Category Archives: Dogs

August 21, 2014 · 22:54

Flash Fiction: Zombies Don’t Eat Fuchsia Poodles

This week the Flash Fiction Challenge from our beloved Chuck Wendig is to write a story with a title including a color. I rolled a 6, so I get to play with “fuchsia.” Okay, I’ll admit, I hear the word all the time, but I have no clue what it looks like, so, “Hello, Google?”

Fuchsia

So, you wonder how a story gets written out of thin air? If it’s a story like this, it helps to have a Robin Williams special going in the background. You sit and think and you’ve got nothing. Any genre? Not a glint. Any style? Not a glimmer. Any ideas? My skull is pulling a hard vacuum. “This one is pretty easy,” Chuck said. I might have a different opinion.

You’re looking for any kind of a hook, a starting point. Finally, the Muse takes mercy on you and says, “Robin thinks you should write something silly.” Great, now my muse is talking to Robin Williams, and Robin is stating the semi-obvious. Say hello for me!

Does Robin have any suggestions on how to write this thing? “Yes,” says the muse, “you should start by thinking up a bizarre, silly, stupid title and then figure out what the story has to be for it.”

Oh, you mean like this one?

Thanks, Robin. Again. For everything.

ZOMBIES DON’T EAT FUCHSIA POODLES

Our backs against the tree, trying to pant and wheeze as quietly as possible while being absolutely motionless, I tried to analyze where the experiment had gone wrong.

Since the ‘Lypse we had all been busy trying to either be fast, good, or lucky. We hadn’t had a lot of time to figure out what had happened, or why, or who was responsible. Research was the luxury of a populace which wasn’t constantly five minutes away from being ripped to shreds. No atheists in foxholes? Maybe, but definitely no paranormal epidemiologists had survived the ‘Lypse.

A few of us had tried to keep our eyes open as we ran for our lives. We would jot down some notes when we found shelter. It was up to us to remove ourselves from the endangered species list – no one was going to do it for us.

There had been a lot of changes real fast. The zombies were the most obvious, but there were massive, overnight, seemingly random mutations throughout the animal kingdom. Among us survivors there were tales of stinging insects the size of blue jays down south, and dolphins big enough and mean enough to sink aircraft carriers along the coast. We hadn’t seen any of those things here in Minnesota. On the other hand, I personally had seen a herd of miniature moose the size of rabbits taking down a bear.

The household pet population had seemed to get hit particularly hard. As a result, no matter where you were, you had been attacked by zombies, and you had seen bizarre cats, dogs, hamsters, birds, snakes, goldfish, and pot-bellied pigs. There were huge ones, tiny ones, weird colors, and psychedelic patterns. Scales where there should be fur or feathers and vice versa.

It was like God had dropped some bad acid and took reality along with him on the trip.

I was the one in our pack who first noticed the growing population of the fuchsia poodles.

While the mutant pets had gotten weird, they hadn’t gotten deadly. Kittens still wanted to play with string. Puppies still wanted their tummies rubbed. They were just as much prey as we were when the zombies came through and they were far less prepared to fight back. Their populations had dropped faster than ours had.

Occasionally we would see packs of feral dogs. More and more they were comprised of fuchsia poodles. Not blue, not green, not yellow. Not Dobermans, not German shepherds, not retrievers.

Fuchsia. Poodles.

We were desperate. We were losing the war. We were being eaten. We had to do something.

Helen was convinced it was the fuchsia color that was the key. She argued we only saw fuchsia poodles because only poodles had turned that color. She went out and found every piece of fuchsia clothing she could and dressed in it head to toe.

It was Helen’s belief that the zombies couldn’t see anything fuchsia colored, sort of like how the Predator couldn’t see Arnold when he was colored in mud. She believed it right up to the point where she stopped screaming after the zombies got her.

The packs of feral fuchsia poodles got larger. The packs of feral humans got smaller.

A week ago my pack ran into another group that was heading north from the Chicago area. We gave them a place to stay overnight. Over a cold dinner we swapped stories and information.

Their leader had also noticed the fuchsia poodle anomaly. Better yet, she had seen in person what was happening. They had been hiding up in a stand of trees, waiting for a zombie pack to shamble on by, when a pack of dogs had run through. The zombies had started to attack the pack, but a handful of fuchsia poodles had counter-attacked without being touched, driving off the undead.

