Shall we pick this up again??

Hrmm, now 3 years later and was required to sign in to post to a faux-cousin's blog.  I suppose there could be an advantege in revival.  I won't bore Facebook with extended tyrades and yet I can keep in some of the details that I might take out of my tumblr that no one knows i have.  Ok, they know, I just don't tell people which one is mine so that I can be more experimental.  A place for writing and other things I keep anonymously public ;)  Let's see how this goes.

Dating Adventures?

Ok, so I mistakenly signed up for e-harmony, then foolishly signed up for match.com, and rounded it all up by signing up for plenty of fish.

I say mistakenly because this e-harmoney thing feels so serious. It costs quite a bit, requires a lot of time and so far seems to have yielded zero results. The closest I've got to a date out of this place was a guy who was going to drive all the way from Houston just to meet me for coffee, plus he was moving to some other state...but that wasn't a deal-breaker. Let me just say a little yikes because we didn't correspond that much and never spoke on the phone. I don't know if I am just lazy, but I would never drive hours upon hours to meet someone for coffee, then turn around and go home, unless there was already a really terrific relationship built up via emails and phone calls.

Sigh... that site I think is designed for the marrying-types, i.e. people who are hard-core looking for their (ick, I hate this term) "soul-mate."

In a bout of desperation I signed up for a year's worth of service, because it was cheaper, like buying a 5-gallon jar of mayonnaise at Costco. I will just have to remember to cancel the subscription when it get's near to the expiration because I've heard, that "for your convenience" the auto-renew your subscription. Wow, thanks e-harmony...I know you only have my best interests at heart...

So then, I was thinking, maybe match.com would be a little lighter, and so far it seems to have been. Except for the fact that I went out on a first date with a lunatic, who didn't show himself as a lunatic until after the date was over, and now I'm a bit gun-shy, and maybe getting uber-picky. Like no boring people, no wierdness, no craziness, no awkwardness. If I have to roll my eyes at anything other than a bad pun or joke, you are the weakest link...goodbye!

Just as a little taste of the craziness of this one-date wonder, or at least what happened afterwards, please read on, and you'll see why I'm a little freaked to go out with anyone wever again, although I am grateful this was through the website and there was no exchange of any personal info beyond the profile stuff...

July 21 (we went for lunch out July 18)
SUBJECT: Sunday
Hi Karin,
I enjoyed your company on Sunday. I hope I was good looking enough for you, and that I didn't talks about money too much. I should have replied sooner, sorry about that. I figured it was your turn with the email, so to speak, and I kind of liked taking a break from the nightly pressure. To be honest, there could have been more chemistry, but like I said in my profile that's not the most important thing to me, and I know I'm not the hottest guy out there. What are your thoughts? Would you like to give it another try?
Bryan

July 25
SUBJECT: Explanation Owed
Karin,
I spent a lot of time composing emails to you. You were very enthusiastic about meeting me, and now you won't even give me the time of day? I deserve to know what happened on Sunday or thereafter that made you do a 180, and the real reason, not a bullshit one. If it's my looks, you are supposed to tell a man when he directly asks if it's that. Is it? If so, what exactly turned you off. I've had 7k worth of work done already. If you think I've lied to you, you are wrong, but please tell me what it is so I can defend myself. I was joking about boycotting the Gap. I assume you don't have a grievance against me as I have treated you with respect. Please return the favor so I can work to improve my dating experience.
Bryan

July 25
SUBJECT: Re: Explanation Owed
Bryan,
I have been busy and it's only been a week since we went out. Looks have nothing to do with it. I don't think our personalities nor senses of humor really click. Your email only solidified those thoughts. I believe the first emails exchanged were superficial enough that we could check-off similar boxes/interests, but that is not what makes a connection.

