Friday, July 9, 2010

Life With Otis - Day 1

Day 1 with Otis dawned like any other of late, hot, humid, and sunny.  The difference was that Leroy, now named Otis, was going to be moving in with us today.  We went to work first thing, trying to make room for his crate.  Once we had moved a huge antique closet on wheels from the master to the spare bedroom, there was room for it.  Step 1 completed.

Step 2 was a visit to the shelter to get some last minute suggestions on last minute purchases for the dog.  I found out what they had been feeding him, decided that he would be better off with a harness than a collar, and pointed the Jeep North toward Bethlehem, GA where the closest PetsMart was located.  $115 later we had toys, harness, food containers, food, and two varieties of treats, and headed back to Monroe. 

We officially became his parents around 2:45 PM, and immediately hit our first roadblock.  Otis does not like to get into vehicles.  After hoisting his skinny butt into the back seat of Marilyn's Commander, we rode home.  The ride started with grave apprehension on Otis' part, and ended with his nose plastered against the window, enjoying the ride.

Out of the car, and into the fenced area in the back yard, sniffing and marking everything on the way.  After a lap around the inside of the fence on the leash, I let him loose to explore his new play area.  He seemed pleased.

We came into the house through the garage, and spent a while in the den while he explored, found his water and food, ate, drank, and slobbered all over the floor.  Otis does not have the most delicate eating habits.  A towel on the tile floor under the water bowl seems to have become a savior for the nearby carpet.  I'm thinking a rubber backed carpet door mat might be a permanent solution.

The next hurdle was meeting Wally.  Aside from a few snarls and snaps when Otis pawed at Wally, I think it went well.  Wally is old, set in his ways, a little arthritic, and a general curmudgeon, but he seems to be making peace with another dog in the house.

The evening was interesting.  A procession of Daughters, Sons, Granddaughters and nearly-in-laws gave him a lot to adjust to. 

Whatever his personal eating issues are, he was good while we ate dinner.  No begging, shmoozing, or whining, but rather a respectful (if slightly drool-filled) wait on the carpet by the side door until dinner was over.  Good Dog, Otis!

After dinner we went for a quick walk, one lap around the block (about 1/2 mile).  He was a gentleman on the leash, with no pulling, no pooping on other folks lawns, and only the occasional mail box "decoration".  The high point of the walk was the 37 three to five year old kids playing at the top of the hill.  They were doing their thing in the street with their calico cat.  This cat must have considered itself a) a lion, and b) the kids her cubs, because she puffed up like an adder and leaped onto Otis face.  Otis had a WTH?! look on his face after the cat got off, but was gentleman enough to let the smallest of the kids pet him.

Bed time was uneventful.  Wally accepted his lift onto the foot of the bed with his usual disdain, and Otis took up a position on the floor at the foot of the bed. 

All was well until about 0230 when Otis decided he needed to go outside.  OK, I can deal with getting up with the baby.  The bad part was that he wanted to play.  We've got a little bit of re-education to do here.  Three o'clock in the morning is no time for a 62 year old man to be running around the back yard in slippers and a bath robe playing with a dog.  It was fun, though.

Playtime over, we slept (in the den out of deference to Marilyn's sleep) until about 0700.  We both took a quick potty break, and then went for a walk.  We covered 1.5 miles in 30 minutes, discovered that Otis does not chase cars, but would eat a golf cart if it got close enough (maybe he just wanted to play a couple of holes) and is a sweety on the leash.

Day 2 will be filled with further adventures, learning experiences on both our parts, and is eagerly anticipated.

Y'all stay well, and keep moving.

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Brain Dump

It's time to clear some of the cobwebs out of my cranial attic.

*****

The Federal suit against Arizona's immigration law has 3 salient points.
1.  The Arizona law merely enables local law enforcement personnel to enforce the existing federal law.
2.  It was enacted because the federal authorities do not enforce existing law.
3.  Since the feds are bringing suit to overturn the state law, it is clear that they have no intention of fulfilling their duty to enforce the law.
Throw the bums out!

*****

Yesterday at the range, Bobby and I were having a great time throwing .45 cal bullets into paper bad guys.  After the 4th shot of a so-so string, my target hit the floor.  A magic ricochet out of the berm cut the wire that held up the target carrier.  My apologies to the guys at the Firing Lane, and I'm still willing to pay for the repairs. 
Footnote:  The next magazine I fired was my best group ever from my Commander.

******

We finally get to bring Otis home today.  I just hope my cold doesn't give him distemper or rinderpest, or some other obscure disease.  He's going to be just what I need, regardless of how he turns out.  If he's a good, laid back, buddy, more power to him.  If he's a hound from hell (unlikely) I get to turn him into a good buddy.  Either way, we both win.

******

Marilyn's home after the work schedule from hell.  It's good to have her here.  Dogs, cats, old trucks, and TV can occupy a day, but there's really no comparison to somebody you love.

******

I really need to stop.  There's much to do today, and less and less time to do it.

Stay well.

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Just In Case You Forgot...

...what all the fireworks are about, I offer here the entire text of the Declaration of Independence. 

Here are a couple of interesting facts.  Look at the last three signers.  I live in Walton County, Georgia.  Gwinnett County is adjacent to the northwest, and Hall County is northeast of Gwinnett.  The people who laid out this state thought enough of the sacrifices of these three men to memorialize them by naming counties after them.*  I think it's fitting that we should remember them, as well, and all the others who bought this Country with their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. 

Enough from me. 

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In Congress, July 4, 1776: The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America


When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

— John Hancock
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts:
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland:
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

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*In the interest of full disclosure, Georgia does, however, have a county with the same name as a baseball player from this state.  Nobody ever said Georgians were always full of patriotic fervor.

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Leroy Is Otis.

I decided on Otis for the dog's name, in honor of Otis McDonald and his victory in the Supreme Court this week.  He's in quarantine for his kennel cough.  Once he's over the cough, he'll be re-scheduled for his "tutoring".  We're going to take advantage of the extension to get Wally current on all his shots.

I'm really looking forward to spending some time getting to know Otis.

Stay well, and remember why we celebrate July 4. 

Thursday, July 1, 2010

The Good, the Bad, and the Really, Really Ugly.

The Good. 
Tyler and Sam came over this afternoon, and Tyler helped me get the bed off the truck.  I can now work at getting the dents out of the back of the cab.

The Bad.
Leroy has kennel cough, and can't have his surgery until it clears up.  Bummer.  I was looking forward to having him around the house this weekend.  As it stands, he's going to have to stay at the shelter until he's relatively health.  We just don't have the ability to isolate him from Wally.

The Ugly.
450,000 miles of leaks can leave a really nasty mess on the underside of a truck.  The sludge coating the undercarriage was so thick that it took a scraper to get it thin enough for the pressure washer to have an effect.  It's gonna take a few days of extremely grimy work to get this back where it belongs.

Stay well and safe this holiday weekend.