Fostering – Page 91

2/16/07

peritoneal lavage*, I got very confused. Turns out I was mixing up theperitoneum and the perineum and couldn’t figure out why they’d need to do THAT. (I did know what “lavage” was, though – washing something out. Just call me Robyn And3rson, GMD**.) 3. That little speech Izzy gave? I’m sorry, no. It was self-serving crap and I think George should have slapped the fuck out of her. The attitude she has toward Callie just annoys the motherfucking fuck out of me and makes her look like a spoiled bitchy bitch and it drives me nuts. NUTS, I SAY. 4. You think after this year lightbulbs are going to pop on over everyone’s head and people are going to start avoiding Meredith in February (see last year re: bomb killing the very hot hot hottie Kyle Chandler (whom I will always think of as the very hot hot hottie Jeff from Homefront, hmmm. Kyle Chandler playing two hot hot hotties. What are the chances? He’s typecast!) bomb guy)? Or will it take one more year? *Upon reading about what exactly a peritoneal lavage entails, I do not believe it was indicated in this instance, and was just Addison throwing around big words trying to impress us. I love Addison, but NOT IMPRESSED, Dr. Montgomery. Step aside and let Dr. Robyn slap some life back into that milquetoast annoyance they call Meredith Grey in this strange TV land of apparently blind men who cannot stop drooling over her for some (“Rescue me! I’m a sad little practically-orphaned waif, adrift in this cold, cruel world, wahhh! Save me! Pity me!”) reason. **Google MD, of course.

* * * Remember when I was going to make a .wav for y’all of me imitating what Myrtle sounded like when she went into Hellbeast mode? Well, I taped myself imitating her, but I can’t get the camera to let me download what I taped (I need to download drivers or something), so in the meantime, here’s pretty much what she sounded like, courtesy of reader Debbie, who sent me the link.

Myrtle maybe didn’t do it for quite so long, but the ferocity and the creepiness (imagine sitting at your desk in a silent house and hearing something like that!) are strikingly similar. * * * BobPod continues to hang on, kind of. I tried all the stuff y’all suggested (except for the banging it against something, which I’m saving for the very last thing to try) and nada. When I hook BobPod to the computer, iPod doesn’t “see” him and BobPod just sits there with the Apple logo staring sadly up at me. I think he might be brain dead. I keep hoping he might come back to life on his own, but I don’t see that happening. I guess I’m going to see about taking him to the Apple store and see if they can fix his sorry little ass. Come back to me, BobPod. I NEEEEEEED YOU! * * * I left the house a few minutes after 8 yesterday morning and didn’t get back home until almost noon. First I had to drive out almost to the Tennessee border to drop Joe Bob off at the vet. Joe Bob wasn’t thrilled with that, but he did give me the Love Eyes when I stuck my finger in the carrier (more on how I got him INTO the carrier in a minute), so hopefully he’ll forgive me. Then I drove back to Madison to hit the T-Mobile store, because although my cell phone has a camera in it and I can take pictures with it, if I try to email or send the pictures anywhere, I get an error message. I didn’t get the phone from T-Mobile, so I guess there’s something they have to do to make it work? I don’t know. Anyway, I walked in and had to wait and wait and wait until the two salespeople were done doing whatever they were doing, and I gave the one saleswoman my cell phone number, and then she told me they couldn’t do anything without Fred’s authorization, since the account is in his name. And we will be rectifying THAT little situation tout-de-fucking-suite, believe you me. So I left there and went over to Lowe’s to look at their cleaning stuff, because I had hoped there’d be something in the cleaning aisle that would take paint off windows and mirrors with no elbow grease from me. I didn’t find anything that fit the bill, but I did find other things I desperately needed, so I bought ’em. From there, I went to the post office to drop off some packages and pick up the mail, then over to Wal-Mart to do a little looking around. The clothes I’ve been wearing out at the new house to paint and clean in have gotten absolutely coated with paint, and there are holes in the ass of the pants, so I wanted to buy some cheap clothes to replace them. A bunch of winter clothes were on sale for $5, so I ended up with a pair of pants, a snarky t-shirt (“I’ll be nicer if you’ll be smarter”) and a flannel shirt to wear over it for less than $20. Woot! From there I went home, chilled out, and spent most of the rest of the day surfing the web and looking sadly at BobPod. A day well spent, I say. * * * So before Joe Bob and I left the house, I naturally needed to get him into the carrier. Joe Bob has himself a very strong go-limp instinct when you grab him by the scruff of the neck, so I knew all I needed to do was grab him and lower him into the carrier. I got up from my desk and went to see where he was. He happened to be walking down the hallway where the cat carrier was sitting (the goddamn things are laying everywhere in this house), so I opened the top of the carrier and turned around to grab him. No fool he, Joe Bob went flying into the living room and hid behind the TV. I used a feather toy to try to coax him out, with no luck, and I tried to lure him out with a laser pointer, and he was not to be lured. Finally, I decided to pull out the big guns, and reeled around the house screeching “Snack Time! Who’s ready for the Snack Time! Snack Time, Boogie!” The cats, who are accustomed to Fred handing out Snack Time, ran in fear from the screeching and were only brought back into the kitchen by the smell of the pouch of treats opening and being dumped onto a plate. The other cats settled in to Snackin’ Time, but Joe Bob was no fool, and he stayed behind the TV until I realized that my hovering above the Snackin’ Time plate was far too obvious, and so I wandered off to get a few tasks done. When I walked back into the kitchen, Joe Bob was bellied up to the Snackin’ Time plate and just starting to eat. I grabbed him up, carried him into the hallway, and put him into the carrier with nary a fight. “But I don’t wanna be in the carrier!” Joe Bob protested, and I lifted up the carrier, speaking soothingly to him as I did so. And then he darted out the front door of the carrier. Because why would it occur to me to check to be sure that the front door was closed? THAT WOULD MAKE SENSE, STUPID. Joe Bob went hauling ass up the stairs, and I stomped and cursed, and then went up after him. Conveniently, he’d run into the master bedroom, so I closed the door and chased him around the room for a few minutes before he went flying into the bathroom to hide in the tub. I shut the bathroom door and chased him back and forth a few times (not easy in a fairly small bathroom, yet somehow we managed it) before he huddled behind the toilet, believing I couldn’t see him, and I grabbed him up and carried him to the carrier. He made one feeble attempt at getting away – he pushed at the carrier with one of his big rabbit-like back feet – but since I had him by the scruff of the neck, I got him in there carrier pretty easily. He didn’t utter a peep on the way to the vet’s office. I guess he didn’t get the Hellbeast gene his sister got. * * * I tried to convince Fred that we should flip this house, but he thinks it’s too small. Hmph.

* * *

Smackdown!

Spot and the Eyes of Lurve.

He’s IN the basket, but he’s not HAPPY about it.

Hatin’ you. * * * Previously 2006: So, in summary, if we are to judge all female cats by Miz Poo, then male cats are nicer, but female cats are clingier. 2005: Don’t you wish I was responsible for your books? 2004: I WANT TO FUCKING KNOW WHAT HE SAID. 2003: No entry. 2002: No entry. 2001.: And almost wet my pants in terror. 2000: So, the nausea continues.]]>

2/15/07

Help Save Rhys From Dying Of Boredom On The PCT!!! Y’all are readers, I know you are. What better to do with your paperbacks than pass them along to a crazy hiking woman? If you want to help, check it out!

