Category: Fostering

Cool new logo from reader Kitty, who responded to my plea. Thanks, Kitty!!!

* * * Hmph. Those polls always make me feel like a, as much mother used to call someone she worked with, “fluff bunny.” Clearly polls are not trained to recognize my subtle badassery. * * * Good god has it gotten cold outside all of a sudden. One day it was in the 70s, the next day I walked outside and the tip of my nose froze off and bounced off across the yard to areas unknown. Fred got all kinds of worried about Newt and Maxi and wanted to bring them inside the (Smallville) house so they wouldn’t freeze to death. I had to tell him “Look, if you do that, you might as well leave them inside, because they’re going to be our cats and I didn’t think you wanted to have eight cats, but since you clearly do, they need to be inside cats like our OTHER cats and shouldn’t be accustomed to being outside all the time.” Besides, it’s not like every outside or feral cat in existence freezes to death every time the temperature drops to 30, right? And most outside or feral cats don’t have a cozy warm HEATED (from the top AND the bottom) cat house in a sheltered area where they can retreat if it gets too nippy outside. Besides. They are NOT OUR CATS. They have owners, damnit, and they’re not us! Yeah, yeah. Shaddup. * * * So it was cold this weekend, but it was also not rainy or particularly crappy (though it was a bit windy, at least in Smallville), so on Saturday and Sunday we worked inside for most of the morning and outside during the afternoon, after it had warmed up (HA) a little. We started working on the computer room (we decided to start at the back of the house and work our way forward) Friday evening, and continued working on it Saturday and Sunday. I’m pretty sure we’re going to be able to finish it out tomorrow. All in all, it went pretty quickly, and I have a feeling that the rest of the downstairs will go pretty quickly as well. Fred did most of the painting in the computer room and I helped him measure and hang the crown molding (that is, I held one end of the crown molding while he nail-gunned it in place), and in between the times when my help was needed, I spent a few hours in the hallway closet pulling down the paper that lined the walls. I’m not sure when the paper was nailed to the wall or why, exactly, but it had started to rip in several places and needed to come down. This is what it looked like when we first saw the house, for the record. I finally got all the paper ripped down and the pieces of wood that had been tacked in place to hold the paper up (I assume) yanked down, and now all that needs to be done is that a zillion small nails need to be removed, then I’m going to paint it and the door, as well. The door has been painted, of course, but only on one side. I had to leave the house a couple of times on Saturday (more on that in a bit), and I came back just in time to watch Fred cut down the maple (?) to the side of the back yard. We spent the afternoon dealing with that tree (which was rotten to the core and had a nice infestation of carpenter ants; I’m sure Fred will provide pictures at some point). Fred cut the tree in pieces and then split the pieces, and I hauled them over to the concrete pad and stacked them. (Eventually we’re going to build some kind of wood shed, but for now, the concrete pad is probably the most convenient place to put the wood.) We also added to our new burn pile. Sunday, more of the same – I finished yanking stuff down in the closet, Fred worked on the computer room, and then Fred cut down another tree and we spent the afternoon tossing the smaller branches on the burn pile and adding to our wood pile. Brush pile. Wood pile. Fred’s thinking he might stop cutting down trees until we have a wood shed to stack the wood in, but we’ll see about that. During our time at the house, I noticed that we’ve finally got birds visiting our bird feeders. I’ve had them up for a few months and the bird seed has slowly gone down, but I guess now that it’s cold, they’re visiting a little more often. The cool thing is that the bird feeders they’re visiting are hanging right outside the computer room (there’s a branch hanging in front of the computer room doors (to the outside), and it was the only branch