Quote

"Let us agree not to step on one another's feet", said the cock to the horse.

--English proverb

Quote

Sport is one area where no participant is worried about another's race, religion or wealth; and where the only concern is 'Have you come to play?'

--Henry Roxborough

Quote

He has all of the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.

--Winston Churchill

Quote

Football combines the two worst features of American life. It is violence punctuated by committee meetings.

--George F. Will

Quote

All cases are unique, and very similar to others.

--T.S Elliot

Gone hunting...

I am off to elk camp. I will be off-blog for a week. I will update you when I get back. Meanwhile, enjoy some quotes I like:

Who lies for you will lie against you.

--Bosnian proverb

Be careful, be very careful...

Appropriating pieces of the American Dream

My husband's grandparents and great grandparents worked hard and invested smart. They believed in this great land of ours, and the leaders chosen to run it. They did their part to bolster and support the economy, the war effort, the stock market, the infrastructure, and the education system. They bought stock in start-up companies, now Wall Street market leaders. They made careful provisions to leave these stock to successive generations of their grandchildren, my husband included.

Among the stock was GMC heritage stock, so called because it was so old. We continued to nurture the stock even in bad times, even when it no longer paid dividends, just like the original investors had. We believed in them and their wishes, and we believed in our country.

Last summer, GMC was turned over to the government, for all intents and purposes. I have never heard a word mentioned about what happened to the stock held by families like ours. Well, it is gone.

It was just simply dissolved, eradicated, disappeared. No hope for reclaiming it later. It is gone. We no longer have it. After a century of loyal investment, we are no longer owners of GMC stock. Stocks have been issued to employees, in a true socialistic fashion. But, the original investors? No kiss, no promise, no thank you, just worthless paper in our safe.

For the first time in a century, we can not give that stock to our children. It cannot help a child through college or medical school. It cannot help build a home, a business, a dream. Heritage stock embodied the American dream, and it, like the American dream for many of us, is gone.

Call the doctor, already!

Google image

I just watched a Viagra commercial. The commentator quickly reads the warnings and complications, adding: 'if you have an erection lasting more than four hours, call your doctor'.

This may be because I don't have bothersome lingering erections, but I'm thinking I would know to do that if I was a man and presented with the obvious symptom.

Who would not do that, call the doctor, I mean? It's not like you could mow the lawn or go shopping to get your mind off of It. I mean, you would be sort of locked into privacy, right? Your partner has left and gone shopping or to work, and you and It are, well, biding your time. All alone with a tent in your pants... For four hours?! My God, call the damn doctor already!

Keep your kitty safe

Put the hunting rifles away until elk season: check, wash the camo: check, vacuum up the pine needles... wait, what was that noise? Listen, listen, wait... there it is again. Coming from the gun safe.

Run through the combo, turn the crank, open the safe, and--theeeere's Kitty!

She is sixteen years old, and is still getting stuck in weird places.

At least I didn't have to remove the carpet and riser off of a stair in our newly built home to get to her, this time.

Winston the Wonder Dog: good/bad dog

Today, Winston just went all hinky, growling, hair standing up, going to the patio door. We opened the door, told him to go find the source of his upset. He stood at the screen door to the south, barking. My brave husband ventured out in the broad daylight to find a hawk on a close-by gate next to the doves! Winnie must have been reacting to the chickens weird 'bad thing from above' sound and got our attention! How cool is that? He got lots of praise.

But, later, after I tended and fed the animals, I looked out the kitchen window to see the same heroic Pugster lying on his tummy in a cage I open each morning to let the girls roam. He was eating fresh eggs! I hollered him out and we had a talk. I made him come in the house.

He came up to me almost immediately with his octopus, a stuffed toy he has had since babyhood. I didn't fall for the bribe. I just came from my bedroom. He left his offering on my pillow. Don't know if he was apologizing or paying his restaurant bill.

