<yawn> G'morning all! Hi Cookie from Louisiana! Some day I'll give you my super-quick-not-to-be-believed Jambalaya recipe. Let me introduce myself. I'm Ellabella from Massachusetts, and I'm on probation with this here herd. New, doncha know? As you may have surmised from her reference to me as her "best buddy", Cowpernia is especially fond of me, and I'm sure is going to advocate, eventually, for me to become a permanent cow. (Hiya Cowp - how're you doing today? :hug: )

I haf' to go get my bath (I am not a shower person) and head down the highway to work, but just wanted to stop by and say "welcome back".

This, incidentally, is our 38th day of rain, and despite my pleadings, my DH has yet to build an ark. Okay maybe not the 38th. We may have a little "wiggle room", but one hates to be last-minute about these things.

My khats are dysfunctional. We got them both from a shelter, and both had been abandoned. They have PTSD, and we've been working with them to demonstrate that humans can be trusted and shouldn't be feared. They're actually much better than they were. I DO try to keep humanity's less humane side from them....don't expose them to reports about Iraq or talk shows like Imus's. Sometimes I worry that we're coddling them TOO much - that we're giving them a false sense of security, but it's actually rather pleasant communing with creatures who are *above* it all. (Above me, too, but those complaints can wait for another time).

Have a lovely day, all..

Ella :coffee:

This Va Tech story is mind numbing. They're saying right now that he showed "not the signs of a lunatic but the signs of a psychopath." Is that helpful information? We just need to know how to keep our babies safe.

It's so sweet that Ell collected khats with ptsd. (Kiwi .. what is that?) I will suggest tough love in dealing with them. Make them pay consequences. If they spill their food off the dish, give them a little dust broom. If they scratch the furniture, get rid of the furniture so they have to sit on the floor.

How can those news people keep showing closeups of kids and teachers crying? They zoom right in and wait while the reporter probes their despair.

In the old days, one became a permanent cow by being named by Lush. Now that Lush has dumped us, I don't know what to do. I will think. Cookie, did Lush name you??? Or try to anyhow. (Can't someone just go to Lush's house and get her?)

Cookie! Yay!

I'm working on a gigantic paper that I hope will eventually become my dissertation proposal, so I've been invisible lately.

Peachie, I followed your story about Z. Wow. I'm so glad he's recovering!

Wabby, congratulations on your new grandbaby on the way!

Gotta go... paper is due today (or, at least one incarnation.)

Oh, and now we're homeschooling DS11. As of today.

Originally Posted by Cowpernia:
She reached down, took his arm and SWUNG HIM from as far as she could reach til he was the the shelf. He put the toy back and she SWUNG HIM back on to his mat. It was monkey like and very effective but disturbing. However, they are horrible and I don't know how to control them.

Hey, if the arm didn't come out of the shoulder socket, where's the harm, eh? :fr:

Originally Posted by ellabella:
My khats are dysfunctional. We got them both from a shelter

Only one of mine is from the shelter; she's the weird one. The other was abandoned, along with her sister, in our yard at the age of perhaps 5 weeks. Too young to know any better, they settled right in and took over the house. The sister was hit by a car :( but Piney is 13 years old and still very much the queen of the house.

I worry about Jet sometimes; she watches an awful lot of cop shows. Do you think she will become violent? Do you think she will ask for video games for her birthday?

Originally Posted by Cowpernia:
ptsd. (Kiwi .. what is that?)

psst: post traumatic stress disorder

Originally Posted by Cherry Cow:
Oh, and now we're homeschooling DS11. As of today.

Whoa, that will take a big chunk of your time, eh? Good luck on your paper (maybe you and ds can write papers together!)

We used to talk about homeschooling DD when she was young, but I knew it would be a constant struggle. She always bristled every time I asked her about her homework, like I had some nerve "questioning" her. Good thing she was highly self-motivated. I should say "is" -- she now won't consult us about what classes she's going to take each semester. She will generously :rolleyes: let us know what she's "thinking about" taking, but won't tell us what she's decided on until after it's a done deal. Independent little sh*t.

