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Critters and Such

In case you haven’t figured it out by now D is something of a goof-ball.  When he opened a new jar of peanut butter this morning and discovered ‘eyes’ staring back at him it was only natural that he give it a mouth.

The bane of my existence ... I swear I dreamt about this last night.

Before you get too excited over my ‘tiling talents’ you should know that these are pre-laid on mesh in a roughly 12x12 square.  Evidently those squares aren’t very square as the issues I’m having are all with proper spacing.

The little plant Greenie sent me perked up nicely overnight.  It’s even thinking about blooming.

Another sewn item in dire need of a home.  The colors aren’t very true (damn kitchen fluorescents) it’s an ecru background with coral-red and pale green dragonflies / trim, and a coral/red/pink lining.  Speak up and its yours!

Update:  It has reach its new home with the fabulous Pea!

Mackie came to work with me today because the vet recommends keeping an eye on them after they’ve been sedated.  She has shiny teeth, clean ears, short nails and a pair of hips that are in very good shape.  The doc said there is some build up on one but not enough to call it arthritis.  He does, however, suspect a knee problem.  When he manipulated it he found that it moves distally, which it shouldn’t.  He likened it to a football injury caused by planting, twisting and pushing off all in one motion.  Of course, when D showed up and she did the ‘I’m so happy I could just die’ dance the doc reconsidered.  She shouldn’t have been able to cavort so ably with that type of injury, so for now we are to just watch her.  It’s mostly good news for our ‘mostly good dog’* and given the way things have been going lately, I’ll take it.

*phrase stolen shamelessly from Dan at Chucklehut, whose ‘mostly good dog’ Cosmo, led me to find his blog while researching doggie joint problems. Its hard to believe that I’ve ‘known’ Dan for three years now!

This post promises to be as wide and varied as my weekend – which means it’s going to be a bit long and a lot scattered.

First: The prize for my ‘100 Things’ name draw.  Brad at Almost Lucid was the winner and as expected was somewhat difficult to craft for.  In the end I settled for a case to store drum sticks in ... or if they wont fit, his wife can pack it with wooden spoons - heh.

But, because I was procrastinating on the decision of what to make him, I first made a smock for his daughter Z, and an apron for his son S.

And then, not wanting to leave anyone out, a tote for his wife, J.

Brad, of course, thinks I’m nuts.  Someday I’ll post a photo of my stash closet and you will all see how much it helps me when you accept a sewn item.  I’m on a strict ‘stash only’ diet, and have been for a while.  My only fabric store purchases have been thread, stabilizer and things from the remnant’s rack (can’t pass up a bargain-heh).  I did fall off of the wagon with my recent purchase from superbuzzy, but I just couldn’t resist that fabric.  Yeah, I’m weak.

I also promised a photo of journals I made for Jae.  She is giving them to friends who participate in wine tastings with her and her hubby.  I will probably bankrupt myself buying the journal inserts for these, I just love ‘em!

Second: Bathroom update.  We installed the remaining cement backer board, and the drywall on Saturday and completed one coat of the water-proofing.  Sunday I applied the second coat.  It goes on Pink Panther Pink, and dries bloody red.  And I thought the bathroom colors were going to be boring - heh.  I’ll probably dry set the floor tiles tonight to get all my cuts figured out, and lay it tomorrow night.  We aren’t doing very well with our schedule, mostly because of drying and curing times.  But, we have tried to do other things (like scrape wallpaper - ugh!) while we wait, so we’re actually ahead in some ways and behind in others.

Third: The open house on Sunday afternoon.  As expected there was tons of food provided by Grandpa’s neighbors.  There was also lots of laughter, and many kind comments.  The only sorrow was as the little old ladies were making their farewells.  They each expressed how much they would miss him, and that they didn’t know how they were going to get by without him (he fixed things, mowed yards, etc) with wavering cracked voices and teary eyes.  It was difficult not to get teary too.  The house is eerily untouched, I don’t think he had moved anything since grandma’s death.  And certainly he did not expect to never return ... there are intentions laying everywhere.  The event itself was far more personal than the church or funeral home would have been, and it was absolutely right in so many ways. 

We were asked to bring photos to the house, and I at least, was shocked at how few current ones I have.  So I took my camera and snapped a few of our dwindling family.

My dad (dad is the oldest son).

My ‘friend’-mom.  (She was trying to get the fan to go - heh).

