Well, I don’t accept what you said.

Her dog was eating 4 cups of Instinct ($2+/lb premium dogfood) a day & he was still losing weight.   She was worried about him; we were all worried about him.   It turned out that he had worms.   She had it taken care of & he looks great now.  I’m sure you want to know why it took so long.   Let me tell you.

She had recently lost her living situation & was crashing her sister’s couch.   She was working full-time to support 2 teenaged daughters, which in itself would be all that anyone could handle.    Her sister’s home didn’t allow pets, so she begged permission to build — by her 90 lb self — a kennel at her mother’s house.   She didn’t ask anyone for help; she just did it.

She’d wake up extra early to take care of her family & then she’d work all day.   When she got home she’d pack up his water bottles & plastic bags & then go to her mother’s house to pick him up.   Then she’d drive him to an area where she could walk him without too many distractions or other dogs because there are too many other dogs in that neighborhood & he can — & has — easily yanked her off her feet because she is so tiny.   Then she’d go back home, take care of her family, & then head back to her mother’s house, where she’d actually sleep in the garage with her dog, because she couldn’t bear to think of him having to sleep by himself.

On the weekends she’d get up extra early to take him running around a park area before other people started showing up.   She spent every spare moment she had being a good owner to him while juggling an already very difficult life.

I wish you could see the pictures she just took of him, because he looks awesome.   He’s almost as handsome as my dog.   No dog is as handsome as my dog, but he comes close.   She is devoted to that dog & you accused her of abusing him.   You demeaned & maligned her in front of a room full of strangers.

I’ve brought 2 of my dogs to Kalihi Pet Clinic.   I had my Basenji, Jack, neutered with you folks earlier this year, & he had a very bad time.   Your staff called me because he was snapping.   This is not typical of Jack; he has always been extremely well behaved at vet visits, including one in which he was getting stapled & stitched after being attacked by bigger dogs.

It was after Jack’s procedure that I decided I was never coming back to your facility specifically because you were so rude to me.   As I stood there, with Jack quite docilely sitting in my arm, asking to book an appointment 6 months ahead for my other dog’s spay, you were so mean & condescending that once I got home I decided to look for a different veterinarian.   When asked why, I said, “I just don’t like that older skinny chick that works there.   She gives me a bad feeling.”   In retrospect, I bet you gave Jack a bad feeling as well.

I’m sure Kalihi Pet Clinic is busy & that business is good.   I’m not writing this letter to you to hurt your business.   I’ve heard from many that your boss is a great guy who actually cares about the animals.

I’m writing this because you humiliated one of my friends — one of the gentlest, kindest, most patient & softhearted people that I know — in front of a bunch of people.   And I want you to have some idea of what it feels like.    But it’ll never quite be the same, because you deserve it.   She didn’t.

You owe her an apology.

For the last few years I’ve stuck to all the same places – places I’ll never write about because I want to keep them to myself. So all kinds of exciting, trendy new places have come & gone & I’ve never stepped foot inside of them. I’m getting old.

When Salt Kitchen & Tasting Bar opened up on Waialae Avenue (it’s right next to Coffee Talk), I heard all kinds of great things. Jason from Kalapawai Cafe had glowing things to say about their menu, so glowy in fact that it occurred to me that I should go there some time. When my friend Wes said he wanted to try it too, it was a done deal.

Jason had very helpfully texted me a list of menu recommendations – the belly pork sandwich, the fried egg, the beet salad, the charcuterie platter, & several others.   Once we arrived I was pleasantly surprised to see Jenny, formerly of Town. Among the very sparkly glittery things I had heard from people was only one piece of criticism: that the food was great but the service was bad. Upon seeing Jenny, however, I felt certain that all was well.

I didn’t keep close track of which wine we ordered or which slice was which cheese & I apologize for that. However, I did take pictures & these are all thumbnails so you may click on them for the larger versions. Enjoy, Logan.

The item I was most curious about was the Fried Egg, which Jason had described to me but which description had just plain fallen out of my head right after he told me because I think we had carbombs that night. I recalled only knowing that it was something very unique I absolutely had to try. I, who have never sampled Balut, but totally would given the opportunity, have always liked eggs. At least since the first time I saw Angel Heart. Actually I think it goes back to my first reading of the Hobbit.   Remember?   “A box without hinges, key or lid; yet golden treasure inside is hid.”   And yes, it should have been “hidden,” but it was Middle Earth & they had Sauron & orcs to deal with so I think that’s a good antigrammar excuse.   And yes, I’m fully aware that instead of golden treasure, balut would have Gollum in it… but anyway.

