Carra makes a funny!

Carra is best known for her long and circuitous tales.  Brevity is not her forte.  But she got me good this weekend!

We all ran by the Bernanders' vet clinic after a long day of dog showing, then dinner.  Carra needed to get meds for some dogs, and Mary Nell and Jordan were going to look at an English Setter puppy.

As Carra walked past the side of my car, she noted all the bird poop on the side.  I have no idea where I parked to get such a fecal assault, but there's a cascade of dried poo down the passenger side door.

Carra said, "You know what the white stuff is in bird poop?"

I said, "Uh, no."

Carra said, "More bird poop."

The matter-of-factly way she said it and the degree of seriousness pretty much made me fall over with laughter.  Classic!

I don't know what it is about the Caring Hands Animal Clinic that brings out the humor in her. That's the funniest thing she's said since we were there last time and she had her blonde moment.

In December, her puppies got a stomach bug.  One was ready to go home with his new family, but his belly ache had returned.  En route to a Corgi Crew trip to the movies, we stopped by the clinic to ask the vet what to do about his tummy ache.  Our vet is David Bernander and he's super smart, loves dogs like you wouldn't believe and is really great for those of us who show dogs because he does it himself.

So David asked her questions about when the pups were sick before and how she treated them.

Dr. B:  So what did you give them?

Carra:  Sulfadimethoxine.

Dr. B:  How much did you give them?

Carra:  150 milligrams.

Dr. B:  And when did you treat them?

Carra:  In the afternoons.

Kim and I nearly fell over laughing!  What he meant was 2 weeks ago? Last week?  Kim and I were on his wavelength, but Carra had, as she referred to it, a blonde moment.  I will never forget the look Kim had on her face, leaning against the doorframe, practically doubled over with laughter, wiping tears from beneath her glasses.

Carra tried to relay the story when we met our pal, Mary Nell, for lunch one day.  She shrugged and said, "I still don't understand.  He asked when, not how long ago!"  Oh Carra!

I just love Carra to bits!  She may have a blonde moment now and again, but she's got a huge heart and is a fantastic friend.  Yeah, I think I'll keep her.

Men are like SNPs

I won't say I have given up on men, but I will say that I am not holding my breath.  If it ever happens, it'll just be the proverbial icing on the cake that is my life.  For now, I'm really thrilled with myself for getting out of the house and getting involved with some groups, like Kennel clubs and the Walk from Obesity group.

One thing Dr. Phil recommends is to put yourself in a target rich environment.  First off, I refuse to Man Hunt in the grocery store or bookstore.  I'll go broke.  Secondly, I picked the entirely wrong type of venues for the target-rich thing.  Dog shows are mostly women, gay guys and old married couples.  Fortunately, I choose groups I love to do, so not meeting single guys is no big whoop.  That's not why I'm there.

A little science background.  A SNP is a single nucleotide polymorphism.  It means you had a little glitch in your DNA and that little glitch can make a big impact.  Like cystic fibrosis is caused by a single nucleotide being deleted.  Out of all those bajillions of bases in the DNA in each cell's nucleus, just one missing base (delta F508) causes a major catastrophe.

Before I was moved into my new Project Manager position, I ran a core facility that searched DNA samples for SNPs.  For neuroscience samples, like kids with autism, or OCD or schizophrenia, etc.  Anyway, it's a hit or miss process.  Just because you see a blip on the screen, doesn't mean you have some Nobel Prize winning discovery.

It's a quest and you have to work your way through the process.  And usually, you fail.  First off, did we see a SNP?  Yeah!  Yay!  Okay, let's sequence the DNA and see if it is real.  Rock on!  We have a heterozygous SNP!  Well, wait.  Is in in the coding region?  OMG, I think it is! Man, man, this could actually Be Something!  Does it affect the resulting protein sequence? NO!  Damnit!  A silent mutation.  Pttoey!!!

This is how I am with men in my non-target rich environment.  You get close, but in the end, zippo.

