maybe I'll take up a study of the migration habits of city squirrels

The other day during my daily squirrel feeding there was a stranger squirrel in our midst. He was very aggressive. He also had a distinctive looking tail that looked like the end had been chopped off and grown back crooked.

The next morning I was driving to work and I saw the same squirrel (recognizable by that tail). He was one block down and 2 blocks over.

I wonder...how far do city squirrels normally range?

Another Stupid Criminal Moment at Fruth

The other night we had a woman stealing 2 very large boxes of condoms. When the clerk said something to her she promptly dropped the boxes (one from which she had already removed all the condoms) and ran out of the store.

SHE ACCIDENTALLY DROPPED HER DRIVER'S LICENSE WITH THE 2 BOXES OF CONDOMS!

ON THE BRIGHT SIDE...AT LEAST SHE WAS TRYING NOT TO REPRODUCE!!!

Classic Moment in Fruth History

My friend Judy was checking out a lady one day when she looked up and saw the woman's 5 year old son in the ice machine. (It is one of those giant machines with a glass door that holds a couple hundred bags of ice) Apparently the door had locked behind him when he had climbed in there and he was beating on the door and screaming as only a 5 year old can when he is locked up in a verylarge, very cold box! The sight was even funnier by the fact that apparently when you are locked in an ice machine it is soundproof - so we could see him beating on the door and his mouth contorting but we couldn't hear any sounds!

Judy exclaimed, "Jaunita! look at Joey!"

Jaunita turned to look at her son and turned back to Judy and calmly said, "How embarrassing!" and started to cackle with laughter. Then she walked over and opened the door and let her son out and apologized to Judy for the commotion

The Invasion of the Crabs!

This was one of the most terror filled moments of my life!

Bobby and I had gone to Florida for a vacation after a truck had run over my foot. I was either on crutches or sitting with my foot propped up on ice the whole time. We were in Melbourne, Florida visiting my dad and it just so happenned that for some reason thousands of crabs had decided to beach themselves. There were so many crabs that you couldn't drive down the road without running over hundreds of them. There was no way to miss them there were so many.

They weren't quite so bad in the afternoon so Bobby and I decided to venture to the beach. When we walked out onto the beach there were no crabs to be seen anywhere. By the time I made my way to the water (on crutches) the crabs had started to make an appearance. It didn't take long before we decided to leave the beach. I have had a long standing phobia for my whole life about crabs pinching my toes.

As I made my way across the beach the crabs started to converge towards me. Moving across the Florida sand on crutches is not an easy task and it took me some time to cross the beach. I had not quite made it to the brushy woods that was between the beach and the car when there were so many crabs that I could go no further.

I was screaming for Bobby to help me. I was getting hysterical with my tears that I was so afraid of those crabs. Bobby had to pick me up and carry me (and my crutches). Every which way he would turn the crabs would run away but the crabs on all the other sides would make a mad dash for us. He would turn one way (with me in his arms) and stomp his feet and yell. No sooner would he do that than the other crabs would race at us and he would have to turn another way and stomp his feet and yell.

He confessed after he finally got us out of the mess that he didn't know if we were going to make it out of there.

He Ran Over My Foot!!!

I had been training greyhounds for 1 year and I was elibible for my first years paid vacation and I was leaving for Florida the next day. It was at the end of a long, hard day at the track because I worked extra so that the people I work with could get some rest since I would be gone for a week.

I was worn out and I was walking to my truck to go home when the kid from the kennel next door pulled up right in front of me (effectively blocking my way) and started to laugh and tell me jokes. This was especially irritating because I had just told him the day before not to ever bother me again because of a stunt he had pulled with his truck while giving me a ride back to my kennel.

But I was tired, so I leaned on the hood of his truck so that I could rest while I tolerated whatever he was saying to me. All of a sudden he chimed out, "I have to go. I'm late." When BOOM! He gunned the gas. I WAS STILL LEANING ON THE HOOD!

I did not even have time to stand up. I tried to jump back but I couldn't get out of the way fast enough! I managed to get my first foot out of the way but my second foot didn't fare so well. He proceeded to run over my foot! Here is the really nasty part that I didn't even remember happenning for a few months afterwards.

