Wednesday, August 30, 2006

time keeps flying...

I haven't read the news.

I don't know what's going on in the world.

I don't have time to blog.

I haven't adjusted to this new life of new job, new internship and new classes and painting in overdrive in all other waking moments.

I have lots to tell.

I'm too tired to tell.

I haven't adjusted to this new life...

Eventually. Eventually. Eventually.

Thursday, August 24, 2006

nutshells in paradise, etc...

Where have I been? Hubby and I took a 10th anniversary trip to Cancun, where I spent approximately 67 percent of the time vomiting and pooping vile substances thanks to food poisoning I got BEFORE leaving the country. However, I did feel good enough to swim with the dolphins (highly recommended!!!) and take a horseback ride on the beach.

I no longer work in marketing. I am a social worker. Weird.

I started my new job with the geriatric outreach program and also my internship with the veterinary social work program. It made for a stressful week...career change, beginning classes and beginning a new internship.

The vet hospital is a maze with every hallway looking exactly the same. At least I can follow my nose to the large animal section (hay and poop!). Within all those halls, interns, residents, vet techs and veterinarians are flitting around like bees in a hive. Better watch those swinging doors...and don't look inside the necropsy (autopsies for critters) room unless you want to see a kitty in several parts like I did today before I headed out of the building...ugh.

Not quite like sitting at a desk all day. My feet hurt and I'm laden with cell phones for both jobs--not to mention my personal one. I hope I can remember to keep them all charged. Sheesh.

I rarely even have time to check email, much less blog. But, I'm guessing I'll find a way to do it...maybe as a bedtime ritual or something.

I also have a Saturday morning class, which sucks, but I can take it from home via the Internet, which is pretty cool. We'll be logging in and viewing a presentation as well as participating via microphone and speakers. It will be interesting to see how the first meeting goes this Saturday.

And that's all the nutshells I can crack for now.

Friday, August 11, 2006

The Garbage Men Cometh!


This is a 10 x 20 acrylic painting called "The Garbage Men Cometh!" I am gathering up paintings for the show in November and this one will be on display at our local paper as a preview to the show. I'm pretty excited about being in a fine arts show.

Sorry the picture is so crappy (especially washed out on the right side), but I just varnished it this morning and they're picking it up this afternoon, so I literally took the photo as I was running out the door.

On a sad-happy-confused-angst-ridden-note, I have four hours left as a marketing professional. Today is my last day. It's been a nice last week though, with many heartfelt good-byes and nice exchanges. I will miss so many people. I didn't realize how attached I was! My good blog buddy, Barry will keep everyone under control. Thanks for everything B! :-)

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Blankets R Good, mmmm-K?

Part One:


Part Two:


Part Three:

sigh.

Today was my "farewell" lunch at work. I am so sad to leave my old marketing family, even if I don't want to be in marketing anymore. I got a great card, packed with sweet good luck messages and a surprise gift certificate to my favorite art supply store. :-)

I am in the process of cleaning out my office, which is a real bitch, emotionally and physically. That's the price of being a pack-rat. Wah.

I am leaving for Mexico on Sunday for a 10th anniversary trip and everything is all set--a friend to live at the house and take care of the cats, boarding for the dogs... Great!

I am coming down with a cold. Not so great.

Those last two items need to NOT happen at the same time.

But I'm afraid they are going to. Echinacea and zinc here I come.

My husband just called me and said his car broke down and it has to be towed to the garage ($$$ we don't have).

I broke a crown chewing on ice and had to have it fixed yesterday (more $$$ I don't have).

Life is never dull.

Friday, August 04, 2006

I knew I liked that ole' Carl...

"Humans - who enslave, castrate, experiment on, and fillet other animals - have had an understandable penchant for pretending animals do not feel pain. A sharp distinction between humans and 'animals' is essential if we are to bend them to our will, wear them, eat them - without any disquieting tinges of guilt or regret."

--Carl Sagan & Ann Druyan

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

what the hell?!!!

Bizarre that I had dream last night my boss had decided to become a nurse practitioner and had to give me rabies shots... This article was brought to my attention through an animal studies list-serv. Nauseating and unnerving to say the least...

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: August 1, 2006
SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- A county in southwestern China has killed as many as 50,000 dogs in a government campaign ordered after three people died from rabies, official media reported Tuesday.

The five-day massacre in Yunnan province's Mouding county spared only military guard dogs and police canine units, the Shanghai Daily reported, citing local media.

Dogs being walked were taken from their owners and beaten on the spot, the newspaper said. Other killing teams entered villages at night, creating noise to get dogs barking, then honing in and beating them to death.

Owners were offered 63 cents per animal to kill their dogs before the teams were sent in, the report said.

The massacre was widely discussed on the Internet, with both legal scholars and animal rights activists criticizing it as crude and cold-blooded. The World Health Organization said more emphasis needed to be placed on prevention.

''Wiping out the dogs shows these government officials didn't do their jobs right in protecting people from rabies in the first place,'' Legal Daily, a newspaper run by the central government's Politics and Law Committee, said in an editorial in its online edition.

Dr. Francette Dusan, a WHO expert on diseases passed from animals to people, said effective rabies control required coordinated efforts between human and animal health agencies and authorities.

''This has not been pursued adequately to date in China with most control efforts consisting of purely reactive dog culls,'' Dusan said.

The Shanghai Daily said 360 of Mouding county's 200,000 residents suffered dog bites this year. The three rabies victims included a 4-year-old girl, the report said.

''With the aim to keep this horrible disease from people, we decided to kill the dogs,'' Li Haibo, a spokesman for the county government was quoted as saying by the official Xinhua News Agency.

Calls to county government offices rang unanswered on Tuesday.

China has seen a major rise in the number of rabies cases in recent years,
with 2,651 reported deaths from the disease in 2004, the last year for which
data was available, according to the Chinese Center for Disease Control and
Prevention.

Experts have tied the rise in part to an increase in dog ownership,
particularly in rural areas where about 70 percent of households keep dogs.
Only about 3 percent of Chinese dogs are vaccinated against rabies, according
to the center. Access to appropriate treatment is highly limited, especially
in the countryside.

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