing was to be local and the kids had to take him along with them and then write in a journal about it. Kind of like a diary. Then you marked on a map of the city where you went and you could either draw a picture or take pictures and put them in the journal entry. Really, doesn't hold a candle to Mumbai. Realize that we don't actually go anywhere here, it's Texas for crying out loud.

Also, we should have been working on this for weeks now right? Sure yeah, we got to it. Not. The kid has homework everyday and is in gymnastics/after school care every day until I pick her up at 5:30. Until 6:45 on Tuesdays and Thursdays (team practice). I pick her up, drag her home, set her up for homework at the table and prepare dinner. By the time she's done with her regular homework it's time to eat and then are we going to do more? Not likely. Plus we suck and never did it on the weekend. It was due yesterday (Tuesday). We kept her up until 9 pm working on it Monday night because she had to finish her regular homework too. It was like this vile flashback of our college days where we'd leave a huge project untouched until the wee hours of the night before it was due. Of course there's a difference between how late one can force themselves to stay up as a teen to twenty year old and a seven year old. Yeah, we suck. She survived though and that speaks volumes as to how good we are at breeding tough off spring.

Did I mention that we still think of ourselves as marginal when it comes to parenting and this last minute project had just a few of those short comings laid throughout it? I mean the time factor alone, yeah we suck. But there was this "O" face thing that we had to get past too.Yeah, that's what I said, the "O" face. The what face honey? One of the places that she wrote about taking her Olive was the pumpkin patch. She has a preference in pumpkin faces this year and she calls it the "O" face pumpkin. You know what I'm talking about right? The pumpkin that has a big O for the mouth? Yeah, this is her fixation this year and she wanted to put in her journal the phrase "O" face. We had to draw the line there. But of course she wanted to know why. How in the world do you explain the ramifications of the phrase "O" face to a 7 year old that doesn't even know what sex is? I mean even if we were really on it parents and had told her what sex is (don't start with me peeps, I'm passing that duty on to the hubby so harass him) how do you take that the one step further? Do you see the problem here? The universe was being nice to us last night though and she accepted us just telling her to trust us and leave the phrase out. I'm sure she'll end up revisiting it eventually though so really we just dodged the bullet that's going to swing around and come right back at us again though huh?

Ah parenting, we still suck at it. Poor offspring....

The biggest babies EVER

I am not into sports, never have been never will be. It is not lost upon me though that sports do happen and seasons start and end constantly. For example, because I have friends on Facebook that watch sports I know that football season has started. I think I even know that my home team is 2 and 1. They lost 2? I think they lost 2, the Chargers historically tend to suck. I presently live in a city that has no major football team (much to their dismay) but does have 1 major league team (I'm not saying any names, I'm sworn to secrecy as to who I was seeing today)(plus I'm going to fully bash them). They are rabid fans here in the city of San Antonio, of that particular team. I don't get it but whatever floats your boat man.

I have a unique job at work. I am special, my samples are special, the tubes I have the sample (blood) drawn in are special. It just so happens that this local major league team needed me to run their samples. I had to consequently go and take my special tubes to their doctors office and wait while all of the team had their blood drawn so I could take it back and treat it 'special'. Because, ya know, I'm special like that. Mind you, I have no enthusiasm at all for this team or it's player. Mind you, most people in San Antonio would give their left and right nut (or that of their more than willing significant other) for the privilege of sitting in the same room as all of these players. WHATEVER.

So here I was, waiting for these men to finish with their beginning of the season (hint the team is not football) physicals after which they'd come in and have their blood drawn. Mind you the ladies drawing the blood were not phlebotomists, they were medical assistants. Trained to draw blood but they rarely do it. Trust me when I tell you this people, when you have your blood drawn you want it done but someone who does it all day every day. We have a room, a veritable team, of phlebotomists at my job. I myself will only let 2 of them pull my blood because I have a nerve that runs right on top of my vein exactly where they pull the most. The 2 I let pull my blood are the 2 pediatric phlebotomists (note: most of them won't do pedi, these are the only 2 and THEY ROCK). The next time I need blood from these pussys, I'm sorry I mean players, I'm bringing my own phlebotomists.

