Technology Rocks. Sometimes.

Thank you, Rurality! You were right about how to move the blogroller over to the side. I even figured out how to add and edit stuff on the Blogroll. It wasn't nearly as hard as I was anticipating.

Now I just need to learn enough html to fool with the font until I'm happy with it. (Isn't it sad that the only html I know is from neopets??)

I'm feeling technologically gifted today. Yay!

My Aura and Other Stolen Things

From Danger Mouse and Stu, five weird things about myself:

1) My hearing is so acute that I can hear lasers. I can walk into your house and tell you whether or not your TV is on, and the daily hum of the fluorescent lights nearly drives me insane. I carry earplugs with me everywhere I go.

2) Like Danger Mouse, I am totally compulsive about peeling things, any things I can get my fingernails into. From one little flip of wallpaper, I can denude the wall in a couple of hours, without really being conscious of what I'm doing.

3) I am a very picky eater, although I am not allergic to anything foodwise. I do not eat things that live in water, fungus, organs, baby animals or any other animal I've ever considered a friend. I am not, however, a vegetatarian. I consider cows to be dinner and a coat on the hoof.

4) I have a magnetic personality. No, really. I cannot keep credit cards anywhere near me or they are rendered useless. I replace watch batteries several times a year, and I nearly always set off airport security. The wand beeps at all of my joints and about half way up my shins. Electronic devices do not like me and I have more computer malfunctions that anyone else I know - I have my own file of odd computer errors in our IT department, and they use me to beta test everything new.

5) I have no sense of direction. None. I got lost here in the building where I've worked for three years just last week. I went down a different staircase, and nothing looked familiar and for an instant, I had no idea where to go. My family says that I subscribe to the daylight school of navigation - east in the morning, west in the evening and at noon I circle helplessly.

This is fun. I think I'll do more than five.

6) I have a hard time with right and left. Before telling people which way to turn, I make 'L's with my index fingers and thumbs. Occasionally, I can't remember which way the L is supposed to go. I used to wear a ring on my left hand to remind me which one was the left one.

7) I am like a cat with closed doors - I'm always on the wrong side of them. I always sit with my back to a wall in restaurants, and I always know where all the exits are. Any building that I spend any time in at all, I will explore in detail at some point during my time there, usually in the middle of the night when I don't have to try to explain myself. (This makes my getting lost in the building even more embarrassing.)

8) I do not like people walking behind me, and I prefer not to be touched casually. Touchy feely people creep me out. My friends torture me by chasing me around and trying to hug me. I rarely wear my hair down in public because everytime I do, someone attempts to pat my hair as though I were a poodle. It's all I can do not to bite them.

9) I tend to think in cartoons, and most of the people in my world remind me of either a cartoon or a muppet.

10) I don't like odd numbers. They just seem incomplete. Whenever possible, I prefer the number two.

~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~"~
My aura is apparently green. Bummer. I was hoping for blue - that's my favorite color. Thanks, Sharfa, for the idea. :-)

So what's yours?

Your Aura is Green

You're very driven, competitive, and even a bit jealous. However, you seek out balance in your life - and you usually achieve it! The purpose of your life: inspiring others to be better Famous greens include: Tony Robbins, Donald Trump, Martha Stewart Careers for you to try: Guru, CEO, Talk Show Host

What Color Is Your Aura?

I'm afraid that I don't really agree with this. Okay, well. I don't agree with the purpose. My purpose really is getting people to stay the hell outta my way more than them being better. I guess I am fairly driven (if that's the same as really, really stubborn). I'm competitive in that I prefer to win, but I will force myself to be a good sport about it either way. Hmm. I do have to battle back slight jealousies, or more appropriately, mild insecurities so I guess that one holds too. Sorta.

We Need You...

I will restrain myself from a full-bore rant on the state of our union today, but I will say this: I firmly believe that organizations like this one may be our only hope to remain a democratic society. Please visit
DefCon today and look around.

Okay, can't help it. Maybe a little rant...

Here's a news flash for you. The government can't protect you. Thomas Edison said, "Those who prefer security to liberty deserve neither." There is a cost to being free, and it is not rolling over when the government tells you to give up liberties to gain security. You haven't gained security, you've only lost liberty.

The cost, as far as I'm concerned, to liberty is liberty: living in a society where it is possible for another 9/11 to happen. Keeping track of the library books that you read, the places you go, the people you talk to and what you say, the things that you buy and what you do with them will not save us from this happening again. Be vigilant, be aware, don't be apathetic, take control of your life - not just in the day to day moments but also of the big pictures as well. We as a country are eroding. Last year, at the Press Awards Dinner, Bush joked about finding WMD. They showed him looking under podiums and such, saying "nope, not here," while the press laughed along with him - as our sons and daughters died. That didn't really even make the news, but some blonde slut saying she's not going to get laid for a year did. Is anyone else sensing a problem here? All I'm asking is please, for the love of the god you believe in, GET INVOLVED. Pay attention.

Maybe I'm wrong, and the majority of the country really is that small-minded and fundamentalist. Maybe Ben Franklin was right when he said that common sense wasn't. Maybe people getting involved will only mean that stem cell research stops, and women lose their reproductive rights, and we stop teaching science to our children and we build discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation into the Constitution. Maybe we as a nation aren't the people that I think we are. But I'd be easier with that than the current situation, where a few scary nutjobs are holding all the cards, so PLEASE just get involved.

Do it for the kittens, if nothing else.

Transitions.

Happy, or at least comical transition: the kitten has grown enough that if she tries REALLY hard, she can vault onto the hutch once in every 10 tries or so. This is pretty good, since the surface is about waist high. This is bad in that my poor Sophia has one fewer place to hide.

