So it turns out, Sunday September 22 was International Elephant Appreciation Day. I already had the Madeleine L'Engle post queued for the first day of banned books week, so I kinda missed it, but not in real life.
In real life, we went to see the ELEPHANTS!!!!! First I had no idea there was an elephant sanctuary just one town over & I had no idea that they pretty much only open to the public on Elephant Appreciation Day & I found this out the Friday before so:
So on Elephant Appreciation Day I was indeed, appreciating elephants. Not since the baby elephant followed the mama elephant into the water feature at the Jacksonville Zoo & then stood there, under water with his baby elephant trunk sticking out like a periscope have I been so elephantly appreciative.
The event itself was...meager. The elephants were wonderful, as were the elephant people but the promotion had been slim (also it was drizzly) so there was no crowd. This was good for us but not great for them. One of the elephant people told us they opened for Elephant Appreciation Day for the first time last year, expecting 500 people they got 1,500. This year they maybe could have managed 1,500 but I doubt they got 500. Just as well because the volunteers in charge of parking nearly caused two accidents while we ere pulling in. Considering we were the only people pulling in & only two other vehicles were in motion, this was impressive in its own way.
Yes, we went to see the elephant(s), in the rain, still worth it. Also the whole wind-up reminded me of a book from last year's bookclub: Stewart O'Nan's A Prayer for the Dying. His narrator talks about "seeing the elephant". & wholly unrelated to elephants is himself confronted with what he believes is his duty to his fellow men & his god, & what happens when these responsibilities meet mother nature. Good book.
Showing posts with label animal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label animal. Show all posts
Monday, September 23, 2013
Saturday, April 20, 2013
This week at the ranch, uselessly
It has been stooped-crazy-busy here at Useless Ranch this week. So busy I found out about the Boston Marathon bombing Tuesday morning. I learned they had pictures of the suspects after the first one was already dead. & I still say Lucky Me.
Other things that occupied my time this week:
The donkey did some damage to one of his hooves last weekend. Our farrier was sweating, dizzy, barfing sick for what might be the second time EVER in 10+ years & could not get out here until Friday. This means that every day, several times a day I was walking water to him where ever he was; I did not want him getting dehydrated because he did not have what it takes to shove in at the water trough.
We have had a small cold front which coincided with a lot of rain, so four baby birds were back in my bathtub. Maybe I was over reacting, but one in particular was looking a bit glazed, pecking lethargically & why wait until she is too weak to stand?
I have also spent a rather extraordinary amount of time on the phone due to a family event elsewhere. During those conversations I also learned my parents are wallpapering their bedroom, which I guess is their prerogative, but I actually liked the old wallpaper & I NEVER like wallpaper. On the other hand, the mish-mosh of linoleum-thru-the-ages that comprises their kitchen floor remains untouched, especially since I told my mother I am 99.9% sure one of their linoleums is the same as the one in the kitchen of the Marjorie Kinnan Rawling's house.
I finished several books:
Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn. This is the second Flynn book I have read, but I think it was the first she wrote...? All I can say is YIKES.
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery, translated by Alison Anderson. This is my bookclub's May 2013 selection & I have really wanted to read it for awhile (but never had the time, OY). The movie was at the local theatre-that-shows-not-so-much-mainstream-movies over a year ago, so I knew what happened. Still a great book, even though I knew the ending.
Garment of Shadows by Laurie R. King. Not the best of the Russell/Holmes series but I still enjoyed it. What will those crazy kids get up to next?
If this seems like a lot of book for one week, keep in mind the first two were audio, so I listened while I did stuff in the house I listened while I ran errands, I listened while I sat & had a cup of coffee when the rest of the country was watching CNN/Fox/MSNBC et al.
& now I have some work to do, as the cool temps & rainy weather has meant:
The return of the nettle, a noxious unpleasant stinging plant that I have become somewhat immune to much in the way a clownfish does a sea anemone. For much the same reason, I am sorry to say as for all intents & purposes I make my home in a bank of stinging nettle.
Early roses! One of the bushes I planted less than a year ago is covered in blooms & most of the others are pushing buds. It looked like we were going straight from a muddy Fladidah winter to the steamy broil of summer, but we have doubled back for a weekend of spring.
