Only Gotta Minute...

Check out my early morning guest. My what big feet he has, not to mention the big white belly!

Moomin giving me a grip with his handy feet. I love him.

One of my pumpkins. It just keeps getting bigger as the days go by.

My sunflowers. Remember when they were little insignificant sproutlings that were barely peeking out of the containers at the bottom? Well, I think the tallest one (which grows about 5 inches each time I go away to work) may actually fulfill it's "mammothness".

Recent sunset, two dusks ago. Love the colors. Still learning how to use the "sunset" setting.

My friend J2 and her son TJ from this weekend. Too CUTE!

When PMS Ruled the Weekend

I let the PMS Bitch out of the cage this weekend.

All I wanted was to enjoy my Saturday day with J2 and TJ.

Saturday started off with a bang. I get out of the shower to a super lovey-dovey Doodle who wound herself around my legs and purr-chirped at me incessantly while giving me the Bambi-eyes treatment. She only acts like this when she’s yarfed up an entire meal and wants more coz her stomach is completely empty and she thinks cuteness gets her another meal (it usually does). So I wandered around the house looking for the yarf and couldn’t find a damn thing. I had my suspicions that I wasn’t going to find anything because Moomin was acting like a beached whale and laying around. I called the vet who didn’t answer so I called the other local vet who did answer. When I presented my bizarre TMI suspicions that one cat had yarfed and another cat had eaten it and they put me on hold to ask a vet, I found where Doodle had yarfed – on the back of my couch. No wonder I couldn’t find it, I’d been searching the floors. The vet’s were nice enough to let me know that Moomin would be fine (and does this happen often, no because I usually catch her vomiting before Moomin has a chance to be downright disgusting), but they were really concerned about Doodle throwing up, how long had this been going on, and were concerned about her weight. I told them that she does this every so often when she eats a meal too fast, this has happened since she was a kitten, and that Miss Pudge has no problem with her weight. So the upshot was I was able to leave the house without panicking.

I ended up following a 5-10 mile an hour below the speed limit driver the entire way to J2’s which normally takes me 45 minutes and it took me an hour!!!! And it was VERY VERY hot and humid, which makes me even crankier.

I got to J2’s and was greeted by a very excited and loveable small boy and a large greyhound who tried to bust a hole in the door with her tail she was wagging it so hard. Balm to the PMS soul.

We took TJ candlepin bowling and I got some great shots on my camera. Afterward we went to the bakery to learn my two favorite breads were not available. I was sad. J2 took me to the Farmstand and managed to find one of my breads in the sale bin (day old bread) at the bottom and the other bread was one of three loaves left (fresh). I was happy.

We went to our usual restaurant for lunch and were seated in an area with two other families with toddlers. It was a line of three tables, one separated by a divider so diners only see the tops of adults’ heads.

One table had what was obviously a weekend dad who had NO clue how to talk to much less pre-plan how to deal with his kids. The amount of verbals coming out of this man’s mouth was amazing and very much grating on the exposed PMS nerves (“these are Saltines, you know how they are Saltines? Look at the package, there’s a little Saltine guy, see the Saltine guy, no honey don’t tip your drink up like that, you’ll spill it, see the Saltine guy, he’s on the package, he lets you know they are Saltines, no honey, I told you not to tip the drink up that far, you’ll get it on your clothes….”). He took the boy (5 yrs old) to the bathroom, bringing the sister (2 yrs old) with them. When he got back, he left the boy at the table ALONE while he took the sister to the car to get the diaper bag to take the girl to the bathroom and change her. He was gone for 10 minutes. For 10 minutes, the 5 year old boy was left at the table ALONE. Unbelievably and incredibly stupid!!!!

At the table with the divider was Jack-in-the-Box boy with his completely numb parents. This kid did not stay down for two consecutive seconds and his parents did not reprimand or direct him to stay seated once in the 45 minutes we were there. They never turned their heads towards him, ever.

TJ did fine for the first 15 minutes. He played with his puzzles, talked to me and J2, and babbled out “stories”. Our appetizers arrived and after TJ finished his helping, he finally noticed the Weekend Dad boy and Jack-in-the-Box boy having rather inappropriate interactions (their tables were separated by the divider). Weekend Dad boy tried to poke Jack-in-the-Box boy every time he popped up, some toys were unwillingly exchanged and given back, and some loudness occurred. TJ started getting excited and escalated and lost the use of his listening ears. J2 did her best to contain him and tell him what the expectations of him were, but as no one was dealing with Weekend Dad boy or Jack-in-the-Box boy, she wasn’t having much luck. She finally had to take him aside somewhere else in the restaurant but things didn’t get better once she came back as the issues with the other kids were still not being dealt with.

