Whales

I was really sorry to hear about the woman who was killed by the Orca this week at Sea World. It was so unfortunate. But I am getting my dander up by the people who are calling for this whale to be exterminated. It's a wild animal. It is called a
"killer whale". And it never asked to be kept in a swimming pool where it is forced to perform for the thousands of gawkers who parade through Sea World every year. I have some strong feelings about animals in captivity. I know that zoos and aquariums are entertaining, fascinating and educational. I am guilty of visiting them myself. But it always elicits a sense sadness for me....the animals are so beautiful and we have them in jail for our pleasure. There is just something so wrong about that. And to kill an animal because it did something that is a natural behavior for it? Its unthinkable. If you play with fire, you know there is a chance that you might get burned. I hope they will decide to release this whale into the ocean. It might not survive after having been "domesticated" in captivity, but at least it would have a fighting chance.

Adult content.....maybe?

The alarm went off this morning at the usual unGodly time of 6:20am. And yeah, I realize that some of you get up way before that, but its just about as early as I can stand. I stumbled out of my nice warm bed and struggled to find the shut off switch on our alarm clock. My husband stretched slowly and said, "Mmmmmm, I don't want to wake up. I was having the BEST dream!" Well, okay then. I was hesitant to ask.....

"Yeah", he said. "It was all about food! I was someplace where I was surrounded by all kinds of yummy food! There was a flan that was at least 2 feet in diameter. A huge 2 foot FLAN!"

Oh my sweet Lord, it made me laugh. I was thinking it was....well, you KNOW what I was thinking it was. I don't need to spell it out. But it was FLAN, ya'll. And that has made me smile everytime that I think about it ALL day long. LOL!

Why do women do that?

I have a friend who is married to a "not very nice" man. He is overbearing, controlling, and has had about as many affairs as Tiger Woods. No exaggeration. She knows about them, too. But for whatever reason, she chooses to stay with him and be miserable. I really think she is completely afraid of being alone, even though she is smart, competent, and would be so much happier if she didn't have his bad behavior continually dragging her down. Its hard, you know? I mean I KNOW its hard on her, but its hard for me too. When she is upset about his latest (fill in the blank...affair, binge, gambling spree...etc) she confides in me and tells me all of his sins that have rendered her in tears for the gazillionth time. But then, after he comes to his senses and realizes that she "might" actually leave him (she basically supports him, as he prefers to work only on rare occasions so he has free time to pursue his long string of hobbies) he comes back, apologizing profusely, buying her flowers (with HER bank account more often than not), and promising that he will never stray again and is ready to clean his act up. She falls for it. EVERY SINGLE TIME! And then somehow, even though she has told me all of these things that are absolutely unforgivable, I am supposed to act like nothing happened, and like he is the world's nicest guy because she wants to believe that its true. It makes me want to vomit. Seriously.

Sometimes I consider backing off from being her friend. I can't take it, watching her suffer time and time again, and then pretending that everything is fine and dandy once he offers the apology. I can't change her mind. She pretends to listen to me, and agree that she is at the end of her patience....but then....she just can't bring herself to break free and figure out how to be a happy SINGLE woman.
I don't get it. I really, really, REALLY do NOT get it at all. And in a sense, she needs me. Without someone to tell these things to, she is all alone with her misery.
But venting and putting the burden of knowing what the situation is like on me...its really wearing me down. If I could hog tie her and drag her off someplace for about a month or so, maybe I could break her of his evil spell. But until then....???
I just wish women could wake up to the fact that its the 21st century. Women can be self-sufficient and independent. Its not a detriment to NOT have a man. And unless you can find a GOOD man, being single is the absolute best thing that you can be. It kills me how many women put up with so much crap, and then talk themselves into believing that its ok.

I used to listen to this radio talk show psychologist, Dr. Joye Brown. She might still be on the air, but her program changed times, and somehow I lost track. But she always gave out this little pearl of wisdom to women who weren't sure if they should stay in their current relationship: Imagine that you won the lottery tomorrow. You could have anything, do anything, and go anywhere that you wanted.
Can you imagine having your partner with you while you enjoy your unlimited bounty? Or would you feel secure enough to walk away, knowing that you didn't need him anymore? If you would walk, then don't wait on the lottery win to do it. It is NOT worth it.

