It is certainly a good thing that I went out and bought myself a Dyson handheld vacuum last Christmas, because it has come in SO handy. First, it sat all charged and ready for action for months and months and I never ever used it, but then last week came the time for the handheld … Continue reading “10-16-08”
It is certainly a good thing that I went out and bought myself a Dyson handheld vacuum last Christmas, because it has come in SO handy. First, it sat all charged and ready for action for months and months and I never ever used it, but then last week came the time for the handheld to spring into action!
That’s right, it’s wasp season. Every day this week three or more wasps have made their way into the house and caught my attention by banging against the window, banging against the ceiling, or buzzing by my head and making me scream.
There’s little I hate in the insect world as much as I hate wasps. They’re just EVIL looking. Wasps and black widows are the bugs I hate the most, and luckily I haven’t seen many black widows lately. In fact, I don’t think I’ve seen a black widow since I killed one with my bare hand last year.
(Now having said that, I’m sure I’ll wake up face-to-face with one tomorrow.)
So the Dyson handheld, if you’re considering purchasing one for yourself, is very much NOT all that and unless you have a LOT of little spills (of the dry variety) that need to be cleaned up, I don’t think it’s worth the price. The suction is lacking, I hear tell that when fully charged it only lasts for a few minutes, and really when it gets down to it, I don’t actually NEED a handheld vacuum. I’ve honestly only gotten it off the charger a few times in the several months since I bought it, and it’s almost always to suck up a bug.
The suction, let me reiterate, is very much lacking. I actually have to have the end of the vacuum covering the wasp before it gets sucked into the vacuum. With the Dyson upright, if I wave the hose in the general direction of the wasp, it sucks it up.
Also, the trip into the handheld doesn’t kill the wasps, and I can hear several them in the canister of the handheld right now (over in the corner of the room), buzzing angrily. Which leaves me with a dilemma – I mean, I don’t want the evil fucking things to SUFFER and die slow and painful deaths, but if I take the canister off to toss them outside, they will take flight and team up to land on my fucking FACE and sting me directly in the eyeballs.
O lord, what is a wimpy hater of wasps to do?
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I realized the other day, after I’d traded some emails with a reader (hello, Neca!), that I hadn’t told y’all that I’m currently using a powdered laundry detergent instead of the liquid stuff. The liquid stuff gets kind of annoyingly semi-solid, which makes it a pain to pour out of the old vinegar jug I’d been storing it in, and I stumbled across a recipe for powdered laundry detergent, and decided to give it a try.
It makes a TON of detergent – the recipe is here – and I keep mine stored in an old 40-pound Fresh Step scoopable litter container (which I cleaned first, of course). So far it’s working really well for me. It’s been almost two months since I made this batch, and I easily have at least four more months’ worth of detergent, if not six.
If you don’t like the liquid stuff, you might want to give the powdered stuff a try. You could probably halve the recipe (or even quarter it?) if you don’t want to make so much at once.
And while I’m sharing recipes I’ve recently posted on my recipe blog for non-food items, I stumbled across a recipe to make your own freezer bag (like those you use in a cooler to keep your food cool), and I haven’t tried it yet, but I wanted to have it in a place where I’d be able to find it easily, so into the blog it went! See the recipe here.
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That little Delmar is just a lovebug. He’s gotten to the point now where if I go into the room and sit down, he slowly makes his way over to me, meowing sadly the entire way like I’m forcing him to make a long and arduous journey to receive the love that is his due. I pet him and pet him and pet him, and he never gets tired of it. I lay on the floor and he snuggles up to me and drapes himself across my arm and sometimes he naps, draped over my arm.
Lem no longer runs for the cat tree when I enter the room. He also doesn’t necessarily come right over to me, but he comes over eventually. He likes to be petted and to lay on me and he purrs SO loud.
Marion can be lured over with toys – she’s the nosiest, I totally should have named her Gladys Kravitz, and the most playful of the bunch – and so I gather up all the toys and roll them around the room and toss them into the plastic basket in the middle of the room, and she can’thelp it, she HAS to come down and bat some toys around and see what I was tossing in the basket.
Claudette will not be lured. She’ll allow you to pet her, and she’ll let you hold her for a good long time, and she’ll even purr very loudly, but as far as HER approaching YOU? Darling, I think not. At one point yesterday I was laying on the floor reading, Delmar draped over my arm, and she walked around the edge of the room to get to the food dish. She kept an eye on me, but that she’d come down off the tree and move around with me in there? I think it’s only a matter of time before she’s laying on her back in my lap, informing me that I better rub her belly and make it SNAPPY.
Delmar, next to a 20-ounce bottle of water. He’s a teeny thing!
“Sunshiiiiiiine on a Boogie’s face gives him the squinty eye!”
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Previously
2007: No entry. 2006: It’s like when you’re in the car and you smell something, so you turn down the radio and sniff harder.
2005: No entry.
2004: No entry. 2003: “That’s because it fucking HURTS!” I yelled. 2002: TV talk. 2001: Is it just Fred and I that immediately think “Chrissie-anthemums”, or did y’all see that episode of Three’s Company as well? 2000: The Spider Dance.
At Sam’s Club yesterday, I discovered that you can buy a 105-ounce can of tomato sauce for ONE DOLLAR AND SEVENTY-FIVE CENTS. Given the amount of time and effort expended on the pints of tomato sauce I ended up with, made from tomatoes grown in our own garden, by all rights tomato sauce should cost … Continue reading “10-15-08”
At Sam’s Club yesterday, I discovered that you can buy a 105-ounce can of tomato sauce for ONE DOLLAR AND SEVENTY-FIVE CENTS.
Given the amount of time and effort expended on the pints of tomato sauce I ended up with, made from tomatoes grown in our own garden, by all rights tomato sauce should cost at LEAST one hundred and seventy-five dollars for 105 ounces.
If I can go to Sam’s and buy that much tomato sauce for that little cash, you can bet your Aunt Fanny that I will NEVER make my own tomato sauce again. EVER. Because my time is valuable (to me, at least) and that is just some bullshit.
I don’t even CARE how those tomatoes were treated, they could have been factory-raised in substandard soil and sprayed with poison that was subsequently only brushed off before processing, they could have been mocked and abused and called names and cried silent tears of terror every night at bedtime and chomped upon by all manner of bugs before they were mercifully slaughtered and put out of their misery, for ONE DOLLAR AND SEVENTY-FIVE CENTS for a huge-ass can, I am THERE, I am buying that shit.
Which is not to say that I’m not raising tomatoes next year – you bet your ass I am, and I’ll even can them diced or crushed or even whole, but I’m totally not bothering with trying to make my own tomato sauce. My time is valuable, yo!
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So, speaking of Sam’s, I don’t think I’ve mentioned the fact that, ten years after I first got my membership (through Fred’s company, which is where I was working at the time; I still get a membership through his business) I discovered that my membership is a “Gold Key” membership. You’d think that if I have a Gold Key membership that “Gold Key” would be printed somewhere on the card, but apparently not. Apparently any membership attained through a business is considered a Gold Key membership, and you’re just supposed to know that sort of thing.
What are the advantages, you might ask, to a Gold Key membership? So far as I can tell, the one and only advantage is that Gold Key members get extended shopping hours. While the commoners have to wait until 10:00 during the week to shop at Sam’s, we high-and-mighty Gold Keyers get to begin our warehouse shopping at 7:00 if we wish. Take that, unwashed masses!
I mock, but to tell the truth, it’s pretty nice being able to go into Sam’s and shop for what I need before it gets packed and busy with people snatching up the $1.75 cans of tomato sauce and getting in my way. What’s especially nice is knowing that on Thursdays, after I’m done at the pet store, I can run over to Sam’s and get whatever I need, without having to wait until 10:00, like I’ve thought I had to do, all these years.
Sam’s might be the ruination of this nation, but GODDAMN do I love that store.
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Someone asked in my comments whether I’ve checked out the new “Real Housewives” series, this one set in Atlanta. But of course! So far I’ve caught the first episode, and I actually sent an email out about it yesterday that I’m just going to cut and paste here:
Holy COW, I finally watched the Housewives of Atlanta and I just don’t even know where to begin!
NeNe is annoying in that kind of over-the-top shrieky way, but she so didn’t deserve the embarrassment of being kicked out of a party she didn’t belong to!
Sheree is kind of super-intense in a weirdly controlled way. Which is to say that one day, that woman is going to snap, and it’s going to be NASTY. And anyone who is THAT stressed about her birthday party, when she’s supposedly got like five people who are supposed to be in charge of the details is just too much. I mean, I get that she wanted to have a good birthday party, but to apparently have SO much riding on it? What a freak. (I don’t know why she even bothered to invite NeNe, given her utter disdain for the woman!)
I agree that Kim looks a lot like Lori from OC. I suspect that her high-profile boyfriend is probably someone we’ve NEVER heard of and I bet he’s married, too, especially considering the fact that some of her girlfriends have never even met him and don’t know who he is. I like that she was loyal to NeNe and left the party with her, though.
That woman – was it DeShawn? – who hired the “estate manager” to run interference so DeShawn and her husband would never have to deal with the hired help directly just made me roll my eyes. Could you imagine if someone was coming to visit and stay with you, and the ESTATE MANAGER called them and said “Is there anything special you’d like to have available to you?” Hell, I’d be all “Yes, please make sure that I have seven pillows and some extra blankets and also THREE TINY LITTLE FLUFFY PURRING KITTENS, thank you! Also, one million dollars in cash, thanks!”
