Because I Am

72 and rainy

2006-07-28T10:00:00.000-04:00

The yard dude saga continues. I fired the most recent one about two weeks ago because I had paid ahead and when I said that we were caught up so I didn't owe him anything that week he argued with me and refused to believe me even when I showed him the check and a calendar. He got kind of nasty when I told him that I didn't want him to mow, then or ever. The boyfriend wanted me to buy a mower so he could just do it but that just didn't seem like a particularly good idea. Things are okay on both new, new yard dude (5 bucks cheaper and much nicer to deal with plus he does a better job) and the boyfriend front. Before EC went awol I already had adding a new pack (or flock) member in the works. If all goes well, Q will arrive the first week of August. It's a little bittersweet because I still hold out hope that EC will find his/her way home and I wonder if I should even be allowed to have another bird after The Diva and EC.

Business is good, J and I have been getting together at least once a week and I am very much enjoying the friendship and even seem to be getting to be pals with another client which is nice as well as renewing my friendship with two high school friends. So, that's all good. Everything is pretty good. I just feel a bit blah. It's been very, very hot here so maybe that's it?

I love my air conditioning

2006-07-14T18:31:00.000-04:00

Bubba got his ac fixed yesterday. I've been driving around in a big black oven for two years over a stupid eighty dollar fix so the joy of feeling that cold air rushing out of the vents is somewhat tempered by the stupidity I feel for not getting it fixed before. A broken O ring. I drove around all day today singing "I love my air conditioning. Air conditioning is what I love." There's a dance too. The boyfriend is out of town for work but should be back late tonight and then gone again on Sunday. I could have done girl stuff I suppose but mostly I'm content to just have some space and quiet. I don't mean that in a bad way like he's crowding me just that I've lived by myself for a good dozen years so it's a bit of an adjustment for me to have him around so much although I enjoy that too. Anyway, I love my air conditioning!

I'm still alive :-)

2006-07-06T09:59:00.000-04:00

Nothing really is up. Same old daily walking routine. EC flew the coop which is distressing but he was sighted last Friday so there is still hope that I'll get him back. I have a boyfriend which is sort of new and interesting for me but mostly nice. I've mostly spent the summer hanging out with the boy, cooking out with friends, using my netflix account to the point of getting put on the "frequent user" list, going out for dinner and getting kinda fat.

One reason I haven't posted is that this new angstless existence is stiflingly dull to write about much less read about! Hope everyone else is managing okay :-)

Life is good

2006-05-10T09:25:00.000-04:00

I was thinking about this the other day. I used to post at least once a day, often I posted several times a day. I wasn't actually doing anything that I might want to write about. I was just working through the last 15 years of life's little struggles. Now I'm actually out doing stuff all the time. Averaging two dates a week. The house is basically clean and tidy - or at least as much as it can be with a slobby person in charge of three dogs and a parrot. I go out to dinner. I go to the movies. I go to plays and concerts and poetry readings. Business is good. I've been cooking quite a bit.

In all I would say I am pretty much healed. I still see mother about once a week and talk with DTD every couple of months. CPG and I IM regularly. Oh, and EC is now officially an outdoor free flying bird!

I actually wanted to set up a new blog with just a photo a day so that when this lovely time of being active and happy is over I'll have stuff to reflect over but I'm just too busy/lazy to manage to even do that.

I will say that as I scootch the negative people in my life over to make room for good stuff, other negative people try to wedge themselves into my life. I'm having that problem with L/N/S (L/N are twins I've known forever and S is L's totally nonfunctional boyfriend) So, I'm learning how to set some limits for people in my life. Or at least trying to.

Bluegrass Musician has been out of the picture for the last month although he's started emailing me again in the last few days. The Buddhist is still in the picture although there's somewhere I'm working on setting some limits. There is also The Photographer but I didn't talk to him at all last week. I don't think he can cope with the dogs and bird.

So, still haven't met Mr. Right but I'm having a damn good time looking for him.

Part I

2006-04-10T09:43:00.000-04:00

Thursday: The bluegrass musician took me to a great little seafood place. I had picked him up a really cute turtle earring. We had a good time. I called him on Friday to thank him.

BGM: I know you're not naive and you know I have some issues (I might have forgotten to tell you, gentle readers, that he's been married THREE times AND said "I love you" the first night we almost had sex - I say almost 'cause he also has some ED issues)
Me: ...
BGM: I really tried not to fall for you but I just can't do it. I know that isn't how you feel so I think it's probably best if we don't see each other anymore.
Me: ...
BGM: Are you okay?
Me: Yeah. Take care, and I really hope you do meet the right person.

So, that's done. And, I've gotta say that was about the nicest way you could possibly break up with someone.

Friday: The Buddhist took me to a great little Russian cafe then on to see Carousel then we did a little, uh, toy shopping.

Saturday: I took EC to my dad's office to do some flight skills work then a client and I took my friend E, who just had hand surgery, out to lunch and then to see Failure to Launch which was cute.

To be continued...

April Fool

2006-04-02T09:34:00.000-04:00

On Friday, Pup came up with the best April Fool's joke to play on BGM. I went to a tattoo shop and convinced the guy to do a temporary tat for me:

Yup, a true tramp stamp with BGM's name (he was born on election day.)

When he showed up for our Saturday date he first presented me with:

A whole set of little pink and silver toe rings (awwww...good thing I'd already gotten that pedicure!)

CC: Uh, you know how I couldn't see you last night?
BGM: Yeah
CC: Well, uh, the reason I couldn't is 'cause I did something sorta stupid.
BGM: Oh?
CC: Yeah, uh, well, I was going to cover it up but I'm afraid my shirt will ride up so I might as well go ahead and show you (turns and pulls up bottom of pink polo shirt)
BGM: dead silence
CC: What do you think?
BGM: dead silence
CC:(turns and sees deer in the headlights look on his face) Oh no!
BGM: dead silence
CC: April Fool!

Really, it was absolutely classic and hilarious. Pup rocks!

So, with joke played and toering donned, we set off for our aquarium experience.

We saw sharks and alligator snapping turtles and alligators and fish and more fish and tortoises and sea turtles and more fish and the sharkray (sweetpea) and penguins sitting on eggs and otters and lorikeets...

Then I went outside to smoke and he bought me a lovely pair of pink opal earrings. I've never dated anyone who spoiled me like that before. He tells me I'm beautiful and sweet and that he loves to see me smile. Dinner was gnocchi in a cream fontina sauce...mmmm...

The entire day was more fun than I've had in a very, very long time.

A buddhist and a musician walked into a bar...

2006-03-30T08:38:00.000-05:00

Things are pretty status quo with the buddhist. The musician is proving to be quite a bit more complicated. I don't even quite know what to say about him. The PS and DW has been keeping very busy. E had her hand surgery on Tuesday so that's keeping me occupied as well.

My first month on match.com is up tomorrow. I would count it very much as a success. 'Course I think my criteria is a bit different than most people's but I did go out on more than three dates with three different guys. I've made at least one good friend and gotten a lot of sex. I feel a lot more desirable which is very nice. I've gone out and done a lot of things I wouldn't have done otherwise.

I guess my problem is that I don't know where exactly I'm going from here.

Awww

2006-03-23T08:53:00.000-05:00

You all know my thing about the Galapagos Tortoise. I asked BGM the question on Tuesday night and last night when he arrived to pick me up he handed me a cute little gift bag with this inside. All together now....awwwwwwww!

Seriously, how freakin sweet is that?!?

Oh, other news, Mrs. DTD is pregnant again! Their son turns seven on Saturday. Ooops ;-)

Weekly Wrap Up

2006-03-19T11:35:00.000-05:00

Tuesday: BGM brought me lunch at the park while I was there with the dogs. That was pretty damn sweet. Then the buddhist and I went out for cajun before coming back here and watching a movie.

Wednesday: I offerred to take BGM dinner at his shop but it was his band practice night so I went and listened. They're pretty good. Then we went and got some dinner. I discovered that he lives in a room behind his shop. Illegally. Hmmm.

Friday: The buddhist and I went to dinner at J&A's house and watched the parrot movie. He was really quite sweet and charming. Then we came back here and watched Super Size Me and I fell asleep. Ooops. He hung out most of Saturday. We watched several dumb movies, ate a bunch of junk food and had quite a lot of sex.

Saturday: Went to see Walk The Line with BGM. Three hours in the dark and he didn't even touch me. Seriously. It totally ruined my concentration on the movie! We went and got a bite to eat after and then he finally really kissed me when he dropped me off. I told him he should lead off with that 'cause he's a damn fine kisser!

A real grownup date!

2006-03-13T10:36:00.000-05:00

Saturday Bluegrass Musician took me out for a really nice dinner at a pretty good and very popular restaurant and then to see Hayseed Dixie a totally kickass bluegrass band that does covers of classic rock. Seriously, you haven't heard Zeppelin unless you've heard it on a banjo.

He was SO NICE. The look of horror on his face when I asked if I could please pay for my dinner was comical:

me: Just because you're a guy doesn't mean you should always have to pay for stuff, that's hardly fair to you.
him: But I consider it an honor.
me: That's so sweet but will you at least let me pay for the show?
him: I already bought the tickets online when you said you would go out with me.
me: You're totally getting a goodnight kiss.

He is, oddly, a lot cuter than the photos in his profile. Yeah, usually goes the other way, I know. I sent him an email yesterday morning saying thanks, I had a great time and he called in the afternoon because he said he was worried that he hadn't actually conveyed to me what a good time he had and how much he would like to see me again.

The funny thing? The buddhist/mason was also at the show. He came over to watch Hitch on Friday then stayed most of Saturday and even helped me pick out an outfit to wear on my date with another guy.

Have to say, really enjoying the regular sex thing.

TooMuch ToDo

2006-03-08T10:52:00.000-05:00

Well, my weekend is now basically booked. Dinner with BGM on Saturday and another dinner with FFFG on Sunday. Tomorrow J is coming over here for dinner and a screening of The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill (fucking netflix isn't going to get it here til Friday...pout) courtesy of Netflix (and CSMDB for hooking up my dvd player although if I had gone ahead and gone to Best Buy to get what I thought I needed I would have run across the universal DVD connection pack that ultimately solved the problem so we don't have to thank CSMDB all that much.)

I'm loving having a girlfriend!

Seriously, she's smart, she's funny as hell, she's incredibly nice, we like a lot of the same kind of stuff...

Okay, I'm pathetic but I really don't have a lot of real life friends and I tend to have female friends who are quite a bit older than I am thus limiting things we might do together.

So, today:

CLEAN KITCHEN! (table, counters, floors and cobwebs - do other people have serious cobweb problems???)
Bathroom
Floors
Bedroom (bookshelf, dust)
Print out paperwork for new client

Thursday:

Prelim visit with new client
Grocery store
Bedroom (fresh sheets, etc.)
Cook (grilled fresh mozarella sandwiches; fresh, megacreamy tomato soup; cucumber salad)

Whew. All this social life stuff is a lot of work!

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And, once again we get to play: will she get the house clean for her company? Place your bets now!

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Ok, the kitchen still needs work but the weather was so nice we ate outside anyway.

dating is hard work, baby

2006-03-07T08:58:00.000-05:00

K, where did we leave off? Ah, breakfast with J on Saturday. That was fun. I really, really like having J as a friend. But, something I ate totally disagreed with me and I was ill the rest of the day so I cancelled on CSMBD and he did not take it well which I found very unattractive personally. Pretty much slept all day Saturday.

Sunday morning I happened to be in IM with FFFG and he said he was going to go out for brunch so I just hopped in the car and went to meet him. I heart brunch. FFFG is sooo nice. Totally good guy with a good job. No spark at all. But, I am going out with him again this Sunday just to see.

Sunday afternoon I picked up a new daily DW client, stopped by the rents house to check in with them and then met CSMBD for mexican. Then I took him out for ice cream and he came over to hook up my DVD player. We watched Bubba Ho-Tep and then he wanted to watch Memento which I thought was just annoying. The movie AND the fact that he wanted to watch it. So, he wound up staying all night and I wound up having sex with him just 'cause. The sex was fine and the guy is ok to go out with some but I think he thinks he's like my freakin' boyfriend or something.

