draggonlaady

So when I did not receive a call on 3/10 from anyone at The Berry Company (much to my surprise, I'm sure), I sent an email to the area, regional, and state managers at CenturyLink, telling them that their contractor sucks and detailing why, and suggesting they may want to find a different contractor.

I have not heard back from them either, which is less than entirely pleasing.

HOWEVER, on 3/11, Bonnie from The Berry Company did call me back. I do not know if this is because someone from CenturyLink contacted her to ask what the hell they were playing at, or if this is because Chad decided he couldn't cope with a direct, written request and passed it on. Either way, I got an apology for not having been contacted in time to make updates to the listing, and was told that I will not be charged for 2011. We'll see if that actually happens, of course, but at this point it appears that persistence, clear explanation of what the problem is, and written requests to address said problems are winning.

So you all know that I recently purchased the business. Since then, I've been frantically updating everything that has the previous owner's name on it. Currently, that means that I am having fits trying to deal with a phone book company. The Berry Company publishes CenturyLink's phone book in this area. Late in February, I called CenturyLink about updating the yellow pages and white pages listings, and getting a better price on the listings, since the book they send out is smaller and less popular than the other local book, which offers me a larger ad space for about half as much. CenturyLink referred me to Berry, and then the fun was on.

On the 27th or 28th of Feb, I called Berry, and left a message because nobody answered. Nobody called back by the 3rd of March, so I called again. And was informed by the customer service rep that I had to have contacted them by the 28th of February. Isn't that shiny? She also informed me that she cannot update the listings, or change the contract price, but would send an email to Sales and someone from Sales would get back to me.

On the 7th, having not received a call back, I called again. I was on hold for half an hour before customer service picked up. The on-hold adverts have an insanely varying volume level, from ear-shattering to inaudible. Also, every third ad states that "our goal is 100% customer satisfaction, 100% of the time." HAH! So I get another customer service rep after half an hour of this crap. This customer rep apparently knows that the hold ads suck ass, because when I told her, she says "yeah, they're trying to fix that". So I ask about updating the listings again, and she then oh so helpfully tells me that I had to have contacted them by the 28th of February, that she cannot update the listings, or change the contract price, but would send an email to Sales and someone from Sales would get back to me. I told her that someone already DID that, and Sales hasn't contacted me. I requested that she transfer me to Sales. She can't or won't do so. She instead says that she will mark the message as a priority this time. I then ask her what happens if I pay the rest of my phone bill (because these fuckers bill through the phone company, not separately) but refuse to pay the portion that is billed for them. She tells me that doing so will get my phone disconnected, even if I pay the rest of the bill.

So, today, I call back because, of course, nobody from Sales has called me yet. Perhaps I'm an impatient bitch, but I think that 48 hours between calls is a reasonable waiting time, yeah? I talked to the rep at CenturyLink again today, and she verified that they would have to disconnect service eventually if I stopped paying the whole bill. So back to the Berry Company...I was only on hold 6 minutes listening to the bullshit this time before someone picked up. I asked to be transferred to a supervisor. She says "well, is there something I can help you with?" I said "Seems unlikely, as nobody has yet, can you transfer me to a supervisor or do I need to go through the whole long story so you can tell me you can't help me and transfer me to a supervisor?" So she makes me run through the whole damn thing, and, as predicted, says she can't do anything about it, and goes to find a supervisor. Back on hold for another 5 minutes. Get to talk to Chad, who re-re-re-repeats that it's too late to change the listings for this year, has no comment when I tell him I've been trying to contact someone since February but have not gotten any calls back (other than "we have several thousand customers, even if you'd talked to someone on the 28th, I can't guarantee that we could have gotten the listing changed"), and who assures me that he knows what my sales agreement for the business states and that there is a clause in there saying specifically that I will take over responsibility for directory listings. He wants me to fax him a copy of my sales agreement. When I asked him if sending him this is going to make any difference on whether he is willing to lower the cost of my listings, he evaded answering 5 times (I counted) until I flat said "Sir, you are not answering the question. Is there any realistic chance that if I bother digging this thing out and sending to you that you are going to adjust the price of the listing? can you even do that, or is this just busy work to get me to go away?" He tried evading again, and eventually gave me a stupid-non-answer about not guaranteeing that he'll change anything until he sees the sales agreement that he absolutely will not change anything if he doesn't, but he assures me that he can make adjustments to any account if he thinks it needs adjusted. I did NOT snap at him anything to the effect of "Well then, MAKE A FUCKING ADJUSTMENT. I've already explained to you that the listing you're printing is inaccurate, and that the other phone book in the area, which is more popular and offers me a larger listing, is charging me half as much. No interest whatsoever in being competitive or in trying to make your customer happy as per your stated goals, yeah?" Mr Authority here then had to ask someone else what their fax number was, so that I could send him stuff. So I'm typing a statement to him, explaining my displeasure with the customer service I have so far not received, pointing out that nobody from his company contacted me prior to signing me up for another year of this, that i didn't even know his company EXISTED let alone that I had an account with him (silly me for assuming that when I update my information with CenturyLink, that information will be updated in the phone book with their name on it! How foolish on my part!), that I am paying much less for a larger listing in a more popular book in the area (who DID contact me prior to re-publishing, and therefore has updated information), requesting that he send me a copy of the agreement that he claims prior owner signed which binds me to this amount, and since he has stated that he can make any adjustment he wants to any account, and requesting that he adjust my account to match the amount I'm paying the other phone book company. I expect that if I get any response, it will be a snide no on reduction of the billing, and that he will be unable to produce anything with dr m's signature on it. I also expect that if he doesn't do SOMETHING to reply to my clearly expressed dissatisfaction, I will cancel my listing in this book. Yeah, it's stupid to not have a listing in the yellow pages in every damn book in the area, but fuck it. almost nobody uses the damn thing anyway--it's the skimpiest book you can find in the county, and basically everybody uses the better one that costs half as much to list in.