When the Fried Egg came, all that Jason had told me about it came back, but I was still surprised.   Who would ever have thought of breadcrumbing a boiled egg?   What a pain in the ass this must have been to prepare.   Even more so because, once sliced open, it was apparent that the egg had been perfectly soft boiled.

In the end it was still just a boiled egg that had been breadcrumbed, but I totally enjoyed it because I can never boil my eggs that perfectly. The spiced mayo that came with it was very tasty & went well with the buttery yolk.

Right off the bat I loved the ceviche (photo up above). It hadn’t been on Jason’s list but I love ceviche. There were 2 preparations & I picked the simpler sounding one. Jenny said that it was her favorite as well.

The belly pork sandwich had me from “belly.” Belly pork is decadent. I mean, it’s where bacon comes from. This belly pork was fried crispy & covered with a (traditionally) fried egg. The table next to us exclaimed that it looked like a loco moco sandwich. But it tasted like Heaven. Like Heaven & a really fat ass. But mostly like Heaven. Wes & I actually didn’t even bother with the sandwich top; frankly I would have really loved to have some of that crispy belly pork on some hot steamed rice.

And they had a cheese platter. Of course we had to get it. To be honest, it wasn’t to my taste, but Wes really enjoyed the Oregon Bleu. I like gouda & triple creams – the typical cheeseboard you’d get at your friend’s wedding in Waikiki – & I like anything smoked.

Wes had also never had figs before. Figs are my favorite fruit in the world. I actually have a fig tree but I never get to eat any figs because the birds always get them. Salt’s candied figs were delicious.

And of course we had to order the House Charcuterie Platter. They cure their own meats, after all. I was very excited about the “crispy head cheese,” which was a little medallion of head cheese, battered & deep fried. It was delicious. There was only a very faint hint of vinegar & the different textures within were perfect. It was just right. I also enjoyed explaining to Wes what it was after making him take a bite first. He not only enjoyed it but determined that he needed to visit a market & try head cheese in its “natural form.”

I left the smoked foie gras for last because 1) it was my favorite & 2) it was the worst picture I took. Perhaps my hand was shaking with anticipation.

The outside of the foie gras slice was peppered, & it was too much. I cut it off. Upon tasting the foie gras by itself, the only word I could think of to describe it was “beastly.” I’ve had all kinds of different preparations of foie gras – chilled, with fruit, seared, with sauce, cooked in a pastry – but they were always quite tame. This preparation horrified you at first with a strong raw bloody flavor & primitive texture, & then it immediately knocked you over as the creamy goodness which is foie gras spread through your mouth. And lingered.

It was so good I couldn’t even eat it with bread. I sampled the different cheeses in vain for something suitable to eat in between nibbles of foie gras, but in the end I just ate it, a nibble at a time, very slowly. In retrospect I think some greens would have been ideal.

I had a glass of riesling which was sweeter than promised but ended up being very good to my overwhelmed taste buds as dinner progressed. Wes had some nice, dry Spanish red which was not yet on the menu, & then chianti, which he enjoyed thoroughly. We finished up with flan, which was too spicy & sweet for me. If it had been less sweet I think I would have liked it. I think by the end of dinner I was worn out, & I really wanted a cup of tea.

Our tab came out to $128, pretty cheap for all that we had. Frankly I would like to go back & just eat ceviche & foie gras all night. Anyone?

I first noticed it over a decade ago.   I worked, as all 20-somethings work, at a job where there was just tons of intrigue & drama all the time.   You know, it just seems like the only positions the world will give us at that age.   Everything was so intense & silly all the time.   Anyway.

One of my co-workers had a crush on another one of our co-workers.   I thought she was silly & I knew he was a jack ass, but she really liked him & that was that.   Until she slept with him.   And she told me about it.

“You can’t tell this to anyone,” she said, quite clearly.   “Not to anyone, ok?”   And of course I agreed.   You always agree to stuff like that.   She wasn’t my only friend at work but we were all friends & chances are after she made me promise not to tell anyone, she probably told everyone else, little by little, anyway.   Or, more likely, she had already told other people.   I mean, we were all in our twenties.   It was only a matter of time before someone else broke their vow of silence & told everyone about it even though everyone actually already knew.   But it wasn’t going to be me.

