Rosie is on a pretty aggressive regime of prednisone and while her symptoms have been improved, it’s obvious to me that the auto-immune disease has done serious harm to her musculature.

The most noticeable changes in her head is how pronounced her skull ridge (?) is, as well as the deep pockets behind her eyes. It was hard to get her to sit still enough for photos, but maybe you can see.

I’ll be happy when she’s off the prednisone — it makes her thirsty all the time. She had an accident last week; now we let her out every few hours and take water away at about 9PM. She is probably drinking four to five times her normal amount.

The Good News

However, Rosie does not appear to be in any pain. She is much much happier than before we started treating her. Her eyes used to appear red and were runny before her treatment, and now they’re clear and clean.

She can open her mouth more widely than before. I’d say about 10 – 15% of normal. She can successfully chew on a raw carrot or chunk of sweet potato. She’s also stopped drooling, although I think that was a symptom of her pain prior to treatment.

Overall she’s happy and seems to be improving. She’s probably got about half of her medicine left, then we’ll see what’s next. I don’t know enough about MMM to know if her muscles will ever come back, or if the damage is permanent.

However, she looks, well… different. Frankly it’s been hard to get used to, and Sedagive? has teared up a few times.

It’s really hard to get a picture of her from head-on, but between the ridge and the area behind her eye sockets she looks like a totally different dog.

Our vet said it was unusual for owners to pay that much attention to their dogs. I feel guilty for not catching it sooner but all in all she seems okay and is making improvements. Her weight is steady and she looks happier.

Thanks for being so interested in Rosie’s progress. Despite all the pain and discomfort she’s been an absolute doll. Keep your fingers — or paws — crossed for her.

This episode is a three-parter, with the bare minimum amount of gear I’d recommend, then some more intermediate suggestions, and finally a discussion about a “comfort” or “boo-boo kit” bag.

Part 1: The Bare Necessities

Part 2: Optional Things That Will Be Helpful

Part 3: Optional Comfort / Boo-boo Kit

This is part of an ongoing introductory series and FAQ about firearms, ammunition and accessories for new gun owners or people who want to learn the basics.

Some items featured in this video:

Epicurean makes four lines of wooden utensils. Two of their lines are completely made out of low-impact materials. Two other lines have either plastic or silicone components, and while they look nice enough they don’t seem to fit the eco-friendly motif of their usual products.

Of the two more eco-friendly lines, the Kitchen Series is geared towards regular folks like myself. Epicurean also makes a more durable and expensive line for professionals called the Chef Series.

Today I’ll write about the Kitchen Series utensils I own.

I purchased a large spoon and a large saute tool from Eversharp Knives in downtown Minneapolis. They’re a great store, and sell Epicurean first quality and factory seconds. I was about to buy both tools for about half off. Even at full retail, the Kitchen Series utensils are about $10 each. I bought mine for about $6.99 per.

The utensils feel well-crafted and sturdy without being unwieldy. Like the cutting boards, the wooden spoon and saute tool are made out of wood from sustainable and/or recycled sources. You can read more about the company’s history and manufacturing processes, but one of our tools is made out of 50% recycled cardboard, and the other from low-impact trees.

Both utensils are dishwasher safe, and tolerate up to 350°F. The materials used in both spoons are nonpourous and resists bacteria. The spoon, which is made out of new materials, is certified by the National Sanitary Foundation and the Forest Stewardship Council. The utensils are safe to use on non-stick cookware.

I really like using the saute tool. I don’t personally use the spoon very often for the things I cook, but Sedagive? likes it as well. The saute tool has a beveled edge that makes it easy to push around eggs or pieces of sausage or whatever I have frying up in my cast iron skillet. I like the heft of the utensils, especially compared to flimsy plastic tools I’ve used in the past. I also don’t have to worry about any plastic bits melting if I leave the saute tool on my skillet.

I recommend the Kitchen Series tools made by Epicurean. If you live in the Minneapolis area you should swing by Eversharp to see if they have any discounted factory seconds for sale. Mine look great, and were almost half the retail price.

You can order directly from Epicurean, but I’m not sure what their shipping prices are. Amazon has the spoon for the suggested retail price. As of this writing, the saute tool appears to be about $5 more than retail. If you plan on buying things from Amazon and you have a Prime account, it might turn out to be about the same as getting it directly. You can also find Epicurean products at places like Bed Bath & Beyond, Crate & Barrel, and some grocery stores, but I’m not sure if they carry the utensils or just the cutting boards. Use this store locator to find retailers near you.

