Category: The Good Man

If only The Feline had email

Look, I’ve managed people as part of my job for quite some time now. It’s a rollercoaster experience every day.

And yes, I’ve resorted to that weenie method of managing the hard conversations…email.

Hey, oftentimes, it actually works. You can disseminate the issue to a large audience with the click of a button. You don’t actually have to, you know, talk to anyone.

Plus, it gives you a trail. Proof that you told people something!

Anyhow, I’ve been wrestling with The Feline lately. Damn employee of the household has a mind of her own! Feh!

Herewith, the email I’d write to that damn cat if only she had opposable thumbs…and the ability to get online.

_________________

From: TheGirlHuman@thisoldhouse.net
Subject: Recent Issues for discussion
Date: October 22, 2009 8:35 AM PDT
To: CrankyCat@meow.net

Feline – As you and I have been sharing domicile for some time now, I feel we’ve both settled into our routines and know what we’re about.

Things have been slipping a bit lately, and we have some issues we need to discuss. Please bring a copy of this email to our next one-on-one (aka the next time you are standing on my head, sniffing my dinner while I try to eat). We’ll sort out a corrective action plan at that time.

First things first, as you know, you are fed at 8am, 5pm (snack) and 10pm. This has been in effect for some time. You were notified of these changes before they took effect.

Yes, we are giving you diet food. Remember when the vet explained why, Ms Fourteen Pounder?

As such, the yowling for feeding well in advance of any of the set times is unacceptable and this behavior must be curtailed.

This is especially true of the 4am yowlings. This only causes the boy human to throw pillows at you, and usually leads to your banishment from the room, which then produces hurt feelings and sad looks on your part for an entire day.

Please implement these process improvements immediately.

While on the topic of the sleeping situation, we must also address a space issue. As you know, the Boy Human and the Girl Human are soft hearted and allow you to sleep in the bed.

It’s also agreeable that you take certain liberties, like sleeping up ON me while I snooze. Fine.

Here’s the issue. Being as that I was graced with a bladder the size of a small walnut, it’s inevitable that I must rise at least once a night to use the human version of the litter box.

When nature calls, I carefully extract from around you so as not to disturb your slumber. Then when I return, I find you have streeeetched out to fill up the space allotted me in the bed. Sometimes, you even have a proprietary paw placed on the Boy Human.

I then have to push and shove you so I can get back into the bed and next to the boy. You respond by meowing testily at me.

This is uncool, cat. Way uncool.

Finally, while on the topic of usage of the litter box, human or otherwise, I’d like to mention that I can and am able to use the human litter box on my own.

I don’t need your company.

When you use YOUR box, do I run in there to stare at you and then get on the counter and sniff at your head and face while you do your business?

No, I do not.

Please cease and desist.

Immediately.

That said, your work in the sitting on the lap department has improved dramatically lately (coinciding, I’m sure, with the turn toward the cold the weather has taken, but fine).

Also, since you’ve been able to lose some weight, your playful kittenish-ness is rather enjoyable.

Keep it up!

Thanks in advance for your attention to these matters.

Best regards,

The Girl Human

(Execu-Kitty ignores your emails)

Oooh, that’s troubling

Last evening, I was heating up some soup on my electric stove. I managed to drop a bit right in that space between burner coil and the stovetop.

So, stupidly, I stuck my finger down in there to wipe it out. I was thinking, at the time, I don’t want that bit of soup to burn and smoke up the place.

Predictably, my finger accidentally touched the now hot burner coil, and instead of burning soup, I burned my skin.

I leapt back then turned quickly to the sink to run the burn under cold water.

As I rinsed the burn, I thought, “hmm, my food sure smells good!”

The soup was still on the burner, beginning to warm up.

Only problem was, the soup was tomato, and the smell I was savoring had a more meaty tone.

I turned to look, and saw a little smoke rising from the burner from under the pan. It was then I realized that the little bit of skin I’d left behind from the burn was now cooking, a little tomato soup on top for seasoning.

Let me say that again. What I thought, “ooh that smells tasty” about was my OWN SKIN cooking.

I’m now a little skeeved out at myself.

It’s like meeting a really great guy at the party, only to find out he’s your first cousin.

It’s how Luke Skywalker felt when he found out that the woman he’d been perving out about was his twin sister.

The Good Man does, occasionally, refer to me as his “tasty little morsel.”

I just never knew that was also true pan-fried and served with a side of rice.

And a nice chianti.

: shudder :

Life lessons from my craft table

I spent much of Sunday afternoon working on various art and crafting projects. (Check out my Etsy store if you haven’t already!)

So while I applied Mod Podge to glass ornaments and shook out glitter and painted and spilled and generally had a heck of a time, I got to pondering.

I’m a ponderer, donchaknow?

“Iiiii’m the kind of gal who likes to think around, oh I’m the ponderer, oh I’m the pondereeeer!”

Sorry. Ahem, random bit of silliness.

Anyhow, while waiting for glue to dry, I thought about the lessons for a better life that I have learned during the art of crafting.

Here’s a few I quickly jotted down:

  • Angry crafting is not good crafting

    • Oh yeah. I’ve sat down at the table, madder than hell about something, and stabbed paint on things, smashed glue into corners and hastily applied decorations.

    End result? Unpretty.

    To me, creating requires a certain letting go in the mind. Almost a meditation. Not to get all Buddhist or anything, but you have to be in the moment with the paint or glue or papier-mâché or whatever medium you are elbows deep into.

  • Sad crafting can sometimes rock.

