Fish Sticks and Green Jello

I heard a song called, "The New" by Interpol yesterday that I'm totally hooked on. It reminds me of moody 80's music, kinda Echo and the Bunnymen-ish. "Killing Moon" by Echo and the Bunnymen is still one of my favorite 80's songs to this day (There's a great scene in the movie Gia with that song playing). Anyway, if you can find yourself a copy of this song I think it's worth it.

I also heard a song called "Still in Love Song" by The Stills, that I liked a lot as well. It was also reminiscent of old 80's New Wave tunes. I can't find the album on Amazon but you can listen to the song on their website. Just click on Audio/Video and it'll take you there.

I'm so very very bored and restless. I feel like I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop and I don't know why. I'm also moody too so that probably has something to do with it. I think the biggest problem I'm having is not really knowing what I'm doing with my life at this point other than having a career and pets. I feel like my life should be more fabulous than it is. I've got to start figuring out how to make that happen. Otherwise I'm going to go totally crazy. I'm also feeling old lately too which isn't helping my mindset.

My friend Kammie pops into town tomorrow for a night from Vermont. She has to go into the office at Sun in Menlo Park so she'll be staying over. It will be great to see her. Plus we can have girly chats and stuff which is probably what I need right now.

I have to head off to my dog training class soon. I'm not sure if I like it or not. Particularly since I can't trust Toby not to freak out on some other dog. I wish he'd just shut up and sit there like a good dog. Ugh. I figured out why he left me a present yesterday. While I was at my meeting some guys in my hall unleashed him and ran him up and down the hall which gets him all riled up. Then they leashed him back in my office... Of course he had to "go" at that point so he went. The last couple of days have been pretty trying dog owner days for me. I'm feeling worn out I guess.

I got my pictures back from Europe. My friend Dave swore up and down that he was an excellent photographer on our trip. What a liar! His thumb is in half the damn photos! I can't believe it. Since I know he'll be reading this I'd like to say, "Dave you're a big fat liar!". Hrmph.

I had to go to a meeting this morning and I had no one to watch Toby. I've left him leashed in my office before but this time he was upset about it. He took a poo on my Xootr! Oh well, at least it wasn't on the floor. The Xootr was easy enough to clean off. Ugh. For someone who hates poo as much as I do I'm suprised I didn't hurl. I guess having a dog really toughens you up.

On another note, a girl found my blog entry from Sept. 11th re: Solitaire Showdown and asked if I would like to add her to my MSN Messenger list so we could play sometime. Apparently she's been looking for folks to play with since she's also just as addicted to it. I did a search on "Solitaire Showdown" via Google and found other Blog entries referring to it's addictive tendencies.

What really surprised me was how fast search engines find my blog entries! I guess my mindset never updated from five years ago when it took forever for search engines to find your pages. Now it's pretty quick! Which led me to do a search on "Santa Cruz Pet Resort". I found my blog entries on about page 5 of the search results. That's pretty cool.

Before I forget... I dropped Toby off there yesterday and Kevin the owner was there. So he seems nice enough. Professional. He inputs the info into the computer about Toby. Then he comes out to get him. Gets down on one knee and starts petting Toby and saying "It's nice to see you again Toby! Great to have you back again!". Um. Okay....

Then I say thanks and as I'm leaving he says, "Is that a new tint in your hair?" And I say, "No it's always been this color" and he isn't sure what to say next so he's like, "Oh", smiling the whole time. I then get the hell out of there. Chris said I should have called him on it and said, "Did your wife talk to you?". Hehe. At least he's kissing my ass versus calling me a liar now.

So when I first joined Friendster it seemed pretty novel and interesting. I wasn't into joining a meat market site like match.com becase I wasn't interested in meeting anyone but I thought it would be a cool way to keep in touch with friends.

Well Friendster got really popular and then it got to be a real pain to use. Slow, unreliable email, weird message boards. Some folks were inviting me to move over to Tribe.net. Tribe works a lot better than Friendster does but since most people I know already joined Friendster it was going to be impossible to shift everyone over there. So I continued to use Friendster.

Anyway it's really paid off in the last few weeks. First I met a cool new friend on there who I seem to have commonality with. Then I get reunited with my old friends Bill and Shannon who I used to hang out with ten years ago. Plus I was also reunited with an old ex-boyfriend Jeff, who hung out with Bill and Shannon and I. It was nice to hear from him and I was happy to see that a) he didn't hate me still and b) he married a girl who he'd had a crush on since Junior High and they have now been married for ten years and have two kids and he's happy and doing well.

Sometimes I really wish I would have kept in touch with my friends but I seemed to float around so much and it's hard for me to manage my life, work and lots of friends. It's not really an excuse but I'm not sure why it is that happens. I'm hoping I get settled down more in my life at some point where I can sustain the same group of friends for a long period of time. Plus that makes me realize that I need to keep up on my friendships with some of my friends now and not wait around for them to completely die out.

