I will never understand someone who complains about people who are so rude that they don’t answer their text messages – and yet, they themselves don’t answer the ones they receive.  Don’t they understand turnabout is fair play?  How childish.   One would think we weren’t dealing with adults here.

I have a friend whose girlfriend broke up with him and he is having a hard time dealing with it.  I understand that, I do.  Right now he is hating all women – lumping us into the same mold that he was complaining just a few days ago that women lumped men into.  I find it childish on his part that he won’t even acknowledge a text saying good morning.  He is sulking and everything and everyone around him suffers collateral damage.   Maybe I am too harsh but I have little patience for this kind of thing.  If he doesn’t feel like talking, he should text and say so rather than ignore my text altogether.  I am not his girlfriend – I am merely a friend…it won’t hurt my feelings if he said I don’t feel like texting today…what bothers me is the silent treatment.  I’m not the one who broke his heart.

I know, women out there are already making excuses for his behavior and probably think I’m being heartless.  But why should I put up with rude behavior? Seriously? It is called CONVERSATION and people have been doing it for centuries.  Don’t give me the rude silent treatment hoping I’ll get the message – open you mouth and tell me damn it.  I’m not fragile, I don’t break – I am not in kindergarten or so young that I’ll shed tears over it. 

When he feels better, he’ll start texting again as if nothing has happened – it has happened like this before.  I will say something to him about this behavior, he will apologize, and we pass it off as “just one of those things” and life will go on as if it were never interrupted.  BUT, it still pisses me off right now – GROW UP already! 

Cap’n Craig Colantoni I actually got a 911 call from an older lady that stated that she need the paramedics out at her house because her husband was having a stroke. She stated that he was in his 70’s and then she told me the one thing i didn’t want to hear, and she said i shouldn’t tell u this but we just got done having oral sex, well com…(yarr)e to find out they did and her husband died as a result of it, Man she must have been good…..

Lady Princess Of Law Enforcement Best call I ever got was a female who wanted the police to respond to a domestic. Of course since she was female and made the call, officers responded. When they got there, she open the door naked as the day she was born, told the police to arrest her husband because this was his 3rd time coming home this week trying t…(yarr)o have sex with her and all 3 times he basically sucked and should be arrested. Needless to say, the police had to arrest her eventually because she just could not understand why they would not arrest him for being the worst lay ever…..

Lady Megan Henley Top call from last night:

0200: Chest Pain
“What’s going on?”
“My heart keeps stopping…the only way I can keep it going is to hit myself in the chest when I feel it stop.”
“Ah ok….are you having any pain?”
“Yeah, right here” (points to central chest)
“When’d that start?”
“After the second time I restarted my heart…”

Lady Dawn Pope heard over the radio this weekend….21yo complaining of a swollen vagina. had it pierced 2 months ago and cant get the piercing out. We almost fell out of the rig laughing

Lady Emily M Kolkmeyer-Wilson One of the junior fighters was bored one weekend so he called in 4 FAKE calls so he could have something to do. Then he lied about it when they figured out it was him because he called from his OWN cell phone.

Lady JayLynn Sharpe Caller (at 2 in the morning and with great anxiety in her voice): There is a cat stuck in my wall! It is meowing and whining in great distress!
Dispatcher: Ok ma’m we will page out animal control
(30 minutes later and after animal control has been woken up and paged out)
Caller: I called earlier about a cat stuck in my w…(yarr)all.. Well see yesterday was my birthday, and my daughter gave me a clock shaped like a cat.. Well I didn’t know when the alarm goes off it meows, so that is what I was hearing.

Lady Brittany Higginbotham My personal favorite happened earlier this week

The following occured in spanish
0340
Hispanic male walks to ambulance… My feet are gone
me: your feet are right there
Him: No, they are gone, like the bottoms of my feet are gone
me: you just walked to the ambulance, cant do that if your feet are gone
Him: (proceeds to remove…(yarr) his unsocked feet from sneakers) See! My feet are gone
me: (gagging) Thats the worst case of atheletes foot Ive ever seen
Him: What do I do?
me: (still gagging) Well I can take you to
Him: No! No hospital, how do I fix it
me: Tinactin, Lamisil
Him: Ok, thats it, thank you

UGH Atheletes foot is NOT a 4 am 911 call people! just FYI

a very interesting day.  I am here at work, it is 7:04 am and I am operating on less than three hours of sleep.  I’m thankful I’m not training today because I wouldn’t have been any good at it.