And our waitress completely disappeared on us. I kept looking around for her so we could get our checks and go. No such luck. When she finally showed up, I asked her for the checks and boxes and she looked at TJ and asked “are we having a hard time?”

“Are we having a hard time?” Well, she just lit the PMS powder keg. I’d HAD it. TJ had been set up for failure by the ineptitude of the numb grown-ups around him and I’d had my last nerve jumped on for the entire shitty week and I just let the biting sarcastic bitchy comment fly. “Having a hard time? Well, yes he is considering the fine behavior examples he has around him.” I said it loud enough so all the tables around us could hear. And I turned and made a point to meet every single pair of eyes straight on with an unblinking stare and tight jaw. Bring it on coz I’ll gladly give the much deserved smackdown!

We finally were able to leave diner hell and have a post-traumatic giggle in the car. She said I was justifiably awful. I told her I had really wanted to confront the Jack-in-the-Box boy’s parents as I was sure they missed the benefit of my bitchy wisdom because of the divider, and I’d been “this close” to doing so, but cooler heads prevailed.

The rest of the day was spent at J2’s home where it was quiet and we could dip our feet in the lake. And I had my bread. And I was full of fried mozzarella sticks.

Anyone Need a Hand?

I love messing around with my digcamera. I took these on my birthday and thought they were fun.

I just have to be careful, I tried to take StormChaser pics again, but my camera must not have enjoyed the experience as much as I did or I messed up on a setting, coz I managed to freeze the camera up the next day so that it would not respond to any command, even "shut off". I finally had to take the batteries out. Hope that doesn't happen again!

Moomin Update

Moomin has crystals in his urine. This means I have to institute a couple of lifestyle changes for him.

1) I need to keep him regularly supplied with bottled water. Where we live, the water has a distinct “pool” smell, especially first thing in the morning and the vet said the smell of chlorine can turn a cat off drinking water faster than anything. So now, I am a spring water jug buying machine. Well, not completely, my friend J2, who lives by a lake and has “a complete filtration system”, has kindly offered to let me fill said jugs at her house for free. I love my friend, blessings on her!

2) I need to entice him to drink. The vet recommended I “sprinkle salt on his food”. Not so sure about this trick, then he might decide “all food bad like water”. So I settled for getting a fountain where the water circulates and comes out of a spout like the stream from a faucet. The night I set this up (the same night I popped him back in the house after the impromptu-stressed-out-vet-visit on Tuesday and went scurrying all over town and neighboring town to find the vet recommended changes), Moomin had loads of water swiping fun and I saw him try to “bite” the water a couple times. I have yet to see anyone drink out of it, but the sound it makes should entice the herd to drink and pee a lot (it’s doing a job on me). Of course, Doodle and Hobbes were supremely cautious with the fountain after set-up, doing the whole “slowly slinking so low my belly touches the floor, paws way out in front, eyes bigger than a dinner plate, and nose all aquiver” act, but now they just run right by it.

3) I need to give him antibiotic drops for a week twice a day which makes me very popular with the other cats coz they know that when they hear me shaking the drops, I’m going to be giving out treats, real soon.

4) I need to give him pills once a day for two weeks that will encourage him - medication-wise - to drink and pee so the crystals break up and flush (no pun intended) out of his system. I caught him drinking from a water dish on Wednesday night, the FIRST time I have actually seen him drink anything other than what I put in his food in MONTHS! So the pill must be working. Moomin’s such a trooper, giving me urine samples on demand, letting me put water on his dry food, letting me pry open his mouth (with minor resistance, no biting) and squirt drops into his mouth, and letting me toss a pill to the back of his throat (which he swallows right away).

5) I need to give him dry food that has MEAT in the first 4-5 ingredients. Not meat-meal, not meat by-products, not meat substitute, meat flavoring, or fish. But MEAT, an actual meat product, be it chicken, lamb, turkey, duck, or beef. I spent the evening (the scurrying around bit) looking at the ingredients of all the catfood products sold in three stores. Do you know how hard it is to find a cat food with a meat as the main ingredient? It’s like the proverbial needle. I could find meal and by-products out the kazoo, but meat? No way. I finally settled on a Purina One for UTI health, small bag. Moomin wasn’t really keen on it. He’s your typical autistic rigid picky eater. I thought we were doomed coz the vet said his current food is not good for him, too many grain products and trying to change a biologically engineered carnivore into a herbivore isn’t healthy. So I was worried to say the least. I finally was able to visit our local feed and farm store where they sell the food the vet recommended. I was able to snag a trial size bag of the Chicken Soup for the Cat Lover’s Soul which has two meat ingredients in the first 5 AND meat sprinkled throughout the rest of the list! To my utter surprise, Moomin LOVES this food; he can’t wait for me to fill his shot glass and has his nose in the bag. RELIEF! I will be going back to get a larger bag once he finishes the trial, it could just be a honeymoon with this food right now. I’m hoping it will be a marriage that lasts.

