January 'Whatever', cont'd-

Ok, just when I think I'm the craziest bitch I know, God gloriously blesses me in introducing me to someone infinitely more fucked up than I am.

A little while ago, a small dog with a collar showed up in our neighbor's yard, he wouldn't leave, wouldn't let them touch him, so they came and got me to see if I knew who this dog belonged to. I didn't, but due to the condition this dog was in, how healthy he was, well-groomed, etc., Eric and I took him in and tried to find his owners. We put 'found dog' signs up all around the neighborhood, and I also posted some found dog ads online before that, which leads me to the 'crazy fucked up person' part...

I deliberately left out crucial identifying information on both the posters and the online ads so that when we were contacted, a few answered questions could easily confirm that we were giving this dog back to its rightful owners. Not an hour after I put the signs up (on Christmas Day, mind you!), we get a call from a frantic woman who'd been looking for her dog, she was able to describe him down to a tee, answer every question about his 'particulars', and by the end of the day, we got to return a very missed little purebred to his family:) By the new year, I'd totally forgotten about the ads I still had online... until 'the nut' emailed me.

She sent the first email a few days ago, keeping it very brief, saying that the dog was her friend's dog, and that she wanted more information about it, wanted me to hand over the dog. Right from the get-go, the email sounded suspicious. I should've just left it alone, told her that the dog had already been returned, but instead, I was suspicious and stupid enough to email her and tell her that I didn't think this was the dog she was looking for, but if she could email me a description of it, what sex it was, neutered or spayed, coloring, when it was lost, what its collar looked like, etc., I could confirm things for her.

Didn't happen... instead, the really weird emails start coming, where she tells me that she's really not looking for her friend's dog, but that she's a rescuer affiliated with highly respected groups in the area, and that I shouldn't return the dog to its real owners but instead give it to her, that she spends a portion of each day going through local lost and found ads, looking for dogs to save.

WTF? Anybody who knows anything about rescue organizations knows that any one worth their salt does NOT GO OUT looking for animals! They're full up to their tits in animals people are abandoning left and right! So at this point, I'm torn between feeling really sorry for a lying-but-insane wannabe animal rescuer, and being unbelievably pissed off and worried about how many people she may have successfully done this to before.

The pissed off and worried part won out;)

Any of you who know me know that when I want to find something out, I usually can. Hell, enough of you know I can sometimes find out a person's entire history with just an email address and IP number. And fortunately, this woman fit into that category. In about a half hour, I was able to find out her address, full name, age, previous ads she'd posted online, looking for animals, and that she was well known amongst the legitimate rescue community around here as a basic nutcase who they've complained about before due to the fact that she's notorious for showing up at events, shelters, and at veterinary offices, claiming she's with these groups when she's not. She apparently had successfully pulled animals from the pound on more than one occasion by lying, and has either ended up selling them herself or giving them back up when she couldn't.

In the meantime, I had three nasty emails from her, increasingly insane, but after I finally answered her back, calling her by her full name, listing her address, basically showing her that she wasn't as anonymous as she'd thought, ending the email by telling her that she would never get any dog from me, or anyone else ever again if I could help it, she became suddenly quiet... Haven't heard from her since;)

Still, I kinda wonder if I'm not going to wake up one night with a crazy 52 year old Mesquite woman with a pet savior complex standing over me with a knife.

You know, I really don't like messing with people's world's as much as some might think. But when someone intrudes into my world under circumstances like this are involved, I couldn't have just ignored her. Lord knows how many people looking for their lost pets could have been reunited with them if she hadn't come in and taken them for whatever messed up reasons were in her head. And honestly, I still don't fully understand what her motivation was in doing what she's doing. Like I said, I suspect it's more a savior kind of complex thing for her than it is a monetary gain kind of thing. In all my time around real rescuers (and I am not including myself here; I am NOT a rescuer. Just not good enough at it!), I have only met one person who reminds me of this nutjob... a woman I 'cyber' met a few years ago named Susan who was asking for help for an injured animal, and whose story was so weird, I checked her out, too, and it didn't turn out well. Susan, however, I think did mean well, I actually do regret checking her out so well, and I hear that she's really gone on to do a lot of good since then, no deception involved. That's what I hear, anyway;)

So, that's my rescue rant. I think most of the people involved in rescue are passionate, can get emotional as a result, and are definitely a little crazy in their own ways... but they're a good crazy. Effectively eccentric, which is a beautiful thing to be. Still, the one loony from Mesquite has pretty much praying I don't find a lost dog again anytime soon!

Onto other stuff, just brief snippets of things going on around here-

-Finally did the Facebook thing. I think I was a member before, but didn't really do a profile, etc., until I got this little burst of people inviting me to become their friends. I hate to say I opted to ignore a few, a couple by accident/clicking the wrong thing, but the others because they were assholes from my past I had absolutely no interest in catching up with;)

-I have pretty much completely cut off contact with most of my mother's side of the family, including her, and I'm sorry to those of you who think that should never have happened.... I have never felt as much personal peace as a result! I don't know if I had explained it well enough in past entries, but the majority of my life, I have bailed out, enabled, paid for, and sacrificed so much more than I should've for these people, worried like hell about them on so many occasions, and not only has not a one of them to date ever really returned even a portion of the sentiment, they've also tried to drag me down with them on way too many occasions. Blood is supposed to be thicker than water, they say, but you know what? There comes a time in some families when a person has to Heparin the shit out of that family tie and break free for their own survival. I thought that I would feel immensely guilty about it, but honestly, I really do feel more free than I've felt in a long time.  I didn't just say 'I'm cutting off contact'; that's not enough.  Nope, I cut ties on a deeper level, a part of me just 'let go', really let go on a mental level, and I don't regret it.  It's not about punishing people I'm hurt by or angry at, it's not about being selfish, it's about doing what I had to do.  I will always love them, but by doing what I've done, I love myself as much now.

