I Can't Complain

What I'm Wearing Wednesday: June 22, 2011

Today's outfit is all out of the archives (i.e. clothes I've had around long enough that I can't find pictures of them on the internet). In fact, these pants are so old, they fit when I bought them, then got relegated to the way too tight pile after the Bomber was born, very briefly fit again, and then ended up in the waaaaaay too loose pile after I lost 25 lbs. Never fear, though, I didn't gain it all back - I had them taken in (A LOT) by Nick the Amazing Tailor. 

The pants are a brown silk & linen blend with light pink pinstripes, which you can't see in this photo. The shirt is light pink, and I have a brown cami underneath it that you also can't see in the picture. (Great photography, eh?)  All are Banana Republic, and I think they all came from the outlet, but not all at the same time.

As usual, you can't see my shoes, but they're summer favorites of mine. They're made by Guess and the style is called Gwargentina.

The jewelry is brown wood of various kinds and came home with me from the Dominican Republic. Necklace:

And bracelet (which is actually also a necklace, wrapped around my wrist three times):

The cat box is a blue and silver self-cleaning box from Omega Paw.

   


Just checking to see if anyone actually makes it down to the bottom... It is a nice cat box, though.  Oh, and that's not my cat. This is my cat:

She's much nicer to look at than the cat box. She won't let me stand on her (or even in front of her) while I take pictures of myself, though. She's funny like that.

 

An Open Letter

To Whomever Was Breathing in My Face Last Night (and you know who you are):

Don't get me wrong. I'm happy that now that the cooler weather is here, you've decided to once again join us for that nightly ritual in which we turn out the light, close our eyes and lay on the bed in approximately the same position for approximately eight hours.We really do miss you when you spend the summer nights hanging out on the back porch watching the bats and owls. But you seem to be missing some of the more crucial points of the ritual; most notably, the part where we lay in the same position for eight hours, give or take. I understand large-ish portions of the bed are taken up by others and I realize that you want to find just the right spot for yourself, so I'm willing to let your wandering around the bed pass mostly unremarked, even though you frequently wander over various soft and ticklish parts of my body.

But let me assure you, I'm still fairly young and in pretty good health. In part because of this whole laying on the bed with my eyes closed in approximately the same position for approximately eight hours every night. The likelihood that I am not just partaking of this nightly ritual but have actually expired is quite small. There's no need to make sure I'm still alive by sticking your nose a half inch from mine, huffing on me until I open my eyes and then meowing directly into my face. Really.  So quit it, would you? Or you're going to find yourself on the wrong side of the door.

Yours truly,

The one who prefers not to open her eyes in the middle of the night and find someone else's peering into hers.

The Slightly Psychotic Cat and the Strange Looking Kitten

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned on Facebook that I needed a topic, and I got some interesting suggestions (plus one slightly insulting comment on my choice of profile pic), so I thought I'd try to say something about each of them, even if I know absolutely nothing about the topic. (See last week's post on robots, for example...)  Today's topic, though, I know plenty about - Dianne asked about Boo, the Slightly Psychotic Cat, and how she gets along with the H-bomb.

When I was pregnant, I remember being nervous about the SPC and how she would react to having a new little person in the house. She's always been somewhat skittish and she occasionally bites when she's unhappy, so I was a little worried about how she'd be with the Bomber once he arrived. Turns out I needn't have worried - almost immediately after we brought him home, she decided he was nothing but a strange looking kitten, and it was her duty to protect and comfort him. When we gave him his first bath, she tried to assist by cleaning his head, cat-style:

When H was teeny, nothing would bring the SPC out from wherever she was lurking faster than his crying. If he cried for more than 30 seconds or so, she would start circling our feet and butting her head against our legs as if to say "don't you hear that? My kitten is unhappy! DO SOMETHING!"  Even now, if she hears him crying for an extended period, she'll come to see why, and more than once she's heard him crying in one room (usually his, during nap time) and come to find one of us in another room.

Once H became more mobile, I thought she'd finally realize that he's not only not a kitten, but also a bundle of energy with swinging hands and kicking feet. But no, she still loves him, even when he pulls her tail, or pokes her belly (which she REALLY does not like) or rubs her fur the wrong way. She even puts up with his full body hugs, which involve him wrapping his arms completely around her and putting his head right up into her face.  In fact, she gives him kisses whenever she gets a chance, and she's only really bitten him once (she's also given him two "warning shots" that didn't break the skin). And frankly, he deserved it. 