Strongly recommended

To paraphrase something I read : when someone dies, the burdens they carried do not disappear. The burdens move onto the shoulders of those around them.

The rest of us move through life. The world does not stop, although a part of me is frozen in time. I recall with absolute clarity the phone call I got from my mother, the terror in her voice. I remember calling my father, and the distant regret in his voice. Time lurched forward, and my life changed in many, many ways. But that day carved a hole in my heart that may never be filled.

Visited Dad last year. It was the first time I saw him since your funeral. He’s doing well.

Today marks the fourteenth year of my sister’s passing. At this point I rarely remember the times we shared, but instead consider all of the things that she missed. I think part of it is the erosion of memories over time. I think a bigger part of it is the emotional seesaw of being so happy with my life and then so sad she is not here to participate.

I love you, Sue. For as long as I live. I am grateful for our time together, and the wisdom you passed on to me. I hope that I am strong enough to carry my burdens, and still have room to help the people I love when their shoulders get tired.

Like Sedative?… You would have loved her.

And her boys… You’d love them, too.

I am sorry I didn’t do that for you.

Availability or prices are starting to come down as the vast majority of anti-gun legislation was defeated. The problem is that you typically can only choose “availability” or “price” when it comes to buying ammunition. Meaning, you can either find ammunition at higher-than usual prices, or you can find pre-panic prices on ammunition that’s only available for an extremely short amount of time.

Here are some techniques on buying enough practice ammunition for this season without going into debt.


Don’t let this happen to you.

• Set a per-round limit that you’re willing to pay. I keep a spreadsheet with prices for the calibers I need. I factor in sales tax if I’m buying locally, and shipping if buying online. For example, I’m unwilling to buy 5.56 / .223 ammunition for more than $0.37 a round delivered. That’s still a lot more than the $0.25 – $0.30 per round delivered before American went full idiot, but it’s the best I can do.
• Have money on hand to buy ammunition. This sounds dumb, but when you find a lot of ammo locally or online you have to be ready to pounce on it. This is one of the reasons knowing how much you are willing to pay is important. If it’s within your price range, buy it.
• Identify reliable, predictable online vendors that sell ammunition. I really like AIM Surplus, SG Ammo, and Midway USA. My second tier of vendors is Sportsman’s Guide, Natchez Shooter’s Supply and Widener’s. I also have a bunch of “third tier” vendors like Ammoman, J&G Sales, Palmetto State Armory, etc but their availability and restocking is so low I don’t actively follow them.
• Sign up for email notification on all out of stock items. Regardless of how good the vendor is or not at getting restocked product I sign up for everyone’s newsletters and email notification lists. If you get an email from Vendor X stating that ammunition is in your price range you’d better be ready to buy it.
• Get your requirements out of the way before you try to buy. All of the vendors I buy from require proof of age before selling ammunition online. You’ll want to comply with their policies (usually scanning the front of your driver’s license and sending it to them) before the next round of inventory arrives. Sign up for an account and fill out all of your contact information ahead of time. You’re not going to have time to sign up once all of those in-stock notifications go out via email.
• Stay logged into as many sites as possible. You should “rove” top-tier sites, so it should be obvious if you’re logged in or not. If you visit a site and you’re not logged in, do so. Servers frequently slow down or fail outright once ammunition (and sometimes magazines) come back in stock. Any extra activity like logging in may cost you.
• Follow, but do not depend on, gunbot.net. Gunbot.net is a Web site that periodically scans ammunition vendor Web sites. It reports new products as they become available, as well as the total price for a unit and a per-round breakdown (before shipping). As of this writing, the most recent result for 5.56 ammunition according to Gunbot is Federal Lake City 5.56mm M855 62 Grain Full Metal Jacket in a 250 round pack for $200, or about $0.80 per round before shipping. This is obviously way outside of my price range, so I don’t pay attention to it. You can create a Gunbot account and set your own per-round thresholds. When a deal hits your threshold Gunbot plays a sound. Gunbot is not very accurate, and often gives false information about availability and pricing. For example, Gunbot has reported that AIM Surplus has had Wolf ammunition twice today, but it never restocked. Other times Gunbot lists ammunition as sold out when there is still some to be had. I scored 500 rounds of Tula-made .223 from Midway USA this way. Had I believed Gunbot I would have missed it. All that being said, it’s another resource. At the very least it helps you identify who’s gouging shooters and who is trying to keep their prices decent.
• Cruise your top tier sites several times a day. Some sites send out email so slowly that by the time you get your notice the inventory is sold out. SG Ammo is a good example of this; twice I’ve not received emails from SG Ammo when the item was in stock. I bought 200 rounds of defensive ammunition this way; I never received a notification from SG Ammo nor did Gunbot alert me.
• Consider a bounty. Enlist friends to help widen your net. I am all set on 9mm practice ammunition for the season, but I will still buy within my price point to help my friends who are training with me this year. I’ve offered a +10% bounty to all friends who can get me .223 within my price range. This could be between $25 – $40 in their pocket for being a compulsive shopper.
• Consider stopping by your local Wal-Mart or gun store if it’s on your normal route. Wal-Mart employees have a bit of a reputation for keeping things to themselves and reselling them, and ammunition is no exception. Because of this you can’t trust their mobile app, which lists stock levels for ammunition by store. However, if you’re in the neighborhood anyway it’s worth swinging by. Almost every brick and mortar store has limits set, usually 3 to 5 boxes. I’ve abandoned this method as it’s totally random and a big pain in the ass. However, you might get lucky.