This whole situation is bullshit.

Idaho Board of Pharmacy received a complaint alleging that on Nov. 6 a Walgreens pharmacist refused to fill a prescription ordered by one of Planned Parenthood's Boise-based nurse practitioners. The prescription was for a Planned Parenthood patient for Methergine, a medicine used to prevent or control bleeding of the uterus following childbirth or an abortion.

An inquiry to Walgreens' Corporate office seeking comment was not immediately addressed.

Planned Parenthood officials said the complaint states that the pharmacist inquired if the patient needed the drug for post-abortion care. The nurse refused to answer the question based on confidentiality of health information.

According to Planned Parenthood, the pharmacist then stated that if the nurse practitioner did not disclose that information, she would not fill the prescription. The nurse alleged that the pharmacist hung up when asked for a referral to another pharmacy that would fill the prescription.

Because the whole "separation of Church and State" thing is, in reality, tenuous at best, there is a (stupid!) legal loophole that allows pharmacists to decide they have moral objections to dispensing a medication, but they are required to refer the caller to a pharmacy that will dispense. Specifically, this is typically used by pharmacists who have decided that birth control is evil. In this case, however, this pharmacist (allegedly) decided that their moral judgment was more important than the risk of this patient bleeding to death, AND they refused to give a referral to a different pharmacy.

So, since I'm opinionated and this is my blog, you all get a big dose of my opinion tonight.

1: You're a pharmacist. Your fucking job is to dispense pharmaceuticals as prescribed by doctors and/or practitioners, not to pass judgment on whether the person deserves said medications. If you cannot or will not, for whatever reason, actually DO THIS JOB, then fucking get a different damned job. I really don't give a shit if that means you BUY the whole damned pharmacy and then decline to stock certain medications, but do NOT for FUCK'S SAKE have the medication in stock and then refuse to dispense it just because you have some "holier than thou" bullshit attitude. Read the damned bible again, paying particular attention to the calls for humility and refraining from judgment, you hypocritical fuckhead. (Yes, I'm assuming Christianity here, because odds are really high that only a Christian will pull this stunt.)

2: You can have whatever religious, ethical, and moral beliefs you want, I don't give a rat's ass. You want to picket the Planned Parenthood on weekends, whatever. I think you're wrong, but you're entitled to be wrong. Just don't bring it to work and inflict it on unsuspecting people there.

3: Your moral judgment DOES FUCKING NOT outweigh the risk of a patient DYING. You wanna whine about how teenagers shouldn't take birth control because they shouldn't be having sex anyway, whatever. This was someone with a potentially life-threatening, immediate condition. If they die, you have ZERO chance of ever converting them to your mighty moral standing, so what do you win by being a fucknut? Nada, except, in my mind anyway, a manslaughter charge on your soul when you check out. Go on, explain how that makes you more deserving of entry to Heaven than the poor woman you refused to help. Better make it good though, I hear God's a tough judge and doesn't care much for lying and dissembling.

4: So all the above is just my opinion on why pharmacists pulling these stunts are fucking fuckheads, but refusing the referral to another pharmacy is not only an asshole beyond fuckhead move, it's ILLEGAL. Since I'm not a proponent of putting non-violent offenders in jail, and it's a dubious claim for violence here, I hope that either there was really a phone-failure/disconnect and this pharmacist isn't actually this much of an asshole, or that they get fined like bloody hell. Or fired. I'd accept fired.

Ok. I think I'm done ranting. and no, I'm not going back and proofreading that, so if there are errors, repetitions, or inconsistencies, sorry. You're all big kids, you'll find a way to cope, I'm sure. :D

Loaded Bruce into the car and took off to the huge and bustling metropolis of Tonasket, Washington on Friday afternoon. Saturday was a "celebration of life" in Loomis for a great aunt and uncle who'd passed on.
We stayed at a little place called The Junction; this is a motel, laundromat, and gas station all in one. There are a total of 8 motel rooms, and my family descending on the town took up at least half of them. (Maybe more, if folks from other branches of the family that I'm not as familiar with--we're a big clan.) Kind of a cute place; the rooms are all decorated differently, with nice quilts instead of cheap "hotel-style" bedspreads, and knotted-pine bed frames. My only complaint was that the air conditioner of my cousin's room (right next to ours) sounded like an aging Mack truck with aspirations of astronautics winding up for take off. We did not turn on the AC in our room.

Dinner Friday night was take-out from a little "Mexicatessan" called La Ultima. Think taco stand, but with higher quality food made on site. The proprietor was really (REALLY) friendly, and happy to go through the entire menu in great detail, telling us where the ingredients came from, who made the bread, who cooked the chicken, etc. He generally gave the impression that we could have anything we wanted, whether it was on the menu or not, and if they didn't have it, he'd send his daughter out to get it for us. We wonder, actually, if he did this--when we first asked, he said that they didn't have tortilla chips right now; but would be adding nachos to the menu soon and we were always welcome to come back. But when he packed up our order, there was a box of tortilla chips. The food was quite good; I'd definitely go back if it wasn't such a stupid-long drive from here.

