Caterpillarpalooza

When I was up at State Park the other weekend, it must have been Homecoming Weekend for the caterpillars, because they were all on the move.

There were woolly bear caterpillars:

And white caterpillars:

(and let me tell you, that white dude was beatin' feet.  He was one speedy guy.)

And yellow caterpillars:

Oh!  And let's not forget the turtle!

As soon as he saw me, he tucked in, but once I walked a little ways away, he started moving again.

And there was a green heron, hunting frogs:

See him, there on the branch?

Everybody's on the move!

Would you?

At State Park, there is a device for taking people over the river.  I'm not sure why, exactly, as there are several bridges in the area.  I'm guessing this is for some kind of emergency evacuation?  Maybe?  I don't know.

ANYway, here is the basket:

And here is the zip line!

Would you?

I shoulda named him "Ticks", instead

I have pulled three ticks offa this guy in the last two days.

I guess when you've got fur that floofy, you're prime real estate for ticks.

Poor Tinks. Instead of a chick magnet, he's a tick magnet.  *sigh*

Do not ever, ever, EVER ...

... jump-start somebody else's car.

A lesson I am learning the hard way.

Yesterday, I gave my boss a jump-start, because the dipsh*t left his fog lights on.  After I jumped him (Ewwwww ... you know what I mean), I ran some errands, and MY car started refusing to start..  I knew that my battery was due for replacement, so I figured that jumping his car had killed it, and stopped at the parts store and had the battery replaced.

This morning I was out running work errands and the check engine light came on.  I popped into the garage around the corner from the office, explained to the dude there what was going on, and the first thing he said was,

"Do not ever, ever, EVER jump-start someone's car."

He explained that it was fine with the older cars, but with newer cars, the computer-controlled system can get f*cked UP by giving someone a jump.  It sends a charge through the system that, well, screws the pooch.

So he ran the computer on it, and all kinds of codes popped up, and who KNOWS how much this is gonna cost me.  The only thing I'm trying to figure out right now is how much of this is going to be an "office expense", because you'd better believe I'm gonna pro-rate some of this cost to my boss.

So if someone asks you for a jump?  Tell 'em to call AAA.  If they don't have AAA? Tell 'em to call Allstate Roadside Assistance.  They don't have to be a member, and they don't have to have Allstate Insurance, they just have to call Allstate Roadside Assistance and a truck will come out to help.  It's fifty bucks for a jump.

Lesson learned.  The hard way.




(And no, I am not being compensated by Allstate in any way, shape or form for this post.  I just think they are providing a super service.)

Saturday ... in the park ...

Saturday, I went walking on the old towpath near State Park.

At one point, two guys in a Beamer passed me.  This is mainly a walking trail, not a vehicle road, so I figured there were three options:  1.  Drugs.  2.  Sex.  3.  Lost.

As it turned out, it was #3, which I discovered when they turned around and the driver rolled down his window to say, "Excuse me, ma'am, but we're on our way to a corporate bean-bag event at State Park.  Do you know the best way to get there?"

Okay, first off, corporate bean-bag event?  Like, as in, bean-bag toss? 

Dude certainly LOOKED the corporate type:  Clean-shaven, well-dressed, driving a Beamer.  But ... bean bag?

Trying not to laugh, I gave him directions to the park entrance.  What the hell is a corporate bean-bag event?  When I walked back through the park, later in the day, I briefly thought about trying to locate said event, but decided that the reality could never be as entertaining as the picture I had in my mind, so I gave it a pass.

And you know, I find myself getting "ma'am"ed an awful lot lately.  And I got a bunch of it on Saturday, first from the cable guy (who looked disturbingly like a young, fit Russell Crowe *cough*), then from the Beamer dude, and still more later on when I went shopping.

When do we go from Miss to Ma'am, do you think?  Is there an age cutoff?  I'd rather be a Miss than a Ma'am, although I can't quite put my finger on why.  Is it because Ma'am means old and Miss means young?  

While I spend zero time wishing I was young again, I do kind of miss Miss.  Go figure.

The Name Game

So!  The fosters are still with me. Here they are!

Not much progress to report.  They are not UNfriendly; they just don't trust people.  Understandable.  And so I soldier on; I am breaking down and having cable put into that bedroom this weekend.  I might as well be able to watch TV while they ignore me.

And.  Names.  The calico I've been calling Callie, because that's original *snort* and also the name of every other calico on the planet.  I tried LOTS of names, but Callie is the only one that has stuck to date. Callie Ann, to be specific.

Now.  THIS girl:

Isn't she a spitfire?  That is one fine-lookin' cat.

I thought about a jewel name, because of the spot she has on her forehead.  Topaz ... oops ... no stripper names.  Amber?  Nah, she's not really an Amber.  Plus, that's perilously close to stripper territory as well.  Garnet?  Maybe ... but to me that almost sounds like a boy name.  She needs a pretty name to help her overcome her tortie rep.

And oh!  That makes me think!  I was at a garden center last weekend when a cat came strolling up the entrance path to meet me.  It was a tortie ... a FRIENDLY tortie.  Her name was Shellie, as in Tortoiseshell.  I thought about Shellie for this girl, but ... nah.

And then I was on my way to work this morning, singing songs from Man of La Mancha as one does *cough*, and I started singing "Dulcinea".

"I have sought thee, sung thee, dreamed thee ... Dulcinea ..."

Hmmm ... Dulcinea ... Well, it's gotta be two syllables.  (Rescue rules - two syllables, nothing "odd", esoteric, or awkward to explain to a child.)  What about Dulcie?

