The Right Jack.
I got about fifty pages into Maneater, and decided to stop because I flat-out didn’t give a shit what happened in the book. I don’t care if the author IS married to Brian Grazer – being married to a big-time producer apparently doesn’t magically bestow upon you the ability to write an interesting book.
I’m disappointed, though. I was hoping for some good Hollywood gossip.
* * *
At some point in the past year or so, I became aware that when the spud was washing her hair and then brushing it, instead of taking the loose strands of hair and putting them in the trash, she was putting them in the sink and running the water, so that the hair was going down the sink. Since her hair is about to the middle of her back and she sheds worse than a cat in spring, that’s a lot of fucking hair.
I told her to stop washing her hair down the sink, and she promised to stop, but the sink in her bathroom was draining very, very slowly. Since Liz is going to be here on Sunday and she’ll be staying in the spud’s bedroom and using her bathroom, I knew that something needed to be done. I suggested to Fred that we might think about taking the pipe under her sink apart and pulling out any hair that was stuck in there.
Last night I was eating dinner – sushi for dinner, YUM! – and was just about finished when he called down to me from upstairs. I went up to see what was going on, and I realized that as soon as I hit the top of the stairs, it smelled like a great big huge nasty stinky fart.
“Look at this,” Fred said, indicating the spud’s under-sink area. I looked, and saw two pieces of pipe with a great mass of hair spilling out, covered in a sludgy, stinky mold-and-mildew mixture.
“God, what an AWFUL SMELL!” I said, almost gagging.
And we spent the next half hour pulling sludgy, nasty hair out of the pipes, cleaning the pipes with a very strong bathroom cleaner, and then putting it all back together.
Then I text messaged the spud, told her what we’d done, and told her I’d beat her if I ever saw another hair in her sink again. She text messaged me back and said “At least my sink will drain now!”
Brat. She’s just lucky she’s in California (“California! California! Caaaaaaaaaaaaaliforrrrrrniaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”) and not here where I can give her hell to her face. Giving her hell via text message isn’t quite as satisfying.
* * *
The week before last, I spent some time online looking for a new comforter for the spud. I just bought her a new one last year, but it wasn’t really one that she much liked, and she spends so much time sitting on her bed that her comforter was pretty grimy – plus, apparently every time she shaves her legs she seems to scrape off about a three-inch piece of skin, so there were plenty of blood spots on the comforter, too.
I found several comforters that I thought she might like, sent her the links to them, and let her pick her favorite. I told her that if she didn’t like any of them I’d take her shopping for one, but she liked
this one, so I ordered it and hoped it would arrive before Liz got here.
I got notification that the comforter had shipped, and when I looked at the UPS tracking, saw that it was scheduled to arrive on Tuesday. Tuesday came, and in the evening I was sitting in the computer room and glanced up to see the UPS man walking back to his truck and leaving. I was puzzled that he hadn’t rang the doorbell, but when I went to the door to get the package, there was no package. I went and checked the garage in case by some chance he’d decided to leave it by the garage door, but there was nothing there either. I went to my computer, looked up the tracking number, and saw that according to UPS the package had been delivered.
I puzzled over it, decided the UPS guy had delivered it to one of my neighbors by mistake, and put it out of my head for the time being. Because if he’d done that, surely whoever he’d mistakenly delivered it to would bring it by, or come over to let us know, right? Right. Riiiiiiight.
Wednesday came and went, and I spent a good part of the day hoping to see someone walk to the door with a big box, but no one ever did. I didn’t worry about it too much, because I had a box of pillows from
Overstock scheduled to be delivered – those for the spud’s bedroom, too, because she hasn’t had new pillows in as long as I can remember – and I figured I’d just catch him when he delivered that box and say, you know, “Yo, motherfucker, what the fuck?”
Only that UPS man is a FAST MOTHERFUCKER, and I was in the kitchen making dinner when he showed up, and I ran for the door but by the time I got it open he was driving away up the street, and I wasn’t about to go chasing after him. So I sat down at my computer and went to the UPS page and was looking for the number, so I could call UPS headquarters and bitch about my missing comforter, when the doorbell rang. I looked out the window and saw a truck in the driveway, a man at our front door, and a box on the ground in front of him.
It appears that UPS had delivered the box to a house with the same number, only on a street with a name that isn’t anything at all like our street name. It wasn’t even near our street. I have no idea what that UPS driver was smoking, but he’d fucked up in a big way.
And this nice, nice, NICE man had gone out of his way to deliver the box to the right address. He said he’d thought about calling UPS, but didn’t think it’d be worth the hassle, that it would just be easier to bring it over himself.
What an awesome guy. I thanked him profusely, he said it was nothing, I thanked him again, and he was on his way.
I have renewed faith in my fellow man.
* * *
So, Liz is going to be here on Sunday. I have no idea what my schedule is going to be like next week and whether I’ll have the time or inclination to update. If I do I will and if not I’ll see you after she leaves. Fair enough?
* * *
The section about the kittens.
I am pleased – nay, THRILLED – to announce that as of last night, every single kitten has used the litter box at least once. When Fred and I were in the room last night, I said “I haven’t seen Edgar or Oy use the litter box yet…” and as if he’d heard me and wanted to prove himself, Edgar went over to the corner and pooped in the litter box. And when he was on his way out of the litter box, Oy climbed in and pooped too!
By god, I think they have the hang of it. They’re all eating kitten food now, too, and nursing as well. I’m sure Mia’s going to wean them in the next few weeks.
They’re getting more playful, too, with the jumping and the running and the climbing. I need to find some stuff to take in there that they can climb on – maybe a scratching post – and maybe some small boxes they can hide in.
This morning Edgar ran at Peanut, who reacted by humping up and running sideways. It was about the funniest thing I’ve ever seen.
By god I love these kittens, can you tell?
Today’s pictures were all taken by Fred. You can tell, because they’re not BLURRY.
Mia was feeling playful last night, and Fred rolled her onto her back.
Miss Flossie, with her usual worried look.
Peanut, creeping slowly over Fred’s leg.
Snoopy gets a cleaning from Mia.
Oy. That’s my leg in the picture – you can’t really tell from this picture, but my legs and arms have tons and tons of little scratches caused by these little monsters.
Fred gives Edgar a belly rub. Edgar pretends not to enjoy it.
* * *
We moved this dresser out into the hallway – Fred didn’t want a bunch of little kittens scratching it up and peeing on it, go figure – and I set this blanket on top of it because I’d just taken it out of the dryer, when Miz Poo spotted it and settled in. I’d say she spends two or three hours of every day hanging out on that blanket, now. I guess I’m going to have to wash it again to get rid of the cat hair!
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