Going private

Since I get the most from writing in my blog as a personal journal rather than a place to keep people up to date, I'm going private. Please don't be offended when the screen says the blog is for "invited guests only", because no one is invited. I simply need a place where I can write and vent.

July 4th Weekend

Flew to Dallas this weekend to surprise my mom with a 60th birthday party. I felt like a jet setter, flying in then getting my nails done to pass the time. Then I realized I needed a shower before the party (in a big way) so I went into an LA Fitness and they gave me a day pass after I acted like I wanted to join. Stopping to shower at a gym and drying off with the pajamas you packed takes the jet setter feeling away pretty quickly.

Mom was shocked about the party and especially when I came out of the kitchen at the restaurant for the reveal. My grandma, three aunts and two uncles drove out from Kansas and Louisiana and when they showed up she about lost it. It was pretty cool. My uncle Steve, a total cowboy, from Kansas, cracked me up with his one liners and cowboy sensibility. One of my favorites: "Nobody likes to go to bed a loser." I wish I could have videotaped the whole night.

My sister still drives me crazy. We had not seen each other in ten years (!!!) because we do not see eye to eye. I am briquettes on the grill and she is gasoline. I managed to play it cool and not get too worked up. In a group setting it's not too bad but in the car with just her, my step dad and her husband? I thought I might die of being pissed off.

She took Drama in high school and never left class. Everything is either FANTASTIC! or HORRIBLE! and it makes me want to vomit. If I had a dollar for every time she said the word 'fantastic' this weekend it would have paid for my plane ticket. And to say she stretches the truth is an understatement. Here are some examples:

"I'm a child psychologist" What she means is that she has a masters in psych and works with kids. Different from someone with a doctorate. When called out by mom with the doctorate part she says, "Well, I don't have one yet".

"Joe Family Member (named changed) only played baseball in college because his dad did" In reality, Joe's dad never played baseball. Or went to college. But she honestly, seriously, believes her story is correct.

"My friend saw the picture of us on Facebook and asked if we were twins" OK now I'm pissed. Pictures of us when we were each five years old are similar. Thirty years later, she is 50 pounds heavier and...50 pounds heavier. I'm no supermodel but I sure as hell couldn't pass for the twin of a 240 pound woman.

I am hoping, OK praying, that she just texts me and doesn't start to call, now that she has my number. It feels so wrong to not want to hang out with my 'sister', but if she was just a person I knew, I would stay about a thousand miles away. Maybe that's why I live in NC and she's in Missouri. One of the reasons anyway. I used to feel pretty guilty about not trying harder to reach out to her, or about not extending the olive branch one more time. However the guilt I have felt about not having her in my life has been absolved. She is a complete wacko in my eyes and there are very good reasons why I have not seen her in 10 years. Maybe in another 10 things will mellow out?

Am I allowed to digress? I'm not even 100% sure what that means, but overall it was a good weekend. I got to almost make my mom pee in her pants with excitement and laugher (twice!) and was able to see relatives I hadn't seen in a long time. The travel stories at coffee time the day of departure were worth the flight. And spending time with Mark and Lori at the restaurant for a few hours before the party was really super great. Even sleeping on the sofa pull-out wasn't bad because Twig would cuddle with me.

Now I'm home and back to work. Made some headway today and hoping to have programs in place for the Fayetteville VA hospital in the next month or so. Sissy is staying with us while Dewey is in rehab; we placed Sis in Dewey's home then he had a stroke. I'm taking her to see him tomorrow and then he is supposed to go home next week. I'm not really hopeful and she may have to stay with us, which I (and Jason) are totally OK with. Three dogs again! Well she is small, so 2.5 dogs. Maybe the vet will charge us half for her annual visit. ha ha

Wow, that is the most I have written in a long time. Maybe I only like to write when something pisses me off? I was yearning for a laptop or a word processor or something to put my thoughts on paper with while on the plane. I might be on to something. So, wait, this means I haven't been really pissed off in a few months? Holy hell that is freaking amazing!

Great weekend

More bullets. Bullets=too lazy to write. I know because I'm too lazy to write right now. Totally OK with it.

