Category Archives: cat

Potty Deux

I had to deal with some pretty intense “share shame” after writing my two last posts. My husband’s acerbic comment, made after reading the first one, didn’t help:

“Jesus. You’re either going to gain a lot of readers from this one…or they’re gonna desert you in droves.” Such a cheerleader, that Mike.

And it was eerily quiet after I published what I have begun to refer to, in my mind, as the “poop posts.” Very little in the way of commentary. Even from the regulars.

“I can’t wait to hear what your mom says about this,” Mike asserted.

She didn’t say anything. Crickets. Struck dumb with horror, I suppose. Very unlike her.

And speaking of likes? None. Not that I care, really. But, OK, dammit, I do. Just a bit. As to how many dozens of followers deserted me? Hard to know.

One thing I do know? You’ll find no poop on Goop. I checked. The closest I found was “The Dirty on Getting Clean.” Which sounds pretty interesting, actually. And not at all fecal. No wonder Gwyneth is so popular.

Tonight, to distract myself from my recent perceived humiliation, I hacked into my mom’s HBO Go and watched an hour of Louis CK. I’ve been obsessed with stand up comedy lately, due to the free trial of Sirius radio I’ve had in my new car. At first I didn’t like Sirius–how the fuck do you navigate through all of those channels?–then I found the Comedy Central channel and my life changed. Commute? What commute? I’m listening to people being stupidly hilarious–I don’t even know I’m driving! It’s a superb, elating way to pass the time; now that I’ve experienced it, I don’t know how I’ll ever go back to NPR.

But I will; my free trial is about to be over. And I’m too cheap to pay for it.

Back to stand up. Louis CK is my all-time favorite. I’d be in love with him, if he weren’t so gross. And masturbatory. And, yes, scatological. But these are exactly the things I also adore about him. He did a whole segment tonight on his leaky asshole. He said that sometimes he’s just sitting around, and suddenly he sniffs, and realizes he has to go wipe it. I quote: “My asshole is like a bag of leaves that no one remembered to tie up.” He utters such words. He paints such pictures in our minds. Nobody abandons him in droves. Jeez.

Feeling buoyed by my good laugh, I decided to get back on the literary horse. I know, this is hardly literature. But here I am. I’ve decided not, ever again, to discuss poop, assholes, or anything south of the waist on this blog. I leave that to the comics, who do it elsewhere–in my car, for starters!–with impunity and absolutely no shame. Me, I’m heading back to safer territory–laundry, my dog, our fucked up dishwasher, the fact that my daughter has now declared her middle name to be “Falcon,” (which sounds amazingly like “fucking'” when she says it quickly.)

And cute pictures of birds. I have tons of them. I am developing a collection. I’ll share them with you. You’ll “like” them, I’m sure.

But if you want to laugh your ass off? About shit, assholes, and other forbidden topics? Oh My God, you need to get HBO.

Or steal it from your parents.

Bird (on the) Brain

4 Replies

First the Big Bang. Now tiny tweets.

As they are wont to do, Myra-Jean’s obsessions have shifted again. Leaving behind the interstellar plane, they’ve flitted back to earth and landed nimbly in the world of ornithology. Good-bye, Jupiter! We are all about Juncos now.

It began with a book our next-door neighbor gave us some time back. It’s a quirky, prettily drawn tome called, simply, “Birds.” It sat unread for awhile, but gradually MJ took to it, eventually memorizing it nearly completely. This happened between literary flights to outer space, of course. “Birds” was a side interest, you could say. A flight of fancy. Had a bit too much Kuiper Belt? Let’s take a palate-cleanser with a belted Kingfisher!

Then my mom got her a bird bingo set for Christmas. A simple but pleasant game, with gorgeous drawings of exotic breeds, it became a daily activity. MJ–a typical, classification-loving four-year-old–learned quickly how to spot Spotted Kiwis, Arctic terns, and Magnificent Frigatebirds. It’s weird to hear your kid pull a card out of a bag and cry, in a competitive fervor, “Come on, Andean cock-of-the-rock!” But, with kids this age, you get used to anything.

