Not really a book review.. more of a gripe session..

Source

Have you ever read a book and wondered, "Why the hell did I just waste those hours of my life? I'll never get those back, dammit!" Well, I bought this book because.. Hello! It has dogs in it, right? Most people who write about animals in their books (from my experience) have a sense of humor and they are fun reads.

NOT this book, and for the love of everything that is my great followers, DO NOT click on the source and buy the damn thing. I'll mail you my copy if you want it that bad. I don't want to give that author any more cha-ching. I didn't want to put the source on there, but I didn't want the copyright police all over me someday.

Anyway.. To begin with, this author obviously has a word-of-the-day calendar on her freaking desk! I read this in paper form before my Kindle so I couldn't look up all the big damn words she decided to put on pretty much every page. I mean you wouldn't believe some of the things she would stick in odd places. I consider myself a pretty well-educated person so I don't normally need to look things up. If nothing else, I can usually figure out what a word means from the context. With her, it was like she just wanted to challenge herself to see how many of these off-the-wall words she could put in there.

My next problem was the storyline. It is supposed to be about a group of people who hang out at the dog park and one of them goes missing. So the others decide to try to find out what happened to her. I thought it was be humorous. NOT! These people were just plain strange, and not in a quirky, fun kinda way either. I wanted them ALL to be missing by the end of the book. And I won't even BEGIN to tell you how freaking stupid the ending of the book was!

In closing on that topic, do not waste your time on this book. A friend at work heard me bitching about it one day so she picked on me like crazy every time she saw me with it after that. I just had to give the author the benefit of the doubt and finish the damn thing. Yeah, I'm that kinda stupid. I just wanted to warn you all since I knew many of you love to read and are animal lovers. Oh, and if you are a writer, this might be a tool of how NOT to write a novel. (I'll feel really bad if the author stumbles onto this post, but maybe she'll change some things in her next novels.)

While we are talking about dumb things, wanna see the wonderfully stupid thing my town did?

Beautiful entrance to an industrial park, right?

Do you know what this expensive little project leads to? Absolutely NOTHING! It is simply an entrance and turnaround to what they hope will someday, maybe, if we pray really hard, industrial park. We have companies leaving our little town, but this is where we'll put our Obama incentive money, by God! Heaven forbid we fix the stinking highway that runs right through the town so I'm not hitting a million holes on the way home every day. I'm so proud that this is where my tax dollars went. Aren't you?

Okay, I'm done with my rants for the day. I have two article critiques to do by tonight, so I better get crackin'.

Did I mention it's freakin' cold outside?!

While we are all freezing our ta-tas and cha-chas off outside, I thought I would give you all this visual. I found this cartoon somewhere several years ago, and I keep it on my peg board at work. (I think it was actually in a safety magazine.)

But anyway.... I must say that while I am shivering in the smoking area at work, if I hear one more person who walks by saying, "Wow, you are really dedicated!" I'm going to stab them with a letter opener. Do they not realize that the only thing we are dedicated to is keeping them alive and not going to jail for killing them? I mean, we smoke outside for their health, right? And if I didn't smoke sometimes, I would really want to go after some people with an office tool. So what would you think is the real dedication? Please think of this the next time you are walking into a nice warm, comfy building and being "cute" to the poor smokers who are standing outside.

This PSA was brought to you by the Talkative Taurus. She only asks that you be nice to your fellow men and women who are smokers, as being anything but nice could cause you physical harm. You might even want to thank them!

Should I reproduce? .. Animal lovers chime in!

Okay, now that I look at it, that title is a bit creepy. No, I am NOT reproducing with animals because that would just be gross. However, the only way my household will grow at this point is by having more pets (unless Mister Right falls out of the sky.. Ha!.. Holding my breath for that one!). I am one of those whose pets are a part of the family though.