Went to bed last night around 10:30pm hoping I would get a decent enough amount of sleep.  Well, I was up again by 12:15am because I heard a loud vehicle outside gunning it’s engine and honking it’s horn.  Then there were people laughing and carrying on out on the sidewalk as all the drunks in the next building found their way home (or maybe they were going out…I really don’t know).

Wide awake, but oh so weary, I tossed and turned once they finally left the area returning the night to a soft silence.  At 1am I decided that I wasn’t going back to bed because I was wide awake so I turned on music very low hoping it would be like a lullaby helping me drift off to sleep.  It didn’t.

So 1:30-3am saw me up watching tv.  About 3:15 or so I finally started to feel drowsy so I set the tv to automatically turn off in 30 minutes.  I was about to drift off when Bennie informed me he needed to go outside so I had to get back up for that.  I lay there listening to Columbo until the tv shut off.  Last time I looked at the clock it was 4:04 – drifted off and was awakened around 5am by another car outside delivering papers.  So that was my night.

I got up, walked the dogs again and got ready for work…yippee.  My only consolation is that this is the last day I have to work for the next five so I will have plenty of opportunity to get caught up on my sleep.

Also, I can’t complain too much because one of the officers worked 16 hours yesterday, went home for 8 hours of which he probably slept five, and came back in for another 16.  He is here now until 3pm.  I realize he signed up for the OT but that is still damn brutal.

I know I harp on this a lot but it infuriates to the point of rage when people think they have a right to poach animals off refuges or anywhere.  This kind of thing needs to stop NOW before all our endangered species are no longer endangered but have moved to the “extinct” category.   This video brought tears to my eyes.  That poor tiger might lose it’s paw because of this.

Here is part of the article at the WWF website:

The Tiger was freed from the snare early Sunday morning by the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (Perhilitan) officers who were called to the scene. The Tiger is being treated by Perhilitan at the Malacca Zoo and vets are hopeful that they might not need to amputate the animal’s leg.

Perhilitan Perak Director Shabrina Mohd Shariff said investigations into the case were ongoing and that initial information showed the suspected poachers were from Kelantan.

The rescue should set alarm bells ringing for the remaining wild Tigers in the Belum-Temengor forests, one of the last strongholds for this species, said a WWF Malaysia and TRAFFIC joint press statement.

Research carried out in the area by both groups has indicated that the rescued Tiger is very likely just one of many that have been poached in the area.  Illegal hunting in the Belum-Temengor area is rampant and the demand for tigers continues to drive criminals into the forest to kill the remaining ones.

The Belum-Temengor forest complex is one of three priority areas identified in Malaysia’s National Tiger Action Plan. It is also part of an area of global priority for Tiger conservation. Yet it is highly vulnerable to encroachment and poaching for several reasons.

The area lies close to the porous Malaysia-Thai border and is easily accessible because of the 80 km long Gerik-Jeli highway that cuts across the landscape, providing hundreds of easy entry points for poachers.

Apart from the Perhilitan-WPU joint patrols, neither the vast and wildlife-rich area, nor the highway is systematically or thoroughly patrolled, making it an open target for poachers.

In August, a Thai national was caught by the police with pangolin scales and agarwood in the forested near the highway. He was one of 10 poachers arrested in the area over the last nine months. In that time also, Perhilitan, Police and the WPU removed 101 snares from the area.

“This incident clearly demonstrates the need for a stronger enforcement presence in the Belum-Temengor area. If this isn’t enough of a clarion call for the government to afford more resources to form an anti-poaching Task Force, I don’t know what is,” he added.

Let’s talk about headlights for a moment.  I don’t understand what is so hard for people to comprehend when headlights are required so figured I’d explain it a little.

It is standard rule that if the street lights are on, your headlights must also be on.  Most people would have them on before this but they absolutely must be on by this time.

If it is raining and you have your windshield wipers on, your lights are also supposed to be on.

If it is dusk or cloudy and you find it hard to read your speedometer, your lights should be on.  This not only lights up your dash but also makes you visible to others.

If you are in a funeral procession, your lights should be on.

Please remember people that while your excuse might be “I can see fine without my lights” – an officer will probably still give you a verbal warning if not a ticket.  The reason, of course, is that your headlights are not just for you to see by but also for you to be SEEN by other vehicles.  Once heavy shadows start to fall, vehicles of all colors are harder to see and judge distance/speed of oncoming traffic.

Be safe people, and remember…it’s a jungle out there.

Talk about something being hilariously ironic – I finally get an offer on my condo just after I’m served the foreclosure documents.  Isn’t that just so damn laughable that it makes a person want to laugh till they cry? I know I sure laughed over it.  It is too late, according to the attorney, to sell it now that I have an offer.  It has been on the market for almost a year.  Really just makes one want to throw up their hands in disgust and shout out at the universe “what took you so damn long?”

