Category: Life

I would never have guessed that she had such a skinny, sticklike arm under there. You have to wonder how she manages to walk around on such skinny little things. (She’s doing fine, by the way. I know you were wondering!)

* * * I was sitting in the living room reading last night after Survivor and before ER came on. We had The Jamie Kennedy Experiment on, which is a show I like, but not one I can just sit and watch, I have to be reading or cross-stitching while it’s on. So I was reading an old issue of People, because when magazines arrive at the house, I toss them in the magazine basket by the couch, and instead of digging to the bottom to read the older magazines first, I tend to just read from the top down. I know the minutiae of my life fascinates you. Don’t try to deny it. Anyway, I read a blurb about Frenchie Davis covering the Grammys as a special Entertainment Tonight correspondent. I turned to Fred, who was staring at the television set. “Hey,” I said. “Did you know that Frenchie covered the Grammys as a special correspondent.” I figured that he did know, because he surfs all the entertainment web sites, and that’s just the sort of information he would have picked up and not told me. He turned and looked at me. “Who?” “Frenchie,” I said. He stared at me, and I could see the gears in his head slowly grinding, grinding, grinding. A light appeared over his head, and he got a wide-eyed, surprised look. “From Grease?!” he exclaimed excitedly. Yeah, don’t look at me. I have no idea what goes on his head, either. * * * Survivor mini-spoiler ahead; skip to the next section if you haven’t seen it yet! So, I was thrilled as hell when they reconfigured the tribe last night, and about the vote, all I can say is that clearly Heidi has some kind of charm or comes across a lot nicer in person than what we’re seeing of her, because I was hoping like hell that her ass would GO. When I realized Heidi would be on a tribe without Jenna and Shawna, I turned to Fred and said, in a whiny, annoying voice, “Awwww. Now she won’t have anybody else to be CUTE with!” Rob’s such an ass, whining about how Dave “Didn’t have MY best interests in mind!” Well, no shit, sherlock. Why should he? Reminder, y’all – next week it’s on Wednesday night instead of Thursday, because of some stupid basketball game. Hmph. * * * 1. Do you like talking on the phone? Why or why not? I loathe talking on the phone, because I hate the long pauses while you’re trying to think of something to say. The only people I can stand to talk on the phone with are Fred, Debbie, and Liz. Everyone else? Sorry, I’d rather get an email. Nothing personal, y’know. 2. Who is the last person you talked to on the phone? Fred. We call each other 45,000 times a day during the week. I asked him if he knew how to spell “minutiae.” 3. About how many telephones do you have at home? One in the living room, one in the kitchen, one in the computer room, two in the master bedroom (one on each side of the bed), one in the spud’s room, and two cell phones. So, that’s a total of 8. Pretty good for someone who hates to talk on the phone, eh? 4. Have you encountered anyone who has really bad phone manners? What happened? I hate it when people constantly space out because they’re watching TV, or constantly talking to someone else, while they’re on the phone with me. I tend to react by pulling out the bitchy “Well, I’ll let you GO, since you’re clearly BUSY.” and getting off the phone as soon as possible. I mean, I understand if you’re in the middle of something and need to go, but DON’T act like you’re wanting to talk to me, just TELL me you have to go. Damn! 5. Would you rather pick up the phone and call someone or write them an e-mail or a letter? Why or why not? Email or letter will always win out, because I can write an email at my leisure, and the person I’m sending it to can read it at their leisure – I don’t have to worry about bugging them when they’re busy. And I sound more intelligent in print. (Oh, shaddup. Heh.)]]>

Poo update: She’s doing well. She’s done the important things – eat, drink, use the litter box – and she’s moving slowly, but a lot better than I expected. She spent all night either perched on top of me or perched atop the pillow next to me. I woke up a million times through the night to check on her, and she was always there, purring and staring at me. Hopefully she wasn’t thinking “Yeah, sleep tight, bitch. When you’re least expecting it, I’m going to kick you in the face with my nasty back claws!” She’s spent the morning alternating snoozing upstairs and coming down to get some love. After I took my shower and settled in the chair upstairs to read for a bit, she climbed up on me and flopped over, so I stayed there for about an hour. Currently, she’s back on the kitty condo, sleeping. Spud update: The spud stayed home yesterday, because she was still feeling nauseous, and spent a good part of the day – the majority of the day, I’d say – sleeping and slurping ginger ale. She actually half-heartedly vomited last night, but come this morning she was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and headed off to school. Time for things to get back to normal ’round here, yessirree bob!

