My Current Favorite Non-Fiction Book

If you eat food, this book should be at the top of your reading list: The Omnivore's Dilemma, by Michael Pollan. Recommended to me as a "life-changing" book, I thought yeah, right, a book about food, life-changing, mmHmmm... but he was right!

Pollan brilliantly illustrates four different meals he partakes of, following each through the entire food chain. From industrial food (what most of us in the US eat, most of the time), to industrial organic, then on to sustainable farms and finally winding up with the shortest (and probably least utilized, or perhaps least accessable) food chain of all, the hunter/gatherer meal, the author will leave you completely incapable of thinking about food the same way again!

Fireflies

I love making new discoveries - tonight it was Owl City and his song "Fireflies." OMG what a magical, delightful, delicious song! Maybe everyone else in the world already knows about Adam Young, I suppose I've been sleeping. But if you don't know about him either, you should!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aI4JLa0hbUw

Ok, just in case; I'm just sharing a link here, gettin' nuttin outta this but the good feeling of passing it along...

Recovery

Yeah!!! Glad to report, Keelie has made a full recovery!

Vomit and Vomitus

I wonder if there are others out here who, like me, see an awful lot of similarities between dogs and kids... not necessarily good or bad, just similar.

OK, some good, some bad. Today, not so good. I left early this morning for an hour or so, without my purse - and with my dog (Keelie.) My trusted companion, my guardian, my watchdog!

I came back to find a trail of stuff down the hallway, like children leaving marks on a trail so they can find their way back. Except of course, this was the dog and she wasnt exactly thinking ahead (I didnt say there weren't differences!) So I follow her trail. Its' definitely looking like she'd gotten into the garbage . . . until I saw that was untouched and looked again. Trail mix candy bar wrapper - wait, I hadn't ate that yet! Evidence of a pack of my favorite gum. Hey, that stuff was in my purse!

Keelie is not in sight, she knows better... (actually I think she thinks if she's hiding somewhere that she can't see me, then I can't see her!)

But I'm certainly seeing evidence -and this isn't good at all; the dog has gotten into my nicorettes, which were in my purse from the night before, in case I was tempted to smoke while I was out and about. Not good! I see at least 4 or 5 empty crinkled up packages that they come sealed in. I could tell they were her work from the teethmarks on the plastic. And I wondered if it were possible that she might have swollowed some whole. Now I'm getting really worried...


I look online, and learned 5 0r 6 of the 2 mg. size shouldn't kill her, but they wont do her any good, and what if she chewed more?


So I see a recommendation on a doggie poison control site to give a dog 3% Hydrogen peroxide for nicotine poisoning - get it out of their stomache, quick as possible. I called my vet to confirm, and then got the goods. I then, well, forced her to drink that stuff and took her outside to let her stir things up a bit. The idea is to get the dog to puke, ralph, throw up, regurgitate, - whatever your word for that wonderful reversal of fortune (cookies.) If you do that in time, you can get most of the nicotine out and perhaps spare the dog a stomache pumping - or even save its' life.


It didnt take right away, so I gave her a second dose And about 5 minutes later, as I was giving her the last of it, things started working a bit more effectively. Rather quickly this time, I might add. I ran with her, poor thing gagging, for the door. But just as we got there, she couldn't wait any longer. And that's when I got to use another thing I learned on the poison control site. There is actually a different word for puke the noun than for vomit the verb: vomitus. And there was quite an ample supply. Lots and lots of vomitus. Just inside the door, and quite colorful with red gum and white gum (if i'd only had blue it would have been patriotic vomitus.)

OK, disgusting post, I know, but that is how it is sometimes, with dogs!

Water Skiing Whale

The (almost) final result, tho I retain the right to re-do this rather quick "sketch-painting," along with adding an admission of a certain amount of TECHN-ILITERACY on my part, as I seem unable to crop this pic to fit correctly - but then, there you have it, such as it is!

The Angry Whale

A few days ago I was on a painting expedition with my friend Mick. I had been doing yet another whale painting (part of an ongoing series I call "A Whale A Day") and having trouble making that day's subject matter (a waterskiing whale) look believeable. (Gee, why would that be hard to believe?!)

I was working out this problem with some sketches when, for whatever out-of -the-blue reason, I started telling him how angry I continued to be with a person I had once considered a friend, and how it seemed like every time I thought about the way she had "wronged" me, I just kept getting madder and madder.

Eventually I started paying attention to the expressions I was giving my water-skiing whales - and realized the whale I was working on when I was venting to Mick about my anger concerning my former friend, had an absolute expression of total anger on his face! (You might note it is the only unhappy whale in the whole pod of sketches!) Isn't that a scream?!!! I have to say, we howled a good long while over my Angry Whale!

(And now, for your amusement, my cathartic whale drawings...)

BTW - the whale on the top of the page is the Angry Whale; the one on the bottom is the one that I based the painting on...

It's Been a Long, Long, Tii-eee-iimmme....

Seriously, I cant believe how friggin long its been - no wonder no one ever drops by my blog!
5 months and counting!

