Veterans vs. Soldiers

There I was minding my own business, just chowing down on a hot dog and a soda, when I look up and see this guy grinding his coffee beans and wearing the the sweatshirt pictured below. As an atheist I am appalled at anything that can be interpreted as violence in the name of religion, whether Muslim jihadists, Jewish zionists or so-called "soldiers for Christ."

As a veteran I am also appalled at these sorts of militant religious people. "Soldiers for Christ" sends the wrong message. First of all, Jesus preached against violence and harm. He was a hippy, peace, love, swords to plows and all of that. 

So, I walked up to the man (after I finished my hot dog), tapped him on the shoulder and asked, "Are you a real veteran?"

He didn't turn around, just looked at me over his shoulder, "No."

"Oh, good," I said and walked away. He didn't argue or follow, nor did he create a scene. I fully expected him to be full of righteous fury but he wasn't. Color me surprised.

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272 Words

The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation invited all Americans to submit 272 words in honor of the sixteenth president's famous Gettysburg Address.

To commemorate the sesquicentennial of the Address, on the 19th day of the 11th month of this, our 2013th year, the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library, Museum and Foundation challenge you to participate in an historic project: “272 Words,” wherein people from all walks of life write 272 words in the spirit of the 16th U.S. President. You can write about Abraham Lincoln, the Gettysburg Address or a cause which stirs your passions, but remember, in the spirit of Mr. Lincoln, write only 272 words.

 This year I decided to submit 272 words of my own. Keeping in mind we're emulating a speech I wrote my 272 words in a manner characteristic of what I'd like to say to a throng of people. Short, succinct and hopefully pushing the right buttons to make people think. Two hundred and seventy-two words isn't a lot of room to express an idea with enough conviction to have an impact upon the listeners, or in the case, the readers. Hopefully mine carries some of the same resolution our former president's carried all those decades ago:

How do we talk about the United States today? The land of the free? Of opportunity? As a shining example of rule of secular law?

There was a dream once -- a promise made to each and every person born to this nation: you are exempt from the tyranny sweeping through other nations. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is yours for no other reason than you were born to, or came to these shores yearning to be free. That promise was penned in ink and confirmed by thirty-nine men. The freedom to speak your mind without retaliation; to hold on to your religion against another’s will; to report on the government and others -- all are inalienable rights. There are more, the right to privacy, to petition the government and to be secure in your belongings. And there are more.

Yet these rights -- this covenant -- has gradually been eroded over time. We’ve seen speech by individuals restricted, while speech by corporate interests expanded; the majority religion imposed on the minority; the press harassed and hounded for not toeing the acceptable line.

Abraham Lincoln once declared all men are created equal. We believe this to be true at the polls demonstrated by ‘one man, one vote,’ but this has not been the truth in society where well funded interests are trying to take away equal rights from the gay population, from the disenfranchised, from those who don’t participate in the majority religion.

Two months and two-hundred and thirty years ago thirty-nine men signed a piece of paper creating a vision come to life. We have repeatedly failed them.

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Google NOW has New Commands!

Since this handy-dandy infograph has already been shared all over the interwebz, I don't feel like my posting it is special anymore. However, I did take the time and effort to copy and past the link to this image so I'm going to publish this anyway.

Why?

Why not?

I present unto thee, Google NOW commands!


Google Now voice commands by trendblog.net

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Bred to Be Hated and Feared

Earlier today I received a normal weekly correspondence from the local city council person for the area in which I live. Every week he sends out a missive about what he feels is an important issue before the council, letting us all know about social and educational events in the city and occasionally tidbits of trivia or a joke.

This week's email reads in part:

In My Opinion

With the recent attention received regarding a Pit Bull that was traveling through Aurora being taken to it's new home in New Jersey, and while it was here it attacked another dog in a park, the breed specific legislation in our City is again being challenged. Since it has come to light again, opponents of our ordinance are contacting elected officials in the City hoping to convince us to reconsider our positions on not allowing certain breeds of dog in the City limits. This week I have received no less than half a dozen emails from people asking me to consider support of lifting the BSL (so far, none from Aurora residents).

An Op-Ed appeared in the Aurora Sentinel yesterday regarding this topic. And while it doesn't happen often, I happen to agree with this one:

http://www.aurorasentinel.com/opinion/perry-aurora-shouldnt-bite-foolish-push-let-pit-bulls-back-city/

I am certainly not a dog expert. But I do know that many breeds of dogs have very specific traits inbred that have very real possibilities of showing up...who knows when or why.

Years ago, I had a German Wirehaired Pointer that I rescued at the Denver Dumb Friends League when she was a puppy. She was part of our family for years, but was never the bird-hunter her ancestors were bred for.  She could pass within feet of a bird, out in the open or in a bush, and not even care that it was there. But every once in awhile, for no discernible rhyme or reason, she would stop shock still with her nose level, ears up, tail straight out and right front leg lifted staring at a bush. She would wait for me to give her the okay to chase the bird out of the bush. I never taught her to do that...I wouldn't even know how to. But her wiring was preset to be a bird dog, and even though she had not been taught to do so, she instinctively knew the steps.

I believe the same prewiring is true of many breeds of dog. This is one reason I will continue to support our BSL policy in the City of Aurora.

But the main reason by far is that of the nearly 100 people I have personally spoke with on this issue, who live IN Aurora, and who live IN Ward V, only a small handful so far have asked me to support lifting the ordinance. The vast majority have made it clear that they do not want this ordinance changed.

I am no fan of breed specific legislation or bans, just as I am no fan of gender specific legislation, race specific legislation or and other legislation that singles out a subset or group for no reason other than fear or ignorance (which, in my opinion, is a vast majority of legislation that targets a subset of a group).