* * * Y’know, sometimes I wonder how I make it through the world, clueless as I am. The spud will often start the dishwasher when there’s not a full load of dishes in there – yes, I’ve spoken to her, but she just can’t seem to understand exactly what a full load is – so I’ve gotten into the habit of checking the dishwasher each night after she starts it, and if it’s not full I stop the cycle so that more dishes can be put in there. Last night I checked, and since the bottom rack was about half empty, I turned it off. This morning, I loaded the dishes in the sink in there, and checked to be sure there was an Electrasol tablet in the dispenser. There wasn’t, so I added one, closed the dishwasher and started it. Ten minutes later I wandered back into the kitchen to get a cup of water, and saw a pile of suds on the floor, and more slowly pouring out the bottom of the door. Clearly, there HAD been an Electrasol tablet in there, and now the dishes were being cleaned with twice the amount of soap they needed. It reminded me of the time when I lived in Rhode Island and didn’t have dishwasher soap, so I filled the dispenser with liquid Joy. The floor was pretty much covered in suds that time. But I learned a valuable lesson in that, anyway – ie, don’t use any soap other than the soap made specifically for dishwashers! And this time I’ve learned another valuable lesson, I suppose – do some looking around before you decide to add more soap to the load! * * * Actually, I’ve been doing more than worrying over Miz Poo for the past few days, really I have. For one, I’ve been looking over and completing the paperwork to create a corporation. A corporation so that we can self-publish Fred’s book. It’s a bit of a pain in the ass, because first I had to send off the form to reserve the name of the corporation. Once I get a certificate back from the Secretary of State showing that the name’s been reserved, I have to make copies of and send out the Articles of Incorporation. When we’re officially incorporated, I have to apply for a Federal Tax ID number, and then and only then can we open a checking account for the corporation and deposit the loan check. Yep, pain in the ass. And no, don’t ask what the name of the corporation is – I’ll announce it once we’re incorporated and have a web site set up, which is a few weeks away still. This is the third time I’ve been through the incorporation process, so you’d think I’d remember what to do and where to do it, but I’d be pretty lost without How to Incorporate and Start a Business in Alabama. And now? I’m off to have lunch. Y’all have a good one.]]>

You can’t really tell when she’s laying down, but she’s visibly smaller. Getting some love from the Momma, and wondering what the hell the Daddy is doing (and yes. My thighs look huge from this angle, I’m aware, so you just shaddup). I swear to you she wasn’t in pain when I was holding her up like this. She was purring her ass off – I think she rather liked it. Poor Poo with the shaved belly and the belly full of staples. My poor baby! (And in THIS picture, not only do I have huge thighs and porky fingers, but my leg looks like it’s 6 inches long, max. You want me, admit it.) I got up shortly after Fred left for work this morning, did a few chores around the house, and then headed out to the garage to ride the Ass Master for an hour. I came back into the house after, did a few more chores, checked on the spud (who is still feeling under the weather), and took my shower. I was standing in the bathroom combing my hair when the phone rang. I saw by the caller id that it was the vet’s office, so naturally I picked it up. They told me that Miz Poo (only they call her “Scrappy”, of course) was ready to come home. I dressed quickly and raced to the office, which is only about 3 minutes away. They brought her out while I was writing a check so large it was painful to actually write the numbers ($778, on top of the $300 we had to pay for the emergency room visit on Sunday. Ouch. Thankyajesus for the emergency fund we have stashed away for just such an occasion.). The instant she saw me through the holes in the carrier box, she started howling and howled all the way home. I brought her inside and upstairs before letting her out of the box. I didn’t know if she was in a lot of pain or not, and I didn’t want her to have to climb the stairs if she wanted food or the litter box. I opened the top of the carrier box, and she hopped out, meowing and chirping and purring all at once. She rubbed up against my legs, and I sat down on the floor with her. She crawled between my legs and flopped down, showing me her poor little belly. After ten or fifteen minutes of being petted and told how much she’d been missed, she seemed to suddenly realize “Wait a minute. You took me to that place! You evil bitch!”, and she went into the kitty condo, gave me a look o’ hatred, and settled down for a nap. I folded some laundry, put it away, and cleaned the garage, all the while keeping an eye on her. She continued sleeping, every now and then coming out to stretch and then go back in. Some time later, I was out back filling the bird feeders. It’s a gorgeous day outside, so I left the back door open to let a breeze in, and I looked up to see her coming out the door. She meowed at me, let me pet her a little, and then rolled around in the sun. For the rest of the afternoon, she alternated asking for love and hiding under the couch to sleep. At the moment, she’s upstairs sleeping in a patch of sunlight. She’s had a lot of water, some food, and used the litter box at least once. Lord but it’s nice to have her home! (I promise, entries will go back to normal tomorrow.)]]>