-And this brings me to a much more serious note- One family member from my Mom's side I didn't cut out of my life and wish I heard more from, my niece Dorothy, is battling an extremely serious medical condition. She is fighting like crazy, is determined to beat this, and if I didn't think it would piss her off immensely to give more detail here, I'd have long ago written an entire 20 paragraph entry about her and her alone. But since that would piss her off, all I can do is ask that you guys spare some extra prayers, vibes, and energy for her and her three children. I thank you in advance, friends!

-I still love the paranormal, still believe in ghosts, don't believe in most psychics, still have had a couple of experiences since writing last, but get the weirdest kick out of watching Ghost Adventures on the Travel Channel. Though the show basically just involves an hour of three guys who say 'Dude' all the time getting locked into haunted houses and taunting air throughout the night, I gotta admit that I'm eager for the new season. It's a trainwreck kind of thing;)

Okay, that's it for now. Gotta go, but my cat friends, I miss you and will write soon, my writer friends, I haven't forgotten you, and thank you for not forgetting me, my alumni buds, it's great to be back in touch with you all, and to all the rest of my friends, I'd plant a big old slobbery bitch kiss on you if you were standing in front of me... I swear!;) I hope all of you are surviving, better yet thriving, in this economy, and that the days ahead only improve:)

January 'whatever', 2009- One Hell of a Catch-Up-

... Or at least a start.

Holy piss-dumplings, I've been gone awhile! I've missed venting here, and in my absence, I've looked back at all the childish things I've said here, all the people I've gone off on, all the trivial, dramatic, and arguably stupid things I've said here. I've read my past writings, soaked them in, vowed to learn from them, and what I learned is this:

I meant them when I wrote them, still mean most of 'em now, so guess what, folks? This new diary page is about as close to being an evolution as Jeff Conaway is to teaching Bible school.

Seriously, I've winced at a lot of what I've written since starting this whole 'eripaul.com' thing, but when I'm done wincing, I'm left still not wanting to delete, amend, much less forget about my diatribes. That kind of thing's for pussies;)

Okay, onto some of the rest.

Still don't have a ton of time, but in this first entry, I'll just update as many things I can think of that might help close the gap between my last full entry and this one:

-I am still annoyed by the presidential elections, and how blindly I think most people voted, sheep following the media's call. My feelings towards the great O , btw, have nothing to do with race, color, creed, etc., and I will bitchslap the next person shallow enough to pull this out of their ass. Me saying this also does NOT make me a Conservative all of a sudden when I've been Liberal my whole life. To say that I do not have great faith in Barack Obama nowadays is pretty much the equivalent to opening myself up to unbelievably harsh criticism, accusations that I am a million things I'm not. Still, I'm saying it, God forbid. I think that most folks who voted for Barack were voting for a brilliantly advertised pop product, voting against a party whose exiting president sucked on so many levels, you'd need a hyperbaric chamber to come back up from visiting them all, or voted simply because the media, the government, celebrities, and the rest of the influential world has made sure the 'us vs. them' mentality is alive and well , very few based on actual policy or original thought. This election has made me wonder if we've really gotten anywhere in rising above what those before us didn't. I just hope, really and truly hope, that this change worth believing in happens, and if and when it does, I'll be the first to recant. And you have no idea how much I hope I'll have to recant here! Oh, by the way, I still haven't heard from a single person, including my mother (who's pissed at me still because I called her blindly partisan), who could give me any real, detailed, or thorough explanation of what they felt 'Change We Can Believe In' means. I can't tell you how much I was hoping somebody would've really answered my request. I just want this country to get better, be better. I want all of its citizens to like each other, work together, give up the special interests in exchange for a common goal. I want the stress to no longer be on how we're different, want us to not flock towards an image, but instead universally thrive in its absence. Is that really too much to ask?

-On the animal front, our city passed a new code here, as I mentioned in an older page's diary entry, cutting the number of animals a person can have, along with enforcing some new rules. I'm grandfathered in, so it doesn't affect me in that way, but what has affected me is that this new code, combined with the state of the economy, has resulted in animals dumped on my doorstep in HUGE numbers lately. In the last couple of months, I have gone outside in the morning to find puppies, grown dogs, and kittens suddenly living on my porch, and nope, they didn't just 'find' this house! People cutting costs are cutting out their 'pet costs' first, and with my luck, seems like a lot of those people know people who live on my street, people who say 'Hey, there's this woman a few houses down...', etc. So far, I've been lucky and placed most these dumped guys in new homes, at a hell of a lot of expense, but I'm telling you, it sucks waking up in the morning now because the first thing I do is check my front yard, nervous as hell until I see it's clear. And I swear, if I ever catch someone red-handed dumping an animal here, there's going to be a physical altercation. And do I need at this point to stress to any of you that emailing me for help about an animal you don't want anymore is by far a NO NO???? Then again, if you email me about wanting to adopt one, you may just become a god in my eyes!!!!

As for my own animals, we lost Hyanna a couple of months ago due to CHF, Congestive Heart Failure. She'd had that diagnosis for a couple of years, had lived well with it until the last few days, and when she did pass, it was peacefully and with Eric and me both by her side. The rest of my 'permanent' animals are mostly elderly, but are doing well at this point. And with this many senior and special needs animals here, that's the absolute best one can hope for.

-Damn, gonna have to update the rest later. From writers to friends to family to outright gossip, the economy, and reality tv... I've got a lot to bitch about;) In the meantime, I love you guys, missed you, thank in particular those who didn't fade away when I did. You inspire me, bitches;)