Monday 31 January 2005

humane society update

i sometimes have a difficult time coming to terms with situations that occur in my life .. especially so when the situations were what i consider avoidable or preventable
so it was with a situation that occurred last weekend at the humane society ..
since the city of San Jose opened up their own shelter late last year and reduced the amount of incoming pets to our shelter, we have more room to offer to other shelters to help them reduce the overcrowding that sometimes occurs .. last week we had 27 dogs transferred from a shelter in a neighboring city .. 10 of the dogs were puppies
last saturday we were scheduled to healthcheck all 27 dogs for possible adoption .. at first glance it was obvious the puppies were deathly ill with what was obviously parvovirus .. since i was the only one not scheduled to work a full day (the virus isn't contagious to cats so my own pets were safe from the virus) so the supervisor had me gown up and hold the puppies for parvo testing .. sadly, they all tested positive .. they were all suffering the effects of advanced parvovirus .. an extremely contagious and often deadly disease for puppies
and now a large number of our kennels are under quarantine until they have been sufficiently disinfected to prevent passing the virus on to other dogs at the shelter
when i returned to the shelter this past saturday i learned that none of the puppies survived ..
not only is my heart breaking for the adorable puppies, i am livid that a shelter can operate so poorly that 10 puppies can pass through their facilities to our shelter without one person noticing that the puppies were ill .. i am angry that not one person noticed that what should have been bouncing playful puppies were instead lethargic .. noticeably lethargic
so i get to spend my day transferring sick puppies to quarantine to prevent any more dogs at our shelter catching the virus .. and of course afterwards it was necessary that i leave the shelter immediately afterwards to prevent me from transferring the virus .. i spent the day bleaching my clothes and disinfecting myself ..
i also learned that the supervisor that has become my mentor over the past year had given his notice .. i was thinking it would be several months before his replacement was found but i found out this weekend that last weekend was the last time i'd ever work with him again
part of me wants to call him today and thank him for sharing his knowledge with me .. for helping me learn more about canine behavior after my involvement with the fight between the pitbulls .. for giving me enough knowledge that my fear didn't overwhelm me and prevent me from returning to the shelter ..
but i'm not good at good-byes .. some things just don't get easier with practice

Friday 28 January 2005

having life flipped upside down

my 14 year old daughter has this sure fire way of getting my attention .. all she has to do is start a conversation with "mom, i know you're probably going to get upset but ..."
and this morning she got my attention
i've been divorced from my children's father for 11 years, the same amount of time i endured being married to him .. at first we shared joint custody but for the last 8 years i've had full custody of my daughter .. out of sheer financial necessity, i finally convinced myself last year that i had a responsibility to sue him for child support
my ex-husband and his new wife have a nice local home that they were in the process of remodeling .. they also have a second home in hawaii .. all the while, my daughter and i struggle to pay for groceries .. there was something wrong with the picture and i finally decided i needed to "fix" it .. last week i was informed that the papers were finally being drawn up so i should begin receiving child support very soon
fast forward to this morning ..
"mom, dad is thinking about moving and last night he asked me if i wanted to live with him in hawaii during my freshman year in high school"
like i said, she knows how to get my attention .. and "upset" is an understatement
i want my children to experience as many things in life as opportunity affords them .. even though i was crushed 2 years ago to find out my son would be attending college in hawaii instead of locally, i was excited for him that he had the opportunity to experience something that is not offered to everyone
the same holds true for my feelings for my daughters life .. how exciting it would be for a 14 year old to be able to live for a year on the islands !!
i've already warned her not to get too excited .. her dad blows smoke out his butt with regularity .. i have yet to have him give his word on anything that he followed through on
the thought of losing my daughter for an entire year has me floored .. weall knew when they bought the second home in hawaii that there was a really good chance that they'd be moving over there .. i just never dreamed he'd want to take my daughter
right now i want to hurt him or at the very least, to call him on the phone and scream at him .. how DARE he feel he has the right to entice my daughter away from me
i can't compete with hawaii .. hell .. i'd probably move over there myself if he asked me (NOT !!) but it sure would be tempting
part of me would probably enjoy having my own life again for a year .. yea right
i knew both of my children would be leaving the nest someday .. just not THIS soon
color me cynical .. 11 years he's gone without showing any interest in living with his daughter .. until the very week that i am granted child support .. i wonder if there's a connection
i need to go distract myself .. i'm feeling ill

