Goodbye and Goodluck

I had a lot of fun doing the dinner party up and I looked forward to seeing everyone. I spent the morning cleaning and the afternoon cooking. The beef wellington came out perfect, which was great cause the slab of meat cost about 36$. Very nice and tasty cut though. Made some chicken soup to start, where the carrot was a no go, too ... yucky (tried it the week before). Then had a salad and then the main course. People were stuffed, which was a good sign, ushered them into the living room, had the fire place (fake) going and some candles on. Settled them in and got them some coffee and desserts. Banana bread and pumpkin roll was a hit, didn't have time to make the dumplings. It was very good but like how I found most things in life are ... it doesn't last. I thought I had escaped it this time, I had hugged my dad goodbye, both my brothers and then it was just me and my mom and her boyfriend (he's sweet). We chatted for a little bit but I knew something was up. She had bought me a little wolverine lunch box for my kid bin. I've got this huge tupperwear bin thing that I house little things I want to give to my kids, whenever I have them. Like jean lookin kinda diapers, how cool is that? They might not have them when I have my kids. Anyways, I thought it was cool, cause wolverine is my thing, I collect a lot of the stuff, but that wasn't it. She hadn't let me touch it most of the night and I figured that was her playing keep away, like she likes to do.

When she held onto it this time, there was something in her eyes. She touched Bill, (her boyfriend)she touched his leg and then looked at me. She was crying and still holding the lunchbox. Now I'm worried. If the strongest woman I know is crying ... that's enough to make me cry right there. I simply said to her. "Tell me."

She said that I had asked her to tell me when I was home. And then I knew. My dog was gone. I had a shepherd mix growing up, called Sheba. She was my dog. She was the most awesome dog ever. Never really liked anyone out the family that much but she was so sweet to us.

Growing up we were told we would never get another dog. We had one before but I don't remember that well, I was too little. My BroBro and me always went into the pet store in the mall because we liked to look at the animals. This day they had the shepherd/Keeshond/lab puppies. They looked like straight up sheherds with curly tails, we loved them. We loved them sooo much. Mom went looking to find us but always knew where we were. She looked to me, to my BroBro and then the dogs and said No Way. She herded us out of the store and we eventually went home. All the way home we talked about the dog, how we wanted one, how cute they were and the millions promises to take care of it. My father was away for a few months during this time, he came home a bit but worked most of it. There had been a serious multi agency disaster that he had to be on site for. She called him because we kept at her long enough. His words. "No. Don't you ..." Which lead to "....fine." We drove all the way back to the mall which is in another city and went right back to the pet shop. Our hands on the glass windows we looked over each of the little bundles, knowing one would be ours. I had been 11 at the time and my brother was 13, but we acted like 5 year olds giggling and laughing, the dogs had their paws up on the glass looking right back at us. They all were running around, like they knew it too. All except for one. One was curled up in the corner and had her back to everyone. She didn't want to play with them and didn't want to see us.

The store clerk told us that the puppies had been abandoned and all of them had been rescued during a storm. We determined that one was bitter about it, probably didn't trust people and wouldn't come to see us. It was the first time I heard this quote, it was something along the lines of "Those who are the hardest to love are the ones who need it most". That dog needed us. It needed to be loved. We wanted her. The clerk asked us if we were sure and said she'd bring it out just in case. She brought it out and the dog didn't look at us. She looked away and was shaking. I held her, this little fur ball that shook like she was crumbling. We spoke softly to her, and patted her. This was the dog for us. She wouldn't walk on the leash, well ...she wouldn't walk at all. We were advised to give her a choke chain for her as she'd be a big dog. We did and it has ALWAYS been very loose on her. It was her bling, her necklace. She hated any collar we put on her so she'd always just have the chain. She squatted her butt down and wouldn't move. So we picked her up again and carried her to our van. Of course between two kids she had to sit in between us. She was very scared in the van, she didn't like it and whined. We took her home and let her see it as hers too.

Over time she softened up and began to run around foolishly and to bark and play. She would run to greet us and lick our faces. She never trusted people who came to the door and would bark at them to protect her turf. I remember when I was home alone, which didn't happen a lot at that age. I had an overactive imagination and before long I envisioned terrible things happening. I was afraid of the house burning down or that someone might break in. Sheba and I sat in the middle of the living room, I had a bag packed just in case I had to run out the door. She never let me though I'm sure she was confused as to what I was afraid of. She spent almost every night on my bed and managed to push me into the crack between the bed and the wall a few times.

