In my head.
I really need to just type it on my laptop and upload when possible.
A month or two ago around June 8th or 9th, Leila's owner found he could no longer keep her. He had been working two jobs and had a new girlfriend and Leila had become a back yard dog. For a dog who needed to be around humans as much as Leila was it was Hellish for her. The problem with finding Leila a home is she is a pit bull. I know that only 1 in 8 pits find a home once they enter the system. I could not let Leila go to the pound. She is a sweet baby who only wants to be with someone. She only needs a look or a word to obey. She knew me and my house she came in and flopped down like she was never going to go anywhere else again. When her former owner called her over to say goodbye she would not even look at him.
Leila has three faults. She jumps on people. She can't hold her licker and she is incontinent. I put a diaper on her when she is in the house and took her to the vet to get medication that stopped the problem.
I did not get a chance to ask Phil I just took her. Poor Phil resented that. I was also a bit on the forgetful side from the pain meds I was taking. I had left the front door open a couple of times and the cats got out. About two days after I got Leila I went to a taekwondo class and I once again left the door open. This time Leila and Sarah escaped to go have an adventure.
And quite an adventure it was. I got back an hour later and found them gone. I looked all around. A few people has seen them. One of them said she remembered a spaniel (well close enough) and a pit with a diaper going into the canyon. Sarah loves going down there and if let out will go down there on her own. I was looking all over the place I even ran down into the canyon calling to them. I should have driven to the other side of the canyon and called there. Sigh. My friend Barb who is an angel drove around asking people if they saw the dog and gave out my number on some post its. I had gotten my car in order to look for them and was in a nearby park when Phil called me to tell me they had been seen at the Von's (a grocery store) which was nearby. I raced there and no one had seen them. Then he called to tell me they were not at the Von's close to our house if you drive, but the Von's about three miles down the canyon and up the other side. It was a long drive by car but I got there as fast as I could and after asking people in the parking lot if they had seen them, someone finally told me they had gone down a side street. I also learned Sarah stood for a long time in the middle of a busy road. I went down the street and found a woman, who was trailing the dogs, had gotten Leila to come to her but not Sarah. Leila was chained in her back yard. Sarah had gone farther down the street and people kept pointing the way. Finally I was at a four way intersection, not knowing where to go. I asked a young couple with a baby had they seen a dog. The woman replied no. Ugh, my heart fell as I looked at the streets that were my three choices. The man finally spoke up. He did remember a dog running down that street. I thanked them and went forward down the indicated street. It was a dead end street and I called and whistled for Sarah the entire length of the way. Finally at the end I saw her. She was running towards me with the most relieved look I have ever seen on a dogs face. She jumped in the car and cried and I cried and she licked me and I kissed her.
I went to the nice Lady's house to get Leila. She was happy to see me as well. I put Leila in the car with Sarah and they promptly fell asleep. They had been gone for about 4 hours. The Lady who captured Leila I couldn't thank enough. She said that she hoped I would pay it forward by trying to get any dog I saw straying from its owner. I said I would. Then I realized I had 15 minutes to get to Leila's vet appointment. After that we all napped until about 9 pm.
I kept Leila until just recently. Phil was kind enough to keep her and Sarah while I was in Korea. More on that later.
So I am taking a singing class at the UCSD extension. It is really fun. I think I am in love with the teacher. Sigh.
We had our midterm at a karaoke bar in La Mesa. For those of you who don't know San Diego that is about 1/2 an hours drive from my house. Half an hour if you take the freeways. I had one (1) cosmopolitan. I was fine sitting. I ate an artichoke as I knew I had already blown my diet with the booze. mmmmmm artichoke! No butter no mayo and it was still good.
I wanted to sing a song I knew really well so I sang Nick Cave's "Henry Lee" acapella. I also sang Ol' 55 (written by Tom Waits but covered by the Eagles). It semi sucked but I got a big round of applause from generous patrons of the bar. After we had all sang a couple times my teacher announced she had to get going as she still had to drive home to LA. So she went and then everyone left.
I was under the influence of alcohol. Heavily under. I wanted to have fun. Lots more fun. I drunk dialed my friend Lars who couldn't come out to play and my friend Toni who was probably already in bed as she works in the morning. I am sure she was in bed as she turned off her cell. The problem with being my age is most of my friends are at least semi-respectable and have to get up for a job in the morning. So I left as well. I started pulling out of my parking spot and I know I was in no shape to drive. I called my friend Matt who came and rescued me. I was feeling light headed and the world was spinning around me, and yet giddy and talkative. Matt brought H along and he drove my car back and H followed in his car. I am lucky to have such good friends.
I am probably lucky to have such good meds as well, although I am sure they are why one drink affected me like that. There was a time when I would have had to have three to act that way. Three over a short time that is. Although I don't drink often I seem to have a tolerance for alcohol. Sigh I like my monthly drink in the company of friends. Ah well I can be silly without alcohol and I would rather have the friends than the booze.
Thanks to Matt and H. for interrupting your movie and coming to my rescue. I love you
]]>I can do 25 at once but to do 55 is hard for me. I made it to the aforementioned 25, barely, then rested a minute or so. Taking time off to go to Oregon had curtailed my taekwondo activities for a while, including the sit ups I so dread. So I manage to squeeze out about 10 more. Then I fell back and had to rest, my face hot and sweaty as I puffed and gasped for breath. Master Kim was sitting up at the judges table telling me to take my time. I nodded at him as I didn't have the air to speak. I did five more. The man holding my legs told me I needed ten more. I nodded at him gasped and wheezed a bit as I lay on the mats, then I did four more. He counted off nine, eight, seven, six. I flopped back, gasped a bit then reminded him he forgot to count ten. I needed six more not five. I did three, then rested. Finally I did the last three. Truthfully the last one was about three quarters of a sit up, but I was too tired to care. I stood up to the thunderous applause of my fellow black belts. I bowed to the helper who held my ankles down and then to Master Kim then finally to the audience. Then I went down. One of the other black belts turned and held out her hand to give me five. I felt so good.
