Stash buster?

It started out with trying to just whip stitch the holes in the dog beds so they wouldn’t get any larger. Then it went to simply placing one on top of the other so there’s still a raised bed, but now it’s one and not two.

Then I got faux leather because it was on clearance, leather needles (the packet said leather needles so I thought I’d give it a go), and a fresh roll of 100% cotton thread. I have beeswax at the house, so stealing one of the many little rectangles from Jamie’s beard oil stash wouldn’t be a problem.

Then a dog puked on the beds, then the faux leather got moved elsewhere, and then the bag with the needles and thread went poof.

The dogs did not have a kuranda style bed for about two weeks before I went “I wonder if I could just buy belt webbing and weave one. I watched a video ages ago of a guy doing it.” I looked up the video, still amazed at how fast this guy could work, and watched a couple more from other people making beds with this weave technique.

I think the whole thing is fascinating.

Then I wonder: could I use some of my stash to make a dog bed? I mean, I have the frame for the bed, and I have all this yarn. I know it’ll take time.

So it begins

I started one way, realized it wouldn’t be a good idea, unwrapped the 10 minutes of work, and wrapped it a different way with different yarn. There went 90% of a ball of yarn.

I started weaving. Two hours in and I got maybe 4 inches done. It’s a long process.

I realize this is going to take forever, but now I’m committed. At this stage I don’t know if I hate it or not.

Eventually I run out of the little orange ball of yarn and go into the tote I brought up to be the “dig through this tote for supplies” yarn tote. I grabbed a weird ball of knit jersey yarn that should make it where I’ve stopped and around the piece of plastic used to hold the bars and the bottom support together. It works. It looks weird but it works

Such weird yarn

I have flipped the bed around to work on it. I pull out a ball of pink yarn, the yarn is ridiculously thin. I pull it out and try another one.

My intention was to have just the Jersey knit be the break in between the two balls of yarn, but by this point I had spent hours on this thing and was just wanting to stop.

There is a small stretch of pink yarn, so I’ve used maybe 1/8 of the ball I have. I switch to my thicker grey/purple yarn to finish up.

It is getting tighter, I am getting messier. I give up, I start adding two strings to the weave instead of the one.

Done with this

I am done. I am not cleaning it up or fixing where the bottom squeezes in tighter with itself. It is done, I give up, I am done with this idea.

I feed the dogs, take them out, put two of them up so I can get Bug to try the bed. Bug is pleased. I put the bed into their room and am delighted that it has not busted.

Very happy dog

I have a very happy dog who has climbed up on the bed and is now refusing to move.

I begin to formulate plans for the next one.

Overall, I used up 2 balls of yarn, 90% of one, about 1/8 of one, and about 1/4 of another. My knuckles hurt, among other things. But, my dog is happy and that’s what matters.

I can use this idea as a stash buster, but with more time and ability to tell myself “an hour tops” instead of losing hours of my day to this at a time.

Thinking on dogs

Well, mostly dog.

Bug is 13. Bug is the last pit mix of the original pit mixes for us. She’s starting to slow down and, honestly, I’m not ready for it.

She’s having a hard time going up and down stairs, so my basement buddy has turned into Renfri, who mostly spends most of her time snuffling around and spazzing out. She’s starting to have a hard time in the mornings, going up and down the two steps that is the back porch. And recently, she’s gotten to the “I’mma flop on the grass and not move for anything.”

I’m not ready for this.

On a slightly lighter note, Kevin Sonney mentioned reading KB Spangler’s Open Letter about goldendoodles. I have read it and I have to laugh because it’s so true.

And it made me think on Bug. My tank. My constantly shedding, smelly goober.

Bug, the dog who should’ve died when she was 2 or 3. The dog who stumped the emergency vet, our vet, and Virginia Tech.

The dog who ate 90% of a tote of Peeps in various stages of going stale in various colours and flavors. The dog who successfully ate one of Jamie’s logger boots, grommets and all, down to the rubber sole. The dog who, on one very memorable occasion, ate an entire 100-count pack of tealight candles–metal and all–, a decorative candle, and a brand new wax melt.

Bug, the same dog who has survived eating grapes, raisins, dried cranberries, various chocolates, half of a peanut butter jar, granola bars, beans, and various other dot-for-dogs stuff.

But if she eats lamb, she’ll probably die.

I’m not ready for my tank of a dog to slow down.