I have a memory of waking up to the sound of her growling. I was afraid cause I could see her head, her teeth, she was snarling and the hackles were raised. I looked up at the door and my mother had just closed it behind her. Sheba stopped growling but watched the door for as long as I could remember before I fell asleep. I asked my mom what she was doing the next day and she told me she was just putting one of my shirts back into the room. She had decided against it when Sheba growled. I felt very safe from then on, knowing that if anyone ever did break into our house and tried to come in my room, she would protect me.

These were the memories that came back to me in a flash. I almost couldn't hear my mother talking tonight. I knew Sheba had bad hips, that things were getting harder for her. She was peeing in her sleep and a hard time getting up. Today, this morning she couldn't get up at all. She was in pain. When my dad tried to help her up she tried to bite him. All of her hurt. Sheba was 12 almost 13 years old. Today was the last day she was going to suffer. Mom and dad got her in the car, and they took her to the vet. They said it was very peaceful, and I have to believe that.

As I opened up the lunchbox, her chain was coiled at the bottom. I cried. They soon left and I was alone with it. My cat, Lee, sat on my lap and I patted him for awhile. Then I drank a lot of wine while cleaning the dishes going over the memories.

She was a good dog. She was my best friend growing up. I told her all my secrets, my dreams and my confessions. Good luck girl. Goodbye and good luck.

Training and trashing the place

My BroBro came over tonight, which was a great idea on days off ... not so much tonight. Found out that I have to come in early tomorrow for a 6 hr training exercise, lovely 4:30 start time just means an early night tonight. Glad the last Monday is under my belt, I do not like them and they do not like me. It's been accepted. Got called into the Assistant Manager's office right off the bat, and I'm freaking out slightly in my head because on days off I dreamt that this had happened and she threw 2 cycles worth of calls on her desk and said not acceptable then tossed me outside into a snowbank. Thank goodness all she wanted to say was that I forgot to submit my payslip, (again, whoops!) and to do that first thing. Right away! Just don't toss me in a snowbank, I uh ... had to explain that to her.

Two feet from her office my supervisor, JP called me in to his office and shut the door. I believe Mama Fargo said it best in her post, http://mommafargo.blogspot.com/2011/01/its-just-words.html 'Fuck me in the ass!' aragh. That is actually a saying up here as well. This was not starting out great. Turns out he just wanted to ask me how I was, cause apparently I was upset looking when I left last night shift, that were his words. He wanted to make sure I was ok. I was fine, just the office politics get to me some nights more then others. All good.

Well ... I broke four things today, sigh. I was harassing/playing with Dispatcher Grumpy, poking him, pushing the movable light around his desk and then I leaned against the half wall. No sooner had I done that, a loose half wall panel fell off and broke onto the floor. "Whoops."
Thrown out of the pod, yet again. Broke my computer, my pencil (right in half) and my shoe lace.
We had this call about a cat. It was sad. I hated the human race that moment. This ... can't even call her woman, this female human like life form, had been evicted and moved out of her apartment. She left behind her cat inside a carrier. When the maintenance people came in to change the locks, they found the cat screaming. There was blood in the carrier underneath it, it's face was bloodied and I could hear it over the phone. She hadn't been there in days, maybe a week. It was starving, sitting in shit and injured. That human like life form is lucky it wasn't dead. Or there would be one pissed off call taker on a rampage. I couldn't do anything but I'd rampage. I hate violence/neglect/sexual assault on animals and children, god those break my heart. We had a sexAssault case on a cat last year ... I wanted to sooooo do something more then curse under my breath.

Onto different news I have training next cycle as well ... yey ... sorta. It's 2 days of sitting in a room for our 911 refresher training. It's going to be painful. The 911 training was painful, like you're looking at your pencil wondering how much it would hurt to shove that in your eyes. The refresher is going to be so boring. Another call taker was trying to make me see the good in it, at least it's 2 days you don't have to be here. 1, I like here, 2, it's 911 training! 3, god I'd rather take a robi! At least then I know I won't fall on my pencil and skewer my eye 'accidentally'.
All good all good. I was making my breakfast and lunch for tomorrow and my brother laughed at me. I put them in two reusable lunch bags that I got free from subway. I don't know if he was laughing at my breakfast or that fact that I kept it separate from my lunch. They're two different meals, two different bags. Breakfast, banana, half baggy full of cheerios and a half peanut butter sandwich (1 piece folded in half).

