DLand - ARRR ... Maggie the Pirate Dog

Lots going on in the head of GenieAlisa if not really a lot going on to the outside world. I suppose the first bit of big news is about Bossman's dog, Maggie.Just before New Year's, Maggie's right eye started swelling ... like A LOT. Medicine made the swelling go down, but it came back a few weeks later. The diagnosis was cancer of the eyeball. I mean, REALLY, who gets that?! But apparently it's not that uncommon in dogs or humans. So last week she went in for surgery and had her right eye and the cancerous growth removed. Unfortunately, they could see some tumor had spread to the brain. Now, Maggie is a golden retriever, so I'm sure she wouldn't miss a little brain or depth perception, but this was traumatic news all the same. Yesterday was Maggie's MRI. Mrs. Bossman, Momma and Daddy Bossman and Maggie all drove up to Vienna to the only MRI machine on the east coast that works for animals. Hehe, they have separate receiving areas for cats and dogs. I guess MRIs are stressful enough on everyone as it is. The good news in all of this is that the tumor in Maggie's brain is not cancerous. Apparently the eye cancer is a special type that affects the optic nerve but doesn't really spread. So now plans just have to be made to either treat the tumor in her brain with radiation or surgery. It's like an ER episode in my office. So while it's been a tough few weeks for her, Maggie seems to be doing well. She came home yesterday from the MRI and we all are awaiting the test results. I'm pretty optimistic about it as is Maggie. Apparently being the pirate dog has not really dampened her spirits any. Ah, well, I was going to start a small rant about how I hate librarians, but I'm out of time for now. Working from home means I'm in my pajamas still, but I still have to get crap done. Guess I need to finish writing up the docs for our Patriot Act Subversion Tool (tm). Ugh. Stay tuned ...

DLand - Fast Cars and Sass

Had a good day today, overall. Thanks for asking. Painted my nails Maple Leaf blue. I even went into Sally's Beauty Supply and held bottles of polish up to my jersey to make sure the match was appropriate. And it doesn't even clash with the car.We saw two more Mini's outside the Ukrops tonight. One was the dark blue (Maple Leaf even) and one was like mine. But neither had the amazing stripes or headlamps like mine. And I'm sure none of them had all the goodies mine did. But still I parked facing them so my little car could visit with them. They could start a gang. A British, miniature, heart-stoppingly cute gang. I think I'm going to make a t-shirt for myself to wear at work that says “I did all your work plus the giant pile of crap I have to do and am still done before quitting time. What the fuck did you do all day?”. I'm not sure how it would fit on the front though; it may have to wrap around to the back. Maybe if my tits were bigger I could fit it all on there. Stop thinking about my tits. Geez ... you perv ... P.S. I just noticed that Andrew added a super keen new feature of having private diary entries as well (for gold and supergold members). You can read all about it here. Man, that Andrew guy just rocks!

DLand - Me and Bat Boy Kickin' It Freestyle

This was sitting on my desk when I got back from lunch today. The thing I find most disturbing about this is the quote halfway through the article that, “Batboy learned how to drive while working with the U.S. military combating terrorism in Afghanistan.” This weekend was a much needed recharge for my system. There was a bit of gaming with Byron and Sarah, a LOT of football watching (and commentary - I'm telling you it's all about the parity), and some casual reading. There is nothing better than curling up and reading in bed. I did pretty well too in that my book was somewhat heavy but I managed to not have it land on my face after dropping off to sleep. The book is actually very interesting. I think you would like it, Jeremy. It talks a lot about the basics of cooking and it has a fair amount of humor in it. I turned down Julia Child, Martha Stewart and Aunt Mae for the wisdom of Alton Brown. Also, I bought Signs, although I haven't yet worked up the nerve to watch it yet (me = giant chicken). But that was about it this weekend. The Mini really is amazingly cute and wonderful. I'm not nearly as neurotic about parking it and touching as I thought I would be. And I literally get all giggly when I look out the front window and see it in the parking lot. I've already put four people in it a few times and so far, so good. We're hitting the road this weekend to go the the Caps game and brave the traffic of Northern Virginia. I bought blue nail polish yesterday to match my Leafs jersey and have white strips to put over them for “bonnet stripes” to both compliment the Leafs and my car. It's a win, win, win situation. Hopefully, I won't get pulled over by any cops for a supposed tri-state joy ride.