Surfin' USA

I like looking around and seeing what other people are doing with their blogs, so all those viral marketing services work well for me -- I'm going to be looking at sites anyhow, why not have some traffic directed back in my direction.

My favorite is still Blog Explosion -- they just seem to not only have the most sites but their site is set up in a way where I can easily assign my credits with no guess work or confusion. It's my first choice for reliability, ease of use, and variety of blogs. The only advanatages the other sites have is a shorter browsing time.

is okay too, but I cannot figure out how to blogmark -- it's probably something obvious. There seems to be a good variety of sites. I plan on continuing to use this one, but it's not as intuitive as BE.

Then there is BlogXchange which is about equal to BlogClicker: Worth it, but not up to the level of BE. I do think this one has potential.

Blogsoldiers. This one just started and the jury is still out. Because it's new there are not a lot of sites yet, and there is something really hinky about assigning credits where I'm really not sure if I'm doing it right. I think it has potential, but at this point the pickings are poor enough that I surf it just to get my own blog out there, rather than real joy. I consider it a good investment because there are so few sites it makes mine more prominent.

There was another one I considered with Lemming in the title. When I went to sign up they wanted a ridiculous amount of information. Will not do that one, because, well it just seems skeezy! There are too many of these things out there!

This services have directed me to a good many of my favorite blogs -- the ones listed to the right of course, and also others like: Last Girl on Earth with my favorite entry showing the episode of Ambush Makeover she was in. (And for the record, Ambushing is NEVER a good thing, and harrassing people on the street -- as if they should wear formal wear to Chucky Cheese -- is Just Crass! I'll pay someone to ambush some of the faux experts who do the show, okay, not really...unless I win the lottery.)

I believe BE also introduced me to Do They Have Salsa In China? -- which is done by a couple who are planning on adopting a little Chinese girl. I so want to do that someday. At the shelter we had a woman who'd adoped a Chinese girl, and she was just a beautiful child -- her mother actually told people not to always be telling her how gorgeous she was, because she thought the child hearing it constantly had to be a not good thing. It just makes me sad to think how little girls are undervalued in some parts of the world. (Don't they know that boys have cooties?!?!)

I don't know where I found Longmire Does Romance Covers, but it always makes me laugh. It reminds me of another site which votes on the worst romance covers (it's fun to go through the archives to see all the worsts 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999) Even non-romance readers would get a good chuckle. If you tell me this "worst" does not look like Star Jones-Reynolds, you are a DAMNED liar:

For the record, and because I have not ruled out writing a romance novel, most covers are really, really "purty." And you can't judge a book by it's -- well, you know! Ahem. See, purty:

And how could you not love Squareslant? Just for the saucy pictures (images?!) alone! I keep on meaning to tell my friend Arch to check out this blog -- but since he reads my blog, I suppose I just did!

Last, but not lea...oh, you know, is Coroner Stories for the true crime/CSI minded folk! I worked with a guy who used to be a coroner's assistant, and he would tell me about worms poking their heads out during autopsies. And that is why they make Colon Blow.

I'll just leave you with that thought.

Cop-Out

I'm usually pretty good at spotting Urban Legends, but I was fooled by this one. I cannot be the only person who thought, if you asked directly, a cop had to (ahem) cop to the truth.

Glad I found this out before I picked my street corner. Whew! That could have been really embarrassing.

Satisfying My Hunger

Googlism.com informs me that Detroit is the Anus of the Universe. I cannot call that one of the more appetizing thoughts I've ever contemplated. That being said, you cannot dis The Industrial Heart of the Country (as Animal Cops: Detroit calls it every episode) for its food. There's exceptional Soul Food, and Greek Food, and Pizza, and Ethiopian. There are also places which are way out of my league -- like the Rattle Snake Club.

When I move I'll miss the food -- at least the wide variety of foods you can get around the big city. I don't think there are a lot of sushi restaurants in Northern MN...and there are certainly none exactly where I'm moving.

And I don't seem to care all that much. Trust me, it's not because I don't have a deep and abiding love of food. It just seems like it's a fair tradeoff for being able to be close to my grandmother and heal some battle wounds.

