Kari Neumeyer

To the punk who gave me the finger while I walked my dogs

Look, I have a complicated relationship with the cyclists who travel 32nd Street and thereabouts. I know it’s not politically correct to say, but you’re mostly in my way. Mine is a reasonably trafficked street, but it only has two lanes, so when you’re riding your bike between moving cars and parked cars, with your little kiddie trailer swaying behind you, you get on my nerves.

When I am on foot with my four-legged companions, I go out of my way not to cause problems for you and your buddies, the joggers and the strollers, skateboarders and scooter gliders. I know I have big scary dogs and I don’t want anyone to feel intimidated by us on the sidewalk.

I have my own baggage where this is concerned. It is because of you, because of all of you, that I couldn’t walk Isis on her very own street. I wished we lived in a neighborhood with no other people at all, near a woodsy trail all to ourselves. When Isis started consistently barking and lunging at passing bicycles, I tried setting my alarm and timing my walks to avoid all of you fit, environmentally friendly people on your morning commutes. I followed the Dog Whisperer’s advice and kept walking, walking, because walking is the answer to all behavior problems. And if she saw a bike, I would bump her with my leg to distract her from the oncoming threat. Doing this while she was midbark resulted in her powerful jaw coming down and leaving a nasty bruise on my thigh. To be honest, I have no idea how you cyclists felt about this, because I was so distracted by Isis’ tantrum, that I never even saw your faces. I wondered whether Isis was barking at the same person day after day, and why that person didn’t get the message and find another route.

Later I learned methods of desensitizing her to sidewalk stimuli, but walking her remained stressful the rest of her life.

Walking my dogs now is a joy. Leo had his own challenges, like when he used to jump up and chomp on our arms and legs (and Rob’s crotch) in the middle of the walk. Have to say, I was less embarrassed to have my dentist drive by and see Isis raging at a golden retriever in its own yard than I was to stand on the sidewalk with my puppy dangling from my bloody arm. But Leo’s a good walker now, and last week I started walking him and Mia at the same time by myself.

This morning, a couple of bicycles passed us, including one that made that clicking noise that sometimes startles dogs. The doggies thought nothing of it. At one point, Leo started doing a little dance behind me and I turned around, surprised to see you, sunglassed, helmeted teenager, whizzing from behind, stealthlike. I hadn’t heard you coming, or else I would have protected you from my dog’s terrifying stare. I don’t even think Leo barked, but maybe he jumped his front legs off the ground in your direction.

You looked at me through your mirrored shades and extended your middle finger as you rode by.

Seriously, what did we ever do to you? Do you think it’s easy, walking 170 pounds of German shepherds? I’m very considerate of the people who share the road. Sometimes people stare or move funny and set off my dogs, but do I give them the finger? No. I am a grown woman.

My very mature response was “Thanks. For the finger.” And you were gone. I do wish I could discuss this with you further. Was I being somehow irresponsible or rude to walk my dogs on that sidewalk? My feelings are hurt, here. Really, they are.

You stupid a-hole.

Oh deer

Our property is bordered along one side by a creek. The creek is bordered by thick brambles of invasive blackberry bushes, which effectively fenced in our dogs. The ones that we raised from puppyhood, anyway.

A few weeks after we got Mia, whom we believe to have lived a tough life on the streets, I was surprised to come home from a quick jaunt to Radio Shack to find the dogs sniffing around the front yard. Rob had left them in the backyard, but they’d gotten out. Impossible! We have a cedar fence on one side and those blackberries on the other.

Later, they were out back while I was getting something from my car and who should come trotting out from around the house, on the blackberry side, but Leo. Busted. I’m sure Mia was the one who showed Leo he could get out that way, but she was smart enough not to do it in front of me. They had created a little tunnel through the blackberries to the path along the side of the house.

We put up a few chain link panels to block the path, and were amused when they kept using the tunnel as a little hidey hole. Then, Leo, who does not swim, suddenly got brave and started going all the way down to the creek and splashing around in there. Probably he can’t get into too much trouble down there, but I worried because I couldn’t see him and would have a hard time getting to him should he need to be rescued.