Darwin Awards

If you want a laugh, and want to restore your faith that some form of culling the herd is occurring, you need to go to this site and read: http://www.darwinawards.com

Here, you will find true stories of how the lesser fit among us have graciously taken themselves out of the gene pool in spectacular fashion.

Like this one:

She Talks Faster Than She Walks
2009 Darwin Award Nominee
Confirmed True by Darwin

(30 May 2009, Louisiana) Back seat drivers beware! Annoyed at how slowly her boyfriend was driving, Tamera B, 22, encouraged him to pick up the pace so she could get to work on time. Joking that it would be faster to walk to work, she opened the door of the pickup truck and stuck her foot out. Other drivers saw the woman open the door herself before falling out. Her death was ruled accidental. Deputies of the jurisdictional Sheriff's Office state that the truck was traveling at highway speed on Interstate 12 at the time of the incident. Or this: Saw It Coming! 2009 Darwin Award Nominee Confirmed True by Darwin (27 June 2009, Pennsylvania) A severe storm damaged power lines and left 17,000 homes without electricity. Mieczyskaw Mil, 64, was one of the affected parties. His power line serviced only 17 homes and therefore was one of the last to be repaired. Seven hours after the line fell, Mieczyskaw Mil finally lost his patience. The old man had been shooed away repeatedly by firefighters who were guarding the power line. "Police and firefighters literally chased him away. We did everything we could," said Dick Martinkovic, commissioner of public safety in Sullivan County. But they were not prepared for the homeowner's sudden bold move. Frustrated with waiting, Mil emerged from his home shortly after midnight with an industrial circular saw in his hand and plastic bags on his feet. He stood in a puddle of water and attempted to saw through a 4800-volt feeder line that was dangling off the pole. He fell and became tangled in the hissing and buzzing live wire. While emergency responders waited for utility workers to shut down the power, Mil was busy being killed by continuous electrocution. The story says it all. He was repeatedly shooed away from the power line, but insisted on cutting it while standing in a puddle, and now is safely out of the gene pool. Thanks for doing our species a favor, Mil!

The Darwin Awards:

What are they?

The Darwin Awards commemorate individuals who protect our gene pool by making the ultimate sacrifice of their own lives: by eliminating themselves in an extraordinarily idiotic manner, thereby improving our species' chance of long-term survival. In other words, they are cautionary tales about people who kill themselves in really stupid ways, and in doing so, significantly improve the gene pool by eliminating themselves from the human race.

These individuals carry out disastrous plans that any average pre-teen knows are the result of a really bad idea. The single-minded purpose and self-sacrifice of the winners, and the spectacular means by which they snuff themselves, make them candidates for the honor of winning a Darwin Award.

(the above from the Darwin site)

How cool is that? A posthumus prize for checking out of Life!

Read and enjoy!

Medical terminology

Images of the unfortunate or just plain stupid people medical personnel are faced with everyday, from Google)

As I have noted in past blogs, we medical types have developed our own language, usually used to deal with the frustrations, pain, and stress of lives spent taking care of others. Others who seem determined to mistreat themselves in the most shocking and sometimes heartbreaking ways.

Like, the young man who presented in the Emergency Department, noting on his intake sheet 'bleeding scrotum' as his reason for seeking treatment. I took him back to a room, gave him a gown, and returned to look at the offending scrotum. To my surprise, he had recently had an orchiectomy, that is, a testicle had been removed. The other was not there, having been removed previously, judging by the scars. I asked him what had happened, and he told me he had removed it himself a week prior, and the incision wouldn't stop bleeding. He had removed his first testicle two years previously, and it hadn't bled like this. When I asked him why he had done this, he said, 'Personal choice.' He was accompanied by his fiance, a lovely young woman.

Or like the 785 pound woman who had laid down on her couch a year and a half earlier, weighing 490 and, in her depression and grief over her father's death, never got back up. Paramedics had to cut the couch fabric to take with her because it was bonded and rotted to her necrotic tissue. While taking care of her that first night when she arrived, we slipped in the pus that dripped onto the floor under the gurney. We all burned our shoes after the shift.

