:: Archipelapogo ::

:: 31.1.05 ::

:: Scott [+] ::
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:: Scott [+] ::
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:: Scott [+] ::
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So what the hell have I been up to?

Glad you asked. Eh? You didn't? Well then, piss off and move on to your next feed/bookmark/work-wasting-site. Else, feel free to read on.

So after being laid-off (or, as they like to call it "reduction in force"-ed) out of the Office of Government Slack, I spent a bit much time in Tulsa, celebrating the holidays with my parents and waxing philosophical about the past year - hence the incoherent negative streak a few posts below - and then returned to Dallas to begin drawing unemployment* and figure out what to do for a few months.

A few e-mails, a sorta-interviewy kind of thing, and a background check later, I've thus embarked (jebus, no pun intended there) on my new career as a profeshunal dog-walker.

Yeah.

Turns out that one of the pet-sitting services I e-mailed is owned by a guy that needed some time away from his daily route to kind of bolster that company and work on some other stuff he has floating in his synaptic areas. Also turns out that I'm looking for a non-careerish way to make ends meet and I'd really rather not sit under flourescent lights punching a register - you know, been there, done that, would prefer not to relive it.

So now, 90% of my conversations contain the following phrases:

"How're my sweet girls doing? Huh? Sweeties??? Sweeeeeeeties!!!!"
"You ready to go for that big boy walk? Huh? Yeeeeeeeeeahhhhh!!!"
"Good girl! Goooooooood girrrrrrrrrrrrl!!!"
"Sit! Siiiiiiiit! There we goooooooo....."

Nauseating, no?

Nah. Well, not explicitly, at least.** The other 10% of my conversations now involve telling all of my friends the cute/amazing/inane details of my dog-walking experiences. I have instantaniously now understood exactly where all of my teacher/camp counselor/nurse friends are coming from. And I formally apologize to the rest of my friends that now have to put up with my cutesy-wootsey bullshit.

But screw it. I'm loving this. The last time I actually looked forward to work this much was when I worked at a local pizza parlor in High School, back when the Federal Minimum Wage was $4.25 an hour, which is precisely what I earned. The work was alright, nothing too mentally stressing, for sure, but we had a great team of employees there. It felt like family. Plus, I got to get out of my house and make $130 a week, which was akin to earning $70k a year to my 16 year old scrawny ass. In fact, I liked it so much, that, to this day, I visit with more people from that pizza parlor when I go home than I do from my actual High School (not that that's saying a whole lot).

Strangely, though, there are a lot of parallels between that job and doing the dog-walking thing. I somehow feel like my pooches are coworkers, working diligently towards a goal, an end. And that end is enjoying the hell out of walking outside and breathing fresh air. Granted, at the pizza parlor, I'd sneak into the bathroom and turn the lights out whenever a co-worker was taking a shit, and now I have to watch them do it and grab it via a plastic bag, but you know, we can argue semantics all night and not get anywhere...

I'll do my best not to bore you with the ins and outs and quirks of my newfound pavement pounding pup coworkers***, like the fact that I've found out that certain Weimaraners apparently don't mind having their nails polished and get an insane "I'm going nuts! I'm going nuts!" look about them as they run in the park or that at least one particular Jack Russell Terrier has the greatest "I'm baring my teeth to sorta look intimidating but really I'm just happy to see you" look. Nor will I, already, bemoan the fact that my favorite pooch is (at least temporarily) no longer part of my route, the beautiful brown mutt whose Medieval name would be something along the lines of "Piper, she who stops, points, creeps, and runs at squirrels only to watch them run up the trees and be taunted". Really, I won't.

Suffice to say, though, it's a great stopgap solution, and maybe it's the melatonin talking****, but I'm happier than I've been in quite some time. It's not going to save the world, and yeah, it's a service for those who have way too much money - I mean, you should see some of the houses I now have access to, not that I'd do anything about it, but DAMN! - but it enriches the lives of some great dogs, and for tonight, at least, I'm going to sit back with my best shit-eating grin, listen to some Mingus, and look forward to tomorrow. While waiting for the other boot to drop, of course, but until then...

*speaking of, do any of my fellow Texans know if you have to declare that you've found a new job to cease your status with the Texas Workforce/UI folks, or just stop calling in? I've yet to find an answer

**Not explicitly until I did my first 'yard-clean' today, wherein you don a latex glove and, armed with a grocery bag, go easter egg hunting in someone's backyard. I'll be damned if I could've made a worst-case-scenario of how much a 70 lb. Boxer could lay out in a week. I don't konw about you, but my traditional Easter festivities didn't involve finding the surprise scrambled egg behind a bush. It really made me wish I hadn't gone to Cafe Brazil for Migas this morning. Yeah, I know, too much.