I believe you have a bit of a hang-up with your looks. I am returning the favor (as you said) and am being completely honest to help you with your dating experience... The repetetive selfdeprication regarding your looks is not an attractive quality. The repeated emails asking me why I haven't replied to you within the week are draining. I actually have a lot going on and at times I don't have the time nor energy to respond to emails right away...I am getting ready to leave the country again this week so you'll forgive me that responding to your emails wasn't top of the list. Using phrases like "you are supposed to" are also a turn-off. No one likes to be told what to do by someone who is barely more than a stranger. The questioning and the assumptions and demanding the real reason is a little odd when we've only met once, it's only been a week since we've last met and you don't really have any "rights" on what I do or say and the words sound like undercurrents of fear, anger and self-doubt.

I don't mean to hurt your feelings because we did have a nice time. But for me a nice time doesn't really cut it - that's not what I am looking for because I have more than a nice time with the friends I already have. It's not to do with you nor I, but I don't think there would be any possibility of even a decent friendship between us.

I wish you luck in your dating search and again, the feedback was only based on my feelings and my experiences as you so kindly requested. Take it or leave it.

Have a good week.
Karin

July 25
SUBJECT: Re: Explanation Owed
Thanks Karin. Is there anything that I said or did BEFORE today? The pelican remark was a dig at both the rescuers and the hunters, and your reply seemed like a non sequitur. Why was my personality OK in email but not in person? I have a migraine condition and that sometimes causes me to appear disinterested, anxious, etc., even though my words indicate otherwise. Was that a factor? It didn't seem like it to me.

As far as your complaints about my email go, I'll work on being a little less testy, but the rest we'll have to disagree on.

I don't think I told you that I went to Australia for 9 1/2 weeks last year for the abusive bigot that I worked for. That was very stressful, and I was glad to make it back safely after he fired me for refusing to go back for another 6 weeks.
Bryan

July 26
SUBJECT: Re: Re: Explanation Owed
When I said you're supposed to be honest about my looks, that was because the owner of a dating service said so to the females in a seminar I attended.

I come away from this thinking that my tone and my mannerisms in person do not live up to expectations. People think they are so good at reading mannerisms, sigh.

If the talk about my looks were a deal breaker, it would be because I were unable to control my Tourette's-like proclivity to blurt out "I'm ugly", or you would simply accept my promise to stop talking about it.

I take it you meant that all of the emails were superficial, but that doesn't explain what exactly I said or did on Sunday that made you so sure there would be no possibility of a decent friendship between us. I'm pretty sure I didn't say a word about my looks until three days after that Sunday.

It costs $80,000 to clean an otter of oil (from an Exxon Valdez study) and 2/3 of the cleaned ones dies within two years (or was it one year?). Jon Stewart made fun of these people too. Pelicans are not endangered species. Is one animal's value more than another because it is more sentient, or because people like it more? Hence the "non sequitur" label.

You seem to have good managerial skills. I like that, but I didn't sense that you grasped how distinguished I am. I guess I still struggle with how to communicate that without appearing stuck up.

There were not "repeated emails" asking you why you haven't contacted me. There was just one, a whole week after you didn't take five minutes to say. "I'm really busy now planning for my trip, sorry".

I demanded the real reason, because I know that everyone thinks they're supposed to be polite. It was not personal. In fact, your unconventional and counter-culture interests indicated hope that you were not a typical meme carrier.

Have you read _How to Win Friends and Influence People_? I have. Your manager speak indicates that you probably have.

I want to confess I am an athiest. I'm agnostic about as much as I think Zeus might exist.

I may have been a little unenthusiastic Sunday because your age went up in your profile, from 35 to 36, and I was a little concerned that you had lied. After checking your sign, I figured you probably had not, but I still think it's a little wierd you didn't mention your birthday to me. Age is the most common thing women lie about (for men it's income).

It took so much less time to think all those thoughs than to write them. That is truly just the tip of the iceburg. Have a good time with your friends though, I'm sure they're all members of Triplle Nine Society too.
Bryan

He unfavorited me after that.