There will be no fancy dinner for my birthday (June 10th - Daisies are my favorite flowers and my pale skin looks best in cool tones), but there will be fresh air, and my grandmother, and her cooking.

And there will probably not be any fine dining for my anniversary in August, but there will be starlight and I know how to light candles and pop open a bottle of wine. Yah You Betcha!

By the way, Googlism says: ely minnesota is about as good as you can get. And who am I to argue? (At least not this time!)

Now Darling Nikki...That's a Song!

I know the time to write about the school in Benton Harbor banning Louie, Louie was a day ago, before everyone else already covered it, but what can I say 'cept I just wasn't feeling it then.

I think people have been needlessly harsh toward the school and the superintendant. They were merely acting in the best interest of the kids. It's no different from their decision to not allow kids in the lunchroom to drink carbonated beverage while eating pop rocks, and their decision to close down Lover's Lane until the mental institution escapee with the hooked for a hand is apprehended. And who can say anything bad about their proactive stance on preventing more incidences of spunkball?

Anyhow, I have a song lyric story that paints me as either a teacher's pet, a little tattle-tale, or a Mistress of Revenge! You decide. It's 1984 and I'm in speech class, pretty much flunking due to stage fright, when the assignment is to lipsynch to a pop song.

It was Walter's turn. Walter that loser(deleted list of prejoratives). Walter who blew spitballs at me and tripped me once. You know, Walter! Anyhow, he lip synched Little Red Corvette. (By the way there was a certain irony to the fact that Wally looked like Hitler's wet dream.) The teacher, who was 105 pounds of martinet, was clearly loving Walter's performance. As she was seated next to me I casually pointed out that the lyrics were really dirty when you really listened to him. She stopped smiling. When it ended there was a silence for several seconds. She gave him a "D" and told him she was not as stupid as he thought she was, and that she did not appreciate him singing smut in her classroom.

You know that scene in A Christmas Story where the teacher lectures everyone on what happened to Flick, and Ralphie looks around at the other kids like it had nothing to do with him? While Mrs McCormick is ranting at Walter I'm shooting everyone a "Who narced on Walter?" look. In any case, I didn't think she would spaz that much, but hey, my Pat Benatar lipsynch was ruined by him miming cunnilingus, so I call it even.

Because of this incident neither one of us got accepted to Harvard.

Let's Begin at The Beginning.

Citrus wanted to know about early memories. This is tough -- not because I have no early memories, but because I am one of those people seem to have many really early memories. Oddly enough I can't tell you what brand of bottled tea I drink NOW (athough I can describe the bottle), but I'm big with the early memories. And because I have so many, I'm not sure which one is first.

Submitted for you perusal... Some early memories.

I'm toddling around like a drunken sailor and my grandmother and mother are behind a closed door. I want to be in there with them. I pound on the door. They let me in and then my mother puts me in my crib, which is in the room. The thing is - they're done (folding laundry?) so they turn off the light and leave. There are a couple indignant seconds as I process this, and then I begin to wail. My mother walks in the room and stares at me like she just doesn't know what my deal is ... I can't tell her. I'm frustrated. (We do variations on this for decades to come!)

My uncle is eating steak. I want some. I walk up to him and stare at him -- just stare at him, knowing I'm looking cute. He smiles and folds out the fork to me. The A-1 sauce explodes on my taste buds, a little too peppery. (I had to be under 3, because he went away to Viet Nam, came home, and died in a car accident by the time I was 3.)

I remember falling down a steep staircase. No, that's not true. I remember standing at the top of the staircase and wanting down. My grandmother is not paying attention; she's talking to someone. I decide I can do this on my own. I see one of my feet stepping out. Suddenly I'm at the bottom of the stairs -- no memory of in between. (My grandmother told me I was so still that she was sure that I was dead.) I begin to cry. Contrary to my grandmother's telling of the story, at no point did I think I could fly.

I remember being called by my childhood nickname -- Lou. My real name is not Nicolette, but neither is it Lou -- or anything close to Lou. I'm told I received the nick because when my grandfather first saw me he said I was a "Real Lou-Lou."