Saturday morning, we were awakened by our rowdy damn neighbors (that'd be the grandparents) and the fact that there was not much in the way of sound-proofing around the door connecting our rooms. We complained to the manager, who laughed at us as we were all checking out together. We went over to Whistler's for breakfast. Can't say as I'm terribly impressed with the new cook; my hash browns were a bit scorched in areas, and otherwise the food was acceptable but not outstanding. Service here, in sharp contrast to La Ultima, was only what was asked for; if you didn't specify, it didn't happen. For example: I asked if they had blueberries instead of strawberries to put on french toast or waffles. Waitress said "no, I'm sorry". And then brought out blueberry syrup with my cousin's pancakes. Apparently it didn't occur to her to add "we don't have fresh berries, but we do have blueberry syrup" to the end of the "no, I'm sorry". Ah well.

Hit a garage sale with mom before the main event Saturday afternoon and picked up some books I'd been looking for (But No Elephants and a few of the "Little Miss/Mr" books), then got milkshakes at Sully's in Loomis. Not hard to find, if you can find Loomis, that is. Sully's is one of 3 businesses in town, if you count the post office as a business. It burned down a while back and was just rebuilt, so everything is shiny and new and still smells like construction. Milkshakes were definitely required, as it was quite hot out and we'd packed appropriate clothes for the weather we had at home Thursday, which was soggy and windy and cold. Oops.

Vacation in St. Kitts was much fun, so this will be long, with lots of links. Feel free to skip if you're bored by my ramblings. Bruce's comments are in italics.

The trip down was quite long. We flew on Delta this time. Overall, Delta treated us much better than United did on our Knoxville trip. Bruce slept most of the way down. I didn't get to sleep on the plane at all—the leg I was trying to sleep on, the seat was broken and wouldn't lay back, so I couldn't get into a comfortable position. I ended up sleeping a couple hours in the airport during layover though. We had a brief bit of panic when we belatedly realized that the gate had been changed on the last leg of the flight (the important one, as Delta only flies to St. Kitts once a week) and we were waiting on the wrong concourse! We hauled butt across the airport (Atlanta is BIG) and made it to the correct gate just as they were pulling our bag out of the cargo hold and giving up on us. It was 35F when we boarded in Atlanta.

The 85F and 90% humidity when we deplaned in St. Kitts was a pretty brutal change! But we made it through Customs and Immigration with only a small issue (we only got one of the two forms we were supposed to've been given to fill out, so had to fill the other out while standing in line. Hardly the worst Immigrations complication to have!) and Bear and Georgia met us as we staggered back out into the heat. We went to their place and changed into summer gear. Chased lizards in the back yard for a few minutes (little brown anoles with an almost transparent yellow tail, and medium/big brown anoles with stripes, and tiny quick little lizards—you'd think they were teleporting, they're so quick). Then we headed for the beach to chase critters and waves. I'm sure you'll be terribly surprised by all the parts where I list what critters we saw! I did my best to ID birds for Nessa, but didn't get very good pictures of most of them, sorry. I did get a lot of pictures of lizards though! (surprised, anybody?)

So the beach called The Strip was our first St. Kitts play destination; we found a bunch of little sand crabs and one camouflaged crab, watched the Brown Pelicans diving for fish, and the sunset over the water, then hit Buddie's for some BBQ. Pretty good stuff, and had our first experience with restaurants that hand you a bottle of mosquito repellent when you walk in. And our first taste of the nearly absolute lack of customer service exhibited at restaurants on the island. Then we went home to sleep off the travel exhaustion.

Day 1 Bird list: Brown Pelican (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Sea%20Birds/1%20Pelican.JPG)

Cattle Egret (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Shore%20Birds/Cattle%20Egrets%201.JPG)

Wood dove (Zenaida Aurita) (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Land%20Birds/Zenida.jpg)

 

Next morning we got up late and had delicious strawberry pancakes with banana syrup. Bruce and I spent a couple hours swimming and hanging out on Whitehouse Beach while Bear and Georgia had their final sailing lesson. Wind was from the wrong direction, so water was too choppy for snorkeling, but was fun to play around anyway. Tons of different tiny little shore snails; took pictures of some of the more striking color patterns. Scraped my ankle up on something underwater. Chased some birds around, and debated the pros and cons of the waterfront property for sale at the corner of the beach... Bruce's new goal in life is to move the the Caribbean and become a Cabana Boy. We went to PJ's for dinner; no bug spray on the table there, because they have an automatic sprayer in the doorways (every 19 minutes—how's that for a random time cycle?). Chicken picatta is yummy, mon.

We went home and met a friend and previous student of Bear's, Laura. Laura is a wonderful outdoor warrior type; she came over to borrow Bear's sewing machine after having done a 50 mile bicycle ride on the neighboring island of Nevis. FIFTY MILES! For fun! That means, by the way, that she was making laps of the island, because seriously, the island isn't that big.

Day 2 Bird list: Thick billed plover (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Shore%20Birds/Charadrius_wilsonia.jpg)

Grey Kingbird (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Land%20Birds/Grey%20King%20bird-Tyrannus_dominicensis.jpg)

 

Monday there was no sleeping in, as we decided to join a Ross University Adventure Club hike. Why yes, we ARE crazy. The hike was lead by Warrior Laura, you see... Mt Liamuiga is the volcano responsible for forming St. Kitts. We hiked all the way up to the crater, and the view was incredible. For future reference, when the warrior woman says “moderate hike” she means “do try not to die, as it would be moderately inconvenient to have to carry you out”. But we managed to hup our out-of-shape and not-heat-accustomed selves all the way up. It wasn't all that bad. There was one girl who almost quit out crying, and one guy who got heat-sick enough that he threw up. They were not us! Only new bird for Day 3 was the Antillean Crested Hummingbird that hung out with us on the edge of the crater for a while. I failed to get good pictures, as he was a speedy critter, but his crest was a beautiful iridescent green. This picture utterly fails to do him justice: http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Land%20Birds/Antillean%20Crested%20Hummingbird.jpg. Several other pictures available here: http://ibc.lynxeds.com/photo/antillean-crested-hummingbird-orthorhyncus-cristatus/lateral-view-perched-adult-male.

