TortoiseGeek's Burrow

Not Dead, Just Busy!

2010-08-26T16:57:00.000-06:00

...And we're back. That was a long hiatus, huh?

I'm not dead; just busy with a new job. I'm the official Institutional Researcher for New Mexico Tech these days. I spend my days looking at spreadsheets and databases, crunching and sorting numbers. It sounds boring, I know, but I really do like it.

For example, I just completed a grade study for Physics I and Physics II, figuring out the failure rate for each section spanning the past five years. This is actually useful information for the department to have since they've instituted different teaching methods and would like to know if their changes are paying off.

That's the benefit of having a full-time Institutional Researcher, rather than a part-time one (as I was for many years). In moving from Research Services Manager to Institutional Researcher, I basically traded six part-time tasks for one full-time job that I can really focus on.

I'm in the Registrar's Office these days, in a newer building with better climate control. I still have my fish tanks, but the painted turtles had to go back to their pond, because they'd become too large to be kept in an aquarium any longer.

I miss working with the faculty on getting their proposals submitted, but I still do get to work with some of them, just in a different capacity: now they need demographic data for their proposals and reports.

I've made some inroads into building a data warehouse for institutional data. I hope to be able to train some of the departments on how to access the data themselves, rather than continually having to ask me to get it for them. We'll see.... we all know how resistant to change a bureaucracy can be.

Back at the homefront, we're back up to four kitties, a new one having appeared to take Kiddo's food bowl, but not his spot in my heart. We finished (finally) the box turtle pen. The tortoises are huge and getting heavier all the time. We need to build a heated shed for them because I'm not sure I can lift them into the garden cart or wheelbarrow to get them to their old winter shelter (a heated room in our shop) any more.

Bobby Lesperance, who helped us with the irrigation and mowing chores on our property, and who kept his Appaloosa horses and mule in our back field, passed away unexpectedly in April. He is very much missed.

Well, that's about all I've got. Just wanted to reassure anyone who might be concerned about the lack of updates to this blog.

Goodbye, Kiddo

2010-01-17T21:24:00.003-07:00

My boy, my little guy, my hunka hunka purrin' love.
Old age was not kind to you.
But you're at peace now.

I will forever miss you.

Welcome to The Property of Misfit Cars

2009-12-09T09:42:00.007-07:00

How apropos: Last week, CBS showed that stop-motion animation holiday classic Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer. You remember the Island of Misfit Toys, of course? Where all the unwanted, weird, eccentric toys go?

Well, we have that with cars. We're definitely The Property of Misfit Cars. And it's finally reached a breaking point. Let me introduce you to the inmates:

1. 1997 Dodge Dakota with 235,000 miles on it. It's been through a major hailstorm, so it's badly dented and divoted everywhere. It's been in the process of dying for about three years now. It's had a constant problem with the power steering fluid leaking -- by constant, I mean that's it's been leaking PS fluid for about 5 years now, it's been "repaired" several times, and yet it still drips.

The Dakota has, in the past year: had all four shocks replaced, at the cost of $1200; clutch plate and bearing replaced, at the cost of $300; water pump replaced at the cost of $400; front brake rotors resurfaced and pads replaced at the cost of $600.

Now the Check Engine light is on, it runs like crap, and smells like it's burning. Lovely. Another X hundred dollars needs to be coughed up to try to save this crumbling piece of junk. I'm not sure I'm willing to have this new problem fixed, but I may have no choice.

2. 1997 Geo Prizm with approximately 85,000 miles on it. The clearcoat on this car is peeling like a bad sunburn. It vibrates like a Home Depot paint shaker at speeds above 45 mph -- so basically, pretty much anytime you drive it. The driver's side seatbelt is nearly impossible to use because it has a problem with the ratcheting mechanism. It also needs new tires.

I drove it into town yesterday. Last night it wouldn't start for the drive home. It's got a new battery. The lights were not left on, so I have no idea what's going on with it. It simply will not turn over, at all. This car's nickname is the Piece of S#!t Car for a reason. The gasoline in the tank is worth more than the rest of the car.

3. 1993 Ford Ranger with about 70,000 miles on it. This was my mom's truck, so it arrived on our property with very low mileage. We've since run it up considerably.

You drive this truck more by aiming it than actually steering it since it wanders like a beagle on a rabbit trail. It has newish tires. And a new battery. It also has a bedful of turkey poop, since the feral turkeys that adopted us just love to perch on the sides of the bed and poop into it. Their claws have also scratched the paint all to hell.

There is a problem with the gas tank that makes it leak gasoline when you fill up the tank. But it runs. That is its saving grace right now.

4. 2001 Dodge Intrepid, with about 68,000 miles on it. Our newest car, which my mom gave us when she got a Honda Civic. This one starts and runs. It's comfy. It even gets relatively good gas mileage in spite of it having a six-cylinder engine.

Now, though, it's developed a problem with the venting system for the gas tank. The vent that allows air to leave the tank as it's displaced by the gasoline being put in has clogged. So it takes about 15 minutes to fill up the tank, and you have to constantly start and stop the gas pump handle. Alan googled this, and it's a known issue with 2001 and 2002 Intrepids. How to fix it -- and how much that will cost -- is another issue entirely.

I also have two motorcycles that are sitting underneath covers because it's simply too cold to ride now. I commute most of the year on one or the other since they get between 43 and 50 miles per gallon, it costs less than 20 bucks to fill the tank, and I simply enjoy riding. But not when the weather is 24 degrees and the wind is howling.

So my current proposition to Alan is that we attempt to trade in the Dakota, the POS car, the Ranger, and one of the motorcycles to get a used Hyundai Tucson or Santa Fe. I'd love to have the Santa Fe, but our finances may dictate getting the smaller, less-expensive Tucson. We need an SUV, since I haul laundry, garbage, and several 5-gallon water bottles into town once a week. We go to Albuquerque to get groceries, pet supplies, building materials, and so forth on a regular basis, too.

Alan remains unconvinced. And while that situation prevails, we remain stuck with vehicles that look like crap, run like crap, or don't run at all.

Frustrated? You bet.

I'm seriously considering getting a nighttime and weekend job at Walmart -- that's how frustrated I am. I'm willing to work for the Evil Empire (no, not Disney -- the OTHER Evil Empire) just to get a vehicle that starts reliably, runs reliably, and doesn't look like a golf ball.

Ah well.

Merry farkin' Christmas to you too.

Yet another thing for the list....

2009-11-10T12:13:00.003-07:00

For years I've been developing a list, a to-do list of sorts.

When humanity finally comes around and realizes how eminently suited I am for the job, and finally declares me Emperor of the Planet, I have a list of things I want to accomplish.

Somewhere in the top five on my list is this action item: BAN GOLF!

It's not that I hate golf per se. It's just that it's such a destructive past-time.

One of my major pet peeves is golf courses in the desert. And they just keep spreading: Every year when we go to Phoenix for our annual pilgrimage to the Estrella War (SCA event), we find that

1. Phoenix is now closer -- i.e., the developments keep spreading west-ward; and
2. There's another bloddy golf course in almost every new development.

(Maybe the economic crash will help alleviate these issues.)

Not only do these courses deplete our scarce drinking water supplies just to irrigate grass; not only do they put out significant amounts of herbicides and fertilizers in their runoff; not only do they displace wildlife during construction; but now, it turns out, the bloddy golf balls themselves are toxic.

See:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SPORT/11/04/littering.golf.balls/index.html

I know, I know: If I ban golf, then where will the businessmen and politicians schmooze? How will political deals get done? How will older folks get their exercise? Et Cetera and so forth. I'm working on that. It's on the list.....

Feeling less swinish...

2009-10-23T15:42:00.002-06:00

I've spent the past five days at home, reading, sleeping, hacking and coughing. Not exactly a fun way to take a week off from work, but it could have been worse. My flu experience was like a bad cold, only much longer-lasting.

Those first two days, though.... There's something about sitting on the toilet in the wee small hours of the morning, bucket between your knees, that makes you question your will to live. Once I got past that stage, the lingering hacking and coughing has been more annoying than anything else.

Alan got a flu shot earlier this year, so I'm hoping he'll not come down with this.

Green tea stockpiles around the world must have been depleted by my constant brewing and drinking copious quantities of the stuff all week.

The real winner in all this were our kitties. They've been able to increase their "begging for food" time (with moderate success, unfortunately) by 8 to 10 more hours every day. I envision rioting -- okay, well, major couch-raking -- when I go back to work next week.

Stay well, folks.

Flu sucks

2009-10-19T17:01:00.004-06:00

Do yourselves a favor: Get the shot, be it the H1N1 or seasonal flu, when you can.

I've been sicker than this, but it's not fun. I feel like hell. And I got the fun version -- with the nausea and diarrhea. I haven't had a real voice for about a week now, just a weird croak that completely fails to summon kitties when it's time for them to come in.

Went to the doctor in Socorro today, but other than confirm my self-diagnosis and make comforting "poor you" noises, there ain't much they can do. At least my lungs seem to be clear. I was worried about developing walking pneumonia again. That was *really* not fun.

Back to the couch with my mug of green tea with a small chunk of ginger in it. Don't think I'll be at work until at least Wednesday at this rate....

bleah.

Feckin' amazing!

2009-09-30T16:07:00.003-06:00

That's the only way to describe this:

Top Secret Drum Corps

Yes, it's over six minutes long, but keep watching til the 5 minute 40 second mark.... utterly feckin' amazing.

Dear World....

2009-09-28T14:02:00.005-06:00

Hate the stupid Ph.D.s here who have an advanced degree but absolutely no common sense;
Hate the rat race where people who work 40 hours per week are still broke and poor;
Hate that pro football and pro basketball players make more for playing a game than the educators who teach our children do;
Hate that education is now completely overwhelmed with administrations who care more about covering their own backsides and the bottom line than actually educating kids;
Hate the stupid parents who've endowed their precious snowflakes with both a sense of entitlement and learned helplessness -- so much so that they can't be bothered to be respectful, responsible, capable people in their own right;
Hate the stupid Birthers and Truthers and right-wing nutcases who spew their own special brand of hate and hypocracy disguised as "Family Values";
Hate the people who compare President Obama to Hitler;
Hate the Teabaggers who claim to be "unaware" of the racist imagery they use when protesting;
Hate the media for its complicity in enabling fascism in America by spewing propaganda on behalf of its corporate masters;
Hate Obama for all but abandoning the public option in health care reform and for allowing "business as usual" to run the show (and I do mean "Show") in D.C.;
Hate the fact that this country never seems to learn from history -- the British and the Russians both invaded Afghanistan, and look how well that turned out for them;
Hate this apparently now-inevitable descent into yet another war, this time with Iran;
Hate myself for buying into "Change we can believe in" and "Yes we can" -- and not making sure that he really meant "Yes we WILL!";
Hate the Democratic Senate for squandering their mandate to actually produce such change -- since they probably won't keep their 60-seat majority come mid-term;
Hate Pelosi, Reid, Rahm Emanuel, and all the other power-brokers who fiddle and look important while the republic burns;
Hate the sense of cynicism and despair that all of the above brings to me every time I go online or watch the news.

Glad I don't have human children. I would hate to leave them with this farkin' mess that we've created. Hope my brother and his wife and kids move to Canada.

Cool beer company - at least to a tortoisegeek

2009-08-03T12:07:00.003-06:00

This is probably inappropriate for the office, but it would look great at home!

Terrapin Beer metal sign

I like their graphics. Wonder if their beer is any good?

(Lightweight: someone who has one beer and is pretty much plastered. See TortoiseGeek.)

Getting older - the geek version

2009-07-22T16:06:00.003-06:00

Alan and I have this conversation more and more frequently:

"Remember when... (insert some random tech/geek thing)...?"

"Oh yeah. I haven't had to do that in X years."

"Man, we're old!!!"

I really didn't need the internet to provide concrete examples to make it crystal-clear just how old we are:

100 things your kids may never know about

How depressed should I be that I've done a significant chunk of the 100 things myself at some point in the past? Or worse: I am at least familiar with all of them?

(Sigh) I'm old.

WANT! No, Really

2009-07-17T14:29:00.007-06:00

http://www.universaldesigns.ca/UDR/ID/IDjacket.html

Yes, I am a bit obsessed with The Dark Knight.

(I can hear Alan laughing at me from here, and he's clear across campus.....)

This explains everything....

2009-07-02T15:19:00.004-06:00

Yep, it's been years since I've peed without feline supervision at my house, too.....

Easily-Amused Friday #3

2009-06-26T14:02:00.003-06:00

... the dark humor edition:

It had to happen...

2009-06-24T17:39:00.003-06:00

The guy is a politician, y'know.

President Obama has basically thrown his GLBT supporters under the bus, in that he has completely reneged on his promises to repeal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and to repeal the federal Defense of Marriage Act. In fact, Obama's Dept. of Justice filed a brief with the Supreme Court that pretty much equated gay marriage with incest and pedophilia.

I truly hoped that we had finally elected someone who would not posit such idiotic beliefs. Sadly, that's not the case.... See: Daily Kos and AmericaBlog and PFAW letter

I think I feel most sorry for the younger voters who put Obama into office, fully believing that he really would make a difference for them. I myself voted for him, hoping this guy would be different, at least for their sakes, as well as for the gay and lesbian friends I have.

And I hate that my cynicism about Washington politics has yet again been validated.

Your inappropriate laughter of the day...

2009-05-07T15:49:00.003-06:00

Saw this signature line just now in a forum somewhere, and it made me snort:

The 2009 Swine Flu Pandemic - killing fewer people worldwide than angry, disgruntled ex-employees with guns

Inappropriate? Yes.

But true? YES.

Easily-Amused Friday, part 2

2009-05-01T18:01:00.002-06:00

Oh NOES!!!

(still giggling and wiping my eyes....)

LOLS for Friday

2009-05-01T12:19:00.001-06:00

http://xkcd.com/576/

Okay, can I just say how much I *heart* XKCD?

That is all.

More flu-nanity

2009-04-30T13:27:00.003-06:00

One news story that I can respect in this whole panic/pandemic, courtesy of the LA Times:
http://tinyurl.com/d4bhrv

I was bemused to see that My Employer made the Albuquerque television news last night with The Administration's decision to restrict gym hours, cancel certain classes, and limit campus gatherings:
http://tinyurl.com/cduarb

... Still wondering when/if The Administration is going to realize that the Chinese Acrobats show is tonight, and whether they'll decide to be consistent in their "limit campus gatherings" stance and cancel it.

My bet is NO.

Another thought for you

2009-04-29T15:13:00.005-06:00

So, My Employer has decided in its infinite wisdom (?) to close the gym at 5 PM, to cancel Community College classes, and to reschedule the fine arts reception scheduled on campus yesterday to "prevent possible exposure to Swine Flu." And my spouse reports that the campus swing dance group have been asked to cancel their regularly-scheduled dance on Thursday night.

But hey, the Chinese Acrobats' performance is still on for tomorrow night! Get your tickets!

Yeah, that's smart: A performance by a troop of acrobats that have traveled throughout the USA, and which is likely to draw people from out of town -- maybe even from *El Paso* where they HAVE had the flu -- is going to continue.

But all you other folks who have non-paying gigs (as in, the university isn't getting any money from YOU) -- GTFO!

Makes me think that all of this "look how concerned we are" stuff isn't really about trying to stave off a so-far-not-even-been-reported in New Mexico flu. Looks to me like it's more about reducing the university's perception of liability.

disgustedly yours,

tortoisegeek

Humanity. Weep for it: The Sequel

2009-04-29T12:57:00.007-06:00

Okay. This Swine Flu thing is out of control.

Not the flu itself, mind you -- it's the irrational response by stupid people, fueled by the media blitz.

Case in point: My Employer has decided to:

1. Close the gym daily at 5 PM for the time being,
2. Cancel all Community College classes for the time being, and
3. Reschedule any and all campus functions that may draw townspeople to campus.

The "rationale" behind these decisions, I suppose, is to prevent townspeople from coming to campus and potentially spreading "the KILLER Swine Flu!"

Never mind that our own damned FACULTY and researchers typically travel the globe for their research projects. And wait a minute -- we have international students too! Shouldn't we be rounding them all up and quarantining them in the gym or something? OMGZ we're all gonna die!!!

