Keith and the Girl podcast (they always totally crack me up), then came home, had breakfast, took a shower, and headed off to the dentist. My teeth were looking okay this time around, according to the hygienist, except that I need to pay special attention to a couple of teeth in the front, on top, because in my usual sloppy, lackadaisical way I’ve not brushed them enough, and the gums are inflamed around those two teeth. So she was cleaning my teeth and she said “How long have you had that spot on your tongue?”, and I said “I have a spot on my tongue?” – in other words, I have no idea how long it’s been there. She got out the hand-held mirror and showed it to me, and I just basically kind of shrugged and said “I dunno!” So she measured it with her metal torturing pointy tool of satan, and told me it’s about 3 mm across. “Hmm,” I said, like that meant something to me. She quizzed me about whether or not it was painful or tender (no to both), and then said she was going to take a picture of it for their records so that if it’s still there when I go back in four months they’d have a baseline picture to go by. She told me, trying to be reassuring, that perhaps it was just an inflamed tastebud, but before I left one of the dentists wandered by and she grabbed him and asked him to take a look at it. He said he thought it was a – I might have this word wrong, it’s been almost a day since he said it – fibroma, and nothing to worry about. I think they’re liars. I think it’s tongue cancer, and they’re going to have to remove my entire tongue. AND THAT WILL SUCK. Then I was off to the pet store (not the one I volunteer at, another one) to buy a couple of small bags of Natural Balance cat food at the suggestion of a reader (Hi, Susan!), who had a cat with a swollen-lipped problem like Miz Poo, and Susan used the magic words “less litterbox bulk, and less toxic stank” and I was SOLD on the idea of giving the Natural Balance cat food a try, because anything that will reduce bulk and stank in the litter area is going to be A-OK with me. Here’s hoping it works! I left the pet store and headed to Sam’s, because I was out of Mr. Clean Magic Erasers, which I use for absolutely EVERYTHING (a couple of people recommended that I try one on the walls in the living room when I was bitching about the state of them last week, and I would, except that the stain that annoyed me the most was comprised of oil – a great big mouthful Miz Poo spit out on the wall a few years ago – and Mr. Clean’s erasers might be magic, but they ain’t THAT magic, trust me). I KNOW I’ve gotten the magic erasers at Sam’s before, but to my dismay there were no magic sponges to be seen anywhere, so I had to content myself with buying a big box of microwave popcorn for Fred and the spud and a huge-ass box of trash bags just because I like to live life on the edge. Also, you just can’t possibly ever have enough trash bags in the house. From Sam’s I went to the mall, because I was a woman on a mission. See, these days I wear pants without pockets, and if I use something – like a pair of nail clippers – that I need to remember to bring back upstairs with me to put away and I have no pockets, I stick it in my bra. And the day I realized that I’d been wandering around the house with a pair of nail clippers in my bra (because of course I immediately forgot I’d put them there) and hadn’t remembered until I took my bra off when I was getting ready for bed is the day I realized I needed to go shopping for new bras. And there’s a Lane Bryant at the mall, and Lane Bryant is where I currently get my bras, because Victoria’s Secret doesn’t carry bras in my size just yet. So I get to the mall and I walk inside.. and Lane Bryant isn’t where it’s always been. They’re doing some work on the inside of the mall and I thought perhaps Lane Bryant had moved, so I walked around the entire mall looking for it, and it was nowhere to be seen. I remembered that there was a Lane Bryant near Target so I decided to go there, but first I had to stop at Yankee Candles and see what I could find on sale. I ended up with an air freshener for my car (grapefruit-something scented) and a bunch of wall plug-in refills. I LOVE the Lemon Zest scent and for that matter Fred and the spud like it too, so that’s a bonus. Anyway, I headed for the other (I guess “the only”, now) Lane Bryant, and must have spent forty-five minutes browsing. First I had to try on bras to see what size I’m wearing now (I’ve gone down three band sizes since the surgery, but the cup size has stayed the same) and then I was looking through the shirts on sale and decided to try one on and I liked (!) the way I looked in it so much that I ended up getting two of them, one in blue and one in yellow. I had a hell of a time finding six bras in my size, but finally did. Now I’ve got bras that fit, at least for a little while, and I can get rid of the old ones! I was going to just go straight home from there, but I passed Bed, Bath and Beyond and decided to go in and see what I could find for a shelf unit to go over the toilet in the downstairs bathroom. And I ended up standing there dithering for at least half an hour. What I