Dell's Bells

When my HP desktop crashed THREE TIMES for no explicable reason other than the possible alignment of Saturn and Venus, their not-so-English-speaking-customer service department sent me a box so I could fed-ex the computer that time forgot to them in California. They replaced the hard drive and eventually mailed it back to me - a week and a half later.

My current soulmate, a Dell laptop that's still under warranty, lost/misplaced two letters off the keyboard (completely cat-related, of course, as one was trying to jump on my lap, his claw gripped the keyboard and pulled as he tried desperately to stay attached, but gravity won instead*), so I was thinking they could send a few letters? P and 0? Nah, they sent a whole new keyboard PLUS a cute, tiny screwdriver.

*this reminds me of my boss, who insists that if you throw dice, the number three will come up most often and believes that he knows, from research, the luckiest numbers for the Florida state lottery to eventually win. I keep telling him statistically, the odds of each number is the same. He can refuse to believe in statistics and gravity, but they're still there, regardless.

My laptop screen occasionally blinks, so I thought I could find out if it was covered under the warranty, which it is. A technician came to my house, cleaned the connections and replaced the video card. Two months later, it did it a few times again, so another technician arrived the next day with a brand new screen.

I can't get over this customer service...Budweiser needs something similar.

Not again

At the risk of having cats completly take over my blog, meet Addison, the sister of one-eyed Bowie:
When I got home from work yesterday, I noticed her eyes were barely open and she seemed to be sick. Please let it be a sympathy reaction to her sister losing an eye and nothing more.

They're poisoning cats on Fort Rucker, Alabama...

...and I feel sick.

I mentioned the other day my feral crew of approximately twenty cats at work (well, seventeen, since I took three kittens home. One with a bad eye needed antibiotics, but she was lonely so I grabbed her sister, then yesterday I took them up to visit their mom, who missed them not at all, though their brother was ecstatic to see them so I took him back with me).

Yesterday, there were only ten waiting for breakfast, then today, only six. Someone at work mentioned that they poison the feral cats on base about once a year, to keep the population down, and they had posted the "DO NOT FEED THE CATS" signs just last week, so he figured it was time again. What the hell? Is there a time warp tunnel from the Dark Ages around here?

Military bases are historically chock full of abandoned pets, with soldiers not wanting to go through the trouble or expense to take them once they move, especially overseas. I contacted the Veterinary office on post last week about a feral release program and they told me they would take the cats in, put them up for adoption, then put down the cats that didn't get taken. What part of FERAL do they not understand? No one will adopt these cats. I've fed them every day since November, some of them trust me enough that I could catch them, but I can't live with their blood on my hands if I take them in.

I decided to talk to my Veterinarian, to see if he would give me a discount so I could get the females spayed then return them back to their homebase to roam and hunt rodents, but I never got the chance. They're being murdered by thirds. every. single. day. My boss suggested I verify the information before I continue my obsession.

I'm tired of explaining to rednecks that have shot at birds and squirrels their entire lives with BB guns that this is CRUEL. I'm tired of expecting co-workers to have compassion. I'm tired of not having enough money or space to save them all. I'm just...tired.

Raindrops on roses and eyedrops in kittens

I take my "stupid" pills daily, like a good multivitamin, but this weekend I threw caution to the wind and consumed the entire bottle.

A major SUCKAH for cats, I accidentally ended up with six at home after one disappeared (read here). And at work? I've been feeding an average of ten cats since around October, when we discovered abandoned kittens under one of our storage units. That number has steadily increased, and with the birth of a few more batches, it's up to around twenty. About two weeks ago, I saw a cute little kitten with one brown eye, one blue, and named her Bowie. She was one of the more tame ones, occasionally allowing me to pet her.

When I went in Saturday morning, I noticed her brown eye was closed, with pus and drainage making it impossible for her to open it, so I drove her over to my veternarian, who said it could be a viral or bacterial infection that's caused such a deep lesion. He gave me antibiotics for the eye, antifungal for her ringworm, told me to keep her separated from my animals if I was taking her home, then bring her back Tuesday to see if she's improving.

She looked so lost and pathetic, sitting in the cat carrier in my bathroom by herself, but I didn't want to take her back to work since I have to give her medicine four times a day. I did the only logical thing: went back to work and nabbed her sister. The two of them are living like fat cats.

Captive audience:

From the Barney summer collection

I don't "get" fireworks: they're loud, look the same every year, my pets are terrified and we're in a drought, for heaven's sake! Besides, I'm the anti-celebrator during holidays. It's what I do.

While everyone else was pigging out on hotdogs and rancid cole slaw, I spent my weekend refinishing the little desk in my kitchen. What I envisioned as a sleek, dark eggplant surfing-stand turned out to be more of a grape kool-aid disaster.

I rummaged through my storage shed and found some limewash, which I painted on the desk with my random criss cross brush strokes. Nope. I dug deeper and found some crackle buried beneath some ancient pesticide, slopped some of that over the "raisin" base coat, then covered with a layer of white.


Before: old, dark brown, ragged desk. Dated.




Midproject: grape monstrosity.



After: old, purple, crackled, one-of-a-kind desk. Never been kissed.