I left work last night at 7:30. By the time I got here this morning, My Employer's other minions had installed a little hand-sanitizer dispenser on each floor of the building. Oh yeah, that will work wonders. Maybe against spreading hepatitis or salmonella perhaps, particularly for those gross people who don't wash their hands after going to the bathroom.

And may I please, please, PLEASE point out that while yes, possibly 150 people may have died from Swine Flu in Mexico City, and there may be 2000 cases of the flu there right now,we're talking about a metropolitan area with a population of 22 MILLION. That means that SIGNIFICANTLY LESS THAN 1 PERCENT of the population EVEN HAS the flu. And most of them are recovering just fine.

Seriously, I'm going to go out and buy lottery tickets -- I have a better shot of winning the Powerball than of getting the "deadly" Swine Flu.

When did we as a species lose our ever-loving, farking MINDS??!? Or have we always been this stupid -- we just get to see it on full display now because of the 24-hour news cycle and the Internet?

Humanity. Weep for it.

2009-04-16T15:07:00.005-06:00

... On the one hand, this is f*cking hilarious:

Jurassic Farce

On the other hand, if you peruse that website for long enough, you really start to worry about the future of the human species... or you become convinced that there just won't be much of one.

I cannot get over the fact that "Common Sense" isn't... well.... common!

One of the single best signature files I ever saw on Fark.com was this one:

"Some people believe that the human race is fast approaching a state of terminal stupidity, wherein there are so many panicky idiots as a ratio to critical, intelligent thinkers that society collapses. I find it difficult to refute that belief."

I see it all the time here at my mental institution... I mean, institution of Higher Education.

I cannot believe how ... (how should I put this?) ... incredibly clueless a sizeable percentage of the student body is. Oh, don't get me wrong: some of them are really smart. But they are clueless about the little, common-sensible things that they encounter on a daily basis. And frankly, they SUCK at simple things like reading signs, following directions, and being able to do things for themselves.

Cases in point:

1. When the Registrar's office used to be in this building, they were in the office adjacent to mine. Every year, they would put up signs to announce "The Course Catalogs will be available on (date)." And every year, students would march up to the Registrar window, right past all the signs, to ask, "When will the Course Catalogs be here?"

2. Every semester, the various Technical Writing classes here assign projects to their students, requiring them to develop and administer a survey, questionnaire, or user test to other students, staff, and/or faculty. Before they can start their project, I give a presentation to each class about the forms they must complete so that we remain in compliance with federal rules about "Human Subjects Research."

I tell them, "You need to fill out this Application Form -- BUT you ALSO need to write up a one-page description of your project. Tell me who you're going to talk to, where you're going to talk to them, what you're going to ask them, how you plan to record that data, and where you plan to keep your recorded data. Then you need to attach that written description to your form. I need that description to be able to review your project."

And invariably, of the 10 to 12 people in each class, at least three will show up in my office, their completed Application Form in hand -- with nothing else. (And invariably, these three students are male.)

I'll sigh, and then ask him, "Where is your written description?"

Student gives me a blank, deer-in-the-headlights look.

"Were you in class the day when I gave that presentation?"

"Yes."

"Do you remember what I said? I said that I needed a written description of your project."

"But I filled out the form!"

"The form doesn't tell me exactly what you plan to do. I need to know what you're going to do -- Who, What, When, Where, and How -- before I can review your project."

"Can't I just tell you that, right now?"

"No. Go write it down."

And eventually, they return to my office, written description in hand. (And again, invariably, one of the three will be hand-written, poorly, on a sheet of notebook paper.)

3. I take a late lunch hour, so consequently, I am the only person in the Administration building from noon to 1PM. Often, I'll serve as information center, tour director, and/or traffic cop for the building, depending upon who wanders into my office.

I note that the older folks (i.e., Boomers) who show up are looking for places like the Library, the Mineral Museum, or the Bureau of Geology. I pull a printed map from the stack in my office, make some notes on it, pointing out various landmarks and buildings for them, and they are on their way. They don't come back, so I assume they were capable of following directions and found their way to their intended destination.

The same cannot be said for the potential students who show up in my office. I have found that they need to be walked directly to a particular building -- and in some cases, a particular office. If you show them a printed map, you can see their eyes glaze over. The connections between the map and what they see in front of them as they walk around campus apparently don't work in their brains. If they do take the map, they end up coming back to my office in about 15 minutes, lost puppy-dog looks on their faces. "Where was the XXXX building again?" or "I couldn't find So-and-so's office. There wasn't a Room 298."

(Well, you're looking for Room 298, buddy. Did ya happen to notice while you were wandering around the ground floor of that building that all of the room numbers started with "1"? Did it ever occur to you that perhaps there was a correlation between being on the *first* floor of a three-story building and the room numbers starting with "1"? You might even have gone so far as to climb those stairs and see what rooms were on the second floor and whether their numbers started with a "2".....)

My main question is this: What changed between the Boomers and the Millenials? Hell, what changed between Generation X (which is my generation) and the Millenials? Is it because of the insane focus on standardized testing (thanks a farking lot, No Child Left Behind!) to the exclusion of teaching kids how to actually THINK?

I don't know. All I do know is that if I were in business and had to face hiring these kids as employees, I'd be terrified or exceedingly depressed. Can they even function in the working world?

Once again, GraphJam captures the reality of my life

2009-04-01T17:45:00.007-06:00

This one was named one of the top cartoons of all time. I agree with that, but it's not my favorite.

I think this one is better: Rabbit of Seville

[Blogmeister's note: Did you know that there are no full clips of the Rabbit of Seville available on Youtube? Why? Apparently Warner Brothers has demanded that all of them be removed (or have the posters remove the original audio track). I find it interesting that they have not done the same thing with What's Opera, Doc.

WTF? I mean, c'mon. Who hasn't seen these cartoons? And they're available on the Looney Tunes Golden Collections DVDs if you really want to own them. (I have volumes 1-4, thankyouverymuch!) Why demand that they be taken down from Youtube?]

Anyway, Chuck Jones *was* a genius... and Looney Tunes were never intended for kids.

"Welcome to my shop
Let me cut your mop,
Let me shave your crop,
Daintily,
Daintily..."

"HEY YOU!
Don't look so perplexed,
Why must you be vexed?
Can't you see you're next
you're so next...."

Leno? Letterman? Fallon? Nope.

2009-03-25T11:40:00.004-06:00

Here's my choice in the Late Night Talk Show Wars:

http://tinyurl.com/dm7qsm

Craig's opening bit always makes me laugh.

This particular opening bit, though: I thought I injured something, I was laughing so hard.

Yes, I'm easily amused... and a yodeling monkey with a shark and crocodile singing backup had me holding my sides and wiping tears.

Officially Certifiable...

2009-03-20T14:38:00.007-06:00

Just confirming what everybody has suspected for a while:

I'm a ten-year survivor of this mental institution.

Thanks for the swell certificate and all, but how much cooler would it have been if the administration had coughed up a I've survived ten years at this mental institution and all I got was this lousy t-shirt t-shirt?

Just sayin'...

What I would LIKE to post to our researchers...

2009-03-18T14:40:00.004-06:00

I had to send out an email earlier this week regarding the mess that is the Grants.gov website. This was my first draft -- needless to say, this version didn't get sent.

Dear Research Community at NMT --

Please be aware that the Grants.gov website is a piece of crap that should never have been allowed to get past the beta stage.

I say this because many of you may be accustomed to using the NSF's FastLane website. FastLane is usually stable and reliable (although it can get bogged down on deadline days), and the NSF's servers are robust and typically don't fail or crash.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Grants.gov. In fact, even the help desk at Grants.gov readily admits that their own servers are overwhelmed and prone to crashing.

Other problems occur with regularity, such as suddenly not being able to log in, for no apparent reason whatsoever. Then after you wait 20 minutes, tearing your hair out and sweating bullets all the while, lo and behold: suddenly the system recognizes your login again and everything proceeds normally. Why? Who knows. I'm not even sure the system admins at Grants.gov would know.

[Which leads us to the modern version of the Chicken and Egg Question: Is Grants.gov so bad because as a government entity, they could only afford to hire the "D is for Degree" students who couldn't get jobs in private sector IT? Or is it bad because even good programmers and system admins can't overcome the limitations of crappy (i.e., government-procured) IT systems?]

The problems at Grants.gov have become so well-known that even the DOE, that bastion of unchanging bureaucratic imperviousness, has recognized that they need to allow PIs to submit proposals by other means, including email. Imagine that!

Please, don't short-circuit your own efforts by waiting until the last possible moments before your deadline to submit a Grants.gov proposal. The odds are not in your favor that the website will be up and running and ready to accept your proposal in a timely manner.

Oh, by the way: you know all that government bailout money that's going to be distributed to someone other than AIG and Wall Street schemers in the indefinite near future? Guess how potential recipients are going to be asked to apply for it. Yep, you guessed it. They'll be quadrupling (likely even more than that) the traffic on Grants.gov's already-overburdened servers. Don't be caught in the impending train wreck, folks. Submit your Grants.gov proposals early!

Sincerely,

Cog in the Machine

Car Lust -- No, seriously: this is an awesome car

2009-03-13T16:40:00.007-06:00

One of my coworkers drove his 1960 Caddy to work today. Once I got done slobbering over it, I got his permission to post a few pix here.

A long and low-slung beauty:

The front end:

Glorious fins:

Fin closeup:

And of course, the detail that absolutely makes the car:

Gangster whitewalls on laced rims

Oh, if I won a lottery....... (scheming and dreaming about someday restoring classic cars....)

sigh.

Eh... got a cold

2009-03-05T17:06:00.002-07:00

I hate colds.

If mucus were worth money, I'd be rich.

Entertain yourselves for a bit while I rest & recover.

Here's a great photo of Gizmo the kitty.

More at Flickr.

Random You-Tubage

2009-02-26T12:32:00.001-07:00

Nora plays the piano pretty well -- if a bit avant-garde:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ860P4iTaM

And don't miss the sequel:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0zgQAp7EYw

What did we do before YouTube?

Back from Estrella War XXV

2009-02-18T17:00:00.007-07:00

Alan and I are back from our annual pilgrimage to The Estrella War, held at the Canyon Creek Ranch outside Florence, Arizona.

A bit of background for those of you who are not familiar with the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA):

You know those folks you see in the local park on weekends, dressed up in homemade armor, holding homemade shields, and bashing each other with rattan sticks covered in duct tape? Well, that's the most familiar part of the SCA to most mundane (i.e., not-SCA) folks.

The SCA is more than that, though. If you like to cook, bake, sew, or just research history, the SCA is for you, too. The goal (I'm not sure whether it's official or unofficial) is to "Recreate the Middle Ages as they should have been."

Participants in the SCA are called "players," and you have to choose and develop a "persona," a character who could conceivably have occupied a certain place (typically Western Europe, although there are some Chinese and Japanese personae), and a certain time period (typically between the Fall of Rome and the Renaissance, approximately 500 A.D. to 1600 A.D. [If you want a bit more detail, visit the official SCA website.]

My particular area of historical interest is La Convivencia, the period in Spain's history when Muslims, Christians, and Jews all shared the Iberian Peninsula in relative tolerance of one another. I play a Visigothic Mozarab living in Cordoba around 950 A.D. At that time, Cordoba was the capital city of al-Andalus, under the rule of the Caliph, Abd-ar-Rahman III.

And anyway..... (I could go on for several paragraphs, but won't.)

This year's Estrella seemed to be "The Forgetful Estrella," at least by the folks camping with our local group, The College of St. Golias. I don't know why, but it was endemic: everybody forgot to bring at least one important thing. It's like everybody caught the same brain fart and couldn't get even the basic necessities packed before the "Gotta get on the road!" mantra took over and they shot out the door and headed down the road to the event.

Case in Point: We got to the event and realized we had forgotten things like tea, bread, peanut butter, plates and bowls, which are important things at a camping event. We might have even forgotten the sleeping bags, had Alan not suddenly remembered the night before we left that they hadn't been put in the truck yet....I forgot to take my camera, among other things. Alan had his video camera with him, but its still-picture abilities aren't that great.

And the other thing this year's Estrella will be remembered for: It was COLD!

[Last year, it was The Rainy Estrella: It rained every day. Poured most days. The entire site was a soup bowl of slippery slimy mud. It was all a little TOO realistically medieval, if you ask me....]

This year, though, it really never got good and warm. The nights were down into the 30s, and the days felt as though they never got out of the low 60s. There was frost on the ground for the first hour of daylight on most days. I imitated my tortoises: I sat a chair out in the sun on many late afternoons and basked.

Estrella usually has a pretty good Merchants' Row, an area where vendors of various stuff open tents to display their wares. Some people go to Estrella for the martial events (heavy fighting, fencing, or archery). Others go for the shopping. We are decidedly in the latter group. This year, we found a marvelous booth selling all sorts of pretty and wonderful rocks. (Yes, of course, I found the rocks!) We made several purchases there. The other booth I spent money at was a fabric booth that was selling linen and linen-cotton blend fabrics for 3 dollars a yard. Here's to making more Garb! (Garb is what we call our costumes in the SCA.)

Finally, the last day of the event, when I was tired of freezing and the merchants were having sales to get rid of as much stuff as they could before packing up and leaving, I found a wonderful coat that I picked up at 30 percent off. The outside is a nice patterned chenille fabric with brown background and golden-yellow patterning. Inside is a nice fleece fabric. It's WARM!. It even looks appropriate for my persona's period. It was so worth purchasing!

Anyway, we're back home, and now getting ready to run an event in the State Science Olympiad this coming Saturday. Hope it goes smoothly....

More later.

The Ride isn't over until the kickstand is down

2009-01-22T12:37:00.007-07:00

(or, Watch Captain Sullenberger do a facepalm....)

Alan is in my office, waiting as I put on my BatSuit (i.e., my motorcycle gear). We are heading home after attending the latest SCA populace meeting. As the last step, I make sure my cell phone is in my motorcycle tail bag. He jokingly asks why I don't keep it on me so he can call me while I'm on the bike. I grin and reply that I can't use the phone during a ride. I tell him I don't even think I can use the phone with my full-face helmet on.

He brought his car, so he leaves first from the parking lot. It takes me a while to get the tail bag situated on the bike, start it up and let it warm up, and then I follow.

It takes about 20 minutes to get from Brown Hall to the house. I cruise up the driveway, make my turnaround in front of the shop, then pull to my parking space at the end of the house. I park the bike there because it needs to be plugged into a battery tender every night (motorcycle batteries don't like cold weather very much).

I stop, turn off the engine, and put the kickstand down... or so I thought.

As I swing my right leg up and over the tail bag to get off the bike, I realize something is not quite right. I have just enough time to think the classic expletive ("SH*T!!"), then I realize what is happening: The bike is falling -- and towards me.

I try to catch the bike, to keep it from falling to the ground. Not a great plan, considering that the bike weighs 300-plus pounds, and I weigh 135....

We live in a mobile home, so there is a small set of wooden steps leading up to the utility room door at the end of the house. The fall concludes with me sitting on the steps, the bike resting atop me.

Whuh. Okay, let's see. Here I am, sitting on the steps, a motorcycle in my lap. Now what? I try pushing the bike upright. No go. I don't have the leverage in my seated position. Can I get out? No. My legs are trapped between the lowest step and the left-side muffler of the bike. Okay, I need help.

Fortunately, I can reach the tail bag bungieed to the pillion seat. I unzip it and start rooting through it to find my cell phone. Belatedly I notice that I still have my gloves on, which I why I can't find the phone. Take my glove off and find the phone. Call Alan. Who is about 25 feet from me, inside the house.

He answers with a note of surprise in his voice. "Help. Stuck!" I say. I still have my full-face helmet on, and I'm holding the phone as close as the opened visor will allow me to get it. "I'm at the end of the house. The bike fell, and I'm stuck between it and the steps, I can't get it off of me, come help!"

(I ask him later if I sounded panicked and he says no. I was completely calm -- so calm that he wasn't sure if needed help until I specifically asked for it.)