I could reach to hang feeders from). I intend to keep that area a bird-feeding area because not only is it right outside the computer room door, which means I’ll have a good view of the visiting birds, but it also won’t be in the fenced-in area, so our cats won’t be able to pounce on unsuspecting birds and bring them inside. Female woodpecker. Chickadee. My mother has a whole flock of chickadees she feeds, and I’ve come to love the feisty little birds, from watching them at her house. Anyone know what kind of bird this is? Before we left the Smallville house on Saturday I noticed that one of the bird feeders needed to be filled, so I carried the ladder outside and asked Fred to hold on to the ladder so it wouldn’t wobble or fall over. Everything went well (even though I was higher than I like to be when perched on a flimsy ladder that will only hold twice my body weight), I filled and rehung the bird feeder, holding onto the end of the branch as I rehung it. “Don’t fall,” Fred warned. “You’ll pull the branch down with you and that’ll hurt worse than just falling ’cause it’ll hit you on the head.” “Har har,” I said darkly. “Just shut up and hold the ladder.” The bird feeder hung, I started back down the ladder. I’d gotten one foot on the middle rung, when something hit me VERY HARD on the back of my head. “OW!” I yelled, stopping and looking around. “What the fuck?” Fred laughed and laughed and laaaaaaughed. Because a piece of the branch I’d hung the feeder on had broken and fallen, hitting me in the back of the on its way to the ground. Fucking trees. The branch that bonked me. AND IT HURT. Two days later, the back of my head still hurts a little. Hmph. * * * So I had to leave the Smallville house on Saturday because the shelter manager called and told me that there was room at the pet store for the foster kittens, and could I send her some pictures and their names, and take them to the pet store later? Even though we’d only had them about twenty-four hours, I was more than willing to take them to the pet store because the sooner they go to the pet store, the sooner they get into loving homes, that’s how I see it. Momma kitty would be staying with us a few more days, because spaying is a bigger deal for older cats and they need a little more time to heal. I drove to Madison and sent the shelter manager pictures of the kittens and their names, went back to Smallville for an hour, then went BACK to Madison, picked up the kittens, and took them to the pet store. Oh, their names. Thanks, you guys, for your suggestions, I loved ’em all! I was particularly taken with Beth from Long Island’s suggestion of naming them after Beatrix Potter characters, so I settled on Mopsy, Flopsy, and Cottontail for the girls. I named the boy Seamus because I think all orange kitties should have Irish names (what can I say? I’m weird.) (Stub would be a good name for a bobtail, wouldn’t it?) So anyway, the kittens went to the petstore, and Seamus (the buff tabby) and Cottontail (the dilute calico) were adopted on Saturday. The two Calitabbies, Mopsy and Flopsy were there this morning and I gave them tons of love and kisses before I put them back in their cage and left. They seem to be adjusting pretty well, and I suspect that they’ll be adopted before next Monday because they are SO FREAKIN’ CUTE. On to the pictures! Seamus the love bug.   Mopsy. Doesn’t she look like a fox in the face, in this picture?   Cottontail.   I love the look on her face, like she’s saying “Do you BELIEVE this?” Because those kittens, despite eating solid food and being pretty much weaned, would still try to nurse. She’d let them for a moment, then get up and walk away.       * * * All of today’s uploaded pictures are here. * * * Previously 2005: No entry. 2004: It is FUCKING cold downstairs in our house. 2003: And then I got the Best Picture EVER Taken. 2002: Fluff? Perhaps. But very entertaining fluff. 2001: “Who’s Robyn?” said the realtor. 2000: “You little bastard!” I yelled, and then ran at him 1999: Through three moves and a name change, they’ve managed to keep up with me, sending address labels all the way.]]>

I’m a bit of a pyromaniac (really, who isn’t?), so my eyes twirled and glittered like Beavis’, and I had to restrain the urge to yell “Fire! Fire! Fire!”

