the fox

i pad over to the river and take a drink. its been a long day, and i'm now far from my pack. i stay alert, listening for the hunters i know are present. after i drink, i look back the way i came. my pack has forced me out, and so i must find another. winter is approaching, i can smell it in the air. the smell of fresh snow is strong. the geese overhead are flying south, and i long to go with them. with no pack, it will be a hard winter. i will have to look hard, for myself and my unborne pup. the pup. the reason i am forced out. the pup was not the alpha's therefore, it, and i with it, cannot stay. i travel onward, as far south as i can. i want to be able to stay as warm, and to find as much food as possible if i am to live this winter. the hunter's dogs follow me, silently. i smell them though, and make sure to stay as far downwind as i can. it eventually grows to be night. the dogs go home, and i am free to travel. and travel i do. i nearly fly over the ground, running as fast and as far as i can. i find an empty cave, and i stop and rest. i need to find food, but the dogs and hunters are back, so i must wait. and watch. the dogs come closer to where i am hiding, they seem to have caught my sent. i silently slip out of the cave and run like the silent winds. the dogs give chase. i run fast, but they are faster. they are fresh, and have had a decent meal recently. i am still tired from running all night, and have only eaten some grass, and that a few days ago. i am surrounded. they bark and the hunters come. i am caught. they place something around my mouth. surprisingly, they do not kill me, even though it is late fall, and the season for killing. instead, they cage me up, and take me with them. i am placed in some human contraption, in the dark. i can smell deer in with me as well, and the smell makes me go wild. i try to get at the deer, but the thing makes it so that i cannot get at it. i cannot bark. i will not be eating. we stay at the human camp for a few more days. each day, i hear the hunters go out, looking for something else. each day, i try and get get out of that thing so i may get at that deer, but each time, i fail. eventually, i give up, and try and conserve what energy i have for surviving in the cold and dark. the hunters must have eventually given up for we move after some days. i am taken out of the dark and into the bright sunlight. i am no longer in the forest, but surrounded by humans and noise and smells. two humans seem to be talking. they are gesturing towards me, and the deer a lot. the hunter leaves, and we are left with the other human. we are taken in another contraption, but not as far. we stop, and they lead the deer out while i remain, waiting, and still in the dark. a while later, we move again, this time for a lot longer time. eventually, we stop, and i am lead out. i am led into a building, where many humans live. it is warm in the house, and i smell delicious meat somewhere in the house. i try to yelp, but i still have the thing around my mouth, and cannot. i begine to have hope that maybe me and my pup will be able to survive. the man who brought me here leaves, and i am left with many humans looking at me. they talk, and eventually i am led back outside. the thing is taken off my mouth, and i try to run to the meat i smell. a man catches me, and i am forced back into the thing around my mouth and tied to a tree.

final verdict # 2

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

so, we got a call from chris this morning. apparantly we wont get rachel AT ALL in two weeks. he wont tell us why. the way he said it at first made it sound like it was our fault, and that we werent doing something right, but he wont tell us what. so, in two weeks, rachel is going to apparantly be moving out. i guess we'll see what happens with it. we're currently (as in right this minute) trying to talk this out and see what his reasons are for it, but he wont say. not really. grar!