* * * I am a murderer. I HAVE KILLED. BobPod, may you rest in peace. I dropped my goddamn iPod while I was at the house yesterday (a sign that the house does not appreciate Keith and the Girl, obviously), and it froze up, and it’s still frozen and nothing I try will get it unfrozen, it’s all frozen up with my KATG goodness locked inside, and I am panicked at the idea of (1) working on the house or (2) exercising without my BobPod. Why, BobPod? WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY? Why have you left me, forlorn and battered, to face this dark world without you? Was it something I did? (“Yes, you stupid bitch, you DROPPED ME, and it wasn’t the first time!”) Please come back to me, BobPod. PLEEEEEEEASE! Any suggestions would be very much appreciated. I cannot spend another 10-hour day at the house without podcasts to listen to, for I will be driven mad without something to take my mind off the tedium of the cleaning and painting and painting and painting and painting some more. HELP ME. * * * So I spent a total of 11 hours at the house yesterday. I got there at 7:30, hoping to get the upper half of the upstairs bathroom painted before the insulation guys arrived (not that I expected they would actually ever really show up), but I realized that I had to do something to protect the lower half of the bathroom from the paint I’d be slinging around as I painted the upper half (note to self: when painting a room two different colors, paint the upper half first next time, dummy), so I took the roll of contractor paper we bought at Lowe’s over the weekend, pulled off thick strips of it, and taped it over the lower half of the bathroom where I’d already painted, and over the freshly tiled shower. I was almost done with the bathroom when the insulation guys showed up. After I was done reeling around the house in shock that the guys had shown up, I showed them where the attic accesses were, and then went downstairs to stay out of the way. I did some painting (and I’d show you what I painted, because it’s too hard to explain, but I am a dumbass who forgot to take her camera with her OF COURSE on a day when there were many things to take pictures of, DAMNIT) and when I was done with my painting an hour later, the insulation guys had come to the conclusion that the “broken” truck was still broken (the truck itself was working, but the part that blows insulation through the big tubes was busted), and that “the boss” had another truck in the area doing other jobs and would try to get them out to the house at some point during the day. I said goodbye to the insulation guys, then went off to eat breakfast and then call my parents, who are in Florida this week, and then went upstairs to start painting the bathroom. Painting the bathroom was a humongous pain in the motherfucking ass. The lower part of the bathroom is composed of beadboard with the lines going vertically, and it wasn’t too much of a pain to paint. The upper half, however, is beadboard with the lines going horizontally, and it was a humongous pain to get the paint in the lines. I had to push really hard on the roller to get the paint to go in the lines, and once I was done doing that with the roller I had to go back over the walls with a brush and get all the spots I had missed. By lunchtime, though, I had gotten two coats of paint on the wall, and decided it looked good enough to leave for the time being. I figured once Fred had the lights installed in that room (I did the whole freakin’ paint job with just the light coming in through the window) I’d go back over the wall with a paint brush and touch up what I’d missed. I decided to hit Sonic for a salad for lunch, grabbed my purse, and headed out the front door. When I walked out the front door, I got a lovely, lovely surprise. Actually, I got a couple of lovely surprises. The first lovely surprise was that there was a fucking DRIFT of insulation across the front and side yards. Apparently what the insulation guys (part one) had done to determine that their truck wasn’t operating properly was to blow fucking insulation all over the yard, then leave without cleaning it the fuck up. I called Fred and bitched at him about it, and he told me he was going to go raise some hell. The second lovely, lovely surprise – after I talked to Fred – was that Maxi was slinking back and forth on the front porch, howling, and when I walked out the door, she excitedly led me to the rocking chair I usually sit in (when it’s not so goddamn cold), underneath which lay a dead mole. And in front of the rocking chair? A mouse head. Just the head, no other body parts. Maxi must REALLY love me, that’s all I have to say about that.

Cold-blooded murderer. Just like ME. I went to Sonic, got my salad, got home, ate my salad, did a little reading (What? I don’t deserve a damn break? YES I DO.) and was about to go back upstairs to tape off the bathroom and paint the trim when Fred called to let me know that the insulation guys were on the way. I went upstairs to pull down the contractor paper I’d left taped to the wall, and was just about done with that when the tile guy showed up. I got out of his way and went downstairs to putty the holes in the shoe molding (ie, quarter-round) Fred had put down on Tuesday. I hadn’t been doing that for long when the insulation guys (part two) showed up. Apparently they hadn’t been informed by the insulation guys (part one) that there was a drift of insulation in the front yard, and they were appropriately aghast that anyone would leave something like that behind. And for the first time in my life when someone profusely apologized, I didn’t say “No, it’s okay!”, because I was rawwwwther ticked off about the whole damn thing. I did, however, graciously say “I appreciate that” when they promised they’d clean up the mess. So I was puttying more shoe molding when one of the insulation guys – I told my sister he looked like Jay from Clerks, but on second look, he really bore more of a resemblance to Tommy Lee (just the face, pervs. I didn’t get a chance – or have the desire – to inquire after further resemblance.) – asked if there was a restroom he could use. I pointed him to it, and he said “Is there tissue in there?” Oh boy. “There sure is,” I said with a smile, then beat it out of there and went to the kitchen (ie, far away from the bathroom) to text my sister that a workman was stankin’ up the joint. See, this is how nice I am. I was working in the computer room, and the bathroom is right off the computer room. I didn’t want Tommy Lee to feel all SELF-CONSCIOUS about stankin’ up my bathroom, so I went a few rooms away so as to make the experience more pleasing for him. And then when I went into the computer room and was about knocked over from the ROTTING STENCH OF A THOUSAND DEAD PEOPLE coming from the bathroom, I wanted to go get a box of matches and light them ALL, but I didn’t want to make him FEEL BAD about the stench he’d left behind, so I covered my nose with my shirt and tried my best to ignore the smell. Until I couldn’t stand it anymore, and went and got the matches, and lit about a hundred of them. (A hundred, or three. One or the other. WHATEVER.) Finally, Fred showed up and I could relax, because when he’d called to tell me that the insulation guys (part two) were on the way, he’d also told me to not pay them until they’d talked to the salesguy, who’d promised that either the guys would clean up the mess, or we’d get a discount on the service. This way, he could deal with the whole messy paying-the-guys stuff, and I could wander off and do mind-numbing tasks that desperately needed doing. Though the insulation guys did an admirable job of attempting to clean up the mess left behind by the first set of guys, they weren’t able to really clean it all up (I think they would have needed some sort of vacuum for that), and so Fred gave the salesguy a call and let him know how very unhappy he was with the whole experience. Fred, who is a genius, has learned that if you express your displeasure with a service, and then keep silent while the man in charge babbles nervously, in the end they’ll generally offer something you want. In this case, we got a 25% discount on the cost of the insulation installation. Happy Valentine’s Day to me!!! Once the insulation guys left, we put up the crown molding in the downstairs bathroom, then Fred went around and measured and cut shoe molding for the front room and kitchen. We ate dinner in there somewhere, and finally left around 6:30. I am NOT going out to the house today, but do have to run Joe Bob to the vet because he’s still straining to pee (though I don’t think he’s blocked, because he’s not distressed, plus he’s actually peeing a tiny bit every time he tries) and after five days of being on Clavam0x and the special food, he should be doing better. I’m dropping him off at the vet for observation and so they can figure out what the hell is going on, and will get him back tomorrow evening. * * * It’s pretty much looking like we’re very close to being done with the renovations, and will be moving me and the cats out to Smallville the first weekend in March, or thereabouts. Can you believe it? FINALLY. * * * My Valentine’s Day was… well, it was pretty much like any other day, because we don’t really go all out for the occasion. I picked up a card and some Dove chocolates for him (dark chocolate, because he loves dark chocolate and I hate it and thus won’t eat it). He gave me a card and a single-serving bag of peanut M&Ms (I ate a few and tossed the rest). Maybe next year we’ll go out to eat or have a date night for Valentine’s Day, but I kinda doubt it – and I’m okay with that. He spoils me rotten 365.25 days a year; I don’t need to be extra spoiled on this particular day. * * *

Warning: Cat cannot hold his licker. (Several more Booger pics, here) * * * Previously 2006: I suspect the latter, personally. Fuckers. 2005: Collab 2004: No entry. 2003: No entry. 2002: William Fichtner is a hottie. 2001: I hope I’m not doing serious damage to myself, but if you saw how clean the showers get, you’d know how much it’s worth it. 2000: I highly recommend a warm, purring kitten laying against you when you’re feeling nauseous.]]>

2/12/07

funny. That one wasn’t easy to write.