We left the house around 4 on Friday – earlier than usual – because I had to box up the foster kittens and take them to the pet store. I didn’t want to, but it was that or adopt them, and like I’ve said in the recent past, ten cats running around the house is just too freakin’ many cats. Christina and Izzie adjusted pretty well to being put in a cage (though Christina gave me the “What the-? Lady, get over here and get me out of here!” look), but Meredith Grey didn’t care for the new situation at ALL, and immediately went to hide in the litter box. O’Malley seemed pretty calm, just stood and looked around at all the people walking by his cage. I know they’ll go to a good home, I know they’ll go to a good home, I know they’ll go to a good home… I thought this was supposed to be easier, the more I did it! (As of this morning, Christina and Izzie had been adopted, both by the same person, and O’Malley and Meredith Grey are still at the pet store. Naturally, I let them out to play first, and gave them lots of lurve.) Saturday we got up and going early, stopped for breakfast on the way to the house, and then when we got to the house, Fred headed back to the back fourty to start the BIG fire. There’s a big-ass pile of crap that was there when we bought the house, and we’ve hated seeing it back there and planned to burn it at some point. After our successful burning of the day before, Fred decided that the time had come. I watched him start it burning and helpfully added a few things to the pile, then went off to do my own thing. My own thing, I’d decided the night before, was going to be to finish clearing out the ditch FINALLY, even if it took all day. It took close to all day, because this is what it looked like before: For a couple of hours I went along the ditch, using the hedge trimmer to cut down the overgrown weeds and grass on the sides and bottom of the ditch then switching to the chainsaw to cut down the bigger bushes and saplings. Things were going well until I hit a particularly thick section of weeds while using the hedgehog and I came across the metal frame that had been holding the political sign I’d thrown away earlier, and it bent the goddamn motherfucking FUCKING FUCKING FUCKING blade of the hedge trimmer. (Third from the top, on the left) I trudged out to the burn pile where Fred was reorganizing things, moving wood from one section to another, trying to get everything burned up. “Can you talk me through fixing this?” I asked, because I had bent the hedge trimmer blade before, and he’d had to take it apart somehow and hammer it straight. He talked for about three minutes straight about how it was going to take a couple of hours and I had to use the (something) to do the (something) and the (something something something something) and I finally just shook my head and walked away, saying “Nevermind.” I was going to give up and just say FUCK IT THE FUCKING DITCH CAN JUST FUCKING STAY OVERGROWN ASK ME IF I GIVE A FUCKING FUCK, but after a break and some kitty-petting*, I got my second wind and said FUCK YOU, YOU FUCKING DITCH, YOU WILL NOT CONQUER ME, I WILL CONQUER YOU AND I WILL KICK YOUR OVERGROWN FUCKING ASS. So I went back to the ditch, and I used the chainsaw to cut down the rest of the overgrown weeds and saplings and then used the push mower to cut the grass growing along the sides and I kicked that ditch’s ASS. And after I kicked that ditch’s ass, I raked all the weeds and leaves into five big piles, and I burned three of those piles. AND THAT WILL TEACH THAT FUCKING DITCH TO GET ALL OVERGROWN AGAIN, DAMNIT. Then I spent the rest of the afternoon raking the side yard and the other end of the ditch (the already-cleared section), and ended up with several fairly large piles of leaves. At one point I went back to check on Fred’s fire, and he pointed to the middle of the burn pile. “I don’t think this is going to burn,” he said. “Why’s that?” I asked. “Because it’s DIRT,” he said. “You are SHITTING me,” I said, and shook my head and then we cursed the names of the family who’d sold us the Smallville house, as we are wont to do at least once every weekend. Not only was there a huge pile of dirt in the burn pile (they were the ones who’d told us that it WAS a burn pile, it’s not like they told us they were tossing garbage out in a pile with no intention of burning it), there was wire fencing, big pieces of tin, and various and sundry other things that – at least on OUR planet – aren’t known for burning easily. Or at all. We didn’t leave the house ’til 5:30 on Saturday (I usually prefer to leave by 5 at the latest), and when I got home I realized I smelled very strongly of smoke, so I hopped into the shower, put on my way-oversized sweatsuit, and spent the evening on the couch ignoring the movie Fred was watching (Slither) and reading. Sunday we left for Smallville