I quite seriously resolved to never tell anyone what she had told me, & went about my own business, which was already quite exciting & silly even without her news.   And rather quickly I forgot what she had told me & in fact that she had ever told it to me at all.   I didn’t notice doing it.   Apparently when things fall out of my head they make very little noise.

A month later she confided to me that she was pregnant.   She was so pissed off at me when I had no idea who the father might be, & quite put out that she had to tell me the same secret story she had told me a month ago, because I was supposed to just know by interpreting the lift of her eyebrows.

Naturally her pregnancy wasn’t something I was allowed to broadcast to the world & so I forgot about it.   Later when she wanted to vent to me about what a jerk he was when it came to helping her pay for an abortion I initially had no idea what she was talking about, but quickly caught on, remembered & played it out as she complained about her current situation, which was fortunate for our friendship.   It was this stressful brush with my apparent selective amnesia that got my attention.

Over the years secrets have resurfaced & I’ve known by my immediate confusion that I was looking at one of many confidences that simply fell out of my head after I promised not to tell.   The trick is making an agreement not to repeat the knowledge.   Other folks have granted me sensitive information & if I didn’t know it was secret then I remembered quite easily & often mentioned it casually somewhere I wasn’t supposed to.   Story of my life.

Recently a personally embarrassing incident with a guy occurred, & after telling my sister about it I resolved to keep it a secret forever, because I liked him & I didn’t want to embarrass him.   When he started acting like a jerk to me I was hurt & confused & I thought out all kinds of (ultimately) inaccurate theories as to how I had offended him.   I spent 2-3 weeks feeling tortured over it until I finally decided which inaccurate theory it must be & told my sister about it.

She reminded me about the secret I’d forgotten & all of a sudden everything made sense & I felt better.

I don’t know why I forget secrets.    There is no particularly traumatic indiscretion (that I can recall) in my past.   It’s not that I’m completely apathetic to people’s personal details; generally people who confide in me are those who are close to me & who I care about.

When I was in college I worked at a Japanese restaurant & in the mornings I hung out at a coffee cart.   I ended up chatting with one of the other espresso drinkers about the Eagles, & we became friends.   Over the course of our friendship he mentioned that we had first met when I waited on his table & I couldn’t remember him at all.   When he reminded me that he was a vegetarian I suddenly remembered everything – that I had suggested a zaru soba & then a meatless hiyashi ramen to him, & that his friend had had a sashimi/tempura combination & 3 Budweisers.

“I can’t believe your mind is co compartmentalized,” he said.   So perhaps my selective memory is due to mental segregation.   In addition to secrets, I have difficulty remembering people’s names.   Sometimes I can’t remember the name of this person that I was just introduced to 5 minutes ago.   And sometimes I can’t remember the name of this person I have known for 5 years.   However, I almost always remember what both of those people drink if they have ever sat on my bar.   Apparently their drink preferences are filed in my brain’s For Practical Use folder.

Secrets are not for practical use.   They are actually just clutter for non-manipulative types like me.   Maybe that’s why I forget them.   I’d probably have a better idea if I could remember.

1. The obvious losers – every update is a link to their product or pornsite or seminar or keylogger or whatever – it doesn’t matter since I don’t click on the links.   Twitter is a networking site & I guess a lot of people think it’s a way to advertise their otherwise immobile offerings to a wide audience, but not me.   I’m not here to shop.   If I want to buy something I’m not going to look on Twitter; I’m going to go to the appropriate pornsite.   Fewer middlemen ftw.

2. Uninteresting people (that I don’t know).   I originally just said “uninteresting people” but then I thought of the multitudes of totally boring people that I follow on Twitter.   The catch is that these people are friends of mine & their lives are of interest to me, boring or otherwise.   Am I talking about you?   You’ll never know.  But if I don’t know you, the only reason why I’m going to follow you is because you’re interesting.

When I first joined Twitter, I was pretty sure none of my friends had even heard of it but even so I probably wouldn’t have gone looking for them.   The few who have gotten lost & found themselves with a Twitter account & then found me, I’m happy to follow, but in the grand scheme of things I’m mostly interested in the 140 character statements of total strangers.   Who are interesting, of course.

