…or Balloon

So, at the committee meeting today the Manager brought her deal back and put it on the table. Her soft suggestion that $15,000 be ‘forgiven’ didn’t fly. And now the folks she was working on this for will end up with having to come up with a $15,000 “balloon payment” in less than 3 years time, at one sitting. Methinks she didn’t do them any favors.

Speaking of balloons, Mary Baby Mary has been exhibiting a shift from her usual hugely passive behavior and is taking a position on the nom debate. MBMary is PRO-nom, and wants to have some right now. The new ’system’ has been for me to get Pearl situated in the WC with her nom on a multiple-y folded paper towel or the ziplock bag and then to pop open a can of Yum for Earl, Minnie, and MBMary. I put there’s in the space sink in a nice kitty dish so that mouths can approach it from all sides and it doesn’t fall off the counter or get shoved around the floor.

Well, MBMary does not like having to push in with the brownies. She loves Earl (indeed, she is actually Earl’s kittie), but Minnie puts her in a more grumpy mood just to look at her (that imp!). She usually just hangs back and lets the crowd go by and then pokes around in what’s left. You wouldn’t think it to see how big she is; she’s been bigger than even Pearl was before she lost weight due to her ‘condition’, and she can leave a bruise if she stands on you with even one foot.

Hanging back and frowning over the dastardly Minnie got her to passing by the WC door. Now that the other kitties are eating Yum I haven’t worried about their taking Pearl’s nom away, and I leave the door cracked open so Pearl can come out when she is finished. That means I don’t have to sit in there with her and watch her lurp-lurp-lurp, but can go on and tend to other things. MBMary, being a cat (= curious) nudged the WC door open with her flat little nose and stomped in to see what Pearl was doing. NOM!!! And MBM who never really got much of a taste of it before when the early leftovers after Pearl was sated was shared out, has discovered that she LOVES nom. She loves it MUCH better than Yum. Now I am catching her over and over having unbelievably been able to shove Pearl aside and tucking into the nom patty. Pearl doesn’t usually get shoved aside; she stands stalwartly with planted little feet on her short sturdy legs and her low center of gravity. She doesn’t move and doesn’t get intimidated. But for some reason she is sharing with MBM and even leaving her to it once she’s gotten her first share (she was going back for seconds and thirds after she caught her breath). And MBM does NOT want me to scold her and run her off. She resists for as long as she can before she trot trot trots away from me, squinting her eyes shut so I can’t see her.

Meanwhile, I may look back over at the sink and the blue kitty I see head down in the Yum bowl, flanked by brownies, is Miss Pearl.

It’s too complicated.

Oh, and back to the balloon reference — with happily sneaking nom, MBMary is growing rounder like a cherubic fuzzy blue balloon. Tee hee!

Postpone or Forgive

The “word” in question from Tuesday:

Scenario: A tenant is behind 3 months of rent for (with charges) approximately $15,000.

The manager wants to help out and requests the ability to defer the $15,000 until the end of the term, plus add 3 months to the term. Her request is considered and approved.

Comes time to write the document, the drafter poses the question, “Isn’t that going to be a big hit to have to come up with $15,000 in the last month of the term in addition to that month’s rent? Do you want to take that big amount and spread it out over the last year so it is not so awful for them?”

The manager says, “Let’s spread it out over the last 3 years, here’s the amount.”

Drafter starts to sew that into the document but then pauses, sharpens pencil, and realizes 36 x amount given doesn’t equal $15,000. Drafter suggests that the amounts be reconsidered. Manager admits that the final number wasn’t initially calculated correctly and promises to revisit.

Suddenly Manager says, “but DEFER means the debt is forgiven. When I was sick and couldn’t work a few years ago, my mortgage company DEFERRED my mortgage for several months and just tacked those months on at the end.”

Drafter says, “But extending your mortgage period is not the same as extending a lease term. You still owe RENT for the months you are in the space; additionally you have DEFERRED $15,000 of debt to a later time to be paid off.”

“No, I know DEFER means that the $15,000 is forgiven. I asked a couple of other people and they agree with me.”

Drafter: [Reads aloud: Deferral, from there and several other online dictionaries}

Manager says, "well, I really want forgiveness."

Drafter says, "That's fine. I'll add you to the committee agenda and you can go back and ask approval of whatever deal you like."

Manger says, "Thank you - yes that, plus I want them to clarify for me what DEFERRAL means."

[But did I not just ....] “fine, okay, that’s cool. Go for it.”

I wish I could find someone in the Angry Folks who defined DEFERRAL as she does, and I’d ask for it all day long.

Running Brat update: Several booby traps laid out for me today, set ups to goad me, etc. I didn’t “bite”, but passed the word along to my boss (who was out of the office). Shared some of my frustration with an ace from the Other Floor, who promptly shot up a flare to my boss and my boss’s boss asking for relief. Hmm. We’ll see if and how that plays out. I could actually physically feel my blood pressure elevating today, but I did not give in to temptation to squeeze the brat until his eyeballs popped out. AND no sniveling in the car from pent up anger as I blew home tonight. Some days I can withstand and shrug off slings and arrows better than others. There should be combat pay attached to this job, although there should be NO reason for it!