He comes out of the house, looks at the tableau of his wife sitting calmly on the utility room steps, a motorcycle leaning against her. He takes a second to figure out the best place to grab the bike, then starts it moving back upright. I help, and I am finally freed. My first thought is "Is the bike okay?" He wants to know if I'm okay. Yes. I think so. Nothing broken. Nothing overtly painful.

I make sure the bike's kickstand is *firmly* down, plug the bike into the battery tender, then go in the house for the night.

--------------------

This morning, I'm sore, and I'm developing nice big bruises on the back of my left thigh where it encountered the step edges and down my left calf where it was pinched between the bike and the porch. My left shoulder hurts, probably from trying to keep the bike from falling.

But it could have been a lot worse. If the steps hadn't been there to abbreviate the fall, I might not have been able to reach the tail bag. If I hadn't had my armored overpants on, I might have gotten my shins burned by the hot muffler. And since it fell towards me, I padded the bike's fall, preventing damage to the left-side fairing and muffler. It'll get a closer look-over today when I go home. (I drove the truck in to work today.)

Alan and I laughed about it last night at bedtime. As Alan reminded me: The Ride isn't over until the kickstand is down. Since it wasn't fully down when I got off the bike, technically, I did need the cell phone during the ride. And yes, it turns out that I can use a cell phone with my full-face helmet on.

As we laughed, we riffed on ways we could post this on any of the Cheezburger Network sites:

Failblog.org Kickstand Deployment: FAIL

I Has a Hotdog Me to bike: You iz NOT lapdog!

Engrish Funny Ground-rod superior position important!

Sheesh. A week ago, Captain Sullenberger makes a disabled Airbus walk on water in NYC, while I can't even put down a bloody kickstand....

Tag this little adventure: Self-Inflicted Stupidity (SIS).

Human Cloning NOW!

2009-01-19T17:52:00.001-07:00

Okay, now that we're gonna have someone who's not dogmatically religious as President, can we PLEASE move forward with human cloning?

'Cuz dammit, I need about three more of me to accomplish all the stuff I have to do...

ARGH!!!!!

Mencken envy

2008-12-19T10:41:00.005-07:00

Sig file seen on a random forum I visit:

"Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats."

-H. L. Mencken

A Mencken quote I hadn't seen before -- and yet another one from him that I completely agree with. Some of my other favorites:

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

The average man doesn't want to be free. He wants to be safe.

[Government] is apprehended, not as a committee of citizens chosen to carry on the communal business of the whole population, but as a separate and autonomous corporation, mainly devoted to exploiting the population for the benefit of its own members. .... When a private citizen is robbed, a worthy man is deprived of the fruits of his industry and thrift; when the government is robbed, the worst that happens is that certain rogues and loafers have less money to play with than they had before.

It is the invariable habit of bureaucracies, at all times and everywhere, to assume...that every citizen is a criminal. Their one apparent purpose, pursued with a relentless and furious diligence, is to convert the assumption into a fact. They hunt endlessly for proofs, and, when proofs are lacking, for mere suspicions. The moment they become aware of a definite citizen, John Doe, seeking what is his right under the law, they begin searching feverishly for an excuse for withholding it from him.

The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naive and usually idiotic. He is, more likely, one who loves his country more than the rest of us, and is thus more disturbed than the rest of us when he sees it debauched. He is not a bad citizen turning to crime; he is a good citizen driven to despair.

The inferior man's reasons for hating knowledge are not hard to discern. He hates it because it is complex - because it puts an unbearable burden upon his meager capacity for taking in ideas. Thus his search is always for short cuts. Their aim is to make the unintelligible simple, and even obvious.

Wonder what that says about me?

My thoughts on Christmas

2008-12-18T11:55:00.002-07:00

I am ambivalent at best about this time of year.

One the one hand, Eat my Holiday Cheer is an essay from 2005 that encapsulates my frustrations quite nicely.

And then, there's this -- my all-time favorite Christmas Story.

You're welcome. Just send the bill for your replacement monitor and keyboard to North Pole IT Services, c/o Santa.

Meme Time!

2008-12-05T12:55:00.007-07:00

Saw this on another blog and stole it because I knew nobody would ever tag me.

The Rules:
a. People who have been tagged must write their answers on their blog and replace any question that they dislike with a new original question.
b. Tag 8 people. Don't refuse to do that. Don't tag whomever tagged you.

1. What are your nicknames?

TortoiseGeek

The Turtle Lady! (the two little girls who sell me a local newspaper every Wednesday called me that when they saw me in Supermart last Saturday)

2. How many pens/pencils/markers do you have on or in your desk?

Oh geez -- I have a serious pen fetish, so lots... at least two dozen pens, a dozen highlighters and some mechanical pencils.

3. If you're in a relationship, what do you miss most about being single?

The lack of clutter.

4. How many colors are you wearing right now?

Three: Olive green thermal henley over a black t-shirt, black bandana, blue jeans.

5. Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

Definitely an introvert.

6. What was the last book you read?

I often read several books simultaneously. The last one I finished was The Lord of the Rings. I hadn't read it before and I wanted to see how much of the books actually ended up in the movies. For what it's worth, I think Peter Jackson actually improved things greatly by leaving out a lot of the extraneous storylines and focusing on a single, more linear narrative.

7. What's the last movie you saw?

In the theater: The Dark Knight (I've always identified with Batman, but Christian Bale's embodiment is by far the best movie one. Can't wait for the DVD release next week!)

At home via Netflix DVD: The Caine Mutiny. (I love old movies)

8. Let's play everybody's favorite game: what would you do if you won the lottery?

Pay off all my debts. Set up college funds for my niece and nephew and the kids of some of my friends. Donate money to animal charities that I like. Quit my job at Tech and set up my own bakery (with lottery money, I wouldn't care if it didn't make any profit).

9. Do you like snow?

On the mountains, yes, so that we have nice runoff levels for irrigation in the spring and summer. But down here where I have to drive in it? Not so much.

10. Is there anything that has made you unhappy these days?

My cat Gracie was snuggling with me one night last week when something frightened her, causing her to launch herself off me. Her claws left huge deep gashes on my chest and belly. It really hurt and it's going to leave scars. I was more pissed than unhappy.

Unhappy? Well, my job does that, many days. I try to do a good job but I feel very unappreciated and not valued. (I know, welcome to life on this planet...)

11. What was the last thing you ate today?

Fruit and nut bread, spread with peanut butter

12. How long does it take you to get ready in the morning?

Two hours. I'm actually physically ready (i.e., dressed and could leave) in about a half-hour; it takes me 1.5 hours to wake up mentally enough to drive/ride to work. Coffee and protein definitely help, but they do take time to kick in.

13. What websites do you visit daily?

J-Walk Blog
Matt's Braindump Blog
Oliver Willis
Trauma Queen
Respiratory Therapy 101
Cute Overload
ICHC and its affiliated sites
AmericaBlog
Fark
XKCD (on mon/wed/fri)

14. What classes are you taking right now? If you're not in school, what is your job?

I don't go to school, but I do work at one as a bureaucrat. (Yes, Pogo: We have met the enemy, and yes, he/she is us!

15. Do you like to clean?

I don't necessarily like to clean. But I do have to clean. It's an OCD thing....

16. What do you want for Christmas?

Nothing. I don't really do Christmas anymore.

17. What are you doing right now?

Avoiding the mindless task of updating a database.

18. Who was your childhood idol?

Mr. Spock of Star Trek. I wanted to be as smart, logical, and emotionless as he was, for a variety of reasons.

19. What would you do if you saw $100 lying on the ground?

Pick it up, see if anybody was around to claim it, then donate it to some charity.

20. What is your dream car?

Mini Cooper Clubman

22. What is your dream motorcycle? (new question)

2009 Suzuki Gladius, because fuel injection is much better than carburetion, and Suzukis are cheaper to maintain than Ducatis....

23. Tell me something you love about the person who tagged you.

Nobody tagged me because pretty much nobody reads this blog. I stole this meme from a blog that I read semi-regularly. I suppose that means that I tagged myself. What do I love about me? Hmmmm.... Well, that I'm definitely not "run of the mill." That I have a pretty good sense of humor, dark though it may be. That I know how to ride both motorcycles and horses. That I have dreadlocks that many people comment favorably upon. That for the most part, I'm pretty nice to people (although certain NMT personnel really, REALLLLY push their limits with me....).

As for tagging: I only have one person that I can really tag: Flainn, you're it!

I HATE the Dept of Energy

2008-12-01T12:10:00.006-07:00

Ah, yes, the DOE. The very epitome of "useless bureaucracy." Even FEMA has nothing on the DOE.

Case in Point:

An Amendment (i.e., more money) was awarded to an existing DOE grant to our university. We need to have a copy of this Amendment in our files, somewhere, or the stars will not align, the gods will be displeased and not send the rains, and our children will starve. Or something.

The Grants and Contracts office asked me to get this Amendment for them. They forwarded the DOE's emails to me so that I could try to figure out DOE's online management system.

After reading the DOE's emails, and then attempting to figure out their system, I would have LOVED to send this email response to DOE. Of course, I will not...

Good afternoon all --

The NM Institute of Mining and Technology has apparently received an amendment to an existing grant from your organization. Per the email notice we received, we allegedly can check on/find this amendment in your EERE Project Management System.

My question to you is: WHERE?

Our Grants and Contracts office forwarded your email notice to me since I am responsible for all electronic proposal submissions from NMIMT. They were desperately (maybe futilely) hoping that I could figure out your system so that I could download the Amendment notice for them.

I must confess that, despite having a degree in Technical Communication, ten-plus years working with federal websites, and even more years working with various legal documents, I have failed completely to decipher your EERE Project Management System.

Yes, I read the "User Manual," a document more textually dense than Tolstoy's "War and Peace," but not nearly as entertaining, I'm afraid. And despite its marvelous use of bureaucratese, it was absolutely no help whatsoever. Your manual writers have a truly rare gift for obfuscating crucial information. Have they considered offering their talents to the CIA or perhaps the National Security Agency?

I could really use a Pro Tip here, guys.

(Pro Tip: A term from electronic gaming meaning "a small suggestion or useful hint that allows an inexperienced player to access features and system tricks so that said player's game character doesn't continue to die in stupid ways at level two in a 30-level game.")

I am breathlessly awaiting your response... assuming I can decipher it, that is.

Sincerely,

Frustrated Cog

Even useless bureaucrats sing the blues

2008-11-30T17:53:00.004-07:00

Okay, here's the deal: I get depressed, so I write stuff and then, stupidly, post it here on this blog.

Why do I do this? Because in real life, I don't talk to anyone. I mean really talk, about what's going on with me. Reason two is, nobody reads this stupid thing anyway. And why should they?

After a few days, I realize that I've been stupid and shallow and pointless, and then I remove the post, knowing that nobody will notice or care anyway.

So with all that in mind...

I'm overwhelmed. I work 40 hours a week at a pointless job that will never, ever, be challenging or rewarding in anyway, except for those small occasional victories where I actually do get to help someone.

Then I go home and spend another 20 or 30 hours a week at my unofficial second job: dealing with pets. I get to spend a third of my income and most of my spare time on the care and feeding of various turtles, eight sulcata tortoises, and four cats. For what? Why?

It's like the Monty Python skit with the four Yorkshiremen. “I go to work, do eight hours of time that nobody really needs or appreciates, and when I get my pay, it's all spent on old debts and pet supplies for an overabundance of dumped, rescued animals who take a physical, emotional, and financial toll on me. I get to be mostly ignored by a computer-obsessed husband (that is, whenever it is that he's actually home at the same time I am), I have nobody who actually really cares how I am, and I feel like I'm going under for the third time here.”

I'm frustrated that my life has been like this for years now and I'm only now realizing how useless and pointless I've become.

I realize that I've ceased to have goals or dreams. It's just a matter of getting up and slogging through to bedtime, when I won't sleep anyway. Then I get to get up and do it all over again the next day.

When exactly did I die and end up here in hell, anyway?

Random thoughts on health care (or lack thereof)

2008-11-21T14:29:00.006-07:00

Lately I've started to spend time reading various ER / EMT blogs.

I've always been fascinated with that aspect of medicine (probably fostered by watching Emergency! as a child, an admission that dates me to the bad-fashion, archaic-medical-technology days of the early 1970s....) .

Anyway, the blogs I read, in this order, are:

1. Trauma Queen
2. Respiratory Therapy 101
3. Voodoo Medicine Man
4. WhiteCoat Rants
5. Crass-Polination
6. Movin' Meat

Trauma Queen is marvelous -- he's a gay paramedic who works in Edinburgh, Scotland and he has a true gift for writing. I would kill to have this guy's literary skills. (And I'm learning a lot of... erm... interesting Scottish slang, too.)

The others are, as far as I can tell, US-based. They post interesting cases they encounter on the job, and sometimes intersperse their political beliefs and most importantly, their thoughts on the current problems with health care in the United States.

The physicians and EMTs who write my favorite blogs reveal a seamy underside to the business of emergency medicine that I didn't even know existed.

I was surprised by how many ER doc blogs share "frequent flyer" stories, about people who expertly manipulate the system to get prescription painkillers. Protip: Don't engage any ER doc in a discussion about Fibromyalgia. Just. Don't.

These blogs also detail the frustrations that many ER doctors have with people who abuse the their health for years, develop chronic and incurable health problems, and who then clog the ERs with minor issues, simply because Medicare will pay for emergency treatment.

I was surprised by how many times these ER docs have to deal with patients who are morbidly obese, chain smokers, or drunks (or worst: all three) that show up in the ER because of minor, non-specific, certainly non-emergency complaints.

Myself, I'm loathe to ever call an ambulance. I mean, when I fell out of a truck bed and tore ligaments in my knee, the husband picked me up, shoved me in the truck, and we rolled for the hospital. But these folks, apparently, call 911 to have an ambulance come fetch them to the ER for things like "I'm out of aspirin," or "My feet hurt," without repercussion because Medicare or Medicaid or indigent funds will pay for it, no questions asked.

These people, whose health problems 1) weren't created overnight, and 2) most certainly won't be solved by a simple ER visit, get to clog up the ERs while people who truly need help (like Mrs. Fletcher, who's fallen and probably has a hip fracture, but isn't high up on the triage list) have to sit and wait.

As one commentor put it: "It's job security I wish I didn't have."

I feel these doctors' frustrations, I truly do. But let me share a bit from the other end of that spectrum.

Back in June, I ended up in the local ER because of a case of pneumonia. I didn't know I had pneumonia; I was afraid I was having a heart attack so I went in. Thankfully, the ER wasn't busy (it was a Monday afternoon), so they got me right to a bed, hooked me up to an EKG and took blood. They also did chest X-Rays right there and those showed that the source of my pain and shortness of breath was a slight case of pneumonia.

Yes, I did take up a bed in the ER, for basically no reason, as my case was hardly life-threatening. But I wasn't there to get drugs and I'm usually in excellent health. In a functional health-care system, I could perhaps have visited an Urgent Care Clinic, or tried to get an appointment with a primary care physician in a day or two.

The reality is that, at least in my little town, medical care is not functional; in fact, it's problematic at best. We don't have an Urgent Care Center. There are two medical offices in this town, but they are so oversubscribed that one of them doesn't even answer the office phone so you can't make an appointment. The other would be happy to see you in December. Mid-December. That leaves no recourse but to go to the ER for primary medical care.

My previous visit to the ER cost me $100. The rest of the approximately $1200 bill was picked up by my health insurance. Yes, I'm lucky -- I actually have decent health insurance. What happens to the folks who don't, or who don't have any insurance? Who has $1200 sitting around?

Right now, I have another a chest cold, and I am worried about it turning into another case of pneumonia. I am again experiencing chest pain and dizziness. Hell, I get winded walking from the damned truck to my office, a distance well under 100 yards.

So I've spent this afternoon trying to get an appointment, any appointment, with any doctor in town. Not happening. I tried calling some doctors in Albuquerque. So far, none of the Internal Medicine and Family Practice docs that I've called are taking new patients.

I'm frustrated, and a little scared. If this is what happens with a case of bronchitis (which is what I suspect I have), what happens if I ever get diagnosed with cancer or something worse (gods forbid)?

