http://www.wordle.net

Longing for the days when gals like me were labeled “Nervous” and sent away to paint watercolors and drink broth by a soothing seaside.

It seems somehow appropriate for a “Monday-Tuesday” like today. Although I don’t really long for “those days” I just think it would be cool to be sent away to a soothing seaside with some painting supplies and wonton soup! ;D

Our vet had several options. We could do exploratory surgery and get a definitive diagnosis of cancer or IBD to the tune of $700-900 bucks. If it was cancer then he could do chemo at UF for a couple thousand more dollars. The problem (besides the primary issue of us just simply not having the cashola) is that he’s 17, going on 18, and has a heart murmur which makes anesthesia tricky. So those two issues combined with our brokedness pretty much nixes the surgery/chemo-if-necessary route.

She told us that if it is IBD, we would treat it by steroids and if it was cancer, steriods would keep the growth at bay for a time. So we’re going the steroids route. It’s a real bummer to see him so thin- he’s lost 3lbs since May and is down to 6lbs now (keep in mind, this is a cat who has been 14.7 lbs pretty much his entire life up until the last year). I gave him a bath Tuesday night and he looked so much like Pris in the tub- he’s that small now. :\

The good news is that when Pris was on steroids, they bought her two extra years near the end. So maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll buy us just a little extra time with the big guy not so big guy. :)

He’s so happy to be home tonight. It’s kinda sad, they missed a few spots on his belly when they shaved him so he looks a little funny. We started him on the steroids earlier this eve along with antibiotics to clear up the possible infection. Man, it’s hard to believe that it’s been 17 years since Tim rescued him from Molnar in Ft. Pierce!

wow! that was fast- it got pulled pretty quickly this morning. hurry and catch a glimpse while you still can. (alternately you can buy a numbered DVD of this video from his site here: http://www.runwrake.com/ )

I’m sorry, but I do not get warm fuzzies remembering all those times I was trapped in the pit orchestra (to keep my music scholarship!), playing for Bye Bye Birdie, Sound of Music, Music Man and one other musical that has finally escaped my memory (thank you jeh-zus!). I am also proud to say that I’ve never seen Cats, Rent, Les Miserables, Wicked, etc. Please don’t waste your time trying to convince me otherwise, many before you have tried and all have failed.

But then, one day, along comes this clever guy, with a few of his clever friends. They get together, have a few beer, a few laughs and brainstorm on an idea which soon snowballs into a real project without a budget, funded by their own pocket change and starring one of my ‘favoritest’ actors from one of my ‘favoritest’ movies and then, before I knew it, BAM!

Damn you Joss Whedon, damn you straight to hell…

Hurry, it gets pulled on July 20th and then it’s pay to download only (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing).

Took a little googling to finally id the suckers and it wasn’t until I used the very professional search term of “pink fungus that oozes green slime” that I got some decent hits. My Library Science profs would be oh so proud…heh. I don’t feel too bad about searching with that term as I noticed later on Flickr that “Your Neighborhood Librarian” from Maryland, googled “dog penis mushroom” in her search for this fungi (of course that would have been my next search if the first one hadn’t worked out! haha).

I love this article/description from Mushrom Expert:

Stinkhorns frequently bewilder people by popping up in lawns, thrusting their slime-covered tips into the world within a matter of hours. They have been much maligned over the years, probably because–well, because they stink and they often look like penises (human, canine, or alien). Unlike other mushrooms, the stinkhorn distributes its spores by applying an odorous, spore-thick slime to its tip, which flies and other insects are attracted to. The flies then carry the spores to other places.

Several stinkhorns are common in North America, including the aptly named Phallus impudicus and the netted stinkhorn, Phallus duplicatus. Among the stinkhorns, species of Mutinus are fairly unique in their appearance: they look like pinkish to orangish spikes which arise from whitish “eggs” in the ground, and they are initially covered with brown or olive brown slime (before being ravaged by flies). Unlike Phallus species, which mimic human anatomy, Mutinus species have more of a canine thrust. The description below combines Mutinus elegans, Mutinus caninus, and Mutinus ravenelii, which stinkhorn specialists (there really are such people) consider to be separate species.

Very Strange are the things that sometimes voluntarily grow in my “garden.” The Hunter Valley Backyard Nature site is right about the emerging, elongating, wilt, and decay all within a few hours. I noticed them on my way to the store and by the time I got back (about an hour later) and shot the photos below, they had already begun to wilt. I wonder if any others will pop up.

Kingdom: Fungi
Phylum: Basidiomycota
Order: Phallales
Family: Phallaceae

synonyms: Dog Stinkhorn, Hundsrute, Phallus de Chien, Satyre des cheins