At the airport…
(the hyperventilation from being awy from Bunny hasn’t kicked in yet.)
The Bun in the oven.
Well, its the best I can do to keep her warm for now. And she gets in there so that’s half the battle.
Also its been pretty warm lately, so my freak-out levels are pretty low.
Sad and Pathetic
Of course I am rage filled, indignant, disgusted, horrified and all sorts of other pessimistic verbs about Lovelle Mixon and his family.
There will be people who say it better than me, more compassionate than me, more rational than me or everyone will just avoid this flammable issue and talk about housewares or knitting and come across as the nice people they actually are… I’ll spare you my rant. (I’d probably just come off as a bigot and a bitch… I’m not, I’m pretty harsh on everyone, no matter what race, color or creed, I am kind of a bitch though because I tend to not let people get away with the shit they try to pull.)
We’re pretty much all whiny babies when it comes down to it.
But… the thing that strikes me as the hugest problem in Lovelle Mixon’s life is his family.
They defend him as “not a monster” or as “failed by the system” or (and this one offends me to my core) “He needs sympathy too. If he’s a criminal, everybody’s a criminal.”…(I’m ashamed to share the species with these people.)
The fact that these deeply stupid people BELIEVE that he is a good person. That nothing was his fault. That it was the Oakland Police Department that caused him to choose to drop out of high school , to pistol whip a man and not even bother to finish stealing the car from him but choose another one, rape and sodomize a 12 year old girl and then kill 4 police officers because he didn’t want to go back to jail (and they are also accusing the OPD of genocide…no I haven’t figured that one out either.)
But none of this was his fault. Oh no. In fact they’d probably blame it on me if I was there. I’m kinda pink, so I must have been the reason that the original African slaves (sold by other African tribes into slavery) were brought over (to displace the native americans-my people actually, this is where I come into play) and that is the reason that Mixon did all this stuff. He wasn’t actually to blame for anything.
His choices had nothing to do with it.
And they probably BELIEVE all of this. They won’t ever change their minds, open their eyes and now that the world is rid of this walking disaster, he’s now a martyr in their eyes.
All those babies they have made and make from now on will hear all this.
I just hope some of them don’t believe it.
Dozens march for Mixon, against police
Vigil for suspected Oakland cop shooter
Oakland killer had just been linked to rape
Family’s account of Oakland parolee who killed the four police officers
Oh and all you Uhuru idiots who are lionizing him…
1. you are Americans, not Africans. If you are Africans you would have been born in Africa and would have been deported long ago. “Stop the war on the African Community” my ass. Last I checked, Oakland was in California.
2. Choosing a poster boy who rapes a 12 year old OF YOUR OWN COMMUNITY doesn’t lend your party any credence or make me think you are worth supporting. in fact, i think the FBI should be keeping tabs on you if you advocate raping children…
Packing List:Kermit 2.5 days
Bag
Ogio Metro Backpack (mine doesn't have the Firefox on it, but I wish it did)
Clothes
2 short sleeved Tshirts
1 long sleeve Tshirt
yoga pants (doubles as jammies)
sleeping Tshirt
1 long sleeve heavier shirt*
sock/undies
Keen shoes
plane wear: jeans, long sleeve Tshirt, Eddie Bauer jacket I wore to Green Bay
*maybe
Stuff
Treo + cables etc
iPod Touch + cables
Belkin power strip (AC + 2 USB ports)
Solio + connecties
camera + stuff
external drive
shampoo etc
sunglasses
Crystal Lite mixes, snack bars, nuts
empty water bottle
I'll probably take my Acer, but I really don't feel like futzing around with all the associated angst it takes to get through security and carry all the cables… but given that it was necessary when I traveled last time as I got trapped, it might still be worth it (though the incidence of blizzard is statistically low in Kermit). Also, I have an idea for a TSA safe laptop bag (a two bottle wine carrier from BuiltNY with the center stitching removed. No zippers, no extra pockets and very viewable on security cam.)
No decision yet… however, leaning toward YES.
Il Buono, Il Brutto, Il Cattivo
Sunday we spent the day at Mikey's having the pre-birthday celebration for Tex (cupcakes and puppy dog noses trying to get in the cupcakes) and was a pretty good day. We got back to the apartment and fed Bunny, who was acting pretty normal, though she started slowing down about an hour later and then her front leg seemed to fill with fluid very quickly.
She wasn't acting right so I carried her on to the bed to pet her.
Her leg was tender, it was swollen so it would be tender, but I couldn't find a break or a cut. But she also wasn't putting much weight on it, so there was something wrong.
She started acting disoriented, but not in pain and it was one of the things animals do before they die… I really couldn't deal with THAT decision right then, so I tried to get her to settle and talked to her to keep her calm.
I thought I was losing her.
I turned up the warming pad in her bed to keep her comfy and just talked to her for about an hour. I just couldn't wrap my head around the fact that I was going to lose her at that point.
When she finally stretched out on the heating pad and sighed a little Bunny sigh, I figured we were out of the woods. Poor little kitty doesn't have very much blood as it is, when she gets cold I supposed it gathers center mass and leaves her brain to its own devices. Also, her leg drained nicely and she rested for a while as long as I stayed there. So I didn't move.
