Life with the Two Crazy Dogs

I took Cooper and Chase to the trails by the woods.  This set of trails are right by the Civic Center where the skating rink, hockey rink, skate board rink, police department and City Hall are.  I thought I let them run free in the woods.  Off the leash and into the trails we went.  Chase loves the trails.  This is the 3rd time he has been in the woods.  This is a small little trails.  I took my usual route in the trail and went down the little path and Urghhhhhhh………@#$%$.  All the effenheimers came spilling out.  Cooper stopped and looked at me.  At least he knows I’m in some sort of trouble.

See that green wire string in the above picture?  Thank goodness for camera phones.

Here is another view of the string or whatever you called it.  That string was tied onto two skinny trees between the path.  I obviously didn’t see it and since I’m short, it caught me right on my throat.   When I got myself back on track, I looked around to see if there were anyone around but there were none.  If there were, the two boys especially Cooper, he is actually a good guard dog, will growl.  I walked away hacking away but then I thought I should take a picture to show it to DBs what I encountered in the trails.  So I did and walked away still rubbing my throat.

Came home, told DBs about it and he said I should call the cops to tell them someone put up the string with no signs of warning.  It was a prank obviously.  He called the cops for me, told them where it was and they said they will go check it out.  I then went out again to walk Ranger, the slow coach, not on the trails coz it was already getting dark by the time we got done with the call to the cops. 

When I got home, DBs said the cops called twice: once to see if I’m OK, if I need to go to the ER and then he said they drove by the trails and saw nothing there.  Hello, we already told them it’s inside the trails.  they have to walk in to the trails to look for it.  Darn cops.  I will go out there when I get off work tomorrow to see if that string is still there.  What an experience!

Yep, I went to the Minnesota State Fair on Friday, August 30th with Simmie.  She drove to the bus terminal on Hwy 13 and I met her there in the evening.  I bought the fair ticket from the convenience store at work at a discounted price fo $8 for each ticket.  The price per ticket at the ticket booth at the fair grounds is $11.  We took the Metro Transit which costs us $5 inclusive of the return trip.  It’s considered cheap as parking fees at the fair areas comes to $20 and $25 depending on where you park.  This is first time I took the bus to the fair.  Save all the hassle of the jam and parking.  There are buses every 15 minutes to the State Fair.  It’s very convenient and I wish buses are that convenient on other regular days.

 The bus drops us off at the designated lot for buses from all over the metro - Bloomington, Burnsville-Savage, and can’t remember where else.  Get off the bus, gave our tickets at one of the entrances (didn’t see which entrance street it was), over the overhead bridge and right to the Miracle of Birth Center.

What a quinkie dink with that guy pushing a stroller when I was taking that picture!!!  We walked right into a crowd of observers observing the birth of a calf.  See the TVs up there, the veteranian is helping the cow with the birth of her calf/calves.  It was quite bloody, the vet had his gloved up arm all the way inside the cow, pulling on the chain.  (DB said if the vet had to put a chain on the calf that means the calf is position upside down - leg first and the vet has to work quick to get the calf out.)  The birth was happening right smack in the birth center, inside the building.  There were cameras surrounding the birth area.  I wanted to stay to watch the entire birth, but I was too hungry.  It was already past my dinner time.  Stomach was screaming for some deep fried food.  I could still eat even watching the gross looking stuff, no probs for me.

My first chow was the foot long hot dog followed by a small corn dog.  No fair is complete without mawing down a corn dog.  Then for some pork chops on a stick.  Most of every food in the Fair are on a stick.  The pork chop was a little too charred but it still tasted good.  I must be just plain greedy!  Next on the menu I thought of getting was walleye on a stick but I didn’t get it.  For some reason I’m too paranoid that there are some bones on the fillet and I might happen to swallow those bones.

 

Another food that is a must at the Fair are Cheese Curds.  They are deep fried cheese curds, very good but a sure fire heart attack, artery clogger food.  I didn’t get it coz I know I won’t be able to eat the entire serving. 

Simmie mentioned about the Nitro ice-cream and we found it.  The scream was so smooth, best ever ice-cream I ever had.  I googled nitro ice-cream and found a recipe for it but where do you find liquid nitrogen?  Hah, like I’m gonna try it. 

Our next dairy food and our last meal for the night was Dipping Dots, tiny bits of super freezing cold ice-cream, much older than the Nitro scream.  While still eating these little dots, we look took a jaunt to Sweet Martha’s Cookies.