So far I'm enjoying the dating thing in that it is honestly really nice to have guys be all interested in me, want to take me out and spend time with me. I kinda missed a lot of that what with the MS stuff and DTD. But the whole thing is a bit exhausting and since I don't want guys to think anything is anything other than lighthearted fun I'm going dutch on everything so it's getting a bit expensive for my DWing budget too!

The most exciting news of the weekend is that the diva's mom laid an egg! Looks like I'll have another baby bird in three months or so.

Right now I'm taking down TPB. All these guys keep freakin' googling me and that's just a lot of information to give someone you're just going to coffee with. It has taken way way too much time to save all my old posts when all I really wanted to do was get rid of my name from the blog or to make it completely private. My brother and I are thinking of the possibility of building a better blogging tool. What things drive you crazy about your current blogging tool?

Update

2006-03-04T09:05:00.000-05:00

So, the date on Thursday was nice. We wandered around the bookstore for a while then went down to a restaurant in the same buiding and had some dinner. Conservative, libertarian, monotheistic/masonic, buddhist dude (CSMBD) is far from perfect but he's nice (mostly), sorta funny and a pretty good date. Tonight he's coming over here to hook up my dvd player so we can watch a movie.

In just a few minutes I'm going out to breakfast with J (gave me the diva) then it's a mad dash to clean this place up for CSMBD. Tomorrow is fun, fun, fun guy (FFFG) who actually has turned out to have some hidden depths. Plus I have a prelim visit with a possible daily DW client! Woohoo!

Next weekend is bluegrass musician (BM) who seems a bit blah but incredibly complimentary.

This actually is turning out to be fun :-)

Next!

2006-03-02T10:31:00.000-05:00

So, tonight is the ultra conservative, libertarian, buddhist. Yes, he voted for the evil one and would do it again. So far, marks against him are a tendency to be a know it all and well, the whole servant of satan thing. In his favor, he's cute, he's alive, he's in the right age range, he's reasonably intelligent...

I don't know. Now he's being a pain about where we're going to meet. My vote was for a bookstore/cafe place. Relaxed, well-lit, lots of people, at least some of whom I will undoubtedly know. Somewhere I feel comfortable. He wants to go for a rib place next to the bookstore. I'm compromising and saying we can meet at the bookstore and if we want to, we can go over to the rib place for a drink.

But, really, I'm the girl. Don't I get to be the one who says what a comfortable meeting place is? Without having to feel defensive about it?

More online dating adventures

2006-03-01T10:22:00.000-05:00

CC: This is what he just said:

You'll have to get to know me to find out how much fun I have. I promise you that I am worth the time. ;) I am a lot more fun than you'd think I was the first time you see me. I'll just leave it at that...

How much fun are you. I bet you are unbelievably fun fun fun.

CC: uh ugh, how do I respond to that??
CPG: with tums?
CC: 3 dates, remember the goal and he's a nice cheeseball
CPG: here:

No i'm not fun fun fun, just fun. One fun and its quite believable.

CC: You're not helping.

One guy emailed me late on Monday night and when I responded on Tuesday he told me that he had "met someone and wanted to see where it was going." Twelve hours? In twelve hours you met someone you're serious about?

Normally I lean a bit toward the suggestive but with this? I swear I'm so careful not to say anything that could even remotely be connected with a sexual reference I feel like a freakin' nun! People keep saying they're tired of the bar scene and that's why they're trying an online dating site but I swear it's a way worse meat market than any bar I've ever been in.

Stood. Up.

2006-02-27T21:36:00.000-05:00

Seriously. I got stood up! What the FUCK?!? I didn't pursue this guy, he was totally bugging me into getting together with him asap and I did and he didn't fucking show or answer his phone or respond to the WTF happened to you today email.

In the middle of all this I started an email conversation with this buddhist guy who seems kinda cool and when I got back from being stood up, he said it was "a hoot."

And this national guardsman dude with the one word email responses. It's email. The words are free.

Guys. What the FUCK is wrong with YOU!

Put your seatbelts on...

2006-02-25T15:19:00.000-05:00

...it's gonna be a bumpy ride for a while. I've just plunged into the rather alarming world of online dating. Yes, I've dated people I've met online before but I've never joined a dating site. I spent most of yesterday writing profiles for Friendster and Match.com. If you're on friendster, please please list me as a friend?

Anyway, everything was going fine. A couple of guys emailed me. One stopped responding as soon as he saw my photos but oh well, right? He was way way cuter than I am anyway. One seems like he might be a unibomber wannabe and one is a dungeons and dragons sorta geek with kids, and a freakin' republican to boot - says he's a west coast republican, my response was that there AREN'T any republicans on the west coast except for Arnold.

So, I sent several guys winks thinking that in real life basically guys are practically always at least 1/2 interested and look for a physical signal from a girl to see if she is approachable so I was just saying "yeah, I'd talk to you." One guy? Sent me an actual not interested and blocked me from viewing his profile. WTF? He's older than I would be interested in and doesn't have any photos up. I only sent the wink in the interest of casting a wider net and being more open to possibilities. It's not like I'm a freakin' stalker! If you're not interested, just don't respond. Trust me, I'll take the hint.

My brother told me to "relax and have fun with it" but have to say: So. Not. Fun.

Not so bad afterall

2006-02-23T15:46:00.000-05:00

The highs:

and the lows:

And, I just registered thebloggingdogs.com, tehbloggingdogs.com (thanks mdmh!), thebloggindogs.com and tehbloggindogs.com.

It is gorgeous here today! Fifty-five degrees and brilliantly sunny. Ab.So.Lute.Ly beeutifool!

Almost makes up for the fact that I'm in a bit of a mood.

My mother broke her ankle while they were on vacation and is in a wheelchair because she doesn't have the upper body strength to manage crutches. She is kind of making everyone's lives hell as a result.
The bird people are not playing well with others. Okay, they're not being nice to me and it's hurting my feelings. CPG and BTD are at the TOP of that list but on the other hand, I just talked to J and the original diva's parents are nesting right now and they are planning on giving me another baby! Now I have to decide if I want a mate for EC or just a buddy or what and I must say it was incredibly heartening that she would trust me with another baby after what happened to the diva. J's kinda always good for a lift in spirits.

Hmm, I thought it was going to be a longer list but really just those two things. Okay. That's not so bad then.

That dog blog thing

2006-02-22T11:15:00.000-05:00

So I think I'm ready to do a dog blog redux. Things finally seem done with CPG and since K-FED would never join match.com (I'll explain that sometime, maybe) I'm in need of a PROJECT and the house is actually reasonable to apper on camera so here are our choices:

creaturecomfortsdogsblog.com
theofficialdogblog.com
thebloggingdogs.com
mydogsphotoblog.com

Vote in the comments and if, when I decide to register one, I discover that it's been purchased I will know that someone reading this stole it and I will be pissed so please don't steal my domain names, k?

I would be worried if Sally had this dream!

2006-02-20T14:13:00.000-05:00

Just before I woke up this morning I dreamt that I had to board just the brown dog and the bird for some reason. My parents were still living in their old, kinda nice, house and I was packing things up and writing instructions for the kennel on keeping my animals. Then all the sudden it turned into a dream where I had to spend one night in jail. This was a scheduled thing and only one night. It wasn't a joke, I had been actually sentenced for something I had done and had to spend just one night in jail.

When I woke up I didn't know it wasn't real. Just for a minute but I was so confused for that minute trying to remember 1. when my one night was and 2. wtf I had done to wind up in jail in the first place! But I just took it as TRUTH that I did in fact have to spend one night in jail at some point.

Very strange but my day has been fairly ordinary.

Blogging Inspiration

2006-02-16T15:45:00.000-05:00

I just got fan mail. Seriously, I just opened the sweetest card that said I am a neat person and that the writer loves my blog. FUCK, I'm putting a card in the mail to someone right now 'cause you have absolutely no idea how nice it was to go through what I expected to be just bills and junk and find such an absolutely lovely, thoughtful note!

Kenna had a meme the other day:

If there is someone on your friends list or blogroll who makes your world a better place just because they exist and who you would not have met (in real life or not) without the internet, then post this same sentence in your journal.

I love that sentiment as well because there are a LOT of people on my blogroll who make my world a better place and who I would not have met without the web but there's just something about snail mail. 'Course I have not one but TWO snailmailed Kenna cards featured on my fridge so I'm obviously stupendously special but I'm serious that I'm going to pick someone and tell them how much I like them and appreciate having them in my life. An out of the blue affirmation like that? That's powerful.

And I got TWO today! I got the fan mail and then a thank you from J (gave me the original diva) for a basket of stuff I took to her when she had to have a minor surgery a couple of weeks ago. She didn't just thank me for the stuff but also said how happy she is to have met me and that we've become friends.

And, both of these pieces of mail came from strong, intelligent, kind, creative women who I so very much appreciate having in MY life so it really is just the most incredible affirmation. Two people I admire saying that they appreciate me in their lives? Wow!

So I'm having a pretty good day.

EC said "hello" this morning. Yesterday she said, "stop it" which is what I'm always yelling at her when she chews on my fingers when I'm trying to compute. I felt sort of bad that those were her first words so this morning I said "hello" every time she did it and ta da, she repeated it back., thus earning herself a peanut.

There was other stuff I was going to blog but it was basically filler links and shit so this is about it for now. Go write your affirming note to snail mail to someone...now...do it, as Pup would say, comply!

Scratch that

2006-02-12T10:32:00.000-05:00

Now my brother is not coming home to take a break. I don't know whether I really am worried about and for him or if I'm just bummed that I won't get to hang out with him.

In the last month he's gone from:

moving out of his place and taking the money he'll get from it as a down payment on buying a place in Brooklyn
moving out of his place and going to Japan for a year
moving out of his place and coming home for a couple of months to figure out what he wants to do and where he wants to be
moving out of his place, moving in with a couple of friends in Brooklyn

The only certainty is that he's moving out of his place.

I had to get my driver's license renewed last week:

Oh yeah, and I cut my hair. It looks crazy there 'cause I was running late and didn't have time to mess with it and well, it's a freakin' DMV photo. So far it's gotten very positive reviews. Everyone keeps saying how young and playful it and I guess, by association, I look.

I'm happy with it.

I'm carrying a bit of extra holiday/grief over solo weight. Just ten pounds but my favorite jeans were due to be replaced and were a bit tight so I got a size larger than I normally wear. My thinking was that I need to feel comfortable enough to move around in order to be motivated to lose the extra weight and that a girl should always have a pair of "fat" jeans in her closet anyway. My regular size was a bit uncomfortable anyway during PMS weeks. I don't need to punish myself for having gained a bit. CPG, of course, feels 100% the opposite - that I should have bought a size smaller even to motivate myself. I find that attitude tiresome.

Roomies

2006-02-10T09:26:00.000-05:00

My brother has lived in New York since I was a teenager. I talk to him on the phone at least once a week and he was really my only support system when I was dealing with the first of the MS stuff and through some pretty major depression.

All the sudden he has decided he doesn't want to be in New York. He's coming home at the end of the month.

He's kinda going through some stuff and I'm sure you all will understand why we've determined that it will work better if he stays in my spare room instead of at the 'rents.

I have 18 days to turn the spare room back into a bedroom instead of a kennel/aviary.

I want him to feel comfortable staying here even though he's not a big animal person.

I've lived by myself in this place for over a decade. G's lived by himself for even longer.

I can't even figure out whether to put crates in the living room or try to squeeze them in my bedroom. Or, I guess I could stack them in the kitchen? Then there's the bird cage. No more leaving ec loose in "her" room so I can take an afternoon nap.

Anyway, that's what's up with me.

Let it snow...

2006-02-04T12:59:00.000-05:00

We've got about an inch on the ground now. My plan for today is remarkably similar to last Saturday since instead of putting up my shelves and organizing all the crap in the spare bedroom/kennel/aviary last weekend, I watched a Clean Sweep marathon.

Yeah, not even I can justify that.

So far today I have organized dog food and treats in the laundry/dog food/utility closet. I have a laundry room!

I had a distressing thing this week. A woman I cyberknow got involved with the evil bird email list where they were apparently discussing So's death. She asked me if she could post about it. I asked her not to. Let those people think whatever they want to. I'm not on that list because those people are unpleasant and negative. Despite my specifically asking her to please just let it go and not post about So's death, she did anyway!

