Category: blahg

  • Trendy Tilapia

    Tilapia has become quite the trendy fish lately. I see it on more and more restaurant menus. I hear people talking about eating it. I see it in “regular” (i.e. middle class) grocery stores at prices far above what it used to sell for.

    I have never eaten it, and don’t have any desire to. I’m not saying I won’t ever eat it, but I certainly won’t be making the choice to order or buy it myself. This is fairly odd, because I am generally an adventurous eater who is up for trying almost anything once.

    Tilapia used to be a “trash” fish, very cheap and found in markets in lower income neighborhoods, and I never saw it on restaurant menus. Now, that isn’t what I have against it. Lobster used to be a trash fish too, and I quite enjoy lobster.

    I feed my own dogs (never the fosters) a raw food diet. Now London was kind of known for eating anything and everything. He never want off his feed for little illnesses, he has only ever turned down food when he was literally dying. He also ate a door, a remote, a box of tampons (including the box, but carefully removing the wrappers), a Costco sized bottle of Liquid Advil, and the list goes on.

    Because a lot of what is great to feed dogs are odd cuts of meat that don’t often make it to the typical middle class white bread American table, I often shopped at ethnic markets or markets in poorer areas in order to find things like chicken feet, and lamb heart and the like. I like to give the dogs fish, especially being a husky and a husky mix, which as originally bred consume a lot of fish for protein source, but I don’t feed it all the time because of the expense. The dogs always looked on it as a special treat, and London was especially fond of salmon.

    Then one day I spotted tilapia in the market. It was below my protein price point for dog food, and I quickly bought a package to take home to the dogs.

    I prepped their food bowls that night and plopped them down and both dogs dug in.

    Then both dogs spit out the tilapia and stared at me, “What the fuck is this shit?”  No amount of coaxing or refusing to offer them anything else would convince them to eat it. They carefully ate all the other things around it, and left behind the tilapia in disgust.  They think cat turds covered in kitty litter is the best treat ever, and they outright refused to eat tilapia.

    So yeah, whenever I see it on a menu, or hear people talking about making it, I always just think of it as the one thing that London totally refused to eat.

    It just isn’t appealing to me.

  • An Incident

    I don’t know what happened.

    I know a few facts, and then I have my imagination.

    The new house has a large laundry room, upstairs. It is the largest laundry room I’ve ever had, with storage and counter space for folding. It is also where we have chosen to keep the kitty litter and where we feed the cats. It has a linoleum floor, so it was a sensible place for that.

    Indy likes to eat cat food, both before the cats have eaten it, and after. After is a special treat. Ugh.

    So, we do not want Indy to have access to the cat bowls or the litter box. This has been handled a variety of ways in the past, but at this house we went with a barrier method.

    We have a metal gate, like a baby gate, but it is a little bit taller, and it has a cat door built into it. We keep that in the laundry room door. The cats can get in and out through the door, and Indy cannot get in and out. She isn’t spry enough to jump it, and she is too large to fit through the cat door.

    One night this week we went out to dinner. When we got home Indy was downstairs. I went upstairs and found a slightly bent and dented metal gate on the floor at our master bedroom door, down the hall from the laundry room. There were a variety of dents, scrapes and gouges in the hallway wall. Willow was hiding under the master bedroom bed, shaking and traumatized. Xander was locked in the office.

    Xander being locked in the office is to the best of my knowledge and imagination, unrelated, other than it apparently being a lucky circumstance if Willow’s current state of sanity is any indication.

    What I envision happening is Indy thinking that there were tasty treats on the other side of that gate and giving a shot at getting in the way the cats do. It failed to work in her favor, and she got stuck and freaked out. At which point I think she managed to rip the gate out of the doorway (bending it a bit). Then I picture Freaked Out Dogzilla, with a giant, sharp cornered, metal collar staggering frantically through the hall. I wish we had video.