fairly early again, and again spent most of the day burning shit, which is starting to be my favorite way to spend a day in Smallville. Fred got the big burn pile going again and I started burning the rest of the piles I’d made the day before. I think I had four piles going at once, but I was keeping a close eye on them, and had the hose close at hand, and they burned down nicely. I spent the rest of the day doing various things – checking on Fred’s fire, raking leaves over by the house (and burning them), painting a door inside the house, and painting the cat house. Okay, so it’s not the most gorgeous, professionally done house. Someone report us to Ty! Not badly built for a man who’d never built anything before AND didn’t have a table saw, and not badly painted for someone who’d never painted before we bought this house, I think. (It’s not the finished finished product, actually – I need to put a second coat on it, and sand down the edges of the roof.) It serves its purpose nicely, though, and Maxi and Newt seem to really like it. We left Smallville a little after 3:00, because we’d run out of things to do outside and we’d been working hard all weekend, so decided that we deserved a bit of a break. And that was our exciting weekend! *Not a euphemism for sex. * * * Oh, and the spud’s surgery went just fine on Wednesday. I finally understand why it is that Fred always laughs at me when I’m in Recovery and they bring him back to see me. Because I was sitting by the spud’s bed after she’d had surgery and I’d ask her a question and there’d be silence… silence… silence… silence… and I’d decide she’d gone to sleep when she’d answer my question. “Spud? Do you want some more apple juice?” Silence. Silence. Silence. Silence. “Yeah….” She didn’t have much pain (in fact, I think she only took the one hydrocodone from the prescription the doctor gave us because both Fred and I told her she should before she went to sleep that night), and she was fine at Thanksgiving the next day, and what’d she do Friday? Went SHOPPING. I guess we’ll save that hydrocodone for a rainy day (ie: it’ll sit in the cupboard for a couple of years until I clean out the cupboard, note the date the prescription was filled, and toss it). * * * Evil Momma Maxi kicks Newt’s butt. She does that a lot.   Fred has taken to calling Maxi “Mom Cullen” because she looks and sounds so much like Tommy.       ***************************************   “Bob! Hey BOB! I hear you’re the guy to know!”       * * * Previously 2005: No entry. 2004: No entry. 2003: You were always what I needed. I thought you always would be. 2002: Then I snorted. “But *I* am not going to do ANYTHING with the turkey, ’cause it’s not MY job!” 2001: Thankyajeezus for hooking me up with a geek. 2000: I’m going crazy with wanting you, and crazier still to know that I can never have you. 1999: spud: Momma let her go into heat!]]>

Thank you to everyone who’s donated so far – I have more than $500 in my PayPal account; I can’t wait to write that check to the shelter! The rest of you – get to donating! Whatcha waiting for? You can donate to the shelter directly via PayPal now, too.

* * * People, please. For the love of all that is holy, it is NOT “You’ve got another thing coming.” It’s “You’ve got another THINK coming.” THINK. NOT THING. Thank you. * * * Sometimes when we drive back from Smallville, we take a different, less country road, route. On the way, there’s a stand that sells apples. A few weeks ago we passed the sign that said “Fresh orchard apples” and I said to Fred, “Doesn’t that sound like a euphemism for cow shit?” and he laughed and agreed. Now I can’t pass that sign without thinking “I wonder how much they’d charge for a bushel of cow shit?” * * * I think I mentioned the other day that Fezzik, Westley, and Princess Buttercup had been adopted when I went to the pet store. Poor Inigo was in a cage all by himself, and when he saw me walk into the room, he started howling and pushing his little face against the cage. I usually start by cleaning out the cages on the bottom, letting the cats out of each cage as I get to it, so that when the most cats are out running around, I’ve got the bottom cages all cleaned and am working on the top cages, which they can’t run in and out of and get in my way. However. Inigo was one of my BAYBEES, so I wasn’t about to make him stay in his cage until I got done with the bottom cages. I opened the door to take him out, and he threw himself at me, purring, and let me hold him for the longest time before he demanded that I put him down so he could go play. I basically let him stay out and play the entire time I was at the pet store, and he played very nicely with the other cats. I thought about putting him in a cage with the kitten he seemed to be having the most fun playing with, but there were no big cages available, so