* * * Found in my bookmarks:

Hee! * * * Someone did a site search on “Spanky lips”. Is it just me, or would that make an excellent (1) Band name, (2) Album name, or (3) Novel name? Actually, it sounds a little porny. Maybe it would be a good porn actress name. If anyone’s planning on going into porn, feel free to use Spanky Lips – no, Spanky Lipps would be better – as your name. A gift from me to you. * * * Friday Sugarbutt was dancing around on the table in the foyer, chirruping and grunting and just generally acting like he was Disturbed. I got up from the computer and stood in the doorway looking at him. Then I happened to glance down and saw that Joe Bob was sitting in front of the window. He’s a goofy guy – Fred said the other day “I think Joe Bob might be the epitome of a gaum”, and he SO is – and he was sitting oddly, and I looked at him with affection and then with dawning horror as I realized he was squatting there PEEING in the cat bed he was sitting in. “JOE! NO!” I bellowed, and he hopped up and hauled ass away from me as fast as he could, leaving little droplets of pee in various places along the way. (How do I know where the droplets of pee were? Why, because nothing fascinates a cat more than smelling the pee of another cat. All I had to do was look and see where Sugarbutt, Tommy, Spot, and Miz Poo were sniffing, spray that area with some cleaning solution and wipe it up. They’re little cat detectives!) Thursday I had removed the litter box from the guest bedroom so that there was only one litter box, so I thought for sure that Joe Bob was making a statement about the availability – or NONavailability, I guess – of litter boxes in the house. Since I had no desire to find Joe peeing anywhere else (like, say, the couch), I went upstairs as fast as my stubby legs could carry me, put litter in a litter box, and put it back in the guest bedroom, thereby making it a 2 1/2-bathroom house for the people and a 2-bathroom house for the cats. Friday night I was cleaning out the big litter box in the laundry room when Joe came sniffing around, saw that I was cleaning the box, and ran off. I told Fred to grab him and put him in the litter box, because I didn’t want him deciding “Oh! No litter box available! Time to pee on someone’s bed!” Fred put him in the litter box and Joe squatted… and squatted… and squatted. “Oh NO,” I said. “I hope he doesn’t have a urinary tract infection.” I do NOT know why I’m such an idiot. Except for Tubby, the only time we’ve ever had an issue with cats peeing outside the litter box, it’s been because they’ve developed a urinary tract infection. Spanky’s had that problem a few times and Spot has once. And they NEVER pee outside the litter box otherwise. Yet anytime I find a cat who has previously never peed outside the litter box doing so, it never EVER dawns on me that it could be a UTI. Joe Bob left behind a small wet spot in the litter box so I thought maybe he was just nervous because we were hovering over him, only Fred went downstairs and I wandered off to fold some laundry, and I realized that Joe was back in the litter box in about two minutes. And this time, he left nothin’ behind. I said to Fred, “He’s got a UTI!” I called the shelter manager, and she said that if I could possibly take him to the vet on Saturday so they could check him for crystals, that would be the best way to go. Also, I should keep an eye on him, and if he started acting like he was in distress, I should take him to the emergency vet.

Not so much with the “in distress.” I kept an eye on him, but he very much did not appear to be in any kind of distress, unless looking like a big dork, scampering around the living room, and keeping an eye on Fred in case Fred might suddenly feel the need to hand out food is his way of acting distressed. Saturday morning Fred went and got groceries, then headed out to Smallville to meet up with a guy delivering lumber. I stayed in Madison until about 10 minutes before 9, then popped Joe Bob into the cat carrier and carried him to the vet. They were only taking drop-offs, so I dropped him off and left my cell phone number to call when he was ready to go. I went home until about 10, then decided to go on out to Smallville, figuring that even if they called in the next hour or so, I’d just tell them I’d pick him up before they closed at 5. Well. They didn’t call and didn’t call, so finally after Fred and I made a trip to Lowe’s to return a thousand different things we needed to return, and bought a thousand items we needed to buy, I called them on the way back to the house. At this point it was 3:30, and the receptionist said that he wouldn’t be ready ’til 4:30 and I could just show up at 4:30 and he’d be ready to go. We went back to the house and did a few things, and I decided to go ahead and head out to the vet. I got in the car, and just as I was about to put the car in gear, my cell phone rang. The vet’s assistant had some more questions about Joe Bob, and kept asking if he’d been outside in the last few days. Finally I told her we’d had him a month and he had never been outside, and then she asked me to hold on, because the vet wanted to talk to me. The vet told me that they’d put Joe Bob in a cage with a litter box and water, and wanted to see if he’d pee so she wouldn’t have to get a urine sample direct from the source. He didn’t pee and didn’t pee, so she used a needle to the abdomen – (go ahead and scream and run around in sympathy. I sure did.) and his bladder was very very small and the urine was dark brown with blood in it. What concerned her was that pretty much every time a cat gets a needle to the bladder they immediately have to pee afterward. When they put Joe Bob back in the cage, he didn’t even think about peeing. Which, to the vet, indicated that there was a blockage. “And I’ve never ever seen a cat with a blockage whose bladder is this tiny,” she said. I was opening my mouth to say “And this means.. what?” when there was an excited voice in the background, and the vet said “Oh! He just peed! Yay!” She said she hadn’t had a chance to spin down the urine sample, but she’d do it and call me back, but since I was on my way out there anyway, I told her I’d be there in a little while and would talk to her then. When I got to the vet’s, forty minutes later, she was just then looking at Joe’s urine via a microscope, so I waited and watched dogs being groomed. It turns out that ol’ Joe is loaded up with crystals in his urine and needed medicine and a new special diet. Also, I needed to keep an eye on him to make sure he’s not acting distressed, and still using the litter box. When we got home, I took all the old cat food away from the cats and put them all on the special prescription cat food I’d gotten for Joe (I got a nifty “prescription” card so that I can buy more when I need it; the pet store won’t sell the prescription food to you without the doofy special card, either. I feel so special.). I figure it’s a matter of locking Joe away in a room by himself where he only has access to the one kind of food, or switch the diet for all of them, and I opted for switching all of them, because he has a pretty good time playing with Sugarbutt and Tom Cullen. (Y’all just SHUT UP. No, we’re not adopting him!) So it seems that he’ll be with us for at least two more weeks ’til he finishes his medication. Sunday morning Fred woke me up to let me know that he’d gone downstairs to find that someone (we suspect either Joe Bob or Spot) had pulled a chicken bone out of the garbage can and chewed part of it up. Which means, no doubt, that splinters of chicken bone are working their way through SOMEONE’s intestinal tract and in two days one or the other of them will die from chicken bone splinters poking through their intestines. Or whatever it is that happens when cats eat chicken bones. According to something Fred found online, it takes two days for symptoms to start, so we get another day of eyeballing Spot and Joe and making sure there’s no vomiting and/ or bloody diarrhea. Also, we need to make sure Joe’s getting enough water in (I made Fred squirt a couple of syringes of water down Joe’s throat last night just to be sure) and is using the litter box. You know, KIDS aren’t this much work. Maybe we should jettison the cats and have a couple of kids. God knows that even if he lived that long, Mister Boogers wouldn’t even consider taking care of me in my old age. * * * Sunday morning after Fred told me that someone had dragged a chicken bone out of the trash, he said “We need to remember to keep the closet (where we keep the trash) door shut.” “Yeah, we do,” I agreed. When I got downstairs 45 minutes later, the closet door was open. I shut it. “We need to remember to keep the closet door shut,” I said when I walked into the computer room. “Yeah,” Fred agreed absentmindedly. He got up a few minutes later and got coffee or something. When I was done eating my breakfast, I went into the kitchen to put my plate in the dishwasher. The closet door was open, and I shut it. “We need to keep the closet door shut,” I said when I went back into the computer room. “Yeah, I know,” Fred said. I stood and stared at him. “What?” he said. “Oh. Did I leave the closet door open?” “Yes,” I said. “Sorry.” Five minutes later, Fred said “Are you about ready to go?” I allowed that I would be, in a few minutes, and he went into the kitchen to grab a lunch to take to Smallville with him. I finished the email I was typing, sent it, and went out into the kitchen. The closet door was standing open. I stood and stared at him until he looked over and said “What?” and then I ostentatiously walked over to the closet door and firmly pushed it close. “Oh,” he said with a grin. “Sorry!” I put on my jacket, grabbed my purse, and headed for the garage door. Fred picked up his lunch, threw away a piece of paper towel, and headed for the door as well. The closet door stood open. “OH MY GOD!” I yelled, and he jumped. “What?!” he said, panicked, looking around. I stomped over to the closet door, slammed it shut, gave him a dirty look, and flounced out the door. If Joe Bob dies from chicken splinters I THINK WE ALL KNOW WHO TO BLAME. * * *

Apparently something was going on out there.