I have a shirt that says, 'Hi, I am your nurse. What stupid fucking thing have you done to yourself?' And, you know, that is how you feel sometimes, watching these patients troop through with maladies that deserve a Darwin award.

So, here are some more abbreviations to bring you up to speed on modern medical terminology:

Giving a shot to a fat person: harpooning

Motorcycle: Donor cycle

GPO: Good for parts only

CNS/QNS: Central nervous system quotient not sufficient

Gas passer: anesthesiologist

Rear admiral: gastroenterologist

Plumber: urologist

The house red: blood

TMB: diagnosis of 'too many birthdays'

NTB: not too bright

LOL/NAD: Little old lady/no acute distress

ETOH/FO: ETOH (chemical shorthand for alcohol/fell over), also related to

AGA: Acute gravity attack

Looking for a new nest

My husband and I are house hunting, as I have mentioned before. I had absolutely, positively made up my mind to stay in the cold, rainy valley of my upbringing. He wanted to be in the nearby high desert town that bears a resemblance to Aspen. But, he said, you ultimately have the say, meaning me.

Well, at this point, we are looking for homes in that ski resort town in the mountains. I know.

It's not that I don't like the town; I love it. As a newly wed couple, we had moved to that very town and lived there for over two years before family responsibility to George's aging parents called us back to the valley. It's just that I am afraid I will see my kids a lot less if we move there.

The real estate selections are newer, grander, more numerous, and a better value. George will be retired soon, and I can go where I want. Nurse work, especially for a critical care nurse, is everywhere. So, I have no reason to not want to go. Except for my kids.

'Well, hell', George says (he talks like that), 'the kids don't even know where they're gonna be in a couple years, and they can hop a flight from anywhere'.

Me: 'Um, yeah, I know, but what if they don't?'

Him: 'Then they'll miss out on some good times and some good meals...'

See how simple being an empty nest dad is?

Anyway, it is strange looking at homes with the idea that we are just a couple now, not a family of five with active kids who need their space. Of course, the house will be large enough to accommodate visits from them, but I really don't know if any one of them will ever live under our roof again. And that is so strange to me, to know that they don't consider their home with us any longer. After all we have been through, it is down to just us two, me and George.

It is the natural way of things. It is gratifying to watch the ones we have prepared make a success of their lives in the real world. It is just, I don't know, so soon, I guess.

I'm telling you, if you have kids at home, don't wish them older or gone. Get down and roll in your parenthood and the proximity to them. Make it count. Take it from me, it goes by fast. Too fast.

Before you know it, you're looking for a new nest for just two.

Shed antlers

Right after the bucks and bulls drop their antlers for the year, our family finds it fun and relaxing to go to the wintering grounds and look for shed antlers. It's like a glorified Easter egg hunt.

But, it gets us out of doors, active and in healthy air. Often, it is 12-18 degrees Fahrenheit at night and 25-30 during the days. We commonly hike up to six miles a day, and we see a lot of wildlife.

The video clip shows how difficult it is to spot a shed. They look like the dry sage limbs lying around. The only sound on the video is the wind.

Autumn musings

Google image

The rain has begun. Didn't take long for me to be 'slogging and blogging' again, did it? I have thought about changing my header, but I can't bring myself to take 'an old Chihuahua' off of it, so I have left it.

But, I digress. The rain. It's baaaack... The leaves are turning and some are falling. The nights are chilly. Methinks the autumnal equinox doth approach. Either that, or fall is here. It gets me thinking about other autumn seasons.

I love the fall. The colors, the smells, my birthday, the turning to homier pursuits, hunting, my birthday, the approaching holidays. In my childhood, it was a time when I could stop work in the fields and use my money to buy school clothing and shoes. New shoes! We got them once a year, when we started school. By summer, we cut the ends out of the toes or we went barefoot.

