It's been slow

And there's hasn't been much to say.

I'm still trying to figure out the New Hampshire thing from the other night - was it just me, or was Big Media really bummed when Barack Obama didn't run off into the night with a 20-point win and the Democratic nomination tucked under his arm?

I'm also still trying to get ahead of the untidiness that is Bad Dog Central this week. I'm off to do some dishes before I shower.

Need some advice

Casey the G. Shep is working up another case of the very dry skin. I'd like to try to prevent the whole itchy/raw/infected situation we wrestled last summer, and I'm thinking I need food supplement. She's already on some OTC joint stuff.

For the skin I'm thinking some sort of cod liver or fish oil. What says the pack?

True Love

Baby, you're so sweet, I could just eat you up...

TYLER, Texas (AP) -- A man killed his girlfriend, then filleted and cooked parts of her body before calling police to tell them what he was doing, authorities said Sunday.

I've been paying attention to the crime in Texas since we've moved here, and mostly it's more brutal, but less creative, than the crime in Florida. This one pretty well covers both bases, being vicious and weird.

Authorities believe Shearer, 21, was abducted from her home Friday night and killed. Her death and mutilation was apparently the beginning of a crime spree that also included McCuin allegedly stabbing the boyfriend of his estranged wife and breaking into a business.

That is one feral SOB.

Army Drowsy

I love this reserve unit I landed with - it's a great group of people. But it makes for some long weekend days.

I came home today, ate and curled up on the couch with a blanket and a small dog. Can't beat a couch nap. I caught the first five and last ten minutes of the Steelers/Jaguars ballgame, and it looked like a fun one.

Most annoying - because this is Texas, and because it is a good unit, I really can't bitch too much with my 38-mile drive to drill. Some of these people commute from different timezones.

Know what's amazing?

The fact that you can order Pizza Hut online.

You don't have to talk to anyone stupid, you can just click click click, and there you go!

Also, you can specifiy extra toppings on all or only on a portion of your pizza. How cool is that?

No, I probably don't get out enough.

Scratching my head

Is tonight's headline from Iowa

Iowa voters call for change, vote for character and hope?

or is it

Voters in Iowa go big for two guys who spent a lot of time having coffee with them?

I have got to tell you, I just don't know.

So it begins

Well, gang, the actual counting part of Election '08 begins tonight in Iowa.

For some odd reason, after Iowans "caucus," and after...New Hampshirites? New Hamphshirians? New Hamsters? vote, several of the candidates will be judged "unelectable," and the rest of the nation will be offered a steadily dwindling slate of choices.

I cannot stand the primary system, can you tell?

Anyway, I'm a giant geek this way, so I'll be looking forward to watching the news this evening, which should be beyond hysterical in its coverage of what 36 people in a church basement outside of Waterloo think.

I don't know if we've got any Iowans who hang out here, but if so, please understand that I don't have anything against you - it just doesn't seem like a logical setup to me. But if you are an Iowan, particularly one who does this whole caucus thing, I'd love it if you dropped a comment to tell us a little about it.

I am grumpy, but intrigued.

Busy day

After four days away from work, the whininess level today was high. Swear to God, if I ever work in customer service again after this, it'll be for a medical supply company or something where lives really do depend on the product.

I did get to finish off a fun project - an Army buddy who is one of the most talented people I know is applying to several MBA programs, and I wrote a couple letters of recommendation. I enjoy doing that - I've worked with some good people and helping them try to get where they want to be is gratifying.

The monthly depressing ordeal of wrestling bills was also completed. Good news - electic waaay down, gas only slightly up (let's hear it for keeping the house uncomfortably chilly!). Bad news - still no money for truck-lot ammo purchases.

And best of all...received news that Cousin R and her longtime companion, Mr. Really Great, have decided to make it all official and get hitched.

I was an only child, but I grew up never more than a couple miles from Cousin R, who is exactly four days older than I am. We're close members of an already close family, I love her like I imagine one would love a sister, and the fact that she's delirious with happiness makes me smile.

And, of course, the fact that she and Mr. Really Great are getting hitched means we have another lab in the family! Yep - Dog Cousin Allie is now going to be Canine Family.