Cricket is acting like she’s slowing down, but I also know that border collies are different from pits. She’s starting to get little flakes of grey in her muzzle, so soon we won’t be able to tell where the white patch is from where she got nicked as a puppy. But then she’ll spend twenty minutes playing Bite Your Face with Ren and then I’m not so sure on how she feels.

Been a sad week

This past week has, well, sucked.

We–well, Jamie–made the decision to say goodbye to the pomdog. We’ve been taking everything one day at a time for the last 8 months and…yeah. Jamie was there for him when the vet did it and told me a couple days later that the vet said it was a good decision and a good time, not too early and not too late. He continued with telling me that the vet told him to not beat himself up for thinking he waited too long and that he did a good job with the pom.

Poe was a couple weeks shy of turning 17.

Jamie’s handled it remarkably well, and I think it’s because he’s been kind of in that mourning process since Poe came to live with us 8 months ago. Jamie will be picking up his ashes on Tuesday and says he and his grandmother are going to go visit his mom to let her know. It’s a huge leap for him since he hasn’t been able to go to the graveyard since we buried her two years ago.

It’s been hard.

That night, Jamie decided he wanted to do something to take his mind off of what happened, so we headed to Walmart for a cheap bleach kit to bleach his Mohawk and found they carry Manic Panic, so we immediately bought the hot pink. Jamie has a fuchsia Mohawk.

I, myself, bought a box of Splat “for dark hair” in this green to see if it would work better than the “dark sapphire” or whatever nonsense I tried the last time with that brand. This box actually rinsed out and did not bleed everywhere for days nor get on my fingers every time I scratched my head, which is nice, but it stinks to high heaven.

I didn’t even get 1/4 of the way through my hair with the squeezy bottle. Separated it into four chunks like the instructions say and started with the front. And realized shortly through the first chunk that I should do the second chunk and try to even it out. Back two chunks got the rest of my Manic Panic purple so I either a) look like a clown or b) look more like the bog witch that I am.

One coworker says I look like “a water-logged corpse,” which is the best compliment and one coworker raised their hands up and went “lord why do people dye their hair weird colors.” I told that one “my body is a canvas, I will decorate it how I want.”

I did get asked “why green” and I just shrugged and went “why not.”

A few days later, we picked up some neon green, electric blue, and my personal favorite after midnight blue manic panic for when the colors fade. After midnight blue for me and the other two for Jamie. I figure when mine begins to fade, I’ll just lob the color on and be done with it.

If I were to be serious about this, I would need multiple days in a row to go through the whole process and multiple containers of bleach and color and, well, I ain’t got time for that.

But yeah, overall it’s been weird not having the Pomeranian. The bedroom looks way bigger, we’re not used to being able to open the door without making sure we don’t bonk the blind dog in the head, I can walk to the computer without having to step over the tote I was using as a physical blocker to keep him from getting hurt or into things under the desk.

I no longer have to buy baby food or blend up kibble. It’s really weird and it’ll take some more time to adjust.

Ok, now that I’m less sleep-deprived than I have been for the last few days, let’s try this again.

On Wednesday, Jamie’s grandmother called to say we needed to come pick up Poe and…a whole lot of turmoil happened. I made mental plans on how to rearrange the house while Jamie became inconsolable. Jamie’s grandmother said she felt that she couldn’t adequately care for him any longer and Allen, Jamie’s bonus-dad, is having back surgery in a couple of weeks and can’t bend over to take off and put on Poedog’s diapers. We’d made the agreement to pick him up the next day.

We were stuck in our neighborhood the next day due to flooding. Sure, there was one road that hadn’t flooded and left us completely blocked in, but other roads nearby were also flooded and made normal traffic more nightmarish, so we stayed home and I tried, and failed, to catch up on some of the sleep I missed from staying up with Cricket trying to reassure her that the world wasn’t ending because someone thought it was a great idea to set off fireworks after 10pm.

Thursday night, same thing. After 10 pm, someone set off fireworks and I wound up half dozing until the alarm went off to get up and get ready for work, so I got to spend all day at work with a low-grade migraine which is never fun. We picked up Poedog and set him up in the bedroom, which de-throned Uggs. Uggs got set up in the bathroom and we spent the afternoon watching Poe try to learn the way around the bedroom without running into things.

Poe is 16 or 17 (I think he’s 16), deaf, and mostly blind. He’s wobbly, barks at corners, and we have learned that while it is adorable to watch puppies do that “I’m not tired” fall over sleepy thing, it is harrowing to watch an old dog do it. He still lets me pick him up to take him outside and does his grumpy growl, but hey, I’ll take it.