Using these methods I’ve managed to cobble together enough ammunition to take our two new rifles to all of our rifle training this year. I will probably shoot some of our other rifles during at least some of those classes, but I like having extra just in case ammo continues to be difficult to find.

If you are successful at getting ammunition, make sure you are storing it properly. I recommend MTM plastic locking ammo cans (here’s my review of the smaller AC50 can and the larger AC11 can). I also recommend putting desiccant packs in each ammo box — here’s my home made solution.

Good luck — be ready to buy and spend a little bit of time and you can save yourself a lot of money.

Our vet ruled out physical trauma, and thought it might be a fungal infection due to something she ate or encountered. He prescribed a round of antibotics and some pain medication. Within half a day Rosie felt and looked much better. She was wagging her tail, bouncing around, and continued to eat and drink. As the days passed, her demeanor improved, but her mouth stayed mostly shut.

In the meantime, my friends and family contacted me with advice and shared their own vet knowledge. Many of them suggested that it may be masticatory muscle myositis, often abbreviated MMM. Basically, MMM is when a dog’s body interprets specialized muscle tissue in the jaw as bacteria and starts to attack itself. Long term effects include the degeneration of the jaw muscles that causes lasting damage. The disease itself is not fatal, but the effects of losing the jaw muscles is obviously dangerous.


On the juice, and on the mend.

Our vet called us twice last week, once just to see how we were doing, and once to give us the results of Rosie’s initial blood work. Except for some slightly elevated cholesterol, her blood work looks awesome. This led the doctor to think that it wasn’t a fungal infection that he was hoping for, and he asked us to monitor Rosie for a few days and then set up a follow-up appointment on Monday of this week.

The weekend passed, with Sedagive? and Rosie going on a few walks. Rosie played with the other dogs just like she always does, minus the snapping of her jaws and play-biting. However, I tried to get her to open her mouth and it was a no-go. Back to the doc.

Sedagive? took Rosie in on Monday and the doctor remarked that she looked and behaved great. She was roughly the same weight as the week before, which was also a good sign. He gave us two options: go in for a CT scan or run a test to see if Rosie had MMM. Based on the advice I got from my pals, I voted for the MMM. Sedagive? and I also asked that we start Rosie on the drug regime for MMM without waiting for the results to come back. The vet agreed, and prescribed us a cycle of prednisone. The results take over two weeks to come back, and I didn’t want Rosie to suffer any more, nor did I want the MMM to wreck her jaw muscles any more than it already has.

Side effects of the prednisone is increased appetite, increased water consumption, bloating, and possibly lethargy. She’s been a little less bouncy today, but that could also be due to the snow and air pressure associated with a winter storm in May.

For those following along in the home game, she’s on 45mg of prednisone once daily for about 26 days. I am not sure if there are refills or not; most of the research I’ve done regarding MMM suggests that treatment may last up to six months, with tapering doses.