For the Bomber's part, he's really pretty good with her, for a not-quite-three year old. He usually tries to be gentle, he likes to give her pettins (though not always in the spots she prefers) and he frequently tries to share his toys with her. Especially his stuffed kitty, which Boo seems to appreciate.

And when she got tangled up with that illegal catnip ring, the Bomber even came and visited her in prison:

Now THAT'S love.

Wordless Wednesday: Swine Flu?

Mother's Day

Well, it was a lovely Mother's Day.  H-bomb slept (or at least stayed in his room) until 7 AM, which is a good hour late for him, and then joined us in bed for some Mother's Day snuggles:

Then we went out for breakfast (pancakes, H-bomb's favorite) and then some yard work/play. H-bomb had kind of a rough nap time, but I used the long "nap" time to clean up my craft room, and after he woke up, Larry took him out to give me a few minutes to myself, which was lovely. Then Larry made me dinner, which included him grilling in the rain, and we watched the movie of my choice. And now it's bedtime.  But I wasn't the only one celebrating Mother's Day:

Stinky Diapers also updated!

Wordless Wednesday: The Slightly Psychotic Cat

 

 

It's Wordless Wednesday on Stinky Diapers, too!

Overweight Ghost Meets Smally Furry Elephant

(I was planning on writing a whole big post about the state of my next door neighbors' living room, but I promised them I wouldn't. ;-)  Instead, I'm dredging up another re-run, originally posted to my Live Journal in February 2005. Apologies to those who have seen this before.)

A play in three acts:

Act 1:

Small furry elephant (otherwise known as our ten month old Bengal kitten, Boo) is introduced to Money Eating House. SFE commences wailing sufficient to not only wake the dead, but chase him from his hearth and home. The Overweight Ghost becomes conspicuously absent from the MEH (presumably the neighbors were treated to creaky stairs and mysteriously moved items for the next few days). The Money Eating Homeowners contemplate a new business: Exorcism by Kitten.

Act 2:

The Overweight Ghost girds his loins (assuming non-corporeal beings have loins) and returns to face his nemesis, the Small Furry Elephant. OG immediately begins a campaign of cat intimidation, which appears to involve primarily creaking the stairs for most of the night, with a few instances of hiding SFE's Beloved Catnip Mice. The latter tactic serves only to prove that the Money Eating Homeowners are, in fact, giant suckers who will spend inordinate amounts of time looking for small bits of felt to keep the SFE happy.

Act 3:

The Overweight Ghost and the Small Furry Elephant become fast friends and nighttime playmates. For anyone who doesn't have both a ghost and a kitten, that sounds something like this:

Creeeeeeeak. Thump. Thumpity-thump-thump. Creak. Creakity-creak. Thump. Thump Thump Creak. Creakity-thump. Repeat for several hours.

The Money Eating Homeowners wake up exceedingly cranky, and contemplate abandoning the MEH to anyone brave or foolish enough to take on a ghost and a cat in the same house.

Zee Tale of Zee Orenge Mouse

This was originally posted to my Live Journal in June 2005. I apologize for the rerun, especially to those who have already seen it, but my day is insane and my evening is full.

When we first got our cat, Boo, my law clerk gave us this little orange catnip mouse as a gift from her cats to my cat. For whatever reason, and despite our best efforts, Orange Mouse has always been Boo's favorite cat toy (I say favorite *cat* toy, because no cat toy can compare with the glory that is the bathroom garbage can, which apparently makes a wonderful clunky noise when knocked over, and sometimes has the added bonus of being filled with used tissues). Orange Mouse sometimes goes missing for long periods of time (i.e. four minutes), which results in piteous wailing from the cat, and frantic moving of furniture and sticking of hands into dark, dusty places by the humans. When Boo and Orange Mouse are together, all is right in Boo's World.

This morning, Boo and Orange Mouse were having a bonding moment. (In other words, the cat was alternating between attempting to rip poor Orange Mouse's stuffing out, batting him down the stairs, and carrying him back up the stairs to spit him out on the landing and start all over again.) During one of the "spit the mouse on the landing" periods, I hear this monologue from Larry in the bedroom:

"Oh, silly kitteee, you cannot defeat meeeeee. I am zee Oreenge Mouse. Heh heh heh."