These houses are just absolutely insane. And the way these women spend money makes me worry for them, I mean it’s their money and all, but I’m thinking “NO, put the thousand-dollar pants back, you don’t need those! The money won’t last forever, girls!”
I love the way the Atlanta wives are just way over the top. I’m going to enjoy watching this show and seeing their crazy drama unfold!!!
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I was sitting on the floor of the kitten room yesterday and I leaned way over to kiss a kitten atop his head (a kitten that was in my lap, by the way!), and I got something that felt very much like a charley horse in my abdomen and I thought I was going to DIE. I had to breathe shallowly and gasp “Ohgod ohgod ohgod” very quietly so I wouldn’t alarm the kittens, and after some breathing and stretching, the muscle let up and I felt perfectly fine.
It sure did hurt like a motherfucker while it lasted, though.
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I broke the monkeys! The boys, at least. When I went into the kitten room yesterday, I’d go over and pet each of them just a little bit, and then I’d go across the room and sit on the floor and talk to them. The girls would just ignore me, but the boys would look at me and meow like “Come back here!” I’d talk and talk to them, then when they’d start to settle down, I’d go back and pet each of them juuuuust a little, just until they were starting to like it, and then off I’d go to the other side of the room.
Lem jumped down off the tree onto the condo (which is right next to the tree) and he hung out next to the condo and eyeballed me and thought about it, but refused to come any closer.
Finally, Delmar was like “FINE!” and jumped down and came over to be petted. After some petting, he and I stretched out on the floor, face-to-face, and he purred and slept a little, and then eventually Lem was like “Hmmm. He seems to be safe over there with her. Maybe I would be safe, too!”, so he came over for petting, though he didn’t stay for long.
My tongue is absolutely in shreds from my biting it so I won’t squeeze them to death. They are SERIOUSLY cute and sweet, these kittens.
Delmar lay next to me on the floor for a long time yesterday afternoon. I said, “You’re going to break my heart, aren’t you?” and he said “That’s my plan, ma’am.”
Previously 2007: if you set foot in Crooked Acres, the law is that you admire not only the And3rson kitties, but also the And3rson fosters.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry. 2004: Pretty beach pictures! 2003: I’m afraid Miz Poo’s reign as Queen Shit may be coming to a close. 2002: Elvis sneer, zits, weird wiry hair. What next, I ask you? 2001: Cheater entry.
2000: No entry. 1999: Fascinating, isn’t it?!
So yeah, as some of you pointed out yesterday, despite the fact that I’d written about them over on Love & Hisses, I hadn’t mentioned anything here about no foster kittens. We have foster kittens! You can read more about them at Love & Hisses, starting here and I’ll update the sidebar here at some … Continue reading “10-14-08”
So yeah, as some of you pointed out yesterday, despite the fact that I’d written about them over on Love & Hisses, I hadn’t mentioned anything here about no foster kittens.
We have foster kittens!
You can read more about them at Love & Hisses, starting here and I’ll update the sidebar here at some point today. Despite their scaredy-cat nature when we first got them, they have chilled out a little, and we’ve gotten all four of them to purr. They don’t particularly care for being held – YET – but they also don’t freak out too much if we pick them up, as long as we don’t go too far from the cat tree.
Speaking of Love & Hisses, I got my entries from our very first set of fosters back in May – July 2005 pasted over there. You can read a little about Mia and her babies, and follow the link on that page to see the entries about them.
We’ve had a LOT of foster kittens in the past three and a half years; I couldn’t even begin to guess what the number is.
It’ll take me a while to balance writing here about the fosters and writing there about them and what goes where and how. Be patient, I’ll get it figured out!
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Christy in KS mentioned in my comments last week that they like to take their bacon, dredge it through brown sugar and put it under the broiler for 7 minutes. Yesterday, I got out a package of 4 slices of bacon (I thawed and repackaged one of the big packages of bacon a few weeks ago, because there are only two of us, after all) and told Fred I was going to make bacon and eggs for breakfast. He requested just salt and pepper on his bacon – unadventurous bastard – so I salt and peppered his two pieces and rubbed brown sugar, salt, and pepper on my two pieces.
Ho. Ly. GOD. That is some FABULOUS stuff right there. Not only is it fabulous, but making it in the oven on a foil-lined cookie sheet was so much easier and less messy than frying it in the pan that that’s how I’m making my bacon from here on out!
Thank you, Christy – you rock!
And speaking of food, for dinner on Sunday (and Monday!) I took a pork shoulder from the freezer, rubbed spices all over it, let it cook all day in the crock pot, took it out of the crock pot, drained the fat off (into the pig bucket, actually, shaddup), shredded the meat and put it back in the crock pot with barbecue sauce for a couple more hours.
It was SO good. It would have been better if I’d used our standby barbecue sauce – Gibson’s – but I tried something new that I ended up not liking as much. Still good, just not AS good. I also roasted a butternut squash (not one we grew ourselves, one I picked up at a local farm stand, but I think we need to keep butternut squash in mind for next year!) and mashed it, and we had green beans too.
I also made a big bunch of egg salad Sunday afternoon, and Fred and I had egg salad sandwiches Sunday and Monday.
I think it’s safe to say that growing our own food is working out pretty well for us.
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Speaking of hard-boiling eggs (which I used for egg salad), I tried hard-boiling fresh eggs rather than older ones to see if slow-boiling them for 12 minutes then soaking them in ice water plus baking soda would make peeling fresh eggs easier, the way it worked for the older eggs I made deviled eggs with a few weeks ago.
Not so much.
I mean, probably less egg stuck to the shell than would have done so if I hadn’t added the baking soda to the water, but still far too much egg came off with the shell. We probably could have gotten three meals of egg salad sandwiches from a dozen hard-boiled eggs if so much egg hadn’t stuck to the shell instead of the two (plus a little more) we did get.
In case you were curious.
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Last night (though I got no pictures of the momentous occasion), we got the kittens down off the cat tree. The boys stayed down on the floor with us for the longest time, rubbing back and forth and purring like crazy. In what I considered a giant step forward, Delmar got back up on the cat tree, saw Lem purring and rubbing on Fred, and then jumped down off the cat tree and came over for some more love.
Marion had no desire to be off the cat tree. Fred picked her up and walked across the room to hand her to me, and she ran back to the cat tree and shot him dirty looks. Claudette, on the other hand, stayed in my arms for several minutes, purring and watching her brothers ask to be petted.
Both Lem and Delmar have meowed at us, Delmar the most. You know how you pet a kitten and then you stop and the kitten meows at you like “Why’d you STOP?!”? That’s how he was meowing.
These kittens are adorable. Now I’d like to see them come down off the cat tree of their own accord, and then I’d like to see them play!
Look at Delmar over there on the right, giving me the sass as if he doesn’t fling himself onto his back at the slightest touch.
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Such a good boy, our Spanky. (He’s not usually pink, for the record.)
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Previously
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry. 2005: “M-O-O-N!” Fred said. “That spells Tom Cullen!”
2004: No entry. 2003: I’m pretty certain “Never going to fucking go hiking with him EVER A-FUCKING-GAIN” crossed my mind at least once. 2002: Hotel room so big/ roomy, spacious, perfect. Butt/ is what it smells like.
2001: No entry.
2000: No entry. 1999: Don’t get your bippies in an uproar, though; we’re not trying to get pregnant.
I had a scattered weekend. There were things I intended to get done, and I got them all done, but in kind of a haphazard manner and I found myself staring off into space thinking “What was I going to do…?” many, many times. Can I blame it on ovulating? Given that everything on earth … Continue reading “10-13-08”
I had a scattered weekend. There were things I intended to get done, and I got them all done, but in kind of a haphazard manner and I found myself staring off into space thinking “What was I going to do…?” many, many times.
Can I blame it on ovulating? Given that everything on earth revolves around my menstrual cycle?
I think I can.
So Saturday morning I got up earlier than I wanted to because I was going to Decatur with Fred to pick up the fence for the back forty. We left the house a little after 7 so we could stop by the L0we’s in Decatur before we went to the place where we were getting the fence. Since I hadn’t slept very well Friday night, I was kind of sleepy and cranky and in desperate need of eating junky, greasy, crappy food for breakfast.
Fred refused to stop at Waffle House or the “good” breakfast buffet place in Decatur because he’s a motherfucker.
We were in L0we’s for about half an hour and at first I followed Fred around and then he grabbed something and I was all “What’s that?” and he said whatever it was (please, like I was really LISTENING) and I said “What’s that for?” and he turned and gave me an annoyed look and I flung my arm up in a “talk to the hand” gesture and said “Whatever, I’m going to look at the storage shit” and huffed off.
In the storage section, which was not easy to find (I don’t know why they don’t set every Lowe’s up in the exact same way, perhaps it’s to annoy me), I looked around and pondered and considered and thought. I want to put the pillows and sheets and comforter that go on the guest bed in some sort of secure container so that if the cats feel the need to pee on something, it won’t be the bedding for the guest bed. After some looking around and thinking, I ended up picking up a couple of boxes of heavy-duty 22-gallon Ziploc bags. The idea was that I’d putting the bedding and pillows in the bags, and then slide them under the bed.
I was headed to the section to look at curtains, when Fred waved me down. I followed him while he decided on storm windows (the new chicken coop will have windows, just like the current one), picked up some nails or something, and then he pointed out two kinds of wood.
“These are to go around the windows,” he said. “Which one is better?”
I looked at the one on the left and said “Well, that one looks better.”
He started snarking at me about how I was looking at both pieces of wood when I said that, so I threw up my hand, said “I was looking at the one on the right, assface. I’m going to look at the curtains.”