For the record, this has NOTHING to do with my husband, who is absolutely perfect in every single way (he reads this occasionally...LOL). I would definitely take him with me to enjoy the spoils of my win. And after we traveled the world over, we would come back and set up a foundation to save homeless animals. And after that....? I may set out on a worldwide crusade to educate and encourage women to believe in themselves.

False Alarm

Bruce took my laptop apart, and cleaned out/readjusted the wireless switch and miraculously it works again! Yay Bruce!!! I have a computer again. I am so grateful. He had switched out the wireless card, and that didn't help it. We were about to assume the motherboard had gone bad and start shopping. I'm so glad it didn't come to that.

And we had a good weekend. We took Delaney out for lunch and shopping yesterday while Calvin had the misfortune to go to a funeral. And everybody got a chance to play our new wii game "Mario Kart". I have yet to play it, but from the reaction it seems like fun. I will eventually get around to trying it.

I talked to Stephen today, and his conference/presentation was successful. I know he is glad that it's over because it was taking an enormous amount of his time. But it went well and that is awesome.

We have heat again, but still no roof. I think Bruce is going to call those guys tomorrow and see what is going on. Maybe one day soon....?

All in all it was a good weekend, the weather was really nice, and things are getting straightened out after our long bout of mishaps and catastrophes. I told Jeanne that it is probably a good thing that we gave away our goats, because if any more unfortunate incidents were to happen to us, I might resort to animal sacrifice to try and break the streak of bad luck....LOL. Of course, there are always the dogs.....hmmmmmm. The kitties are exempt from being sacrificial offerings due to their insane amount of cuteness. But if those dogs wake me up early on my weekends one more time...well....who knows.

Computer problems

My computer is out of action for the moment. I am going to be stealing Bruce's off and on, whenever I can until mine gets fixed. But in the meantime, I might not have much blogging time. Hopefully it won't take too long to be back.

Jeanne, Calvin, and Delaney are up here for the weekend. Casey doesn't love me apparently, and stayed home with her friends. How sad. But we went out shopping today and had lunch at my favorite Chinese buffet. Its the place I always go to with Erica, so I was feeling a little nostalgic.

So, we are having a good weekend. I am hoping that Stephen is having a good time at his conference, too. I have been sending him happy vibes to get him through his presentation flawlessly...but honestly I know he will be fine.

Things and stuff...

A bunch of random stuff, because my brain is not in organized mode today:

1. Its Hannia's Birthday today. I hope she is having a happy one, too. Mordida!
Mordida! Mordida! (the Mexican birthday chant meaning "bite" as in bite into the cake. I think that at some point the birthday person gets their face shoved in the cake, too, but I may be wrong about that part.)

2. Its not that Omen is acting all that awful when I am trying to give her the medication. Its more that she looks at me like I am torturing her and being mean to her. And that breaks my heart. She struggles but doesn't really bite or scratch. She is such a sweetheart. The meds go on for another week though, and today I crushed it up and sprinkled it over her food. Girlfriend loves to eat, so I think she got the full dose without my having to make her unhappy. I will be so glad to be done with this.

3. Still no heat in this part of the house, but the motor came in today, so....hopefully tomorrow we will be back to normal again. ??? Thats assuming, of course, that we ever were really "normal", so...

4. The roof people from our insurance company came out to look and to measure things to get started on our roof dilemma. That was Tuesday. No word since. I have no idea when to expect to get that fixed. The good news is that we didn't appear to have any leaks during the snow this weekend.

5. I don't know if any of you really knew this, but Erica applied for a scholarship kind of thing with the Department of Defense in D.C. They would fund the rest of her time working on her Ph.D. and also guarantee her a job upon graduation. She heard back yesterday that she made the semi-finalist list, so....Congratulations Erica.

6. We might be seeing Calvin this weekend. He is coming up to go to a friend's father's funeral. Not a happy occasion, but we haven't seen him in a while, so the visiting part is good.