In addition to that, birdwoman sent an email to a guy that CPG knows who lost one of his outdoor flyers when he was hit by a car the other day. The guy really did not want to go public with the information yet, you kind of have to brace yourself for the unpleasant I told you so emails you know you will get. CPG told me about the bird being killed. I told BW about it, prior to her other innappropriate behavior, and asked her to respect the fact that the guy wanted some time before he had to discuss it with all and sundry. Boom she emails him about it.

Since this is an internet acquaintance, I've pretty much decided that I don't owe her any explanation and I just don't want her in my life. I'm sorry that she's so bored that she has to create these dramas but her behavior is innappropriate and hurtful and I am personally trying to cut down on the drama in my life, not create it.

Funny, I had pretty much forgotten about the whole thing until she sent me an email just now.

Anyway, I have now managed to put off today's tasks until afternoon so maybe I better get started? Or take a nap...

I got nothin'

2006-01-31T20:18:00.000-05:00

That's not entirely true. There are ideas floating around but I'm too lazy to process them to the point of a coherent post. I think the lex makes me a little lazy mentally. Like my brain is wrapped in cotton swabbing or something. Well, that's not true when it comes to actually putting thoughts into words verbally but as far as writing it out or doing any design work.

I did make EC a hanging playgym. I've got more stuff to add to it but I wanted to get it up so she could start getting used to it.

Anyway, I'm alive and well and just kind of boring.

Everything I need to know I learned from Captain Kangaroo!

2006-01-26T11:11:00.000-05:00

Spot the GCC? This really is becoming a photo a day blog. I've been thinking about the power of images a lot over the last few days. Think, Hello my name is Simon and the things I draw come true. Really it makes me a bit leery of doing the little cartoon pics I used to use on TPB.

Doldrums?

2006-01-25T09:07:00.000-05:00

It wasn't blogger yeterday. Firefox "encountered problems and had to quit." So far as I know, you can't recover a post in those circumstances. If anyone does know a way to do so, please do tell!

You're right Ms. A.R., when I cut my hair really really short before I just walked into my stylist's and told her I wanted it as short as a boy's. If I really wanted it short, I wouldn't have to ask anyone if I should cut it.

CPG was seriously snarky about yesterday's photo. It really bummed me out. I dunno, everything's bumming me out a little right now. I don't know why. Life is pretty good. I have money in the bank and cable and broadband and unlimited long distance and a washer and a dryer and a bird and a new digital camera. I even have a new real life friend. Life really is good. I don't know where the ennui is coming from.

I guess it's just the time of the year.

Sigh.

2006-01-24T09:25:00.000-05:00

I wrote a whole post with a lot of links but blogger just ate it so all you get it the photo, sorry.

Decadent

2006-01-22T09:51:00.000-05:00

I know it is absurd. I know that. My brother pointed out that these things that I perceive as crazy luxuries (washer & dryer, cable, broadband, cell phone) are, to most people, almost actual necessities. Yesterday, I had the tv on watching What Not To Wear while I was chatting on the phone and checking out my new high speed connection and my cell phone rang. Very weird moment for me. I feel like I'm living in someone else's house. The only time I get to sit around and watch cable while I'm doing laundry is when I'm housesitting or something.

Yesterday was very stressful for me. I could not fall alseep on Friday worrying about the house being messy, potential problems with cable guy, etc. Very high anxiety level. Made me realize just how far I've really come since almost everything prompted that response a year ago.

Speaking of days gone by, the 'rents found some old photos (about 6 years ago?) from my friend N's wedding. This one is from the brunch the next day:

Me, with super short hair with N's twin and my neighbor/friend, L. Before the MS, before S fired me, before the PS. Funny thing is that I know I was about 15 pounds heavier there but I think I look a lot better. Should I cut off all my hair again? Also, I really thought I was very relaxed and at ease but my body posture says NOT! Every one of the photos has me with my arms crossed tightly in front of me.

J is coming over later today to meet EC. I have some web stuff I need to do. Bunny to take care of as well. More cleaning since J is like totally organized and ocd - she's Swedish remember. Oh, and big sale at the used bookstore I like. 75% off marked price!

This is not what I should be doing

2006-01-21T07:30:00.000-05:00

The cable guy could potentially be here in 30 minutes. Or 4 hours and thirty minutes. Or anywhere in between. Bed isn't made. Floors aren't mopped. I'm not showered. As a matter of fact I'm wearing my oldest, rattiest, holiest jeans and I've been sweeping and dusting for the last hour so I'm sure I look a sight.

Both E and CPG told me to blow it off. Who fucking cares what the cable guy thinks of my housekeeping and obviously if I really did care, I've had a week to clean and haven't done it. This behavior is a major holdover from old patterns and I don't know why I still have it.

So, rather than using this half an hour to sweep and mop, I thought I would try to figure out what this is about and then take a shower before my deadline.

I just don't get this. Obviously it does bother me to have the house a mess when someone has to be here. I'm nowhere near as messy as I used to be - scary thought - but yet I just cannot make myself take that last teeny step to generally straightening before someone is going to be in the house so I must get something from this behavior. Otherise it would extinguish itself.

I'm intelligent. And, pretty self-aware. But, I just have no idea why it is that I do this to myself. No. Idea.

I'm not...

2006-01-19T10:13:00.000-05:00

...finished (or even really started) getting the house straightened up for the cable guy.

...spending $400 on another bird that doesn't have a health certificate.

...using the new camera to even a little bit of its potential.

I don't have anything to say really. I wrote a whole post about whether or not I should buy this bird but in the process decided I wasn't going to so I deleted the post - it served its purpose. Life is fine, just a bit boring at the moment.

That's what I'm talkin about!

2006-01-16T20:12:00.000-05:00

I'm already getting shit on controlling EC's food. The very first thing I said when I saw her was, "you're just a little smidge of a thing." I insisted, despite the 'rents claims to the contrary, that EC was genuinely smaller than the original Diva was. The lowest I ever took So's weight was 64 grams and at the end I was flying her at 68 grams. I finally managed to weigh EC yesterday evening and she was 60g and 64g this morning.

I reported this on CPG's and my email list today and have already been accused of practically starving her.

Am I ever going to get to be someone who doesn't get picked on for controlling my bird's food intake? Please? I thought since EC was an adult that the detractors would leave me alone this time but no. Sigh.

EC seems fairly happy. Apparently I forgot to lock her cage last night 'cause this morning she let herself out and when I was letting the dogs out I heard "thwap thwap thwap thwap thwap" and all the sudden had a little, green bat tangled in my hair. Fortunately I heard her coming before I opened the back door and I am somewhat pleased that she was coming to me rather than attempting an out and out escape. When I weighed her she didn't want to step up off the scale so I walked out of the room and again, she followed me so I let her hang out for a little bit this morning. She put herself back in her cage though. I don't think she knows how not to be in a cage. So was raised getting to hang out in a house whenever anyone was home while EC was pretty much always in a cage. I even let EC take a shower with me this morning. The Diva was obsessed with bathing and dunked herself in her water bowl routinely but EC has not taken a bath all week which is some slight cause for concern and she does not appear to like being misted in the slightest.

Sorry, it's all about the bird lately, innit? And I still need to get around to doing mdmh's meme. Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow.

They are SO pets!

2006-01-15T09:32:00.000-05:00

Someone gave me The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill for my birthday. A fairly obvious gift. It's about conures. I have a conure. I have a fair amount of interest in conures.

I'm maybe 3/4 of the way through the book. An easy read. I just started it yesterday. You would think I'm speeding through it because it is enjoyable but in fact it fucking pisses me off!

Nothing made this more clear to me than this article about Mr. Bittner's ongoing battle to protect the trees the parrots perch in near his house. Not only do I have some mild opposition to going to such lengths to keep a non-native species living in exactly the same state it is currently living in: i.e., maybe it is meant to be that the parrots move on to another set of trees? Trees rot and fall in the wild thus depriving parrots of a normal foraging spot and forcing them to find a new one. This is not a nesting or roosting location for them, simply where they hang out in between feedings given by Bittner. There is a valid argument against allowing the parrots to continue to breed in San Fran anyway since they are not native and could have long term impact on that ecosystem.

Even more so than all that though is this Bittner guy constantly refering to the parrots as his "friends". There's an idiot who runs a yahoo group who has a thing about parrots aren't pets, they are friends for life. This pisses me off. A friend is 1. a person for doG's sake! 2. has some ability to feel affection for you as well that I do not personally believe parrots capable of and 3. it is a reciprocal relationship: you are not completely responsible for your friends' well being. You ARE responsible for your freakin' PETS' well being.

The yahoo yahoo allows his parrots to roam free. Basically he wants a relationship with them quite similar to what Bittner seems to have with the wild parrots except that he wants a little more control over them since he uses them in shows he puts on at state fairs and such.

Please note that both Bittner and the yahoo have basically made their living off parrots. And yet, they both look down their noses at those of us who keep parrots as pets. The yahoo came in on the side of the people who said that I was unethical and inhumane for controlling So's food. When Bittner decides to capture sick or injured members of the wild flock to attempt to rehab them what is the very first thing he does to them? He clips their wings because that is, of course, the only way one can keep a parrot safe in a house and he wouldn't dream of attempting to train the bird thus imposing his own strictures on it by teaching it to step up or say hello. He constantly dreams of being allowed to pet the wild birds and is delighted when the birds he has clipped allow him this luxury.

How bout this asshole? How bout you quit spouting off this fucking nonsense, aknowledge that you have something the parrots need: food and security and you are putting the price of allowing you to touch them on this?

So would let me roll her onto her back in my palm and I didn't have to fucking clip her wings to get that. I've had EC precisely one week and she already flaps to me from her cage when I call her.

It isn't magical or mystical or whatever. It's just me putting that particular price on what the damn bird needs and that I have easy access to.

Not allowing the bird to roam free is just common fucking sense! Look what happened to So when I was standing right there? This guy has lost a large number of birds that he doesn't even always know what happened to them because he wasn't with them at the time. I don't let my dogs roam free! Not only is it illegal, it isn't safe for the dogs and it potentially puts other people at risk of either being injured or having their property damaged. Your rights end where mine begin, etc.

Speaking of EC, she just did a flighted recall to me from the cage with the door open to my hand!

The pics are sorta crappy 'cause I pulled them from video. One irritating thing I have discovered is that the fancy shmancy new camera won't work in burst mode if it detects that you need the flash which you baically always do indoors unless you have lights set up for that sort of thing.

Funny note: while I was writing this post, one of the labs I am watching this weekend chewed up my copy of The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill!

This time next week...

2006-01-13T18:51:00.000-05:00

...I will be desperately trying to straighten up the house in preparation for getting cable installed on pretty much everything except the washer and dryer.

EC is now stepping up onto my hand to eat. In a lot of ways this is a lot easier than that first couple of weeks with So. I almost immediately let her out of her cage and then coped with having to hunt her down to put her up before I left. And a week into having her I had been bitten numerous times whereas EC hasn't bitten me even once. She does suck on my fingers though.

The big difference is that I don't have that sense of wonder with EC that I did with So. So always wanted to be ON me. From day one she wanted to be on my shoulder or head or wherever I would let her be. With EC it is a lot more clearly that I have what she needs: food.

I'm still delighted to have EC, it's just interesting to note the difference in my feelings about the two experiences.

Postcards are going out tomorrow so if you haven't given me your snail mail address and believe yourself to be a member of Team CC send me your real world contact info asap!

Click, click, tweet*

2006-01-12T21:34:00.000-05:00

The brown dog and a client's dog at the park today. I heart my new camera.

EC ate HER dinner out of my hand tonight! She even stepped up onto my hand to better get at the seed. I count this as progress.

*the camera makes a tweety noise when you click something in the menu system, it's cute I tell you...cute!

He's a SHE, dammit!

2006-01-11T10:07:00.000-05:00

Let me just clear something up. Fairly certain that "anonymous" is CPG who has a bug up his butt about EC's gender. EC has been DNA tested and found to be a male. That is actually why I have her. The breeder thought they had two breeding pairs then discovered that in fact, they had 4 boys. BUT, the DNA test is NOT 100% accurate (think OJ ;-) AND, I did purchase the domain littlegreenDIVA.com for So and plan to eventually use it to record EC's training progress, etc. This has led me to decide to use female pronouns for EC.