Poo update: (this part is from the end of yesterday’s entry, in case you didn’t go back and check): Update 1:00 pm: I talked to the vet, and Miz Poo will be fine. He didn’t find any string in her intestines, though – what he found was a partial blockage at the top of her colon, where the intestines dump into the colon. There was a lot of fur and “matter”, and apparently the appendix (which isn’t called the appendix in cats, but it’s much the same) was impacted, so he did a partial appendectomy and removed all the hair and stuff, and he feels that she’ll be fine. He thinks that the pain of that partial blockage may be what was making her vomit, and she’s got a long incision that will be tender for a while, but he’s pretty sure she’ll be okay. And today: Fred talked to the vet earlier, who said that Miz Poo is doing just fine. She’s alert and looking around, watching to see what’s going on, which is her natural nosiness coming out I’m sure. He wants to keep her another night so they can keep an eye on her and be sure she gets plenty of fluids and also be sure that she starts drinking water. The house will be empty for another night – when you’re used to having a portly Poo tromp all over you through the night, not having her do so is weird, believe me – but it’ll be worth it if it helps her heal. I have no idea whether there’ll be an entry tomorrow – it’s going to depend on Miz Poo. If she just wants to be left alone to sleep, I’ll leave her alone, but if she wants to lay on me, I’ll lay on the couch with her ’til the cows come home, which isn’t terribly conducive to entry writing. So there might be an entry tomorrow, and there might not. We’ll just have to wait and see! Thanks again for all your good thoughts and kind emails, y’all. I truly appreciate them!

* * * So, after a night spent without Miz Poo jumping across me, snuggling up with me, or occasionally smacking me with her paw to get me to roll over, I woke up and popped in my contacts. My left eye seemed a little troublesome, but I ignored it and came downstairs to get my exercise done and out of the way. After about two minutes on the stationary bike, I decided I wasn’t in the mood for the bike today, and came back inside. Yes, bad. Spank me? I hung around, responding to email, reading a book, making the bed, and finally taking my shower. I had a 9:30 hair appointment, and wanted to leave the house by 9:15. It doesn’t taken 15 minutes to get there, but since I haven’t been on time for a hair appointment in two years – I’m usually about 5 minutes late – I thought I’d show up early and surprise her. I was heading downstairs at 9:12 when the phone rang. “Hi, mom,” said the spud. “Can you come get me? I don’t feel well.” So I raced to the school to pick her up, asked her how she didn’t feel well (stomach hurts, earache, throat hurts, stuffy nose), dropped her off, told her to take Tylenol and go to bed, told her that my cellphone would be off, to call Fred if she had any problems, and raced to my hair appointment, getting there about two minutes late. I was absolutely miserable the whole time I was having my hair done, because my FRIGGIN’ eye was driving me nuts. It had gotten redder and blurrier, and I kept putting drops in my eye, but that was only helping for a few minutes each time. Finally, my hair was done – I had it relayered, but kept the length, but I’m not showing you a picture, because the ones I took didn’t come out well, and I look like a dork in my glasses – and so I ran to the movie store (SwimFan, White Oleander, and Mulholland Drive), ran to the grocery store, and now I’m home. Wearing my glasses. Which I hate. I wouldn’t be surprised if stress didn’t bring on the conjunctivitis, I really wouldn’t. And I hate my glasses (have I mentioned?) and need new ones, but we’ll be paying an arm and a leg for Miz Poo’s surgery (well, maybe just an arm – but it’s worth it for my baby!), so I’ll wait a while before I worry about getting new glasses. So, there. That’s my day so far. I believe I’m going to go have lunch now, so y’all have a good one! * * * Oh, but before I go, I should mention that 7 years ago, Fred and I met online. 7 years! I can’t believe it’s been so long. Happy anniversary, baby! (Y’all can read some mush in the two years ago entry, here. Lucky for me, it all still holds true!)]]>