Since I have been volunteering on the board for our pitiful animal shelter, everyone keeps trying to get me to take more animals home with me. I currently have a bird (not from the shelter) and my Bailey (who came from the shelter 2 years ago). While I would love to have another dog, I really don't think my landlord would appreciate that, and I don't think that would be fair when I don't have a fenced yard for them to play in. However, I have been considering getting a cat.

"Rescue me, Krissy. Please!"

Now I used to be a dog and cat person. Over the years, I have pretty much just been a dog person. The thought of having a cat climbing on my kitchen counters does not appeal to me. I thought a cat might be a good addition to the house to help entertain Bailey, though she goes ape-shit over cats she sees outside. I didn't consider it any further because of the bird.

On Black Friday when we were having breakfast, Mom was reminding Dad that she misses her bird and wants one for Christmas. I looked at her and suggested she take my Petey. She said she couldn't believe I'd give him up. Now they have kept Petey for me on occasion, and he LOVES my parents, especially Dad. This Cockatiel will give me a headache when he comes home from staying with them because Dad whistles and talks to him all the time! And believe me, he loves my mother just as much because his cage and water bowl have never been so clean as when he stays with them.

So it's been decided she will get Petey for Christmas... or whenever I make the drive again. Merry Christmas to Mom and Petey!

Mom suggested that if I get a cat it should be a kitten even though I wanted to rescue this one cat that has been at the shelter for quite a while. She said she thought it would be an easier transition for Bailey to accept. Do you all agree?

Also, she mentioned that now they have self-cleaning litter boxes. Is this true? I didn't consider the litter box much because the last cat I had rarely used it and went outside to go potty in the mulch. Since this cat would probably not be outside at all (if I can help it), I want something that would be easy, as odor free as possible, and something that Bailey HOPEFULLY won't get into. Although I found some ideas online today about how to keep Bailey out of a little box, no matter what shape or size if I have to resort to it.

What type of cat do you prefer? I have always found that calicoes are the sweetest, but what do you think? Should I get one that similar in color to Bailey so I only have the same type of hair color to worry about? It's been so long since I had a cat, that I need you all to refresh my memory. We have so many up there that need rescued.

I love this Calico, but should I get one of these with her because they are more the color of Bailey?

Please give me your opinions on the whole dog/cat thing, litter boxes, etc. I will try to make the funny posts resume tomorrow. :)

Dropbox

If any of you want to scan and keep documents, or want to save things somewhere that can be accessed no matter where you are, this Dropbox is really cool! If you click on my link, then we both get more storage space, too!

http://www.dropbox.com/referrals/NTExMjgyNzg5OQ

Also, if you want to be able to scan and save things as PDF's, then you can go to this website to download the free software instead of having to buy Adobe Acrobat.

http://cutepdf.com/ (Thanks for that one, Squish! That really comes in handy.)

Ways to make life easier...

Have a created a blogging monster by starting this? Hey, at least the stuff I'm searching for are ways to make my life easier. I found this guy's website while looking at Google Reader. He has a lot of helpful hints about organizing your life and things to make it easier. I scan almost everything at work because I hate having piles of papers if I can avoid it. So why don't I do that at home? A friend of mine gave me the website to use to make PDF's at home, but I'll have to check and let you know what that is if you need it so you don't have to buy Adobe Acrobat. But this guy has some great ideas here and on links coming from this page.

http://simpleorganizedlife.com/using-dropbox-to-manage-files-on-multiple-computers/

Anyway, you know all of those cards you have to carry around to save money at stores. There's an app for that! The only thing I can see that this won't help me with is that I have to use the actual card at the gas station when I redeem my gas perks from Bi-Lo. But other than that, I love the idea!

http://keyringapp.com/

Here are some other ideas he had for iPhone things to help you get organized, too.

http://simpleorganizedlife.com/iphone-apps-that-help-you-get-and-stay-organized/

But you might want to check out his site. He's got a lot of great ideas, and not just about organizing your things.

P.S. See my post from this evening for the link for us to both get more storage space on Dropbox and the link for the website for free PDF software.