Not because they didn't have good veins, no, no, they had steel pipes. Not that the medical assistants couldn't draw the blood, they were ok fine (not as good as our people of course). But because these HUGE 7ft players were the biggest babies I have ever seen in my God given life. Holy crap people you would not believe their complete and utter lack of balls. There was not a single one of them that didn't sit down in the chair and didn't whine. "I hate getting stuck" "I hate getting blood drawn" Blah blah blah whine whine snivel. One actually sat in the chair, worked himself up and then proceeded to punch the wall next to him. Can you say dumb ass? Yeah I think so. Several of them swore up a storm even after the needle went in their arm. There was squirming and bitching and foot stomping (totally serious here) and I thought a few of them were going to pass out cold before the needle even got to them. No. Lie. These guys can go out and play a game and get body slammed all over the place and have their heads slammed into a floor or wall but one needle in the arm? Oh hells no. Did I mention their ink? Only a few of them weren't covered in tattoos. Hypodermic needle though? Oh no.

I swear we would have had a much easier time if we just punched each one in the nose and collected the blood that seeped out of it. I even think they would have totally agreed to it. Ultimately in the end the biggest knowledge that came out of it for me is my complete total and utter lack of respect for these wussies. SERIOUSLY, these guys are payed huge amounts of money to be manly men and play manly men games. I watched 2 little soft spoken women coax these men one by one into sitting in a chair and have 1 stick in the arm. 1 stick. It was a total tragedy. We got the blood (barely) but the crap we had to go through was insane. I wish that their mothers could have been there to see it. Or even better, been able to tape it and Youtube it. And how much do these guys earn for being a manly men? Oh the tragedy...

It took me 8 years and 8 colleges

To get a degree that is. Well 2 actually, I got a 2 yr and a 4 yr. I was married (yes, I have an ex husband) to a military guy and we moved a lot. Plus there was just the turmoil of not figuring out what I wanted to be when I grew up for an eternity. Let's see if I can remember where I went...
Hey I went from a Banana Slug to a Terrapin, up the evolutionary ladder!

Mesa College in San Diego, I took a German course here while in high school, yes I was a TOTAL geek and randomly decided to take a college course during the summer, for fun. It eventually counted towards my final degrees so I count it on the list

UC Santa Cruz, This was my first 4 year college and I can't even begin to tell you how wrong this college was for me. I went there for 1 year. 3 trimesters back in the day before they had grades. Yes, this college had no grades. Transferring those credits was a total bitch.

Skyline community college in South San Francisco, This was after I was married and the ex husband was stationed at The Presidio and we had a hideous little apartment in Pacifica while waiting for on base housing.

College of Marin, This was the community college north of San Francisco in Marin. We were offered on base housing for the lowly enlisted on the San Francisco side of the Golden Gate bridge but it was nasty and had roaches. I refused to live there. Since the base was closing down they had officer housing available and they offered us a duplex in Fort Baker. If you've ever jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge you'd know the place, they pull all the jumpers in to the little Horse Shoe Bay there. The place a freaking beautiful. Too bad we were too poor to appreciate it any at all. Apparently it's been sold and will be some sort of first class resort. Awesome.

Montgomery College Germantown, This is in Maryland suburbs, the ex was stationed at Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington DC. Only a feaking moron would live in DC proper so we lived in Maryland. This was the college that The Blair Witch Project came out of. I claim no responsibility and never watched the movie. Again, only a moron would....

Montgomery College Rockville, We went here for summer school. It's their main campus I think and Calculus was only offered here. This is where Tabitha and I had that math teacher with skin tight WHITE Levi's. Don't ask, it was a tragedy.

*please note* I loved this community college (the Germantown campus), when they told me I was up for graduation for my 2 year degree I almost cried, I didn't want to leave. 4 year colleges suck. This was also where I had such a stellar teacher (in organic chemistry) that I decided to be a chem major.

Hood College, One of the bigger disappointments of my college career and that's saying something. It used to be a private all girls school. Now it's just private and stupid expensive. I was told I would have a scholarship. 2 weeks after school started I was told I wasn't getting anything. I went in to the office and cried. Seriously. And you know what? It worked. Got something like $3000 knocked off my bill. Only had to come up with something like $8000, for the ONE semester I had there. Redunculous. Obviously that was my first and last semester there. They still send me mail begging for donations. I don't think so.


