Month: January 2007

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

* * * Yesterday was a busy-ass day for me. I left here a little before 8:30 to drive to the other side of Huntsville for an appointment with my nutritionist (it being my one-year Surgiversary and all), and to have a metabolic cart test done. I hate doing that metabolic cart, because you put a clip on your nose and have to breathe in and out through this tube in your mouth, and it makes me feel like I’m smothering to death. Metabolic cart test: my metabolism is high. I am skeptical of the metabolic cart test, personally, but it’s certainly interesting to see the little printed-out chart. My BMI according to the nutritionist is 26.3. Normal for a woman is 20 to 25. Thus I am still overweight. But I can handle it, since I’m no longer in the “Holy shit!” BMI category. My BMI the first time I went into the nutritionist’s office was 52.1. For the record. The nutritionist told me to keep doing what I was doing, and I left his office to go sit in the parking lot in my car and read for an hour until my appointment with the surgeon. Now, just a note here. My original appointment with the surgeon was scheduled for 11:15. Monday, when his office called to remind me that I had an appointment, the appointment-reminder-lady told me that they’d had a cancellation and 10:45 was available, and would I be interested? I was, so they rescheduled me for 10:45. What time did I actually see the surgeon? Why, at 11:45, of course. OF COURSE. Good thing they rescheduled me for 10:45, huh? I wasn’t pissed off, though, because I brought my book and bottle of water with me, so I sat and read and read some more, until he came in to see me. He told me that if I get my BMI to or under 25, I don’t have to wait until the two-year mark to have plastic surgery done. Woot! By the time I left his office, it was close to noon, and although I’d considered blowing off my next appointment, I decided that since I was on that side of Huntsville and I REALLY needed to have it done, I’d just suck it up and go have it done. I wasn’t sure where the office was, so I went to make sure I could find it. I found it, but then couldn’t find a damn place to turn around, and after a certain point, the road that the office was on doesn’t have any streets off to the side of it, so I ended up having to drive all the way over the damn mountain to the other side (note to those of you in the area: did you know that Cecil Ashburn Drive takes you from Bailey Cove Rd to Hampton Cove? I didn’t, until now.) to turn around. I made it back to the office just in time for my appointment, so parked and – a little nervous – walked in. “I have a 12:45 with Hilary?” I told the girl at the front desk, who very strongly resembled a much younger (and much shorter) Nicole Kidman. She directed me upstairs, and I told the woman at that desk my name and who my appointment was with. She beckoned for me to follow her, and led me into a waiting room. A fancy waiting room. A hoity-toity waiting room. “Hilary will be with you in a few minutes,” she said. Across the room, three women wearing fluffy robes and fluffy slippers lounged on a couch, sipping water from fancy glasses and flipping through glossy magazines. One of them, a well-preserved older woman, glanced up at me and then nudged the woman – a younger, well-groomed woman – sitting next to her. The second woman looked me over, then looked back at the first. Not our type, she mouthed. The first woman nodded in agreement. The wall next to me was a wall fountain – I guess that’s what they’re called, when the whole wall is water? A wall of water? I don’t know what they’re called but they are the exclusive province of hoity-toity places, I assure you. A few more moments passed as I looked around the waiting room from under lowered lashes and registered that relaxing fancypants music was playing through hidden speakers. Hilary stepped into the room, introduced herself, and led me away. I smiled tentatively at the three women as I walked by them, and they rewarded me with fake, icy smiles. As the door closed behind me, I heard one of them whisper to the other, Is she… pregnant? (Okay. I made that italicized section up. Except for the wall of water and the fact that there were three women in robes in that room. Who ignored me. But that’s okay, ’cause I ignored them, too. SO THERE.) Hilary led me into a small room, one playing the same fancypants Music o’ Relaxation that had been playing in the waiting room. She gestured toward a wide padded table covered with a sheet and told me to lay down face-up. It got a little Three-Stoogesesque (or possibly more “Who’s on First” Abbott and Costelloesque) as I tried to determine where my head was supposed to go, and finally she patted the table and said “Head on this end, face up.” I got up on the table and laid down, my face under a light. “So, you’ve had this done before?” she asked, looking at the sheet I’d filled out in the waiting room. “Yes, but it’s been quite a while,” I said. “And what brings you here now?” she asked, or something along those lines. “A bunch of crazy bitches who read my online journal keep ragging at me about my horrible eyebrows, and I saw one of your pamphlets around Christmas time, and since I was going to be on this side of town today, I thought I’d just come and have my eyebrows waxed,” I said. (Only I didn’t really say the “crazy bitches online” part. But I was thinking it! I actually just mumbled something about being 39 and deciding it was time to get this thing done regularly.) I have to say, getting your eyebrows (and upper lip) waxed at a hoity-toity fancypants place? Somehow, it hurts a lot less than it does at the cheap hair salon at the mall. Maybe it’s the relaxing music, or the warm table (there was some sort of heating blanket under there and it was HEAVENLY) or a woman who really knows what she’s doing. I prefer to think that it’s MAGIC, myself. It took, maybe, ten minutes to have my eyebrows completely done and my upper lip done as well, and I have to say – I don’t see a huge difference in the eyebrows, but I do like what I see. Before. After. Now, in a couple of months when I’ve gotten lazy about plucking the hairs that have grown back, y’all remind me to go have it done again, okay? So from there, I went straight home with the intention of settling on the couch and maybe taking a nap, but when I checked my email I found one from the shelter manager, letting me know that there was space at the pet store, and I could take Fantine there. I grabbed Fantine up, gave her some love, tossed her in a carrier, and took her to the pet store. I took my time getting her cage set up, letting her sniff around the cat room for a while, then I hugged and kissed her, told her to get adopted fastfastfast (I always tell the kitties that I take to the pet store to get adopt fastfastfast), and left. I always feel awful leaving cats at the pet store. I hope like hell she gets adopted before Monday! Then I came home, ate lunch, and had half an hour to sit on my dead ass and surf the web before I had to start dinner. We had jambalaya last night and between the chopping and the cooking, it takes about an hour to make. It took me almost exactly an hour to make, and we ate dinner at 4:30 (which, for the record, is far too fucking early for me, but Fred would eat dinner at 3:00 every day if allowed, I’m sure). Once we’d finished eating, Fred and I headed out to his car, to drive over to Smallville and check out the floors, which had been stained. Except that as I was walking by the spud’s car, I looked down and noticed that her right front tire was completely flat. After telling the spud not to go anywhere and that Fred would take care of it when we got back, we headed out to the house. I really, really like the stain color we chose. It looks good (and will look even better once the polyurethane is added, I’m sure), and the floor guy actually told Fred that he was going to start recommending that color to people, it looked so good. I don’t have a picture of the floors – though no doubt Fred will put up pictures of the floor in a future entry – but the stain we chose is called English Chestnut. We weren’t able to go in and see all the floors, just went into the laundry room and looked at the kitchen floor, then looked at the living room floor from the front porch. It definitely looks good – the first thing Fred wants to do when we can get back into the house is to put quarter-round down in the front room to see what the completed picture will look like. I suspect it’ll look damn fine, myself. Newt was there when we got there – we haven’t seen Maxi in a while, and I think Fred is getting worried – so we filled up the food bowl and gave him a can of wet food. He’s gotten particularly skittish lately, it seems, maybe because we haven’t been around all that much. Hopefully Maxi will show up this weekend while we’re working on the house. I hope so! We got home and Fred and the spud went out to change the tire on her car. Except that her car didn’t have a jack, and even after he took the jack from my car, Fred couldn’t figure out where to put it (there’s a specific place to put the jack, and he wasn’t able to find it, even looking around under the car with a flashlight), so he gave up and had me call AAA. “Tell them your husband is out of town!” he whispered, sure that they’d take his Man card away from him if they knew he was allowing a tow truck driver to change a tire on a car in his driveway. We needed to go to Lowe’s for potting soil, so I told the spud to get her AAA card and driver’s license, and keep an eye out for the tow truck driver. “Tell them your dad is out of town!” Fred instructed her. We went to Lowe’s and bought the potting soil – and a couple of blackberry bushes, woot! I also eyed the blueberry bushes and the strawberry plants, all of which we’re going to eventually have Smallville – and were home in about twenty minutes. Just as we pulled into the driveway, the tow truck came up the street. “Tell them I’m out of town!” Fred joked, but I just smiled and left him to deal with the driver, who took about two minutes to change the tire. (Time to revoke Fred’s Man Card, obviously.) Then we killed about half an hour online (I had to call my sister and let her know that CopperTop’s horse had given birth. SO SWEET!) before it was time to settle down and watch TV. Well, I settled down while Fred stood in the kitchen and planted in planters the two apple trees and two peach trees we’d bought online. It’s way too cold outside right now to put young trees in the ground so they’ll be in pots for another month and a half or so. (This morning it looked as though Fred opened a bag of potting soil and tossed it around the entire kitchen during the planting process.) I had to pause the TV and assist Fred in getting the pots of trees upstairs to his room, since it’s the only room in the house where we keep the door closed, plus it gets a lot of morning sun, which the trees will hopefully enjoy. The rest of the evening was spent watching TV, then after Fred went to bed I read until I couldn’t keep my eyes open, and went to sleep. You’ll forgive me if I don’t do a damn thing today! * * * She loved that banana/ catnip toy. I should have taken it to the pet store with her. * * * Previously 2006: No entry. 2005: Hey, can you eat raw kale? 2004: No entry. 2003: My whole life is a vicious circle, really. 2002: No entry. 2001: I mean, what the fuck did I do? 2000: Yeah, I know, woe is me.]]>

Newt is anxious to see the new floors!