Other things that occupied my time this week:
The donkey did some damage to one of his hooves last weekend. Our farrier was sweating, dizzy, barfing sick for what might be the second time EVER in 10+ years & could not get out here until Friday. This means that every day, several times a day I was walking water to him where ever he was; I did not want him getting dehydrated because he did not have what it takes to shove in at the water trough.
We have had a small cold front which coincided with a lot of rain, so four baby birds were back in my bathtub. Maybe I was over reacting, but one in particular was looking a bit glazed, pecking lethargically & why wait until she is too weak to stand?
I have also spent a rather extraordinary amount of time on the phone due to a family event elsewhere. During those conversations I also learned my parents are wallpapering their bedroom, which I guess is their prerogative, but I actually liked the old wallpaper & I NEVER like wallpaper. On the other hand, the mish-mosh of linoleum-thru-the-ages that comprises their kitchen floor remains untouched, especially since I told my mother I am 99.9% sure one of their linoleums is the same as the one in the kitchen of the Marjorie Kinnan Rawling's house.
I finished several books:
Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn. This is the second Flynn book I have read, but I think it was the first she wrote...? All I can say is YIKES.
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery, translated by Alison Anderson. This is my bookclub's May 2013 selection & I have really wanted to read it for awhile (but never had the time, OY). The movie was at the local theatre-that-shows-not-so-much-mainstream-movies over a year ago, so I knew what happened. Still a great book, even though I knew the ending.
Garment of Shadows by Laurie R. King. Not the best of the Russell/Holmes series but I still enjoyed it. What will those crazy kids get up to next?
If this seems like a lot of book for one week, keep in mind the first two were audio, so I listened while I did stuff in the house I listened while I ran errands, I listened while I sat & had a cup of coffee when the rest of the country was watching CNN/Fox/MSNBC et al.
& now I have some work to do, as the cool temps & rainy weather has meant:
The return of the nettle, a noxious unpleasant stinging plant that I have become somewhat immune to much in the way a clownfish does a sea anemone. For much the same reason, I am sorry to say as for all intents & purposes I make my home in a bank of stinging nettle.
Early roses! One of the bushes I planted less than a year ago is covered in blooms & most of the others are pushing buds. It looked like we were going straight from a muddy Fladidah winter to the steamy broil of summer, but we have doubled back for a weekend of spring.
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Big doings week-end
There is A LOT going on in our little corner of earth over the next few days. Let me start be describing the one thing we will not be doing & yet benefits us greatly. Wait, let me back up.
How do you feel about football? College football? Gator college football? Well, we have a love hate relationship. More like a like, don't really care relationship, but whatever. The short version is when there is a home game we do everything we can to get the hell out of Dodge. It is not just what the people attending the game do. I don't mean drunk & disorderly, although that is a factor, I mean thing like the university reselling ALL THE PARKING SPACES to alumni & other fans, so if you have not done something about your car before the end of business Friday, you can count on getting towed & fined. When you consider how much it costs to park near A's building (I will give you a hint: it is more than $500), you can see how it might get old. Fast. But added to that are all the people not attending the game, who just want to hang out & bask in the drunken halo outside of the stadium. & that is before we get into any real rivalry games.
Well, this weekend is the most famous college football rivalry of all time: The World's Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party. & the good news is it is so damned big (& the rival is so damned close), they have all agreed to move it to Jacksonville & we get our town back. Which means we will be able to move about freely & do everything else going on this week-end.
Today is the first day you can vote in the election here in Florida. I am told that this is the second busiest day (the first being the actual 2nd Tuesday in November), but I probably won't get there until Monday myself.
Today is the first day of the Friends of the Library Book Sale. We actually have a FOL booksale twice a year (we do love our library) but the October sale is usually the BIG one. We will not be there this first day, but we do plan to go Sunday (the book sale runs Saturday to Wednesday). We are arriving late because
Saturday is the only day of the Bat Festival at the Lubee Bat Conservancy. We have never been, but I am determined to go this year.
Yesterday I was on campus, for the first time in a long time I might add, & was talking with the most recent set of undergrads work-studying in the Herbarium when one of them bemoaned the "home game" being "so far away" & how he was just going to have to watch it on tv because without football there is "nothing to do in this town".
