Dear Russian Spam Accounts,

I'm not friending you back.

So buzz off!

Merry Christmas!

I'm having a "Pay it Forward" sale in my etsy shop. All items that we have on hand are on sale at reduced prices. All proceeds will be donated to the fight against Prop 8.

This sale is for today only and will end at 4am Pacific Time, Thursday, October 23rd.

WTF happened with butch-femme.com? Is it a domain renewal issue or is this court order related? The whois says (for those of you who can't read the micro type) "Pending renewal or deletion".

I know someone's got the 411! Help a girl out.

Cafepress?

Anyone have any experience using their services?

Thoughts?

Feedback?

Photo Set

Favorites? Best of? 

Opinions greatly appreciated.

Expanded update sometime this weekend.

Detail:
 

I passed my exam!

WOOHOO!

Next on the agenda: world conquest.

Or not.

I'd really just like to get a job offer. That would be sweet.

Pet Peeve of the Morning:

Technically, this is the pet peeve of dinner last night. I tried to post about it from the restaurant via email using my cell phone (because, y'all, I am like that), but then I went to backspace over a word, held the stupid button down too long and lost the entire freaking thing.

Y'all. I am like that, too.

We went to Mel's for dinner after some discussion as to how I am still Mr. Pickle'd out and not even kind of interested in going there.

They sat us in a booth, which had an added bonus feature - the ass of one of the children in the adjoining booth planted firmly on my daughter's head (or the seat back. whatever).

Even after we sat down, the parents did not see anything wrong with allowing the rodent their daughter to sit on the shared seat back. We actually had to ask the server to ask them to have their daughter sit down.

The exact phrasing of this request was (and I quote paraphrase): Is it possible for us to get a booth where there's not an ass on our daughter's head?

Our lovely server (actually, the gal that seated us and got our drinks) brought it up to the manager, who advised the parents that it was inappropriate for their daughter to be seated there, and that we were not paying for the pleasure of having her ass next to our heads.

Yes way.

So they put the younger daughter on our side and the older daughter on the other side, which had no adjoining booth. Which was good, I guess, because she sat on the seat back throughout dinner. Meanwhile, the little rodent girl was standing on the seat and facing us through most of our dinner.

If it had been a different situation, SweetPea would have proceeded to spend the meal making faces at and entertaining the rodent wee one. Because that's how she is.

However, given that they had already set a precedent for being oblivious to the inappropriateness of their rodent's daughter's behavior, instead, we spent the meal repressing the urge to ask the parents just what the hell was wrong with them that they thought it was ok to allow their children to behave in this manner in a public eatery around perfect strangers.

After they were gone, I asked SweetPea what their problem was. She was facing their booth, so she had a view of what was happening at their table.

"Bohemian parenting."

"So they want to be their kids' buddies?"

"Yup."

Y'all.

That creature you squirted out from between your legs is

NOT

YOUR

FRIEND.

That is your child. You are responsible for housing it, feeding it, clothing it, teaching it and (this one is important, so pay attention) disciplining it.

You are responsible for instructing your child on how to behave in public, which does, I swear, include consideration for others. Children need discipline. They need limits, they need consequences, and they need to understand where they fit in with the larger picture. I'm not (just) saying this from the viewpoint of someone who doesn't want to put up with crap from other people's kids. Ask a child psychologist, this is what they will tell you.

Parenting in such a manner where you're trying to be their friend is doing them no favors.

You are not their friend.

You are their parent. Protector. Guardian. Teacher. Provider. Disciplinarian.

I'm sorry if you had them with the intention of having a built-in buddy, but that's not how it works. Your children do not become anything remotely resembling "friends" until they're grown.

If you're lucky.

And you don't screw up now.

Pet Peeve of the Night:

Really less of a pet peeve and more of a complete and total freak out. I'll begin with a little back info.

Our dog is a good dog. She's an outdoor dog (and, yes, I know that makes us horrible, and I'm working on it, but the clutterfuck that is our house is just not prepared for her giant ass), and she's not a barker. She will literally and seriously only bark if there's something wrong.

A few months ago, she woke me up at three-some-odd in the morning on a weekend. Barking. I got up, went to the bathroom window and called her, let her know it was ok, I hear her. That totally shuts her up. Every time. She's letting us know, now we know, so her job is done. Then I sat down on the potty and had a think. I was debating calling the cops and asking for a neighborhood buzz-through, because our dog just does not bark like that. After I was done having my think, I went to the front door, to see if I could peep anything untoward going on the neighborhood.

You mean like the five cop cars parked out front of my house?

Yeah.

Like that.

So I thought to myself "Huh. I guess they're on it," and went back to bed.