Update 1:00 pm: I talked to the vet, and Miz Poo will be fine. He didn’t find any string in her intestines, though – what he found was a partial blockage at the top of her colon, where the intestines dump into the colon. There was a lot of fur and “matter”, and apparently the appendix (which isn’t called the appendix in cats, but it’s much the same) was impacted, so he did a partial appendectomy and removed all the hair and stuff, and he feels that she’ll be fine. He thinks that the pain of that partial blockage may be what was making her vomit, and she’s got a long incision that will be tender for a while, but he’s pretty sure she’ll be okay. They’re keeping her overnight, and I have to call in the morning to see if I can pick her up. I am SO relieved, y’all! Thanks for all your kind emails and thoughts – I really appreciate them all!]]>

* * * Last week’s Friday Five. 1. What is your favorite type of literature to read (magazine, newspaper, novels, nonfiction, poetry, etc.)? I prefer novels – suspense, mystery, horror, and (most of all) chick lit. Also known as Zany Chick novels. But I read a lot – a LOT – of magazines, US being my favorite, and People and Marie Claire running a close second. 2. What is your favorite novel? That would be a three-way tie between The Stand, Swan Song, and Good in Bed. 3. Do you have a favorite poem? (Share it!) I do, actually. It’s called From the Journals of the Frog Prince. It’s by Susan Mitchell, and I first read it in a college class ten or more years ago. Something about it immediately captured my imagination. I also love Dirge Without Music, by Edna St. Vincent Millay. And lastly, I really like this A. E. Housman poem, mostly because I memorized it in college (the same class wherein I discovered From the Journals of the Frog Prince, actually) and can still whip off the first 10 or so lines of it. I like the rhythm of it. 4. What is one thing you’ve always wanted to read, or wish you had more time to read? Actually, nothing. If I want to read it, I do. 5. What are you currently reading? Quentins, by Maeve Binchy.

* * * Y’all see Survivor last night? Man-o-man does Heidi have an inflated opinion of her cuteness, or what? I finally – after she’d referred to the fact that she’s so cute angels come to throw roses at her feet for the 28th time in a row – turned to Fred and said “You know, I don’t think she’s cute at ALL.” Fred replied with “She’s not. She’s ass ugly.” He paused. “Ass hole ugly,” he corrected himself. He said that Shawna – despite the whininess – was the best looking one of the three “cute” girls. And then during the Gap commercial, he bitched about how all the women in the commercial were too bony. Heh. * * * Friday Five. 1. What was the last song you heard? I don’t know that I can remember the last song I heard on the radio, but I’ve been humming “Build Me up Buttercup” all morning. 2. What were the last two movies you saw? Uh. Oh, let me think… 1 Hour Photo and Swept Away, I think. That’s right, I rented Swept Away, just because I knew it was going to be awful, and I was right. There was nothing at all original about it, not one single thing. I’d like to see someone make a stranded-on-a-desert-island movie where the man and woman DON’T “fall in love” and fuck like bunnies. Ooh, sorry. Did I ruin the plot for you? 1 Hour Photo, on the other hand was good and creepy as hell from the very beginning to the very end. 3. What were the last three things you purchased? Groceries. Other than that, I don’t know. Maybe lotion. Oh, bird seed! 4. What four things do you need to do this weekend? Take the spud to the eye doctor, go to the mall, force my ass to exercise, vacuum the downstairs. 5. Who are the last five people you talked to? Fred, the spud, Miz Poo, Spanky, and Tubby. What? Cats are people too!]]>