Now my goal is... a date with a pleasant, humorous, intelligent, not crazy guy. I mean I just want a freakin fun/nice night out. Is that too much to ask?!?!

So, I decided to check out Plenty of Fish. It's free. Now I know that perhaps by paying for a service, you may get a better quality of matches, however given that e-harm seems to be going nowhere quickly, and match.com, while less expensive, yielded crazy Bryan, who as a friend of mine reminded me, should probably befriend crazy Dmitri of blog voicemail fame, then I figured why not, I've already spent $$$ on other sites, so try out the freebie.

I've already been chatted up a few times within 24 hours of signing up. Not sure if I dig it or not. One guy was like hey, do you have Yahoo messenger? I said no. He said ok, can I text you sometime? I said umm, I don't know anything about you so sorry, but I'm not going to give you my telephone number to text me. He's like ok, no prob, good luck.

Am I getting old, and/or grouchy, or are people just socially retarded? What happened to the art of converstaion and getting to know someone a bit before exchanging more personal information. And why are some people so ridiculously boring? Do they really believe that what they are saying is interesting or attractive subject matter to anyone but themselves? Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesh.

So let's hope things get better from here. I mean I know there are interesting people around here. I've got some terrific male friends who are interesting, funny, etc. so it's not like they don't exist, I guess I just need to wade through the swamp of crazies and snorefests...

Hasta prontoooooooooo
POF
yahoo? text?

Random Thoughts on a Sunday...

1. The garden looks good so far. No plants have died, 2 of 3 tomato plants are flowering and I bought a jasmine plant too. Yay!

2. Went salsa dancing last night at Gloria's. I was wary because I'm a bit of a snob and don't dig the dance-school-cult crowd, but it turned out to be great fun. I've got the aching feet today to prove it. Next Friday we might try La Joya for something new, at least new to me. Funny thing is that I danced with a Honduran for quite awhile, and although it was pretty loud and hard to hear, he told me I was going to marry him. I asked him if he had a green card, because I needed one. hehehe Ok, so technically I would need to marry a citizen rather than a greencard holder but I didn't want to say I needed to marry a legal citizen. Kinda funny and he didn't even run off at that point, although shortly after I told him I was difficult, he excused himself to the bathroom and I never saw him again. Like I have told people many a time, I suck at the dating scene.

3. Speaking of dating scene, I've got lots of matches on eharmony but now I have to decide if I am up for the financial commitment. That's the rub. You can create a profile and see your matches, but you can't communicate with them unless you subscribe. The subscription part is a bit of a scam too because they really, really, really try to rope you in for a 1-year commitement by making the 3-month package or the one-month trial a lot more expensive. The catch is that they bill you up front, so although they say it's like $23 or $49 or whatever a month, it's all paid when you subscribe. Or, if you go for a 12-month plan, you can have it spread out over 3 payments. My real problem with this is that I am a bit of a cheapskate and have commitment issues in signing up for 12 months for a service I have never used before, but it hurts me to thing of paying 25% of a 12-month deal for the 1-month trial. And all for the plasure of "dating." Arg. I kind of loath the idea and yet I don't meet enough new people in day to day life to get even 1 date, so here I am stuck...

4. Yay, a swallow just landed on my balcony as I am writing this. I love watching their acrobatic flight shows.

5. Legend of the Seeker is a repeat!! And I mean a repeat of a repeat! Arg. I guess that means I should probably get my act together, put on some clothes and get some groceries today. Oooo, Whole Foods here I come!!

6. Don't you hate it when the pharmacy doesn't remind you that your prescription is about to or has already run out?!? Now I have to try and get my doctor to refill or at least give me a bridge one til I can get in for an appointment. I wish someone would have told me sooner. I mean I know it's my responsability too to look at the number of refills remaining on the tag, but some help, even a mention of it just once near the end from the pharmacy team would have been nice. Sigh...

That's all I have for now. Just a lazy Sunday...