 

Tuesday, Bear had to work. Georgia dropped us off in the tourist area of town, and we wandered around shopping, had a good bit of fun watching how people's attitudes changed when we told them we were not on a cruise ship. (There is a distinct range in the prices a lot of places charge ranging from local/native through local/student or uni employee up through visiting-but-staying-in-an-actual-house and topping at cruise ship tourists. There are some places where there is literally a 4-fold difference in prices for things depending on which category you are.) Met Bear and Georgia for lunch at Circus Grill. Bruce got Bear into a fight with a street vendor outside the restaurant. He wanted to try the local carrots, as Laura had told us they tasted different. Bear told him that the price the vendor was asking for carrots was too high, which apparently seriously offended the woman, because when Bear asked what she wanted for the sweet potatoes, the vendor said “You can't afford them,” and refused to give her a price or sell her anything. I stood back and tried not to laugh too loudly. Had “Caribbean Creole” chicken for lunch, which was significantly milder than I expected. The ginger beer was made in-house, and VERY gingery. And thick! Like whole milk thick. Scoops is a wonderful ice cream place in Port Zante. The coconut ice cream is made with actual coconut, and the rum raisin ice cream is made with actual rum. A shot per scoop, according to our guides.

Day 4 bird list: Magnificent Frigatebird (http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Magnificent_Frigatebird/id)

Terns (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Sea%20Birds/Common%20Tern.jpg)

Black headed grassquit (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Land%20Birds/Antillian%20Grass%20Quit.jpg)

 

Mostly lounged around the next day, Bear headed back to the States to be a bridesmaid for her friend in New Orleans. Georgia and Bruce and I walked down the hill from the house to Bird Rock Hotel in the afternoon to play fetch in the water with the dogs. Saw some big black crabs on the road, not the beach (body big as a fist) and a huge skink (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Reptiles/Geckos/Ameiva%20erythrocephala%20%28ground%20lizard%29.jpg). We went out with Laura that evening to catch Dr Kevin Fitzgerald's comedy routine (he was on the island to do some guest lectures for the students at Ross, and had an evening comedy show). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Fitzgerald

 

Thursday we walked back to Bird Rock Motel and played with the snorkeling equipment. Saw 3 different types of fish, but since I know nothing about fish identification, I can only tell you that the blue ones were probably Yellow Tail Damselfish. No idea what the slightly larger black ones, or much larger brown and black fish were. Did not see the huge skink, probably because we had the camera with us this time. While there, we had a lovely “you're not in the States anymore” experience. Watching this gent I'm still unconvinced that both X and Y chromosomes were present with a baby girl playing in the sand... he strips the kid naked, smears on some sunscreen, and then walks off and leaves her alone. On the beach. With nobody between her and the water. Not that the kid DID anything but sit there and play in the sand, but still... that'd never happen on a US beach without someone freaking out.

Back to the house to shower the sand and salt off, and then off to the Veterinary College with Laura to catch a couple of Dr Fitzgerald's exotics animal medicine lectures. I got left behind with Georgia. Then a walk-around of the campus, which was quite nice. Things you only hear from veterinary students: “Look, a pig skeleton! How cute!”

Went to Bary's for dinner; really good BBQ. Says Bruce “He's not afraid of flavor and this is obviously not toned down for the tourists. That's not a complaint.”

And on the walk home, saw geckos! Sadly, no camera.

 

Friday we thought we'd try out Sky Safari (http://www.skysafaristkitts.com/) but turns out they only go by appointment. Made an appointment for Sunday morning, and went to the Caribelle Batik (http://www.caribellebatikstkitts.com/) instead. Got some pretties, wandered around the grounds and took pictures of purple plants and pretty Brahmin cows. Despite the doubting Thomases, I got a really nice picture of a Green Throated Carib. Bruce claimed to see a monkey, but sure looks like a silver tabby cat in the photos... Stupid shape-shifting voodoo monkeys. Then we went to dinner at Pizza Shack at the Marriott. Decent pizza, but a bit spendy.

Day 7 Bird List: Green Throated Carib (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/Bio-div%20Thumbnails/1%20Green%20Carib.JPG)

Lesser Antillean Bullfinch (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Land%20Birds/Antillian%20bullfinch.jpg)

Bananaquit (http://www.bio-diversity-nevis.org/images/Nevis%20Birds/Land%20Birds/Bananaquits.jpg)

 

 

Saturday we slept late, then spent the afternoon at Sandy Beach. Did a little snorkeling, and saw a stingray; he was pretty cool! Some silvery fish with blue dorsal line and blue around the eye, apparently called Grab Jacks? Lay on the beach reading for a while, then headed off to dinner. On the walk back to the car, Bruce saw a mongoose, but I missed it. Not the voodoo kind. We went to La Belle Vie, which, as you might guess from the name, is a fancy French restaurant. It was quite nice, though it's rather an odd cultural dissonance to sit in a fancy restaurant and be handed a bottle of bug spray...

