Oscar & Me

This is Oscar.

Oscar lives behind the rescue center.  Its not a great picture of him because he was rubbing against my legs telling me how much he loves me.  And he does love me.  Just for me.  And not for the empty box of herring I was throwing away.   Really.  Its the real thing!

One foot in front of the other

Last Sunday I did AIDS Walk NY with 45,000 other New Yorkers in Central park.  Thanks to my dear friends, family, clients and random strangers I raised enough to be a star walker again this year.

Star walker status gets me in the tented check-in which was huge with the rain this year, the nifty goodies and the breakfast tent.  Some people really do take that whole free breakfast thing seriously, charity or not.  Little lesson for you all, never get between a queen and her pastry.  I may have a life long bruise.

There were a bunch of famous people at the opening ceremonies.  I'm not a big network TV watcher so I really have no idea who they are I'm sad to say.

Its hard to really describe 45,000 people inside central park all walking in the same direction, to the same destination for the same selfless cause.  But this is a glimpse of what some of it looks like.

I wish it hadn't been raining or that spring hadn't been so confused this year.  My sinuses couldn't really hang for the after walk festivities.  But I had a blast.  I'm hoping that next year I can have a nice star walker buddy to come with me!

I poked around Central Park for a little bit and then headed home.

Seal team day two: What's that smell?

I walked into the foundation with all kinds of misplaced confidence after my whopping six hours of experience from last week.  I mean I fed seals, I scrubbed a tank, I washed a floor.  I would be super volunteer in no time!

Thankfully the staff dashed my dreams quickly.  My first job of the day was to feed the turtles.  Oh I love the turtles!  I would be honored to prepare their food! What do they ea...wtf is in that box?  That's right ladies and gentlemen they eat squid.  And not the cleaned up for the super market looking squid.  This is just hauled out of the water stuck in a crate and shipped to the rescue center type squid.  So I get to cut up the squid and stuff vitamins up in the little tail bits.   It was smelly, it was slimy and it looked pretty nasty.  As an added bonus Elvis and Jetty splashed me again this week.  Joy.

They brought a live seal in to be admitted and I got to observe the examination.  I hurried down to the exam room only to be hit by this odd smell.  Turns out our new patient had herself a little accident when freed from the transport cage and dragged it clear across the floor.  I'd never seen a live seal this close up before and for sure never seen an exam before.  I wasn't as squeamish as I expected and I didn't even notice the smell.   But the best part was finding out that I wasn't the one who had to wash the exam room floor!

After the seal feeding I got to head out with a biologist to some seal sightings.  Our first seal was a very active pup who was not afraid to express his annoyance at us blocking his sun.  He had no wounds and his weight was good so we left him to his tanning and moved on.

Our next two sightings were for two dead seals.  The foundation takes these in and does necropsies on them to make sure there's nothing but normal circle of life factors going on.  I was so all over the Caruso pose at the first sighting.

There didn't seem to be much foul play surrounding our dead seals just some really foul smells.

I may never complain about my dad's lunch smells again.

Seal Team, Day One

This Monday was my first day on the rescue team with the Riverhead Foundation.  I've seen a list of the duties so I was mostly prepared for what was headed my way.  Much washing and scrubbing.  And then scrubbing and washing.  Endangered species are a messy lot.

I get my first job, scrub the turtle tanks.  Oh I love the turtles!  I would be honored to scrub their tanks with a vigor that comes only from some lunitard first day volunteer.  So I finish the first tank of the little green turtles and move to the next tank.  I'm scrubbing along and I hear a splash behind me.  I turn around, nothing to see, so I go back to scrubbing the tank.  It happens again, but louder and messier.  Turn around, still nothing to see.  Back again, third splash, huge splash down my back.  Warm turtle water.....ew.  Listen I know that these are wild animals and all and its arrogant of me to give them human qualities but I am positive they were laughing their turtle asses off in that tank.

Elvis aka Beavis

Jetty aka Butthead

 








I got to feed the seals twice and refill the medication bottles for the next day.  I did a lot of washing.  Trays, walls, counters, floors, truck cabs.  I learned many things on Monday.  Mostly importantly I learned the boots I chose were all kinds of wrong.   I also learned that when I am nervous I make Homer Simpson look like Steven Hawking.  Here's to hoping that next week I demonstrate actual skills with a mop and the English language!