Sad, but expected transition: my parents had to put Lady down on Friday. It's actually past time. Ideally, we would have done it when I was home in April, but Dad just wasn't ready to let go. She's happier now. I hope that until we meet again, she has someone to throw sticks for her, and shovels full of snow. And, since I'm not the one washing her, I hope there's a lakeshore, with lots of dead rotting fish to roll in. That's her favorite smell in the world. And basketballs to pop, and UPS men to chase. I love you, puppy.

From the Archives...

I'm saving things I've written about elsewhere, since I'm not sure how long that forum will continue to exist.

From Wednesday, June 22, 2005: "Glued to You, Too"
I co-opted in college at a fiberglass company. One fine day I was running some tests on a couple of different adhesives (they smelled SO good) that we had gotten in. One required heat and pressure to set. The other was pretty much industrial superglue. My luck, they had mislabeled which was which. So I THOUGHT I had all kinds of time and I had this glue all over my hand and I put my hand down on the work bench and... stuck. So I tugged and pulled... still stuck. The work bench was this huge steel thing that I couldn't move at all and I threw myself backwards as hard as I could but... still stuck. So I started trying to reach the acetone that would dissolve the glue, but it was on another bench. And I stretched and pulled and threw myself in THAT direction. No dice, but that didn't stop me from exhausting myself trying to reach it.

Just about then, one of the VP's of the company comes into the lab, so I tried to assume a fairly comfortable position - one that didn't scream that I'd glued myself to a table. He walked over to me and told me that he had some paperwork that I had asked for. Not willing to admit that I'd glued myself down, I tried for nonchalance and told him that I'd be along shortly. At this point, he was starting to smirk, and he said that he had meetings and now was really better. So, I said that I'd be right along and he should go ahead. At which point he burst into laughter and said 'you've glued yourself to the table, haven't you?' while I was trying to figure out how to plausibly deny this, he holds the acetone bottle just out of reach and starts singsonging 'trying to reach this?' *sigh* That was not my best day.

From Friday, June 24, 2005: "Some Mornings Suck More Than Others"
I had to come in an hour earlier than normal this morning for a meeting. Ergle. And I just now realized that I only applied deodorant on one side this morning.

Also this morning, I tripped over the cat and sent my BlackBerry into a sink full of water. I have to say that these blackberries are much more durable that you'd think, 'cause it's still working.

But I have several new lovely bruises where I crashed into the wall tripping over the cat and then the sink trying to grab the slippery little BlackBerry.

Then I put the coffee pot into the fridge and noticed only because the milk jug wouldn't fit under the coffee filter basket. Left my car keys in the house and couldn't figure out why my house key wouldn't open the car door. AND then got stuck on the car door 'cause the strap of my bag got caught on the corner of the door. *sigh*

From Tuesday, June 28, 2005: "Historical Car Moment"
Since I got hung up on the car door the other day, I thought I'd share another stellar car door moment from the archives.

I learned to drive in a Chevy Suburban. Man, I miss that truck! It could pass anything but a gas station. At any rate, I drove it to school one day 'cause I had a large ungainly project to transport.

I am not exactly tall, and the Suburban wasn't what you'd call low to the ground so to disembark, I had to hop/jump/rappel out. So I slung my backpack over my shoulders, opened the door, hit the lock button automatically and jumped. Somehow or another, I managed a series of events - 1 - my backpack strap got hooked over the door; 2 - I bumped the door closed on the strap and 3 - the force of the jolt when the door closed caused me to drop my keys. The result of this series of events was that the keys were on the ground and I was dangling nearly 2 feet above the ground by my backpack, which was securely closed in the locked door.

Trapped. Trapped like a rat. Trapped like a rat while my esteemed fellow students laughed like hyenas at my predicament. Trapped further when a teacher came over to figure out what they were laughing at, and nearly hurt himself laughing at me as well. *sigh* Eventually, he recovered enough to get the keys, unlock the door and free me from captivity.

Looking back, I can only thank the stars that camera phones didn't yet exist.


From Friday, July 22. 2005: "Irony on a Sunday"
I have 'moments' often enough, that if I detailed all of 'em, I'd never get anything else done but last weekend's moment just smacks of the sort of irony I enjoy, when it happens to someone else.

When I get really ticked off at the world, very little makes me feel better than the sound of breaking china. Not glass, china. So, I haunt yard sales and goodwill and pick up cheap china, just so I can hurl it into walls when I feel like it.

The walls in my apartment would NOT react well to this treatment, so I use a brick wall outside. (My neighbors thought I was nuts BEFORE I started throwing things.)

Last weekend, I was out playing in my flowers in my bare feet. I stepped on something that REALLY hurt and after I dug it out of the bottom of my foot, I realized that it was a china fragment from my last temper tantrum. The china gets the last laugh this time!

From Tuesday, August 2, 2005: "Smokin'!!"
My work keeps the building very cold - I detest air conditioning - and so we've gotten into the habit of eating outside to warm up. (I bask in the sun like a reptile to store warmth for the rest of the day.) The tables outside are stone, with stone benches. Only one table has a tilt feature on the umbrella, but it gets quite toasty on the benches in the sun.

So yesterday, I took my lunch outside, wrestled the umbrella into the right position and plopped myself down for lunch. The bench was VERY warm. Uncomfortably warm...Ooh, my biscuits are burning warm. Well, these tables are built for 4 and we usually squish 7 or 8 people at each one, so I really didn't have room to sit anywhere else at the table. So I sat on that really hot bench for an hour...and now, ladies and gentlemen, I have burnt my ass - I got a sunburn from that damn bench!

Bonus friend moment: My friend C just told me that she went home last night, pulled in her driveway, shut off the car, got out and stuffed her key in the garage door (she just moved in and hasn't installed the garage door opener yet), and then spent several minutes swearing and fighting with the key, which wasn't unlocking the door. At some point, she realized that it wasn't unlocking the door because it wasn't her door. She had pulled into the driveway 2 down from hers.

