So Miss Lily went in for surgery this morning. She had a fatty tumor on the upper part of her right front leg. They removed it and are sending it in for a biopsy. Originally, the vet thought she may have been shot with a beebee gun while she was a stray and the pellet was still in there, but after removing it she didn't see anything like that. She believes it is just fatty tissue, though.

But they also removed two toes from her back legs. She had a toe of sorts on each back leg that stuck straight out the side. They had no bone in them, but there was a nail growing. The vet said she'd seen dogs with this issue before and they usually end up snagging the nail on something and tearing the toe off because they don't feel it. So we opted to have them removed.

Lily is very loopy right now. I'll have to take pictures of her, though, before she realizes what I'm doing. She's got one of those cones on her neck to keep her from chewing her stitches. And with being loopy, she'll smack the cone into a wall and moonwalk. It's hysterical! We took her outside to go to the bathroom before and she wanted to sniff, so she bends her head down and the cone hit the pavement. She walks by sniffing with the opening of the cone completely on the ground, and it was just too funny to watch.

She's doing ok. She's really drugged, unfortunetly, so she isn't sure what's going on and spends a lot of time staring off into space. I finally convinced her that she can lay down with the cone, so she spent a lot of time sleeping once she noticed the cone was flexible. The area on her front leg is really mean looking. And her back feet have bandages on them. The cone has to stay on for 10 days. She couldn't figure out how to eat with it this evening, so I held her bowl for her so that it was inside the cone and she could eat normally. We just can't get her to drink any water. Which is unusual because this dog drinks about three bowls of water a day. Once the drugs completely wear off, she'll be able to figure this all out, but right now she's walking like she's drunk and it is just too much effort for her.

So the front leg wound is still bleeding a little. She stretched once when we got home and some blood dripped down her leg. There I am trying to dab it away with a damp towel. Poor thing. It isn't bleeding unusually heavy, the vet said this would happen. Right now I am the only one in the house with the stomach to look at it, so I've been tending to her wound.

Mom thinks she hates her now. Which isn't true. The dog was wagging her tail at her and all. She just spent the time since she got home following me around. Let's face it... mom brought her in this morning and I was the one who walked her out this afternoon. I carried her to the car and up the steps. I held her bowl for her. I was on the floor with her most of the night. And I've been directing her and the cone around walls and furniture as well as cleaning and inspecting her wound. Plus... she was reacting to hand movements, following my snaps and waves, not really my voice or anything. I did that with Poochanne towards the end because she couldn't hear us but she would follow my hands if I bent down and made gestures. I just used the same thing with Lily tonight. But mostly it's stuff my parents just can't do anymore. This dog is not a light weight animal. And with her knees the way they are, mom can't get on the floor or stand bent over while holding the dog's bowl and letting her finish eating. She's been getting her around the room and the dog follows her when she calls her. She spent a good deal of the night with mom while she pet her on the sofa. And I am pretty sure she's sleeping on the floor next to their bed downstairs. Lily just saw me as the one who rescued her.

I just couldn't take it much longer this evening. I felt so bad for her. She's been crying since she came home and I have done everything I can to help her, but I can't take the pain away. So I came up here early because the whining and crying was really starting to tear me apart. She was content sitting there with mom and not screaming when I left her for a minute, so it was ok. I think finally getting some food into her system brought her around a little, plus once I showed her how to lay on the cone she was doing pretty well. Felt bad leaving her like that, but I just couldn't do it anymore. I was tired from moving her around and petting her, I've been listening to the whining and crying since she came home, and eventually it wears on you because you wish you could make the pain stop, but you can't.

I'm off to bed. I'll try to take some pictures of her with the cone. Truth be told, she looks sort of cute with it. LOL! Once the drugs wear off it's gonna drive her crazy because she has dry skin and can't scratch or chew the itches. Which is something else I spent the night doing, scratching her itchy spots. But I'm pooped. :) Goodnight!
 

My mailbox is being flooded with mail concerning gas prices and illegal immigrants. To boycott oil companies or not; to provide amnesty to illegal immigrants or not, etc.