6) I need to dial down the adrenaline junky’s need for high intensity cat games and play quieter, less zooey games. There’s nothing Moomin likes better than to get all reved up and zoom around the house chasing a feather on a string on a stick, but if stress is a result of getting too worked up, then he and I need to play calmer games that are fun and active and not an indoor version of Extreme Sports.

So far, he seems to be peeing, drinking, eating, playing, napping, chomping and wrestling the other cats, climbing his cat trees, window gazing, and love-festing. He even slept on my lap with the other cats last night, something he hasn’t done in quite some time (basically since summer landed on our head’s with a vengeance). He’s my good monkey-butt boy. I regret he had to wait so long to get treatment (rassin’ sassin’ frassin’ vet clinic).

Today is NOT a Good Day

It’s PMS week.

I woke up with a headache.

I woke up tired and had a very difficult time actually getting out of bed.

I came home last night to a message from the vet’s saying their outsource analysts have no record of the fabulous urine sample I collected last Thursday and could I collect another. I told Moomin this and he gave me a small bright yellow, verging on orange, sample on demand.

This morning, I watched Moomin try four times to give me a urine sample and the last time he was finally able to strain out a tiny bloody sample, no more than 4-5 drops.

I took a shower angry and frustrated, feelings which only grew as I got ready for work.

I took the sample into the vet's and tried really hard to contain my anger while explaining that I am extremely upset and frustrated that now Moomin is worse than he was when I first told them he was having UTI symptoms, gave them the first sample, and got the one week’s worth of antiBs. Now what ever that week’s antiBs has killed off has come back with a vengeance and stronger because it’s been a full week of no meds and now he has bloody pee and is straining and this should have been taken care of two fucking weeks ago!!!

The vet isn’t coming in until 2:00pm today and it’s the woman vet I am so not impressed with. I was told to call today at that time. I’m in a meeting at that time. I have another meeting at 3:00pm.

I plan on calling in between the meetings, but if the vet is coming in at 2pm, she’s not going to have analyzed the sample by the time I call.

On the way to work, there was much evidence of recent roadkill, so depressing and so not what I need to see when worried about my kitty.

It’s kinda feeling like whenever something good happens or there’s good news, the Universe needs to have an immediate SlamboSmackdown every time.

Based On This Morning's Events...

I am expecting to run the rest of the emotional gamut today.

I woke up to the phone ringing at 7:00am (well, I was awake but not yet ready to “get up”) and was serenaded by my mom singing “Happy Birthday”. She and Dad are on their way out of state. I got their card in the mail yesterday, Elvis of course. It’s become a running joke to get me Elvis cards for my b’day because I can’t stand the man and the fact he had to die on my b’day and all I get all day is “Elvis Elvis Elv-ass!”

I got a package from my brother yesterday as well. It’s a “Box O’ Fun” and I am going to open all the goodie bags in it today (why not yesterday? It wasn’t my official b’day that’s why) when I get home from work early… I plan on playing hooky before lunch, just finishing up some loose ends this morning.

The absolutely amazing event was after the phone call and after I fed the furry herd. But before I tell you this, I have to take you back two weeks ago… Moomin was starting the whole bladder infection symptom cycle again two weeks ago so the vet receptionist told me I need to get a sample of his urine. Her suggestion was for me to put him in a room by himself all day with a litter box full of fish rocks. I laughed at her on the phone and told her that was not going work in my household o’pets as I’d most likely come home to the doors hanging off their hinges and someone seriously hurt. So other than bringing Moomin in so they could squeeze him like a grape, I was going to have to be fast and careful in catching a sample. The next morning I had the litter box closet all ready (door wide open, ceramic mini bowl in fast reach). Moomin decided he was going to fart around in the dining room and torment the other cats. I had to get to work, so I said out loud, “Moomin, I have to go and I need to get some from pee from you, please come in here and go to the bathroom.” What does he do? I know, you’re thinking “cat = animal = no real verbal understanding = no results”. To my utter amazement, he waltzes around the corner, comes into the living room, walks directly into the litter box, and cops a squat. I grab the dish, slide it under him and viola I have a perfect urine sample. It turns out he needed to be on a week’s worth of antiBs and I would need to get another urine sample after that week to see if he needs more of them. And now for the amazing and uncanny morning event. Last night I verbally told Moomin that I was going to need a urine sample from him in the morning and he needed to be as good as last time. I said this about 3 times before bed. This morning, I answered the phone, fed the cats, and waited. I had the litter closet ready, bowl at hand, and just as he finished his breakfast, I reminded him I needed a pee sample. This wonderful cat jumps off his TV tray, saunters into the litter box, and futzes around a bit to find THE spot and then lets me not once, not twice, but adjust the bowl under him three times to get an unlittered sample. Of course when he was done and I took the bowl, he didn’t quite understand “where” his pee had gone and why it wasn’t there for him to cover up. His puzzled face was priceless.