I was looking at the curtains – I don’t know why I bother, there’s never anything I like in their curtain section – when Fred came up to me, pushing the cart, and said, accusingly, “Did you take my list?”
Like I was having a temper tantrum, so I grabbed his list and took off so he couldn’t check it twice. Fucker.
(Okay, it totally sounds like something I’d do. Except I hadn’t.)
“No, you put it down when you were looking at the wood,” I said. He left the cart with me and wandered off. Eventually he came back, having found the list and picking up the one thing left that he hadn’t gotten yet. We checked out and then headed off to get the fence.
Naturally, despite the fact that he’d ordered the fence the middle of last week, and the guy running the place had told him it would be there waiting for him on Saturday, only part of the fence order was ready. The rest, apparently, was still in the warehouse. The guy who runs the place told Fred that the guy who takes care of the warehouse could meet him at the warehouse and Fred could get the rest of the fence, but the guy who’d meet him there would take about half an hour to get to town.
Fred said “How much would you charge me to just deliver it to Smallville?”
The guy considered. “Usually we charge fifty dollars. But I’d only charge you twenty!”
“Really,” Fred said. “You’d charge me twenty dollars to deliver fence that I’ve already paid for, that you promised me would be sitting here waiting for me?”
The guy considered. “I could do it for free!”
After some discussion, they decided to meet halfway between Smallville and Decatur this afternoon.
We got home (despite the many times I pointed out places where we could get a good breakfast because Fred wanted to get home and get started on the chicken coop, BASTARD) and then I changed into a pair of shorts and t-shirt (it’s been cool in the mornings and much warmer as the day goes by lately. I’m not complaining!) and got started on wandering around the house trying to remember what I’d been intending to do.
I ate breakfast and then cleaned up the kitchen, and then went upstairs and spent about an hour in the foster kitten room reading. The kittens alternately slept and stared down at me, trying to figure out what my game was.
I came back downstairs and decided it was time to make a loaf of apple bread and then use the rest of the bag of apples to make and can some applesauce. I knew we had a doohickey that would peel, slice, and core apples at the same time, but I could NOT find the friggin’ thing. I got the apple bread in the oven and then started peeling apples to make the applesauce. I’d peel and core an apple, think “FUCK THIS”, dig through the cabinets to look for the peeler/ slicer/ corer, wouldn’t be able to find it, peel and core another apple, think “FUCK THIS”, dig some more, and so on until all the apples had been cored, sliced, and peeled.
(I eventually found the doohickey, in the closet in the laundry room. Right where I’d put it. OF COURSE.)
Long, boring-ass story short, I made the applesauce and canned it (ended up with three and a half pints), cleaned up the kitchen, ate lunch, and spent a few hours with the kittens.
Every night, Fred and I start watching TV around 7. Some nights it’s earlier – in fact, it’s trending earlier since it’s getting dark earlier and the chickens are ready to be put up when it’s dark, and by the time they’re put up and the cats are brought inside, it’s about 6:30. Lately, right around 8:00 one or the other of us will say “Is it time for bed yet?”
I must be getting SO FREAKIN’ OLD, because if Fred said “Hey, you ready to go to bed?” at 8:00, I’d jump at the chance. We don’t go immediately to bed and then to sleep when we say we’re going to bed – there’s a whole process that involves my clearing all the dishes out of the sink, starting the dishwasher if need be, checking my email, Fred checking his email and his doofy online places he likes to hang out, Fred checking to see if Her Majesty Maxi or His Majesty Newtles wants to come inside, brushing our teeth, taking our contacts out, and the last few nights, spending some time with the kittens (edited to add: oh, right. I didn’t mention here that we have new kittens, did I? Duh. Go here to see them – there are three or four entries about them so far!).
So it’s not like I want to go to SLEEP at 8:00, I just want to start the process of heading for bed. Nothing on TV is really lighting my fire these days, and so when we start watching TV at 7, I sit there bored and count the minutes ’til bedtime. And unlike the old days, when Fred would go to bed and I’d turn the light on and read or come back downstairs and sit in front of my computer, these days I tend to just roll over and go to sleep when Fred goes to bed.
Most nights, I’m asleep pretty soon after 9:30.
I’d mock myself here, except that I’m usually out of bed in the mornings by 6:00, so it’s not like I’m sleeping 12 hours at a stretch (though on the weekends when Fred is around to let the chickens out of the coop when it gets light out, I do tend to sleep ’til 6:30 or so).
I’ve always considered myself a night owl, so to be the sort of person who’d prefer to go to bed when the sun goes down (or shortly thereafter) and get up when it comes up is really weird to me.
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Friday afternoon, the guy came to fix the dishwasher. When I tried to start the dishwasher Wednesday night, it made a very loud grinding noise, and I thought it prudent to not use it ’til a professional had had a chance to look it over. So the guy showed up Friday afternoon and looked at the dishwasher, and I stood in the kitchen and watched, because I always feel like I’m being rude if I wander off to do something INTERESTING. And as seems to be the way with repairmen or delivery men, he felt the need to make conversation with me. He was a perfectly nice man, but he kept talking about dishwashers, and that is a topic I neither know nor care about, but I made the attempt to look interested as he went on. And on. AND ON about dishwashers.
And then I had an epiphany.
I bet this is how Fred feels when I babble on. And on. AND ON about cats.
When I said this very same thing to Fred when we were laying in bed talking that night, he laughed and didn’t even attempt to deny it.
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A sweet moment between brothers. Right before Mister Boogers jumped on Tommy and bit his neck.
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Previously
2007: No entry. 2006: I sure do wish I was going to see Callie Torres and not some old guy. 2005: Does this mean I’m getting old?
2004: No entry. 2003: Bringing home Mister Boogers.
2002: No entry.
2001: No entry. 2000: All about the cats. 1999: I certainly am bitching a lot today, aren’t I?
For the last couple of days, I’ve felt that there was something about today’s date. “Is there something happening, or something happened on this date?” I asked Fred. He shrugged and said he didn’t think so. Did someone die? Was I supposed to do something? Go somewhere? And this morning I realized what it was, … Continue reading “10-10-08”
For the last couple of days, I’ve felt that there was something about today’s date. “Is there something happening, or something happened on this date?” I asked Fred. He shrugged and said he didn’t think so. Did someone die? Was I supposed to do something? Go somewhere?
And this morning I realized what it was, why this date is stuck in my head: it’s been nine years since I started this journal!
Nine years!
Nine years of writing five days a week, most weeks. Nine years of writing about my life. Who the hell knew it was going to last so long?
NINE YEARS.
That’s a long fucking time, ain’t it? What kind of freak writes a daily journal for nine years?
Some of you have been reading me every day since way back then, and some of you showed up at various points along the way, and some of you read for a while then disappeared but then COULD NOT RESIST THE LURE OF THE KITTEHS and came back, and some of you check in occasionally, and some of you read every single day, and some of you are brand-spanking-new to the Bitchypoo experience.
To all of you, I say: Thank you. I might still be writing even if none of you were reading, but it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun!
Here’s to another nine!
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This is pretty neat:
I’d do something like that with our webcam, except I have NO desire to see what I do or look like while I’m sleeping!
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Is Newt as soft as he looks?
Actually, he’s not! He looks like he’d be cottony soft, but he’s got coarse, wiry hair.
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I just have to say, I love hearing about Newt. He’s such a cutie. Serial-killer instincts and all.
He really is an awfully good boy. And considering how skittish he was when we first met him (almost exactly two years ago!), he’s come a long way, baby. For those of you who weren’t reading back then, when Maxi showed up with Newt in tow, we thought he was her friend. Then, a few days later when they showed up with a bunch of kittens in tow, we thought he was the father of the kittens, so we called him “Daddy” for a long time. When he and Maxi went to be spayed and neutered, I had to come up with a name to give the vet, and I glanced at the TV and saw Newt Gingrich, and a name was born.
Yes, he’s named after Newt Gingrich.
After he was neutered, I talked to the vet and she asked if we thought he could be Maxi’s kitten from a previous litter (he was obviously not fully grown, and when I look at pictures of him from back then, I’m amazed at how little he was. Not that he’s a big cat now, but he was clearly not grown up when he first showed up.), so we’re assuming now that they’re mother and son.
But anyway, Newt is perfectly happy to come inside these days, and he often spends the night inside. The other night I came downstairs after Fred went to bed, and Newt was laying on top of the kitchen cabinets, sound asleep. He’s really made himself at home here!
He still hasn’t figured out the cat door, though.
Other interesting fact about Newt: he has the highest-pitched meow I’ve ever heard from any cat, as evidenced by this video:
I never ever have to wonder who’s meowing when it’s him, it’s such a distinctive meow. It’s almost ghostly sounding, especially if I’m sitting at my desk and he starts meowing to be let out – he always sounds alarmed, and it raises the hairs on the back of my neck.
Last interesting fact about Newt: even though he’s no longer skittish and seems to trust us, he always has this look on his face when we approach him that indicates that he suspects we’re about to torture and then murder him. Seriously, he always looks PETRIFIED. He doesn’t shy away from us or act scared of us, but it’s like that last remnant of wild cat in the back of his brain just KNOWS we’re out to kill him.
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For anyone wanting to watch current tv shows on premium channels- check out www.surfthechannel.com. They have uploads of just about every show you can imagine premium and non-premium channels. Thats where I watch Dexter, Weeds, True Blood….
I went back and added this into my entry last week after Lisa posted it in my comments, but I wanted to post it again in case anyone missed it. I think this is AWESOME!
