My 28 Days

Hey Foopanistas! [Yes, I miss you, ever so much!] You can find me here for the month of February, being all Zen and shit.

NRA saves Crush Videos from Oblivion. Rah rah.

If you don’t know what a crush video is, you might not want to. Really. I’ve been in animal rescue long enough to see things that would give some people PTSD. The idea of crush videos still makes my lunch want to come up and my brain want to shut down.

The fact that there is an entire industry out there based on people’s consumption of something so truly repugnant makes me want to turn in my membership to the human race and reenlist as a once-celled organism.

Today, the Supreme Court overturned a ban on crush videos, dog fighting videos, and other videos depicting acts of horrendous animal cruelty, claiming that they are protected under the First Amendment.

They say the law, as it is written, is too broad. I get it. I’m an idealist, but I’m not stupid. I understand that there are protections and subtleties and so on and so forth. But if child porn is illegal, then why aren’t depictions of felony animal cruelty? Really, Justice Roberts, I’m waiting. Call me.

The crush video industry was pretty much dead in the water as a result of the ban, but not anymore. Justice Alito, in his dissent, states,

We are told that '[b]y 2007, sponsors of §48 declared the crush video industry dead. Even overseas Websites shut down in the wake of §48. Now, after the Third Circuit's decision [facially invalidating the statute], crush videos are already back online.

While the ruling is an existential kick in the gut, the soul-annihilating bucket-of-truth here is that cases like this one and the case last week, in which authorities in Washington State shut down a bestiality sex-tourism business (some of the animals so badly injured they had to be euthanized), serve to demonstrate the enormity of the problem. It offers a glimpse into a shockingly sick, widespread culture of child sex traffickers, dog fighters, rapists, pedophiles, people who get off on watching women in high heels crush kittens to death, and so on and so forth.

Once someone has pulled back the curtain and your eyes have been exposed to this festering corner of hell, the world never looks the same again.

I’m hardly thin-skinned. I can handle personal hardship and come back twice as strong. I can stomach a whole lot of man’s inhumanity to man, to animals, and to just about everything else. But this shit hits me like a tsunami. It feels that big and I feel just that small and powerless to stop it. I feel like the world has gotten away from me and it’s as out of reach as a kid’s balloon floating above a supermarket parking lot.

Tomorrow, I’m going to start calling my lawyer friends, advocates, lobbyists, and anyone else I can think of. I’m going to dust myself off and figure out what I have to do to help get this thing fixed.

But that’s tomorrow.

Right now, all I can do is go stand in the shower and cry until the hot water runs out.

Remembering Feeney

In memory of Phoenix, AKA Feeney, rescued after Hurricane Katrina and again after she fell into the hands of a criminal and abusive owner.

Feeney was adored by a little boy and his family. She was a a silly monkey, a wiggle-butt, and a big moosh. She snored and hogged the bed and flirted with the neighbor so he would feed her cheese.

Feeney never fully recovered from the scars of her abuse and died on June 12, 2008. She left a big, dog-shaped hole in our hearts, but we are grateful that she got the chance to be loved before she had to go.

This is for anyone who has ever loved a dog and for everyone who was part of Feeney's life. Thanks for everything you did for her.

Kutiman-Thru-you - 01 - Mother of All Funk Chords

via youtube.com

Gotta read the back-story on this one:
http://tinyurl.com/af6gx3

Posted via web from gonzo's posterous

Bathtub IV

via vimeo.com

Thanks Michael B for this link. Crazy cool.

Posted via web from gonzo's posterous

Vitamin Easy Rider

Foop, who vibrates a little high, has long been entertaining fantasies of long mother-son bike trips. You know, the kind that take you to wholesome, rugged locales usually reserved for Subaru commercials.

Meanwhile, Vitamin E likes his bike, but not enough to travel great distances - or even moderate ones - on it. This has been a source of some frustration. We'll go through all the preliminaries of donning appropriate footwear, securing the requisite protective gear, saddling up, and riding for about three blocks. It's kind of like putting twelve layers of clothes on your kid so you can go play in the snow only to have them throw two snowballs and march back inside.

But that was before the Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator*. OK, it's a bike trailer thing, but It. Is. The. Bomb.

