Oh No I Spelt Mum Wrong

One of the dogs at work was being fostered for a while. The foster parent wanted a tag made to put on the collar, just in case she got lost.
I know how to work the tag machine without tattooing my fingers with 'Rex', 'Chico' and 'doggie love' to often.

On one side we engraved " Foster Mum" and phone number
on the other was the work address and number

Just as I hit the engrave button, I realised I wrote Mum as Mum not Mom.
The small cultural spelling thang.

I'm a Aussie despite the re education camps they send me to.

CAN TORTOISES CREEP?

We are the now proud owners of two Ferrets. Work got 4 last week.
I'm not sure of the story behind them but they are very well behaved and have no inclination to bite, and i think they must be used to dogs.
We named them Rorschach and Plan B.
We bought a cage over a year ago because it was very cheap and big. Its been sitting in the tomb since then, just in case.
As most of you know we had ferrets in Sydney for 6 years....a love and hate relationship.
We loved them and most everybody else hated them.
We were worried about the dogs. They love chasing Squirrels and leaves and Elks and Lizards and tails.
They are Cattle dog mixes so the whole instinct to eat and/or herd small fast furry things is strong in these ones.
I brought the two males home on Sunday for a test. The dogs were all a quiver.
All nose and tail.


Slowly introduced them....and well no blood shed as yet.
We will keep them in the cage with supervisered outings.
Though me laying on the lounge watching the BBC drama "Waking The Dead" and ignoring the 4 some running around there has been little drama.
Roo is way more interested. She wants everyone and everything to love her so she follows them around tail wagging and crazy blue eyes intent. She is pretty good only with the occasional paw on the head when it gets all to much. Darwin is keen and baffled, but its like another foster pup....
'yeah yeah you will take it back soon, won't you'

I was gooogling "ferret' quotes just to see what was out there...not many it seems.


Virginia Woolf once described Noel Coward as
"clever as a bag of ferrets and trivial as a perch of canaries".
which reminds of me Blackadder 4th happily misquoted.

The Bible.
“These also shall be unclean unto you among the creeping things that creep upon the earth; the weasel, and the mouse, and the tortoise after his kind, / And the ferret, and the chameleon, and the lizard, and the snail, and the mole.”

god dosen't like little critters, now if he mentioned Cockroaches, i may go along with the whole thing...but Moles...oohhh scary.
Tortises, i find them very unclean and ohh so creepy and that slow moving woogly eyed Chameleon stay away or he will cap your arse.
Snails...noooooooodontlookback.

OUTSIDE A DOG, A BOOK (OR LEONARD COHEN) IS YOUR BEST FREIND.

INSIDE A DOG ITS TOO DARK TO READ

Its been a week and a half since seeing Leonard Cohen in Phoenix. Happy me.
I've been waiting for this moment since I was 15 and was not a let down.
He was amazing. I knew he would be.
Flopearedmule best reviews eva
At 74 he had all the energy, verve and strength of voice of a ninja.
Something to be said for 5 years in a Buddhist Monastery.
The voice reverberated through your chest like a uber reverb machine set to 11.
In part of his patter to me, just me of course, no one else was in the room. Went like this
"I've spent many years studying all religions and their philosophies, but cheerfulness kept breaking through...'
And cheerful it was, no "music to die by.." here.
Phoenix review and set list

Just when you thought it all over, the last perfect song to end on, he would skip back in and sing some more. A few saps left probably thinking it was all over and racing to their car...hehe suckers.
It made my 15 year old heart and this 36 year old one all a flutter.
One strong memory I have
Staying in some pub with my parents somewhere in NSW, maybe Rylstone or Denman way.
I had a MAD special collection, thicker than the usual mags, which i was eeking out to last the time, reading a page here and there. Black Spy Vs White Spy etc.
Long before the time of iPod or even CDs, I had my own non musical brain which had to try and remember the tune.
Walking up the dark brown curved stairs of the pub singing "Suzanne' to my room.
"and jesus was a sailor when he walked upon the water..."
Hearing him sing this I could see that pub, the smooth hand rail and me, trying not to read that MAD mag all at once, and singing Len to myself.


Quick camping trip recap. I got sun burnt hiking along the Verde, drove back to Flagstaff in the snow.

To say nothing of the dog

Our battered copy of Jerome K Jerome's 'Three Men In A Boat'.

First taken on a 8 day Overland Trail hike in Tasmania. Where we took turns reading it out loud and giggling.
We still giggle

Camping on the Verde River, Camp Verde, AZ

Dance me to the end of love

SPRING HAS SPRUNG

This is the reason why you don't get lulled by the spate of warm weather and start planting the garden.

Zombies...we all love them.
We all, (don't kid yourself we know you do it) walk, groove or saunter into a Mall, Theatre, Pub, Gun Show and/or Bridal Shower, instantly suss the exits, mentally work out the best on hand weapon and who has the juiciest brainz...brainzzzz for when, not if, the Zombies start the shambling.
This is why I wear comfortable shoes.

Flopeared Mule gave us Zombies years ago. We played it once or twice and then forgot it, but we still shipped it over.

Rob and I have played it twice this week and I have bought 2 expansions off ebay which should turn up soon. Its good fun and I'm not sure why we left it gathering dust. Yes it would be more fun with at least 3 players but we are lacking gamers....so we play what we can get. We are slowly, slowly converting Laura and co to less than usual games. They are coping with Settlers Of Catan, Munchkin, Carcasonne, Franks Zoo and a few others.
Sam who is 8 is a born gamer, she loves playing anything and has the attention span to see most things through, J is 11 and is more flightly. I saw that in my other niece and nephew, she the younger will want to play games and keep at it, while he was a bit distracted.
But any game is a good game...except monopoly
We found 12 Minute Games by Gamewright, who have fun quick card games for 6 and up.
I know most of your little ones are a bit too little yet but worth remembering.

One of the big things I miss is the game nights we had in Sydney. Have not found anywhere near the equivalent.
I miss you guys...


Rob inna kilt