Merry Christmas!

Sorry so Busy

I have been overwhelmed busy between dogs and my friend's baby girl in the hospital. She had brain surgery on thursday and seems to be doing better now. Yesterday she was able to hold her head up and last night she had her first real meal since the accident. Poor thing. I have had a few dogs adopted in the last week which is good but I still have two puppies left. Can't believe it. I guess I need to send out a Grapevine message and see if I can get them placed. I would really like to see them in homes by the weekend. I really wish I had time to do an adoption event but I am overwhelmed with stuff to do until 31'th of december. Between work and Madde and the benefit fundraiser I am barely holding it all together, I am running on fumes. I have open foster homes and no dogs to give them, partly because the ones I have at my house are high energy and won't work in the foster homes I have... There are about 4 dogs at the local pound I want to get, so tempting... maybe I will do that today after work, which means I need to bust my ass to get a bunch of stuff done so I can get the heck out of here early!

Guilty People get so Angry - Part 2

Clearly you tie dogs up outside unattended. Ok, so that is a no on being approved. Come on people, really? You really think that a legitimate rescue is going to think it is ok to take a dog and tie it up on a chain outside and never talk to it again. If you want something that is more self sufficient and doesn't need as much attention get a cat! Why do people think it is ok to tie a puppy to a puppy house? Why? I don't understand the purpose of having a dog if you just tie it up and walk away. Dogs are socials animals they can not be left alone for days at a time they will become aggressive. Dogs are pack animals and need a pack (for example a family). It makes me crazy. I honestly would rather see a dog dumped on the side of the road to run free to taken to a local kill shelter then put on the end of a chain and left there. I would rather humanely euthanize a dog then see it suffer on a chain. I think there is nothing more cruel then putting a dog on a chain. The dog suffers every day for its entire life. That is horrible.

Guilty People get so Angry

In the last few days I have encountered some pretty interesting situations with people. For example my rescue friend received an application and something just didn't sit right with her. She forwarded it to me and said "what do you think about this" I read over the application and you could almost tell the person was trying to "hide" something. She talked about having a kennel run, a puppy house with a tie out but said "it is only used for potty breaks" Hmm why do you need a puppy house for potty breaks? The thing is about applications sometimes you have to read between the lines. There were a few other things on the application as well that just smelled fishy but I won't bore you with those details. Anyway, I told her that I thought the application read like people who have been turned down before and that she should call them and see what they say. Ask them questions like "why do you have a puppy house?" and see if they will give you a neighbor as a reference. That way you can ask the neighbor "was their last puppy tied up outside a lot?". So my rescue friend called them and just talked to them about the daily routine and what activities they planned with the puppy, etc. The people live on farm so lots to do for a puppy. She then asked the applicant, what is the puppy house used for? The women went off she got a huge attitude and starting saying how they take excellent care of their animals. Never really stating what the puppy house was for just immediately getting mad when asked the question.

Last Week

Last week was out of control. I barely slept. Seriously! I had a total of 15 hours of sleep in 3 nights. The fund raiser did go really well and we raised a lot of money so hopefully that helps my BBF not stress out since Madde's care is going to cost so much. Not to mention the girl is spending crazy mad money on gas driving to and from the hospital. The dog rescue is going ok. Took in 5 dogs in a week but had a few adopted. I still have dogs that I never thought I would have this long, including a 3 month old GSD puppy. All his siblings were adopted but he is left behind; I know it is because he isn't black and tan but all black. He is a good puppy but definitely needs a family of his own soon! I still have Luke who is now a 6 months old, how the heck I still have that dog is beyond me, he is so good. And cute!

Some of the foster homes are on a break which is good for them, they need to do that so they don't get burned out but stinks for me or really the dogs b/c I can't take in any new ones, I am totally full with 18 dogs at my house. Oh Mr. Crazy has been so quiet since I put up the security cameras. He doesn't come outside and antagonize the dogs. It is so nice to not have to worry about "what he might do next" because well I have him on video tape should he do something and I have proof that I am not doing anything. Because you know you are actually guilty until you prove yourself innocent. And the photo album lady is at it again. She is appealing the judges decision that she isn't owed any money. So, I guess that battle continues. And the people that stole the dog are still harassing me. I really wish people would just go on with their lives.