She may only be marrying him for his dog, but she's a Very Good Dog, so that's cool.

For Joseph

..and in the spirit of learning something new, we here at Bad Dog Central bring you...video. We think. We hope. An ongoing discussion in comments about the takedown procedure for a pistol prompted me to see if I could do this. If it works, we should have two video clips - one on takedown, and the second on reassembly.


OK. Once you have it apart, you clean it. Then, if you're me, you force your poor, tortured spouse to take six videos of you jabbering and trying get the darn thing back together.



If you watch these, let me know if they work smoothly for you or not. If video is a winner, then there may be no limit to the hours of canine hysteria we'll be able to share.

Another one bites the dust

As we fling 2007 onto the scap heap and tear open a shiny new 2008. Last year was an adventure, and this one promises to be entertaining as well.

I avoided too much wild and craziness last night, so I'm munching on donuts and feeling superior. The Mister, on the other hand, is suffering just a little.

I hope y'all survived your evenings in good shape.

Preparation

The Mister just took off with the Senior Dogs to drop them at their Bed and Breakfast for the weekend.

So Jack and I are left to round up the food portion of this outing. Normally, I wouldn't be able to keep him out of the cooler and the dry goods box. But since the other two got to wear leashes and disappear, he's very concerned, and is pacing around the house whining.

Yes, Jack. Daddy took Sparky and Casey and left us here forever. [roll eyes]

If only we could communicate with them for just a couple of minutes...

Listen, boy. They're going to Dog Camp, and you get to go camping. So just chill out, mmmmkay?

Routine maintenance

I tried to think of a dog-related title, but all of them involved butt-licking. Since this is one of those updating-the-blogroll posts, I thought it would rude to associate our blog friends with the licking of butts.

Which I have entirely managed to do now, so I think I'll just get down to business.

I was inspired to do a little updating when I found out that Rustmeister, who tends to come around when we're talking about things-that-go-bang, has a new place. Rustermeister's Alehouse, open for business!

We love Morning Glory around here. She's a supporter of our fine warriors downrange - as she should be, as her daughter is among them. Go, visit, thank her for raising a Soldier!

Holly's Histrionics...is almost too eclectic to blurb here. Suffice it to say she's very clever, a fellow North Texan, and not shy about pointing it out when she notices insanity in the world around us.

My Own Woman strikes a chord with me - she's a nurse (and I grew up surrounded by those) who is, like the rest of it, looking for the meaning of it all. She's aided in that search by a pair of Yorkies, so we know she's a patient and tolerant soul.

For all of your totally gratuitous meat pics, and fabulous still lifes of Koran abuse, drop on over to Horseshoes and Hand Grenades. I like Daddyquatro's sense of humor.

That's going to have to do it for the evening. A little blog maintenance is better than none.

Now, if I could just bring myself to do some Workspace Maintenance...



Yes, that is the most horrifying thing you've ever seen. And yes, that minty 3 Musketeers bar is fabulous.

Well, it's that time again

It's Friday night. Thanks to my Evil Corporate Masters, I have a four-day weekend.

Hey - you've all been great employees, so we're going to close on Christmas and New Year's Eve!

Awesome! Hey - are we getting paid?

No, you have to use PTO. Unless you haven't been here a year, in which case you have PTO but aren't allowed to use it!

Gee, thanks for the short holiday paycheck!

Anyway, I'd rather have time than money (although the mortgage people don't see it that way), so we're taking advantage of the time off and we're going camping.

(Yes, we used to go hunting. But we suck and the animals are all hiding, so now we call it camping.)

The Senior Dogs have reservations at some canine bed and breakfast, and Puptard is coming with us. Tomorrow is packing day, tonight is sitting around drinking coffee and eating leftover Christmas candy.

Today's news

The assassination of Pakistans' once-and-perhaps-future prime minister Benazir Bhutto is a dark thing.

It is a sad thing - her candidacy and the support for it hinted at progress in Pakistan. The country could define "fragmented," but there was real support, groundswell support, for a woman of education and prestige to help push all of Pakistan further into the modern era and onto the world economic stage.