Jamie’s grandmother admitted that the reason why she wanted us to take him is because she’s terrified that one morning she’ll wake up and he’ll be dead and she can’t handle that. He’s got a vet appointment tomorrow to see how he’s doing health wise and to see what would be best for him because now it’s a quality of life issue and Jamie needs someone who can look at it from an outside perspective and who is not emotionally invested in this little old pomeranian.

—

In less…depressing news (I guess)

The solstice was on Saturday. Yay. I did not do anything.

I’d planned to wear a flower crown to be a dork at work and it is currently in pieces on the top shelf of the computer desk, waiting to be finished. I spent the whole day at work with a pounding headache that also caused me to think that a box of merch was something else entirely.

Wound up being too tired and fogged up to be much use to anyone or anything. Jamie wound up being the one to reassure Cricket that the world is not ending. Yesterday was a haze.

So, I failed at my goal of making a flower crown and wearing it to work. It works out because my head was pounding and I do not like things on/around my head when it pounds. I still have the supplies and plan on finishing it at some point.

The farthest I’ve gotten with Jamie’s dog/fox mask is the duct tape pattern, which I want to make a paper pattern with so I can use that to make a mock up with and go from there. I did buy some felt sheets as a “I want to try it and see how it looks.” kind of thing.

The closest to writing I’ve gotten is about half a page of rambling notes about an idea that I hope to build on. I like the idea, but I gotta work on it. Hopefully it’ll kick me back into doing stuff. I’ve got a number of unfinished stories just sitting on the computer, waiting for me to work on them again.

I’m listening to the same handful of audiobooks over and over again, watching the same handful of content creators on youtube, and finding that it’s hard as hell to read more than tweet-length posts at a time. This makes it very hard to read books because I’ll get about half a page or so and be done.

Is it because of the dumbest apocalypse ever? Possibly. I feel like I was already “burned out” before everything started and now it’s just more. Gotta keep going.

It’s been a roller coaster

This week has…fucking sucked.

While we did prepare ourselves for Hobbes dying, he died sometime between Jamie leaving for work and my getting up to check on everyone before I left for work the other day. While it was raining. And he decided to go while laying in the hallway near the backdoor so I couldn’t get past him without causing an awkward moment of me apologizing to the corpse of my dog for hitting his paw with the door as I tried to squeeze through to go out and come back in. Love you too, buddy.

But, Jamie’s dad left work and came down to the house to bury him while we were at work and wound up burying him where he decided to roll in the grass one last time underneath one of the bedroom windows. It’s fitting and it’s kind of hilarious that he put him there and didn’t know that’s what Hobbes did the day before.

But, overall, it’s been a rollercoaster of a week.

Hobbes stopped eating and died on us. Granted: he was old (for a pitbull/American bulldog mix) and he was greiving (he and Firefly were inseperable). And the whole time I couldn’t help but be reminded of that part in American Gods where Ibis or Jaquel points out that if the wife goes first, the husband goes shortly thereafter. And that’s kind of how it was for them.

Bug and Cricket are doing fine. They’re used to dogs coming and going (like Firefly and Hobbes were used to dogs coming and going because we used to do a lot of fostering for various local organizations), but they don’t seem to have much of an issue. Bug is still fat and happy and Cricket is…Cricket. Fat, stupid, and bouncy like border collies are (or at least as bouncy as border collie/German shepherds are that I am used to because Cricket is like 7 and still insane. she learned from the best crazy dog: Firefly).

To end on a lighter note:

A friend of mine told me yesterday that she was wandering around and found that a bunch of yarn was on clearance and she had to buy it. So now I have 10 skeins of yarn and her only requests are: a scarf/hat combo for her Ravi doll and something for herself. I already have an idea of what to make for her out of all this freaking yarn she’s gifted me.

Yes, she knows my weakness.

Ye (short) Saga of Dog

Yesterday, Jamie busted into my department saying that he got a voicemail from Animal Control saying they had our dog.

What.

I listened to the voicemail and called them back, Jamie talked over the robot voice so I had to hang up and wait until I could hear well enough to go through the keypad list and get a human on the phone.

“Hi, someone called and said they have my dog.”

(request of what the dog looks like, etc)

I describe the dog and get “Oh! L wants to talk to you, hang on a sec.”

Oh thank gods. L is there and she knows us, she knows we’re obsessive over our dogs. She kept in touch with us when Hobbes had been stolen. L is awesome.

L gets on the line and tells me that yeah, they have Hobbes and the neighbor was able to get the others in the yard.