The Tension of Opposites

The Tension of Opposites by Kristina McBride mini book review. It's been two years since Noelle has disappeared. Since her bike was found, sprawled on a sidewalk. Years of silence, worry and fear. For those two years, her best friend Tessa has waited, living her life in a state of suspended animation. How can she allow herself to enjoy a normal life if Noelle can't? How dare she have other friends without knowing what happened to the girl she would share everything with? And then one day, someone calls Noelle's house. She's alive! The cover and the title really drew me to the book. The cover is dark and mysterious (oooh). And the title name is just so great. Well, I watched the book trailer and I wasn't too floored, not at all floored to be exact. But I forgot about the trailer, and this book just became another "Oh, everyone says this is so good, I have to check it out". So when I got it from the library and read the summary I had a feeling I wouldn't get into the book. I read about seven chapters and quit, my reason is that there was a lack of suspense and a lack of poignancy. The chapters I read were an anticlimactic build-up to what seemed to me to be nothing of importance. An attempt at romance was taken, and basically that was all the first few chapters were about, our heroine falling in love (or something). I decided to quit after Tessa was pondering what her crush's tongue tasted like. Mmm, okay. Nothing was happening of interest, and I really wasn't willing to read more. I tried to get into it and failed. With so many people reading and loving this book I won't dissuade anyone from at least trying this out. Go ahead, check her (I decided the book is a female...) out.

A Frugal Guide to The South Beach Diet

Carbs are cheap. You can get a loaf of bread for $1.00. Meat is much more than that per pound and prices seem to just go up. Here are some great ways to save money and stay on your south beach diet phases. Don’t eat out. This is an important thing to think about when considering how to save money. Restaurant food is mark-up so much that you can easily spend the entire grocery budget for a week for a family of four during a night out for those same four people. Home cooked food is more nutritious, better tasting and creates great family memories. Let’s talk about how you can save money when purchasing that food that you are going to make at home. The best way to save money on meat is to buy in bulk and buy a lot during really good sales. Since I always seem to miss the really good sales, so I usually stick to buying the bulk packages. I am talking about the bulk packaging that is available at your local grocery store not the Club stores. They always have portions that are way to big for what I can store. If you have memberships in these stores and can store the food, by all means, get your meats from there. For the rest of us, buy the bulk chicken, beef and pork at your grocery store. To make sure that you don’t waste any of it separate the meat when you get home. I usually cook most of the meat in different ways and put a smaller portion in the freezer. 

For example, if I buy bulk chicken I cook some in the oven for a oven fried or bar-b-que chicken. At the same time I will also boil some of the chicken to use as a chicken salad or similar recipe. I will also throw a third of the raw chicken in the freezer to use when I need to make a chicken recipe. I will also freeze some of the cooked chicken if I don’t think I will use it in a day or two. This way I have prepared food in the refrigerator, prepared food in the freezer and raw food in the freezer in case company comes over. Use coupons. It is possible to get your entire grocery cart for free if you use double, triple and manufacturers coupons. I have seen others do it and I have come close myself. It might not be possible to get the entire bill down to zero when you are on the south beach diet because many times you have to buy some packaged food. Usually packaged food falls into the category of carbs. You can save a lot of money if you clip coupons. It doesn’t take any time if you do it while you are sitting in front of the TV. Buy your produce seasonally and locally. Vegetables are also expensive these days but you can save by purchasing the produce that is in season. You can usually get some great skills. South beach diet phase two & three dieters can practice on their baking skills by making fruit dishes with sugar substitutes that are ok for the south beach diet. Local produce also will cost less especially if you go to the local farmers markets. I find gorgeous produce at my local flea market and the prices are unbeatable. This is a www.weightshapes.com diet guide.

Depressing

The month of December has been a very good month for adoptions. We seems to have adopted out a lot of dogs and things are going pretty well for the rescue. But man oh man is it a depressing world when you look at the shelters. Yesterday I went to Richland County Ohio shelter listing on Petfinder. They have 90 dogs! I have been to that shelter, they do not have room for 90 dogs. I was talking to the women that works there last night via email and she said in July they put to sleep 16 dogs in one day. 16! I know that there are just too many dogs and not all of them can be saved but that is a lot of dogs for one shelter to put down in one day. That is just depressing. Dog rescue and really cat rescue is worse, I think is such a pointless war. I mean you aren't ever really going to end or change anything. For every one dog you save some asshole just created an entire litter more and nothing changes it only seems to get worse. I feel like a crazy person... fighting a battle that I will never ever win nor will I ever put a dent in it. And the sick thing is I hear stories from people all the time about how their dog had puppies, how their co-worker is buying a dog, how this person or that person has a dog that isn't fixed. It just isn't going to end, is it? Nothing will ever change will it? The suffering, the killing, the abuse will continue forever...