E has a deep appreciation for speed and absolutely loved flying down the hills in our neighborhood. He kept shouting "Mom! I love this!!!" And then he'd cheer me on as I huffed and puffed on the uphills. Maybe I underestimated the added workload of an extra 5o+ lbs on the back end, but I don't mind.

We have arrived.



*(yes that's Marvin the Martian)

boys + drums

Wishes

Last night, before we went to bed, Vitamin E and I held hands, squeezed our eyes shut, and made a wish for the Mayor .

After E fell asleep, I just stayed there watching him, trying to imagine how The Mayor's parents must feel, thinking about the universal joy and anguish of parenting, and feeling both raw and grateful.

Long before I had even considered becoming a mother, a friend of mine told me that having a child was like taking your heart out of your chest, putting it into the body of this little thing and watching it run around all over the place. I had no idea how spot on he was.

So today I'm wishing that the Mayor will be able to go home, safe and sound, with his parents' hearts.

The Exam

As is a custom of the season, I spent the afternoon with my snot-nosed child at the pediatrician's office. Vitamin E was a little grumpy and apprehensive about the impending exam, so I was doing my best to reassure him that there would be no egregiously invasive procedures, long hospitalizations, or shots involved.

I walked him through what was going to happen. "Do you remember what a stethoscope is? Well the doctor will put it here to listen to your heart. Then he'll put the stethoscope on your back so he can listen to your breathing."

I pretended to examine his ears. I put my eyeball up to his nostril and peered up. He giggled uncontrollably.

To reciprocate, he tilted my head up and squinted into my nose.

His assessment:

"Mommy, your nose needs a haircut."

First Kisses

Annie Savoy: What do you believe in, then?

Crash Davis: Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap. I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter. I believe in the sweet spot, soft-core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas Eve and I believe in long, slow, deep, soft, wet kisses that last three days. [pause] Crash Davis: Goodnight.

Annie Savoy: Oh my. Crash...

Ebby Calvin LaLoosh: Hey, Annie, what's all this molecule stuff?

- Bull Durham


First kisses should be rarified, mystical things. The first time you kiss somebody, you should feel the need for that kiss gathering like a layer of hot magma in the belly of a volcano. You are functioning and talking and listening but underneath it all is a mantra that says kiss her kiss her kiss her for the love of God kiss her!

You can work up to it all night or it can just catch you in an instant. Somehow that person passes, a full moon, right into your gravitational field, stirring within you a million microscopic cellular oceans, pulling their tides inexorably toward her. And you do. You put your hands on her face, or grab her by the arm, or you lean in. You kiss her.

A really good first kiss feels like falling. Feels like smiling. Like the embrace of a perfect blanket in front of a perfect fireplace. A good first kiss will elicit a swoony feeling.

Swoony feelings are highly underrated.

To kiss someone at the end of a first date simply because that’s what you think you’re supposed to do, that’s like throwing away a golden ticket to Willie Wonka’s chocolate factory. It’s a sin and a waste.

First kisses are worth waiting for. The good ones are.

8 State Kate

A plug for a friend, a great dog story, and a good cause:

This book was written by my Katrina friend, Jenny. In addition to Kate's amazing story, it features letters and essays from a number of Katrina volunteers, including me. There's reason enough to slap down a few bucks right there!

$5 PER BOOK ORDERED AT https://www.createspace.com/3342404 DURING THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER WILL BE DONATED TO ANIMAL RESCUE ORGANIZATIONS THAT ARE SHELTERING ANIMALS FROM HURRICANE GUSTAV IN LOUISIANA AND SURROUNDING AREAS.

8 State Hurricane Kate
The Journey and Legacy of a Katrina Cattle Dog

By Jenny Pavlovic

On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina roared into New Orleans, Louisiana, unleashing a torrent of wind and water that forever altered the landscape. In the ensuing weeks, countless people and animals were rescued from the flood-ravaged city. 8 State Hurricane Kate is the unforgettable story of the powerful bond between a cattle dog rescued from a rooftop and the woman who wouldn't give up on her. The heartwarming story of Kate's post-Katrina journey is a testament to the will and perseverance of the dog and human spirit! As they make that courageous journey together, new worlds open up for Jenny and Kate, an amazing survivor and teacher. Kate's remarkable journey, a tale of love, courage, and compassion, has inspired many others. Her legacy is a rescue network that continues to help dogs across the country today. At least 50% of book profits will go to the 8 State Kate Fund, to provide financial relief for animals in desperate situations. Learn more at www.8StateKate.net.