Headnoise revisited

i'm a product of my generation .. i hope Picture from Hometown

i console myself with thinking that i'm a product of my generation .. in high school, the guys took auto shop .. the girls took home economics .. that was the way things were supposed to be
 
i know absolutely nothing about cars .. what little i do know i've gained from watching the men in my life with their cars .. my brother had even tried to teach me a few things but lost his temper when i wouldn't stop cleaning his tools .. ok, so my priorities were a little skewed, but honestly, i didn't see how he could concentrate with every single tool being absolutely filthy and covered with dirt and oil

the only help i've gotten along the way was from the service station attendants .. reminding me to check my oil .. letting me know my battery was empty .. hey !!  empty of what?  nobody told me about batteries .. and now of course, service station attendants are a thing of the past and i'm on my own

i ruined my minivan .. i assumed that i was covered by modern technology and one of those little lights would come on when i needed to check the oil .. 50,000 miles later the light finally came on .. and now they tell me it was too late .. nobody told me i swear

so now i have a new truck and i've got the oil thing covered

my tires were looking a little low, so i bought a tire gauge and read the little book that came with my truck .. i even had one of my guy friends show me how to use the gauge .. i have realized how important those maintenance issues are and i'm not leaving anything to chance

the book said that i need 35 pounds hot or 32 pounds cold

i found the air pump at the service station  .. i even had those handy little wipes cause i knew i'd be getting my hands dirty

i tested the air from the pump but it felt "warm" so i wasn't sure how much to put in each tire .. the book said nothing about WARM air so rather than screw things up yet again i decided to admit i knew nothing and made a quick phone call to one of my guy friends

today i know the answer .. today i realize how stupid my question was .. but its too late to salvage my pride with my friend who thinks i'm a full blown helpless idiot of the female persuasion

Thursday 27 January 2005

ready to laugh?

i found this while out and about in journal land and thought it was good for a few laughs (at our house, we laughed till we cried!!)  i have no shame, i've stolen it directly from A Ticket To Ride (is stealing ok if you confess? hehe)
~~

A boss concerned with his best worker not showing up for work, decides to give him a call.
He dialed the employee's home phone number and was greeted with a child's whisper, "Hello?"
Feeling put out at the inconvenience of having to talk to a youngster, the boss asked, "Is your Daddy home?"
"Yes," whispered the small voice. "May I talk with him?" the man asked. The small voice whispered, "No."
Wanting to talk with an adult, the boss asked, "Is your Mommy there?"
"Yes," came the answer.
"May I talk with her?"
Again the small voice whispered, "No."
Knowing that it was not likely that a young child would be left home alone, the boss decided he would just leave a message with the person who should be there watching over the child.
"Is there anyone else there in your house?" The boss asked the child.
"Yes," whispered the child, "a policeman."
Wondering what a cop would be doing at his employee's home, the Boss asked,
"May I speak with the policeman?" "No, he's busy," whispered the child.
"Busy doing what?" asked the boss.
"Talking to Daddy and Mommy and the fireman," whispered the child.
Growing concerned and even worried as he heard what sounded like a helicopter through the earpiece on the phone, the boss asked, "What is that noise?"
"A hello-copper," answered the whispering voice.
"What is going on there?" asked the boss, now alarmed.
In an awed hushed voice the child answered, "The search team just landed the hello-copper."
Alarmed, concerned and more than just a little frustrated, the boss asked, "What are they searching for?"
Still whispering, the young voice replied, along with a muffled giggle:
"Me."

Wednesday 26 January 2005

my life is complete - Head Noise revisited

while i struggle with working through yet another tax season, i thought i'd drag up some previous posts that i enjoyed .. this one was originally posted on April 4, 2004 ~~

well, according to the AOL powers that be, this morning our journals were refreshed to include the beta functions that have been tested for the past several months .. i'm hoping for a smooth transition .. yea yea i know .. i'm of the "ye of little faith" category  
i've decided i'm glad that my daughter has a few character traits that she didn't get from me .. there are just certain things that i despise about my character and i'm glad they weren't passed on to her  
like shopping  
they created online shopping for me .. no traveling necessary .. no maps necessary to find the mall that i've been to no less than a million times .. no fighting for a parking space .. no forgetting where i parked my truck .. no standing in line with people who have no respect for "personal space" and stand wayyyyyy too close .. no dealing with cranky employees .. give me online shopping any day and i'm a happy camper  
in addition to qualifying for a "born to shop" bumper sticker .. my daughter has an affection for infomercials .. i have sticky notes surrounding my workspace at home with all the items she just HAS to have .. i keep each note for a certain period of time before i "lose" it .. whoops, sorry, can't buy that product .. i have NO idea what happened to your note .. hahaha .. thankfully she hasn't caught on yet  
or maybe she has  
this weekend she decided she just HAS to have the "6 second ab" contraption .. not trusting that she could simply leave me a note she insisted that we travel to the mall to the "as seen on TV" store in the mall to at least check it out
  