Since I have become jaded to the various solutions proposed by the Republicans, Democrats, Sierra Club, ACLU, etc. I have elected to solve the problems as they affect me. It solves both my gas and illegal immigrant problems.

I have hired illegal immigrants to push my car. They're plentiful and cheaper than buying gas.

Author: TomAroundtheWorld (myspace)
 

http://images17.fotki.com/v305/photos/1/109239/847497/DSCN0404-vi.jpg

http://images17.fotki.com/v309/photos/1/109239/847497/DSCN0407-vi.jpg

The above URLs will take you to photos of my taser burns

It seems the taser wanted to leave me something to remember it by. On Saturday, after I got hit with the taser, it felt like my shoulder - where the charge entered - was sunburned. That wasn't the case, but it did get burned. I found that when I got home, and it is not pretty looking by any means (it is still very ugly, and I am 99.9% sure it will scar... although what doesn't scar on me? I have sunburns that scar). I can't get a less blurry photo of it, for some reason, but you get the general idea. What bothers me is that the other sales guy did not receive a burn like this. So I went to the GM with it, told him about the demo (he wasn't there for it), and explained that I had been hit with a taser during the demonstration (and included why so the rep wouldn't get into trouble for nothing). They're trying to figure out at this point if that is normal or not. We have one guy who is an ex-deputy and he says it is normal (he's been hit with various tasers in various styles and has seen it before) but no one else has ever seen something like that happen. So I know there are people here reading this who have been hit by tasers before. Is that normal?

I was just about able to take part in my belly dancing class tonight, too. I am still full of knots, so my arms and my left leg (where the charged exited) were not being helpful at all. Next week is the last class, but I am signing up for the same class again, which starts on June 5th.

Oh, the fun of the day! One of the range officers - a dude who has been there since I began using the range there oh so long ago - is getting married this coming weekend. So I gave him his wedding gifts today since I won't see him anymore for a few weeks. Actually, they were "honeymoon gifts." LOL! It gave us all a good laugh for a little while this morning, and he showed everyone else in the store during the day. I handed him a bag of goodies I got from the local sex shop. He got "Oral Sex Dice," a "Tie the Knot" light bondage kit (including soft wrist cuffs, a blindfold, and soft binds to hold the ankles in place by way of the thighs, and it is all in bridal white), two vibrating cock rings (they are one use only, which is why I got two of them), and a kama sutra kit in Rasberry Kiss (included body powder with a feather applicator, love oil, and pleasure balm). He opened this back on the range and it was a shit load of laughs back there! LOL! He then called his fiance to tell her about it and she got mildly offended. Oh well. He knows me and was expecting something along this line. And you know she's going to want to use the shit, too. LOL! She'll get over it. I think she was ok by the time they hung up, but who knows. And who really cares. I don't know her, I got the gifts with him in mind.

I guess that's it for tonight. Goodnight!

 

Someone told this at work the other day, so sorry if you've already heard it.

Walmart was hiring a new greeter and they had it down to four people. So the interviewer calls the four people into his office and sits them down.

"Now, I am going to ask you all one question, and you need to answer it as best you can. Whoever has the best answer gets the job. What is the fastest thing you know of?"

The first person says, "Well, I think it would have to be a thought because it just comes to you like that."

The interviewer nods. "Good answer. How about you, what is the fastest thing you know of?"

"I would have to say the blink of an eye, because it happens and you don't even know it."

Nodding again he asks the third person.

"I remember when I was a kid I would wake up in the morning and turn on a switch outside, and way off across the field a light would suddenly come on. So I would have to say light is the fastest thing I know of."

The interviewer nods, thinking he has found the winner. But there is one more to go. The last person is old Bubba.

"What is the fastest thing you know of?"

"Well, sir, I'd have to say it is diarrhea."

"Diarrhea?! What the hell are you talking about?"

"Well, sir, about a week ago I ate something that didn't really agree with me, and before I could think, blink, or turn on a light I done shit all over myself!"
 