The bird bingo craze abated. But, for MJ, interest in her feathered earth-mates did not. A couple of weeks ago, at the library, she found a just-published book called “Look Up!” Everything you ever wanted to know about birdwatching, it’s for kids a bit older than my daughter. But that didn’t stop her. We read it. And read it. And reeeeeeead it. Soon she (and we) knew more about ornithology than any person without binoculars decently should. I was more than a bit embarrassed when, at the zoo, MJ pointed at a cage and yelled “Look! A Eurasian blackbird! I think he’s a juvenile!”

“Ok, kid,” I muttered. “Simmer down. Let’s keep the Linnaean classifications to a dull roar.”

One day not long after that we took a trip to the beach. Many of MJ’s classmates were there. “Why don’t you go play with them?” I asked.

“No way. I want to go sketch those brown pelicans.”

“Um–”

“And Mom! I think that’s an albatross!”

Little Miss Audubon drew for hours. I went to sit with the adults.

The obsession, at this point, is at what I’ve come to call its “boiling point.” We’re as far in as we can be. I half expect to go into her bedroom in the morning and find my daughter incubating eggs. All day today she insisted on being called “Saurus Crane.” She routinely squawks. She says she dreams of penguins.

And we’ve hit the library again. In fact we’ve pretty much cleaned it out. The whole avian oeuvre is here, with us. We have books about penguins, birds of prey, crows, owls, and sparrows. We have generalized bird books. We have “Birds of Los Angeles County” and “the Audubon Guide for Young Birders.” We are steeped in ornithological facts. It’s even infecting me. I am looking at our local ravens with new eyes, staring obsessively at mourning doves, and considering killing the neighbor’s cat on behalf of the local hummingbird population.

OK, not really. Although I have taken to calling him Hitler.

Anyway. It’s super weird. But also wonderful. I wish I’d noticed the natural world when I was younger. Perhaps, growing up in Brooklyn, it was an impossibility. Certainly growing up in my brain it was. Either way, I’m thrilled to have a kid who makes me pay attention now. Oh, there’s a down side. The more you learn, the more there is to get depressed about–half of the damn bird species are struggling to survive, and the neighbor’s cat will continue to do his fucked up, feline part. But there’s beauty in the minutiae of this world; I’ve found that learning about it makes the somewhat rampant ugliness a touch more bearable.

So here’s to the robins! Hail to the mockingbirds! Kudos, California condor!

Now how can I get a bell on that asshole tabby…?

Redlined

Salt And Pay-Per-View

2 Replies

A couple of nights ago I ate a jar and a half of pickles. In one sitting. A jar and a half. Admittedly, it was spread out over three episodes of “Girls,” but still. That’s a lot. Enough to make me wonder, at the time, if there is such a thing as saline poisoning. And, if so, whether I had contracted it. Turns out I was fine–just really, really thirsty. A bottle and a half of Gerolsteiner later I was as right as rain. No worse for wear the next morning, either. If salt bloats me I am unaware of it. Having eaten such ginormous quantities of it, I believe I’ve become immune to its water-retaining properties. I could ingest it the way a deer does–right off of a salt lick in the middle of a frozen woods–and be completely fine. Except for the hunter gathering me in his sights.

At least I’d die unpuffy.

All of this is to say that I’ve not written in ages. But after the pickle incident I knew it was time. One can only, after all, watch so much TV–especially when such ruinous culinary conduct accompanies the endeavor. I have, since my last post, consumed not only many high-sodium foods, but also six seasons of Sons of Anarchy, half a dozen episodes of “Downton Abbey,” and an hour and a half of “Girls.” Before I start watching–or should I say shooting up–whatever brilliant entertainment comes next, I’ve got to break the cycle. I am becoming a TV junkie. A VOD fiend. The Sid and Nancy of Amazon Prime.

You may say I’m being hard on myself. After all, I’m just doing what most people do, right? This is the American Way! I work hard, I have a plethora of responsibilities, my days are full and dizzying. This gives me leave to vegetate at the end of the day. I’ve earned it. I have sold, clientelled, fundraised, cooked, cleaned, shopped, swept, laundered, counseled, bathed, and entertained. I have played “babies” with my daughter for hours. I have read multiple dinosaur books. I have walked the dog, fed the cat, made the bed. I have stain-treated, book-clubbed, bill-payed, friend-helped, thank-you-card written, photo-uploaded, battery-charged, filter-changed, customer-service-called, paperwork completed, password updated, breakfast-dish-washed, lint-filter-cleaned, and toilet-scrubbed for dozens of waking hours. I have fulfilled my responsibilities. No one in my charge has gone unattended. I am done.