3. People who update too much.   Just today I unfollowed a fairly funny comedian because more than half of the visible posts on my Twitter page were his.   I realize that it takes a lot of effort to post that much, & while I know there are people whose lives are just soooo empty that they really have nothing better to do than post on Twitter, I personally am big on quality over quantity.   There is a certain experience I want to have on Twitter, & that involves seeing posts from multiple people, not just one dude who spams all over my feed.

4. People who reply more often than they make actual posts.   This is a point on which my abovementioned friend & I differ in our opinions.   She likes people who “engage” their Twitter contacts.   While I’m not opposed to occasionally responding to folks on Twitter, I do think too much of it gets away from the microblogging perspective & then this is all reduced to shitty chat.   There are much better places for chat, like Facebook or email or Starbucks.   Why do it on Twitter?

If you take a look at the 50 people I’m following at this moment, a lot of them violate this rule.   All I can say is that at the time that I first looked at them on Twitter they didn’t have a fuckton of @s.   Since I block @s that don’t involve me I don’t see it.   So why bother to avoid folks with lots of @s since I won’t see it anyway?   I don’t know.   It’s just a turn off when I do see it.

I do @ people on occasion when I think the content of the @ would be funny or interesting to others with respect to previous tweets, & when I think it wouldn’t I use Twitter’s shitty 140 character messaging.   And I try to keep my @s at a third or less of my total tweets.   And yes, I do have anxiety issues.   Why do you ask?

Celebrities or media folks I follow because I think their content is entertaining or otherwise interesting: Olivia Wilde, Conan O’Brien, Bernie Hou (Alien Loves Predator), Jenny Johnson, Julius Sharpe, Steve Isaacs, Trent Reznor.

Random people I follow because their updates enrich my life: Tina Chesal, Fat Jeff, Paula Bender, Jarad Johnson, Donna/Champuru.   These are people I have never met except on Twitter.   I followed them because they had interesting content.

Fictitious entities I follow on Twitter because I just had to: Darth Vader, Grand Moff Tarkin, The Great Cornholio.   There were also a number of World of Warcraft characters who were quite entertaining for awhile with their Azeroth-related tweets, but they all kind of petered out so I unfollowed them.

When I first joined Twitter it was being marketed as a “microblogging tool.”   Imagine if, instead of reading one person’s long, self-aggrandizing post about what they think about Twitter (hello there), you could just see a stream of short, sweet statements from people of all walks of life, telling you, in 140 characters or less, what they want out of Twitter?   How much of a bigger experience would that be?

Yeah, I know… everyone just wants to chat & network & be popular.   Actual content happens, but serendipitously.   But there are still folks like me who can dream about it.

At 8 months of age, my American Bulldog Boomer is getting pretty big.   He’s also pretty athletic.   Most recently he’s added excitement to my life by managing to jump on top of the 6′ wall around my backyard in order to get at the neighbor’s dogs.   He hasn’t actually gotten over yet, but he’s also not full grown yet.

This could be some seriously bad stuff.

On Sunday I thought I was having a heart attack when I saw that he was able to get both of his front legs over the top of the wall.   I ended up packing him up & taking him to the bar with me because I didn’t know what else to do.

Boomer was an excellent bar dog.   For the first few hours, while it was slow, he basically followed me, on leash, everywhere.   He met the early patrons & was nice to everyone except the guy that T hates, probably because he saw the look on T’s face when he interacted with the guy.   I was very unhappy about it; T felt rather pleased.   Men.   By the time the bar got busy, Boomer was so popular with everyone that he ended up hanging out at one of the tables with the guys.

This isn’t really an ideal way to socialize a dog imo, but it ended up being a very good experience for him.   And he wasn’t climbing into my neighbor’s yard to eat their dogs.

I looked at some electronic pet containment systems & the one that looked like it might fit my needs best was Petsafe’s inground one, especially since I could pick it up immediately at Home Depot.   When I discussed it with Boomer’s imminent trainer from Sit Means Sit, he cautioned me that if Boomer rushed the area in a state of excitement that it could actually fuel his frenzy.   Knowing that Boomer is a very drive-y dog (once he focuses on something it is very difficult to change his course), I decided I had to find another solution.

My mom got out of her classroom & came along with me to City Mill, where we picked up 2 7′x3′ segments of wire mesh fencing & a roll of metal wire.   We had to fold it up quite a bit to fit it into my RSX, but managed to get it here without too much damage to my interior.   We bent the loose spindles on the edge of each segment into the patterned hollow tiles lining the top of the wall, then proceeded to tie the fencing to the wall with the metal wire.   It took about an hour.