I dunno.  Whaddaya think?  And any OTHER name suggestions are welcome.  Just remember the rescue rules.  While I am free to name my OWN cats things like Ponyboy and Sodapop, the fosters need to be plain vanilla.  




p.s.  Yes, I DID review name suggestions from previous posts.  None of them seemed quite right for this gal, although Domestic Kate's earlier suggestion of Poppy comes pretty close ...

p.p.s. And yes, ninety percent of the fosters get renamed when they get rehomed, but still, I've gotta have something to call them other than Kitty while they're here.

Tonight I had to google "trumpet vine pod" ...

... because a fantastical thing is happening out back by the shed.

I'll tell you what, fifty years in, something manages to surprise me every damn day.

... and yet another thing I have apparently aged myself out of understanding ...

... grown-up sippy cups.

I just had to run up to Staples to pick up some stuff for the office, and the guy standing behind me in line had a Dunkin Donuts sippy cup, presumably full of coffee.  He took a couple of swigs while he was standing there, in the thirty seconds or so it took me to check out, and I thought, really?  You're that thirsty?

And this is common now.  Surely you've noticed it.  Every damn place you go, there's a bunch of people with their sippy cups.  The mall, the grocery store, in the park for Chrissakes, it doesn't matter.  Where people are, there are sippy cups.

And I have to wonder, are all of these people really so sleep-deprived, or so caffeine-addicted, that they have to have their coffee with them everywhere they go?  I mean, I'm not averse to a nice hot cup of coffee, first thing in the morning or sometimes right before bed, but constantly?  How much coffee are these people drinking?  And what is it doing to their guts?  Coffee's pretty acidic.  (Although I am, admittedly, a little overly sensitive to intestinal issues at this point.)  And what's the appeal of lukewarm coffee?  Even in an insulated sippy cup, that sh*t's not gonna stay hot too awful long.

And I wonder how store clerks feel about constantly wiping up coffee spills and coffee rings and throwing away the discarded sippy cups. 

I'm thinking that maybe coffee is the new cigarettes.  You can't smoke all over the place like you used to be able to, so maybe carrying around a sippy cup is the new security blanket?

I dunno, I didn't meant to go all Andy Rooney here, but it's once of those things that once noticed, can't be un-noticed.  What do you think?  Are sippy-cup people taking over the world?  Are you one of them?

Hip to be square

So, I was watching The Voice last night (don't JUDGE) (hell, go ahead), and I couldn't help but notice all the hipster dudes.  Some were competing, and some were there to support family members, but when did boxy black glasses, side parts and bow ties (no, I'm not kidding) become ... cool?  Or wait ... is it supposed to be ironic?  I'M SO OLD.

It reminds me of what the math nerds in my high school were sporting circa 1978.  (And yes,  I DO understand that those '70s math nerds now make five times what I do.)  I guess that's "the look" these days?  It seems rather unfortunate.  Those are the dudes that got beat up by the bus garage. 

And there was even a Manic Pixie Dream Girl competing, which ... can't we lose that trend already?  Isn't that one kind of yesterday?

I guess I must be older than dirt, because I don't find either look appealing.  I just want to yell "Grow up and get damn job, already!"  *sigh*  And get off my lawn while you're at it.

I could probably use it for mortar

So!  I tried a new recipe the other night, for hamburger stroganoff.  It sounded quick and easy and ... good.  It was quick and easy.  Good?

Not so much.

I don't mind cooking.  I love to eat; thus, I cook.  But  it seems like I make the same stuff all the damn time.  Chicken.  Pizza (okay, totally take-out on that one.).  Steak.  Chicken. Spaghetti.  Pork.  More chicken. 

And I do not do complicated recipes.  If a recipe has more than, say, eight or ten ingredients?  Nope. I don't have the time, or the inclination, to screw with anything complex.

So when I saw a recipe for hamburger stroganoff that sounded edible, and cheap, and simple, I gave it a whirl.

Which explains why I currently have a big ol' tub of bland, mortar-like substance in my fridge.  I keep opening it up, and looking at it, and sniffing it, hoping it will magically transform into something delicious at some point, but two days in, I'm giving up hope.

Time to call the pizza place.

Anybody got any good recipes?

Feeling churlish

So, the furnace has been acting up the last few days.  It never has run right, being grossly oversized for the house (thanks, previous dipsh*t owner!), but the last few days it refused to run at all.

I did a little research, and discovered that furnaces are kind of like cars - you can spend as much as you wanna spend, depending on size, bells and whistles, warranty, etc.  I figured that if I needed to replace the sucker, the furnace itself would cost somewhere between one and two grand.  Add in labor - maybe 500 bucks, I figured, for a full-day install, and there ya go. 

I called the furnace dude and asked him to come out and take a look, saying nothing about replacement, only that it wasn't working correctly and needed to be fixed.  While he was tinkering and adjusting and doing furnace things, I said, "So, if it turns out this thing needs to be replaced, what are we looking at?"

"Oh, geez, at least three grand," he said.

"what?,"  I squeaked.  I'm pretty sure my voice went up at least an octave.  "From what I can figure, I'm looking at between one and two grand for the furnace.  It's gonna take at least a grand for the install?  It's a plug and play, for Pete's sake!  How long could it take?"

"Oh, well," the dude said.  "I could probably cut you a deal on the labor.  Say, eight hundred."

This guy is a one-man operation.  I will eat my HAT if it takes him longer than four hours to swap out a furnace.  Eight hundred divided by four is two hundred bucks an hour.

Holy sh*t, I shoulda been a furnace dude.

Seen on Craigslist

This ad was in the "Pets" section of my local Craigslist.  Spelling errors are the author's, not mine.

Children - free to good home!!!