Weekend bullets:

garage sale, made $27 after four hours in 92 degree with 80% humidity.

took a bunch of stuff to Goodwill that didn't sell. that'll teach you, you "will you take 50 cents for all of this?" cheapos. the tax donation is worth more: go away.

awesome lunch with Jason including wine with gorgonzola and onion pizza. i love him.

trip to the library. one new book, a CD and two movies to watch. free. awesome.

meeting with Hilary and Becca for newsletter. love their help, but starting to remember why I hate meetings.

great episodes of This American Life on Netflix streaming. we watched four in a row.

finished up painting the living room. looks so great. beautiful color.

researched a camping trip. 4pawskingdom.com looks like where we are going. cannot wait!

one fantastic night's sleep.

sleeping until 9am. glorious!

fighting (not literally) over the book Super Freakonomics with Jason. interesting read.

browsing laptop computers at Best Buy.

bought two used games for the PS3 and Wii.

bought an Izze soda from Starbucks and didn't get charged for a large cup of ice to pour it into... score! now i have an awesome Starbucks cup to reuse for drinks this week. it's the small things.

spent $21 at the farmer's market and got: 30 farm fresh eggs, 3 pounds of fresh peaches, two giant fresh tomatoes, four big onions, a homemade cherry pie, fingerling potatoes and a head of good garlic.

made some headway into the Mount Everest of laundry in our closet.

made a frittata and working on egg salad.

homemade gorgonzola and onion pizza tonight.

Update

Things are starting to get a little less crazy, which I welcome. My partner Hil and I are developing a routine and we're starting to get into a groove with who takes care of what. Because I'm no longer working a 40 hour week for the Census and another 30 to 40 for the nonprofit, my life has come back into balance. Thank Gawd.

We have been taking Diesel to Dogtopia to help with his socialization, and this weekend we took him out to a Dog Sports Day at the US National Whitewater Center. He was so good and we are both very proud of him.

I borrowed a few exercise tapes from a friend, and one of my goals is to start working out at least a couple of times a week. I sit at this computer all day, if I'm not out meeting with someone, so I'm leading a pretty inactive life and have put on a few pounds since being out of school and not going to my part time job. One of my other goals is to go out with a girlfriend (or a group of friends) once every two weeks. This is difficult, because most of my friends are also very busy people. And many, like me, aren't very social. Once we are finished with work, we want to hang around the house or do something solo.

Hmmm, what else is new? I'm meeting with a potential mentor tomorrow and working on building our board of directors over the next few weeks. And working on creating a long-distance program for Fort Bragg, which is about three hours away. We have a local program in place, now it's time to branch out. Once we have the kinks out we can expand to other cities, which I am really looking forward to.

Jason and I bought some paint this weekend and have started to paint our new place. We hired an interior decorator as a consultant when we first moved in back in January to help us pick our colors, now we're getting around to painting. The kitchen is almost done. It's a very light brown suede color. The living and dining areas are a greenish gray, the hallway is another version of the light brown suede, then the master bedroom is a very light, warm gray and the bathroom is a much darker version. It's going to look awesome. Will post some before and after pics next week some time.

Nonprofit nutso

My last post was written just before deciding to start a nonprofit. I have thought about posting a few times over the last two weeks but literally haven't had a spare half an hour to sit down and write. I'm a little upset that I didn't make time, because the last two months have been an insane ride with lots of ups and downs. It would have been nice to have a journal account of it to remind myself of the craziness, joy and heartbreak.

Since I only have a few minutes and I'm not sure when I will have time to write again, I'm resorting to bullet points...again. Here's my last two months, or what I can remember of it, in no particular order:

received an email about a nonprofit in Washington DC about a group that provides companion animals for veterans

contacted group to see if they had a Charlotte chapter. they do not

emailed my friend Hilary: "We should do this here!"

started a nonprofit

filled out a 37 page IRS form for nonprofit status

got an EIN from the IRS and formed a NC corporation

started a very long to-do list

got a web site

got a logo

wrote stuff

called a bunch of people

begged a bunch of people for money and in-kind donations

had a lot of meetings

found a veteran who wants a dog

adopted a dog from animal control that spewed diarrhea all over Hil's house for a week

took dog back to animal control

got reamed out by a rescue group woman for returning the dog, in front of people, in the lobby of animal control

got another, healthy dog from another rescue group

took dog to veteran

got recruited to work for the census

worked my ass off

thought i had found two good volunteers but they're not reliable. damnit

attended the most fun wedding ever. jason looked so good in his suit. he's a handsome man and i'm very lucky.

battled insomnia

took care of a stray dog jason brought home. found her at Tryon and Clanton streets.

