26 posts from November 2007

I topped 40,000 words tonight.  NOw if I can just write 5000 words tomorrow and the next day - I'll be a NaNoWriMo winner.  To bad I typed it in the Klingon language - he had - just kidding. Now here I am falling asleep with the laptop on my uh...  lap. 

Come on in and meet the Elves in Boss Lady's workshop!

First we have Sweets Elf.  She does cookies, bars, sweet breads and pies.  And she’s really really good at what she does.  She’s quiet and funny and so beautiful that men kinda turn to mush around her sometimes.  It’s funny.  She no longer uses the can opener because she seems to have a nack for slicing herself open.  She did cut herself once and then when she looked at the cut, she passed out because she thought she saw the bone inside her finger.  Passing out on concrete floor – not so good.  So anyway, she’s a smart beautiful funny creature, who has a can opener phobia.  That’s Sweets Elf

Then there is Scape Goat Elf, who gets blamed for everything.  She makes all the cake icings and fillings and does a little bit of everything else.  She’d forget her head if it wasn’t attached with hemp macramé chokers, but I think she gets blamed for more than she actually does.  She’s fun and I like her, and she wants to help out and do a good job, it’s just that she has a loose grip on information.

There’s Business Manager Elf, and she’s a New Yorker.  She’s a riot and I adore her.  But don’t get on her bad side, she’s a back biter.  She gets flustered easy and humiliated easy and everything is pretty dramatic with her.  Don’t cross her.  Not good.

There’s the Elf that ices cakes for me.  She is a delicate flower with a sensitive spirit and a sensitive body.  And when she’s sick, (which happens rather often) she can bite – though I’ve never seen her so much as raise her voice to me.  The rest of the time she’s an absolute delight. 

That’s all the important elves, and then there is Boss Lady.  She bit the head off of Scape Goat Elf worse than usual today.  She sent Icing Elf home, but not until she’d noted every little thing she’d said that she thought was snipey.  Business Mananger Elf took me aside to ask me what bug is up “BL’s” but?  I didn’t know, but I’ll tell ya, it’s not much fun at work right now.  And apparently she went off on the guy who does the dishes big time.  She was telling me about it (in a look how horrible my life is kind of way) and I just had this image in my head of a dumbfounded horrified man with BL yelling at him.  Oh, how it tickled my funny bone.  I don’t know how long to expect this to last.  I don’t know if this mean bitch ate my sweet boss or what, but I’m thinking it could be a long December.  Cause when BL ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.  Well kids, the honeymoon at my job is over.  Over.  OVER!

Yeah, saw these on a blog I checked out and spent some time just playing through a long list of these.  Actually pretty interesting.  And I've tried this myself - not using the term "Christian" because it has so much baggage now with that one Republican guy and all.  Oh well.

Well, I’ve blown off church again.  As I was waking up I could feel the pain in my body so I got up long enough to take a pain killer, eat a roll and crawl back into bed.  I figured if I was feeling better when I woke up – I’d take a bath and then head off to church.  Well, I woke up at 9:55 when one of my dogs decided to have a nice bark.  And church starts at 10:00.  Tsk tsk, I missed it.  Hubby will be annoyed with me, but hey, he missed it also.  Because he’s working.  I just missed it because I’m… uh… well… 

I’m half way through my NaNoWriMo project.  I was ahead most of the time, keeping up with my daily word count and such.  Then everything kind of hit at once, the dealy with the neighbor’s dog, the visit of the inlaws, Misde’s seizures and then working really long hours at work.  I didn’t add a single word to my total in about a week and a half and got about 15,000 words in the hole.  Crap!  Hard to come back from that.  So anyway, my response has been to write something – even though it’s more like a journal entry at the end of the manuscript – just to see the word count go up.  I don’t know if I’ll keep it in edit or what, but at this point, it’s at least a documentation of how I’m feeling about my life at the moment.  Yeah, my life is in this crappy stuck horrible place.  I hate it.  Blah!  Me and my brick wall.  May the Lord have mercy on my soul.