***Be forewarned, though, that some phonecam to Flickr to blog images may be showing up in the near future.

****My farmer's tan from last Summer, wherein I did all the biking and the running, never really left. Now, it's being resurrected like Jason Bateman's career. I think the watch-line is even coming back, already. And yes, I'm aware it's January 19th.
:: Scott [+] ::
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Organic Awards 2004

organicARCHITECT has realeased their Organic Awards for 2004 consumer products. There's a lot of great stuff in there. I've seen quite a few people raise a fuss about the stapleless stapler (and rightly so) but I'm just as impressed by the Corn Bio-Polymer Printer, made by Hewlitt-Packard. Computer recycling is going to be a huge issue in the future, what with all the lead and other toxins that go into these blessed machines. I'm definitely enjoying seeing what companies can do to help out.
:: Scott [+] ::
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Uprooted?

Okay, a quick question for you local hipsters: When did Trees, the venue, change their URL to treeslive.com and not the traditional trees.com, which now shills shrubbery? It can't have been too long ago.

Anyone know if they got bought out or usurped?
:: Scott [+] ::
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Clearing out my bookmarks

I've been bookmarking stuff instead of posting it. Let's clear some things out:

..::I need to mess around with The BBC's Get Writing site, but it looks like it could be a pretty sweet resource for those with aspirations::..

..::The Vintage Soviet Posters Database gives me a bit of a historical chubby::..

..::Read about some of the trials of the upcoming Iraqi Election over at Baghdad Burning:

Another problem is the selling of ballots. We're getting our ballots through the people who give out the food rations in the varying areas. The whole family is registered with this person(s) and the ages of the varying family members are known. Many, many, many people are not going to vote. Some of those people are selling their voting cards for up to $400. The word on the street is that these ballots are being bought by people coming in from Iran. They will purchase the ballots, make false IDs (which is ridiculously easy these days) and vote for SCIRI or Daawa candidates. Sunnis are receiving their ballots although they don't intend to vote, just so that they won't be sold.

I heard a report on NPR this morning about how Iraqi civilians living abroad can go register to vote at various locales, including a grand total of five cities in the US. They then have to go back to those same sites with their registration cards and vote. I'm sure this is very convenient for someone living in, say, Bismark, North Dakota::..

..::Finally, I love the fact that some local taggers snapped up DallasPolice.com to upload and display their work. Some of it's quite cool, too. Check it::..
:: Scott [+] ::
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Random Observation

I inadvertantly caught about five minutes of an episode of Family Ties this weekend - which was really strange considering that the new Family Guy episode tossed a little reference their way.

Anyhow, if John Kerry decided to follow in Al Gore's post-election footsteps, put on a little weight, and grow a beard, he'd look like the spitting image of Steven Keaton. Draw your own conclusions.
:: Scott [+] ::
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Link-link-link-linkity

Just some random stuff. If'n you care about my personal life, well, wait a few days, I may have something towards the end of the week. 'Til then, waste your time here:

..::Only you can prevent hot-air balloon disasters - that pic of the guy exiting the basket is amazing. I wish I had a follow up to see if he made it out allright::..

..::The GreenPeace ship Rainbow Warrior - how outdated is that name now?? - has been helping deliver aid to Tsunami victims. Like 'em or not (and I'm kind of ~meh~), they are blogging live from the scene. You can read all about it here::..

..::Seriously, how cool would it be to go up into the arctic circle, build your own igloo, and chill out watching the Northern Lights? these folks can make it happen. Truth be told, though, I'd be slightly more interested in the Ice Bear Tour. Just incase they become the next Dodos::..

..::Tired of my greenie/hippy preaching? Take a break and play some games at tea games. The *new* 'Chuck' game is especially interesting::..

..::Finally, just in case you've not seen it, not only does Mark Cuban come out as a Dubya supporter - both in 2000 and 2004 (which makes the baby ufez cry) - he does have a rather poingnant post about eschewing the inauguration party. Worth a read, for sure::..
:: Scott [+] ::
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:: Scott [+] ::
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We can sexy is totally going to be my epitaph!

It may take me a while to dig through this guide to the best of webcomics 2004, but damn if Daily Dinosaur Comics has't gone straight into my bookmarks. They're not all genius, but these two convinced me it's worth a daily click.
:: Scott [+] ::
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Aught-Five, eh?

Kinda smells the same as last year. Anyhow...

It may be to early to declare 2k5 as "The year of...." anything. I'll at least declare Organic Braeburn Apples as the official fruit of this year. I had one with my lunch today and felt like I'd discovered the forbidden fruit from the tree of life. I see myself heading back to the market to buy three dozen or so more tomorrow. They'll be gone by Sunday.

Looking back on 2004 may be so Monday or whatever, but here are two lists that I found worth a perusal:

This one form a Sierra Club poll on the 10 most significant environmental events of the year

-and-

Retrocrush's 100 most annoying things of 2004 - giving you a sneak peak at one episode of Vh1's "I love the naught-ies", a show that should be out in, oh, July or so.

Also, it looks like Tucker Carlson got canned. Nobody fucks with the Stewart!
:: Scott [+] ::
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