I fell asleep sideways on the bed and woke up about 3 am with my legs killing me (from hanging over the side of the bed) and had to pee like mad. When I got up, she stood up, all perky-like, meowed and hopped off the bed as neat as you please to go to the kitchen for her 3am snack.
I was still worried about her the next morning even though she was moving around well, eating like a little lion and generally acting her normal self. Tex was home all day Monday, so I went to work and left her in his care (he was a wreck at this point). I called the vet and told them about what happened and asked my vet to call me back with a yay/nay on bringing her in for a look-see and also what her test results were from last time.
Eventually, my very tolerant and long suffering veterinarian calls me back and says that her numbers are improving, that we should keep all her medicines at current levels and to keep doing what I am doing. He wasn't as concerned about the fluid build up in her leg as it had already receded. He did agree with my theory about her getting cold and her internal pumps going a little cattywampus.
Then he said he really didn't need to see her for another 6 months.
*blink*
This kind of floored me because I got the impression from his last visit, because he didn't give out a year’s prescription on the fluids and needles, that he didn't believe she had that long left… and she had lost a little more weight last time, I thought she was starting her final decline.
Such relief that I get to be around her a lot more.
She's such a sweet little cat. She's smart, she's hilarious, she loves me and frankly after 18 years of having her around, I don't know what I will do without her. I was basically a different person when I got her.
So, I still have my little kitty and I'll do every thing I possibly can for her while she still wants to be here.
Punto; full stop.
Have I talked about her lineage?
I worked at a bookstore in Austin and worked with some seriously awesome people. Melvyn (his nickname, I have a thing for nicknames…you may have noticed) and Amy were roomies before Melvyn became my roomie. Amy had Peanut the cat who was a dark brown calico. She had a litter at one point and one of those kitties went to her brother Marshall in San Antonio. Marshall had a problem with not spaying his cats, so lucky for me, she had kittens; I asked for the runt and got Bunny.
She's part siamese, I believe, and part calico. I always hear that she is the most beautiful cat… and she is :) . She started off with dark ears and tail and the rest of her was white with cream spots. Gorgeous then and gorgeous now that she darkened up over time (that's siamese trait) to dark brown, caramel and tan (calico markings). Silky fur and blue eyes…not to mention the siamese talkative thing. She's got quite the vocabulary. She even has special meows for different people; ring tones effectively.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fredlet/tags/bunnycat/
I've mentioned before what weird luck I have. In fact, I wouldn't call it luck per se, but more along the lines of balance put upon me.
Something horrible happens and then something offsets it.
Bunny seemed like she was dying, then she was ok and I find out her numbers are actually very good.
or then what happened MON night…
My car's Check Engine light came on and I find out its just a little hose that we replaced summarily with a minimum of jostling… and I don't even have to use up my spare $100 part I keep in the car for the more common failure.
At 150k miles, the beast is a work horse. I love this car.
Its comfy, it gets reasonable gas mileage and its of a vintage that its still repairable by a non-dealer mechanic. (Even more awesome is the fact that Tex's nephew is my pet mechanic and we bribe him with computer parts and keep his machine going). I even have a spare ignition coil to fix it on the spot when I get that particular code showing on the code reader. However, it turned out not to be the case in this one. It was the mass airflow filter that we'd replaced a while back, and I didn't have a spare one of those…but Michael looked at it and said "Hmmm, this hose feels funny."
He replaced it and so far, so good.
So, Bunny still trotting around nicely, the tension levels (well, Bunny related tensions) in the house have calmed (ants are back…grr. I don't want to move but Tex is insane when the ants show up. We'll see what happens.(read:if he wants to move my apartment full of crap, he'll get off his butt, go find a place and organize the money to do so himself. I'm busy taking care of Bunny and the rest of life right now.)) and I think I found a reasonable option for keeping her warm when the radiator is off. Summer is coming and in NorCal is COLD.
I got one of those pop-up dog crates. I turned it on its side so that one of the vents was under her, the other one, now on top, I covered with a dishtowel to keep the warm air in and then covered the whole thing with a beach towel for insulation.
Her warming pad and current towel I moved in wholesale and set it all on the couch.
She was not amused.
She walked in and stood there with her tail swishing in that I'm-irritated-with-you way and didn't move for a full minute. Then she turned around, walked out and then climbed all over me (I was sitting in the chair where her bed used to be.) and gave me The Look several times.
After about 45 minutes, she got in, turned around and lay down, but still gave me the look telling me that this wasn't over yet. (I called it "The Oven"… obvious joke of "The Bun is in The Oven" followed shortly after.)
I think that it will hold enough heat to keep her a bit more comfy, but I'm sure we'll tweak the setup over time and see if she starts to get used to it.
So, the plan for the next six months it to keep her weight up. We're talking ounces, so a regular scale is useless, she's not featherweight so a kitchen scale is too wimpy, and some of the larger scales seem overkill.
My fabulous find? A travel luggage scale. Works in ounces and is compact. I'll just stuff her in a carrier for a few minutes every few weeks and weigh her; I'm sure she'll love that.