I guess I’ll try and see if I can bang out the remaining 25,000 words to reach the nano finish line this week.  I’m not going to work endless hours into the night on it, I just don’t think I want it that much.  I don’t know that all these words will make it through the final cut to become part of the novel – but it’s words.  And it’s first draft, so it’s ok.  And right now, absent a great passion for the work and motivation… well, that will just have to do for now.  Maybe one day when I DON'T think my life is completely stuck, I’ll come back to it and work till it all sorts itself out. 

Yeah, I’m not big on traditions.  I don't really like turkey.  Dressing is ok - depending but I wouldn't go out of my way for it.  Potatoes that are real, and of the right consistancy and with gravy - now that's worth the price of admission.  What else?  Oh yeah, Dad's cranberry salad is divine.  But pretty much everything else on the table is something I can take or leave.  Well, desert is usually good.  Pumpkin pie is fine, as far as pie goes.  One should have a slice of said pie at least once a year.

I’m used to working right through this inconvenient holiday.  Since I’m no longer self employed, I actually got the day off.  I worked like hell for the first three days of the week though, so generally I was a little too shot to really care about all the hoopla. 

So this year I sat on the couch putzing with some stuff on the computer while the parade passed us by with the giant silver bunny and Sara Brightman in thigh high boots and Wynona Judd lip syncing.  Oh yeah, and a bunch of loud marching bands with people who look like they’d be so perky that if I had to work with them I’d likely to bop them on a regular basis.  A very low key and enjoyable morning.

The big meal of the day was…  wait for it… supper.  No, not lunch.  And we had…  wait for it… pizza.  Yeah.  For real.  No, I’m not joking.  My parents have developed an offspring free tradition and they get together with people of their own age.  Blame that on my brother.  No, blame that on my brother’s wife – who must be with her family at Thanksgiving.  Sometimes my brother goes along, sometimes not.  Generally I think he’s a happier man when he doesn’t go.  His mother in law is a bitch to an exceptional degree.  They take the dog along to the inlaws house though.  That part sucks.  I’m sure he misses the kids to.  But the dog… yeah!

So we had my brother over and I made pizza.  Hubby made the pizza crust dough in the bread machine and I did the rest.  I usually have hubby’s help in the kitchen but I guess he just wasn’t in the mood this time so it was pretty much me flying solo.  I made the first one with white sauce, spinach, mozzarella, red onions, fresh tomatoes and plenty of garlic and fresh basil.  About half way through I took it out and added fresh mozzarella (that I’d made myself) and shrimp and put it back in.  Yummy!  It’s kind of a modified traditional “Margarita” pizza.

The second one was red sauce piled with sausage, pepperoni, onions and red, green and orange peppers.  Lots of cheese.  It was a thing of beauty!

The final one was red sauce again piled with peppered ham, pineapple, onions and more red, green and orange bell peppers.  Yeah, and lots more cheese.  That’s a modified Hawaiian style pizza and very yummy!    

I didn’t get them made much in advance so we waited on them to come out of the oven for a while.  Then as each one got done we’d each chow on a piece of it.  Finally, we’d had as much pizza as we could handle.  And I pulled out the French silk pie from work.  Oh yeah baby, that’s my favorite pie.  Soooo good!  Yeah, we’re not talking about the high calorie contents – things like heavy whipping cream, etc…  I’m sure it wasn’t a low calorie food, but it was divine.  I got it from the bakery where I work and those dang things sell for $18!  Can you believe that?  That’s $3 for a slice.  Dang!  Anyway, I only paid $13.50 for it because of my employee discount but I think I’m going to try to find the recipe and make it myself the next time.  That’s a hefty price tag but it’s an excellent pie. 

And that was pretty much it.  Big brother wasn’t in a talkative mood so we just kinda played it pretty low key.  We played a game or two then he went back to the project he’d spent his day on and I went to the sofa to chill out.  Yeah, a pretty nice day.  Good food, good company and even a leftover piece of French silk pie with my name on it.  (Well, technically only half of it is really mine – but the hubby is away till Sunday and I’m sure that gives me the rights to the whole thing.)  J  He’s just not here to defend it.  Tsk tsk!