Unc W and cousin S (middle son)

Unc D and aunt R (youngest son)

D (sorry ladies, no imp this time)

Finally: Mackenzie.  I dropped her off at the vet this morning to get her teeth cleaned and have her hips x-rayed.  She’s been a little mopy lately and more drooly than usual so we suspect a bad tooth.  Since they knock her out for the cleaning we elected to have the x-ray done at the same time.  Due to hip displasia at a very early age she is all plates and screws in her hind quarters; ie. she has a bionic butt and she is therefor an early candidate for arthritis (of the butt - hehe).  The x-ray will tell us if its time to start treating her for that condition.  In any case she’s pissed with me, and delighted with D – who will be rescuing her tonight.  It sucks being the bad guy.

And that’s all the news I have, with exception of receiving a lovely little plant from Greenie (yes she’s blogging again) on Saturday morning.  I have no photo of it yet as I’m waiting for it to right itself, it is still a tad miffed at spending time in a box.  It was all the same a very sweet, and greatly appreciated gesture (many thanks Greenie). 

And many, many thanks to everyone who has offered well wishes and support in the last few months.  Its been rough, and you guys never once failed to be the light at the end of the tunnel.  Thank-you.

House is clean, lawn is mowed, laundry is done and its mighty sleepy around here. 

Libby on the dining room table (naughty kitty).

Lenny on D’s office floor.

Leona on the chair in my office, the needle point pillow behind her says ‘home is where the cat is’ - heh.

Daniel, in the middle of my work table.

Why, you may ask is my work table covered in fabric, simple, I told my mom I’d make a tote for her to give as a gift....and have it done tonight.  It’s maybe two hours of work, but after too much sun, a relaxing margarita, and a delightful conversation with Amysue by phone (she found me online) ... I’m having trouble getting started.  Of course I wouldnt’ trade any of it.  Well maybe cleaning the toilets.  But certainly not Amysue’s call.  She was a little surprised to find I didn’t knit, but she talks fabric with the best of them, and lots of other things too.  I fear I may have talked her ear off, and I know I made her late for choir practice.  But I wouldn’t trade that either, it was a great finish to a busy, but nice weekend. 

Oh, and I nearly forgot.  Last weekend I finished my pincushion, for the pincushion challenge.  I can’t say it turned out how I had hoped ... in fact I can’t say I’m happy with it at all.  But, its done, and I can move on to something else.  The challenge was recycling, and in keeping I raided the recycling bin.  The fence and dragon fly are cut from plastic bottles, and the flowers from a cardboard soda box.  The felt isn’t recycled, but is from my scrap bag, and it is stuffed with trimmings from the serger.  The idea was a hillside garden ... but it falls a little short.  Oh well, onward and upward.  Tomorrow...Monday, sigh.

There was a package from Binkie and Doogy for Mackie on Friday (my that’s a lotta ‘ie’s’ ).  As you can probably tell from her tense stance in the photo, a nano-second later she was off, hedgehog firmly in mouth, ripping through the house to make sure all the cats saw -and heard- her new toy!  Dooce does an entry from time to time called ‘How to Charm Me’, well, sending a giftie for Mackenzie just charms my socks off!  Thanks Rox!  It was an amazingly sweet thing to do!

Saturday morning, D forgot to turn off his alarm clock, and we all rolled out at a disgustingly early hour.  D spent the morning on the computer (I swear the man’s brain is gonna melt) and I went into town to try to find fabric for my quilt conundrum.  I started at a very nice, and expensive quilt shop and ran smack into qult snobbery.  The woman who offered to help me could barely contain her disgust over my color choices.  I tried to explain the ‘bruise’ request, but she didn’t see the humor in it.  I left empty handed.  I scored, however, at Joann’s with two fabrics in the odd green category.  Hopefully, the quilt is back on track for its November deadline.

After solving my fabric problem, I lurked around some furniture stores, which is worse than used car shopping, took my mom to lunch, and went shopping at my favorite high-end grocery.  Any time I shop there you can be sure I’ve got a better-than-average dinner in mind.  Last night we dined on sirloin crusted in black pepper and garlic, with a Madeira reduction, baked potatoes, and rosemary/sea salt flat bread.  And capped it with a BIG zin, Poizin.  I admit I bought the bottle for its label, but was happy to find the contents just as pleasing.

Before dinner though, it rained.  And rained.  And rained.  We’ve had more than our normal share lately and the ground has had enough.  The yard is still full this morning, unusual for our sandy soil.  We had a good amount of lightening to go with it and we lost power for a couple of hours.  So, we sat in the front of the house, near the big windows and read.  It was a pleasant way to spend the afternoon, though damp, way to spend the afternoon. 