really wanted was a unit with doors on it so that I could put things like tampons in there and then shut the door so people – like the carpet guy who used the bathroom yesterday morning and shat it up* – wouldn’t necessarily come face-to-face with my tampons. But the shelf unit with doors that came with the bottom part that straddles the toilet top – for want of a better description – was $129 (more than I wanted to spend), and the shelf unit I really liked with doors that closed didn’t come with a part that straddles the toilet and Fred would have had to hang it over the toilet and that would require finding studs to hang it from, and you just KNOW that there aren’t studs centered over the damn toilet. And I dithered and dithered and dithered some more, and then I finally did “eenie meenie minie moe”, which I fucked up because I couldn’t remember the words, but in any case even after the eenieing and the meenieing, I still dithered some more until finally I checked the clock on my cell phone and realized it was 1:30 and I’d left the house three hours earlier, and I could either make a fucking decision or throw myself off the nearest bridge, because I was tromping all OVER my own nerves. So I decided on an open spacesaver/ shelf unit (similar to this, but not that one) and decided I’d worry about the whole tampon thing later. Like I have SO many people in my house, using that bathroom, that I even have to worry about shielding their tender eyes from my tampons, right? But, still. I worry because I am a freak. And I’ve decided that a lovely decorative basket would be JUST the ticket to hide my tampons from the public. Problem solved! And THEN I left there and had to stop at the grocery store on my way home to pick up a prescription and some baby spinach (I support the torture and eating of innocent baby spinaches) and by the time I got home and hauled everything inside, it was past lunch time and I was STARVING. So I made lunch and ate it while talking to my sister on the phone, and the next thing I knew it was after 3:00 and Fred was calling to tell me he was on his way home. Shows are piling up on the DVR like mad. I’m going to need to schedule myself a tv-watching day or two so we don’t run out of space. *I don’t care if strangers go Number Two in my bathroom – hell, everyone! Come on over for a poop! – but for the love of GOD, people, flush twice! I don’t want to walk into my bathroom and come face to face with poop dust in the bottom of the bowl!
::lick::
::lick::
“WHAT?”
Brudderly love.
1. Thanks for telling us about Keith & the Girl. They crack me up!
2. When we moved into our new house, we’d just been in for just a few days when we had a worker guy in the house. At some point he asked if he could use the restroom. I said sure and pointed him to the bath down the hall. It’s the bathroom everyone uses on the bottom floor of the house – small with a door to outside (for use if we had a pool) with a small window in the door. At the time we didn’t have blinds on the window yet, but the window faces our very private backyard, and while sitting on the toilet, you cannot even see the window. The guy refused to use that bathroom, saying “But someone might see me.” Ooookay… So he went upstairs and proceeded to take the biggest, smelliest dump in a bathroom WE hadn’t even pooped in yet. The whole thing really irritated the hell out of me.
’round these parts, we call em ‘Poop Flakes’…
Oh gawd, we had a worker use my girls’ bathroom and it smelled so bad I started gagging in the hallway. I cleaned the entire bathroom top to bottom before I allowed my kids back in there, because it just smelled so toxic.
As far as tampons go, in the master bath I tear the tops off the boxes and put a few boxes in a basket on the back of the toilet. In the guest bath, which I end up using a lot and need supplies in, I have a smallish decorative tin to keep about 20 tampons. I’ve also used a wicker index card box in there too. I have above-toilet cabinetry, but I just like having everything where I can reach it.
I care deeply if strangers poop in my bathroom. It’s not right! People should poop AT HOME. Regulate your damn bowels, people.
Hiya Robyn,
Check out this over-toilet thingy I got at Wal-Mart. It cost $49.99 on sale & required assembly. BUT it was easy enough that I was able to do it myself (with some help to bolt it to the wall after). I also have a 3 drawer plastic rolling thingy that I keep out-of-sight stuff in. Here’s a pic: http://www.flickr.com/photos/47341438@N00/108546500/
Of course this may just annoy you as you’ve already bought something. Sorry? 🙂
Shortly after I had moved into my first home, I was having the carpet installed, phone installed, and satellite installed all at once. The carpet guys had to crank the heat up to over 95F in order for the carpet to set correctly, the phone guy was trying to work around the carpet guys, and the satellite guy came inside to shit and somehow managed to clog up the toilet (and walked out without telling me). A hot house will quickly inform you when you there is unflushed feces. I had to wait for the phone guy to finish so I could call my friends to bring me a plunger.