Off to the kitties!

And then there was Tuesday

This was my head by the end of the workday today. The day did not whiz by in a focused rapture, it was a day of torture. I know that with the Big Change to come with the Goat Rodeo there is going to be some lashing out and thrashing and punching and screeching. I just hate when I’m the one in the crosshairs.

Especially when I haven’t earned a good punch or thrash. And then I get to read an email that is so vague and amorphous and yet so full of despising for me without being able to put a fact to anything. Oh, other than that I am not acting as the secretary for a 25-year old ignorant entitled brat (out of college 4-ish months ago, never had a job before) and that, at MY boss’s direction, I sent an email requesting that work for our group be brought to me so that I can assign it to the proper person. Beyond that, nothing made any sense to me.

And as much as that steams me with ire towards the brat and it was all, ALL, I could do today to keep my mouth (and fingers) shut and just doggedly keep on trucking with work… I’m a bit frosted with the bosses who continue to allow the entitled behavior and try to tickle it under the chin with avuncular circle talking and cooing at the “precociousness”. This is the same kid who attacked Sis, who’s been horrible to me numerous times to my face, and who hasn’t a clue how to do the work. One could at least consider forgiving a bit if he knew how to do the work. But, no.

So, my boss says, “trust me, I’ll handle things.” “I’m schooling him.” “I’ll get with the lad.” Losing faith.

I wanted to leave earlier tonight because I was chest-poundingly upset once I read ‘that’ email, but at the 11th hour we had all the answers to the pending items from the negotiation I held “with” Whiny the other day, and I wanted to finish changes and ship the document out, and get on to other things.

On top of all this malarkey which truly had me upset, one of our pals, who is wonderful but just isn’t ‘getting’ everything in her new function, was in and out of my office, on the email, on the phone, because she couldn’t articulate something. She had presented a deal to committee, had it approved, and sent the document request. I have been working on it since the minute I got it, but have been stalled because she didn’t provide enough information, and as I questioned her on what was needed, she suddenly realized that she may have used the wrong words in her presentation and her request. She kept wheedling with me to try to have me ‘agree’ that her word meant something different. It doesn’t. I pulled up online dictionary one after the other and read the meaning to her. She still wanted to say she just knew it meant what she was thinking and she had asked around and… So she wants to go back to committee and ask for her meaning, and wants them to clarify what the word means. I told her, absolutely. Go for it. I’ll write you right in to the agenda. Whatever you get approved, that’s what we’ll do. But the word still means what it means. (Feeling a little like I was hanging headfirst through the looking glass). Let me know if you want to know the word and what she was morphing it to do to her situation.

At least Sis will be back tomorrow — although I was VERY glad Sis wasn’t there today while I was finding out things that were getting me so upset. Sis gets pissed if people upset me, and since she is already pondering deep and hard about whether SHE even wants to hang in this circus, I do NOT want her getting upset over more evidence of the kinds of things that have her squinting her eyes at this place anyway. I also do NOT want the target for flailing to get pinned back on her in any event.

To more important things, after I drove home with the wind blowing dust but not funk off of me, trying to go ahead and get a good cry out to relieve the pressure in my chest…

Home to Snowy already abed, although Chick said she had stayed up until almost 5:40 today, and had been up with only a few short naps all day, eating well. Chick is working away on a number of new header requests, some for people who are instantly thrilled, some for people who want to ponder the shape of a tiger’s cage. She still is finding bliss with this. I am SO happy!

Home to my kitties, ready to EAT. I’m doing better with getting the Yum out of the can for the brownies and Mary, but dang if they all don’t really, really, REALLY want to eat nom with Pearl! I’m now pondering that (once they get through all the Yum cans I bought!). Feeding them nom, too, would be 1/3 the cost of the cans, which I was surprised to puzzle out. I’m guessing it would have to be good for them, too? Hmm. Kitties are mysteries. I can only scratch the surface of figuring them out. Just when I think I do, they show me I don’t.

Tomorrow if I can get through the day with my equanimity, I must deal with the bad news letter with the help of “my people”. I just could not last night as was so worn out and late when I got home, and tonight my composure is too fragile to take it on, too.

Where’s a good fire hose when one would really come in handy on a day like today?

But good things: I made sweet tea all by myself again (and from memory this time), and while that was steeping I helped a tiny bit with household chores by emptying the dishwasher (did everyone else already know how much putaway time you save if you put all the knives, all the forks, all the spoons, into their own separate compartments in the silverware rack instead of mixing them up– and I just figured it out?), and taking things out and putting things in the dryer.

And I think Chick may be winding to a stopping point which means we can eat our own ‘nom’ and watch some shows together and be mindlessly entertained. Yea!

Tomorrow is another day, but what will it be?

Was that Monday?

Can’t believe the day whizzed by so quickly. That is not usual with a Monday, especially when I wasn’t feeling ready to go in and deal with things.