And my final college may I never ever have to go to another college again, the
University of Maryland at College Park, A nice college with a very demoralized chemistry department. I found that even though there was no money in the department they had a fabulous dean and that makes a HUGE difference. We were on a first name basis because, as you might know, I do not fear making my voice heard. Yes I may have had a few petitions signed and burned a few bridges (Dr. Fenselau is a raging bitch, just sayin') but I built a few too so it was all good. Dr. Khanna taught me Physical Chemistry and I was in his office for every single office hour he had. I never ever understood that course and I swear he passed me on pity/effort alone. He was supposed to be retired when I was there and I graduated in 1999, do the math. He's still there. He patted my head once and told me I reminded him of his daughter. I think he had a thick headed daughter but I took it as a complement that he didn't kick me out of his class at all. He must really really like teaching, he was a gem.

Wouldn't you know it though, the one professor I had that most related to what I eventually found my niche in I still think is one of the most useless teachers I ever had. Dr. Lee's accent was so thick he couldn't pronounce his name, it always came out Dr. Ree. He put up overheads and then passed out packets of copies of all the over heads. No one could understand his english so he had to do something. Not a very creative man but hey, he taught Instrumental Analysis. Just how creative do you think we analytical chemists are anyway? He actually studies Genome Mapping/Typing and proteome analysis, it's what I spent my first 6 years in the field doing. Working with the biggest name in the research field might I add. Dr. Lee has no idea what he was missing. Poor man, if he only knew...

I'll have you know the purpose of this particular post had very little to do with what I ended up writing about. I seem to have a hang up with back story, have you noticed? My original purpose was to tell you about the UC Santa Cruz Occupation. I'm totally serious, they are experiencing a student led occupation. Freaking morons, they brought it on themselves. I told you I didn't belong there right? They say there was a student living out of his van and eating road kill back when I went there. Looks like they're all going to be doing that soon with the cost hikes. Not really, those wanna be hippies are all trust fund babies you know. I spent my loser Saturday nights doing laundry and being mocked by them. I worked in the building that's being occupied. My parents didn't send me weekend party money, I worked to to put myself through school. Looks like the trust fund babies don't want to give up their pot money....

Often I eat alone

It's the nature of my work. I don't actually work 'with' anybody really. I have a part time employee that comes in the afternoon to take over but he's here at like 3:30, long after lunch. So when I feel like going out to lunch I take a book. Not everyone is comfortable going to restaurants by themselves but I have never had problem with it. I'm antisocial, what can I say.

So today I felt the need for Chinese food. I decided to go out to the one quick and cheap place near my work (the food is terrible, really I can't explain the urge). Here's a quick not so tangent tangent for ya, we have a janitor here at work. Nice woman, in her early 40's, born again Christian (serious bible thumper), not married, never had kids. She's very nice, very naive, and high maintenance. You know the type? Real sweet but drives you nuts like nails on a chalkboard? She really wants a husband so she's decided to fast once a week. Because, you know, if you starve yourself God will give you a husband. I'm sorry, say what?

I'm just about done eating lunch and in she walks. And, of course, comes and sits with me. We work on a time clock here. I can see at this point I am not going to be getting back within my hour for lunch. Good thing I don't see patients here huh? She proceeds to prattle on to me and I still have my book on my lap and am kind of reading it and nodding and agreeing with whatever it is she's saying. You know what she's talking about? A friend of hers. Male friend. Oh and did I mention that he's dead? Now you know why I like having lunch by myself. Yeah dead guy conversation for lunch. With a born again Christian. Thank God it's Friday.

OK now here's what really weirded me out (mind you, I'm used to these strange conversations with her so the dead guy thing, not so weird), the quantity of food she ate. Swear to God it was not until I moved to Texas where I actually saw people clear their whole plate. All the lunch portions at this place were the same size, soup with crunchies, main course with rice (big ol pile of rice) and egg rolls or rangoons, and a fortune cookie. I'm going to say right now that I could never ever finish a whole serving of whatever it is on the plate. Much less the rice and egg roll/rangoon/whatever. I'd explode. It is physically beyond my capabilities. I think one would have to train to fit that all in. Plus it's not a very good Chinese place, why would you want to pack all that in? Apparently I was sitting across from a food packin' in Olympian. She started with the soup, added about a half cup of soy sauce and crunchies to it. Then her main meal, she added enough soy sauce to turn it to soup and then she scraped the plate clean. Swear to God I'm not sure she even tasted it. Then she ate her fortune cookie. Oh! Then she noticed I didn't eat mine. So she ate that too. Human vacuum cleaner much? And this whole time she's going on about the dead guy. She must not miss him that much because his memory obviously did nothing to quench her appetite. Of course I was almost physically ill watching it all go down. Literally.