There are memories of lincoln logs, which were useless to me. I hated them. I liked the carpet sweeper quite a lot. Rotary phones were a blast. Cardboard boxes were loads of fun.

I remember the kitchen that all these memories happened in...and a weird lookin wall hanging that was a copper rooster.

Like Citrus there are swimming pool memories. There's the smell of plastic... plastic pool, plastic pool toys, a plastic bucket and shovel. Bright vivid colors. For years I associate that same plastic smell with Kmart. (Kmart becomes the smell of plastic combined with the taste of a frozen coke.)

The pool belongs to the boy who lived downstairs from us --Scotty. (I had to be slightly older than in the previous memories -- 3-4.) Water going up my nose and burning my sinuses, being cold, a little bikini.

Scotty being mean to me one too many times. My grandmother actually tolds him still so I can beat on him for a minute. (I'd like to see an adult do that today!!)

I think that's enough for now. Anyone else?

Exquisite, Vivid Writing!

All I know is it has always been this sunny.

I just love the above entry. Beautifully rendered with details which are somehow both unique and universal.

Odd and Ends! (Passwords, Spam, Walmart, and Puppy Poison.)

Mounting a search for an old password.

1. My password choices seem to go in waves. Depending on when I started an account for something, it changes. There are few things more annoying than typing in the wrong password, and being informed it was wrong. I feel judged! (Yeah, right, not logical.) I want to scream at the computer, "You know what I meant! You know I know it! Stop screwing with me!"

Then I have to dig through my brain for whatever I was obsessing on when I created THAT account. It's like an archeological dig -- only not fun. And to ask to have a reminder sent? That's admitting defeat.

2. I will never, ever, ever purchase something from a pop-up or spam -- and whatever people ARE keeping these idiots in business deserve to be horsewhipped in the town square. I recently got a pop-up from Walmart.

3. I would never purchase anything from Walmart before the pop-up, now I want to exhume Sam Walton and... okay, maybe I don't want to share the rest of the details.

I once had a co-worker tell me he saw me and my husband at Walmart. I was appalled -- this was tantamount, for me, to saying I was at a KKK rally. I told him he was very mistaken. He then admitted he had not seen me -- only my husband -- but had assumed I was around. I told him this could not be, because my husband shared the same values. I asked him which Walmart. He named the one a mere 2 miles from my house. I gasped!

My husband swore he was just there killing time while he waited for carry-out. He assured me he had purchased nothing. He told me it would never happen again. He was pretty sure he left a dirty footprint on the floor. He promised me it would never happen again.

After several months of intensive marriage counseling, I chose to forgive him. (Yes, yes, kidding about that last part.)

In any community there are only x dollars to be spent. Inevitably a little guy loses business, no matter what Walmart says, when they enter the community. Even if it seems like they are bringing people into town, it's from neighboring towns, and then THEY are losing money.

And they pay such low wages that their employees end up buying cheapie product there, like The Worst Brand of Dog Food Ever.

4. Ol' Roy dog food is one mini-step above poison. It has little nutritional value, traces of Sodium Pentobarbitol (Euth Solution which is NOT destroyed by heat), and -- as cheap as it is -- is a rip-off. I would feed my dogs roadkill, or certainly table scraps, before Ol' Roy.

(The above book is by the Gears -- Kathleen and W. Michael -- and is part of a series about Pre-Columbian tribes and clans. If you enjoyed the books of Jean Auel or have an interest in archeology, most of the series is a good read. The first book in the series might be the weakest entry.)

Goodbye Old Friend!

My husband has informed me that my elliptical cannot come with us on the move. Apparently the cost of hauling it is more than it's worth. I can only surmise this means it's not worth it to keep my ass from dragging on the ground.

The good news is that he will buy me a new one when we get there. He promised, and I will nag him to death until he makes good on it, so I believe him.

So goodbye old friend who has seen me through a every season of American Idol, The Buffy Soundtrack -- Once More With Feeling, and 80s headbanger music. Thank you for allowing me to drip my salty sweat all over your display.

Oh sure, I'll love my next elliptical, but you were my first!