R.I.P - John Ritter and Johnny Cash. EVERYONE I know is sad that Johnny Cash died. Yes it's sad, he was very talented. But he was also old.

I'm not hearing too many R.I.P - John Ritter's though. John Ritter was also talented in his own way and was relatively young (54). He also left behind 4 kids including one 5 year old daughter.

So I just want to say R.I.P JOHN RITTER who you may also know as Jack Tripper from Three's Company. A show I watched ALL the time when I was a kid.

Thank you.

Why doesn't anyone buy me anything nice off my girlshop registry? I'd like that Lulu Guiness weiner dog purse please. Thanks.

I'm addicted! You can only play it with a friend via MSN Messenger 6. Sucks! I have to beg my friend Austin to play with me all the time. I'm a solitaire showdown fiend! If anyone has some time on their hands and would like to play, I'm available.

Are you British enough to get a British passport? Take the
test and let me know how well you do! I only got a lousy two questions right. Sheesh.

The Official Marshmallow Peeps site. Enjoy...

I have a new Santa Cruz Pet Resort story. Last Saturday I took Toby in to drop him off. The girls there were nice as usual, no owner, all was well. As I'm getting him checked in I notice the reservation clipboard on the desk. It has the names of the dogs, breed and special instructions. I was the last person to check in so my lines weren't crossed out yet.

I see: Toby - Lhasa Apso
Special Instructions: CHARGE FOR EVERYTHING, LIAR!!

What the...?? I'm pretty disturbed at this point. I check Toby in and then walk out a bit dumbfounded. I call Chris and tell him the story. He said that he'd probably say something so I turn around and go back in there. I ask the girl why the sheet says that. She said she hadn't read it and had no idea. I explain to her that I got into it with Kevin the owner the previous weekend and why me might type such a rude thing into the computer. She suggested I talk to his wife, the co-owner when I pick Toby up. I say fine.

Today I pick up Toby. I talk to the wife. She looks in the computer and looks shocked. Whatever. She says that her husband and her are always having to deal with people dropping their pets off at all hours and expecting them to deal with it without it costing them. She explains this for awhile, apologizes profusely and says she'll speak to her husband. Okay I feel a TAD better. I did want SOMEONE to apologize that's for sure. The truth of the matter is I like this place. The girls who work here are nice. Toby seems to have a lot of fun there and they are the cheapest deal anywhere around. So I wasn't ready to run my business elsewhere if you know what I mean.

Mary at Small Dog House Boarding is my absolute fave though. She takes great care of the dogs and has a nice house in Belmont. The only problem for me is she's really out of the way and costs $25 a night versus the $18 a night I pay in Santa Cruz. Anyway, I guess I'm taking Toby back to Santa Cruz Pet Resort. What a hassle though. People make me nuts. Particularly the people in Santa Cruz. I'm not sure what it is but they tend to be ruder over there than most other places. I think it's the ME FIRST attitude there that makes me nuts.

On another note I saw "Le Divorce" this weekend with my friend Cristy. Nice film. I enjoyed it and would probably see it again on DVD. I liked the parisian scenery. It made me miss being in Paris. I can't wait to go back next year when the weather is cooler and I can stay a bit longer. Anyway, some of the jokes about the French were pretty right on. Go check it out at a matinee. I'ts fun.

Also, I'll be at Fischerspooner next Monday. That promises to be an excellent show. I'll be accompanied by my lovely friend Amrah who I haven't seen in awhile. I'm looking forward to it. Next week will be particularly busy for me since I'll be going to Fischerspooner on Monday, Beg. Dog Training on Tuesday, and French class on Wednesday. The week after I'll be starting Yoga on Mondays. I can't remember the last time I had a schedule like that. It's kinda nice!

By the way... while I'm slamming places (or people) in the Santa Cruz area I have to mention "Scotts Valley Mini Storage". Whatever you do do NOT store your stuff there. Last week my friend Cristy went to go get a DVD out of her storage, she opens the lock up and notices that it seems a bit rattley. She gets into her 5x10 storage room and notices that half the stuff is missing if not more. All her DVD's, CD's, Mom's Jewelry, Mom's Crystal is GONE! She was in the midst of possibly moving so she had put all her stuff in her storage room. So everything of value she had is now GONE.

To make matters worse the Scotts Valley PD said there had been a few robberies at this place. The management hadn't even bothered to inform the tenants of this. What's even scarier is they picked the lock and put it back where they found it. No forced entry. Plus they seemed to know exactly what to take and what to leave. They'll probably never catch the guys but at least she had rental insurance that covered her storage room. It won't make up for the memorabilia and things she got from her mom though. If I believed in Karma then I would say those guys are going to get theirs! Alas I don't so what I will do is hope they get run over by a Mack truck instead. Jerks!