And, since I prefer fact, reason and objectivity over fearmongering and hysteria, I wrote a rebuttal:

First and foremost, I am a dog owner. I do not own a pit bull-style breed, but a good ol’ fashioned American mutt. He may or may not have some of a couple breeds in him: Australian Shepherd, Border Collie, A. Cattle Dog, some sort of setter (English, Gordon) or some breed of spaniel.

He is a killer.

Chasing the Duck

With a handful of bunnies, squirrels and birds who have fallen prey to his teeth, Rufus is indeed a killer, as all dogs have the potential to be one. In fact, any creature on this planet with canine teeth has the potential to be a killer, including humans.

Recently, Aurora’s “pit bull” ban has come to light again. A “pit bull” named Stallone, a “pit bull” that had a history of being abused by other dogs in dog fighting arenas. As a bait dog, Stallone would have subject to disfigurement, torment and constantly in fear of his life on a regular basis. He would have been bitten, left bleeding and possibly to die over and over again, in the name of sport for a handful of spectators. He would have had no choice in the matter, he would have had no way out, no quitting and only retiring when he was considered to be useless as bait dog.

Stallone was stolen from his family in Arizona. The thieves then filed down his teeth, hobbled his legs and forced him into the fighting ring as bait. When they had no more use for the dog they threw him from a car. ~

http://denver.cbslocal.com/2013/11/07/attorney-fights-to-save-pit-bulls-life/

When Stallone was brought to a local area dog park he attacked at dachshund, possibly having a flashback to his time as a bait dog upon seeing another dog running for him. We see this sort of behavior all the time with victims of PTSD who lash out physically when society would advise most people to walk away or ignore a situation.

Whether anyone wants to believe “pit bulls” are inherently vicious dogs is up to them, but while many of us are predestined to certain traits (intelligence, physical acuity, music ability or even math) many more of our traits are learned, some from the culture in which we were raised, others from training and education and still others from adapting to new situations. We’re all products of our environment.

Even dogs. Even “pit bulls” are products of their upbringing, wherein one, raised by a loving family, can be submissive and congenial while another from the same litter but raised by different people can be vicious and terrifying.

People v. Riddle, 258 Ill. App. 3d 253, 630 N.E.

2d 141 (Ill. App. Ct. 2d Dist. 1994), stated,

“merely applying the label ‘pit bull’ to a dog does little to describe it and provides no

basis for determining whether it is dangerous... we cannot malign a breed of dogs on the

basis of rumor and hysteria”. Id.

Furthermore, the court added,  

“vicious dogs shall not be classified in a manner that is specific as to breed. Our

legislature chose not to accede to the stereotypes the State urges here. In Illinois, each

dog is to be evaluated individually and is not to be classified as "vicious" merely because

of its breed or type.” Riddle at 260-261. ~

http://www.lclark.edu/live/files/7623-2011-teamtwentybrief

Targeting a breed, or a breadth of breeds, based on appearance or stereotypes is no different than targeting people of races not Caucasian, the bald, the tattoo’d or the biker in his leather jacket.

There are still people out there who would claim that African-Americans are inherently violent, who would claim that Hispanics are inherently lazy or unethical, or who would claim gays are inherently immoral.

We know none of these claims to be any more true than single women with a cat are witches waiting for the right moment to steal our children.

On a daily basis we are surrounded by lies and half-truths, facts slanted or spun  to favor our preconceived notions. Supposedly, as an enlightened generation, we rely on facts over fiction, reason over superstition and observation over stereotyping.

I am no fan of “pit bull” style breeds just as I am no fan of Huskies, Chihuahuas, larger breeds or smaller breeds. It’s a personal preference. Just as choosing to love “pit bull” breeds is a personal preference for others.

The Aurora Sentinel’s opinion piece about Stallone cited the proverbial statistics, without actually providing a single statistic in support of his argument:

That’s for a good reason. As clear as the statistics are showing that the majority of deadly dog bites in this country come from just a few breeds, including and especially pit bulls, it’s even clearer that pit-bull biters will bite again. ~ http://www.aurorasentinel.com/opinion/perry-aurora-shouldnt-bite-foolish-push-let-pit-bulls-back-city/#sthash.p88Qx7mw.dpuf

However, the American Humane Association states that breed specific legislation does not reduce or prevent dog attacks.  ~ http://www.americanhumane.org/animals/stop-animal-abuse/fact-sheets/breed-specific-legislation.html

A Center for Disease Control study also does not support breed specific legislation, supporting instead legislation holding dog owners more accountable for the actions of their dogs and suggesting programs that encourage people to socialize their pets properly. ~ http://www.cdc.gov/homeandrecreationalsafety/images/dogbreeds-a.pdf (pg 5)

The National Canine Research Council also questions the validity and success of breed specific legislation:

Q. Does BSL reduce dog bites?

No. BSL has not succeeded in reducing dog bite-related injuries wherever in the world it has been enacted.