Sweet Martha’s is famous at the State Fair.  I had to buy a bucket since both DB and I are cookie monsters.  There were “yan san, yan hoi” (people mountain, people sea) standing at lines that were forming all over the cookie booth.  Finally got to a bucket and Simmie got pictures of me with the sweet smelling cookies.  Honest to God, after consuming all the sweet diary icre-cream, the cookie was the last thing I wanted to eat, but I still ate a piece but it didn’t taste the best.  We both needed water and we were full, stomach loaded with lactose and I was kinda worried too since I am lactose intolerant now, I was not looking forward for a major diarheaa.  Luckily, no stomach aches. 

There are a lot to see at the Fair.  We walked along the streets and saw the Republican, McCain’s booth.  So, where is the Democrat, Obama’s booth.  We could not find the Democrat’s booth which has to be somewhere.  Yeah, the lady VP elect McCain picked!!!  What a disaster waiting to happen!  And I just heard on the evening news that Pallin’s 17-year old daughter is pregnant.  I can see how the Donkeys gonna bombard the Elephants. 

Anyways, on our way out we stopped by the diary barn where the goats were residing.  At the State Fair, farmers load their farm animals (goats, swines, cows, horses, roosters, turkeys) to compete for medals - which is the best looking animal, gua?  But we were at the goats barn, the goats were darn cute though.  One even tried to bite the plastic bag with the cookies in it, the picture below.  I even saw one of the farmers milking the goat, the goat that has just given birth.  There were definitely a lot of pregnant goats in that barn, probably waiting to be delivered in the Miracle of Birth Center.

 

From the diary barn, we were going to head out to the gates but then I wanted to see the horses.  We found some petting horses.  I didn’t take any pictures on my camera but Simmie took some of me with her phone and camera.  The horse are such lovely creatures.  Love them.

And that was the last place we visited.  Walked to the bus site and catch our bus back to the terminal.  Bus came, got into our seats and waited for more fair goers to board the bus.  Actually more drunkards boarded the bus and it was darn noisy.  To me, as long as they are bugging me, I’m fine with it.  I lived with a drunkard for 6 years i know how loud it can be and I can tolerate it.  Simmie on the other hand was uncomfortable with those doorknobs.  I have to say it was a bus ride from hell but we were all safe and I am not complaining.  It got me to point B to point A where our cars were. 

Overall, I thought I would spend a lot more money than I thought.  I only spent about $30+ at the fair.  I guess I’m kinda reminding myself that the food prices have all gone up, so I was a little kedukut.  I would go again next year just for the food and farm animals….I should just move to the farm……

A lady who walks her dog every day stopped me one day asking me if I have seen the German Shepard that lives in the corner house on 130th Street.  I know which house she was referring to and she continued to tell me that her dog was attacked by the shepard.  Her dog is slightly smaller than my two older ones, well, probably her dog is about 60+ pounds.  She and her dog were walking passed the house and the shepard was in his outside kennel, scooted right out, grabbed a hold of her dog’s neck and not letting go.  She said she was screaming for the shepard’s owners and eventually they came out.  The shepard is a big dog too, I think that shepard is about 10 years old, always barks each time someone with a dog walks passed its house.  The lady said she called the cops with her cell right away.  The cops came and wrote a ticket to the shepard’s owners for not securing their dog from the public.  Since the dog is an outside dog and withno fence, owners need to supervise their dogs when the dogs are unleashed.  The lady’s dog is traumatized by that incident.  Each time they are near that house, the dog will stop short and will not move.  She is carrying a bear spray with her at all times.

Then, she told me a Pit Bull ran across the street and was about to attack her dog couple of days ago.  What bad luck and the owner of the pit bull needs to be shot or hung.  The owner was out on the driveway fiddling with the car and his dog was not leashed.  The lady used her bear spray, sprayed the pittbull in the eyes.  She said the pittbull was ready to charge her dog, bearing its teeth and has a very eerie growl.  Damn, that’s really scary.  The cops came and gave a warning to the owner, only a warning because it was the first offence.

All these routes she takes are the routes I take every day or every other.  Where else is safe for the public to walk?   I walked passed the shepard’s home every other day lately and I have not seen the dog anywhere.  I am wondering did the owners put him down because even if the dog is in the house, he will bark at me and the boys.  I still do not carry any pepper or bear spray, just my cellphone.  Maybe I should get one since my boys are always too friendly with strangers.  They are not guard dogs like shepards, rotweillers, pitbulls or dobermans.  Definitely no walks for me in the crack of dawn since DB told me he don’t feel safe with me walking the boys at 3:30  or 4 am.   I have yet to see the pittbull the lady was telling me, but I am keeping my eyes open each time I am out on my walks.