From Friday, August 5, 2005: "Hair Moment, Revisited"
*sigh* I took my hair down last night and as usual, my disobedient hair wrapped itself around everything around me. Not thinking about it, I realized I was late for a meeting, jumped up to take off and was attacked by my chair, which was attached to me by several feet of hair. The chair came at me, I jumped backwards, tripped over my computer bag and landed in a heap on the floor, with my chair on top of me, still attached. AND not only did I land on the floor under the chair, I ended up in the aisleway between my cube and the wall, just as the VP of operations walked by. *shakes head* Why me?!?

From Monday, August 22, 2005: "Need More Caffeine..."
So yesterday I took the trash out to the dumpster, walking past my neighbors - who were sitting out on their patio enjoying the day. Got to the dumpster, spied my jeep and decided that I needed to check the oil. Went past the neighbors to go in and get my car keys. Realized that I was still holding the trash bag. Passed the neighbors to throw away the trash. Then passed them again to get my car keys then again with the keys to get into the jeep. Then again to find a paper towel to clean the oil off the dipstick then again to get back to the jeep to check the oil. Then again to go inside. Then back to the jeep to retrieve the house keys from the jeep. *giggle* They kind of looked like they were watching a tennis match - back and forth, back and forth. The last few times I wandered past them, they had a distinct look of - wow, something is WRONG with her - on their faces.


From Friday, December 2, 2005: "Coffee Mornings"
Every morning has a routine - I get into work, turn the 'puter on, grab my carafe and trudle off to the coffee station. This morning, like every other, I filled the carafe and hauled it back to my desk.

Today, I attempted to multitask, which always works well before my first shot of caffeine. So I was reading emails as I was pouring and pouring and pouring 'cause I kinda forgot that arm hanging in the air with the coffee pot. I totally flooded my entire desk - most of a pot of coffee tidalwaved over and out of the mug and washed my desk and most everything on it onto the floor, which is currently squishing.

*sigh* It's going to be a LONG day. I can just tell.

From Monday, December 19, 2005: "Dude, Where's My Car?"
so saturday night i braved the mall to do some christmas shopping. they're open 'till 11, so i arrived around 8:30, parked and went in.

just on a side note, what the hell HAPPENS to people in a mall?!? they walk normally in the parking lot, i've seen 'em do it! then they get inside and suddenly they're trying to propel themselves through syrup. hello! move your ass! i'm not here for the scenery and i WILL run your ass over if you don't stay out of my way. i know people who consider a trip to the mall as entertainment. i do not understand those people. i think of it as a war, and i'm not willing to take prisoners. i have an objective, a timeframe and i like the sound people make when they hit the ground and all the air rushes out of their lungs. grr.


anywho... i really don't like this mall 'cause it confuses me. it's got several levels and they all have entrances and i always get confused about what entrance i parked near and what level i have to be on to get out - erk, it's horrid. (keep your smartass remarks about my sense of direction to yourself, please.) and really, i'm sure the sight of me racing past people to one end of the mall only to stop in befuddlement, turn around and race the other way kept the security people entertained for the evening.

so, i finally finish my shopping (or more correctly, give up, utterly unable to deal any further with the rest of humanity), locate a likely looking exit and flee the building, lugging about 400 lb of christmas crap... only to wander around the nearly empty parking lot, freaking out 'cause i can't find the jeep that i know i parked RIGHT THERE. i found and commandered a shopping cart, which made lugging the crap easier, but it was REALLY FREAKING COLD and my jeep was totally gone and i was panicing bigtime - aargh someone stole it and i don't have time to deal with this!! so i decided to get security and i made my way back to the building. by this point, the mall is closed and the doors are locked, but before i decide to erm, finesse, the door, someone waiting for a ride let me in.

now you can picture me in my old-lady-purple coat, pushing a shopping cart full of bags and muttering to myself wandering lost in an empty shopping mall, looking for security... when i realize that i passed a hallmark going in and there's no hallmark in this hallway. crap. my next plan was to find a mall directory to locate the hallmark so i can get out and wow, that's like snipe hunting in december. but eventually i truimphed - at the wrong end of the mall and on the wrong level as well. *sigh*

so i truddled with my cart to the other end of the mall and up the down escalator (as entertaining as it could have been, they'd been turned off by this point) and out the correct door where my jeep was sitting in solitary splendor right where i left it. i felt kinda bad leaving the cart there in the cold when it had been so helpful...

flash to today, when i had to go out at lunch to pick up a filing cabinent. and once again it is freakin' cold here (chicago in december, go figure) and i have NO clue where i parked. so, i was wandering up and down the rows of cars when a coworker pulls up and rolls down his window to see what exactly i'm doing out there. and i told him that i couldn't remember where i put my car, and i was kind of looking around trying to spot it and he says to me - "you really have no clue where it is, do you?" he did offer to drive me around the parking lot and help look, but it's not that big of a lot and i'd already wandered through most of it and my jeep was in the aisle i was in, just hiding behind a hummer so i was close...

so there you have it - twice in three days i have totally and completely lost my vehicle and had to wander around outside in sub-zero weather for several minutes to find it. *headdesk* why me?

German Kung Fu

So, did anyone watch Jon Stewart last night?

He had a clip of our fearless leader grabbing onto the German chancellor at the G8 conference. She got this look of total revulsion on her face and threw her hands in the air - sort of like they tell you to do to break someone's hold on you in self defense class. Actually, Jon's comment was that she learned that maneuver in date rape avoidance class. I haven't been able to find the clip anywhere, and I prefer to check my sources. Did it really happen? The eight most important people on the planet, and one of them is so clueless regarding protocol that he clamps onto one of the others like she's one of his cigar-smoking crony poker buddies back on the ranch. WTF??

On the other hand, he also showed the clip of Bush vs. Putin on democracy. Here's the transcript:

BUSH: I talked about my desire to promote institutional change in parts of the world, like Iraq, where there's a free press and free religion. And I told him that a lot of people in our country would hope that Russia will do the same thing. I fully understand, however, that there will be a Russian-style democracy.