• An analysis published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association explains why BSL does not reduce serious dog bites. The authors calculated the absurdly large numbers of dogs of targeted breeds who would have to be completely removed from a community in order to prevent even one serious dog bite-related injury. For example, in order to prevent a single hospitalization resulting from a dog bite, the authors calculate that a city or town would have to remove more than 100,000 dogs of a targeted group. To prevent a second hospitalization, double that number.[4]

• Denver, CO enacted a breed ban in 1989. Citizens of Denver continue to suffer a higher rate of  hospitalization from dog bite-related injuries after the ban, than the citizens of breed-neutral Colorado  counties.[5]

• A study published in the Journal of Veterinary Behavior (2007), compared medically treated dog bites in  Aragon, Spain for 5 years prior to and following enactment of Spain’s “Law on the legal treatment of the  possession of dangerous animals” (sometimes referred to Spain’s Dangerous Animal Act) (2000). The results  showed no significant effect in dog bite incidences when comparing before and after enactment of the BSL.[6]

• The Netherlands repealed a 15-year-old breed ban in 2008 after commissioning a study of its effectiveness.  The study revealed that BSL was not a successful dog-bite mitigation strategy because it had not resulted in  a decrease in dog bites. [7]

• The Province of Ontario in Canada enacted a breed ban in 2005. In 2010, based on a survey of municipalities across the Province, the Toronto Humane Society reported that, despite five years of BSL and  the destruction of "countless" dogs, there had been no significant decrease in the number of dog bites.[8]

• Winnipeg, Manitoba enacted a breed ban in 1990. Winnipeg’s rate of dog bite-injury hospitalizations is  virtually unchanged from that day to this, and remains significantly higher than the rate in breed-neutral,  responsible pet ownership Calgary[9] ~

http://www.nationalcanineresearchcouncil.com/dog-legislation/breed-specific-legislation-bsl-faq

Do “pit bulls” bite? Absolutely. So do Cairn Terriers, Great Danes, Golden Retrievers and St. Bernards. In fact, dogs bite. All of them. There is no question that dogs bite. Cats bite, as well. So do horses, mice and the occasional snake. Even human beings bite. Without fingers and thumbs most animals’ only defensive tool is to bite it’s tormentor. Sometimes that’s another dog, sometimes it’s another animal and sometimes it’s a human being.

Is it the dog’s fault the human being tormented it, tortured it or otherwise hurt it? Is it the dog’s fault it is a product of it’s environment, an environment created by human beings? Even a study published by the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center cites the human beings, the dog owners, who are creating environments of that nurture dogs into aggressive animals when they might otherwise be docile family pets:

Categories of criminal convictions examined were aggressive crimes, drugs, alcohol, domestic violence, crimes involving children, firearm convictions, and major and minor traffic citations. Owners of cited high-risk ("vicious") dogs had significantly more criminal convictions than owners of licensed low-risk dogs. Findings suggest that the ownership of a high-risk ("vicious") dog can be a significant marker for general deviance and should be an element considered when assessing risk for child endangerment. ~

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17065657

Let us not look at a breed or subset of a group with eyes and minds tinted with fearmongering and hysteria. Instead, let’s look at the root cause of this problem and address the cause not the symptom.

My dog, Rufus, has rid the city of birds, squirrels and bunnies. He is, without a doubt, a killer. Does the city wish to ban his anonymous breed because he has the 'taste of blood?"

Getting My Bed Dirty

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Dead DV6

The worst part about having ideas to write about is not having the ability to write them down. Last week, without notice, my laptop died on me. Allow me to explain:

I was actively using my laptop one morning last week. Using as normal: social networking, job hunting, etc. You know, nothing out of the ordinary. This went on for about two hours when I decided it was time to take the dogs to the dog park.

Sometimes we head over to the dog park mid-afternoon and sometimes mid-morning. A couple of weeks ago I met a really pretty very intelligent girl during one of our mid-morning jaunts and a few days later ran across her again at roughly the same time. So, naturally, I've been heading over there at roughly the same time. Mid-morning.

I set the laptop down on the ottoman (on the cooling tray it rarely ever leaves) and let MS Windows naturally fall into hibernation mode while I was away.

A couple of hours later I return. The laptop is still sitting where I left it, the fan is running, as it is wont to do, the screen is dark and the LEDs are on and blinking. All was normal.

After lunch I decided to wake the computer up and get some NaNoWriMo writing done. Nothing. Hmm... So, I force a reset by holding the power button down until the laptop shuts down -- a few seconds later I hit the button to fire it back up.

Instead of seeing the "Windows Was Shut Down Incorrectly Screen" I see... nothing. Nothing at all. The fan fires up, the LEDs are alll working, but nothing appears on the screen. So, I shut it down again and pull the battery, just to make sure any caches holding onto data are wiped.

I replace the battery and push the power button. Nothing. Or rather, the same as before: LEDs, fan, nothing on the screen, not even the "Press F-whatever to enter BIOS" screen comes up.

Okay, then. I call my friend who works in IT and she says it sounds like the graphics chip.  She suggests I plug in an external monitor and try again.

No difference.

I post the symptoms online:

And Nate Taylor also suggests it's the video card.

The next day, or was it a day later, I take it up to Nate's shop for a re-seating of the video chip. After a little more than an hour the laptop is back together, plugged in and ... nothing.

Argh!

First, this was an expensive laptop and second, it's still technology relevant. That is, it can still run all the programs, has all the latest and greatest technologies built in and aside from having a touch screen is still a contemporary machine. There is no reason to replace it, especially considering I don't have to the money to replace it right now.

To the Internet!

A quick search of eBay shows a replacement motherboard at about $100. Sometimes more, sometimes less. Okay, not too shabby. $100 is definitely better than replacing the laptop with a like spec'd machine. But everything on eBay was used. But could they guarantee it was good? Not to mention eBay's policies are atrocious for returns and/or complaints.

So, I ask my friend in IT again. Do you know a better place to look for laptop motherboards? She comes back with a link from Amazon.

Fantastic! I have a DV6-3000 laptop and the price is so much better than eBay! However, the item doesn't indicate NEW, USED or Refurbished and the seller isn't responding to questions in a timely manner.

Before I go to order the board I do some more research, is this the right motherboard? Seems I'm not the only person with this question.

However, the question is never truly answered.

I check the HP Manual for the DV6-3000 and then the Parts Guide for HP products. Nothing says this 

632103-003 motherboard will work properly. 