One of many pathways to the creek the dogs have burrowed.

Emboldened, he started rustling around in the bushes in the northeast corner of the property, where a chain link fence separates us from the freeway. We put up a few more chain link panels to close some soil erosion gaps that a brave doggie could squeeze through and get himself schmooshed. My real concern though, is that he could wander north through a woodsy patch and then over the creek and off into some neighbor’s yard, and maybe to REI or the movie theater or something.

He’d disappear into that patch of bushes, but usually come back when I called him. I haven’t been worried at all about Mia running off, because she knows what a good thing she’s got going here. One night a few weeks ago, though, she kept racing into those bushes, and not coming back willingly when I called. I’d finally coax her out only to have her race back in. Figured there was some kind of animal in there tempting her.

The next day, I tromped through the bushes with my doggies and discovered tufts of brown and black fur in the blackberry thorns, and a clearing that would have been way fun to play in when I was a kid, or if I were a dog.

Rob and I fastened the last four of our spare chain link panels across the opening to the clearing, knowing full well that the dogs could still get around them, but hoping at least to discourage them or slow them down.

A few days ago, they didn’t come when I called, so I went up and found them sniffing around on the wrong side of the chain link. “You dopes, you figured out how to get out, but now you can’t get back in?”

Apparently, deer have the opposite problem. The other day, the dogs went bonkers at the back door because this guy was wandering around out there.

The chain link in this photo is the barrier to the freeway.

He walked around our studio building, then back toward the clearing, which I presume was the direction from whence he came. After Rob took the above picture, the deer walked up to the chain link, then barreled through, flipping the panels on their sides and running under them.

So, uh, what now?

I went up and righted the chain link this morning. Trying the same thing that didn’t work before. That’s the definition of insanity, isn’t it?

Dogs, if this were your playground, would you try to escape?

Everyone who’s ever had a dog has had a dog who died

I’m taking a new writing class with my fiction-writing teacher. A memoir-writing class, because I knew when Isis died that I was meant to write a memoir about our life together.

I’m wary of writing a book where the dog’s death is a surprise. When I read Marley & Me, I knew how it was going to end, because I did the math. Still, I heard from several readers who felt betrayed by the sweet little story where the dog dies at the end. At the end of a long, happy life, I might add.

Although Isis’ sudden and unexpected death is a wonderfully surprising twist that no one would see coming, I want to protect my readers from the heartbreak that we felt. I have written ten pages to turn in about that day in February when I brought Leo to work with me, had the loveliest time, and then got the call that Isis had died. I think the first part of those pages, up until I arrive home, will be the first chapter of the book. But the rest of what I turn in — the details of what happened to her, how we felt that day, and what we did next — will happen later in the book. After the first chapter, I will go back to the day we got Isis and tell the story from the beginning.

Yesterday, I wrote the scene at the vet’s office the day Isis died. We saw a vet I’d never seen before (and hadn’t seen since). I remembered her first and last name, and how nice she was.

Today I took the dogs to the vet for some routine stuff, and was very surprised when that doctor came into the exam room. The first thing I said was, “Oh! You were here when my dog Isis died in February.” She said she thought I looked familiar, and then had the pleasure of meeting Miss Mia.

Get over yourself, poets

I don’t pretend to know anything about poetry. I didn’t even know we were going to a poetry reading Monday night. I thought we were going to a music open mic thing.

Rob’s friend Rion had a couple of pieces he wanted to perform. He asked the MC if profanity was OK.

“I think misogyny is lame,” the MC said. I thought he said “massaging.” Why is massage lame?

“And racism’s no good either.”

Rion was cool with that, so we took our seats. The MC announced that this is a “challenging space. You might hear something you don’t like, and you might say something other people don’t like. But keep it civil. Have a dialogue.”

The first guy to read was pretty good. The following several were pretty “meh,” but I’m very supportive of burgeoning artists for putting themselves out there.

The guy before Rion takes a dramatic pause and says. “2012. FUCK. None of the above.” That was it. His poem.

