The Results Are In...

From my informal survey, conducted on a busy Saturday afternoon as I navigated my way through Wal-Mart and Target parking lots.

People with Obama bumper stickers are more likely to let you into a gap in traffic than people with McCain bumper stickers.

(Sample Size: 3 Margin of error: infinite)

Not an endorsement. Just an observation.

For the Dogs

One of the weird things about living in Florida is that the Farmer's market runs from October until May. So, while yesterday was the last Farmer's market of the year in my hometown, it was also the first one of the season here.

My plan was to get there around 9:00 in the morning while there was some good stuff still there. But for some reason, I actually managed to sleep in (which I usually can't do on the weekends). I didn't get there until well after 11:00 and was a little bummed. I was hoping to get there before everyone bought all the good veggies.

However, my disappointment quickly turned to excitement, as I realized that the doggie costume contest was about to begin!

Since Cory was off at a work event, it was a little bit sad that I had to experience all the crazy cuteness by myself- so I took pictures to share with him, and now with you. The photos aren't great (I took them with my cell phone), and there were some dogs much cuter than these-- but these were the best photos:

The little guy on the left is a fisherman. His little hat had some lures attached to it, and I'm sure he probably had some bait stuffed in his little vest somewhere.







The tiny little dog on the right was a dinosaur. He was there with two other little guys dressed as cops, with uniforms that said "Dog Park Security."







These were some of yesterday's winners-- the Princess and the Pirate were hilarious-- I particularly loved the blonde wig on the princess. It stayed on the entire morning, which makes me wonder how they attached it to her.



The little weiner-dog on the right was wearing a little varsity jacket. He was there with two other dachshunds, who were dressed as cheerleaders. They won "best group costume."





And speaking of dachshunds, you can't have a doggie costume contest without a weinermobile, right? He won an award, too.







Another winner for group costume-- Tinkerbell and Captain Hook. Ol' Hook was a little camera-shy, but Tinkerbell spent the entire morning posing for the cameras. These were by far the tiniest dogs there.





The largest dog there, no contest, was this big fuzzy Great Pyreneese. Maybe not the fanciest costume, but definitely the most creative. I don't think I'd want to bite into an Oreo with that much fur, though!

Obligatory Sports-Related Post

A local sports story made its way onto the front page of ESPN.com yesterday-- as one of our area high school football teams beat another local squad 91-0.

Had I not been unceremoniously dumped by my previous employer, there's a very good chance I would have been at that game and would be covering that story.

I know how 91-0 looks. But for what it's worth, the Naples High School coach is an okay guy. He's not some asshat that wants to run up the score on his team's opponents. I've seen him pull his starters after the first half-- or even the first quarter-- numerous times. And while he certainly enjoys winning-- he's not just a coach, but he's also an educator who cares about students. All students, not just the ones on his side of the field.

Sign of the Times

There's a new Ruby Tuesday opening down the street from where I work (actually, it's almost exactly halfway between cory's workplace and mine).

Between part-time and full-time positions, they have about 80 available jobs. And today, they received 1,000 applications.

Every day, I thank my lucky stars that I found a job... and that I actually like it.

Only in Florida

In our area, and in other sandy, hot climates, cute little birds called "Burrowing Owls" exist.

Now normally, I find owls to be a little creepy. And those old ladies who's homes are decorated with thousands and thousands of macrame owls are even creepier.

But burrowing owls are pretty cute. They're less than a foot tall, they live in little holes in people's lawns (thus the name), they have beautiful lemon-yellow eyes, and their little babies (owlets? owlings?) are fluffy.

And in our neighborhood, like much of the Cape, they're everywhere.

Since burrowing owls are a protected species, we have a group called the "friends of wildlife" that go around marking owl nests, so that people know where they are and the owls don't get disturbed. After all, it would suck to have someone with a big lawnmower mow down your house.

Well, last weekend, we had a Columbus Day parade downtown. It was pretty sad, but there were a few funny moments. And one of them happened when the "Friends of Wildlife" rode by:

The video quality is pretty poor, I know. So if you can't figure it out, it's an "owl" in the back of a convertible. And an "owl" riding a segway.

Good times.

Here she comes, Miss MRSA

One of my co-workers has MRSA.
Problem is, none of us (including herself) found out she had MRSA until I'd spend the a good chunk of the day working at her computer. Her (probably) highly contagious computer. And scratched a bunch of mosquito bites after touching her (probably) higly contagious keyboard.
So that's fun, right?