Monthly Archive for October, 2006

Furry Antics

Published on October 31, 2006 in For the Record and Pets. 6 Comments

Furry Antics-Tuesday, October 31, 2006-1:48AM

After a full night of social adventures I slept most of the day away. I got in bed at 8am Monday morning and got up various times during the day to take care of the Three Stooges Captain, Gracie and Bella. Bella and Captain have come to an understanding of sorts. If he leaves something in the bowl she can have it. Never walk under him from tale to head expecting to steal food without the possibility of being barked at and chased away. Since Captain never leaves anything in his bowl she skips right to just staying away. Right now she’s sitting at his empty bowl longingly, wondering why it is that her patience was not rewarded with a crumb. She looks at him, looks at the bowl then back at him with pure disappointment in her eyes. She wanted meatloaf too. Poor baby. After reading about Velvet Sacks’ close call with her meatloaf I started craving meatloaf so I had to make one. It was okay I guess. Cap didn’t complain and neither did the company who scarfed it like they had never eaten a meal before in their lives. The first night all Cap got was the bread I put at the bottom of the pan to soak up any grease. He enjoyed it though. It was gone in no time flat.

Cap is my breathing vacuum cleaner. If I drop food on the floor I let him do the enhaling thing. No worries that I dropped carrots and peas on the floor, Cap will get it. No worries that I spilled a spoon of sugar on the floor, Cap’ll get it. I don’t even have to replace vacuum bags. I give a simple “good boy” and go about my business. That’s what I call cleaning these days, Cap’ll get it. He takes care of the crumbs that I leave in the bed when I do my night time eating. That’s my boy, always willing to help out.

When I start the sweeper the only one that didn’t run was Bella. I think she and Grace had a talk and now Bella runs when I turn on the sweeper. I think Gracie taught her to be afraid of it because at first Bella wasn’t even fazed by the vacuum cleaner. Well, the other day when I was running the monster machine I decided to also sweep Bella’s toy bear rug teddy bear. It’s kinda big and it lays flat on its belly like a bear rug. She gets on it and does the kneading thing then falls asleep right on the bears head. I figured it was about time I vacuumed that thing just in case dander was trying to live in it or something. When I detached the hose and put it on the bears head she looked like she was going to fall over dead. NO, NOT MY BEAR! Ai, caramba! Bell was a bit upset with me for the rest of the day because I swept her security bear. I think she thought I might go as far as to put water and soap on it. Had I done that she would have packed her cat nip and run away from home.

She gets bored easily so I have to keep her busy. Sometimes when I’ve tried to entertain her but she just has too much energy and I’ve got too much stuff to do around the house I come up with alternative play. I take a laundry rope/string/whachamacallit and let it hang from my back pocket. While I work around the house it drags across the floor so she follows it and attacks it. She’s not trying to climb my fake trees. She’s not trying to get on the table to see if I left any food up there by chance. She’s not pulling the hair out of Captain’s tail or driving Gracie crazy to the point of Gracie swatting at her. Poor Bell needs a lot of attention. I just put that pink and white twisted rope in the back pocket and give the other 2/3 rds of the Three Stooges a break. She’s six months old now. On the 2nd of November she goes in to get spayed. As much as this girl talks while not in heat I can’t imagine going through her meowing and bitch goddess attitude that Gracie got when she was in heat. Man Grace got mean! So, Bell will be getting cut the second of November. I hope she doesn’t calm down because she is fun most of the time. It’s only when she has excess energy that she starts bothering the rest of the stooges. She keeps the others on their toes. Heck Keepers dog Shakespeare lived to be 18 years old because of her two cats Owen and Max. They are so pretty too, gorgeous cats.

I gotta write down my latest cat dream. I need to get ready to see the chiropracter first.

Austin

My Time To Heal

Published on October 31, 2006 in Mental Health and Therapy. 4 Comments

New Links added to the page My Time To Heal

Mothers Of Survivors

This blog is written by a woman that searched for information for her own support while her daughter heals from sexual abuse. She says she looked for advice on the net and found a bunch of stuff for survivors but not for the parents of survivors, not for mothers or fathers. This is something that never ever occurred to me, support for mothers of survivors. I thought this journal was good to put up on my links because the idea was totally foreign to me. It seems like a good journal with a mother who truly supports her daughters healing process. I thought it was quite the move to seek out other mothers who support their daughters. This is nice to see.

Blog Carnival Against Child Abuse: It’s the Fifth Edition!

This newest blog carnival seems like it has a wealth of information that survivors will really find helpful so I’m posting this for everybody so they can go check out the other links for themselves. I definitely encourage all in the right space to go to this. Marj is doing a really good thing by collecting information written by survivors.

