I think I'm done here.

I last had real things to say quite a long time ago...almost a year, now.

I've run out of anger...I just can't talk about it anymore.  And unfortunately, I haven't been to the range in over a year due to the aforementioned furry face exhausting most of my funds and all of my free time.

I'm going to leave this blog up...for now, at least.  I still see a lot of folks visiting (I've almost hit 100k, what the what??!?) and some of the information posted may act as a resource.  But don't expect to see posts here in the next year or so, at least.  I have too many other things going on.


Signing off,
Laura

I believe more than a few of you are fans of Viking history, no?

If so, this is right up your alley.



Here is some background on the song.

Enjoy!

I was waiting until I had the time to read this to post a review, but I'd rather get the link out there.

A friend of mine wrote a book!

More info is available here.

I read the story as he posted it on his blog, and it was good.  I can't wait to dive in to the book!

Go get yourself a copy if it interests you, and write an Amazon review.  :)

Still crazy-busy.

Puppies, particularly high drive puppies, take a hell of a lot of work.

To explain...our dobergirl is just like this puppy.  She's brilliant, stubborn, easily bored, and constantly needs supervision, even at 8 months old.  Until this week, we had her in two classes a week and she'd still drive us nuts.  She is a great dog, and we're starting to see glimpses of the lady she'll become once she gets all the puppy wiggles out of her system, but it means I just don't have time for the blog lately.

She also has me on what I've dubbed the Puppy Diet - I'm down 10 pounds and might actually have a chance hitting my goal weight in a year.  Soon, we'll start working on dog sports as well as her other training, so any free time (and excess weight) should be melting away.  :)

Unfortunately, time for the blog has basically dissolved.  Chris should have something up soonish about the HQL, I think.  Maybe.

I still read blogs, and I still comment when I get the time.  But this face has taken priority.  I hope y'all understand.

Happy 365 Day Reset.

Huzzah to another successful cycle around the sun!

Happy Whatever-you-celebrate.

Even if it's just "Wednesday."  Merry whatever. :)

10 Alternate Christmas Movies

So it's that holiday season, the decorations are up, and the presents are wrapped. The lights are twinkling, the tree is looking good and the snow may or may not be falling. You're digging the mood, a little cheery, a little dreamy as long as you don't talk about Christmas itself everything will be fine. You just want to sit down and relax, maybe watch a movie, but everything is Christmas themed.  Santa this and Reindeer that, it's spoiling your mood. If only I could find something to watch that would maybe keep me right in this twilight place.

Here are 10 suggestions that take place at Christmas, but aren't about Christmas. They are in no particular ranking order. Because hey, we already had enough fighting and arguing.    

Sci Fi / Horror

Night of the Comet - 80's Cult classic, Space Zombies, Teens ruling the world and the ultimate line for spoiled, bratty valley girls everywhere "See, Daddy would've gotten us UZI's."

Black Christmas - 1974 Some say the film that started the slasher genre.  The first creepy phone call heavy breather. Sorority girls terrorized at Christmas.

Gremlins - You know this one but you forgot it's Christmas.  Fun, creepy, don't get em wet and don't feed em after midnight.

Action

Rocky IV - 80's, Ivan Drago, Training montage in the snow and a fight on Christmas eve?  Enough Said.

Lethal Weapon - Awesome 80's, Awesome Buddy Cops, Awesome bad guy, Awesome action flick you forgot takes place at Christmas.

Die Hard -  Gaining in popularity this time of year as the best un-Christmas Christmas movie, but it's actually about a Christmas theme. Still it's pretty damn great.

Comedy

Better Off  Dead - Another cult classic. Teen Comedy rife with that aww nostalgia feeling for people my age. John Cusack in a drag race with Asian guys that can only speak English as Howard Cosell.

1941- The forgotten Spielberg comedy containing an all star cast.  It's not great, but it's good, and it takes place in mid December.

Grumpy Old Men - It's funny and snowy.  Jack Lemon, Walter Matthau and Ann Margret.  The add libs are great and don't forget to look for Burgess Meredith's outtakes.

Trading Places - Lot's of Christmas background, but revenge isn't really a Christmas theme is it?  Very Funny, some overt some dry humor, all good.

Honorable Mention Drama

Eyes Wide Shut - It's very dreamy and surreal, but also very heavy on context and plot. It is about a Christmas theme.  Unless you want something to really sink your teeth into skip until you can pay attention to detail.


Hope I may have helped and Have a Merry Christmas!

Going to be ignoring the blogosphere for a bit.

Have a new fuzzy thing trying to kill her toys and wear us out. :)

I'm not qute sure how to title this post.

I'm still way behind in checking blog posts. Home time is mostly spent with Chris and in cleaning the house in preparation for a new member of the family joining us soon (NOT a two-legged screaming thing, so don't even suggest it), work time is spent working. So I mostly mark everything as read to avoid getting overwhelmed.

Well, two days ago a fellow blogger did a pretty remarkable thing...especially considering how many pro-gun folks tend to be very against the idea of people's genders not fitting the bodies with which they were born.


I know really, really well how hard it is to admit something that major to family and friends. To admit it to a large crowd of people that may or may not support one is ... stressful. And terrifying. And I'm thrilled to see so many people supporting her.

This isn't eloquent; it's late, my brain is squish, and I'm not terribly good at using my words with that combination of situations. Just go read what she has to say.

The worst thing about going on vacation...

Is trying to pick up where you left off before you went away.

After 8 days disconnected, I'm a bit behind. Marking most things as read. If I've missed something important, please let me know.

That was a lovely weekend.