I forgot to mention this about a week ago. My father had been online and he went, I believe, to the county website. I can't find the feature on the town's website, so it must be the county. Anyway. He found this feature that allows you to click on properties.

Now, this might not sound so bad, but listen to what you get when you click on the map. You get a picture of the house, who lives there, how much they paid for the house, and how long they have lived there. This sounds like step one towards stalker's paradise, first of all.

Dad doesn't see this as a bad thing, and he proceeded to look up all the information for our neighbors. It's legal, as public record. But what good is this service? You are making it easier for people to find people who may not want to be found. Plus, you are giving them information that isn't any of their business. Maybe I'm far too territorial and what not, but I really don't see it as such a good thing that my neighbors can see how much we paid for the house. It isn't any of their business.

Let's look at this in terms of what, exactly, this site is telling perfect strangers. Yes, neighbors are one thing. But scary people online are a whole other thing. Let's say you live in, oh, I don't know... Greensboro, NC. Now, while online, some guy in Durham, NC sees you on livejournal or MySpace. You may not even talk to this guy, but you may have put in your limited profile that you live in Greensboro. He's curious. He's been reading your posts and let's say you slip and mention your last name in a survey. Or, more probable, you post your photo in your journal, either in your icon or just as a regular post.

Ok, Mr. Durham is a little nuts. He does some research online, and finds out your last name. Now he wants to know as much as possible about you, and visits the website for your county. He now has access to your address, phone number, knows what your house looks like, and can guestimate how much you make by how much you paid for your house and when you bought it.

Here's another scenario. A guy you work with does some hacking on the side. He's running a little low on money and decides he's going to drain someone's bank account. But who to hit? Going to the county website now gives him that same guestimate that Mr. Durham got, and he can decide who to clean out by figuring who he imagines to have the most money in their account.

Now, maybe none of this will happen. But it really does bother me to know that my neighbors and co-workers, just for shits and giggles, can get this information. I don't give people my address, and I certainly don't tell people how much my folks paid for their house. Maybe people are searching for high end properties and home values and shit, but telling people what we paid for our house a few years ago really doesn't tell them much, when you think about it.

This development is broken up into three sections: the town homes, the normal homes, and the rich-bitch homes. Nothing here is exactly what a normal human being would call "reasonably priced." Now, by going through this site and looking at what people bought and how long they have owned the home, they think this is a wonderful neighborhood. What it doesn't tell them is how many of the home owners <i>live</i> in those homes. There are a lot of rental properties here now. But the site won't tell you that. The site will also not tell you that there is a gang problem in this neighborhood, and there is. There has been a wide spread issue the past two months with cars being broken in to and vandalized, and that includes the rich-bitch section. None of that is ever mentioned. No one considers the two schools on the block and the amount of school bus stops in this general area, which have a lot of kids and teenagers standing out on the corners. The one corner, where all the high school kids stand, has recently been watched over by the police because, apparently, the kids started car jacking people and tossing rocks and shit at their passing vehicles that they didn't feel like jacking. The site won't tell you that, either.

The site won't tell you current property values. Maybe a house here was worth $300,000 three years ago when the family moved in. But today the house is only worth $200,000 because of the crime rate. Because the crime rate isn't mentioned, a person cruising around for a great neighborhood to raise their kids will think the property values must obviously be on the rise since 3/4 of the homes are also Centex built and the neighborhood is perfection.

Aside from all of this, it really isn't anyone else's business what the neighbors paid for their homes. Or what random people throughout the county paid. It may be considered public record, but making it that easy to find out is just wrong. What happened to having to go down an request these records instead of getting them in the comfort of your own home? No good can come of that. If you really want to know, you should have the will power to go look up public records in an actual building instead of getting curious fingers, or just making it easy for people looking for shits and giggles. I don't want random people knowing where I live and getting all the gory details about it. It disturbs me.

