Random and fun experiences of camping...

Bojangles peeing on Chris's leg after he met all the other camping dogs...He was super scared. We laughed forever!!
Kim and Dave's broken down ATV.
Waiting for Kim and Dave before realizing they were broken down....
The photo before the priceless photo...which Chris would not let me post....Darn!
Cobbler before...
Cobbler after....Ahh heaven!! We just needed some ice cream!
A cool cave
Headed to the Blue Lagoon...
Perfect day! This is the blue lagoon.
Everyone relaxing...right before Bojangles rolls around in cow poop several times!
Bojangles dipping his toes in the cold water... which we eventually made him go in because he stunk so bad!
More relaxing...
Bojangles is a great camper! No lease needed for him.
Our first dutch oven meal...Layering all the ingredients...
Ready to be cooked! It fed everyone and was delicious!!

Petco grooming sucks!

Super short do... showing his skin on his left leg.
Shaved to his skin on his neck....
He looks like he just got out of surgery...

My poor baby Bojangles got a spring trimming over the weekend which ended up being a complete buzz/shave. I went into Petco asking them to trim it short but to show "no skin". Well, I went to pick him up and they immediately tell me that I have to pay first before they let me see/pick up my dog. Now I see why they do this. Because they shaved my dog down to the skin in some places and I even saw a few places where they nicked him. Ooowe! That makes me so mad. I should have said something but I just walked out of there in shock. I would not have paid a dime had I seen him before paying. He doesn't look right. He looks a like an overgrown weenier dog. Anyway, I held back the tears until I brought him to the office to show Chris. Chris is pretty mellow and this fired him up. He immediately got all of us into the car and we went back to Petco. He talked to the manager who refused to own up to the problem. He said the nicks could have been on the dog before grooming and also that sometimes certain hot spots get red afterwards. These were obvious nicks from grooming people. And then the groomer got all defensive saying that Bojangles wasnt any easy dog to groom and she had to muzzle him. Chris fired up, "With you nicking him, I don't blame the guy for squirming?" She was a jerk. The manager was a jerk. They ended up giving us a credit for $10 on a $40 ticket. What happened to the customer is always right mentality?! We are never going back.

Our new roomie

Chris and I have decided to rent out our basement again. We rarely go downstairs so we figure why not make extra income every month off of it. We waited until we found someone who was a great fit for us and our place. Especially since we have little Bojangles. Well we found Sara and she is great. She is 34, recently divorced. She works at the hospital as a radiologist and goes to school. So far she is great! The interesting thing about Sara is that she has a pet bird named Kia. I have never been around a pet bird before and wow... am I learning all kinds of cool things about birds. Kia sleeps 8 hours a night. Once he goes to sleep, he doesn't wake up for 8 hours. He sleeps on one leg with his head tucked in his wings. You can go in his room and he won't move. I thought they just chilled half awake/asleep during all hours. He is totally potty trained and he does his potty dance when he has to go to the bathroom. He can hold himself around 3 hours, close to what a dog can. If he is out in public, she has him trained to go potty on a toilet. He mimics sounds too. Sara said he will be barking if he hears Bojangles bark. So we will have a bird and dog barking probably in the future. His species of bird is suppose to live around 60 years! So he will outlive some humans. They grow very attached to people. When Sara broke up with her last boyfriend, the bird went into a small depression. And lastly, Kia likes to be around people eating. So cooking dinner together last night was interesting. She keeps Kia on her shoulder which really bugs Chris. He complains to me about it being unsanitary. And I feel that as long as there are no poop droppings, it's all good. But maybe that will be a later conversation we have with Sara. I don't want to lay down the hatchet too early. Plus she explained to us how Kia cleans himself for hours. So the guy must be pretty clean. I just don't know if Chris buys it. He was pretty grumpy because of this cute bird in our kitchen.

Anyway, Bojangles is still an unknown card in our bird situation. Fact #1-He goes after birds in our yard. This guy is fast too. He chases them with serious mojo. Fact #2- We have stumbled across a dead bird from time to time in our yard. However we don't know if that is the result of our dog or random acts of nature. Fact #3- He is intrigued by Kia so far. No aggressive behavior yet but we are still leary. This could become a potentially dangerous and even deadly situation if we don't closely monitor it if you know what I mean.... Sara doesn't seem concerned but I sure do!

Temporary employment...

This is my first week of training with the Census. A new experience for me which I am enjoying very much. My technical title is "enumerator". I have to work 20 hours a week. I have complete flexibility as to when I work which is a necessity with real estate since that is still my priority. This job lasts only 6-8 weeks and they pay quite well. It is a great gig! I passed the finger printing stage and the background check. Hopefully next week I will be knocking on doors. Apparently you encounter strange things out in the field. People answer the door naked, people hate the government and don't want to give you any answers, you can knock on the door of drug dealers and you have to still ask them the 10 questions. Yikes! It should be interesting. So I am collecting info from those people who have not turned their census in. About 80% of households have. I am targeting that remaining 20%. So for those of you that have not turned in your census, please do so. It will save me or a fellow census worker a door to your knock. We hunt down people all hours of the day apparently.

On another note, the other night I was watching a show on tv about the KKK, Ku Klux Klan. Good grief! How is this party still together? And they are so strong still. They have marches in Washington DC because of freedom of speech and DC brings in so much security for them. I am amazed. Our country is supporting them in a way. They apparently are jumping on the latino bandwagon and shifting their focus of hate away from blacks and more on mexican americans. How the hell do these people still exist! I was watching this show just dumbfounded. The sad thing is they would involve their tiny kids in the marches. So even future generations are exposed to such hatred. Sad! And then I was thinking that I could be knocking on the door of a KKK member during my census assignment. Frightening!