Previously 2006: No entry. 2005: No entry. 2004: Sounds like corporate logic, to me – cable guys having to service DVRs when they don’t know anything at all about them. 2003: Uninspired. 2002: Dude, what the fuck? They don’t have mirrors on Boston Public? 2001: My husband, Narcissus. 2000: No entry.]]>

2/7/07

these carriers in the larger size, and I very highly recommend them. In fact, I’m going to go add them to the “recommended” page right now!) Except that when I leaned over to drop her into the carrier, she went all starfish on me, and no matter how much I struggled, I couldn’t get her ass into the damn thing, and then she flailed around and being that she’s not a small cat (I think her insides are made of lead) I couldn’t keep my grip on her and she went flying across the kitchen, down the hallway, and upstairs. “DAMN IT!” I yelled. Here I was, not particularly wanting to take the damn cat to the pet store (though she really had worn out her welcome with the screaming and the bitchiness) and especially not wanting to have to chase her ass around to force her into the carrier. I went upstairs and started searching with her, starting with under the spud’s bed, which is where she first hid all the time when we initially let her and Joe Bob out of the room we were keeping them in. She wasn’t in there, wasn’t in the guest bedroom, wasn’t in the cat room. “Where the hell’d she go?” I asked Sugarbutt, who seemed to be under the impression that it was Snackin’! Time! and if he followed me around long enough I’d stop this foolishness and give him a damn Snackin’! Time! snack. Sugarbutt seemed to neither know nor give a shit where Myrtle was, just looked up at me with big hopeful eyes. We walked into my bedroom, and saw that she was hanging out in the middle of the floor batting a toy mouse around. Apparently in the 90 seconds between the time she ran off and the time I found her, she’d completely forgotten what was going on. She meowed up at me, then rolled over on her back. I went into the guest bedroom, where we had one of the carriers, carried it into the bedroom where Myrtle was, and put it in the middle of the floor, expecting her to run like hell, maybe hide under the bed or in the bathroom behind the toilet. She looked at me, looked at the carrier, and kept batting at the toy mouse. I picked her up, carried her over to the carrier, and tried to shove her in the front. She became entirely liquid somehow, and flowed through my fingers and across the room, ending up under the bed. “GODDAMN IT!” I said sternly yet kindly. “Sweet baby, I know you don’t want to get in the carrier, but you’re GONNA!” From her spot under the bed, she appeared to disagree. I stood and thought about it for a moment, headed for the bedside table to grab a can of compressed air, then came up with a brilliant idea. Myrtle, you see, is a sucker for the laser. She loves to chase the little red dot around, even if you (FRED) make her run around in circle after circle until she’s dizzy. So I got the laser pointer out and Myrtle came running out when she saw the little red dot and I had her do a few laps around the room, then pointed the light into the carrier, and like a big sucker she went halfway in the carrier and stared at the little red dot. I ran over and pushed on her butt, knowing that she’d go the rest of the way into the carrier and I could shut the door and this story would be over. Except that she liquified once again and reappeared on the other side of the room, giving me hurt looks of “I said I didn’t want to go IN the carrier, why are you being mean to me?” A total of three more times I ran her halfway into the carrier and tried to push her in, and every goddamn time, no matter how suddenly I pushed her or how hard, she liquified and appeared elsewhere. Finally, SICK AND GODDAMN TIRED OF THIS, GODDAMNIT, I ran the laser light up the side of the bed, and she jumped up onto the bed, and I grabbed her firmly by the scruff of the neck. She went limp and motionless, and I carried her over to the carrier, shut the front door of the carrier, opened the top door, and dropped her in (though she did kick out one of her hind legs in a starfish attempt) and then shut the top of the carrier. And then I felt like an asshole because she meowed very, very sadly as I carried the carrier downstairs, out to the car, drove to the pet store, set up her cage, gave her some love, and put her in the cage. She immediately went into the litter box to hide. I wonder if I’ll ever get to the point where I don’t feel like a complete asshole for taking cats to the pet store and putting them in cages. (The only reason, by the way, that Joe Bob didn’t go to the pet store is because there weren’t enough cages.) Y’all send happy adoption thoughts to Myrtle, would you? I think she’d make someone a great pet. Maybe someone who’s a little hard of hearing.

* * * Thanks, those of you who reassured me that the rooster curtains would look fine in the kitchen. I’ve informed Fred that we’re going to go for it, and I can’t wait to see them once they’re put up! * * * A few weeks ago I put the Best of Donny & Marie DVDs at the top of my Netflix queue, and yesterday I watched the first DVD. There’s not much that’s funnier than Donny & Marie Osmond singing Jive Talkin’, I’ll tell you that much. Also, looking around on YouTube netted me this bit of fabulousness.

Note that she’s wearing the “Good Sandy” outfit rather than the “Bad Sandy” skin-tight leather pants and heels. Also, I think Donny blushes when she sings “Feel your way.” I was looking for a clip of the time Marie sang “He’s out of my life” on the show, but I didn’t see it anywhere. Hmph. * * *

But of course. Why NOT hang out in the trash an and sniff the wall? What do you do with YOUR days?

Harbl: Aired. Mission: Accomplished. * * * Previously 2006: I think that the next thing Apple should create is a cell phone/ iPod player. 2005: Yes, I use the same kind of lotion as my CAT. 2004: No entry. 2003: Anyway. Enough about my underwear. 2002: You’ve been warned, skank hos out there who would swoop down upon my husband in his grief and get him to marry you. 2001: Yeah, that’s me, not giving a shit if they can see me or not… 2000: Really, what other journaller will thrill you with pictures from the litter box?]]>

2/5/07

thought the free Hellcat with every case of water promotion at Sam’s was over, but apparently they’ve extended it. Now I’m torn. I need to get me some bottled water, but our house limit on wearing-out-her-welcome Hellcats (ie, MYRTLE) is at a maximum right now. Actually, if you consider that Miz Poo and Mister Boogers are approximately 48 – 53% Hellcat* depending on the day of the month and how many other cats are in residence, we’re over our limit. *Mister Booger’s Momma was 100% Hellcat, but luckily his father was half Ass-Showing-Fuckhead and half Sweet-Love-Monkey. Miz Poo’s mother was Crazy-Ass Tortie with a taste for the bad boys, thus her fling with a boycat who was mostly Hellcat, with a bit of the unknown tossed in there; I don’t know if he was a bit brain damaged or just flat out bugshit, but when the moon is full, you can see her Daddy’s influence as she races from one end of the house to the other, stopping along the way to smack the shit out of the boys.