I'm not one of those gals who has a checklist for men.  I'm not that picky.  I won't settle for some goofball just so I can say I'm in a relationship.  But I want a good guy.  A nice guy.

So I'm at the regional specialty this week and there's an interesting guy there.  He first caught my attention when he commented on this:

Sally:  Here's the envelope.  I forget what's in it.

New Guy:  A rattlesnake!

Me:  bahahahahaha!

Okay, it was funny because it was a regular mailing envelope.  No possible way a rattler could be in there.  Nor was it making any noise.  But the visual of this rattle snake leaping out of a small flat envelope, aiming at Carra's face was quite amusing to me.  Not that I want Carra to get bit by a rattle snake, mind you.  The quickness of wit and improbability was what was funny.

He seemed like a really nice guy.  He even helped Carra change out her battery on her camper.  I quit looking for wedding rings on dog show guys a long time ago.  Most are gay or 67 and married.

But when he made a comment on the Corgi Mafia, I actually had to look at the old left hand. While hanging out with Aunt Paulette, Carra and the New Guy in the hotel, I told him how Tuesday flushes out the victims, Jack is the hit man and Map disposes of the body.  Her gastric equivalent of rolling the body up in an old rug.  I said I didn't know what the Duppy's role was yet.  

He popped off without a pause, "Oh, she's the patsy!"

OMG!  

Now I have a Painted By Evie image in my head of the three all pointing at Millie. She did it! Millie Dup, the fall guy.  But she always gets out in the end because she's the super cute one. Who could sentence that face to 20 years to life??

So I begin my mental Man SNP checklist:

• Is he a guy?  (yup)
• Is he STRAIGHT? (wow, actually yeah)
• Is he married?  (holy cow, no?!?)
• Is he funny? (dear God yes!)
• Does he love dogs (he's a corgi guy no less!!! Has two and wants more!!!)
• Is he attached?  (ahhh, there's the clinker!)

So close, but yet so far away!  The story of my life!  

Worst case scenario, I made a new friend.  And who knows, maybe he has a brother!

Surly Ann Sends Innocent Victim Straight To HELL!

Okay, this is what happens when I don't write things down immediately.  I forget about them until I am gently reminded by hearing a fluff piece on the news.

So last weekend was the Nashville Kennel Club's dog show.  I was pretty much a floater, volunteering all 4 days, picking up the slack where needed, or hanging with my friends when things were slow.

I was sitting at the Catalog Table on Friday when this woman came up and got a few pieces of chocolate. Ann keeps a massive bowl of chocolate on the trophy table or catalog table, just to lure innocents to her so she can bitch later about how this person grabbed a pocket full or how that person dug through it and took out all the peanut butter cups.  Mostly she puts it out to provide snacks for people because they are so busy they don't have much time to eat. That it gives her something to bitch about later is just a perk.

So after the woman took and ate a few pieces, she got a horrified look on her face.  "I forgot!  I gave up chocolate for Lent!"

Of course I found this hysterically funny.  Not because she is doomed to hell, but just from the look on her face.  Maaaan, I had been doing so well and blew it unconsciously while hanging around the catalog table.  Why?  WHHHYYYY???

Being the evil henchman that I am, I took great pleasure in letting Ann know she sent this poor exhibitor on the fast route to the everlasting rotisserie.  And Ann took great pleasure in repeating the story to others, heh heh.  I knew she'd be pleased!

Okay, I don't have a picture of Ann throwing scathing looks from the trophy table, but I do have a lovely picture of one of Joy Bernander's Vampire English Setters.  Evil is evil, right?  

Just kidding, Ann!!!!

Blah!  I vant to suck your blooood!

MINE! MINE! MINE!!!!

Today I made my very first purchase at eBay.  I won the auction for an original piece of art by Evie Anderson.  She does this whimsical corgi themed work that is amazing.  These dogs are clowns by nature and she captures that essence beautifully.