What is so hard about remembering my days off? Why do people constantly ask me if I have today off or do I have tomorrow off when I have told them a hundred times I have Wed-Fri nights off. What is so freaking hard about remembering that? So damn irritating.

Every single week my neighbor asks me if I have to work tonight – every single week! I know her schedule so why is it so hard for her to remember mine? I tell her each week what I have off and she still asks me the next night if I have to work. For example, last night she asked me if I had to work – I said yes but it was my last day for this week. I get home a few minutes ago and she said “Don’t you have to work tonight?”

It is a simple case of it not being important enough for other people to remember because it doesn’t affect their life. People ask questions but then don’t even listen to the answer so then they end up asking the same questions over and over. My schedule is not that difficult to remember – I work Sat-Tues. She said to me last night “isn’t that every weekend?” and I so wanted to say something smart and cynical but I held back.

If it isn’t important enough to remember my answer, then please don’t ask me the question. I don’t ask unnecessary questions just to hear myself talk. If I ask you something it is because I am curious about the answer. If you don’t want to tell me the answer then simply say so and I won’t ask you again. If I’m not sure about the question I will say “I know you told me once but I forgot…” so it isn’t like I’m asking the same question over and over because I’m admitting I was the one who forgot but it is important enough to me to want to remember. Does that make sense?

I think my neighbor likes to hear herself talk because she talks and talks and talks about absolutely nothing. You walk away what was the point of listening to her when she had nothing to say. She gossips a lot about others and knows everyone in the complex already plus the names of their pets and some of their children/grandchildren. That is admirable that she gets to know people whereas I hardly know anyone after living here a whole year. However, she gets to know them just so she can gossip about them to others. To me, that is worse than not getting to know them at all.

I think the other folks in the complex are wising up to her tactics though because fewer and fewer stop over to chat with her. Who wants all their business out for everyone to criticize?

Anyway, went to lunch with my son. Yes, soup again. I wanted to go somewhere else but he was meeting his friend later for supper so he didn’t want to eat or be gone a long time. So we went to Panera for soup and coffee. I also ran him to Walmart for some supplies, then dropped him off at home.

On my way home I went to Hyvee for the stuff to try potato soup again…hope it turns out good this time. While sitting at a stoplight I noticed hundreds of birds along the highwires and in a tree next to the wires. I mean the birds literally covered everything with some even still flying around trying to find a perch. Just as I was remarking outloud that it reminded me of the movie “The Birds,” they all took flight as one making what appeared to be a moving black hole in the sky. The cool thing was how they flew in formation through several cool spirals and turns before settling back down on the wires. I tried to get my camera out but it wouldn’t have caught them very well anyway.

Sitting there waiting on some slow ass person who wasn’t paying attention to the light changing to green, I again wished I had a little mountain retreat to whisk away to. I need a break from so many people – want peace, quiet, and a serene view. Want to see nature up close and breathe some fresh air.

Tigers have long been a favorite big cat of mine – they are graceful, stunning and firmly on their way to extinction.  Of the eight subspecies of tigers, three have met with total extinction in my life time. This knowledge grieves me greatly.  I will never understand the human races need to destroy everything in its path in an effort to grind the environment to meet our needs rather than vice versa.

All tigers are on the endangered species list according to C.I.T.E.S (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species).  The tiger is currently the MOST endangered animal in the world – so much so that the entire species may die out before our young children reach middle age.  How could we let this happen? Seriously, how can we live our lives every day not understanding how just about everything we do impacts the environment and the animals that live within it?

Below is the reported findings of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources that summarizes the current status of my beloved felines.

Caspian Tigers: Became extinct in the early 1970’s.  As there are no specimens in captivity, this species has truly been wiped off the face of the earth.

Balinese Tigers: Became extinct in the mid 1970’s.  Again, as there are none in captivity, these beauties are also lost to us.

Javan Tiger: Became extinct in the early 1980’s.  Again, none are in captivity.  These three tigers will never again walk the earth or bask in the sunshine.

Sumatran Tigers: in critical danger.  There are no more than 250 tigers in the wild with their numbers declining each year.  Of the 250 tigers, there are less than 50 reproductive adults left.  Currently there are approximately 250 animals in captivity.

South China Tiger: in critical danger/pre-extinction.  Currently there are about 20 to 80 tigers left in the wild.  There are about 40 more in captivity.  Experts fear that there are not enough of these animals left to repopulate the species no matter how hard they try.  All efforts to save this animal came too little, too late. 