The weekend was a bit of a wash, what with feeling badly all Saturday and Snowy having a dip in her connecting. She wasn’t sure where she was, and we weren’t sure WHEN she was. At one point on Sunday as I helped her walk out of the bathroom, she thanked me for coming to see her and hoped we could have a nice visit. I laughed and said, “Snowy, we LIVE together! You can see me as long as you want!” She looked at me a bit askance then kinda-laughed, like she was humoring ME.

In the afternoon on Sunday we had a wonderful call from Nannie who at first didn’t want to push talking to Snowy in case that might disorient her. But when I hung up with her, Snowy asked if she could talk to Nannie, so we called her right back and they had a lovely quick conversation.

Later about 15 minutes after Snowy had gone to bed, my sib and family called and wanted to talk to her. I went in to see if I could stir her, and she woke right up and took the phone. I left her to have a long actually interactive conversation — which was unusual for her for a long time. She started with each of them the litany she does on the phone with just about everybody, “when are you going to come see me? I wish I could see you. I miss you. When are you going to come see me? I wish I could see you. I miss you.” Just the words make her start tearing up and getting weepy, and she doesn’t hear or doesn’t retain when the person on the other end makes some response. She forgets it and starts asking over again. Another thing she has started saying to us and to others, which isn’t a reflection of how things really are, “I just do what I’m told.” HA. “I don’t know, whatever you/they say, I just do what I’m told.” She can’t be made to do anything and it isn’t something we try on her!

And then as soon as the phone is hung up, she’s already forgotten that she talked to someone or what they said (she can never pass along a message or a story or share what was told her). The tears stop instantly — they are just a groove, a part of the pattern that goes with talking to people on the phone (= “I wish you’d come see me” = tears). It tugs at people and makes them feel guilty that they aren’t here. But we are at the point where many times in many days she doesn’t know US, who are here every day with her, even Chick who is here ALL day every day with her. Sometimes we are the help or visitors or just odd people in the house because she HAS no children so she can’t be my mother or Chick’s grandmother. As I mentioned before, she is having some times now where she can’t quite pull Pop out of the mist, confusing him with her father — but at least knowing that one was a father and one was a husband.

Oh, this horrible thieving disease.

But on to work today — don’t know where the day went, noodling and doodling and focusing on revising documents from the negotiation last week, and trying to get the pending issues sketched out and off to the real estate committee with all the information before Whiny could catch one of them in the hall and wheedle a complete giveaway. There may still be a complete giveaway, but at least it will be done with knowledge and information.

And then to find out that since MARCH there was a letter of intent for the 2nd deal with the same tenant that has all kinds of different terms from what was submitted for approval and then requested in a document — plus comments since May 2 that hadn’t been shared… And to discover that among other things the whole financial structure of the deal was quite different from that presented and approved and requested, I just don’t GET how that kind of information can be kept stashed away and not given out. So trying to work on revisions to THAT document was quite challenging and not behind me yet. Indeed when Doll stuck her head in and told me good night, I had to pull my head out of my narrow focus and come up for air for almost the first time all day. I thought it was still morning!

documents are hard to write and revise when information is not timely and complete:

I started to leave about 6:30 but HR stopped in on her way out the door to tell me she has a new philosophy that we all should just Get Along and Be Teammates with each other. I laughed at her. She kept jabbering until it was almost 7, saying we were all just needing to get along and work to help each other, while at the same time giving 93 examples of how she was feeling abused by various people expecting her to do things for them ‘instantly’ as if they didn’t know that she was working on some superhighpriority matters. Hmm.

I finally noticed that my phone message light was blinking, as I was shutting down my computer in an effort to bring the conversation to an end and walk out with HR to the parking lot to leave. It was a forwarded message by my boss asking me to listen and help him with the person having the problem who was voicing it so vociferously. That meant having to crank the computer back on, check some things out, call the boss, then call the person and leave a message telling him to call me with his problems. In his voicemail he was FOAMING and RANTING against Whiny, and calling her every spiteful thing you could call a deal person. So, apparently I will inherit him in the morning and try to finalize their issues. So, tomorrow probably won’t be boring.

I went home by way of the Cat Food Store as Pearl was down to one nom, and I had decided, after much convincing by the brownies and MBMary, to get them canned cat food to eat while Pearl had her nom. I was convinced to get the canned version of the dried food I got them the other day, and they were rabidly chomping on it even before I could get it knocked out of the can into a dish (phwomp - the sound of the vacuum ’seal’ letting go of the cat food). So, happy kitties in my tribe tonight.

Chick’s kitty BG is being fed her medicinal, dissolving-of-kidney-stones food in a (barf) effort-laden way. At least 4 times a day Chick fills up 12 needleless syringes with the cat food which she has blended with some water to make it syringable, and then she catches her kitty and squirts these down her throat as BG will not eat the food on her own. It is disgusting, but it works. We are hoping to see her improving more and more, although she is still thin now and will still howl, either from the pain when she has to use the litter box or when some of her meds make her feel like yodeling.

We have an eclectic household.