I hope that when the Obama administration attempts to get some sort of handle on the health care system in this country, they will do two things:

1. Listen to the doctors -- not the administrators, but the ones in the trenches who have to deal with the bureaucracies, the inadequacies... hell, the downright failures that happen in our current system. Maybe, as some of them suggest on their blogs, we as a country do need to make some hard decisions about restricting care for those people who abuse the system. Maybe Universal Health Care isn't the best way to proceed. Maybe Tough Love is.

2. And please, please, PLEASE, Obama administration: Also listen to the folks in rural America who fall between the existing planks, because we're equally frustrated by the current system. Hospitals and doctors are evaporating from our areas. Corporations decide that the economies of scale make small local clinics and hospitals untenable and close them, while new doctors up to their eyeballs in medical-school debt have no incentive to serve in poorer, remote areas.

I have no idea what the answers are. But I hope we at least start the process to find out, and to develop solutions.

Because it sucks that I cannot walk from my vehicle to my office without sounding like a bellows and hacking up a lung, dammit!

Yes, we can

2008-11-05T11:34:00.004-07:00

Today I am stunned, happy, and for once, proud of my country.

During the whole campaign season, I was afraid this country wasn't grown-up enough to elect a black president. I was afraid there were too many racist, ignorant people out there who were still too afraid and unenlightened to vote for Obama.

I am completely thrilled to be proven wrong.

Realize that in real life, I'm a fairly cynical, sardonic person. Although I am definitely fond of individual persons in my life, I can be pretty misanthropic when it comes to people in general terms. I've long believed that people in general are prone to being dumb, dangerous, and disappointing.

I tell you that so you'll realize what it takes to reduce me to tears, to create a lump in my throat. It's not easy, but this site did exactly that:

BarackAsPresident.com

You'll need your sound turned up for it.

And you'll need a tissue. Here.

"In the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope."
-- Barack Obama

Thank you, everyone. For proving me wrong.

Okay, yes - - I watch too much CSI...

2008-10-27T16:29:00.002-06:00

... because I found this hilarious:

more animals

It's just too perfect a cross-pollination: LOLcats, CSI, and dark humor....my favorites.

Thank you, Tom Udall

2008-10-17T15:38:00.004-06:00

This is what political advertisements SHOULD do. It makes me tear up every time I see it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h12mEegemI0

It makes me hope that there are some pols out there who do "get it" and who try to do the right thing by our wounded soldiers.

I'm humbled, too, Tom. I hope you win the seat in the Senate. You've got my vote.

Study reveals "Children not our future"

2008-10-09T17:55:00.002-06:00

Oh. My. God.

I laughed, hard. Then I wondered why I was laughing....

THESE BASTARDS: Broken News: Study reveals "Children not our future"

'Nuff said....

2008-10-06T15:18:00.002-06:00

Box Turtle Pen; random Fall musings

2008-09-29T13:38:00.005-06:00

Well, as of about 7 PM last night, the box turtle pen fencing is complete.

After much thinking and redesign, the final version has metal flashing or metal roofing panels sunk into 6-inch-deep trenches on the inside of each wall. Outside that, the fencing is six-foot-high game fence stretched tightly and stapled to six-foot wooden posts sunk in concrete.

We may run a hot wire around the top of the pen at a later point, just to make sure that raccoons stay out.

Next steps:

Backfilling the trenches - in some places with a mixture of concrete and soil to make sure the little buggers don't dig out.
Building some sort of stopgap across the gate openings to prevent escapes if someone forgets to shut a gate.
Building gates and hanging them.

Inside the box turtle pen, we plan to install a turtle pond. At one point we were thinking two ponds -- a smaller and a larger, with a small channel that simulates a short riverbed between the two. We'll see how that goes....

I'd like to be able to put the pair of Reeves' turtles in there during "turtle season" so they can get natural sunshine, swim in a pond, and generally behave like they're supposed to, seeing as they're actually a semi-aquatic species, but I have them in a fully aquatic situation out of necessity at the moment. I'd be a worried mom and bring them during the fall and winter, though.

And of course, if we do keep one of the painted turtle hatchlings, it would eventually go into our pond as well. We've returned two of the original five back to A.E.'s pond (that's where they came from); two more should be returned in the next couple of weeks so they can acclimate before it gets cold.

This time of year is kinda melancholy at Sulcata Station -- the box turtles are winding down, eating less, getting ready to go into hibernation. The tortoises sense the change of season and start to become slightly less active, more prone to finding a warm sunny spot and sitting in it for longer periods. The various fence lizards and whiptails go away (those that survive the cats' murder sprees) and the hummingbirds and songbirds start to leave.

On the other hand, fall in New Mexico is a glorious time of year. And living out in rural New Mexico really puts you into the autumn mood. The cottonwood trees along the Rio Grande turn a gorgeous fiery yellow, while the creeper vines along the fencelines turn bright red. The light changes character, too -- and no matter how I try, it's impossible to truly photograph.

The nights are cooler, but not yet cold. The smell of various kinds of smoke in the air, from farmers clearing out the debris from their fields, from folks starting up their fireplaces with juniper or pinon or cedar, or from roasting green chile in the supermarket parking lot... and I can't forget the smell of fresh-cut alfalfa, either.

I love this time of year, but it also makes me a bit sad.

Things that prove life truly is stranger than fiction

2008-09-18T09:38:00.004-06:00

So here I am in Clark's Pet Supply yesterday afternoon, waiting to pay for my new fish, some cat food, and other supplies.

The phone rings, the clerk answers it, then puts the caller on hold to page an employee:

"Alan in reptiles, Alan in reptiles, caller on line two wants to know if his tarantula is poisonous. Please pick up ASAP!"

The clerk and I agree, the tarantula probably bit the guy and he's freaking out. And to our everlasting damnation (I suppose), this causes us both to giggle uncontrollably.....

They did WHAT? You're kidding me!

2008-09-05T13:29:00.002-06:00

So in going through various blogs over the lunch hour today, it's becoming apparent that nobody in McCain's campaign is competent.

The image displayed behind McCain while he was speaking last night -- which probably was supposed to be Walter Reed Medical Center -- was in fact Walter Reed Middle School, located in California.

So here's McCain, giving what ostensibly should be the biggest speech of his life, accepting the candidacy of the Republican Party, for the presidency of the United States, and his tech geeks can't even get the right bloody IMAGE?

As one poster on Fark put it: "It's blind incompetence. You have a national stage to carefully craft your message -- and you don't know what Walter Reed Medical looks like??"

And it gets better: This particular Middle School was not in fact named after the General Walter Reed. Again, from Fark's comments page:

ju66l3r: The campaign should do a bit more research. Walter Reed Middle School was not named after the army general. It's named after the Broadway/Hollywood actor Walter Reed who played a wagon driver in Seven Men From Now in the 50's. He died in 2001 and his estate donated a large sum of money to the school so they renamed it after him.

...So I wonder who's getting fired for all of this? And how many staff members it will require to restrain McCain when he finds out? (Hope they're smart enough to keep a few tranquilizer-dart guns handy when working around The Maverick (TM)).

I knew idiocy was rampant in this country (and seemingly ever-increasing) but I had no idea how high the tides could reach.

Almost enough to make me wish I'd moved to Florida...

2008-08-18T16:53:00.005-06:00

... along with my friends Roxanne and Shawn.

Proceeds from sales of this license plate go to help sea turtles in Florida.

I want one! [grumble, mumble, mutter]But no, I live in the stupid ol' desert southwest with no sea turtles anywhere, except maybe in the Albuquerque BioPark.... [mutter grumble grouch complain].

Sure, New Mexico has a Share with Wildlife specialty plate, but it's not nearly as cool-looking as this one.

Pout!

Blogging: FAIL!

2008-08-14T17:33:00.004-06:00

Blogging is an interesting phenomenon.

First of all, you have to goad yourself into believing that what you have to say is worth sharing with other people. You also have to believe that other people actually care what you think.

If you manage to make yourself believe both of these things, you start up your blog with great intentions, thinking that you'll keep it updated regularly, thinking that it will be a great outlet for stuff you want to say, or a way to keep your friends informed with what's going on with you.

For me, the thought was "I write things in my head all the time anyway. So why not blog?" (I really do write quite a bit in my head. I find myself rewriting things I've read, trying to polish the language, or trying to develop a particularly nifty turn of phrase, etc. Some people visualize things in pictures. My visualizations have always involved words. Black text on white paper....)

All well and good -- but when the time comes that I actually find myself sitting in front of the computer, ready to actually post to my blog, every thought leaves my head and I suddenly clam up.

The same thing happens when I go into a music store or a book store. I walk through the doors intending to get this book or that CD.... and then it goes away and I stand there, staring at all the choices, overwhelmed and lost.

Nine times out of ten when I log into Blogger, I sit and stare at the screen, waiting for the blankness to fill up with something, anything.

Most of the time, nothing comes.

This is one of those times.

Another new turtle arrives in the office....

2008-07-10T17:46:00.005-06:00

This one came from Silver City.

Someone picked it up crossing the road (grrrrrrr).

Please, people!

If you see a turtle crossing the road, help it along by picking it up and moving it to the side of the road so it doesn't get run over, but fer gosh sakes, please don't take it home!

I can't put her back where she was found so I'll have to add her to the existing herd.

She sure is pretty, though.

It broke the rules, so it had to die....

2008-06-16T11:30:00.006-06:00

I like snakes. I always have. I don't like it when people kill snakes immediately and indiscriminately. Snakes serve a valuable purpose in nature because they help keep the rodent populations in check.

When we moved out to our rural property, I had three rules for snakes:

1. Non-venomous snakes can stay, no matter where they are on the property.

2. Venomous snakes (i.e., rattlesnakes) can stay IF they are away from the house and outbuildings. Out there, they are in their space, and they can do their job eating rodent pests. I know I need to be careful and watch my step and/or watch where I put my hands when I am in their space.

3. However, if they're in MY SPACE (near the house, shop, etc.), they become a safety issue and they have to die.

By now, you've probably guessed what I'm getting at with this post: yes, we had a rattlesnake near the house.

When I came out of the shower last night, Alan mentioned that the cats were outside being freaked because of the snake under the porch.

"Was it the checkered-belly snake that we've seen before under there?"

"Not sure. Wanna put some shoes on and come see?"

I'm dressed in my jammies at this point, towel wrapped around my head, but I find shoes and put them on, then go out with Alan to see the snake.

We go around to the north side of the porch deck and crouch down, shining flashlights through the latticework to the space underneath the deck. There is the snake, just on the other side of the lattice, calmly sitting there with its head raised.

"Umm... dude, that's a rattlesnake." I say very calmly.

"It is??? Are you sure?"

"Yes, pretty damned sure. Go get the gun, I'll stay here and keep an eye on it."

Alan goes back into the house to get the .22 rifle. His footsteps across the top of the porch make the snake rattle, briefly. I crouch down again by the porch and train the flashlight beam on the snake again. It's calm. I'm strangely calm as well. We sit there, watching each other. I'm sorry that we have to do this, I'm thinking.

Alan comes back with the rifle. I hold the flashlight, keeping the beam trained on the snake. He pokes the muzzle of the rifle through the latticework. The snake, amazingly, just sits there, not moving, not coiled up, not rattling.

Alan fires once with the muzzle positioned about four or five inches from the snake's head. That one shot basically obliterates the snake's head. It writhes, so Alan waits a bit, then shoots again, through the thickest part of the snake's body, hoping to hit its heart as well.

It takes a long time for reptiles to die, and this snake is no exception. Even with its brain gone (hell, its whole head is gone!), the snake moves, rhythmically and almost mesmerizingly as we watch.

"I start to understand why snake cults exist," says Alan. "Even when it's dead, it's like it's still alive."

Using sticks, we drag the snake out from under the porch. It's a Western Diamondback, probably about 3.5 to 4 feet long, with a nice set of about nine rattles on the tail.

We leave the snake where it is, knowing that it will continue to move through reflex action for several hours, and go back into the house. The cats, completely freaked by this whole episode, come inside when we do. (Well, except for Pipsqueak, who almost never wants in the house. Alan went back out and picked her up to bring her in. Amazingly, she didn't fight him like she normally does....)

This morning, the cats didn't demand to go outside immediately after eating. Heh. Wonder why?

Gizmo finally did venture outside as I went out to take photos of the dead snake. She sniffed around, but didn't get too close to the dead snake. That's good. I'd rather have scared cats than dead cats.

The photos of the snake are linked here. I didn't post them to this page because I know many people are scared/phobic of snakes.

I'm not phobic. I like snakes. And I'm sorry we had to kill this one. But there was no good way to safely extract it from underneath the porch to relocate it. It broke the rules, so it had to die.

Dammit it all, anyway.....

New music from hubby

2008-06-11T10:30:00.001-06:00

I was very pleasantly surprised when Alan presented me with two new CDs.

One is an old favorite -- Eric Clapton's Just One Night. I've loved this album for years and wore out several copies of it on cassette tape with repeated playing.

The other is the new CD (Stop, Drop, and Roll) from Green Day's latest alter-egos The Foxboro Hot Tubs.

Guess I'll spend today in headphones.

wheeeee!

UnFun illnesses

2008-06-06T15:34:00.002-06:00

Part the first, in which our TortoiseGeek goes to the ER on Monday afternoon, and ends up discovering that Walking Pneumonia -- besides being a great name for a band -- is not much fun.

And now to the story: I wrote my previous post to this blog about 11 AM or so. I was just sitting at my desk, doing the usual bureaucratic stuff and I started to have chest pain. Very odd. Then I started to have other symptoms, too. Lightheaded? Yep. Shaky? Uh-huh. Somewhat nauseous? Ulp. Think I'm gonna faint? Yep. What the hell is going on? Can I possibly be having a heart attack? Panic attack? What the hell??

After 10 minutes the symptoms weren't abating, so I went upstairs and coerced a co-worker into taking me to the local hospital ER -- a place I swore I would NEVER enter again after my last ER experience (post-tearing my ACL, whereupon the ER doc told me I was being overly dramatic and that it was probably just a sprain....bastard!).

Anyway, they took blood, ran an EKG, and took two chest X-rays. Turns out my heart was fine. I had an elevated white blood cell count, a slight temperature, and extremely low potassium. Oh, and by the way, there were shadows on the X-ray, so we think you have a case of walking pneumonia, coupled with dehydration from working outdoors in the heat the previous day.

I was at the ER for about three hours. By the time they let me go, it was about 4 PM and I hadn't eaten anything since breakfast, so I was in the throes of a major low blood sugar event. Yep, that's right: even more dizziness, lightheadedness, nausea and a pounding headache to go with it....

The ER prescribed Azithromycin, which I've been taking for the past five days. Today is the last dose. Not sure I feel any better, but I'll wait and see. I sound like a three-pack a day smoker first thing in the morning -- something about having been horizontal all night really makes the lungs fill up. I hack and cough for a good half-hour or so.

Of course, living in rural New Mexico, the first thing my brain goes to when anything respiratory is involved is "OMG! Hanta Virus!11@!!! We do have deer mice, after all. But with no other symptoms than just chest pain and feeling like I can't get enough air, it isn't likely to be Hanta Virus.

Pleagh!

Guess I should blog about tortoises....

2008-06-02T10:07:00.000-06:00

...since that is the title of this blog.

Alan and I spent a few hours on Sunday afternoon re-organizing all the bale structures in the sulcata torts' pen.

Backstory: we use straw and hay bales to build structures for the torts to hide in. We move the structures based on seasonal positions of the sunny and shady areas in the torts' pen. Winter structures are located where they receive sun almost all day; summer structures are moved so that they get shade during the hottest parts of the day.

Currently the torts come up about 8 am to bask and eat until about 10 or 11 am when the heat of the day sets in. Then they'll go back into their structures to escape the heat until late afternoon, when the shade from our trees reaches their pen. They'll come back up and eat some more, then go to bed for the evening about 6 pm or so.

Anyway, we dismantled their winter structure and used the bales to build their summer shelter. It's got lots of overhangs to provide shade, and hopefully enough corners so that everyone can have their own. (For the non-tortoise-folk out there: Tortoises love corners. They'll plow into a corner face-first, and then wedge themselves in using their tremendously-strong front legs. It's a good survival strategy -- most predators aren't likely to be able to haul them out or get through their shells.)