I'd already been a week without my laptop. Writing isn't getting done, photos aren't getting edited and I'm bored. So, I go ahead and buy the one for sale on Amazon using gift cards bequeathed to me by family for birthdays and holidays.  

Supposedly, it will arrive between the 18th and the 21st of this month, so here's to fingers being crossed and it working as advertised.

Anywho, if you're curious as to why I'm not writing more, that's why. Right now I'm typing away on my 5 year old Asus netbook EeePC, which doesn't have the processing power to do much of anything other than the most basic of web surfing.

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Lappy Toppy Broke-y

Terrible news! Not only am I going to lose very valuable time with NaNoWriMo, but photos, photo-editing and a host of other things.

Hopefully, +Nate Taylor's offer solves my problems.

In the meantime I have my Note II (to keep me connected) and my old +ASUS netbook with limited computing power for everything else. I can blog, but there's not enough power to edit 20mpx images or to run numerous programs at once, Hangout or even watch HD videos on Youtube. Heck, even running numerous tabs in +Google Chrome bogs it down.

Here's to crossed fingers.

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I Saved a Shark's LIfe

It was a dark and stormy night... No, not really, but it was dark outside and I did have the TV's volume up a good notch while I sat on the couch and edited pictures on the computer. The dogs were asleep, Charlie on the other end of the couch and Rufus presumably on my bed.

Then I hear it... beep. Huh, what?

A few moments later ... beep.

Great. One of the smoke detectors is giving off it's low battery beep.

Beep.

I let it beep a few more times before finally getting my fat butt off the couch and figuring out which one is beeping and as it turned out it's the one in my roommate's bedroom.

Fantastic. She's out of town and now I have to go into her room and change out her smoke detector battery before I go to bed as the beep, as quiet as it is, is indeed loud enough to keep me awake at night. Especially with her bedroom door open and mine as well (since she's out of town)

I find a 9volt battery in a drawer and set it on the counter waiting for the DVD I was watching to finish. Yes, I could have paused it, but why? The beep was annoying, not super loud.

Suddenly, out of the blue a hear something move in the kitchen. I mean a real movement, not just a normal kitchen noise like the ice maker turning on or a drip, drip, dripping from the faucet or something else common place. Whatever it was that I heard was loud enough to wake both dogs and even cause Rufus to come out of my bedroom to see what was happening.

The first thing I did was send a chat message to my roommate who's out of town, letting her know that there's a weird noise in the kitchen. It's a running joke in the house that we have a ghost living here and anytime there's a weird noise or a flickering light bulb we jokingly blame it on the imaginary ghost.

"Something in the kitchen just moved and it's own. I mean, Charlie jumped and Rufus came of the room to see what the noise was." ~ Me, 18:50

She replied with a joke about the 'demon' doing dishes for us.

When the movie was finally over I set the laptop down and head over towards her bedroom, grabbing the battery along the way.  I step into her room, turn off the ceiling fan and look at the alarm. It should be easy enough to change the battery and I step back into the dining room to grab a chair real quick. As I step up to the table I see what looks like a fish shaped dog toy on the ground underneath the chair I'm about to pull away.

Fish Out of Water

That's weird, the toy didn't look familiar. I look again and see that it's not actually a toy, it's one of the two sharks in the fish tank. You see, right there on the bar between the kitchen and the dining room my roommate placed a fish tank a few years ago. It's still there. A year ago, or so, one of the silver dollar fish jumped out and landed on the kitchen counter, suffocating slowly until it was found hours later by my roommate.

This time, however, the fish made it from about 5 feet high (the top of the tank) and onto the floor, probably bouncing off the table or the chair on it's way down to land where it did. If that was the noise I heard earlier, then that means it's been out of the tank for at least an hour.

I reach down to pick it up only to have to swat Rufus away in the process to prevent him from treating it like a snack. As soon as I touch the 6 inch shark it jumped.

Was that a death throe? A spasm? Nerves reacting?

I reach for the fish again and this time it doesn't move. It's eyes aren't moving, it's gills aren't moving and it's dry. Limp, but dry.

As I walk it around to the garbage can I pull out my cell phone and call my roommate to let her know her black shark is dead. The other end rings as I step on the lever that opens the can's lid and she answers as I'm about to drop the shark. I stop and explain what happened, "Remember when I sent you that message about a noise in the kitchen? Well, I figured out it was your shark. Somehow it jumped out of the tank and landed underneath the table."

She's not happy and I'm about to drop the shark when it starts squirming and slips out of my hand falling straight into the garbage can, sliding between a couple of things and down into the bag. Crap.

"Well, I thought it was dead, but it just moved and fell into the can," I explained the current situation.

"Can you get it out and put it in water?"

"Maybe. It slipped down into the can."

I had to fish around (he he, see what I did there?) up to my elbow, until I was able to grab the shark and pull it out of the garbage can. The shark's skin was covered in garbage, dog fur and other things I didn't want coming off in the fish tank so I quickly filled a Big Gulp cup I normally use for filling the dogs' water bowl and set the shark in there to rinse of for a few minutes.Without a lot of room to move, the shark sat there, face down, as the dog fur and a piece of lettuce separated from his skin. When I deemed him clean enough I dumped most of the dirty water out into the sink and then slid the shark out into the aquarium.

It sank. To the bottom. Like a rock. A real rock, not a Chevy truck, although I'm sure a Chevy truck would sink to the bottom as well.

For a second I thought it really was dead and I was just dealing with nerve system reactions when I noticed it's gills were moving. And then an eye. I watched for a few moments more and then the shark shook. It was upside down at this point, but moving. I thought about reaching in and adjusting his body right-side up, but before I could his whole body shifted like a shark does when it's swimming. It was still upside down, but it was moving. And then it righted itself.