did i mention the stray dog was unsocialized, afraid of everyone but me and jason?

she lived with us for 10 days.

and did i mention she was in heat? do you know what that means? the carpet was disgusting.

named her Girl Dog. found a great home for her. now she is Gracie.

i miss her.

so does jason.

our dogs do not.

worked for two weeks for the census, was supposed to be paid, but wasn't.

had to call my other 6 team members to tell them we weren't being paid for another week.

finally got paid and it looks like they took out 28% tax. why?? i'm in the lowest bracket.

got 501c3 approval from the IRS. jumped for joy.

sat in a census training class for 40 hours. considered suicide daily.

stood up in front of a lot of people while Hilary gave a speech. i was so proud of her.

decided not to apply to vet tech school. 99% sure not going to apply to vet school.

created a traffic report for H4H. funny, because while working at the ad agency a few years back, i made fun of this seemingly archaic document. and the agency where i used to work was HMH. interesting.

heard we might be getting a grant. holding breath for mail. not counting chickens.

Although I'm working about 80 hours weeks, I'm loving it. Hopefully Census will be done this week so I can knock back to a leisurely 50 hours. Seriously, 50 hours is not bad when you're doing what you love.

Dog drama

First, pictures:

If I had a PhD, I would be offended by this.
The squirrels at the campground are heavily imprinted, meaning, they look to humans for food. I can't condone it, but it makes for good photo opportunities.
Diesel loves to lay in the water, preferably in water that is only a couple of inches deep.
Hilary and I made a natural centerpiece for the table, in the spirit of Jen W. And Erin W.
Hilary's face is so funny in this picture. I love it!

Friday afternoon, Jason returned early from work so we could leave for the campground in time to set up before dark. I had lined up a dog sitter to come by to walk the dogs three times a day, at 8am, noon and 6pm. He was surprisingly inexpensive, but came with great references, and Diesel even warmed up to him after only a ten minute visit. So we left, footloose and fancy free, around 4 o'clock Friday. Unfortunately I neglected to check the campground lock up time (6pm) so when we arrived at 7, we couldn't get in. So we drove another hour to find (thank God) a hotel.

We slept like babies in the super comfy bed with a down comforter, until my cell rang at 8am the next day. On the other end of the line, the man I had trusted with our dogs was out of breath and freaking out. He was scared to tell me what was going on a three hour drive away. Finally he told me that Diesel had gotten out of the house, without his leash, and was running at a high rate of speed away from him. Diesel was on the lam.

I knew we had to go home. I looked at Jason and he could tell from my face that we had to go home. We threw off the covers, threw on our shoes, shoved our stuff in our bags, and bugged out, to home. I frantically called the sitter on the phone every few minutes, hoping he had gotten Diesel back into the house. But I knew it wouldn't happen, since Diesel is male-wary and the sitter (male) probably spooked him somehow, which is what made him run in the first place. I felt helpless. Jason was quiet.

I wished and prayed for a helicopter to meet us at the next highway. There was no helicopter, and no way to shorten the three hour trip. I racked (wracked?) my brain for alternatives. What to do...who to call...what to do...damn it who can help?

HILARY! Diesel likes Hilary! She could maybe go over and get him to go inside! I would do it for her dogs and she would do it for mine! HILLLLLLLARRRRY!!! I frantically dialed her number, then remembered speaking to her the night before, a little late, after she had just discovered a new Apple Cider drink. Hmmm, she might still be sleeping. But wouldn't you know it, she called me right back, and she said she would be at our house in ten minutes. Have I mentioned that I love HIlary?

It took nearly two hours, but Diesel was finally back in the house.

We decided that, in order to continue our vacation, that the dogs would need to come with us. This put a bit of a damper on the "romantic" aspect of the weekend, but we still had a lot of fun at the lake. Hilary even came out for a night of shenanigans and we all fell asleep before ten, after roasting weiners on the fire and watching a movie. At what point did we get old?

Monday was the best day, waking around eight, making breakfast burritos and coffee, then spending the entire day lounging on a grassy knoll overlooking the lake. The weather couldn't have been more perfect: sunny and about 73 degrees. We all now wear badges of sun on our cheeks, noses and arms. It was glorious.

Camping!

Heading out to the lake for our first trip of 2010. We're going for 6 days, sans dogs. My good friend Hilary is coming out to stay with us for one night. Bon voyage!