Anyway, I didn't get pics yesterday but will soon.

There -- there's your tortoise post for the week. (grin)

Apropos of nothing....

2008-05-19T12:55:00.003-06:00

I came across this essay in The Atlantic, via Eric Alterman's Altercation Blog:

In the Basement of the Ivory Tower

It's an interesting look at how the American ideal that "all men are created equal" runs the stoplight and slams head-on into the reality that most Americans are anything and everything but college material.

From the essay:

For I, who teach these low-level, must-pass, no-multiple-choice-test classes, am the one who ultimately delivers the news to those unfit for college: that they lack the most-basic skills and have no sense of the volume of work required; that they are in some cases barely literate; that they are so bereft of schemata, so dispossessed of contexts in which to place newly acquired knowledge, that every bit of information simply raises more questions. They are not ready for high school, some of them, much less for college.

Too true. Jay Leno takes a camera out every so often to find people for his "Jaywalking" segments on The Tonight Show. He shows the resulting question-and-answer sessions on his show. While I'm laughing and cringing at how clueless these people are, I have to wonder: How hard does Leno have to look to find these people, who are bereft of even the most basic knowledge of history, civics, science, or current events? I have a sneaking suspicion that it's pretty easy to find these know-nothings.

And I have to admit, I'm also mystified. How can someone be *that* clueless? I routinely absorb information, often without knowing it. I read newspapers (still! yes, I'm old-school), I watch the news, I read blogs, I read books. Even when I'm not actively trying to learn, I still do so, just by immersion. How is it that I can do that, but these folks can't? Or don't? I simply don't get it.

I'm not an elitist who feels that everyone should go to college. But I do feel strongly that everyone should possess a basic set of skills and knowledge. I believe that we should, at the very least, teach people how to learn, if for no other reason than so that when they have kids of their own, they can teach those kids how to learn, so that they'll go on to gather/develop knowledge of their own. That process, in my opinion, is what keeps civil society functioning. Hell, it's what has kept Humanity going since we settled down into simple agrarian communities some 5000 years ago and started building civilizations.

Words (and graph) to live by....

2008-05-16T16:01:00.000-06:00

more song chart memes

Brrrrr!

2008-05-15T17:08:00.001-06:00

It's cold and wet here today. Not May-like at all!

Alan cracked me up. He was complaining about this cold and damp, and in mock exasperation asked, "Okay, who's graduating from Tech? Hell is freezing over here!"

Okay, good question. Who would be the most unlikely person to be graduating from Tech on Saturday?

(checks current graduating class list)...

Maybe Toad?

Is there a web developer in the house?

2008-05-07T13:52:00.002-06:00

I've gotten lots of emails from people wondering about the Sulcata Station website. They want to know what happened to the site, why it's still down, and why I haven't resurrected it yet.

Rather than answer each email individually, I thought I would use my blog to address the issue.

Question 1: What happened to the Sulcata Station website?

Answer: The site host where Sulcata Station's pages were located decided to try to extort several hundred dollars out of me -- money that I did not owe them (and, frankly, that I flat out don't have). You can read the whole sordid story in this blog's archives. Rather than give in, I took down the pages.

Question 2: So why is the website STILL down?

Answer: Because I wanted to update them and make them more interactive, more "web 2.0" looking. It turns out that I don't have the chops to actually do this.

I built the old site using Adobe GoLive, a program which I was familiar with and had used successfully for a few years. But to keep up with the newest web standards, I migrated to DreamWeaver and attempted to rebuild the website using CSS layout rather than tables. Ostensibly, CSS layout will pass the new validation standards and be handicapped-accessible.

... and maybe it would, if I knew what the hell I were doing. But me using DreamWeaver is kinda like taking the kid who's good at swimming in the pool with water wings out to the North Shore of Oahu and telling her to head out there into the surf: So NOT a good idea.

Case in point: I'm trying to redo a set of about six webpages for my employer. And I'm failing miserably. Take a look, and see if you can find out what the heck I'm doing wrong:

The New Mexico Tech IRB home page

What it's supposed to look like

I have no idea why it's not working. I don't know how to fix it because I don't even know what's broken. So, like the title of this post asks: Is there a web developer in the audience? Someone want to tell me what I did wrong -- and more importantly, how I fix it?

Question 3: So that's it? It's down because you can't code?

Answer: Not entirely.

Another reason why I've been reluctant to resurrect the Station is because we've had two tortoises die on us. My point of view until recently has been "How on earth can I justify telling anyone else how to care for their tortoises when I can't even do it correctly myself?"

And I'm still beholden to that thought. But I've had people tell me that putting the website back up is helping to improve the lives of many more than just two tortoises. Maybe they're right.

So, I've started the process. I've got a site host now. I just need to work with a site designer to fix up the site itself.

Thanks for listening, all.

My Résumé - Let me show you it

2008-05-05T16:38:00.000-06:00

Folks, let me ask you one question:

Who wouldn't like a competent, intelligent employee working for them?

Well, my current employer, apparently.

I've had it with the R&ED Office and I really don't want to work at a place that doesn't appreciate my abilities and the service I've provided to them.

Here's my résumé for your perusal. If you have a lead, let me know.

Résumé of Steph Moore

"Give me what I want or I'll hate you!"

2008-04-11T12:50:00.000-06:00

Remember back in 2000 when Bush, et. al., first entered office? Remember how they made snide comments about how "the grownups were now going to be in charge" -- implying that they were going to be more sober and responsible and "better" than the Clinton administration?

As it turns out: Not so much. An excellent essay posted by Hunter at Daily Kos makes a pretty good case that the White House is occupied by folks with the intellectual and emotional development of children:

Foreign Policy As Practiced By Seven Year Old Children

... Scary!

What? Worse than Warren G. Harding?

2008-04-07T12:54:00.000-06:00

Found an interesting item while perusing the political blogs this lunch hour:

A whopping 61 percent of historians rate Dubya as the worst president ever.

I particularly like one historian's comment about Dubya's combining "the paranoia of Nixon, the ethics of Harding and the good sense of Herbert Hoover."

That same historian also said " . . . . God willing, this will go down as the nadir of American politics."

I *so* hope he or she is right.

Obama 2008, babies.

2008-03-30T19:24:00.001-06:00

This is the story of a wanna-be motorcyclist on a quest for the right bike.

Once upon a time, there was a dreadlocked person who wanted to learn to ride motorcycles. This person was fairly smart and mostly rational and somewhat concerned about her own personal safety in this activity. So rather than going to a dealership and plunking down money on a supersport bike, she decided to get some good advice about motorcycle choices and some safety training first.

Dreadie-Locks went to the nearest Harley dealership and took the Rider's Edge Basic Rider Course. Despite the attempted brainwashing into buying all things Harley, the course did provide very valid and useful information about safer riding. Dreadie-Locks also bought a couple of books about "Proficient Motorcycling" and spent a lot of time reading and re-reading them.

After passing the BRC and getting certified for a motorcycle endorsement on her license, Dreadie-Locks went online and found a nice community of folks at BeginnerBikers.org who were generous with their advice and their time. They asked Dreadie-Locks a few questions, mostly about her size and riding abilities.

"Well," Dreadie-Locks replied, "I'm about 5 foot 3 on a tall day, with a 29-inch inseam. And I weigh about 130 pounds, if that's truly important."

"Oh, it is," the community assured her. "It means that a low center of gravity is just as important as a low seat height when you choose your first bike."

Dreadie-Locks had been to a few dealerships and sat on a few bikes. She really liked a particular V-Star 650 custom that she spied in a dealership in Albuquerque.

The community hmmmed to themselves, and said "Well, it might be better to start on a Ninja 250 or something small, but you might do okay with the V-Star...."

So, Dreadie-Locks bought the V-Star. She rode it for a couple of years, had a few scary encounters with trucks on the freeway, and generally wondered if motorcycling was indeed for her.

After much soul-searching, Dreadie-Locks realized something:

The V-Star was Just Too Big.

It would have to go.

So Dreadie-Locks used Craigslist to sell the V-Star to a nice man who came all the way from Kansas to New Mexico to buy her bike. Then she bought what the nice and smart folks at BeginnerBikers.org had recommended at the start: a Ninja 250.

The Ninja 250 was a much better choice. It was light, nimble, and confidence-inspiring. It let her do some stupid things safely, thereby helping Dreadie-Locks learn to be a better and safer rider. It was nice to commute on, too, because it got about 57 mpg.

But after a year on the 250, Dreadie-Locks was slowly realizing some limitations of the bike. It was light, yes, but that meant that cross-winds were a b*tch. And getting onto the freeway was a bit scary.

And so, after more soul-searching (some of which occurred in the "Bike Choices: Starter Bikes" section of the Beginnerbikers.org forum), Dreadie-Locks came to another realization:

The Ninja 250 was Too Small.

It too -- reluctantly -- would have to go.

Luckily, the dealership that had sold Dreadie-Locks the Ninja 250 had a Ninja 500 on the floor. A 2007 model. That they wanted to get out the door....

So Dreadie-Locks made a deal and traded in her 250 for the 500. The dealer, a nice guy named Albert Benavidez, made Dreadie-Locks a very good deal and even delivered the 500 to Dreadie-Locks, free of charge, on Thursday afternoon.

Since there was an hour of daylight left and the 500 had a full tank of gas, Dreadie-Locks donned her armor and mounted the 500 to take a spin. The first ride, 17 miles in total, took Dreadie-Locks from her home in San Acacia down one freeway frontage road to Lemitar, then back up the other frontage road.

Dreadie-Locks was impressed: the 500 was more powerful than the 250, but well-mannered and docile. Most importantly, Dreadie-Locks noticed something else -- that the 500 wasn't as easily deterred by cross-winds as the 250 had been.

All in all, Dreadie-Locks was pleased.

Friday came, but Dreadie-Locks had to take the Cage in to work, and then she didn't get home til late so there was no opportunity to ride again that day.

It wasn't until mid-afternoon Saturday that Dreadie-Locks was able to don her armor again and take another ride on the 500.

This ride was longer that the first one -- a whopping 60 miles! This was the longest ride Dreadie-Locks had ever been on. By taking frontage roads or back roads, Dreadie-Locks could move up and down the gears, accelerating and decelerating to test the bike's mettle. This ride also helped Dreadie-Locks become familiar with the brakes, how the bike handled in turns, and what to expect when she really cranked open the throttle.

This, Dreadie-Locks decided, was a thoroughly enjoyable way to spend 90 minutes on a beautiful Saturday afternoon.

As Dreadie-Locks was riding home, another realization dawned upon her:

This bike, the Ninja 500, was Just Right.

And hopefully, Dreadie-locks and the Ninja 500 will live and ride happily ever after.

The End

Update on the tiny chelonians....

2008-03-28T13:08:00.000-06:00

Well, all five little ones are still my office. They've been moved to spacious new digs -- from a plastic sweater box to a 10-gallon aquarium complete with Rena XP2 filter, 100 watt Mega-Ray UVB bulb, a floating turtle dock, and all the anacharis and hornwort they could hope to eat or float on.

(Talk about Extreme Makeover: Home Edition: You could almost hear them chanting, "Bus driver -- move that bus!!" in tiny little cartoon voices....)

I also marked them with a small dot of nail polish. Every turtle has five scutes that run along its spine, which made things easy: The first turtle I hauled out got a small dot on the first scute; the second one got a dot on the second scute, and so on.

I just weighed them using my brand-new digital scale from Old Will Knott Scales. They are still tiny but hopefully growing... god knows they're eating like little piglets with shells.

Here are the results of the initial weigh-in:

Turtle 1: 5 grams
Turtle 2: 8 grams
Turtle 3: 8 grams
Turtle 4: 7 grams
Turtle 5: 9 grams

Like I said, they're TINY!

And like all the other turtles I've ever encountered, they are extremely food-motivated. They've already learned that the big scary floating hand brings food, so they now swim toward me rather than away from me.

And how's your Friday going?

Band names from spam

2008-03-18T11:16:00.000-06:00

We all hate spam. We can't do much about it, but I've found one way to make it a bit more entertaining.

I'm weird (oh, I know -- believe me, I KNOW), but I actually scan through the spam folders of my various email accounts, reading all the subject lines, before I delete them all. Most are, of course, random gibberish generated by spambots, but every so often, there's one that makes me think to myself "Wow, that would be a great name for a band!"

I've decided to start listing them in a widget on this blog. So when you look over to the right, you'll see the Band Names from Spam item. That's where they'll be listed. You are, of course, free to send me suggestions (and "hey, shut up!" is not one I'd like) or additions.

Just one more useless thing on the web. That's me!

More photos of Painted turtles

2008-03-07T16:48:00.000-07:00

I don't even have to leave the office anymore....

2008-03-07T12:08:00.001-07:00

... the chelonians come to me!

I got a phone call yesterday from an acquaintance of mine (coincidentally, also named Alan) here at Tech. He was digging irrigation trenches on his property yesterday and uncovered a nest of hatchling turtles. Could I take them and provide a foster home for them? Of course, I replied. I'm thinking, again, that they're probably box turtles and because we already have the crew of juveniles inside the house in a large enclosure, I'll just take these guys home and put them in with the others.

Well, I get a pleasant surprise when Alan arrives in my office bearing a small plastic sweater box. I open it to find five *tiny* Painted Turtles (Chrysemys picta).

They are absolutely glorious, with bright red patterned plastrons. No yolk sacs or even little belly buttons where the yolk sac had been attached, so I'm guessing these guys hatched last fall and just overwintered in their nest until Alan uncovered them.

I'm going to keep them until they are large enough to release back into his pond (did I mention he has a large pond on his property?) At their current size, these guys are basically predator chow for the bass and catfish and bullfrogs in the pond; hopefully a year or two of good food and UVB lighting will help these guys reach the size where they'll have a fighting chance at life in the pond.

So this weekend will now be devoted to transferring The Guppy Factory out of its current 10-gallon tank and into a five-gallon bucket (guppys are pretty much indestructible, and besides -- they're feeder fish for the other aquatic turtles I've got). Once that's done, I can re-set the tank up for the five little turtles.

Like I said, I don't even have to leave the office anymore. The animals just come to me now.

Stupid feeding accident - the chelonian version

2008-02-10T23:08:00.000-07:00

You may think that juvenile box turtles are cute, adorable little critters, but you’re wrong. They’re actually vicious little killers with strong jaws and pugnacious attitudes.

Case in point: I’m handing out apple slices yesterday to the crew of juvenile boxies we’ve got in the house over the winter. As I place an apple slice on a flat rock, I feel an incredibly painful pinch start on the side of my middle left finger. I look down to see an ornate box turtle has greedily latched onto my finger and, being an ornate, he is NOT going to let go of his prize.

I lift my hand, turtle still attached as Alan runs into the room -- having heard my shouts from the opposite end of the house -- and using the thumbnail on my right hand, I manage to pry the turtle’s beak open far enough to extricate my finger.

I’ve got a nice diamond-shaped bruise from the beak edges, as well as a blood blister and swelling. It broke the skin slightly, but I’m not too worried about it.

I’ve gotten nailed by our cornsnakes in previous stupid feeding accidents, but lemme tell you: those didn’t didn’t hurt nearly as badly as the bite from this little turtle that’s smaller in diameter than a 50-cent piece.

People who visit Sulcata Station are always worried about being bitten by our big sulcata tortoises, but ironically, they aren’t anywhere near as bad as our boxies. The tortoises never attempt to bite you intentionally, and if they accidentally grab a finger as you’re offering them a treat, they’ll let go immediately.

=====================================================================

Watching the Grammies this evening. Tina was fantastic, as was Aretha. I was boogie-ing around the living room. I was surprised at Kid Rock’s performance; no idea he could sing, and sing that well.

When Kanye won best rap album and was giving his "I deserve this" speech, I said something about Kanye definitely bringing his ego with him tonight.

Alan’s response: “Yeah, but he only brought what he could actually fit into the building. The rest of it is out in the parking lot, hosting its own tailgate party…..”

And we both cackled at Ricky Skaggs’ dig at Kanye: “I just got an award from a Beatle! You had that happen yet, Kanye?”

And Alan's comment when the Foo Fighters won: "Oh noes! Foo! We must fight it! Think of what could happen if the Foo finds some Bars! We'll all be screwed!!"