Rion delivers two fast-paced, hard core pieces. They sound like a cappella rap. Listen for yourself.

I thought he was wonderful, but like I said, I don’t know anything about poetry. I guess it’s not good if you don’t read it slow.

…

Taking dramatic pauses for effect.

Reading from the backs of envelopes where you’ve scrawled your poems, so marvelous that they need no revision, and you can’t be bothered to copy them onto a real sheet of paper, or even …

Type them.

A featured poet gets 20 minutes to read. She’s angry at the world, men and therapists in particular, and the audience laughs like she’s the best observational comedian they’ve ever heard. I’m uncomfortable. Her poetry makes me sad, and kind of offends me. I want to leave but don’t want to be rude, and finally she’s done and it’s the intermission and we get up to leave.

On our way out, past the other artists taking smoke breaks, the MC pulls Rion aside and invites him NOT to return to open mic night.

What. the. fuck.

Rion leaves, but Rob wants to know why, so we ask. The MC has gone inside, but a few few other guys tell us it’s because Poetrynight should be a “safe space.”

Wait. I thought it was supposed to be a “challenging space.” I ask, “What was threatening about it?”

“Oh, I don’t know, talking about ramming some bitch with his dick.”

I don’t recall that being a line in Rion’s poem. I say, “He was just telling a story.”

An older guy with mutton chops said, “I didn’t mind it. It was very raw.”

Bewildered, we consult the video. Two parts that possibly could have offended people were the thing about killing a bitch like OJ and the other taking out his cock to piss on his father’s corpse. omg. He said cock. And jism.

People were threatened by that? Really? Enough to banish him from an open mic night?

I don’t get it. Stupid, pretentious poets.

Unless what they were really mad about is that he went over the three minute limit.

Beyond Oyster Dome

During the past few years, I’ve come to terms with the fact that I’m just not that outdoorsy. And that’s OK.

Never mind that I live in the Northwest and that my friends and colleagues hike, kayak, climb rocks and sleep outside for fun. Sometimes I get to wade in rivers and brave the elements for work, and I enjoy the adventure. But it’s also OK when I find it challenging.

I like to read. And I like to nap.

I have chronicled a couple of the adventures that led me to this conclusion. They include a mountain goat survey for work. And the hike that made me realize that I would definitely hold Rob back if we were partners in the Amazing Race.

Here I am at the zenith of the Bat Caves hike of 2005:

I look proud of myself, don’t I?

Totally faking it.

Here I am last weekend, having hiked that same trail even higher to the Oyster Dome:

That’s genuine pride.

Rob had gotten it into his head to hike up to the Oyster Dome, spend the night and then do a TRX/portable kettlebell workout the next morning. I said, “Good luck with that. Enjoy.” But then he started acquiring all kinds of gear and it started to sound like fun. I said I’d go too, and we’d bring the dogs. Then I thought it might rain that night, and I chickened out. Then the weather was supposed to be really nice, and I was back in.

We got a tent, sleeping bags, camp food, headlamps, little reflecting things for the dogs. And I just committed to it. I was going to make it up there.

It helped that it was not too hot, not too cold, and we left in plenty of time to get to the top before sundown. Because we would have had a hell of a time setting up camp after dark.

In my 2005 blog post, I was very descriptive about each step of that agonizing hike. This time, I was prepared for Rob to take off way ahead of me, but he was pretty weighed down by his backpack full of lanterns and a 2.5 gallon jug of drinking water, so for most of the hike, we were together. We strapped a backpack on Leo too, with his food and two bottles of water. It was a pretty heavy pack and he did seem tired. We took it off him during our many rest stops and he’d plop down beside us, looking enormously proud of himself.

Each time we got up to go again, he’d stand, resigned to his duty, and let me strap that thing back on him. For the first half of the hike, he also had the burden of pulling me. As we got to the steeper parts, I unhooked Leo’s leash as well. That’s when I fell behind.

Mia was off leash almost the whole way, and would trot ahead, leading the pack, looking back at us frequently to make sure we were still with her. I worried the hike would be too strenuous for her, but she kept bounding ahead.

