click click click click click

we saw a dolphin today at the beach. life is good. -lj

hook, line and...patte'?

I'm pretty sure we told you about the two ducks outside, Foie and Gras, but after I blogged last we realized there was a third duck as well. We decided to name this one Patte'. (We work in restaurants, what do you want from us?) Well we consider all these ducks our pals. When we step outside, if they're around at the time, they'll stop what they're doing to come hang out. Sometimes we feed them Honey Nut Cheerios even though there's an obvious sign that says not to. We've really acquired a soft spot for our little duckies. Well a few days ago, Rach and I were sitting in the living room sipping coffee and watching TV. Every morning Mike and "D" come in at 8:30 to do constuction on the bathroom so they were here as well. We glanced outside the sliding glass doors that seperate the living room from the patio and saw Patte' sitting outside our door. This was not unusual becomes sometimes the ducks hang out on the patio and stare inside waiting for us to come out. We went outside to say good morning. When we first walked out we could tell he was standing funny. His mouth seemed slighted opened and his head was pushed down and cocked to the side. Rachel noticed she could see something yellow by his neck. We walked behind him to investigate. We were terrified to realize that Patte had a fish hook stuck through the bottom his beak so big that he couldn't close his mouth. To make it a million times worse, the other (hooked) end of the fish hook was jabbed into his wing. He couldn't even move his neck because the double sided hook was so short. We tried to approach him so we could see if we could help him. We still hadn't touched our ducks and he obviously didn't want to be touched. It was obvious however, that he wanted help. He was just standing at the door of the patio waiting for us to come outside. Mike was outside too and called the manager office to see who we should call. They gave us the number of some non profit animal sanctuary. Rachel called while I tried to further assess poor little Patte's situation. I kept wondering how long he'd been like this. All night? My heart was beating so fast and my fear quickly turned into anger. You're not even supposed to fish in the lake! What kind of asshole leaves these things around? Pate's must be so scared. The animal sanctuary informed us that they do not come get animals, but if we wanted to catch him and bring him in, they would help him. Mike said he would catch him for us and Rachel and I went inside and lined a big box with a beach towel. Rachel went outside and started the car while I returned outside with Mike. Once I was outside with the box, we cornered poor Patte' and through a blanket over him. "D" held him down to see if he could get the hook out. It was really in there, on both ends, and we didn't want to further hurt our duck friend. I pet Patte's head while Mike was at least able to cut the linking piece so that he could at least move his head again. We gently put Patte in the box and I took him out to the car. We drove the ten long minutes to the animal sanctuary, reassuring Patte with soothing words the whole time. We finally got there and had to walk past a huge mountain lion in a cage and some parrots to get to the animal hospital. When we got there, we were so relieved. The supervisor was standing right where we walked in. "Hey, what do we have here?" She says. "A duck." Since we had called I figured they might be expecting us. I handed her the box containing our injured friend. As she took if from me she asked if I wanted the box back. I told her it didn't matter as long as we got our duck back. "We can't give you the duck back." Wait, What!? "What do you mean?" She explained to us that they weren't a vet, they were a non-profit. The duck was a non-native invasive species and once we turn it over to them, they are now in charge of it and cannot, by law, give us our pal back. For a second Rach and I just stood in disbelief. This duck had a great home...it had friends. "What will you do with him?" "Well, if we can get the hook out then we try to find it a home." We didn't understand...this duck already had a home. I asked if Patte' would have the opportunity to fly back to his original home once he was placed in his new home if he so chooses. The answer was no. He would be living in a confined sanctuary. She told us she'd give us a few minutes to think about this. We would have to choose whether to leave him in their care, or try a vet who would probably give it back to us. The superivisor had to go outside to speak to animal control and we were left with someone else who worked there. A really sweet girl around our age. She saw we were upset and explained the law to us again. She told us that we'd have to lie to the vet a little and say that we planned to get Patte's wings cropped and that we had a good home for him. She wasn't sure how much a vet would cost. We also knew that taking him to a vet would mean more time with the hook. I asked the girl if they killed animals if they couldn't find them a home. I absolutely did not get the answer I wanted. Now this decision was really hard. Patte' had come to us for help and now he might die because of our decision. The girl lowered her voice. "Did you try to take the hook out yourselves?" We told her we had tried but didn't try hard. We didn't know anything about ducks and didn't want to hurt Patte' further. She glanced outside and bent down toward the box. In five seconds she had the hook out of his mouth. She fumbled with the wing for a bit. She stood up. "Ok, I can get the hook out. But not infront of my boss. Just say you've decided to take him to a vet". Our eyes shot open. Was she serious!? This girl was about to risk her job and break the law for us and Patte'. She ran in the back to get pliers. She came back quickly and got to work. We heard two loud clicks and watched her slide something shiny and silver into her hoodie pocket. Then the pliers followed. She looked at us and smiled. We scooped up the box and thanked her probably too many times and way too loud. This was supposed to be a secret secret operation. She hurried away from us with a quick "you're welcome" since we obviously weren't playing it as cool as she asked us to play it. Talk about an act of kindness. We took our pal home and fed him Cheerios outside on our patio. Where he belongs. -lj

no more excuses

Ok seriously "followers"...if you can get through college or hold careers you can figure out how to comment on a freakin blog. Really now! -lj and r