Did I mention that Alan is hysterically funny at times?

Blogger vs LiveJournal

2008-02-10T22:59:00.000-07:00

I started up another blog at LiveJournal earlier this year.

I kept the same name as this one (originality, thy name is NOT tortoisegeek!) and just posted more of my BS there, mainly because people whose blogs I really like (and like commenting upon) are on LiveJournal.

My experience so far is that Blogger is easier for me to use than LiveJournal. Blogger also allows me to post photos without going to a paid account.

So my dilemma is: which blog do I keep? Both? Neither?

Your thoughts? Anybody? Does anybody read this thing?

Things that make me laugh

2007-10-23T10:06:00.000-06:00

First thing every morning when I log on, I check all of my various email accounts, then I start down the list of my favorite blogs.

This had me giggling this AM:

Top 12 Examples of Graffiti Humor

Two things for Sentimentality Monday

2007-10-22T16:53:00.000-06:00

I'm just a soft-hearted fool, I guess.

The first thing on today's agenda is a YouTube video. This link showed up on one of my favorite turtle-related Yahoo Groups and it actually made me tear up....

http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=HvW64NMA7b0

Somewhat bittersweet to this turtle lover, and major bonus points for making use of one of my very favorite songs. (My brother can confirm that I was a major Styx fan back in the day.) Godspeed and good luck, little shelled ones.

The second thing today is a way for you to put the "warm&fuzzy" feeling into action. If you can, please consider a donation to PlayPumps International.

This is my brother's email about this:

Hi all,

The kids and I are raising money for PlayPumps International, a clean water initiative that helps build merry-go-rounds in sub-Saharan African schools that pump water. We are raising $500. If it works well, then we're going to ask their school to raise enough for one complete pump ($14,000).

So, I'm asking for your help. Make a donation, if you can. Even $6 can provide water up to one person for ten years! Unlike a lot of promised programs, the PlayPump water system is a tangible, sustainable solution to water crisis... and they're fun, too. Kids play, water pumps!

Visit www.kintera.com/findaperson/garthmoore to donate to the kids page (we didn't put up their picture, they're nervous). You can also read more about PlayPumps by visiting www.playpumps.org or www.knowh2o.org. Also, spread the word if you can.

(and yes, they are one of my clients)

Thanks everyone!
--
Garth Moore
garthmoore@gmail.com

So, do some karmic cleansing and donate. I'm gonna.

.... still thinking about those little DiamondBack Terrapins. sigh

The Station is still down

2007-10-01T18:53:00.000-06:00

I apologize to all of you other tortoise geeks out there, but the Sulcata Station website is still down.

I am rebuilding pages in between the demands of my 9-5 job and my home life. Once that's done, I'll look for a new site host. Many people have emailed me to offer their services, and it's very deeply appreciated. I hope to be in touch with you soon.

In the meantime, Don Williams has very kindly provided a way to find the archived Sulcata Station website, if you need one of the pages immediately:

> ...you can still access it if you use the WayBack Machine,
> which has archived files for literally thousands/millions?
> of web pages, often for many years back in web time.
> (I recently needed this tool to get the info on the
> Hatchling Failure Syndrome by Brad Morris).
>
> WayBack Machine
>
> Once there, you simply type in the URL for the site
> you are looking for, and it brings up the archived
> records/pages of that URL - Sulcata Station is below
> as is the CTTC page.
> Archived Sulcata Station Pages back to 1998

Thanks, Don!

And thanks to everyone who relied on Sulcata Station. I apologize for basically pulling the rug out from under you. It feels that way to me too. I hope to be back up and running soon.

AVOID addr.com like the plague!

2007-09-19T13:59:00.000-06:00

Right now, Sulcata Station's main website is down. I am posting this to my blog to warn others about the problems with a site hosting service.

Addr.com was the site host I was using for Sulcata Station. I had recently registered a couple of additional domain names at GoDaddy.com, and wanted addr.com to make sure the new names were going to point at the website correctly. While I was logged into my account at addr.com, I also checked my personal profile and updated my credit card info, since I'm migrating all online purchases to a single card. It's easier to track them if they're all on one statement.

Yesterday afternoon, I'm checking my banking and credit card statements on line. I do this at least once a week to make sure there aren't any problems. Well, I was completely shocked to discover a $645.84 charge from addr.com dated 09/07/2007 on my card.

Initially, I thought "Okay, this is a mistake, I'll call the company, point out their mistake, and have them reverse the charges." Turns out, that isn't possible with this company.

When I called addr.com's billing office, I spoke with some call center employee who went by the name "Shawn" -- yeah, right. With that heavy, non-native-English-speaking accent, I could tell that I'm doing business with an overseas call center. This is my first red flag.

"Shawn" would not answer my questions, other than to repeatedly assert that my account was in arrears due to an expired credit card and that addr.com had sent emails to me about this expired credit card.

What he seems to be unaware of is that addr.com has had my verified email address and verified mailing address on file since 2001 when I first contracted with them for site hosting. My email account at Yahoo is a paid account that has been in existence since 2001 as well. Because it's a paid account, I have lots of storage space so I can save every email I receive related to either my websites or domains.

I can verify that I have received NO EMAILS whatsoever from addr.com about any billing issues. An interesting Catch-22 there, as well: If I wasn't paying my bill, how come addr.com kept the website up and didn't terminate its service -- as stated in its OWN Terms of Service?

I found the call center employee's attempts to lie bald-facedly to me about this matter insulting, and I told him so. Despite three specific requests from me, he would NOT transfer me to his supervisor. Hoo boy. Major second red flag goes up.

What really pissed me off was his repeated allegations that addr.com had notified me about an expired credit card. I could not believe the gall this man had -- that he would straight out lie to me.

I hang up on "Shawn" and try calling another phone number listed in addr.com's contact information. Guess who answers the phone. Again. Yep, it was my buddy "Shawn". I tell him I am not paying this damned bill and they had better reverse the charges. He says "Ma'am, I'm authorized to offer you two free years of hosting...." I cut him off with "Don't even go there. Don't insult me. I don't want anything to do with addr.com and I'm taking my pages down immediately!" And I hang up on him again.

Googling "addr.com + billing problems" turns up an interesting and disheartening fact: this seems to be a common problem. There are at least three different websites discussing this issue:

ComplaintsBoard.com

RateItAll.com

Vista Intermedia Corp site host review site

I note that one guy is posting on these sites asking burned former addr.com customers to email him in hopes of raising a class-action suit. Guess I'm going to be contacting the guy.... I also started the process of filing a complaint with my credit card company about the fraudulent charge by addr.com

To sum up: They did *NOT* notify me of any billing issues, and their attempt to extort money from me is appalling and will not be tolerated. I have removed my pages from addr.com effective immediately, and I strongly recommend to all my former internet visitors that addr.com is not to be trusted.

I found a snake!

2007-08-16T11:39:00.000-06:00

And on campus, no less!

I came out of the gym last night about 8:30; it was mostly dark and I was walking along, looking down as usual. ( I can hear my brother: "No! Really?!? Looking down at the ground? How unusual!" ;-)

On the east side of the gym, on the main sidewalk running from Fitch to Weir, I see this small snake. No rattles, and to me it looks like a garter snake. It's just sitting there. I'm totally surprised to see it, and especially to see it's so calm.

There are a couple of girls who are apparently trainers with the UTEP football team over by the outdoor faucet, filling up the big Gatorade coolers for the players. They are about ten feet behind me, and I'm envisioning the screaming and ridiculousness that will ensue if I say anything about the snake.

I have my gym bag with me, so on the spur of the moment, I set the bag down, open it up, pick up the snake, and put it into the bag.

Well, of course the snake musked me pretty well as I picked it up, but it didn't even offer to bite me. It just hung out in my hands until I could put it into my bag. (Musk has to be a pretty damned good defense -- it's completely *NASTY* smelling. Think feces and concentrated foot odor combined and you've pretty well got it.)

I left the bag outside Brown Hall while I went in, washed my hands, and picked up my stuff. Then I put the snake and bag in the bed of my truck, went up the hill behind campus, and let the snake go near the Sarate Reservoir.

The release was neat -- I opened the bag, tipped it up and waited while the snake checked out all the smells for about thirty seconds, then it exited the bag and went on its way.

When I got home, I immediately went to my copy of Reptiles and Amphibians of New Mexico to look up exactly what species it was. I was correct: it was a Checkered Garter Snake. Really pretty, and about two feet long. Here's a link to a photo on the Internet:

Checkered Garter Snake at Kingsnake.com

Of course, my gym bag is probably a goner unless I can get that smell out.... But I did find that the de-skunking stuff we bought when Gracie tangled with a skunk last year also works really well at getting musk off your hands. I'll have to try it on the gym bag.

Skunks.... why did it have to be skunks?

2007-07-11T17:29:00.001-06:00

Last night we were out making sure that all the turtles and tortoises were bedded down for the night. Hearing a lot of scuffing and scraping underneath one of the porch decks, Alan and I shined flashlights into the space underneath and saw a skunk.

Not wanting to get sprayed, we decided that discretion was the better part of valor and left the skunk alone. Maybe we spooked it and it will leave, we thought.

This morning, though, Alan discovered a momma skunk and at least five babies making themselves comfy in our covered storage area behind the hay bales we keep for the tortoises.

Great.... NOW what do we do? We have a couple of humane live traps, but I don't want to be the one that has to approach a trap full of angry momma skunk. (Or worse -- a trapful of baby skunks with angry momma outside ready to do battle....)

Back when I was a kid, my dad shot a skunk that was foraging from our outdoor cat's bowl.... problem was, the skunk was *on the porch* when Dad decided to go all macho and handle the problem with a .22 caliber handgun. All I can clearly remember of that incident was the wave of skunk smell that immediately inundated the house, and my mom yelling at my dad about what an idiot he was....

... ah the joys of rural life. Dammit all anyway.

My blog, my opinion

2007-07-06T12:32:00.001-06:00

Can I just say how much I adore Charlie Pierce? He's one of my favorite contestants on "Wait, Wait... Don't Tell Me" and he writes an absolutely devastating opinion piece:

Charlie Pierce, 7/6/07, on Altercation by Eric Alterman

Nothing the Bush Hegemony does surprises me anymore. I will be surprised if they actually leave office come January. I'm cynical enough to believe that they'll conjure up some excuse to delay or cancel the elections in November, if not declare outright martial law. After all, they're not done pillaging us bone-dry yet. And there's always that war with Iran they're just longing to start....

And the American sheeple can't be bothered to think for themselves, so bring on more Paris Hilton and iPhones and simpleminded, racist bashing of "those damn illegals" (who actually contribute a hell of a lot of money to our economy from their taxes and their buying power , but who are increasingly getting shafted in return).....

Yes, I'm outraged -- I'm actually paying attention, dammit!

Yesterday SUCKED!

2007-06-27T12:44:00.000-06:00

How badly did my day go yesterday? Well, here are a few examples:

1. I was supposed to give a presentation to an MST class at 10 AM. I'm a bit late, as is unfortunately usual. Then my frigging laptop goes haywire and has major problems in displaying my Power Point file while connected to the projector. Thank god that my friend Roxanne was in the class *and* that she had her laptop computer with her. We transferred the presentation to her computer, hooked it up to the projector, and off we went.

2. Being bugged about my laptop's problem with external displays, I spent several hours hunting on the net for any sort of solution. No results. I updated the drivers and all, but that didn't help resolve the problem.

Basically: When I hook any sort of external display device to my computer, it initially does fine. When I open any sort of Microsoft Office product (Word, PP, Excel), the application freaks out and goes to maximum zoom and starts flashing and beeping like mad. If anyone has any solutions, now would be a *great* time to let me know.

3. Wasted the several hours searching for a solution for my laptop. Attempted to help an MST student with setting up webpages, which took way too long. We had to go over to the Fidel Center so that she could access the wireless network, then we had to jump through hoops to get access to the TCC's FTP server.

4. The Gym was full so I didn't get a full workout in. Poor baby, I know.

5. Not being done tormenting me yet, the Gods of Farce (tm) then had my motorcycle tip over onto its side while I was attaching my bag to the rear rack. I knew it was hot yesterday, but I didn't think it was hot enough to melt asphalt under my side stand.... so one minute I'm trying to bungee the bag to the rack, then BONK -- I'm staring at the bike on its side on the ground. At that very moment, my cell phone rings -- and it's in the bag bungeed to the now-horizontal bike.

Much cursing and fumbling later, I get the phone out and answer it. It's Alan, in Albuquerque, wanting to know about what groceries to buy. I'm afraid I was very nasty. "I don't frigging care! My bike is on its side and I can't get it back up! Go away!"

Again, I lucked out: another friend, Patrick, happened to be driving by and came to help. We got the bike up and found very minimal damage. It started right up, too.

6. And the final parting shot by the Gods of Farce: some inattentive dumbass nearly runs me off the road at the end of the freeway on-ramp. How someone could miss a bright yellow motorcycle -- being ridden by someone wearing a bright yellow helmet and a high-visibility safety vest -- merging onto a freeway is beyond me. He eventually moved over at the last moment.

So today, I'm keeping my head down and trying to avoid pissing off the fates. Here's hoping that the Gods of Farce have been entertained enough by my travails, and have moved on to tormenting someone else....

Kitten photos

2007-06-22T16:38:00.001-06:00

Here's Gizmo and Pippen (aka Pipsqueak) again. Just thought I'd post these photos because they're cute and they've grown quite a bit since their last photos.

New arrivals at Sulcata Station

2007-06-18T17:21:00.000-06:00

Sulcata Station has two new arrivals. Sherman (the larger tort) and Rascal (the little guy) came to us from K. Mullady in El Paso.

I drove down to Las Cruces on Sunday to meet with the Mulladys so I could pick up the torts from them. I hadn't been to Cruces in about 15 years, so I was truly stunned at how much the city has grown. Fifteen years ago, the "conquistador" water tank at the northern end of the city was out in the middle of nowhere. It's completely surrounded by mega-retail now; all the standard big boxes are in place right off Lohman Avenue.

Once I returned home, Sherman and Rascal each got a long soak in lukewarm water, and then went to bed. Today, Rascal (the little guy) got to go out with Lou in the "little guys" enclosure. Sherman will go outdoors into the regular pen -- but only after we make sure it's safe for him and he can't get out anywhere.

We finally got our swamp cooler in the house up and running, so I'm looking forward to temps in the mid 70s in the house rather than the mid 80s we've been having. The kitties will be much happier, too.

Fishtank Bizarre-ness

2007-06-13T15:35:00.000-06:00

Okay, I'm very confused. Apparently the Rapture occurred over the weekend in my invertebrate tank, but only certain freshwater invertebrates were invited to participate.

I've literally gone from having multitudes of Ghost Shrimp to *none* -- and there is absolutely no sign that there were *ever* any Ghost Shrimp in the tank. No live shrimp, no little bodies lying around on the substrate. They're just gone.

All the guppies are still there, as are the snails. The remaining critters and plants are healthy, and the water quality is good.

WTF? Were they Holy Ghost Shrimp?

Remember: Dogs and Torts do NOT mix!

2007-06-12T15:04:00.000-06:00

There's a moderately intense discussion going on at the sulcatastation Yahoo Group right now regarding dog-chewed tortoises. This is what I posted on the list regarding this issue:

=============================

Good afternoon list folk --

I'm greatly distressed that there have been several posts lately about
tortoises being chewed on by dogs.

I am very aware that this post is going to hurt some feelings on this
list. Please understand it is prompted by the responsibility I feel
toward helping tortoises -- and that my definition of helping includes
avoiding illness and injury.

To that end, I have the following recommendations for those of you who
have both dog(s) and tortoise(s):

1. KEEP THEM SEPARATED! I *cannot* stress this enough. Dogs are not
humans in furry suits. They do not rationalize or understand things in
the same way as humans. It's not the dog's fault when it gets to a
tortoise and chews it up or kills it. I do feel, very strongly though,
that it is a failure on the part of the owner.

I have heard all the rationalizations: "But my dog is a sweetie, she
would never, EVER hurt my tort." Many folks who make that
rationalization end up being very surprised, disappointed, and
regretful when the dog reverts to normal doggy behavior and the
tortoise ends up dead as a result. In short, don't take the risk. KEEP
THEM SEPARATED!