so i'm thinking .. 6 second abs .. maybe they have a sample in the store that she could try out FOR 6SECONDS and then i wouldn't have to buy it for her  
i should have known it wouldn't be that easy .. or that cheap  
i should have known that naming their product "6 second abs" was misleading .. i hate liars .. turns out that each series of exercises is only 6 seconds long .. but you have to complete a million or so of the series before you have abs to die for  
and with swimsuit season almost upon us .. my daughter just HAS to have abs to die for .. and now she owns the wonderful machine that will allow her to obtain them  
word to the wise .. if you decide to enter the "as seen on TV" store, leave your credit card at home .. they have EVERY product ever shown on an infomercial .. all those wonderfully ingenious products that every single person on earth simply has to have in order to make their life complete  
my life is now complete ..
i have this fantastic little product that i call my bug sucker upper .. spiders, flies .. any insect invading my home will now be sucked up and disposed of, alive, outside where they belong and its no longer necessary to me to get close enough to them for them to "get" me  
sadly after spending years wishing i had this product, once i got it home and used it ONCE .. word got out in the insect community and the insects stopped coming to visit .. but i still have it handy .. just in case  
i am the proud owner of a "driveway patrol" .. a product i don't know how i lived without .. its a small sensor hanging on the fence that detects any movement on the entrance to my driveway and alerts me, inside the house with a series of 3 (very loud) beeps .. kinda like having a doorbell at the entrance to my driveway instead of on my front door  
yea ok .. so it also detects kitties jumping off the fence at 4 am and startles me awake .. running, baseball bat in hand .. to protect my family from home invaders so i was forced to turn it off after a few early morning alerts .. i was forced to save my sanity and prevent 4am heart attacks ..  
the good news is that my daughter no longer has split ends thanks to the wonderful "split ender" that i found at the store .. gone are the hours upon hours of me sitting trimming each single split end that prevented her from wanting to go to school several mornings a week .. now she can successfully trim her own split ends .. life (without split ends) resumes  
oh ! and my daughters progress on her to-die-for-abs?   
sadly its becoming obvious to her that 12 seconds just isn't going to cut it and so far, it appears that yet another swimsuit season will pass us by without her feeling confident enough to wear a skimpy little 2 piece bikini  
yet instead of feeling like i've wasted money .. i am oddly thankful

Monday 17 January 2005

sharing my recent turmoil

::sigh::  this issue has been weighing heavily on me for the past few weeks .. if i had to name one aspect of my nature that i'd like to change it would be how i detest conflict .. i remember back in high school i flunked debate for "buckling under pressure" .. thats me
it took me a lifetime to discover that i don't live in a world where i can simply ask for things i feel are fair and have them drop into my lap .. there are times i must go against my nature and fight for what i believe is right or fair .. and the "fights" make me ill .. i can't begin to describe how frustrating it is for me to know that any amount of conflict is going to bring on physical symptoms that last for weeks .. i wasn't always this way,  probably due to the fact that i've probably spent most of my life avoiding conflict .. it wasn't until my divorce that i started becoming physically ill after conflict
i had asked my ex-husband (nicely) for child support and he refused .. claiming he had a "moral issue" with having to give me money for not seeing his daughter often enough .. so i sat him down and explained to him that she REALLY needed to see him more often .. i gave him 6 months, keeping track of any time he spent with her and he proved to me that all too often his life gets in the way of spending time with his daughter
so i went to Child Support Services back in April of last year and filed for child support .. needless to say, he was a bit angry with me for bringing the government into our personal issues .. i just about fell off the chair though when he said "why didn't you just ASK me for help" .. i'd laugh but it just wasn't funny
he and i finally sat down at the end of July of last year and hashed out what we both thought was an equitable agreement .. and then i waited for the results .. i waited 5 months for him to live up to his end of the agreement .. sadly, nothing changed .. until that is, he received notice that our court date was set for January 18th .. suddenly he started showing interest in his daughter .. by suddenly, i mean the very day that i received the notice of the court date in the mail
seriously, i never wanted it to come this far .. each night i'd hope that he'd come to his senses and do the right thing by his daughter .. and we got nothing but more excuses from him every time his "life" got in the way
i have to confess, i have NO desire to go to court tomorrow .. airing my dirty laundry in front of dozens of people who have NO business knowing isn't my idea of fun .. imagine me having to beg my ex-husband to work with me so that we can stipulate to an agreement and avoid court
yesterday my ex finally returns my calls .. after i had already told the attorney that he hadn't returned any of my calls and i had all but given up on us reaching an agreement and avoiding court .. he wanted credit for the money he'd spent on our daughter for gifts .. i took my daughters advice .. "mom, you need to grow some balls and stand up and do the right thing" .. thats my daughter lol
i firmly told him "no" .. we're making the child support retroactive to August of last year, when we first made the agreement and he's not getting out of it .. but i've decided i'm not going to ask for interest