* * * Moonman has earned himself the nickname “Joe Bob” for no reason other than it’s a good nickname for him (also, I occasionally call him “Joseph Robert”). He’s integrated into the And3rson herd of cats pretty well (Mister Boogers continues to show his butt, but not nearly as often), and he does NOT like being put back into his room with Moondance at night. We continue to put him up at night because I value my sleep and don’t want to listen to Mister Boogers’ hysteria all night long. Moondance is a scaredy cat and either hangs out in their room all day (despite the fact that the door is open), or hides under the spud’s bed. She’s a sweet thing, but very, very timid. Poor baby. The Les Mis kitties are doing just fine. They came through the spaying and neutering with flying colors, no problems at all. The three females were pretty sleepy Friday evening and most of Saturday, but Javert was his usual energetic, mouthy self. If it wasn’t for the shaved back end, you’d never know he’d had himself some surgery. All of today’s uploaded pictures are hither. * * * Self-portrait #13: I suffer from Severe BedHeaditis. Self-portrait #12 is here, and #11 is here. * * * The spud’s paternal grandfather passed away over the weekend. He had prostate cancer, which went into remission for several years, then came back last year along with multiple myeloma. The spud’s going to California on Tuesday and staying until Sunday. She knew it was coming so at least it wasn’t a surprise, but I know she’s going to miss him an awful lot. * * * Previously 2006: No entry. 2005: No entry. 2004: You don’t actually have to say the words “You’re a dumbass” to get the idea across, and thus when your wife is mad at you later and you so very innocently say “Are you mad about something?” and she says “YOU CALLED ME A DUMBASS!” and you say “I did NOT call you a dumbass!”, you are wrong and she is right and you’d best commence to begging for forgiveness, you fucker. 2003: Little bastard. 2002: I can’t believe I’m FUCKING FALLING DOWN. 2001: Oh, wait. I guess the worst part was actually the rectal exam. 2000: One thing you don’t particularly want to see is Tex running at you, let me tell ya.]]>

hands picture, for one – I’ve used the Gorillapod Fred gave me for Christmas. This year, Fred I swore to each other that we were only buying each other one thing. He wanted a mug from me, and I wanted the Gorillapod from him. And I have to say – the Gorillapod is one of the best Christmas presents I got. The other best present is a tote bag from my sister. It looks like this: But the really cool thing is that it folds up, like so: and it fits very nicely in my purse. I carry one in my purse at all times, and I had her buy me another three, which I leave in my car and take into the store with me if I think I’ll need more than one bag. They’re very sturdy, and SO convenient. (And Debbie’s saying “All the stuff I gave you for Christmas and THAT’s your favorite??” What can I say? The simplest things are the best.)