The last thing I want to do now is concentrate. On anything.

So I watch. And watch. And man, it feels good.

But then I think of my readers, the few, the quirky, the persistent. And the historians, the ones for whom I claim to write. And my daughter, for whom I really do. And I know I need to put. Down. The. Remote.

For just five minutes.

So I have done it. Bravo! I will again tomorrow, if I can. And the day after. For if I don’t I’ve left nothing behind. Nothing. Except some empty jars, a crumpled napkin, and the scattered palpitations of other peoples’ stories. Rape? In the servants’ quarters? How could it be???

Anyway. I’m back.

And now I’m going to go watch an episode of Boardwalk Empire. Just one. Heck, I’ve earned it.

Pickle, anyone?

To Done, 12/1/13

3 Replies

On early shift. Woke up at 6:30 with MJ. Gave her breakfast, read half of “Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs.” Played six rounds of Candyland. Won more than I would’ve liked.
Fed both animals.
Put in a load of laundry.
Did breakfast dishes.
Said good morning to Mike. Apologized for forgetting to make his coffee.
Still didn’t make it.
Swept part of living room.
Stripped bedroom sheets.
Put in another load of laundry.
Showered.
Got dressed.
Went to put on makeup. Found cat in the toilet, where he finds his happy place.
Took cat out. Dropped him on floor.
Realized toilet was filled with pee.
Tried to clean up. Promptly stepped in cat-wet floor in stocking feet.
Realized I did not have time to change.
Said goodbye to Mike and MJ and ran out, cursing cat, in wet-footed haste.
Worked from 10:00 AM to 6:30.
Raced home.
Changed clothes.
Put MJ to bed.
Had quick dinner with Mike.
Washed dinner dishes.
Switched laundry again.
Worked on raffle tickets.
Checked weather for the weekend. Worried in spite of good forecast.
Wrote 23 e-mails re Saturday’s fundraiser.
Made a double batch of candycane cookie batter for same.
Talked on phone to girlfriend about her romantic problems. Her boyfriend is allergic to her cat. Told her I am allergic to mine. Or at least my feet are.
Put batter in fridge.
Checked weather for Saturday again. Still worried.
Wrote 21 more fundraiser-related e-mails.
Shooed persistent racoon away from front porch so dog would stop growling.
Walked said dog.
Checked child.
Put cat in back room. Away from all toilets.
Left pantyhose soaking in Woolite.
Checked weather.
Went to bed.
Worried some more.

Sums of Manicky

1 Reply

If this blog is the second kid I never had, I’m guilty of some serious neglect.

I’m sorry. I want to be more regular about writing. I have been in the past. Why, back in the day, when I was home with MJ all the time, I was a veritable posting fool. Before she went to a co-op preschool, that is. Back when she napped! But now, this life! The work–in high-end retail at holiday season–the fundraising, the childcare, the housecleaning, the pet chasing, the board meetings, the volunteer days at MJ’s school. The giant event I am planning for same. The need to consume great amounts of “Sons of Anarchy” on my scant downtime. I swear to God, there aren’t two spare moments to rub together. At least two spare moments when I have a functional brain cell left for creative thought. I’m a zombie. A never-stopping, always-behind, constantly number-tallying, guilty-binge-TV-watching zombie.

Even now, I have nothing to say. I am tapped. Zapped. Sapped. My every moment, in these last two weeks, has been consumed with selling raffle tickets, (when I am not at work), and selling overpriced jewelry, (when I am.) In between I try to sell my family on the idea that I am a competent wife and mother. They’re buying, but only because I’m the only shop on the block. God forbid a Walmart should open up next door. Figuratively speaking. Although what a figurative Walmart looks like is anyone’s guess.

Finally, I clean poop. Because our new cat has feces that stink viciously, absurdly, brutally, like dead bodies on crack. If we don’t scoop it out right away the entire house becomes an intolerable, unbreathable haz-mat zone.

He also likes to pad around in our sinks and toilet bowls, leaving dirty little footprints on the porcelain.