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Our cardinal came back to partake of some nourishing wild bird seed. Looks like he’s peeking at me, doesn’t he? * * * I have to announce that I haven’t watched one single moment of Married by America, and I have no plans to start. I might have, except that during the blizzard of commercials Fox tossed at us, there was this girl – I think it was Billie Jeanne, but I can’t swear to it – who said, at the end of the commercial, “Pleeeeazh. No lewwwwwzherz”, and she sounded JUST FUCKING LIKE ROGER RABBIT, which is fine and dandy if you’re a cartoon rabbit, but I swear to each and every one of you that if she had been standing in front of me when she said that, my hand would have reflexively shot out, and I would have beaten her to death. I don’t think I’ve ever taken such an instant dislike to anyone before in my life, but I find myself, at odd moments, imitating her, and if you could bottle the vitriol in my voice when I do it, you could probably use it quite effectively in the War on Terror.� Something about her is like biting on tinfoil to me, and I writhe in hatred every time I think of her. Of course, I just did another imitation of her for Fred, and I think I make her sound more like Carol Channing. Roger Rabbit, Carol Channing, same diff. I still hate that girl, no matter who she sounds like. And besides – someone who’s going on a show to have the country pair her up with some stranger is requesting no losers? Honey, you’re already there. * * * Miz Poo just adores draping herself over my arm, so that I may easily rub her chin and belly. This is why it takes me so long to write an entry some days.]]>