he's not happy with me .. i guess its mutual

so this morning i need to call the attorney and ask her to prepare the stipulation agreement and postpone our court date until after we've both signed the agreement .. it will be entered as a judgment and i've decided to take the attorney's advice and go for wage garnishment .. even my daughter thought it was wise since "daddy is always forgetting important stuff"
oh .. i guess i forgot to mention the words "wage garnishment" to him yesterday .. you can bet he's not gonna be a happy camper when he finds out the money is going to be taken out by his employeer

its been ages since we had any "extra" money around our house .. there are times i think the term "living paycheck to paycheck" was invented just for us .. my idea of splurging meant buying kitchen tongs that i couldn't really afford .. i haven't counted my chickens yet .. but the very idea of not having to worry about grocery money at the end of the month feels like winning the lottery

i don't talk to my children about the sacrifices i feel i've made .. they already know that if a choice has to be made, my needs or desires will come last .. thats what being a mother is to me .. putting mychildrens needs before my own .. but my daughter made a special request .. that the first few checks that we get from her daddy be spent on ME .. perhaps finally getting my hair cut .. getting new glasses so that i can actually see something .. making an appointment with the chiropractor so that my headaches stop .. getting the little cart for the recycle bins so that i don't have to lug them out to the curb each week .. ya know .. all those luxuries i felt i could do without because i couldn't justify the expense

this battle has taken its toll on me .. i'm trying to hold on .. just a few more weeks, hopefully and i can take off my suit of armor
give me a brow to soothe .. hurt feelings to comfort .. a heart to hold gently .. a knee to bandage .. i'll show you the stuff i'm made of .. i just don't make a very good warrior
i think i'd like to take a vacation with my children .. something i haven't been able to afford since the divorce 12 years ago .. cause even warriors need vacations right?
maybe i'll even have enough to put a little aside each month for my dream .. a little house for me after my retirement .. high in the mountains surrounded by enough land for all the pets and animals that need a place to live  .. i want dogs and cats .. goats and chickens .. maybe even a pig or two .. and of course a couple of extra bedrooms for when my children come to visit their old momma :)

Monday morning headnoise

i've been finding it extremely difficult to sit down and write a journal entry lately .. its been extremely hectic around these parts ..  i've been taking care of some long overdue issues .. add that to the fact that i'm now in the busiest time of year at the office and it breaks down to having so much head noise that its difficult to find anything interesting to write about in a public journal, let alone find the time to actually sit down long enough to actually concentrate on writing
~ we finally got my sons pictures back from AOL that were taken with his new digital camera .. and i can say now that i would definitely recommend the service .. they even emailed me a couple of days after i put in my order to let me know they'd been processed and mailed out .. just go to keyword: printstore !!
~ we're loving our new blockbuster.com membership !!  it works out perfectly for us since we're more inclined to watch movies during the weekend .. i mail the 3 dvd's back on Monday and by the end of the week we've received 3 more .. my daughter and i have just finished watching all the dvd's from the first year of CSI and by the end of the week should have the first shows from the 2nd year safely in hand :)
~ i usually volunteer at the humane society on Sundays, but i'm switching back to Saturdays after one of the employees i've worked with for over a year requested that i change days so i can work with her in healthcheck on Saturdays .. last Saturday though, the shelter was shorthanded so they closed healthcheck .. not sure if i should even stick around or not, i asked the supervisor if they needed my help anywhere else so he assigned me to dog walking .. since the new shelter opened up in San Jose back in October, we have a LOT more room to house animals for as long as they need to find a home .. sadly what this translates into is that there are some dogs that are growing up in the shelter .. i made a quick list of the dogs that had been there the longest and then tried to spend at least 30 minutes with each, walking them around the facilities .. smelling, exploring and doing whatever else dogs are prone to do .. then we'd head off to the play yard for a few minutes to let them burn off some of their energy
4 hours later i was exhausted !!!  we have one rambunctious little boy, now 7 months old that has been at the shelter for 5 months .. his name (appropriately enough) is Spunky !! and he IS spunky .. you'd think he'd never been on a leash before .. we got quite a few laughs from the employees as he literally dragged me around the shelter in search of people to play with lol
i have to say out of the 8 dogs i walked that morning, Jack was my favorite .. he was very timid at first so i wasn't sure if he even wanted to go for a walk .. but a helpful employee decided to help us out and formally introduce us, so we were both more at ease
i snagged some pictures off of the Humane Society webpage of the dogs i got to spend time with Saturday :)


