Oh yeah, I have a blog

Random thoughts:

-Five more months and then Chalotte can go to nursery. I think that will make church a lot more enjoyable.

-I watch all these kid on campus and wonder if I was as annying as they are.

-I love being in school, but I hate all the work that is required.

-me: What do you want for breakfast? Anything besides Brueggers.
Vanessa: Why did you say that? Now it's all that I can think about. You incepted me.

-Getting in shape sucks. I guess the key is to not get out of shape.

-I think the perfect job for me would be retirement.

-I get to start teaching the Scouts how to play tennis this week. That should be pretty fun.

-Charlotte is walking everywhere now. I don't know how she got to be so big. It seems like yesterday we were tiptoeing around the house trying not to wake up the baby, or hoping we could get three hours of sleep.

-I think it's fascinating that the Qur'an seems to hold Ishmael in higher esteem than Isaac. My theory is that Islam approves having multiple wives and Ishmael is Abraham's first son, and therefore claims the birthright, regardless of who the mother is.

-I wish laptops were banned in all of my classes. The sea of facebook is extremely distracting. I saw one guy chatting with the girl beside him. Am I the only one who want to hear the head of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Tel-Aviv lecture on the creation of the Israeli state?

-I might try to post on this thing more often. I have no idea if anyone even sees this.

Laser Cats

This is Seamus, pronounced shay-mus. We adopted this eight month old tabby last Saturday from the local humane society. We were looking at all the cats and they were all laying around and sleeping like cats tend to do, but this guy saw us coming and knew he had to turn up the charm or he was going to be stuck in that little cage. The cage had a glass door and he was rubbing up against it and you could hear him purring. The worker at the humane society opened the door for us and he and Vanessa clicked. I was happy too because I've always wanted an orange tabby kitten and I was afraid that Vanessa would want a long haired cat so this worked out for both of us. For the past few months I've been telling Vanessa that I wanted to name our next cat General Beauregard and I think Vanessa was actually convinced but when I saw this guy, the name didn't fit. Because of the orange color I thought an Irish name would work and I've always liked the name Seamus, so I pitched it to Vanessa and got the approval. Because last Monday was a holiday, we couldn't get Seamus until Tuesday. They had to neuter and vaccinate and install the microchip. Vanessa went to the humane society after work to pick him up and on the way home, noticed the paperwork said he had tested positive for either feline leukemia of feline aids. Either of which is highly contagious and drastically shortens the cats life. As soon as she got home we put Seamus in the guest room and contacted the humane society. A cat who tests positive for feline leukemia is generally put down and a cat testing positive for feline aids requires a series of medications and the people adopting the cat have to fill out special forms to make sure they know what they are getting in to. We didn't have to fill out any special forms and Seamus was alive so we were hoping it was a mistake, especially since we had already formed a connection with him. Vanessa finally got a hold of someone at the humane society and they said that it was probably a clerical error but they would have to check the test results and would get back with us the next day. Meanwhile, we were worried about Cole catching something so Vanessa made an appointment with the vet for first thing in the morning to get Seamus tested and get Cole vaccinated. He was vaccinated as a kitten, but that was ten years ago and we just thought, better safe than sorry. So I slept in the guest room with Seamus to make sure he had some company. Seamus tested negative for both conditions and the SPCA called us to confirm it was a clerical error and sent us a new copy of the paperwork with the error corrected.

Now the real test. How was Cole going to react to his new housemate. The first night was miserable. Cole slept on the bed with us and every time Seamus tried to come in the room I was awaken to growling and hissing. After a few day though, they are actually beginning to sniff each other and I think it won't be long before they are playing together. It's been a while since Cole had another cat around and he's never been the dominant one, so it's really interesting to see how he acts. Animals in nature are just amazing. They know their place. Cole knows he's senior cat and Seamus reacts accordingly. All in all, he's a great kitten and I'm really happy we got him. It's been so long since I've lived with a kitten. I've forgotten how much energy they have. It's so much fun.

Sorry it's been so long since I last posted. It seems that everyone is too busy with facebook to blog anymore. I miss the constant updates. I guess I'm actually going to have to call some of you sometime. School started this week. I feel like the semester just ended. I'm working on my next post. I think it will be my Oscar predictions tied in with my best of 2008. See you then.

Yes We Can

So Congressman Barr didn't even get a mention on the news today, but to be honest, who expected him to. I have no great dream of a strong Libertarian party but more than two choices would be nice. On the other hand, if you have too many parties, then a candidate with 22% of the vote or something could win an election. Then you get what the French had in the late 1940's with it's 4th Republic. The communist party received 25%, the socialist party received 22%, and Charles deGaulle's party (I can't remember what it was called) received 25%. These three major parties tried to rule the country equally, but of course none of them could get along so nothing could get done. So maybe two parties make it possible to accomplish more. I just wish I had more in common with one of them or that they had more in common with my views.

I'll be honest though, I'm excited at the prospect of change. I don't know that Obama is the change I was personally looking for, but he dominated the election and he's our president. All we can do is pray for the best. And in this transition time before he takes office I'll give him a blank slate. His speech last night moved me and as much I hate saying this, I'm glad that the rest of the world is approving and excited about Obama. I care about this country first but I recognize that in 2008 we live in a global society. I hope that Obama can use his popularity in foreign lands for our good instead of his personal good. I think that the republican party deserved the defeat for nominating John McCain. I'm not saying that I would rather the democrats to win, but to nominate someone like McCain was just asking for it. I think the republican party should be kicking themselves for not nominating Romney. I don't know that I would have supported him, but with the economic troubles now, I really believe he could have won.