* * * Standing in the kitchen of the Smallville house, filling up a sink of water to which I’d just added a big glug of ammonia so I could wipe down the counters, I paused. God. That sounds just like a herd of elephants, I thought. Though I was listening to a Grey’s Anatomy podcast, I could clearly hear the thundering sound approaching the kitchen. I switched off the water and turned toward the sound. Fred appeared in the doorway between the kitchen and dining room, wild-eyed and frantic. The front of his sweatshirt and his jeans were soaking wet. “MOVE!” he bellowed at me, and I wheeled backward, watching him run past me. My god! I thought. Something’s happened to Maxi or Newt! What if one of them have been hit by a car?! Why would he be running for the back door instead of the front?! Fred fumbled with the lock on the back door, half-turning toward me as I pulled the earphones from my head. “I don’t know why I said ‘Move’,” he said. “You weren’t even in the way!” He flung the door open and ran down the steps. My god! I thought, as I realized the thundering sound was continuing. He SAID ‘Move!’, but clearly Crackhead Bob broke into the house and is chasing him! Obviously what he meant was ‘RUN!’ I ran several big, goony running steps to the back door in time to see Fred reach the bottom of the steps. As I watched, he ran to the right, leaning into the curve in a motion we call a “Tubby Run.”

The Tubby Run: Years ago when Tubby was still alive, he was hanging out in the kitchen and somehow got the wrapper to a popsicle stuck to his tail. It freaked him the hell out, and he ran into the living room and did an end-run around the couch, where he leaned into the run, and it was about the funniest thing we’ve ever seen a cat do. To this day just thinking about it makes me laugh ’til I cry.

“What’s going ON?!” I said, though he was too far away to hear me. I threw my hands up in the air. “What the HELL?” The thundering sound continued. It sounded like… well, it sounded like a waterfall and THAT was ridiculous. Wasn’t it? Except that it was coming from the bathroom. And he’d been working on replacing the faucet and handles in the tub. I did another goony half-run to the hallway and saw water spraying out of the bathroom. As I watched, the flow of water stopped. I ran to the cabinet where we keep the cleaning rags – a huge pile of them – grabbed them all, and went to the hallway, where I threw them all down on the lake of water heading for the bottom of the stairs. “How bad is it?” Fred asked as he came through the back door. “You need to go somewhere and get more towels, because we don’t have enough to get all this water up!” I said, panicked at the thought that we’d paid thousands of dollars to have the floors redone, and they were on the verge of ruin. Then I caught sight of Fred’s face, remembered his Tubby Run to the water shutoff valve, and started laughing so hard I couldn’t say anything else. (We got the water cleaned up pretty quickly, from the floor where it was pooled, and the walls of the bathroom and the wall outside the bathroom, with no damage to the floors that we can tell. Thank god I’d recently stocked up on paper towels!) * * * Note to the concerned: We saw Maxi briefly on Saturday, so apparently she’s okay. I saw her sitting at the edge of the yard belonging to the people she officially belongs to, and told Fred she was out there. Fred went to the back door and called for her. In fits and starts she crossed our neighbor’s back yard, glancing cautiously toward the front yard, and finally approached Fred. Fred snatched her up, hugged and kissed and petted her, and brought her into the house for a few minutes. She didn’t want to stay in the house long, so I let her out the front door, where she ate a little food and then disappeared again. Later, I saw a couple of Mockingbirds hanging out in the front yard, eyeing the dish of cat food. I remembered how skittish Newt was earlier this week, and now I’m wondering if the fucking Mockingbirds have been dive-bombing the cats and eating their food. I love Mockingbirds because they’re sassy, but if they’re harassing the cats, I’ll kick their little feathered asses. * * * Fred put up a bunch of floor pictures over on his site. Check ’em out! * * *

“Pardon me, but is it about time for the snackin’?” ::the sound of a porky cat hustling through the house as fast as his little paws can carry him::

“Did someone say ‘snackin’ time’?” * * * Previously 2006: No entry. 2005: No entry. 2004: I DON’T KNOW YOU, I CAN’T CHAT WITH YOU, PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE. 2003: Pictures found. 2002: That’s just the kind of sucky slacking emailer I am. 2001: You know, if I had ANY self-control at all, I’d wait to buy these books ’til they come out in paperback. 2000: No entry.]]>

2/2/07

* * * I finished reading Death Match by Lincoln Child last night. Altogether it was a good book, though there were things I found unbelievable about it (when I say that I find something in a book or movie unbelievable, Fred always says, pointedly, “Willing suspension of disbelief.”). The thing is that Lincoln Child is a computer geek and as I’ve discovered through ten years of living with a computer geek – if I may generalize about all computer geeks – is that they really like to overexplain the fucking shit out of everything. Whether you understand it or not. So there was a lot of technical-type babble in the last fifteen or twenty pages of Death Match, and I read it as “Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah”, but really and truly don’t feel like I missed a single thing. Overall I liked the book (even though I think it’s complete and utter bullshit that a company like Eden could do what it did in the book), but be warned that the protagonist is a pompous pain in the ass.

* * * We went out to Smallville last night to pay the floor guy and look at the floors, and we LOVE them. They came out really, really nice, and I think we did a good job of choosing the color. The floor guy was the most conscientious worker we’ve ever dealt with – always checking in with Fred to let him know what had been done, and the job took about as long as he thought it would. And we love the results! If you’re in the area and need the name of a good floor guy, ask and I’ll happily give you his name and number.

* * * Fred is seriously talking about buying and flipping a house in Smallville (he has a particular house in mind, not just some random house) when we’ve sold the Madison house. I haven’t determined whether the idea fills me with excitement, or dread. We’ll see. * * * Self-portrait #24.

This is how I feel when I realize I need to take another goddamn picture of myself. I think this little project is coming to an end, because I am SICK of looking at pictures of myself. I’ll still take the occasional picture and post it – I think I’ve made it pretty clear that I’m willing to jump in front of the camera at any time – or maybe I’ll make it a weekly thing. We’ll see. * * *

Apparently he likes to sit around with his foot hiked up over his head, and watch the other cats play. Don’t ask me what that’s all about. * * * Previously 2006: So, that’s the state of things with me. 2005: “Oh my god!” he said. “There’s a dead mole under here!” 2004: The man thinks that “hot” and “good-looking” are the same thing! 2003: No entry. 2002: No entry. 2001: No entry. 2000: We all know I’m lazy, but this is ridiculous.]]>

2/1/07

new logo! This one was created by the talented Aly, who RAWKS! Thanks, Aly!

* * * We got snow last night, around an inch, Fred estimated. And SOMEHOW they didn’t cancel school! I’m amazed at that, believe you me! (The streets are wet, but not slippery) My daffodils are glaring at me like “You SAID it was Spring and okay to bloom, bitch!”, poor frozen things. I’ll be watching to see if they stay alive or give up the ghost. Stupid Mother Nature. * * * Man alive, I’m telling you – Myrtle is getting on my last fucking nerve. She’ll be fine and get along okay with the other cats for days and days, then all of a sudden one of them gets too close to her or looks at her the wrong way or THINKS of looking at her, and she lets out her hellbeast scream and it scares the fucking shit out of everyone in the house, cats included. Normal cats will hiss or growl at other cats when they get annoyed with them. Not our Myrtle, no – she SCREAMS. I swear to god, she sounds exactly like I’d imagine a cougar in heat would sound. Hell, maybe she IS part cougar. That would explain a lot.

* * * From my comments: Robyn – have you read “Stiff” by Mary Roach yet? I did – I read it back in 2005, and enjoyed it, though I wasn’t head-over-heels about it the way Fred was. I tend to not care for the nonfiction stuff, unless it’s in memoir form. * * * Um, does anyone else see that Spanky has lips. Non-kitty looking lips? He is definitely a pretty boy. Fred loves to tease Spanky about his big pink lips. Spanky doesn’t care, though. He knows he’s gorgeous. * * * Do you read hardback books with the loose cover on them or do you usually take them off? I usually read hardcovers with the dustcover on, because I use the inside of the dustcover (the leaf?) as a bookmark. And since I rarely keep the books I read, I’m not that worried about keeping the dustcover in perfect shape. The exception is when I borrow a book from someone and know that they’ll want it back; in that case, I take the cover off and put it somewhere safe so I won’t spill anything on it. * * * Self-portrait #23.