Once the segments were secured, the neighbor let his dogs out so we could see if Boomer would figure out to jump at new locations.   Since the neighbor’s dogs tend to bark at specific areas, it was a toss up.   During this time Boomer stuck to only one area, & the fencing worked like a dream.   Because he was unable to jump with his head forward, he couldn’t even get his paws on the top of the wall, so all he could really do was jump up & down.   And then he got really tired.

Tired Boomer is good.

I started walking my dogs but since I have to walk them one at a time (they are obedient when we are one on one; when there are more of them they get this “pack” attitude, which is sometimes hard on my wrists) it occurred to me by the 3rd day that I was getting 3x as much exercise as they were, & although I do want to lose weight, I don’t want to hurt quite this much.   And a third of whatever exercise I can handle before my legs fall off of my body wasn’t enough for any of them anyway.

To make this week more intense, Madeline got spayed today.   She’s being kept overnight so I can keep Boomer & Chie indoors with me while I sleep tonight, but once Madeline comes home my little wall jumper has to stay outside for 5 days while Madeline wears a funnel collar.   This means that Boomer will be able to patrol the wall while I am sleeping, which makes me nervous.

I don’t want him to figure out that some areas of the wall are unblocked.   Right now if I call him off the wall most times he will leave it without my having to go out there & threaten him, but while I’m asleep no one will be watching him.   It’s entirely possible that I won’t be getting a lot of sleep this week.

Hopefully I can find someone with a truck who can help me pick up more fencing before Boomer figures anything out, & hopefully with help from Sit Means Sit we can eventually train him not to worry about the neighbor’s dogs barking on the other side of the wall.   Today I lured him away from the barking with treats & then rewarded him for sitting on my porch while they barked.

Currently Boomer is passed out on my floor & we are safe for the evening.

Time for some WoW.

Snake wine is, without a doubt, the most disgusting thing I’ve ever tasted, or ever had in my mouth for that matter.   At one time we had some friends who made regular trips to China & would bring back bottles of snake wine.   As far as I know, folks aren’t allowed to bring bottles of snake wine back to the US… but our friends had ways.   Oh yes, they did.

The bottles our friends always brought back had what appeared to be cobras in them.   I actually know very little of snakes but I assume if it’s got a hood, it’s a cobra.   My understanding is that when drinking this particular snake wine we are also drinking the snake’s venom, & I did notice immediate numbness on my lips the first time I tried it.   That evening I didn’t feel any alcoholic effects, but I did have to call people & apologize the next day for saying things I shouldn’t have said (worse than usual).

I’ve shot snake wine whenever it was available, definitely not for the taste but mostly just to get someone else to have a shot of it with me because I really enjoy the look on their face during & after the swallow.   And usually for a few minutes after swallowing.   John here was a total sport about it.

A handful of us had all sampled the snake wine – Jason & I had done out virgin shots together & I have pictures of that — Jason handled it pretty well but I went running for a napkin.   When John dropped in to the bar he agreed to try some as well.

John is so game.   So trusting.   He’s awesome.

The few of us who were there at the bar that evening (it was pretty early still) watched in gleeful anticipation as John bravely raised the shot to his lips.   As you can see I already had the camera ready.   Before John had even straightened his head, you could see the pain on his face.

We all knew it hurt.

John suffered very quietly for several moments.   John is by nature a quiet, intelligent person, & as he concentrated on keeping his head from sloughing off his neck by force of sheer will, I doubt he was coming up with anything intelligent to say about his experience, but he was definitely quiet, unlike Mele, who had bellowed like a bull who just got his nuts snipped before the shot glass even got back down to the counter.

No one really said anything; we just let him experience the pain.   Speaking doesn’t help it, anyway.

My favorite part of drinking Scotch is the exhale after swallowing.   With snake wine, that’s probably the worst part.   You just drank some super shitty 3rd world grain liquor mixed with decomposing snake parts & waste matter.   Snake wine tastes so bad that the Vietnamese bootleggers have probably pissed in it to give it the right color & there’s no way you can tell.   God help you if you need to burp.

John waited much longer than I did to grab the napkin.   He did try to man it out, but I think that just as he thought he had stabilized the cells of his body… he exhaled & it all went to pieces again.   When I’d taken my shot, before the snake wine was even completely down my throat I was already dashing for a napkin.   Not because I needed to vomit or spit, but because I thought it might help me to keep my face from falling off of my head.