    Somewhere in this story is Willow. I’m not sure where, but the cat is NOT HAPPY. It took about 20 hours before she would willingly leave the space under our bed. She doesn’t want to be in the laundry room. I think Dogzilla with the metal collar destroying the walls was SCARY.

    I have another, insane cartoon vision, where the cat door was nudged shut. Willow tried to sneak between the posts and got stuck. She freaked out and caused Indy to investigate. Indy got stuck in the cat door, ripped the gate out of the doorway and went raging down the hall wearing a giant sharp cornered metal collar with a cat dangling from it. I don’t really think this happened, but it makes me laugh when I think about it. (I cringe too, I am not 100% cruel and coldhearted, but come on – It looks hysterical).

    Now, whatever happened, I’d like to believe that Indy will never do it again, but sadly because of the senility, I’m not so sure. Ugh

    Of course, it is also possible that somebody let themselves into the house, carefully removed the gate, bent it up and damaged our wall, locked Xander into the office, tortured Willow, and then left the house and locked up behind them.

    Willow knows what happened, but she isn’t talking.

  • Substantial Dissatisfaction

    Tonight we had a “get to know you” potluck at an acting program the kid is considering joining.

    There is good luck and bad luck, but for some of the worst kind of luck is potluck.

    I hate it. I just do.

    When I go to a potluck event, I plan to eat either before or after, depending on the time of day. I bring something that I am sure I am willing to eat, and that is unlikely to spoil, no matter how annoyingly they’ve set up the table or the timing of the event. Then I pretend I am eating while there, while occasionally actually consuming a little of the thing I brought.

    So, we got invited to this event – evited, actually. They requested that in the comments section of the RSVP we say what we will be bringing. I took a quick look at the other items people were bringing.

    Brownies
    Chips and cheese dip
    Snickers Salad!!! *
    Tuna sandwiches

    … wait – Snickers Salad?
    So, I googled because WTF? but they were excited about it.

    I read recipes, and I was like
    OMFG WHUT? NO!

    (recipes varied, but basically, chopped Snickers candy bars, fruit and Cool Whip)

    *shudder*

    And then, I blocked it out.

    But, when I was there tonight, I heard people talking. They were so excited that somebody brought Snickers Salad.

    And I try to have an open minded policy about trying new food.

    Since I wasn’t planning to ever make it, I decided I should try it, since there it was, conveniently on the table.

    Just in case I was wrong.

    Snickers, apples, Cool Whip, something I couldn’t identify, somebody else mentioned Nilla Wafers…

    The kid found a grape in hers. She announced, “I found a grape.” It sounded neutral and polite, if you didn’t know her, but to my ears it sounded a lot like, “I found a booger, in a pile of gross.”

    My food horizons have been expanded. I resent this expansion. I probably should have stuck to my pretend to eat policy.

    * Yes, the !!! was part of the comment about what they were bringing

  • I Am

    I am really pissed off.
    I HATE being interrupted.
    It is so fucking rude.
    And the thing is, I wasn’t done.
    I had stuff to tell my friend about still.
    We had plans.
    We had things to talk about.
    I am really really pissed off that he is dead.
    Because –
    The thing is
    The week prior?
    He wasn’t dead.
    The week prior?
    He was talking to me
    And he didn’t bother to mention,
    “Hey. This is the last fucking time we are talking. EVER”
    Bastard
    He didn’t say,
    “By the way, this stupid hospital stay,
    that I am being released from today,
    supposedly all better,
    even though they couldn’t figure out the CAUSE,
    but hey they treated the symptoms.
    Well, THIS stay, gave me an infection
    that is going to lead to my death.”
    Nope.
    He failed to fucking impart that information to me,
    and
    I am FURIOUS.
    I am raw and rage filled.
    I am very very tired
    So tired I can’t remember how to rest.
    I know
    I am supposed to learn from this.
    I am supposed to learn things like
    Don’t go to bed angry.
    I am supposed to learn things like,
    Let people know all the time how you feel about them.
    I am supposed to learn things like,
    Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today.
    I am supposed to turn this into a fucking motivational poster.
    What I am inclined to do is lock myself in the basement
    and not speak to anybody
    ever again.
    In the end, everything ends.
    At some point, this mood of mine will end too.
    That is how it goes, in the end.
    I am well fucking aware.