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“they may have belonged to the people who sold us this house. I’d love to get my hands on them to at least have them neutered, but the few times they’ve caught sight of me, they’ve run off immediately and ignored my calls.” The DOGS, right? although I’m guessin’ that the previous owners could use it hehehehe
Yeah, the dogs. Although if neutering stopped people from abandoning animals…
(Would you believe I actually proofread that entry? I rarely do, which is probably obvious!)
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I had to watch it a couple of times to be sure, but I am almost positive that that is not a spider at the end of the video. I think it may be a camel cricket/spider cricket/cave cricket. They get into my garage every fall and hide behind things on the wall. I HATE THEM WITH EVERY BONE IN MY BODY! You can probably hear me for miles screaming like a ninja and slamming my broom down on the floor to kill them. SHUUDDER….
Yeah, that’s a cave cricket. I hate cave crickets because they look like a cricket/ spider hybrid to me, and they are CREEPY. You don’t want to come down here and visit us in the summer, that’s for sure – when Fred would go outside at bedtime to go to the garage, there’d be hundreds of them popping around near the stairs to the side door. There’s a bird feeder hanging there, and the cave crickets were eating the fallen bird seed.
On the up side, chickens really like eating cave crickets, so Fred would catch one and toss it in the brooder then watch one of the chicks snatch it up and run around with it.
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The next time you are buying a ton of cat stuff and someone asks you how many cats you have, tell them none and then just stare at them…..
and
My husband’s answer: “How many do you need?”
and
Next time someone asks, just say, “Well, I foster cats and kittens while they’re waiting for adoptive homes, so right now I have [number].” They don’t need to know that none, or very few, of that [number] are fosters… and the “so” could mean “if I had fosters right now there’d be more” just as easily as it could mean “if I didn’t have fosters right now there’d be less.” (Fewer?)
and
you could finish up the answer of “None,” with “haven’t you tried the turkey and giblets dinner? It’s delicious on a Ritz.” 🙂
All very good answers, especially if you follow up the “None” with a puzzled look like they’re weird for asking. Also, I know that last comment was a joke, but I have to say, if I were starving to death there’d be worse things to eat than Fancy Feast Medleys. Some of that stuff looks really good! (No, I’ve never eaten canned cat food and I don’t plan to start. I’m just saying!)
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We just got a kitten a few weeks ago, and this is my first cat. He is adorable and teeny and I blame my weakness entirely on you, but he’s cute so it’s okay! Anyway, he is scratching the hell out of my chenille couches, and I want to get him some softpaws. I just had a few questions, and I hope you don’t mind answering them. First of all, from what google has shown me, declawing is pretty inhumane, correct? Is that complete declawing, or is it okay to remove their front claws? Second of all, if I put softpaws on him, will he still be able to climb up the furniture like he loves to do? It’s part of the way he plays, when he’s “attacking” things, so I am a little nervous about taking that away from him. Finally, do you put the caps on all four feet, just the front, just the back, what? I trust your experience more than the softpaws website so that’s why I figured I’d ask. Also, we have two dogs; one of them just loves him but the other one isn’t very friendly, so that’s another reason I was a little nervous about putting the caps on. He can swat and run away, but is that enough?
Declawing is widely considered to be pretty inhumane, yes – they say it would be like having your fingers removed at the first knuckle.
I think you can put SoftPaws on all four claws, but we only do the front claws, because that’s where most of the damage (furniture-clawing) comes from. The cats can absolutely still climb furniture with Softpaws on – in fact, Tommy and Sugarbutt almost always have SoftPaws on their claws, and if there wasn’t something around the tree in the back yard to prevent it, they’d easily be able to climb the tree; as it is, they climb up the tree to the barrier and just hang there for a surprisingly long time before they drop to the ground and run off. Cats use their back paws for climbing much more than their front. Also, cats can still swat with the SoftPaws on, even if there’s no claw behind it, and I would bet that a swat on the nose with an angry paw would still deter your cat-hatin’ dog.
If you’re planning to use SoftPaws, it’s best to start earlier (so he’s used to having his paws dealt with) rather than later. Oh, and you might not find this information on the SoftPaws site, but I’ve found that when you first start using the SoftPaws, they tend to fall off often (every few days), but if you keep on using them, they stay on longer and longer. I honestly don’t know why that is, whether the cats shed their claws more slowly if they’re not using them, or what, but I know that Tommy had a cap that lasted for close to three months before it came off and had to be replaced.
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Don’t know if you’ve seen this or not, but it cracked me UP!!!
I think it’s the voice that really makes that video!
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Dangit, I am no good at searching the website. I know you’ve mentioned it two dozen times, but what do you use to get the cat pee stink out? Fortunately (knock on wood) my cats haven’t peed inside, but my sister has a suede couch that her cat has peed on and she is thinking of getting rid of it. I thought the stuff you use might help her save the couch. This stupid couch she loves so much that when I came to visit her she wouldn’t even let me SIT ON IT.
It’s called “Stink Free“, and I got it at P3tSmart. I used to use this stuff called Axi-Dent (which you can only find online), but Stink Free works just as well – it’s been months since I first used it on our couch, and there’s been no reappearance of the smell. The Stink Free itself has a light, pleasant smell (it kind of smells like laundry detergent) that eventually goes away. I highly recommend it!
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When I read that Fred had started “fencing in the back forty,” I pictured him all in white with a face mask, En Garde-ing all over the place. I’m a dope, I know.
Oh, I’m sure that’s the next thing! Heh.
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I can’t say enough how great y’all are doing with Crooked Acres. The layout, everything , and you did it yourselves! I love hawks but it’s one of those love/hate relationships. They’re beautiful but they can be lethal.
Thank you! Although, we’re working on moving our chickens for the third time in less than two years, so maybe we should have thought about the layout a little more!
I think hawks are gorgeous and I love watching them soar, I just don’t want the bastards to get hold of our chickens!
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Is a Roomba pointless if I have wall-to-wall carpet?
I think – and the rest of you Roomba owners can feel free to jump in here – that it depends on the kind of carpet. If it’s Berber or relatively low-pile, the Roomba works well on it. I have a low-pile rug in my bedroom. I run the Roomba in there every so often and it does a great job. If you have the really thick, luxurious stuff, I don’t think the Roomba would work very well, though.
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Roomba can talk? Seriously? Our little Roomba seems broken. It is on an scheduler and when it turns itself on, it undocks…goes 3 feet, turns red and returns to the base. I am guessing the battery pack has essentially died. But I have never, ever heard it talking! And there have been many times where it gets stuck, lost, or just plain fails to dock. Must be a newer version. And yes, it would scare the crap out of me to hear a voice in another room if I were home “alone” with a bazillion cats.
Mine is the Roomba 560. Usually it doesn’t talk to (bellow at) me, though if it’s in the middle of vacuuming it might stop, making a sad sound, and when I hit the button to try to get it to go again, it’ll tell me what the problem is (“Please remove and clean Roomba’s brushes!” or “Please clean Roomba’s cliff sensors!”)
By the way, my favorite sound the Roomba makes is when I put it on the dock and it makes that happy “I’m recharging!” sound.
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Didn’t you have an actual name for your Roomba – like Maria? I remember it cracked me up when you’d call her by her name. Please remind me.
Does anyone else find it highly amusing that Robyn is feeding the chickens scrambled eggs? ANYONE?
We used to feed them chicken, too, when we were still eating chicken from the store. Now that we’re eating our own chicken (and let me point out here that we don’t eat nearly as much chicken as we used to!), I refuse to feed leftover chicken scraps to the chickens, just because the idea weirds me out. The pigs get THOSE leftovers.
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I keep hoping that you and Fred will decide to keep Kara. I think that it’s different when fostering kittens, but an adult cat might think she’s found her forever home, so I’m going to keep hoping that you’ll keep Kara. She’s entertainment, too, as she’ll lay the smack down on any cat who gets out of line. She’d be the Regulator! You NEED a Regulator!!
I know, I felt horrible leaving her at P3tSmart yesterday. And I did hint around about it a few times when talking to Fred, but the truth is that we’ve really hit our limit with nine cats. Our nine permanent cats work fairly well together (with occasional moments of assholery), and adding Kara to the mix even for a few months put them off-balance. Last night, Stinkerbelle was almost giddy that Kara wasn’t around – she raced around, she played, she sharpened her claws on the cat tree. I know that Kara will find a good home with someone who loves her whole-heartedly.
We did miss her last night and this morning, though. Along with being the Regulator, her job was apparently that of the Upstairs Greeter – it was strange to go upstairs and not have her at the top of the stairs to greet me.
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Robyn, everybody knows you shoot at hawks with a SHOTGUN! 😉 You need a spray pattern, not a single bullet! Ha ha ha.
Uh huh. ‘Cause I’m a gun and rifle expert, you know. Heh.
Here’s a gun story for y’all: earlier this week a hawk kept coming back and swooping through the chicken yard and freaking the chickens (and me!) out. I was bitching about it (via email) to Fred, and he said I should go out with a gun and fire it into the ground, that hawks will understand the noise and it will chase them away. And though I’ve handled and fired guns before, I have a healthy respect for them, and I refused to do it, because I just knew that I’d attempt to fire the gun into the ground and end up shooting my foot, a chicken, or a passerby because that’s just how my life goes!
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I have never heard of an assassin bug. Wonder if they are a southern thing. I live in Indiana and I have never seen one here that I can remember. Saturday I was out in the yard and felt something crawling up my leg and it was a praying mantis. I looked at it and said “Hey, I am not a tree or a bush” I got it off my leg and put it in the bush beside the porch. It had a huge stomach so I am thinking it was getting ready to lay eggs. Do you know if this is the time of year for them to do that and the eggs lay dormant until Spring?