 

We have a new member of our family, she came home today! Her name is Lily, and she is a 3 year old Beagle mix. She was rescued by the ASPCA and now lives with us. If you'd like to have a cute attack, check out the photos: http://public.fotki.com/Scars19/pets_and_things/lily/

And if you happen to be really bored, Lily has her own online journal at Dogster! http://www.dogster.com/?305174
 

Yes, I will freely admit, I have no life. But I think anyone reading this journal already knows that (and still loves me! AWWW! Aren't you shaweet!). But with the past three years sucking the very life force out of my soul and living on nothing but work, sleep, repeat, I lost contact with the outside world.

And I will admit also... I have forgotten how to do this. I've gone with co-workers to a bar after work. I've gone out to lunch with another. And I didn't do such a good job. First, not so good at conversation anymore. I have nothing but work to really talk about. Second, haven't really gone out drinking with people since college. Third, been a long, long time since I "played." Now, you might say I am not giving myself enough credit and seeing myself as me, but let me put it this way... I haven't been invited out since. Granted, I was asked out to lunch by another co-worker and went, but me and this guy... I don't know, I think we see eye to eye. He's a sales guy, an older gentleman, and we're both in financial hell and think we deserve better than this out of life, so we have something to talk about and gripe about. When I bought all those lottery tickets that one day, I was really hoping he'd win the $5000. He got $3, at least it was something. LOL!

There is the other issue. The "only exposed to men for three years" issue. I'm not interested in talking about things girls usually talk about, so to be alone with another female or group of females, I am sort of outcasted. Most of my life I've been the "bodyguard" anyway, not really there for any other reason than I was a foot taller than most of my female friends (and wasn't trendy and cute) and could easily kick the ass straight off of anyone who confronted them. But when it comes to "girl talk," I am seriously lacking. Now, girls don't know what to do with me, and guys don't want to invite me to lunch or to go out after work in fear of other co-workers spreading rumors about dating. So there I am.

Now I am attempting to get a life. So I signed up for belly dancing lessons. And today I attempted to pick up another sport.

Some of you may already know, but I have been on an endless hunt for archery lessons. And, of course, someplace to fire off arrows since doing so in my backyard would probably mean the much dreaded shish-ka-poodle.

There, glowing up at me from the newspaper today, was an ad for a store close by with an indoor archery range. Brand spankin' new! Main focus of the ad, taunting me, saying, "Come play with sharp pointy projectiles on a stick!" So I figure, ok. Let's go to the archery range and rub elbows (possibly literally) with a new breed of weapons lovers.

I drive out towards the end of rush hour, which is no less horrifying than driving in rush hour traffic at any other time, and I end up at the archery range. I am now happy, because there is a range, and I am there, and someone will hand me something sharp to fling at a wall. I get out and strut over, all ready to embrace a new weapon.

Only I go inside to find out their range isn't done being built yet.

I ended up making friends with a woman who could have been my mother, which seems to really be something with me. I have a real knack for making friends with people 40+ years older than me, and to be honest, 3/4 of the time they are way more fun. But in this store are several angry people who all came for the range, because here is this newspaper ad telling us the range is open and functional, when in reality the range won't be in this state of functionality for another month at the very least.

So I walk around the store to see what they have to offer. At this point, it has come out that I work at the local gun shop (this happens without me realizing it, it is an amazing phenomena, although I think one guy there is a regular and that may be how it happened this time), and as that goes, everyone has to point out to me how much better these prices are than where I work. Like the prices at our store are at all my decision. Like telling the warehouse paper filer is going to shatter the earth.

I smile and take a look at the only thing this store has in common with where I work: ammo. They had no guns of any kind, or any gun supplies (it is a hunting supply store with no guns, only fishing and archery, although where I work is also a hunting supply store... with no fishing or archery, so it balances). The only thing they had for guns was a few shelves of ammo. Nothing earth shattering there, and they really only had three brands. I know guys with more ammo in the trunk of their cars than this store had in stock. Although... yeah, this is the South, that isn't saying much.