I didn’t. The entire time I was cleaning, he’d play and play and play, and then come over and politely tap at my leg as if to say “Please, ma’am, may I have another?” and I’d pick him up and cuddle him for a few minutes. When it was time for me to leave, I popped him in his cage and booked it out of there before he could give me the betrayed look and howls of rage. It was actually easier for me to leave him than I thought it would be. Last year when I left Jodie and Rambo and had to come back the next day to clean, it was very difficult to leave them, because they – Jodie, especially – were so scared. The fact that Inigo was pretty much taking it in stride made it easier to leave him. I hope like hell he gets adopted before next Monday, though. * * * Note to myself: Do not give Miz Poo medicine on your desk. Because when she fights the medicine – and she WILL – it will go flying all over the damn place, and you will end up with little splatters of medicine all over your monitor, your desk, and your keyboard, and that medicine is some sticky-ass shit. (Mister Boogers, Spanky, Miz Poo, and now Sugarbutt appear to have developed Upper Respiratory Infections. According to the know-it-all front desk lady at the vet’s office, kittens can be carriers of Upper Respiratory Infections while not actually getting sick themselves. I think she just hates kittens and is a big fat LIAR.) * * * We went to the house last night, and I intended to get the rest of the switches and plugs in the upstairs changed out, but it was already too dark by the time we got there, so I’ll have to wait and do it this weekend. Fred spent a little time out on the roof of the house dealing with something that was causing a leak (I wasn’t listening all that closely when he explained it to me), and I started cleaning the paint spatters off the stairs. It took me an hour and a half to get down to the landing, and then Fred wanted to start rehanging the doors in the upstairs, so I never did get the lower half of the stairs cleaned. The cleaned stairs, by the way, look pretty damn good. We’d pretty much decided not to paint the stairs (since so many people in Fred’s comments were opposed to it) and thought we might stain them, but actually I think they look just fine the way they are, so we might just leave them alone. We started hanging doors upstairs, which quickly turned out to be a bit of a cluster fuck since we hadn’t made any attempt to keep the correct hinge with each door/ doorway. We got the door to one of the spud’s closets hung, but then it wouldn’t close, so we had to take it back down and start comparing hinges to find the right one for the door. We finally did, and Fred was so frustrated that he snapped “We are NOT taking ANY MORE doors down!” When I thought of how crappy the doors would look, he gave me a long-suffering look and said in his “Look how patient and long-suffering I am” voice, “I’ll paint them.” Yeah, well, I’ve seen the paint job he’s done on a door we left standing in place and I WAS NOT IMPRESSED. But I bit my tongue and said nothing. It is my considered opinion that I don’t pull my weight when it comes to renovating the house because I can’t cut or hang crown molding (though I can help hang it), I suck at painting, you DON’T want me to replace lights (trust me), and it’s taking me forever to replace the switches because it’s hard to get the wires out of the back of the switch thingy. I feel like I spend a lot of time wandering around, listening to my iPod and half-assedly swiping at things with a cleaning cloth, and doing dumbfuck things like slicing through the extension cord with the hedge trimmer. So when Fred says something that indicates that he thinks I’m not pulling my weight, it makes me squawk indignantly. As I mentioned, though, I bit my tongue and didn’t say anything, but a few minutes later when he was trying to put the screws in the bottom of the door to the spud’s room and he said, impatiently “Hold the door UP a little!”, because I’d held the door up a little and then apparently let it go back to where it was without realizing it, I squawked indignantly “I AM!” and he said “No you’re not, you let it go back too close to the wall!” and I squawked indignantly “NO I’M NOT!” and he laughed at me and I killed him and buried him in the back forty told him to shut up, and then felt better about it. Today, my hip is KILLING me. I have no idea what I did to it, but it hurts to lift my leg, and I’m walking with a limp. I’m sure it’s Fred’s fault. * * * * * * Previously 2005: “Fascinating.” 2004: All your frog are belong to us. 2003: No entry. 2002: I am freezing to death. 2001: I think I need to get a life… 2000: In other words, Robyn is a total spaz about her eyes, comprende? 1999: On the way into work, and the whole time I worked today, I reconsidered that reconsideration.]]>