I had never heard of them before this year, either. The juvenile ones look a lot like praying mantii (?) to me and the bigger ones kind of resemble shield bugs to me.
According to Wikipedia, the mating season for praying mantii in temperate climates is in the Fall, but it doesn’t say whether the eggs lay dormant ’til Spring. It seems like they would, but I don’t know for sure! Anyone out there know?
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I was wondering, has Maxi been chasing the chicks anymore? Since Newt is the mighty mighty hunter, it is surprising that he has left them alone. *knocks on wood* Good boy Newtles! Be a good boy and leave the chickies alone.
We actually moved them to the little coop in the chicken yard so they’re not as accessible to her, but they’re also bigger now, too. So she hasn’t been showing too much interest in them, thank god, and hopefully they’re big enough that she’s not really interested any more.
When I got home from running errands the other day, she came running across the driveway with something small in her mouth. It was squeaking, and at first glance I thought it was a hummingbird.
“Miss Momma!” I gasped. “Bad!”
So she dropped it, and that’s when I realized it was a little mouse. It tried running away from her, but was clearly badly injured – I think probably its back was broken – so I said “Carry on”, and she snatched it up and ran off with it.
Circle of life, don’tchaknow.
Newt has shown little interest in the chicks, but he’s such a mighty, mighty hunter that I think he prefers something with a little challenge to it.
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You can set up your site the way you want, but don’t most people who visit Bitchypoo do so in order to hear about your life with your cats? I know I do. The more cats the better! I don’t get tired of the photos either. If I did, I wouldn’t bookmark your site. Anyway …
Would you believe that I have readers who don’t care for cats at all? In any case, the main reason for my starting up Love & Hisses is that I wanted to have all my foster entries in one place so that if I wanted to remember at what point, for instance, Maddy started eating solid food, I wouldn’t have to wade through all the non-cat entries to find that out (of course, before that happens, I also have to get all those foster kitten entries copied & pasted, too!). I also wanted to have a G-rated place (okay, PG? Maybe PG-13?!) for people to see pictures of our foster cats and information about them without having to wade through the “Fuckity fuckity FUCK FUCK FUCK!” stuff.
By the way, while I was working on setting up Love & Hisses, the tagline in the title bar was “Love & Hisses: Your source for the sweetest pussy on the internet.” (I changed it, though. See above about trying to keep it PG-rated.)
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Are there any restrictions there on pet ownership? Here we are not supposed to have more than 5 cats and/or dogs total. Not sure why but when it is discovered that you have more it is enforced.
Luckily, there are no restrictions at all! I worry that our little town will be annexed by Closeville and restrictions will be imposed, but even if that happened (I don’t think Closeville is really interested in annexation of Smallville), I’m hoping our animals would be grandfathered in.
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I make quiche all the time sans crust. At this point my preferred method is to make it in nonstick mini pie pans, for portability and portion control, but in general I advise using a nonstick cake or loaf pan – it pops right out, and it makes the outside of the quiche tough enough to hold together but not inedibly hard. Glass or porcelain don’t work as well, no matter how much you grease it. I like cheddar, bacon, and salad shrimp quiche the best.
Cheddar, bacon, and shrimp quiche sounds like HEAVEN to me. I really like the idea of using mini pie pans for single-serving quiches, I’m going to have to give that a try!
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Do the pigs ever get sick from food that you give them? Sounds like they’ll eat just about anything!
So far, they’ve never gotten sick from anything we’ve given them – I hear that pigs have cast-iron stomachs and you can really give them just about anything and they’ll eat it. At this point, the only things we’ve given them that they absolutely refuse to eat are raw carrots (they sat there for days before Fred scooped them up and tossed them on the compost heap) and raw okra. Everything else, they eat. They have their favorites, of course, and sometimes stuff will sit there for a while before they eat it, but usually everything gets eaten eventually.
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OMG keep the Newtles pictures coming. so cute. Do you think he’d like a california vacation?
I think Newt needs to visit California and go surfing!
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Does the ‘troll under the stairs’ ever reach out to swat at unsuspecting feet? And is there video of that?!
No, there’s never any swatting from the troll. She’s a benevolent troll – unless one of the other cats gets all up in her space (which Joe Bob and Mister Boogers like to do), in which case there’s a lot of hissing and growling. The troll under the stairs needs her space!
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I’ve heard that cats, who have had multiple UTIs, can actually develop thick walls in their urinary tract. This can cause multiple infections. One of my co-workers started her cat on glucosamine supplements along with antibiotics per her vet’s instructions to help with this. She says her cat is doing really well. This is only something I’ve heard secondhand, but it does sound interesting.
I’ll have to check with our vet about that – it certainly does sound interesting! If glucosamine supplements meant that Joe wouldn’t have to deal with UTIs, I’m all for it!
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Do you think Fred might like the girl pigs better if you put lipstick on them?
You betcha!
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Spanky has a box. But not just ANY box, a PRIORITY box.
This pleases him.
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Previously 2007: “Because you’re a spineless, self-indulgent, self-absorbed narcissist, DUH.” 2006: As of today, I’ve been journaling for seven years. 2005: What I’m not going to miss is the rotten-egg gas Sugarbutt’s been suffering from lately. 2004: Off to Myrtle Beach. 2003: Instead, we should probably go for “Shizzle M. Andersizzle.” 2002: Why I journal.
2001: No entry. 2000: Okay, enough of that mushy crap. 1999: So. Welcome to my journal.
Have you checked out Love & Hisses yet? & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & Lately, I’ve been trying out new recipes to have for lunch. I have to make something early in the week to have for lunches for the … Continue reading “10-9-08”
Lately, I’ve been trying out new recipes to have for lunch. I have to make something early in the week to have for lunches for the rest of the week, otherwise when lunchtime comes around I’m left poking sadly through the fridge and the pantry to find something to eat and eating something like Cup o’ Noodles, which is not in the least bit healthy or nutritious and doesn’t really contain protein, which is supposed to be a cornerstone of the post-WLS patient’s diet.
A few weeks ago I happened upon canned clams (from Maine!) at Big Lots (don’t judge me!) for $1.50 a can. I don’t know what the usual cost of canned clams is, but it seemed that $1.50 a can sounded like a good price, so I bought three of them. After hemming and hawing and putting it off, as is my way, I finally buckled down and did a search for a simple clam chowder recipe, came across this one, and decided it looked good enough to try. Last week, I finally gave it a try.
Making the “Cliff House Spice Blend” was a pain in the ass, and when it came time to eat the chowder it was good, but there was something in it I didn’t really care for. There were so many spices in the “spice blend” that I wasn’t sure what it was, but I think it was probably the sage. I don’t think I like sage.
I ate a serving of it for lunch that day, and I ate a serving the next day, but whatever was in it that I didn’t like the first day, I really didn’t like the second day, so the pigs got what was left.
Earlier this week I made it again, this time using two cans of clams instead of one, a little extra clam juice, and left out the “spice blend” and just used salt and pepper instead. It was pretty good, actually, but it gave me the most wicked gas. What I’d failed to remember, because I was so busy hating the sage, is that too much dairy gives me gas and makes me bloated. You’d think two and a half years after surgery, I’d remember that sort of thing.
So I gave the rest of the clam chowder to the pigs (who apparently gave it two (four? eight?) hooves up) and went through the big pile of “recipes I haven’t tried yet”, a pile that grows larger every day.
So I got everything I needed, and I cut down on the calories by using skim milk instead of whole and light mayo instead of full-fat. I bought the pie crust already made from the freezer section because I’ve never made a pie crust in my life, and I don’t intend to start now.
It was pretty easy to throw together, and I have to say – that is some GOOD stuff. I used canned crabmeat (I don’t like the imitation stuff at ALL), and best of all, it’s giving me a week of lunches. A piece of quiche and a small salad, and I’m set for lunch time.
I think that next time I make it, I might do it without the crust completely. I don’t particularly care about pie crust one way or the other, and if I can cut out the carbs and calories and not even notice, I might as well, right?
So anyway – the clam chowder: good, but not for me. The crab quiche: VERY good, and I’ll definitely be making it again!
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While I’m thinking of it, I used bacon in that clam chowder, but I ended up using slices from a pack of bacon I bought several months ago, and split up into two-slice packages and froze.
“Robyn,” you are saying, “Did you not recently have your very own pigs slaughtered so that you could feast upon their flesh and don’t pigs provide bacon?”
The thing I didn’t know about this whole pig raising-and-slaughtering thing is that apparently not all slaughtering houses will cure bacon for you. So, we got several packages of sliced bacon from the slaughtering houses, and the guy who processed the pigs for us told Fred that fresh bacon was very good, so I fried up some bacon, and while it’s true that fresh bacon is not bad at all, it also very much doesn’t taste like bacon. At all.
Sue me; I like my bacon to taste like bacon.
(The sausage, on the other hand, is VERY good. It’s fattier than we’d like, which is why god invented colanders, so one can drain the fat from sausage and not immediately die of a sausage-induced heart attack as your arteries slam audibly shut.)
So Fred decided to do some experimenting and he took some bacon and rubbed something on it, I don’t remember what-all he rubbed on it, but I know there was salt. Because after he let it sit for a while and then rinsed it off, and then I cooked it, it was salty. It was VERY salty. It was so salty my tastebuds went on strike and I spent the rest of the day guzzling water to try to recover.
The next time he tried messing with the bacon – last weekend – he rubbed it with brown sugar, pepper, and just a tiny bit of salt. We let it sit for a few hours, then I wiped some of the brown sugar off, and fried it up. And holy CRAP that stuff was good. I thought I was going to have to divorce Fred and marry the bacon.