    • So very stereotypical to say that you have to be sad and depressed to really create. In fact, I pretty much hate that this concept has become so ubiquitous.

    But, I do have to admit, sometimes, when I’m really down, and tired of feeling down, exhausted from the sad, I turn off my brain and let the paintbrush take over (or the keyboard if I’m writing) and I find that in that non-thinking space, I make some of the best stuff.

    Then again, I can be crazy-ass happy like a chimpanzee and make cool stuff too.

    It all comes back to where your mind is at. Not to put too fine a point on it.

  • Tipsy crafting is a no.

    • Yeah. Worse than angry crafting. You *think* you are doing a great job, but then you wake up the next day and see big gaps you missed, stuff is crooked, left the glue pot open, etc.

    Not that drunk crafting isn’t fun, it just isn’t advisable.

    There’s letting go the mind and there is letting go of your faculties. Know when to put the glue gun down!

    This was a hard lesson learned after sharing a small pitcher of margaritas with The Good Man over homemade enchiladas. Yum!

    Should have chosen singing out loud or playing the guitar instead. Will still come out crappy, but no lasting effects to remind!

  • A rhinestone or other well placed embellishment can cover a multitude of sins.

    • When I was learning to drive, my mom always said, “If you miss your turn, just turn around and try again.” And you know what? She’s always been right. Flat right. Don’t panic. Don’t freak out. Don’t give up on the whole thing.

    Just, be calm, and fix it.

    Look, they say what makes a book great isn’t the initial writing, it is the editing. I think what makes art great isn’t that you make something perfectly the first time, but it’s about all those “happy accidents.” Those goofs you didn’t expect but show you something more profound or deeper or more meaningful than you first imagined.

    Then sometimes there are just those “oops, my freaking thumb got in the way and now I have a huge ass smudge.” That’s when you slap a big rhinestone or a button, a milagro or SOMETHING fun over it and smile, because then only YOU know there is a mistake under there.

    Everyone else thinks you meant it that way.

    Crafting has made me give up on trying to be pefect and learn to welcome those “hey what the!?!? Oh, heeeeeey…..” moments.

  • And finally, as much as you may love your pets, and believe me, I LOVE my pet a lot, don’t craft with your pets nearby.

    • Let’s just say this…I was covering a wooden item in glitter. Glue went on, glitter covered the item in a big pile.

    I got up to wash off my glue brush. As I stood, the Feline was fast asleep nearby (on the table actually).

    I walked from the room, turned to check, yep, still asleep.

    Returned in about two minutes. I find my Feline with glitter ALL over her face and the glitter spread *everywhere*.

    Seems she’d taken a sniff, inhaled a bit o’ the Crafty Chica Nova Blue, and sneezed.

    *sigh*

    Also, I got weary of constantly picking cat hair out of my paint and glue and did I mention she likes to sleep on my paint rag?

    Feline doesn’t get to sleep on the craft table anymore.

    So, just exile your pets from your art space. Believe me, this will save many headaches.

    Unless pet hair is your medium, then knock yourself out!

All right, enough pondering. Time to get back into my Zen space, pick up my purple acrylic paint, and get back to crafting.

(not my craft table, but might as well be!)

Cost Savings Euphoria!

So despite the media chirruping that the “economic crisis is OVER”, really, folks, it’s not over. Not by a long shot. Recovery is a long and arduous process.

Like, you know, gaining weight is easy, losing the weight takes work.

And so, as we continue to deal with life, and money and everything that entails, The Good Man and I have been taking a look at expenses.

How freaking grown up of us. *sigh*

The first focus of our ire is Comcast. We have only the most basic of analog packages. It’s been fine. Cable goes right into the back of the TV and there you go. But recently, Comcast required us to get a box so we can receive digital channels. (they keep deleting analog channels as a way to force us over)

Trouble is, the box screws up the signal. It pops and pixilates and blacks out. If we unplug the box and plug back into the TV, no issue. The box is a piece of #$%^.

And really, we don’t watch that much regular TV anyway, other than baseball games, and the SF Giants season is ovah.

Soooo.

We ordered a digital converter for regular rabbit eared signal, and we are cancelling Comcast.

Oooh man, I can hardly wait to make that call.

As a primer, I called AT&T yesterday. I have a long and colorful history with AT&T. (work related…long story)

We hardly use our landline phone anymore, so I whacked all extra services, left just local on our line (for 911 calls or emergency use, we can still get incoming calls) and also got assurances they’ll keep our DSL rates flat.

I cut $53 a month from the bill! That is more than HALF of what we were paying!

Woooooo! Really, it was heady, adrenaline rushing fun!

Now I’m looking at everything trying to figure out how we can save.

Can we use a smaller trashcan? That would cut the trash bill.

Can we wear extra layers and set the heater at a lower temp?

Can we reduce water use?

Should be buy a generator and go off the grid?

Should we live in a shack with no running water and an outhouse and I’ll wear a hooded sweatshirt and write my manifesto?

Wait. Back the truck up.

Let’s not get carried away.

Update: I called up Sirius radio, I love my Sirius radio, and got them to knock over $70 off my annual renewal. Amazing what “I’d like to cancel” caused them to do! Yay!

Morning!

A nice way to begin the day. Sloppy greetings from my goddog.

Sometimes, you know you must be an ok sort of person if a dog thinks you rock.

My god cat was less sure about the necessity of my existence this morning.

It’s a gorgeous day in Southern New Mexico. I head back home tomorrow, happy from a great trip back to NM, and very happy to get back to The Good Man. I miss him so much it aches.