There are forces of darkness in Pakistan - it's where the Taliban came from. The area called Waziristan - you'll find it labeled "Northwest Tribal Area - Ungoverned" on many maps - is probably where Bin Laden lurks, and it's been no-man's land for hundreds, if not thousands of years.

Pakistan has nuclear weapons, and the "dictatorship" of Pervez Musharraf is not a sure thing - he walks a fine line to maintain control of a military and security service with Taliban sympathizers in its ranks.

It is a country vital not only for its support of our country's agenda in the region, but the security of which is vital to the safety of the world.

It will be touch-and-go for some time there. It will be a challenge to read between the wallowing, wailing lines of the media to try to see what is really happening there, but I think it's worth paying attention to.

Any developments there could also, incidentally, make the discussions among all our aspiring commanders-in-chief very interesting.

New rifle thoughts

I've done a bit of poking around to figure this out. I have an FEG SA2000-M rifle. These are, it seems, a Hungarian rifle imported during the Bad Old Days of the AWB, and were manufactured (or at least heavily modified) specifically for US sale.


(image swiped from the highly informational folks at The Guns Network)

Therefore, they have the dubious distinction of having been somehow modified to accept only a proprietary 10-round magazine.

This is, of course, not necessarily a positive thing. Other than that, what little information I have found seems to indicate they are, in general, a good, servicable rifle.

It appears there is a conversion option, but information is scanty as to whether this is one of the easiest things in the world or a very difficult one requiring talent and specialized equipment.

For the time being, I think I'll let that ride. I've ordered a couple spare 10-rounders, and I think that will be entirely sufficient for my needs. I do reserve the right, if I eventually decide it's necessary, to get down with my bad pseudo-machinist self and start making modifications.

But I am thinking of some slightly more traditional wood furniture for it to wear. Hmmm...

Fair play

So. It comes to our attention that Mike Huckabee went hunting. It appears he may even have been successful.

Huckabee's team brought back three pheasants — one of which the candidate claimed he personally shot — and promised they'd be "cleaned and eaten."

This is all fine and good and pretty much par for the course. What caught my eye was the picture. It's a still from the beginning of the CNN video. Observe (the still, that is).



Now, there was a big brouhaha over an distinctly unflattering picture of the junior Senator from New York recently.



I found that whole shriekfest tacky in the extreme, and it one of the few times I've been tempted to shoot the bird to the whole Sexist World Intent on Oppressing the Sisterhood, and get behind Hillary.

However, I think I shall simply call for justice and equal time. The Huckabee hunting photo makes a fairly handsome man look like...well, the punchlines write themselves. But I think we must, in the interest of the all important fairness, make fun of it.



In this picture, Mr. Huckabee looks like a gap-toothed, double-negative employing, stained-tanktop-wearing yahoo.

So there.

For the first gift of Christmas

my true love gave to me...

A nice snuggly bathrobe.

And for the second gift of Christmas, my Yorkie gave the me...

this slightly disturbing package.



That's right, folks - gifts are here often go BOOM.



That would be a Hungarian AK. Someone (and I do have my suspicions that it's not Sparky) decided that the gap in my arms collection was too large.

So now I have something totally new to learn about. Which is cool.

And the Mister?

Santa brought him some sort of integrated taillight thingamabob for his motorcycle, among the usual assortment of clothes.

And socks. Socks were big this year.

Santa Paws was here!

I am not kidding when I tell you that I had to drag Casey back to bed at 0553, because she heard the Fat Man in the Red Suit and wanted to see what he'd left.

It turned out she was right to be excited.



Santa had apparently also heard about Sparky's toad issue, and brought him an amphibian he could handle.



And since this is, we believe, Jack's first Christmas, there were a couple of things he wasn't aware of. Including the fact that although Santa puts things in his stocking, those items are still in their original wrappers.



Because the bones ARE better if you take the plastic off.

Santa Paws is Coming To Town

And one of us is soooo excited....



(yes, the scale is all weird in that one, but is that an impressive display of canine acrobatics or what?)