But anyway, we don’t have any bacon that tastes like bacon just sitting around, Fred spices it up when we’re ready to use it, and so I had to use the two slices that were in the freezer for my clam chowder.
And that was a fascinating tale, wasn’t it?
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Tuesday evening, Fred and I walked out to give the pigs their nightly snack (for the record, Fred does not like the girl pigs as much as he liked the boy pigs. He says they have no personality. I think they have plenty of personality, but I think he just misses his annoying boy pigs.) and as I walked out the back door to meet Fred in the chicken yard
(I really think that 15 year-old Robyn never would have expected “the chicken yard” to be in 40 year-old Robyn’s life. Or pigs, for that matter.)
I saw Joe Bob crouched in the back yard in that far-too-familiar position. I rolled my eyes and pointed him out to Fred, and then we went out and gave the pigs their snack.
When we headed back to the house, I glanced at the back yard and saw Joe Bob in that position again (I say “again” rather than “still” because he was in a different part of the yard). This caused concern, because back when Joe Bob was our foster cat, he had an issue with a urinary tract infection, and I know that cats with that issue tend to have the issue repeatedly (although now that I think about it, both Spanky and Spot had UTIs only once and never again, so maybe I’m making that up.)
Fred and I talked about it, and part of what we discussed was that we weren’t sure whether he was trying to go Number One or Number Two, so was he constipated, or dealing with a UTI? We decided to give him a dollop of cat laxative just in case, and to keep an eye on him to see what was going on.
The question was solved pretty quickly – I walked into the laundry room a while later, and Joe Bob ran over to the litter box and hunkered over and I went over to see what was going on, and he peed three little droplets of urine and then went along his way.
This is such an appetizing topic, isn’t it? I draw you in with talk of clam chowder and quiche and then hit you with litter box talk. Sneaky!
So yesterday morning Fred called and made a 9:00 appointment for Joe Bob with the vet 5 minutes up the road, and when I got up I got out the cat carrier and put it in the computer room so that the cats would initially freak out about its presence and then forget it was there, and then a few minutes before 9:00, I could snatch up Joe Bob and pop him in the carrier and be on our way. Joe Bob is such a good boy that when I went to put him in the carrier, he fought a little bit, but gave up pretty quickly and gave me a baleful look but didn’t meow even once during the trip to the vet or his appointment.
Long story short (too late!), the vet looked Joe Bob over, did some blood work, and decided that he has a Urinary Tract Infection, big shock. They gave him a couple of shots, a bottle of pills, and a bag of the special prescription cat food (which is okay for all the cats to eat).
Poor Joe Bob. When he was hanging out on the staircase right before I snatched him up, he had no idea he’d be suffering such indignities in just a little while.
(Note the troll under the stairs, sound asleep.)
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It was raining so hard yesterday that Newt stood at the side door and howled ’til I let him in (he NEVER does that), and he was soaked, so I dried him off with a towel, and he was so grumpy he climbed into this box, licked himself the rest of the way dry, and slept most of the day away.
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Previously 2007: Further proof, in case you needed it, that I’m a dumbass.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.
2004: No entry. 2003: I’ve SEEN Deliverance, and I have no desire to be forced to squeal like a pig. 2002: Well, duh.
2001: No entry. 2000: We like our fast food, we do.
Okay, I have a new site up and running. It’s devoted exclusively to our foster cats and the pet store kitties. I wanted a place where I could go on and on and ON about our foster kitties and not feel like I was boring the shit out of anyone not interested, and I also … Continue reading “10-8-08”
Okay, I have a new site up and running.
It’s devoted exclusively to our foster cats and the pet store kitties. I wanted a place where I could go on and on and ON about our foster kitties and not feel like I was boring the shit out of anyone not interested, and I also wanted to have all that stuff in one place.
Oh, I’ll still talk about the fosters here on this page, though not to the extent I will over at Love & Hisses, and there’ll be a lot more pictures over there too. There’s a graphic link to the site over there in the left sidebar under the “misc” heading, and also one in the right sidebar under the “me, elsewhere” heading.
I’ve copied all the entries about Kara and her babies over there (they’re still here, but they’re also over there too) and I’m probably going to go back to the very first batch of fosters (Mia and her babies) and work forward from there. At some point, all the fosters will be represented over there.
If you have questions or issues with the site, let me know!
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And since there’s not a lot going on around here (except that it’s raining for the first time in forever, yay!), here are some pictures from around Crooked Acres.
Apparently it was a good idea to keep the hummingbird feeders up and filled. This little guy made several trips to the feeder yesterday, all day long. I’ll continue to leave the feeders up (and filled with fresh nectar) for the foreseeable future.
Newt lets his country roots show.
Tommy showed that leaf just who the boss is. (Hint: not the leaf!)
If you’ve already been over to Fred’s site, you know that he added on to the cat playground in the back yard by putting in another post, running a catwalk from one post to the other, and putting a perch on the end of the board. The cats LOVE IT.
Tommy got a wee bit klutzy on his descent down the stairs. He’s just like his Momma!
Tommy on the perch.
Joe Bob on the catwalk.
Fred harvested our first teeny-weeny carrot the other day. Not surprisingly, it tasted… just like carrot! They sure do grow slowly.
Cardinal in the side yard (trust me, it looks much better this small. I took it through the window.)
I got this bird bath/ waterer recently because it’s been so dry out, and I wanted to have a bird bath, but I didn’t want to have to clean it out every day. This one works out really well – I clean it and refill it a couple of times a week, and the birds and squirrels appreciate it.
I’m pretty sure this is an assassin bug, a very young one (the pictures don’t really show you their true size, but trust me when I say they are NOT big bugs). I don’t know if this is the time of year for assassin bugs to hatch or what, but I’m finding them everywhere. I rescued one in my bathroom one day last week (scooped it up on a piece of paper and put it outside on the window ledge). A few days ago, the one in the first picture up there was hanging out near the ceiling in the computer room. I couldn’t reach him, so I left him alone, and he eventually showed up on my computer speaker (the second picture). I scooped him up on a piece of paper and took him outside. Rumor has it that assassin bug bites are painful, BUT they eat flies, which means they’re aces with me!
Sugarbutt on the platform one day last week, before Fred added the catwalk.
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Previously 2007: Whither Tom-Tom goest, the Stank will follow.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry. 2004: I’m just going to sit here and whine about being cold and thirsty, I suppose. Sounds like a plan! 2003: Just know that it was a little SKEERY. 2002: This is a mighty exciting entry, isn’t it? Could I be any more interesting? Should I do an entry about watching paint dry, or what? 2001: “Farm boy, fetch me some ice! Farm boy, fetch me a diet coke, chop-chop!”
2000: No entry.
This past weekend – I think it was Saturday morning – I was out by the chicken yard, tossing them leftover scrambled eggs from breakfast. Fred came out to check on the chicks, who were in their little “playpen” by the garage (he usually lets them stay outside all day on the weekends, then puts … Continue reading “10-7-08”
This past weekend – I think it was Saturday morning – I was out by the chicken yard, tossing them leftover scrambled eggs from breakfast. Fred came out to check on the chicks, who were in their little “playpen” by the garage (he usually lets them stay outside all day on the weekends, then puts them outside when he gets home from work during the week. It’s been especially gorgeous lately, since we haven’t seen a lick of rain in forever.). He was just giving me hell for not giving the chicks when the chickens, all of a sudden, started clucking in alarm and moved faster than I’ve ever seen them move. They ran as a giant wave of panicked chickens for the coop (under the coop is their safe place) and with a giant cartoon question mark hanging over my head, I looked up and said “Wha -?”
And a goddamn hawk swooped through the chicken yard, perhaps six feet from the ground. I shouted in alarm and then began running along the fenceline (I was actually outside the chicken yard), and I raised my arm to throw the plate at the hawk, then he seemed to think better of grabbing himself a chicken, and he flew up into a tree at the edge of the property.
Fred had managed not to see any of it – though to be fair, on Saturday morning when there are a lot of cars going by, it’s kind of loud out there.
The chickens were all either in or under the chicken coop, and Fred and I stood in the chicken yard and stared up at the trees to see if the hawk would reappear, but he (or she) didn’t. After a few minutes, Fred went and got a cup of cracked corn and tossed it out, and I accused him of trying to get the hawk to come back so he could see it (“baiting the trap” is what I accused him of) and he tried to pretend like he was doing no such thing, and he made a special point to toss the cracked corn close to the coop, but please. I know my husband. He totally wanted that hawk to come back.
And he likes the chickens, but I think if a hawk swooped down and snatched one up while he was watching, it would make his YEAR.
So, I haven’t mentioned it, but Fred mentioned it over on his site that he’s started fencing in the back forty, because we’ve decided to move the chickens back there and let them have some REAL room to roam (also, if they have a ton of space, why would we ever have to stop getting new chickens? It’s an illness, I tell ya.). And after Saturday’s experience with the hawk, I’ve started having fucking NIGHTMARES about hawks swooping down and grabbing chickens. Last night I had a nightmare that seemed to last ALL NIGHT LONG wherein hawks were circling the chicken yard and I was shooting at them with the rifle (yes, it’s illegal to shoot hawks; they’re federally protected. IT WAS A DREAM.) (also, I’ve fired that rifle exactly once in my life, and it had such a kick on it that I immediately dropped it and have refused to fire it since).
We’re going to cut down on the wide-open spaces that allow the hawks to just kind of swoop down and grab chickens by planting a couple of trees in the back forty and Fred’s going to put a couple of shade shelters up, but still. I’ll be worrying about those goddamn hawks all the time, I’m sure.