About the author:

Jenny Pavlovic, Ph.D. is a biomedical engineer by vocation and a "dog person" by avocation. She has adopted and rescued purebred and mixed breed dogs, and currently lives in Minnesota with Australian Cattle Dog (ACD) Bandit, rescued ACD-Collie mix Chase, and rescued ACD mix Cayenne. One of her greatest rewards has been seeing rescued dogs break away from pasts of abuse, neglect, or trauma and begin to enjoy life. Jenny has also learned a lot from watching her herding dogs do what they were bred to do. Through working and living with them, she has become a better person and a more confident leader. Jenny has trained her dogs in obedience, rally obedience, agility, herding, carting, tracking, acting (tricks), and therapy dog work. Her day is not complete until she gets out for a walk and a ball game with the dogs. She is active in Australian Cattle Dog rescue and has helped rescue many purebred and mixed breed dogs since Hurricane Katrina. You can see their stories and happy endings at www.8StateKate.net. Jenny is grateful for the new friends that she met through her Katrina rescue efforts and to all who supported Kate. Having the faith to take that unknown journey led to many new riches in her life. Jenny has published technical abstracts, patents, and magazine and newspaper articles. This is her first book.

Three years later...

I wrote this on the first anniversary of Hurricane Katrina as a message to all of the many people who I had met, in person and online, in the course of post-Katrina animal rescue.

I'm posting it again, in honor of all of these same people and in memory of so many animals. For anyone who gives of themselves for others, this is for you, too.

With love,

Foop

=====================
Hurricane Katrina, one year later…

So here we are, one year after Hurricane Katrina. Hard to believe – it seems at once as if it was last week and yet a thousand years ago. So much has been done. So much has not.

I had been struggling to decide out how to mark this day and it came to me to observe the (Korean) Buddhist tradition of performing 108 bows. You begin in a standing position, drop to your knees, touch your forehead to the floor with palms up on either side of your head, stand up, and repeat. The gesture is somewhat akin to lighting a candle in a Catholic church, but the end result is that your ass hurts a whole lot more when you’re done.

So I awoke this morning before dawn and shuffled outside to my memorial garden, equipped with my trusty zabuton, some incense, a couple of candles, and a very foggy head.

As I was bowing and standing, bowing and standing, the past year flooded over me. I saw the images, remembered the names, relived the stories, and experienced the intolerable heartbreak anew. Linus, Big Yellow Dog, Mee-Moo, 8 State Kate, Cleo, Leaf, Little Joe, Pasados, Noah’s Wish, Camp Katrina, Best Friends, Gonzales, Lamar Dixon, the Superdome, the Ninth Ward, St. Bernard’s Parish...St. Bernard’s Parish…St. Bernard’s Parish…

Our hearts have broken a thousand times in the last year. And they will break at least thousand more. But, for many of us, we chose the heartbreak over inaction because inaction would crush our souls. We are each of us climbing an arduous and, at times, forbidding mountain. Day after day, we go on.

Some days, your heart is light and you run on the swift legs of the deer.

Some days, your heart is on fire and you prowl with the powerful legs of the tiger.

But on some days, your heart is drowning, and your legs are like lead.

On those days, stop, for the love of God. Sit down, rest yourself, say a prayer for Shannon Moore and then and sit some more. Call a friend, get drunk, go to church, meditate, scream, tell your pets and your family that you love them. Whatever you have to do.

To paraphrase the mighty Ani DiFranco:

i could wake up screaming sometimesbut i don't
i could step off the end of this pier but
i've got a litter of puppies to bottle feed
and an appointment on tuesday
to have 47 cats neutered


Instead of looking up the mountain to the terrain you have yet to cover, try to see behind you to all of the lives you have saved, the lives you’ve tried to save, and the innumerable lives you have touched. The number is unknowable, but I assure each of you that it is profound and it is precious beyond words. This is the revolution of Kindness that Michael Mountain talks about. We touch so many lives that we don’t even know about.

