I really have been ultra busy. It’s amazing how such a lull in life can precede such a tsunami of craziness. Let me try and catch you up on why I have neglected to both write and visit you. I really am sorry about that. š So here are a few key points in my life as of late.
Almost kept a puppy! I was driving to the hospital a few weeks ago and this little guy ran out in front of me. I stopped, got out, fully expecting him to run away, and tied to see if I could read his tag. Instead of timid little guy he jumped straight into my arms. Of course he didn’t have a tag so I was forced to knock on all the neighboring houses looking for the possible owners. No luck so I put him in the car and took off to attend a course that I was already ten minutes late for.
Oddly enough he didn’t chew up or pee in the car. I spent an hour in the class nervously drumming my fingers, expecting the worse but when I came out he was propped up on the steering wheel, head cocked but tail wagging.
I really didn’t know what to do with him since finding the owners was a feat in and of itself. So, enlisted the help of friends and we did what anyone else would do. We kept him for the weekend and had a blast. He was a great dog. Almost like a stuffed animal that can move and poop.
Well, I contacted the local fire department where I found him since I have “connections” there and sure enough the chief knew the pup and the owners. It turns out the owners let him out for an hour each morning when the go to their horse field and clean the stalls. So, I pretty much kidnapped their dog for a weekend. I returned him to the fire chief anonymously and it was a little heartbreaking to hear him whine when I turned to get back in the car. I still have his chew toy on my floor board.
I came real close to buying the big box condo last Friday during a structure fire. Apparently, when I was on a single hose line a high voltage wire snapped from the heat of the fire and landed on the ground next to me causing a huge electrical arch that chard the ground around me, fried the hose and created a big blue light over top of me. I was oblivious to this until I heard screaming over my radio from the incident commander that I was on a live wire and to drop the hose. I did so and was stuck in one spot until the electric company could come out and turn off the electricity. Since then I have been a luck charm for the company and other stations. But I still have the creeps since everyone including the electrician kept repeating that there is no reason that I should have survived that. So technically, I shouldn’t be here writing you.
The fire departments have been consolidating and that means my hours have been cut pretty dramatically. So, I have been forced to dust off the ol’ resume’ and now I find myself back in corporate America until they finish the rezoning of the fire agencies. It’s cool I guess. I work as a consultant for a company that streamlines large businesses as far as their digital postage, copy, office supply and equipment. The first day on the job everyone called me Jim Halpurt. Great.
So, this is what I see instead of fire trucks and catastrophic scenery. I still can’t believe I am a suit again but at least I can still work rescue part time. Actually, it’s everything I can do not to stab myself in the leg with a pen. Shit, I’m lucky to have a job though. Listen to me! I’m bitching about having a job and take little regard for the fact I was almost a post-toasty last week. I’m sorry.
Last week it was 68 and beautiful. For the first time I was able to leave the confines of the shack that had been buried in snow to cruise the logging trails on a warm afternoon run. It was glorious! I had not felt this good in months and to see the snow gone and the lake completely free of ice made me want to…to…do everything! I wanted swim, no, run a marathon or ride bikes or play guitar by a campfire. Shit, there isn’t enough time. And there wasn’t. Today I got up and looked out my window to see this. Shit I did.
In defiance, I went running anyway. In shorts and a t-shirt none the less. I know it looks pretty but it’s almost May and I need this crap to go. Please mother nature. Take pity on this boy from the south east. He knows not what he’s done.
So, that is pretty much March and April. I trust Easter went well for everyone? I had a pretty good one. The highlight was watching my friend’s dog, Ruger, and his habitual face press against the sliding glass door. I love dogs.
Casserole of Disaster 
I love those dog pictures. That puppy is too damn cute.
Isn’t he? Except he did shit quiet a lot in my friend’s house even after I boasted how “potty trained” he was.
The puppy at the top had me all warm and fuzzy feeling, but the dog at the bottom made me emit one of those unexpected horse laughs.