The tires on the truck were bald. There were little wires sticking out all around the perimeter of the tire. These wires got caught in my tennis shoe, so that after the truck actually ran over my foot my shoe was still stuck to the tire! To make matters even worse the kid didn't realize he had run over my foot and he kept moving while my foot was turning with the tire!

As the tire slowly turned, my legs were becoming entangled with each other and my foot actually turned around completely backward so that it was facing the opposite way that it was supposed to. I, of course, yelled out in pain at first but the pain was so completely devastating that it took my breath away. I knew if I didn't do something my foot was going to twist completely off my body!

I tried to flip my other leg over the leg that was connected to the wheel. This generated enough force that my shoe finally disengaged from the tire and I fell to the ground writhing in pain. He immediately stopped and jumped out of his truck to help me. He and another friend that had seen the whole thing wanted to take my shoe off and look at my foot. I stopped them because I thought that the shoe was the only thing holding my foot together. I could just picture them untying my shoe and my foot spilling all over the pavement!

They loaded me in the truck and drove me to the guard shack where the paramedics were called. They called Bobby and he came up from the track to check on me. Here is where I made my big mistake. Instead of letting the paramedics take me to the hospital, I had Bobby drive me there. The reason it was a mistake is because it gave the track a chance to cover everything up and there was no public record of my injury.

At the hospital they x-rayed my foot and miracle of all miracles nothing was broken. I just had soft tissue damage they said. The doctor even told me I would be able to go on my vacation if I used crutches - which I did. What they didn't tell me is what having soft tissue damage meant.

All my ligaments and tendons were severely damaged. The veins and nerves were also severely damaged. It took 9 months of me lying in bed with my foot elevated before I was able to walk well enough to go back to work. Everytime I would put my foot down it would swell up bigger than a football in a matter of minutes. It was an extremely painful recuperation.

In the meantime because there was no public record of my going from the track to the hospital the track covered up the incident. They would not release the report that the guard filed at the guard shack that night. The other kennel's insurance refuse to pay for my work missed and my medical bills (which is all I asked for - no pain and suffering). They said the boy told them that he had run over my foot intentionally and so they didn't have to pay - the 16 year old kid was responsible. His dad shipped him back to his mom in Florida and I didn't see him again for 5 more years.

I am officially a "has been"

I guess that is better than being a "never was".

One night last year I was at work and I was laughing with a friend about the time I thought the people at the track were messing with me when they told me that greyhounds used to race with monkeys on their backs. Turns out they were telling the truth. They did do that back in the 30's but too many monkeys were killed so they had to quit it.

A girl who had overheard me talking walked up and told me that it was true. I told her that I knew it was because I used to train greyhounds and she told me that she was a trainer now. I enjoyed talking to her. It was like talking to myself 20 years ago.

She bragged about several of her accomplishments at the track including having an all female kennel. (a rare thing in a male dominated business) She told me that she was the first to have one at Tri-State. She was very proud of this and I didn't have the heart to tell her that I had one twice - and I was not the first female to do so.

If she goes back and happens to mention me to an old timer, she will find out. I didn't see the point in busting her bubble. It is tough to make it in that business - male or female. And I wish her all the best.

My 4th.

The fireworks were glorious. (when are they not) I had a good time in spite of the fact that from the first boom I knew it would kick off my migraine - and it did. I went straight home with the intentions of going to bed but someone had kicked off the fire alarm again so there were 2 firetrucks in front of the building. This meant the elevators were closed and I had to wait 1/2 an hour before I could go to bed for the night. I'm fine this morning though.

I am going to work this morning to try to make up the hours where I missed work last week.

The fireworks made me feel nostalgic. When I was taking care of my dad we lived in Huntington, WV. We lived about 3 miles from Camden Park which is the only amusement park in WV as far as I know. One 4th. of July I walked out on our porch to see that we had a perfect view of the fireworks going off at Camden Park.

I went back inside and put Daddy in his wheelchair because he was particularly weak that day. I took him out to the sidewalk and we stood there at dusk, watching the fireworks together. He in his wheelchair and I standing beside him. It was a very close father/daughter moment for us for some reason. It was nice.