And so begins the gardening season...

I finally broke down and got my shite together to get my balcony garden going. After hitting a local farmers' market and picking up some eggplant, basil and an heirloom tomato plant, I rounded out yesterday at Home Depot. I now have onions, cucumber, zucchini, tomato, sweet pepper and I think that's it. And after some advice from the guy @ the GreenSpot F.M., everything should be set up and planted today! Yay! I just hope that the 10-day or so trip to Germany doesn't kill them in June...

I will post pictures shortly. I think this year will be dedicated to food-producing plants over flowering beauties.

On another front, I just created a profile on e-Harmony... what a drag! It took so long to complete and I don't even know if I like what I've said. I know it's changeable, I just don't know if I am ready for the dating games to begin. Also, cheapskate side of me says why spend money on this thing. We shall see how it pans out.

And lastly, on the hedgehog front, Trickles, (tribute to Pickles), who had been suffering from significant swelling in his lower jaw, is on his last couple of days of antibiotics. Good news is that the swelling seems to be gone and he's none the worse for the wear, beyond being a mighty pissed off creature who has had to endure twice-daily syringes of medicine in the mouth. Other good news? The penecillin-based meds did not give me any kinds of problems either.

Ooh, I just remembered, I have to call a local artist to see if I can pick up a couple of his magnets. He's an amazing metal artist/welder who creates wickedness and also does a lot of calavera-themed objets d'art. Will post pictures soon also. Look at me promising to do things hehehe we'll see how that works out.

Just over 2 years since...

Wow, it has been a long stretch. In a few brief words, here's where we find ourselves today...

Karin is living and working in Dallas and back on the singles scene (arg).
Loves her job for the most part even though it can be a drag some days.
Trickles is now nearly 3 and Karin and Trickles are living with 2 of Trickles' 5 illegitimate Hoglettes.
Karin is slowly starting to find some coolio and off-the-beaten path areas and scenes in Dallas.
Karin just got back from Chile for work and is heading back home for a mini-break next weekend.

Must clean the apartamento, which has been suffering since the return from Chile last week followed by a bout of Westie flu.

Am now on the search for some cool new arsty type friends and hipster/rocker knitters to get me back into the groove of creativitay.

Ok, enough with the disjointed blurbs. Am trying to get back into this as an alternative to the quick n dirty Facebook status changes. Stay tuned for the latest!!!

All Bran Strawberry Medley - the Frankenberry for Grown-Ups?

Ok, tell me I am not the only person who has found a pleasantly eery similarity between these two marvelous products...

Frankenberry tastes fruitlicious (Ok, I haven't had this for maybe 20 years and don't even know if it is still available), but fruitilicious of the berry variety, not the Fruity Pebbles variety.

All Bran Strawberry Medley tastes fruitilicious of the berry variety and has cool pieces of dehydrated strawberries that are like sponges until rehydrated by milk - perhaps this camouflages the mildly cardboard-like flavour of high-fibre cereals.

Frankenberry turns cereal milk pink and makes it like strawberry milk.

All Bran Strawberry Medley turns cereal milk pink and makes it taste like strawberry milk.

Frankenberry is part of your complete breakfast (read: add juice, toast, an egg and an apple to round it out).

All Bran Strawberry Medley IS your complete breakfast (I mean really, it's serving size is a whopping 1.5 cups and has 10g of fibre...10 grams!!!!).

Frankenberry was marketed to children in the 70s and 80s.

All Bran Strawberry Medley is marketed to people who want to live to be older than 70 or 80.

Ok, that statement was just to be cute and flippant. What I was getting at is now that us children of the era of ultra-sugary cereals (some of which were only ever rare treats because some parents didn't let us have sugary cereals - maybe that's why I turned out the way I did, mom) are of the age to perhaps have children of our own who we'd like to see grow up, or else are at least realizing that we should maybe look after ourselves a little better, and yet we can't quite give up our sugary-cereal-craving inner child.