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Now that all her babies have been adopted, Kara will be going to the pet store on Thursday, hopefully to be adopted quickly.
She’s really integrated into the family in the past few weeks – her happiest time is at bedtime when Fred and I go upstairs. She considers the upstairs her domain, and she loves to climb on the bed with us and be petted vigorously, then run off to do her rounds of the other rooms to make sure all is secure, back for another bout of petting, and so forth.
She’s such a sweet thing, I really hope someone falls in love with her quickly and brings her home.
Yes, I feel bad about taking her.
No, we’re not keeping her. (Y’all never believe me when I say that, do you?)
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Three of the most recent little chicks – not the ones we hatched ourselves or bought at the flea market, but the ones that were hatched by Momma chickens – are still small enough to squeeze under the gate between the chicken yard and the front yard. It’s not really a problem, because they don’t venture too far from the chicken yard (they go up to the front corner of the house and no further, usually) and they like to hang out under the bird feeders and eat the seed the wild birds knock onto the ground.
I see this sight from the computer room a lot.
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It’s a rough life out there for a Newtles.
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Previously
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry. 2005: 9. What is your biggest mistake? Immediately believing what I’m told without standing back and thinking about it. 2004: Reader requests. 2003: Why have kids if you aren’t going to make them do the scut work? 2002: You know, I don’t even have the words.
2001: No entry.
2000: No entry.
Good news – Zoe got adopted over the weekend! Whee!!!! & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & On Thursday, after my stint at the pet store, I went to Target. While I was there, I checked on the price of … Continue reading “10-6-08”
Good news – Zoe got adopted over the weekend! Whee!!!!
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On Thursday, after my stint at the pet store, I went to Target. While I was there, I checked on the price of canned Fancy Feast – what I give the cats every night at Snackin’! Time! – and found that individual cans were on sale for a very good price. I piled a ton of them in my cart, I think I must have grabbed close to thirty cans, and so when I checked out, it was normal that the cashier would ask how many cats I have.
Except that he didn’t ask the open-ended “How many cats do you have?”, but rather opted for “Do you have one cat, or two?”
I was surprised by the limitation in the question, so I hesitated for a long moment before I smiled and said “Seven.”
Insert the usual face of surprise and the “Oh wow! Seven?!”
That’s right I LIED, though I don’t know why I didn’t just claim to have two cats. It’s not like the cashier was going to sense my deception and refuse to ring up my purchases. I almost always lie when a stranger in the store asks me how many cats I have because it’s always when I’m buying a lot of cat-related items, whether it be cat food or kitty litter or cat toys. The subtext of the question, to me at least, is “Just how fucking batshit crazy ARE you, anyway?”
Pretty batshit crazy, as it turns out.
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I was sitting in front of the computer at some point on Friday. I had been running the Roomba in the kitchen, but she had finished the job and I’d helped her back onto the charging station (I know the damn thing is supposed to be able to find her way back to the dock on her own, but she’s rarely successful. Perhaps I got the spatially challenged Roomba. I love her anyway.). So it had been charging for a few minutes, and I was caught up in reading something, and then all of a sudden, from the kitchen, came a bellow.
“ROOMBA CHARGING ERROR. FIVE!!!!” it echoed.
I was so surprised that I almost fell off my chair, and my heart raced for several minutes afterward.
I pulled the Roomba off the charging dock and reseated her, and so far everything seems to be fine.
You’d think they could come up with a better way of letting you know there’s a problem than bellowing loudly out of nowhere. Perhaps a quiet cough and an “Excuse me” first?
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“Does my butt taste funny to you, too?”
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Previously
2007: No entry. 2006: You all have my full permission to skip the boring stuff to get to the cute kitten stuff. 2005: I forsee a lot of spud-teasing this evening. 2004: Phil Hellmuth is a whiny little bitch. 2003: “And then he told me he likes to have sex with you in the break room every day at 11!” he lied.
2002: No entry. 2001: Recovery. 2000: No one ever said I had a long attention span!
I’m telling you now, though, if you don’t read The Thirteenth Tale soon, I’m going to show up on your porch, barge my way in, set you down in a recliner, hand you the book and force you to read it. I’m just sayin’. It’s in the queue! I swear it! In fact, I’ll look … Continue reading “10-3-08”
I’m telling you now, though, if you don’t read The Thirteenth Tale soon, I’m going to show up on your porch, barge my way in, set you down in a recliner, hand you the book and force you to read it. I’m just sayin’.
It’s in the queue! I swear it! In fact, I’ll look when I go upstairs tonight, and if it’s not in the next five books, I’ll move it up! How’s that?
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We have those type of stairs and call them “pain in the ass to move anything big up them” stairs.
Dude. TELL me about it. When we had to move my furniture upstairs (when I moved from the downstairs bedroom to the upstairs), it was a HUGE pain in the ass to get my mattress up the stairs, let alone anything else. I guess I’m just lucky I don’t sleep in a King size bed!
[It’s called a]return staircase. sorry, i know the strangest things!
I knew someone would know the answer!
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We have hardwood floors in our house. They need to be refinished. How did you decide between doing it yourself or having them done by somebody else?
I actually had to call Fred and ask him for the answer to this one, ’cause I couldn’t remember. At first Fred was planning to do them himself (with some help from me, I’m sure), but he always researches everything thoroughly before he does it, and the more research he did, the more concerned he was that he’d mess it up and we’d end up paying a professional to do it anyway. After much deliberation, waffling, dithering and A LOT OF ANNOYING OF HIS WIFE, he decided to get quotes from local area businesses. The first guy who came and looked the house over gave us a quote that fit into our budget (I’m not being coy here, I honestly don’t remember how much it cost at ALL), was very professional, and gave us a lot of references. I really wanted to have a professional do it, and after a little more time spent thinking about it, Fred ended up agreeing with me.
Fred did end up redoing the stairs himself (with a lot of help and direction from his father), which gave him a definite appreciation for the work involved, and a year and a half later, he says that if he had it to do over again, he’d still hire a professional for the floors.
Oh my lord, my head aches. I found that if you read it quickly rather than try to figure out every word, it goes a lot easier.
And it is pretty funny!
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I’m cracking up at the last sentence of your bringing Miz Poo home story….Sorry for all the kitten talk. HAHAHAHA. If you knew then what you know now.
I totally had no idea, 9 years ago, that I was going to turn into a batshit crazy cat lady!
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Hey! Didn’t you have a camera set up to see who was peeing on the bed???? Whatever happened to that? Did you find out who it was????
After a stint as an egg-hatching cam, a brooder cam and a front-porch cam, the webcam is… You know, I’m not even sure where I stashed it. I think it’s on the bookcase in the front room. I need to set it back up in the guest bedroom because it’s been long enough since the bed was peed upon that we’re just about due for an incident!
(I’m trying to convince Fred that we should set the webcam up in the chicken yard for at least a few days so y’all can watch the chickens strut about!)
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OK – am I the only one who wonders why you don’t take your shower BEFORE you go get your hair done? Or are you one of those fussies (like my daughter) who hates the way the hairdresser styles their hair?
Oh, I do take a shower before I go have my hair done – and then I take another afterward. She tends to use a lot of product in my hair, and I touch my hair a LOT (also, I touch my face a lot. Apparently I’m a self-touching fool.) and the feel of product-laden hair bugs me. Also, she’s good about getting most of the teeny little hairs off me when she’s done, but there are still plenty on me, so I take a shower and change clothes to get rid of those.
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What’s a girl who lives in the boonies with rabbit ears to do? I only get 3 networks, and I still struggle with watching/taping everything! I actually look forward to re-runs!!!
I recommend Hulu.com and iTunes! Edited to add – you can go here and search to find your favorite shows. Thank you, Lisa the awesome!!!
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Didn’t you have a recipe for homemade liquid hand soap? If not do know anyone who has made some successfully?
I haven’t made the hand soap yet myself, but Nance did, and her recipe is: 1 bar Castille soap, grated; 3 c. water. Heat ’til the soap melts. I have the soap and am ready to make it, but my liquid soap dispensers aren’t anywhere close to empty, so I’m waiting ’til they are. I have it on good authority that it works pretty well!
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Mister Boogers LOVES someone?? How is that even possible?
In his own way, Mister Boogers loves people. For a little while. Until the het takes over and he has to cast them aside. His love is fleeting; his het is not.
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(From Kinzie, whose daughter coined “Honkshu”, which I immediately stole for my own usage) Got another one for ya. They told me they can’t talk about the “b-word”, which is Pickle’s balls, so they say “He’s showing me his beehive.” HAHAHA. Where do they GET this stuff??
HEE.
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I think you would like this site too: http://iamneurotic.com/ It’s kind of like post secret but you list your neuroses. Very fun to browse through–makes me feel normal!
I do like that site – and you’re right, it totally makes me feel normal!
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I just finished Manhunt, which is about the 12 day chase for John Wilkes Booth after Lincoln’s death. There was an incredible amount of research done and it ended up reading more like a suspense/thriller than a history book. I hear that that book is supposedly being made into a made for tv movie. Hope it does! Reading it made me want to go do all of the tours of Mudd’s house and the Surratt house and Ford’s Theatre again. Good thing I live nearby them!
Is it a gap in my education, or was I just not paying attention, that I didn’t realize it took 12 days for them to catch him? I had no idea – I thought it was a matter of HOURS! (I’m definitely adding that book to my wish list. It sounds good – also, educational. Clearly I need me some education.)
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Um, can i come vacation at your house? I think I could really be happy eating and watching TV.
Wouldn’t I be an excellent slacker vacation host? I’m always excited to have people come visit ’cause it means I have someone to go out to eat with and drag to whatever store I want to visit!
