Lonely, I'm So Lonely

DM has been out of town for a few days and it's been awful lonesome around the house. I've tried not to mope about it because that only makes it worse.

But he's coming home tonight, so I'll probably be spending the evening finding a way to glue myself to him, my cuddle meter is running really low.

Damn clock, go faster!

Funky Knees

My knees have been aching lately, thanks to the barometer doing a reasonable impression of a roller coaster, plus the rib on my left side that responded to me trying to ease the pain in the cracked rib on the right side floating out of place and throwing everything out of whack. ("does your rib hurt tonight?" DM asked me the other night, "A little, why?" I responded. "Because it looks like it's trying to jump out of your back." )

Anyway, I recently had a couple of friends to visit, one of whom is an anthropologist. We spent a couple hours in the car, followed by several hiking up and down a mountain, followed by a couple more hours in the car. Home again for pizza and alcohol until late in the evening, at which point I mentioned that my knees were feeling a little sore.

And demonstrated that the swelling (minor, for what it has been in the past) would bulge out the other side of the knee cap when you pressed on one side. Absentmindedly I started rubbing at my knee and the anthro gal suddenly cringed. I realized then that I'd rubbed my kneecap off to one side... yeah apparently that's far more disturbing than the swelling thing.

We then spent some time with me demonstrating the things my knees will do that they apparently aren't supposed to and still let me stand up, and I've been told that if I ever make it to Albuquerque anthro gal knows a couple people who would love to x-ray me. Or maybe cat scan. Cause apparently my knees shouldn't let me stand up.

The orthopedic surgeon's daughter just cocked her head to one side and commented that she'd be interested in seeing how the muscles surrounding differed from "normal" in order to compensate for the instability.

I do think making the anthro gal cringe and get all squicked out means I win forever, though. I am a little worried that if they ever manage to get me in front of an ortho to demonstrate that I'll wind up in surgery before you can say "knee replacement."

They don't hurt that bad....

New House

Well, since we reached the halfway point and that was enough for the tank and the filter for the turtle, I decided to go ahead and pick that up today while I was off work. Since I promised you lovely people who donated a chance to see the new digs once I got them, I made sure and took pictures.

Here's the previous turtle house:


And here's the shiny new one:


Bit of a difference there, I think. Well after much wiping (the new tank is used, and I wanted to clean it thoroughly before putting the turtle in, so there was much bleaching followed by much dechlorinating) and much hauling, because at five gallons a trip it takes a bit to fill that big sucker even part way up, we get this:


I think she's going to like it once she gets the whole "I can swim" thing figured out. We plan on getting some bigger rocks to build up a good land area on the right side, at which point the floating basking platform will go away since it's only mostly useful at best. She's too heavy for it to be really useful, it doesn't have quite enough float to it and all the things I can think of to make it float better involve things that she might eat or that can harm her.


No substrate yet, she'll get along ok without it for a bit, though I would like to get her some, traction when she's trying to walk across the bottom is nonexistant, of course, and it does help with the biological filtration to help keep things clean and happy.

We're getting there, though. Slowly, but surely. I am far more pleased with this set up than the old one, though the turtle isn't entirely sure about that yet, I think she's gonna wind up much happier and healthier in her new home.

Turtle House Update

Halfway to "just go buy everything at once" on the turtle house, and cruising for deals on the bits I expect I might be able to find a bargain on.

I know I say this a lot but my readers are totally awesome!

Pleeeeassseeee? Gimme!

So, since I asked for donations for the turtle I thought I ought to post something of her being cute. Since she's not really made for cute, I got the next best thing. Her begging.

See, she loves earthworms, and at three bucks and change for thirty of them it's pretty easy to keep her supplied as treats. She also begs for the freeze dried pre-gut-loaded crickets since I'm not fucking about with keeping crickets and gut loading them before feeding them to her.

(You have to feed the crickets stuff so that their stomachs are full of goodies like calcium and junk for them to be nutritionally worth it. Someone else can do that. I have a whole jar of them and they don't chirp at me all the time, and I'm good with that.)

This isn't the best job she's done of it and you may see some floaties in the water, the skin on her neck is peeling (in the normal shedding kind of way) and the white floaties are bits of skin that have sloughed off that the filter hasn't quite eliminated yet (but give it ten minutes.) The dark floaties are worm dirt that washes off when she drags them to their doom. But still. Turtle begging. Didn't know that was possible.



ETA: I put the wrong video on here. The previous one was also the turtle begging but this one is better.

We've Really Got To Name This Turtle

So, we've been looking into the possibility of getting the turtle a new home, mostly because of the costs to get her set up properly. See, the tank she's in is too small, mostly on the "happy" side, although some more room to move and exercise would be good for her as well.

She needs at least a fifty five gallon tank, really, but those are expensive. I found one used at the local fish shop for about sixty five dollars but by the time you add in substrate and a new filter because the one she's got (that I swear would filter a fresh bucket of quick crete and spit out pure water,) is made for the half-side style tank she's in now, and won't work on a full tank, and the other bits and bobs, you're approaching about two hundred dollars even with the cheap tank.

But, nobody we know has a burning desire for a red eared slider.

So, in the time honored FarmFam tradition it looks like I've got a permanent new pet.

Now, I know my readers are awesome, they've come through for me in the past. I feel bad asking anything more of ya'll... and I wouldn't, if it were for me. It's not... it's for the turtle. If you want to throw a couple bucks at the tip jar for a new turtle home, feel free. If you don't have it to spare, don't sweat it.

If we reach the goal and get the turtle's new house I'll post pictures.

Five Years Old

Today, I've been blogging for five years.

Over the years I've been amazed at the friendships I've made through this blog, and the encouragement and support, and frankly patience, of my readers.

I started this blog because I needed something to occupy my mind during a difficult time. It's served that purpose more than once since then, but one thing I discovered as I went along... I really liked blogging.

It could be said that AD and LawDog are my two blog daddies, since it was their blogs that made me believe that I might have something to say that someone might want to read.

So a big thank you to both of them and to everyone else who has read, commented, conspired, or despaired over the years. And a major thank you to everyone who has inspired me, both on this blog and in my other writing, which has occasionally taken a very distant back seat.

If I started naming off everyone who has made an impact on my life through or because of this blog, this post would never end, so I'm just gonna leave it at that.

Oh, one more thing... I expect presents, guys. At least a cake.... something? Anything? Bueller?