* * * This is the name and brand of the color we used in the living room, for those who asked: * * * We went out to the house yesterday afternoon and met up with Fred’s father, stepmother, and their friend. The friend has known Fred for years and she’s moved away from Alabama but comes back to visit from time to time. I guess Fred’s parents had told her all about the house, and she wanted to see it. We spent a long time showing them around the house, talking about what we’d done and what we had left to do. The funny thing is that when I’m in one of the rooms we’ve finished, I look around and see all the small flaws and they bother me – until I look at a picture of what it looked like before, and then I think “This place looks AWESOME.” Anyway, we got the quote from the blinds guy, talked about it, talked about it, talked about it some more, and then decided we’d try putting up blinds from Lowe’s in one of the upstairs bedrooms and see (1) how it looked and (2) how much of a pain in the ass it was, and decide from there whether to go with the professional or not. Later in the evening, after we’d gotten home, Fred opened his email to find a quote from the tile guy (for around the showers). It wasn’t bad – ’til we realized the quote was PER SHOWER rather than for the whole job, and Fred decided to give tiling around the shower a try himself. While we watched American Idol last night, he sat and leafed through his tiling book. I think if the tiling goes well, he should hire himself out on the weekends to make some extra money. Momma needs some bon-bons, don’tchaknow. * * * Speaking of American Idol, did y’all see that really tall black woman? Here’s what I don’t get – they ask her how tall she is, she says “I’m 6’7″.” Simon says “In heels?” She says “Yes. I’m 6’4″ in flats.” Well, then. YOU’RE NOT 6’7″, ARE YOU?? NO YOU ARE NOT. IF YOU ARE 6’4″ IN FLATS, THAT IS HOW TALL YOU ARE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD; THOSE THREE INCHES ARE NOT HEIGHT INCHES THAT ARE YOURS, THEY ARE ONLY DUE TO YOUR HEELS AND YOU ARE NOT REALLY THAT HEIGHT. I turned to Fred and said “Well if we’re counting heel height, I guess I’m 5’7 1/2″. Hey! I should go stand on a ladder! If I use the tall one, I can claim I’m nine feet tall! I think that means I’m a little UNDERWEIGHT now, doesn’t it? Just call me Nicole Richie!” Good lord. * * * Self-portrait #9: “What you lookin’ at, lady?” * * * In this section, pictures of stuff I didn’t buy when we were in Pigeon Forge, doing an amazing amount of shopping. Why didn’t I buy them? Because I have a limited amount of money and space. When I win the lottery and can buy a 30,000 square foot warehouse to put all my crap in, I’ll run right back to Pigeon Forge and snatch all this stuff up. Money talks, but chocolate sings. Hike faster! I hear banjo music! (I actually did get this t-shirt for Fred) Sweet Lincoln’s mullet. (Debbie bought this at the Smoky Mountain Cat House) Why suffer in silence when I can moan, whimper, and complain? (My new motto!) Dull women have immaculate homes. Raising a teenager is like nailing Jello to a tree. I love you more today than yesterday. Yesterday you really pissed me off. I can’t remember if I’m the good sister or the evil one. Wrinkled was not one of the things I wanted to be when I grew up. The cops just pulled me over for carrying THESE GUNS. (This is very very “The Todd” from Scrubs, isn’t it?) Paddle faster! I hear banjo music! The nice part about living in a small town: When you don’t know what you’re doing, someone else always does. And my absolute favorite: It’s better to have loved and lost, than to live with a psycho for the rest of your life. There are even more pictures of stuff I didn’t buy, here. * * * The fosters are continuing to do well. Fantine and her babies have been around long enough to garner nicknames from Fred. He calls Fantine “Momma” (and cats who have ever delivered kittens become “Momma” to him – that’s what he still calls Maxi, even), Eponine is “Scaredy Cat” (for obvious reasons), Cosette is “Litter Maid” because of all the time she spent in the litter box with her UTI, and Javert is “Little Brother.” We’ve been letting Moonman and Moondance out of their room for several hours a day. Everyone except Mister Boogers is taking it quite well (Miz Poo and Spot are mostly excited when we open the door because that means there’s another bowl of food they can stick their faces in). Tommy is the gentleman of the bunch; he and Moonman have been seen touching noses several times. Moonman is such a sweet, friendly guy and he’s worming his way into Fred’s heart. (No, we’re not adopting him! But Fred’s going to be sad to see him go.) Moondance. The best pictures are the one you get accidentally, I’ve found. Javert, the squeaky, always-talking little monster. It’s tiring, being this damn cute. Fantine falls asleep with her tongue sticking out. I love the look on her face, like “Do you believe what I’ve got to put up with?” All of today’s uploaded pictures are here. * * * Previously 2006: I’d be a lobster, ’cause they are yummy, and I would be bringing joy to someone after I die a horrible boiling death. 2005: Saturday I spent at least two hours – conservative estimate – finding and downloading a ringtone that sounds exactly like the “internal call” ring on 24. 2004: No entry. 2003: No entry. 2002: No entry. 2001: I’m quite the stylin’ bitchypoo, I really am. 2000: It’s the period that never ennnnnnds! Yes, it goes on and on my friends!]]>