I have loved the crap out of my web host since I switched over last Fall after a horrifying attempt at hosting our own web sites for several months. Here’s a tip for you if you’re thinking about doing that: if your internet goes down, so do alllllll those sites you’re hosting. When I think about how often our internet service went down when we were with PCL Cable (which was bought out by Knology just before we went screaming to Charter), it makes me mad all over again.
HOWEVER, for the past three Mondays, my sites (which are all hosted on the same damn machine) have been down for a couple of hours. It’s getting on my NERVES, and when I put in a trouble ticket yesterday, I made the subject “It must be Monday.”
They got it fixed – they always do – but OH how it pisses me off. Which, I know, first-world problems and all, but EXCUSE ME, WEB HOST, THERE ARE PEOPLE OUT THERE WHO NEED TO KNOW IF MY FOSTER CAT HAS BIRTHED SOME KITTENS YET!
Also, I usually write my entries the night before and set them to publish at 6 am (my secret is out! Are you horrified?), so that’s why this is going up so damn late.
If you were wondering.
I have an utterly idiotic question that I’m hoping you guys will just answer and not judge me for: is Guinness Extra Stout something I can buy in the grocery store? As I understand it, it’s beer? Is it something I’d find around here, or must I go somewhere special? I’m wanting to make a batch of this, because I sense it’s something Fred would enjoy.
Any tips (or alternate recipes for spicy mustard!) would be appreciated.
I think I mentioned, didn’t I, that I planted radishes, carrots and cabbage last Fall? As it turned out, the radishes were ready to be harvested, but because I’m a dumbass I didn’t harvest them before it got cold out, and they froze. The carrots never got big enough to harvest, and the cabbage didn’t either – in fact, there are three or four cabbages still sitting in the big garden trying valiantly to get big. The winter didn’t kill them, so we’re going to let them grow and see if we can actually harvest a couple of them, which would be pretty neat.
The carrots are still in the raised bed where I planted them, and when I pulled a couple of them up last weekend, there were these tiny little carrots on the end of the stalks. I think I’m going to leave about half of those in the raised bed and see if they grow to harvesting size, and then plant fresh carrot seeds in the other half.
I kind of hoped that maybe the radishes survived the winter, but when I started pulling them up, there was nothing on the end of the stalks but some radish skin; I guess the radishes pretty much composted themselves over the winter.
Okay, enough yammering about the garden. Let’s get to the kittehs.
!!!!!!!!!!!
Last week on Facebook I linked to Barking Deals, which is one of those sites like Groupon or Woot, where they offer daily (actually, I don’t think it’s every single day, but it’s several times a week, at least) deals on dog snacks and toys. At the time, I said “They need to have a site like this for cats.”
WELL HELLO, MEOWING DEALS! Do you hear the beep-beep-beep of the money truck backing up to that web site (not that a truck can actually back up to a web site, since web sites are made of glitter and magic, but you know what I mean.) When I claim poverty in a couple of months, you’ll be able to trace it directly back to this moment.
Love & Hisses now has its own Facebook page, here. If I did it right, you can see it without having a Facebook account or being Facebook friends with me (not that I don’t think you should be FB friends with me, just not everyone wants to be friends with everyone, or so I’ve heard.)
Do you see this face?
And this?
He looks SO relaxed, but we couldn’t lure that boy out of the guest bedroom for anything. I’ve let cats in to visit with him (Alice spent pretty much the entire day in there with him yesterday and Corbie went in several times) and he seems to like seeing them. So when I left the door open yesterday afternoon, I expected he’d be out exploring in no time.
Not so much. In fact, he stayed as far away from that door as he possibly could, and even though I left it wide open for two hours, he stayed on his bed and just watched the cats come and go.
Last night I said to Fred “I think I’m going to just leave the door open all day tomorrow and see if he’ll venture out.” What Fred heard was “Please open the door before you leave for work tomorrow morning and don’t tell me that you’ve done so, so that when I get up, I’ll see the door open and go on a frantic search for Rufus, finally finding him huddled under the couch.”
He’s still under the couch at the moment. If he’s still there in a couple of hours, I’ll pull him out and make sure he knows where his room (ie, the litter box and food bowls) is located. Hopefully he’ll see the other cats running around and won’t be able to stop himself from coming out to play with them.
Oh, Maggie. When you gonna give us those babies?
She certainly likes the belly rubs, but I always feel bad for her when she flops over on her side and I immediately put my hand on her belly to feel the babies moving. She’s more than a baby machine, you know! She has hopes (“You’ll bring me snacks?”) and dreams (“You’ll hold the scratcher so it doesn’t slide while I sharpen my claws?”) too!
“This is so undignified. Just for that, I’m going to hold on to these babies for another week!”
Tommy (left) and Elwood (right) snuggle up for the evening.
Previously
2010: “YOU DIDN’T USE THE COOOOOOOOOOOUPONS?!”
2009: No entry.
2008: No entry.
2007: “What’d you do, come up with some new exercise plan?” he asked.