It is a gorgeous day here :sunny: -- just bright and sunny and I should get outside. Well, for more than the morning tennis ball throwing ritual. Finally, the rain seems to have stopped. Maybe the snow will melt before June.

Yes, I do remember the day Lush named me -- she came up with Bunny, but I changed it to Wabbit.

I know news reporters are necessary, but they are pretty much vermin. I say this from experience. They have no qualms about calling and calling ppl who are going through the most traumatic experience of their life in hopes of catching you disintegrating. Makes such fascinating human interest stories.

Hey Cookie! good to "see" you! :mag:

Cherry, what are your reasons for homeschooling? Whatever they are, I admire your parental devotion.

Here's my animal story for the day --- My Dotty dog had a lump on her side that the vet said was probably a fatty cyst. It's been there for about 3 years. About a week ago it started changing to a darkened color, so I'd made an appointment for next week to have it removed. Well--- yesterday when I went home this tumory looking thing had erupted and was hanging by a nasty chunk of flesh. It's about 1" in diameter, so I called the vet and asked to bring her right in --- long story, short---- they removed it, biopsied it, now he's talking about removing a large area of skin around it. I hope it's benign. I don't want to lose my doggie. The vet said he'd never seen anything like it before, where the tumor erupted through the skin on it's own. She now has a huge crater on her side that will take forever to heal up. Gross. $485 and if they have to do further surgery, who knows how much........ and my other doggie, Lucas is getting sooooo old and arthritic. Why do they have to get old so soon? My doggies prefer "The Dog Whisperer" to violent shows or the news.

It's bright and sunny today here, too, Kiwonk. :cool: Finally!

My first Belgian had one of those fat deposits. It never changed as far as I know. That is pretty gross -- I wonder if Dotty worried at it, chewed it or something. If it itched, that wouldn't be surprising. I hope she's okay.

I'm appalled at what passes for "news"; most of the time I just can't watch it, or it seems, even read it online. Do I really want to look at the vicious face of that sick ******* from the hate video he put together? I do not, and I don't even have any connection to the people who were massacred by him. I can't bring myself to turn on the TV news; that was on an article on Yahoo. Thanks a lot Yahoo.

There's been a lot of analysis of why the national news media has gotten so horrid, and the conclusions seem to be 1) the 24 hour news cycle -- how do you fill in all that time? With lurid video and by interviewing everyone who will talk to you; and 2) the merging of news and entertainment by the big media companies. News departments used to have some credibility and took pains to maintain that; now they're required to be entertaining and have pretty much given up on substance, I guess.

The other night I was watching the local news and I have to say that is disappointing in its own way. For us, local covers most of the state of Maine, so I wasn't surprised to see a lot of coverage of the damage to the coast and southern parts of the state early this week from the really bad storms. What I couldn't figure out was why they were interviewing a man who had something to do with an area that didn't get hit by the storm. Seriously, "no, we were lucky, the storm didn't do any damage in our area." An in-person interview, not over the phone, broadcast on the evening news. Well, we didn't have any damage here either, maybe I should call them up and let them know the breaking news... They could take video of our mud.

