from Standing in the Shadow

to believe
winds that blow, do coldly,
set loose this soul's unease.
a heart that ventured boldly,
now loneliness must appease.

for why in shelter even sought
this heart a comfort from the wind?
crushed so carelessly without a thought,
man has fallen, love has sinned.

still stands fast this simple man,
with discipline and trust.
for courage wavers without plan
and believing is a must.

tomorrow is but another day,
brought by night to end.
if then love should come my way,
it will be brought,
by you,
my friend.

written by Shadow, for me, shortly after we met

It's been 3 years. I still miss you everyday.

My buddy

This is Ears, a red-nose pit bull who lives at the vet clinic where I worked. One of the sweetest, goofiest dogs I've ever met.
Ears is a Katrina refugee. I started working for Doc shortly after Katrina. She was already involved in the rescue/shelter operation, providing veterinary services and helping to locate owners for all the animals who ended up here. I don't know if anyone saw (or remembers) the story one of the news stations did about the animal shelter set up in a Louisiana prison with the inmates doing a lot of the daily care for the animals. That's the one Doc helped with and that's how I met Ears. We thought he'd had a home at some point since he was in pretty good shape and obviously accustomed to being handled. As a matter of fact, Ears insists on being handled, played with and loved on. He doesn't mind men, but he absolutely adores women. Needless to say, he enjoys living at Doc's clinic, since her staff is usually all female. After taking care of him for months, none of us wanted to let him go so Doc kept him. He's survived Katrina, living on the streets of New Orleans in the aftermath, lots of upheaval and a pretty bad case of heartworms.
Being around Ears is one of the things I miss about working at the clinic. He thinks he is a lap dog so he's constantly trying to climb up and sit on someone. Sometimes he would come and sit under my desk, resting his chin on my feet. He's quite an escape artist, he figured out how to get out of kennels pretty quick. There were several mornings I walked in to the clinic to find him sitting on my desk or laying in front of the door waiting for someone to arrive. He bounces around like a puppy if he sees a tennis ball and he's one of the few dogs I've seen who is happy to jump up on an exam table. To him it means lots of petting, a few pokes when he gets a shot, and then more loving and treats. He's a little spoiled now, but as sweet as ever. When I took Skye to the vet the other day, he ran right up to the fence to say hi and get some pets and scratches. He also wanted to see Skye, since the two of them got along pretty well. She doesn't much care for being licked head to tail in one swipe and he always looks as if he's laughing when he does it.
All of my life I've heard horror stories about pits. Ears is nothing like that. He's just a great dog, big hearted, loving, sweet, mischievious and funny. And a reminder (to me, anyway) that judging a book by its cover and living a life based on assumptions is a good way to miss out on too many wonderful things.

Princess, Pampered

I've already introduced my min-pin Skye. And I'm pretty sure I mentioned that she is incredibly spoiled and pampered. Somehow I get blamed for this. Dad brings her bags of Cheetos every time he stops by and T gives her cookies slathered with peanut butter. Sarge and Wench have been known to feed her steak. Everyone else babies her outrageously but it's my fault she's rotten. Yeah, right.
Skye is an indoor dog, has a nice little bed with a blanket on it, plus a blanket on the couch and another under my computer table. T insisted she needed a house. Why? Because she needed "her own little space". I said okay, figuring we'd get a carrier. Wrong. That wasn't big enough or good enough according to T. And carriers don't look like houses. (spoiled, remember?) So we looked for dog houses that looked like people houses. And found one at Hell-mart. I read the description on the box and tried to talk T out of it, since it was for dogs up to 70 lbs. Skye weighs 7 lbs. "That's going to be too big" I told him. Not to mention, it would take up a lot of room in our very small house. But he really, really wanted to get it and since I have a hard time saying no to him we bought it. (Okay, okay I'll admit I thought it would be kinda cute for Skye to have this huge house)Anyway, we bought it, brought it home and put it together. T stuck her bed in there then decided she wouldn't like walking on plastic. He took her blanket, folded it and used it to cover the floor. She now has wall-to-wall carpet. Since he'd used her blanket for the floor, he took one of my fleece throws and gave it to her for a blanket. Needless to say, Skye loves it.

The sight of this tiny dog lounging in this huge house makes me smile.Pretty darned cute, huh?

Not on my need to know list

One of my favorite characters from Edding's Belgariad said "Any day you learn something is a day you haven't wasted." (Badly paraphrased, but I can't find my copy)
Last night I learned how to remove stitches from incisions. Hopefully, I'll never have to do it again. I'm not squeamish, but I don't do well with scissors.
Talked to my dad today, he'd been to the doctor. His eyes are doing great.
T goes to the doctor tomorrow, but he is doing really well. The stitches were actually cutting into his shoulder and the incisions were getting irritated. Since they came out, he's done much better. He still can't lift his arm or use it to push/pull/carry anything, but he can move it pretty well. Plus, it's not hurting as much.

Things are going pretty well, there have been further developments on the job issues. I'm waiting to see what happens next and how everything turns out. (Can't talk about it in detail until it's all done. Cross your fingers for me, please!)

