6/25/09 – Thursday

So after Miz Poo drove me nuts all Tuesday night and a good part of Wednesday by howling, whining, and chatting, Fred called the vet to find out that she was likely having a reaction to the medication. One of the side effects of the medication she was on (at least in humans) is that it makes you “talkative”, and I’d say that that’s for sure what was going on with Miz Poo. We stopped the medication, and will go back in a few days to get Elavil for her.

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This has been the week of the spider for me. Monday and Tuesday mornings, I went out to weed the tomato rows. Monday, I was about halfway down the first row of tomatoes, and as I pulled a huge handful of weeds out from under a huge tomato plant, a garden spider the size of my hand came sauntering out.

“What up, bitch?” he said, his 73 eyeballs glittering at me.

“I am not scared of you,” I said, keeping a respectful distance. “For I know you are but a helpful garden spider, hanging out under the plants and eating all the bugs that try to eat my tomatoes. I appreciate that. But now I’m going to use this hand hoe to herd you over to the pepper plants while I finish weeding under the tomatoes, and then you can return home. You might have to rebuild your web, if you have one, though. Sorry ’bout that.”

Then I leaned down and waved my hand hoe behind the spider, and he saw it with his 73 glittering eyes, and he moved in the direction of the pepper plants. I took my eye off him for one second, and he immediately zagged left and began skittering up my boot.

I reacted calmly, of course. I mean, it’s only a SPIDER.

The size of my hand.

With 73 glittering eyeballs.

Making a sound of horror, I flailed about, threw my hand hoe at my boot, and danced a getitoffme! GETITOFFME! jig. The spider landed near a pepper plant and rolled his eyeballs at me (which took some time, as you can imagine). I looked around to make sure that no one had seen me, wiped off the gash the hand hoe had left in my shin, and went back to weeding. The spider stayed under his pepper plant for a long time (I kept an eye on him), then disappeared. Maybe he was looking for friendlier pastures.

Tuesday morning I was walking across the yard toward the gate, on my way to the garden, when I glanced over at the cement pad and saw Tommy sitting there, watching something with interest. I went over to see what it was, and saw a beetle, the size of my thumb. It was caught up in a web, and as Tommy and I watched, a jet-black spider came sauntering out from under the metal hanging over the side of the cement pad, and began doing whatever the hell spiders do to their prey.

I waited until I saw the red hourglass shape on its abdomen, but I was pretty certain from the first glimpse that I was looking at a black widow. They are so fucking EVIL looking, those spiders. Once I saw the red hourglass, I kicked at it with my boot. I managed to miss the black widow completely, but I crushed the beetle and put it out of its misery. The black widow ran off and hid for a moment, then came rushing back out to see what the hell was going on.

Whereupon I crushed it with my boot.

Black widows like to hide under things, and I think what we need to do is pull up all the metal around the cement pad so that we don’t get a damn colony of them hiding under there. (Although I actually think that black widows are pretty solitary creatures.)

I’m sure tomorrow morning I’ll wake up and find a brown recluse on my freakin’ pillow or something.

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Regarding the Gosselins (ie, Jon and Kate Plus Eight).

I have to say that I was kind of surprised to find that Jon and Kate Gosselin really are divorcing. I half expected they’d sucker everyone in with their ads about “Jon and Kate have made a decision!”, and then there would be Jon and Kate, all cozy on the interview couch, holding hands and talking about how they’ve started counseling. It’s disappointing that they’re divorcing, because obviously you want people to stay together, and you’d hope that the kids would be enough of an incentive for them to work through their issues.

I think that Kate is very sad about the split up, that she’s still working through it, and that Jon checked out a long time ago. I get the feeling that he’s ready to par-tay, and I expect to see lots of pictures of him partying it up with 21 year-olds.

(Earrings on Jon: Not a good look. Some men can carry it off. He’s not one of them.)

Also, I dearly wish Aunt Jodi and skeevy Uncle Kevin would shut their fucking faces instead of sounding off about every move Jon and Kate make.