Nemo Was a Sissy

This entire time I'm giving a verbal account to my roommate over the phone (hence the lack of pictures) and she let's me know she'd be surprised if the shark lasted through the night.

The shark swam around the tank a couple of times, still a little dirty from the adventure in the garbage can, and I leave to replace the 9volt in my roommate's bedroom.

A few hours later I check on it before heading off to bed and it seems fine. The following morning it was swimming around like nothing was wrong.

Amazing.

Black Shark Swimming with Albino Shark, the Next Day

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Sunday Morning

True Story

So, as I start every morning, I took Rufus for a walk. For once we didn't have my roommate's dog with us so I decided to let Rufus be Rufus and chase squirrels, sniff what he wanted to sniff, walk where he wanted to walk and so on. I guess we could call it more of a leisurely stroll than a bonafide walk

With the warmer temperatures compared to the last couple of days, blue skies over Colorado and the clean fresh air, it was a good morning, me and Rufus and dozens of chattering squirrels.

Until ....

Duh! Duh! Duh! Duuuuh!

Since I had every intention of taking Rufus to the dog park later that day we cut our normally one mile morning walk down to about a half a mile, cutting through a nearby neighborhood instead of walking around it, as is our normal routine.

Squirrels were all over the place, running up and down trees, chasing each other across the grounds, chitter-chattering at themselves, us and each other. The occasional crow cawed at either the squirrels or Rufus and I. In short, it was a typical day in the life of Jason and Rufus (minus Charlie).

As we came around a corner Rufus stopped and crouched into his stalking pose. I looked along his line of site and didn't see any squirrels near the base of trees or running around on the grounds but further along, up ahead, I did see a black cat.

Now let me explain: Rufus loves kitties. Not in the oh, look, they're so adorable sort of way, but in the, that is my nemesis and I must destroy my nemesis sort of way. He will bypass squirrels to get to a cat. He will ignore a bacon cheeseburger to go after a cat. For all the things in this universe Rufus loves chasing, it's cats that are his drug addiction.

I know this. Therefore, I usually never let him chase cats. Sometimes I do, simply because it's so fun for him and if I know the cat has an escape route: a door, a tree, under a car -- something. Just like I let him chase squirrels and the occasional bunny. I don't necessarily want him to catch anything, but the chase -- the hunt -- is paramount.

Christmas morning to a seven year old has nothing on Rufus chasing a kitty.

Rufus Laying in the Grass

And then we see this cat up ahead. Not a large cat by any means, about the size of a typical house cat, solid black with bright green eyes. It was actually a pretty animal as it sat on some stairs, about 6 steps up from the ground. The black cat watched Rufus and he watched the cat in a stare down to give any Hollywood gunslinger a run for his money. The cat's emerald eyes as wide as they could open. I walk closer. Rufus still leashed. While I don't mind him chasing a kitty now and again, I don't need him hurting himself chasing one, so I didn't let him off leash. A couple of years ago he hurt his ACL chasing a squirrel around a tree and a few years before that he tore open his leg, slicing the skin on an exposed root, as he charged after a squirrel.

As we got closer to the cat Rufus lunged and the cat bolted up the remaining stairs, Rufus following until he reaches the end of the leash, about 2/3 of the way up to the top. The cat is as far from Rufus as it can get, which is more than eight feet away.

Then from behind me, "What the fuck are you doing!"

Huh?

"What the fuck are you doing!"

I turned to see a slightly less than obese woman dressed in what I assumed was either her church clothes or the attire of a realtor (I couldn't help it, she looked like she was a realtor): black slacks below a black shirt with some sort of lighter long sleeved print over that; some gaudy necklace and enough makeup to service the entire circus. "What the fuck are you doing to my cat?"

She was stepping away from a mid-90s Cadillac and approaching me, "Why is your cat outside?" I asked in response.

"Why are you scaring my cat?"

I asked again, "Why is your cat outside?" I didn't explain this, but it's common knowledge in larger cities: pets aren't supposed to be outside running loose. That not only means dogs, but cats as well. This cat was not on a tie out, did not have a collar on and wasn't behind a fence or anything else; it was sitting outside on some stairs, as free as the wind.

"You asshole, you're scaring my cat!"

"Well, you're cat isn't supposed to be outside running around," I said. I didn't feel the need to explain to her that her HOA (that's Home Owner's Association) would back me on this -- my dog was on leash this entire time and I did not let him come into contact with the cat.

"You're a dick," she said in reply.

"Why do you feel the need to be so vulgar," I asked her to which her response was to call me a 'dick' once again. So I said, Well, if I'm a dick then you're a bitch," which was enough of a catalyst to start screaming at me to leave and get off my property. I explained to her that I was not on her property and she nearly went hysterical with statements of, "I own this, this is my  property and you're trespassing!"

"How come you can call me a dick and an asshole, but if I call you a bitch you get so upset? I'm not upset. I'm calm," I explained to her, which just made her even more mad.

I should explain. I was walking through a condo association's property. Condo owners own the content inside their walls, not the grounds outside, not the sidewalks and not the grass. While, yes, she does have a financial stake in the grounds, she does not singularly own any piece of property outside her home. Technically, she doesn't even own her front porch or her patio. In Colorado these areas are known as "exclusive use, common property" meaning she has exclusive rights to use those areas, but they still belong to the HOA, not the individual homeowner.

Also, at this point, she doesn't know if I'm a resident of her community or not. It didn't matter: I was on a sidewalk and my dog was on leash. We were doing nothing wrong.

She passed me and followed her cat up the stairs where it waited, eyes wide, fur puffy, "Leave!" she screamed at me over and over again. There was no law saying I have to, so I stood my ground. Where I was and what I as doing was completely legal. And I told her that. And she became even more enraged.