  • Indy found her inner husky, but now it’s coming out in clumps

    Indy is a rescue dog. She is at the very least a husky/shepherd mix, and might have some other stuff thrown in. She has a GSD nose, stance and coloration, and a husky coat and tail.

    She was a So Cal dog and has always hated rain and wetness. Also, she is getting older and has arthritis, so I was pretty concerned about this move to MN where she was concerned. So concerned, that I actually considered whether I should try to find her a place to stay in So Cal, even though it would mean breaking up our family.

    She absolutely THRIVED in the MN winter though. She has loved it. It took years off of her. She even lost some of the gray from her coat. It has been so fun to see her running around in the snow, a cute ball of puff.

    Now however? She is not a cute ball of puff. She is a mess. She is blowing her coat so much worse than she ever has before. It is just… o.O

    She is embarrassing.

    London is barely tufting at all so far.

    When a double coated dog is blowing their coat, people who are unfamiliar with this process will ask what is wrong with the dog.

    This year, Indy is blowing so much more fur than usual that WE keep asking what is wrong with the dog.

    Poor Indy.

    Poor us.

    There is finally an end in sight, as more of her body is summer coat than winter right now. She looks so much smaller than she did a month ago it is crazy.

    I knew she had really packed on an impressive winter coat this year, but… I had not realized just how much of a difference it was.

    The house is disgusting. We can’t keep up with it. Plus her undercoat is black, and the carpet is cream.

    Anyhow, things have warmed up enough that I am doing night walks again. I prefer this since that way we don’t run into other people out walking their dogs.

    It is still staying below freezing on many days, but there are also many days above freezing.

    Also? Our back door locks again. When it got really cold, the whole back portion of the house shifted and the storm door and door quit lining up properly with the jam. The storm door still can’t lock, and the door latch still doesn’t line up, but the deadbolt can be forced closed again as of last night. This is exciting to me. The kitchen table is still wobbly (this also happened with the cold weather and the shifting of the house), but I am hoping it will improve soon too.

    Also also? I still am sucking at sleeping.

    Indy, when she was cute –

     

  • The State Farm Thing

    On Friday night I was driving on the freeway, with my daughter in the passenger seat, in stop and go traffic. The vehicles in front of me stopped. I stopped. The driver behind me didn’t stop. Well, he did stop, but he did it by running into us.

    I was driving a compact SUV (2006 Ford Escape Hybrid). He was driving a midsize SUV (2006 Nissan Pathfinder).

    He jumped out of his car almost immediately, stopped to pick up a hunk of his car and came up to my window. I was feeling a bit shaken and scattered, and was concerned about my daughter, so it took me a bit of fumbling to get the window down. The first thing he wanted to know is if we were okay. It took me longer to ask the same question of him, and while his immediately hopping out of his vehicle was a good indication, and my distraction over my upset daughter played a part, I am not proud that it wasn’t the first thing I wanted to know from him.

    We agreed to pull over before exchanging information. He gathered some more bits from his car off of the freeway. I put on my signal and had to wait and wait for enough of a break in traffic to move over two lanes and pull up onto an island dividing the long exit lane from the freeway. He followed me over. A police officer stopped to see if we needed an ambulance. We said we did not. The officer said he was on his way to a call so he could not fill out a report, but he would have a trooper come. It was raining, so began to exchange information inside the Pathfinder. We traded insurance cards. We were both with State Farm, but with different agents. I began to type his information into my phone. He was writing mine on a scrap of paper. Then a man from FIRST knocked on the window. He wanted to know how much longer we would be and if the cars were drivable. I said mine was. The driver of the Pathfinder said he didn’t think his could go very far. FIRST asked if we needed an ambulance and again we said no. He asked us to exit the freeway and exchange information in a hotel parking lot toward the top of the ramp. The exit lane was moving along at a good clip, and he said he would block traffic when we were ready to go. We gathered up our own insurance cards, and agreed to meet up in the parking lot.