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Annnnd regarding the NJ Housewives, Reunion Part 1 (and I’m sorry, how ridiculous is it that they’re splitting the reunions into two parts now? Don’t get me wrong, I can’t wait to see Part 2 tonight!).

Warning: Possible spoilers within.

I don’t know that that reunion was all that exciting – although it certainly looks like tomorrow night’s is going to involve everyone ganging up on Danielle.

While I understand Teresa’s defense of Joe (that he’s not homophobic and that he’s not “like that”, why some of his best friends are gay!) I know that I grew up saying “That’s gay” and “you’re so gay” and certainly NOT meaning anything homophobic by it. It’s sometimes a knee-jerk reaction on my part to reach for those phrases just because I grew up hearing and saying them for so many years, and you can train yourself to not say things like that, but you can’t stop them from coming to mind.

BUT. I also know BETTER THAN TO SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT WITH THE FREAKIN’ CAMERAS AROUND and in front of complete strangers. I’m glad Teresa apologized for him. Also – bless her heart, that woman has a disconnect between her brain and her mouth. “Cleansiness?” Wha-? Also, Teresa’s not invited over to my house anytime soon because I’m sure the state of my house (can’t remember the last time I cleaned the floors!) would horrify her. She’d probably start itching two inches inside the door.

Danielle looked like she’d rather be scrubbing Teresa’s floors with a toothbrush than be at that reunion. She didn’t have much to say, did she? And is it just me, or is her color odd? Too much fake tan? I wish someone had called her on her “I’ve never had plastic surgery aside from the bubbies!”, because come ON. She’s had at the very least an eye lift if not a face lift. Eyebrows don’t get hiked up that high by Mother Nature.

I like that Dina addressed the fact that her husband has no desire to be on the show. I don’t remember much about what Dina had to say, actually. She certainly is pretty, and I’ll reiterate – she SO looks like a young Lorraine Bracco.

Jacqueline and the crying over the miscarriages – I felt bad for her. You KNOW Bravo was hoping like hell she’d go into labor during the reunion. I’m surprised they didn’t tell her to call them when her water broke so they could do the reunion on the way to the hospital! Was it just me, or did she spend a lot of time NOT looking at Danielle?

Caroline just scares the hell out of me. She is the most intense little spitfire I’ve ever seen. I will never never mess with her family, she would fuck me UP. So sad to hear about her father in law (did you get the impression that Dina didn’t want to talk about that topic? She tried to change the topic a few times.). I’m anxious to see what has her teary-eyed in part 2 of the reunion! I get how tired they all are of hearing the mafia question, but COME ON – maybe the Manzos aren’t mobbed up, but five bucks says Teresa’s husband is!

Okay, that’s all I can think of. I wonder why they wouldn’t disclose where they were having the reunion? It’s not like it was airing live.

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The babies are back from their spaying & neutering/ id chipping/ rabies shots none the worse for wear. Phyllis was a little cranky last night (as the tiniest of the three, I think she feels a little more discomfort from the id chip and the rabies shot – plus let us not forget that her spaying was a more major surgery than the boys’ neutering. They might disagree with that, though.), and Creed spent the evening sleeping on Fred’s lap, but this morning they’re racing around as if nothing ever happened.

They need their second vaccination shots (which will be either today or tomorrow), and then it’s just a matter of waiting their turn ’til space opens up at PetSmart. There’s a flood of kittens right now, so it could be soon, or it could be a few weeks. All depends on where we are in the queue, and how fast adoptions go!

Gone campin’.

Dwight enjoys hanging off the cat tree.

“Daaaaang, woman, you desperately need a pedicure!”

Princess Phyllis.

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Smilin’ Joe.

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Previously
2008: I know, I’m lame. But you’ve gotta have priorities!
2007: Three times in the course of an hour, the same conversation, word-for-word, I swear it.
2006: No entry.
2005: I’d say this country is going to hell, but that handbasket sailed a loooooong time ago.
2004: Yes. Robyn DID recently learn how to do popup windows. Why do you ask?
2003: Do I LOOK like an outside kinda gal?
2002: Which is when I realized that I’d actually dreamed the conversation and hug and kiss.
2001: No entry.
2000: No entry.