Be Your Own Fuel!

With gas going up to $4-$5 a gallon this summer and projected in the next two years to hit an unbelievable and intolerable $10/gallon... there MUST be a change somewhere! I don't believe that the government will do anything significant to lower fuel prices -- most of the politicians are making too much money off the skyrocketing gas market to care how the peons feel.

Therefore, Americans must simply decide to make a change themselves. We must alter the way we think about transportation. If you live close enough to work or school to ride a bike or walk there... DO IT! Be your own fuel, I say! There is nothing wrong with leaving the car in the garage and pedaling to work. Not only does it benefit the environment and your waistline, if enough people start finding alternate means of transportation, it will show the government that the American people will not swallow this pill. We cannot stand by and let them make millions off of us, while we go broke because we are stubborn.

Driving a car is so totally ingrained in American culture as a necessity and a status symbol and that mindset is what the oil companies are counting on. Let's show them that we DO NOT rely on their overpriced fuel -- they rely on us for their jobs and we should be treated with respect. They think they can get away with charging outrageous amounts for gas, but my trike says differently.

We bought this sweet trike from Walmart and I have been riding it to work. I am trying really hard to change the way I think about getting from point A to point B. In a town as small as Starkville, a lot of places are close enough to pedal or walk to. This is the case in towns all across the country, but still people get in their cars and drive five minutes to work every day or three minutes to the store to pick up a gallon of milk. I'm not saying stop driving altogether -- sometimes it is necessary. What I am saying is... before you go start up the car, think about where you are going and, if it is less than a 5 or 10 minute drive, make a point to walk or ride your bike there.

Just seeing people riding bikes, encourages other people to do the same. Let's start a movement toward self-propelled transportation and be our own fuel!

Rider Trouble Taylor

This is my precious Rider. She is NOT shy for the camera and is extremely photogenic as you can see. She is very thoughtful and outgoing and is not as frightening as she looks. Everyone calls her "he" and people cross the street to avoid us when we walk her. I say she wouldn't hurt a soul, but I feel pretty sure if Paul or I was threatened she would tear into someone.

She is obsessed with any kind of fetch game on land or water and will return anything to you that you throw... even if you were throwing it to get it away from you and didn't want it returned. Her absolute favorite thing in the world to do is get a running start and jump as far out into the lake as possible after whatever is thrown out there and she would sooner drown than come back without it. If you have a ball or a frisbee she never takes her eyes off of it and she never tires of playing. She also enjoys drinking out of the hose or toilet, riding in the car, and occasionally cuddling.

If Posey has a toy, she wants it -- even if she has one exactly like it. She has been known to carry around two rawhide bones in her mouth at once, just so her sister can't have one. She is the polar opposite of Posey and that is what makes them so fun! She is only two and a half but already has severe hip dysplasia from playing on the concrete too much as a puppy. I wish more than anything we had known it was hurting her -- it is one of the greatest regrets of my life. But we do everything we can to keep her painfree, including giving her glucosamine supplements daily and taking her to swim a lot. She is Paul's and my first love and we wouldn't trade her for anything in the world.

You can read more about German Shepherds at http://www.canismajor.com/dog/germansh.html or http://www.akc.org/breeds/german_shepherd_dog/index.cfm.

Posey Long-legs Taylor

This is my sweet Posey. She is camera shy and doesn't like to have her picture taken... so I end up taking 5,000 pictures of her trying to get just one good one! She is the sweetest dog in the world. If anyone sits down on the couch, within a minute and a half she will be cuddled up next to them. She is extremely soft, especially her ears... I call her my Velveteen Puppy. She doesn't listen well, is totally oblivious to most of what is going on around her, and she freaks out if left alone. She doesn't like to swim but loves jumping in and out of the water and then running crazily around in circles -- she is dizzyingly fast! She is stubborn and lives to mess with her sister.

She wants to be doing whatever we are doing. She loves to be under the covers. She also secretly likes to be in her crate with her bone because Rider can't get to her to take it away and it drives her crazy! She is clumsy as all hell and mysteriously hurts herself fairly often... that goes back to her being oblivious. Most recently she fell out of the back of Paul's truck and was scraped up from head to toe -- Neosporin is her best friend. Now we have pet insurance on both of them, and she will probably never get hurt again! That's a good thing though.

