6/24/05

reading: The Innocent, by Harlan Coben. Finished last night: Fat Girl. I don’t know, I can’t put my finger on it, but I just didn’t care for that book. Part of it is that I have no patience with long passages of lovingly-described food – it bores the shit out of me, to be honest, which is probably not what you would expect from a lifelong fat chick – and part of it is that it’s such a fucking downer of a book, and part of it is that my heart has not the ability to bleed for someone who’s always struggled with their weight yet has never crossed the 200-pound mark. I guess that’s my own personal prejudice, and I know that the struggle’s the same whether you need to lose 20 pounds or 200, I do intellectually understand and accept that, but in my heart I just can’t cry for someone who talks about how grossly obese they are when I outweigh them by 50 or 100 pounds or more. Because I think, “If that’s what you think about yourself, what on god’s green earth must you think to yourself about ME?” (And I know that the answer to that is probably “I think nothing at all about you, because you are NOT the center of the universe, even though you APPARENTLY think you are, and are under the impression that all everyone ever does is think about YOU.”, but I think we can all agree that the truth is that I’m the center of my universe, and so I think I should be the center of YOUR universe, even though YOU are the center of your universe, and SHE is the center of HER universe, and so on and so forth.) My beloved Andrew Vachss gave this book a rave, though, so perhaps I’m blinded by my own prejudices. In fact, I’m sure I am. But I’m not giving the book another shot – I’m going to release it into the wild one of these days so that someone else can give it a loving home.

* * * From my comments: Robyn, here is a non-cat question. You had mentioned you have read Marian Keyes & Anna Maxted – can you suggest any other similiar (fun, fluffy, Brit, chick lit) authors I can check out. I have exhausted all Keyes & Maxted’s books and now I am bored! Thanks. I’m going to throw this one to the rest of my readers, because honestly no one else is coming to mind, though I KNOW there are more authors out there. I just can’t think of them at the minute. If you have a suggestion for Natalie, leave a comment, eh? Robyn did you read Metro Girl by Janet Evanovich? Do you know if this is going to be a new series and when the next comes out? Have you read Eleven on Top yet? I did read Metro Girl, and I wasn’t sure if this was going to be a new series or not, so I checked out Janet Evanovich’s page, and stumbled on her tour and release dates page. According to that, Motor Mouth(Metro Girl #2) is coming out next March, so it does appear that it’s going to be a new series. Yay! I haven’t read Eleven on Top yet, only because I’m waiting for it to arrive – I ordered it from the book club I belong to. I’m definitely looking forward to it, though! That Janet Evanovich is one hard-working woman, isn’t she? * * * The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that local governments may seize people’s homes and businesses — even against their will — for private economic development. For the record, that’s the sort of thing that gives me a fucking stroke. LOCAL GOVERNMENT can seize your home for PRIVATE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT. Joe-Bob Dumfuck can decide a Wal-Mart would look right nice where your house happens to stand (yes, I’m simplifying – BUT PROBABLY NOT BY MUCH), and you haven’t got a goddamn legal leg to stand on. I’d say this country is going to hell, but that handbasket sailed a loooooong time ago. * * * Fred sent me an email yesterday letting me know that it appears the former Judge Roy “I am a law unto myself” Moore will be running for governor. Then he said we might have to move out of the state if that happens. That bastard, he just looooves to tease me. Think I could convince him to move to Maine? There are no poisonous snakes in Maine, you know. At least not ’til Fred shows up and they follow him into the state, that is. * * * There are four things I really hate doing when I’m sitting at my desk. The first is keeping our checkbook (which I keep in Quicken) up to date. We use our debit cards an absolute criminal amount, never save receipts, and having to sit and figure out what’s been entered already and what hasn’t is a huge pain in the ass. The second thing I hate doing is paying bills, which is why our absolutely stellar credit status shocked me so much when we refinanced the house a few months ago. I know it’ll only take me a few minutes to write a check or move the money online, but day after day I think “I need to pay bills”, then “Eh. I’ll do that later.” and never get around to it until the day I force myself to sit down and get it done. Our bills are very rarely paid late, but it’s not uncommon for me to run to the post office at the last minute to mail off a payment or stop by the bank to make a credit card payment. The third thing I can’t stand doing is cleaning off my desk. I always have piles of shit everywhere (though I can’t blame my lack of bill-paying on that. I’ve TRIED, but I can’t bullshit myself, much as I try.) and it’s always a pain in the ass to find anything, but I’d rather just let the piles grow taller and taller and yell at Mister Boogers when he gaums* around on my desk and knocks shit over. It isn’t until I’m pissed off enough to do something about it – like when Mister Boogers knocks the same pile of shit over six times in a row – that I actually DO something about it. And the fourth? Email. I love getting email, love reading it, love pondering the questions you ask, the advice you give, but answering? Um, yeah. Not so hot at that. Which you know if you’ve EVER emailed me. So on Sunday, I came up with a brilliant idea. BRILLIANT. This brilliant idea is that I can stand just about anything for five minutes. And so, I suggested to myself, why not start a five-minute dealie once a day where I spend five minutes doing one of the four things I loathe doing so much, or a little of each of the four things for five minutes, and when the five minutes is up, I go on my merry way, guilt-free, to surf to my heart’s desire. I attempted the five-minute dealie almost as soon as I thought of it on Sunday afternoon, and ended up spending half an hour paying bills and balancing the checkbook. Good enough. I mean, after all, the rule is that I CAN give up after five minutes, not that I