Dennis Lehane

Dennis Lehane

Behold, my favorite author!
Dennis Lehane.
Why?
Because reading him makes me feel jealous and unworthy.
And what potential writer doesn't want to feel like crap?
I need to be humbled often.

Dennis Lehane is the guy behind Mystic River.
(What? Clint Eastwood? He directed the movie --
Lehane wrote the words!)
If you liked the movie -- try the book!

Now Ben Affleck, also a Mass. Native, is making his directing debut with
Gone, Baby, Gone.
Ben Affleck needed a good career move --
This could be it!
Strong Characters.
(Angela Gennaro and Patrick Kenzie.)
Strong Dialogue.
Compelling Plot.
(Can't tell you the interesting part.)

GBG is not the first book in the series thouugh --
That's A Drink Before The War.
My favorite in the series, and I hope it makes it to the big screen is --
Darkness Take My Hand.

And then there was Shutter Island.
A different feel than Angela and Patrick.
A different feel than Mystic River.
And what an end!
Wow!
I still think about that book --
How everything led up to that ending.
The inevitability.

Lehane makes me thoroughly enjoy books that are not supposed to be my style.
Hard boiled crime fiction?
Are you kidding me?
But I sit here waiting for the next book --
Whatever it will be.
And I'll hang on every word.

Mother's Day is On It's Way -- What A Horrifying Concept!

I'm estranged from my mother. Severely estranged, as in: Have spoken less that 2 dozen words to her in the last decade +. I'm not saying she's completely at fault, or I'm completely at fault -- it is what it is.

There is an odd facet to our non-relationship. We have exchanged cards for holidays and I send her occasional gifts. I can't explain it. She actually didn't send me a birthday card last year because -- this is so weird -- at the urging of my grandmother I called my mother. My mother is pretty ill and my grandmother thought she could use the help. So I swallowed down my fears of further rejection and called my mother and the less than 2 dozen words occurred. Basically, she didn't want my help. I kept my cool until I hung up the phone, and then I sobbed, and vowed not to call her again. And she didn't send me a birthday card. Nor did she put any of the blame for my calling on my grandmother.

I love my mother, and I want to help her, but I can't beg her to love me back anymore. Cannot do it. The very act of asking the person who is supposed to love you unconditionally to love you at all is degrading. I was never the perfect daughter, and I made mistakes, but I've loved her and wanted the best for her my whole life.

The wound never heals. And even though I'm finally getting the move I want, part of me is feeling that same unworthiness -- part of me is asking what kind of person leaves the state when her mother is ailing? And people who care about me can tell me I've tried, and she's a grown woman who has chosen to cut me out of her life, but I still feel guilt. And anger.

Anger because something will happen to her someday. And I will blame myself for not being there. I will feel the weight of an incredible unworthiness. Her epitaph will be that her daughter was not good enough. Never good enough. What sort of mother leaves her daughter with that legacy? And how unworthy does a daughter have to be to deserve it?

(All these years later and I still can't "talk" about it without crying.)

So in short, would be be too much to ask, when I walk into Hallmark to just find a bleepin' card that says Happy Mother's Day? No wonderful memories, or the times to come, or spending the day together -- Just Happy Mother's Day. (Let's make it a clean incision rather than a jagged tear.)

How Can It Be A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood -- If The Neighborhood is Damned?

(Much thanks goes to Cyn for directing me to the really scary Kirk Cameron link posted below.)

Ever have two completely unrelated thoughts come together -- and create something new, different, and a little bit scary?

I'm watching the E True Hollywood Story of I Love Lucy...and then it hits me: If I were a Fire and Brimstone Christian this would be a real bummer! Say my name were, oh, Kirk Cameron -- would I be thinking, "Wow, the Ricardos and the Mertzs are together again...in hell!"?

I mean how does on go around knowing that more than 99% of the people you lay eyes on are destined for a sulphorous pit of fire? This includes: your family, non-church friends, the nice couple who live next door and their children, and pretty much everyone you see on tv, or read about, or...