So, now Snowy has been tucked up tight for hours and hours (rising periodically to sleepwalk to the bathroom and then back to her room), my tribe ate their Yum and nom respectively several hours ago, BG just had her last feeding, and Chick has walked Charlie and she and Charlie and BG have just gone up the stairs to the aerie and shut the door. And I’m the only one still puttering in the dark.

YAWN! Think I will head for the bed and see if any sweet dreams come my way tonight. I know my tribe will try to convince me that I haven’t fed them yet, but I do remember that I did.

Chick made cream cheese and olive for a surprise for sandwiches for supper tonight, and she thinks that tomorrow she might, MIGHT make me some iced tea. All things to dream about

Sunday :-)

Chick didn’t take the hint in my yesterday post (in which I pined for her making me some of Snowy’s “recipe” for Sweet Tea). She has been splashing and swimming and soaking up the creativity pool with her headers, using each request to learn something new she is able to ably do with this art form. It is all pretty amazing and fascinating to watch her take the vaguest of ‘wishes’ and turn them into individual works of art.

There’s almost nothing she won’t/can’t do for the sake of trying to get things Just Right. Witness this picture of her braving the heights of a bucket truck to take an artistic photograph of a shopping center, for goodness’s sake!

She is delving into the intricacies of Photo Shop and Photo Shop Elements and coming up with some great things. I had no idea what those programs could do - I’ve used Elements to sharpen or brighten, but could never figure out how to do any real tricks. It takes patience and a dedication to the final vision! I love watching the creation process, although it is so magical that you can never put your finger on what? how? - just suddenly the SPECIAL is there!

Chick is wunderbar!!!!!

Added: Chick is so wonderful, she even  had a post on her blog about how to make Snowy’s recipe for sweet tea so I made some myself (I’m not helpless, but her version is better. Saw Jacques Pepin in an Artist’s Table episode with Itzhak Perlman, and he said, “once you write a recipe down, you destroy it; you lose the spontaneity with which you prepared the original.” Truth be told, eh?)

SO tired of this!

I knew I wasn’t ‘right’ when I woke up this morning, but attributed it initially to staying up until after 4 AM. Had some unhappy stuff in the mail, which Chick brought in right before she went to bed, and it upset and unnerved me — had the icy cold chilled water take over my veins.

So I stayed up a bit and hung out with Pogo, my solace many times, but even it was having a hard time settling me down, so I finally went to bed. The kitties were waiting for their supper (BAD Shu!) so they ate greedily at 4:15, but at 7:15 they were ready for me to get up and fix breakfast. I was not ready.

I played some of the Tivo recorded programs, which put me to sleep repeatedly. I’ve been watching “The Pledge” with Jack Nicholson for weeks now, over and over, and never make it even 20 minutes in without dozing off. It’s not a dull or badly done movie, so I don’t know what it is that just resets me to Zzzzzz.

The cats drove me as nutty as they could manage — walking on me, stickering me, nudging me, cold wet nose kisses… Pearl has this move where she starts off lying on top of me, then just slowly oozes herself forward without perceptible movement until she is completely covering my head and face. She thinks suffocating me will get me up. It usually gets her a push off the bed.

I couldn’t lie still anymore after awhile so I began actually THINKING about getting up. That helped a little - my head began to clear. Still, I needed some motivation so I scrolled around the dial until I found the cheesiest home decorating show and just could NOT stare at it. So I sat up.

And when I did, there was an echo from last week… which I tried to ignore because, hey, I’m WELL now, right? But no. I ran for the WC scattering kitties in my wake (they always try to wrap my ankles in order to herd me towards the cat food bowls).

Eventually I felt ’safer’, and headed out to the den to seek sympathy from the fam. Instead I found Chick superspeed cleaning in the kitchen, soaking down and scrubbing countertops, etc. “Don’t put anything down on there right now,” she admonished me as I started getting Pearl’s frozen nom out to put in a baggie to put in the fridge to thaw for tonight while I took out the one I’d started thawing at 4 AM. She told me that Snowy had already gone to bed, “for the night?” I asked? Yep. I looked at the clock and it was about 2:30. She said Snowy had gotten up at 7:10 AM, and was now exhausted and begged to put on her gown and go to bed. We can only hope that she’ll get a second wind and join us sometime this evening.

I took the nom back to Pearl and fed the brownies and Mary Baby Mary one of the last Meow Mix ’stews’ while Pearl lurped in the WC.

I’m so glad that Chick wasn’t mad at me for being such a layabout. I was hoping she would remember my pitiful request last night for a pitcher of iced tea (haven’t had any for 2 weeks :-(), but she has been busy rocking out headers for folks blogs and is WRAPPED up happily in a creative cocoon. When I came back out she showed me a number of the ones she’s been working on all day, with a list of folks waiting. I am amazed not only at how beautifully done these are but also at how different they are from each other. Every blogger has a different voice on her blog and a different image she wants to convey with her header. Many are not able to articulate what they want (”look at the words to this song and see what imagery you come up with”; “uh, I’d like something in these colors that is sassy”; “a skyline and some chickens and a martini glass”) and Chick delves into her own imagination and pulls out some pretty clever and cool visuals. Then she works by email with each ‘client’, endlessly allowing font changes, color changes, moving of elements in a square dance around the header, until the client proclaims, “That’s It! That’s Me!”. She keeps all the information organized in a notebook and color codes the status. And she is happy! She is joyful! She is being wonderfully creative (which is a huge part of WHO she is but hasn’t gotten to be for so long) and is getting near-instant feedback and appreciation for her creativity — almost like the days when she was on stage performing for an audience. I’m so proud of her!