The kind that sneak out of your mouth like ‘BAH!’ before you know it. What a great photo. Sorry you didn’t get to keep the pup!
You should have seen me spit beer when I looked behind my chair to see him blowing his cheeks (?) up in the window. He’s a good boy.
That is the most adorable puppy ever! OMG, I just wanted to croon and cuddle up with it! And that other dog is hilarious! What a couple months you have had! I am glad you are all right and still amongst us! Be careful!
I predict the next couple of months to be a little less exciting. I think I’ll be doing it from the safety of an office.
I am grateful to the powers that be that you survived your ordeal! You meed to go find yourself a dogster of your very own to love and to care for!
There must be a Ruger Jr. somewhere out there!!
Wow, glad the electricity didn’t take you out!!! I’m having my own issues with Mother Nature (I’m thinking about making her write a hundred lines of “Easter comes AFTER Christmas”, due to the inch or so we got yesterday.). And there’s worse comparisons than Jim. No one called you Dwight, now, did they?
Cute puppies, hilarious dogs, and a near-death experience. VeggieMacabre, ladies and gentlemen. Let’s give him a big hand.
So that is what you have been up to! When your hours were cut short you should of gone on a road trip to come see me. You could of acted like an unemployed bum sleeping on my couch for at least a day or so.
I am not a pet person but that puppy was so cute!!
We haven’t gotten any snow for a while, but man oh man was this winter a bitch! I am loving this 70’s mild breeze weather lately. Spring has always been the best, not too hot not too cold with everything going into bloom. Like Bart says the birds are singing, bees are trying to have sex with them.
A few things:
-That puppy is sooo cute, sounds like you gave him the weekend of his life, which means it’s all downhill from here for him…a shame!
-OMG a live-wire, I’m so glad you’re not dead!!!
-welcome back to corporate america, I’m at my corporate desk right now wanting to stab myself, but hey at least I can take a break to read blogs š
-We’ve missed you like crazy!!!
This was pretty frickin’ hilarious for being an “update on life” type of post. Then again, not many of us get to almost be electrocuted so that was a good way to start off. I am sorry you didn’t get to keep the dog…I recently saw Marley and Me so maybe you are better off in the long run. Too funny. Glad you are still alive. Sorry about the suit and tie gig. Sigh.
Your description of the arc of blue light made me think immediately of the Terminator movies/TV show… Time travel seems preferable in a big and bad way to the ‘buying it’ possibility and I am VERY glad that you are still with us (out of curiosity were you or were you not wearing the “it’s all good” t-shirt because if you were then it is possible it is a protective device rather than a potentially ironic curse…).
As I say, I am glad you survived that even if you have now wound up feeling corporate zombie-like at your desk… I’ve never had a job that made me want to wound myself with my writing implement but I have had MANY conversations that have made me feel that way so I do, at least, appreciate the instinct if not the inspiration… I’m also not sure I’ve ever had a job i’ve been quite as passionate about as you seem to be about firefighting so I do hope that you continue to be able to do that work once the dust has settled on the consolidation.
As for that puppy… It is nauseatingly cute and you should take the picture down before my IQ drops more than it already has looking at it. Geez.
Ruger blowing fish faces on the window robs me of any more words…
Dude! Thanks for not dying and all, that’s craziness! The corporate world may be mundane, but at least it’s a little bit safer š
The dog at the top is adorable. The dog on the bottom on the other hand… Actually I saw the pic before I read what was going on – pretty funny dog! That is pure madness about the live wire and I’m glad you lived to tell the tale. Sorry about the sucky snow!
The little dog you found too bad he or she wasn’t a keeper looks like a really cute one and the last dog on the post very funny pressed against the glass. Spring will eventually be back.
Oh and good thing you live to tell the tale of the close call pretty scary.
I’m officially in love with your neighbor’s dog.