*************This is not a real post**********

HELP NEEDED ASAP: Please help!!!! After two long years of being on a waiting list for a dog, we have been notified by the breeder that, at long last, our number has come up and ... WE ARE HAVING A PUPPY!!!
 

I must get rid of my children IMMEDIATELY because we just know how time consuming our new little puppy is going to be and it just wouldn't be fair to my children. Since our little puppy will be arriving on Monday we MUST place the children into rescue this weekend! They are described as:

One male - His name is Dustin, Caucasian (English/Irish mix), light blonde hair, blue eyes. Thirteen years old. Excellent disposition. He doesn't bite. Temperament tested. Does have problems with peeing directly in the toilet. Has had chicken Pox and is current on all shots. Tonsils have already been removed. Dustin eats everything, is very clean, house trained; gets along well with others. He does have a little problem with listening in school.........and he might have to go to summer school BUT only a couple of weeks and then you'll have the rest of the summer to play.(to late for that) He went still has a little problem listening but I'm sure if you give it some time he'll come around. Well guess what summerschool came and no change ...so it's all up to you, just give it a year or two.


One female - Her name is Katelyn, Caucasian (English/Irish mix), strawberry blonde hair, green eyes quite freckled.,six years old.. Non-biter, thumb sucker. Has been temperament tested but needs a little attitude adjusting occasionally. She is current on all shots, tonsils out, and is very healthy; can be affectionate. Gets along well with other little girls & little boys but does not like to share her toys and therefore would do best in a one child household. She is a very quick learner and is currently working on her house training-shouldn't take long at all.

I really do LOVE my children and want to do what's right for them; that is why we contacted you.. But I simply can no longer keep them. Also, I am afraid that they may hurt my new puppy. (and of course the puppy comes first) and besides the dog might have allergies to the children, I'm moving and where I'm going to they don't allow children.(can you imagine that)

I hope you understand that ours is a UNIQUE situation and I have a real emergency here!!! They MUST be placed by Sunday night at the latest or I will be forced to drop them off at the orphanage or along some dark, country road. Our priority now has to be our new puppy.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
O MY I forgot I didn't think they would get this big!!!!!

p.s. hi mom!! love you :) 

 

 

 

 

 

RockyCat here:  In case you're not a regular Craigslist Pets section reader, this post basically nails all of the "rehoming" ads.  The animals have to go TODAY, the kids are allergic, she's moving and can't take the animals, etc.  I think the only one she missed was, "I'm pregnant and I can't clean the litterbox."  Classic!

Oops! He did it again ...

Scalped my back yard, that is.

I got home from work last night to discover that B. had, once again, mowed my back-backyard down to the dirt.

How on earth do I tell my neighbor to STOP MOWING MY LAWN, ALREADY? 

Enquiring minds want to know.

Playing hooky

I should have mowed the lawn last Sunday.  Anyway, that was the plan.  But I hit the woods instead.

There's a bear in that tree! -

Fields full of yellow:

Wild asters:

Pretty soon, we'll get a hard frost and the leaves will start to change, but for now, it's still summer, dammit.

What would you do?

On Saturday, I went grocery shopping.  It was the last in a long list of chores, and I was pretty well frazzled by the time I got home and started unloading the car.

Which is when I discovered an extra bag of groceries.

The cashier had been using one of those turntable-thingies, and must have neglected to hand over this bag to the person in line before me, instead loading it into my cart.

What to do, what to do?

I did NOT want to have to schlep back to CrapMart and stand in line at customer service.  And it wasn't like it was a LOT of groceries; just a few items.

But still ... the stuff wasn't mine. 

"Forget about it!,"  I told myself. "This probably happens all the time!  And it's not like they could just restock the groceries - they'll have to throw them out.  The person who got shorted will come back in and they'll give him new groceries, that's all."

But still ...

I called the store and explained the situation.

The gal on the phone started laughing.  "Oh, lord," she said, "That happens a lot.  You don't have to bring the groceries back.  If someone shows up missing groceries, we'll give them new ones, that's all."

I feel better.  But I also feel a little bit sad for the person who is missing their Lean Pockets, Suave deodorant, store-brand immodium (I feel ya there, honey!), and cat snacks.  I ... I think we may be twins.  Well, except for the Lean Pockets, anyway.  That sh*t's just nasty.

And I still feel a little guilty that I didn't just get in the car and take the damn groceries back. What would you have done?

Crazy Rain

Last night, severe thunderstorms hit just as I was heading home from work.

It was loads of fun - Lightning, and thunder, and crazy rain, and gusty winds, and flooded roads and downed power lines and I kept pulling into parking lots to wait it out, but then the parking lot would start to flood and I would have to keep moving, and at one point there was a flock of flipping TURKEYS in the road, and I started to wonder if I was dreaming.

So yeah.  Fun.

In the space of 45 minutes, I got over two and a half inches of rain at my place.  That's a lotta rain.

Oh, I mean, it's not as much as in 2011, when Tropical Storm Lee dropped over ten inches of rain before the rain gauge finally overflowed.  And it's not as bad as Hurricane Irene, when I got over five inches.  And ...

... it's official.  I'm officially old, aren't I?  "I remember back in 2011, when Tropical Storm Lee blah blah blah ..."

Geez.  Only fifty, and already reminiscing about the weather.  Sucks getting old.

Wait ... what?

There's a Harlequin Romance on my bookshelf.  I have no idea how it got there; I mean, I assume I picked it up at a book sale someplace, but I'm not sure why.

Not that there's anything WRONG with Harlequin Romances; the mom of one of my best friends in high school went to the library every week and brought home a wheelbarrow full of them; I have nothing but respect for anyone who reads that much, and for books in any form.  I have no idea how many Archie comic books I plowed my way through in elementary school.  Reading is reading.