I intend to be all on the post called “No One Would Blame You” and

“Humiliating Others-Deliberate Abuse that Cuts Deep.” Marj says about this submission: “This post explores humiliation, why parents emotionally abuse their children in this way, and why children pass these borderline traits along to their children.” You couldn’t keep me from that post if you tried. My mother’s specialty was humiliation. As a matter of fact it is the one emotional response that will drive me to suicidal thinking. and

Last but not least I’ll be traveling to a post by a male survivor named Mike called “The Power of Touch.”.

This carnival is definitely one to go to.

Austin

I Googled Myself

Published on October 30, 2006 in For the Record. 2 Comments

I did a google of myself. I googled my legal name, my main email address and my on-line name Austin of Sundrip Journals. Too much info out there I do mean to tell ya. I found out too that there is a place in Bangladesh called Sundrip. In just a few seconds I got 19,100 hits for the word Sundrip. I hope I’m not mixed up with the lady who had a baby recently. She and I seem to have the name Sundrip mixed in with one another but on totally opposite topics. I saw like 3 or 4 of hers mixed in with mine. I was like, dang who joined Pregnant Club of America and had the nerve to use my name so it could be traced. I was so pleased to find out this was a white woman who was married with a new baby. I sighed with relief, sheeshhhh! Okay, I’m good, everything is in tact.

So, yes, I googled myself and like I said there is way too much info out there about me. Every comment I’ve ever left on any journal at all, my entries, any journal I use to have, anytime someone said something about me, any spam blogs that used my links illegally and everything in between. Just way too much info out there on the net especially to have come up so quickly. Heck, that was just the English search. I don’t even want to think about other languages. I’ve written on some other blogs thanks to myfreetranslation.com . Lord, I can never hide again. So much for ever believing in anonymity. Ah, and I googled my IP address…not pretty, just as much info out there. Lord, I use to really like that search engine. Continue reading ‘I Googled Myself’

Nice People Make Me Suspicious

Published on October 30, 2006 in For the Record. 2 Comments

Nice People Make Me Suspicious-Monday, October 30, 2006-2:01AM EST

Well, not all nice people just people that usually aren’t very nice but suddenly they’re saying thank you and asking you how you’re doing, ya know social and mannerly things like that. The other day Barney (roommate/landlord) said thank you to me. He came in the house and said, “Thanks for turning on the porch light so I could see to put the key in the door.” I replied, “Did I forget to turn on the light?” I thought he was being passive aggressive but he said, “No, really, thank you.” I was floored because this is the first time I’ve ever heard that man say thank you to me or anyone at all for that matter. He is usually in his own little world which is void of basic couth known to the reasonable man. So yeah, I was shocked.

I was really shocked Friday evening when he asked if I wanted to go to my personal favorite Chinese buffet. It’s the cheapest I’ve ever been to ($3.99 all day) and the best I’ve been to. As far as authenticity goes they’ve got a strong case. You know when you see them eating their own food and see other Asian-Americans eating at the Chinese restaurant the food is either authentic or as close as you’ll get in the Midwestern states. Today at the restaurant we could have held a United Nations meeting. We had three guys from Libya, a Native American man, Cambodians, and different Latin groups. Add to those the basic white American and black Americans and you’ve got yourself a serious representation. But wait, when the Middle Eastern family of 8 showed up we knew everyone was pretty much represented in that very small ill-lit and under decorated restaurant. I frequent that fine establishment quite often, often enough for the under-aged worker to say, “Austin, have you lost weight?” I think she just wanted a bigger tip.

Okay so back to Barney. Not only did he pay for the meal but he held a decent conversation with me. It wasn’t like pulling teeth either. He initiated conversation which also kinda blew me away. The man talked about his feelings. Dear Lord the world has come to an end. I thought to myself, who are you and what have you done with Barney? That thought was followed by, whatever you’ve done with him keep him and you stay in his place. So, to throw me further into the depths of suspicion Saturday the man brought home for me cupcakes with…get this…dairy free icing. Okay now, what’s up!!! What is wrong with you? Are these laced with arsenic? Are you about to ask me to move? Have you committed some huge crime and now you’re about to go to prison and you want me to stay and take care of your  plants …plant? What’s up!!!! I thought it but I said no such thing. I thanked him and ate my chocolate-like cupcake with dairy free icing.

The second person who made me suspicious is my neighbor’s husband. We’ll just call him AH. He is usually a major a-hole. He bad mouths UK something terrible. He’s really just a professional jackass. It seems to only be in his DNA strand because his mom and dad are nice and so are his brothers and his cousins. Whatever happened to AH really made him a bitter man UNTIL the other day. He called me to mess with me. I was quite shocked and felt privileged that he called me of all people to tell me I was a dumb ass for saying that his Halloween lights were Christmas lights. The man doesn’t call anyone or joke with anyone. I was shocked.

I thought I was privileged then but I’ve moved right into suspicion. Tonight when I was leaving to come back home AH waved goodbye and said, “Have a good night, take care.” Who are you and what have you done with AH? What do you want? Are you going to prison and you want me to take care of your kids while your wife picks up a third job? I slowly closed the door behind me and while I wanted to keep looking over my shoulder I didn’t. I just prayed he wasn’t going to come out of nowhere and choke the life out of me for having the nerve to wear my shoes on his brand new carpet. He never did.