Other breeds, other colored poodles, all turned into zombie chow, while the fuchsia poodles could as well have been invisible.

I was tired of running and sick of being prey. The best defense is a good offense. Insert your favorite platitude here. I finally had a plan.

We kept our eyes open and the next time we saw a pack of dogs, we didn’t ignore them or scare them off. We tempted them with food, got them to come near, and performed a quick re-domestication operation.

So it was that I found myself strolling across an open field with two dozen dogs, including five fuchsia poodles, just tempting the zombies to appear. Which, of course, they did.

I don’t know what I was expecting. I guess I was hoping my new, magical, magenta canine friends would attack the zombies and protect me. I wanted to find the silver bullet that could even the playing field against this ravenous horror.

The dogs saw the zombies and took off running for safety. Some of the zombies broke away to chase them, but they were driven back by the fuchsia poodles, allowing the rest of the pack to escape.

The rest of the zombies kept coming straight for me. My friends in the trees yelled, “RUN!” I didn’t need to be told. The fuchsia poodles could not have cared less. I was not part of their pack.

So now we’re here, once again trying to catch our breath, once again trying not to give away our position. Failure is an option that equals a horrible, painful death.

The scientific method is apparently dead, along with ninety percent of the world’s population. So much for working hypotheses, testing of theories through experimentation, and revision of the theory based on new data.

We’ve been transported to a universe of chaos and insanity, but we probably won’t be here long.

The universe has gone mad. Rules? None. Logic? Dead.

“But that’s not the way it is,” you say, “it can’t be!”

Tell it to the zombies behind us and the herd of miniature piranha-like moose thundering toward us from the other direction.

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Filed under Critters, Dogs, Farce, Science Fiction, Writing

July 18, 2014 · 14:38

Evil Joey Chan

I’m more of a “dog person” than a “cat person,” which is not to say that I don’t enjoy a warm, purring ball of fluff in my lap on a cold evening. But given the choice, I would (and will in the future) have a dog (or two) but no cats. For now however, I “inherited” my daughter’s cat when she went off to college, so Joey Chan is “mine.”

The Long-Suffering Wife is mildly allergic to cats, so the two of them have long since reached an uneasy truce. The only time they’re supposed to have any real interaction is when I’m gone and Ronnie has to feed Joey for a day or two. Joey seems to be forgetting this as she’s gotten older and more senile (Joey, not Ronnie) and she will occasionally try to hop up onto Ronnie’s lap for petting and snuggles. Much hilarity has been known to occur during such events.

Both household critters, Joey the cat and Jessie the dog, are getting on in years. Neither is as spry as they used to be and they both sleep about twenty-three hours a day. (Since they used to sleep twenty-two hours a day it’s not much of a change.) We’ve noticed that both are exhibiting odd behavior. Jessie has started sleeping in places she’s never slept before, i.e., right next to my side of the bed, which makes it interesting when I get up in the dark and have to remember she’s there and try not to step on her. Jessie’s also doing that “digging through the carpet” thing that dogs sometimes do before they lie down. Another thing that she’s never done before, and another thing that’s a real joy at 3:00 AM.

Joey on the other hand is showing her senility in other ways. As the joke goes, she’s forgotten to be aloof. Where for years I was tolerated only because I was the “food guy,” now I’m the number one source of attention and petting and scratching. I don’t remember her ever wanting any attention or petting at all from anyone when she was younger.

The other thing she’s doing is taking over my office chair the instant I get out of it and then refusing to get up when I come back.

photo 1

 

Doesn’t she look innocent? “Who, me?” “Is this YOUR chair?” “I was just keeping it warm for you!”

photo 2

“No, that doesn’t mean that I’m giving it back. Go away.”

In the past when she did this there was an easy solution. Now it no longer works at all and she actually seems to enjoy it:

Good thing that she’s cute. And that she gives me an excuse to post “emergency cat pictures” at the end of a week where the world’s had a tough time.

Be cool out there, folks. The world’s a better place when we stop acting like assholes, and that goes double for international leaders. (You know who you are!) Do unto others and all of that.

Let’s put the “peace” back in “Peace out.”

Peace out.