CPG: he's gonna write a book about you
Me: if he can do that then he's pretty goshdarned special
CPG: true

Seriously, we've gone ten rounds every day since I got EC about the male/female pronouns. My point is that EC is a BIRD. And, while they're pretty smart, I don't think the English gender-specific pronouns are meaningful for them so why does he care which I decide to use? The whole thing makes me think of the dog in The Incredible Lightness of Being where they made such a todo about her heat cycles but consistently referred to him with male pronouns.

CPG also said that Encore was "crap" as a name. I pointed out that there are much nicer ways of saying that you don't like something.

Also, EC doesn't talk (yet!) and has spent the last 45 minutes squawking at wild birds SHE can see outside my kitchen window. It's a bit annoying. So was a very quiet bird.

In other news...I just got rid of my $150 phone bill and my $20 isp bill in favor of a $111 broadband/cable tv/unlimited long distance bill.

Man, last year at this time, I didn't have a bird, I didn't have a washer/dryer, I didn't have broadband, I didn't have a digital camera, I didn't have a cell phone and I didn't have cable.

I don't even know what to do with all this.

Next thing is a freakin' boyfriend. Right?

It's here, it's here!

2006-01-10T18:44:00.000-05:00

No, not da plane. Da CAMERA!

And it was so worth the $342! So tiny, so sleek, so shiny, so black. And the photos are so crisp and vivid.

EC ate a half a grape and some seed and has progressed to playing on her perches today. She's doing a lot of head bobbing which at least gives the appearance of being happy and excited. She remains suspicious of the birdie bunk but I don't think S crawled in it for at least a week so I am going to leave it in the cage to see if she discovers that it is a nice place to take a nap.

She was rubbing her face against the cage bars there. Look how much less maroon she has on her tummy than S did.

K, sorry, I don't have anything actually useful or imporantant or interesting to talk about. Today was okay. I'm thrilled with EC and with the camera.

Thanks a lot, universe

2006-01-09T10:12:00.000-05:00

EC seems to be settling in fairly well. It's so sad. She doesn't seem to understand what perches are for much less the birdie bunk. She either sits on the floor of the cage or clings to the sides.

When I was setting things up to pick up EC yesterday I got an email about a rescue dog with 3 puppies in need of transportation. I thought this was happening last weekend and since part of the route coincided with my route to pick up EC and I felt like I needed to do something to even out the universe handing me a new bird, I offerred to help transport the dogs.

Turns out that this isn't happening until NEXT weekend, the 14th and 15th. Well, since I had already offered I couldn't very well say, "oh no now it's an actual inconveience for me, universe!" So, I am still covering the Elizabethtown to Florence route. But, there are still quite a few stretches in the Pennsylvania/New York sections that still need to be filled.

So, if anyone wants to help out these dogs and get in good with the universe, email me and I will put you in contact with the coordinator.

This is the section of the route that still needs people to agree to help:

*LEG8> Wheeling, WV to New Stanton, PA - 71 Miles (NEED!)
1 hour 8 minutes (depart 6:45pm)

OVERNIGHT NEEDED AROUND LEGS 8-10 !!!

*LEG9> New Stanton, PA to Bedford, PA - 74 Miles (NEED!)
1 hour 17 minutes

*LEG 10> Bedford, PA to Carlisle, PA - 87 Miles (NEED!)
1 hour 28 minutes

*LEG 11> Carlisle, PA to Frackville, PA - 77 Miles (NEED!)
1 hour 15 minutes

LEG12> Frackville, PA to Scranton, PA - 63 Miles ~filled~
1 hour 5 minutes

*LEG13> Scranton, Pa to Milford, PA - 53 Miles (NEED!)
1 hour

*LEG13a> Milford, PA to Newburgh, NY - 44 Miles (NEED!)
45 minutes

Whip it, whip it good!*

2006-01-08T18:53:00.000-05:00

For a bird who has never been handled, I am absolutely amazed at how docile EC is. I borrowed Daddy's vehicle to drive to Columbus (I did 202 miles in 2.5 hours on the way up but man I am sick of being in the car - started at 10:00 am and didn't get home until 6:30 pm) so I took EC out of the carrier at Mom and Dad's when I picked Bubba back up and got Mom to take this quick photo for me. If you had tried to reach in and grab S like that you would have wounds to clean afterwards but EC just seemed to shrug although he did do several tight circles over our heads when I first opened the carrier.

Seeing the full flight feathers really is a kick for me. They are a much darker blue than I thought they would be. I think EC is smaller than S was but M&D think the opposite. It'll be interesting to see when I get him on the scale. I'll give that a shot tomorrow.

*Ms. A.R. suggested Divo as a name and that made me think of Devo and I've had it in my head all day!!!

Someone please stop me!

2006-01-07T10:07:00.000-05:00

I just keep spending money! I just spent $30 at Barnes & Noble and am considering dropping $75 on a new cage for the new Diva in the rough.

This, on top of the whomping $342 I dropped on the camera. That site has way better photos of it, including one showing the ginormous 2.5" lcd screen on the back. I'm keeping it open to remind myself not to trip about the cost 'cause it is just soooo pretty and in just 4 short months it should be warm enough to begin outdoor flight training with my new Diva and it will just be lovely to do that with such a small, fast camera in my my hands.

The only things left on the grand ToDo list are:

Dogs' nails

straighten up the bird room some more (perhaps try to find Big Bags again and pick up a few storage bins from Home Depot?)

DTD's site update

pick up some grapes, apples and millet sprays for EC. Hmm, that's a thought: Encore to EC to Easy :-)

Shovel out Bubba in case Daddy decides to drive him tomorrow

Get the carrier arranged for tomorrow

move the original Diva's blog to lgd.com and begin a new one for the new Diva.

Laundry ;-)

set up cable! (which means spending some more $$$)

Wow, I started this post almost 2 hours ago. In the meantime, the realtors I did a site for before the holidays have fired me. I got a new PS job. PS is a lot less hassle although not quite as much money as WD. E agrees that my proposed name for the new Diva is a good choice and is available to offer tech support for the directionally challenged tomorrow when we all know I will get lost trying to get to where I'm picking up the bird. Directions and information already printed out via the fancy shmancy new printer. The bird people called and tried to talk me into two for the price of one which I turned down.

Excuse me while I hyperventilate

2006-01-06T10:46:00.000-05:00

Not so long ago I was frequently scraping up change from Bubba's floorboards to afford groceries and I still have months where money is, shall we say, tight.

This wasn't the wisest money decision I've ever made and I suppose, as a result, I can't just enjoy the fact that I'm getting something new and that I have the money in the bank to pay for it.

I've been using my friend E's digital camera (only 2MP and quite, quite slow plus it's way sucky for print) off and on for the last year. She needed it back before the holidays and I have money from holiday PS so I just bought:

She's a Panasonic. 5MP, great lens, much MUCH faster than her predecessor. 2.5" LCD screen on the back, fabulous Burst Mode for those flying pics.

I'm excited. Really, I am. But I still feel sick. I mean seriously, I feel like I'm going to puke over spending $342 on a non-necessity.

I'm trying to view it as just a done deed. That money no longer exists for me. It'll be awesome to have a fancy new camera to take photos of the new bird. Sigh.

Okay, vote please (in the comments), on bird names:

1. Ace
2. Deuce
3. Encore
4. Other

I'm leaning hard toward 3. CPG says it is "crap" as a name. One of my client's thought of Encore and I think it's sort of cute and honors the original Diva.

Another kind of list

2006-01-04T20:05:00.000-05:00

Instead of stuff I need to get done, this is the stuff I HAVE gotten done this week:

more loads of laundry than I can even count. ALL my clothes are all clean at once!
paid bills on time!
renewed my car registration (only a little more than a year late)
scheduled the plumber for tomorrow
arranged to drive two legs of transportation for a rescue ACD next weekend

Okay, it's only five things. Now back to the usual, need to do:

sweep/mop
bank
call cable company
update realtor's site
get bird's room set up again (woohoo!)

So, as many things have gotten done as remain to be done.

There is still some numbness on my left side but in general I feel pretty darn good.

I don't DO patience!

2006-01-03T20:06:00.000-05:00

Dear contentiouschic,
Here is your horoscope
for Tuesday, January 3:

Sometimes the best thing to do is wait. While it's not a process that's familiar to you, learn to utilize and appreciate a more receptive kind of energy. Let the universe do the work and figure this one out.

You know what Monday is, right? Blech and probably one of the main reasons for my recent blahs. But, guess what I am doing on Sunday?

On Sunday I am driving to Columbus and picking up a new bird! One year old, male (but since I already own littlegreendiva.com we're going to pretend we don't know that), the same kind of bird as the Diva :-)

I had given up hope on finding a bird before early summer when conures are hatching again.

It made me so happy to have my little Diva. I walked around for the first month with this goofy I have a secret feeling like you do when you first fall in love and I was always looking for an opportunity to work her into a conversation the way you want to work your boyfriend/girlfriend's name in just to say it.

So maybe, just maybe, things are starting to look up a little bit?

Oh, and my left side is numb again. Oh joy.

and we have agitation!

2005-12-30T18:58:00.000-05:00

Not the bad kind. The washing machine kind! I don't think anyone understands how happy it makes me to have a washer and dryer. It only took two days, about a dozen phone calls and 3 favors to get it up and running. I am doing my first load (pinks, what else?) as I type this.

Otherwise though I seem to be in a bit of a funk. I think it is year end/year beginning stuff. I just have the blahs.

I've never liked New Year's Eve. As a hard drinking relative of mine used to say, New Year's Eve and St. Patrick's Day are for amatuers. I'm the one who never drinks or goes out on NYE and hence gets called at 3 a.m. to give some acquaintance a ride home from a party. NYE and birthdays are never actually fun because there is just too much pressure to HAVE FUN on them. Nothing can live up to that.

So, I bought some favorite treats, a new Dana Stabenow novel (Kate Shugak is back baby!) and my only plan is to give myself a pedicure with a kit I got for Christmas.

I hope you guys get to do what you enjoy doing for NYE.

Oh, and I have a post holiday card for everyone. I'm missing Debra's, Jessica's, mdmh's, Angie's (new), and Pup's (new) addresses. So, if you want your cards, send me your info.

busybusybusy

2005-12-28T09:46:00.000-05:00

Numbness: basically gone but I fell walking dogs yesterday and have messed my right pinky finger up. I don't think it's broken but it huwts. A lot.

Christmas: no fights, very little stress. I made Flying Spaghetti Monster crackers for Christmas Eve. Pirate hats, teeny dinosaurs, bubbles and pirate action figures. I'm going to send a photo in for "sightings". I felt very hip.

Online: DTD wants a new website. My rules are that he cannot be unpleasant to me and that he can't harrass me to get it done. CPG is gone until after the new year. I've got to get BTD's site up. The design is just so dreadful I can barely stand to do it.

Other: I genuinely love to do laundry. It's the only household task I really like. I don't have a washer or dryer. Haven't in more than ten years. I hate the laundromat. It's depressing. A friend of mine knows someone who needs to get rid of one and I found someone who can go get it, haul it over here and get it set up for me. But all of this has to take place tomorrow which means I have to get everything out of the way in the utility room and generally get the house straightened up so I won't be mortified when they come in to install the washer and dryer. With a hurt finger. Deadlines are good though. They make things get done.

That was weird.

2005-12-22T09:10:00.000-05:00

So, yesterday the numbness mostly went away. There was never any weakness. My hands are always a little numb and both are more so than usual now. I felt like I was walking around with fire ants in my shoes yesterday, my feet itched so terribly. And, the left side of my face is still a tiny bit tingly but basically, whatever this was, seems to have gone away.

I should just be glad but the whole thing was just too fucking weird. I mean seriously, it was weird.

Everything was all numb, the dog had that seizure, I wash everything in the house, switch to a brand new down comforter and boom, it goes away.

In other news, the realtors finally paid me and I've now spent almost every cent of the money on gifts. I'm mad at CPG and BTD. It's petty and my own fault but that doesn't make the hurt feelings any better. Or any less valid dammit!

Happy Holidays and all that.

She's a CoverDog!

2005-12-17T22:40:00.000-05:00

Yeah, it's pathetic that I'm blogging at 10:41 on a Saturday night. This numbness thing is just generally driving me crazy.