    FIRST blocked traffic and then followed us to the parking lot. The drive to the parking lot convinced the driver of the Pathfinder that his vehicle was not really drivable, and FIRST called a tow truck for him. We again exchanged cards. He had lost the scrap of paper and needed to start all over again. I double checked the information I had put in my phone, and took a photo of his insurance card. He made some comment about his lack of technology. We traded drivers licenses next and I typed in that information and took a photo of it too. I also took a photo of his license plate.

    Our condition was not serious enough that it warranted Emergency Room care. We attempted to go to Urgent Care on Friday night, but everywhere was closed. I did email my State Farm office on Friday night and provided them with the information and the photos that I took. They were amused by the photos, since they were “not necessary” but I’d rather have that info on a photo, in case I copied down something incorrectly.

    On Saturday we spent the first part of the day in Urgent Care. Then we got a prescription filled, and then I went to bed. Saturday and Sunday was mainly about sleeping and resting. State Farm called and left me a message on Saturday. This was based on the other driver’s claim. I did not take or return the call as I was not feeling well enough.

    On Monday, I did take a call from State Farm. She was was following up on the Saturday message. The claim from his side already had a claim number and they were accepting all responsibility on the claim, so I just needed to decide where I wanted to have my car repair work done. I got information on how to look up their preferred shops, as that would be easiest for securing payment of the repairs, and told her I would call her back with my choice, and got her contact information.

    I also spoke to my insurance agent’s office on Monday. They confirmed that they would be handling the medical portion of the claim.

    Most of Monday was still spent sleeping.

    On Tuesday I selected a conveniently located body shop from the list and called and left a message about my choice for the State Farm person who was handling the auto claim. After close of business for the insurance company on Tuesday, the body shop called and told me that they had received an assignment from State Farm to give an estimate on the repair work and wanted to let me know when I could bring in my 2005 Toyota Prius.

    Umm…

    Okay. We do own a 2005 Toyota Prius, which is also insured by State Farm. This was annoying and a bit strange, but it seemed within the realm of a clerical error. I told the body shop that I would contact the insurance company and they said they would be in touch when they had the correct assignment from them.

    On Wednesday morning I called the woman who was assigned our claim and spoke to her in person. I explained that the body shop called and they had the wrong car down as authorized for repairs. She was surprised and asked which car it was, and I told her it was the other car on the policy, the Ford Escape. She said that she would get it straightened out at the body shop.

    Soon after, another woman called from State Farm, about the medical claim. She wanted to go over all the information of what my coverage was and assure me that everything would be handled.

    Thirty minutes after that, yet another call came in from State Farm. Like everybody else, this woman’s words were polite, however her tone and manner were different. She began by asking my about injuries. I gave her a surface answer and then interrupted to tell her that somebody had already spoken to me today to give me all the details on the injury claim. She said that was fine, she was calling about the auto claim. (Okay… then why ask about the injuries?) She then begins asking about the accident, wanting a description of events. This conversation is NOTHING like any of the other conversations have been. This is probing and adversarial in tone. I describe the events to her, and she is asking for details like how many lanes there were and exactly which lane we were in.

    Then she gets to asking what car I was driving. I tell her. Then she wants to know if the Toyota Prius was involved in an accident on the same day. I assure her it was not. She tells me that I can file another claim for my Ford Escape, but that they would not be covering that without an investigation. She the begins to go into details on how I need to get my car inspected. What for, I want to know, to prove that I am not lying about what car I am driving? She assures me that she did not say I was lying, she is just saying that there is “a dispute of the facts”.

    Right.