Goat cheese absolutely should be served warm over salad with bacon and a nice vinaigrette. It was quite yummy; easily the best thing I've ever eaten with goat cheese. Tomato slices would have been nice. Steaklet of duck in green and black pepper sauce was quite delicious also. The rack of lamb in thyme sauce was also nice but the sauce was not as flavorful. The assortment of cheeses was pretty good too; finally was introduced to a cheese in the bleu family that does NOT taste overwhelmingly of mold. Bleuforte is much mellower, though a bit salty. Salty is an understatement. Good stuff, though.

Bird of the day: Red Tailed Hawk. Looks shockingly like the Red Tailed Hawks at home.

 

Sunday we got up early to get to Sky Safaris. Zip lines are fun! Sadly, it was a pretty short course... I was really expecting it to be longer. Ah well. Got some good pictures of “rasta” Bruce (I'd braided and beaded his hair the night before). There is nothing I wouldn't do for her, obviously, nor is there such a thing as a "good" picture of said devotion. Shortly after finishing the Sky Safari, the drought broke and boy howdy can it rain down there. Beach out of the question for the evening, we decided to check out the shiny new 8-screen cinema. And give our host a bit of personal time, rasta style. We went to the conveniently located Domino's Pizza (right next door to the theater) for dinner. It was absolute insanity. The group that shoved in front of us while we were politely waiting our turn at the counter was led by a young girl (10 years ish?) followed by a very tall woman who didn't seem to think children needed any controls, and a very fat woman who had no good grasp of communication. She pointed at the sign and told the lady that she wanted the chicken sandwich. Fine and dandy, but there are 4 different chicken sandwiches listed. When the lady behind the counter asked which sandwich she meant, they went around in circles 3 or 4 times about there being more than one chicken sandwich. She storms out, the tall lady starts to order. Then the fat lady comes back with reinforcements in the form of a guy and 2 more kids. *sigh*. All in all, it took them about half an hour of arguing and fussing to actually give their order. Then the kids proceeded to run in and out of the building randomly, taking extra stuff from the chip rack and refrigerator case, so that the tall lady ended up standing at the counter and just passing over money every few minutes when some kid ran through and grabbed something. All for a small pizza, a couple sides of bread sticks, and an untold number of sodas and bags of chips. The chaos was such that the lady working there forgot to bring us our pizza until I went up and asked for it again. Daybreakers was a pretty darn entertaining flick.

 

Still raining on Monday, so we mostly lounged around and read all day. Checked my receipts to put them in my check book, and was unpleasantly surprised by the Sky Safari charges. Called and inquired why I was charged $100 (US!) more than expected. Explained that we are not rich cruise ship tourists, and would really appreciate the Ross University price (nicely, really. and the lady was quite nice too. But we have to go back in person to get a refund, and can't get there today; they're closing early because of the rain.) Bear got back from the States, so Bruce and I headed out for the evening to give her and Georgia some alone time. Took Laura to see Book of Eli; good stuff. Rather more overtly religious than we were expecting, but good fun.

 

Tuesday we went back out to Sky Safaris and got refunded. Wandered around downtown, saw the Spencer Gallery (some interesting artwork, but not a big selection). The honey bees in the ceiling were pretty darn cool. Best viewing of active honeycombs I've ever seen. Bought Bear a new phone, since her old one went swimming with us at Sandy Beach, oops. Georgia went to pick Bear up from work, and Bruce and I wandered through a little toy store with a crazy mix of really old toys and new stuff. Bear wasn't feeling well, so we didn't do much exciting for dinner, just back to the house.

 

Wednesday, Georgia kicked us out to fend for ourselves while he cleaned the house. Heh, but that's a story for another time. We taxied up to Brimstone Fort, an old British military fort (http://www.geographia.com/StKitts-nevis/knbrim01.htm). We spent about 4 1/2 hours wandering around this place. This day was a lot of "you're not in the States any more" stuff. There was only 1 warning sign in the entire place, and there was "you could die" stuff at each step. Drop-offs down rock walls, stairways in the middle of sloped floors with no indication of which end of the opening is the top of the stairs, no guard rails anywhere. It was great! Truly, she speaks. Though apparently my feelings of "you could die" were not unfounded; during an Easter picnic years ago, a rush to get out of a sudden rain ended up with 10 dead...

Deciding that the taxi was way, way too expensive to call back, we caught the local bus home. The bus system in St Kitts is completely unlike the US systems. Buses are privately owned and operated mini-vans, that have vaguely recommended routes but no real set times or stops. almost entirely along a single road on the coast. A bus coming through town with space on it will honk when approaching people, and if you want on, you just step up and wave. They'll stop anywhere to pick people up, usually in the middle of traffic with minimal warning. They don't bother to pull out of the lane, so traffic just goes whipping around past them. Switching buses consists of signaling your driver, who begins honking at other buses until one of them honks back, then both stop (blocking the whole road, of course) and people jump off one, run or saunter, depending on their mood across the road, and climb on the other. To get off the bus, you just tell the driver where you want to stop; there aren't scheduled stops any more than there are scheduled routes, so you say "that pink house" or whatever, and the driver stops and lets you off. Again, they don't bother to pull off to the curb for this, just slam on the brakes and stop in the road. The maximum speed limit on the island is 40mph. Buses commonly disregard such niceties, and accelerate as fast as possible between stops, so you go 0 to 60 to 0 to 60 repeatedly and suddenly. It's like a roller coaster ride, in traffic. And much (1/10th of the price) much less expensive than the taxis. If we ever go back (or to a different island) we will absolutely be using the bus system! It was exhilarating.

We asked a random taxi driver on the street where we should eat dinner tonight, and he sent us to Chef's Garden, which was great food, once we convinced them to cook it for us. Then as we were walking downtown, we crossed paths with the lady from Scoops. By this time, we'd been in so often that she recognized us on the street and asked why we hadn't come in today...