I don’t think I’m in such better shape than I was in 2005, although maybe I walk more often, because of the dogs, and I knew what to expect. We passed a couple of dry streambeds and I remembered how scary they were when they were filled with water.

The last part of the hike was no joke. Very steep. At one point, I could take only five to ten steps at a time. I’d stop, take a few breaths, and count out steps again. I made it to twelve a few times. Then back to five. My feet were unsteady because of the weight of the pack. I struggled to find my footing amid the roots. Rob and the dogs had climbed out of sight, but I didn’t have the devastated, abandoned feeling I had before. Even if I took only five steps at a time, I was going to get there.

During the last stretch, I knew we were almost there. I could see sky between the trees. The trail was uphill, but smooth. No roots to trip me up. I made it.

Rob wanted to set up the tent right on the rock face, looking out at the bay. We found that spot to be a little too windy, so we moved the fully assembled tent to a spot nestled between the trees. Still with a water view. We had tethered the dogs to a tree and left them there while we moved the tent. They cried and moaned.”You didn’t bring us all the way up here to leave us tied to this tree, did you?”

No one else camped up there with us, although we did see a guy carrying a wiener dog when we first reached the top. Carrying his dog, I think, so Leo wouldn’t eat it. “So this is the dome?” he asked. It was very near sunset and I didn’t envy him having to make that downward hike in the dark.

Our dogs slept with us in the tent, and let us snuggle them more than usual. Mia makes an excellent pillow.

I highly recommend a headlamp for late night bathroom trips in pitch black woods. Rob slept like a rock, as usual, but I barely slept, which was not entirely unexpected. I frequently have trouble sleeping in new places. Add to that the extreme physical exertion, and yeah, I’ll confess, I was in a great deal of pain. Too bad we both brought first aid kits with Band-Aids and Neosporin, but no ibuprofen. My legs ached. Not just in the muscles, but deep in the bones and joints. I couldn’t get comfortable even just lying there. Everything hurt. I remembered a similar feeling in my arms following an overzealous kayaking adventure in 2006. I also remembered it would not last.

In the morning, I felt better, and Leo was antsy. I tethered him to a tree and tried to let him wander outside the tent. He kept winding himself around trees, and a few times tried to take down the tent by circling around it. I’d bring him back in the tent, hoping he’d settle down, but he wouldn’t, so I’d let him out again. Finally, after he was quiet for several minutes, I thought he’d just settled down outside. I gave the tether a gentle tug and felt its slack. I reeled it in, still slack, until I had in my hand, like a scene from a horror movie, the chewed-off end of a leash. “Leo chewed through the tether!” Rob didn’t even wake.

I slipped on my hiking boots and said, “Mia, go find Leo.” Oyster Dome is basically a rock formation surrounded by cliffs. A dog could easily slide, jump or fall off one of them. I called Leo’s name a few times and he finally bounded toward us, romping with Mia through the trees until I clamped a leash back on his collar.

Leo was duplicating his usual morning routine. He doesn’t want us to stay in bed all morning. He’ll start tearing at the bedsheets until I get up. But if I relocate to the couch, he’ll hop up on the chair across from me and go back to sleep. I grabbed my sleeping bag, leashed both dogs, and lay down on a nice slanty rock with a view of the bay. Rob woke up and started putting on his shoes to come join us, but we were interrupted by Leo’s territorial bark. Some rotten people had gotten up at the crack of dawn and summitted the Oyster Dome already. By this time, Leo considered the rock to be our new house, and he was going to protect it. Sorry, folks who thought you would experience a peaceful morning atop the dome. Sorry my dog ruined it for you.

So we didn’t get a picture of me snuggled in my sleeping bag on the rock.

We stretched with our TRXs, ate a leisurely breakfast and walked the agonizingly steep trail home. It was murder on the knees.

Warrior, come out and play

Since I’m writing a novel about mixed martial arts, I was excited when I first saw the trailer for Warrior. It looked like The Fighter, right down to the rivalry between brothers, except about MMA instead of boxing. I didn’t give much thought about whether the movie would be good or not; it didn’t matter. Anything that raises MMA’s profile is good for the sport, and good for the marketability of my novel!

