I Love Fall!

Winter is my absolute favorite season, Fall is second. You just can't beat the mother earth colors.

I went out grocery shopping and ended up taking the long way home so I could capture some of the beauty around here this season.

Kris Kristofferson Concert

The lights dimmed and Kris walked out. No fanfare, just the man and his guitar.

His voice was in great form, he joked, he told anecdotes from his time spent with the "losers" as he obviously lovingly calls them, Johnny, Waylon and the boys. Sang some hauntingly beautiful songs written for his "babies and their Momma's", some classics like Me and Bobby McGee, The Silver Tongued Devil & I, Darby's castle and a whole lot more.

As well as some really wonderful material that doesn't make the airwaves as often as others. One song was written for Layla Al-Attar, who was an accomplished Iraqi artist. She, along with her husband and housekeeper were murdered by a missile attack directed by Clinton after the attempted assassination of the senior Bush. The song is called The Circle.

People were snapping photos all around me and I cursed myself for not bringing my camera. I just did not expect that it would be allowed. At the end of the concert I rushed up to the stage and stuck my hand out. KRIS KRISTOFFERSON SHOOK MY HAND!!!!! Although, I guess he didn't have a choice. It was either a shake or a slap, and since there were witnesses he went for the shake. He's got a nice firm handshake...just in case you were wondering. :))

My fantabulous cousin Denny, who treated me to the evening, took some pics with his cell. Here's Kris....*swoon*

Seeing him last night means I can cross one more thing off my Bucket List!

Back Up Baby!

The last 2 days I've been unpacking and putting away the very last 3 boxes of stuff. And so there have been a few things out of place. For instance, in the bathroom I placed a flattened out box between the toilet and counter til I took it and the others outside. It stuck out of the bathroom about a foot but left just enough room for the dogs to get in the washroom and have a drink of water. ( I have to leave their water dish in the tub or else Henry thinks the dish is his own personal water park and well, you get the idea )

Henry's first trip in to get a drink was a disaster. I heard him in their drinking and then heard what sounded like a dozen dogs in with him thrashing and crashing against the walls and flattened boxes. I run to go see wtf is going on and see him caught between the tub and the boxes. He had tried to turn around in an area that no other dog would attempt. I got him turned around and told him he was silly when it was so easy to just back up as the other dogs did!

A couple hours later and he is again thrashing and crashing and stuck. It was then that I realized he doesn't know how to back up! There was never a problem where he needed to. I made sure that where we lived he had open spaces. Nothing for him to crash into.

Crap man, it was hard enough teaching him stairs, now I have to teach him to back up!

My cousin Denny, who's blog is Running With Safety Scissors is taking me to see Kris Kristofferson tonight!!! Front row seats....I may just pass out from delirious glee when he walks on stage. I can now cross seeing him off my Bucket List!

Dinosaurs

Dinosaurs....I was reading a blog a bit ago written by a self proclaimed dinosaur. She's an animal rescue person who is my age. In the beginning she rescued cats, and for the last five years has been a multi-species rescue. Or, as she told me once, she now has the hobby farm she has wanted since she was a kid.

My immediate thought when I read her proclamation, was to think of the lady whom I met one day while she chasing a dog down my alley. I helped her finally catch him and we introduced ourselves to each other. She was Nancy Mason and she ran one of the very few animal rescues in B.C. which was called Mercy Volunteers For Animals. We talked for a bit, she explaining about her organization, and me immediately volunteering to foster. I fostered dogs for her for 8 years, then moved to Manitoba. I was 20 when I met her and she had to be in her mid 50's.

She did more work in the name of rescue than the self proclaimed dinosaur ever has done, and can ever imagine to do. Nancy passed away a number of years ago, she had to be in her 80's. Back in Nancy's day there wasn't the ease of the Internet. It was snail mail, horrendously expensive long distance phone calls where you waited till after 6 pm to call to get the cheapest rates, personally driving dogs across the provinces, not the free airline deals they have now. The fund-raising was almost nil, not like the $20,000 + the *dinosaur* can raise in one evening. Funds were for the most part, paid out of pocket by foster people like myself.

Now, Nancy was a true dinosaur in the rescue world.

Or the 2 elders on a reserve near Princeton. One is 87, her sister is 91. They STILL spay/neuter/feed/foster out of their own pockets. I met them in 1982, through Nancy. I cannot say how many dogs they have tended to, but the number might be 3 times as high, or probably higher as the year I met them! They've been rescuing since they were in their late teens! And there isn't any fancy fund-raising for them either. Or internet. I visited them 3 weeks ago and loaded them up with some kibble kindly donated by a grocery store in town. They are still rescuing, with the help of a few family members now.

They are dinosaurs in the rescue world.