What.

So I tell her that Jamie is on his way and send him to go talk to management about leaving for a bit due to family emergency. (it is our family and this is an emergency)

I text Jamie to make sure Firefly is there because if the neighbor has gotten the dogs in the backyard, Firefly has undoubtedly gotten out (because she is an old woman who doesn’t believe in fences nor rules). Jamie gets to Animal Control and finds that it’s not just Hobbes that they have.

They have Firefly, Cricket, and Hobbes.

They tell Jamie that “the other dog, the one with the disability, stayed in the yard.” Jamie told them to not believe Bug because Bug is a tank. (it’s true. If she had 4 paws, she’d be able to take over the world). Stuff happens.

Jamie gets them inside and just lets them roam the house. Cat boxes, cat food, dirty dishes (not many, just like breakfast bowls and such from before we left for work) be damned. Let them pee on the floor, we’ll clean it up when we get home.

Jamie comes back to work, texts me that he’s back, and we continue the day.

We get home to find that someone has found the sunflower seeds and has pooped them out. There is poo and explosive poo in various spots around the living room and kitchen.  Jamie walks back into the living room, where I am coming through the door, and tells me that “it’s bad.”

They’ve knocked over the trash can and have strewn trash all over the kitchen. There is peices of trash bag mixed in. All I can do is use the broom and dust pan and just dump everything into the bin (sans bag) and tell the dogs to not do it again.

Jamie tells me that the AC officer was telling him that they found where the dogs got out of the backyard and that we need to fix the fence. Jamie wound up having to explain until they understood that we don’t have dog doors, the dogs were in the basement (not crated because I wanted them to have some roaming time) and that they must’ve gotten out via the basement door or the window.

Check the basement: someone (probably Hobbes) hit the plexiglass window that I had epoxied up last year perfectly and broke it free of the epoxy. We have a 14″ high, 20″ long open window leading out into the back yard. They stayed in the living room over night until the morning when I could find the super awesome duct tape and tape the window back on so I could crate them. Now, I am going to have to look for a non-dull saw so I can saw part of a pallet apart so I can nail bits of pallet across the window so a certain old man can’t break out again.

Jamie also told me that the AC officer told him that normally dogs are very timid when they go to let them out of the little holdy thing in the trucks, but not Cricket. Cricket jumped out (aiming for the face, of course. stupid dog) and was all wiggles and play bows.

Today:

I duct taped the window and put the half-door that Jamie made for upstairs but didn’t fit up against the stairwell that leads to the backyard. I also pulled the extra pallets we had, that were tucked up, and put them against the hole that was caused by the nice person who mowed the ditch beside the fence, the hole that was patched, and the hole that apparently Firefly made when she realized Hobbes had gotten out.

These are our dogs. They’re sweet, they’re loving, and they firmly believe that fences are for other people.

Tell a story

I was speaking with my mom last friday (because it was my birthday. yay birthday) and my main goal is to make her laugh. I love making my mom laugh. Be it with a joke, a story, a terrible side comment while we’re out. Anything. If I can make my mom laugh, she can be happy, and that’s the important bit. (my mom is awesome)

She asked me if I had gotten a new job yet or if I was just taking this time as an “extended vacation.” I told her I was looking for a new job, but in the mean time I’m working on writing and cleaning and dog stuff. Mom told me that I should write because I “tell good stories” and that I would be great at it. She continued with saying that I should tell my funny stories because it makes her laugh and I could “easily get a lot of followers.” lol

What caused this was I was telling her a story, to make her laugh and to show how derpy Cricket is.

So.

Since it’s hot outside and we live in SWVA, it’s muggy from 8 am to 8 pm. We have a short time for yardwork between 7 am, when the noise ordinance is over, and 8–maybe 9 if we’re lucky. Or, between like 7:50 pm to when the sun goes down and we no longer have visible light to see by. But my tomato and melon plants and corn are thriving, so there’s that (however, the grass has come back so now the areas look like a grassy plane with plants)

We own a kiddie pool. A Bright. Neon. Pink. kiddie pool. I got it on sale for $5 like two years ago. The dogs use it as a giant water bowl and the only dog to ever lay in it was Hobbes (and now he can’t because some fucking peice of shit fucking stole him out of my yard. lured him out of my yard and sped away. I wish nothing but bad, horrible, terrible luck on them and I want my godsdamned dog back).