And on my way to work (on a B’day high and super-pumped about Moomin and there was good music on the radio so I didn’t have to change the station more than once), the Universe decides I need a smackdown, way down. I’m tooling along and come around a corner and a dithering chipmunk is in the road. Before I can react and slow down or honk the horn, he’s dithered himself under my car and the visual that is stuck in my head (and will be for the next several weeks) is what I saw in my rearview side mirror of the chipmunk flipping around like a beached fish on my side of the road. So I sobbed the rest of the way to work.

The next stop on the emotional gamut was embarrassment coz I forgot one co-worker’s thankyou card as I was handing out their thank you’s for yesterday’s cheesecake, balloon, and cat calendar. I will have to get it to her tomorrow.

That makes euphoria, trauma, and mortification. That leaves plenty of other extreme emotions to run up against today.

Moving Day at the Office

So the whole Suite has been in total chaos and upheaval the entire day. I was the only one not to move. Says something… not sure I like what it says.

I did something to my back this morning so I was unable to be the big strong helper I typically am. No one wants a workman’s comp issue. Not sure what the back issue was. All I know is that I woke up, walked to the bathroom, sat down, and instantly stood back up because the sharp shooting pain in the small of my back was not to be endured in the seated position. I almost did not make it back to the bedroom coz my legs felt weak. Lying down on my back, side, or stomach didn’t help. I literally could not stand up straight, bend from the waist, or turn to the side for about an hour and I thought I was going to pass out in the shower. Things did end up loosening up in the shower a bit and by the time I was driving to work, I was actually able to sit and bend at the waist at a 90* angle. Right now (late afternoon) every thing seems to be back to normal except for occasional minor twinges and what appears to be residual soreness, but I can reach my toes again and pick things up and sit for longer than 5 minutes. I must have tweaked the muscles wrong first thing this morning.

Anyhoo, all day long it’s been chickens without heads running amok in the Suite. Some stuff or people could not be moved as other stuff needed to be moved to make room and then there was no where to move that stuff as there was no room to put it anywhere and then two people were missing who needed to be packed up. Yeah, just utter chaos.

But everyone is now in their respective positions busy as bees trying to re-nest themselves, the phones are being reprogrammed, and all the computers work. So I guess all’s well that end’s well. I’m still going to miss Favorite Co-Worker. Gum-Chewing Co-Worker left several of her plants on my office’s windowsill. I consulted with my two new office-mates and with their approval, made the executive decision to move the fugly plants into her new office and put them on her windowsill. Hah, executive decision. I also managed to snag a wall shelf for my office. Sheer shameless greediness I know, but my office has the wall for the longest shelf and damn-it, I’ve been coveting a shelf ever since we moved to this building.

Going to a BBQ Saturday night. I’m in charge of making a potato salad. I’d like to make it with the “gourmet” purple potatoes but that may gross out the less creative eaters, so I will most likely just go the normal potato route.

The Definitive in Campy SciFi Cheesiness with Glitter*

*And let me tell you, the digital remastery has made the movie VERY glittery!!!

I got my Flash Gordon DVD yesterday! It came in right on time and before my b’day. I picked it up, got home, and settled into the Chair of Death to overdose on a childhood movie.

I have to say, watching it in it’s entirety through adult eyes was a bit vertigo inducing. I kept expecting scenes, effects, dialogue, and random details that were either before I thought they should happen or some time after I thought they should happen or they were missing altogether or were completely different. So it was fun, but as I said, it was almost like wearing glasses that allow you to see but are just off enough to slightly tweak what you see thus causing some discombobulation.

One thing that really struck me was how accepting as a kid I was of Dale and Flash’s relationship. One minute they’ve just met each other, next minute they are holding hands and unconscious in a rocket ship, then they are an item when they arrive on Mongo, profess their feelings while he’s chained up, after he comes back from the dead they get engaged and discuss kids, and after he’s saved Earth, they’re inseparable. And this was all happening in less than 48 hours. As a kid, this did not seem at all out of the ordinary for me, it made sense that it was “insta-love” as there is nothing like extreme sci-fi events to promote getting to know your significant other as quickly as possible. As an adult, I had some difficulty wrapping my mind around how fast their relationship developed until I finally mentally yelled at myself to just stop it and enjoy a childhood favorite.