final verdict

Part 1
Part 2
so, we now have a final verdict on whats going on with rachel. soooo sorry. its been on my mind, and i need to tell someone. even if no one really reads this, the possiblity is there. so, we found out, finally, that chris has, as we suspected, sided with the hawks, and has it so that rachel will be spending every_single_weekend_ with the hawks. i dont know why we cant have just one weekend a month. their reasonin in why we couldnt have her every other weeked was even weak. they said "two weeks is too long. she'll forget us inbetween that time." sorry, i dont think so. i dont even want to know what sort of lame excuse they came up with for not even one weekend a month. it was supposed to start this weekend, even though we had told them, and they had been fine with it, that she had something this weekend, an they couldnt have her. i dont think i've ever been so close to abducting a child in my life. they are being absolutely unreasonable. oh, and something we just found out. the hawks apparantly dont think we are teaching her "life skills" because over chrismas, they asked her to go pack her suitcase to come home, and all she did was just sit there. now, rachel has this personality, and other kids do too, so i dont know why they had a problem with it, that if she doesnt want to do something, she'll just sit there, and not do it. its not like we let her gt away with it, we make her do it. apparantly, though, they think we're not teaching her life skills, and not teaching her how to pack a suitcase, just because she sat there and didnt pack it over christmas. what do they think we're doing with her? absolutely nothing? my personal oppinion is that she didnt do it because she was doped up on benedryl all the week she was visiting them over christmas. but, again, my oppinion doesnt count for anything. so, she's going to go there and learn the life skills (what life skills is she going to learn? whenever she goes with them, she's on benedryl the whole time, and all they do is go shopping. what's she to learn. how to be doped up and how to shop?)that we are apparantly failing to teach her. am i being unreasonable in really not wanting her to go?

update

so here's a quick update on the rachel thingy. i know, i know, its boring to hear about it all the time, but i need to get it out for my sake.
so chris finally called back last night to supposedly tell us what kind of decision he had come to on where rachel was going to live and where she was going to spend her weekends. apparantly the hawks (stupid chuffers) are very adamant about rachel comming to see them every single weekend. i'm all for them getting her every other weekend, but apparantly they think that "every other weekend is too long in between, and she'll forget us" yeah right! she doesnt even really want to go spend time with them. she's scared of them. she is willing to get to know them, but she wants to have chris there, as a support. (she wont tell chris any of this, but she will tell me, who then has to relate it to dad, who will relate it to chris.) so, we're trying to see if we can have rachel for just ONE weekend a MONTH. i'm not at all happy about this idea, when are we supposed to do anything fun with her? i guess we're not supposed to. we've finally gotten to a point that chris will listen to us about what rachel needs/wants. so, he's still thinking about it, and supposedly he will call us back tonight to let us know what he has figured out.
here's the thing about all this that bothers me. chris is currently on marrage number three, and having just come home from iraq with PTSD, he's very likely to do whatever he can to save this newest marrage. including, apparantly, forget about the needs of his child so that he can please his wife. the fact that he'll put his marrage before his children, that should come, but just to an extent. he shouldnt be forcing rachel into something she REALLY doesnt want to do. its stupid, and will just make rachel dislike her daddy all the more, which is something that chris really wouldnt like. and another thing that we found out that bothers me is the fact that krystal says that rachel has to call her "mummy" not "mommy", but close enough. ah ha, now i see and understand. they say that they dont want krystal to take the place of jen, rachel's real mommy, but forcing her to call krystal mummy? mmmm... there's a problem there. they may say that they dont want krystal to take her place, but really, i think they want rachel to have absolutely nothing to do with us, and with jen, and with everything else to do with her real mom's family. mayhaps i'm over reacting, i dont know. i just dont like the stupid chuffers, and this isnt helping to make me like them more.

