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If you want to go straight to Volume 10 you will have to make a choice between the full version and the censored version. If you can handle frank discussion of follicular deficiency go with the full version. More sensitive souls may need to go with the censored version.
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March is the month that spring really starts. The temperature has risen incredibly, along with the level of the Potomac. Cherry blossoms and other blossoms have been out and made for excellent viewing, daffodils have come and gone and tulips are now in full force. Sounds so blissful. The annoying thing is that we haven't been able to truly enjoy it. The first part of the month was spent with Kajsa recovering, the third weekend we went down to North Carolina (which was nice anyway) and the fourth weekend was spent with Taltarni being ill so we didn't get to go into DC and check out the trees. Tim has been so busy at work that he can hardly remember what happened at the beginning of the month (and as Kajsa is upstairs groaning, it is up to him to put some description of our month down).
In the first weekend we finally made it up to visit Bill Hemschrodt and his family in Maryland. Maryland is an odd state as far as geography goes. It lies to the east of Virginia for the most part but there is a long thin section of Maryland that stretches above Virginia and West Virginia and almost goes as far as Ohio. In fact it would if it weren't for West Virginia (the Tasmania of the US) which is deformed also and had a long thin piece which is nestled between Ohio and Pennsylvania. Check a map including Virginia and West Virginia to see what I mean. The drive up was good and the dinner very pleasant.
The next weekend we had dinner with John and Christine Neil, Greg and Margaret Tindall and some Norwegians. It was also very pleasant. Kajsa got to drink and get silly while Tim maintained an air of sobriety.
The following weekend was the big road trip to North Carolina to see the puppies. We started out just after an open day at Swedish school at around 11am. We drove and drove and drove until the kids fell asleep and drove some more until we had to eat. By this time we were almost in North Carolina. We had noticed on the way down that there was a lot of water. This was most likely due to El Nino plus the warm weather melting the snow on the mountains. Anyway, all the rivers were flooded. Luckily none of the roads were.
We had heard that there had been a twister through North Carolina earlier in the week, doing the normal thing - ripping up a few trailer homes, but we saw no sign of it. We found out later that it had been further west.
After lunch we kept going and got into North Carolina. Tim wanted to make a break for it and get to South Carolina, about 30 miles further than where we actually had to go but Kajsa wouldn't be in it.
While at lunch we picked up a book of coupons for hotels and we selected a place from it. It sounded great (Free HBO) but when we got there it was a dump that was perched on the edge of the freeway with nothing to commend it other than it was near the truckstop. It is sad when that is a positive point.
So we selected another place and headed off for that. It was far superior (and $10 more expensive - 33% more expensive that is). We got settled a little and then headed off for something to eat. Tim made another run for the border - there may be a nice place up a bit further (only 20 miles to go, just keep her attention diverted). Unreasonable, very loud demands for pizza forced us to turn around about 12 miles from the border.
As we left the freeway and drove into the town (Fayetteville), we noticed something very odd. Something that made us rue that it was dark and that photographs would not come out well. This road we drove along was like the Parramatta Road of trailer and mobile homes. There was literally hundreds of homes on a stick with signs saying "Come in an buy your new house today!" Row upon row of the them. It was truly awesome. The part of town we were in also consisted entirely of trailer park estates. We were beginning to wonder, as we drove along, whether the entire population of North Carolina resided in trailer vans. (Harking to a recent episode of the X-Files, would that make them all ... - oops, better not give away the secret.)
Pondering further it answered a question that had been plaguing us (oh, be honest, me - Tim). Why, whenever there is a twister in the US, does it rip up trailer parks. Does god hate trailer trash? You see images of trees falling on real homes but invariably it is the inhabitants of trailers that have the heart rending stories of "Well, we was jes' havin' a drink and the's thi suge wind come through and it done took all th' beer an' ma burdie and threws 'em righ in the air like. I was right mad an' all till course I done found the beer, yuck yuck. ... wassat .. Oh no storm gonna hurt Hank none, he's gort hisself a ding dang bo diddly thick skull that varmint" (or words to that effect.)
One of the latest twisters had a miraculous story. A child was picked up and deposited in a tree. A toddler or some such and not only was he alive afterwards, he had not been injured and in fact had not been awakened by the storm. Now that is bizarre. (Oh and yes, he did live in a trailer.)
Anyway, we finally found something to eat and got ourselves home and rested for the next day.
The people we were to visit are big-time breeders by Australian standards but we get the impression that they are small potatoes compared to some of the really huge ones here. This one had only in the order of about forty dogs. Another that was colocated had about the same.
Both of them (both ladies) were very nice and seemed to like their dogs but there seems to be a big difference between what is seen to be a good dog in Australia and what is good here. Tim noticed that their tails are often quite short in comparison to what we would call acceptable. But, on the other hand, there is no mention of tail length in the standard. It just doesn't look right if the tail is too short.
Not all of the dogs there had that problem and Ann, in particular, had some puppies that were absolutely gorgeous with racoon like markings on the face. It is a very unusual look and something that would be well worth bringing back to Australia. The only issue is that what looks really good in a puppy may not look so crash hot in an adult (when it is beyond the purely cute stage). Still, it is something for us to think about.
So after a couple of hours looking at dogs, being totally convinced that if you are going to be a breeder you should try to stay small scale so that you can enjoy your dogs and actually know them, we set off. Not before Tim promised to do what he could to get Ann's daughter a job in Australia, especially when she made a comment that she would be very happy if we could help - she might even give us puppy for free. That would certainly help the finances - and I think it would be a boost for her to have a dog in Australia, she would then be an international breeder. We just have to ensure that the dog has a good tail.