PUTIN: We certainly would not want to have same kind of democracy as they have in Iraq, quite honestly.

BUSH: Just wait.

"Just wait?!?" Wow. There's some stunningly clever repartee. Does that mean we're invading Russia next? *sigh*



EDIT: I'll be damned. It did happen. Check it out.

By Jove, I Think I've Got It!

So, today I set up something approaching a blogroll. I have no idea how to edit it, or move it from the bottom to the side, or (for that matter) give it a title, but I've managed to start one, AND have it show up on my blog. Hot dog! Maybe I can handle this whole technology thing after all. Next thing you know, I'll figure out how to turn off the fire alarm without ripping out all its little wires... Or or or how to adjust my toaster so that I don't set the damn alarm off in the first place.

Today, I feel all things technological are possible!

A Milestone, of sorts

Today is the first day that the kitten is free during the day. Up 'till this point, I've locked her in the spare room while I'm at work. I stopped locking her up at night on Friday (or maybe Thursday) of last week.

I sleep like the dead, which is fortunate because I think the kitten spends the entire night racing around the bed like it's a NASCAR track. Any downtime is spent chewing on any part of me above the covers. My hand looks like it went through a meat grinder, and I vaguely remember waking up sometime Saturday night to find a kitten wrapped around my hand, gnawing away.

My main line of defense to date has been to have the air conditioner on. I am not fond of air conditioning as a rule, and I prefer the hot, sticky weather we've had lately, but even I am not willing to remain too covered up when the temperature climbs into the 90s. So, the air conditioner is on and I spent my evenings in long pants and sweatshirts, hundled under blankets. That way, when the kitten climbs me like a tree, it's not actually my flesh that she's digging her razor-like little claws into.

My Sophia remains unconvinced about this whole thing. She is sorta playing with the kitten, occasionally. She chases it around, and it chases her, but she's still spending most of her time up high on the hutch, or on the top shelf of the flora cart.

Sophia is quite the picky eater - food is her kibble in her bowl. Food is not my food or different kinds of her food. Spiders and flying things are food, if she can catch 'em. The invisible semi-annual invaders are food. Kitten food is NOT food - she tried to bury it after a sniff. The kitten, on the other hand, eats EVERYTHING. I am not used to having to guard my food from the cat. I walked in the room yesterday to find the kitten snarfing down cheese corn. This can't be good for her (although the orange all over her face and whiskers was pretty cute). Also yesterday, the kitten damn near drowned herself in a coffee mug, trying to drink my coffee. I'm thinking that the last thing I need is to caffinate that animal. And she LOVES Sophia's food - just hoovers it right down. So, Sophia's food is now living on the hutch, where the kitten can't reach it. Lord only knows what we're going to do when the kitten is big enough to jump.

Of course, that's assuming we keep it. I have yet to name the kitten, and on the whole, I don't think it's nearly cute enough to put up with the irritation. This little adventure has definitely reinforced my no-children policy. If Sophia doesn't warm up to this creature, it's outta here. I think I can watch it growing, though, so hopefully this kitten stage won't last too long and it'll turn into a cat - one both of us can get along with.

Spiders, Oh My!

Several years ago, my uncle bought a house in Phoenix. It had been a rental for many years, and the small 'yard' between the house and the carport had been largely neglected. There's a shed to the one side that contains the washer and dryer, and it was home to spider central - many of them black widows. My uncle is not the spider lover that I am, and he bug bombed the bejesus out of the area, until it was mostly arachnid free. I say mostly, because there was one very sizable black widow that lived behind the siding of his house, accessible through the gap under his outside faucet. You don't know my uncle, but he's very quiet, introspective and intellectual. The image of him, sliding mission impossible style through his door, with a can of raid in both hands, trying to sneak up on this spider then jumping around the doorframe and letting go with both barrels (er, cans) only to have the spider escape uninjured AGAIN just makes me happy. He spent literally months trying to kill this thing - with cans of spray, with brooms and shoes and the hose and other assorted tools, and I'm not sure he ever got it - but his stories of his battles with the spider made my day on more than one occasion.

Flash forward to present day. My brother bought a house a year ago. His adventures in spider-cide have kept me entertained since he moved in. Picture, if you will, my brother with a raid can in one hand and his 'spider broom' in the other as he circles his house on a murderous rampage... The spiders outside appreciate, I think, that Scott cleans all those husks out of the way while they hide in the sliding.

At any rate, if you were to venture down into scott's mostly finished basement, you may spot the source of scott's current unrest. A large spider lives in a hole near his fake fireplace. Scott has been gunning for this thing for months. He's got a can of raid sitting on the steps, where he can grab it and charge for the hole. The other day, he came home and went downstairs to find the spider on the far wall - too far away from his hole to make it to safety. Scott, scenting triumph, decided that a more hands-on approach was called for, and went after the spider with his shoe. As the spider fled for its life, Scott smacked at it - and the spider knew to alter its pattern. Right before impact, the spider dodged and varied its speed, so Scott never connected... But he chased it all the way across the basement, where the spider dove into its hole. (I get pictures of Bugs Bunny swan diving into his hole after escaping Elmer Fudd in my head every time I picture this.)

Scott recently had a flooding problem. It rained all day, then it dumped 7" of rain in under four hours on the area. His sump pump decided that was the perfect time to die so Scott ended up with several inches of standing water in his basement. Apparently, at one point, Scott was sitting on his steps, watching the water rise, with his cat sitting next to him. Suddenly, Hammie's litter box came floating out of one room and past the steps. Apparently the look on the cat's face was almost worth the water. As Scott pondered the water levels in his basement, he noticed the spider, up high on the wall - also pondering the water in the basement. Scott said that the relief he felt upon realizing that the flood had not killed his adversary is making him rethink his position on killing it. He can't help but respect his enemy, and may end up leaving the spider alone.

Both my uncle and my brother swear that they can hear the spiders laughing at them. I think maybe they've both inhaled a bit too much insecticide.