Today it’s back to the real world, cleaning, grocery shopping, yard work if it dries up some, and if I’m lucky quilting.

My work schedule has changed, by my own choosing and hopefully for-the-better for all parties involved. Rather than work 8-5 I’ve elected to work 9-6. The office benefits by having someone here later that can order emergency parts and close out calls that end after 5. It also allows the ‘on call’ person to get all the way home before the office phones are forwarded to their cell (our busiest after hours time is often between 5 and 6pm. My benefits are faster drive times due to lighter traffic, a whole hour in the afternoon to work with almost no interruption, and a more leisurely morning.

I’m also more likely to walk in the mornings because I find 6:30 far easier than 5:30. So, to that end, I’ve been waking at six-ish and hitting the pavement with Mackie in tow. This morning, however, I didn’t roust myself until 6:30 and we didn’t set off until a quarter to 7. I had already noticed on previous mornings that my landscape had changed. Before Mac and I had the road to ourselves, now we share it with teenagers trekking sleepily to the bus stop. They move like noisy shadows, slow deliberate zombies that do not turn their heads or acknowledge my “Good Morning”. It took Mac only two days to decide they weren’t any fun and put them in the ‘not interesting’ category.

My tardiness this morning further changed that landscape. The bus teenagers were replaced with those that drive. They zipped past us in too noisy rice burners, bass thumping, and loose parts rattling. The only other pedestrians we encountered were one little old lady all in pink, who walked as far to the other side of the road as she dared to pass us (frightened of Mackie), and the guy.

I’ve seen him when I ride my bike. Usually he is seated in a chair in front of his house, surrounded by beer cans, where he yells exuberant greetings in a garbled tongue. He is wild haired and unkempt; the house and his clothes perfect mirrors of each other in their tattered shambles. This morning he boiled out of his house just as we reached his property line, in a wild gait; half stumble and half run, that pitched him into the street just in front of us as we gained the driveway.

He seemed surprised to find us there. I smiled and offered a good morning, which he grunted back, before continuing rapidly ahead of us. I guessed he’d had a stroke, his left hand was fisted tightly against his chest, and his odd, flailing gait seemed caused by his efforts to propel his left leg forward. He accomplished this by raising high on the toes of his right foot and sharply kicking his hips to the left. The left foot scraped off of the pavement in a wide arc out to the side that ended half a step in front of him. His right arm followed a similar arc, for balance, and kept time with the left leg.

Mackie’s initial reaction was a full body wag, and as the man lurched away she took two bouncing steps to join him in the fun, before I pulled her back. I slowed our pace a little to open the distance between us. But he suddenly stopped and turned toward the center of the street. The gap closed and we overtook him. I offered another smile, he nodded in return as he fished in his pockets. He remove a large bunch of keys which he clipped to his belt, and a lighter to fire up the cigarette dangling from his lips.

Sometime in our passing Mackie’s attitude changed. Perhaps because he didn’t acknowledge her. That always seems to throw her a little, she doesn’t understand that not everyone appreciates her cuteness; like the pink lady a few blocks back. Truly though, it was the way he moved, and the awkward unpredictablenessof that movement that unglued her. And, when he lurched back into foot scraping-key jingling-arm flailing motion, she freaked completely out.

She danced out to the end of her lead like a terrified horse and paced back and forth, all the while moving backward, so she could watch that terrible octopus on roller-skates traveling behind us. I hissed and scolded to no avail, she wasn’t having it ... chasing him up the street was one thing; him chasing us was something altogether different. Thankfully his house is less than a block from where we turn around and once we made the u-turn she settled somewhat, but still watched him closely, and was careful to keep me between him and her. I nodded to him as we passed, but he didn’t seem to notice as all of his concentration on his forward motion. We walked almost three more blocks before she stopped looking over her shoulder to make sure he wasn’t sneaking up on us.

I leaned a valuable lesson. In the case of an emergency, there will be no miraculous doggy rescue. Oh no. Its every dog for herself around here, and those silly, slow humans can stick around to ‘play dead’ for the bear. She better hope I don’t fall on the lead – heh.

I was cleaning off the camera disk and found this photo I took a few days ago.  One of Mackenzie’s favorite ‘toys’ is a cardboard tube, in this case a wrapping paper core, but she’s also happy with paper towel rolls too.  It was a difficult photo to take, because when I got down on her level she just couldn’t resist the urge to crawl toward me and swab my head with her big pink tongue, heh.