rantings

so, we got a call from rachel's dad (chirs) sunday night. he told us that his wife's family (the hawks) want to start taking rachel every weekend, and if we ever wanted rachel on a weekend, we would have to call them and see if it was okay with them, wich doesnt make sense when we have her living at our house anyhow. we tried to talk the hawks down to every other week, because we want to be able to see her on the weekends too, instead of just during the week, when we cant go and do anything fun with her (she would go with them from friday afternoon after she gets home from school, to sunday night at bedtime. all she has time to do here is go to school, come home and do her homework, and then its bedtime. we dont want to be just the disiplanarians, and have them be the fun grandparents. we want to be able to have some fun with her and see hersometimes too). they wont bend, and take her just every other weekend, so their other idea is to take her permanantly, for everything, she would be moving out of our house. one problem we have with that is that chris will be comming here in about six months. she's insecure about life as it is (hence the thumb sucking, as mentioned earlier), why move her twice, when she could be moved just once, when chris came. chris's wife (krystal) wants rachel to be able to spend time with the hawks's, to get to know them better. thats not a bad idea, but she's told us that she is kinda scared of her grandpa hawks (according to rachel, he is kinda big, and in a wheelchair, and thats what scares her), and she would be more comfortable getting to know him if krysyal was here, but krystal is in DC with chris (he's in walter reed hospital). another thing is that they have dogs, and rachel is allergic to dogs. apparantly when she went to spend the week with them over christmas, she was on benadryl the whole time. sorry, that shouldnt have to happen. are they willing to give up their dogs to have rachel come live wit them? the answer to that was no, they are going to keep their dogs, and just keep rachel on benydryl. a stupid idea, because she cant remember what she did over christmas from being on benydryl. her school performance would go way way down. the last issue we had was that rachel has been living here for about four-five years. over that time she's grown to be like a daughter to not just me, but to mom and dad as well. they want to take rachel in about...oh...a week. now, we were just getting used to, and were fine with the idea of rachel leaving to live with her DAD in six months. thats time enough that we can still have her, and see her, and all that. the thing about the hawks is that if she leaves to live with them, we wont ever see her again. they dont like her living here with us, and try and take her all the time. i think i've mentioned that we werent sure if she would come back after both thanksgiving and christmas with them. we know for a fact that if she were to live with them, we would never ever see her again. and then she's just leaving in a week?! oh, and to top it all off, (this doesnt really have to do with this subject, but i need to get it out) when she went to spend time with them over thanksgiving and christmas, the time they wanted to come pick her up was inconvienint for our family. they were NOT AT ALL willing to see that we cant really do it then, can you come pick her up at a different date and time? both times, we had to rearrange our lives to make accomidations for THEM and yet they never do that for US. ajslfjasdlfjasdlfjasdl;fja;sd lfjk! chuffers! sorry. anyhow, to finish this up, and not make it horrendously long, we want her to live here, and they can wait to have her (we would make acceptions for some weekends, but not every weekend) for the six months till chris and krystal get home, when chris and krystal will be living out near the hawks', and they can see her every single day if they want, and we will never see her again, but cant they wait for the six months? cant they see that those six months should be ours? chris was supposed to call last night to tell us what was going on, but did he call? nooo, he did not call. so now we are stuck wondering what is going on with rachel and everything else. grar

just maybe

my roomate from california has been trying to convince me for a long time that i want to go at least visit california. i used to adamatly refuse to go to the state. but, upon further research, i might end up visiting the state, if i ever had a summer to go visit it. and, because i'm a fan of the national park service, i decided that is what i would mostly go visit. there have been a few places inspired by others that have actually made me want to go visit the state, inspite of myself. so, i've layed out a plan. kinda. more like, a list of places i want to go if i ever make it to california. it would have to all be done in one trip, which is why it would take a whole summer. but it would be a trip well worth the time and money it would take. i would be visiting some wonderful national treaures, and helping to preserve the area so that others can go and visit them. some of these will take just a day, or a half a day, but others of these will take many days, so that i can try and see as much of it as possible, go on hikes, and such. because the list is so long, and the ammount of time needed is so variable, i'll have to plan for one whole summer, or at least most of a summer. meaning it wont be able to be done until i'm all graduated, an have saved lots and lots so that i can make the trip, and pay any and all entrance fees/overnight fees. as well as providing food stuffs for myself. anyhow, all that being said, if i were to ever take a trip, here's the order of things, and what things i want to see while there.

Redwood Forest
Lava Beds
Lassen Volcanic National Park
John Muir National Historic Site
Black Diamond Mines Park
Round Valley
Yosemite National Park
Devils Postpile National Monument
Sequoia & Kings Canyon National Parks
Pinnacles National Monument
Death Valley National Park
Manzanar National Historic Site
Mojave National Preserve
Santa Monica Mountians National Recreation Area
Hidden Valley
Rachael's House
Joshua Tree National Park