Two Cats and Counting

Random musing…

Facebook has stolen what little discipline I had for writing blog posts. The ability to post stream-of-consciousness notes to a group of friends is seductive. It undermines my resolve to use a blog to practice regular writing that’s a bit more formal than blathering with friends.

Interesting how FB insinuated itself into my life. I had an account for a couple of years that was unused. I’d made it when trying to get in touch with my nephew, who was changing his social identities at the slightest whim. I finally sold my soul when a critical mass of VL acquaintiances started using it, and now more RL friends are connecting up.

I’m still skeptical at what it…what social media… provides. It’s so fractured, scattered, and…well, flighty, that I’m not sure it’s benefits are as revolutionary as touted.

Just what I needed. Another very cool material acquisition website to waste time on. FredFlare.com immediately became one of my favorite places to window shop. Others are Etsy and ThinkGeek.

…I’d have a t-shirt with a picture of the Dalai Lama wearing a Che Guevera t-shirt.

It is thought that dogs and humans have been a team for perhaps as long as 100,000 years. Perhaps dogs not only accompanied Man across the Bering Straight and down into the New World, but made it possible for us to migrate through dangerous territory. If it’s true that dogs and humans have largely grown up together, learning language and migrating around the globe, is it strange that we can be so attached to one another?

Dogs have complied with our requests no matter how insensible, inexplicable, or just plain stupid the jobs have been. We’ve asked them to do everything from hunt for us to be content to be adornments in gaudy handbags. Dogs naturally inclined to work herding cattle or sheep are companions to construction workers and to blind people.

I know one dog who helped me navigate my own terrifying and unknown territory of divorce. Learning to live without a partner who I loved, still love, with every cell in my body seemed impossible most days. If she only served to be a reason to get up in the morning and feed, water, and walk, it would have been enough. But she put up with me uprooting our lives, and did what I needed her to do, more or less, for 12 years. I don’t even mind that she ate a library book once.

Ta. Job well done, Stella.

A shooting involving neighbors on the street in front of my house spurred me to attend a newly formed neighborhood group last fall. Since then several severe storms have hit Seattle. The past few weeks of freezing temperatures, followed by yesterdays thaw resulted in 6″ of water in my basement. (I had just dried out from the 4″ I had at the end of December, which I wrote about here.)

Luckily my poor old dog woke me up at 4:30 this morning to go out. Before going out, I glanced down my stairwell and saw the lake, nay ocean, at the foot of the stairs. While out with the dog, in the quiet of that time of morning, I heard a waterfall coming from the vacant house behind me. Long story short, the landlords had turned off the heat, but not the water, and the pipes had burst.

This brings me to neighborhoods and involvement. Because I’m involved in my neighborhood group, I’d been nosy when men were breaking into the vacant house a few weeks ago. (I was pretty sure they weren’t burglars.) So I had met the landlord and had a phone number for him. I also had a phone number to call when my basement flooded so the sewer department could check for city drainage problems. I called the city, which had a crew at my house by 5:00 am. They were really nice men. They confirmed that my lines seemed fine, and that there weren’t any other sewage problems. They also called the water department to come out because they wanted me to be sure that my lines were okay.

I called the landlord, poor man, with the bad news about his property. His partner got in touch with me later in the morning and I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to work amicably to fix any damage to my basement.

Never a natural “joiner” and not terribly social or outgoing, I’m happy to be connected to my community and I’m grateful for the knowledge they share.

If you find yourself saying “It may or may not be true, but…” stop and search Snopes. Snopes isn’t infallible, (Snopepedia anyone?), but it is very simple to check urban legends there.

Recently a few bloggers have written about comments “supposedly” (ha!) spoken by Bill Gates. But they aren’t his.

As a corollary, when you hear ,” stop before repeating it. Don your skeptics hat. What they’re really saying is “I don’t know, and I didn’t investigate it thoroughly enough to be able say for sure one way or the other.” Don’t compound the error.

More than 13 years ago, an acquaintance once said she knew she was starting to get better after grieving over the loss of a long and passionate relationship because she was listening less to The Cowboy Junkies and more to to k.d. lang. I’d never listened to either, but both became favorites.

Today I’m listening to Lay it Down, by the Cowboy Junkies.