I spent a little time in the yard early this evening, and while I was pinching spent dahlia blooms, I found this interesting fellow.  I’m calling him a ghost spider for obvious reasons - in truth I’ve no idea what kind he is.  I suppose its better than calling him ‘Bob’.

The first time I visited D at his home he greeted me at the door accompanied by an ancient and decrepit collie mix, named Max that belonged to his roommate. There were also two cats, he explained, one belonging to him and one to his roommate. And there were eighteen or twenty fish tanks, also the roommate’s, that ranged from a beautiful and crystalline salt tank, to several dingy and dark tanks that could have as easily held horror movie experiments as they did fish. After a quick tour of his roommate’s portion of the house, he lead me through the garbage and unimaginable clutter to his marginally neater room. It was a tiny space, packed with all of his belongings. A twin bed on one wall and a desk on the other left an aisle of about two feet wide that you walked through to reach the bathroom, which was barely big enough to hold a wall mounted sink, toilet and tiny shower. The one open spot in the floor was where he sat to watch the TV at the foot of the bed. Being over thirty and desperate is probably all that kept me from running for my life, especially when he admitted that he’d been cleaning all day in preparation for my visit (it was a Herculean effort on my part not to allow my jaw to drop).

I remember sitting behind him on the bed, while he sat at the desk and showed me his computer art. The files, being large were slow to load, giving me ample time to look around the room and sort individual items from the cacophony of clutter. Among them, nearly invisible, was a somewhat round, grey tabby, watching me from atop a low bookshelf. The moment she realized I had seen her, she streaked from the room. D shrugged, and said, “she’s not always very people friendly”, and then leaned back into the computer.

Subsequent visits and more conversation with D revealed that she wasn’t people friendly at all, she also wasn’t technically his cat, but his ex-wife’s. As the story goes, he had come home one day to find that his wife had adopted a rather scrawny kitten, and while he liked animals he was none too thrilled with this particular choice or his wife’s choice of names: ChiChi. Every effort I made to ‘make up’ with her was rebuked, either by a mad dash from the room, or with claws and fangs. When she did make an affectionate appeal it was only to D, and even he could only accomplish a brief chin scratch before she morphed into a wild clawing creature. Much of it I thought, was from being raised by a man who rough-housed with her. This was her form of affection, and she was wild about D; he has the scars to prove it.
When they moved in, I still had no true attachment to ChiChi, or Cheech as we often called her. Once settled, she was willing to be around me without flying from the room, and she rewarded my affections with teeth and claws. I supposed she liked me, in her own way, and we found a middle ground were we could both be comfortable. Besides, at the time, I had four cats of my own, all of whom were more than willing to put up with any amount of attention.

Around the same time, a local TV station began showing reruns of ‘The Pretender’, a mid 90’s show about a genius who could take on any persona in any field and in ‘A-Team’ style, enacted vengeance on unassuming bad guys. All the while being pursued by the ‘Center’ and one Ms. Parker, played by Andrea Parker, who later appeared in ER and JAG. He character in ‘The Pretender’ was a tough as nails, iron-clad, leather wearing bitch. It wasn’t long before I had hung her moniker on ChiChi. In fact, most of our animals have a handful of nicknames, some of which are far more fitting than their given name. Ms. Parker fit particularly well, and in no time D was also using it with a certain amount of wicked glee.  We had found our very own p.c. way of calling her a bitch.

As couples do, the more time we spent under the same roof the more comfortable we became with each other’s peculiarities, though certainly some still drive us loony. One of my least favorites is D’s desire to show the animals ‘love’ by giving them tidbits off of his plate. Not because he’s encouraging begging, but because he insists on placing those tidbits on the arm of the sofa or on the carpet. Ms. Parker was well versed in this habit, and as we generally eat in front of the TV, could always be found waiting patiently on the sofa arm for something tasty to head her way. More often than not it was also something extremely spicy (we’ve only found one place with hot sauce that is too hot for D) and to her credit it never seemed to bother her much. Even things that would make the dog’s eyes well up, she wolfed down expeditiously.

One afternoon I came home to find D knee-deep in something called ‘flamingo wings’, a local restaurant’s version of buffalo wings. Chicken wings were quite possibly ChiChi’s all time favorite food, and are certainly D’s, but both had nearly met their match with this particularly batch. D’s forehead was awash in sweat, and his face flushed. Cheech, one the sofa arm, greeted each bite with a barrage of clawed bats, hurting the chicken for stinging her. Not that it slowed her down overmuch, she still ate everything offered, and if she suffered any ill effects they were overshadowed by D’s own violent gaseous explosions.