Meanwhile, about the most productive I got today was to capture each of my tribe in turn and clip long stickers down to a more manageable length. Mary Baby Mary hates that The Most, and choked back a really ugly-languaged scream at me when she was the final one in my lap. MBM is a bit of a grump, though she is so passive and independent that she doesn’t wave that flag that visibly (she’s the one who thinks if her eyes are closed You can’t see HER). The other productiveness was to mow through bills — I have my more organized way of dealing with them now, and that brings some satisfaction to an task. Like housework, no matter how hard you work on it, it never gets done. Monday’s post will bring a new wave.

And there’s countless running from the computer to the W.C., doses of immodium, a few prayers. That’s what I get for eating.

Fried day and a meme for the kitties

Such a relatively quiet day at work today. There’s “some golf tournament” going on down the road a bit, and seems like most everyone who thought of it took the day to go enjoy. That made it pretty enjoyable at the office

Still, getting all caught up means there were many, many minutes that had to be stared at 1 second at a time — do you ever have those days?

Got roped into a conference call negotiation by one of the Kindergarteners — was put on standby yesterday starting at 11, then watched the time change about 6 times that day. It was shifted to 10:30 this morning and at 10:22 had a phone call that we were delayed again. Finally around 11:55 I was asked how long I would be at the office today. I sighed and said, well, I was really hoping to get out a bit early (thinking 5:30). She said, “oh, so we need to have the call by 3?” Cool! “Yeah, 3 works for me. Eventually 2 pm was settled on.

Of course, 2 came and went, but before 2:30 we were finally underway. I dreaded the call not because it was a negotiation. I’ve enjoyed a few thousand negotiations over the last 22+ years, and have always liked the play of the game. These are especially enjoyable if you are talking across someone who is NICE and SMART. I love learning new things, new reasons, new trains of thought, new information. I don’t like STUPID and MEAN - that’s a bad combination, and once or twice I’ve had to cut short a call with an admonition to act better or there was no point in talking. I don’t enjoy STUPID and LONGWINDED — that drives me nuts
and sends my attention to answering email or surfing the internet to keep from screaming.

However, today I dreaded just having to be in a negotiation with the Kindergartener, as I knew the other fellow was decent enough and his comments were fairly picayune. However, my ‘team mate’ has a voice that makes you cringe like fingernails on the chalkboard, she uses a very whiny tone, and she starts a sentence but by the time you get to the end she’s wandered through about 16 topics, not connecting the dots on any of them, and you don’t know what the hell she’s talking about. Not my ideal choice of ‘partner’ for a negotiation.

We got underway and the Fellow started by sneering and casting aspersions on a technical drawing from one of our really good people - he’d found a typo and started ranting about how he couldn’t trust anything we did. Not the way to get on a good side with me for sure. Whiny started babbling and giving up many things even unasked for to ‘make amends’. I tried to stop it cold by saying, “I’m not changing any of that on your sayso, only the boss man’s.” We eventually got by it.

As I feared, the Fellow wanted to march through every item from his previous list of comments that he hadn’t ‘won’, and Whiny wanted to just hand it all to him plus extras. I finally got her attention and signaled her to just SHUSH!!!!! I whipped through the rest of the conversation, giving up ‘little’, and that seemingly begrudgingly, so that soon, when I held silences (nearly having to clap my hand across Whiny’s mouth), he gave up ‘big’. We finished with a short list of things that really do need higher authority and another list of things I’ll just make work but he thinks will be a huge favor… and after we hung up, I pointed at Whiny and said, The More You Talk In A Negotiation, The More You Give UP! She gasped and said, I never knew that! Oh, I learned so much listening to you!

To which I coughed, “bullshit”, knowing her other strong habit of instantly forgetting anything good you do for her and instead tossing you out in front of the bus and driving efficiently right over you.

So, Monday we’ll get the bits approved or not and then I’ll zip through a revision and shoot it out to the Fellow, and eventually we’ll end up with 2 deals signed. I love that. There are things about the way things usually work at this place in this regard that I don’t love, and find totally ridiculous, and have been promised for 2 years that such would be fixed and it hasn’t, HOWEVER… with the long-hoped-for change to the Goat Rodeo on the horizon, I can only have that glimmer of hope that has been lacking for awhile.

Okay– enough about work. OTHER THAN TO SAY, right after 4 o’clock I went wandering the halls and found them echoingly empty and discovered that I was the most senior person in the building. When I ran up on someone a bit less senior, I ran the proposal past him that we should tell people to go home. He agreed that was a great idea So when I looked down the back hallway and saw a number of people peeking out of their offices, because FRIDAY and WHERE’S EVERYONE? was making the day unbearably long for about everyone, I called out, EVERYBODY CAN GO HOME!