So glad we got a second animal.

Anyway. I just wanted to tell you that I’m here–that the blogger in me is still alive, if currently buried in receipts, petty cash, and five-dollar raffle tickets. She will re-emerge. Probably after December 7th, when this damn event will be over, and definitely after December 25th, when the other damn event (otherwise known as Christmas) will be similarly behind us.

Until then, exhausted, distracted, and enfeebled by her desire to raise funds, she will poke her head up only occasionally, with some effort, and with predictably mediocre results.

Then she’ll poke it back down, to watch her favorite motorcycling sexpots run more guns.

A girl’s got to decompress somehow.

Raffle ticket, anyone?

Candy Barred

2 Replies

You know you’re getting old when you start off a sentence with “Back when I was a kid–”

But that’s exactly what I did this morning when my daughter woke up, found out Halloween was over, and burst into copious tears.

“B-b-but Daddy told me Halloween goes on for days!” she wailed.

“I think he meant days in advance,” I said drily. Off her blank look I added “you’ve been celebrating it for roughly two weeks.”

Time means little to a four year old. Elapsed time, even less. Elapsed time during which the child was eating more candy than any adult should in a decade and feeling absolutely fantastic about it? Unintelligible.

“Look,” I went on, “back when I was a kid, Halloween was only one night. About three hours. That was all we got.”

“Really?” Myra-Jean responded in a quavering voice.

“Yup.” I cuddled her a little closer–we were in her bed together, she under the blankets, me on top of them. “We didn’t have the Halloween festivals leading up to it, the block parties, the “Boo on the Boolevards.” We didn’t trick or treat at Starbucks a week before. We didn’t even have Starbucks. ”

She looked at me, obviously pained. “Whoa.”

I built up steam. “It was one night. A little sliver of time. We didn’t even get face painted at school. Heck,” I went on, musingly, “I don’t think I got face painted at all until I was, like, twenty.”

MJ started crying again. I should’ve quit when I was ahead.

“The point is,” I went on, stroking her forehead, “you get a lot more Halloween than me or Daddy ever did. So I’m sorry it’s over, but–”

Myra-Jean sobbed harder. “It’s really over?”

I looked at her in disbelief. “Didn’t we just discuss this?”

Her cries rose loudly in the small, morning-shadowed room. Jesus. You’d think her dog had just died. She would definitely wake Mike.

“Let’s go get some breakfast.” The kitchen was a bit farther from our bedroom.

Feeding the animals distracted her for a few minutes, but soon Myra-Jean was whimpering again. Standing by the dining room table, she poked at the ruined finish of the wood with a stray fork. “Mama. I’m not happy.”

“You don’t say.” Grabbing the utensil gently out of her hand I tossed it into the sink. Just because she was grieving didn’t mean she got to be destructive.

“I want to go trick or treating one more time!”

I sighed, staring at her uselessly. I was out of ideas. At my feet, Walter mewled. Mina nipped at him. Walter hissed. Myra-Jean screamed.

“Mina!” I shouted. “Walter. Myra-Jean! All of you calm down!”

Enter Mike. No big surprise. Hard to imagine how anyone could sleep through an uproar of such Biblical proportions.

“What’s going on?” he asked blearily.

Handing him a cup of coffee, I explained. “Mina’s trying to kill Walter, as usual. Also,” trying to keep any trace of sarcasm out of my voice,”Myra-Jean is feeling really sad because Halloween is over.”

Mike nodded gravely and turned to MJ. “You know, you can still wear your costume any time you–”

I had tried this tack already, and knew where it was going. I covered my ears.

“I don’t care about my costume! I want to trick or treat!”

“OK,” Mike said calmly. Really calmly, considering the hearing damage he’d just incurred. “You know,” he continued, “back when we were kids–”

“I tried this,” I interjected quietly.

Deaf to my warning, he went on. “Back when we were kids Halloween only lasted for one night.”

Shaking my head, I began washing dishes. Mike talked for a few minutes, repeating essentially what I’d said earlier. But he closed with something new, something said in a fun and conspiratorial voice:

“Even though trick or treating is done, we still have the candy! Lots of it! Candy eating goes on for awhile.”

MJ’s head swivelled towards me. “But Mama said no more candy after Halloween.”