 

 

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Filed under Cats, Critters, Dogs, Photography

July 15, 2014 · 21:20

We Have Dogs Because…

…some days you don’t have two neurons to rub together at the end of the day and all you want to do is post a couple of nice pictures to cheer everyone (and yourself) up because you try to keep the highs from being too high and the lows from being too low (the test pilots referred to this as “maintaining an even strain” according to Tom Wolfe) but it’s hard some days when you were foolish enough to get a little bit of encouragement and then when it gets smooshed like a bug you still have to go through the rest of the day despite the fact that you would really like to find a dark spot to curl up in and while you’re carrying on you see a bunch of bad car accidents near your home and you want to realize that it could be worse, you could be one of those guys, but that’s not helping much and then you get weird phone calls that just piss you off and when all is said and done you need some cheering up and while traditional (going back almost ten years!) internet wisdom says that cat pictures are the way to go you really would prefer dog pictures and you just happened to have found a couple the other day of the Lucky Puppy who was just the best dog in the world ever and you set them aside for just such a situation as this so that foresight is going to pay off in spaces since it will cheer me up to look at them and share them and THAT’s why we have dogs!

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July 13, 2014 · 21:45

Random Blatherationings For July 13th

We haven’t done this in a while, and since the muse-driven spark plugs in my brain seem to be missing on all four cylinders (I only wish that there were eight or sixteen), let’s see if this little exercise can jump-start the neurons. Remember, if you think there should be rules, they’re here, but the first rule of Random Blatherationings is that we’re making this up as we go along. What? You mean it’s not blatantly obvious?

Tonight’s three random seed words are “assentatory”, “maleberry”, and “sourwood.”

ASSENTATORY: The short definition is “flattering or obsequious,” but it’s an obsolete term. Apparently over a hundred years obsolete, since the last reference to the word seems to be the 1913 Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary. Looking for a reference where the term is used, I get nothing except a prompt asking if I’m really asking about “USS Sentry.”

Sure, let’s go with that! The USS Sentry is an Avenger-class mine sweeper (officially a “mine countermeasure ship”, or “MCM”), commissioned in 1989. She’s apparently based out of San Diego at the moment, with a complement of six officers and seventy-five enlisted, although there is a note on Wikipedia that she’s been designated a reserve ship and only at full crew-capacity when the reservists are aboard. Interesting.

I’m sure when people volunteer or enlist they all imagine that they’ll be driving a tank or on a nuclear submarine or aircraft carrier or flying an F-18. But some end up on the smaller ships that are just as important, just as critical with their jobs. It may not be glorious, it may not be flashy or spectacular, but all of the pieces count in the big picture. Plus, these days, it’s a job, and that’s not to be sneezed at.

MALEBERRY: Isn’t that where Opie, Andy, Gomer, and Aunt Bea lived? While the black and white, “aw shucks” attitude, and happy ending with goofy residents every twenty-nine minutes looks a bit dated, the show still holds up pretty well.

Plus, it gave us Ron Howard, who may have only been six years old when the show started in 1960, he must have really been soaking up knowledge about how things worked. As impressive as his acting credits might be (“Andy Griffith Show,” “The Music Man,” “Happy Days,” “American Graffiti”), his directing credits are just amazing. (We’ll just overlook the live-action version of “How The Grinch Stole Christmas.”) “Splash,” “Cocoon,” “Parenthood,” “Apollo 13,” “A Beautiful Mind,” “Rush,” and those are just the ones that pop out of the list as being fantastic instead of merely good. Best of all, he’s in negotiations to do a film version of Neil Gaiman’s “The Graveyard Book”? Please, please, please, please, please make that happen!

Ignoring my blatherationings above, a maleberry is “a deciduous, much branched shrub, Lyonia ligustrina, with dense downy panicles of small, bell-shaped white flowers — also called swamp andromeda.” Oh, yeah, that stuff. (I don’t know that I’ve ever seen it, and if I did, I didn’t know what it was.) Apparently it’s only found in the United States along the Eastern seaboard, inland as far the Ohio River Valley, then in the south along the Gulf Coast as far north as Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Tennessee.

It’s also apparently toxic if your dog eats it. Why your dog might be eating it is beyond me, but dogs do strange things. They’re weird creatures some times.

See, the blatherationings were more interesting! (That’s sort of the point.)