The trip home was reasonably uneventful and we were even back in time to see the X-Files!
On the following Thursday, Tim made the ultimate sacrifice, taking some time from work to take Kalle and the rest of his class on a field trip to the National Air and Space Museum. It is good to see so many fathers who are deeply involved in their child's education.
The next Saturday we had another very enjoyable dinner, this time at the hands of Glenn and Vicki Doherty (and I am reliably informed that this is pronounced Doh!-hurty with a strong Irish accent on the "hurty"). They live in a very nice street in Maryland and timed their dinner perfectly - precisely on the day that all the trees in the street had burst into blossom. An excellent entrance. We sat around shooting the breeze well into the night. Typical really that Taltarni decided to become sick that night and massacre our sleep! She is better now and on antibiotics.
Talking of massacres, that is one of the topics on conversation here at the moment and was one at the dinner. It was refreshing to be reminded that there are some others around that don't think it strange that two boys should steal a pick-up truck and a huge arsenal of weapons (from their parents and grandparents) and shoot five people - but nothing is said about the accessibility of weapons. In fact that one of the suggested causes of the massacre was the removal of prayers from the school.
It seems that, although there is an anti-gun movement, newspapers do not report their views in these situations. I mean how balanced and rational is a person who is threatening the right to bear arms?
Let's say, hypothetically, that a group of people looked at the statistics and noted that 9300 people were killed by guns the in US in 1997, versus 13 in Australia (yes I know that there is more than ten times the population in the US but if you look at the death rate another way it is .8/million in Australia and 37/million in America, a difference of 50:1 (the rate for Washington DC is something like 700/million or about 1000 times that of Australia)). Say these people thought that, rather than trying to ban guns, which is impossible, they should look at other ways of saving lives. They might get the Center for Disease Control to look at the problem as if it were an epidemic (quite a serious one really). This would result in statistics such as for each felon killed in a home with a gun (i.e. burglars) something like 50 inhabitants of homes with guns died from gun wounds (domestic violence and suicide).
Do you think that Congress would be outraged by such findings? Damn straight they were, oops would be, all funding for that research would be cut and the Center for Disease Control would be told that if it devoted any other funds to the issue, those funds would be cut too! Hypothetically.
And, let's say, hypothetically, that the gun marketers realised that their market was saturated. Their major market being, of course, white males. What would they do in such a case? Of course, exactly the same as cigarette manufacturers, market to children. Of course, it is a bit more sophisticated - they market to the gun-toting parents of brave and free American children and persuade these parents that it is a good idea to get their children used to guns at an early age. So, for instance, if an immature 10 and/or 13 year old got a bit pissed off, they would, with total confidence and lack of fear, not to mention great accuracy, be able to slaughter a few classmates.
And further, let us ponder what the immediate response to such a tragedy would be. Well, first you'd have the very useful suggestion of "Why don't we all go down to the town hall and try to love each other?" followed by a very serious search for a way to try the 10 and 13 year olds as adults so that they can be sent either sent to prison for the rest of their lives or be strapped into "Old Sparky" for a bit of electro-convulsive justice. But of course, these little boys, like most of the reported mass murderers over here, are white males and therefore are not likely to fry. People of African heritage are far more likely to benefit from that type of rehabilitation.
One of the best editorial cartoons after the incident had a person looking at the carnage saying "Isn't it terrible!" and a very serious, large bloke with an NRA badge responding "I'll say. They should have all had guns to defend themselves with."
Oh well, none of us have been shot yet.
Most of you forgot Kajsa's birthday. Two that didn't actually visited that day and had dinner at our place. Eva and Peter were visiting from Sweden and came down for two days (sort of, they came early one day and left late the next doing some sightseeing in between). Then they sneaked off the New York and got married without telling anyone but Berit, Eva's sister. What cheek!
Possibly the most exciting thing to happen on Kajsa's birthday (apart from her turning 34!) was unveiling the barbecue for 1998. There was the normal standing around waiting for the blasted coals to light before Tim noticed that while the packaging said "quick lighting" and "lights faster than other brands - burns longer too" it also said "when compared to other ordinary charcoal brands", i.e. not when compared to the fire brigade attracting super fast lighting fuel enhanced charcoal, the one Tim thought he had bought. After the liberal use of fuel alcohol (leftovers from Tim's predecessor) a suitable blaze was achieved and the meat was set upon the barbecue. A while after Tim went out to check it. He lifted the lid off the Weber and that was probably the major mistake.
You see, during the winter there were some storms which blew things around on the back porch. Once Tim was sitting watching TV while the family was in Sweden and Tasha's plastic dog house fair flew across the porch and slammed into the barbecue. The neither seemed damaged, stress on "seemed". When Tim lifted the lid of the barbecue, he was greeted by the heartening sight of red hot coals and the aroma of roasting dead stuff. Then he was horrified to see the whole barbecue topple over, spilling all the red hot coals over the porch. At some stage one of the legs of the barbecue had come loose and it had chosen that precise moment to give way. After spending a few moments hopping around, Tim did the Smokey Bear thing - that is he put the fire out.
There was a fair amount of swearing and carrying on involved and Tim had to suffer the indignity of having to finish the cooking in the oven. Kajsa, Eva, Peter and Julia all thought it was very funny, totally missing the point that Tim had reacted swiftly and courageously to protect the house and so missing the opportunity to congratulate him for his actions. At least they were very quiet about dinner being an hour and a half late.