Name: Jack         ID#: 5714
Chow Chow Mix
Age:3y9m              

I'm a little shy when meeting new people, but if they seem nice, I enjoy having them hold me and pet me. I love having them stroke my soft fur. I'm always quite calm and have usually lived in the house with my family and their cat. I know to sit and I come when called. I know I could be happy in any family that wanted a cuddly friend.

Name: Peter         ID#: 4731
Pit Bull
Age:1y              

I'm a brown and white fellow with a lot of energy and I love to play fetch. I'm still young but I have already learned to sit when told and I come when called because that may mean we get to play a game. I'm quite strong, so I'd play best with older children, say 8 years or older.

Name: Puma         ID#: 5208
Dalmation Dog
Age: 4y                    Spayed Female

Puma is a speckled sweetheart who responds to the sit command. She is very affectionate and would be a great companion for any family.
Name: Spunky        ID#: 4963
Mastiff Mix
Age:4m                   

I have an abundance of energy and get very excited when I get to meet new people. I love to make new friends and they have been teaching me to sit, which is really fun as I get a yummy piece of meat when I sit. I always come when people call me, because you never know what good things they have. I'm looking for a family that will be patient with me and teach me new things.
~ i signed up to "google alerts" a few months back .. basically google searches for any reference to my journal on the internet and then emails me a notice .. up until now all i've received are notices of comments i've left in other peoples AOL journals where i provided the link to my journal lol
low and behold i actually got a notice yesterday of a reference to my journal outside AOL journals which quoted an entry i wrote about Atlas and food aggression .. i do believe this is the first time my journal has broken out of AOL journal land !!

here's the link .. www.canecorso.org.uk - wfsection-Food Aggression

Saturday 8 January 2005

just a bit of excitement to round out the week

its another rainy day here in sunny california but thats OK because i have plans for today that don't include getting soaked  

last week i joined www.blockbuster.com .. a service similar to netflix except a couple of dollars a month cheaper .. of course being the forensic science nut that i am, the first 3 dvd's that i ordered are half of the first season of CSI Las Vegas .. as soon as we're done watching the 3 dvd's, we mail them back to blockbuster and they mail us 3 more .. all for $15 a month  

my son flew back to Hawaii yesterday morning after spending 21 days with us ::sigh::  

i had gotten my son a pretty nifty weatherproof digital camera for Christmas but since his computer is down he has no way of getting the pics from his camera .. i tried downloading the images to my computer and printing them but my printer kept jamming .. so i finally broke down and decided to try the Print Store on AOL .. i just selected the images that i want printed, filled out a bit of information and for $3.50 they're going to mail me prints .. i'll make sure and let y'all know if i spent my $3.50 wisely !!  

we had a rather exciting evening last night .. i had just arrived home from picking my daughter up from school and suddenly it felt and sounded like someone picked up our little cottage and dropped it .. both my daughter and i went running outside to find the entire neighborhood running up to the main street where we could hear people screaming and bits of debris floating in the sky  

a mere 1/2 block away, we saw smoke at the local exotic car dealership and within a few moments the entire building was engulfed in flames .. we learned later that 2 plumbers were working on the water heater, one mentioned that he smelled gas and then the entire building was demolished in an explosion .. one lady who happened to be standing out there when the explosion occurred said that the entire roof of the building went flying up into the air  

within minutes every available fire truck, engine, paramedic, ambulance and police cruiser arrived and blocked off the area and began fighting the fire .. 3 people were rushed off to the local burn center (the 2 plumbers were listed as critical)  

we saw the news footage a bit later that evening and the entire building was leveled in the explosion .. cars parked nearby had their windows broken from the force of the explosion .. thankfully there were no customers inside the dealership and as yet, no fatalities

even though they're a bit blurry, here are the pics i got with my cell phone




and how was your evening?