For some reason we've become a society of people who walk away. I don't know why, but it annoys me. We're supposed to cater to those people who want their way instead of standing up for our own. We see it all the time as Ms. Grumpy pants walks down the street and the neighbors cross to avoid her; as people stop confronting He Who Yells Loudest in an effort to not get dragged into an argument; as the Constant Complainer gets his/her way because more reasonable people are tired of hearing them complain over and over again. It's always, don't upset those who get upset easily or as we said in the military, catering to the weakest of the group.

I decided long ago these people getting their way just because they were throwing tantrums. They're the ones who are loudest and therefore they're the ones who are listened to and sympathized with -- and they're always the victim. Are we training a society of victims out there? Just because someone is loud and hysterical doesn't mean that person is morally, ethically or legally right. In fact, many times they're wrong.

"Why don't you let your cat inside," I suggested. She turned to open the door to the upstairs unit and then stopped herself. "Ah, that's not your home, is it? So, technically you're trespassing," I smirked.

"Why are yo being an asshole?"

"I'm not, but you're definitely being a bitch," I said back to her, and she became even more pissed, if at all possible at this point.

She came down the stairs, without her cat I might add, "I'm going to call the police."

"Sure, why don't you," I encouraged knowing full well I was not in the legal wrong and her cat was outside off leash. She stalked past me again and to her car where she pulled out a cell phone, presumably, to call the police. She walked right past me again, within arm's length, to the shade of a tree where she could read her screen and started dialing.

The next couple of moments were her giving her address, unit number and then saying, "This man is harassing me. He won't leave and he's on my property."

She's been vulgar to me since her first words, called me names, screamed at me and I'm harassing her?

"Why don't you tell the truth," I said calmly but hopefully loud enough to be heard through her phone. "I'm on a sidewalk, not your property and I'm not harassing you, you're the one calling me names and being vulgar."

She went on, "He's wearing a black shirt and blue jeans, with a black dog and he won't leave me alone," As she said that she, apparently feeling courageous with the police on the phone, stalked straight towards me and stopped just a foot or so from my face, "Leave me alone! Just go away!"

My mouth was now closer to her phone than it would be to my outstretched hand, I was sure I could reach past her head if I wanted to test my theory, but instead I just said into her phone,  "Why don't you tell them that you just came up to me and now you're in my face? I haven't moved one step."

Either she realized her error or the dispatch operator told her to back off because she took that moment to walk away, towards her car. As she moved away she kept on talking into her phone, "I don't know where he lives... I don't know," then to me, "What's your name?"

"I'm not telling you my name. We can wait for the cops to arrive."

Back to her phone, "He won't tell me... I don't know, thirty?" Sweet! She thinks I'm younger than I am! "Brown hair..." and so forth.

She gets into her car and at that point I presume the operator told her to get inside somewhere and wait for the officers to arrive. Having not done anything illegal I had no reason to walk away so I waited for the police. There way no way in the world they were only getting her side of the story. Unfortunately, it was at this point that I thought to pull out my phone and record the exchange.

Once inside her car, she rolls the windows up and starts the engine, again I'm thinking this is just to have the air on and the vehicle secure for her safety. I was wrong. She backs out and pulls away and now I'm thinking she's going to park on the other side of the lot or something. Again, to be safer.

Nope. She pulls out of the lot and turns down the street. I watch her drive off and after she's out of sight I let Rufus know that we're leaving (if she didn't stick around for the police, why should I?) and looked one more time at the black cat that's still outside, still watching Rufus.

To sum up:

• she was terrified for her cat
• she didn't put her cat inside
• she called the police
• she didn't wait for the police
• she called me names: "dick," "asshole" etc.
• she became very upset when I called her "bitch"

Yet, I'm in the wrong. She'll go on the rest of her day and perhaps tomorrow telling people about the mean man who harassed her, leaving out her vulgarity; leaving out that her cat was outside without a leash and leaving out that she repeatedly got in my face.

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There's a Noise in the Bin

I may have saved a life today. Well, not maybe, I definitely saved a life today, the question is how did I save a life today?

Just like every other morning in my life I woke, showered, dressed and then took the dogs for a walk. We walked our normal route around the neighborhood, around a nearby park, through another neighborhood and back to ours.

Just like every other morning. Nothing different at all.

As we came back around to our neighborhood from the opposite direction I heard a rustling in the dumpster on the corner. This wasn't uncommon as squirrels like to get in there and tear apart the garbage bags looking for food. However, the attention Rufus gave to the noise was uncanny. Usually when he hears the squirrels he searches around the dumpster and when he doesn't find anything to chase he follows me. I rarely stop walking this is so common.

Believe it or not, there are four

But this rustling seemed somehow larger and Rufus seemed way more interested in what was making the noise. I stepped into the dumpster's corral and looked inside the big blue box. Obviously the garbage collection service had been by within the past 24 hours as the dumpster was nearly empty. Well, empty of trash. In fact, there were some raccoons in there looking for a free meal.

One of the raccoons stuck it's nose out of a water drainage hole in the bottom and Rufus just went bonkers trying to get to it, but I held him back, releasing him only after realizing there was no way he could harm or be harmed by the animals through that small hole.

I snapped an image of the raccoons and then for giggles picked Rufus up and let him look at the furry bandits as I saw them. I think he went to hunter's heaven for a second there before I set him back down.

Realizing the animals were small, possibly the size of a house cat, I looked around for any avenue of escape for them. There was nothing. As I stated before, the can was nearly empty, the walls were four feet of sheer metal with no hand holds or anything else to grab hold of and climb free. The raccoons were stuck. For a second I feared the next garbage pickup would just dump them in the back of their truck and either kill them or deposit them at the local dump.