There’s really nothing like the first time you try snake wine.   I understand there are other snake wines – the Okinawan ones, for instance – that don’t make you feel like you’re going to die.   However, I haven’t tried them.   I totally would though.   I’ll try anything once.   I think.

John suffered for several minutes, but he was quite stoic about it.   He didn’t cry, although his eyes did water quite a bit.   That’s not technically crying; that’s your body’s physical reaction to intense pain.   Ok, maybe that’s crying.   But anyway, he wasn’t sad or anything.

He was being celebrated & congratulated for joining the ranks of those of us who were dumb enough to drink a shot of snake wine.

You go John.

Maybe tomorrow.   It’s too late for a Xanax today; I’ll oversleep if I take one now.

2011 has, so far, been a very rough year.   My impaired memory can only go back so far, but in February we had to get my house tented.   I live in my grandparents’ home, where I stayed with them until they passed in 2008 & 2009, here in their house.   Now it’s just me… & 4 dogs & a cat.   And a guppy.

Getting the house tented was important, but being homeless for 36 hours with 4 dogs, a cat & a guppy was daunting.   I had been planning to get Jack neutered, in the hope that he would stop being so confrontational with Madeline, who is 4 times his size & has rather large jaws.   Madeline has taken shit from Jack since she was a puppy, & generally always been fairly easygoing about it, but you could see her patience was wearing thin, & in the last few months Jack had gotten bitten, although it seemed to do nothing to dampen his attitude.   I booked Jack’s surgery for the day of the tenting, which would leave me with 3 dogs, a cat & a guppy to house overnight.

Fortunately my brother has a kennel at his house, which is where Boomer grew up (Boomer’s dad, Gunner, is my brother’s oldest dog), & I arranged to have Madeline & Chie stay in the kennel with Boomer in the house with his dad, sister & uncles (my brother, like me, has 4 dogs), & my cat & I would crash in the spare room.

Getting your house tented, especially if you are the sole human occupant, sucks.   Seriously.   There’s no other way it can be.   There’s no way to prepare so that it won’t suck.   But for minimal suckage, I highly recommend going through your refrigerator & freezer the week before & throwing out everything you don’t care about or can’t identify.   Same for your cupboards.   Do not buy any groceries.   Having to double bag all edibles that I intended to keep in the few nights before the tenting really, really sucked.   It might be worse for me than for other people because I have OCD-type issues about organization & order.   I actually ended up taking things out of the bags & re-bagging.   And then I’d see something else that I knew should go into the back of the bag I just sealed, & I’d try to ignore it but in the end I’d end up re-doing the bag again.    It was a nightmare.   No, it did not occur to me to take a Xanax.

Also know that any shrubbery you have growing near the house is going to be included in the tent.   My folks & I spent 2 days pruning & lopping in the hopes that Terminix would spare some of the more rare flora that my grandparents had cultivated, with no luck.   Even with enough room for someone to walk between the plant & the house, it was still deemed not far away enough.   None of the plants died, but it looked like they did for a couple of weeks.

Transporting everyone to my brother’s place in Kaneohe was rough, having the 2 girls outside, scared, in the kennel, was rough, & having the vet call to say that Jack was being difficult & they wanted me to pick him up early was rough.   I also got pulled over, on my final trip, for doing 73/50.   The cop heard Honeygirl wailing nonstop in her carrier & decided to let me off with a lecture, after petting Chie on the head, because he could see how fucked up my day was.   When I finally got everyone home I wanted to kiss the ground.   It was so good to be home!   Jack had to be kept in the front yard because he had stitches on his nuts & a funnel collar, & he howled in misery until I brought Chie to stay with him.   Basenjis cry tears, & when I had picked him up at the vet’s I think he had decided that I had discarded him, & his face was matted with tears as he lay staring at nothing.   It had taken him a moment to realize that I was there to get him, & when it sunk in I had to carry him out because he wouldn’t let me put him down.   It sucked that they had to stay in the front yard for the 2 weeks of convalescence the vet instructed for Jack to have, especially since there isn’t a lot of shelter.   I tarped an area & it was really ghetto & sucky for them but it was only going to be temporary.   I was just glad to be home.   Life would get back to normal shortly.