Maybe something is in the water, I don’t know. Whatever this new form of pollution is I hope it continues to make rude people polite as well as thoughtful and mean people laugh and socialize. I hope the two keep drinking it, in massive quantities I hope they keep drinking it. I can’t take care of Barney’s plant, I’ll just kill it. I can’t take care of AH & UK’s kids, I’ll just kill ‘em. Little bit (now 16) and Booger (8) are bad kids. They should drink the water too.

Joan of Arc

My Reply Child Rape and the Death Penalty

Published on October 29, 2006 in Soapbox. 3 Comments

The Godfather Says: (in part)

Don’t know if rape should result in death penalty. The large majority of child rapes take place in families and are committed by persons known to the victim. So the question is: How many survivors would refrain from accusing their daddy/mommy/brother or whomever due to the death penalty waiting who would indeed accuse them with the current statutory situation applying? And the other family members could put pressure on the victim, too.

Austin says

Well Godfather, unfortunately abusers have a lot of ammunition to use on kids. If you tell it’ll break up the family. If you tell it’ll kill your mother. If you tell they’ll take you away. I’ll go to jail. You’ll go to jail. They’ll do this, that and the other. There will always be something an abuser can use to silence a child. Family members that hurt their kids tell the same lies as strangers do. Somehow I doubt the reporting of such crimes would increase or decrease. As far as the death penalty goes, as I have read it doesn’t really deter criminals from committing crimes. Would the death penalty even work in these cases? I don’t know if they would but putting it on the books in more than three states would be a powerful statement.

Basically, in most cases rape is not seen as reason to spend life in prison. If it was viewed as a horrific crime that the citizens will not stand for then they (sex offenders) wouldn’t be let go on good behavior or let go early due to over crowding. They wouldn’t be given home detention or some pitiful plea bargain and a slap on the wrist. They wouldn’t have the privilege of reduced charges that allow them to go home after a few years or allow them to go home with “counseling.” How people, how lawmakers and voters view the victim is how harsh the sentencing will be. We all know children are basically property with few rights of their own. We all know that being female in a male dominated country means we will not be seen as equal when it comes to being hurt. It is my strong opinion that when the value of women and children rises, the penalties for hurting us will be harsher. Sorry to sound like a man basher or a feminist or anything along those lines but this is the truth, when we are seen at equal value then the punishment for harming us will be stronger and more effective.

Did you know that some drug crimes not involving death are being tossed around as a death penalty offense? Why not rape then? And if you don’t want the death penalty at all then why not just leave their asses in prison until they fall off their beds rotten? Get a mop and bucket and clean ‘em off the floor. That floor did nothing at all to deserve to be dressed with the blood of a pedophile.

Austin

Original conversation link.

Austin’s Fairy

Published on October 29, 2006 in Art. 0 Comments

Copyright 2006 @ Sundrip Graphics All rights reserved
Fairy

Austin’s Fairy

Excedrin For Racial Tension Headaches

Published on October 28, 2006 in For the Record and Gratitude Journal. 7 Comments

click the pic

(click to see the commercial-Fast relief for hundreds of years of pain.)

My friends are twisted enough to send me stuff like this in email and I’m sick enough to put it on the web for all to see.

The stuff this actress is saying sounds funny but I can tell you from experience that she didn’t have to write those jokes because these questions are real. While this commercial is down right hilarious it also shows just how prevalent stupidity is.

My sophomore year my English teacher asked me if black people use shampoo and what kind of toothpaste we use. She was asking me this as we drove to her home. I was the newest foster child in her home. Strangely enough her house was the safest place I’ve ever been in my life. I’m grateful for the time I had there despite the initial ignorance. That was 1987 which was the second year the high school was completely integrated.

I probably think of that teacher every day. I certainly think of her when I hear the song Fire & Rain because she use to sing it in the morning. And I think of her whenever I see a blueberry muffin because she use to make them all the time for breakfast. I’ve gotten to talk to her on and off through the years and truthfully I smile most of the time when I think of her. She is one of the reasons I decided to become a foster parent. When I took care of the three boys I knew they would one day be able to say that there was at least one home where they went to bed well fed, warm and without cause for fear. My sophomore English teacher did that for me and I will be forever grateful. She may have asked stupid questions in the beginning and gave me tension headaches but in the end she gave me the best home I’ve ever had. I’m thankful to her for that.

Austin

Ps. I use Crest and Suave

James Taylor › Fire & Rain

Oh, I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain
I’ve seen sunny days that I thought would never end
I’ve seen lonely times when I could not find a friend
But I always thought that Id see you again….

This song was also in the movie Running On empty staring Joaquin Phoenix’s older brother River Phoenix.