Thanks to everyone who emailed, texted, called, and posted to Facebook. I really appreciate it. Rosie has been super cuddly lately and even though I try to pet them and say goodbye to them every time I leave for work I’ve given her some extra special attention lately.

Hug your loved ones, and stay tuned for more information about Rosie Doodle.

I’ve also enjoyed learning from Sean “Day9″ Plott, who is a former professional StarCraft gamer and current commentator and analyst. Again, all of these episodes streamed over the Web.

These days the majority of my games are 2v2 or 3v3 games with my friends. The team format doesn’t get a lot of attention, and I wondered if my friends would get a kick out of watching me play. On a personal level, I wanted to start streaming because Sedagive? is too short to see my monitors at my standing desk. She used to sit by my side in Virginia and watch me play, and we still watch tons of online games together.

I figured it was time to figure out how to share my gaming experience with my family and friends.

About two weeks ago I started streaming my own games on Twitch.tv. You can watch me play on my Twitch channel, www.twitch.tv/drfaulken and view our past games here.

I play 1v1 games every now and then, but the majority of my playtime is in team games.

I’m hooked up to a microphone and call my partners over Skype, so there’s a lot of interaction while the game goes on. Most pro-gamers have a Web cam running on themselves while they play, but I thought it would be more interesting to see the keys that I press during games. I run a virtual keyboard that shows up on the stream when I’m playing.

So far streaming has been a lot of fun, especially for my friends who are completely new to StarCraft. It’s fun explaining the game to them and answering their questions. The in-game chatter between myself and my partners is fun to listen to, especially when the action heats up.

The easiest way to watch me stream is to create a Twitch.tv account and follow the channel. The next best way is to like our group on Facebook, and then if you’re the kind of person who likes to try your luck you can just tune in randomly.

Pearl, like the other dogs, has had a great year. The biggest improvement to her quality of life has been the raw food diet. I owe this 100% to Sedagive?, who did all of the research and spends a ton of time making the dogs’s food and rotating what they eat so they get a balanced diet. Pearl’s coat is better than ever before, and she’s getting more trim around the waistline.

Pearl’s diet is also fortified by fun stuff like a plastic “grabber” arm used to pick up small pieces of whatnot, shipping boxes, various toys, Lego block, wires, and jackalopes. One of those isn’t true; I’ll let you guess which one I fibbed about.

Despite nom-noming everything in the house, Pearl is a real sweetheart. She’s the first at our side in the morning and the last to leave. She tries our patience sometimes, but she gives a lot back to our hearts.

Happy birthday, Pearl!

This is part of an ongoing introductory series and FAQ about firearms, ammunition and accessories for new gun owners or people who want to learn the basics.

The base game is almost perfect. Here are some adjustments we’ve made so far.


Would we all live to fight another day, or die to a bad luck draw? House rules made Zombicide more fun for our gaming group.

House Rules

• Removed all of the “go again” style cards. Zombie spawning cards normally dictate what kinds of zombies appear, and how many. There are some, however, that allow the zombies to move again. This is particularly damaging when a bunch of runners on are the board. We died several times due to this randomness, and it pissed everyone off. This has been our biggest change, and we like it a lot.
• Call for backup. The game isn’t well-suited for four players. Each player gets one character, and that means you’re automatically two survivors down. The first adventure is a real bitch this way. We set the extra survivors aside and “rescue” them when opening a new structure. This allows us to refill our ranks during the inevitable player deaths.
• Up to 8 players. So far we’ve played games with up to eight players. This makes the scenarios easy once survivors get good weapons and items, but we may start a game with four players and end it with eight as people filter in. Instead of making them watch or play another game, we just add them in with starter items (pan, pistol, crowbar, fireaxe). Next time we play with eight we may re-add the “go again” cards.
• Just add more zombies. The standard rules state that if you run out of a type of zombie (e.g., walker) and you draw a walker card you make all of them move again. This is frustrating just like the “go again” and I think allows for some player-knowledge gaming (“we’re almost out of walkers, stop moving forward so much”). We use dice to indicate the number of zombies, and then put the zombie to the side of the die. 3 runners in a square? No problem, turn a D6 up to 2 and then put a runner next to it.

Overall we feel like this adds to the fun, social nature of how we play Zombicide. We focus on the heroic versus a grim-and-gritty style.

Do you have any Zombicide house rules? Give ours a try, and let us know if you like them or not.