And you know what? My other uncle had a spider episode many years ago in my grandmother's old house. The spider lived in the sink, and every time anyone made a grab for it, it would jump down the drain and escape. My uncle spent a ridiculous amount of time trying to kill that spider and finally one day, he snapped. He poured something flammable down the sink, then he sprayed a bunch of hairspray down the drain, and then... He lit a match and dropped that down the sink too. The resulting explosion blew off his eyebrows, but the most painful part of the experience for my uncle was having that damn spider pop back out of the drain. Hmm. He swore he could hear the spider laughing at him too. I'm beginning to sense a trend.

This is at least partly why I have a catch and release policy - my family does not have an impressive track record when it comes to doing away with our 8 legged neighbors.

A Breakthrough?

Last night, while the kitten was asleep, Sophia snuck up on it, sniffed its head, and didn't hiss. This is the first time that she's been within 2 feet of it and hasn't sounded like a dragon. We'll see.

Yay!

MM and Blaze the Wonder Dog have made it back from the dark side. We're still waiting for the full story, but both of them are bruised and battered. Apparently Blaze's old owner stole him from the Magazine Mansion, just to beat the crap out of him. I just report the news, folks, I don't try to explain it. Whatever his motivation, I hope the asshat rots for a good long while.

Hissin' in the Pit

I've subjected numerous people to what my family affectionately calls 'Pete Hill jokes' over the years. All I remember to another one is the punchline 'hissin' in the pit' and something about baby snakes. *shrug* One day it'll come to me.

In the meantime, this phrase was running through my head yesterday as I watched my Sophia react to the presence of another four-footed furry one. I've been debating with myself about this since a bit before Memorial Day. My mom's cat had 6 kittens. She's keeping one, my brother is taking one to entertain his cat and she's looking for homes for the rest. [Want a kitty??]

My poor Sophia spends a lot of time alone, and I've considered getting another cat for a while. She was also the only cat in a cage at the shelter, and she had that bright orange caution sticker. I just have never determined whether that sticker was for people or other pets.

When my brother lived near my parents' house, I would stay with him over the holidays. I would also bring Sophia with me. His cat, Hammie, is an affectionate but timid Russian Blue. Hammie (short for hammerhead, as his friendly head-butts to the backs of your knees can send you flying) is a sack o' sand cat. Anything you want to do to him is okay by him. He is one of those cats that you hear about, that you can dress up in baby clothes and haul them around like luggage. One thing: Hammie LOVES other kitties. They aren't ever as fond of him, but he certainly tries. Think here of Peppy La Pew and his frantic cat girlfriend.



One of the funniest things I've ever seen was near Christmas a couple of years ago, while Sophia and I were at my brother's. I was cross-stitching. My cat has a string/thread fetish. Sophia was utterly intent upon my needle and thread, and the tip of her tail was twitching. Hammie was utterly intent on the tip of Sophia's tail. He came slinking along the couch, stalk stalk stalk and then POUNCE! onto her tail. My cat jumped several feet into the air, hissed like a dragon and took off running, with Hammie in hot pursuit. Poor baby - it makes me laugh just thinking about it.

At any rate, I went home for the fourth of July and was captivated by the little balls o' fuzz. So captivated, in fact, that when I returned to the Chicago area last Wednesday, I brought along a small passenger. The road trip wasn't nearly as bad as I feared - the kitten spent most of the time sprawled bonelessly across my lap, dreaming kitten dreams. I also hauled back some of my furniture, so I had a fair bit of unloading to do.

My first trip into the house, I deposited the kitten in the spare room and shut the door. Then I grabbed my cat, stuffed her in my bedroom and shut the door. This way, I could leave the sliding glass door open while I unloaded without fear of feline escape. It didn't take Sophia long at all to start complaining about her captivity, and she was in mid-yowl when the kitten also voiced her displeasure at being detained. (She has an impressive lung capacity for one so small.) Sophia's yowl died mid-stream, and she was suddenly a very quiet kitty. After I finished unloading, I freed her, and she immediately glued herself to the spare room door.

*sniff, sniff* Indignant look at me - one that clearly says, "What the hell have you done?!?" *sniff, sniff* *mutter, growl*

I scooped her up, went into the spare room, shutting the door behind me, and plopped down on the floor with my Sophia in my lap. The kitten came bounding over (as much as she could - coordination is still something of an issue), thrilled to find another cat here in the wilderness. Sophia quickly disabused her of that notion. My baby turned into a hissing, snarling demon.

So far, Sophia has been dealing with the issue by sticking to the high road. By that I mean that she's been living on top of all the furniture, and hissing anytime the kitten passes below her. The kitten resides in the spare room while I'm at work, and at night. I'll give Sophia a couple of weeks to adjust, but I'm trying hard not to get too attached to the kitten, just in case things don't work out. I already miss my Sophia - I'm on the shit list for now. Wish me luck with the adjustment period!

The Lengths We Go To...

The Magazine Family over at the Masthead is not having a pleasant holiday. Their dog, Blaze, was apparently stolen off his run in their backyard. Given that the neighbors' disappeared dog ended up being found in the city's garage dump, a victim of dogfighting, there's a whole lot of people currently fearing the worst for Blaze.

Some bonehead with 20/20 hindsight demanded to know why Blaze was left unattended for a split second (which actually makes me wonder if someone was gunning for him, 'cause he's not unattended often). Being much more gracious than I happen to be, MM turned it into a request: when you say that your animals are family, to what extent do you mean it? Give examples.

It got me to thinking, which was undoubtedly the point. I've said for years that I prefer animals to most people. I've cried harder for them than at any other occasion in my life (but I am very fortunate that I haven't lost those closest to me). So, how far would I go? I'm not sure I'll know until I'm actually there, but I can look back at what I've done in the past.