This is where she sits with her sister and waits for us to get home from work and then she jumps jumps jumps and can't contain her excitement even though she knows better. She doesn't care for balls or frisbees but loves a good rope that she can swing around the room like a lunatic. Paul gave her to me for Christmas when he asked me to marry him. She is my first dog and one of the loves of my life.

If you want to know more about Weimaraners you can visit http://www.weimclubamerica.org/ or http://www.weimaranersavvy.com/index.html.

Arts Festival -- Always a Good Time

Starkville recently hosted the Cotton District Arts Festival -- my favorite event of the year. It is in this little neighborhood right off campus where they close down all the streets and set up booths for local artists to come and sell their work. They also have poetry readings, a dog parade, a fashion show, and a sweet tea contest among the restaurant vendors (only in Mississippi!). There is always tons of good food, good beer, great art, and it's always a fun time.

We usually just buy little knick-knacks, but this year, Paul and I decided to make an investment on a painting by a good friend of our's, Drew Divilbiss. He is a super-talented and really dedicated art student at MS State and an all-around interesting guy. We have known him forever -- he was there when Paul and I first met! So, this painting really means a lot to us and we know that we will have it for the rest of our lives. Not to mention, it's beautiful and we LOVE it!

If you have a MySpace account you can view more of Drew's work at
http://www.myspace.com/dbissartanddesign.

You can also check out the Arts Festival website at http://www.starkvillearts.org/CDAF.shtml.

Good Searching

We use internet search engines every day, right? So why not search with a purpose?

When you use the "GoodSearch" search engine you can choose a charity that will benefit every time you search for something. One cent is donated to your charity of choice for every search you do. This doesn't sound like a lot, but the ASPCA (American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals -- my chosen charity) has earned more than $14,000 over the last three years from searches alone. You can stick with one charity all the time or alternate between different causes as much as you want.

In the country's current troubled economic state, it may be hard to find a few extra dollars to donate yourself. But that doesn't mean we can just stop caring. Using this search engine is a free way to benefit charities in need. Plus, it makes you feel good to know that your internet activity can actually count for something!

Go to http://www.goodsearch.com/ and bookmark it or save it as your homepage. The search results are not much different than a Google search. Also, if you know of a charity that is not currently participating, you can send them a link to sign up. It doesn't cost anything!

(HINT: When I need to go to a website and I already know the web address, I go to GoodSearch and search for the website anyway -- it's just one extra step and it gets more searches in.)

KNOW that you can make a difference and attempt to do so!

Spread the Love Around

Henry David Thoreau once said, "The finest qualities of our nature, like the bloom on fruits, can be preserved only by the most delicate handling. Yet we do not treat ourselves nor one another thus tenderly."

This is so true! So, why are people so hateful towards each other? There is no reason for anyone to make fun of or be unpleasant to anyone else. When someone makes someone else the butt of a joke, people excuse it by saying, "They're just doing it to make themselves feel better." However, it doesn't make you feel better -- every time you speak hatefully about or to someone the bad feelings multiply, spreading inwards to your soul and outwards affecting (or infecting) others around you.

Live and let live, I say! Everyone is different and that is what makes the world so wonderful. No one is better than anyone else, so no one has the right to look down on others. Just because you don't agree with something, doesn't make it wrong, it just means you have a different opinion. Your own personal experiences shape the way you think about things -- the same for everyone else. No one has the same experiences in life; as a result, people will have different opinions, but that doesn't make anyone's more valid than anyone else's.

Just be pleasant and have a positive attitude. Be considerate of people, all people, in your daily life. Being rude spreads bad feelings like wildfire and there is no reason for it. When you are rude to the teller at the bank, it ruins her day and she will then be unpleasant to the next customer in line, who will then be rude to the next person he sees. Why not smile at people, hold the door for someone, say "Thank you!" or compliment someone. It doesn't take any effort at all and it makes you feel good in your heart. And, just like bad feelings, goodness spreads like wildfire too.

There is enough hate and conflict in the world at large, let's spread some goodness where we are. There's no reason not to!