MUST. Monday afternoon I spent five minutes cleaning off my desk, and even went and got the spray bottle of ammonia and scrubbed the surface of my desk where I rest my arms most of the time, and let me tell YOU, that was one nasty, dirty desk. Tuesday, I completely forgot about the five-minute dealie until Fred had gone off to bed and I was settling in with my book. I groaned and fussed, then forced myself to come downstairs, where I spent five-ish minutes checking our checking account online to make sure the debit card hadn’t been used since the last time I looked on Sunday (it hadn’t), threw a few pieces of paper from my desktop to the trash, answered an email that had been sitting in my inbox for six weeks (I suck), and went back upstairs to read. Wednesday, I spent about a minute and a half rearranging the pens in my “How much shit could a dipshit dip if a dipshit could dip shit?” mug, and filed a couple of bank statements. Thursday? No five-minute dealie. No two-minute dealie. No ONE-minute dealie. No dealie at all. I couldn’t even make it an entire week. I am the lamest lame-o that ever lamed. *According to dictionary.com, “gaum” is defined as “To smudge or smear.”, but my mother always used it as a substitution for “klutz” or “klutzy” – ie, “What a gaum.” I think it works well in the sentence “…when he gaums around on my desk and knocks shit over”, don’t you? * * * PS: Did you know that Guam is developing new tourist attractions? I would SO love to go back to Guam someday – did I ever mention that we lived there for two years when I was a kid? I could go back and smack myself for not appreciating the beauty of the place, but that’s just not the sort of thing an 8 year-old does, I guess. PPS: Psst! Fred: Guam covers an area of 212 square miles (549 square km), and is about 30 miles (48.39 km) in length with a width of 8 1/2 miles (13.71 km) at the northern tip and a maximum width in the south of 11 1/2 miles (remember when we were talking about it the other night?) PPPS: Psst! Fred: There’s apparently a big snake problem on Guam. Also, there’s hiking. Lots of it. Lots of difficult hiking. Isn’t it too bad it’s 20ish hours away by plane? PPPS: I only bring this stuff about Guam up because when I Googled “gaum”, the ever-helpful Google suggested that I might be a dumbass and possibly what I REALLY meant to type was “guam.” * * * The kitten section. The kittens are exactly two months old today. My lord, I’m such an idiot. In the mornings when I go into the cat room, I tend to leave the door to the room open, because the big cardboard box is there blocking Mia and the babies from the rest of the house, and they like to run out there and sniff around, and rather than chase them back into the room, I let them stay out there for a little while if they want to. What’s the harm, right? Well, this morning I heard a loud thump and when I went to investigate, I found that one of the kittens had figured out that he could pull the cardboard away from the wall a little, and slip through to the other side. I was a bit freaked out that Mia might try to run through the gap – though she was flopped over on her side and wasn’t even paying attention to what her kittens were doing – and so I picked up the can of compressed air that I leave sitting right by the door, and I herded Mia and whichever kittens were in the cardboard area back into the cat room. I shut the door and then went after the kitten who had escaped, who happened to be Oy. He might be little, but he’s smart, that one. So I found Oy in the spud’s bathroom, with Miz Poo sniffing at his butt, and when he turned around to look at her, she hissed and backed up. The reaction of our cats to the kittens – especially Miz Poo and Mister Boogers – is hilarious, because these kittens are a tenth the size of either of them, but they react like they’re seeing the most threatening things ever put on the face of this earth. I grabbed Oy up and took him back into the cat room and stayed for a few more minutes until Edgar pooped in the litter box, then tromped through it, and then bounced across the room to bounce across my leg and leave a big nugget of poop on my pants leg. I can take a hint, plus I had errands to run, so I said goodbye to the kitties (and yes, I ALWAYS say “hello” and “goodbye” the kitties.) and came downstairs. I spent a few minutes checking my mail, made a quick phone call to Fred, and headed for the door. As I was almost to the door, I heard a loud bang from upstairs, and I paused and thought about going to check it out, but then remembered I’d started the washer and decided that was what I’d heard. I went to the bank and the grocery store and then to McDonald’s for a Diet Coke. When I got home I started putting away the groceries, when I heard a loud wailing sound from upstairs. “What the – ?” I said to Miz Poo, who was looking more than a little freaked out. She shrugged at me, and I went upstairs to see what was going on. What was going on was that Snoopy was sitting outside the door to the cat room, every piece of fur on his body fluffed up as far as it could fluff, wailing to be let back in with his family. “What happened, baby?” I said to him, and he turned and saw me, and ran toward me as fast as his little legs could carry him. He was TERRIFIED. I guess it had been fun to wander around for a little while, but when it came down to it, he really wanted to be with his brothers and sisters and his Momma. I took him into the cat room, where he immediately started running around and jumping on his siblings. Then he saw Mia laying on the floor, and he ran over and started trying to nurse. She wasn’t up for that, though, and walked away. He kept following her, until she turned around and smacked him, which is when he decided that the kitten food in the bowls was just fine with him. Poor baby. I don’t know if he got out when Oy escaped and I just didn’t realize it, or if he ran out of the cat room when I was leaving and I didn’t see him, or what. I guess I need to start counting kittens before I leave the cat room, huh? He’s such a Momma’s boy. He follows his Momma around a lot. When he’s not chasing his siblings around, that is. Hugging his Momma. He LURVES his Momma. But Momma can only take so much love before she has to flee the interview premises. Oy is such a sweet little brat. Snoopy grabs for the camera. Don’t mess with Miss Flossie. “You lookin’ at ME?” (Edgar) “You puts your paws in the AYER like you just don’t CAYER!” The damage those kittens do. ]]>