No, she’s happy, really


See that hint of a smile?

She and five of her friends are being relocated to a nice place where they won’t disturb farmland or farmers anymore.

Unfortunately, she must have injured herself on the cage. Poor thing. Stew has done that before.

4 p.m. update: Oh dear. I’m sorry to report that she died en route. It did not occur to me at all when I first posted the picture that she might not make it.

I guess there’s a 10 percent mortality rate with elk transports. That doesn’t make me feel any better. Passive trapping is meant to be humane, but would it have been more quick and painless to let a farmer shoot her? And would she have survived if she’d been shot with a tranquilizer from a helicopter and transported unconscious?

Latest

They told me it couldn’t be done. Which oddly enough is what “they” said about installing a dishwasher.

I reluctantly agreed to let them put the new countertop on the old cabinet, and set aside my dreams of a new vanity with a patented bottom drawer across the bottom. At least I could get my money back for the cabinet, right?

Returning to the kitchen, and looking at the makeshift back cabinets on the backside of my dishwasher, I felt sad. Why can’t I have nice things? Why can’t I be a better do-it-myselfer? Why can’t I just hire some designer who will charge $20,000 to redo the bathroom? Why can’t I get on one of those HGTV shows?

But then the dude came out of my bathroom with good news: He could get the old cabinet out after all, should he go for it?

Hells yeah!

And did I want them to take out the next layer of gold tile?

But of course.

I asked the guy if it went faster than he thought…because the thing is in there already, and it was faster than I thought.

He said, “I had to do some pretty extreme things.”

Do I even want to know?

Just what I wanted to hear

The delivery/installation/old vanity removal guys are here. When they saw how the old cabinet is embedded in tile, they said, “This is going to be a job.”

Which wouldn’t be a problem, necessarily, if I could spend the whole day at home. But as luck would have it, I might have to go out into the woods and take some pictures of wild elk today. The scheduling of this event, of course, depends on the elk.

They’ve started hammering away. A good sign, perhaps, because I was thinking we might have to call the whole thing off when they asked where the main water shutoff is. I’m supposed to know this? Nobody told me I’d need to know this. Nobody else seems to know either. It’s not just me.

The right tool

random aside: OMG, are you watching 24? You totally should be.

Rob doesn’t really understand my need to redecorate our entire house. Maybe we should have discussed this before we got the place. I really hate the golden tiles in both bathrooms, but I have learned to accept them in the guest bath, because a pretty shower curtain ties the whole room together. When I say golden, by the way, what I mean is orange.

It’s time to redo the master bath. Starting with the vanity, because the sink is chipped. I successfully forced Rob to help pick out a vanity and countertop, which will be installed Thursday. Some of the golden tile has to come out with the old countertop, and since I want to remove all the golden tile, I thought this weekend was a splendid time to start.

Unfortunately, Rob’s dad thought we should start with a very high profile row above the lightswitch and proceeded to carve into the wall with a “grinder” which looked more like a circular saw to me. I took over the operation and managed to pry off exactly one other tile, next to the one Rob’s dad removed, and chip several in a lower spot above the vanity.

The grinder sparked and smelled smoky and was no fun at all. I kept at it a good 10 minutes longer than I should have, because I thought, “Surely I can do this. How hard is tile demolition?”

A couple of times my hand slipped and the unwieldy powertool skidded over some of the perfectly attractive white tile, leaving black marks.

Finally, I realized that the problem was not me, but the tool, and I set it aside. Yesterday I bought a smaller handheld grinder with a little cone-shaped bit…but really a hammer and chisel works best. I have now removed 3.5 tiles on the row Rob’s dad started, and 3 tiles on the lower section. Because the tiles were affixed to drywall, the surface underneath is a mess. I have many more tiles to remove, but I think I’ll wait til after the new vanity goes in. See how dirty I can get it the first week.

I said to Rob, “It sucks that even when we get the new vanity installed, the bathroom’s not going to look good because of the mess on the walls.”

He said, “I know!” In a tone that sounded suspiciously like I told you so. Not the most effective way to convince him that this redecorating business is terrific fun.

Today I picked up some wall patching goo, so we’ll see if I can cover up the evidence before the vanity installer comes.

Serious matters and not so much

Barney is doing well.

Here’s a picture from a couple of years ago.