If you rescue, if you make phone calls, if you transport, if you cross post, if you change someone’s mind, if you donate or meditate or light a candle or say a prayer – all of these things change the world. Never underestimate the value of what you do. One step at a time - one dog, one horse, one mind, three dozen cats (come on cat people, that’s funny!).

So as I was struggling back to the standing position after my 108th bow, I glanced up at my little Buddha statue and saw something that struck me. A miniscule spider was blithely repelling down the face of the Buddha. I don’t even like spiders, but this one seemed to me as a messenger. As if my little Buddha was winking at me. “Life is here. You are here. All of Life is in this moment. It’s OK. Go ahead, girl.”

Can I get an AMEN?

“Namaste” represents the belief that there is a Divine spark within each of us. It an acknowledgment of the soul in one by the soul in another. "Nama" means bow, "as" means I, and "te" means you. Therefore, Namaste literally means "I bow to you."

Namaste. I bow to you all.

8/29/06

Incomprehensible... but deep

"Fried chicken pants! We are elastic! We are elastic!"

- Random exclamations by my son, who is running around the house like a little apple-cheeked psychopath.

The view from here...

The other day I was sitting at my computer, intently working on something of great personal interest. I felt a pang of guilt and caught myself thinking “Wow, I should really get back to work.”

Then I remembered, “Oh yeah, this IS my job!”

[Pinch me, somebody!]

Several months into my radical and much-agonized-over career change, I could not be happier with my choice. I can’t believe I stuck around the old gig for so long. I’ve kept in touch with friends from The Old Job and they tell me things are exceptionally toxic around the water cooler these days.

Ahhhh, I don’t miss it one teeny weeny bit.

Ten Thousand Leagues Under the Neighborhood Pool

The E-man has started jumping off the diving board.

THE

DIVING

BOARD

(!!!)

The kid’s not even five for cri-eye-eye! I don’t know what The Magic Diving Board Age is supposed to be, but we’re talking about my baby here. It’s all just so…so sudden.

...

The little man adjusts his neon-green shark goggles and steps onto the board. He walks to the end and stops. He does a little butt-shaking dance to pass the time until the diving area is clear.

He glances over his shoulder to make sure Mommy is watching. I smile unconvincingly.

He jumps.

Plunging in, he displaces a little-kid shaped plume of water.

One, one thousand...

In a cylindrical explosion of bubbles, his impossibly tiny body plummets toward the bottom of the pool - the reeelly, reeelly deep part of the pool, which suddenly looks to be about two thousand feet down.

His momentum slows. He starts his lopsided dog-paddle upward, toward the sunlight and air.

I can’t see him. His head is not breaking the surface. Self-talk: He’s fine. Give him a second.

He’s been underwater for hours.

I take a step toward the pool, craning my neck. A miniscule jolt of adrenaline tingles in my torso. I’m ready to jump in.

He emerges.

Two, one-thousand...

I breathe.

He’s beaming. He swims to the ladder, hoists himself out, does that funny little race-walk that kids do in order go as fast as they possibly can without getting called out by the life-guard, and takes his place at the end of the line for the diving board.

Repeat six-hundred and thirty-seven times.

Somebody, please tell me they're kidding

From the latest New Yorker. Really.

Who Said You Could Grow Up??

It's official. My son no longer says "Yeyyo". Sad mommy. I've had so much fun singing The E-Man's greatest hits including "We all live in a yeyyo submarine", and the line from Coldplay (I think) that goes: "and it was all yeyyo-o".

Happily, the following vocabulary is still in full effect:

Bofe - (there's TWO of 'em!)

Benember - as in "benember to look bofe ways before you cross the street"

Disposedto - as in "benember you're disposedto eat your vegetables"

Paff - as in "We ourselves must walk the paff.” (Buddha, through the mouth of The E-Man)

The Lizard Abazz - is it a new black power character from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series?? No! It's a cult movie starring Judy Garland!

Muncheekins - the little guys who sing "the lollipop man" song from The Lizard Abazz

There are more, many more, which I plan to document obsessively before they become "estink" (like the dinosaurs).

Tell me, Fooplets, what are your favorite kid words??

Compromises

My mom and her husband are coming to visit. My mom, being of the same ineffable (read, "often confounding and occasionally intolerable") stock as me, equivocated until the last minute and then announced, yesterday, that, yes indeed, they were going to arrive Thursday evening. Well, maybe Wednesday, but probably Thursday.