This is the first year I have not helped a least one of my kids with back to school needs, either supplies, clothes, furniture or linens. After twenty-some years, that's odd. It feels like I am being remiss in my duties as a mother. I miss it. Just another unexpected 'gotcha' for the newly emptied nest mom.

Think George would stand still for me dragging him around shopping for him, making him try things on, fitting him for shoes, getting him a backpack and filling it full of essentials? It makes me laugh to think about it. His idea of essentials for the backpack would be plenty of snacks, beer, game regulations, snickers candy, and some more snacks.

six months 'til tax day

Don't forget: six (6) months 'til April 15th, tax day for all us Obama lovers. Plan ahead!

Albert, the basket case

Today, I looked outside into the screen room/lanai/Florida room thing and observed that the basket that we use to block the pet door was in its usual 'not in use' place, on the step up to the pet door. This was about four o' clock, maybe three thirty.

George came home about five thirty. He noticed Timora, our little hen, on the roost in her's & Albert's cage, alone. Winnie the Wonder Dog came in the pet door as George was going through the person door. Winnie paused and sniffed at the basket, which George observed was now upside down on the floor. He thought 'I wonder', and picked up the basket, and yep, there was Albert.

He apparently had tried to fly up on the basket and flipped it onto himself. He made no noise or commotion. I am glad I remembered that the basket had been upright, and about what time, or I would have felt awful, wondering how many hours ago he had become a basket case!

Mother/Earth

Google images

The dry snow of the high Cascades slanted down softly, tiny dry flakes with miniscule ice crystals sprinkled within. They clung to the trees and the sage, millions piling up to soften the harsh dusty outlines of the high desert forest.

Any deer that I might see would appear as a ghostly gray image, as if far off and insubstantial, impossible for a mere mortal hunter to kill.

The sound was almost silent, a distant hushing interrupted by muffled crackles or thumps. An alone sound.

The air was so cold going into my body that my nose and lips burned, my lungs were clearly outlined within my body by the frigid sensation of icy air deep within. I snuggled my nose and mouth into the fleece at my neck. The fleece felt like a baby blanket to me, as soft and comforting as those I had tightened around my babies.

Just then, a tiny snowflake skittered over the surface of my cheek as it floated earthward. It was dry and fluttery, reminding me of a baby's eyelashes closing near my skin.

How profoundly the journey of motherhood has altered my perceptions of every aspect of life. I feel closer to the changes, the seasons, the tiny appreciations of the Earth. She and I brought forth life, nurtured and grew it, and now continue to support and nourish it with food and water and rest time and encouragement.

I do not find it incongruous or inappropriate that I am touching motherhood in my thoughts while engaged in predatory hunting. Like the wolf, the lioness, the bird, the bobcat, like mothers the world over in all biological strata, I harvest the food that will feed my family. I feel good that it is natural, lean, free of additives. I feel gratified for seeking and bringing it home. It is part of motherhood and of a nearly forgotten circle of food and life.

Unpredictable

Google images

Animals are unpredictable. We like that about them, mostly. That characteristic provides us with hours of entertainment, titillation, and excitement. When it is our little Fluffy or Slappy or Goofy, we prefer predictability bordering on full control of the little darlings.

I give you some pictures of circumstances where unpredictability became the order of the day. Wonder how these situations turned out...

Non-existent deer

Google image

There are no deer to speak of in the Fort Rock Unit. I looked. I tracked. I got up way too early, before dawn, in 9 degree weather. My family and friends and I covered scored of miles over the weekend, moving, moving, moving.

Sitting, listening, sneaking, strategizing. And no amount of the aforementioned will scare up deer that are not there. Few tracks, few sightings, no killing.

Well, that's why they call it 'hunting', and not 'harvesting' or 'killing'. We went, we hunted. Score: deer 1, humans 0.