* * * Someone who considers herself a fan of the spud (and why did I not realize that the spud has her own fans?) sent in a bunch of questions about the spud yesterday. Since I had a few about her in the queue, I decided today I’d get the spud questions answered. I’m not going to answer all of them, out of respect for her privacy, but I’ll answer most of them. Reader Patty asks: How does your daughter feel about having her life written about? She actually seems to think it’s pretty cool. I don’t know that she completely understands it all, but when we mention that we’ve written about her in an entry, she’s pleased. Fred and I were talking about an entry once at the dinner table, and she said “Am I in the entry?” Fred said, “Yes, it’s about you!” (It was an entry about something funny she’d said or done) She responded with “Good.” That pretty much sums up her attitude about it – as long as we mention her every once in a while, she’s happy. Reader Shannon asks: How about answering the question of why you refer to your daughter as only the Spud. I actually addressed this on her cast page, saying Because it creeps me out, the thought of complete strangers knowing her name. Nothing personal, you understand. Of course, that was written 3 1/2 years ago, when I had images of stalkers tracking her down. At this point, plenty of you out there know her first name. But she doesn’t have the same last name as Fred and I, so it would be that much more difficult for you crazy stalkers to find her. It’s pretty much become a habit, and I think it’s probably safer to keep it up at least for the next few years. Reader Rebecca asks: Does The Spud know about the website, and if she doesn’t, are you concerned that maybe one day she will find out about it and read it? She does know that Fred and I have websites, but she’s never asked to read them, maybe because the idea of reading her parents’ journals sounds pretty boring. If she wanted to read my journal, I can’t imagine that I’d have much of a problem with it – she knows I swear like a sailor, and I don’t think I’ve ever gone into my sex life in detail, so I can’t think of anything I wouldn’t want her to read. Reader Judy asks: Does the “spud” have a nice ole’ southern accent–and is that sort of weird to you? What were other kids reactions to her at first? She doesn’t really – at least not that I can tell – have a southern accent. A couple of years ago she was telling me a story about being outside roller skating, and she said “I was fixing to go up the hill…”, which is a definite southern-ism, so I guess she’s picked up some southern sayings, but not an accent. At least I don’t think so! I think that part of that is because the area where we live is filled with people from other parts of the country – a large number of people from St. Louis, for one, plus there’s a large Army base nearby – so she doesn’t pick up southern accents from the other kids. The kids at her school and in our neighborhood didn’t really have a reaction to her, because they’re used to non-southerners. It would probably be different if we lived out in the country, I’m sure. Reader Angie asks: What do you and Fred call your daughter at home? Since both of you always refer to her as “the Spud” in your journals, I wondered if you call her by her real name the rest of the time. Do you sometimes slip and call her Spud when you’re not writing a journal entry? I usually call her by her name; Fred either calls her by her name, or occasionally, when he wants to get her attention, he’ll call her “young child.” I don’t know that we’ve ever called her “Spud” to her face, but she knows that that’s the name we call her in our journals, and she’ll sometimes refer to herself as “The Spud”, because it amuses her. Reader Suzie asks: Where is “Spud’s” biological father? Are you two divorced, never married, is he deceased? If he’s not the last option, does the “Spud” ever see, talk to, or hear from her father? The spud’s father lives in Rhode Island with his fiancee. He calls the spud at least every other week on Sunday evenings, and she spent two weeks in California with he and his fiancee last summer – he’s from California, and his parents, sister, and various other relatives live out there. She’ll be seeing him again this summer for a week. Additionally, they email back and forth every so often, and if the spud has a question or something she wants to discuss with him, she’s free to call him. I was married to the spud’s father for 8 years, and our divorce was finalized shortly after I moved to Alabama. Reader Heather asks: I read and enjoy both your and Fred’s journals. I have noticed that he discusses interactions with the Spud much more than you do, or seem to in my perception anyway. I was wondering if this is just because they tend to do more stuff together or if you do and it is just so everyday that you don’t think if mentioning it, or if you try to give her a little more privacy about her actions. You know, that’s a good question. I think the reason Fred ends up writing more about the spud is because when she does or says something funny, he’ll ask if he can write about it, and since he’s writing about it, I don’t, because we have many shared readers, and it would be rather redundant to both write about the same thing. There are things that go on in her life that I don’t write about because I feel like it would be an invasion of her privacy, but I try to be nice to my readers and not allude to them in the “There’s something going on that I can’t talk about” way. Nothing big, really, just things I don’t think she’d want a bazillion strangers reading about. And big spud fan reader CA asks: What does she want to be when she grows up? At the moment, she wants to be a math teacher – a 5th grade math teacher, to be exact. Actually, I say “at the moment”, but I think she’s wanted to be a teacher since she was 10 or so. Does she think about college and stuff? She does think about college, although it’s more of a vague way rather than where she wants to go to college or anything concrete. One of the things I really like is that she takes it for granted that she’s going to go to college – it’s a “when”, not an “if”. Are you freaked out by the thought of the Spud going to college? Not yet – I’m more freaked out at the idea of her driving in less than two years. Eeek! If given my choice, I’d like to have her live at home for her first year of college – or at least go locally – but it’s not my choice, and I’m not going to push her in any particular direction. What are the Spud’s hobbies, if any? She likes playing games on her computer, watching TV, and writing short stories and poetry. Oh, and listening to music. Favorite food? She loves chinese food – she’d probably eat it every single day if she could. Music? Like me, it really depends on the song. She likes country and pop, the Beatles and some cheesy ’80s stuff. I recently made a CD for her at her request, and the song list was: Ironic – Alanis Morrissette, Losing Grip – Avril Lavigne, Hard Days Night – the Beatles, Old Red – Blake Shelton, The Baby – Blake Shelton, Living on a Prayer – Bonjovi, Fishin’ Song – Brad Paisley, No Such Thing – John Mayer, Proud to be an American – Lee Greenwood, God Blessed Texas – Little Texas, Just a Friend – Mario, Concrete Angel – Martina McBride, I Have Been Blessed – Martina McBride, Youth of the Nation – POD, She’s My Kind of Rain – Tim McGraw and the Dance Hall Doctors, Let’s Talk about Me – Toby Keith. So, yeah – lots of country, but a little bit of everything tossed in. Does it bother the Spud that she lives so far from her Dad? Her cousin? It doesn’t seem to – she’s used to it, I think. She does get plenty of time with Brian and Debbie and my parents in the summer, though. She’s never said that it bothers her and she doesn’t act like it does, so I’m going to assume that she’s okay with it. Do you think the Spud talks to you about everything? Actually, I think she does. She’s pretty open about her life and her friends and how she feels, and she certainly talks to me more openly than I ever talked to my mother, so I’ll say that yes – she talks to me about most everything. (Back to the FAQ page) Have a question you’d like answered? Ask away!]]>

(pardon the blurriness) As a result, we’re going through bird seed at an amazing rate, with the feeders needing to be filled up almost every day. Since the wild bird seed (the cheapest stuff I can find – what, like I’m going to buy the expensive stuff? They’re birds!) at the grocery store is about twice as expensive as that at Wal-Mart, I bought a few big bags at Wal-Mart (yes, I swore I’d never return. Believe me, I wasn’t happy about it), but the birds burned through those in no time flat. Finally, last week when Fred and I were feeding the cats at the pet store, I noticed that they had huge bags on sale for a pretty good price. When we were almost out of the Wal-Mart bird seed, I went to the pet store and bought a 40 pound bag of wild bird seed for $7.50.

