Friday, November 03, 2006 , late evening

Green Tripe Fiasco

Whenever I write about feeding green tripe to the dogs, someone invariably leaves a comment saying how disgusting the stuff smells, how it makes them want to vomit, and how they can’t bear to feed it to their pet.  I’ve always found those observations a little bit strange, because to me, green tripe has always just smelled like tripe.  Toss in some onions, oregano, and red chile, and I’ve always thought that a can of green tripe just smells like a steaming bowl of fabulous menudo waiting to happen.

Today, however, I had my eyes opened to this alternate viewpoint.  I opened a can of green tripe to mix in with some kibble—the same brand I always buy—and was immediately hit by the overwhelming stench of manure.  If I’m enjoying a pleasant drive through the countryside and pass a dairy farm, the smell of manure is fine.  However, when I’m in my kitchen and about to give the offending substance to my dogs, I feel a bit differently about it.  I have no idea what was different about this can versus other cans I’ve opened in the past, except this can’s contents were more soupy and mushy, and didn’t have any large chunks.  Maybe grinding it into a puree releases the true essence, but I gotta tell ya—it was gross.  To those of you who’ve encountered this before, I now understand your pain.  I fed it to my dogs anyway, and they loved it, which is why I never let them cook dinner for me.

While we’re on the tripe subject, I named my fantasy football team “Green Tripe Fiasco”.  After the first week it seemed the team was named appropriately, as I lost by a wide margin and figured I was doomed for the season.  However, I’ve since been on a seven week win streak, and am leading my league, so maybe the “green” part of “green tripe fiasco” is lucky, like a shamrock.  This weekend I play Flippy’s team, the “Hail Marys”, so one of us will be sulking in our lattes come Monday night.  It’s terrible how fantasy sports can break up a family.  :boogie: 

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/03 at 10:02 PM
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Thursday, November 02, 2006 , evening

Something for the old folks

I’d just written a very nice blog entry, but IE 7 crashed and I lost it.  I’m not sure how I feel about IE 7—I’m getting used to the features, but it’s so “locked down” it’s sort of a pain to use.  I’ll need to find the security settings and loosen things a bit, and it had better stop crashing or I’ll go back to IE 6.  So there.  And yes, I’ve tried Netscape and Firefox and Opera, and I just can’t seem to adapt to them.

You’ll now get an abbreviated version of my original post, as it bores me to write it again :p I was posting about this very cool thing I saw in the Hammacher catalog, an LP-to-CD converter:

LP-to-CD Recorder Stereo System

When I was growing up all we had were vinyl LPs and cassette tapes (8 track had already perished), so I’ve still got literally hundreds of LPs stored (safely?) in our garage.  I worry about the heat getting to them every year, but they’re stacked properly and tightly, and they always seem to weather the temperatures well.  If I had this sort of converter gadget I could copy my rare LPs (the ones which were never re-released on CD), and then sell the originals on eBay.  And then we could retire!  Or at least, we could probably go out for sushi.

I’d never want to go back in time to before the days of CDs, because CDs are so tidy and durable.  Still, I miss owning a turntable and listening to my old “classics’ (taste is subjective), and it would be nice to hear them again.  Hammacher also sells an LP-to-MP3 converter, but MP3 files are just too technical for me.  Now hand me my Geritol.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/02 at 09:51 PM
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Surprise!

I’ve done some cleaning and tidying up around here, trying to make the place easier on the eyes.  Cleaning is easy when it doesn’t involve dusting and vacuuming.  Things aren’t quite perfect yet, but it’s a step in the right direction.

We’ve had at least three different cats roaming around our front yard for the past couple of weeks.  One of them cries loudly at our front door, but runs away when I open it.  Two others regularly fight, and we can hear it inside even with all the windows closed.  I’m on the verge of bringing out the traps to check for testicles and ovaries, but I’ve been so busy with work that I haven’t had time to really plan anything.  I think the sound of the cats fighting might upset Jackson, though, so I need it to stop.  I could just chase the cats away, but I feel like that’s irresponsible.  Apparently no one else cares about cats roaming the neighbourhood, so perhaps I should.