At some point, Cheech and I both realized that I had been her ‘mama’ longer than D’s ex-wife, and we started sharing my chair in the evenings while I read or watched TV. It was my habit to turn her around and tuck her butt under my elbow, so that she was wedged between the arm of the chair and my hip. This way I didn’t rest my book on her as I was reading. Once tucked in she would start to purr, and I’d always admonish, “You better be careful, someone will hear you and think you’re happy”. This was usually met with a patented, ChiChi, ‘F-U’ stare that suggested she very readily understood English as a second language.

In recent years she even started tucking herself into her corner without my prompting, and my lap became the household favorite, but Cheech was loath to admit it. If, for example, D entered the room while she occupied her corner of my chair, she would jump down and take up a nonchalant position on the coffee table. Once he was gone, she’d return, snuggle down and drift into a light doze, only broken by D’s re-entry or the dog’s wet, curious, nose.

For all her bitchy attitude, she liked the dog, and tolerated these intrusions with equanimity. Often when they were both in the kitchen, begging food, she would do her damnest to get Mackie to pet her by bumping up against her, walking beneath her belly, and crying. Mackie never did figure this out and always looked a little nervous when Cheech made this request. She was probably remembering their earlier games of ‘lets terrify the puppy’.

She had her playful moments, but her aim was deadly and her claws long, so I didn’t partake in her games. D, however, had taught them to her, and this was their way of being affectionate. His particular favorite was ‘grab the tongue’. Cheech was always considerate, and washed the spot on your hand where she was preparing to remove a chunk of flesh. With each pass of her tongue he’d try to grab it. When he was successful she’d turn pro-wrestler, grab him and hold him till the lines of ‘who’s got whom’ blurred. She played hard, and she played for keeps, but it was their private game and they both seemed to understand rules I never figured out - and loved it!

She had one oddity, that I’ve never seen in another cat. Sometime before I met them, D had made a costume that included a rabbit hide cloak. He carefully stitched a large number of cured, but still hairy, white hides into a rough cloak shape. During in the process ChiChi found the hides and adopted one as her very own. She would drag it from room to room, a lioness dragging a kill, and when she found a suitable place she made love to it. Can you imagine if she’d ever had the opportunity to catch a real bunny? The poor little guy would just know he was dead, but instead would get a painful massage, while the nape of his neck was firmly clutched in her teeth, all the while making noises like a banshee. He’d either die of fright or be laughed out of the warren when he tried to tell his tale at the bunny bar. Luckily we keep all the kitties inside, and with the exception of the occasional frog, lizard or spider we don’t often have to deal with remains of their hunting instincts.

When Cheech was diagnosed with feline diabetes she became both bitchier and sweeter. A bizarre mix that only she could have accomplished. Sweeter was exhibited with more lap time, a greater desire to be around people, and sharing space on the couch with the dog. Bitchier emerged as a ferocious attempt to draw a liter of blood for every drop we took to do her blood sugar test. Administering insulin twice a day was a dangerous chore, blood sugar curves (12 tests in a day) were likely to leave us both anemic. But we did what we could, and she always forgave us our clumsiness as soon as a ‘lap’ was made. She survived two ‘crashes’; instances where her blood sugar was so high or low that her body shut down. One such occasion she came home blind, and rather than lay down, went banging through the house bashing into walls and people and other cats. Luckily, she was her normal self the next morning, though we both thought her eyesight was never what it had been before.

For what now seems like forever, she has been the first thing we checked on when we woke up, and the last before we went to bed. Phone calls home always included the question “How’s Cheech?”, often times before “How are you?”. She has endured countless vet trips, needle pricks, tests and has been a bone grinding four and a half pounds for the last year. Diabetes often causes nerve damage in their hind feet, making them ‘sit back’ on their paws. In the last year that had extended up her legs so that when she stood you could see them trembling. It never seemed to slow her down though, her last night of life she was still hurling herself at the top of the entertainment center, crashing to the floor and trying again - our hearts were in our mouths with every attempt.

In the last few days we fed her everything she wasn’t supposed to have, grilled chicken, tuna ‘juice’, canned cat food, Doritos; if we had it and she wanted it she got a little taste.  Neither of us could pass her without a soft word or a gentle pat.  D hopped her up on catnip this morning, nearly a half cup worth, figuring if she had to go she may as well go happy.  Before the vet came today I whispered to her, “ When you see that bright little bird you go after it, you go as fast as you can and don’t look back, and don’t worry.  You’ve done your job, and you’ve done it well, I love you”.  She didn’t have to be the ‘best cat’ for us to love her, because we are as stubborn as she was, and loved her anyway.  And though she would never have admitted it, at least not to the other cats, we know she loved us in return. 