Good news: unbeknownst to me, the little white dog was voted onto the cover of a Frisbee Dog Calendar!

I think that photo is a strange choice as well. You guys have seen photos of her catching discs in the air. I don't know why it was chosen but hey, we'll take what we can get, ya know?

That's pretty much it.

Am I crazy?

2005-12-16T09:34:00.000-05:00

When I first got sick both the dogs I had at the time (the brown one I have now and her 1/2 brother) had seriously weird neurological seeming events. Not seizures exactly. Very brief periods where they just could not move their limbs normally. As though their muscles had completely seized up on them.

Yesterday I wake up with my entire left side numb and some weakness in my left arm. Later, the brown dog had another one of these events.

I haven't had anything this severe since that first incident and the dog has never had another one of these events.

My dogs sleep on my bed, eat a lot of what I eat and go pretty much everywhere I go.

What if there is something fucked up with my immune system or CNS from that first incident - remember that I wound up hospitalized with menegitis, one neuro said it was viral, one said it was just the ms, the infectious disease specialist strongly believed it was bacterial from this weird bacteria that doesn't have cell walls so won't grow in a culture but which I had an alarmingly high level of when I was tested for it - but what if it isn't normal MS? What if that first neuro was just desperately trying to cover his ass on the menegitis from spinal tap issue and rushed me into an MS diagnosis and now I'm stuck with that label so no one is looking for anything else?

What if the whole thing started with exposure to some chemical and that's what happened yesterday with both me and the dog?

It's just too weird that I haven't had anything like this for years and all the sudden I have this huge flare up and and the dog has a neurological incident at the exact same time.

The numbness is still there. The weakness is less today. I can actually hit my nose with my left index finger today.

I don't know quite what to do about this other than give the dog a bath, change my sheets, do major laundry, wash everything in the house/truck and try to prevent re-exposure.

Fabulous

2005-12-15T10:00:00.000-05:00

I know it was bound to happen. And that actually I'm pretty lucky about this stuff. But really, I don't have enough bad stuff right now?

K, I'm giving in to flat out whining.

It's my blog, I can whine if I want to.

Woke up this morning with the left side of my face numb and my left arm all fucked up.

It's not my legs. It's not optic neuritus.

I am so fucking tired of having to look on the bright side of my MS.

It pisses me off!

Angst-mas indeed!

2005-12-13T14:11:00.000-05:00

I actually had a lovely time with J (gave me the bird) when I went to visit the other night. We hung out with her birds for a bit then, when it appeared she didn't have anything better to do, I invited her out for coffee. We had a good time. She was complaining that she has a horrible time trying to make friends. It was all I could do not to say, "Good! Now I can monopolize all your time and we can be best friends!"

Don't worry, I restrained myself.

Really, my delightful and caring clients are the only thing keeping me from the deep end right now. I know it's just a bad time and it will go away and be fine again but that doesn't actually make it a whole lot less icky for the here and now.

I can feel the lexapro helping. Well, the lex and that I've come out on the other side of this stuff before. I've just got to get through Christ...er...ANGSTmas and then it'll smooth out from there I'm sure.

In the meantime, mdmh stuck me with the five weird habits stick.

I'm too messy/slobby/lazy to have a lot of OCDish habits.

1. I kiss my fingers and hit the roof of the car, saying "no cops" anytime I run a red light. I've never gotten a ticket for running a red light.

2. I cannot fall asleep without reading first. Even if I've been drinking and am all but passed out it is seriously unusual for me not to read myself to sleep.

3. I make a wish if I happen to notice it is 11:11 and I keep wishing until 11:12.

4. I hate bookmarks. I always dogear. It is very intentional.

5.

I can't think of anything else! Since I only got 4/5ths of the meme done, I'll only stick two people with it: Pup and Debra, consider yourselves stuck!

I'm still alive.

2005-12-09T09:28:00.000-05:00

Sorry, I didn't mean to drop off the blogsphere. I'm still really depressed about the bird. I'm barely managing to make myself do the absolutely, positively, has to, has to, HAS TO get done stuff.

I did a lesson with a client in a pet store that had a bird just like the one I had yesterday. It was plucked almost bare and terribly stressed out. Clipped of course. I almost started crying and then had to talk my client out of buying the bird for me.

I'm now thinking of getting one of these. A bit bigger than the diva, supposed to be great talkers and very laid back.

I'm going over to the people who gave me the diva's house tonight. They're so nice but I know it is going to make me sad to see my bird's parents.

In addition to being depressed and sad about the bird, I'm stressed about money and never really psyched about Christmas anyway.

So, it's just a bad month. Bad months end. The sun'll come out tomorrow...blah blah blah.

It's always something with me

2005-11-29T20:46:00.000-05:00

On Friday, my brother and I took the bird here to fly. She misjudged a landing and was on the ground about seven feet in front of us when a freakin' hawk swooped down and killed her.

I miss her so much.

This is insane but that bird changed my life.

She was so tiny and so joyful.

She didn't make it even quite nine months but she lived every single one of those days to the absolute fullest. She demanded that things be brought up to her standards.

She just made me happy.

Tryptophan

2005-11-24T10:26:00.000-05:00

Very strange dream last night involving lesbians, a used bookstore, 2 grocery stores, dogs, a small town, high school teachers and car insurance. Seriously weird.

My mother's dog almost ate my bird yesterday. Rather alarming. I was extremely calm about it. Based on everyone else's reactions the Lexapro is definitely having a positive effect.

A few weeks ago there was an announcement I am too lazy to look back up to link to about tryptophan's positive effects on MS. Tryptophan increases seratonin. Lexapro inhibits the uptake of seratonin meaning that it gets to float around in my brain longer. You can buy trptophan supplements over the counter but I've had no luck finding them and I'm frankly a tiny bit worried about taking it since I had such a dreadful reaction to the 10mg Lexapro dosage. I suppose I am going to order some just to see what if anything it does to me.

Anyway, enjoy your natural tryptophan. Remember that your family isn't as dreadful as you think. And watch at least fifteen minutes of the parade.

Argh!

2005-11-18T10:42:00.000-05:00

Me: I think DTD yelled at the mechanic for fucking up last time 'cause he was so freakin' nice today. Plus I think he's like mega curious about our relationship.
CPG: Yours and my relationship?
Me: ...?
Me: DTD's and my relationship. You and I don't have a relationship!!!

Okay, DTD and I don't have a relationship either but I have known him for like ten years and he did set me up with this mechanic who is a buddy of his and does know that I've known DTD for ages and that I'm like under his protection or whatever. I mean, if I really needed help with something DTD would help me. I mean, he did yell at the mechanic for fucking up last time and the mechanic was mega nice yesterday. The way that I explain it to people anymore is that I would trust him with my life and with any dog training problem but other than that...

So, how sad is it that I trust DTD more than I trust CPG? And what was with him assuming that I was talking about some imaginary relationship between he and I? Him and me? Whatever.

He obviously wasn't listening to me 'cause I was clearly talking about DTD but how weird that he zoned out and then just assumed that I was referring to him.

Oh and yeah, Bubba had to get a new alternator yesterday. Blah.

I'm fine, dammit

2005-11-16T08:54:00.000-05:00

Me: I'm fine.
CPG: Liar.
Me: We've had this conversation.
CPG: Then tell me the truth and we can stop having it.
Me: I told you, it's nothing I can discuss with you.

I mean, that's pretty much it. It was a major theme of Grey's Anatomy last week. The person who broke your heart can't help you get over it.

And I am. Fine. I'm fine. Really. I am. I need to stop spending money but it beats eating ice cream as a coping mechanism I suppose. Okay, probably not 'cause it would be a lot better if I saved money than spent it and at least ice cream is cheap but whatever.

Boo Fucking Hoo

2005-11-13T23:29:00.000-05:00

This isn't a "oh poor CC" post. I'm only writing this to keep track of this sort of thing. I just feel sad. Like these horrible waves of sadness. I don't even know how to explain it and it isn't about anything in particular. I'm not mad. I'm not unhappy. I feel fine basically. Just really, really sad. It's more than a little peculiar. It isn't a pms thing. Everything is exactly the same as it was yesterday. I just feel unbearably sad. Like I could sit down and just bawl but I don't have the energy to do so. I don't recall ever feeling like this before. And it's like it isn't even me that feels sad. It almost feels like there is some other sad entity who has just taken up residence for the day in my head. You know the ghost in Harry Potter that would make girls cry in the bathroom? It's like that.

Honk if...

2005-11-12T12:36:00.000-05:00

You're bidding on this:

...for your bird of course.

No? Well maybe you just won an auction on this:

...for your bird of course.

No? Well surely you just won an auction on this:

...for CPG's birds.

K, I have gotta stop spending money! Especially on CPG. Just in the last week I have gotten little holiday hats for his birds, the m&m thing and now this. He calls me all the time. I want more than this but would ultimately be satisfied with a lot less than he claims to need and it is just making me unhappy.

Whoa! This just in, my father just called and told me that he is never voting republican again! Said he'd vote for Hilary even! The man who voted for dubyass TWICE!

But, I digress. Where was I? Oh yeah, CPG makes me unhappy. The bird, obviously, doesn't. That's part of the problem. He's kind of intertwined with the whole bird thing. I'm getting her acclimated to the tutu! And I got her to say, "hello" today.

I've tentatively tried to bring up the topic with CPG but he just ignores it. Does being passive agressive come with the penis thing or something? I can't make myself just not have anything to do with him and the lines are just blurred when we do communicate. He was actually flirting with me the other day.

Whittling Away

2005-11-11T18:32:00.000-05:00

This weekend

Wash windows before barbarian returns to replace storm windows.
Work on lgd.com

Photo of The Diva in TUTU!!!
Photo Gallery
Training Journal
Flash
Fairy Tale

finish putting up shelves for storage!
Work on some tricks with F
tweak evil site

neighborhoods
malls

Sometime

see about increasing hosting package
move DTD's sites and CC site
L's bathroom, my kitchen sink

Progress has been made! Man it feels good to have the vast majority of the evil site behind me!!! You have no idea! It will be fun to get back to work on lgd.com too. Hell, it'll be fun to get the stupid windows washed. At least that isn't fucking with a stupid real estate web site! Good day today, took the bird with me to the park. Some guy sat in his truck and watched us the entire time we were there. I couldn't decide whether to be creeped out or flattered.

How. Cute. Is. That?!?

2005-11-10T20:36:00.000-05:00

Can you believe I found a Diva sized tutu at Michaels??? And DIVA foam stickers? In PINK?!?

I know! I was blown away by it too ;-)

Made much headway on the evil site today. Ordered some of these for CPG. The reason I'm not being all bitchy to him right this second is 'cause he's got some serious back problems and is in a considerable amount of pain at the moment.

Pretty good day really.

Make it go away!

2005-11-10T10:29:00.000-05:00

The site from hell seems to just keep growing. Almost done with the property listings, last night I found something in the ones I had already done that they hadn't told me had to be changed but looked to me like it absolutely had to be. At least they seem to get that most of this is totally not on me since no one gave me a complete list of changes.

The client whose dog died a few weeks ago has a rescue dog that I am training for her. She came with me to the park yesterday for a lesson and brought her other dog with her who promptly got into a fight with one of the labs and got bitten. It wasn't serious and I wouldn't have taken one of my own dogs to the vet over it but she's a bit of an hysteric so I immediately told her to take the dog to the vet and get it checked out. She's not upset but still, not a good thing.

Odd CPG interaction last night. This just is not healthy. Too much like DTD. I mean, not that he's mean and controlling, just...I dunno. Not healthy.

More complete list

2005-11-09T08:47:00.000-05:00

Wash windows before barbarian returns to replace storm windows.
laundry
bank
treats for F's lesson in the park!!
finish putting up shelves for storage!
Get the site from fucking hell done so I can get fucking paid!!!!!!

5 "meet" pages
mortgage
hot properties (30 pages)
neighborhoods
malls
contact (check emails)

Update CPG's site. 'Cause you know it made the most sense to get the one thing that isn't for me and that I'm not making any money from and was for someone who doesn't even care if I fuck strange gas dudes done first.