]]>Damn! I knew that steroid shot would kick me in the ass (a word one should never say on CO) . I have some sort of contact dermatitis going on and I had some solumedrol given to me by a very handsome hispanic doctor. Poor young man must of thought I was nuts because he came in the room I popped my shirt off and showed him the rash all over my back and arms. Later when he came at me to listen to my chest I popped it off again. Sheesh then he came in to give me a shot and I popped it off one more time. It was going to go into my arm, but I couldn't just drag up the sleeve like a normal person. LMAO I haven't been such an exhibitionist is well...months. Just like last time the Corticosteroids are keeping me up. Even an ambien is not helping. ah well
on to things I hate.
People who read someone's blog and then warn people not to have "bad language" like they own the place. To me, bad language is language that consistently has very poor grammar, horrific spelling (not just the occasional typo) and mean or smugly holier/morally better than thou attitudes.
Hate speech is often made b those who consider themselves smugly holier or morally better than others. This type of language does not wound so much in the broadly stereotypical word volleys of the morally and educationally deprived. Hate speech does the greatest damage in the subtle verbal knife twists of those whose agenda is fogged by class, status and or education. Often this type has more power to harm with their words.
Ugh it's 5AM I have to get up in three hours.
good night
I am going to try to sleep
I see a few people recently were still on the Irish name generator. Well my irish name is Róisín or Róis ingean uí Fhlaithbheartaigh if you want my 10th century Irish name. I plugged Roisin into the Irish name generator and got some other Irish name and though screw that. I will stick to my SCA given name.
]]> So I left San Diego and got in the Prius with too much stuff and my dog and drove. Sarah is not the best of travelers on her good days. We stopped frequently. The first stop was at the Dog Park in Griffith Park in LA. I'll give it an eh it was ok, small with not much grass and a very high fence all around. I felt like I was in a Prison. After about an hour, we loaded back into the car, hooking Sarah into her seat belt and drove on, down I-5.
We stopped again after the Grapevine and I walked Sarah around on the side of the street for a while. Driving through the San Joaquin Valley lengthwise is tedious at best and Sara and I took frequent rest stop breaks. From just after the steep descent of the Grapevine north of LA to Redding it's flat and dull with mostly two lane driving. It doesn't help that the worst accident Phil and I saw was around Coalinga (named because it was Coaling Station A during the railroad times). I was so glad to get to the Residence Inn in Sacramento that evening. I was tired and ready to relax. Sarah was ready to never see my car again. We made ourselves at home for the evening and after relaxing a bit had a good night's sleep.
We left not so early in the morning and went to a dog park a few miles away. While trying to find this place, I came across a sign that cracked me up. I really wish I had taken a picture of it. The sign read "undulations ahead". I looked for undulations and all I saw were bumps. Sheesh what jumped-up lingo. I suppose the sign was made by some poor soul who firmly believes that the more syllables a word has the more classy it is. Language to these boobs is a no a way to communicate but rather a way to show off. Unfortunately for those who do not understand that language is best when it is clear and precise, polysyllabic words can instead of making one look erudite and sophisticated make them look like an utter ass.
But I digressed, and my story was derailed, probably by some penny left on the tracks. Although there was a dog park within a few blocks of my hotel, I went to one a bit farther off. Lured but promises of 2 acres by the website, I arrived to find that although indeed this was a relatively easy park to find the Dog park was about the size of my backyard.
I really should have gone to the one around the corner from my hotel. I must have zigged when I should have zagged on the way home. I was a bit lost. I had a map on my computer of the area so I was not horribly lost and I did find my way back to the hotel only to find the exits only came from the northbound and exited to the southbound lanes. So I wandered around a bit longer until I found an exit going north. It took about 1/2 an hour all told.
But then we were flying down the freeway. Of course Sarah was still not too happy about the idea. We made it all the way to Redding though before we stopped. My sister's house was only 2 1/2 hours away. So we stopped to gas up and then we went to the local Dog Park. Redding Dog Park is pretty nice. The people who go there are very friendly as well. We stayed there an hour.
The next leg of the journey was up the Shasta-Cascades. Mount Shasta was covered in snow. It was beautiful. In the higher elevations the ground was covered in snow along the freeway but the road was dry. It really is a beautiful drive. I wished I could take pictures of the drive every 20 feet. I would really like to visit Castle Crags in the summer at some point. Finally we were driving down the steep descent into Medford aka Deadford aka Methford. We were happy to be there. We have been here over a week but I will write about that tomorrow.
Here are the rules
1. Grab your nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 3 sentences on your blog along with these instructions.
5. Tag 5 different people.
Ok the nearest book is my son's baby book and doesn't go up to that page. The next nearest books are scores for various symphonies and concertos. Ok finally a book that has words and a page 123, Phil's copy of "The Completely Useless Unauthorized Star Trek Encyclopedia" by Steve Lyons and Chris Howarth.
123
Five sentences down, which luckily started at the beginning of an entry.
"Morn: The name that was given, belatedly, to Mark Allen Shepherd's semi-regular 'alien barfly' character in Deep Space Nine. His demeanour as he sat at Quark's bar reminded the production team so much of the popular character Norm Peterson from Cheers that they christened him accordingly.
Although they haven't admitted it yet, the same logic must have applied when Jonathan Frakes's Next Generation commander was named with a partial anagram of 'Kirk'."
I tag the new Mrs. Hewes, Matt, Lars and anyone else who cares to try this and has not yet been tagged.