One raccoon remains hidden beneath the others

With that scenario in mind I walked the dogs home, dragging Rufus who didn't want to leave, and then walked the neighborhood looking for something to put in the dumpster that would give the animals an escape route. Usually, the dumpster areas have furniture or extra wood people toss out, bicycles and electronics but I found nothing. Not only had the service been by recently, but the grounds crew were clearing out the dumpster enclosures as I looked.

Finally I remembered an area on the other side of the neighborhood where extra building supplies were stored. I walked over there and found a handful of 2x4s as well as an old pallet. While in route to this area I went ahead and called the city's police dispatch and asked them if they had animal control who could help these guys escape. The dispatcher, Brad, took down the address nearest the dumpster and said he'd send someone along. In the meantime, I grabbed one of the 2x4s and walked it back to the garbage bin and dropped it in leaving the end of it sticking out for the animals to make their escape.

I let the dispatcher know what I'd done and went home. Surprisingly, it wasn't 20 minutes before I received a phone call from the animal control officer. He'd helped the raccoons escape and was letting me know they were in a nearby tree. He asked if I was the person who put the 2x4 in the bin and I said yes, I was. He told me that was a brilliant idea and if the animals were still in there come sundown they would have used it to escape, but as it was, raccoons don't typically make their way around during the day.

I did not know that. I knew they were more active at night, but not that they were unwilling to move about during the day.

The officer also mentioned the four raccoons were young and that full grown raccoons would have the muscles strength to jump out of the dumpster of their own.

I didn't know that, either.

I thanked him for not taking the animals in for euthanizing and he admitted that, per law, they are not allowed to put an animal down unless it's sick or aggressive. As these were neither, he just helped them along.

Now, off to traffic court. Yay!

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Chilies, Chilies Everywhere

It wasn't my decision, honestly. In fact, I'm not really into "spicy" foods, preferring well balanced flavors over the tongue and gums burning of jalapeno, ghost and habanero peppers. However, I was invited down to the Pueblo, CO Chili  Pepper Festival and having never been, I decided it would be fun to go for an afternoon.

While chili peppers aren't necessarily my thing, I do love doing experiences that are outside my comfort zone. Besides, I thought if I brought my camera I could get some good cultural shots of the festival to share with the world on Blogger and Google+.

But this morning didn't work out the way we'd planned. My friend sent me a message after 9AM citing her alarm clock didn't go off and she was running later. That was fine by me since I didn't even set an alarm, just trusting that I would awake far earlier than she. She asked me if dogs could go tot he festival.

How the heck would I know? I've never been there.

So, we each took turns looking online for info on whether dogs were welcome. Since the original plan was to head down to Pueblo (a roughly two hour drive) spend a couple of hours at the fest and then take the long way back through the mountains for photo opportunities, neither of us made plans to do anything with our dogs while we were gone. We really thought we'd bring them along.

Then my friend decided there was too much of a chance of rain in the mountains to make driving through them worth while. She knows as well as I do that cloudy conditions and rain can sometimes improve chances for photo opportunities, but she was driving and it was her "fest" that I was invited to attend. In the end, we decided not to go do any of the plans for the day.

The Aisles at Costco

Instead, we decided to go to Costco. Don't get me wrong, I love Costco, but I can go to Costco any day of the week, I don't need to burn a Sunday just to go there. On the way to Costco there was a chili stand on the side of the road. It's been there for a few weeks now, but neither of us have stopped there before today. Me, because I really don't care about chilies that much and her because, well, I don't know.

 So we stop at the chili pepper stand. I really do like these roadside stands for shopping. Many times you're buying directly from the manufacturer, much like a farmer's market, bypassing the cost-raising expenses of middle-men and you get to sample flavors, meet the owners and watch as the item, or food, is made right in front of you.

We parked right up front and walked into the pop-up tent. Pumpkins and peppers were everywhere. Baskets and bags full of red and green peppers of some sort, jams, jellies and even something called "cherry juice." Up front was a table with various salsas spread out with tortilla chips for taste testing and when we wanted to try something that wasn't already out there one of the stand's workers opened up a jar and let us take a bite. Luckily my friend wanted to buy it so they just gave us the jar, but when was the last time the giant supermarket chain opened a package so you could try it before buying? Sure Costco has their tasters and even some of the supermarkets in the area will let you taste their deli offerings, but will they open a jar of jam or a bag of potato chips for your taste buds?

 

 

 While I didn't purchase anything (again, not my scene) my friend did spend a bit of money there. We did spend quite a but longer there than I thought we would, but -- again, this is new to me -- if you buy chili peppers, apparently they roast them right then and there for you in some giant fire roasting contraption straight out of Mad Max.

I haven't checked yet, but apparently there are over 500 chili pepper recipes at their website: roastedchili.com.

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Google Maps Strikes Again

I really really hate Google Maps. This is no easy thing to admit since I'm incredibly immersed in the Google ecosystem. Recently I had to wonder if I was going to leave the Android experience for, perhaps, the Windows Lumia experience or even the Blackberry experience. Having loved both my earlier Nokia and Blackberry handsets, I would have no misgivings about going back to those particular companies. However, as I looked at their online app store offerings, I cringed. Sure they had Facebook and Twitter, music and movie apps and hosts more, they didn't have +Google+ , +Snapseed (one of my most used apps) or very many of the Google suite of apps at all. I suppose I could use more Flickr than Picasaweb/G+ Photos, Skydrive over +Google Drive  or a variety of other workarounds that give the same functionability but without the Google ecosystem.