Hrmph. The Santa Cruz area used to be fulla nice folks! It's not like Scotts Valley is East Oakland or anything sheesh! Anyways, think bad thoughts towards those dang thieves and send happy thoughts towards my friend Cristy. Maybe... just MAYBE the cops can recover some of her stuff. I sure hope so.

Last Sunday Toby went to his private training session. The verdict is that he's not an agressive dog. He did fine with all the dominant and submissive dogs they brought around him. They even brought in a wolf-hybrid dominant dog and he was fine with him. Although this dog was WAY bigger than Toby and pretty scary looking so I wouldn't wanna mess with him either! Toby does fine around socialized dogs, but not as well around non-socialized dogs which may be part of the problem with my co-workers dog at work that he gets into it with.

I also attended the first dog training session last night for an hour and a half. It was interesting, a bit hard to hear and lots of people there but good information and hand outs. Our next class is in two weeks, I get to bring Toby to that one. I'm already working on the commands with him and he's doing pretty well. The class focuses on positive reinforcement and lots of treats. Dogs are food motivated so special extra good treats motivate them to listen to you more. It seems to be pretty effective so far. I can't wait until he's jumping through flaming hoops and twirling batons. That's probably in the advanced class though, so a few more months to go.

Toby stayed at Santa Cruz Pet Resort last weekend while I was down in Santa Cruz. He seemed to love it. They let the dogs go out and roll in the dirt and jump on trampolines and do crazy stuff. I visited him on Labor Day and he could care less that I was there so that indicated to me that he was having fun. It's very nice there with a koi pond and everything. I like to think of it as doggy overnight/day spa. It was great... oh except for the owner who's a total jerk.

Last Thursday I call the place and I ask if I can bring Toby in on Sunday and pick him up on Tuesday AM. The girl says sure, but we're only open from 4-5pm on Sunday so you have to show up during that hour to drop him off. I say great see you Sunday. I take Toby in at about 4:15 and there's no one there. There's a big CLOSED sign on the gate and a sign that says "Labor Day Weekend: Closed Sunday". Okay so that's lame. I'm po'ed at this point. Great now what do I do? So I say screw it and go in the gate. I head through the place to the office which is wide open. No one in sight. I call out... no one there. I hang out for about 15 min talking to Chris on the phone trying to figure out what to do and a girl shows up. I tell her the story and she says, "Okay let me call the owner and see if we can take your dog". She calls Kevin the owner up and he says okay but it's "after hours" so there's a $25 charge for it. Then he hangs up. She relays the news to me. I get upset and explain to her how it's not my fault because I was told it was okay to come today. She says, "Well you don't have to pay today so talk to the owner when you pick your dog up on Tuesday. I'll try to talk to him about it too".

On Labor Day I come to visit Toby and the girl is there and she says it's fine, she never entered the fee into the computer. I thank her for being so nice. Tuesday. I go to pick up Toby. I get there and the owner asks me when I arrived. I say Sunday and he says, "Okay well we were closed that day and usually it's a $50 after hours drop off fee but I'm just going to charge you $25 this time". I tell him that's not okay with me because I was told it was okay to come in on Sunday and I came all the way down there with my dog. He says, "That's impossible, no one would have said Sunday because the computer couldn't take reservations for Sunday since we were closed". I say, "I didn't say I made a reservation I said I was told I could come in on Sunday". Again he says, "That's not possible". I then say, "Look... I'm not an idiot I know what I was told". At this point I'm starting to get really po'ed at the guy.

He then says, "When you got here wasn't there a sign on the gate that said CLOSED?? That's because we were CLOSED yet you still dropped your dog off so you have to pay the fee". I then reiterate to Kevin exactly how much business I'm going to be giving him in the future and how I don't feel that I was wrong in what I did since I was told it was okay to bring my dog in. Then Kevin says, "Well I can't take the fee out of the computer". OH BROTHER! Computers are scary! I don't understand their mystical ways! You got me there Kevin, you own the joint but you can't take a price out of the computer?? PLEASE! I say nothing and finally Kevin gives and says.... "Okay I'll let the fee go this time. I'll take it out of HER paycheck instead". I then said, "Whatever you have to do!". What a colossal jerk. He's going to take a measly $25 out of some poor college girl's paycheck. I assume he was trying to bluff me out so I wasn't gonna buy his crap but if he really does that then what a @#^$!

I wouldn't go back except for the fact that it's the only good place in Santa Cruz. It's actually a nice facility and the girls that work there are very very cool. It's just the owner that's bugs me. My friend Johnny said that maybe next time instead of taking the money out of some girl's check he could just go out back and beat one of the dogs to punish me for not paying my fee. Har har!