7. Stephen is giving a presentation at a linguistics conference this weekend. He works for the professor that organizes and coordinates the whole thing every year so he has been participating in this from the beginning. It was an honor to be chosen to present, and he has been so busy working on this that we have barely seen him (or Hannia). I wish him well, although I am sure he will do an excellent job. After this, more serious work on his thesis, so....I probably still won't see a whole lot of them. Sad, but necessary, I guess.

8. I am usually a winter-loving girl. I dislike heat, and humidity with a passion.
But this year? This year I am actually ready for spring. It probably has something to do with the fact that we have had rain, ice and snow (mainly rain) almost non-stop since December. It has been a cold, dreary and harsh winter and I am ready to put it behind me.

9. 6 weeks until sunny San Juan, Puerto Rico!!!! Yay!!! Will I be able to hold out long enough to make it????????

10. A happy springtime picture to warm us up a little bit:

Here kitty kitty

I "borrowed" this from another website that I found while researching ways to get a cat to take a pill more easily. Apparently, there is NO easy way. In fact, I came across several sites that claim some cats can't be medicated with pills. In that case, you have to ask the vet for special liquids or pastes....So, we aren't having that much trouble, but its no easy task either. And she hates it more than ever, since she knows the warning signs that its med time.

How to Give a Cat a Pill (followed by How to Give a Dog a Pill)

1. Pick up cat and cradle it in the crook of your left arm, as if holding a baby. Position right forefinger and thumb on either side of cat’s mouth and gently apply pressure to cheeks while holding pill in right hand. As cat opens mouth, pop in the pill. Allow cat to close mouth and swallow.

2. Retrieve pill from floor, and cat from behind sofa. Cradle cat in left arm and repeat process.

3. Retrieve cat from bedroom and throw away soggy pill.

4. Take new pill from foil wrapper. Cradle cat in left arm, holding rear paws tightly with left hand. Force open the jaws and push pill to back of mouth with right forefinger. Hold mouth shut for a count of ten.

5. Retrieve pill from goldfish bowl, and cat from top of wardrobe. Call spouse from garden.

6. Kneel on floor with cat wedged firmly between knees. Hold front and rear paws, ignoring low growls emitted by cat. Get spouse to hold head firmly with one hand, while forcing wooden ruler into mouth. Drop pill down ruler and rub cat’s throat vigorously.

7. Retrieve cat from curtain rail, and get another pill from foil wrapper. Make note to buy new ruler and repair curtains. Carefully sweep shattered figurines and vases from hearth, and set aside for gluing later.

8. Wrap cat in large towel, and get spouse to lie on cat with head just visible from below armpit. Put pill in end of drinking straw, force cat’s mouth open with pencil, and blow down straw.

9. Check label to make sure pill is not harmful to humans. Drink one beer to take away taste of pill. Apply Band-Aid to spouse’s forearm and remove blood from carpet with cold water and soap.

10. Retrieve cat from neighbor’s shed. Get another pill. Open another beer. Place cat in cupboard and close door onto neck to leave head showing. Force mouth open with dessert spoon. Flick pill down throat with rubber band.

11. Fetch screwdriver from garage, and replace cupboard door on hinges. Drink beer. Fetch bottle of Scotch. Pour shot and drink. Apply cold compress to cheek and check medical records for date of last tetanus shot. Apply whiskey compress to cheek to disinfect. Toss back another shot. Throw away tee-shirt and fetch another one from bedroom.

12. Call fire department to retrieve ****ing cat from tree across the road. Apologize to neighbour who crashed into fence while swerving to avoid cat. Take last pill from foil wrapper.

13. Tie the cat's front paws with garden twine and bind tightly to leg of dining table. Fetch heavy duty pruning gloves from shed. Push pill into mouth, followed by large piece of fillet steak. Be rough about it. Hold head vertically and pour two pints of water down throat to wash down pill.

14. Consume remainder of Scotch. Get spouse to drive you to the emergency room. Sit quietly while doctor stitches fingers and forearm, and removes pill remnants from right eye. Stop in at furniture shop on the way home, to order new dining table.

15. Place “Free Mutant Cat from Hell” ad in local newspaper and call local pet shop to see if they have any bunnies.

How to Give a Dog a Pill

1. Wrap it in bacon.