Currently, Dunk-dog will step in it and stand there most days and Cricket will step in it occasionally. Firefly and Bug will drink out of the kiddie pool, but that’s it. Bug thinks it’s a ploy for something and Firefly knows that if she’s not careful the giant water bowl will turn into the giant bath bowl and that’s never good. Firefly is weary of any large body of water that is not a dog dish.

Jamie bought a sprinkler, saying it’d be great for the dogs before realizing it’d be a great waterer for the garden…if we can get it to do a 180 sprinkle instead of a 110 sprinkle. Bug and Firefly see it as a barrier of awful, Dunk thinks it’s weird, and Cricket’s like eh, whatever and walks around. Currently, we haven’t used the sprinkler for them specifically. We’ve just played with it. Normally, we use the hose and its sprayer-of-many-settings.

Bug and Firefly are terrified, hanging back if I fill the water bowl and kiddie pool or at least being a few steps away watching me wearily as I water the garden. Dunk stands near me but doesn’t want to get sprayed in the head. And then there’s Cricket.

Cricket is our black derpy border collie. She’s average height, but mostly black. So, we worry about her when she’s out. Sure, we have half of the area shaded by our awesome tree, but she’s …special. She’ll stand on the porch or patio in the blaring sun and just stand there. Every so often she’ll stand in the kiddie pool or hang out in the shade. But then she’ll stand on the porch or roll in something in the sunny area and be a silly dog.

So, I was watering the garden. It was after 4pm and I try to stick with what my grandmother told me: if you water your garden, don’t do it between 10am and 4pm because that’s the hottest part of the day and it’ll just evaporate and you’ll have wasted your time.

I changed the setting from jet (to get to the farthest garden spots) to shower (to get to the closest areas) and realized that Cricket was just standing there. So I sprayed her a little.

She walked away, played with Firefly for a bit, and came right back. So I sprayed her again.

I didn’t hold her down and spray her, nor did I chase her with the hose (because, hell, if I wanted to, I could chase all the dogs and spray them). I was like 5-10ft away from her.

I put the hose down, I had finished with the garden, and Cricket immediately came up and jumped on me, grinning like a goober. I rubbed her ears, laughing at her, and then she got down, shook excess water on me, and ran away to go play with Dunk.

I got my dog with the hose, and she got me back.

 

I told this story to my mom and she howled with laughter.

St Patrick’s Parade

This past Saturday was our St Patrick’s parade event…thing.  Streets had already been starting to be “shut down” since the night before, our local bus system was on a set delay for the entire day, and a few events were planned. The 5k and 10k races, the parade, and the “two” festivals (regular festival where kids are allowed until 5 and the regular festival where booze is involved and going on until 8). We had Jamie’s mom drop us off at the main branch of Member One, because it was the easiest spot for her to be able to turn around and not get lost.

While it’s not that hard to get lost in Roanoke, for some people it is. It’s nothing but circles within circles overlapping a circle/gridlock motif with hidden one-way streets and dead ends.

We walked from the bank branch to Angels of Asissi’s building (with a side-stop of that weird walkway bridge thing where on one end is a life-sized statue of MLK, Jr) and waited a bit for them to officially open for volunteers and their new Walk-In program, which a couple were doing with their new dog (Doogie Howser. I should’ve gotten a photo of him, he was adorable!). We headed in and were surprised to find we were the first ones to show up so we hung out, I played with Buttercup-the-puppy while Jamie loved on cats. We hung out while the dogs who were going were being harnassed up and people showed up.

Eventually most of the people showed up, and most of us walked to the starting area of the parade. People were starting to slowly trickle around to set up on the parade route, chairs were just sitting empty (because people are dicks) and it got to the point where we were wondering if we had gone the wrong way. But, the starting-area was a little farther than I thought it was, and we were able to eventually find the Angels truck as well as the dogs.

It was madness. People were just everywhere, floats and trucks were parked on either side of the street and in any parking area they could find. People were walking their dogs and not paying attention (because some of the Angels dogs, while really well behaved, do not appreciate having dogs run up to their faces). The guy who was walking Jase (big dog, super sweet), ended up having to sit on the ground and cling to Jase away from everyone because people weren’t paying attention and being ignorant dog owners.

At one point, one woman was walking this dog who was covered in stickers (and on a flexi lead, christ) and not paying any attention whatsoever. She let the dog get into one of our adoptee dogs’ face, and he turned and barked while the woman who has been working with him and walking him started yelling “No!” and “Hey!”, this dumb bitch just kept standing there so her little dog could be annoying. If I could talk, I would’ve said something, but finally the dumbass walked away and the woman who was trying to get the adoptee dog relaxed started saying really loudly “Are you kidding me?! Watch your dog, stupid!” Jamie and I agreed with her that someone should kick the woman to get her to pay attention.