I ripped all the duct work out of the basement to free my hamster, who promptly bit me. At the time, however, I was all of 10 or so and didn't understand the havoc I was wreaking on our heating and cooling system. I still have the scars, from the bite and from the nasty slice I got from the really sharp metal edges of the ducts. Of course, since then I've ripped into those ducts often enough, to free assorted rodents, that Dad actually put in a little door specifically to rescue the wildlife that finds its way in from the dryer vent. So I'd have to say that the second time I tore it all apart, to save a chipmunk, took more nerve, since I vividly remembered Dad's reaction to the first time. I took a deep breathe, thought to myself, "well, I'm going to pay for this," and dug in.

As a teenager, I braved "the thunderstorm of the century" in a nightgown to retrieve my panic-stricken cat. I nearly got squashed by two different trees before I caught the cat and made it back to the safety of our basement. In this case, as with most, I can't take credit for bravery or even nerve (or sense for that matter), since it never occurred to me until it was too late to turn back that maybe this wasn't the wisest course of action.

And really, maybe that is one of the defining characteristics of "family" - to be willing to rush headlong into something dangerous, maybe even lethal, knowing full well that you are going to potentially (maybe even probably) cause yourself pain and doing it anyway because it needs done, because you've promised someone - even if it was just yourself - that you were the caregiver. It was your responsibility to see to the safety, care and comfort of that soul.

I've darted into the street in front of a moving vehicle to snatch a very dear friend's toddler from nearly under the bumper. We were in the house and an hour had passed before I realized that I very nearly didn't make it. If I'd been wearing a bulky sweater that day, that car would have had me. Once again, sheer blind reflex.

I routinely risk my fingers moving snapping turtles out of the path of traffic, and I probably risked more than that freeing a fox from a leg trap one winter day many years ago. That is not extraordinary behavior as far as I'm concerned. I have zero tolerance for seeing animals in pain. My feeling is that if you have the ability to reason and to realize that someone/something is in distress, then you have the responsibility to do something about it.

I've spent more money than I care to think about (and certainly more than I had readily available at the time) on vet bills. Fred, our cockatiel, managed to get into rat poison once - I caught him crunching those greenish bluish pellets like candy and my heart stopped. We spent several hundred dollars on the vet, and then had the added joy of another couple of weeks of giving him shots in his scrawny little chest, and squirting medication down his throat to bring him back to full strength. The best was when the little shit figured out that he could stick his tongue into the end of the syringe to keep the medication from flowing down his little birdie gullet.

I have volunteered with abused and neglected horses for years, and some of the things I've seen that people do to them just sickens me. I've been in situations where I stood there in horror and literally had no idea where to start - like when some fucknut decided to hogtie a misbehaving filly to a fence - with barbed wire. Or the little goat that was stuck, chest high, in a stall so full of waste that he literally couldn't move. At what point, exactly, did this seem like the proper way to care for an animal?

And that brings me to what is the hardest thing of all: when there is nothing you can do but say goodbye, and help them go gently into the night... When I was 12, and our dog had arthritis so badly that we had to carry him outside to go to the bathroom, and he looked at my mom, his best friend in the whole wide world, and she knew he was ready to call it quits... When our cat was hit by a car, and dragged herself home and touching her caused her so much pain... When Fred, our wonderful little cockatiel, wouldn't eat and couldn't sleep and stayed puffed up and miserable in the corner of his cage... And now, with Lady, our courageous, ferocious darling with her damned pure-blooded hindquarters, who drags herself over to get pats and attention and snaps at her own rear when it won't do what she wants it to, and who is so mortified at her growing incontinence. It's killing me inside, and I'm crying now, because I know her time is short. She looked at me the other day the way Hanz looked at Mom all those years ago - this isn't fun anymore and she's ready to go home. Now I need to find the strength that my mom had then - to let go, to say goodbye and help her leave the body that's become a prison.

I don't know if there's a Heaven or a Hell, or if it's all just Karma and we're working our way up from dung beetles but Hell is saying goodbye. And if Heaven doesn't include my four-footed friends, I'm not going.

Happiness in June is... THE WILTON TENT SALE!

I have a vast assortment of really cool kitchen gizmos that I will probably never use. These include (but are in no way limited to) muffin tins shaped like shells, hearts, snowmen, and Scooby Doo too; cake pans in the form of snowflakes, presents and odd geometric designs; stoneware shaped like eggs, bunny heads, and hearts; enough cake decorating do-dads to open my own bakery; gizmos large and small - a food mill, cookie press, roughly 400 whisks of assorted sizes, lots of tongs, wooden utensils, cookie cutters in an astonishing range of shapes and sizes, popsicle makers; miniature bakeware - tiny tart pans, little metal donut looking things for baby angel food cakes, small loaf and round cake pans; and so on.

That doesn't include all the toys that I've actually used - cookie sheets; baking pans; sparking sugars; cupcake liners; pots; bowls; measuring do-dads; the best tasting spoons ever; thermometers for candy, meat, the oven; my teapot; a colander or two; cutting boards; knives; the garlic squasher; salt and pepper mills; lettuce knife; salad spinner; cookbook holder; coffee carafe; spoon straws; graters; 3D bunny cake pan; tea ball; tea bag squeezer; percolator; a collection of picture frames; candy molds; pitchers; slicers and dicers; and so on.

Where did I get all this cool kitchen swag? The Wilton tent sale, of course. I am fortunate (although my checkbook doesn't always agree) to live not far from the worldwide headquarters of Wilton, renowned for cake decorating. Every year in June, they erect a monster tent in their parking lot, mark everything in it down 30 - 70% and then they stand back and wait for the people. Every year, the people arrive to fill shopping carts full of overstock/discontinued/just on sale stuff. And every year, I'm right there with the rest of the people. This is my third year, and given that I'm job searching, it may be my last. *sob* At this point, I have to schedule things carefully 'cause I have friends coming in for every weekend so they can load up on random fun toys as well.