I used to love being in church and being involved in all kinds of stuff happening there.  But right now I can barely make myself attend church.  We go to a good church – much better than that last nightmare we attended for five years.  (What was that about anyway?!)  NO, it's not a perfect church - mainly cause I'm there.  But still, I’m not invested there, I fail to see the point of going through those motions and generally I miss the point of getting up early to go observe the same stuff over again.  I have the sneaking suspicion that if I told my Pastor that, I’d be considered in need of prayer or something.  Go ahead, pray for me, I need it.  (Don’t treat me like a mission project though – that doesn’t work real well with me.)  Cause if church bores me, something must be wrong with me.  Well, I don’t actually believe that.  I actually believe something is wrong with church - but I digress. 

Going to church and finding that everyone else seems happy with how things are – it just makes me feel like the closeted bitch for my secret fears, frustrations and unmet expectations.  I used to have an aquaintance with God, He used to like me a good bit.  I don't know what happened to that.  And I know there is more out there than seems available to me at the moment.  I don’t get it.  I think people at church must think I’m a real grumpy bitch, but I’m just not seeing the point of pretending that I like it when I don’t.  And my husband won’t let me be someone who doesn’t attend church.  So I’m a little caught in a crappy place with this whole thing.  I don’t like it much, no siree. 

Church leaders talked to the hubby and I about the possibility of leading a thing that would look maybe a tiny bit different.  Good God, I didn’t want it to be only a TINY bit different – I want the WHOLE FREAKIN REVOLUTION!  I guess I shouldn’t say that too loudly.  (ooopps, tooo late!)  I know that our leadership isn’t much into the girls doing stuff in church and the only reason I was included in the conversation (bein female and all) is because I used to lead worship.  Years ago.  A lifetime ago really.  And I said I’d never go back.  But they didn’t stop to ask about that part.  Some assumptions have been made.  I wanted to be included in the conversation so I haven't popped their little assumption balloon yet.  The conversation has never gotten really deep enough to include that bit anyway.  So I’m included in the conversation because it seems like we’d be good – the really sweet guy with the pastoring gifts servant's heart and his wife who used to lead worship and seems generally talented for whatever else we might need done.  We seem pretty normal, willing to serve and generally nice folks.  (Well, I haven't been so nice lately.)  Seems like those two could get the job done.  Oh wait…  what is the matter with this picture? 

I want to be involved in something new, something that is real and actually works for me.  But…  I don’t know that this is it.  And I don’t see any movement forward with it anyway.  It’s all been just talk this year so far.  All talk and no action.  So here I am.  I still fail to see the point.  And maybe I’m a bit frustrated with God for the lack of Him in this current situation.  What seems to be missing in my church experience?  Well, uh… for starters – the blaring absense of the divine "Himself."  Oh well, I have a hard time forcing myself to show up, why should anyone else - much less HIM?! 

I am so tired.  After Misde had her series of seizures last night, I didn’t want her out of my sight.  But I had to sleep…  Not like I can do anything about it if she has another one anyway.  I don’t think I slept well at all.  I think most of the night I was kind of listening for any strange sound from her.

So, I went to my first job this morning, did my little routine there and went over to my studio and tried to get my email and stuff and the internet wasn’t working at the building again.  I think our internet guy has gone screwy in the head.  He changed out a piece of equipment and now we’re having all this trouble…  Anyway, just an annoyance.

I went back home and gathered up Misde to take her to the vet.  Hope didn’t like the idea of being left behind but she didn’t make it into a drama – so I was very grateful for that.  I told her she was not going, and she seemed to understand that.  So Misde and I went off to the vet.  And after a bunch of tests that seemed to go ok, she said that it did not appear to be rat poison or antifreeze.  But if it was rat poison, it would work itself into her liver and kill her over the course of the next week or so.  Good grief!  Why do we “civilized” humans think its ok to kill rats this way?  No more Decon for me, baby.  No thanks.