I take down the ammo for .357 magnums and 40 S&W and check the prices. As I have noted before, people are delusional. They see lower prices because they want to. Like the shotgun I found at another gun store where people ranted and raved to me about the prices where I work. I was handed this shotgun as a "prime example." That shotgun was $150 more expensive at this place than where I work. And now, this ammo I have in hand, it is all a good $5 to $10 higher than what we sell, for the same brand (at least two of them, the third was so overpriced you can't really get it anywhere). All they offered for handguns was 9mm and the two I had, three brands of each. So I checked the shotgun and rifle rounds. That was even worse. I swear, they must be marking this ammo up at least 50% or more. They had a box of dove shot, 20 rounds. We sell the exact same boxes for $4.95 a box. They were selling them for $15.99. How can the prices be so drastically different, but people see ours as being higher? And how does the store get away with doing that? I mean, that is a major difference from anywhere I've ever seen this ammo before. Jumps right out at you... or it should, anyway.

But here is another issue I have with people. They don't look around. Let's look at the gas prices. Things might get better if people shop around a little, but they don't. The last time I went out with mom, she stopped for gas. Now, there were two gas stations, a Crown and a BP, and they were directly across the street from each other, neither harder to get to than the other. Regular gas prices: Crown = $2.75 BP = $2.89. You would think the BP would be empty, right? The prices are drastically different. But no. Both stations had cars out the whazoo. And we wonder why gas prices keep going up. Because we're willing to pay for it. Gas is never going to go bellow $2 again, and by summer's end it will be close to $4. There are a lot of reasons for this, some debatable and others not. But the unwillingness of the American people to drive across the street and get their gas at the cheaper station isn't going to help. They see this and the cheaper stations say, "Hey! We could be making a killing!" and raise their prices, instead of the more expensive ones getting into "price wars" with the cheaper ones.

Same for the ammo. If the gun stores see you paying $16 for a box of ammo they usually sell for $5, guess what? That's pure profit. The gun stores will start repricing their shit to $16, too, because you are willing to pay it and they are willing to take your money.

Wow... this really went off, didn't it?

 

I don't know, I just wasn't in to the whole day. I don't know why, but it really was one of those "just going through the motions" types of days. Almost wish I had more of them because nothing really happened. My moods didn't even swing too badly.

So my sista (aka, my best friend, who lives in Michigan) is taking belly dancing classes. I thought, HMMM! So guess what I did tonight? I signed up for belly dancing classes once a week, and had the first class tonight! I actually enjoyed it a lot. And even the real basic stuff, which is what I am doing now, is a real good work out.

The age range was glorious, I must say. It wasn't all college girls like I thought it would be. And the vast majority of them were, in fact, very thin. Which I was afraid of. When I saw all the skinny girls in there, I seriously almost walked out, figuring I was just making a fool of myself.

But one of the more seasoned belly dancers was there warming up. She was there to brush up a little, and she came in a full belly dancing outfit. She's pretty good, too. But I walked in because of her. She was about the same size as me. And it turns out the instructor had a baby not too long ago, and she's got a bit of a belly as well. I wouldn't call her fat by any means, but she had some jiggle in her wiggle!

Next week I am wearing a skirt. The instructor advised it because I told her after class that I felt like a stiff board with no hips. I am not graceful, I can tell you that much. I've got the arm movements down, no problem. But the hip shimmies... I dunno. She told me I was doing better than I thought I was, but a skirt might make me feel a little more comfortable and let me see what my hips are actually doing down there.

And let's face it. I'm a tense and self-conscious person. Always have been. So, honestly, this is a big step for me, even attempting it. But it is probably why I feel so stiff. I also chose to stand next to the belly dancer I mentioned, and she was told to go faster because she knows what she's doing, so I kept falling off beat. LOL!

The class is six weeks long, and then we can either retake the same class or move up to the next level. I'll let you know in six weeks. :)

 

You're An EXTREME Redneck When.....