Not only was this a pretty damn good price (as far as I can tell – don’t burst my bubble), but it’s also started attracting a cardinal, who stops by regularly to fill up. He’s a nervous sort, though, and apparently knows that we have cats, so he sits in the tree and checks out the surroundings carefully before venturing forth to eat. And then he swoops in to eat a little before something spooks him and he flies off. The birds in our back yard spend a LOT of time being spooked. One minute the ground will be covered with blackbirds and doves, and the feeders will be coated in (we think) finches, and suddenly they’ll all fly off in a cloud with a loud squawk, sit in the trees for a few minutes, and then gradually make their way back to the feeders. They see the cats watching them, but they don’t seem to be scared of the cats – perhaps they don’t realize that’s a cat door right by the feeders. Of course, they’re perfectly safe, because although the cats will chatter and whip their tails around and flatten themselves along the floor and watch the birds with big, dark eyes, it doesn’t seem to occur to them that they can actually go through the cat door and chase the birds. * * * The spud got off the phone after talking to her father last week and said “Daddy said that [his girlfriend] is going to have her tubes cleaned out!” “Oh really?” I said. “Yeah. He says they want to have a kid. Daddy wants twins! Fraternal twins!” she said, a little excited at the idea of having a little brother or sister or maybe both. “Well, good luck to Daddy on that,” I said. Heh. * * * It occurs to me that I have a whole folder of FAQ questions I still haven’t gotten to. If nothing more exciting happens around here, I’ll concentrate on getting those answered over the next few days. If you have any burning questions to be added to the list, ask!]]>

* * * So, I’ve been thinking lately about making some changes. Not anything big, just journal-related stuff. I’ve decided to buy another named-related url (Robyn-related, not Bitchypoo-related, that is), and I can’t decide whether I want to keep the same journal name, or change it. I’d kind of like to change it, because 3 1/2 years is a long time with the same journal name, but I’m stumped. I can’t seem to come up with another journal name that’s as much “me” as Bitchypoo. That’s where you come in. Suggest a new journal name! I reserve the right to not like anything and decide to stick with Bitchypoo, though. Yeah, Bitchypoo will be moving. It’ll be a while – I haven’t even bought the url I want to, yet – but I thought I’d mention it so that y’all wouldn’t be taken by surprise. Also, due to popular request, I’ve started rating the books I read – you can see the new rating system on the 2003 reading page. Thanks to Fred, who gave me the idea! Over the weekend, Fred took the spud and went to a nearby flea market. When he came home, he had something that your ordinary person would consider a clothes hamper. But he’s not an ordinary person, so he looked at it and immediately thought…

“The cats would love that!” (The hamper didn’t come with that pillow – we added it so the little dears would be comfortable) It was only $3, so he bought it. When he put it down on the living room floor, Miz Poo immediately set up camp. He brought it upstairs last night and put the pillow in it, and Spot claimed it. This morning, it was empty for quite a while, until someone else found it. I think they like it so much because they feel enclosed, but they can see everything that’s going on around them through the mesh “walls”. We now have five places in the master bedroom specifically for the cats to lay and/ or sleep on – the hamper (above), the sweater dryer under the TV, the pillow atop the cedar chest under the window, the amazon box we cut a hole in, and the kitty condo, which is another place Tubby likes to snooze. * * * And last, but certainly not least, speaking of kitties, today being Monday, Fred and I made our usual trip to the pet store. There were only two cats in the entire cat room – Midgie, and a new one, Bella. Bella’s just as friendly as she can be, and let us hold her for quite a while. She’s a serious shedder, though, and when I handed her back to Fred, I felt like I was wearing a beard made of cat fur. I love her little pink nose, and shedding aside, she has really soft fur. Such a cutie! ]]>