SOURWOOD: This is another word for the sorrel tree, which is great information if you know what a sorrel tree is. For the rest of us… Google it. It’s a big tree with big, long, flat leaves and bunches of little white flowers and pods at the end that look like tiny white bells. It looks like it can grow pretty much anywhere in the US except for the central-northern tier of states, Idaho over to Minnesota. From the pictures I see, it seems that it turns bright, bright colors in the fall, red, yellow, and purple, which I really like, but I can’t say that I remember ever seeing one.

I really enjoy the fall colors when the trees turn, something that I miss here in Southern California. We do have some trees that turn and some of them do so with spectacular color, but it’s a tree here or a couple there, all surrounded by dry brush, palm trees, cactus, and so on. In the midwest, northwest, or up in New England especially, it’s every stinkin’ deciduous tree from horizon to horizon that each turn their own palate of colors, with the pines and evergreens thrown in for contrast.

Of course, that simply a sign that snow is around the corner, and while that’s also something I miss in SoCal, I’m not so sure how well I’ll react to it if and when I end up back in a climate where there are actually four seasons. It should be “interesting” when it happens.

 

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Filed under Dogs, Entertainment, Flowers, Random Blatherationings

May 26, 2014 · 22:22

Coyote Close Encounter

I took Jessie out for her “evening constitutional” after the first period of tonight’s Kings game. (“Go, Kings! GO!!”) It turned out to be more exciting than I expected.

About 99% of the time we go out into the front yard, Jessie has to be on a lead. She’s old and creaky, but given something to chase, she’s a pup again and can get curious and/or territorial. Since we often have people walking their dogs, or just walking, it’s easier for everyone involved (and our homeowner’s insurance rates) if she’s on a lead until we can see what’s around.

Normally, if the sidewalks are clear, we’ll let her off the lead to sniff, check her “pee-mail”, leave her own, find a spot to poop, check to see if there are any squirrels in the date palm, any bunnies under the bushes, and so on. She won’t take off unless something provokes her, and even at that it hasn’t happened in years.

Tonight, as we hit the sidewalk, the coast was clear and she headed toward the driveway and mailbox to pee. I reached down to unsnap the lead — at which point a very mangy, skinny, and sickly looking coyote came out from behind the car, about seven or eight feet away. I think we were both surprised to see each other.

Needless to say, I left Jessie attached to the lead and locked it down so she couldn’t take off. She still had no idea that the coyote was there since she had her head down. But as soon as she looked up, as expected, she “poofed”, let out a growl, and started to move forward. I was ready for it and stopped her and the coyote didn’t wait around, crossing the street and standing on the sidewalk over there to watch us.

For the next five minutes or so, the Jessie and the coyote kept a very close eye on one another. Jessie didn’t try to go after her again, but neither of them ever let the other out of their sight.

We see coyotes around here every now and then, but this was unusual. You almost always see them at night, never in the day. They’re way too exposed and vulnerable during the day. In addition, this critter was emaciated, really, really thin. Finally, what I had thought were patches where its fur was patchy or mangy looked more like large, open sores on its sides.

I’ve never heard of a coyote attacking an adult. They’re opportunists and bandits, but they’re cautious to the point of cowardice. They have been known to attack small dogs in people’s yards, and given a chance they’ll take out a house cat, feral or otherwise. Bunnies make a great dinner for a coyote, as would a skunk or baby raccoon. (I think one of our adult racoons, one of which is running wind sprints on the roof as I type, would kick the butt of that scrawny coyote.) But mostly they like garbage and pet food left outdoors.

I wasn’t upset or scared at any point, but given the critter’s condition, apparent injuries, and unusual activities, I was concerned that it might not be normal, possibly diseased or even rabid. That’s a level of grief I could live without.

Finally a neighbor’s sprinklers turned on and the coyote slowly backed away down the block, always keeping an eye on Jessie. Once it got to the sprinklers it started to drink from the water on the sidewalk and in the gutter. That didn’t surprise me at all, given the severe drought we’ve got going and the lack of any kind of water up in the hills away from the houses.

I did take Jessie for a short walk down the block the other way, where there are neighbors who have small dogs and small children. While a normal coyote might not attack a human adult, I thought it conceivable that a starving, diseased coyote might try taking on a toddler.

Once again, the term “urban jungle” takes on a whole new meaning. Welcome to LA, don’t pet the coyotes!

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Filed under Critters, Dogs, Los Angeles

May 7, 2014 · 22:51

Dog Food

I was at the local branch of the national massive pet supply superstore the other day to get dog food. It turned out to be an exercise in frustration and a lesson in marketing.