And you know why I stayed and didn't just leave when she got there (and I had already been done with my meal?)? She doesn't have a license and someone had dropped her off. I didn't want to leave her there to walk the 5 blocks back to work. In retrospect I should have let her walk. After that meal she really needed to get rid of some calories....

Homosexuality "represents the dead end of human development"

A statement spoken by Ukrainian Orthodox Church spokesman Father Georgy Gulyaev. Really now who are these freaks? Apparently Elton John and his husband (yes, it's legal in England, home of the more enlightened than the right wing US) were (are?) trying to adopt a 14 month old HIV positive baby boy in the Ukraine. Here's the commentary, Let Elton John and his partner adopt. It's really funny, I like the author but please note it's a commentary and not "official" news. They were denied. Of course. On the grounds that they are too old. Too gay more like. I mean really this is Elton John we're talking about here. How could that boy do any better? He's got HIV, no one else is going to adopt him and no one else can give him the health care and love that Elton and David can. Ever. Do you disagree? Can you imagine what kind of life he would have with them? And can you imagine what kind of life he's going to have without them? It's not a pretty thought by any means.

And oh lordy the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Does it get more archaic than them? They make the Roman Catholic Church look like new age Birkenstock wearing hippes. I think they still do animal sacrifices and maybe even throw in a few virgins to boot. They are the ones making these policies. You know they have some sort of strangle hold on the government policies. I've never even been there and I am absolutely sure that the good Father Gulyaev has his sticky little fingers in all the politics over there. Don't get me started on what rules he breaks either, all those 'celibate' religions have some seriously big ass horrifying skeletons in their closets.

You know what Elton and David need to do? Pay the Russian mafia to get the kid. Those guys are bad ass and the only thing nastier then the Orthodox Church over there. And don't tell me Elton doesn't have that kind of spare cash. You know he'd totally pay bank for the kid.

Ask and ye shall recieve...

The Urban Cowboy asked for some pictures of the tattoo and piercing. I have yet to get off my duff and take any but I do have pics of my shoulder tattoo from way back when during that, you know, wedding thing. The kid was 8 months old. No comments from the peanut gallery, I wasn't really all that game for getting married at all. I told the man that he didn't want to marry me and he didn't listen. Don't say I didn't warn him.
BTW, the pics are from before I had it recolored, it's a bit darker now. At the time of these photos I think the tattoo was about 7 years old and had survived my teens and twenties where I sunbathed like a woman on a mission. To get skin cancer.

Friday night in suburbia

So the kid decided to spend the night at her friend's house tonight. I took the opportunity to get adventurous. My day was dull, noted only by the fact that I voluntarily got my flu vaccination at work. I hate needles, did I ever mention that? I used to have acupuncture done and unlike every other human on the face of this earth I can feel each and every one of those wee little needles go in. I don't hate needles so much as to not have my vaccinations done or blood pulled when need be but I don't have to like it.

When I was 18 I had a tattoo done on my ankle. A wee little 5 minute job, only a black outline since I could not even imagine sitting for longer so they could color it in. Oh hells no, it hurt. One does not go into a tattoo parlor and not expect pain though right? It took me several more years to get another, a Chinese character for 'love' although this one was filled in (blue to purple fade) it was still small and hurt like hell. It's old enough that I've had it re-colored since then and sure enough, those needles still hurt. Really though it's a good thing I can't take the pain. I love tattoos and I'd probably be covered in them (my employer would have a hissy fit) but the pain keeps me in check.

Notice how my hatred of needles still didn't keep me from getting the 2 tats I have though? Might I also mention that it didn't stop me from getting 7 ear ring piercings in my teen years and 1 nose ring in my early college years. I didn't even wear any earrings by the time I was in college because the holes themselves seemed to be very irritated whenever I wore them. It wasn't until I got the nose ring that I figured out why and that I was sure that I have an allergy to most metals. BTW, that nose ring was done using a piercing gun, it was almost 20 years ago that I had that thing done and it still sends shivers up my spine when I think about it. I had to take it out and leave it out since back then there were no specialty non-metal piercings that I could use. It really was a tragedy, that particular piercing looked really cute on my nose. It was not a septum piercing (I hate that cow look) but a side one and I used a hoop. I never got a picture of it, what a shame.