I'm still not quite sure what I'll do to help this ugly stepchild of a desk, but I'm guessing some sort of stripping will be involved. For now, I giggle whenever I look at it, and shouldn't home decorating involve laughter? Or is that just me?

'Twas 71

My parents both use the internet phone plan Vonage, so sometimes our conversations are a series of clicks and echos. Sunday's conversation with my dad was particularly crowded with my ghost menagerie, which led him to tell me this:

When my aunt Denise told her son Travis about taking her first trip to Ireland this summer with her four sisters, he told her, "don't go with them, go with me instead." My twenty-seven year old cousin passed away at the end of February, so in the end, aunt Denise would make the journey with her sisters.

They stayed in a room with the skeleton key inside the lock, but the door would rattle and shake every night regardless. "Leave us alone, Travis...we're old women trying to sleep" became part of the nightly ritual.

On the return flight home, my aunt Denise would have to take a different plane home. Flight 71, which was also Travis' jersey number. Coincidence? Or did he perhaps take the trip to Ireland with his mom, afterall?

Think you know me?

100 fun facts:
I always wanted to be an archeologist (and still do)
I believe in reincarnation
I can touch my nose with my tongue
I'm an insomniac
I once thought I was driving to Austria, but ended up in Switzerland
While drunk, I've lost 6 watches
....and 3 pairs of earrings
I once took a Latin exam, and wrote all my answers in Spanish
I can write in cursive, backwards and upside down
I can drink diet pepsi and imagine it's bud light
I can drink an Atkins chocolate protein shake and imagine it's kalua & cream
I've moved 45 times
I'm afraid of bridges
...and seaweed
I've gotten 12 speeding tickets
I would love to go to school forever
I eat crunchy peanut butter out of the jar
I'm a LEO
I wear a sweater if it's cooler than 75 degrees F.
A ouji board told me I'd die at 42 - and I believe it*
     *apparently it lied, as I'm 49 and updating this in 2017
I have whole cds I can't listen to because they make me cry
I can ask for a beer in 6 different languages
I love shoes
....but have ugly feet
I always wanted to have a little girl
My eyes are hazel but bright green when I'm emotional
I have extremely cold-sensitive teeth - sometimes I have to drink beer with a straw
I've never been on a blind date
I sleep with a FLAT pillow
I've broken my nose twice
I've never been in a fist fight
I've weighed from 102 to 148 lbs during the past 10 years
I'm shy
I'm an only child
I accidentally forgot to file my state taxes
TWO YEARS IN A ROW!
I have 6 cats
and a dog
and feed close to 20 wild cats at work
I've driven 120 mph on the Autobahn
I climbed a pyramid in Chichen-Itza with a hangover (and the bus had to stop so I could get out and throw up)
I'm quite sure I was George Harrison's greatest fan
My cell phone plays Fur Elise
I hate talking on the phone
I love Volcanoes
...and Depeche Mode's Dave Gahan's voice.
I never understood logarithms
I eat Whoppers malted milk balls until I'm sick
I was a medic in the Army
I love any and every combination of purple and green
I'm Irish, Hungarian, German and Polish - when people ask, I just say IRISH
I was Captain of my Varsity Lacrosse and Field Hockey teams
I melt butter and pour it over microwave buttered popcorn (a trick I learned from my mom)
I used to be 5'7"...now I'm only 5'5"
I have a hard time saying "I love you"
My ring finger is a size 4-1/2
I consider driving a 5 speed a good workout
I can't parallel park
INXS was the first concert I ever attended...
Natalie Merchant was the most recent
I can whistle, but not sing
Calla Lillies are my favorite flower
I don't like Lord of the Rings
I would kidnap Tom Brady of the NE Patriots if I thought I could get away with it
I learned how to drive when I was 12
...and drove from Michigan to Alabama and back, through snow, when I was 15
...and subtracted 10 years from my dad's life
I love reality tv shows
...but would hate to be on one
I know 4 different versions of solitaire
My 400+ cds are arranged alphabetically
My closet is arranged by color (ROYGBIV)
Each of my shoe boxes has a photo of the pair inside
I can't multi-task
If I had been a boy, my name would be Shane
I got caught cheating in 6th grade and never did it again
I went to a Catholic school for 1st grade
I have a BS in Biology/Chemistry
I don't use an alarm clock (I'm automatically up by 5:00)
When I'm drinking, my ears turn red
....and I can't find enough laps to sit on
One of my biggest faults is insecurity
Another is impulsiveness
But I'm an amazing procrastinator
I was a bartender
My favorite shot is a lemon drop with Absolut
I want to live in Italy
....and eat gelato EVERY DAY!
My favorite song is Peter Gabriel's In Your Eyes
I can't listen to it without crying
I love to vacuum
I drove a 2-1/2 ton truck (deuce and a half) in the Army
I can drive a forklift
I can also take out large chunks of walls with said forklift
I won $350 the first time I played Blackjack
I can forge my ex-husband's signature
I dump potato chips into the dip container and eat them with a spoon
Every week, I buy myself flowers and pretend someone loves me

Giza

"From atop these pyramids, forty centuries look down upon you."

-- Napoleon Bonaparte

**An added bonus of Blogspot: if you click on a photo in an entry, it will appear full size. Can you feel the sand between your toes?