    I ask her who is disputing the facts, and she tells me the other driver is, and I tell her that I don’t believe her. I tell her there is no way that the other driver told anybody that he hit a Toyota Prius. That makes no sense, how could he just happen to claim he hit a different car that I happen to own. It is obviously some kind of clerical error in pulling up the policy. She says, that she was told by the claim adjuster that there is a dispute in facts and they have opened an investigation. She begins to tell me about how to get my vehicles inspected.

    I explained to her that I would not be getting my vehicles inspected because I challenge the very notion that there is an actual dispute of facts. I tell her to speak to the other driver.

    We go around and around and eventually we hang up, and I am just shaking with anger. I am in pain, I am on medication, and now the insurance company that I have been insured by for over 20 years. Yes, I’ve had my auto insurance with them for more than 20 years, and they have my home owners insurance too, and in that time I filed one single claim when somebody hit my car in a parking lot and didn’t leave a note (I am not 100% sure I actually filed, I might have been too worried about my rates going up, and that was at least 15 years ago and I just can’t remember what I decided to do). Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there, my ass.

    She calls back more than an hour later and tells me that she has spoken to the other driver and “NOW he says that the other car was a Ford Escape.”

    Sure. NOW he says that, indicating that BEFORE he was saying a Prius and that it simply was not State Farms fault.

    I say bullshit.

    And here is the thing.

    There are two ways that the wrong car ended up in the system, and neither was by their other driver saying that he hit a Toyota Prius.

    Either:
    A) because we share the same company, it pulled up all of our details when they typed in our insurance info, and a slip of the mouse or whatever, managed to select the wrong car – and then never went over the info with the driver in a way that included mentioning the type car because it was such a straight forward case.
    B) he gave them the wrong policy number because I gave him the wrong card causing them to pull up the wrong car and then never went over the info with the driver in a way that included mentioning the type of car because it was such a straight forward case

    Now, I agree that B is a possibility. While I am 100% certain that I gave him the correct card the first time I handed him the card. I absolutely checked to make sure I did. He managed to lose that info and had to start from scratch when we moved to the hotel parking lot. We were both flustered and time number two I was just handing him back the card, and I probably didn’t really look at it again first. So, I could have given him the card for the other car. He was coming to realize how screwed up his car was and he might not have thought about the fact the car listed on it was the wrong type of vehicle. We were two people who were stressed after just being involved in an accident. That is possible.

    What pisses me off is that as soon as this problem appears where they have it assigned to one car, and I say it is another, they opened an investigation against me and started treating me as an adversary. That was their first step. A quick phone call to the other driver to just say, “Hey, by the way, did you rear end a car, or an SUV?” would have resolved it right away.

    The claim representative that I called back about the problem didn’t tell me she was going to need to check with the other driver. She didn’t tell me that there was any problem at all. She told me she would fix it with the body shop. Then she went and called the investigation department so they could start questioning me in depth about an accident that wasn’t even my fault.

    I also admit that it might be she was only following procedure, and if that is the case I am not one tiny bit less pissed off at State Farm, because then their official procedure sucks.

    I am not with a different insurance company, hoping to screw State Farm. I am in a state with NO Fault Personal Injury, so I can’t sue their other customer for pain and suffering. I am a State Farm customer too. I don’t care who first filed the claim, they should be treating each of us as covered and cared for customers. They make commercials claiming personal service and that it is about more than just a 20 page obnoxious full of fine print and loopholes policy. They claim it is a company that cares, so how about they make THAT their policy? Because a HUMAN looking at the situation, and treating both parties in the accident as valued customers of State Farm, would have thought that a clerical or some other mix up was a more likely explanation than insurance fraud. Seriously, they can see my record, because I am their customer too. Yet, their first reaction was to assume a person who had been paying them for 20 years without filing any suspicious claims was suddenly going to try to work some bizarre scam by which I substitute a compact SUV that is less likely to have been badly damaged and in which the occupants are less likely to sustain serious injury when being hit by a midsize SUV for the compact car which got listed by the computer as being in the accident.