About Jackson, the vet called to say that his lab results were negative for a urine infection, even though he had blood cells in his sample.  She wants me to keep him on the antibiotics for another week then she’ll do a recheck, but she thinks he has a case of cystitis rather than a UTI.  The cystitis can be brought on by stress, so he’s definitely a candidate.  Knock on wood, he hasn’t peed inappropriately since the antibiotics, but he’s still pooping in locations which are frowned upon.

Oh, I downloaded the new version of IE today, version 7.  It still feels so strange and awkward… Barbie says learning new things is hard!

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/02 at 01:11 AM
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Wednesday, November 01, 2006 , early evening

Adopt-a-Senior-Pet Month

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is sponsoring the month of November as, “Adopt a Senior Pet” month.  Senior pets are often overlooked at shelters in favour of younger, “cuter” animals, but senior pets have many advantages.  Their personalities are established so you’ll really know the animal you’re adopting, many older pets are trained and used to routines, and senior pets can be more “steady” and calm than a younger dog or cat.  If you’re considering adoption, why not open your home to an animal in its golden years—you won’t regret it.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/01 at 06:46 PM
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Bargains4Pets.com

One of the very first websites Flippy and I ever started was Bargains4Pets.com.  I think it begain in 1998, which was an unbelievably miraculous time for Internet shoppers.  There were so many Internet startup companies, and they were all just giving things away.  Flippy and I earned about $600 in Petsmart gift certificates from one company, just for signing up new referrals.  We won a DVD player (the first one we owned), from playing an online slot machine game called “Jackpot”.  I think we won a coffee mugs and caps, too.  Stores like Buy.com offered coupons like “$50 off a $50 purchase” to new customers, which honestly meant $50 of free merchandise.  Websites were new to the e-commerce game and often guilty of pricing errors, meaning a $150 watch might be marked as $2 on the website, and you could seriously order it and have it delivered.  It was just insane.  Best of all were all the new pet store websites, though.  Places like Pets.com had new “$50 off $50” and “$20 off $20” every week—you could make a living just going from website to website, shopping with coupons, and paying nothing for merchandise.  The UPS man showed up at our apartment every day, often with all our deliveries on a dolly because he otherwise couldn’t carry them all.  It was fantasyland and it was incredible and it didn’t last very long.  So many Internet startups went under because their promotional efforts were ludicrous—I never understood what they gained by giving away free things, yet they continued to do it until they ran out of money.  We gave away lots of things to charity when all was said and done, yet I still have a stash of pet toys in the garage in a cabinet for emergency purposes.

Bargains4Pets was our effort to list pet store coupons and freebies in one place.  It started as an ugly single page, then it expanded to two pages.  Then I added a pet photo gallery, so people could submit pics of their pets.  It grew substantially and had a dedicated following of people until the good discount coupons become more and more rare.  I redesigned the site to feature automatically-updated banner ads featuring current sales, but the site was never really the same.

As my inbox still fills up with emails announcing sales and discounts and free shipping offers, I decided to turn Bargains4Pets into a blog.  I’ve tried to list all the major online pet retailers, and when they send me information about a new coupon special or an interesting product, I blog about it.  I’ve organized the blog by company, so if you have a particular website you like to shop at, you can browse that category only for current and past specials.  I’m also trying to toss in the occasional product review, and eventually I’ll do some website reviews and price comparisons as well.

So, if you’re interested, please check out Bargains4Pets.com, the pet coupon blog.  I’ve got comments shut off over there because of the high potential for spam, but if you have any questions, feel free to contact me here.  The B4P blog will look pretty familiar—I used the same blog template as I use here, although I’m hoping to change this one in the near future.

Happy shopping!

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 11/01 at 01:31 AM
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