SO.  My point.  I do have one.  The other day I was browsing my bookshelf, seeing what to read next, when I spotted the Harlequin.  I picked it up, flipped it open, and here's the first sentence I came to:

"In all probability Luque de Mayo was so unpredictable that those who knew him as well as anyone was able to know him were not surprised when he did the unexpected."

- from Satan Took a Bride by Violet Winspear.
 
FIRST off, "Satan Took a Bride"?!?  AWESOME title.  Secondly, I think that sentence has to be one of the most convoluted things I've ever read.   What's that award?  The "dark and stormy night" award?  They should start up another one for most confusing sentence.  I'm pretty sure Ms. Winspear would win.

I mean, a simple "Everyone knew that Luque was unpredictable" would have done.  I am hoping that Ms. Winspear was getting paid by the word, because she really milked that baby for all it was worth.  Now I kind of want to meet her.  Just to shake her hand.

Weekend roundup

Well, I started off the weekend on Friday afternoon with a couple of hours in the doctor's office, which is never a good thing.

And then Saturday morning I had to pick up a prescription at the pharmacy, which turned out to be for ... suppositories?  VERY FUNNY, DOCTOR.  That's a big hell no. What the f*ck?  nonononono.  Jeezus Christ, everybody's a comedian.

I decided to spend the weekend looking for the stuff I'd been trying to buy all summer on the cheap without success.  I started off by hitting up the garage sales the next street over, where I picked up a pickaxe for five bucks.  Now it will be MUCH easier to kill those pesky neighbors.

I finally went ahead and did this:

It's hard to tell from the reflection of the trees in the glass, but there's seventeen cats on the window.  Well, actually, now there's more, since I went out again and painted some more on.  I used white-out, which may have turned out to be an unwise decision, since I spilled some on my leg and many scrubbings later, it's still there.  Those cats may be on that car when I trade it in, is all I'm sayin'.

Sunday I hit the flea market, where I picked up an area rug for five bucks!  After scrubbing about five pounds of pet hair out of it, it's currently drying in the back yard.  What else?  Oh yeah, I picked up a landing net, which I'm going to remake with a pillowcase into a cat capture device.  Because I've learned how effective those rescue gloves are ... Oh yeah!  And I got a pair of turquoise boots for three bucks.

Next stop, Label Shopper, home of incredibly cute Chinese-import shoes.   One pair of unicorn shoes later, it was off to the thrift store, where I stole Birdie's idea and bought a mirror for the garden.

There was a lot of time spent in the foster room.  *sigh*  Dear kittens:  I am not the enemy.  I will not eat you.  Trust me.

And I watched the Bills game, which ... oh lord, hope springs eternal in the hearts of Bills fans.  And that's all we have, is hope, because holy SH*T those guys sure know how to break your spirit.

And then the new week started at two-thirty this morning, when I discovered a frog in the bathroom.  At first I thought the poor thing was a goner, because he was belly up and not moving, but when I went to scoop him into an empty cool-whip bowl he twitched, so I set him in the tub and ran a little water and ...voila!  Rejuvenated frog.  I left him there until it got light out and moved him outside into the ditch, where he happily hopped away.

Hopefully that's a good omen for the week ahead, and not a precursor for a plague of locusts or something.

Tinks explains it all

As I've mentioned before, these two little gals absolutely worship Tinks.  Heck, they were rescued from the same neighborhood - maybe they're long-lost cousins or something.

Tinks has always been good with the foster kittens.  All of the perma-cats like to go in the foster room to check out the food (it's a grass is greener kind of thing, I think - the food is basically the same as what they get), but Tinks is the only one who will stay and visit.  In the mornings before I leave for work, I often have to pick him up and carry him out of the room - I'm afraid he'd get bored if he stayed in there all day, and I don't want him busting out the door or anything.  (Don't laugh - that is one strong cat.)

And Tinks LOVES to have new cats to practice his grooming skills on:

Oh, Tinks.  You're a sweetie.

What in the hell IS that?!

This:

I mean, obviously, it's some kind of PLANT.  But it appears to be growing in the air, on the phone pole guy wires.

Here's a closer look at the leaves.  Earlier in the summer, it was greener, but now it's starting to turn red.

It's almost tree-like, in that the stems are woody like branches:

It seems to be coming out of that yellow wire guide, which makes me wonder if enough dirt made its way in to the wire guide over the years to give sustenance to the plant.  I dunno.

Anybody know?

Lake Edition

On Sunday, I headed for Cayuga Lake, where my family has a cottage.  I haven't been to the cottage in years due to my sister TIB being a b*tch (long story).  The cottage hasn't changed; I'll tell you what, that thing musta been built like a brick sh*thouse, because it was built over 80 years ago, right on the water, and it's still standing.

My brother A (the one I got busted for trespassing with) took me for a boat ride:

See ya next time, A!

State Fair Edition

So, yesterday, I hit the road for the fair.

Whole lotta nothin' in the ninety miles between here and Syracuse,  where the fair is held, but it's still a pretty drive. I was not feeling well (Hello C-diff my old friend; you've come to f*ck with me again) and I  couldn't eat any trashy fair food (deep-fried oreos! chocolate coated bacon!) but I was able to handle some preshus, preshus soft-serve ice cream.

There was a sand sculpture:

And a butter  sculpture:

That thing  on top is a cow statue of liberty.  Awesome!  I was having a hard time getting good pics in the buildings.

And I got to thinking, they ought to make the sand sculpture out of brown sugar instead.  Then, at the end of the fair, they could take the sugar sculpture and the butter sculpture and bulldoze them together and dump a truckload of flour and lots of eggs on top and make cookies!  State Fair cookies!