So, the time to get new tabs for the Blazer.  The tabs are just the same as road tax in Malaysia.  You renew it every year.  The Blazer’s tabs were due in July.  I took the renewal form from DMV (department of motor vehicle) to work so I can send the form with a check in.  The company I work for is sweet enough to provide such services for its employees.  We employees can renew our license tabs, boat license, motorcycle and don’t know what else that I didn’t bother to care for since I do not utilize them.  How it works is I enclose the form from DMV and the check into an envelope provided by the license bureau.  The license bureau officer comes once every Wednesday to the company to do all these license stuff for employees.  If you drop the envelope off on Wednesday you can pick the tabs up after 12 noon the next day.

When I picked my tabs up on Thursday, I saw they included new plates, too.  The first thing I saw on the plates was the numbers 455, and being a Chinese, it’s an automatic thing to get them Cantonese translation which means “die fast fast” (sei fai fai).  I told that to DB’s since those plates will be going up on his Blazer, he said jokingly, “Great.  Does that mean I will die faster?”  He knows now that the number 4 is a number that should be avoided if possible in the Chinese community.  I told him about the number 4 when I saw our house number which ends with a 4, too.  But I know he is not superstitious and so am I, but it’s just so weird how it pops right into my brain bucket when I saw those numbers.  Guess it’s the Chinese in me.

The humidity went away and of course the dewpoint dropped to the 50’s this evening.  I went for a walk with Ranger and Cooper.  There was a nice breeze, the sun was still quite hot to the skin.  Ranger as usual was holding up the walk but I still need to walk him, if not he wouldn’t do much business in the backyard of our house.

We walked out to the main road and farther down the sidewalk I saw this black dude walking towards our direction.  Ranger had to take a big business so I waited and this dude continued towards my direction.  However, when he saw me and the two boys walking towards him, he walked outside the sidewalk on to the shoulder of the road.  When we walked passed him he said:

He: You have big dogs.
Me: Yes, they are big (smiling and continued walking. He speaks with a heavy accent from Africa)
He: Yeah, they are big (looks like he was not comfortable with the boys)
He: Are they male? (By then I was a good 20 feet away from him)
Me: I’m sorry? Are they males you mean? Yes, they are males.
He: Are you married? (Pointing to his left hand and the ring finger)
Me: (WTF) Yeah, I am married. (And I pulled Ranger to walk away as fast as he could)

I kept turning back to see if that black dude was following me, but he didn’t.   I have never had a stranger while on a walk asked me this question.  When I got home, I pretended nothing happened on my walk, I didn’t tell DB.  If I had told him, he will tell me “No-More-Walks-By-Yourself”.  It’s better to keep things to myself sometimes.

This is suppose to be the Boston Pops which is on live right now.  I tried to take a better clearer picture, no can do.  I still want to go to this Boston Pops.  Hopefully I can make a trip to Boston to see this.  I almost made it in 2005 when I was in Boston, but my boss then told me I have to leave MSP for Boston after the 4th.   Watching it on TV is not too bad, in the comfort of my own home, bathroom is just down the corner and popcorn and drinks are free.  Been in this country for 11 years and have been watching Boston Pops every year. They are almost the same each year, but I still love watching it.

Surprisingly, this year’s 4th is very quiet in the neighborhood, quiet being no fireworks.  The state only allows fireworks that do not leave the grounds type.  What kind of fireworks are those.  No fun to play, right?  And the city is not holding any fireworks for the public.  It was at the school behind our home last year which was so convenient for us, plant our butts on the outside furniture and watch the fireworks.  Not this year tho.  Usually by this hour we can see the fireworks.  Na-da.  Cheap ass city.  Good thing I have the fireworks from the Boston Pops to watch.

George Carlin died yesterday, Sunday, June 22, 2008 from heart failure.  He was 71.  Still young if you ask me.   You can read more of him here.   The first time I saw his stand up was on HBO about 9 years ago and I have I have liked it ever since.  Whether it was a rerun of his shows, I still watch them and recorded them for future viewing.  The below two from YouTube are some of my favorites, if you are interested.  There is one that I enjoy much which I am not putting up here.  I know for sure many will find this stand-up comedian very offensive because of his language.  So if you are offended with profanities, his videos are not suitable for ya.  You are now home, George! :D 

I took this picture on Saturday on my walk with Chase. 

This afternoon at 2:50 p.m., it’s this ungodly price….

Let’s say goodbye to $3.09/gallon from now on.  I pumped 1/2 a tank of gas yesterday at $3.89 and it cost me $27+ which is usually the total I pay for a full tank.  Time to think of car pooling which mean no flex hours of 6 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.!!