It still doesn’t rule out some other toxin and she also could have epilepsy.  And if they put her on the epilepsy medication to keep her from having seizures, she’ll have to take it for life and the medication will eventually cause her kidneys to fail, thus killing her.  And my reaction to that is pretty much “hell no!”  The vet was not recommending that we do that unless she seizes again.  They took her back to give her some fluids because she’s dehydrated and also for some anti nausea thing – which I tried to talk her out of but she insisted.  Why give her meds for something she isn’t experiencing?  She came to me this morning demanding her breakfast, snarfed it and we never saw it again.  She even made the car ride without urping.  Oh well, I guess I should have been stronger and more insistent on refusing that medication.  The vet really didn’t make the case to support giving her that one.  And whatever they did back there in the treatment room got her all spooked.  Not cool.  So we’re going to keep a very close eye on her and see how it all goes.  I really hope and pray this is an isolated event.  And I also hope she doesn’t think of the vets as a bad place to go after whatever happened to her there that got her all spooked this morning.  And I didn't get out of there cheap - no sir!  Ka-ching! Ka-ching! Ka-ching!  That is not where that money needed to go right now!

All that before work at the bakery.  No one seemed to notice that I had a rough morning and I tried not to take it out on them.  The lady who ices my cakes noticed that my hands were shaking.  Oh well, so I shake.  Life’s a bitch.

Nanowrimo.org?  What the heck is that?  I don’t think I even know.  I haven’t written anything in days.  And I was going to try to get ahead for the fact that the in-laws are coming this weekend.  It’s not happening.  And I’m losing any sort of internal motivation to make it happen.  A friend of mine has finished his nano but not his novel.  He’s passed the 50,000 mark but still has story to finish up.  Wow!  I’m so completely floored by how impressive that is.  Amazing! 

Work – well, I have an order for sugar cookies at work.  We have a display of cute baby shower sugar cookies, only we didn’t realize that we no longer have the equipment to make these cookies.  Apparently they belonged to the previous cake decorator who took them with her when she left.  Which is fine that she took stuff that belonged to her, but we keep finding a little bit of this and that missing.  And it keeps slapping BL upside the head.  And it’s frustrating to look for equipment that isn’t even in the building. 

3:36, and my dog is jerking around in her sleep.  That actually could have been one of the smaller seizures.  See?  Every time my dog twitches I’m going to be thinking – “Oh &%$@!  She’s having another seizure.”  I think this majorly sucks!  Why, why why??!!??

BL is giving me some space in the bakery to put out stuff I’ve made for them to sell on pseudo consignment.  So I should really be working at packaging up goodies and making displays and moving in my inventory.  And if I had any energy at all right now – that’s what I should be working at.  I’d like to have it all in place this weekend for the Thanksgiving crowd.  Which means that is what I should be doing right this moment.  Which is a royal pain, because there are forty other things I really should be doing this moment also.  And I’m exhausted. 

3:55  My dog is twitching again.  The vet was explaining that there are actually quite a few jerks and twitches a dog does that can actually be seizures.  I don’t know whether to make lists of this little stuff and call the vet or only call her if Misde has another grand mal.  I don’t know how this is going to end.  Which I guess is a good thing.  But really!

I saw snowflakes this afternoon - briefly.  And then nothing.  If we could have enough snow to keep my inlaws safely in their portion of the country - that would be sweet. 

Oh well, buck up baby.  It's going to be over soon.  Maybe not quite soon enough, but soon.

...but my dog has just had two grand mal seizures.  Weirdest thing I ever saw in my life.  Blindness, walking like a drunk and weird spasms.  Repeated vomiting.  This isn't any fun at all.  Hubby sees human seizures alot with his work.  Not me, no sir no thank you.  Vet said bring her in if she has another one.  Ca ching, ca ching.  I'm not liken this one single bit!  I keep thinking of the timing of the thing with the neighbors. 

It was a dark and stormy night and my border collie stood accused of the horrible crime of murder. 

Uh, yeah… 

not exactly. 

But sort of. 

Hope

2 comments

Yeah, so the neighbor’s Pomeranian got loose and came *under my fence* into my yard to take on my two border collies – four times it’s size.  And it did not end well.  The neighbors took it to the emergency vet and then decided to put it to sleep. 