Yeah,  I think about weird stuff when I'm wandering around the fair.

There was a display of miniature circuses (circi?):

Bought:  A dress and a skirt (I am not immune to the trashy, supposedly "ethnic" crap you can buy at the state fair), some two-bucks-each cocktail rings, and an amazing pair of bobblehead dragons.  My bobblehead animal craze faded away several years ago, but if you can pass up bobblehead dragons, you're a better man than I am,  Gunga Din.

Got to see a heifer calf being born - let's just say that the people in the audience who were dismayed  when the chains came out have obviously not spent much time on a farm.  And there were plenty of piglets:

That mama looks like she's just about over it, don't she?  "Yeah, yeah, you guys keep eating, I'm gonna take a little nap, here."

You could buy a chicken:

Those 4Hers are a practical lot.  "I will display my chicken with pride, and then sell it."

And I always love looking at the flowers:

I didn't even know they MADE round carriages, did you?:

I love the carriage and the agricultural museums, because they have volunteers there making baskets, and quilting, and blacksmithing, and doing all kinds of old-fashioned stuff.  And the average age of the volunteers is, like, ninety-five,  which is awesome.


Oh, and I spent a less-than-entertaining half hour in the parking lot arguing with my doctor's office over whether they would prescribe more Vanco for my third (or is it fourth) C-diff recurrence.  Final answer?  "No".  Should be an interesting next coupla weeks.

I  think I saw just about everything at the fair.  It was a ton of fun, and the people-watching is EXcellent.  You've just gotta carry a map and choose your restrooms wisely.

See ya next time, fair!

Oh, you shouldn't have!

... I mean, REALLY,  you SHOULDN'T have!

I got home from work last night to discover that when my neighbor mowed his back-backyard yesterday, he also mowed MY back-backyard.

I understand that he thought he was repaying a favor; earlier this summer, I mowed HIS back-backyard, when we had had a lot of rain and I knew that he wouldn't be able to use his big ride-on mower without getting it stuck.

It was really in my own self-interest, since the LAST time he tried to mow his back-backyard, he DID get the  mower stuck.  And then his son came to tow it out, and got his pickup stuck in MY backyard, and they never DID fill in the ruts like they SAID they would, and so I mowed his back-backyard that one time.

So!  He mowed MY back-backyard.  Sadly,  he evidently had his mower blade level set on  "bare earth", because now my back-backyard looks like a schoolhouse lawn where the kids walk every day, i.e, there's no GRASS there anymore.

*sigh*

Time to buy some  green spray paint, I guess.

Pretty pretty girls

So!  While the calico is slowly, slowly becoming less afraid of me, the tortie's favorite spot is still under the bed:

She IS a pretty thing, isn't she:

She looks kinda like a Jackson Pollock painting.  I believe her actual coat designation is "tortie and white" - please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

I have to confess - I am not fond of torties as a rule.  Their schizophrenic personalities are wearying.   Rescues I've volunteered with call friendly torties "anti-torties", because most torties want nothing to do with people.  They're really kind of ideal for someone who ... can take a lot of ignoring?  And sleep with one eye open?

Jump in any time with your friendly tortie stories - it gives me hope for the future.  And I'm hoping that by badmouthing torties here, the gal in my bedroom will prove me wrong and turn into a lovebug.  Hey, one can hope, right?

ANYhow, at this point, her sister the calico really isn't a whole lot friendlier:

The one-eye-eyeliner look SLAYS me.  I call her the pirate cat.  And her coat is really interesting.  Here's a better shot of it:

Isn't that gorgeous?  I think technically she's a Caliby, or Calico Tabby.  Maybe.  I'm really bad at coat designations, and I still have NO IDEA what a "torbie" is.  Anybody?

That's Tinks in the foreground of the pic above.  Both of the fosters IDOLIZE Tinks.  It's adorable.  As soon as he strolls into the room, they are ALL OVER HIM. The calico lays down in front of him and purrs and purrs and purrs.  He is a rock star of the cat world, evidently.

So!  That's the news from the foster room.  Slow and steady progress.  These gals were four months old when they came to me, which most rescues regard as "too old" to be socialized.  And up to that point, every single contact they had with humans resulted in bad things - Being live-trapped, being separated from their mama, being spayed, being vaccinated ... It's like if I was walking down the street one day, minding my own business, and a spaceship full of aliens swooped down and beamed me up and started doing experiments on me.  I don't think I'd be befriending my captors any time soon, if ever, and that's what these guys are going through.  I'll tell you what, when you foster ferals, you've gotta be good at handling rejection.  It DOES hurt to have a cute, cuddly kitten in your house who hates you. But as it turned out, my busy schedule hasn't been a problem, because about twenty minutes at a time of "human in the room" is all they can handle at this point.

And I will keep soldiering on, because every cat (yes, even torties. *sigh*) deserves a chance.

Who knows?  One of these days I may actually be able to PET them.

So, yeah, I was all excited about it until I wasn't

The Million Second Quiz, that is.

I was watching some god-awful show on TV last night when an ad came on for something called the "Million Second Quiz".  I wasn't really paying much attention, as usual, but I did hear the part where you could qualify on line.  Ha!  A way to fill up my lunch break!

So today, on my break, I went on line and qualified for the show.  It's basically a remake of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire", and my butt is STILL smarting from the time I blew it with that one (back when Millionaire was big, I ALMOST made it on the show, but choked when I got a question about "The Godfather", which I'd never read or seen.  Sh*t!).

Wait ... where was I?  Okay, so yeah, Million Second Quiz is multiple choice like Millionaire, and to qualify, you just go on line and sign up, and you can either play against your friends, or have the software randomly match you with someone.

