* * * GodDAMN the flies are about to drive me fucking mad. It’s not that the house is swarming with flies, but I’ve usually got one dive-bombing me when I sit at my desk and there’s invariably another one buzzing around in the kitchen. I’ve got fly swatters in both rooms, but I’m not terribly coordinated and I rarely get the goddamn things on the first try. (Miz Poo, upon seeing me pick up a fly swatter and walk toward her, whines and runs away. Like I beat her spoiled ass on a regular basis! I don’t, but I oughta. She deserves it.) Flies, to me, are the nastiest fucking things on earth. I can handle most any kind of bug (which is not to say that I deliberately get close to them or pick them up with my BARE HANDS or anything, but I they don’t usually make me want to take a boiling-hot shower), but the thought of flies flying about my house makes me want to barf. Possibly it’s because when I was a kid, I was ADDICTED to tuna sandwiches, and one day I was making my lunch and I took the container of tuna out of the fridge, and there was a dead fly floating in a pool of mayonnaise, and I do believe I haven’t eaten a tuna sandwich since. The thought makes me nauseous. I can’t even stand the smell of tuna anymore. BLEGH. The flies are worst in and around the chicken coop, not surprisingly. And not surprisingly, I don’t go out to the chicken coop unless I have to. (Did you read that we’ve started getting eggs?) What’s worse is that the fucking flies buzz around slowly and lazily in the heat outside, then they come inside and they’re rejuvenated by the air conditioning, and they turn into speedy little motherfuckers, buzzing around and easily dodging my klutzy attempts to get them with the fly swatter. God, I hate flies. ::shudder::
Also not fond of these. But they tend to keep their distance and not dive-bomb me, so we live in harmony. Unless there’s one in the bathtub, whereupon I direct Fred to either pick it up and take it outside, or kill it. I’m not going near the goddamn thing – you see how LONG their fucking legs are? I don’t want them TOUCHING ME with those things. ::shudder::
The chickens don’t care at all, and he’s not that interested in the chickens, just in being under the coop, where it’s nice and cool. He hung out for ten minutes, then climbed back over the gate and went inside with me when I was done hanging laundry.
3. I took Gilligan and Spanky to the pet store on Friday. They were FREAKED OUT and immediately climbed into the litter box to hide.
Break my heart, why don’tcha?
I don’t know if they’ve been adopted yet – I’m heading out to the pet store in a little while; I’ll report back on them tomorrow.
The last of the pictures I took of them before we left for the pet store are here.
4. The only reason I never separated the kittens – like someone suggested a while back – is because we couldn’t stand the thought of a kitten sitting in the guest bedroom, separated from his or her sibling, all sad and lonely with no one to play with.
We are idiots.
When I got back from taking Spanky and Gilligan to the pet store, I went up to see Maryanne. I brought the carrier in with me, because I like to leave a carrier in the room with the fosters so they’ll get used to its presence, so that when the time comes I can snatch them up and toss them in there and they won’t know what hit ’em. Anyway, I put the carrier down and opened the door. She hopped down off the cat tree, went into the carrier, sniffed the towel where her brothers had so recently been, made a sound of confusion, and licked the towel.
I felt like the most heartless, evil bitch in the world.
And THEN. What did she do? She came over to me to be petted. She came OVER to ME to BE PETTED. On PURPOSE. And she was a little skittish, but she let me pet her. And then she flopped over and made me pet her some more. And then she rubbed against me and purred and meowed. Then, when Tommy tapped at the door to be let in, instead of hissing and running from him like she’d done every single time we let him into the foster room in the past, she ran over to him and rubbed up against him.
It’s a goddamn Christmas miracle in August, is what it is.
We’ve pretty much let her have the run of the house the last few days and she’s been playing and running and meowing (girlfriend has some LUNGS, and plenty to say) and just generally making herself at home. She’s still a bit skittish – she doesn’t like you walking toward her or standing over here – but if you get on her level, she’ll come for some loving. She lets Fred pick her up and hold her, and she and Fred (and Miz Poo!) took a nap together yesterday.
I will never doubt the advice to split up skittish kittens again, I swear it.
“I am a pretty, pretty princess.”
“And I am the Queen, bitch.”
She’s not a lap-sitter, but it’s early days yet. I think she’ll get there!
Someone left a perfectly good cat’s head on the side stoop! (I know y’all KNOW that the rest of Newt is laying (attached to his head) on the second step, but for the idiot (yeah, I know you’re there, Skimmy McDumbass) who thinks that, seriously, there’s a goddamn cat head laying on my stoop and I’m taking a PICTURE of it*, hi. His body is resting (attached to his head) on the second step. It’s a funny picture, see? Ha! Ha! Ha?)
*Oh, ALRIGHT. I think we all know that if someone HAD left a cat head on my side stoop, probably I would have taken a picture of it. I wouldn’t have shared it in my journal, though, ’cause I’m not THAT much of an ass. Bugs? Yes. Cat heads? Not so much.