This year, the sale ends on the 20th. I've already been twice. I'll be going at least once more - more friends coming into town. Every year I find another 'the coolest thing ever!' and this year, it's a 3 in 1 cake saver. I love this thing!! It holds a 9x13 cake pan, which is cool, but the best part is the removable tray. The tray holds 12 cupcakes or, if you flip it over, 24 mini-cupcakes. How cool is that?!? And it has a handle to carry it for travel! I love this thing!! Okay. Better now. It'll have to be a really cool something to beat that.

Now, I just have to find room for all the new stuff. I need more cabinet space!!

Arguing with Myself

If you haven't seen Jeff Dunham's DVD, you need to. The guy is a genius. The group watching it was in tears from laughing so hard - both times we watched it last weekend.

Jeff is a ventriloquist, and you've probably seen him on Leno, Letterman, or on comedy central. His act starts with Walter, a salty old codger. The two middle puppets are obviously newer, although still funny - Sweet Daddy D, and Bubba Junior. The funniest, in my opinion, is Peanut. I'm not sure what, exactly, Peanut is - kind of a chimp-like purple thing with fraggle rock hair - but he's hilarious. Pity those around me - they haven't seen the DVD (yet - my copy will be arriving this week, and everyone I know will have seen it shortly thereafter) but they have gotten to listen to my nonsensical quotations. (We're in HELL, and these are our hellmates! She got out of bed, jumped on her menstrual cycle and RAN MY ASS OVER! And so on...)

Make sure you watch the bloopers, with commentary at the end. The commentary explains so much.

If you have little ones, there is a bleeped track for them, but watch it again after they've gone to bed. Just make sure you're a ways away - your laughter will wake them up otherwise.

Kitties!

My mother is finally a grandmother. Nope, wasn't me. Or my brother. It was the most recent addition to the family - Goldy.

Sometime in January, Lady (our German Shepherd) was outside with Dad. She found something of intense interest under a tree in the front yard, and whined and carried on 'till Dad came over to see what she'd found. She had discovered a tiny gold kitten, shivering and half starved in the snow. Dad brought it in the house and Mom took over as medic, with Lady in attendance.

It didn't take very long for the kitten to recover, and become the typical manic ball of ever-moving fluff that kittens tend to be. It also didn't take very long for our long-suffering dog to heartily regret rescuing that animal. The kitten, now christened Goldy, considered Lady to be her mom, her nurse and her favorite jungle gym, all rolled into one. If she wasn't on the dog, she was stalking her. Lady was supremely good-natured about the whole thing, right up until Goldy decided that she should be eating from Lady's plate. Fortunately, the kitten was bright enough to realize that Lady's warning snarls were serious.

The vet wouldn't fix the kitten until she was six months old. My mother, in spite of the mean dogs and the proximity of the road, wasn't willing to keep the kitten indoors.

The end result: yesterday my mom left a message on my machine - Goldy was having her kittens in the middle of the living room floor. There are six of them, although one is a runt and may not make it. Three are gold, one is black and white and two are calicos.

Mom's keeping one, my brother will be taking one, I may take one and the vet has agreed to post pictures of the remaining kittens in her office. I have told Mom that I'll take one, conditionally. I'm not at all sure how my Sophia will react to a fuzzy little interloper, so Mom needs to have a buy-back clause.

But in the meantime, feel for my poor puppy. She thought she had it rough with one kitten in the house. Now, she essentially has to deal with seven of them.

Ode to an Edit...

So it occurs to me, as I look over the list of my posts, that I have a lot of them to finish...

Many, many lines of green look back at me.

"Edit me! Post me! Finish me!" they cry.

It's becoming quite a clamor.

They're stacking ever higher.

Will I ever end another post again?

Oh me, oh my!

Call it done, good enough.

Why is it so hard to stop?

Say it's good enough and move on to the next?

Never again, I fear, will I see "blog published successfully."

Is there a secret? Is it a trick?

To close, to finish and then move along - this is my goal, you see.

Shouldn't be hard, people do it every day.

Why must I edit? Who will see?

Must stop now and call it done.

Complete. Finished.

No really, this time I mean it.

Adventures in Surgery

Wow. My face hurts. Okay, not all of it - just the left side. And I'm not too swollen, although my jaw is turning a lovely yellowish black and it looks for all the world like I've been punched.

Last Thursday, I went under the knife (or pliers or whatever) to have my wisdom teeth removed. They came in late last spring - I was competing with my friends' kids for teething rings. At first, I tried to go to a surgeon recommended by my dentist at home but the timing just wouldn't work out. And I have to confess that I've been stalling. I've never gone under anesthetic before and it wasn't an experience I was looking forward to, not by any means.

But, I could feel them pushing and crowding for room, and I am not willing to go through another eight years of orthodontical hell to straighten out my teeth. Not again. Nope, nope, nope. Maybe not all orthodontists are sadists, but you couldn't prove it by me.

The surgeon was recommended by a friend, whose two teenagers had their wisdom teeth taken out within a few months of each other (and me, as it turned out). There was quite a wait for the first appointment - three months or so. Once I got in there though, it was all systems full go - it was less than a month before the teeth were coming out. It would have been a week or two, but I wanted a Thursday appointment as opposed to a Monday appointment. No sense in missing an entire week of work.

When your wisdom teeth come in, there are two possible problems. On the top, the tooth can grow into your sinus cavity. This happened to my brother. At the time, I found it hilarious - he couldn't get any suction to smoke. On the bottom, the tooth can grow very near or into a major nerve - leading to complications ranging from permanent numbness to partial paralysis of your face. Just my luck, on my right side, I have both. Yay for me. Fortunately, I guess, only the ones on the left have actually broken through, so the doctor made the decision to leave the ones on the right alone and just hope they don't come in. He did leave me with the cheery news that should they come in, and need removed, nothing I'm going through this time will compare to the agony of next time. Lovely. Thank you.

My mom flew in for my surgery (and that'll merit a post on its own - she's never flown commercially before) and first thing Thursday morning, we were in the doctor's office.