< /back story>

At three-some-odd this morning, I get drug out of a dead sleep by my barking dog. I am laying on my side and SuperFat is laying on top of me. I try to get up but he won't move. So I drop his ass and get up. I head to the bathroom window and look out into the yard. I make the kissy noise. I call her name. I call her name again and tell her to come here. Now, I'm parched as fuck, so I'm probably not being very loud with any of this. But she's still barking. And then I notice it.

She's hoarse.

My good dog that doesn't bark unless something is wrong has barked herself hoarse at three-some-odd in the morning.

Between that and the stories we've heard about theiving and attempted break-ins on the street behind us, I fly into full alert mode. I'm fumbling around in the dark trying to figure out where I left my clothes, where the hell my sandals are, where the fuck is my phone.

Then I realize that I've actually watched a horror movie in my life. Once or twice. I know that there is no way in hell I should be flying out into the pitch black backyard in the dead of night with nobody the wiser as to where I am.

So I get SweetPea up.

Now we're both up and dressed and we've each got a cell phone and a flashlight and we head into the yard. Tatiana charges at us like she's just won the Super Bowl and now she's going to Disneyland. We check things out and everything appears ok in our world, but dogs on the street behind us are going nuts, too.

Mind you, the main house with the issues backs up to our next door neighbor's house.

SweetPea locks me in the house with both sets of keys, the flashlight and the dog and takes off in the car to cruise the neighborhood. She cruises up the street behind us and notices that the house in question is pitch dark. Except for the garage, which is not only lit up, but the garage door is open about a foot.

She calls me up on the phone and tells me this and that she's seen some guy walking up the street.

It's now four-some-odd in the morning, and, probably, some guy shouldn't be walking up the street.

I tell her to call Emergency, and to call Emergency now.

When she gets off the phone, she comes home and we both go stand out front.

Picture if you will:

Two fat dykes standing in the front yard of a pitch dark house in the middle of the pitch dark night with a big ass Akita, a bat, and a pack of cloves. On the plus side, we're both clothed, so that's a bonus.

After a while, the cops came cruising through and declared the all-clear, and told us we'd be better off in the house.

Which is all well and good, except now we're both strung out on nerves.

SweetPea is finally asleep again, but - Hi! Here I am because, y'all, I may not be sleeping any day real soon.

Further... Clutterfuck or not, that dog is sleeping in the house from here on in. If SweetPea's real lucky, Tatiana will be sleeping on the floor, instead of in the bed.

The sky is finally getting brighter, and hopefully Neighbor will be up soon so that I can go down and have a(nother) smoke. Because I've been forbade going outside until it's full bright, and only if Neighbor goes with me.

I'm working on my Christmas card list. YES, yes, I AM.

Yes I know it's November.

Shut up.

Want one?

If you do, shoot me your address. I will make comments screened, so you can post it as a reply and only I'll see it. Or you can send me an email. The address is on my profile.

This does not apply if you live in Pennsylvania or Sacramento, because I've already got your addresses.

kthxbi

PS: this post is public, so, stalkers, you, too!

ETA: I will be purchasing postage in the "shipping to Canada" rate, too... Just so you know

OMG, I have missed y'all so much!

I finally stopped waiting on hp's dumb ass and dragged mine down to Fry's... spent $60 on a part that hp should have delivered me for free.

Neighbor says I should send a bill to hp. I wonder if I could take them to small claims court?

HA.

OK, y'all.... I have news and gossip for days, plus a metric ton of catching up to do. I also need to actually get the computer fully functioning on it's regular windows os again so I can do everything I need to do. This will be a long and, hopefully, productive weekend.

I plan to be able to catch up and catch y'all up by Monday.

Huzzah!

My grandmother has alzheimer's.

Because of the familial nature of the disease, and my already shoddy memory, I worry about my future. I worry about my dad. 

Because it has been shown to be linked to diabetes, I worry about SweetPea, who is pre-diabetic and has a strong family history of diabetes. 

My dad, who had his hip replaced this past January, is participating in Memory Walk 2007 to raise money to help find a cure for alzheimer's and to help care for those with the disease. 

If you can spare anything, please donate. Every little bit helps. 

I'll be donating as much as I can, just as soon as I get paid. 

I'm doing it for her. I'm doing it for him. And I'm doing it for me.

Thanks!

Uh.



Yeah.

My Week In Pictures has been updated!

Dear Target,

What is wrong with your trouser socks? Do you not get the concept? Why does one variety come almost up to my underwear? And why, if you insist on dragging the sock the entire length of the leg, do you not accomodate for the fact that my thigh is wider than my calf? Hello? We're not back to that thing about "if you're that wide,  you must be really tall' again, are we? Why is another variety double lined... except for the toes? Did it not occur to you that the toes take as much abuse as the rest of the sock? Have you never seen a pair of socks with the big toe poking out? 

Target.... WTF is wrong with you? 

Signed,
A concerned customer.