After what seemed like an eternity, we were told to line up and wait. When we get started, the Shriners decided they were going to start up their firetrucks and set off the sound. Gee, thanks guys. They did it around dogs and, of course, some of them jumped. Hell, some of the people jumped. It was a dick move on their part.

During the parade, the kids who had showed up after we had gotten to the “hold area” were tossing candy around and handing out pamphlets. People were cheering Angels on, which is really great and I am very glad that they show support for a local no-kill shelter. People were taking photos, one woman got in Jamie’s face and asked him a question while recording on her phone. The Salem Red Sox people were running around like insects and not paying any attention to where they were going. They ran into us, we had to dodge around them, they almost stepped on a few kids, and the people who had the toddler and his radio-flyer wagon kept stopping so they’d wind up with us instead of around their float.

There was a ton of people, there were announcers on a dais (it was weird), and when we were nearing the end of the parade route, people were walking with everyone in the parade so they could go to other areas in Downtown. People were cutting through or pushing up against the marchers and it was kind of maddening. One or two people darting through or saying sorry/excuse me is one thing, but it was gobs of people.

At one point, I had told Jamie that people go all-out and more crazy with costumes/whatnot than they do with Halloween. The St. Patrick’s parade is Roanoke’s own little halloween get-together.

And then we stopped. There was no police officer or sign to state this was the end of the parade route. The Red Sox truck just stopped and the driver cut the engine. Our being in the parade is over and we walk up the street to our right, where there are 5 cars trying to get out of a parkinglot (because apparently they think they’re going somewhere!) There are still groups behind us and we walk up and realize…the next part of the parade is going on.

This is a long fucking parade.

I have no idea where Furever Friends (or is it forever home? It’s something like that) were in the parade, no idea where Star City Greyhounds were placed (so we completely missed seeing Rob and Lee walking Goose, Fiddler, and Dizzy D), nor do I have any idea where the RVSPCA guys are. And I have absolutely no idea if there were any other shelters in the parade.

We turn around, I get Jamie to let some of the dog walkers know that there is no way we can get through a little farther up (because one of the dogs was in a stroller and the walker was having trouble with it), so we all cut through a carpark and Jamie and I manage to get across the street before one of the groups comes through. Jamie ends up having to pull me through the throng of people because it was so crowded, if he let go that was it.

We managed to get away, and walked back to Angels to drop off our signs (as well as the hat Jamie had and the clover headband I grabbed) and sat down for a few minutes. Then we headed back down because we were going to Make a Day out of it.

It was a terrible idea.

The parade was still going on, there was literally a wall of people around (and goats! there were two goats just watching the parade. For Roanoke, this isn’t weird. At any event, like parade or whatever, you will probably find a goat or two). We get to the “beer tent” area (a giant roped off block surrounding Corned Beef & Co), we hand over our IDs, get braceleted, and turn to find: there are 4 options of liquor (fireball whiskey, jager, irish sour something, and something) and 6 options of beer (heiniken, budweiser, corona, milwaulke, and two other things), all $6 and all none I will touch. Ok, if you put Fireball whiskey into some coke, I’ll drink that (but on my terms because I’m not a big fan of Fireball).

There are people everywhere, there are fucking rude ass people who are mostly drinking everywhere, and we just tried to get the hell out of there. Managed to get our of the “beer tent” area and agreed to attempt to look for somewhere to eat, but every. single. place. was packed. There were places where lines were out the door, one or two places had signs up saying how long the wait was and I was just like “fuck that, not worth it.”

We found the other area of “festivities” that was a giant viking bounce-house (if it wasn’t surrounded by people and I was in a better mood, I would’ve dragged Jamie with me and whined until I got my way because, dude, bounce house!) and the “beer tent” there was a little tent with a sign that said: “Beer ticket, $5 each.”

We agreed to get the hell out of there as more people thronged through. I was at the point where I would punch someone for just being there because it was too many people and we left downtown. We started walking away and Jamie called his mom to ask if she could pick us up  when we got to a better area for her and after a while, we got picked up and dropped off at the house.