Oh my oh my.

1) My house is SO not where I want it to be to receive visitors, and B) as I have previously mentioned, I'm a bit anal.

I made A List.

It was an ambitious list. It was a comprehensive list. It was the list of someone who has no idea how long it takes to shampoo a carpet or finish painting a bedroom.

It was a list that was doomed from the beginning. The rug that was going to be shampooed was Carpet Fresh-ed. Mop the hallway? Please.

At approximately 10:52 on Wednesday evening, the list was wadded up and tossed in a trash can.

Ooh - I need to empty all the trash cans...

A Moment for Mister Kitty

Almost exactly twenty years ago, my roommate’s cat went trampin’ around and turned up pregnant. She had four very sickly little kittens and the residents of a ramshackle rental house suddenly found themselves on round-the-clock nursing duty.

The kittens were impossibly small and delicate. For a pack of slacker college students, we were remarkably diligent about the almost hourly bottle feedings. Neil, the wonderfully weird roommate, would carry the tiny things around his shirt pocket to keep them warm – and, well, because he could.

I fell in love with one of the more pathetic ones, a little buff-orange boy I named Opie.

Around that same time, the cat-owning roommate (also my boyfriend) and I were at the tail end of a seriously bad relationship - the worst of my life, without question. One of my earliest memories of Opie was of him sleeping peacefully on my shoulder as Crazy Boyfriend pounded on the bedroom door and shouted death threats at me. I ended up hiding tiny little Opie in a dresser drawer when it sounded like the door was getting ready to give in, just in case I had to go out the window.

It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

In his early years, he was known as “Opie Commando”, named for his habit of gamely attacking my much larger but very neurotic cat, Norman (“Come on, old man, you know you ain’t got no BLADES!”). Opie Commando’s main pastime – no, his mission in life - was Knocking Things Off Of Other Things. Seriously. He would look you flat in the eye as he stretched out on the coffee table and oh-so-deliberately knocked your water glass on the floor.

He was a holy terror and the inspiration for Pony Girl’s poem – ostensibly written for a class – titled “That Furry Piece of Shit,” which included this passage: “I mandated the painful removal of his claws and nads, and he will have his revenge!”

In the words of Bette Davis, Byron couldn’t have said it better.

Opie saw me through the aftermath of Crazy Boyfriend, my transition from college life to adulthood, at least 5 cities, and more apartments than I care to name. He has known many of my friends and aggravated many of my roommates. He terrorized a lot of dates too. He once pooped in a boyfriend’s coat the first time he spent the night. (That’s kitty for “Dis’s MAH house”)

I met one of my best friends in New York one day when I came home from work and found her stuffing food under the door to my apartment. Opie had a habit of howling when he was bored, hungry, cranky, or, well, awake, and she thought maybe someone had died in there and the poor cat was starving. Hardly, the fat bastard.

Opie has been with me for the last twenty years, literally half of my life. I have obsessed about his well being as if I had pushed him out of my own loins. I wrote poetry about this cat (in quite a different vein as the previously mentioned piece). This cat outlasted my marriage.

By now, Opie is ancient; a feline Methuselah. I can’t comprehend how his little body keeps going. He has wicked arthritis and is in advanced renal failure. My friend Lisa described his coat as looking like “buffalo fur”. I give him shots and subcutaneous fluids on a regular basis (someone should really make me an honorary vet tech). Mostly he sleeps on his little heating pad and follows me into the kitchen to grouse at me until I give him chicken baby food. Then he goes and poops it out on the basement floor right next to the litter box.

This past weekend, on the day between my birthday and Mother’s day, I was taking in some much-needed girlfriend time with one my favoritest favorite girlz, OTJ. We were on the way to the little Vietnamese nail place for mani-pedi’s when my cell phone rang. It was XS. Before he even said a word, I could tell by his panicked breathing that something was terribly wrong.

I... I was… well… Feeney… we were…

XS was watching the animals for me. This is no small job. My first thought was that my foster dog, who is such a terrier, had gotten away from him and blithely run off into the the big world. I was half right. She is a lovely, silly thing who adores people, but cats are a different matter. I should say right now that I love her and I don't blame her a bit for being what she is.