I was originally going to title this particular post "No Shit Sherlock!" - in reference to my comment in my last post that I am not particularly good about keeping my resolution to post a bit more frequently than once or twice a year!

No matter; its just time for a little update - Jovi is now a bit over 6 months old and ridiculously cute! My granny name didn't end up being Exreme Granny or even Extreme Grammy after all - I'm going with an abbreviated form - "E.G." Not a Granny name in sight (tho it does still stand for Extreme Granny!) I imagine I'll get over this eventually, but for now - as much as I love and adore my grandaughter, I still have not reconciled myself with the idea that I am, indeed, a Grandma! Jeeze, aren't I just way too young for that? *Sigh* I feel that way, anyhow - at least til I look in the mirror! So, E.G. it is, for now anyway! (Jovi can call me Extreme, I suppose, if she wants - I'm really just trying to keep the Granny part from going public (which is why, of course, it feels safe to spout off about it here! I don't have to worry about anyone seeing it!)

OK, I'll try to update this a bit - I mentioned in my last post about getting the heck out of Dodge (caravan) but never actually told the story. I also said I would post a picture of the fire trucks in action, putting out my van, and of course I haven't done that - but I have a good excuse there. I sent my cell phone (which is all I had with me at the time to take pictures with, as unfortunately I left my camera inside the van when I made the mad dash to safety!) Anyhow, I sent my cell phone through the wash cycle not long after that , and sad to say, everything but the outer shell of that little razor phone got washed away as well :( So you'll just have to take my word for it, but yes, I was driving the van down the highway when I apparently had a little issue with a broken fuel line - and my nephew, who by sheer coincidence happened to be in his truck right behind me (not that he was following me to a repair shop or anything!!!) started blasting his horn and when I looked in the mirror I saw him flashing his lights in a rather frenzied sort of way. Whoa! Nephew is not the kind of person to joke around about that sort of thing, so I knew he was trying to tell me something - and then I saw the smoke pouring out from under the hood - and then (yes, it's true, where there's smoke there's...) FIRE! Sweet Jesus, what the hell! So I'm in the middle of a 4 lane highway and I can't just leave the damn thing there, so I try to pull off to the left where there's a parking lot, but damn, there's a semi coming the other way, and what the hell, why wont he get out of my way, doesnt he see I'm burning up and oh, YEAH!, he does see and now I see he's stopped and blinking his lights on and off, waiting for me to make my move, so I whip the van across the road in front of him, flames totally coming up out of the hood of the car, and skid through the gravel in the lot and I dont even think the stupid thing came to a full stop before I grabbed my purse (yes, duh, I did that!) and leaped out of that hellish trap before I turned into pink mist! Pschew! (Unfortunately I didn't think to grab my camera as well, which is why I had to take pics with the cell...)

Then my too-brave nephew goes flying into the resturaunt (in whose parking lot I'd just left my hot little van!) and back out again with a fire extinguisher and tries to put out the fire... and tries and tries and tries, and I'm screaming at him to get outta there, it aint worth it, and he finally gives up, thank God! And that's another lesson to be learned (besides don't try to put out a fire yourself due to all the danger involved) - you also shouldn't try to put out a vehicle fire with a restaurant's grease-fire style fire extinguisher, even if it is a big hulking commercial grade one. (Oh yah, and that'll be about fitty bucks getting that one refilled for the restaurant owner, I'm about to find out in a few days!) And so we (and about half of our small town by then) are just sorta standing there, milling around while we wait for the fire department to arrive. Finally they do, and after what seems like an awfully long time, they do put it out, so fortunately there was no big explosion, no pink mist, just me and my nephew and half the town, and - oh, crap, my sister had driven past just before everything started getting fired up, I'd better call and tell her I'm ok, not that she'd be worried because of course I had no reason to think she'd have walked past my car and noticed any kind of gas smell or anything, how could that be? So, I said to my nephew, I probably should call her anyhow, its a small town and all, and as I was attempting to do just that, I see her come up and I wave and say "hey, how ya doin' I was just trying to call you..." and then of course the firemen wanted to chit-chat a bit, what happened? - oh just the funniest thing, you know how these things go, I'm driving along, and suddenly, out of the blue the damn fuel line musta broke, and something musta sparked it, and damn! I'm glad no one got hurt, too damn bad I only have liability but then this van was on its last wheels you know, what are you gonna do? (Certainly not put full coverage on a beater like that, unfortunately, as it turns out!)

Anyhow, I get through that, and getting it towed out of there, and of course there was never an issue about responsibility for the fire trucks having to respond or anything because I certainly wouldn't be caught dead driving an unsafe vehicle with an issue like that, not that I had any reason to worry or anything!!!

These days I drive a real sweet little sedona red Subaru Forester, now thats a nice little car, doubt she'll be catching fire any time soon! ('Course, if she did ever have a problem like a fuel leak, I certainly wouldn't try to get thrifty and drive the damn thing to a repair shop or anything like that, not that I've ever had any experience with that sort of thing, I'm just sayin'! She's fully insured (including fire insurance, I'm pretty certain!) Named her Phoenix, just because ...