New photo
get rid of comments and add "feedback" page
new products
Promo greeting card sale

see about increasing hosting package
move DTD's sites and CC site
L's bathroom, my kitchen sink
Work on lgd.com

Photo Gallery
Training Journal
Flash
Fairy Tale

That so just makes me want to take a damn nap. I spent most of yesterday afternoon frantically working on the site from hell and dealing with the fact that the local gas company had turned my gas off to work on the lines and wouldn't/couldn't tell me when they would turn it back on and repeatedly wandered around my back yard leaving my damn gate open! But, the guy who did eventually turn up to turn it back on was cute, flirty and immediately struck up a conversation with me about smoking pot - L said, "I always find that is a good ice breaker!"

CPG was completely sanguine about gas dude (hey, at least he isn't gas dude 'cause he works at a convenience store!) which sort of bothered me. Okay, it bothered me a lot! I mean, why would you call a girl every single night if you still really considered things over to the point where it wouldn't bother you if she was fucking some other guy? I don't get that.

One of those.

2005-11-08T11:09:00.000-05:00

Yup. Life is spinning out of control a little, time for a ToDo post.

Wash windows before barbarian returns to replace storm windows.
Get the site from fucking hell done so I can get fucking paid!!!!!!
Update CPG's site.
Work on lgd.com

Photo Gallery
Training Journal
Flash
Fairy Tale

Hey, something cool happened yesterday about that though! I started putting some feelers out last weekend about possibly buying a mate for the bird. I want a baby so I can raise him and get him flying outside. They aren't old enough to mate until they're like 2 or 3 years old so it is a while down the road. A woman emailed me back and offerred to give me a baby bird if I would train one of her birds to fly outside. She even wanted to advertise me as a freakin' bird trainer!!! Me who doesn't even want to advertise as a dog trainer and have only had ONE bird in my entire freakin' life! BTD kind of stomped on the +R rush I got from it but I rebounded.

Whew

2005-11-04T10:17:00.000-05:00

As Ms. A.R. predicted, today is a new day. I had a major Alltell problem yesterday but I calmly spent 45 minutes dealing with them this morning and while it is almost undoubtedly not going to help my credit rating that I dispute these charges at least it isn't going to interfere with my regular service or put me in the poor house.

In the middle of the Alltell problems yesterday my computer also started going bonkers but that also seems to have remedied itself. And Blogger wouldn't let me post this photo:

To a client's blog. The dog on the left is the client's dog that I am training. She called me Wednesday morning because she was convinced that her dog had eaten my bird and I was furious with her. This is the rescue dog who is supposedly viscious with other dogs (middle dog is my malinut, Pug is a client's) and runs away all the time. He's got a 20' long line on but the other end isn't attached to anything, just there in case I need to grab him. The bird could fly anywhere she wants to but always flies right back to me. I take a really pathetic amount of confidence from the bird training thing and knowing that only about a hundred people in the country fly their pet birds outside.

But c'mon, four dogs (the other Pug did not feel like being photographed yesterday) for all intents and purposes off leash in a public park holding a stay while a bird flies over their heads? And the bird is obeying a recall cue from me? And this was after walking 5 other dogs with the bird sitting on my shoulder (yes, Brian I am now the pirate's pet sitter, dammit!)

Anyway, makes me feel cool.

Argh!

2005-11-03T20:00:00.000-05:00

Not. Having. Good. Day!!!!!

More Diva

2005-11-01T10:43:00.000-05:00

I think this is my favorite. Especially since it is so appropriate for the moment, the diva herself is tucked between my arm and my side making her little sleepy clucks.

I even added them as a Camisole and Tweet Dreams Thong to the diva's cafepress shop.

Happy Owl-o-ween

2005-10-31T18:09:00.000-05:00

We got our treat bags (dog biscuits, pressed rawhides, generic version of greenies, toasted pumpkin seeds, candy and flowers) and the prelaunch version of The Diva's site done today.

I just had my first few trick or treaters. It's been years since I felt reasonable and organized enough to turn on the light and have a bowl of candy at the ready on Halloween. One little boy just kept standing there. I dropped some candy in his bag, moved on to the next kid and he kept standing there so I shrugged and dropped another piece of candy in his bag. He didn't move. Not a bad tactic really.

The barbarians are gone! The absence of a negative is a positive.

The client whose dog just died has been talking me up like crazy to her vet who keeps asking if he can give out my name and number to his clients for training. I'm a bit nervous about doing it. My confidence in my ability to deal with dog training clients is still very low. Even despite a very successful year as a pet sitter with the best clients ever. My brother and CPG bullied and badgered me into saying that the vet could give out my name and number. That client has a new rescue dog that she wants me to work with for her. And I am still walking her other dog three days a week. The little white dog got me that job, btw. I guess I'll take the stray dog into that clinic to get shots to touch base with him. But she's the worst behaved off the lot which doesn't reflect so well on my training abilities.

rainy days and sundays...

2005-10-30T12:16:00.000-05:00

Except that it's not raining and for a Sunday I'm actually in a pretty good mood. I'm working like mad trying to get a version of the diva's site up by tomorrow. Cute little graphics of her in rain gear or a pith helmet or footed pajamas. Well, it amuses me.

My parents were just here dropping off some shelves my father thought would work well for me for storage which I could desperately use. Normally I don't actually let them come in the house. I don't think my mother has been inside my house in almost ten years. The last time the house was actually neater than it is right at this moment but she was really horrible and snarky about it being messy so I just don't let her come into my space.

It isn't that anything was different today. I've been in a few other people's houses recently that are as bad, if not worse, than mine and mostly I have just decided that I refuse to care about it. If guests can't behave pleasantly under the circumstances they just will not be invited back. At least not for ten years.

never again

2005-10-28T22:45:00.000-04:00

I hate the pumpkins. I'm so not happy with how they look. I can't do shit freehand. There's no fucking Ctrl-Z. Life needs a fucking Ctrl-Z dammit! I'm thinking paper bags with the diva logo printed out and glued to them. Maybe crumple the paper and antique it a bit? Then that also gives me tons more time to work on the diva's site which is ultimately what the whole thing was about anyway. I just lost sight of that for a bit. No biggie. A bit of wasted time. And some wasted pumpkins. Spending more time on it would just be absurd at this point. Especially when I could be either spending time on something that will make me money or that I enjoy doing. I know that sounds petulant but seriously, this is not going anywhere I'm going to be happy about, I have a reasonable alternate plan B so everyone gets their treats and I get to get the site up and let people know about it which was the whole plan: give my clients a little thank you for being so great and get the word out about lgd.com. I'm not being petulant. I'm not! People will get their chocolate and pumpkins seeds. I get to sit around and play with Flash instead of dremeling pumpkins. It's all good.

Duh!

2005-10-28T09:47:00.000-04:00

I do get an extension! Just because my mental deadline for this was today doesn't mean that I can't wait and distribute the pumpkins on Halloween itself which gives me the whole weekend to get everything finished.

I started this post at like 9:30 this morning but all the sudden my keyboard wouldn't work. I popped a couple of keys out of it to see if I could figure out what was making it stick and you would NOT believe the amount of dog hair caught between and under those keys! Even after I cleaned it out the keyboard still wouldn't work so I went to
Wal Mart and picked up a new one for ten bucks. Works quite well really.

I have had a day though so I am off to take a nap and will elaborate later...maybe.

this was a terrible idea

2005-10-27T23:15:00.000-04:00

Terrible. Dreadful. Ridiculous even.

I have now been to two separate Krogers, one Wal-Mart and one Walgreens. I've dremeled 4 pumpkins. None of them are finished. They don't look good. I am not happy with them. I just want to go to bed.

I'm now doing bas-relief and using poster paints on them.

I still haven't started roasting seeds.

Did I mention I just want to go to bed???

the barbarians are at the door

2005-10-27T10:02:00.000-04:00

The PH aluminum siding guys have been upgraded (downgraded?) to barbarian status. I will be so happy when they are done. The absence of a negative is a postive.

Mother, however, genuinely redeemed herself last night. My brand new printer, the one I bought to replace the one that didn't work? Well, it isn't working. So I needed their printer to print out copies of the lgd logo to use as templates to carve these pumpkins...the answer to number two from last night's post btw is Home Depot...who woulda thunk? Anyway, I went to print the logos, she fixed steak, oven fries and salad...yum...then I brought one of the pumpkins in to check the size of the printed logo and she said, "this is going to take you forever, bring them in and let us help you." If not for that? I would have been still cleaning out pumpkins at 3 am and undoubtedly in tears. It took t0ok the three of us about an hour to clean out a dozen pumpkins.

And the dremel pumpkin carving?

It looks okay. Don't worry, it looks a lot better in the dark illuminated from within. I think it will get easier and faster and have better results as I continue doing them. We shall see. Be forewarned that the dremel spits pumpkin goop in a several foot radius.

CPG said something last night that led me to believe he regrets ending things. 'Course he's on big time pain killers for a possibly herniated disc so who knows. Again, we shall see.

I'm off to shower the pumpkin goop out of my hair.

a list of a different sort

2005-10-26T17:22:00.000-04:00

Sometimes? The fat/ugly/old should just have to get out of the way of the rest of us! Really. Admit it, you feel this way too!
Where the fuck do procrastinators buy smallish to medium sized pumpkins????
Can we please extend the deadline on Halloween? Just by a few days. That would be great, thanks!
Is there some reason we had to wait until the first cold snap of the season to put aluminum siding on all the windows?

Mother: Hi, the guys are coming to do the windows today and you have to leave them open about an inch.
Me: It's 40 degrees outside! The bird will die!!!!
Mother: Oh, I guess you should call the guy.
Me: Ok.

Sigh. They just had to be unlocked, not OPEN!

I'm telling you she yearns to destroy anything I care about.

And the aluminum siding guys? Penis heads.

Okay, good stuff has happened this week too. I made a bunch of money that is already earmarked to pay bills which kind of takes the fun out of making a bunch of money. My friend E gave me a 13" color TV for the kitchen. That was very nice. I got a reprieve on the realtors site giving me time to get my pumpkins and littlegreendiva.com done for halloween but...see above. I've got to get the DNS transfers on lgd.com and BTD's sites done tonight before I freakin' forget all about it! I've got to finish reading someone's manuscript - a daunting task!

Sigh.

Current T-shirt ideas:
Your Logo Here
Umm, yeah, I do other stuff like a girl too ;-)
I'd Really Rather Be Napping

Pop...goes the Diva!

2005-10-22T21:54:00.000-04:00

I'm having no luck making this simpler. Funny that Debra suggested opacity on the navigation when I had come to the same conclusion! Remember that the site will ultimately be Flash and the navigation is drag and drop: you pop the bubble, drag an item to the diva then she interacts with it, you answer a question and something happens in the mirror. The umbrella is for rainy day activities: paper dolls to print and cut out, make your own magic green diva fairy dust, a coloring book. The binoculars are for a weekly round of "spot the diva" with photos of the bird hiding in a tree and you have to find her. I'm thinking the nav bubbles can float up from the bottom of the screen and constantly be moving. Thoughts?

I know it is terribly fussy/frilly/girly but I'm telling you, this site is designing itself with very little control on my part! The diva is fading a bit with all the other junk but I think once she's animated and has a voice that will be remedied. She is, after all, a terribly small diva!

Random

2005-10-21T21:50:00.000-04:00

Very rough. This is kind of my method. I started with only a plain green background then added all this. Now I'll start taking stuff out. Messing with the colors. I think it might be, gasp, too much pink? Flash navigation, drag an object (there are six all together) to The Diva (I decided not to use her real name, just call her The Diva), she holds the binoculars to her eyes and says, "wanna do some bird watching?" or whatever. CPG does a ton of voices and has one for The Diva.

Yeah, I'm still talking to him a bunch. Not exactly sure why. I miss having him as a boyfriend. A lot. But, I think I just miss having a boyfriend more than I miss having him as a boyfriend. Not that he was much of a boyfriend but it was dipping my toe in, ya know?

Other news: one of my client's dogs died yesterday. The one who had the birthday party last weekend. It was, to some extent, traumatic. In a weird way it gave me closure on a dog I lost when I first got sick though. Long story but I didn't get to say goodbye to him and I guess it has always bothered me more than I realized. Both of them were slightly dreadful dogs.

I had to have the mole I got removed excised on Wednesday so now I've got a three inch gash in my back with stitches and everything. Hurts.

Very busy on website stuff for some realtors and for BTD. Emailed back and forth with DTD a bit.