Our dog can be a bit fussy when eating — she likes what she likes, and she doesn’t always like “new and improved” things. If they don’t have the exact kind of doggy bone treats that she likes, it can be an “adventure” trying to find a substitute that she does like. She prefers “chopped” canned food to the “stew” kind. (Of course, what she really prefers is our food, as in “people food,” but that’s another story.) And what she really likes and eats every day is the Pedigree brand of canned dog food.

I normally go to the national massive pet supply superstore and get 100+ cans at a time of four or six varieties, then mix them up so that she doesn’t get a month of beef, then a month of chicken, then a month of… You get the idea.

This time, I had to hunt all over the store to find the Pedigree dog food. All of a sudden, where it had always filled up thirty to forty feet of an aisle, six or eight shelves high, now it was maybe four feet of aisle, and only the bottom three or four shelves. Needless to say, the variety available and number of cans available was severely limited compared to before.

I was concerned (I don’t need the grief of trying to find a new primary canned dog food that the princess will tolerate), so I asked one of the store employees if there was a problem. Was Pedigree being discontinued or something?

Nope, they just have seriously downsized (as in reduced by over 90%!) the amount that they’re carrying, so that they can use the shelf space to bring me more varieties of other brands and more healthy options for me and my pet.

Guess what? I was skeptical of that justification. More to the point, I immediately felt that the BS level was knee deep and rising.

I took a look at all of those wonderful new options. Every one of them has some buzzword in the brand name, like “homestyle,” “natural,” “wholesome,” “organic,” or “wilderness.” They were all very proud of being made from prime rib, happy sheep, pure buffalo meat, Grade AAA llama meat, or free-range antibiotic-free conflict-free komodo dragon eyelids. A big selection of them weren’t even in cans, they were in a refrigerated section!

To absolutely no one’s surprise, all of these “new and improved” brands cost anywhere from twice as much to six or seven times as much as the “good old stuff” that Jessie’s been eating for years.

I don’t believe the national massive pet supply superstore did this for my benefit.

I don’t believe they did it out of concern for my dog’s health.

I don’t believe they did it because the food Jessie’s been eating her whole life has been bad for her.

Nope, call me crazy, but I think they did this because they’ve hired some “marketing experts” who believe they can screw the customer out of a lot of money.

By putting new, fancy, bright colored labels on dog food, they’re trying to convince everyone that we’re practically abusing our dogs by feeding them the same old food

By going off on all of these bizarre ingredients and so on, they want us to feel guilty if we’re not feeding them the latest, greatest, and trendiest.

Dear marketing experts, if you want to pay three or four times as much for dog food just because it’s got buzzwords printed on the label, knock yourselves out. But if you want to stop selling the brands I’ve been buying for decades just so (you think) I have no choice but to buy the new and improved dog food at the inflated prices, then you’re not very good “experts.”

You’re “one of” the national massive pet supply superstores, not “the only” one. That’s a critical distinction that you need to keep in mind.

Furthermore, I can still buy what I want to buy at places like the grocery store or the warehouse stores. I have been buying it from your store simply because your prices beat theirs by a few cents a can. However, if I used to buy at your store for $0.52/can instead of $0.58/can at the grocery store, but now the only choice you give me is to either buy Pedigree at $0.58/can at the grocery store or to buy Blue Harvest Organic Armadillo Meat at $1.50/can…

Dudes, it’s Economics 101, not rocket science.

Have these “marketing experts” ever heard of “The Law of Unintended Consequences?” Missed class that day, eh?

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April 25, 2014 · 19:38

Odds & Sods For Friday, April 25th

Item The First: The following tweet from CNN is offered as proof that President Obama reads this blog:

2014-04-24 Proof That Obama Reads My BlogIt’s obvious. I post pictures about my visit to Gyeongbok Palace (here and here) and the next thing you know, Air Force One is in Seoul and the President’s getting a tour. Since coincidence = causation, ipso facto, the President reads this blog. (Mr. President, give me a call at your convenience, I’ve got a few thoughts on planetary exploration and the NASA budget that I would like to discuss.)

Item The Second: When I talked about the Hugo Award nominations a few days ago I mentioned that some of the nominees might require some effort to track down, being published in places I don’t normally read. I had forgotten that since 2006, many (if not most, or all) of the literary nominees are available in electronic form to all eligible voters.