Take that, you folks who think that humans have the advantage. And, between all the hunters, we put hundreds of license and tag dollars into the game management system. Much more than the average bunny hugger does in a lifetime. And ya know what? I'm glad to do it. My family and I bonded, we practiced our sneak and stalk, we got out in the woods, and we got tired and dirty.

That means that the season was a success.

Animals

Google image

Animals are part of my life. They enhance and enrich it. They make me feel everything God meant for humans to feel in this life; love, hate, anger, benevolence, tolerance, satisfaction, frustration, impatience, peace. And more.

Whether from chickens, dogs, horses, goats, cats, wild song birds, skunks or feral cats, the emotions are real, raw and unedited. We feel a certain superiority over animals, and the bible says we should. If that ain't your guide, Darwin fills in the rest.

Regardless, we attempt to set up success with our domestic animals; for behavior, for breeding, for increased enhancement of our expectations. Good eggs, chicks or pups when we want, resistance to disease, good behavior, are all common outcomes we strive for. But, alas, nature and the organisms resist, and we are often subjected (or treated) to unexpected, unplanned for, and unacceptable results.

And, how often are we begrudgingly delighted by the outcome? Come on, power issues and animal husbandry and eco-crap aside, isn't it great when a hen goes all broody and a few weeks later, emerges with a bunch of fluffy, scrappy little chicks that you would have never allowed to hatch if she had laid the eggs in the proper designated nest? Isn't it cool when a mating pair of mallards show up to nest in your back yard, requiring you to protect them from pets and family (even being unwilling to light the bonfire in the pit out back?)?

It has been said that life happens when you are making other plans, and animals are the authors of that school of thought. They don't do so well with plans, especially those that don't include their own particular chaos theory.

And, how blessed we are that that is true. And, how wonderful are the humans that appreciate and accept the unexpected and unscripted outcomes, allowing nature and the animals to do a little tailoring in the fabric of our lives.

It gives a glimpse of wildness, a closer acceptance of the bigger ecology that we do not, and cannot, control.

Female imperative

Google image

As a matter of biology, if something bites you, it is probably female.

--Scott M. Kruse

Shared grief

(Winnie rests his chin on my foot. He is not to be ignored. He knows if I am sad...)

Today, I disassembled the memorial to my little girl doggie friend, Caliente. The 'shrine' had previously been moved from the downstairs family room (where her little bed had always been) to the side of my bed upstairs. Filled with her toys, her warm winter sweaters, the sympathy cards from her vet and her many family loved ones, it was a last sweet reminder of a decade filled with love, laughter, tenderness, and goofy behavior.

When I moved it upstairs, five months ago, it upset Winston the Wonder Dog, my granddog. He repeatedly brought her toys back downstairs to their previous spot, where Cali had kept them. Faced with a closed door, he eventually gave up his efforts to put Cali's space back to her liking. Today, I upset his (and my) world. I disassembled her shrine.

'Okay', he must have thought, 'time to my renew efforts to put things right.' He pushed my hands aside, pawed through her toys and sweaters, and began to carry everything back to their original spot that I had changed over five months ago. He even went way outside normal character and climbed up onto the dining room table (!), where her favorite toys had been placed recently, her two alligators, Lally Gator and the Big Green Thing. Winston took them firmly in mouth and returned them to Cali's corner.

Well, I just broke down. And that damn Pug jumped up and licked my tears. I couldn't even push him off my lap. He was relentless in his comfort and his commiseration. No escape. So, I gave myself over to our mutual grief and we just cried. And missed our friend and loved one, Caliente.

I don't know when the time is right to move on. After the loss of both parents, I only know that it always hurts. And, you know, right now, it hurts. It hurts me, and it hurts the the Wonder Dog. For that, I am so sorry.

Tonight, it was with tears and gratitude that I bid him good night. I hope he gets as much from our relationship as he has given me. What must his life be like, to look at this big blonde gramma who cries so easily, and feel the urge and responsibility to comfort her? Wherever my sweet Cali is, I know she must be as grateful as I to see his careful ministrations to my broken heart.