I was surprised, then, to see lots of positive reviews. 82 percent on Rotten Tomatoes. Three stars from Ebert.

From the trailer, I understood there would be two brothers that wind up fighting each other in an MMA tournament. What I didn’t expect is that I’d want them both to win.

In the “tournament” genre, it is customary to give the hero some financial reason why he must win. Brothers Tommy and Brendan each have perfectly noble reasons for needing the $5 million prize money. I didn’t like Tommy for most of the movie. I thought he was supposed to be the hero, but found Brendan to be the more likable brother. But watching the final fight, I hoped whichever brother won, he’d split the prize money, because really, wouldn’t $2.5 million be enough?

Giving the film complexity, both brothers are estranged from each other and from their recovering alcoholic father. For some reason, even though he’s really, really mean to his dad almost until the very end of the movie, Tommy asks him to train him for the big MMA tourney. (That was my only complaint. I felt bad for dad, played by Nick Nolte. Did they have to be so mean to him?) An interesting parallel, which I don’t know how many people will notice is that at one point, Tommy holds his father in a comforting manner that looks similar to a submission wrestling move we see later in the movie. Both times, the “embrace” moved me.

Although there are a lot of perhaps overused conventions at work here, Warrior is a good movie. I appreciate that neither of the heroes are “thugs” who must redeem themselves. They aren’t guys who get in street fights, and then learn how to channel their strength in the cage. They are a U.S. Marine and a physics teacher. The teacher, Brendan, gave up fighting because his wife didn’t want to raise their daughters in a house where “their father gets beat up for a living.”

Here’s the thing: there doesn’t have to be any shame in that, and I think this movie shows it.

Dogs in the graveyard

Early in Isis’ behavioral modification efforts, our trainer suggested we meet at the local cemetery. I thought it a strange place to take one’s dog, but was surprised to see a lot of people walking their dogs there. It’s near an official trail, so people naturally consider the graveyard to be a logical extension of an off-leash area, because there’s lots of grass and very little vehicular traffic.

I wasn’t really for it, but nor was I against it and hey, everyone was doing it.

The people that bothered me were the ones riding bicycles and even driving cars through the cemetery with their dogs running loose alongside them. A recent Bellingham Herald article points out that such use is disrespectful and not allowed.

It interfered with my particular use of the area for dog training, because we were deliberately looking for places to work with Isis that had minimal distractions like loose dogs and bicycles.

I confess, I did use the fenced area near the Jewish cemetery as a place to work with Isis on a long lead. Not on top of the gravestones, but on a grassy area next to the graves. Like the article says, it felt like a protected area, and since my trainer had recommended it, I didn’t realize that it was an inappropriate use of the cemetery. I stopped going there once I found out. I didn’t mean to be disrespectful.

Interestingly, this issue was brought up in a book I just finished called Oogy (which was otherwise not at all thought-provoking). The author discusses the controversial use of a cemetery as an off-leash dog park and says it’s actually beneficial to the graves, because the presence of dogs discourages gophers. So, uh, you’re welcome, all those graves that we may have stepped on during Isis’ dog training. May you rest in peace.

Unflappable

I had about four hours between appointments 20 miles from the office. Plenty of time to return in between, but where’s the fun in that? I brought along my laptop and planned to eat lunch/kill time at Starbucks.

On the way to Starbucks from appointment #1, my car started making a funny noise. It sounded like I had an old-fashioned cassette tape player on the passenger side floor and it was rewinding itself. I had plenty of electronics in the car: laptop, SLR camera, flip camera, MP3 recorder, iPod, mobile phone. None of those make that noise.

I pulled off into a rest area and the noise stopped as I slowed the car. I popped the hood and looked inside. Looked like an engine to me. I turned on the engine and looked again. There was a spinny part, but it wasn’t making the same noise the car made when it was in motion.

I consulted my owner’s manual. Did you know there’s no diagram of the engine in there? How to turn the volume up on the stereo, that’s in there. But if you want to know the name of that spinny thing on the left-hand side, good luck to ya.