I miss road trips…
Of course now, I would feel guilty about all the carbon I release and the fossil fuels I use up, but before things were so apparently dire, I loved being able to throw a bunch of shorts and tshirts into a bag (generally I just dumped my books out of my backpack and stuffed in the clothes) and got in the car for various destination.
One time it was Corpus Christi after working late on a Friday.
We ended up sleeping in the car near the beach until we could find a crappy motel to stay at, but we spent the morning watching the sunrise over the Gulf of Mexico and drinking orange juice from the 7-11.
Or the times (mama, don't read this-or at least remind yourself I graduated with two BA's and made the Dean's list on both…) when finals were the following weekend and I said "I either know this stuff or I don't" and we all headed off to New Orleans.
The joy of all night drives (my favorite-I like the dark), 24h road side diners/truck stops, the "taking your life into your own hands" activity of eating egg salad sandwiches from Skank-E-Marts along I-10 and the hours and hours of talk with my road trip buddies, crappy copies of tapes from Austin bands and even the time spent in my head as I drove while everyone else slept.
Even the standard "go to visit family" was a 4-10 hour driving affair where I would load up the car (in college I would just grab all the dirty laundry as my "packing") sometimes with the cats as well, fill up my Super Big Gulp with Diet Coke and play 10 cd's through the night. (It made my dad crazy that I drove at night, but that is when I am awake (he's a morning person (freak) because in Texas is wasn't scorching hot thenand my eyes, they no like the brightness. It was all good. ).
Weetacon 2009
Another year of trekking to the great white north… though in this case it was the great beige north…it was rather warm for the first couple of days. I never even brought out my big down jacket; I wore my jacket liner the whole time.
I flew in to Appleton, WI instead of Green Bay only because that way I could avoid flying in through Chicago. I was trying to avoid flight delays…but we shall go into that more in depth later.
Took a redeye in and all went well, I had pondered hitching a ride with Joe and Mary since they were coming into Appleton as well, but in the end I decided that I may need to be able to drive places on my own (which after all was said and done was the right decision). So I got my rental heap and started driving the wrong direction. Google maps on my Treo corrected me soon enough, though my route wasn't too far off the recommended route. I'll say it again, my freak-out-OCD levels have dropped significantly with the addition of my data plan on my phone.) and got a Starbucks and some safety pins at a Target (shameful to neglect those in my pack-will not happen again.) and then got on the road for Green Bay.
I brought my standard monster down coat (that squishes nicely in a compression pack), fuzzy long janes and also got a liner jacket for just schlepping around instead of multiple sweaters (new tactic-I love traveling, its all about experimenting until you get it right.). Turns out it was nice and warm and I only needed the liner and a long sleeved shirt for 90% of the weekend.
Arrived at St Brendan's, knitted and talked to the group greeting folks (I knew that if I went to sleep it would be all over for the day.) and generally enjoyed hanging out.
There are two things I enjoy most about going to GB… Hanging around in the pub downstairs with everyone and talking and the sleigh ride and both generally take place on Friday.
The rest of the weekend was a blur of small bursts of sleep and long stretches of hallucination from lack of sleep (par for the course on these weekends-I'm either getting too old to tolerate it anymore or I'm smart enough to just not do it anymore since I didn't tolerate it all that well in the first place), but here were some of the moments I do recall with clarity:
- TranceJen was not sick! and upright! and seemed to be feeling good! Yay!
- Took advantage of the garden tub (well not all the way full, I would have felt guilty and wasteful using all that water) with Zoe Keating on the iPod (no, she wasn't in the tub with me) with my little travel-ly speakers.
- Finishing my ears for this year and improvising the hat as we ended up wearing team hats this year (Weetathalon-raising money for the local food bank).
- Winning the "OCD" trophy for generally trying to be support staff and geeking out by making a mobile site with all the weekend's info including lyrics for Sweet Caroline. I put Gin and Juice up there too but we didn't play the song this year. Huh.
- Watching lesbian drama from afar at the Bad Bar and playing clean up crew along with a few other folks afterward.
- Holiday Inn Appleton sucked….I suppose Joe and Mary must have had a redone room, because mine was NOT all that and a bag of chips. But it was nice having dinner at Outback with J&M while we were trapped one more night, near enough to everyone else, but too far away to be with them.
- Met the famous Jincy-cat at Weetahouse.
- Oh did I mention Blindfolded Spongebob Connect Four? No? Well, that was awesome. We really are animals.
All in all, I love these weekends.
Looking forward to the 2010 version.
All is well…
just haven't had time to write a post. Will do so soon.
Promise.
Ce weekend…
- Tomorrow night: Mostly cloudy skies. Low 29F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph.
- Friday: Some clouds in the morning will give way to mainly sunny skies for the afternoon. High around 45F. Winds WSW at 10 to 20 mph.
- Saturday: Mix of sun and clouds. Highs in the mid 40s and lows in the mid 20s.
- Sunday: Mix of rain and freezing rain. Highs in the mid 30s and lows in the low 20s.