Wuh-whoa. I’d forgotten about that conversation.

MIke cocked his head at me, then looked back at her. “I think she meant no more trick or treating.”

“No,” MJ declared. “Mama said I could only eat candy on Halloween, and after that it was only for ‘special occasions’.” She emphasized the latter phrase carefully, although she had no idea what it meant.

MIke shot a look at me.

Wincing, I muttered ruefully “I think I might have said that.”

Silence.

“I wasn’t really thinking,” I squeaked. “Sugar’s just so bad for you.”

Mike nodded slowly. “So that’s why she was shoving candy in her mouth last night like a just-freed prisoner of war.”

How poetic. I nodded. “It might’ve been.”

“Is this what your parents did?” Mike demanded.

“No.” I winced. I could feel the word HYPOCRITE flashing over my head like a Broadway marquee. “We ate candy all month.”

Mike shook his head, then smiled. He wasn’t mad. He was just laughing at me. Which is worse. I couldn’t blame him.

I turned to MJ. “I’m sorry, honey. Of course you can still eat your candy. For many days to come. Forever.” Or at least a week, I added in my mind.

Myra-Jean smiled for the first time that morning.

When I left the kitchen she and Mike were happily sorting her booty into piles. There was a lot of it. An indecent amount. Absolutely no more trick or treating was necessary.

Just a little bit more give and take by the old timers.

Or one in particular.

If only you could trick or treat for that.

Four for Four

4 Replies

Birthdays come but once a year. And it’s a damn good thing. Any more, and parents would be dropping like flies.

Or I would, anyway. MJ’s party was four days ago now, and I’m only just feeling human again. As for my pocketbook, well, it may need a bit more time to recover. Because you know what? It turns out that even a super casual, bagels-in-the-park, cupcakes from Vons, no favor bags birthday party can be extraordinarily expensive. It might’ve been cheaper to rent a yacht. Who knew?

But it was worth it. I think. Myra-Jean seemed to enjoy it. Mostly. I mean, let’s be honest–by the end of such a party pretty much any preschooler is in a stage five meltdown. What with the sugar, the attention, the pinata, the grownups goosing their cheeks–it’s enough to make even the most phlegmatic of four-year-olds blow a gasket. MJ, being no exception to this rule, spent the last half-hour of the party refusing to acknowledge departing guests and screaming “I just want to open my presents!!” I thought we were going to have to sedate her. Good times.

But then it was over–the invitees headed home, the cups and plates cleaned up, the smashed Jupiter pinata stuffed in the trash, the remaining cupcakes tossed. We headed up the hill to our house and ate takeout lunch with our family. Everyone was starved. One thing you forget to do at these things is eat.

As for MJ, she was all over the place. One minute she played with a new toy, the next she was sobbing over getting served the “wrong kind of chicken.” She said she’d enjoyed the party, but it was hard to tell. She was tired. She was mean. She was edgy. And this edginess lasted for the next three days.

It only seemed to lift yesterday–the actual day of her birthday. I’d had to work–a fact deemed unforgivable by my daughter–and it looked like the day could be a total debacle. Myra-Jean was furious when I left.

“You may never go!” she screamed. “Ever!”

The four birthday-themed postcards I’d left her notwithstanding, I felt like the worst parent alive.

But as the day went on, I heard that she cheered up. School was fun. The weather a bit cooler. In the afternoon she did some gardening with her father.

And then I was able to get off early to meet them for dinner! At our favorite restaurant! We ate pho and crayoned pictures of Walter and Mina on small white pieces of scrap paper. MJ chewed french fries with fish sauce and seemed ecstatic to be up past her bedtime. After dinner, we went to ice cream; when we were done eating it I watched, grinning stupidly, as my husband and daughter danced to “American Pie” in the middle of the empty parlor’s floor.

There, in that moment, I found the joy of her fourth birthday. And, judging by their faces, I’d have to say Mike and MJ did as well. No pinatas, no space decorations, no craft table, no hats. Just a quiet dinner, a sweet dessert, and the hard slate floor of an empty shop.

Perhaps next year we’ll just skip straight to that.