Life persists.

Creative juices are flowing

2005-10-17T10:20:00.000-04:00

I want to launch littlegreendiva.com in time for halloween so I can carve the logo in pumpkins and give them to all my clients with green glowsticks in them and treats for their pets. I'm going to get a bunch of those little tiny, adorable pumpkins. Put a bag of dog treats (or bird or cat) with the PS logo and leave them on clients' porches.

This one is just for Pup since I know he has always wanted to buy his own private island!

And finally, how fucking cool is this?

"The images are in color, and can broadcast anything that can be shown on a regular flat screen monitor or TV, although with a slightly lower quality. These could be short film clips or flash animations like those found on the Internet," the spokesman said.

The paper reported that one square meter of the material costs around 30 pounds ($52), and scientists working on the screens said they should be available by 2007.

I think Ms. A.R. might be onto something with penis head yard art! I think you could sell it on ebay!

The truck goes back to PH mechanic tonight for yet another new fuel pump. That will make three in two years.

I had a wonderful time yesterday with a picnic for the bird at a local park where I often take her to fly. This was the first time that the people who gave her to me got to see her fly outside. They deemed her a completely healthy, happy, spoiled brat! And now they want to train her parents to fly outside too :-)

A Fairy Tail

2005-10-16T11:43:00.000-04:00

Once upon a time a wicked witch decided that birds should have their wings clipped because if she couldn’t fly why should they? The witch cast a spell on everyone in the kingdom so they believed clipping their birds’ wings was the only solution. But, birds have more powerful magic than witches and the birds remembered that once they had been able to fly and they hated the witch for taking that away from them. They tried to tell the people that the witch was wrong but the spell was just too strong and the people could not hear them. Some birds even forgot that they could fly so even when the people left their feathers unclipped they didn’t use their wings. One day, a magical fairy princess bird was hatched. Her magic was so strong that even when her feathers were clipped she could fly! The fairy princess went to live in her own kingdom where she was adored by her loyal subjects. She flew every day in her little kingdom: she flew up, she flew down but she could not fly outside of her kingdom. This made the fairy princess sad. She wanted to go to other kingdoms and teach the people that birds should fly. The fairy princess found a magical knight and convinced him to help her teach her person how to let her fly outside of her kingdom. Now the fairy princess flies in as many kingdoms as she can and sprinkles her green fairy dust over everyone to erase the witches spell.

The dog birthday party was somewhat ghastly. I'll post about it later. Spoke to CPG last night. I'm sorry Ms. A.R., I'm kinda over the mad but it makes me sad to talk to him all the time. I have more thoughts on littlegreendiva.com. I'm thinking a flash thing for the fairy tail, a book via cafepress and a printable pdf coloring book version that people can just download off the site and maybe a couple of t-shirts from it. Well, it amuses me!

Shake yer tailfeather!

2005-10-15T12:57:00.000-04:00

Anything else need to be changed?

Final answer...well, for tonight.

2005-10-15T00:35:00.000-04:00

Thanks for all the +Rs on my little project! This is the most recently tweaked version and I think perhaps even the one to stick with? My idea is to take the information from the blog and have a section about the training, a section about the flying/meeting people and then a book of Where's Waldo-esque photos with the bird in trees, mixed in with stuffed animals, etc. That last idea is also something Ms. A.R. was also thinking about! I was going in that direction with the Spot the GCC photos but I hadn't thought of turning it into a book. Then products via cafepress...eat my fairydust...respect the beak!...?

In other news: the brown dog, the white dog and I have all been invited to a birthday party for a client's dog tomorrow. Tonight is the first night this week that I haven't talked to CPG - he doesn't have internet access for the next two weeks so I am updating his bird's site for him - there is something so wrong with that! Sunday I am organizing a picnic in the park for the bird and some friends who want to see her fly.

Srew mona lisa's smile!

2005-10-14T21:46:00.000-04:00

Should the head be smaller? Thanks Ms. A.R. for giving me the thought to give her a smile! Not quite there yet but I think we're getting closer to ironic fairy princessness ;-)

Another idea

2005-10-13T23:20:00.000-04:00

I have this idea for a site: littlegreendiva.com. That's what people on a list call my bird, the little green diva. Cute. I can't get the graphic to look how I want it to look. She looks sad. I want her to look like a fairy princess. But ironic.

Penis Heads!

2005-10-13T16:25:00.000-04:00

Fucking world is full of them!

I got in the truck to go walk dogs this morning. Truck wouldn't start. Truck that just got a brand new $600 fuel pump wouldn't start. Call the mechanic. He says that he'll have to replace the fuel pump because it isn't calibrated properly so even though the fuel gauge read between 1/4 and 1/2 full I was out of fucking gas. So yeah, he'll put another fuel pump in it at no charge to me but I've got to get gas in the truck. I've got to call my clients, tell them I'm having car trouble and I'm running late. Call my dad (exempted fron penis-head status) and get him to bring me some gas. Put that gas in the truck. Go to the gas station and put $20 of gas in the truck. Go walk dogs.

Come home and deal with an annoying but non-penis head related web design client issue.

Finally. Finally I get to take a (much needed nap) and yard dude turns up. I hear him poking around in the back yard and walk out to pay him. He's breaking up the pear tree branches that I very carefully selected and hauled home to make presents for some bird people I know.

Me: what are you doing?!?
Him: what were these doing there?
Me: they're for the bird, I brought them home (dragging the now useless and splintered branches the curb.)
Him: when will they come to pick those up?
Me: not until next week.
Him: so now I have to move them to mow?
Me: I didn't ask you to move them at all. They were fine where they were.
Him: you need to try not to be so mad at me.
Me: "..."
Me: ya know, here's your money for this week and I think that next summer I should probably find someone else to mow for me, thanks.
Him: (taking money) so is that starting next summer or today?
Me: seeing as I just paid you for today I'd kinda like you to go ahead and mow.

Why was it a big deal for him to destroy those particular branches? Because they were verified pesitcide free, bird safe wood and the perfect size. That is harder to find than one might think. I had gone to the trouble to find them, put them in the truck and hauled them home leaving them outside in my backyard to cure. And this is the guy who didn't bother to mow my backyard the week before CPG came to visit because he didn't want to have to move the yard furniture out of his way. And he has to be paid in cash but won't let you know what day he is coming to mow. Total penis head behavior.

Well that's that then

2005-10-11T00:15:00.000-04:00

We're done. Offically broken up before we ever got started. Pathetic little, passive agressive asswipe got a kickass website and a nifty cafepress shop with t-shirts and such though.

The crazy thing? He doesn't know me at all. The big problem, aside from distance, to him was that he claimed I had said that I didn't enjoy outdoor activities and he was looking for someone who would go to the park and play frisbee. WTF?!? I play frisbee in the goddmaned park every fucking day!! When was the last time that he went to the park to play frisbee? I asked him that, know what he said? Never. NEVER! He better fucking hope he doesn't ever run into me when I happen to have a frisbee in my hand 'cause my aim is getting better.

Yes, I hate tennis. Any halfway rational person hates tennis! It's hot on those stupid courts. I suck at it. I always skipped my tennis lessons at camp to go sailing instead. Sailing. Canoeing. Kayaking. Hiking. Frisbee. Agility. Riding. I have been involved and will continue to be involved in a lot of outdoor activities. I'm the one who wants to live on a goddamned farm!

What a fucking pathetic reason to dump someone.

Pa. Thet. Ic.

And doubly so when it is completely untrue.

He's pathetic. Not me. I'm me and I'm fucking worth putting some time and effort into. Dammit.

His loss 'cause I'm just on the cusp of developing some actual self-confidence and once I really do it is guys like him who won't get the opportunity to prey on me again.

I am not shedding another tear over this.

I even sent his fucking birds little tiny frisbees!

ARGH! What a waste of time, money, energy and emotion. Yeah he's more well adjusted than I am. Right.

I'm starting to think the idea that anyone who doesn't question their own mental wellbeing is in fact crazy might be more true than not.

Not a single fucking tear.

K, I need a rebound onenighter. Who's it gonna be? C'mon boys.

2005-10-06T10:15:00.000-04:00

Daily Horoscope:

For October 6: Love continues to catch you by surprise. Just when you think you’ve seen it all, love catches your breath and leaves you feeling like a dizzy neophyte. Your career circumstances, however, are filled with movers and shakers and opportunities that prove your power and influence. So you’re getting life from both sides now: you feel like an absolute beginner in private and a captain of industry in public.

Would that that were so.

An anniversary of sorts

2005-10-04T09:46:00.000-04:00

Five years ago today my entire right side was numb. Five years ago today my right arm was so numb and weak I couldn't write out the invoices for the dogs I was taking home that night. Five years ago today was the last day I officially worked for DTD. I damn near forgot about it.

Went to the doctor this morning to follow up on the Lexapro thing. Her thought is just that I am terribly sensitive to SSRIs. Yeah, it would lead one to wonder if perhaps I just don't need one if it effects me that drastically but there is the whole potential for MS benefits thing so we decided to leave it at 5mg for the time being and reevaluate in a few weeks.

I've been communicating with CPG a bit. No decisions. Nothing has changed. I'm still pretty much at I don't know that I have any interest in being with someone who would treat me this way and you're not saying or doing anything to assure me that you wouldn't do it again and he is still not fully accepting that he did this - at least to my way of thinking.

I mean, he apologized but he's still saying things like, "you were being mean and snippy."

Me: You were being weird and distant.
Him: I've been depressed and that's how it effects me.
Me: Well, you being weird and distant effects me by making me a little mean and snippy.

He has some really, really good qualities. But, this was a big deal and I never, ever deserve to be treated this way.

This is probably good.

2005-10-02T14:00:00.000-04:00

I finished CPG's bird's site and sent all the instructions on how to manage it. Now I'm quite irritated. He is doing the passive agressive thing again.

Yeah, it's slightly weird that I did his stupid site for him even though he was so dreadful about my coming up there but I feel better for ME that he got his damn site (and sex too dammit!) since that appears like it might have been all he wanted.

Like, if that's all he wanted then it wasn't me being rejected in a way.

I dunno.

Man, I struck out on this money wise! $25/hour for that type of design/coding work, probably about forty hours of work = $800 + $200 for the wasted plane ticket = $1000 + the nice package I sent him a couple of weeks ago + a weekend of lost pet sits at $126 + daytime minutes on my cell package and we're talking like $1500.

And the experience was so not priceless.

I do have a t-shirt to show for it and a fridge full of beer I don't have any desire to drink.

Blah.

Now I'm just torturing myself.

2005-10-01T23:18:00.000-04:00

I saved text files of all our IM conversations up until the last week or so and I just read the very first one. It was such a great, sweet conversation. I haven't spent less than an hour on the phone with him any day for the last two months. I don't even know what to do with myself. I hate this. Hatehatehatehateahatehatehatehatehate it.

On with the moping...

2005-10-01T19:56:00.000-04:00

...I should be going out to dinner with my brother and my boyfriend by now. I should have spent the day in central park. Intead I spent the day working on my ex's website. Don't ask me why I'm bothering to finish the site. I really don't know myself. At least I haven't cried anymore today.

I took my bird out earlier. I barely spoke to anyone. I feel so bruised and like the rug has been pulled out from under me.

I should be on a plane right now.

2005-10-01T09:06:00.000-04:00

I really planned to sleep way, way in this morning but I woke up at my normal eight o'clock and the bird heard me and wanted out of jail. There are tons of things I could/should do this weekend. I would enjoy some of them. I would make money on some of them. Have to say, I'm inclined to go buy some Nyquil so I can truly ignore the entire weekend. I'm not going to but the thought did cross my mind. Crying gives me a headache and makes my nose run. Not to mention making my skin all red and blotchy. I'm not a pretty, Meg Ryan/Demi Moore crier.

Fabulous. I have got to get off all these fucking bird lists. I now know that he spent the day in the park hanging out with some little gay boy whose (female) roommate has the hots for him. I needed to know that. Someone shoot me? Please?

I know, I know. I don't want to be with someone who doesn't care about me but oh god I want him to care about me. At the very least I want him to be heartbroken that this didn't work too.