Sleep well, little hero, silly little Winnie the Wonder Dog.

Hunting

I have been hunting. Where there is no internet, where I take no computer, and where technology is scarce.

I have not blogged. But, I put every experience into words, in my mind, as if I was sharing it with you, my reader.

I have a lot to share. Each snowflake, each sigh of the wind, each rush of excitement at a subtle sound, will be chronicled.

But, tonight, at midnight, after getting home from opening weekend, I will sleep...

Quote

I have never seen a wild thing feel sorry for itself. A little bird will fall dead, frozen from a bough, without ever having felt sorry for itself.

D. H. Lawrence
English novelist (1885 - 1930)

Quote

"I will only discuss anti-hunting issues with vegans who are wearing plastic shoes."

--Massad Ayoob

Quote

“There is a passion for hunting, something deeply implanted in the human breast.”

Charles Dickens quotes (English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian era, 1812-1870)

Hey, Daddy...

Google image

Today, in the early hours of the day in 1978, my father died, in my mother's arms. He was scared, and blinded by the toxic build-up resulting from renal failure. He asked her if she thought he was faking it.

I got the call that morning at 6:30 a.m. I lived in a house with a man, my husband of a few short months. He was a friend, a scuba diving buddy I had married after George broke up with me. After my parents had requested that I marry him, now, so that Daddy could be content in his illness, knowing that I had "someone to take care of" me. He said his dream was to walk his last daughter down the aisle. The other daughters been handed over to a man by age 18, none yet out of high school. I was a hold-out, an enigma, an old maid and a failure to my parents.

Before I even told the man I had married (a few short weeks earlier), even before I awakened him with my painful need, I placed a call to the man I am married to now. I longed to hear him say it would be okay, that he would make it okay. But, at that early hour on a Saturday morning, he was not home; maybe, his roommate chuckled, he had gone home with someone he met in a bar. I left a message with his roommate, a message never returned.

I got through the following days, the shock, the grief, the disbelief that only a 21 year old can feel at the sudden death of her foundation, her daddy. My then-spouse was supportive and kind, having lost his own father at age 16. But, it was then that I realized that I only belonged to myself, that my father's desire for me to have 'someone to take care of' me didn't take into consideration my own ability, education, choice, and resourcefulness.

I was living my father's desire for my life, not mine. A few weeks later, I filed for divorce. I had given my father what he wanted and needed at the end of his life, and now it was time to move on, to give me what I wanted and needed in a life not yet formed or determined.

Five years later, I married the man I called that morning. That was twenty seven years ago.

Daddy, I miss you. I have someone now, someone more like you than I wish to acknowlege, who I take care of as much as he takes care of me. We would have gotten there, anyway, I'm sure. I am sorry I couldn't tell you 'no' when you told me to marry my buddy, the guy I left behind. I hurt him, and I hurt me.

And, you died anyway.

grenade

My house is representative of a hunting household. Right now, during the season, it looks like someone lobbed a grenade into a sporting goods store. Equipment, supplies, boots, and essentials everywhere. The kids are way bigger, each year, so a lot of the stuff is obsolete. That, I jettison, in keeping with my new attitude of 'keep to the basics'.

But, newer and bigger stuff takes it's place, and it is up to me to sort, clean, organize and store it. The kids, of course, are busy at school. They call with lists and last minute worries, expected in the experienced hunter who has to rely on someone else to pack for them.

I also take food orders. My middle son, especially, worries about our diet in camp. Seems that he, as his siblings have, realize that Dad's diet of steak and noodles won't cut it for them. I have risen to the occasion, preparing chicken fettuccini, salads, meat loaf with lots of veggies, homemade clam chowder, cornbread, brown rice, fresh fruit, you know, all the stuff to fuel young athletic bodies in training.

I have always done so. The Dad unit has not. He partakes of a simple and probably dangerous diet that nearly thirty years of effort on my part has not altered. Thank goodness for statin drugs...