It took about half an hour and nine or so rounds to get enough correct answers to amass enough points to qualify.  Of course, like Millionaire, nine billion OTHER people are qualifying, too (the questions AIN'T THAT HARD) (except for the ones about rappers, I'm kinda screwed there), so in order to up my chances of getting called for the show, I'd have to keep on qualifying.

But!  I got my first qualifier, and filled out all the contact info, and realized that I didn't have a current picture to attach, and that I'd have to *gasp* take a selfie.  Errrrrrr ... I skipped that part, figuring it could wait.  Forever, if possible.

But then!  I got to wondering where the "million seconds" come in, and it turns out that the show lasts for twelve days.  Twelve CONSECUTIVE days, where you're shut in a building in Manhattan and have to keep going head to head against other contestants, dueling it out over and over until it gets narrowed down to the final four.

Ummmmmm ... twelve DAYS?


Yeah ... no ... that doesn't sound like so much fun.  Even the free trip to NYC wouldn't be any biggo for me, seeing as how I could get in my car and DRIVE there in four hours.  And the whole thing just sounds kind of ... grueling.  Kind of Long Walk-ish.

I mean, of course, I could just go, and tank out whenever I got tired of it, but I'm pretty sure the producers will come down pretty hard on somebody trying to do that, and ... meh.  I dunno.  And I STILL haven't read or seen The Godfather, so there's that.

In the end, I'll probably keep qualifying.  It IS kind of fun, even if it is a massive time-suck. 

And I need to avenge my Millionaire blowage, dammit!

That time I got my brother busted for trespassing

Yesterday, my brother was in town, and we decided to head up to the schoolhouse. We walked all around and were heading back to the car when this lady came screeching up in a black SUV.

"HEY!" she yelled. "Can't you see this property is POSTED?"

 There was a posted sign on the corner of the building, although it was pretty faded, and you couldn't read the name of the property owner. And the land itself wasn't posted. But I wasn't gonna argue with her. She was pissed.

 "Yes, ma'am," I said. "We just wanted to take a look at the schoolhouse."

 We kept walking toward the car.

"This property is POSTED!" she repeated. "Can't you READ?"

"Yes, ma'am," I said. "We're leaving now."

Posted Lady glared at us from her car, waited until we got in our car, and then FOLLOWED us to make sure we were really leaving.

Phew!

 Look. I understand posting your property. It's just that around here, it's done almost exclusively to keep uninvited hunters off your land. Or, in the case of the schoolhouse, to keep kids from partying there, I would imagine. Most people who post their land don't care if someone just walks through. And I don't know if the lady who had a hissy fit even OWNED the property, or was just a pissy neighbor.

 In any event, we were in the wrong. We were on posted land. Bad us.

And I'm sure we'll be talking about Posted Lady at family get-togethers for quite some time. As I sing-songed in the car, "I got my brother in TROU-ble! I got my brother in TROU-ble!" And as my sister Ditzy's boyfriend said later, "You went looking for ghosts and found a witch!" Posted Lady. Part of Clark family lore since 2013.

The schoolhouse story

Here we go, guys!

As I mentioned yesterday, I was chatting with the door guy, and Ingraham Hill Road came up.

"Do you know the cemetery there?," he asked.

"Sure!," I said.  "I was just there a few weeks ago, checking out the headstones!"

"You know the story about the cemetery, right?  About how it's there for the schoolhouse?," he asked.

"Ermmm, no," I admitted.  "What schoolhouse?"

"That building right up the road from the cemetery," he said.  "The one that's boarded up?"

"Ohhhhhhh!," I said, the light dawning.  That was an old schoolhouse?"

"Yeah, and something awful happened there."  He lowered his voice.  "A long time ago, the schoolteacher locked the doors and set the building on fire.  He killed all of the pupils and himself.  The cemetery was created to bury the bodies."

Whoa.

"Whaaaat?!  How long ago was this?," I asked.  "I've never heard anything about it!"

"Oh, a long time ago," he said.  "Like ... back in the early 1900s.  That's a really spooky neck of the woods," he continued.  "My friends and I used to go up there at night and there was definitely something ... strange.  They say you can see the ghosts of the students in the cemetery.  And one time I heard the school bell ringing in the night."

Sadly, like most good ghost stories, this one did not hold up to scrutiny.

I remembered that there were headstones in the cemetery dating from the 1860s, long before the cemetery was supposedly created for the victims of the fire.  And I didn't remember seeing a large number of headstones of school-aged children, circa early-1900s, at the cemetery.  And I've lived in this town for most of my life - it seemed odd that I'd never heard of this incident before, even if it did take place a century ago.

Time to do some research.

Googling "Ingraham Hill Schoolhouse Tragedy" or "Ingraham Hill School Fire" didn't cough up any info.  I did find a couple of old photos.  This one is dated 1920, and it looks like the building was still in use.

I found some photos of newspaper clippings.  This one says the building hadn't been used for two decades, but there's no date on it:

This photo shows the same distinctive woodwork that I saw the day of my visit:

But there's no mention of a tragedy.  In a local town historical society newsletter, I did find the reminiscences of a woman named Eleanor Maxian Haines of her time at the school:


"As a small child, I lived on Town of Binghamton family farms.  At age 5, in 1930, I started Grove School on the corner of Hawleyton and Maxian Roads.  I walked (really) two miles to school.  With no kindergarten, everyone started in first grade.   One teacher taught 8 grades to 20 students in that one room schoolhouse.  When I was 8, we moved to Ingraham Hill.  There were only 13 students in Ingraham School. My mother, and both her parents, also attended this school.  Usually we went home at noon, but in winter we ate lunch at school. Sometimes a mother would make scalloped potatoes or a kettle of soup. One day a small child brought a mustard sandwich. (Remember, it was the ‘30’s...)