This week (Wednesday?) I decided I wanted a navel piercing. Why? I haven't the faintest clue, just all of a sudden it came to me. I im'd a girlfriend of mine to see if she had one (she does) and if it caused her any problems and since she has 2 kids if she had to take it out during her pregnancies. She had no problems with it and hers didn't even need to be taken out when she had her babies. She also sent me a link for navel rings specially made for pregnant bellies, pregnancypiercings.com. They even come in entirely metal free forms for those getting c-sections. So if I couldn't handle the titanium belly button rings I could switch it to this medical grade plastic pregnancy ring, I know my skin can handle that. Then I went about finding a place to do the piercing.

Do you know these places are open during the weirdest hours? Noon to midnight. Of course I didn't want to drag the kid into a tattoo and piercing parlor and have her see me get a 16 gauge needle shoved through my skin. No, that would be just a wee bit much for her. Not that I have a problem with her seeing my tattoos (she likes the ones I have) or my navel pierced but watching it done? No, she doesn't like needles either and I'd rather not make the phobia worse. Fortunately her girlfriend asked her to spend the night tonight and the spouse was game for a small trek to the other side of the tracks.

I must say these tattoo artists and piercers must find some serious amusement when the suburban housewife shows up for a bit of aesthetic modifications on her Friday night. My piercer was manning the front desk having fun popping bubble wrap. Yes, I'm totally serious. I (most pathetically) forgot to bring my camera so the pic is off their website. I won't show you a picture of my freshly pierced navel. Suffice to say right now ITS PISSED OFF and you don't want to see that. I must say though it isn't anywhere near as painful as getting a tattoo. Nope not even close. It's sore now but my arm doesn't hurt from the vaccine anymore. Lesser of two evils maybe? That's ok though, I have a belly button filled with a shiny fat crystal and a smaller one above it at the top of the piercing. I like it, it's very cute. I may not have a flat tummy like Megan Fox but mine is cuter, it's attached to a moderately coherant person with a brain. Oy did I just bag on Miss Fox? My bad.

My ring looks like this one only the metal part is blue. I don't have a thing for blue but it was the only one they had that was titanium and you don't see the metal barely at all, just the crystal shows. In fact that bottom big crystal fills my entire belly button.

This pleases me and that's what it's all about now isn't it?

TV, do people out there actually watch it?

Yesterday I saw some posts on Facebook (yeah, I'm on all day) about how Patrick Swayze had passed. Of course, I had to look it up (on line, CNN) and confirm because you just never know what the hell some people are blathering on about (Farmville/Mafia Wars crap anyone?). It was then that I realized that 1) I don't watch the news on tv and then 2) I don't watch tv. Oh yeah we do use our tv, the kid sometimes watches cartoons but with her school and homework she never gets a chance anymore. So with that gone we on occasion turn it on in the evening but we don't watch network tv. We used to watch some shows that we'd put on the dvr but eh, we got over it.

We really prefer getting entire seasons on dvd and watching at our own convenience. I stopped watching the news on tv almost 10 years ago. It's just so depressing and none of it is unbiased right? So we have this dvd collection that has practically taken over an entire wall of our house. It's so unattractive but hey, we don't waste time watching commercials anymore! Funny thing is people out there do watch network tv, I hear them talking about it at work. Mostly the reality shows though, and Dancing with the stars, biggest loser and whatnot. I don't ever get curious about them though, none seem terribly entertaining. After all the Joss Whedon stuff gets cut I'm left with very little that interests me more than an infomercial.

What about ya'll? Anything out there you value enough to sit down and watch real time?

This picture, its BIG

I didn't realize how big until I put it on my desktop. You'll have to click on the dang thing to see it all. I picked the center option rather than the stretch, it centers it so much her head is almost real time size and it's mostly just her face.

I always have a pic of the kid up on my work computer. Today I looked at it and thought, dang I haven't changed that for over a year. She looks different now, kids change so quickly. The last pic I had up she was still a little kindergardener almost first grader. Now she's a big second grader. Where the hell did the time go?

The end is near!