This isn’t what I really look like when I’m sleeping. For one, I sleep nekkid, and for two, I sleep with my mouth hanging open. But you get the idea. * * *

“Ah hets yew.” * * * Previously 2006: No entry. 2005: What the hell is “California cuisine”? 2004: No entry. 2003: No entry. 2002: No entry. 2001: Just accept that I’m always right, why don’tcha. 2000: Like I’m going to just stand there all docile-like and let him kill me.]]>

1/31/07

fold-up tote bags and DROOLED. Note to Debbie: Still my favorite Christmas present!!!). And I cannot get the goddamn garage door to go down. Apparently the beams are off-kilter, and I can’t get them to go on-kilter no matter how much I try. And it’s PISSING ME OFF. And I’m fucking cold, even though the space heater is half an inch from me, blasting on high, probably cooking me. How do you prefer your Bitchypoo? Medium rare? Coming right up! Spring, where art thou?

* * * Yesterday was a busy-ass day for me. I left here a little before 8:30 to drive to the other side of Huntsville for an appointment with my nutritionist (it being my one-year Surgiversary and all), and to have a metabolic cart test done. I hate doing that metabolic cart, because you put a clip on your nose and have to breathe in and out through this tube in your mouth, and it makes me feel like I’m smothering to death. Metabolic cart test: my metabolism is high. I am skeptical of the metabolic cart test, personally, but it’s certainly interesting to see the little printed-out chart. My BMI according to the nutritionist is 26.3. Normal for a woman is 20 to 25. Thus I am still overweight. But I can handle it, since I’m no longer in the “Holy shit!” BMI category. My BMI the first time I went into the nutritionist’s office was 52.1. For the record. The nutritionist told me to keep doing what I was doing, and I left his office to go sit in the parking lot in my car and read for an hour until my appointment with the surgeon. Now, just a note here. My original appointment with the surgeon was scheduled for 11:15. Monday, when his office called to remind me that I had an appointment, the appointment-reminder-lady told me that they’d had a cancellation and 10:45 was available, and would I be interested? I was, so they rescheduled me for 10:45. What time did I actually see the surgeon? Why, at 11:45, of course. OF COURSE. Good thing they rescheduled me for 10:45, huh? I wasn’t pissed off, though, because I brought my book and bottle of water with me, so I sat and read and read some more, until he came in to see me. He told me that if I get my BMI to or under 25, I don’t have to wait until the two-year mark to have plastic surgery done. Woot! By the time I left his office, it was close to noon, and although I’d considered blowing off my next appointment, I decided that since I was on that side of Huntsville and I REALLY needed to have it done, I’d just suck it up and go have it done. I wasn’t sure where the office was, so I went to make sure I could find it. I found it, but then couldn’t find a damn place to turn around, and after a certain point, the road that the office was on doesn’t have any streets off to the side of it, so I ended up having to drive all the way over the damn mountain to the other side (note to those of you in the area: did you know that Cecil Ashburn Drive takes you from Bailey Cove Rd to Hampton Cove? I didn’t, until now.) to turn around. I made it back to the office just in time for my appointment, so parked and – a little nervous – walked in. “I have a 12:45 with Hilary?” I told the girl at the front desk, who very strongly resembled a much younger (and much shorter) Nicole Kidman. She directed me upstairs, and I told the woman at that desk my name and who my appointment was with. She beckoned for me to follow her, and led me into a waiting room. A fancy waiting room. A hoity-toity waiting room. “Hilary will be with you in a few minutes,” she said. Across the room, three women wearing fluffy robes and fluffy slippers lounged on a couch, sipping water from fancy glasses and flipping through glossy magazines. One of them, a well-preserved older woman, glanced up at me and then nudged the woman – a younger, well-groomed woman – sitting next to her. The second woman looked me over, then looked back at the first. Not our type, she mouthed. The first woman nodded in agreement. The wall next to me was a wall fountain – I guess that’s what they’re called, when the whole wall is water? A wall of water? I don’t know what they’re called but they are the exclusive province of hoity-toity places, I assure you. A few more moments passed as I looked around the waiting room from under lowered lashes and registered that relaxing fancypants music was playing through hidden speakers. Hilary stepped into the room, introduced herself, and led me away. I smiled tentatively at the three women as I walked by them, and they rewarded me with fake, icy smiles. As the door closed behind me, I heard one of them whisper to the other, Is she… pregnant? (Okay. I made that italicized section up. Except for the wall of water and the fact that there were three women in robes in that room. Who ignored me. But that’s okay, ’cause I ignored them, too. SO THERE.) Hilary led me into a small room, one playing the same fancypants Music o’ Relaxation that had been playing in the waiting room. She gestured toward a wide padded table covered with a sheet and told me to lay down face-up. It got a little Three-Stoogesesque (or possibly more “Who’s on First” Abbott and Costelloesque) as I tried to determine where my head was supposed to go, and finally she patted the table and said “Head on this end, face up.” I got up on the table and laid down, my face under a light. “So, you’ve had this done before?” she asked, looking at the sheet I’d filled out in the waiting room. “Yes, but it’s been quite a while,” I said. “And what brings you here now?” she asked, or something along those lines. “A bunch of crazy bitches who read my online journal keep ragging at me about my horrible eyebrows, and I saw one of your pamphlets around Christmas time, and since I was going to be on this side of town today, I thought I’d just come and have my eyebrows waxed,” I said. (Only I didn’t really say the “crazy bitches online” part. But I was thinking it! I actually just mumbled something about being 39 and deciding it was time to get this thing done regularly.) I have to say, getting your eyebrows (and upper lip) waxed at a hoity-toity fancypants place? Somehow, it hurts a lot less than it does at the cheap hair salon at the mall. Maybe it’s the relaxing music, or the warm table (there was some sort of heating blanket under there and it was HEAVENLY) or a woman who really knows what she’s doing. I prefer to think that it’s MAGIC, myself. It took, maybe, ten minutes to have my eyebrows completely done and my upper lip done as well, and I have to say – I don’t see a huge difference in the eyebrows, but I do like what I see.

Before.