It's so purty

Meet the new door:

It's so funny - this morning I kept walking into the living room and going, "Why is the door open?"  Duh.

The trimwork still needs to be finished up, but I think it's safe to say that that's one purty door.

And oh!  The door guy and I got to gabbing while he did the install, and guess what?  Remember that boarded-up building?  The door guy says that it's an abandoned one-room schoolhouse!  And according to the door guy, it's got a tragic past that ties it in with the cemetery and holy cow it's a rip-snorter of a story.  Which I will tell you tomorrow ...



 

The door guy is here! The door guy is here!

When the contractor called last night and said he could come over today to install the door, I was all, "OH YEAH!"  Such! Excitement!

Here is the old door:

Other than the cool,  cool spyhole, the door is just meh.  I like the natural wood finish,  but I need more light in the living room.

Here's the door from the outside:

It's not exactly ... welcoming, is it?  It's more ... "Halt!  Who goes there?"

So now the old door is gone:

Coming soon:  New door!

And oh!  In other neighborhood news, my crazy-a** neighbors are resealing their driveway AGAIN.  When I saw L.  pulling their car over into the park this morning,  I was all ... naaaaw.  Can't be.  But then I asked her, and yep!  They're having their driveway re-done for the third time in three years.  Ohhh-kay, peeps.  Just DON'T ASK TO PARK IN  MY DRIVEWAY THIS TIME.  Sheesh.

Papa ... papaRAZzi

Oh, these gals are shy.

I was told that the calico would make a mad dash for a hiding spot as soon as her carrier was opened, so I snuck a pic first:

Yeah, she just wanted OUT.

and here's her sister, Closet Cat:

Lordie, she's a tortie.   Heaven help us all.

And I only have half the litter - there's another girl and a boy still to come.  I'm going to start with these two first and get some progress going before the other two come along.

Oh leetle keeeeeteeeeessssssss .....

I got a new doo-ooor, I got a new dooo-oooor

As in, "door".  But it's not as much fun if you don't sing-song it.

I have been delaying buying a new front door for literally years now.  Any time I had the money, something else would come up.  Cat to the vet, car needs new tires, water heater goes kaput, it always seemed to be something.

And then there was the added difficulty of finding a contractor to do the install.  Around here, at least, finding a contractor to do a "small" (i.e., less than a couple of grand) job is nigh impossible.  And no, I will not use Craigslist.  One disastrous experience with a Craigslist "contractor" was enough for me.  And you guys KNOW I'm too cheap to subscribe to Angie's List. 

But!  Back this spring, I found a contractor who would do a door install.  Hallelujah!  And then all three of the cats needed their vaccinations.  And the car needed work. And then I got sick. And and and then I realized that there was never going to be a time when I had a big ol' pile of door money just laying around.

And my old front door was not getting any prettier.  I mean, there was nothing wrong with it, exactly, but I really wanted to get more light into the living room, and the old door only had one little spyhole window in it, which was actually pretty damn cool, but I needed more LIGHT, dammit!

So ... I bought a new doooo-oooor.

The contractor is (hopefully) coming next week to do the install. Yaaaaaaaaay!

ALSO coming soon to my house?  (Looks around to make sure no one is watching) (Leans in to whisper in your ear) (ssssshhhhhhhhhhh)

kittens.


Dun dun duuuuuuuuuun!

Reactionary

When I was a little kid, I tended toward the histrionic side of things.  My family still gets a kick out of the time I picketed the family room, trying to get Dad to stop smoking.  "But, Dad, I don't want you to diiiiiiieeeeeee!" God.

And I was a junior hypochondriac, too.  I must've worn my Mom OUT with my requests for bandaids, for cold packs, for ATTENTION MOM GIVE ME SOME ATTENTION.  Jeeez. 

And then I grew up and left home and in my late teens, all of my drama tended to revolve around my romantic life.  Then I got a little older and poorer and got more involved in the day-to-day struggle of finding enough money to pay for annoying sh*t like food and gas.  *sigh*.

THEN, as I hit my thirties, I got a little more comfortable, money-wise, and a little more resigned, romance-wise, and all of a sudden I had time for CAUSES.  Save the whales!  Feed the children!  MAKE LIFE FAIR!  Oh, yeah, that whole, "life should be fair" thing is a big one at a certain age, ain't it?  And of course, I knew EVERYthing and my self-righteousness knew no bounds.  Oh, I went through an insufferable spell, no doubt about it.

Then the forties rolled around and ran right into fifty, and now?  If you poke at me, instead of being met with an "AAAAHHHHHHH!" and a screaming lecture, you're gonna get a side-eye and a sigh.  Oh, I still CARE about things, just a little more ... selectively.  And somewhere along the line, I actually learned to, well, LEARN about things before going off into a steaming hissy about something.  And most amazingly of all?  I learned that I don't have all the answers.  I don't even know if there ARE answers to some of the big things, to tell ya the truth.

Who knows?  They say that as you get older, you regress, so maybe thirty years from now I'll be in the nursing home begging for band-aids and ranting about how President Bieber ruined everything.

Is this common?  Does everybody go through sea changes in their thinking as they age?  I kind of hate to think that I'm the only one.

Yet another hare-brained scheme

Do you ever see something that at first you think is kind of cute, but after a while it starts to grate on your nerves?  Kind of like those Anne Geddes photos of babies - the first couple that I saw, I was like, "Oh, so cuuuuuuuuute!," but after the millionth one, I was, like, "okay, that's just creepy.  Get the kid out of the flowerpot."