I used my GPS device (oh yeah, forgot to list that one above) to look up the closest Honda dealer. There’s one 20 miles to the north and 20 miles to the south. I looked up “car repair” and found a list of transmission places and body shops. I congratulated myself for knowing that a body shop was not what I wanted. The transmission place wasn’t necessarily correct either, but it was in the right arena. During the 2 mile drive, the sound was awful, but the car felt like it was driving normally.

I passed a Les Schwab (pat on the back for knowing that wasn’t what I needed either) and found a rinky dink car repair place behind a body shop and next to Enterprise rent-a-car. It was closed.

I decided to try my luck at the car dealership across the street from Les Schwab. It’s an American car dealership, but a service departments is a service department, right? I said, “I have the wrong kind of car, but it’s making a funny noise…” After taking a lap around the parking lot, the mechanic agreed. Yes, in fact, it is making a noise.

Now, instead of whiling away my afternoon at Starbucks (which I considered walking to), I’m at a hotel restaurant. I’m told the dealership has a nice waiting room, but lacks an internet connection. The hotel restaurant has wi-fi, a lovely vegetarian sandwich and beer-battered french fries.

I may even still make my afternoon appointment.

Update – 17 minutes later: Gravel got all up in the wheel part or something. Fixed now. Still time to get to Starbucks. Or, you know, take a nap in my car.

The girl with the Isis tattoo, part 2

Getting a tattoo, it turns out, is a lot like buying a house or a used sectional couch.

When I first saw our blue sectional couch in the corner of the townhouse where it was living with college girls, I thought it was in near-perfect condition. But when we got it home, I noticed that there were more tears and areas of wear than I had seen upon first look. Oh, it’s not as good as I thought. Have I made a terrible mistake? In that case, actually, I didn’t mind the wear and tear, because I knew it was just a matter of time before Leo ate the couch. No point starting out with something mint.

Had a similar experience with my house. With every house I took a second look at. There’s so much excitement at having found, perhaps, The One, that the mind overlooks all those little things, like mismatched window sills and frames, and cigarette smoke stains on the ceiling. Once the commitment is made and there is no going back, all the imperfections leap out and leave doubt. The stakes were higher with the house, of course, since it cost 1,000 times more than the couch. We repainted the ceilings before we moved in, but left the mismatched windows. I don’t mind them so much.

While the monetary cost of my tattoo was less than both the couch and the house, the commitment was more serious.

I shopped around for a tattoo parlor where I felt comfortable. The two places that were recommended to me by big dudes with big tattoos intimidated me. I went with the place that catered to first-time tattoos for young women. Private rooms. Maybe a little more expensive than the others, but this wasn’t the time to skimp.

In hindsight … I might have done it differently. Which is not what one wants to feel about a permanent life decision that she does not plan to make again.

Because my tattoo was so simple, I may have been assigned to the least experienced guy. Even though I purposely went to the kinder, gentler place, the dude wasn’t at all concerned about my comfort. Not that my nerves were overly wracked or anything, but I asked if I could lie down and he said, Sure, as long as my foot was still right in front of his face, two feet from the end of the bed. Which actually meant no, because in that case, there wasn’t enough room for my head on the bed. Rob offered to sit on the edge of the bed to prop up my leg, but the guy said he found that kind of distracting.

Was that a point when I should have said, “You know, maybe I’ll do this some other time. I don’t want to be permanently painted by a guy who is so easily distracted.”

The process was quick, but oh. my. god. It hurt. I had heard that the foot was a painful place. I have nothing to compare it to, but I can’t imagine it hurting any less on a fleshier part of the body. I was thinking: acupuncture, blood draw, along those lines. No, it felt like a chainsaw was carving into my foot.

I didn’t scream or cry or writhe or anything. What would the point of that have been? I merely gritted my teeth and turned my head away. Rob said later he couldn’t tell from my reaction how painful it was. I am such a champ.

Afterward, I was happy. It looked just the way I had envisioned. It hurt that evening like a bad sunburn, and it might itch more later, but the healing hasn’t been uncomfortable so far.