Of course, this year the twist is the inclusion of “The Wheel Of Time” novels (all fourteen of them) as a Best Novel nominee. People were wondering how that would be handled, whether or not they would include one novel or just not include any. Instead Tor has decided to include all of them.

That may or may not have any bearing on whether or not other works are included (it’s at the discretion of the author and publisher) but it instantly guarantees a new record for the number of Supporting Memberships for a Worldcon.

It works like this — you get the package of e-books and stories if you’re eligible to vote for the Hugo Awards. You’re eligible to vote if you’re either an Attending Member or a Supporting Member of the convention. Anyone can join. An Attending Membership is currently $205 (and the price will increase in July) and lets you attend pretty much anything at the five-day convention. (We won’t be going unless we win the lottery or something, a fact which displeases me. I really love going to Worldcon!) So if you’re going to be or can be in London in August, get an Attending Membership and have the time of your life!

If you can’t go, you can get a Supporting Membership for $40 (which will also increase in July) and while it doesn’t let you get into the convention, it does let you:

  • get a copy of the program book and other publications
  • vote on where Worldcon will be in 2016 (currently Kansas City and Beijing are competing for the bid)
  • vote on the Hugo Awards, which in turn means that you…
  • …get the books & stories in the voter’s packet.

Let’s do some quick math. The fourteen “Wheel Of Time” books currently are available in the Apple store for a total of $94.86. (For the sake of argument I’m leaving out the one prequel novel, but for all I know Tor might be including it as well.) “Ancillary Justice” is $8.99, “Neptune’s Brood” is $10.99, “Parasite” is $9.99, and “Warbound: Book III of the Grimnoir Chronicles” is $9.99. That’s the potential for $134.82 worth of novels for $40, plus (potentially) many of the best novellas, novelettes, and short stories of 2013, plus voting rights for the Hugos and 2016 site selection, plus the convention program book and other publications.

Now do we see why they’re going to be flooded with $40 supporting memberships?

Item The Third: This is what I have snoring on my left most of the day when I’m at my desk in my home office:

Joey_smallWhen the hummingbirds start hovering outside she gets a bit agitated.

Item The Fourth: The Beijing vs. Kansas City vote for the 2016 Worldcon Site Selection will be a tough one for me. I had an extremely good time on my one visit to China (Shanhai) and would love to go back to see Beijing. (If at all possible we never just go into town for the convention and then boogie back out. We always try to spend at least a few days to visit and see the sights.)

On the other hand, I grew up in Kansas City, Kansas (my elementary school years) and still have many things that I love about the city. (Chiefs! Chiefs! Chiefs!) It will certainly be a lot cheaper to get to KC than Beijing. That could decide it for a majority of US voters — but China’s a really great visit, so don’t rule it out, guys!

Then for the 2017 site selection, there are already bids for Japan, Montreal, Helsinki, and Washington, DC. Tough choice!  I also had a fantastic time on my visit to Kyoto, Japan (we’ll get to those pictures after the Korean pictures) and would love to see the country again. I’ve never been to Scandinavia, so Helsinki would be incredible. Washington, DC is one of my favorite cities on the planet, and I haven’t been there in over thirty years. As for Montreal, it’s okay, but we’ve been there, gotten robbed there, been there again.

Item The Fifth: This is what I have farting on my right most of the day when I’m at my desk in my home office:

jessie_smallShe loves her “desk cave”, but the semi-enclosed area tends to trap the odors. I’ve thought about putting in a fan and a venting system to the outside, but I fear that the neighbors over on that side would (justifiably) demand an Environmental Impact Report, which we would probably fail. Look at all the problems the Sriracha factory is having in Irwindale.

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Filed under Cats, Critters, Dogs, Fandom, KC Chiefs, Odds & Sods, Photography, Science Fiction, Travel

April 7, 2014 · 20:30

No Day So Lousy That…

In Colonel Chris Hadfield’s wonderful TED talk last month (see it! see it! see it!) he says that astronauts know that in space “there is no problem so bad that you can’t make it worse.”

Sounds coming from the other side of the desk are telling me that there’s no day so lousy that it can’t be made worse by…

…hearing the cat making that “gnnuuuurrchh”, “gnuuurchhaaa”, “gghhhaaaaurch”, “splat” sound.