"Yes, you theenk you are tough, but I am tougher. I cannot be defeated. You try to reeep out my stuffing, but I have zee surgery, and immediately I return to zee battle. And that surgeon. Mon dieu! She was a boootcher!"

[At this point, I felt the need to defend my sewing skills, since I'd stuffed Orange Mouse's catnip-y innnards back in and stitched him back up quite nicely, in my humble opinion. My objection, however, did nothing to dissuade Monsieur Mouse, and he continued maligning me in his silly French accent.]

"And she left me zis huuuge scar! And it was not even the right color thread! I will never again be a Catnip Playmate of Zee Month. But I am stronger than you, you silleee kitteeeee. I am... Oreeeenge MOUSE."

At this point the cat decided that even if we do feed her, we are clearly far too crazy to hang around with, and she retreated downstairs to "bond" with Teenie Sardini (who, by the way does not speak with a French accent, but only makes blooping noises and the occasional squeak).

I dissolved into hysterical giggles and was incapable of doing anything more than wondering WHY Orange Mouse had a bad French accent, when he is clearly a Southern mouse. Orange Mouse wisely decided to use the ensuing commotion to make a break for it and escape from this nuthouse. Sadly, he only made it as far as the entrance hall, where Boo spotted him and batted him under the chair. On the bright side, he will safely remain there until we return home tonight. Larry, pleased with the chaos he'd wrought in our little household, skipped happily off to work, leaving a behind only a bag full of cat poo.

It's a strange, strange life...

The Rule of Sixes

My ambitious Blog 365 commitment has had the unexpected side effect of getting my friend Tara re-started on her blog. Who knew I wielded such power? If only I could use it for something really useful, like winning the Powerball....

Anyway, her jump-start post was this photo meme, which she tagged me to do:

Go to your picture files
Go to your 6th folder.
Go to your 6th picture.
Tell us about it.
Tag 6 friends to do the same.

This was actually a little tricky to do, because I don't have "picture files" - I have them scattered all over the computer organized in ways that make sense only to me.  So, I just went to the first place I found that had pictures in it, and followed along from there:

This was taken when H was not quite a year old. The Slightly Psychotic Cat was none too pleased by the fact that her kitten was now able to chase her around the house, and she frequently escaped by jumping over the nearest baby gate.  This one was at the top of the stairwell, and she liked to jump over it and then stare H down from the other side. We came upon this little tableau frequently enough that we had a name for it; we called it "Visiting Day at Cat Prison."

Now to tag six other people....  How about Beth, Ann, Jennifer, Dawn, Tina and Leslie

All Hail the Mighty Huntress

So there we were, sitting on the couch watching Season 1 of "How I Met Your Mother" when we heard a high pitched squeaking noise.  I muted the TV for a moment, but the noise stopped, so we assumed it was in the show. (We were watching the episode where they got to a really loud club, so that wasn't a completely unreasonable assumption.)  Thirty seconds later we heard it again, and this time when I muted, we could still hear it. Being masters of logical reasoning, we quickly surmised that this meant it was *not* coming from the background noise on the TV.

Larry, being the designated Killer of Ugly Bugs and Investigator of Strange Noises, cautiously crept up the stairs, where he discovered our cat, Boo, sitting on the stairs playing enthusiastically with one of her catnip mice.  The furry brown one... that makes high pitched squeaking noises when she bats it... AND HAS WINGS!!    Yeah, the cat caught a bat. In our house.  And it somehow got to the landing on the stairs, away from any possible place it could have come in. Yikes.

If the squeaking was any indication, the poor little thing was completely traumatized by having become a cat toy, so Larry scooped it up and took it outside.  I guess it wasn't physically injured, because it flew away immediately, and we could see it wheeling above the rooftops as it retreated to a less cat-infested spot.  The cat was incredibly disgruntled to have been deprived of a fun new toy, and she wandered around the landing mrowring her displeasure and sniffing hopefully for quite some time. 

I have no idea how it got in. My best guess is through one of the chimneys, which are blocked off with plywood, but not sealed or capped.  It was a little bitty thing, no bigger than the palm of Larry's hand, so based on that, I'm thinking it was an evening bat or an eastern pipistrelle. (It was pretty dark in the stairwell so I didn't get a good look at the coloring.)  Whatever it was, it was a cute little thing, and I hope it's recovered from its encounter with the Mighty Huntress.