However, the next day, I experienced the second look phenomenon.

I had been under the erroneous impression that the artist would design the lettering himself. Several weeks ago, I decided on the style of writing I wanted — a lowercase calligraphy. I found it online and traced the letters from my monitor, carrying around the slip of paper in my wallet to show as an example.

My tattooist merely traced what I had traced, imprinted it on my foot and followed those lines.

Here’s where I had just the slightest tinge of … regret. Had I known my tracing was going to be followed precisely, I would have taken more care to make sure each i and s matched the other one. Instead, they’re not exactly the same. I was bothered by that the second day. Rob says it’s kind of cool, because it’s like real writing, not computer generated. And it’s cool that it’s “my” writing.

By the end of the third day, the buyer’s remorse was gone. Like my house, and my couch, I love my tattoo. It’s perfect.

The flip phone you’ll have to pry from my cold, dead hand

A year and a half ago, when I killed my Motorola flip phone, I replaced it with an identical model purchased from China on eBay. We were happy together for months before it malfunctioned. It stopped responding to any button I pushed.

I gritted my teeth and “upgraded” through AT&T, getting a red Sony Ericsson flip phone with no attractive screen on the outside (to display a photo of Isis) and teeny tiny buttons that make texting difficult. Not a huge deal, since I don’t text too much. I’m old, you know.

Then, not long afterward, the new phone stopped working. Doing that same thing where none of the buttons worked. I called tech support and the chickie asked me to open the battery cover and look for a little dot. It should be red or white. When I finally understood what she was talking about, I told her it was red.

She said, “If it’s red, it means it’s been water damaged and the warranty is no longer valid.”

Did you KNOW that? They installed a device so they can tell if your phone has been wet? Busted. The funny thing is, I don’t remember getting that phone wet. And the most ridiculous part is that the first Motorola, which I dropped one too many times so the screen no longer illuminated — its dot was still white!! The Chinese Motorola had a red dot of course, and had gotten wet a few times, but always before, it dried out eventually and worked again.

Which got me thinking. I put my SIM card back in the Chinese Motorola, and OMG, it worked!!

I stashed the Sony in my purse for emergencies and went back to using my precious Motorola. Until it stopped working again. One of the quirks I’ve discovered, when water has intruded, is that it vibrates and seems to think I’m pressing the buttons on the outside of the phone when I’m not.

By then, the Sony worked, so I went back to it for a while, testing the Motorola here and there to see if it responded to the buttons. A couple of weeks ago, finally it did. Hooray! I was so happy.

That same day, the phone was on the kitchen table while I worked at home. I walked across the house to do some cleaning, and when I returned, a water glass had been knocked over (Ahem! Leo!) and my phone, my iPod and my laptop were in a puddle of water. Just when the Motorola had dried out enough to work!!

The phone was the only thing affected, so I went back to the Sony. It was in the pocket of my hooded windbreaker on the day canoes landed at Swinomish last week. So it got soaked along with everything else as I took pictures in the pouring rain. (Oh yeah, my recently repaired Nikon D50 also is experiencing some electrical difficulties, such as not recognizing my external flash.)

Back to the Motorola I went.

Yesterday, there was a delivery of raw dog food that I was supposed to transport from Mount Vernon to Bellingham for a co-op I belong to. They make a really big deal about having your cell phone charged and on you during the process. There are a lot of people to keep track of. The thought crossed my mind that I should bring the Sony as a back-up, but I didn’t.

Then, at about the exact time the delivery was scheduled to leave Monroe for Mount Vernon, when I was expecting a call from the person bringing it to me, I spilled my Diet Coke on my phone. I immediately took off the cover to minimize the damage, turning over the phone so the battery area had plenty of air. The phone vibrated a few times and switched to camera mode by itself. It didn’t respond to the buttons, BUT I was able to receive calls on it.

By the time I had to call the people I was delivering to, the buttons worked again. Close call.

The price to replace this Motorola on eBay has gone up to about $150, otherwise I would stock up on the thing. I just know when the thing finally dies for good, the only phones on the market will be those newfangled smart phones.