How do you feel about football? College football? Gator college football? Well, we have a love hate relationship. More like a like, don't really care relationship, but whatever. The short version is when there is a home game we do everything we can to get the hell out of Dodge. It is not just what the people attending the game do. I don't mean drunk & disorderly, although that is a factor, I mean thing like the university reselling ALL THE PARKING SPACES to alumni & other fans, so if you have not done something about your car before the end of business Friday, you can count on getting towed & fined. When you consider how much it costs to park near A's building (I will give you a hint: it is more than $500), you can see how it might get old. Fast. But added to that are all the people not attending the game, who just want to hang out & bask in the drunken halo outside of the stadium. & that is before we get into any real rivalry games.
Well, this weekend is the most famous college football rivalry of all time: The World's Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party. & the good news is it is so damned big (& the rival is so damned close), they have all agreed to move it to Jacksonville & we get our town back. Which means we will be able to move about freely & do everything else going on this week-end.
Today is the first day you can vote in the election here in Florida. I am told that this is the second busiest day (the first being the actual 2nd Tuesday in November), but I probably won't get there until Monday myself.
Today is the first day of the Friends of the Library Book Sale. We actually have a FOL booksale twice a year (we do love our library) but the October sale is usually the BIG one. We will not be there this first day, but we do plan to go Sunday (the book sale runs Saturday to Wednesday). We are arriving late because
Saturday is the only day of the Bat Festival at the Lubee Bat Conservancy. We have never been, but I am determined to go this year.
Yesterday I was on campus, for the first time in a long time I might add, & was talking with the most recent set of undergrads work-studying in the Herbarium when one of them bemoaned the "home game" being "so far away" & how he was just going to have to watch it on tv because without football there is "nothing to do in this town".
Thursday, July 19, 2012
To the person who dumped a litter of kittens at the top of our dirt road, just off a four lane highway
Dear Asshat:
Not sure when you did it, but when I went for my daily run on Friday the 13th we (me & the friend I was running with) found five (5) kittens. Actually, they kind of found us; two of them ran into the street yowling & they all looked emaciated. It took a while but we managed to catch 2 of them, Actually at one point we had 4 of them but a car went by & spooked them; we all have scratches to prove just how spooked they were.
Those 2 kittens came home with me & spent most of the weekend hiding in the dense underbrush around my house. They were frantic to rejoin the others but being over a mile away they could not hear them yowling back & also there was food at my house. I saw 2 of the 3 kittens when I went back later that Friday & again when I ran on Saturday, but by Sunday they seemed to have disappeared.
On Sunday evening the kittens at my house moved into a tree at the front door & kept poor A awake for a good part of the night. Monday morning A***** came by to run again; the kittens hanging in the tree crying for their siblings were hard to miss. We went for our run & on the return trip, we heard them. Just like before 2 of them came out to us but the last kitten hung back. I didn't talk about this with A**** at the time but I knew we could not take the other 2 & leave just 1; it wouldn't survive the night.
I ran for the truck & the pet carrier & cat food while A***** managed to get all 3 of them to follow her almost 1/4 mile back towards my house & away from the highway. By the time we caught all of them I was bleeding COPIOUSLY from several wounds on my right hand & I'm sure A***** had scratches too (I can also tell you she didn't smell all that good in the closed cab of the truck for the ride home; a 2 1/2 mile run + cat food being smeared all over her took a toll). At the house, the 3 were reunited with the 2 & there has hardly been any noise since. What they have been doing for the past 4 days is making up for lost time in the eating & sleeping department. They also made a visit to a vet (very likely the step that made you decide they had to go because it costs money). They were nice & calm & purred through most of the exam.
At this point, I realize you might be thinking this played out just fine for everyone: you didn't have to deal with them & still they are headed for good homes. Think again. Generally cats that draw blood & have no medical record are euthanized. Immediately. & the person who gets bit gets to go through the whole rabies vaccination thing. It hurts. Also it isn't free & even if it is covered by insurance there is a $120 co-pay (guess how I know this). For $45, you could have had their mother spayed.
The euthanizing is merciful compared to the usual end for dumped animals; our vet calls them coyote snack packs. Because ours is a neighborhood of family farms, it is a magnet for heartless slacker pet owners like you. & because so many unwanted animals get dumped here, we have a higher than average coyote population harassing our livestock, killing chickens, turkeys, ducks, etc.