2. If your tortoise is chewed on by a dog, resulting in punctures to
the shell or limbs, TAKE THE TORT TO A VET, pronto! Despite the old
wives' tales, dog saliva isn't an antibiotic. The puncture or chewed
area will get infected, and you will have an animal in pain and dying
slowly on your hands.

Yes, vet care can be expensive. But guess what (and this is *really*
going to hurt some feelings here): You *SHOULD* have thought of that
in the first place. That should be part of the decision making process
you undergo before taking on the responsibility of *ANY* pet, be it a
reptile or dog or cat, or even a hamster.

My own personal opinion is that it's just plain cruel and inhuman to
make an animal suffer as a result of an owner's poor judgement or lack
of finances. Better to give the animal to a rehabber (if you can find
one), or barring that, having a vet euthanize the animal.

Also be aware that euthanizing a tortoise is difficult. Mammals are
typically euthanized with an overdose of barbiturates that cause their
breathing and heartbeat to stop. That method does NOT work on a tortoise.

If your vet isn't used to dealing with reptiles -- and especially
those species that can tolerate significant hypoxia -- then have your
vet do a phone consultation with another vet who can provide
information about how to perform a painless, effective euthanasia.

Okay, I'm getting off my soapbox now. I am hoping that you all will
take this in the manner in which I intend it -- as my attempt to help
reduce needless, preventable injuries and deaths of tortoises.

=============================

So far, nobody has been too upset by this post, and a few people have posted or emailed me privately to say that they completely agree. We'll see how the drama plays out.

Better than making it into the phone book

2007-06-08T18:21:00.000-06:00

Sulcata Station made it into the local newspaper:

Mountain Mail Article Page 1

Mountain Mail Article Page 2

Finally, a photo of Alan and a tortoise together. He's holding Willie and I'm holding Lou.

What's happening?

2007-06-07T16:55:00.001-06:00

I always seem to run into writer's block when it comes to this blog. I never feel like I have anything worth posting. I'll try to be better at posting more regularly.

Let's see, what has been happening?

The kittens Gizmo and Pippen (aka Pipsqueak) are pretty much adult-sized by now. Pipsqueak is absolutely nuts. She'll run the length of the house and back, then run into the master bathroom and clatter a complete lap around the rim of the bathtub, leap out, and then start the process over again. When you try to stop her or try to pick her up, she looks at you like "Hey! Busy here! Do you MIND!?"

Gracie is still the alpha cat who does what she wants and goes where she wants. Kiddo doesn't challenge her when she decides he's had enough and now it's HER time for lap snuggling. Pipsqueak is also afraid of Gracie.

Gizmo, however, is no longer afraid of Gracie and is really pushing her luck trying to take on the mantle of alpha cat. I've caught Gizmo attempting to bat Gracie away from the food bowl on more than one occasion.... That's when the Spray Bottle of Justice (tm) intervenes.

In all honesty, I'm finding that four cats is about two too many. But when they adopt you, whaddya gonna do? You have to just deal with it.

The flock of turkeys that adopted us last year has been whittled down from 12 to approximately 7. We're not sure if the missing birds got eaten or if they're off somewhere nesting and will show up with broods of their own later this summer. (I actually hope that coyotes or humans got the missing birds... we've already got more than enough turkeys!)

Peahen (or Fabulous Chicken, as we call her) is still around and spends much of her day preening and posing, typically on one of the parked cars. She's quite sure she makes a fabulous hood ornament, or trunk ornament, or maybe even roof ornament, since you're sure to see her in all her glorious plumage when she's atop the roof.....

The box turtles at home and the aquatic turtles here in my office are doing well. I'm stressed out about the aquatic turtles at the moment because Tech's Physical Plant is going to shut down Brown Hall's electricity over the weekend while they replace the main electrical junction box. They say that they'll have power restored by mid-day Sunday, but this is P-Plant we're talking about....

The power being out for that long is gonna be tough on the fishtanks in my office. I'll attempt to keep the tanks aerated using battery-powered air pumps. But that's not the real problem -- the lack of filtration will be the dangerous thing. When the filters go down, the ammonia levels in the tanks go up. I'll have to do a major cleaning of the filters and major water changes to each tank when the power comes back up. Here's hoping none of the fish perish with the rising ammonia levels.

The tortoises are now famous. Alan and I got a brief mention in an article in New Mexico Magazine's June issue. That mention earned us a phone call from the better local paper, The Mountain Mail. Reporter John Larson came out and took photos of us and the tortoises, took some verbiage I emailed him, and wrote a heckuva story on us. We're actually front-page news! Check the issue that came out today.

I'm slowly working on a redesign of the Sulcata Station website. It still will be text-based, not flashy or anything. I'm experimenting with using a CSS-based navigation system rather than the current Javascript nav bars.

My main requirement is that Sulcata Station has to be accessible to folks who don't have the latest and greatest of computers and software, and who don't have great gobs of bandwidth on their internet access. Heck, out where we live, 26.4K dialup is the only thing available. The infrastructure doesn't even support 55K. And you can forget cable modems or DSL -- not available. Period. Welcome to rural New Mexico. (I'm looking at you, Qwest! Thanks for failing to live up to your corporate promises to invest millions in New Mexico's communications infrastructure!)

Guitar lessons go on. And I still suck. But I've found that I like Les Paul-type guitars much better than Stratocaster-type guitars. I like the Les Paul necks. My current favorite guitar is my Ibanez GAX70. It's light, thin, and easy to play.

I still love my Epiphone Les Paul Studio -- such a beautiful guitar! -- but I'm finding that it's really too big and heavy for me to be comfortable with. It's such a beautiful guitar (I said that already, didn't I?) that I can't quite bring myself to selling it. I would need to find it an excellent home with someone who would play it and enjoy it....

And the motorcycle. Gas prices being what they are, I have set myself a goal of commuting via motorcycle at least three days a week, weather permitting. The other two will require a 4-wheeled vehicle (one day is laundry day, the other is guitar lesson day).

Well, that hits all of the important topics in my typical day..... Hope this hasn't bored you silly.

The dreaded "Homosexual Agenda"

2007-04-30T11:38:00.000-06:00

Yep, you can see what devious, dangerous people these gay folks really are:

Trey's Diary at Pam's House Blend

Geez, the wingers and fanatical evangelicals would have you believe that laundry, soccer practice, and bedtime would end the world as we know it.

I've lived with gay housemates. I have gay friends. Not a big deal. They've never given me grief for being left-handed, somewhat (only somewhat?) neurotic, and having curly hair -- the stuff I was born with. Why should anyone give them grief over what stuff they were born with?

The down side of tortoise-keeping

2007-04-25T17:09:00.000-06:00

One of our original tortoises, Ra, died on March 21st.

He and Isis were the only tortoises we ever purchased, as tiny little hatchlings at one of the Albuquerque reptile expos. They were frighteningly tiny when we got them -- if we wanted to keep them in a particular area in the backyard, we surrounded them with a garden hose. It was a towering wall to them at that size.

Ra was 30 pounds and around ten years old when he died. Garden hose "walls" were a long time gone.

Tortoises take a while to get sick, and when they do, they get very sick. It was very apparent on Saturday March 17th that Ra was very dehydrated. But we couldn't find anyone to look at him. Our regular reptile vet (Dr. Russman) wasn't available, so we took Ra to a different veterinarian in Albuquerque on Sunday the 18th because he was severely dehydrated. The vet injected fluids and vitamins, and tried giving him an enema to get him to poop. But on Wednesday morning, Alan found Ra dead.

I was relatively okay as I drove his body up to Albuquerque on Wednesday afternoon to turn it over to our usual reptile vet so that a necropsy could be performed. I was relatively okay sitting there in the waiting room with Ra in a large box. I was okay until the vet tech picked up the box to take it to the back. Then I absolutely lost it. I sat out in my truck in the parking lot for about 45 minutes just weeping inconsolably.

Some people just looked at me funny when they found out how upset I was. "It's just a tortoise. Why are you so upset?" Well, he was a tortoise, that's true -- but he was MY tortoise. And I feel like I failed him somehow. He was supposed to outlive me. I was supposed to keep him safe and healthy. But I didn't.

The vet called us with a report of the necropsy results yesterday. Ra apparently died from liver failure (in fact, his liver was essentially necrotic, or dead tissue). Now, our task is to understand why. Did he get into something toxic? Is it a dietary issue? Dr. Russman said she would send the report to us.

Once we have the actual written necropsy report in hand, we'll try to assess what went wrong, and whether we need to fix or change the way we take care of our remaining torts.

We've lost three box turtles over this past winter as well. It was just too damned cold for too long here. And it makes me mad and sad and sick at heart.

Sometimes you just NEED bacon....

2007-04-11T11:56:00.000-06:00

Hi, I'm steph and I'm a recovering carnivore.

("Hi steph!")

In addition to being the world's most unlikely bureaucrat, I am also the world's worst vegetarian.

Alan has been a vegetarian for a number of years, and when we got together I decided to become vegetarian too. It seemed like a good, ethical thing to do, on a number of levels: using less resources by eating lower on the food chain, avoiding the contamination problems inherent in the factory farming system, being kind to animals, being healthier.

But why does it have to be so difficult?

As the weather warms up and people fire up the grills in their backyards, the mouthwatering smell drives me insane as I walk around Tech in the late afternoons.

My mom's posole, made with either pork shoulder or (my favorite) turkey, is a bit of heaven on earth.

And what about green chile stew? It's gotta have either pork or chicken in it to be official, and you simply cannot be a New Mexican if you don't eat it on a semi-regular basis.

But the hardest thing of all for me to resist: Bacon.

I know where it comes from. I don't like the fact that semi-sentient animals are being slaughtered to provide my food. As Alan says, "Poor little piggy! It was probably cute, too!"

But let me catch one whiff of bacon as I walk in a restaurant.... and I'm a goner. All my resolve fails and bacon, eggs, and pancakes are suddenly mandatory.

So yes, I'm a lousy vegetarian. I try to avoid eating meat in front of Alan and I probably eat a lot less meat than most Americans. But dammit, sometimes you just NEED bacon!

A joyful Imbolc to you and yours

2007-02-01T11:51:00.000-07:00

For those of you who aren't pagans or Wiccans, today is Imbolc, defined as the midway point between the winter solstice (generally December 21st, also called Yule) and the spring equinox (which will be on March 21st, also called Ostara).

Basically, Imbolc is Gaelic for "It's TIME for Spring, dammit!"

And I want to wish a peaceful and happy (or at least, non-sucky) birthday to my brother Garth -- so, what is this, your 36th birthday? Let's see...if you're 36, that makes me..... OLD!

But wait, there's more! Or Moore, since Garth's son (and my nephew) Emerson also celebrates his birthday today. Emmie turns the big FIVE today! Wooooo Emmie! Happy Birthday! May you have as much cake and ice cream as you can possibly handle without getting sick. You may have to share some of it with Dad, so be a Big Boy about it, okay?

On a completely different note, I was greatly saddened to hear about the death of Molly Ivins. She always made me laugh and yet opened my eyes as well. On the other hand, if there is an afterlife, I'm sure she and Ann Richards are together somewhere, raising hell and telling folks exactly what's what.

I remember watching the Democratic Convention the year that Ann Richards made her famous remark about George Bush the elder being born with a silver foot in his mouth; I about died laughing. And of course, there's Molly's insightful comment about Dubya: "If you think his daddy had trouble with "the vision thing," wait till you meet this one." Would that we had heeded her warning.....

Meet Gizmo and Pippen

2007-01-26T15:40:00.000-07:00

The kittens do now have names, since that's been the number one question from anyone who actually reads this pathetic blog.

The orange kitty is Gizmo and the little tortoiseshell is Pippen (or Pipsqueak, as I refer to her when she's squeaking at me to pick her up). They are both growing like, ummmm, well-fed kittens.

I came home on Tuesday, Jan. 9th to find Pippen limping and not putting weight on her left-side hind leg. I suspect, given the condition of the house, that both kittens had been playing exuberently and she either fell off something or something fell onto her. I called Animal Haven, but found that they were closed while their vets attended Continuing Education classes, and so I ended up taking the kittens to the Ark of Socorro vet clinic on Jan. 11th. I have to say, I was really NOT impressed by their services. Every time I've taken a cat to a vet, the process is:

1. Weigh the cat
2. Palpate the cat's abdomen and chest to make sure there are no suspicious masses
3. Examine the cat's teeth, eyes, and ear canals to ascertain general health and whether ear mites are present
4. Take the cat's temperature
5. Finally, ask what the owner wants to vaccinate the cat against. Rabies is a given, but you typically have a choice whether you want the cat to be vaccinated against other things like distemper, feline leukemia, and so on.

The vet tech who first met us in the examination room took the kittens' temperatures. That's it. Then the vet came in. He gave the kittens an injection (I'm still not sure what he gave them, because he didn't tell me, and it's not labeled clearly on the bill), and then poked and prodded Pippen's back leg to see what actually might be injured. My opinion, which was not solicited, was that something was wrong with her hip, since she doesn't sit in normal cat position. He kept pinching her ankle and toes, trying to get a reaction from her. X-rays were out of the question, because their clinic was extremely busy, and I would have had to leave Pippen there, or wait with her for hours. In the end, he gave her a shot of some sort of anti-inflammatory, and sent us on our way.

Pippen got around marvelously on three legs until earlier this week, when Alan noticed she was using all four legs to chase Gizmo around. Whatever injury she incurred has managed to heal on its own.

When the time comes to get them neutered/spayed, they'll be going to Animal Haven's vets. I still haven't decided whether I should send a letter to Ark of Socorro that tells them how little I thought of their "services."

Two more marks in heaven

2007-01-04T15:26:00.000-07:00

That's what my office mate, Dr. Dan Walsh says. "Bless your heart, kid! You've got two more marks in heaven!"

Alan and I went for a walk just before dusk on Friday, Dec. 21st. We'd been cooped up all day in the house, so I decided a walk out to the mailbox and back (approximately a mile round-trip) would do us some good.

We made it to the mailbox, found nothing in said box, and turned around to walk back home. On the way, these two kittens came tumbling out of a field toward us. The ginger kitty demanded to be petted, while the smaller, darker, tortoise-shell kitty held back a bit. We petted them, then resumed walking.....

...Only to be followed by both kitties. (Actually, I take that back -- Ginger Kitten led us all the way back to our house.) I had to pick up Tortie Kitten because she was falling behind.

So, we already have two adult cats at home. We're standing in the dark on the front porch, and it's cold, and I'm thinking to myself that when we open this front door and the kittens go in, we'll have a riot on our hands; Kiddo the tuxedo cat will try to kill them, and Gracie the calico (who probably had kittens at some point in her life) will try to protect them, and so on.....

We open the door, the kittens go in, and.... not much happens. There were (and still are, but infrequently) some incidents of spitting and growling, but surprisingly, *Gracie* is the one who has been the instigator in those incidents. Kiddo has seemingly adopted the role of grudging uncle who will condescend to participate in a bit of play.

I have never had kittens before. All of the cats who've ever adopted me have been adults, so I never realized that everything is toyetic (i.e., has the potential to be played with, endlessly). Dreadlocks, ankles, toes, cabinet doors, newpapers on the floor, you name it. And especially your sibling, whose tail is a never-ending temptation. They wrestle and play keep away and just generally raise hell until they drop from exhaustion. And then they sleep together, all nestled up to each other. The overweening cuteness of those moments makes you almost forgive all the hell they raised in the two hours previously....

Anyhoo, we still don't have official names for these little ones, so depending on the moment, I've referred to them as (and threatened to name them):

* Thing One and Thing Two
* Damien (the tortoiseshell) and Dennis the Menace (the ginger)
* Dammit and Damnation

You get the idea.....somehow I don't think any marks that I receive from adopting these two kitties are located in heaven ;-)

Happy new year!

The Kerr-Moore Home for Wayward Critters

2006-09-24T16:32:00.000-06:00

... has yet another new arrival. Now, to go with the 12 or 13 (depending on what time of day you're counting) turkeys, we now have a pea hen (female peacock). Oh, joy.