Somehow she got away from XS as he was taking her outside. She ran back into the house and got a hold of Opie.

When XS called he was on the way to the vet. Opie didn’t look good. His eyes were glazed. His tongue was hanging out. There was blood. XS would call me back when he knew more. Finally, he called again and put the vet on the phone. She was very kind. She described his injuries, the worst of which was a broken jaw, and proceeded to explain how they could wire the jaw up until they could do the first surgery and

I stopped her.

I think we need to let him go.

I could actually hear the doctor’s posture change. She exhaled. Yes, that would probably be best.

I wanted to know if there was any way that they could keep him comfortable until I could get home (I was three states away) to say goodbye. He’s in a lot of pain. she replied.

In recent months, I have been coming to terms with the fact that Opie was going to die, probably sometime soon. But it never occurred to me that I wouldn’t be with him when it was time for him to go.

Alright then.

XS, for all his faults, loved Opie too. He held Opie’s little body and cried for a long, long time after his heart stopped beating.

I recounted a kid-friendly version of all of this to my son as we were driving home on Sunday. He took it well. He wanted to know if we were going to get Opie back in a box, like the class hamster who died a couple of weeks ago and was solemnly buried in the preschool flower garden. Then he said Mommy, it’s OK to be sad. Tell me if you need a hug.

When we got home, Opie’s heating pad was still warm and his medicine was sitting on the counter next to the jars of baby food. Who would have thought that a house with six animals and two people in it could feel so empty?

My heart has a big cat-shaped hole in it.

(he of the pooped-on jacket, after achieving security clearance):

E-man's picture of mommy's garden and Opie in his box, with flowers on top:

Goodnight, Mister Kitty. And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.

Hillary the Stalker, The Big Kid Haircut, and A New Rule

No, for real real. In the last two weeks, I have gotten over a dozen phone calls from her. I pick up, she starts talking and I can't get a word in edgewise. "When I'm president, blah blah blah."

Come on, Hil, aren't you going to ask me about my dogs? My son? Do you want to see some pictures? Hil??

Chelsea even called me today for the love of God.

Can't she see that I'm just not that into her?

**************************

My little baby boy finally got a big kid haircut. Mommy has been a little attached to his golden baby curls, and I was quite sure that if we cut his hair short, I would have to go straight into grief counseling.

The kid has XS's thick, wavy good hair. But it tangles like mommy's at the drop of a hat and he's even more tender-headed. The wailing and gnashing of teeth that accompanied the daily comb-out were wearing on both of us.

XS's many unmarketable skills include being handy with a set of clippers, so he did The Deed when the E-Man was staying at his place over the weekend. When E came back and hopped out of the car, newly shorn, I was frozen to the spot. I waited for a second and didn't feel my heart drop into my shoes. In fact, I was amazed. He is so HANDSOME!

Of course, I'm still following him around wondering where this big kid came from.

************************

New Rule: Foop is not allowed anywhere near the greeting card display at Target - EX-PECIALLY around holidays.

I foolishly went shopping for Mother's Day cards for my own momz, my grandfather's widow, and my soon to be ex-mothers in law, AKA The Nana's, who have babysat my son, held my hand, made me dinner, and taken me out to see the blues since XS walked out. God bless them.

All the "thanks for being there, Mom" cards were threatening to turn me into a puddle and then I got into looking for a card for Eileen. My maternal grandma died when I was in my 20's, and some years later, Gramps ran into, fell in love (again) with and married his high school sweetheart. They were very happy together. Gramps died last May. Eileen was holding his hand and I was looking into his eyes.

I miss my Gramps. He was a Viking and a scholar, the Great Sequoia of the family, a true Pater Familias. He was The Dude in Charge and the universe seems a little less substantial now that he's gone. As my very odd, very funny, and very cynical Uncle Eric said, in his typical dry tone, "One less generation standing between me and the abyss." I wouldn't have put it quite that way, but I get what he means.

So there I am in the Target, missing the world the way it was last year, thinking about my broken family, the beautiful women in my life, my dear old Gramps, the grandmother I never met, and a dog named Kona that I will be writing about soon. I was trying to play it off, but tears were streaming down my cheeks.

Damn you greeting card companies! Damn you all to hell!!

*******************

Bonus pic: (when life gets you down, go see Balloon Boy)