After. Now, in a couple of months when I’ve gotten lazy about plucking the hairs that have grown back, y’all remind me to go have it done again, okay? So from there, I went straight home with the intention of settling on the couch and maybe taking a nap, but when I checked my email I found one from the shelter manager, letting me know that there was space at the pet store, and I could take Fantine there. I grabbed Fantine up, gave her some love, tossed her in a carrier, and took her to the pet store. I took my time getting her cage set up, letting her sniff around the cat room for a while, then I hugged and kissed her, told her to get adopted fastfastfast (I always tell the kitties that I take to the pet store to get adopt fastfastfast), and left. I always feel awful leaving cats at the pet store. I hope like hell she gets adopted before Monday! Then I came home, ate lunch, and had half an hour to sit on my dead ass and surf the web before I had to start dinner. We had jambalaya last night and between the chopping and the cooking, it takes about an hour to make. It took me almost exactly an hour to make, and we ate dinner at 4:30 (which, for the record, is far too fucking early for me, but Fred would eat dinner at 3:00 every day if allowed, I’m sure). Once we’d finished eating, Fred and I headed out to his car, to drive over to Smallville and check out the floors, which had been stained. Except that as I was walking by the spud’s car, I looked down and noticed that her right front tire was completely flat. After telling the spud not to go anywhere and that Fred would take care of it when we got back, we headed out to the house. I really, really like the stain color we chose. It looks good (and will look even better once the polyurethane is added, I’m sure), and the floor guy actually told Fred that he was going to start recommending that color to people, it looked so good. I don’t have a picture of the floors – though no doubt Fred will put up pictures of the floor in a future entry – but the stain we chose is called English Chestnut. We weren’t able to go in and see all the floors, just went into the laundry room and looked at the kitchen floor, then looked at the living room floor from the front porch. It definitely looks good – the first thing Fred wants to do when we can get back into the house is to put quarter-round down in the front room to see what the completed picture will look like. I suspect it’ll look damn fine, myself. Newt was there when we got there – we haven’t seen Maxi in a while, and I think Fred is getting worried – so we filled up the food bowl and gave him a can of wet food. He’s gotten particularly skittish lately, it seems, maybe because we haven’t been around all that much. Hopefully Maxi will show up this weekend while we’re working on the house. I hope so! We got home and Fred and the spud went out to change the tire on her car. Except that her car didn’t have a jack, and even after he took the jack from my car, Fred couldn’t figure out where to put it (there’s a specific place to put the jack, and he wasn’t able to find it, even looking around under the car with a flashlight), so he gave up and had me call AAA. “Tell them your husband is out of town!” he whispered, sure that they’d take his Man card away from him if they knew he was allowing a tow truck driver to change a tire on a car in his driveway. We needed to go to Lowe’s for potting soil, so I told the spud to get her AAA card and driver’s license, and keep an eye out for the tow truck driver. “Tell them your dad is out of town!” Fred instructed her. We went to Lowe’s and bought the potting soil – and a couple of blackberry bushes, woot! I also eyed the blueberry bushes and the strawberry plants, all of which we’re going to eventually have Smallville – and were home in about twenty minutes. Just as we pulled into the driveway, the tow truck came up the street. “Tell them I’m out of town!” Fred joked, but I just smiled and left him to deal with the driver, who took about two minutes to change the tire. (Time to revoke Fred’s Man Card, obviously.) Then we killed about half an hour online (I had to call my sister and let her know that CopperTop’s horse had given birth. SO SWEET!) before it was time to settle down and watch TV. Well, I settled down while Fred stood in the kitchen and planted in planters the two apple trees and two peach trees we’d bought online. It’s way too cold outside right now to put young trees in the ground so they’ll be in pots for another month and a half or so. (This morning it looked as though Fred opened a bag of potting soil and tossed it around the entire kitchen during the planting process.) I had to pause the TV and assist Fred in getting the pots of trees upstairs to his room, since it’s the only room in the house where we keep the door closed, plus it gets a lot of morning sun, which the trees will hopefully enjoy. The rest of the evening was spent watching TV, then after Fred went to bed I read until I couldn’t keep my eyes open, and went to sleep. You’ll forgive me if I don’t do a damn thing today! * * *

She loved that banana/ catnip toy. I should have taken it to the pet store with her.

* * * Previously 2006: No entry. 2005: Hey, can you eat raw kale? 2004: No entry. 2003: My whole life is a vicious circle, really. 2002: No entry. 2001: I mean, what the fuck did I do? 2000: Yeah, I know, woe is me.]]>

1/29/07

Property Ladder. We started DVRing it a few months ago, and have been watching every episode we can get our paws on. If you’ve never seen it, the premise is that one person (or a couple of people, sometimes even a group of people) buys a house with the intention of renovating it and selling it for a profit – ie, “flipping” it. Once they’ve bought the house, the host of the show, Kirsten K3mp, shows up to walk through the house with the buyers and hear about their plans. And what really makes the show for us is that Kirsten K3mp, while walking through the house and hearing what the buyers have planned, gets this really DISAPPROVING look on her face. It’s always the same disapproving look, and it cracks us UP. What else we really like about the show is how dumb people are, and they don’t listen to Kirsten (who is a very successful realtor, real estate developer, designer and interior decorator. Also, she was on Saved By the Bell!) when she advises them to do one thing or not do another, and they end up totally fucking up and blowing through their budget in 10.2 seconds flat, and all is chaos. Also, many times they intend to spend, say, $80,000 on renovating a house and end up spending $120,000, so what do they do? Why, they just raise the price, of course! It doesn’t matter what houses are going for in the area and that they’re dumbasses! Hike that price up, and sit on the house for months and months while it doesn’t sell! Makes sense to THEM. It’s just a really damn good show, and we usually hit the “What a FUCKING idiot!” point about halfway through every show, where we both exclaim “What a FUCKING idiot!” and roll our eyes at each other. My only gripe is that we’re apparently in a new season, and at the beginning of the show last season there was a part where Kirsten was talking to someone, and she had that disapproving look on her face, and she sternly said “It’s flipping, not flip-flopping!”, and we’d fast-forward through the opening song-and-credits except for that part, because you can sense the barely concealed rage Kirsten K3mp is carrying around with her, you can TELL that she wants to brand “FLIPPING. NOT FLIP-FLOPPING. YOU FUCKING FOOL.” on the forehead of the idiots she’s talking to, but she holds it together. Barely, but she does it. Anyway, in the new opening sequence, there is no “It’s flipping, not flip-flopping”, and when I first realized that, I turn to Fred and said, plaintively, “How will we know that it’s flipping? Is it flipping, or is it flip-flopping? I don’t KNOW, because she’s not TELLING us anymore!” We also really like Flip This House and Flip That House.

* * * Fred went out to the house on Saturday and Sunday to work on the wood shed and do other tasks around the house. I could have gone out to the house with him – I’m sure I could have found something to do – but instead I opted to stay home and sit around on my dead ass. Besides, Sunday it was FUCKING COLD and I just didn’t even want to think about leaving the house to do anything. So I didn’t. I did a lot of reading and watching TV, is what I did. In fact, I read all of Hannibal Rising on Saturday, and let me tell you this: Don’t fucking bother. There are NO questions that Hannibal Rising answered, that weren’t perfectly well answered in Hannibal. Thomas Harris needs to get his ass off the Hannibal Lechter gravy train and write something as worth reading as The Silence of the Lambs or Red Dragon. Describing why Hannibal Lechter is the way he is makes him less interesting, not more. I can only imagine how much the movie must suck. * * * Movies we watched over the weekend: Of Mice and Men. I read the book recently, which made me want to see the movie again. Gary Sinise as George and John Malkovich as Lenny – I’m not sure the movie could have been any better cast. Saw III. Fred rented a bunch of movies Sunday and this was the one I wanted to see most. Why? I have no fucking clue. I spent most of the movie either looking at the wall waiting for the gross part to be over, or looking at one corner of the screen… waiting for the gross part to be over. The main guy (not Jigsaw or Julie Lawry, but the other main guy) looked terribly familiar to me, and I kept saying to Fred “Who IS that guy?” He didn’t look familiar to Fred, but then I finally figured it out. “That’s Robert the Bruce!” I said. And it was. I love me some Robert the Bruce. (Trivia: he was once engaged to Catherine Zeta-Jones.) The Guardian. Actually a pretty good movie (I think Kelso might have found his niche), but I was cold to start with, and watching all those people swim around in ice-cold water just made me damn colder. * * * You may be asking yourself: “Self, I’m curious. What would be the number of cats that would make one make the jump from needing to vacuum occasionally – say, three times a week – to needing to vacuum each and every day?” And the answer to that, my friends, is that when one makes the increase from six cats running around the house at all hours to nine cats running around the house at all hours. That is when one needs to vacuum every single day just to keep the mess under semi-control. Not that I actually vacuum every day. But I should. So we’re currently letting Joe Bob and Myrtle and Fantine (who we call “Momma”) run around the house all the time, without ever being locked up. I was concerned that Myrtle the Hellbeast would keep me awake at night with her Hellbeast roar (she sounds an awful lot like an angry cougar when she’s, well, angry), but there really hasn’t been an issue. Fred feels sorry for Myrtle and Joe Bob because they’re going to get all comfortable here, and then we’re going to take them back to the pet store (eventually) and they’ll be all locked up in a little cage together. However, he also informed me that if we adopted them, it’d be the last time a foster cat ever came through our door, so there you go. Obviously he just doesn’t love Joe Bob enough. After all these years of not having to worry about the cats eating the plants (though they’d occasionally have a taste of a leaf or two), Joe Bob and Myrtle have made it necessary for me to move the plants off the bar in the kitchen. So I moved the plants out of the kitchen, and they started going after the plant on the Secretaire in the dining room, so I trimmed that plant back so its long, lovely branches (?) wouldn’t tempt them. Then I walked into the dining room yesterday and saw this.