Two weeks ago when the bird list was so dreadful I wanted to do an audiopost to the bird's blog calmly explaining my feelings on the subject and signing off the entire thing. He talked me out of it. I knew that I needed to do something like that. I need closure and that would have been a reasonable way for me to achieve it. By not doing it I continued to expose myself to all this hatred until I just could not handle it and said something very mean to someone on the list. Now, that person totally deserved to have something mean said to him but it leaves me in a bad position because I said it and I think it totally freaked CPG out that I would do it. Moral of the story: I know what I need more than some guy who has only known me, mostly online, for a few months. And I have got to get the fuck away from these fucking bird lists.

I will never date anyone I met online again. Three strikes. No more. Granted I may just never date anyone again but...sigh.

I'm supposed to be on a godamned plane right now flying to NY to see my boyfriend.

Okay, now I'm miserable.

2005-09-30T23:13:00.000-04:00

I get to be miserable for a while, right? I thought I loved this guy. I thought he cared about me. It took me four years to get over DTD to the point where I could let anyone else in at all. So, I get to be misrable and cry now right?

I am honestly humbled...

2005-09-30T15:41:00.000-04:00

...by the truly wonderful people I am fortunate enough to have in my life. Today could have been a really awful day. I'm out two hundred bucks. Well, okay, I canceled the ticket so I think with the change fee and orbitz fee I have like $50 left to use on a Northwest ticket before December 27th. I'm humiliated that someone I truly cared about cared so little about me that ultimately he didn't even want to see me again. I'm heartbroken that someone who so briefly meant so very, very much to me is suddenly out of my life. I will miss him. I'm depressed that for a few days I thought I was going on this wonderful weekend adventure and now I am going to spend the weekend here, sleeping, reading, eating ice cream. Lots and LOTS of ice cream. So, today could have been really awful. It wasn't. I went and walked dogs. And every client? Every single client of mine did something nice for the trip I am not going on. Two clients paid me for this week and next week and left little notes saying they hoped I had a great time and they just wanted to make sure I had pocket money for NY. One client fixed me this absolutely incredible lunch. Two clients hugged me and told me how sorry they were that I wasn't going. My brother stayed up on the phone with me last night and let me vent. Team CC has called and sent supportive (and funny) emails.

So, today sucks a little. But I am so lucky to have people around me to remind me that I deserve someone in my life who wants me for me.

I hate everyone

2005-09-28T20:11:00.000-04:00

And apparently the feeling is reciprocated. Not that I give a fuck. My feeling at the moment is that everyone on the planet can go straight to hell. I'm sick that I bought this stupid fucking plane ticket. I don't actually want to go to NY. I don't know why I would go there to see someone who keeps consistently showing me through word and deed that he doesn't truly care about me. I certainly don't want to see the goddamned parrots fly in the goddamned park so that he can bump his ego up further.

I cut half my goddamned hair off because he made a snarky comment about it. A good six inches (no that's not a goddamned euphemism!) The stylist was like, "are you SURE you want to do this?!?" NO! What I want is a goddamned, fucking boyfriend who can say nice things to me. Tell me I'm fucking pretty. Would it fucking kill you???

And STOP fucking saying that you're sorry for not saying anything nice to me and not communicating reasonably with me and not being supportive. Either get it together to do those things or stop pretending that you're capable of it.

I don't want to hear that my hair looks scraggly. I don't want to hear that I need to lose twenty pounds. I don't want to hear that I should take antidepressants. Let's see, do we ALL think that maybe I've heard enough of that kind of shit to last a goddamned lifetime? 'Cause I do.

I told you all this was gonna suck. Kettle???

This is good...

2005-09-28T10:09:00.000-04:00

...I won't have time to obsess and freak out! Bought the ticket ($199) this morning. 'Course I had to sell my soul to DTD so he would board the mutts for me while I'm in the big city but it'll be worth it, right? New York, Central Park, getting to see Otis (& Gizmo) fly, sex...it'll be worth it....right?

Sorry...

2005-09-27T23:15:00.000-04:00

...about posting an "I'm miserable" kind of thing and then disappearing. I'm okay but I am realizing that when I don't feel like I am getting any positive attention I lavish it on the person I would like to be getting it from which doesn't seem to be working so well.

I was considering going to the big city this weekend but I dunno.

WTF is it with me....

2005-09-24T21:48:00.000-04:00

...and people who think I need to change every blessed thing about myself while they're freakin' perfect?

Not going into too much detail 'cause I'm the idiot who can't keep an anonymous blog anonymous but seriously I'm more than a little sick of it and starting to feel like the only thing really wrong with me is that I am willing to admit that I have faults and failings and that I work so fucking hard all the fucking time to try to please people by changing whatever fault or failing they're focused on right at that moment and that I somehow get entangled with people who not only think they know everything about everything but who can't give any positive reinforcement to save their sorry asses.

Whew.

This is how I spent my day. Thoughts?

Long time no see

2005-09-22T08:45:00.000-04:00

I would apologize for the lack of blogging but that is in the top ten on the list of things not to blog about.

Anthony and Ms. A.R. are correct in that the lack of blogging is because there is so much going on in my real life. Imagine that, I have a real life!

Things are unfortunately stalled with CPG for the time being. We still talk a lot but airfare has doubled since he was here for his visit. My turn to shell out money to visit him and I just don't have it.

The dogblog is also stalled, not because the house is too messy but because I have three sites I am currently working on and get this, two of them are things I'll get paid for.

I've continued taking the bird to the Arboretum. We had a lot of fun last weekend. There were a ton of people there and they all wanted to meet her. Tons of photos on the bird's blog.

I've had a lot of trouble with this Lexapro. I was terribly, terribly lightheaded and dizzy on 10mg so we cut it back to 5 for a week. Today I go back to 10, we'll see if it works or not.

So, things are going pretty darn well :-)

All the news

2005-09-13T07:52:00.000-04:00

You know I always post photos where I'm not exactly clear or in focus. I love this photo from our flight on Sunday because I can count on one hand the number of photos anyone has ever taken where I am smiling naturally and that is a completely natural smile. An unguarded moment.

I was just so thrilled with my little, green bird. I've written the story over and over. I just can't write it again here but you can read it and see photos of the actual flight on the bird's blog.

That little bird really has completely changed my life. Birds are often recommended as pets for the elderly/lonely/depressed. I don't think just the beauty of a bird would have affected me this way but I highly recommend learning to train a flighted parrot as therapy.

Quite a while ago Jessica, fellow MSer and bird owner, posted about the potential benefits of SSRIs prolonging mobility in people with MS. CPG has been on me practically from our first conversation that life would be just a little easier for me if I took something to kind of even things out a bit. He's also the reason that I had to go to the doctor anyway since I needed a new prescription for birth control so while I was there I took the plunge and got my doc to write me a prescription for Lexapro which I started taking this morning. We'll see. I took Prozac when I first got sick and I couldn't tolerate it at all. I couldn't focus. I couldn't sleep. And, every time I told my doctor that I was having trouble with it she raised the dosage until I just quit taking it and quit complaining about it. So, we'll see.

My current focus is on getting enough money together to get up to the big city to see CPG's birds fly in the park before it gets too cold for them to be out. Unfortunately planes need gas to fly and with gas prices...plus Bubba broke down on me last Friday and while he seems okay now it did dip into my NYC fund to get him back on the road...plus doctors and prescriptions cost money too.

So, my life is pretty full right now. And, mostly full with pretty good things to the point where I'm disinclined to dwell on the less good things. Oh, and I'm totally BTD's teacher's pet again ;-)

I think I might puke.

2005-09-11T17:12:00.000-04:00

I'm taking the bird out in a little while to a local Arboretum to do her first official free flight. This has, ironically, created tons and tons of controversy on the email lists which exist specifically to discuss free flying one's birds outside. You would *think* that would be a perfetly safe place to discuss this sort of thing but oh well.

It is now the job of one tiny (64 grams!), green bird to create a whole new meaning for this particular date.

I plan to audblog from the field regardless of whether the experiment is a success or failure.

I'm at least as nervous as I used to be about agility trials. Ok, a lot more 'cause the worst that can happen at an agility trial is you flunk. The worst that could happen with this is that I could never see her again or she could get eaten by a hawk or...

Jeezus.

I'm still alive.

2005-09-08T15:40:00.000-04:00

Things are pretty status quo. Just crazy busy. Tons of PS.

I fired a client this morning. Remember the S cat with the alarm that always goes off? She sent me an email saying, and I quote, that she refused to be held hostage by my policy that unless the client calls me to tell me they have returned from their trip I will return to make another visit on the same schedule. I always leave the call-by time on the note with the final bill. This is a completely industry standard policy and exists so that if the client is killed in a plane crash or stranded the animal continues to receive care so it doesn't work to rely on the person only calling you if they are unable to make it home on time because they can't exactly call and tell you that they were murdered.

I always explain this at the preliminary visit. I refer to it as the eaten by bears clause because that way you don't have to discuss more realistic things like planes crashing and such. Once I explain the concept to the client they are universally all in favor of it and I allow people to leave we're home messages on my voicemail in the middle of the night so they don't have to worry about waking up before 8 a.m. to get a message to me before I return to make the emergency visit.

She actually got really nasty about it in the way that people do when they can hide behind email and don't have to have a face to face confrontation. I make about twenty bucks every couple of months off of the cat and he's still grandfathered at the old rate so even if I did keep her as a client I was already planning on bumping all those clients to the current rates starting September 15 because of gas costs so it's hardly any big loss.

E sent another jrt pup to me for some work.

CPG took his second bird, a rehome, out for his first free flight in the park. I'm helping him put together a website with photos of his birds in the park. Currently it is only a placeholder page but it should be cool when we get it done. It's not completely unlike the DB really. Which I should get back to getting set up. It has pretty much fallen by the wayside.

I think I might take my bird out for her first intentional free flight on Saturday.

Otherwise, the turtle is fine; the dogs are fine; the bird is fine; I'm fine; CPG is fine; my mother is only mildly harassing me; the gas hike is killing my visit CPG in the big city fund; I have a *gasp* doctor's appointment on Monday.

It's Sunday and I'm not wasn't upset about it.

2005-09-04T10:44:00.000-04:00

You know how normally I hate Sundays? Well, my house is not only reasonably neat and tidy but the bird is entertaining herself on the curtain rod. And look at those gorgeous blue flight feathers beginning to loosen and moult on her wings so she can grow a whole new unclipped set!

My brother named the turtle after the main character in this book to commemorate New Orleans as it was. I was thinking about why the turtle we had as a child, also named by G, stuck around the way that he did and I came to the conclusion that a) he was originally a pet store turtle that someone had dumped outside so he was already in the habit of looking to people for food and b) we kept him in the house that first winter. So, I decided I can be a house turtle for the winter. I fixed him some stations around the house so he can hide from the dogs and bought him a fullspectrum sun light (also good for the bird), a bin full of cypress mulch and some fat, juicy nightcrawlers.

And the dogs, what do they think about all of this? They seem content just to have the couch/bed to lie on in the living room.

I told CPG last night that we didn't need so much to figure out which city to live in as we need to find a nice zoo to buy.

And how are things going on that front? I'm not really sure. Okay, I think. I mean, I still very much feel the same way. It's just complicated with the two cities and we can hardly keep up the pace we had going before. We still talk every day. We're just in another holding pattern until I manage to go visit him in the big city and it sucks. If we didn't live so far apart we could hang out and read the paper and be horified about the devastation in New Orleans and how just absolutely dreadfully this administration has been in its response to it and how desperately unfair it is that the head moron gets to appoint not one but TWO new justices. And we could make a harness for the bird, feed the turtle some worms and play frisbee with the dogs and I would make bacon and pancakes.

Instead, I don't know what his plans for the day are. I was feeling bouyant until I typed that last paragraph. I had decided not to blog about Katrina or Renquist. There are so many other bloggers who do it so much better there really seems no point for me to step outside of my frivolous, self-absorbed blox.

We knew it was bound to happen, right?

2005-09-02T11:28:00.000-04:00

It's not Aesop. It's a he for one thing. Mother found him about to be hit by a car. We've decided that G can name him. He's only in the baby pool while I shore up the turtle enclosure. This is good though, CPG might not have to fullfill the Galapogus Tortoise promise. I'm quite delighted with just a Common Eastern Box Turtle. Really, ridiculously delighted. He's very alert and active. I heart turtles. I can do this this time. It won't be another Aesop. I'm going to get him some earthworms today.