…getting your tax returns from your accountant and seeing all of those zeros in the amount you owe in eight days.

…hearing the thirteen-year-old, arthritic, lame dog in the back yard suddenly tearing around at 100 MPH, going “OOOOWWW, WOOOOW, WOOOOW, WOOOOOOOOW” in the dark as she turns into White Fang, Dog of the North — and then you smell the skunk.

…reading the comments on any Internet news story.

…hearing your computer hard disk make that “click” sound, followed by a rhythmic “click-click-CLICK-click-pause” over and over, while on your screen you get some error message that you’re now too panicked to read.

…kidney stones.

…getting the “Thank you for applying, but after careful consideration of your resume” generic email on a job you really, really wanted.

…a phone call checking up on a deadline that you completely, 100%, totally forgot about.

…hearing “your” numbers called as the lottery winners, only to realize that after having tickets with those numbers every draw for the last ten years, you forgot to get a ticket for tonight.

…getting a call from the IRS about the aforementioned tax returns.

…NOT hearing the cat making that “gnnuuuurrchh”, “gnuuurchhaaa”, “gghhhaaaaurch”, “splat” sound, and then finding the “splat” part in your bare feet.

The good news is that the sun will rise tomorrow, and it’s got to be better than today.

Right?

Please say, “right.” Please?

(For the record, only one of these things happened today. But two others have already happened this month. I’m hoping none of the others do.)

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Filed under Cats, Computers, Dogs, Health, Job Hunt

March 25, 2014 · 22:37

Odds & Sods For Tuesday, March 25th

Item The First: On the second episode of the new “Cosmos” series, Neil deGrasse Tyson opened the lesson on evolution by talking about how humans had artificially bred dogs from wolves. In talking about this, he pointed out that we have bred for cuteness in addition to breeding for utility. When The Long-Suffering Dog sits in “The Desk Cave” (she loves it under there when I’m working), I’m wondering if we can breed for dogs that fart less? And can we please do it quickly?

Item The Second: Again we’ve gotten so blase about manned spaceflight. I tuned in on NASA-TV tonight at 19:25 expecting a show to start at 19:30 with live coverage of the Expedition 39/40 crew docking with the International Space Station. Instead I saw that they were already live and a lot of folks were huddled in groups around Mission Control. This is never good.

As we now thing we know, there was just a problem with the third delta-V burn needed to match orbits with ISS, so the burn was cancelled and that meant an abort of the “express” six-hour rendezvous flight plan. The failure scenario o the six-hour flight plan is the old, tired-and-true two-day flight plan. Everyone’s fine, the launch was flawless, there’s no indication that it’s anything other than some sort of software error.

But it was startling how quickly my brain went into “Apollo 1,” “Apollo 13,” “Challenger,” “Columbia” mode.

Item The Third: My Twitter feed is full of comments tonight from planetary scientists and the like (@elakdawalla, @PlanetDr, @Alex_Parker, @RonBaalke) about a news article that’s been released early. I guess there’s a major announcement coming out tomorrow from ESO. I’m assuming they’re talking about the European Southern Observatory instead of the Elder Scrolls Online, but I might be wrong.

Anyway, a couple of media places have released the embargoed story early. A part of the response, a new Twitter hashtag has been born, and it’s pretty funny. Check out #ESOrumors to see what I’m talking about. For example, @mcnees said “Hey no biggie, and totally just out of curiosity, but exactly how many nuclear missiles do we have?” @danielg1905 suggested, “Stronomers: ‘We’re not saying it was aliens . . . but it was aliens.”

Item The Fourth: Speaking of “Cosmos,” it has upset a number of fundamentalist groups that claim that Fox owes them “equal time” to talk about “intelligent design” if “Cosmos” is going to give a “one-sided” view of the arguments on evolution. A few thoughts:

  • This isn’t a political campaign, you have no right to “equal time.”
  • Hypothetically and parenthetically, if you were to win “equal time,” would you in turn be forced to give “equal time” to scientists and rational thinkers as part of every television program put on by some megachurch evangelist (i.e., blackmailing for dollars)?
  • Get over the “evolution is just a theory” argument! All it does is prove that you have no idea what the definition of “theory” means in a scientific discussion. Evolution is a “theory” the same way that gravity is and radioactive decay is. If you still don’t believe or understand, go jump off of a tall cooling tower into the core of a nuclear power plant. Enlightenment will await.
  • Not only are you not entitled to “equal time,” neither are the Flat Earth Society, the Ptolemaic fundamentalists who still believe in epicycles, the Mayan fundamentalists who believe that human sacrifice appeases the sun gods, or the Hindu fundamentalists who think that the Earth is carried around the sun on the back of a giant turtle. It doesn’t matter how big of a turtle they find. (Although, to be fair, if they could find a turtle the size of Saturn or Jupiter, I would be happy to accept at least the possibility that their theory was relevant. But can you imagine how much lettuce that turtle would eat?)