Wow, they've got GOOD drugs. He sprayed this freezey stuff on my arm and I never felt the needle for the IV. I watched the liquid come through the tube and the next thing I knew, it was two hours later and my mouth was full of gauze. I remember getting into my Jeep, 'cause I had to get in on the wrong side (my jeep = I drive, except this day). Then we flash to walking up the drive to my apartment. One of my neighbors was out on her balcony and I attempting, through the gauze, to introduce my mother. Then we flash to Mom waking me up to hand over the prescription meds that she had run out and filled. Then a couple hours later, I realized that the walls and ceiling were pulsing. Note to self - we don't like the prescription pain medication. Next stop - about 12 hours later, when I finally wake up and determine that yes, the ceiling is still pulsing. Walking across the floor was like being on a small boat, in the ocean, during a hurricane. Ugh.

Friday, once I was up and moving - around 3:00 pm or so - I felt fine. Mom and I actually went walking around the town, ate out (carefully, with squishy food, on my part), and rented movies. By the time we were walking home, though, my face hurt. I spent most of the first movie peering past the ice pack.

Saturday, Mom's plane left early so I dropped her off at the airport, came back and went back to bed. Sunday, I did laundry and slept some more. Of course, I must confess that this is pretty typical for me. I (along with the rest of my family) prefer to be nocturnal. This doesn't really agree with my company's take on things, so I tend to spend weekends catching up on the sleep I missed during the week.

So, all things considered, it went quite well. Mom and I actually got along in a small space for several days. I don't really hurt, and my face isn't too puffy, and hopefully the other side won't ever bother coming in. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, anyway.

It's Spring!

Yay! My favorite time of the year is finally here! I knew it was close a few weeks ago, when the robins arrived. I suspected it was creeping closer when the temperature hit 60 F. Now, it's here, it's here!

The spring flowers are blooming, the trees are budding, the frogs are singing, and the geese are pairing off.

And, even better, my daffodils are alive and sprouting. Our house has always had this particular type of daffodil, that I've never seen anywhere else. It has a double flower - almost looking like a small yellow peony, and is very fragrant. It's also very hardy. When I was a child, Mom thinned them out and ended up with a couple of buckets of bulbs. What she couldn't pawn off on the neighbors was finally tossed into the weeds - a couple of acres of scrub that we just left growing wild. The next spring, and to this day, that area is a blanket of yellow in the spring where the bulbs evaded the bunnies and planted themselves.

These particular blooms always signal spring to me. I can't imagine the season without them. Last year, I asked Mom for some to plant here, in my wee bit of dirt. I picked the bag of bulbs up from her at Labor Day, when she told me that she figured that she wouldn't be able to find them in the fall, so she plucked them out of the ground in the spring, right before their foliage died back. I took them back to Chicago with me, and they sat in that bag for another couple of months before I went outside and buried them in my clay. (One day, I'll get around to amending my 'soil' - poor little plantlets.) I also shared some of them with my gardening friend.

Generally speaking, these bulbs are quite early to break the ground and I've been outside looking for any sign of them for nearly two months now - to no avail. The crocus sprouted, and bloomed. Other people's daffodils sprouted, and bloomed. The tulips and the hyacinth have come up... but not my daffodils. I feared the worst - that being yanked out of the ground in the spring and banished to a paper bag for nearly five months was more than they could stand.

Then I went outside on a blustery day to start clearing the winter junk from my bit of ground and - low and behold - my daffodils had sprouted. When I went home for my birthday, they were barely two inches high - while Mom's are in full glorious bloom. I was so relieved to see them that I didn't even care (or so I told myself) if they didn't bloom this year. When I got back into town, however, the blessed little plants had buds! Every single one of them! Yay! Spring has arrived! And I love every petal of it!

George!

Last weekend, I was parked on my quasi-couch with the cat in my lap when I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. When I glanced over, I spotted a house spider zooming across the floor - a sizeable one. Legs included, he was probably two inches across. It was almost under the couch when I realized that one of its little legs was crooked - it was George! And George has grown significantly.

I'm not sure when our adventures with George actually started, since I have always had a catch and release spider policy. Maybe I've only ever had one spider and he keeps coming back? In the summer, I shoo them outside, and in the winter I release them in the water heater room in my apartment building. (I've mentioned how much my neighbors love me, right?)

At any rate, late last summer, I noticed a spider behaving quite strangely. The cat was sprawled across the floor with her fuzzy little feet sticking up in the air, and this little spider was running up to within an inch of her and then doing this weird little bowing thing and then running away again.

This happened several times, with the cat remaining completely oblivious. (I have a PERFECT Garfield cartoon, if I can only remember to bring it in and scan it.) The cat looked over at me when I started laughing, and noticed the spider. That woke her up. She rolled over and kinda batted at the spider, which darted backwards out of reach and then immediately forward again. This continued for a while until finally Sophia rolled onto her feet and started following the spider. She wasn't really chasing it, per say, she just put her nose very close to it and followed it along the floor. This is not normal behavior for my cat, who usually considers spiders to be crunchy kitty yum-yums.

As I watched, fascinated, the spider scurried under a bookshelf. The cat stayed right there where the spider had disappeared, while the spider snuck out another side, circled around, and started that bowing thing behind her. Finally Sophia noticed and she whacked him - which is how his leg got all crooked to begin with. At that point, I intervened, scooped up George and dumped him outside.

A couple of weeks later, he was back challenging the cat. She's never whacked him again - she just follows him around. It's the weirdest damn thing.

I hadn't seen George in several weeks and I wondered what happened to him. What is the lifespan of a common house spider, anyway? I hope that somewhere in his little spider brain he realizes that not everyone is as open-minded about spider visitors as I am. I'd hate to think of George scurrying up to a neighbor, bowing away, and getting squashed like... well, like a bug.

But for right now, I know where he is. He's under my couch, waiting to take on my cat.