And why in the hell are the people who believe this always grinning? Yeah, I get they think they're on the Stairway To Heaven, but even so -- isn't knowing most people are doomed a bit of a mood dampener? If not, I bet Stephen King had no idea The Stand was a comedy, or he would have marketed it differently.

Dont get me wrong -- I admire people of faith -- but this particular vein of Christianity is a mystery to me. The whole thought of looking at people who are by all accounts decent human beings, "knowing they" are going to suffer, and going to church to praise the Man behind the suffering.

The person I understand the least is Jack Chick. In case you are not familiar with Mr. Chick, he writes these religious tracts which are both terrifying in their malevolence and hysterically funny in the delusional quality which permeates every panel. Allow me to explain a Chick tract.

1. Everyone looks like they are out of an Enzyte ad. You know... the commercials with "Bob" who has found the key to natural male enhancement....

I have to think they got the idea for Enzyte Bob from The Church of the Subgenius...

Only instead of Enzyte, the Smiling people have God. The non-smiling people, unlike in the male inhancements ads, are not are not necessarily in need of drugs -- they're merely Godless Infidels.

2. A typical tract/cartoon has a "Ward", a "June", a "Wally", or a "Betty Jane" who is going straight to hell -- we know this because no crazed grin. These people are living their lives, and "delusionally" worshipping their "false idols," when "Bob" -- or someone much like "Bob" -- show up and inform them they are going to hell. They spew some out of context Bible quotes until the infidel -- instead of doing any of the normal things -- falls to their knees and admits the error of their previously hellbound ways!

3. The following elements are also common: the devil, God (who wears white and has beams of light coming from his face), demons, and the occasionally person who does not accept The Gospel According to "Bob" -- who of course dies bad and goes straight to hell -- without passing Go or collecting $200.

One of my favorite ones is about a missionary couple who've been in Africa for 50 years and end up sitting on an airplane next to an ex-con who is born-again. While in Africa they built schools and a hospital for lepers, but they did not preach to people on how to get saved, so when the plane crashes they go to hell. The convict -- because he does force his beliefs on others -- goes to heaven. The last image is of the two old people being tossed naked into hell.

Nice, loving stuff, huh? And not the least bit paranoid.

Bwahaha!

Sleep.

Sleep
International Wolf Center Web Cam - Ely, MN

I love this picture!
Wolves are wild animals and elusive in the wild. It's incredible to be able to view them and study them.

Most of us can still remember when they were vilified and hated. Now they are seen as noble and beautiful creatures. I believe it's a change for the better.

At the IWC they have as little contact with the wolves as possible, so that they can study pack dynamics as they would occur in nature. I believe they only go in for vet care. I also hear that the wolves are often fed roadkill deer. (Quite a delicacy.)

Northern MN is one of the few places in the country that still has a thriving wolf population. If any of this is of even remote interest to you, consider checking out the work of Jim Brandenburg.

Brandenburg is a nature photographer who was done great work with National Geographic and lives among the wolves at a place called Ravenwood.

He also did an extraordinary book called Touched by The Light. The premise of the book was to only take 1 picture a day for 90 days (between the Autunmal Equinox and Winter Soltice.) Most photographers can easily go through many rolls of film a day, but he wanted to focus. The results were extraordinary.

Since then he has done a similar project called Looking for Summer. This one took place between Summer Soltice and Autumnal Equinox.

You can go to his gallery in Ely, watch the slideshows there, and just really get lulled into this sense of peace.

One of the images from Touched by The Light inspired the vampire story (of all things) that I'm working on now. It's called Poacher Killed Deer, and while a very sad image, it's also quite beautiful. A character in my story speaks for me when she talks of not being able to understand people killing for the sport of it, and not even needing (or taking) the meat.

Part of the reason that wolves were seen as "The Bad Guys" is because of their predatory nature. But they kill to eat, to survive, and to take care of their pack. Worlds away from killing just for the fun of it.

Do you guys know there is a place in Texas where people can hunt with a mouseclick? You pay the "nice" people and get to watch animals through webcams, and when you line up the unsuspecting animal: you click. This is a sport?