This brings me to Maps which is by far Google's worst product. Sure, they keep adding features to the service, feature that no one but Googlites seem to actually want (rolling Places and Hotpot into the service) and adding tons of mobile features that, again, are wishlist features, not necessities. Seriously, I can search for restaurants and bars in Maps, get reviews of those places, directions and even call right from Maps, but for some reason Maps can't actually find the business I'm in when trying to tag a location and rarely gets the closet location for food or shopping correct.

And then there's trying to create a Map. I don't know anyone in the real world who uses Google Maps for anything more than setting a placemark for a "I was here" marker to share with friends, or in the case of my motorcycle riding friends, we use Google Maps to plan out routes and that's where Google Maps fails spectacularly. I've talked about it HERE and HERE in the past.

Today, I decided to open up Google Maps for the first time in more than a year to actually create a Map. Yeah, more than a year. For some reason Google likes to create a Map every time I tag or rate a location, but I'm not talking about those "maps" I'm talking about a route. My friend and I thought about killing two birds with one stone tomorrow; one, hit a chili festival in Pueblo, CO and two, take a circuitous mountain path back home to Denver to witness the fall colors.

So, naturally, I fired up Google Maps and tried to create a route. First I tried using the new Google Map Maker to create a Map, but as feature rich as that tool is it's completely useless for create a road route from Point A to Point B. So, back to "classic maps" I go.

I select my starting point, in this case, it's Pueblo, Colorado and I choose the option to create lines following the roads. And I 'draw.' I draw and at each turn I leave one of those white waypoints with a click. Follow this road this long, then turn and follow that road that long, etc. Finally I get to the edge of the screen and have to pan to the right. Click and drag? Nope. It turns the entire map blue and doesn't move a thing. Click again? Nope. Now it's creating a line off on a tangent. Try to delete that tangent? Nope, it deletes the entire line you just drew and now you have to start over.

So, I start over. Follow the same route, get to the part where I have to pan the screen and I click and drag. This time is seems to work, but you can only drag so far before your cursor is off the screen and you have to click and drag. So, I head back, click and drag... nope. Now the entire screen is blue again, no dragging, and when I try it again, another tangent off into the forests of Colorado. Try to delete that short 3 inch segment and the entire route is gone again.

Fuck!

So, I start over. This time at each junction I stop the route, click it as finished (which is clicking the little white waylay point thing twice) and then start a new segment. Why?

This is incredibly inefficient. I can't put a start point where an end point is, but instead I have to place it next to the end point. Sure, if I'm zoomed into street level view that might not be too bad (except for all the panning which results in the above fiascos), but if I'm looking at a quarter of the state then I'm actually setting the waylay marker tens or even a hundred feet apart. Then I have to draw a new line and do this all over again: start the line, follow the roads, click for a turn and find a stopping point. Double click it to an end. Start a new one. Stop it. Start a new one and so forth. Over and over and over again.

It takes hours to create a map that would only take a few moments to actually trace out in ink on an actual map.

If I'm creating a neighborhood map this wouldn't be too big of a deal, but drawing a route through a major city such as Denver or worse yet across the state or region this is incredibly cumbersome and frustrating. And then to have one little thing go wrong, such as Google choosing to follow the wrong route, or even a more frustrating maneuver, when the lines change on their own to the "shortest route" or whatever it's chooses. Sometimes the route "follow the roads" chooses are tens of miles outside of the route I want and then I have to go back and change it. If I click (because I have to pan, or gods forbid I sneeze) and suddenly that route is my route and the only way to change it is to delete and start over.

I just want to draw a friggin map!! I don't want Google to do shit for me, I want to draw my own route. You know, sometimes I don't want the shortest route, such as when finding a motorcycle route, or mapping out a path to my camping location so friends can find it, or going on a scenic drive instead of a direct route home.

What is wrong with Google Maps? At this rate I'd rather just get my Rand MacNally out of the garage and put it on my passenger seat instead of relying on Google Maps to do anything at all. It is by far Google's least consumer friendly tool and Google has a lot of less than friendly products.

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Movies to See: Hobo and Rubber

Just saw two preview for two movie that look ridiculously fun:

Hobo with a Shotgun

and

Rubber

Who doesn't want to see Rutger Hauer as a hobo with a shotgun dispensing hobo-justice? And a killer tire? Sure. Why not?

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Atheists Can be as Dumb as Everyone Else

The truth of the matter is, atheism isn't anything more than being an atheist, and an atheist isn't anything more than someone who does not believe in any sort of gods. It really is that simple. Yet somehow, somewhere along the way, people began trying to attach more significance to atheism. Not only are we supposed to be not believe in any sort of god/s, but we're supposed to be anti-religion, hyper-scientific, super-intellectual and even dismissive of all other forms of the supernatural that have nothing to do with gods.

I've noticed a growing trend on social networks to mock religions with invalid and fallacious arguments. For example, the post linked to above:

Day 1: God created light

Day 4: God created the Sun

If you click through to this post you'll see I'm getting a lot of flack for tearing this argument apart. The premise of the anti-religious statement is that it's illogical that an all-knowing all-powerful god would create light before creating a light source. However, the above statement does not indicate where that light (from Day 1) was coming from, merely that light was created.

And as we all know, there are many forms of light in this universe that don't have the Sun as their source. For example, fire. Fire in no way relies on the Sun for it's light emissions. Neither does star light. And while, yes, the Sun is a star, it is not the source of light from the billions of other stars in the sky.

My point is simple: if we're to take apart religious texts and show the world their fallacies, then we as atheists need to do so in a logical manner based on scientific method and critical thinking. Just making a meme-image with no basis of fact isn't helping our cause to bring enlightenment to the religious masses, but rather just to poke fun or ridicule one's faith isn't helping anyone. Such actions only show that atheists are just as callous and petty as religious adherents.

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