Kathy: Actually, we’re going to need another one for the upstairs bathroom, and I think that one will fit the bill nicely!
*snicker*….”poop flakes”…that’s just the best.
Oh see I’m mean, I’d tell worker man to go find a public toilet to use or shit his pants. Cause a complete stranger using my toilet just skeeves me out! ::Shudder::
One time the telephone guy asked to use my bathroom and when I went in there later he had peed all over the seat and the floor. It was so gross cleaning it up. It really pissed me off (ha ha) because my husband always cleans up after himself if he accidently sprinkles.
Hey, Robyn, when are we going to see some before and after pictures of you?
We call ’em crumbs, as in “Damn, man, you left crumbs in the toilet! You’re nasty!”
I once clogged my not-yet-stepdad’s toilet when he wasn’t home, and ended up having to drive to the hardware store to buy a plunger AND do a load of towel laundry. Yeah, I try to eat more fiber now.
Let us know how the new cat food works! My 2 cats have IAMs right now and I swear there are times I have to leave the house when they are using the box! Do you know if it comes in a hairball remedy?
Jeanette: Around the 30th of this month – they’ll be over at onefatbitchypoo, but I’ll try to remember to link to it from here.
E in WI: I didn’t see a hairball remedy, no.
Hi there… What are those collars around the kitties’ necks? I ask because one of them looked like it had a little box on it, so I was wondering if it was some kind of pest deterrent (ie: fleas). Just wondering ’cause nothing seems to be working for my kitty.
Heh. Poop dust!!! I love it. I can’t wait until I can scold my husband for leaving poop dust around. I like poop flakes too. I’ll break that one out in a few months when we are sick of poop dust.
Hey, do you paint the cats’ fingernails?!?
Are those little boxes around the cats’ necks remote control boxes so your cats are battery operated?
I’ve tried searching your site, but can you tell me what kind of lemon zest stuff you use?
Pumpkin: Yankee Candles Home Air Freshener refills, seen here.
Michele: They’re electric fence collars, so they can’t get out of the back yard.
Better to have them use the toilet than the bushes outside. A friend and his son own a landscape company with no access to toilets unless they are on the road. One time the son really had to go #2. Did so in the mulch behind some bushes. He dug a hole and covered when he was done. The owner, this is a multi-million dollar home, let their white dog out to run in the yard. Guess where the dog rolled? Yup, in the dug up poop the son left. EWWWWW!
I’ve done the “keys in my bra” thing when I’ve been outside working in the flower garden and the house is locked (houses in our neighborhood have had unwelcome ‘guests’when they’ve been in the back yard with doors unlocked) — then discovered when I went back to the house that the keys were no longer in my bra. That necessitated rooting around the flowers and shrubs and the garden to find where the keys had dropped out! As there is substantial. . . uh. . flesh there, I’m not sure how that happened!
We call them “crumbs” in my house, lol.
Go ahead and get the cabinet that bolts to the wall. The studs don’t have to be exactly centered over the toilet for you to hang the cabinet. You just need to find a couple of them, by using a stud finder, and screw through the back rail of the cabinet (not the thin back of the cabinet, the horizontal rail inside–should be about 5/8 to 3/4 of an inch thick). Studs are usually 16 inches apart, center-to-center, and toilets require 30 inches of room, so you’ve got to have a couple studs hiding behind there!
Hey Robyn, I think you need to just integrate a little explainer linky thingy in to your template so you don’t forget to put the links to “HERE is the explanation for the collars, and HERE is the link to what the deal is with the cats nails is.”
What was this, like the FIRST picture where you didn’t have those links posted with the explanations and someone comes along and asks? Heh…
~Juby (just a lurker)
“Skid marks” here……….
Natural Balance is great cat/dog food and one of the few I recommend to other people who don’t want to feed a raw diet like I do.
Better yet, all animals I’ve introduced it to will eat it.