And there were many puffs of smoke and spinning of wheels as we all scratched off shutting down our computers and thundering down the back stairs, heading to our cars and racing out of the parking lot. I was quite popular with this crew, anyway.

So HOME!!! Yea!!!! And I got home in time to see Snowy!

She was sitting in her chair, wrapped up in her blankets, sipping through a straw on her Boost. She had her freshly-done Friday curls and looked so pretty. However, she was tired and faded (going out to the salon really wears her out), and I couldn’t tell if she recognized me at first. The 3 of us sat and watched Oprah, until Snowy had worn out completely and asked for bedtime. Chick got her tucked in and off to dreamland.

I slipped into my room to get out of my costume and into relax-o clothes (ah… nothing like stretch material, elastic waist, and an overlarge t-shirt to say, “Welcome Home, Shu, Welcome Home!”)

I saw my kitties, who are never subtle in trying to manipulate me right to the food dish. The 2 brownies and Mary Baby Mary are still fomenting for canned food, and I’m thinking about that as it gives them such delight — however, it also makes me a slave to meeting scheduled mealtimes, rather than just leaving dried food out for them. Pearl tried to suck in her sides and give me a pitiful look that pled for her nom RIGHT THEN, but I pretended I didn’t see.

Don’t hold me to it, but I’m thinking of tackling their mess in the bathroom this weekend. I had made a firm plan to do so 2 weekends ago, but instead fell so ill I couldn’t even think about it. And last weekend I was (a) still recovering and hurting and (b) up with Chick and Snowy as Snowy fell ill, too. So, those were some pretty good excuses. Don’t know that I have any that can prevail over the need.

Chick has just come up with a new situation — she has been schooling herself in header design and photoshop and creative doing. She started with her own blog and has had some increasingly cool header designs with which she has combined some of her own photography, classic images, imaginative fonting, and fools with it like an artist at the easel.

She casually mentioned on her blog and to a few of her blogging friends that for a small fee to be put towards her saving for her FET she would be glad to try designing headers for others. Almost immediately she’s got @17 orders and has turned around about a third of those already — all different types of designs, images, feels — customized and tweaked to her clients’ content. When she has a lull I may try to get her to design something for me — I sorta’ know what I’d like. I need to save up some money (even though her fee is very small) to pay her!

For now, you see I’ve changed templates again and have a header that reflects the zillion stars and worlds out there in the universe. Can you spot Shu’s Small World amongst the dots?

Before I close, Pearl was tagged with a meme by kloh, and she asked me to post it here for her. She’s still thinking about who she should tag (part of the rules), so I told her we could do that part tomorrow. So I’m now handing over the keyboard to Pearl (unless she prefers to give dictation to me because her nails are too long at the moment to type efficiently).

The rules of the game get posted at the beginning. Each player answers the questions about themselves. At the end of the post, the player than tags 4 or 5 people and post their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves a comment, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know when you have posted your answer.

1. What I was doing 10 years ago.

I think this was the period when my former owners had me on the show circuit (I really have a hard time keeping up with the passing of the years, and can’t believe, looking back, that I’ve been around more than 10 years!). I twice earned Grand Champion status (not to brag, ahem) under my registered name of Lyric (etc.). I was also hanging out with my twin sister, Lullaby, and we were known as the Singing Sisters. Chartreux are noted as being “mute” (sorta, even though Mary Baby Mary makes a lie of that), so when we would sing together we were mostly just opening our mouths and miming our songs. It went over well enough that years later Shu actually ran into people at a cat show in Atlanta who remembered me and us and our cute ‘act’.

2. 5 things on my to-do list for today.

Sleep, purr, annoy Shu by petting her with my stickers out, eat, frown and hiss at Minnie.

3. Snacks I enjoy.

Cheese, nom, catnip, nom, and nom.

4. Things I would do if I were a billionaire.

Buy lots of nom, maybe even buy enough so that Mary Baby Mary, Earl, and even Minnie could have nom for their meals every day, too. Buy a number of automatic litter boxes and maid service to clean up after us all.

5. Three of my bad habits.

Petting Shu with my stickers out, farting, not heading to the litter box in time.

6. Five places I’ve lived.

Texas, Virginia Beach, Atlanta, Tuscaloosa (2 places), Jacksonville.

7. Five jobs I’ve had.

Precious kitten, Show Girl, Infertile non-breeder, Traveler, Best Friend, Healer –oops, that’s 6, but which could I leave out?

Here’s who I am tagging — although it will probably be Saturday before I can get Shu to go tag:

Cali’s Beautiful Girl

Samson at Aw Diddums

Nippon at Cats ‘n Stuff

Leroy at Petals, Kettles and Decals

New rides coming for the Goat Rodeo

Just a moment to wave at anyone looking over this way. I’m still so worn out and exhausted from being sick so long and from heading back into the fray.

Chick is doing much better and  Snowy is doing much better, although with her the sick&tired have definitely kicked out her memory for a bit. She has told Chick that she couldn’t possibly have a granddaughter because she didn’t have any children. And she asked me last night about the 2 portraits in her room, saying she thought one was her husband and one her father but she couldn’t tell which from which.