We walked somewhere between 5 and 7 miles (guestimating) and agreed to go somewhere where it would be a lot less crowded because people would be at the parade/festival. We ended up at the Valley View Buffalo Wild Wings, which in a way was a bad idea because it’s loud as hell in there. It was really busy, we weirded out the poor waitress (she did awesome service! She was constantly on the go trying to make sure all of her tables were doing well, having what they needed, etc) because Jamie was my translator. I learned that I should always ask for a “small” if I get beer from them again (Guiness! Woo! and then I saw they carry Boston Lager. Damn. I’ll get that next time). We picked different things this time, Jamie got a sick-headache (the no-food, loud-atmosphere, and walking through the parade as well as aggrevation at stupid people at the parade kind of hit right after he got his drink). But we had a nice time

 

I found out later that the WWII veterans, who are always in the parade, boycotted it this year. This year, the organizers told them that they’d have to pay the $10 march fee just like everyone else and, frankly, that’s fucked up. I don’t care if you charge group A or group B a $10 march-fee because, technically, it is a type of business, but these are WWII veterans. You don’t charge them, you shouldn’t charge them, and you should ask them to march because they fought for your dumb ass. They had friends who died during that, and hell, chances are they probably got shoved into another confrontation after that war.

Charge the JROTC and the ROTC guys. They’re kids, they don’t know the horrors of war or of looking in the face of “the enemy” and killing them (hell, I don’t either). But, you don’t charge a group of veterans. I don’t care if they just came back from the Middle East (or the base in Germany or Japan), you thank them for their service, you shake their hand, and you don’t deny them being able to march in a freaken parade by being a douchecanoe and demanding money.

Sure, $10 is $10, but it’s the principle. But, the parade organizers, in my opinion, basically told veterans that they have no respect for them nor their services. And that is fucked up.

(I also found out some cool stuff about other parades that were not ours. Sam Adams (Woo!!) pulled out of the Boston parade as well as the mayor over the parade organizers refusal to let open LGBTQ people march. And, the mayor, chamber-of-whatever people, as well as Heiniken and Guiness (Woo! Guiness!) pulled out of the NYC parade for basically the same thing because apparently parade organizers were idiots this year. And it’s cool. No one was forced to change anything, people were being polite about it and explaining their views. This is how change happens)

Is it spring yet?

I am starting to get tired our weather. One day it’s 20 degrees and doing the famed “Wintry Mix”! and the next day it’s 65, all 1/2-inches of “snow” has melted. The following day is a blistering 29 degrees and windy as fuck while the next day is 70.

While the area we live in is technically “bowl” shaped, I’d really prefer to have weeks where we work on getting warmer and warmer and not have weeks where I don’t know if I should wear my boots and an extra jacket. (ok, in all seriousness, I’ll wear my boots until they fall off of me…which is sooner than expected since some of the seaming popped the other night. but they are going to be 10 years old in June). This is March. I don’t want to wake up one morning and to find snow on the ground and then wake up the next morning and feel like I could walk around in my bondage shorts.

But, on the plus side: Just barely over a month and we get to transplant all of the veggies outside into the re-tilled garden area! I am very excited.

The pumpkins decided to damn the germination period (3 weeks) and go for 6 days because we are awesome and the cheap-o germination stand we built has been a success! Quite a few of the plants had to be re-potted, so our bunny room is extra warm (which is good for the bunny as well) and smells of wet dirt (because Jamie re-potted everything in there I think), and we bought a few more seeds. Jamie wanted to try watermellon (and if memory serves correctly, we are going to be buried in creepers. thank whatever god out there that I was very adamant about not planting zucchini). They cayenne peppers seem to be pouting and being slow to germinate, which is fine. The catgrass has gone insane (and we are growing some for Fred’s cat Mr Jingles)

Jamie also found a good website to buy some herbs and other oddities, so when we get the chance, I get to buy me some feverfew (I love me some feverfew). I have another seed website bookmarked because some of the beans looked interested (I do blame Ursula Vernon for that one*)

This weekend or so, we’ll be going to buy (or build) fencing to keep the monkeys out of where the garden is going to be. The downside to this is that we’ve got to find something taller than the basic little white picket fence that’s about a foot tall and is around the outside A/C unit because Hobbes likes to leap over that fence so he can snuffle about and try to eat whatever bug is back there. And we need to keep the monkey-butts out of the future-garden area.

And: hopefully this year will be the spring/summer where we finish the “fire pit” area. We are also still planning to rip up the little fence between our house and our neighbor’s so we can replace it (possibly with the little white picket fence thing like we have around the outside A/C unit). We also need to fix the end of the driveway thanks to our latest snowpocalypse (and stupid City snow plows), which ate away part of the driveway. The neighbor (not the one with the fence) will be starting up the yearly calling-and-harrassing some City employee to “clean the culvert” and “dig it out” because it is not our responsibility. If it were, that shit would be a concrete ditch by now.