I was wrong.   One afternoon I had all 4 dogs romping in the front yard & the neighbor’s dog came charging out to the fence.   Madeline of course was all over the fence doing the “Fuck me? No fuck you!” thing, which generally stopped after a few seconds because I would step in & chase her off.   This time, the neighbor’s other dog, a little French Bulldog, also charged out & things got very heated.   The Frenchie’s infrequent appearances are apparently very refreshing to my dogs’ aggression levels, & somehow in the frenzy Boomer attacked Jack; he latched on to Jack’s side & wouldn’t let go.   In fact, he kept biting down harder & harder, which was around when I realized my finger was in Boomer’s mouth & needed to come out immediately.   No sooner had I gotten Boomer off of Jack, Madeline nailed him & fucked him up pretty bad.   My right forefinger was also pretty messed up; the entire right half of the nail was ripped off.   I could barely do anything between dripping blood everywhere & shaking.   Fortunately for me, my parents live in the next valley & they came over & helped me mobilize Jack (who screamed every time we had to move him) & drove us to Feather & Fur in Kailua, which was open until midnight.

The veterinarian there patched Jack up nicely; there were no broken bones but he was going to have to wear the funnel collar for a week to keep him from messing with the staples.   I went from horrified to panicked to a different flavor of panicked to not wanting to have dogs any more to heavily blaming myself for not having my dogs under control & the last one has kind of stuck.   I booked an appointment with Leonard of Sit Means Sit because it was apparent that this situation was not under control.

So Jack & Chie were sentenced to staying in the front yard for an indefinite period of time, & I decided that I needed to find Jack another home because I just didn’t trust Madeline & Boomer any more.   I knew I needed to tighten up the discipline, but I couldn’t let Jack get attacked again while I figured it out.   I cried for 2 days.   I blamed myself.   I still blame myself.   I should have seen the problems when they were still small.

Naturally there were very few candidates to take Jack.   No one wants your dog; they want puppies that will start off their lives as their dog & their dog alone.   Also, Jack being Jack he needed a household where there would be someone home all the time, because Jack can’t stand being alone.   Everyone I emailed either responded with regret or didn’t respond at all.   And it was torture because giving Jack to someone else wasn’t something I wanted to do.

And then last Friday Boomer threw up his food & looked sick.   I gave him peroxide to induce vomiting because I thought he might have swallowed a mango seed from the yard & obstructed himself, & ended up taking him in to the vet where he tested positive for Parvo.

FUCK MY FUCKING LIFE.

This is because I forgot to get his boosters, which were due a month before, & because my life wasn’t hard enough.   Parvo is one of those things you never want your puppy to get.   There’s a very high morbidity rate, even with treatment.

Fortunately we had caught it very early.   Boomer was hospitalized overnight but released to me the next day, because he had eaten food & kept it down.   However, once home Boomer began refusing food & water.   My work week begins on Saturday, & having to go to work & not know if Boomer would still be alive when I got home was torture.   When I was at home I was out of my mind worrying about him getting dehydrated, checking his nose because I was worried about fever, endlessly reading forums & articles about Parvovirus & trying to figure out how I was going to pay my charge card after dropping $600 at the vet.

I found that I badly needed these things to take care of Boomer at home:

Thermometer (with sleeves – puppy temps have to be taken rectally)
Unflavored Pedialyte
A medicine dropper

On the 3rd day, the vet told me I could give Boomer Kaopectate for his diarrhea, & that seemed to help a lot as well.   On the 4th day Boomer still hadn’t eaten & was still lying listlessly around the house, resisting the droppers of Pedialyte as much as he could, but he had yet to get dehydrated.   I ended up dropping another $200 for a CBC which showed him at slightly low levels for various things, an antibiotic shot & a subcutaneous fluid injection.   The last was performed by inserting an IV inbetween Boomer’s shoulder blades & then squeezing out half the IV bag into him.

The IV also contained B12, & must have helped Boomer feel significantly better because when I got home that night he ate.   I actually cheered & clapped.   I was afraid to feed him too much.   The next day (today) he remained ravenous & has so far eaten every meal given to him.   I mixed Kaopectate into his meals & I think today (Day 5) he made normal poop.   I say “think” because I’m not sure which poops are Madeline’s & which are his, but there was normal poop in the area of the yard that Boomer normally goes in, & no diarrhea anywhere in the yard.   Also, if it’s all Madeline’s poop then she went 7 times.