I have said it before, but it bears repeating, the veterinary practice we use is the BEST.  Of seven or eight doctors we’ve only found one we don’t like, and she’s just a twit.  They called back this morning, and would be happy to do a house call for us, the cost $50 (a normal office visit is $40).  The doctor that has seen her through the entire illness is the one coming.  He reminds me of Lurch, very tall, deep voiced and small on words.  But he’s packed with patience, has answered every question and returned every phone call.  Despite what he’s coming to do I really can’t say enough nice things about him.

D’s work week went to hell yesterday, so we had to schedule the doctor’s visit or Monday morning.  In the past when I’ve had to put an animal down, I was practically out the door once the decision was made.  This waiting feels weird, as will pre-digging the grave in the yard over the weekend.  Our ‘pet cemetery*’ is not full, but I am no longer sure exactly where each of the four cats are – and disturbing one of them would flip me out, so we will pick up a new tree over the weekend and place ChiChi beneath it.  I’m hoping to find a white orchid tree, though to be honest something with thorns would be more fitting her personality - heh.  Until then, I guess it’s all the ‘tuna juice’ she wants and all the love we can give.  And hopefully, a happier post or two between now and then.

*There are four cats buried beneath a golden rain tree, and jsut so you don’t think I’m killing them outright here’s their history.  The first died from Feline Leukemia, the second (my mom’s cat) was euthanized for old age / kidney failure, the third was euthanized for old age / cancer, and the last euthanized for old age / illness.

We’ve made the decision, we know it’s the right one, and now all we have to do is go through the awful mechanics of it.  D called the vet this morning to ask if he would consider a house call to euthanize ChiChi.  She has never traveled well, quite frankly it terrifies her, and we simply don’t want to add that terror to an already bad situation.  The vet of course was unavailable, so I am waiting a return call, because D will be out of his office most of the day.  Most difficult for us is that she does not always seem to feel bad.  If I call her she comes bounding from somewhere to launch herself ungracefully into my lap, snuggle down, and vibrate my very bones with her purr. She is down to just under five pounds, and we simply cannot fill her up, it is obvious that her body is not using the food we give her.  In the last few weeks her eyes have gone from a warm gold, to a deep, watery copper.  Her hind quarters shake when she stands and she is dwindling before our eyes.  Her ‘bitchy’ personality is still intact, though these days she is content to allow far more affection than she would have in her earlier days.  Officially she is D’s cat, and moved in with him, unofficially she prefers my lap.  But if D comes in the room and she thinks he’s spied her there, she will jump down and go sit innocently on the coffee table.  Once he’s left the room she’ll return, wedge herself in the corner between my hip and the arm of the chair and purr herself to sleep.  She is my last ‘lap cat’, Lenny and Leona are strictly D’s, Daniel is far too aloof to degrade himself with lap sitting, preferring instead, to perch on the back of my chair. And Libby is well Libby, strange, more than a little cracked, and somewhat wild - and none too fond of handling.  I guess I’ll be learning how to live with a cold lap.

I took this picture back in February, on a Saturday morning (hence the no make-up, and unbrushed hair), knowing that we were on borrowed time*.  I never did get the image I wanted, I’ll have to be content with the one in my memories. 

*She’s been fighting feline diabeties and ‘fatty liver’ for two years now.

This friendly little critter was waiting for me in the entry hall when I got home.  He’s between 4 and 5 inches in diameter, and waaaaay beyond my acceptable spider limit.  I think he’s a wolf spider.  The photo’s aren’t great, and I’m sorry, he was creeping me out a bit.  I don’t like to kill anything outright - but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t consider it with him.  Instead I gently knocked him into a bucket with a duster, slapped a pizza baking screen and a rock over the top and took him outside.  I’m glad he’s outside, but I can pretty much promise you what I’ll be dreaming about tonight!

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This is D holding Lenny and Leona, who in the first photo look like two average sized cats.

From the other side, you’ll notice that we grow ‘em big.

D is making that face because he is about to drop a cat ... he’s holding a total of almost 40 lbs of wiggling feline, lol.  Oh, and the room, well, welcome to the ‘red room’ also known as my crap craft room.