So, until the self proclaimed dinosaur does even a smidgen of what these 3 ladies have accomplished, she should quit her ceaseless whining and just freaking do what she has chosen to do. What with the mass of volunteers, the few staff and fund-raising her rescue has, this is a cake walk compared to what Nancy did, and Mabel and Lorraine still do.

And here's a raspberry for anyone who thinks that they are all that and more!

Rain and dirt = mud.

It has rained since 5pm yesterday and still coming down. The weather guys all say it will continue the entire week. Ewwwww.

Where the dogs exit and enter they have transformed the pathway so that it now resembles a pigs wallow.( not really that bad, but on its way there! ) I was thinking of going down to the river front and absconding with a shitload of sand. But then I realized our home would become a beach with the sand the dogs tracked in. So, tomorrow I will trek into the concrete jungle of Chilliwack and grab a few 70 litre bags of shavings and put that down.

Oh gawd, I shudder at what this pink carpet will look like come spring. Plans are to rip it out and lay down some sort of lino or tiles, haven't decided which yet. But, till then, I really should buy a small carpet shampooer.

My Dad was here over the weekend and helped with skirting the trailer. Just the back end to do and it'll be done. Yay! I do believe I am ready for winter to make an appearance!

He doesn't scare me!

Well, he kinda' scares me. Look at that face!

There's a missing blogger! Her name is Jonna. I faithfully read her blog every few days and loved her photos. She blogged about nothing in particular but was interesting. Her photos consisted of her ducks or chickens or the deer that crossed her meadows, or a lovely rock she may have come across. Just everything and nothing in particular. I liked her style of writing, it was real. You felt like what she was saying, in type, is exactly the way she would come across in person.

I went to her blog a few weeks back and it took me to a page that said " the blog you are looking for was not found....blah blah blah. My first thought was ohhhhh crap, she somehow accidentally deleted her blog. Maybe she was trying a different template and something fucked up. But I go back every morning to the link and still, she is not there. It's been 5 weeks.

What happened to Jonna? I don't want to think the worst. Odd how someone I never met, and would probably never meet has me worried for her. She's the one who peaked my interest in blogging.

Speaking of blogging, my cousin Denny has one! He's a great guy and his writing style I admire too! To know him is to love him...he's such a nice guy. You'll have to go read his blog to understand why the word *nice* is exaggerated! Running With Safety Scissors

My beautiful girl Ticket

Hometown Hero ( and stuff )

There once was an old man. He saw a mess and cleaned it up.

That's the gist of the story that you can read here: Hometown Hero

I keep looking at Henry's crate. It looms large and is a monster in this small space. He doesn't use it at night anymore, because he's a big boy and can hold *it* till the a.m. But, I still have to have him in it when I run errands. It's not that I don't trust him, it's that I don't trust Watcher.

You see, while Henry thinks Watcher is *God* and is to die for, Watcher at times, looks at Henry like he should just die.

Henry, when in puppy play mode always seeks out Ticket. They wrestle, toss each other around, snarl, gnash teeth....it's a blast to watch them! But in the midst of all the intense play sometimes Henry loses scent of Ticket and just smashes into the first hairy thing he meets. Immediately Henry senses it's Watcher and goes into his whole "I'm sorry Watcher...I'm sorry Watcher" routine.

The routine is no different than any other pup that is displaying submissiveness. He crouches down to make himself appear as small as possible, all the while tentatively licking at Watcher's face, and generally just pissing Watcher off. Watcher lifts his lip to warn him off, but being blind, Henry just continues with the whole submissive act. Then it progresses. Watcher again does his Elvis lip impersonation with an added deep chested from the bowels of hell growl. It's a soft growl so I don't worry yet.

Most pups being able to see as well as hear all the warning signs would leave. But since Henry can't see the Elvis lip, and can only hear the growl it makes him want to smooth the situation. And so the dance of death intensifies. He keeps licking at Watcher, trying to climb on him, but all the while also trying to make himself as small as he can so as to be non threatening. Watcher growls deeper, Henry licks faster. Watcher grows more angry with each lick.

But still I do nothing. Not until I see Watcher make the real ugly face

I call softly to Henry and he makes a bee line for me. With the biggest shit eatin' grin on his face each time. He thinks he has just made wonderful friends with Watcher. He has no clue of the real situation.

I trusted Watcher one time to deal with it himself and he put 2 tiny puncture holes in Henrys noggin. Nothing to go to the Vet about, but it made me realize that Watcher can't control how far he can go with Henry. If Ticket gets pissed off with Henry she just envelopes his scrawny head in her large mouth and squeezes ever so gently but with enough force to cause him a small amount of pain. Henry *get* that doggy speak and fucks off.

If Watcher could learn that that is all it takes I could get this monstrosity outta' here!

*sigh* I guess the crate will stay where it is.

Here's a video I took of my crew a few months back.