Kitties are perking up — it was HARD on them while I was down and out and not attending to them as assiduously as they prefer. Pearl had no nom for a week, and it ’showed’. She’s back lurping up her nom now, and hopefully her situation will ‘firm up’ again. Minnie and Earl (and Mary Baby Mary in the background) have been making a big case for their getting some canned food — they LURVES it so much (they “had” to eat some Meow Mix cans as hand-me-overs from BG who was sentenced to medicinal cat food for her kidneystone, when I totally ran out of their dry food and could not get OUT). Now they want nothing else even though I insisted that Pet Supplies sell me their yummiest good-for-kitties dry food. So they eat that, but put on Greek Theatre performances pleading for the canned. Must think about that.

At the Goat Rodeo (aka work), some BIG change is a-coming for the kindergarteners. Don’t know if they really know or ‘get it’ yet because they are still very self-absorbed and full of their own ignorant self-importance, but methinks thems about to be hoisted with their own  petards — or at least a bit of discipline and education and improvement is supposed to be coming their way. A new “leader” is going to be chosen from some interviewees in the next several weeks. Any such worth his/her salt will want to fire off a number of petards and clear out the teeming swamp. We’ll see. If nothing else, this should provide some entertainment in the near future.

Sorry — that’s about what I can manage tonight. I’m doing better and should be stronger and back to it in short order.

The universal “omigod omigod”

A couple of things first — thanks to Mary Baby Mary for at least letting folks know I’ve been down sick. Also, playing with my template again and don’t know if this one will last - just wanted something a little brighter at the moment, but feel like the font size is too small for my tired eyes.

Something I thought I would never do — have nothing to eat from Friday night of last week until Friday night of this week. During that period I have been brought low, absolutely FELLED by the gastroenteritis/ virus that took hold of me sometime/somewhere on Friday so that after I ate supper - a little bit of leftover pizza Friday night, I uttered the naive phrase, “maybe I ate too much.”

When I went to bed I could not sleep for the heavy, sour weight that just sat in my stomach. I thought I could will it away, but NO. Inevitably, the careful, cautious stillness-so-as-not-to-shake-anything-loose became the frantic run before the nausea took control. And thus began a week of violent, exhausting vomiting and tear-inducing diarrhea. Rarely more than an hour would pass between attacks, and the fear of leaving the tiny room and awful fatigue from physical exertion and lack of sleep made me cry and sometime want to just lie down and die.

Chick let me isolate, and in between running and losing, I slept and fought with fever. Sometime on Sunday, Chick was hit by a bit less severe attack which she fought HER way through as she was continuing to keep Snowy cared for. She scrubbed her hands and soaked them in Purell and bleached everything she looked at, the mission’s being to keep Snowy from catching this awfulness.

Along about Wednesday, I was allowed ‘out’ in the den, sitting far away from Snowy and soaking myself in Purell, as Snowy was very turned upside down by our unexpected turn of events, and needed some balancing and knowing what was going on. She couldn’t retain being told.

Chick pulled through first, though still, even now, so wiped out and tired. She pushed herself several times to make a quick store run to get the immodium the doctor recommended (I went through an entire bottle of pepto-bismal the first 24 hours with zero effect, and when we finally got the immodium, it was an improvement), SOFT toilet paper, some jello, a few popsicles, etc.

By Friday afternoon, I was no longer in danger of embarrassing myself (hopefully), so I made my first outing in a week and took Snowy to her hair appointment. Chick used the time to run for more vigorous cleaning supplies and scrubbed.

By Friday evening, Chick announced herself hungry and had me ride with her on a quick ‘pick up’ food run, which we did rapidly and returned home to safety. When she headed up to bed, something had me staying up even though my body was crying for the bathroom, for bed, for sleep. But my brain was waiting. I tried to entertain myself with Pogo (not seen in a week!) and kept telling myself, “after this game I’m not staying up!” And yet I waited.

Right around 2 AM, over the monitor, I heard Snowy sneeze. Then sneeze again, and again, and again. “Dang,” I thought. One more sneeze and I’ll get the allergy medicine. She sneezed several more times in a row, and before I could even make it out of my chair, Chick can sweeping down from the aerie to take care of her.

“Ha, BUSTED!” she called at the sight of my pale gaunt face glowing by the light of the computer screen.

I told her something wouldn’t let me go to bed. She snorted as she hunted and hunted for the allergy pills. She took one in to Snowy, and I could hear them murmuring over the monitor. She helped Snowy to the bathroom. Then she called for me.

Yes, Snowy was sneezing with her allergy, but she was also reporting her stomach was hurting. Chick and I exchanged OH-NO looks. We tried to be in denial, at the same time trying to face up to what was likely to come next. We were terrified at the thought of her being hit with this virus, not knowing how it would take the health out of her. Chick found a big bowl and held it for Snowy as Snowy questioned the stability of her stomach and we didn’t know which way she would be hit first.

the narovirus

From experience, I told Snowy, ‘get it out! It’s better once it is out.’ Chick, with her own stomach still feeling suggestive, was not appreciating that, but eventually it came.