The soundtrack was as great as I remembered. And I very much enjoyed the enhanced colorific version as the edition we watched as kids was a recorded from a cable channel version on a VHS tape with two other movies and it was not a very sharp or colorful copy. If I remember correctly, there were some lines and minor tracking issues as well.

Overall, I had fun rocketing down the memory vortex.

It Was a Dark and Stormy Night

Friday night was boomerific! The storm was a long time coming, massive when it arrived, and took it's sweet time to move away. Perfect photo-op for pictures I thought. I tried out the 16 frame picture (took lots of shots) and got some nice views that only needed to be cropped out of the series of 16, enlarged, and sharpened on the computer. Unfortunately I don't have the sharpening option directly on the camera, so when I developed straight from my memory card, the pictures were all digitalized and sucky. But thanks to the computer, you get to see the better pictures.

This was before the storm actually arrived. It was just lighting up the sky at this point and I totally didn't know I got this pretty shot at the time.

I'm in my garage at this point. Things were starting to whip up and I thought I should be under cover so the camera didn't get wet.

This lightening was SOOOOO close that it scared the pants off of me and I almost dropped the camera as you can tell by the double-y exposure!


Then the rain was very intense. You'd never know that this was taken at 10:00pm at night. The lightening just lit it up. See the rain on the roof!

The storm was moving away but I did get this shot, close but not close enough to scare the pants off of me. I got lots of mosquito bites trying to be all Storm Catcherish.

Two things I learned: 1) the garage isn't that great of a storm buffer, but keeps the rain off you and 2) I need to use the "continuous" setting on the camera, should eliminate the pauses between frames and I'd have better luck with actually catching more strikes on digfilm. Hopefully the weather will cooperate and I will get some more chances to Storm Catch this week.

Much Needed Friday Humor

Disclaimer: This joke contains non-PC material and some stereotypes that may be offensive, but damn funny.

I got this in an email and thought I would post it on my blog as it gave me a much-needed giggle, what with the upcoming inter-office shuffle and a deadly boring training today.

Flamboyant Flight Attendant

The flight was being served by an obviously gay flight attendant, who seemed to put everyone in a good mood as he served the food and drinks. As the plane prepared to descend, he came swishing down the aisle and told the passengers “Captain Marvey has asked me to announce that he will be landing the big scary plane shortly, so lovely people, if you could just put your trays up, that would be super.”

On his trip back up the aisles he noticed this well-dressed and rather Arabic looking woman hadn’t moved a muscle. “Perhaps you didn’t hear my over those big brute engines but I asked you to raise your trazy-poo, so the main man can pitty-pat us to the ground.”

She calmly turned her head to the flight attendant and said “In my country, I am called a Princess and I take orders from no one.”

To which the flight attendant replied, without missing a beat, “Well, sweetcheeks, in my country I’m called a Queen, so I out rank you… Tray up Bitch!”

Ch-ch-ch-Changes...

I feel like having a major knock-down drag-out flippin’ tantrum. I want to kick, scream, flop to the floor, and just bewail change at the top of my lungs.

I know that change is the standard, nothing stays the same, change = growth, accepting change is healthy and mature, and adjusting yourself to change is positive.

Well, I DON’T WANNA be all healthy positive and mature. I want to be two years old and mad as hell!

What’s going on is that there are inter-office shifts (read: moving people around) and my favorite co-worker is leaving my office and going across the hall. Now she had stated at yesterday’s staff meeting that she wanted to stay put but the gum-chomping/loud-talking/“like-you-know-what-I-mean”/constantly-talking-repetitively co-worker made HER move contingent on taking Favorite Co-worker with her. So that means I stay. And the sop from my supervisor is that “the new employees wanted to be with you as they said you’ve done most of their training.” Right.

I liked coming to the office in the morning and seeing Favorite Co-worker at her desk, having late afternoon marathon belly laugh sessions, just turning my head and asking wording questions which would lead to totally inappropriate conversation or making sarcastic comments on life in general, and just knowing she was there. You know how you have people in your life that you are just happy by being in their company? She’s like that. She makes me feel better about crappy things, she makes me smile, she makes the day brighter, and she’s a trooper.

Yes I know she’s just across the hall, but still, that’s not the point. The point is the change and hole in the office. And the petty side of my mind is pissed someone stipulated SHE’d move only if she took Favorite Co-worker along. Pissed.

Color me two years old.