Kiwi

I absolutely KNOW that life was at one time, kinder and gentler. And if it wasn't, people had the good sense to keep it to themselves! Oh, I'm sort of half-kidding, of course, but at the same time, I guess I'm at least half-serious, as well. Becoming more global should be a good thing, shouldn't it? I mean, now that we can communicate instantaneously with people on the other side of the earth, never mind a few states away, shouldn't we become more knowledgeable about - and thus more tolerant of other people, other cultures, other world-views? Shouldn't all of this ease in communicating lead to increased cooperation? Less conflict? After all, hasn't it always been a lack of understanding that has led to intolerance and alienation between groups??? Shouldn't we be exposed to different points of view; shouldn't we learn all we possibly can? Isn't knowledge power???? Don't we, the public, have a RIGHT to know all the sordid details, and shouldn't a responsible - and responsive - media give them to us?????
I wonder. I wonder how kids who misbehaved 50 years ago managed to grow up into reasonably functional adults before anybody ever thought of labeling them as having ADHD...I wonder why it is that child abuse statistics, for example, reflect such a frightening INCREASE in child abuse cases. Could it be that there was just as much child abuse in the past, only it was (a) called "discipline", or (b) nobody mentioned it. I wonder how people who are filthy rich today - and getting richer; especially those $%$#@*&^%$ CEO's of the big oil companies who collect billion-dollar BONUSES because we're paying over $3 a gallon for GAS - I wonder how THEY can justify spending billions of dollars buying sports teams, having freaking STADIUMS named after them, having homes in twenty-five different places when that money could probably end homelessness and hunger once and for all.
Ooops. Gotta wind down this tirade. It's depressing, though, isn't it? The way humanity just seems to get worse instead of better? And maybe it doesn't. Maybe good and decent folks have ALWAYS been in the minority. And, of course, there's no news coverage of good and decent folks, so we really have no way of knowing how many of them are out there.
We sure do hear about people like Cho-whatsisname, tho. More than we ever wanted or needed to.
Lucky us.
Progress. Yay!!!!
Blah.

I'm going to go work off some of this vitriol on my trimrider.

TTFN,

Ella :dizzy:

How socratic of you!

But here is the real question: Is it a pan of brownies with a yummy vanilla glaze? Or is it our driveway? You decide.

There's dog hair on the brownies.

how can we be lovers if we can't be friends?

I don't know but I'm flattered.

My driveway looks like rocky road ice cream
 

Make tea, not war. :hug: And send a thank you note afterwards.

Originally Posted by Cowpernia:
In the old days, one became a permanent cow by being named by Lush. Now that Lush has dumped us, I don't know what to do. I will think. Cookie, did Lush name you??? Or try to anyhow. (Can't someone just go to Lush's house and get her?)

Luscious didn't name me, so perhaps I was only tolerated. :dizzy: I was Cookie Monster waaay back at the now defunct CyberMom website.

Cherry you have my admiration. I do not home school, I don't think my kids or I would survive it. Last week they were on spring break which we spent in Arkansas with my mother so her main sitter could have some time off. This week one or more of them have been home everyday due to illness. How is a girl supposed to save up their strength for summer vacation if they won't go to school?

Originally Posted by Kiwonk:
How socratic of you!
But here is the real question: Is it a pan of brownies with a yummy vanilla glaze? Or is it our driveway? You decide.

I know, I know. Just think of me sitting here in my cave, scairt to death of the shadows.
Sorry, ennyhoo, about the ranting.
Sometimes I rant.
I will seek counseling.
I promise.

As for the brownies (it most certainly IS a picture of brownies) I am hesitant to do so, but feel that I must point out that you didn't spread the glaze evenly. Betty Crocker would not approve, and Martha Stewart would be quick to cut up those puppies, put a sprig of something colorful on each one, and start a new domestic fad.

I'm sorry that our little group is having relationship issues. Again, I feel I must interject: "Why can't we all just get along???" (needs to be said in a whining, sniveling and essentially insincere tone)

Friends? Lovers? Some combination thereof? Hmmmmm and ahah!

Where the heck is Schatzi!!! Has anyone spoken to her outside this site? Everything's okay with her, right?

ONE more day at work! <groan> My kiddles came over last night even tho my actual birthday gala is scheduled for Saturday. Lovely of them, but this morning I's dragging.....

TTFN,

Ella :dizzy:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EVE ELLA! I HEAR WE ARE HAVING GOOD WEATHER ON THE EAST COAST THIS WEEKEND!! THAT SHOULD BE GOOD!---i should get out and start cleaning up my garden---it looks horrendous-----all grey and lots of grungy leaves----my daffy down dilly's are trying to poke through that mess---but it's been so effin cold around here.------hey kiwonkers--the snow has disappeared here and there are flooding problems up river starting to cause trouble-----your mudslide is adorable---did you hear about the slides in newfoundland----quite horrible and shocking!!!peoples homes sliding into the sea--they even showed it on nbc news this morning----