2006: Why do I feel like an ass all of a sudden?
2005: Damn. He saw through my wily scheme!
2004: She stood and let it sink in, then turned and flounced off.
2003: No entry.
2002: Cat pee, by the way, is the vilest-smelling stuff on this planet.
2001: Don’t you hate it when someone tries to be reasonable in the midst of your tightly choreographed hissy fit?
2000: “Of course they do, they like soft toilet paper. It’s the mafia, babe!”
You should be able to get guinness at a larger supermarket wherever else you get beer, it may be in the chiller. The draught version in cans is the one I drink when I am in the states but you can also buy it in bottles which may suit your needs better, I am fairly sure we got it in walmart when in NM and from target in iowa x
I found some Extra Stout (last batch!) in Kroger on St. Patty’s Day. There’s a good corned beef recipe on the Allrecipes site that uses a bottle/can of Guiness, btw. And yes, it’s beer.
Dear gawd, it looks like she swallowed a cantaloupe. That canNOT be comfortable.
That mustard recipe sounds delish and we love us some Guinness all up in this house. Well, hunny loves it with a burning passion and while I love dark beer, Guinness is too smooth and creamy for me. It will do in a pinch… I’m weird, I like beer that bites back, hehe. Hey! I’m from Wisconsin, beer loving is in our DNA. Like noo and Elizabeth says, check the chiller section of your grocery store, you should find it.
C’mon Maggie, you need to be birthin those babies!
Jeez, Maggie! Looks very uncomfortable. My last momma cat, Bitty Kitty, had 7 kittens and she is a smallish cat. Still have her with me; I’m a sucker for rescuing the mommas cause I feel they’ve been through enough trauma after birthing kittehs. Once they’re spayed, they live the high life here, I’m telling you! LOL Maybe you should have a poll and let us guess how many beebees Maggie will have.
How good of you to schedule your updates that way! I get to work at 7:00, check to make sure all my data loads worked last night, and then read Robyn over my coffee. Your dependability makes my day!
Yay! Your site is back up!! I thought it was my internet provider being an asshole and I kept refreshing and refreshing. Then I took a nap. 😀
“since web sites are made of glitter and magic” <—made me laugh!
Come on Maggie… We want some kittehs!
Tommy and Elwood: adorbs!
So happy to see your site is finally up! I was wondering if you were sending virtual wasps to your host while it was down 🙂
I love how Rufus is touching his back paws together in that second picture. So adorable.
There’s also a REALLLLLY good chocolate cake recipe that uses a bottle of Guinness.
Oh MY! Rufus is so handsome! I think he’s just a content boy who isn’t a curious cat. Some just have that lazy personality. And Maggie seriously needs to pop. Down there in Alabama do you have kitten season or is it pretty much year round? I’m in PA and volunteer at a no kill shelter, doing floor shifts for the resident cats and intakes for the new ones. We are about to hit major kitten season, we’ve already had some pregnant(about to pop) females come in but we get a break from December thru March when it’s too cold and snowy. We have a foster program too but I’m a failed foster, took in one and he never left and we’ve capped the house limit at four.
It’s mostly year-round down here, but the number of kittens slacks off over the winter and then it ramps back up this time of year.
Is Fred in fucking shorts already?! Is it warm enough there for fucking shorts! I hate you guys. Until babies you know, but until then…
He is in shorts already, but you should keep in mind that he usually wears shorts all year round, even when it’s 30 degrees outside.
On the other hand, I’m the wimpiest of wimps, and I was wearing shorts today ’cause it got close to 80 in the middle of the day. 🙂
Guiness should be available anywhere they sell beer, but sometimes I have a harder time finding it in the summer.
Glad to see you up and running again. Like everyone else I missed my bitchypoo fix and wondered about the kitten birthing status. Luckily facebook had updates! I feel for shy guy Rufus. He’s such a handsome boy. I never realized Tommy had colors other than black. Is he a tortie? He looks a bit like my Elphaba.
We had really warm weather last Friday here in NJ and it got like 50 degrees colder Saturday night. Hate that crap I was freezing after that. Calling for snow showers tonight. Mother nature is messing with everyone but some much worse. Feel a little guilty bitching but will do it anyway.
Not fond of drinking beer but would like to try some recipies with it. It’s really tastes great when I cook brats in it. I’ve used dark beer for that. A local Polish butcher told me to cook his fresh kielbasa in beer. I asked if dark was OK and he said, “No! Your husband must be Irish.” He is-half anyway. Made me laugh.
No, Tommy’s completely black (and Elwood’s completely gray). Any other colors are just a trick of the lighting. It was night, and the only light was a lamp off in the corner.
I’ve never liked beer (except when I was a teenager and drank Michelob Light because it tasted the least like beer. Heh.), so I assumed I wouldn’t want to cook with it. Obviously I need to give it a try!
I saw this and thought you’d like it.
http://www.stitchpoint.com/eng/tool/alph/cross-stitch-writing-tool.php#