 

Thursday we thought we'd try the Bat Cave/Bloody Point hike. Bloody Point (and Bloody Beach, and Bloody Canyon...sensing a theme here?) is where the British and French decided to cooperate with each other long enough to kill essentially all of the native population of Karibs. During a religious rite, no less. The canyon is a very narrow, very deep gorge in which the tribes gathered for ceremonies. The Brits and French split up the top of the gorge, and shot them all during their ceremony. Since we're both terribly masochistic, we called on the lovely warrior woman Laura to lead us on this hike. Unfortunately, with the past several days of rain, the hike was undoable; the trail was thigh-deep in very quickly moving water. We followed the top of the gorge for a while, but started running into fences and such. Backtracked and waded through the river again, then followed the old narrow-gauge rails for a while. The trellis was fun; ties were definitely not evenly spaced. Good thing neither of us is scared of heights!

Home for clean clothes, and then back to the Strip to see The Fireman at Mr. X's Shiggity Shack. The ginger chicken was quite good, and they didn't stint on the spice in the jerk pork. Not even a little stinting. The Fireman is a fire-eater/fire-breather guy who puts on a weekly show, somehow managing to not burn down the very crowded eatery. Well, in fairness, the fire-breathing happened outside. Then he comes back inside and limbos under a burning bar.

 

Friday's trip to the neighboring island of Nevis didn't happen, because it was (surprise!) still raining. Somehow, walking down to the ferry, ferrying across the way, and renting a scooter didn't sound like a good heavy rain plan. She can be so reasonable, sometimes. So we spent the day lounging about with Bear (who'd taken a sick day from work, but was feeling rather better, thankfully) and Georgia. Silly movies were watched, books were read, naps were taken. Good relaxing day.

 

Saturday we packed it all up, and headed to the airport for the return trip. Gotta say, the 24 hours of flying is not the best part of a vacation to St. Kitts! The flight into Atlanta was uneventful, until we got to Atlanta. And spent the first hour of our 2 hour layover sitting on the plane, on the tarmac. No gate to unload at, and then no crew to set up the available gate. Re-routes from some other airport that took priority. All manner of excuses, none of which actually got us deplaned. We finally got to head into the airport and check through customs, and then got the unpleasant news that we had to go pick up our baggage and recheck it, because for some unexplained reason the airline can't/won't shift it to the next plane at this point. Nevermind that this process consisted of standing around a baggage drop, picking our bag up, walking it to the next room, and handing it to someone to put on a different baggage carousel. Very frustrating and pointless. Speaking of pointless--we now have 30 minutes to make it across the Atlanta airport to our next flight before it departs. Which means it's probably boarding already. So we can run for it, right? WRONG. Instead, we have to go through security again. I guess the hand search of every bag, and pat-down of passengers after going through metal detectors and x-raying bags at St. Kitts wasn't sufficient, we have to go through the whole process (minus things like hand searching bags and pat downs, which are too...what... primitive? effective? annoyingly useless? to be bothered with in US security). So we end up with less than 10 minutes to get to our next plane before it departs without us. Good thing Atlanta's airport has trains, because I don't think we could have made the run.

 

When we got to Washington DC, we had 7 hours to kill. Too early to check in for our next flight (can't check in more than 6 hours early), so we weren't sure what the protocol on baggage was. Asked the steward and he said to ask the lady at the gate. So we asked her. She said we should go pick the bag up, since it might not get transferred to the next plane. So we trekked down to baggage claim and waited for it. Tried to check it into the baggage storage area, but they wouldn't take it. So we ended up packing it along with us the rest of the time. Not quite long enough to be worth getting a hotel room, but we thought we'd grab a taxi, and have them take us to food. Now, I don't have much experience with taxis in the States. My experiences with taxis have been on Caribbean islands, where if you ask a taxi driver for recommendations on just about anything, he'll have a list of places he likes, and a list of places that tourists like, and will be happy to (for a small fee, of course!) take you to any and all of them. Apparently, that's not how it works here. The taxi driver seemed to think that we were total nutjobs when we asked him what was a good place for late-night (it was pushing midnight at this point) dinner. He could not grasp the concept that we didn't have a hotel reservation. Finally came down to give him an exact address, or get out of the car. So we got out of the car. Went back inside the airport, found a yellow pages, and started calling restaurants listed as "late night". Got info, directions, and address, and went out to hail a different taxi. Gave address to this taxi driver, who asked what the place was. When we told him the name, he says "oh, I know that place! Good food!" Turns out the place is a 5 minute drive from the airport, frequented by cops and taxi drivers. So why the F did driver number 1 think such a place didn't exist? aarg. I hypothesize that the first driver had spent fewer hours in our nation's capitol than the tourists he was driving around. Ah, the power of a navigation system. Anyway, if you need a late night place in DC that will give you huge portions of food lest you waste away to nothing before breakfast, check out Kabab Palace. (http://www.yelp.com/biz/kabob-palace-arlington-2).

We decided not to try getting a taxi driver to tour us around DC to look at pretty monuments, partly because it was very late and we were tired, partly for fear of asking taxi drivers questions after previous experience, and partly because it was (still, again, some more) raining. We caught a taxi back to the airport, and tried to find some place to sleep for a couple hours. Unfortunately, the DC airport seems to be determined not to provide a comfortable napping area. No benches anywhere, just rows of chairs with metal ridges and low armrests between each seat. We ended up just laying out on the floor, which was cold and uncomfortable and not good sleeping.