Anyway, I just wanted to say that for now, Obama has my support as President-elect of the United States of America. I recognize the historical importance of his win and couldn't be more proud to be an American. To think that 150 years ago this great nation not only approved of but profited in the trade of human lives. To think that 50 years ago forced segregation was a reality for millions. To think that yesterday a black man was elected president of the United States. This is a great leap foward for the race and I only hope that he and the democratic majority in congress don't lead us too far towards socialism. I do believe however, that things will only get worse before our Lord returns and faced with the upcoming armageddon and the whole Earth being cleansed with fire thing, socialism doesn't look that bad.



This is my favorite thing I've read all day:
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said Obama's victory was a landmark for equality.
"Twenty-five years ago Martin Luther King had a dream of an America where men and women would be judged not on the colour of their skin but on the content of their character," Rudd told reporters. "Today what America has done is turn that dream into a reality."

I'm confused. What year did the good Dr. King pass away?

I Love It

It's just seven minutes. Check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im0Wqj3BSvU

Requiem For An Oscar

I came home from work on Friday excited for the weekend. I grabbed a snack and called for the cats to come get their supper. I poured the food and Cole came running like normal, but I didn't see Oscar, which was extremely unusual. I looked around and found him in the back closet in the corner. He looked at me a gave me an awful growl, so I apologized and left him alone. A couple of hours later Vanessa came home and it occurred to me that Oscar still had not made an appearance. This is a cat that lets you know when to feed him and he will not let up until you do. I told Vanessa to go check on him to see if he was still in the closet. She came running back into the run saying something about his legs not working. Apparently, when Vanessa came home, the cat tried to come see her. The poor thing looked so pitiful. His back legs wouldn't work and he was just pulling himself around and he was vomiting. We got the phone book out and started looking for vets. We haven't taken him to one since we've been here and we didn't know who to call. It was late so we needed an emergency room open all night. I called one and they put me on hold. Can you believe that? It's an emergency line, no I can't hold. After a few minutes Vanessa said that there was a clinic down the street so we put Oscar in his carrier and headed out the door. We called the vet from the car and they were ready when we got there. They took Oscar in the back and it wasn't more than five minutes before the doctor was ready to talk to us. He explained that Oscar had developed a blood clot and was not receiving any blood to his lower extremities and it was putting a lot of strain on his heart. He said he could try to work on him, but that euthanasia was probably the best solution considering the pain and the fact that any thing the doctor could do unfortunately wouldn't be much. So we decided to ease his pain. It was a really hard decision. It was just so sudden. I figured he just ate some plastic or something. I'm sure most of you know just how attached my wife is to her cats. As hard as it was for me, it doesn't compare to what she was going through. The vet let her hold Oscar as he injected the drugs and prepared her for what his reactions would be. As the drugs took their effect and Oscar ceased to be, the body appeared to be gasping for air. The vet assured us that Oscar was gone and it was just the reaction to the drugs. I think it was really great for Vanessa to experience that and have some closure. She had only been back in town for a few days when it happened and I'm glad she was able to be there.

Vanessa and I always joked about how spiteful Oscar was. Whenever she would go out of town, he would make sure to go number two on her bath mat. It was inevitable. So we both found it amusing how after Vanessa had handed the body back to the vet, the bladder released on the doctor. Typical spiteful Oscar. We were home in less than an hour and the next couple of days were pretty rough around here. Cole is doing well. He sniffed the empty carrier for a while and I think he knows something is different, but he's just a cat and I don't really know how much he can comprehend. I know some of you might think it silly to be so upset, and honestly, I do too. But I've never really had a pet before and I had unknowingly grown quite close to my cats. Things are getting back to normal now but it's still weird having only the one cat. I keep expecting to see his tail sticking out from under the night stand. Vanessa fed him his wet food around 8 0r 9 every night and on this past Friday, he died at 8.30. This cat lived for his wet food. Vanessa commented that Heaven better be stocked up because he's going to be ready for his treat when he gets there.

Anyway, this has gone on long enough. I wanted to tell everyone when it happened, but I'm glad I let things settle. This was a hard post to write (as crazy as that sounds). Vanessa is doing much better and maybe in a few months we'll be ready to get Cole a new friend.

I found Bai-Ling's blog when I was looking for stuff from the movie the other night. It's hillarious because her english is so bad. She's got pictures from the movie premier.

http://ling-bai.blogspot.com/

I Love Summer

Vanessa left today for a conference in Chapel Hill. I must be bored since I'm writing this. Tucson is pretty much in the triple digits everyday now. We finally turned the air conditioner on. I'm not taking any classes this summer so I decided that I will try to accomplish some goals I've wanted to do for a while now. I'm trying to get better at playing guitar so I've been practicing about an hour a day. My fingertips are pretty much wrecked. Also, I took my first golf lesson today. I just wanted someone to tell me correct form and within thirty minutes, the guy had it figured out and I was hitting straight for the first time. It's such an awesome feeling when you make solid contact with the ball. I know I'm going to have to practice a lot more to get my body used to the movements. The biggest problem is that I found out that my clubs are a little too short for me, so I'm going to have to adapt for a while.

I guess I'll go to the movies tonight. There is this new sci-fi film playing and it looks horrible. I'm a fan of really bad movies. Once they get so bad, they're just funny. Plus the main actress and the director are going to be there to present it and you get a comic book that the movie is based on. Go to you tube and check out the trailer for "Gene Generation" and try not to laugh.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aohBNKq7OPo&feature=related