I'm not a hunter, and never will be, but I'll tell you the truth: I can accept hunting. I can sit down to eat with a man (or woman) who goes out and hunts(not eating the venison though!), but I cannot and will not abide some asshole who could get a video game, shoot all the pretend people and animals he (or she) wants, but prefers a Real Body Count!

In my world you earn the right to hunt by actually working for it -- not to mentioning having some reverence for the fact that an animal died. It has to be an interactive experience, and hunting by computer doesn't cut it.

News, two:I

Your English Skills:

Punctuation: 100%

Vocabulary: 100%

Grammar: 80%

Spelling: 60%

Does Your English Cut the Mustard?

Bottom line: 100% on punctuation is way higher than expected and spelling was lower than expected. I attribute the punctuation score to luck, and I blame the spelling score on too much time reading misspelled words on the internet.

That Darn Shrub! (Or 1 Tequila, 2 Tequila, 3 Tequila, Floor!)

Can we just admit that Laura "Shecky" Bush's uproariously funny comedy routine was, in point of fact, neither uproarious or all that funny? So why is every news outlet I've seen hyping it to the skies?

1. Can we say stilted? Look, I almost flunked speech class because of stage fright -- I understand why one might be a little deer-in-the-headlights under the circumstances, but that does not change the truth. She sounded like she has memorized a script...oh, wait!

The solution? She should have asked herself WWJD? (What would Jenna do?) That's right -- she should have done a shot of Cuervo.

2. These are The Jokes, Folks! (Really?) Someone wrote those "jokes" for her. Were they paid? Because I'm here to tell you that if you get 2 or more women together -- average chicks -- they will come up with the exact same material. For Free! That is if they are residing with their husbands, as opposed to hoping their military spouse comes home alive. THOSE are real Desperate Housewives. (And they would love to have their worst problem be that hubby is in bed by 9pm. )

Solutions? Fire scriptwriter, meet some common folk, do a shot of Cuervo.

3. Thank God Laura was rescued from a life of literacy -- now she can watch more TV! Poor thing -- stuck in a library, among books, possibly thinking... Now all she has to worry about is her husband's narcolepsy, her daughters' drinking, and how such a perfect parent -- as played by Marcia Cross -- could have a sexual deviant for a son.

Solution? Oprah's Book Club...and a shot of Cuervo everytime something depressing happens in Anna Karenina.

4. In the words of John Lennon, "There's no problems, only solutions. Oh, okay...Can we stop referring to ANY first lady as the president's secret weapon? It's just way freakin' condescending! When we get a woman prez, will her husband he her secret weapon?

Even presuming it was funny...so? I'm told this garnered much needed goodwill, and yet I can't see why. The first lady told a few (scripted) jokes, like reg-lar folk, and now we feel better about her husband? Why is that?

Solution? What else? A shot of tequila and pass out by 9:05 next to the man who you -- by your own admission -- desperately married and whose approach to life involves a chainsaw.

Darn, okay, I'll be fair -- it was a good try! She did try! But it was overhyped, over-reported, and just plain not funny.

This Blog Is Filled With Quicksand! And Soylent Green is People!

Main Entry: quick·sand

Pronunciation: 'kwik-"sand

Function: noun Date: 14th century

1 : sand readily yielding to pressure; especially: a deep mass of loose
sand mixed with water into which heavy objects readily sink

2 : something that entraps or frustrates.

I started my blog because I want to write. And potentially sell what I write. I read in a writing magazine that blogs can be incredible promotional tool, so I decided -- since I'm all about talking about Me -- that I would give it a try.

Somewhere along the line it became fun for it's own sake. I'm not just talking about the writing, but also the surfing, and the reading, and the whole leaving of the comments: to the point where I'm not focusing on actually writing the Someone Might Pay Me For This Stuff!

(What? Give up blogging? Are you mad?) I will be taking care of business a little bit more though. I love writing, and yet it seems like I'm always procrastinating. Maybe it's due to an extreme and phobic fear of failure.

Kids out there who dream of writing professionally: don't investigate the odds of success -- it ain't pretty! Although I'm strangely fixated on THIS site: http://rejectioncollection.com/ These people are even more bitter than I am -- and yet I can see my future.