    They just opened an investigation against me, looking at me for insurance fraud while I was trying to recover physically and mentally from being in an accident. An accident that wasn’t my fault. An accident that their other policy holder had already accepted full responsibility for.

    I’m pissed. Also, I’m still in pain. Also, my daughter is still in pain, more pain than me actually. Guess what upsets me even more than me being in pain?

    So yeah, I am just in an all around bad mood. There has been a lot of shaking and stress and crying this week. I am so tired and so far behind on everything I was supposed to get done this week, and I still need to keep dealing with getting the car repaired, and with finding us a doctor if we are not better by Monday.

    Oh yeah, and I can’t sleep properly and I’m having nightmares.

  • State Farm

    Fuck. FUCK. Fuckity fuck fuck fuck!

  • phucking phone

    I’ve mentioned this before. I have. Many times.

    I hate the phone.

    I do.

    I fucking hate the phone.

    I hate getting calls.

    I hate making calls.

    Sometimes I simply cannot make a call. It is too much effort. I don’t really think this is something that I can explain to anyone who does not have this issue with phones, and I don’t need to explain it to them.

    It is effort, because I need to rehearse the phone call and just get myself ready and prepared to deal with the phone call.

    And see, it is difficult to rehearse something when you and the other person are not following the same script.

    Today, I rehearsed a little script for speaking with Diane about something. I prepared. I took a deep breath. I dialed.

    First of all, I get the wrong phone number. *shudder* That was NOT in the script.

    I call again, quadruple checking the number.

    woman: Hello, Crown Management.

    me: Yes, can I please speak to Diane Sumner?

    woman: Who?

    me: Diane Sumner

    woman: Who?

    me: Extension 208?

    woman: What do you want?

    me: Umm, I need to speak to the person who handles The Oaks, is that no longer Diane?

    woman: Who is this?

    me: I… I… Who is managing The Oaks now?

    woman: I don’t know, this is the operator.

    me: What?

    woman: The OP ER A TOR. You’ve called the operator.

    me: Oh. So, I didn’t reach Crown Management?

    woman: Yes, this is Crown Management, but it is the operator.

    me: Okay. So, can I speak to Diane Sumner?

    woman: She isn’t available.

    me: Okay. Well, can I leave a voicemail?

    woman: No.

    me: Oh… When will she be available?

    woman: I don’t know, they didn’t tell me when they would be available.

    me: Oh…

    woman: I can take a verbal message.

    me: I… whatever, that’s okay. (it has veered too far off script and I’ve had enough, so it is just time to hang up)

    And, while I am not sure anybody will understand this. This essentially sums up for me, exactly what it is like to use the phone. Always.

    ETA: It actually went off script for me as soon as a person answered the phone. Normally when I call that number, I get a phone tree system that allows me to just type in the extension of the person I wish to reach, or I can look them up in the directory by last name.

  • posting from my phone

    The mobile interface is very limited. Hopefully I will have a new and better phone tomorrow. I really hope to have internet installed on Monday.

    Woke up to fire news from the place I am honestly still thinking of as “home”, and have continued to monitor the situation all day. Just exchanged some txtmsgs with my neighbor a few minutes ago.

    Unpacking is going slowly. Climate adjustment is also going slowly. My skin hates the change.

    Dogs are… annoying. Indy hates the weather and in her typical weather hating response is going on bathroom strikes. London caught a possum in the backyard, and now only wants to catch more things, and is also becoming a bathroom problem, because he is too busy looking for something to catch and doesn’t want to waste time pooping. Great. I fear for the carpet.

    The cats are doing great.

    The fish is still alive.

    It has been warmer the past two days than it was when we first got here, but is still on the chilly side.

    Wonderful friend arrives on Monday to provide us with a week of company and unpacking help.

    On Monday they are predicting a high of 29 degrees. I hope wonderful friend brings warm clothes.

    I predict I will cook a lot more soup here.