14. Blog

Before my mother e-mails me reminding me how many days it's been since my last blog, I'll have to give you an update. We're here! We said goodbye to Boston with a much anticipated "Farewell and F*!% You!" Okay, so maybe our goodbyes to coworkers contained some sadness, but the goodbye to the apartment was the easiest goodbye of my life. We left one last snack for Joey (who we actually were sad about leaving) and skipped merrily into the night. We even packed our car and loaded our bike rike in the dark so that we could leave Sunday night rather than Monday morning. We spent a few very much needed days in Monroe which always does the soul and tummy good. Top Chef Allstars started on Wednesday and was the primary focus and main event of the trip. Thursday morning after a brief but pleasant visit with Grandma, and a stop at Monroe Bagels and Deli we were back on the road! For lunch we went to Pat's King of Steaks in Philly for a cheesesteak. The oringal cheesesteak. It was the most disappointing sandwhich of my life. I had to stuff it with frenchfries to make it taste good. What a joke. Should have tried Geno's. Whats with Travel Channel leading us astray? If I can't trust travel Channel who can I trust? We drove a while after that and stopped outside Baltimore for the night. Our hotel had a fish tank in the lobby with a blowfish that had only one eye. I was mesmorized while Rachel played the adult and checked us into our room. That night we decided to treat ourselves (big surprise) to Red Lobster because it's our guilty pleasure. I ordered the coconut shrimp and snow crab leg combo entree thing (as usual). It was delicious and our favorite part is the crab. Not only is it delicious but its FUN! My favorite! So we're cracking our way through and talking about how you always run out of crab before you want to and our waiter plops another half a crab onto our table! "Here you go ladies, I got you some more crab legs because your first order wasn't really up to my standards." One of the legs of my first crab had been broken off. Who cares? I had to break it off to eat it anyway. But look! More crab! We thanked our waiter about a hundred times and got crackin...(ha). Let's just say he got VERY good tip. The next day we drove through Washington D.C on a safari. This means we drove around and saw the tourist things from our car. We then headed in a straight line south down to Raleigh, North Carolina to visit my cousin Jamie. She took us out to an awesome Mexican Restaurant and we drove around the city for awhile on another safari. It was amazing to see her. I seriously have the best family. We woke up the next morning and started our 12 hour drive down to Jupiter. We arrived at around 11pm. This place is amazing. It's absolutely gorgeous. We unpacked and went to bed excited to see it in day light. We woke up to a beautiful day. We decided to go to the resaurant across the street from the condos for brunch. It's a new resaurant called Gulfstream Cafe. I plan on dropping my resume off later today. Our server was so kind and we got to chatting. After learning we had just moved there she dropped the check and told us she was going to go see if she could grab us a "treat". She went inside for a minute and came back with two ten dollar gift cards. Again...big tip. After brunch we went to the beach for a few hours. The ocean is so different down there. It's practically green, it looks like the caribbean. We went grocery shopping and cooked our first Jupiter dinner. While we were eating we remembered whey we go out to eat so often. You'd think two people who loved food so much would be able to make things that taste good. I blame some of our meal on the quality of the halibut. It smelled a little fishy and I know fresh fish is not supposed to smell like fish. Stupid whole foods. Today is get our lives together day. We have a huge to do list and I know we'll go to bed feeling so good about ourselves if we cross off at least most of the list if not all. We learned last night that Jupiter doesn't have a craigslist page. This makes finding a job way harder. We have to make sure we don't work to far away from eachother because we only have one car. It'll be a challenge to figure it out this time around but I think we're up for it. Blogging is on the list so now I can cross that off. Laundry is in the washer and Rach is at the beach right now running in the sand. I plan to do the same today but I've decided to wait until sunset. Oh two more things! First thing is that I've literally been looking all over the country for Toaster Scrambles with sausage. I though they'd stopped making them with sausage and I hate the bacon ones. Well I've found them! Hurray! Another thing is that there is a beautiful, palm tree lined, so clear you can see everything on the bottom pond about twenty feet from our porch. It looks almost fake and I love hanging out on the edge and watching turtles swim. People must feed the ducks around here (which don't look like the ducks back home) because they're totally friendly and come right up to you as soon as you walk outside. I give them crackers though I don't think I'm supposed to. I have to duck friends. I've named them Foie and Gras. Daddy helped me name them. I bet by the end of the trip I'll be able to pet them because I almost can now and we've only just met! I have to go see what else is on that to do list. In conclusion, we are happy once again. Our only worry now is getting jobs and once thats settled we're good to go. I'll try to keep everyone updated. -lj (blog - check!)