I bought a ton of her work (8 tiles, 2 keepsake boxes and 20 magnets) to donate to the kennel club as trophies for the classes at the Country Music Cluster last week, and the exhibitors LOVED them!  I was pleased that the woman I bought my first corgi from, Sally, got to pick and got a tile of a corgi standing on its hind legs, looking in the fridge for something to snack on.  She loved it and for her to express how impressed she was with the piece is sayin' something!

The dog show handler who won best of breed on Thursday cracked me up at her response to the keepsake box with "The Window," on it.  She said, "The big ol' queen who owns this dog is going to FREAK when he gets this!  Oh my God!  He has two girls who sit on the couch just like this looking out the window!!!"  

Tee hee, she said "big ol' queen!"

So Evie had two paintings up for auction on eBay and I fell in love with the "'Feed Me' Eyes," and had to own it.  Millie, my 6 month old, reminds me so much of that pup in the picture, down to the look on her face.  Plus when she was smaller, I held her just like that.

After three stressful days of waiting, a nail biting afternoon, and hitting the refresh button about 132059 times as the clock ticked down, I got the painting!  I'm so excited, as it's gonna be perfect in my study, which has walls similar in color to the painting.  

LOVE IT!  I'll post a picture of me holding it when I get it in my grimy little hands.  You'll know which one is me because of the look of joy on my face!

Thank you Evie for sharing your talent with us all--your work is BRILLIANT!!!

First Mob Hit of '09

You know, I just wanted to come home, nurse my aching stomach, do some laundry and bake brownies for a meeting for tomorrow.  But nooooo, it can never be that simple.

I got home (yay, it's still light outside!) and let all the beasties out in the yard.  The buttercups are in bloom and I thought I should go in, grab some scissors and cut them to put in the kitchen.  Tuesday had jumped the edging around the raised bed and was snuffling around in the dried weeds and fresh flowers, sniffing for rabbits.  

What I didn't know was that she actually found some.

My dogs work like a well oiled machine.  Tuesday flushed the baby bunny out of the weed-clogged raised bed, Jack came in for the kill and then Map took care of disposing of the body.

Nice.

I was more concerned about a dog fight (and resulting vet bills) over the nummy bunny than anything else, but I managed to wrangle Tuesday, Jack and Millie into the house.  Map, not so much.  She had the bunny and was not about to give it up.  I got my gopher grabber stick (AS SEEN ON TV) and a gallon sized Ziploc bag and went out to collect the corpse.  

Thing is, I can never catch that stinkin' fluff.  She hops on the deck, runs underneath it, zips behind the air conditioning unit, always out of reach. Damnit!  She just darted around the yard with the saggy, bleeding body in her mouth, not about to be caught.

I came inside to get a spray bottle, thinking I could corner her, squirt her in the face and then grab the bunny with the gopher while she was recoiling from the water.  However, by the time I got outside, she had swallowed that bunny whole.

Now she sits happily under the kitchen table, grooming herself, licking the blood of the innocent off her paws.  She is quite proud of her efforts.  Quite proud.  I, on the other hand, am waiting for the inevitable mess that will come my way when she barfs this thing up about 2 in the morning.

Looks like Millie gets to spend the night out free, as Map will be spending the night in Millie's x-pen, on a carpet of piddle pads.  

Thank God tomorrow is garbage day.

IS IT TIME TO GO YET???

The dog show starts tomorrow and there's work to be done tonight, like getting the parking signs and giving Ann my corgi trophies.  So I am sitting here watching the clock, waiting for time to go!  MAN!

Cool thing of the day:  I added Google Analytics to the Nashville Kennel Club site and there were 60-odd hits yesterday.  One was from Argentina!  Freaky-cool!  I'm having great fun nerding up the website . . . this morning I added the weather forecast for the show's four days and yesterday I figured out how to embed Google Maps.  

Yeah, it doesn't take much to entertain me.

Can I go now??? : )