She's LOUD, too. She must have showed up sometime yesterday afternoon or evening while we were in Albuquerque. We got back well after dark last night, so we had no idea she was there. She definitely woke us up this morning though -- we knew that something out there was making a weird, non-turkey-like noise.

No idea who she might belong to, but she's apparently found her own little nirvana, with other large dino-birds around for companionship, all the food and water and shade she can tolerate, and no large predators.

Geez, my joke about going out some morning and finding the giraffe in the back 40 is starting become increasingly less funny. As Alan put it this morning, "Who knew that in addition to the word 'SUCKER,' there's also the word 'SANCTUARY' on our foreheads?"

One Year Ago Today....

2006-08-29T13:27:00.000-06:00

I was in Albuquerque, having outpatient arthroscopic surgery on my right knee.

The TV in the waiting room was tuned to CNN as I arrived at the surgery center at 6:30 AM for the intake paperwork and prep for surgery. Hurricane Katrina was the all-encompassing topic that morning, with lots of field reporters in N.O. and the Gulf Coast doing their five-minute bits about how the winds were picking up and the water was getting rough.

By 8 AM I was on the table under general anesthesia and the orthopedic surgeon was pulling out the destroyed ACL in my right knee and replacing it with a donor graft.

By this time a year ago, I was home in my own bed, heavily sedated on post-op oxycodone. (So at least I had a legitimate reason why I was completely unaware of what was going on in New Orleans.)

I didn't fully regain consciousness until about mid-morning on Tuesday, August 30. My mom, who was staying with us for the first week after my knee surgery, was in tears as she informed me, "New Orleans is gone." She had been to N.O. a couple of times and deeply loved the music, the food, the culture, the history. I haven't seen her that sad in quite a while.

I spent that first week going between bed, couch, and bathroom, always keeping an eye on the television. And I was stunned by what I was seeing. I kept contrasting it with my own situation: I am in pain, yes. But I have a house. I have food. I have water. I have my husband, my mom, my pets, and we're all okay.

At some point during that week, I stopped taking the oxycodone, which led to what I can only describe as some sort of withdrawal psychosis. I became convinced that the house was gone, that I was at the Superdome with no food and no water and no loved ones. I can dimly remember standing in the hallway, shaking like mad, and somewhere in the back of my mind it occurred to me that this is what it's like to lose your mind.

The only difference between me and the folks at the Superdome is that my hell was imaginary. Theirs was only just beginning.

One year later, my knee is not back to 100 percent. It's creaky and painful and not as reliable as it was before. But so what?

One year later, New Orleans and everything it encompassed -- food, music, culture, architecture, families and lives -- is still devastated. Read the report.

In memory of the people who perished in the storm and those who've since perished in the government-sponsored, bureaucratically-facilitated hell of post-hurricane existence.

PS: As I write this, I have Winamp running in the background. Guess what song came up just as I finished this post: "Macy's Day Parade" by Green Day. Apropos. Very apropos.

Morning Ride In

2006-08-24T17:39:00.000-06:00

Even though my knee hurts and I'm possibly looking at more surgery, I still ride my lil' yellow bike. I always arrive at the office in a good mood when I take the bike. It's just more fun, and more interactive than sitting in a car at 75 mph on the freeway.

Today was a neat ride in to work - a six-foot-long bull snake crossed the road in front of me. This was on the frontage road between San Acacia and Polvadera. Had I been in the car, I would have been on the freeway and missed seeing it. I thought about stopping and getting the snake to release it behind our shop, but I was sure that by the time I went back, it would be long gone. Of course, the concept of being late to work never even entered my mind.....

The Knee Saga, part 17

2006-08-24T17:18:00.000-06:00

Had my appointment with my orthopedic surgeon on Tuesday.

The pain is on the outside of my knee, although it has lessened quite a bit and I'm no longer on crutches. The doc believes that this is most likely a problem with the lateral meniscus.

He said he noticed while he was doing the ACL replacement that the lateral meniscus was slightly damaged, but felt it would be better to let it heal on its own. Well, it apparently didn't, so "we may need to go back in and clean it up a bit."

If my insurance company approves another MRI, we'll know for sure whether a second, less-severe arthroscopy is needed.

Rain, Rain, Go AWAY!

2006-08-16T10:50:00.000-06:00

Okay, those folks who were praying for rain can just STOP already!

Hatch, New Mexico is underwater this morning, due to an arroyo breach. There is speculation that the rest of the chile crop is gone.... which is utterly tragic if you're a native New Mexican.

Parts of Socorro (Florida, specifically) were flooded yesterday. And the lightning! Man, it sounded like it was right outside my building.

But our house is okay. Just lots of mud that we're managing to track inside pretty well. The box turtles and sulcata tortoises seem to be doing okay but I bet they're also wishing it would quit raining for a while.

As for my office turtles (a pair of hatchling Reeves' Turtles and a tiny little slider): I just bought a 40-gallon tank for the Reeves. After I set it up and get them into it, I'll disinfect the 20-long that they're currently in, and then set it up for the slider.

People visit my office specifically to see the turtles -- and I get the "Oh yeah, I needed to talk to you about...."

Back on crutches....

2006-08-07T18:23:00.000-06:00

Well, for some reason, my surgically repaired knee is killing me. It twinges when I step forward and feels like it's going to give out on me. It won't fully straighten out, either. This started yesterday (Sunday) and has only gotten worse. Tried to go for a walk this morning and had to turn back about one-quarter of the way through. I was in tears from the pain by the time I reached the house.

I'm called the orthopedic surgeon to get an appointment -- two weeks from tomorrow. Earliest one I could get. Dammit!

Of course, I went online when I got to work, and the self-diagnosis is Chondromalacia. My symptoms seem to match the ones described on various orthopedic websites. (Google it if you're interested.)

So if stretching and working the knee are the suggested non-surgical treatments, guess I should get mineself to the gym, pronto.

Hasta. (Crutching out of office.....)

Do I detect a theme to this week?

2006-08-04T16:09:00.000-06:00

Sure seems like it. I got a phone call on Monday from a fellow Tech employee to come over and identify a turtle picked up from a road in Belen. It takes me a while to get away from my desk, and I'm thinking "Oh, it's a box turtle, so I'll tell her how to take care of it or offer to adopt it....."

I go over, open the box, and realize no, this is NOT a box turtle! It's actually a good-sized Red Eared Slider (Trachemys scripta elegans), pretty melanistic, about 6 or 7 inches long. So I tell her about the basics of water-turtle-keeping and offer to serve as a conduit for more and better information if she needs it.

Fast forward to Thursday: I get another call about a turtle. Another Tech employee has found a baby turtle on her folks' front porch, and she's afraid it will get stepped on, or wander out into the street and get squished, and she wants to know if I'll take the turtle. Yes, sure, I'll take it, it's gotta be a box turtle and I'll just add it to the indoor enclosure with our other baby boxies....

Well, she gets to my office, hands me a small shopping bag and I open it it and look in: she's found a hatchling Red Eared Slider.....

Fortunately, I already had a 5.5 gallon tank set up in my office with aquatic plants, some guppies, an otocinclus, and some ghost shrimp. So into the tank went Feisty the baby RES, so named because he tried like hell to bite me as I was holding him and looking him over.

Now I gotta go shopping again this weekend. Clark's Pets will be getting even more of my paycheck.....

But with a face like that, how could I possibly resist?

Random Updatage

2006-08-02T14:50:00.000-06:00

Let's see, what's been going on lately......

1. It's been raining.

No, I mean RAINING here. The household about 1/4 mile down the frontage road from us made the Albuquerque news because they got flooded out of their house on Friday evening.

Our official total for the three hour period from about 4 to about 7 pm on that Friday was 2.63 inches. It started raining hard in Socorro about 3 PM while Alan and I were having a late lunch at the Brewpub. Then he headed home and I went back to my office, only to receive a cell phone call from him: "What the hell is going on!?!?" He's calling me from inside his pickup, and I can hear the rain pounding on the cab roof in the background. I get online and check the local radar -- it's a solid band of red/orange/yellow over the entire center of Socorro county. "If you're waiting for it to let up so you can get inside, don't wait!" I tell him.

On my drive home around 7 PM, I see flooded fields everywhere. The low-lying roads in the Polvadera/Lemitar areas are closed, there is significant erosion on the sides of road cuts that left mud, sand and rocks across roads.... just a freakin' mess.

We lucked out though: the guy who originally set up our property had the presence of mind to build up an area of the property -- and then to put the house on this built-up area. So we're fine, the house is fine, and the tortoises seem to be coping with all the rain. The only problem is that our driveway and parking areas are about three to four inches underwater..... All things considered, I'm happy to settle for "Lake Driveway" rather than "Lake Living Room."

2. My dreadlocks are famous.

I had an appointment yesterday in Santa Fe to have some dread maintenance done. (That's where the nice, incredibly patient Nicole goes through my dreads, cuts them apart where they are trying to grow together, and then ties a string around the base of each dreadlock to keep things a little more tidy....)

Since it was a late afternoon appointment, I decided to go do some errands in Albuquerque. Traded in a couple of Stratocasters at Music Go Round (my Les Paul Studio stays in tune SO much better than a Strat, and I got tired of messing with the Strat bridges all the time), then took myself to lunch at the Flying Star cafe on Menaul. Had three different people approach me and compliment my dreadlocks; one employee and two customers.

Then I go to Blue Monkey in Santa Fe, and as I walk in, Nicole tells her previous customer "Here are the famous dreadlocks I was telling you about!" and the customer and Nicole both comment on how nice they look.

Geez, with all this attention, I guess I won't cut them off! (I'm only semi-serious here ;-). I am going to have them colored, though - I've got too much grey and I'm feeling pretty old about it.

3. Coolest interior design I've ever seen.

During my traipsing around Albuquerque yesterday, I went into Evolution Piercing to have my second set of ear piercings re-opened. I fell in love with the place instantly. Their sales floor / waiting area is set up with a (duh!) evolution theme in mind, and there are rocks and fossils all over. They had beautiful ammonite and trilobite fossils set into various places in the floors and walls, stacked limestone (I'd bet it was from the Pennsylvanian age limestone from the top of the Sandias, but hey, I'm a rock geek as well as a tortoise geek), and long sections of rebar bent and shaped to look like vines running from floor to ceiling. They had a small pond in one corner filled with about six or seven arm-length koi (cool), and a water feature with a small pond and gravity-fed stream in the other corner (even cooler). (Trust me, the small photo on their website in no way does their waiting room justice. You just have to go in there and see it for yourself.)

I was probably annoying as all hell, because I was wandering around going "Oh this is SO cool! And look, another ammonite... and look! ...." I made sure to compliment them profusely on their style.

Next time I go in there, I'm taking my digital camera. I want that Room! (or a facsimile thereof!)

4. And finally: How many Tech employees does it take to hook up a phone jack and a data jack?

Apparently: Four. One supervisor to sit on his butt; two employees to run back and forth between the closet containing the junction box and the office containing said jacks; and a student worker from ISD to hook up the computer and then wait for the jacks to become active. So far, he's been waiting since 11 am or so....

Joke? You be the judge.

Update to plumbing problem

2006-08-02T14:39:00.000-06:00

Well, the breaker bar was good; but the one-inch socket I purchased wasn't large enough....

Thank goodness Alan was still in town. I called him and had him drop by AutoZone, where he bought three additional large sockets in increasing size increments over 1 inch. One of them was close enough to fit and with the breaker bar, it was easy.

We now have a working hose bib, with the faucet now 11 inches above ground. I'm really considering spray-painting the thing bright fluorescent orange so that hopefully it won't get run over in future.

Only two trips to the store required with this project... the Gods of Farce (tm) must be slipping.

GRRR! Another plumbing problem!

2006-07-05T14:52:00.001-06:00

Had to go to Albuquerque this morning to deliver proposals to Sandia National Labs. Ran around town twice, getting groceries and supplies, then came home to find that the guy who mows our fields had done so (good) and in the process, run over the hose bib (bad!). Water shooting everywhere is not a good thing.

I had to shut the water off at the street -- something I got a lot of practice with last month when our main water supply line broke -- and then run into town for tools and parts.

I'm hoping that the 18-inch breaker bar and 1-inch socket will help me get the broken bib off the pipe. Then I can attach some pipe and a new bib... What will most likely happen, though, is that I'll have to make at least two more trips into town, because I'll invariably have the wrong thing or the wrong size when I get home.... which leads me to:

Moore's Corollary to Murphy's Law: Any given home improvement project will take twice as long and three times as many trips to the store as you initially anticipated.

It's really true -- just remember this during your next home improvement or repair project.

A close call with Kiddo

2006-06-23T15:08:00.000-06:00

As I posted yesterday, the kitties were at the vet to get their teeth cleaned. I didn't feel good about it, and I found out that my fears were almost borne out.

I arrived at the vet clinic shortly before 5 PM to pick up the kitties and take them home. The receptionist told me that the vet needed to speak with me first. [Uh Oh. Bad sign!] I sit and wait for about 15 minutes.

Finally the vet comes out and sits down beside me. [Oh no -- REALLY bad sign!] He tells me that Kiddo stopped breathing for a while during the procedure. His heart kept going, everything else was fine -- he simply didn't breath. So they breathed for him (I'm assuming an ambu-bag or something was used) and eventually his respiratory reflex kicked back in. At this point, I'm on the verge of hyperventilating myself.

The vet said that Kiddo's gums, nose, and pink pawpads didn't turn blue so it was unlikely that he suffered any hypoxia, but they gave him extra IV fluids to (hopefully) mitigate any damage. They also told me to keep a very close eye on him all night. [Like I'm NOT going to, after this kind of news?!?!!?]

They bring the kitties out to the lobby in their carriers, I load carriers into the car and hit the road for home at... let's just call it a less-than-legal speed.

At home, Kiddo comes out of his carrier and walks around the house like he's disoriented, panting like a dog. At this point, I'm about ten seconds from complete breakdown, but I lay down on the floor and just talk to him. He eventually settles down, but won't come to me. Can't say that I blame him after everything he's been through. After a couple of hours, he decides that he'll come and sit on my lap. After that, everything is okay. This morning, the left side of his mouth is a bit swollen where they removed the broken canine tooth, but he seems to be normal in most other regards.

Gracie came through it all just beautifully. No problems with the anesthesia, no swelling. Of course, she also has virtually no teeth left now, but the vet says she'll adapt and do fine.

Kiddo and Gracie each got their own full can of Fancy Feast this morning. After not having eaten for probably 30 hours or more, I think they earned it. Hell, if they had requested Alaskan salmon, fresh-caught and flown in today, I probably would have provided it.

Give your pets a hug today. You just never know.....

Not happy at ALL!

2006-06-22T15:38:00.000-06:00

The kitties are currently at the vet's office, having their teeth cleaned. I'm a wreck. I hate taking them to the vet, especially when they have to stay there without me, and have to undergo general anesthesia, to boot.

I agree with Gracie's opinion of this whole thing.

Go to bed!

2006-06-20T19:08:00.000-06:00

Or in my case, to the gym.

Good night.

Well, here we go...

2006-06-20T18:10:00.000-06:00

I know, I know: Everyone and their dog has a blog these days. And I've got enough to do on a daily basis with work, keeping up with the menagerie at home, and still having enough time for my other developing hobbies....

Still, there is something very attractive about having your very own forum, your own soapbox, your own little space where your 15 minutes is terminally stuck at 12:59. So what the hell.

I am the shorter, less physically sturdy, and certainly more unusual-looking half of Sulcata Station, an online base for all information (useful or not) about sulcata tortoises. In my "spare time," I do other things as well, like feed multitudes of critters, learn to play guitar badly, go to the gym, and just generally try not to be such a large pain in the @$$ to my long-suffering husband, Alan.

I'm hoping that I'll keep up with this, because we have a truly strange variety of critters at our house -- not all of them "ours" -- and we try to take photos when we can. We've got some great ones! ("We" in this case means "Alan" since he always has a camera at hand around the house.)

Fer'instance: The local roadrunner stopped by to check us out through the back sliding glass door. He was immediately met by the local indoor paparazzi who snapped several photos of him before he could escape. Probably why he looks a bit flustered.....