I realize that Frankenberry was made by General Mills, but Kellogg's has really picked up the ball and made a wicked transition cereal, both sweet-ish and milk flavouring, yet fiberiffic and not an acrid shade of pink.

Kudos to you All Bran Strawberry Medley - and I don't hand those out often!!

PS

PS, Photos of Trickles to follow forthwith...then you'll be able to see how much he looks like his mom, Susan, complete with extra-long, extra-prickly quills.

Back in Black

Alrighty Folks...
It's time to get this back into gear on this Holiest of Sundays (Note to Karin, it has been 15 years and since she witnessed, family in tow, the "parade" - read procession, my bad on the translation gaffe, in Amalfi, complete with the whole, no electricity, completely silent crowd and dead body on platform - very mystically).

So many many things have happened since the last post that it is worth a brief explanation...

Number one, especially because of the nature of this blog and its title, my poor little Pickles has passed on, and in fact, I am looking out over his grave while writing this, in the beautiful foothills of Southern Alberta (a la Brokeback Mountain scenery - breathtaking!, though sad because I can't go visit because of a stubborn, icy snowdrift/bank that has him frozen deep and moderately inaccessible).

It was early summer of 2007 and Pickles' lump had been removed once, and it came back. After a visit to the vet's, the lump could have been removed again, but only in a palliative role - Pickles' days were numbered. So in an effort to make him comfortable and also avoid the poor pet sitter having to potentially come across a dead little hedgehog in her care, I decided to take Pickles back from whence he came.

At this point he wasn't much for food, but at least he was drinking. He was able to finally meet his girlfriend Susan, and in fact, spent the last few days of his life with her. Given that she had become a young/teenage mother (without us knowing until a peeping sound emerged from under her blankets and two little spiky walnuts appeared - and here we just though she was a giant, piggy, bitch of a hedgehog hehehe), she was partial to mothering little Pickles, who was quite weak, but who managed to gather enough energy to run away from her every now and again.

Unfortunately this was the last bit of spry-ness to burst forward from little Pickles. He couldn't really walk, he stopped drinking and eating and slept a lot. He even became cuddly, which, as cute as it might have been, was definitely a bad sign from the formerly feisty little insectivore. Jonathan made it "easy" (it wasn't easy, but having support and reinforcement was very important) to call the vet and make an appointment to put the little guy down.

I spent some precious moments with him, cuddling him and talking to him. It might sound a bit much for such a small little guy, but it was something I had to do. I felt a certain kindred spirit with the little guy.

We went to the vet and had him put down. Days later we took him down, home on the range, for a proper burial, with parents and in-laws present. He now rests in a beautiful cigar box, next to his companion for eternity, Dory the defunct siamese fighting fish, who had been in the freezer till this fateful day.

Fast forward a few days and when Karin returned to the Rott, she brought one of Susan's babies with her, as a new companion. Certainly not a replacement, but good company nonetheless (although I have to say that Susan taught this little guy to curl up into a ball and poke his prickles up too well - I thought Pickles had an attitude - let me tell you!!!).

And my latest little hedgehog's name?

TRICKLES MCCLANE - Trickles as a tribute to Pickles, and MacLane as a tribute to John McClane, aka Bruce Willis in the Die Hard series of films, because Trickles has a penchant for the dramatic, the bold, the adventurous, and has the grappling hook claws to prove it.

And on that note, I must retire to have a lovely Easter brunch. So cheers to you little Pickles, may you have all the adventures you desire up in hedgehog heaven.

Before signing off, I leave you with a note of explanation. Prior to this post, Pickles had been authoring this blog. With his unfortunate demise and Trickles' lack of natural ability with words and the English language in general (his talents lie eslewhere), I have taken over the voice ove the Grand Adventures of Karin and Pickles. I am not sure if the title will or should change or if I should keep it true to the roots. Only time will tell.

Until then, viva los hedgehogs!!!!