When check-in finally opens well 3 of the twenty terminals, anyway, the rest got confused by DST, we pass over the bag, and the woman behind the counter tells us that we should have just left it for the airline workers to transfer, because it was already checked clear through to Spokane (even though we weren't!). She just looked confused and had no explanation when we said that 2 people the night before had told us differently. Ah, consistency.

 

Next stop, St. Paul. In stark contrast to DC, the St. Paul airport actually has at least one corner cubby with a floor pad in it for sleeping on at the gate. Too bad we were only there for an hour. The rest of the trip home was pretty uneventful, and Monday I returned to work to a pile-up of messages from clients. It seems I was missed... Bruce (the lucky lucky bas...er... gentleman) had the day off, and got to sleep in. And sleep in I did.

My PDA being old and starting to fail, and basically used now as a reader, I upgraded to a Sony eReader. For the most part, I'm happy with it. It is, however, giving me fits over 2 things:
1: The software installed on my computer will import and play audio files with no worries. It will, however, NOT transfer them to the reader. I don't particularly care, as I rarely listen to audiobooks anyway, but it torques me off that the adverts say "will import and play audio files" and fail to mention that that's ONLY on the computer. Well, gee, thanks. I can already listen to audio files on the computer, I didn't need yet another media player there. This one is a design/program issue, not a malfunction with my particular reader-it explains this in the user manual.
2: While it uploads PDA and BBeB and plain text files to the reader just duckylike, it will not upload a rich text file. THIS it is supposed to do. So I called customer support today. I shouldn't do these things first off in the morning, as even if I'm perfectly happy and content, my voice sounds gravelly and monotone and therefore cranky, which is always great for the service reps. Nonetheless, that's what I did. After wading through the phone tree (no 800 number, incidentally. That's annoying. This is freaking SONY, they can't afford an 800 number for tech support? Not that it matters to me, since I'm calling from a cellphone with free long distance, but really?) and giving the computer my phone number, I get transferred to a rep. First thing he asks? My phone number. I ask him (cranky, gravelly voice, remember) why I had to give the computer my number if it's not going to give it to him. I can almost hear the "oh god not one of these people" swallow before he answers. But his answer was brilliant. "With all due respect, I wonder that EVERY DAY." I laughed. Unfortunately, when we got to the actual issue, his answer ended up being "it does that sometimes, and we don't know why. Try saving it as plain text instead."

Stuffs for just in case anybody out there visits Knoxville :)

Stayed at Holiday Inn in downtown. Nice place, though not as nice as they charge for, I think.
Had lunch yesterday at Koi Fusion in Market Square. Good stuff, the tom yum was utterly unlike the tom yum I've had before; it was shrimp instead of chicken, and spicier. Good good despite being unexpected. Sesame chicken was excellent, and they managed to make the broccoli NOT squishy and bland.
Dinner plan was originally to go to The Butcher Shop, but they turned out to be closed on Tuesday, despite what the website says. So we took the rec of the hotel bus driver and went to a place called the Copper Cellar. Excellent chicken. Bruce says the bleu cheese grits were wonderful (I declined to try them, as I don't care for bleu cheese). Apparently the beer was great, and Bruce tried a drink called Herbal Remedy. Vodka + white grape + basil + bitters + sugar + lime. A bit too much on the vodka for me, but Bruce declared it his new favorite drink ever. Service was good, lechery was directed towards waitresses.

Today we moved out of downtown and into the much less expensive Super 8. Not as scary as half expected, given the facade of the motel down the street. Definitely missing the Hell out of the double shower heads at home though!
We went to a place called The Bistro for breakfast/lunch. Substantial servings, but the sweet potato fries were rather disappointing. They should not be bland. The Bourbon barbecue chicken sandwich was really good though. Barbecue sauce was quite smokey, and had just enough kick to be attention grabbing but not so much as to overwhelm.

Dinner at The Butcher Shop tonight. Interesting concept. You can pick your own steak, and cook it yourself at the quite sizable grill. We're not really sure how the liability works with that, but hey, fun stuff. Sadly, the steak was of lesser quality than hoped. The double baked potatoes were excellent.

Caught Zombieland after dinner. Much fun was had.

Dessert at Coolato Gelato was yummy. We may be heading back for lunch there tomorrow.

And now, SLEEP!

I just want to scream today. Up since 5 because I couldn't sleep. Rally's had diarrhea for the past 3 days from eating god only knows what out in the woods. She and Haven pulled a disappearing act when Bruce let them out this morning.

Don't know where the rabbit we got yesterday is today. Minnie apparently spent the night in the rabbit pen; she never came in last night. Rabbits were NOT in the pen with her this morning. Hitchhiker came back (god only knows WHY) and I caught her this morning but haven't seen him. So here's hoping he comes back to hang out with her or something, and doesn't end up as coyote dinner.

Called and whined at dad this morning about lack of tree removal and the fact that I can't fence the damn dogs in until Don gets around to finishing, which is getting ridiculously long. Guy doing the tree removal started the first week of July, and estimated 25-30 hours to do the whole thing. That, to me, is half a week's work. So why the crap isn't it done yet? Well, because he shows up for 4 - 6 hours one day every couple weeks randomly with no warning. I have no contact info for him (he's a friend of dad's and dad doesn't have a number, just catches him at his shop intermittently). Can't put the fence up until he's done with the trees. Can't put the invisible fence back out for the dogs, because I can't leave it out while he's working and I never know when he's going to be here. If I leave it out, he'll run it over and potentially break it. And it's expensive. Can't, or can't convince myself I will, put it out and then get out and pull it up at 6AM randomly whenever he shows up. Meanwhile, the dogs are running up the mountain eating dead things, and/or neighbor's garbage, swimming in someone else's pond, probably chasing cats and cows, getting into my rabbit pen, disappearing randomly, and likely to end up dead on the road or shot. I am not happy about this. I'm trying not to be a bitch to dad's friend, but for FUCK'S SAKE just show up and get it DONE!