Last night I got a call from a teacher at Leilehua who heard about Jack & would like to meet him.   He sounded like a really nice guy & he is coming over here on Sunday.   Part of me still feels like crying, but the other part of me imagines the life that Jack might have without me, being someone’s only dog.   I spent some time with him & Chie out front & he laid his head on my knee, staring into my eyes.   At first I wondered how I could let him go when he loved me so much – & believe me, he didn’t love me when I first brought him home; he’s a Basenji & you have to earn it.   Then it occurred to me that with 4 dogs, a cat & a guppy, the amount of quiet moments Jack would have to lay his head on my knee would be scarce, for all his life.   And I thought maybe, with someone else, he might have more of those moments.   I want him to have that.

So it’s been a rough year so far, but I am working through it.   I still have hope that there will be some happy outcomes.   I just have to wait a little longer.

Also, today is Chie’s birthday.   She is 3 years old.   I have special breakfast, lunch & dinner planned for her.

March 23 note: the state just got involved & now the stores are forced to charge sales tax, so the shirts are no longer a flat $20.   I could comment more on this, but I’ll just leave it at that.

April 4 note: Don Quixote has now taken over distribution of Aloha For Japan shirts; Barefoot League (& I think the other stores) will no longer be distributing them.

I have no retail experience.   I don’t even know how to fold a t-shirt (check out my drawers at home — I roll my shirts.) but today I learned & I learned fast.

When I showed up at Barefoot League at 3pm, there were opened boxes of these t-shirts still hot from the delivery truck stacked around the counter, several customers similarly stacked around the counter, a nonstop ringing phone, & an extremely stressed out employee.   We had been told the t-shirts would not be arriving until 6pm but they had apparently shown up early, all but size Small.   Mike, who had been in the shop alone since 10, was getting bombarded with people eager to give their support to Japan.   He needed to count the t-shirts to confirm how many were delivered but with the crowd of people waiting to buy t-shirts standing in front of him there was no way this was going to happen.

Every other person wanted size Small, every other person failed to read the large sign stipulating that fundraiser shirt sales were to be cash only. One lady asked me if by “cash” we actually meant “check.”    That was funny.   I assume this is normal retail stuff & I give you retail people credit.   The cash collected for the t-shirts was dumped into a manila envelope which had to be hidden behind the counter, &  later I begged Jacky, the owner, for a bank bag because reaching into a manila envelope every time I needed to make change was getting ridiculous.

The craziness was nonstop, & it lasted the entire 5 hours I was there.   I got to help a lot of really nice people, which is a great benefit of working charities: all the nice people show up.   We did have a few PITAs, including a woman who insisted we make an exception to our “no holds” rule & obdurately waited several minutes to speak to the manager when she saw that I wasn’t going to bend for her as well as people who complained that we should make a limit on how many shirts people could buy so that they could get the sizes they wanted.   I suppose the occasional “me firsters” show up for charities as well.   Meh.

Most of the day had passed & in spite of the craziness I was still smiling.   I think just coming into contact with good people for a good cause could affect even my general misanthropy.   A Japanese woman entered the shop & when I explained to her that we only had 2XLs & 3XLs left because most of the sizes had sold out within 2 hours of arriving, she expressed appreciation that there was such a great response to the relief fundraiser.   I agreed.

She explained to me that she had friends in Japan, & her voice broke as she said that they were being called today to identify bodies, & then she thanked me & left, sobbing.   As I watched her go out the door everything got quiet for a few seconds, & then I turned to the evening manager, Joey, & said, “Shit just got real.”

Another Japanese national came in &, unable to buy sizes remotely appropriate (we could probably fit 2 or 3 of her into the sizes we had left), burst into tears but shook hands & thanked everyone in the store, other customers included.

At the end of the day not only had we sold almost all the Aloha For Japan t-shirts, but we had collected 3 pages of people who wanted to be called when tomorrow’s shipment arrived, & we had broken our daily sales goal by $137.   The t-shirt madness had been so crazy that it had not felt like we had made much in store sales at all, but apparently we had.   As I drove to Champa Thai to meet my sister for dinner, I imagined what I would say to her about my day.   All I could think of to say was, “It was so awesome.”

Barefoot League is located on Kapahulu Avenue in the Safeway shopping plaza, facing Kapahulu next to Burgers On The Edge.   They specialize in mens & womens apparel & I especially like their baseball caps & dryweave polos.   Their hours are 10am-8pm & purchase of an Aloha For Japan t-shirt gets you 10% off anything in the store.