Item The Fifth: It’s so neat that our space program has taught all of us space cadets how to spell “r-e-n-d-e-z-v-o-u-s”. Is that a great spinoff, or what?

Item The Sixth: Someone the other day wanted to draw me into a political argument, and it was an argument, not a discussion. I wasn’t taking the bait, but after being pressed a bit I put it this way: “I hate all politicians these days. I don’t trust a single one of them, either party, local, county, state, or federal. On a scale of one to ten, I hate the Democrats about a twelve. You just think I’m a ‘liberal’ because I hate the Republicans about a thirteen.”

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Filed under Astronomy, Dogs, Odds & Sods, Politics, Space

February 12, 2014 · 09:12

Thirty-Seconds Of Comedic Horror

About 3:20 AM, I wake up because I’ve gotta pee. Leave the lights off so I don’t wake up The Long-Suffering Wife, there’s just enough light coming from the window and the various digital clocks to see where I’m going. Carefully step into the bathroom where the dog is lying on the floor next to the toilet. She is not going to move or get up (this is not news) so I contort myself to find a way to stand over her and hover over the bowl, leaning against the far wall for support with one hand while “taking care of business” with the other. There’s a little more light in here.

Just after liquids start to flow, something is seen out of the corner of my eye, moving between me and the window. It’s dropping slowly, straight down. Before I have time to react or move, the spider lands on my shoulder.

Chaos ensues.

The sleep-addled brain fragments and freaks out with multiple conflicting and simultaneous goals. Get the spider off of me! Don’t pee on the dog! Stand up so that support arm can be used to battle the spider! Don’t step on the dog! Turn on the light so I can see the spider! Can’t do that, not enough arms! Don’t pee on the wall!

As my head jerks, it hits the web the spider was descending with, draping the single strand across my face, futher invoking reflexive flipping out by my out-of-control meat-sack body. Of course, all of this also alerts the spider to the fact that “Bad Things Are Happening!” so it starts scurrying down my naked body looking for an escape route.

This doesn’t help.

Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! Don’t kick the dog! Spider! Spider! Spider! Don’t pee on the floor! Doing the spider dance while it runs down my back, but don’t move! Don’t fall down and break an arm, leg, skull, or anything else! Jeez louise, how much pee is there?! Where’s the spider, how huge is it, is it going to bite me? Pee, pee, pee! Dance, dance, dance! Twitch, twitch, twitch! Spider, spider, spider!

The spider now drops down onto the back of my leg, just below the knee. The leg muscles, already stressed from the awkward stance needed to lean over the dog to get over the toilet, now twitch involuntarily and go into a full-blown “charlie horse” cramp.

PAIN! Aaaaaaaahhhhh!!! Straighten the leg, stretch it out! But don’t move! Don’t scream! Don’t step on the dog! Don’t spray pee all over the room! Damn, that really hurts! Don’t you dare let the other the other leg cramp up too! Pain, pain, pain!

After a near eternity (ten to fifteen seconds, but all in super spider slo-mo) of panic, confusion, adrenaline, pain, and toilet training nightmares come to life, the flow of pee stops and the spider has fled. I can stand up, flip on the light, work out the leg cramp, and look for my long-gone arachnid archenemy.

No spider in sight, but definitely a web strand across my face. I wasn’t imagining it. Miraculously, no pee on the dog, on the floor, on the wall, on my foot, or on the ceiling.

The dog, of course, has slept through the whole ordeal, blissfully oblivious to the imminent catastrophe just inches away.

Once my leg stops cramping, I limp back to bed in the dark and crawl in. The Long-Suffering Wife stirs enough to mumble, “Everything okay?”

In the interest of brevity and the need to get back to sleep, let’s go with “Yes.” She can read this in the morning.

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Filed under Dogs, Farce, Paul