Got to go, it's late and it's a long day tomorrow

Well endowed snowman and future plans

Last night shift was filled with people getting on each others nerves so I bunkered down and tried to wait out the storm. We have a good group of people working but up in dispatch we're mostly women and I think some how they all start PMSing at the same time. It's chaos. If there were weapons we'd all be dead. One dispatcher has the ability to snap at someone beside her, turn in 1 second to be sweet on the radio and then snap back and continue yelling at the other peson. It's talent, the voice is like a roller coaster going up and down so fast. I'd laugh but uh ... the lying low part.

The night sort of goes like that too, we'll all be laughing and then the next second someone is trying to murder the other with their eyes. Poor, poor Fire Dispatcher, retired FireChief, he's one of two guys on our shift and he's hiding in the fire pod. The other guy is Dispatcher Grumpy and he can fling shit with the best of them.

On one particular leveling out of the hormones, we had a funny call that had two of them in tears laughing. Turns out somone was getting creative out there in that fresh batch of snow. In the midst of this 'snow storm' (right) someone built a snow man with some man parts. Hee. The officers who went said it was a six foot penis. HA! The people even coloured it pink and had branches for hair. Oh god that was creative. But it had to be be smashed cause it was causing a disturbance. The person who made it said the guy who called it in was just suffering from penis envy.

Of course, someone, somehow goes and gets a picture of it before it is ... disassembled(can't say how in case someone from my ... management comes across the blog and goes after that person). That caused another laughing spree up in dispatch and a few giggles to come across the air. I had to double check the address cause my first thought was, damn BroBro this ain't the RedNeck Town where you can get away with it.

Alas what goes up, goes down. I took a call about a manhole cover that had lost it's lid and a 11 year old kid fell in it but thankfully was caught before he went too far. Ouch, so I got a hold of the city to go fix it. Sure they'll go right out. Cool. All done. Was not to be. They called back and said it was a private road and they'd have no part of it. What? Your kiddin? Ok. Plan B. Only other person would be the housing authority, by popular request of my podmates. I give them a call no answer. I am lost now because we have no one else to go. I put in a police call cause hey maybe we can find the damn thing or put cones around it so that nobody else falls in while we're looking for someone to call. I know the dispatcher it's going to is ... well, let's just say she's opinionated and overheating. I call our Watch Commander, someone who is in charge of the entire police force for Crazy town and I ask him what he thinks. He's a nice guy and says to enter a call and have a member look for it, makes me feel better cause that's what I was thinking. Well no sooner then I me putting down the phone did that Dispatcher have a fit. She demanded me to tell her why police would be going. "Uh? City won't respond, no answer at the housing authority and the Staff Sergeant agreed with me putting a call in." Thank god I called him so I'd have something to back me up at least, this guy would do. He wouldn't change his decision just because it was unpopular, I admire that about him. She again demanded, at a loud voice just exactly what I wanted police to do? Starring at her blankly I look back down to my call and read verbatim what I had written. She again stated that this wasn't a police call. I admitted it wasn't our normal function but an 11 year old barely avoided serious injury if not death, those things are deep. Her only response was that would be the city's fault. I am fortunate enough to know when there are words building up inside that could get me in trouble so I held most of them back. I simply told her the Watch Commander also thought this was appropriate and sat down. I wasn't fighting with her anymore, if she didn't like it she could take it up with him. She never did and an officer was sent. The lid was broken in half. Calls were made, the city decided they would go out anyways because of the potential for danger. It wasn't what I needed that night, my head was killing me.

Sometimes I feel in that place there is a constant demand for you to explain yourself and every single action that you do. I don't mind giving my reasons but there comes a point where if we are going to work together you have to trust me. You have to trust that I can make a right decision. My age has come up a lot. I started there when I was 20 and now I'm only 23 and the youngest by about a decade, most of them are late forties and have been doing the job a long time. I don't know, I can only keep telling myself, do a good job, do good work and they'll eventually trust me or retire. Either way, problem solved.

I'm having a dinner party on the 22 and am super stoked for that. Making carrot soup, salad, beef wellington, stuffed double baked potatoes, steamed broccoli and carrots. For desert pumpkin roll, banana bread and apple dumplings. A lot of work but it will be good to see the family again.

Also plans on getting a house soon. Sooner then I had first thought. My mother is building a duplex out in Crazy town but essentially it will be two 2 level houses stuck together. I'd get one and she'd get the other. We've been going over designs and got it tweaked just right. The next choice is do I want to pay rent of 1000$ a month or pay a mortgage and own my side? We're going to talk to the bank to see what's best and what we can do. I have good credit and have had loans before. So getting a vehicle this summer and might be in a house by December. Exciting stuff. When I get a house I am getting 2 dogs, not at the same time, but one will be for sure a German Shepard, maybe 2 of them.

Well that's all for now, on days off, which is a welcome break.