He has a tumor in his jaw, which started bleeding yesterday. He had surgery to remove the necrotic tissue, which must have been what gave him such bad breath last time I saw him. As I understand it from my remote location, the next couple of days will determine whether we have Barney for as many as a few more months, or whether he will not make it to his scheduled road trip to Phoenix next week. He’s 13, but I’m still optimistic!

Here’s my completely ridiculous problem, especially by comparison. A meeting of people who do not regularly work out of this office was scheduled for 10 a.m. I thought I better bring my lunch, in case I was the only one here and needed to stay as long as the meeting went on. I brought some frozen edamame and a potato to microwave-bake, which for some reason, strikes me as an odd office lunch.

The meeting folks are not using the private, back conference room, however, but have gathered at a table in the main office, directly across from the kitchen. I was starving by the time I mustered up enough courage to microwave the edamame and retrieve my Diet Wild Cherry Pepsi. Now I really want my potato, but I’m embarrassed to make my lunch in front of strangers. And I’m not even the only one here, so I could actually go out for food, but I want the potato!

I love potatoes.

Oh wait, they’re leaving right now…

Dogs I have loved, and kinda loved

My little Barney face is having some health problems. Fortunately, I spent some quality time with him on my lap at the vet when I was home for Christmas…especially since I traumatized and neglected him the week I brought Isis into his home. I sort of knew when I said goodbye on Christmas (as opposed to Thanksgiving, when I was so stressed about taking Isis on the plane that I forgot to say goodbye to Barney), that it might be the last time I saw him.

I never really loved a dog before Barney.

Well, I guess I’ve kinda loved dogs before, but not in the way that causes total heartbreak when they’re gone. My brother chastised me recently for not caring when our first dog, a Springer spaniel named Fritzi, was hit by a car. Actually, he flat out blames me for her death (still), because I knew she had gotten out and hadn’t gone after her. We had just moved and she had gotten out a lot at our old house. She was hard to catch, so I just figured I’d wait ’til she came back. Didn’t factor in a negligent, possible inebriated driver.

I was 13 and I didn’t not care that she died. But neither did I go with my mom, my brother and the carcass to wherever it is that you take a dog carcass.

Our subsequent dogs were mistakes in judgment. Note to inexperienced dog owners: it is not wise to take your child to the shelter and let her fall in love with a dog that is being brought in by a nice couple at that moment and take it home that day. Especially when it is a much larger breed than you intended to get. Sasha was a barker and she mysteriously “got out” one day after repeated complaints by our next-door neighbors about the noise.

It also is unwise to take the last cocker spaniel in the litter. Apparently, when we took that puppy to the vet for the first time, the doc said he was a vicious dog and should be put down. I wasn’t the expert puppy raiser then that I am now, and I’m pretty sure it didn’t make Max less vicious to let him bark at me from the back porch every afternoon as I watched soap operas, trying to make myself invisible on the couch so he’d shut up. We held on to that dog until he bit the poolman. Mom bathed him and got him all pretty when she took him to the shelter, in hopes that some sucker might fall in love, but then he bit my mom in front of the shelter employee before my mom was even out of the lobby. We’re pretty sure he was sent to live on that proverbial farm that people talk about…

Barney, on the other hand, is perfect in every way. I had forgotten that he used to hump people’s legs, but it’s cuter when a Lhasa apso does it, isn’t it? We’d never had a dog before Barney who could be trusted to just hang around the house.

It’s the memories of those other “bad” dogs from the past that makes me marvel at how relatively well-behaved Isis is. She jumps a little, and she likes to chew on Rob, but we’re able to have her in the room with us when we’re home. Initially, we planned to not let her on the furniture, but she ruled against us on that one, and uh, we decided not to fight her on it. She knows who’s boss (us). I think. She just likes to leap up on the couch or the recliner and chew on a rawhide.

She has not yet kicked us out of bed, although Rob did give her the impression she is allowed up there. The last couple of nights, she has curled up for a few minutes at our feet, but then got bored and went back down to the floor where all the toys are.

Marking time

Just 6.5 hours away from another 3-day weekend. This is the life. I should note, however, that I have been coming to work on days when others heeded the TV’s advice to stay off the roads because of the ice.

10.5 hours away from a new cell phone billing cycle. What the hell did I do last month? Make the mistake of thinking mail holidays were also cell phone holidays? If they’re not charging for parking meters, why can’t they not count cell phone calls? I resolve to be more careful in the coming cycle.