Southern charms

One of the things I enjoy so much about living in the South is that warm weather comes earlier and stays later here. So, for all my friends enduring icy, dreary weather, here's a little sunshine for y'all.

Tulip magnolias from two different trees. The one above is from the zoo, below is near my home.

Kumquats. Soo good. Right around the corner from my house. I just liked the contrast of red berries and green leaves against that drab, gray wall.

Hope y'all enjoyed this. Wishing everyone warm winds and blue skies. Hugs.

7 Days

Ok, here's a quick rundown of the last 7 days
Friday - sick all day, then the stove died. Bought new stove online, to be picked up on Saturday.
Saturday - went to work, still sick, busted ass all day. T called to tell me the store didn't have the stove we paid for so we were getting a different one. Got flat tire on the way home. Rode home on the spare (scary). Admired new stove, discussed some things with T. Tried to call Wench to cancel plans for Sunday, couldn't get her. Gave up and went to bed.
Sunday - helped T thread and install pipe for gas fireplace, cleaned house, more discussion of issues. Gave up and went to bed.
Monday - worked, worried and worked some more. T put new tire on car, took him to lunch. Ran into SIL, nephew and SIL's aunt at restaraunt. Went back to store and worked some more. Went home, more discussion. Gave up and went to bed.
Tuesday - worked. Found out I may need to update my resume in the near future. Seriously considered finding a hole, crawling in and pulling the ground in behind me. Went home, gave up and went to bed.
Wednesday - sat by phone until I heard from Dad's wife. His surgery went well, they don't think the retina will detach this time, only one more surgery left. Headed for BR, to buy freezer and groceries. Couldn't find right freezer at Sears. Found some jeans (which I desperately needed) and some books. Found freezer at Sam's. Bought freezer and LOTS of groceries. Came home, put everything up, read until I couldn't keep my eyes open. Went to bed.
Thursday - went to BR for T's surgery. Got there at 10:30, waited in Pre-op until after 2 pm. They took him in and I waited. Surgeon came out at 3:30, said everything went better than expected. Finally headed for home at 4:30, didn't get home until 7 something. Very bad traffic.
Got T settled, called the family to let them know (they had all called me, but I couldn't talk and drive), typed this, gave up and went to bed. I don't know why I am so damned tired.

Not a wonderful week, very draining and stressful. On the plus side, I bought a bunch of new books. Heavy Words Lightly Thrown is by a librarian from London, examining the stories behind nursery rhymes. I enjoyed it, lots of info presented in an engaging, funny way. I could almost hear his accent when I read. Not a very long book. Also picked up an anthology of Dorothy Parker's short stories (the actual title is Dorothy Parker Stories). Read it today while waiting. Very 1930s. Kept my attention so worth it to me. Not, however, for those who like happy endings or nice people.
A little more for the plus column, T and Dad both are doing fine. Dad's eye looks great, according to his doctor. So he only has one more to go. T's surgeon told me that he didn't have to do any reconstruction on the rotator cuff, it looked better than he thought it would. That means no immobilization for 6 weeks. YAY!! A sling tonight and for a little while longer for comfort. Also, the surgeon at this point thinks by spring everything will be back to 100%. I'm sure I've left something else good out, but can't think what. To everyone who expressed concern and wished us well, many thanks. Good thoughts and hugs right back to all. Now I'm gonna go get some sleep. Morning comes early and T is already asleep.

Busted

Had a little talk with the Boss Lady recently. She informs me that, while using the store's computer, she found my "little bloggy loggy thing". Not sure which one, probably not this one. I'm thinking it was my profile at MyBlogLog.com. She said from the timestamps (none of which are accurate, different time zone) she knew I had done a lot of that at work and considering all the graphics and text, there was no way I could have done all that in just a few minutes. I'm under the impression she thinks I put all that together, spending hours playing when I should have been working. I don't think she realizes that profiles are pretty much done automatically.
On the other hand, I have used the work computer to send a quick email or message to someone. I've also used it to create a post here. The post only took about 5 - 10 minutes, since it was a copy & paste deal, but still.
I understand that she objects to playing on her time. I even admit that I was wrong to use her computer to play while I was supposed to be working. No problem. Believe me when I say it won't happen again.
The only thing that bothered me: I told her that usually when I used the store's computer for something personal I did it when I was taking a break to eat lunch. I am the only employee, so if she isn't there, I don't get to take an actual lunch break. I sit behind the counter and eat in between customers and phone calls. She told me that if I was taking a break I needed to deduct that time from my hours. My question is, how am I supposed to calculate that as a break when it is constantly interrupted by work? Honestly, some days it takes me 45 minutes to eat a sandwich because I stop so often to help someone. Other days, I end up throwing my lunch away because it sat so long uneaten that I no longer want it.
My solution at this point is that I won't use her computer for anything not work related and when I'm there by myself I'll continue working while eating. Or skip sitting down to eat anything. I guess I'll bring more snacks and just nibble through out the day.
At least she wasn't a raging asshole about the whole thing, like some people's bosses are. She's actually a pretty cool boss so it all evens out. I'll just have to squeeze my play-time here in between work and spending time with T.