Apparently he got up on the Secretaire to chew on the plant, then realized he could get on top of the bookcase from there. So he did. (He didn’t get down on his own, though. Instead, he sat and howled until I dragged a chair up to the bookcase and could reach him to drag him down.) * * * Self-portrait #20: How I Spent my Weekend.

Self-portrait #19 is here, and #18 is here. * * * I had a request for Spanky pictures.

Such a pretty boy, that Spanky. * * * I cannot believe it’s been three years since Tubby died. * * * Previously 2006: No entry. 2005: No entry. 2004: Okay, I promise that’s the last weepy I-miss-my-kitty entry. 2003: Bleach is the shit. 2002: Just for the record, Mike Tyson is the biggest fucking idiot in the entire world. 2001: How the hell am I going to get my ass on Survivor 3 if they’re looking for model types?? 2000: I was quite excited, as I recall. ]]>

1/25/07

* * * The week before last, reader Christine emailed me to tell me that she’d purchased something for me (or, actually, for the cats) and wanted to send it to me, but they wouldn’t deliver to a PO Box address and could she have my mailing address? I thought about it for a while, decided that since we’d occasionally traded emails for the past two years, she maybe wasn’t a psycho stalker and could be trusted with that top-secret information. (Plus, I have her address.) So I gave it to her and sat back to see if a gun-wielding crazy was going to show up on my front steps. Instead, I got a huge, heavy box, and on the outside it said “Cat tree.” Fred kept forgetting to bring his tools home to put it together, and finally remembered to do so on Sunday. The funny thing is that he ended up not needing any tools – the tree screwed together quite easily. And I must say – it’s a big hit with the cats. Sugarbutt and Tommy, especially, like to hang out in the top platform. No one’s tried out the “hammock” on the bottom, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time. Thank you, Christine, on behalf of the cats. They told me that you RAWK! Myrtle (formerly known as Moondance) enjoys her solitude on the platform. She’s got the screech of a hellbeast, and she makes the other cats nervous. When she hangs out on the cat tree, they wisely stay away.

* * * From my comments: Robyn, a question re: your eventual move. Are you going to sell your house in-town first and then move, or move into the Smallville house and sell your in-town house when it’s empty or partly empty? I don’t have as many cats but I do have kids and for me, having realtors come in unannounced or on short notice would be a problem. Originally, our plans were to move Fred and the cats into the Smallville house, recarpet the Madison house, and then put the Madison house up for sale while the spud and I stayed in Madison (so she wouldn’t have as far to drive to get to school). Last week I was thinking about it, and I realized that it was dumb for Fred to move to Smallville first, seeing as he’s the one who has to drive to work in Huntsville, and I’m not. So for now, the plans are to finish the Smallville house, move the cats and me out there, recarpet the Madison house, and put it up for sale while Fred and the spud live here. Obviously during the week I’ll drive from Smallville to Madison to keep the house clean and presentable for potential buyers, make dinner, and hang out with Fred and the spud until bedtime, whereupon I’ll drive back to Smallville, hang out with the kitties, and sleep there with the security system set and a gun under my pillow. I imagine that, with the cats at the Smallville house, it’ll be one hell of a lot easier to keep the Madison house clean! * * * Donna’s right: The next 8 photos could be you with each of your eight (yes, I said eight) cats. Then a photo of you with each of your foster kitties. Then go to other people’s houses and ask to pose with their kitties, or their lawn gnomes or something. Well, I’ve put up pictures of me with Newt and Maxi (aka: NotOurKitties), one with Miz Poo, and one with Tommy. I’m sure there’ll be more cat pictures in the future, but I’m having a good time imagining knocking on a random person’s door, saying “Hey. Can I take a picture of myself with your gnome? Thanks!” * * * What does your “Liz Claiborne Grandma purse” look like? This is the second day you mentioned it, and I have to see it! Well, not really have to, but have a burning desire to see the object of scorn. So I can hate it too. (And did you love the “Liz Claiborne Grandma purse” at one time?) Here it is:

(The splotch of paint is in the upper left corner; it’s actually smaller than I remembered.)

Now, let’s be clear: I do not hate the Liz Claiborne Grandma purse. I like it, I just hate that it didn’t work out for me. That is, I could fit everything in it, but it was hard to get to the stuff in the bottom of the purse, and that always drives me crazy. I’m sure it’ll work better for someone else! * * * Why is the Spud’s school being so hard-assed about absences? Don’t schools get all their funding as long as they get the required parental excusal? I have NO idea what their deal is, and I suspect that if I really pushed it, they’d accept a note from me as a valid excuse (well, actually, I think they’ll accept it anyway, but she doesn’t want it to count against her attendance. Or something. Can you tell I’m kind of fuzzy on the whole thing?) * * * Hi Robyn, I “recommend” that you have a “recommendation page” for products etc that you’ve tried and either liked or hated. I have gotten alot of good ideas from your site on different products. I swear upon all that is holy that I intend to do that. Maybe this weekend, since I won’t be going out to the house, I’ll get my ass in gear and get it done! * * * Do you let the fosters go outside w/the other kitties? We haven’t opened the cat door since we started letting Joe Bob and Myrtle out, because we don’t have extra collars to put on them, and they’re both quite fond of using their claws; I’d worry too much about them climbing the fence and being gone, and the shelter never ever letting me have another foster kitty. I’d love to have a couple of extra collars for just this situation, but they’re more than $80 apiece, plus when we move to Smallville we’re going to use netting over the top of the fence to keep the cats from getting out of the back yard rather than using collars, so it would be a pointless expense. * * * Tuesday, I had to take Fantine back to the vet. Her eyes had cleared up a bit from Friday (they gave me a triple antibiotic to put in her eyes), but had only gotten a little better, and weren’t healed yet, still goopy and crusty and bright pink around the eyelids. The vet gave her a hydrocortisone shot to bring down the swelling, and had me put her on doxycycline, to see if that would solve the problem. I got home from the vet’s, Fred and I ate dinner, we ran out to the Smallville house to check on the floors, then when we got home I boxed up Javert, Eponine, and Cosette, and took them to the pet store. At 7:30 the shelter manager called to let me know that Javert and Eponine had been adopted together! Now that’s what I like to hear – the only thing that would have made me happier would have been to hear that Cosette had been adopted as well. I’m hoping she’ll have been adopted by Monday.

“Right now, I’m sitting in my new Mommy’s home!” As soon as I left to take the cats to the pet store, Fred let Fantine out of her room. She is such a sweet laid-back cat; she sniffed around and explored for a while, then ended up hanging out back in her own room for a good part of the evening. * * *

Free hellcat in every case of water! (All of today’s uploaded pictures are here.) * * *

I opened the cupboard to get out some potatoes to make mashed taters to have with our meatloaf last night, and saw this in the very back of the cupboard. I guess we’re getting a head start on all that gardening we’ll be doing in Smallville. * * * Self-portrait #16:

One of us has litter on our nose. (Hint: It ain’t me.) * * *

* * * Previously 2006: “Thy-y-y-yme is my crack! Yes it is!” 2005: He emailed me back immediately. You’re already too old to die tragically young. 2004: No entry. 2003: No entry. 2002: And Mildred and Myrtle were hanging out merrily in their very sheer bright yellow bra, waving at all and sundry. 2001: Just thinking about it makes me grumpy. 2000: Y’all stay warm, now!]]>