1. You let your 14-year-old daughter smoke at the dinner table in front of her kids.
2. The Blue Book value of your truck goes up and down depending on how much gas is in it.
3. You've been married three times and still have the same in-laws.
4. You think a woman who is "out of your league" bowls on a different night.
5. You wonder how service stations keep their rest-rooms so clean.
6. Someone in your family died right after saying, "Hey, guys, watch this."
7. You think Dom Perignon is a Mafia leader.
8. Your wife's hairdo was once ruined by a ceiling fan.
9. Your junior prom offered day care.
10. You think the last words of the "Star-Spangled Banner" are "Gentlemen, start your engines."
11. You lit a match in the bathroom and your house exploded right off its wheels.
12. The Halloween Pumpkin on your porch has more teeth than your spouse.
13. You have to go outside to get something from the fridge.
14. One of your kids was born on a pool table
15. You need one more hole punched in your card to get a freebie at the House of Tattoos.
16. You can't get married to your sweetheart because there's a law against it.
17. You think loading the dishwasher means getting your wife drunk.
And, saving the best for last...
An East Tennessee couple, both real-live rednecks, had 9 children. They went to the doctor to see about getting the husband "fixed". The doctor asked them why, after nine children would they choose to do this. The husband replied that they had read in a recent article that one out of every ten children being born in North America was Mexican and they didn't want a Mexican baby because neither of them could speak Spanish.

And now that that's over, let me show my own born again redneck anger:

Apparently, Walmart has decided to cease selling guns (for those in NJ, yes, they really do sell guns at Walmart!) so they can appeal to MORE UPSCALE CUSTOMERS. Because, you know, the woman with the ketchup stains all over her shirt who is dragging her two kids - both from different fathers - up the isles by their hair while screaming at them to shut up or they won't be getting Spam for dinner tonight is a lot more upscale than your average law abiding gun owner.
 

As usual, I don't recall it bit by bit, but I remembered enough of it. Have you ever had one of those dreams that pretty much isn't relevant to life, doesn't really make you think of anything, etc., but still has the power to blow your damn mind all day long? This was one of those dreams. However, I must find my dream book because it has been a long, long time since I had a dream at all.

Anyway. The place I work at moved about two years ago to a larger building built specifically for them and unattached to anything else (anyone who remembers my pictures of Bear has actually seen pictures of the old building which was in a strip mall). This dream somewhat circled around that place.

In it, we were at the new store working as usual. Only the general manager got a call saying that the old place had caught fire and the entire piece of the strip mall was just about destroyed. This caused him to freak out badly and he told us all we were closing the store for the day and going back to the old place. Apparently, they were storing things in the old place, for some reason, even though no one had touched the inventory in ages.

So we head to the old store and go inside, where it is completely stocked. The store is laid out almost the same as it was in reality a long time ago. But this was suppossed to be a storage building for the store now, even though it looked like a functional store in the dream. (P.S. In reality, the store is currently vacant... anyone interested in owning their own indoor range? LOL!)

We all walk around and survey the damage. Everything is charred and dripping water, pretty much ruined, and the upper management is going nuts over losing all of this inventory. But while they are doing that, a bunch of us go to the back of the store and open up the old firing range (which is where the store layout gets odd, because the entrance of the range was up front and to the left, with the lanes stretching down the side of the store, but here it was in the back of the store. It also only had space for three lanes). There was a thick blue canvass tarp like thing over the range, but it was hooked up to a pully system so they just pushed a button and it drew in towards us.

The range didn't appear to end anywhere. The walls were gray, which they also were not in reality. But we couldn't see the backstop of the range, it was just complete blackness. The lane partitions were gone and there was just a ledge keeping you off the range itself... something else that didn't exist there, but it did at another range I used to use. So did the gray walls, come to think of it.

Anyway. We somehow found targets and hooked them up, and we all spent some time shooting on the old range before putting the canvass back and locking it up again.

We go back out onto the floor where all the inventory has been cleared out and only the employees are standing there. The general manager steps over to us and we all get into a circle around him. He tells us this is a major blow to the store and nothing is ever going to be the same again. We all nod and walk out of the store with our heads down.

How weird is that?! LOL! So, anyone who is into this stuff, want to offer an interp? I'm actually really curious about this one.