Siberian Tigers – in critical danger.  Less than 200 tigers remain in their natural habitat.  Only 20% of these live in a protected area making the other 80% susceptible to poaching and human encroachment.  There are approximately 1000 animals in captivity.

Indochinese Tigers: threatened.  Current figures believe there are 1200-1700 still roaming their territory.  As their habitat continues to be threatened by humans, their numbers are steadily declining.  There are about 60 tigers in captivity.

Bengal Tiger: In danger.  The Bengal has the largest population of tigers in the wild with 3,000 to 4,000.  Of those numbers, there are 2500 reproductive adults.  However, each year their numbers are declining.  There are some 350 tigers in captivity.

If we do not act now, my beloved tigers will not survive.  We must find a way, globally, to become more in tune with nature and how our behavior is destroying way more than we think.  We can no longer afford a cavalier attitude about anything and must extremely change our attitude if we are to save these exquisite creatures.  Please support conservation and the organizations that fight to save what precious little we have left.  Every little bit helps – each person can make a difference.  If every human donated $1, think of all the good that could be done for our environment!

There are many organizations working feverishly to bring animals back from the brink – a simple internet search and a little research can help you decide which one you would like your money to go to.  If you do not wish to take the time to find one, I would suggest WWF (World Wildlife Fund) as they have over 45 years of experience and work with over 100 countries in the battle to save many species, including the tigers.  You may find them at http://www.worldwildlife.org/

I have another complaint – might as well just get it out in the open because it is going to fester otherwise.  No doubt the conservative state of Iowa thinks it is really doing everyone a great service with this stupid law but I find it asinine. 

When I got off work at 3am I was coughing and feeling like crap.  On my way home I had the great idea of stopping at HyVee for some Corona – maybe alcohol would kill whatever this virus is that is knocking me on my ass.  I have Busch Light at home but, and I apologize to all you Busch drinkers, I think it tastes like crap.  Corona or Miller Light is about the only beer I can tolerate – well, and St Paulie Girl if they still make that and a beer that comes in a little bottle with red on the label…Red Stripe…is that a beer? I don’t know, I haven’t drank it in years – not since Gary and I broke up.

So I grab a few other things while I’m at HyVee – doggie treats and orange juice…that sort of thing.  As I go to check out the clerk informs me that according to Iowa law, one can not purchase beer between the hours of 2am to 7am – Monday thru Saturday.  Now isn’t that the stupidest thing ever?

Let me explain – last call at the bar is 1:20 to 1:30 am – they start kicking people out around 1:30.  The object of the law is that they don’t want the already drunk people leaving the bars to go get beer to continue drinking.  Another one of those “we have to save people from themselves” laws that irritate me.  Anyway, it is stupid because the people all leave the bar about 1:30 am so it gives them time to get to the nearest store to buy beer before they head home anyway.  If the law was going to even attempt to be effective – they should stop selling it at midnight.

What also irritates me is that, for the conscientious person like myself who would never drive home with an open container, I am also inconvenienced by this ridiculous law as I don’t get out till 3 am.  I know, it makes me have to plan ahead but I so very rarely want a beer that it didn’t come up until tonight.  Normally I buy it when I buy groceries but this last time I bought groceries on a Sunday and GOD FORBID anyone  be allowed to buy beer on a Sunday morning…another law I find antiquated and incredibly laughable.

So there you have it – another beef I have with living in the state of Iowa.

I really wanted to give my son a special gift this year – whether it counted towards Christmas or not, I didn’t care.  Faithfully I have checked the website for when tickets went on sale to this special event hoping to catch it early so I could buy him and a friend of his choice the best tickets possible.

Well, tickets are on sale now and do you know what? I can’t begin to afford them.  Not only that, but add a hotel, travel, food, parking, etc., and I don’t see how any middle class person can afford it.  It amazes me that people spend this kind of money for one visit anywhere.  I complained about Disney prices being too high – they are down right affordable compared to this franchise.

I am terribly disappointed that I can’t buy my son this very cool gift.  I know he would have got such a big kick out of going.  It would be cheaper to send him to Las Vegas though for a long weekend.

What am I talking about? I bet sports fans have already figured it out – yes, NFL tickets to a Steeler’s game.  Who can afford $187 per ticket? Then add in the other stuff, you are easily talking $250-300 per person.  I’ve spent less on a two week vacation to Florida.

Right after I started complaining about the prices, my coworker logged on and bought two tickets to a Packer’s game spending the same amount I was complaining about.  She is young, single and just got a sizeable sum of money from her grandparents so she can afford to pay for her boyfriend and herself to go.  {sigh}