And the shock and panic in Snowy’s dear brown eyes was heartbreaking. She didn’t understand, she couldn’t imagine the horrible feeling passing (well, I couldn’t either in the midst of it), she felt terrible and she didn’t know what to do.

Over and over she began saying, the most coherently she’d been in awhile, “Omigod, omigod, omigod, omigod. Make it stop. Help. Help me. Oh, no! Omigod, omigod, omigod!” She swayed, drooped, turned inwards, cried, looked at us to make things better. All we could tell her is, we understand!

And having each just been through what she was going through, we were reliving that awfulness, that desperateness, the fear that the body was controlled by a monster and we were just along for the terrible, ripping ride and things would never be right again.

Frequently she begged to get up and go to bed, and we would make a start down the hallway going the half-a-step an hour speed that she manages when she is not sleepwalking (imagine Tim Conway’s little old man sketches from the old Carol Burnett Show and then slow that down by about 10 times). We never made it to her room’s door before she yipped and we turned and tried to bum’s rush her back to the commode. She doesn’t bum’s rush very cooperatively. Unbelievably there were no accidents, but until there had been much ‘clearing out’, we tried to keep her ’sitting’ for as long as possible.

Her voice became deeper and deeper in pitch as she asked to just ‘forget THIS. Let me go to bed!” And we’d ask her to wait just a little big longer - and were rewarded when this proved the right thing. Or we’d make the start back to her bedroom only to have to turn and make the stampede. At one point I went and got her bed pillows and folded them over so she could lay sideways against them, but that was too tough for her now muscle-taut neck.

Eventually, we headed for her bedroom and made it all the way. Chick had made her bed up with much protection. By then she had gotten chilled - as she began to have a bit of fever, we’d tried to cool it with letting her have her bare feet on the cool tile floor and with a cool dooflicka on the back of her neck. But with her constant need to have on sweaters and have heaters and blankets, etc., the balance had tilted to her getting chilled. She began to shake and shake and her teeth were chattering. We piled her with sheet, blanket, the electric warming blanket, the comforter, and a huge down duvet. Chick put some large towels in the dryer and heated them up and wrapped around her and we heated the neck wrap in the microwave and I wrapped these around her feet to send warmth up her legs.

I took a moment to head to my own bathroom and make a start at putting on my pajamas when Chick ran to tell me not to change, Snowy’s heart was hurting her. I flew back in to her and felt for her heart beat, asking her what hurt. She’d told Chick her heart, her chest, but with me she was still struggling to put the right words to what she was feeling and finally indicated her nether regions. She was so upset and so scared. We were scared and I was trying to decide if we should call an ambulance or bundle her in the car and make a run for the hospital ourselves. I asked her. She shot me a suddenly perceptive look and said, No Hospital. Stomach. Her chills, now that she was all wrapped in heat emitting items, began to abate and she settled down.

We sent Chick to take a rest on the sofa and I stayed with Snowy. I tried first to stretch out next to her on her bed, thinking my warmth (it was SO HOT in that room) would help her, but whatever weight I’ve lost this week wasn’t enough to make me small enough to fit on her twin bed with her. So I pulled a pillow on the floor and stretched out like a faithful dog alongside the bed.

Several times during the night she was able to wake up and, by trying to slip out of bed without disturbing me, I was able to wake up and help her to the bathroom. When she came back she would ask for ice water, and I would fix her ice water. She would drink and drink and then as she handed me the glass to put on the bedside table, she would say, “Sure wish there was some more ice water,” and I would hand it to her again. I was so glad as from doing quick Internet searches Chick and I had seen that dehydration was the biggest thing to fear from this virus for her.

Finally we made it through the night and a last time I awoke to her sliding quietly along her bed. I sat up and offered to get her to the bathroom and she said, “I’ve just come back.” She’d made it alone with no problems and back. Chick popped back up and sent me off to rest on the sofa for awhile and she tended the next number of times. Snowy had little problem going back to sleep between times.

At one point during the night as she was settling back down, I could hear her speaking to herself softly and I craned to listen. I couldn’t make out much, but I did hear her say, “I miss my cat. I really miss my cat.” She thought about that a moment and then began a litany of something else she missed, that I couldn’t make out and didn’t want to disturb her by asking. It made me so sad. I miss her little kitty, too, who made her feel so loved and shared with.

Snowy is now tucked back up in bed and Chick and I have planned to take it in turn with watching out for her all night. I’m up first, then she is, then I will be, etc. Hopefully Snowy is going to get through this the most quickly of the 3 of us, but for her I hate it the most because she can’t remember that she is improving already and that she will feel well soon. She only knows the fear and desperation of the now, the feeling awful now, the omigod omigod now.

We are feeling it with her.

Dr prl

dr prl

u know momz sick? she tole me makes her 2 hot i lie on her. she sleepn so much cept she run fast to little room. how long u thinkz? it ben long timz already. u sposed to make her bettr.

mary baby mary

thas me