To Done, 10/8/13

4 Replies

Today MJ was in school from 9:15 to 2:15. Here’s what I got done while she was gone:

Picked up all toys, clothes, and artwork from floor.
Straightened MJ’s “studio.” Put all beads, pipe cleaners, stickers, “treasures,” and stamps back in their designated bins, muttering under my breath the whole time.
Vacuumed whole house.
Mopped kitchen and utility room.
Cleaned both bathrooms.
Did three loads of laundry.
Wrote fundraising e-mail to committee of Winter Faire at MJ’s school.
Attempted–twice–to reach donation department at Home Depot. Want them to give two Christmas Trees for our Faire. Won’t get hopes up–they won’t even spring for voice mail.
Wrote e-mail to work, asking for days off so that I can attend important Halloween events with MJ. Worried I’ll be denied.
Attempted to play with cat. Desisted, due to lack of interest.
Washed kitchen rug.
Wiped windowsills.
Dusted living room.
Removed one more alphabet sticker from flat screen TV. At this rate it will be cleared of them completely by 2014.
Attempted to remove glue from coffee table. Failed.
Attempted to remove piece of construction paper pasted to bathroom sink. Failed.
Loaded dishwasher.
Wrote another fundraising e-mail.
Scanned and e-mailed banking forms for our life insurance company. We fell victim to fraud again (!!) last week, and have had to close our old checking account and open a new one. This has meant contacting everyone we do online billing with and giving them our new routing number, etc. Next time an innocent-looking teenager comes to our door selling newspaper subscriptions “for her school” and asks me for a voided check I plan on assaulting her with a stepping stool.
Made bed.
Brought in trash cans.
Ate lunch.
Wrote this.
Left for pickup.

Tomorrow, at least, I get to go back to work. Maybe I’ll even get a manicure on my lunch break. That’ll feel like a day off, indeed.

Cat Got Your Tongue?

4 Replies

Walter is many things. Smart isn’t one of them.

I know, cats aren’t generally known for their perspicacity. Still, even graded on a gentle curve–heck, on a horizontal line–he’s not a bright bulb. I’m not even sure he’s plugged in to the socket.

There’s no other explanation for his behavior. The creature is ridiculously docile. Mellow. Calm. He barely plays. He never runs. He doesn’t like to leap. He just wants to cuddle. Nothing irks him. He gets hauled around by my daughter like a half-poured bag of rice; he never says a word. She uses his paws as pointers when we’re reading books. He purrs. She thinks it’s funny to twist his head like Linda Blair–I can’t tell you how many times I’ve uttered the words “stop choking the cat!” And nothing. Just that droopy-eyed bliss look. Or maybe it’s shock. Either way. He should be standing up for himself. Biting her. Yowling. Hell, I’d understand if he packed up and left in the middle of the night. But no. He’s absurdly forgiving.

Which leads me to believe that he must have hit his head when he was a kitten.

He’s also not eating his wet food. Unless it’s at room temperature, which is a third of the time. If it’s cold? No sir. Guess who’s been getting a lot of left over, semi-ossified veal with green peas? The dog, of course. Who is rapidly starting to see the benefits to this whole cat-ownership thing.

Anyway. I know what you’re thinking. He’s sick. I thought so too. But he has no symptoms. And he’s seven months old. How many illnesses has he had time to accumulate? Do kittens get chronically ill? Is this going to end with us in some feline pediatric unit? With little furry candy stripers?

The adoption lady doesn’t think so. She says he’s probably just adapting. And he may just be calm. As for the food? No problem. If we open a can of tuna and “drizzle the oil on his wet food” he’ll eat. Um, OK. That won’t be expensive. Not to mention, who the hell is going to eat the leftover fish? With mercury levels where they are, we’re only supposed to have it once a year. Was this done for him in his foster home? If so, I wonder what they did with the leftovers. Maybe they just fed him the whole can.

Perhaps this explains Walter’s issues. Mercury poisoning.

Or perhaps it indicates that he’s not so dumb after all.

Whatever the case, he’d better start eating. He’s going to need all of his strength at our house.

thumbstumbler

A Subsidiary of "Lesser Homes and Gardens"

Category Archives: cat

Bird (on the) Brain

Redlined

Salt And Pay-Per-View

To Done, 12/1/13

Sums of Manicky

Candy Barred

Four for Four

To Done, 10/8/13

Cat Got Your Tongue?