It's a light and it's at the end of the tunnel! Alright ya'll want perspective now don't ya? I have been a part of a nation wide rescue, FBRN, for about 4 years now. From before I left San Diego (3 years ago) I was asked to help with the review crew and back then I fostered too. In the ~4 years I've been with them I have fostered something like 4 dogs and have had issues with the regime and no longer foster for them anymore. Well that's almost true, I'd foster if and only if 1 person in the rescue asked me too. And the only reason I'd do it for Eilene is because that last monster foster from hell I almost took to get euthanized (seriously I was going to kill this dog) was taken off my hands by her. This dog was fine, as long as we weren't anywhere near each other. This dog and I did not get along and I swear to God I had no idea it could be a normal dog. If Eilene had not recruited her neighbor to fly into my city and fly her back to Colorado that dog would be dead by now. Turns out that dog was fine, just needed someone else. Someone other than me, and thank God we found out before I killed her. I have never ever met a dog I truly hated. Trust FBRN to dump one on me and run. No it was not Eilene's job to get this dog a new foster home, she's just an angel and managed through some act of kindly neighbors to take her into her home. So for her I would do just about anything, even take a foster off her hands. Serious, her and only her.

Eilene is also in charge of the review crew. It's the small small group of volunteers who go through each and every application that comes in for all of our dogs and decide which ones get passed on to the foster parent for her to pick a forever home. It's a thankless job and really all we're doing is picking out the raving morons. If the dog's bio says no kids ya know what? Don't apply if you have 3 kids and are due to give birth to triplets. I shit you not peeps, this is the drivel we have to sift through. Each dog can get up to like 150-200 applications. HELLO how much free time do you think we want to volunteer for the morons who can't read? Out of 200 applications often there are less than 20 that meet the requirements we have plainly spelled out on the dog's bio. But you know, in order to know what the dog needs the applicants have to actually read the bio. Gawd for-frikkin-bid. Can I tell you how many hours of my life I volunteered to looking at the answers these twits filled out on their applications looking for that perfect forever home? The foster parents, volunteers the lot of us, raise these foster dogs as our own. They are in our homes, sleep in our beds, rely on us for (very often extensive) medical treatment. The fact that many applicants don't even put out the effort to read the bio does nothing but piss us off. We aren't going to give you that dog until we know for a fact that you'll love it just as much as we do.

The job as reviewer is a thankless one but necessary. We get to filter the shit out and no one knows who we are or what we do. Nobody says thank you or good job. We have people volunteer for this job but they rarely stay and even those that do slack off and don't actually remember to review on time, or at all. It's very frustrating for Eilene to have to harass those of us on the crew to get on it so she can send the foster mom her good applications. In turn the rescue group in general always and a I mean always criticizes us and how we do our job. Specifically they take it out on Eilene. She took over this job some 5 years ago because back in the day it could take a dog up to 4 months after the applications had been made to actually get it's home. Many of the applicants by then had moved on and no longer wanted the dog. Can you blame them? She turned it around and made a system. It's not perfect but it works and it works well and is as fair as we can possible make it. Shy of having a dog for every applicant that is.

Why do we do it then? For the dogs, we do it for them. That kept Eilene going for many years through all the bs that goes along with rescue. Trust me, there's a TON of bs. I no longer do anything else for the rescue, I don't even look at the Yahoo lists where people bitch and moan back and forth. I'm waaay too inflammatory and I don't have that little check valve on my brain that tells you to shut up or you'll make things worse and piss people off. And I did, with little regret. Beotches the lot of them. Except Eilene.

Turns out she has had it with the ungrateful beotches, thank God. She's quitting the job as review crew coordinator the end of this year. The only reason that I stayed on was as her second, her support when she was on a trip and what not. They can find another moron for a victim. Eilene tried to get me to stay on, she said they'd need someone who knew how to do the job. Get real, those beotches want to fill all the posts with their own yes men. They have their own version of a good ol boys club and I won't touch it with a 10 ft pole. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. They have this thing where they want it done their way because their way is best. Because, you know, doing this for 5 years Eilene could not have possibly gotten anything right much less be doing it the best way.

Yeah you know what this is? This is me not letting the door hit me in the ass on my way out of it. Do I think some dogs are going to have to suffer for it? Maybe. Probably. But only in so far as they will stay in their foster homes longer. It's ok, their foster mommies love them so there are worse fates. Gotta make the break sometime and I think this is the best time. Lordy I am not going to miss this job, I hadn't stopped and thought about how long I'd been doing it until last night and you know what? 4 years is too long, I'm going to let someone else carry that torch. Damn freaky dog rescue people. Dec 31st I'm out!