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What happened with little Zoe? Did she get adopted? I noticed you didn’t mention that you brought her home again.
No, she hasn’t been adopted yet. As of yesterday, she was still there. She’s in a cage by herself, but – I think as a result of being in a cage alone – she’s a lot friendlier than she was when I took her to the pet store. Of course I spoil her when I go in there – she’s the first one out of her cage and the last one back in, and I give her plenty of cuddles in between. If too much more time goes by and she remains unadopted, I’ll likely bring her home to give her a break from the cage and give another kitten a chance to be exposed to the people who go by the cat room.
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There’s a book out about the Ice Man… hit man serial killer…something like that. I have it wrote down somewhere but anyway… I saw a piece on him on A&E (I think) and that man was a cold human being/monster. But his story fascinates me and I want to know more.
I had never heard that! Well, I may have heard of washing your hair with baking soda, but washing your face with oils? That sounds so odd!
Anyone tried either of those?
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What color did she use on your hair?? I must have it too!!!
I haven’t got a clue – it’s something she mixes up in the back. Maybe it’s magic!
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I was about to tell you the surefire method of having easy peeling eggs… which is to not boil them fresh, boil ones that have been in your fridge for a week or so and they peel with ease. Then I remembered that there are ONLY fresh eggs at Crooked Acres. How long does it take for an egg to go from chicken’s ass to the grocery store anyway?
When we have deviled eggs, I always immediately set another dozen eggs aside to let them “age”, because I’ve always heard that they’re easier to peel when they’re a bit older. I want to try the 12-minute low boil followed by baking soda and ice bath, and see if it works as well on fresher eggs. Probably we’ll be having egg salad this weekend!
By the time eggs get to the grocery store, they’re 7 to 10 days old; in comparison, we had scrambled eggs for dinner last night that were maybe three hours out of the chickens.
I can’t recommend getting your own chickens enough, if you live in an area where that’s a possibility.
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Umm…HOW do you get pics of your cats with such awesome expressions? And what the devil was he doing? The doesn’t look like a yawn?
With the invention of digital cameras, people like me can take picture after picture after picture and end up with some pretty good ones. It doesn’t cost anything to take 10 billion pictures and delete all but one of them.
Of course, it also helps to have cats who are real characters and make such goofy faces, too.
Mister Boogers was actually at the tail end of a yawn in that picture – though it’s also the face he makes when he sneezes, so I’ve gotten plenty of pictures of him making that face!
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How surprised were you to see those dogs on your porch? The raccoon wasn’t that surprising (but cute), but those were two big dogs! Speaking of big, the spider that crawls across the porch was pretty large, too. Blech.
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Do you know who those dogs belong to? I would love to save dogs/raccoons/stray cats come up and feed on my porch, but since I live in a suburb with NO land around us whatsoever, I do not think our neighbors would appreciate that.
I wasn’t terribly surprised – we’ve seen both those dogs around here from time to time, ever since we moved in. I think, though I don’t know for sure, that they may have belonged to the people who sold us this house. I’d love to get my hands on them to at least have them neutered, but the few times they’ve caught sight of me, they’ve run off immediately and ignored my calls.
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How much cat food do you go through out on the porch? If that was just a sampling of the free loaders, I can’t imagine that how much food you’re going through.
Less than you’d think, actually – I buy maybe two big bags of (cheap) cat food a month, whatever’s on sale. Some mornings I go out and the food dish is completely empty, but most mornings it’s only 1/3 to 1/2 empty. I’m guessing that the dogs are getting food elsewhere as well as on our front porch. I don’t know if someone else is feeding them, or if they’re catching small animals to eat or what, but they seem to be at a good size, not too skinny, so they’re eating SOMETHING.
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Enjoyed the porch cam. A wild game cam with night vision out at the back forty might truly capture a lot of roaming deer, raccoons and who knows what all. About 100 miles south of where you live, a woman has a wild game cam and catches lots of deer, raccoons, possums — as well as lots of coyotes! (They are not hunters, just like to see what is wandering around their fields and woods.)
I would LOVE to have a wild game cam with night vision! I think it would be really neat to see what moves through the back forty at night. I’m still working on Fred, trying to convince him that we need one!
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LOVE the porch cam! Wouldn’t you have DIED if you were going through the images and saw like, a PERSON sneaking up on your porch? Looking right into the camera? And giving you this evil grin? Shudder.
I told Fred that I half-expected to find a movie of The Walkin’ Dude (who we also refer to as Crackhead Bob) snoozing on the porch swing!
Pigs and birds enjoy popped popcorn….. so does little fat squirrels that you won’t bake cookies for ; )
Oh, the pigs and birds and squirrels get PLENTY of food, believe me. In fact, I have a tree that’s pretty much devoted to squirrels – they get peanut butter suet nuggets, a square of corn and sunflower seeds, and if they get bored with those, I put peanuts (in the shell) on fence posts for them.
Any animal who wanders across our property sure does get spoiled rotten, don’t they?
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What kind of webcam do you have? I just bought one on ebay. Do you capture it to a tape or dvd, or to a browser?
Fred can correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe it’s a TRENDnet Internet Camera. It comes with software you install on your computer, then you connect (wirelessly) to the camera, and you can set it to record manually, at set times, or when motion sets it off; it records right to your hard drive.
You can mess with the motion sensitivity; when I had it on the front porch, I had to fiddle with the camera “zones” so that the bushes blowing in the breeze didn’t set it off.
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Just wanted to say that I used to feel the same way about slow walkers. With all due respect, I changed my mind one day when good friend’s mother, who was elderly and had to use a walker, was “nudged” and knocked down by an impatient truck driver. The truck driver, who saw what he had done, drove off, leaving her lying in the street with a broken hip. She later died. I guess the truck driver had more important things to do in his oh so very busy and important life than help a fellow human being, whose distress he had caused. My attitude now towards people who get impatient with slow-walkers is…take a valium and chill out. You’ll be a lot happier and, unless those 15 extra seconds spent at some intersection mean that now you won’t have time to discover the cure for cancer, I’d say they really aren’t all that important in the grand scheme of things.
Oh, I agree – I figure I’ll get there sooner or later, but CERTAIN PEOPLE take the fact that sometimes people are in their way as personal insults.
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You’ve probably addressed it before, but … WHY does the cat have to pee in the litter box the second it is cleaned and put back on the floor? Said cat, Simon, practically dances on his two back legs clutching his, um, self, waiting for me to finish!
Good question! All I can guess is that some cats are pickier than others when it comes to litter box cleanliness. I know that some of our cats will wait until I’ve scooped all the litter boxes, and then they use them immediately. What drives me crazy is that they’re picky about the cleanliness of their litter boxes, but they ALL use the damn same hole in the back yard as an outside litter box and you can bet I do NOT scoop that damn thing!
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Oh God! No! Don’t waste your time reading those books, read the recaps that Cleolinda Jones wrote. Go here, they’re funny:
Now, in Stephanie Meyer’s defense, she wrote a book called The Host for an adult audience which was much, much better. She’s definitely writing Twilight for a fourteen-year-old reader, and she KNOWS her audience. That’s why Twilight is such a repetitive soap-opera. Don’t be afraid to put the book down.
Oddly enough, I picked up The Host in Target yesterday, then put it down because I decided I had enough damn books to read!
I’m going to check out Cleolinda’s recaps, but I think these are definitely worth checking out as well – they cracked me UP (though I only read the first few chapters so as not to ruin the surprise of the rest of the book for myself!).
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My dad always talks about honkshuing. Of course, he also talks about things being cattywhampus, calls unidentified objects ’sphagnum’, and refers to sick people as having ‘collywabbles in the bingbang’. I’m never sure which words he’s made up, which ones he’s using completely (on purpose) incorrectly, and which ones are legitimate. We are an odd odd family.
I would have guessed, if pressed, that “collywabbles in the bingbang” would be like “bats in the belfry”, guess not! I’m going to try to remember to use “collywabbles” in the future and see if I get A Look. Heh.
So my question is – does he use the phrase just in passing, or does he do it to get A Look from someone?
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I don’t have HBO but really want to see the True Blood series. Does anyone out there have a DVR and is keeping the episodes? Could I beg someone to copy the episodes to a DVD for me (or VHS is fine too)? I’d be happy to wait until the season’s over even if I could get all of them. I’d pay for the DVDs and shipping. If someone’s willing, let me know and we can exchange e-mails or something to work out the details.
Anyone willing to help out, let me know and I’ll pass you along to Lo! Edited to add – you can go here and search to find your favorite shows. Thank you, Lisa the awesome!!!
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So I missed the unveiling of the House Tour, which I had whined for, because of the week-long power outage up here (”Ike Hits Ohio”), and then you up and go away.
I have been in serious BP withdrawal.
Anyone who might have missed it, the House Tour is here (and you can always follow the link in the sidebar to the right in the future).
And there, there. I’m back now, and I don’t intend to take any more time off from journaling in the near future, I promise! 🙂
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Previously 2007: I was a little shaky as I looked around the first floor of the garage, then I said “I have a gun and I’m coming up there!” and I went upstairs. 2006: He’s always a party pooper. 2005: If I hadn’ta covered my head with my hands, I might be DEAD right now!
2004: No entry. 2003: “No,” Fred said. “You’re the muffinhead. DID SHE STAND OVER YOU AND MAKE YOU INSTALL IT??” 2002: Spanky is the Lance Bass of our family. 2001: I guess if tomorrow’s Day Zero and Friday is Day One, that makes today Day Negative One.
2000: No entry.