*Sadness* 

I’m sorry for them, I really am.  But to be honest I thought it was a horrible creature with a huge yippy mouth and even bigger attitude.  When they would tie it outside it would swear at my dogs in its annoying little yippy voice, baring teeth and growling at my house for ages on end. 

Misde Resting

Whether or not my dogs were paying any attention to it. 

And Misde would bark at it briefly then would get bored and walk away. 

Anyway, animal control did the research, talked to the neighbors, the vet and the commonwealth attorney.  Were they going to take the case to court? 

I looked at the Virginia law for dogs deemed “Dangerous.”  Merciful days in the morning!  Muzzles and cages and a registry so neighbors could find the “dangerous” animals in the neighborhood…  special home owners liability insurance (most property insurance companies will not insure a home where they own one of the dangerous breeds.)  The list was long, expensive and horrible.  If she were charged and found guilty – it would cost us a tremendous amount of money and we’d have to be really cruel to her – I mean really – a muzzle on a border collie who only wants to play play play?! 

Hope Working

A muzzle! 

On a border collie!

So the animal control officers call and say they have just finished speaking to my neighbor, they noticed that I’m not home, when would I be getting home?  Uh, well…  I told them to come see me at work.  It’s only five minutes or so from my house – they could come right over if they wished. 

Then I realized that all the girls at work were going to start to wonder the moment two officers come in to talk to me.  Hmmm…  And I hadn’t told anyone at work about the event.  It’s hard to hear over the mixers and machines and we work in a spread out kind of space with shelving in between so it’s not like I do a lot of story telling at work.  So I hadn’t even told them it had happened.  And I realized that wasn’t going to work. 

So…  I went to my boss…

Sheila, the cops are coming for me in a few minutes.”

“What?”

“The cops are coming for me in a few minutes.”

”Whatever for?!”

“Uh, my dog is accused of killing the neighbor’s dog.”

Huge intake of air – “WHAAAAAT?!”  “Nooooooooooooooooo!”

“yeah, I’m ok.  It happened a few weeks ago.”

Misde

It went on like that, they questioned what had happened.  As I’m talking I can feel the tension level in my body going through the roof.  So I answered everyone’s questions, went back to work kind of abuzz.  (Decorating cakes gets interesting when you’re feeling shaky.)  The bakery starts to fill up with people and we get a little “rush.”  Then two cops in full gear walk in.  BL says my name real low and I look up.  I motion to them that I’ll be right there.  I went to wash my hands real quick and then looked around for a kind of private spot to talk.  Well, the place was full so I wasn’t going to get the privacy I wanted but anyway.  We sat down at the table and they started to tell me where things were.  They talked to the vet and the commonwealth attorney.  (The officer is fond of using the phrase “you know” and Uh, No!  I don’t know!)  So the commonwealth attorney is the person who decides whether or not to press charges.  So I’m really trying to contain myself because my tension level is going through the roof.  And finally they tell me that they aren’t pressing charges.  Whew!  He recognized that the incident occurred on MY property, and there may have been some provocation from the Pomeranian.  Yah THINK?!  So we finished out the conversation, I’m relieved, yadda yadda…  They need some information to finish out the file, could I email them photographs of the girls, names and some personal information about me.  I walk them to the door.  Done, over, whew!

Ok, so I get in the back part of the bakery and I’m bumping into stuff and real shaky.  I told the girls how it went and they were all real happy for me.  I’m happy for me.  I’m happy for "Killer," oops, I mean Misde.  So anyway, I had a little fun choosing the photographs to email them of my girls.  These are the four photos I chose.  They look like such angels in these photographs.  You’d almost never know how “dangerous” they can (apparently) be.  I am so relieved! 

Well, this is our Mamma Border Collie, she's a pretty intense individual.  Ironically, she is not the one our neighbors accused of attacking the Pom.  Not that she would.  Her docile sweet harmless daughter got the honors.  Strange!  Hope is the full tilt crazy alpha bitch at my house.  Well...  that is, besides me anyway.