Friday, after work, we packed up the truck, hitched up the new-to-us camper, and headed a short jaunt away to the KOA in Hagerstown, MD. Stayed until check-out time yesterday, then trucked home.

Observations:

• Sleeping in a popup is interesting.  I mean, it's a tent.  On wheels.  With AC and a fridge.  Luxury tenting FTW!
• This particular KOA is nice and small, staff is friendly, and the little restaurant on-site makes the best (and biggest) chocolate chip pancakes I've ever had.  Each was about .25" thick and as wide as a dinner plate...and they give you THREE.  
• This weekend was expensive, but most of that went to outfitting the camper.  We have a couple more things to buy and we're golden, I think.  Our goal is to get it outfitted to the point where we just need to throw clothes in a bag, food in a cooler, and go.  This is a hard transition for two tent campers to make. :D

We spent the weekend, relaxing, cooking, hanging out by the fire, and fishing.  I could think of far worse ways to spend a couple of sunny days...

Not dead, not missing, just lacking material.

Life's kept us busy, and I'm too disheartened about Maryland's political situation to have much to talk about.

God, 2012 sucks.

Today I read that Garand Gal lost her puppy, Hag. My heart just broke a second time in two days.

You see, Deckard's been at the vet since Wednesday. And I'm not sure how much longer we're going to have him with us.

He's clumsy and awkward on his feet (just like me) and had managed to injure himself twice in the span of 3 days...the first injury was from trying to take out a tree with his shoulder, and the second was a strained ligament in the rear leg on the opposite side of the sore shoulder, probably from chasing the cats. I took him to the vet Tuesday a week ago, and she did the usual: check all joints for proper movement, X-rays, the whole nine yards. The vet prescribed Rimadyl (an NSAID) and Tramadol (a narcotic) and sent us home. For the first couple of days he was hippity-hopping on his back leg, as his front shoulder had mostly healed up. When I saw he was putting weight down without the narcotic, I stopped the Tramadol immediately...and the following day (this past Saturday, 12/8) we stopped the Rimadyl.

He looked like he was on the mend on Monday...Chris even took him for a walk, and he seemed to enjoy it. Tuesday he appeared to be depressed, so we took him for a walk in the evening, and again, he seemed fine.

Wednesday, though...

Wednesday morning he wobbled on his feet. And we took him in. Turns out my baby boy is in ARF (acute renal failure) and his prognosis is...not good. They've run test after test after test, and have managed to rule out a lot of stuff. They also took a look inside with an ultrasound, and didn't like what they saw. Apparently one of his kidneys isn't fully formed, and so it was not functioning well, if at all. So his other kidney was doing all the work. This would be fine, if we hadn't put him on something that assaulted his kidneys. NSAIDs are really bad for the kidneys.

So now, we wait. The vet is going to have a consult with Pennsylvania University today regarding what, if anything, they can do for him. Our vet is not optimistic, though, and gave a prognosis of 6-12 months.

I'm heartbroken. He's only 10 months old. Why must the good pups go so early? It's really, really not fair.

Anyway...he's fighting, so we're going to fight with him until he tells us he's ready to leave. We will do everything we can to make his remaining time good for him as well as us. There's a chance we'll be selling some of our firearms and other items, should things get exceedingly expensive. If that happens, I'll start posting things for sale locally.

Just 18 Hours.

Just 18 hours until the polls open in Baltimore (and, I assume, elsewhere on the East Coast). Just 18 hours until we should all do our civic duty and vote.

I won't tell you who to vote for, and I won't tell you who I intend to vote for, but please...PLEASE...get out there and vote. There are a lot of very important things on the ballot this year, and they all need your decision.

And if you don't vote? I don't want to hear you crying about the choice you COULD have made. I don't want to hear the whining about how you hate where the country is going, because you have no right to say a word if you haven't put out the effort to give your opinion/choice at the polls. Don't throw away your right.

Today.

Lots of people have said things far better than I could say them. Go, hit the sidebar, read their blogs.


(Borrowed from cuteoverload. Please visit their blog.)

So, I'm home.

Thanks for the well-wishes. I'm gonna go focus on post-op recovery.

I have some of the worst luck, I swear.

So Chris and I were planning on going up to NH for Jay's shooty event, but my body had other plans. I'm still at the hospital, and will probably be here well into next week. FML.

Hope everyone has fun. Really wish i didn't have to keep sitting things out. :(

Hitting the "mark all as read" button today.

Am spending some time in a hospital room for the immediate future. If there's anything I'm missing that I absolutely need to see, please let me know. Otherwise I'm going to work on getting out of here.

Brain no worky, have something that's only mildly interesting.

Apparently I can read quite a bit faster than most folks. I took the speed reading test over here and my result surprised me.



...yow.


Also, in other news, Chris went away for the weekend. Somehow I managed to go about my day without running terrified to the safest corner of the house. Apparently that's not what's expected of women. Sure, I was armed at night, but shouldn't we be armed at night in a city where crime happens on the regular?

Also also, I had had something scheduled for Memorial Day but it never posted. Anyone have a clue as to why that happened?

It followed me home...part 2!

Remember way back in the beginning of February when I posted this? Well, that was part 1...the black and shiny thing.

Part 2 involved a trek almost back to Pittsburgh...twice. The first time, we met the little individual...and the second was yesterday, when we brought him home.

I'd like everyone to meet Deckard.

He's an 8-week-old rust and red doberman. And he's kept me up all night. Finally got 4 hours of uninterrupted sleep when Chris got up this morning. He's a cute little guy, and I can't wait until he learns to sleep through the night.