Nah, I think you have to go in hanging on your belief in yourself in much the same way that Trump hangs on to the comb-over. And you need to take the rejections as they come. (I say this as one of my stories is in the "maybe" pile for an anthology, and while hoping I won't have to be taking rejection in stride over that one.)

I used to work with a girl who wanted to be a dancer. I'm not sure if she ever actually uttered the words, but my husband's imitation of her included the phrase, "I must dahnce!" Somewhere along the line I started doing an imitation of his imitation and began saying, usually apropos of nothing, "I simply must write, daaarling!"

So while I want to try hard to keep up, if you don't hear from me more than once a day, just know: I Simply Must Write Something Other Than the Blog, My Darlings!

(Plus there's the whole moving thing...)

Insert Eye-Catching Title

(Insert witty, inciteful, well-thought out observations in the style of the Algonquin Round Table. Imagine Nicolette making all sorts of knee-slapping Dorothy Parker-esque Bon Mots. )

Just to cleanse the palate of all the recent puppy and kitten pictures!

Going Home! Happy Endings.

(MHS Adoption Event Held at Detroit Zoo.)

If interested in adopting a pet, please consider:

1. Visiting Your Local Animal Shelter.

2. Visiting petfinder.com -- a site which lists animals available at shelters in your area.

3. A purebred rescue group. For just about every breed of dog you can think of, there are rescue groups staffed by fans of that breed. A websearch for rescue, your state, and the breed should give you the information you need.

Congratulations -- It's Twins!

Stormy and Gracie meet their new family (Day 2.)

Hey! White Goes With Simply EVERYTHING!

Karina attending the 2nd day of the MHS adoption event at The Detroit Zoo.

It's A Little Like The Scene From Alien... Only Double.

A volunteer warming Dixie and Trixie.

Michelle and Trixie.

My friend, Michelle, with Lil' Miss Trixie at the Michigan Humane Society Adoption Event (Day 2.)

3 Times in 3 Weeks? Are We Going Steady?

http://uhohnowlook.blogspot.com/2005/04/booty-flies-from-my-life-in-stirrups.html

So I'm making the rounds and went to Susie's site (http://uhohnowlook.blogspot.com/), and she now only has some really cool pictures of flowers and trees, but also some hysterically funny stories (like the one above.) In the last 3 weeks I've sent you guys to her take on cell phones, AND to see how her ass apparently holds the very universe in it's cheeks, and now...Booty Flies!

Here's the thing though...Rosie O'Donnell is commenting on her site now. Only I knew Susie first, right? I was telling you how cool she was whole weeks before Ro was hip to Susie. And that's why I've now linked her permanently -- I'm stakin' my claim! (Isn't it enough that Rosie beat me out for the part of Betty Rubble?)

Of Course You Didn't Want to Go Through With The Wedding - Who Does?

Hey, Runaway Bride! You think I wanted to go through with my wedding ceremony? Hell, no! My wedding day found me sitting on the floor of a rented condo, in my gown, eating brownies, drinking Mike's Hard Lemonade, and waivering between catatonic and hysterical, while my Matron of Honor -- a feisty Southern chick -- convinced me I really wanted to get married.

I loved the guy, and did not want to humiliate him in front of his whole family -- let alone the world -- so I wiped the crumbs off the corner of my mouth, careful not to mess up the make-up, and I went and got married.

If I was not going thorough with it there would have been ample time to call the thing off. I would have done it somewhere in the many proceeding months -- call me crazy.

Now I know the thing escalated beyond anticipation after the running away part. Who expected all the search parties, and the CNN, and the... er, hoopla? But why not call at the first sign that this was snowballing?

I'm not even really busting your chops -- you have to live with the shame and embarrassment, and even the post traumatic stress every time a certain Julia Roberts/Richard Gere movie is mentioned.

I guess the guy is sticking by you, and from the outside looking in, he seems like a keeper since you sorta/kinda made him look like Cletus The Local Yokel in front of everyone -- and I do mean everyone.

I'm just saying -- would it not have been easier to have just done it it my way? (Get married while 1.5 sheets to the wind and tasting like chocolate and lemons?)