Still don't have the new washing machine we bought 7/30. Called the shipper's 800 number. woman puts me on hold to look stuff up. comes back, transfers me to Michigan. That woman puts me on hold to make a phone call. Comes back and says she can't get a hold of anyone, gives me the number for the distribution center in kent, but says the washer is in Spokane.
I call Kent. Kent says Spokane has it, call Spokane.
I call Spokane, Spokane says they don't have it, call Kent.
I call Kent again, and tell them that the Spokane guy walked the dock and verified that it's not there but missing a number or something stupid.
Kent woman puts me on hold to look stuff up. Comes back and asks for my number, says she's going to go look in the warehouse.
2 hours later, she calls back. Kent still has the damn thing. It's been there since the 10th. When I asked what the hold up was, she said "miscommunication in the system". It's supposed to be shipped from Kent to Spokane on Monday and they will call when they get it to arrange delivery sometime next week. Though with as smoothly as their shit's been handled so far, maybe we'll have it for Christmas.

Turns out that I am expected to do fair check in today--just that nobody actually bothered to talk to ME about that. So I'll be up in C-ville (30 mile drive) from 4 - 7 or 8 tonight dealing with disorganized kids that don't bring their paperwork and can't grasp the concept of waiting their turn to be checked in, and I don't have the advantage of Bruce lining them up and telling them to get their paperwork done before I get to them this year (which was unbelievably helpful last year!), because he found out last night that he's supposed to be taking Bruce Jr to the 7th grade open house thing tonight. Yay for people making plans for other people and NOTIFYING them, right?

Get to work and the parvo pup I've been treating died over night. Why the bloody fuck to people who can't afford to take care of dogs breed them? These people tried to convince me to send this dog home with an IV catheter in because they're "used to doing their own vet care". This immediately after telling me that the dog never got her 4 month vaccine booster because they "couldn't get it in her". RIIIIIGHT. But they didn't want to leave her in hospital because they can't afford it. Well then don't be fucking breeding them. When I talk to them today, they say that one of the pups in their 7 week old litter (not vaccinated yet, of course!) is now vomiting. Woman posits that this is "failure to thrive, and not actually sick". Bloody hell it is. "Failure to thrive" is a generic label that gets stamped on new borns that don't do well, waste, and die within the first 2 weeks. It is NOT a previously healthy 7 week old pup that starts vomiting after a known parvo exposure. But I'd bet on my receptionist being elected the Tzarevna of England before betting these people will bring that litter in and have it treated.

So yesterday, Bruce and I lounged about in bed much too late, then got all spruced up and went to town to see Spam-a-lot (his Christmas present to me). On the way out of the house, Bruce gets the brilliant idea to go to the Melting Pot for dinner if we can get reservations; he calls and spins a sob story about it being our anniversary and he's not so good at remembering these things and please please please please? and the guy on the receiving end of the call laughed at him and got us a table reserved, and generally acted like he hears this at least weekly. (meanwhile, I'm trying frantically not to bust up laughing next to him, because if anybody's likely to forget a date, it's me, but Bruce played it quite well--not over the top, just enough desperation. And no, none of you've forgotten our anniversary either. Depending on what you start counting from, it was January, February, or March. But it's not Christmas today either.)

Spam-a-lot was amusing, basically Quest for the Holy Grail set to music, but with plenty of scantily clad dancing girls to amuse Bruce and the other men in the audience who'd been wondering why they were going to a musical.

Then we walked over to the Melting Pot, where everyone was very happy to see us, and wished us Happy Anniversary, and there was an anniversary card on the table signed by all the cooks and the manager and our server. The server rocked, and talked us through all the different (overwhelming variety of) options, and even went so far as to suggest that we split an individual order so we'd have room for chocolate--which never happens, because why would a server try to sell you LESS food? And the food was all quite good. (Except I accidentally ordered a salad that was basically a tomato sliced up with slabs of Mozzarella on it. Great for those who like tomatoes, but I don't.)

Then we skipped into the mall to get me new thigh-highs that don't have that stupid rubber stay-up strap that doesn't actually make them stay up but does make it impossible to keep a garter belt fastened to them. Quite hard to find these things for some reason, and I don't know why because I refuse to believe that anybody actually LIKES the stupid rubber strap.

And came home to find the house flooded. It seems that our washing machine is possessed, or something, and decided that it should just run water all day long and not drain it out of the tub at all, so it's overflowed across the utility room and entire kitchen and is draining out down the heating vent in the kitchen floor.... yay. Thanks, washer. Great Christmas/anniversary present. But I refuse to be upset enough by it to cancel all the good. Despite the washer, it was a lovely, fun day.

So, other than trying not to die on the road, yesterday was pretty fun. Went thrift-store shopping with Bruce. Found a kick-ass pair of boots (good spottin', Bruce!). Picked up lots of books, and had fun trying on dresses that I'll never wear.

Stopped for dinner at Top of India on the way home. Pretty disappointing, really. the food was acceptable, but I can get better than acceptable food at home. Eating out should be really damn good food, or stuff that's too hard/time consuming to bother making it at home. Wish Cedars was closer, we could go get really good Indian. Service was cheerful and the one girl was lech-worthy though. So was her friend who came in to pick her up.






Also, today Bruce made me chocolate covered mangoes. Delicious!