Right now what's bothering me are those family car window decals - you know, the stick figure ones?  When they were just stick figures, I was kind of okay with it, other than that it's letting potential pedophiles know exACTly how many kids you've got in that minivan and, therefore, the odds of being able to snatch one out of the herd without mom noticing.

But then they started to get a little fancier - Mom with a briefcase, Son with a soccer ball - and then, of course, the zombies came and ruined everything.

But now that I am evidently about to start fostering again (I KNOW), I was thinking of doing family decals of my own.  Stick-figure me, and my three stick-figure cats, and then one stick-figure each for the cats I have fostered.  I figure I can fill up the entire back window AND some of the sides.  Leaving room to see out, of course.  Safety first!*

Well, my dear religious neighbors will probably like it better than the Darwin-fish-with-legs bumper sticker, at least.  I'm just trying to be considerate, here.



*Ha.  Speaking of car safety, ask me about the shattered seat belt clasp that I shoved under the back seat.  On second thought, don't ask. 

Recently Read

Blah blah blah, skip it if you wanna.

1.  Nine Years Under by Sheri Booker - Memoir about a teenager who worked in a funeral home - Interesting.

2.  Clay's Quilt by Silas House - Novel about a contemporary coal miner in the Appalachians and his courting of a fiddle player. So-so.

3.   Next to Love by Ellen Feldman - Novel about WWII war brides.  I dunno; I felt like I've read this exact same book, by different authors, before.  Meh.

4.  Mama's  Bank Account by Kathryn Forbes - Short novel about an immigrant family in San Francisco in the early 1900s.  Charming.

5.  Dwarf by Tiffanie DiDonato - Memoir about a Little Person.  Interesting.  

6.  This is Graceanne's Book by P.L. Whitney - I loved, loved, LOVED this book about a girl coming of age in 1960, as told by her ten-year-old brother.  I actually dragged out finishing it because I didn't want it to end.  The only thing I really have to compare this to is To Kill a Mockingbird - it's almost that  good.  Highly recommended. 

7.  The House on  Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros - Vignettes about growing up Latino in Chicago - good.

8.  The Supremes at Earl's All You Can Eat by Edward Kelsey Moore - Novel about three women who are life-long friends - Funny and good.  Reminded me of Fannie Flagg's books.

9.  Moon over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool - Novel about an orphan during the  Depression - Technically a kid's book, but still interesting.

10.  Movie review time!  "Foo Fighters - Back and Forth" is a doc about, duh, the Foo Fighters.  Interesting and enjoyable, especially if you like Dave Grohl.

11.  West of Here by Jonathan Evison - Novel based in Port Bonita, Washington, with sections set alternately in the 1890s and the present day.  I had the same problem with this book that I did with a lot of stuff I've read lately - I didn't care about any of the main characters.  Meh.

12.  Palisades Park by Alan Brennert - Historical fiction focusing on a family working at Palisades Park.  Interesting and an enjoyable read.

12.  Faraway Places by Tom Spanbauer - Novella about a teenage boy in 1950s Idaho who witnesses a murder.  Lyrical and absorbing and short.

14.  Ten Cents a Dance by Christine Fletcher - Novel  about a teenage taxi dancer in WWII Chicago - Technically a YA, but with adult themes (premarital sex, gambling, etc.).  The novelist did her research, and it was an interesting and entertaining book.

15.  Big Girl Small by Rachel DeWoskin - Novel about a Little Person navigating her way through high school.  Sharply funny and a good book.  I'm not going to give away any plot points here, but suffice it to say that the author navigated several difficult subjects with humor and tact.  Recommended.

16.  Bright Lights, Big Ass by Jen Lancaster - Short, autobiographical stories about living in Chicago - Self-deprecating and funny.

17.  The Sweet By and By by Todd Johnson - Novel about two women in a nursing home and the people who care for them - Very good.


How about you?  Reading anything good?

Turns out the Mormons aren't the only ones with holy underwear

Remember back when Mitt Romney was running for President and people got all in a snit over the holy underwear the Mormons wear?

Yeah, well, I was perusing the Discount Catholic Store on line today (don't ask) (I need a plastic shrine, cheap), and it turns out they have a whole section devoted to "scapulars".

Which is a pretty gross word, actually, as it seems to be some kind of unholy mash-up of "scrape" and "scab", but do you know what a scapular actually is?

Here ya go.

My brother-in-law is a deacon in the RC church and now I kind of want to ask him what he's got on under his clothes, except that would be gross.

What IS it with these religious people, anyway?  I mean, I've said it before and I'll say it again, I don't give a sh*t who or what you worship, as long as you don't beat people over the head with it, but that's how it always ends up, isn't it?  You don't believe what I believe, and wham, there's a war on.  And now you add in holy underwear and all this other hocus-pocus bullsh*t, and I just can't with these religious types.

I mean, I understand that religions were basically created to keep people in line, because our ancient ancestors figured out pretty early on that a lot of people would run around killing each other and banging sheep and stuff unless there was the threat of an angry God hanging over their heads.  But now, millenia later, is that still really necessary?  Because it seems that there are still an awful lot of people acting like savages, usually doing so in the name of religion.  That don't seem right.

I don't know.  I don't believe in anything.  I'm fairly certain that the sun is going to rise in the morning.  There are lots of things that I like, but that doesn't make them beliefs.  And there are plenty of thing that I believe, even though I don't understand how they happen.  Like, I believe that planes can fly, even if I don't understand the mechanics of it all.  I see planes fly, therefore I believe that they can.  Or should it be, I see planes fly, therefore I *know* that they can?  I mean, it's not my belief that's keep those planes up in the air.  It's ... aerodynamics. 

There ya go.  Your daily dose of religion, with a side trip through aerodynamics, courtesy of RockyCat.  Ha.