Now, to enjoy the weather, pop in headphones (and put on pants, I don’t want to put on real pants) and clean the backyard)

 

* My hope is that I will not turn into an avid gardener like Ursula Vernon because her posts (and mentions on KUEC) are kind of scary when she goes off on tangents about mulch and the large number of beds she has. But she does try very hard to grow just things in general (with an attitude of “let’s see if this sprouts!) and has a specific type of plant that she tries to grow (it’s native gardening or something?).  I love her work, she cracks me up.

Can we re-start this month, please?

This month has been hell.

The beginning, I was in the ER, off work for an entire week (working 4 hours out of 7 or 8 days), and coughed so much I lost my voice. Jamie got fairly sick at the beginning (flu with viral bronchitis, woo!) Then the whole…dog attacking cat and cat dying thing. Saturday is when Izzy goes off to The Big Sleep, but we haven’t changed routine or treated her any different. 

This past Monday evening, after work, Jamie took me back to the ER because I couldn’t breathe, was making horrible wheezy noises (to the point where numerous customers asked if I was ok and offered to get a supervisor, one of the supervisors tried to convince me to leave before my first break, and our loss prevention lady said I was crazy for staying when I obviously should be getting looked at). 4 1/2 hours in the waiting room after being sent into the “triage” room (where the nurse/tech said “wow, at least you came in with something exciting like that hideous wheezing instead of ‘I hurt my finger.'” [found out later that the “I hurt my finger” was a guy who had fucked his hand all up and had wrapped so much guaze around it to staunch the bloodflow that he looked like he was wearing a boxing glove. he got called back to a “room” about an hour before we did])

We finally get sent back to a “room” about 2-3 hours after I had been taken back for chest x-rays and Jamie loudly grumbles “well, it’s a good thing to know that your having trouble breathing isn’t a big deal.” and the tech/nurse just looks at us like we’re crazy because I’m wheezing like hell. Jamie has to be my interpreter and I’m trying to say stuff too to the nurse/tech and the doctor, who decides without wanting any information (like, oh, I’ve been waking up every few nights for the past two months because I stop breathing) because she’s already decided what I have. 

She ignores the large bumps on the back of my tongue, the roof of my mouth being nasty white, and comments that my throat is “very red.” (yes, and it’s also got pustules), states that my lungs are fine, and that I’ve “just got some inflammation” in my neck due to trying to talk. She says she’ll “be back soon” with an evaluation and so we wait. For two hours.

Finally, Jamie asks if he can rip out the doo-hickey and I unplug myself, causing the monitor to go off. Put my polo shirt back on and head out to the desk, where the nurse/tech is…doing nothing. Jamie says “I’m sorry, but we need to leave, we both have to be at work by 6.” And we find out that the doctor has given her my discharge papers a while ago. wonderful. We have to go back to the room so she can rip out the thing in my arm (I’m still having problems. She got the same vein as the other nurse/tech did at the beginning of the month, but for whatever reason, it hurts like a motherfucker) and she informs me that the doctor says that I’ve got laryingitis, but it’s so bad that I pretty much blew my vocal cords.

The poor girl goes on to explain what laryngitis is and I had to stop her and say this is the 5th time I’ve had it (I was wrong, I told her since 2009, but it’s been once a year, every year, for the past five years). She continues with “I know someone who’s had it for 3 months” before telling me that I could either get my voice back in a few days, a few weeks, or possibly never. 

Fan-freaken-tastic.

On the plus side, I’m pissing off a lot of stupid people at work (who ignore my dry-erase board sign that says: “Terribly sorry, but I cannot talk. Have a nice day”) and this is giving Jamie and me a much-needed push to learn ASL like we’ve been wanting to do. We know a couple of signs, but not a lot to make conversation.

I did have a gentleman today get super excited and think I was deaf who could read lips really well. I had to write no, I just blew my vocal cords. He mentioned trying yoga and unclogging the throat chakra by breathing through the nose and mouth as well as imagining a bright, pure white light that will heal my throat from the inside out. I thought it was pretty awesome.

Some of the customers who come in about once a week or so are still shocked I can’t speak. It’ll have been a month tomorrow and, frankly, I’m tired of it myself.

Hopefully next month will be a lot better. On the plus side, an old friend of ours is coming down to Roanoke to visit us for a few days. We’ll be playing “tourist” while she’s down here.