Believe it or not the story I related is the short version. I did not tell you about the family that pulled over with their full horse trailer & tried to help to catch the kittens the first time, or the farmer that saw me when I went back Friday evening & left his work to make sure someone hadn't broken down, or the woman at the house we finally caught the kittens who is caring for her daughter-in-law's 3 dogs each of which was also dumped in their turn at the same intersection.
As revolting as we all find you to be, it is nothing compared to our disgust at how stoopid you are. We all presume you were just too cheap to deal with the kittens ethically. As it happens, you unloaded them in a county with MULTIPLE agencies that would have inoculated them & placed them in foster homes at no charge to you.
So you put a neighborhood to inconvenience & expense for quite literally no reason at all. It is my fondest wish that some day, maybe when you are old & cannot care for yourself, that the people you always thought would help you instead heave you out of the back of a pick-up to die in a ditch by the side of the road. I am only sorry it can only happen once.
Not sure when you did it, but when I went for my daily run on Friday the 13th we (me & the friend I was running with) found five (5) kittens. Actually, they kind of found us; two of them ran into the street yowling & they all looked emaciated. It took a while but we managed to catch 2 of them, Actually at one point we had 4 of them but a car went by & spooked them; we all have scratches to prove just how spooked they were.
Those 2 kittens came home with me & spent most of the weekend hiding in the dense underbrush around my house. They were frantic to rejoin the others but being over a mile away they could not hear them yowling back & also there was food at my house. I saw 2 of the 3 kittens when I went back later that Friday & again when I ran on Saturday, but by Sunday they seemed to have disappeared.
On Sunday evening the kittens at my house moved into a tree at the front door & kept poor A awake for a good part of the night. Monday morning A***** came by to run again; the kittens hanging in the tree crying for their siblings were hard to miss. We went for our run & on the return trip, we heard them. Just like before 2 of them came out to us but the last kitten hung back. I didn't talk about this with A**** at the time but I knew we could not take the other 2 & leave just 1; it wouldn't survive the night.
I ran for the truck & the pet carrier & cat food while A***** managed to get all 3 of them to follow her almost 1/4 mile back towards my house & away from the highway. By the time we caught all of them I was bleeding COPIOUSLY from several wounds on my right hand & I'm sure A***** had scratches too (I can also tell you she didn't smell all that good in the closed cab of the truck for the ride home; a 2 1/2 mile run + cat food being smeared all over her took a toll). At the house, the 3 were reunited with the 2 & there has hardly been any noise since. What they have been doing for the past 4 days is making up for lost time in the eating & sleeping department. They also made a visit to a vet (very likely the step that made you decide they had to go because it costs money). They were nice & calm & purred through most of the exam.
At this point, I realize you might be thinking this played out just fine for everyone: you didn't have to deal with them & still they are headed for good homes. Think again. Generally cats that draw blood & have no medical record are euthanized. Immediately. & the person who gets bit gets to go through the whole rabies vaccination thing. It hurts. Also it isn't free & even if it is covered by insurance there is a $120 co-pay (guess how I know this). For $45, you could have had their mother spayed.
The euthanizing is merciful compared to the usual end for dumped animals; our vet calls them coyote snack packs. Because ours is a neighborhood of family farms, it is a magnet for heartless slacker pet owners like you. & because so many unwanted animals get dumped here, we have a higher than average coyote population harassing our livestock, killing chickens, turkeys, ducks, etc.
Believe it or not the story I related is the short version. I did not tell you about the family that pulled over with their full horse trailer & tried to help to catch the kittens the first time, or the farmer that saw me when I went back Friday evening & left his work to make sure someone hadn't broken down, or the woman at the house we finally caught the kittens who is caring for her daughter-in-law's 3 dogs each of which was also dumped in their turn at the same intersection.
As revolting as we all find you to be, it is nothing compared to our disgust at how stoopid you are. We all presume you were just too cheap to deal with the kittens ethically. As it happens, you unloaded them in a county with MULTIPLE agencies that would have inoculated them & placed them in foster homes at no charge to you.
So you put a neighborhood to inconvenience & expense for quite literally no reason at all. It is my fondest wish that some day, maybe when you are old & cannot care for yourself, that the people you always thought would help you instead heave you out of the back of a pick-up to die in a ditch by the side of the road. I am only sorry it can only happen once.
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