Lazy Blogging = Must Be Christmas Week

Christmas time is here much like a big truck barreling out of control down the street, its driver passed out at the wheel from meth, right into the side of my face. Of course I only notice it coming at the very last moment and then it is upon me faster than I'd have thought possible. I am helpless to stop its relentless forward momentum as it plows over me, leaving in its wake disappointment and emotional carnage. Yup, it's just like that only with tinsel. Suffice it to say, I'm too goddamn busy to write an entry and so I'm delegating this task to everyone's favorite guest author, Oliver the Cat. He's got a lot to say about the changes the house undergoes during this holiday season and offers many insights into why plastic bags are awesome.


Hey there everybody! Looks like I'm going to get another shot at this! Let's get into it! Exclamation points are fun!

I've been around for a while now. Like easily more than ... ok, I don't know numbers very well. All I know is that I have noticed that this house goes through weird changes. Right now we're in what appears to be the Tease Oliver Season. I'm not normally a complainer (unless I'm super starving or tired) but I don't think the humans understand us cats very well at all. Let me break it down for you all. See, we're creatures of habit. We like things to be just so. I, for one, check the condition of the pile of sneakers in the upstairs bedroom at least twice a day. If even one of them has moved, I will notice it and I then have to reinspect the entire collection. I then have to rub my face on all the remaining pairs of sneakers just to make sure that they smell like me. I don't want to, I HAVE to.

The Christmas Tree: They put up this big plastic tree-looking thingie that has all these flashy lights on it and then they dangled all kinds of toys from it. These toys look fantastic and I want to play with them immediately! But as soon as I even start towards this big distraction, the humans yell at me! Why? I should be yelling at them for not allowing the toys to be free! They seem to want to just have them all on display and not let us play with them. Where's the fun in that? Wouldn't it be more interesting to see how that shiny glass ball looks as it shoots across the room? They can't possibly be vigilant forever. As soon as they let their guard down, I'm jumping up and grabbing some of these toys for my secret stash (that's where I store stray socks, wine corks, and bits of plastic for future use). I will have that ornament. It will be mine.

Presents: As you probably already know, us cats frickin' love boxes. We love to sleep in them, hide in them, jump in and out of them, y'know, the usual stuff. But oh man, when a box has some crinkly wrapping paper on it? It's just this side of heaven. I could spend my entire day walking on those boxes that are sitting under that sorry, plastic excuse for a tree. The sounds of the paper combined with the angular rigidity of the box are intoxicating. I think I'll go rub my face on the corner of the boxes again and again until the wrapping paper either tears or gets all greasy from my scent. Ew, I just skeeved myself out.


Christmas Cards: One of the humans insists on putting these little bits of paper on the doorway from the big room with the fire to the big room with the food in it. She uses these little pieces of plastic that don't taste quite as good as a bag does but in a pinch they'll do for a quick fix. What is annoying about these pieces of paper is that she hangs them quite high up initially and it makes it rather difficult to get at them. It's like she doesn't want me to bat at them at all. I have noticed that sometimes the cards fall off the door frame and that's when I pounce! First, after sniffing the card to make sure it isn't going to murder me, I'll sit on it for a while. Then, when that gets boring, I'll eat the little piece of plastic tape. Fantastic.


Plastic Bags: This time of year the humans seem to bring a lot more plastic bags into the house than usual. Seriously I cannot say enough good things about these things. They are delicious. They make wonderful sounds. They're cool to the touch and oh, the texture. That amazing texture. I really don't think I can do it justice by trying to explain it here on this stupid fat man's blog. Go find a plastic bag and put it on the floor (if you have to jump on a table and knock it onto the floor, that's perfectly acceptable in my opinion. I take this approach when it comes to jumping up on things: "If the humans didn't see it, I didn't do it"). Now walk around on the plastic bag for a while. Sniff it. Sniff it a lot. Like waaaay too much really. Taste it. First start with some small licks that gradually increase in intensity and frequency until you have whipped yourself into a glorious, blissful frenzy. Then, just when you feel like you simply cannot handle it anymore, take some little nibbles out of the bag and let the full plasticky goodness take over your mouth. You should get some faint notes of animal renderings on the back end of the finish. Oh, it's in there somewhere. Then, flop down on your side and take a nap on the bag. If the moment grabs you, maybe cough up a bothersome hairball on the handle part so that the bag cannot be used as intended by the humans. That'll teach those show-offs. "OooOOooh, lookit me! I have thumbs!" Whatever freakshow, go clean my litter box.

Sir Oliver the Stupidhead

Turnips are Gross, That's Why

I have a compressed nerve in my neck. I didn't call it "pinched" because apparently doctors don't like that term. Whatever doctors...god, they're soooo sensitive. Yea, so um...my neck hurts and it sends waves of owies down my left arm as well that go all the way down the front of my forearm and onto my fingers. It sucks balls. So I ignored it for a couple days (shutup, I'm a stubborn dumbass) until finally last Sunday night, the pain actually kept me from getting any sleep. It got so bad in fact that I punched a wall in frustration. Not recommended by the way for two reasons: 1) it makes a hole that you then have to fix. 2) you could further injure yourself you big dummy. Also, you look like a huge jackass and immediately feel stupid and childish afterwards.

On Monday I went to my doctor and after some prodding, questions, and strength tests (still strong like bull) I was diagnosed with the nerve thingie. Luckily it was a muscle in spasm and not the more serious structural problems that was causing the pain. I was given a sling, a couple prescriptions for some meds (more on that later), told to rest for a few days and sent on my merry way. Well, that really wasn't good enough for me. I was still in pain and they hadn't done much to actually fix the problem. I then made the decision to go back to my old chiropractor to see what, if anything, he could do about this. Dr. Friedman worked on me back in 2002-2003 when I had injured my back. He's great and I can't recommend his practice Right Spine enough. I have gone a few times since Wednesday of this week and I can already feel the improvement in the neck.

So on Monday night after getting the prescriptions filled I took them and passed the frick out. The meds were 600mg of Ibuprofen, some Vicodin and some muscle relaxer thing (the name escapes me). I slept better certainly if by sleep you mean being in a coma. On Tuesday morning when I woke up, it was clear to me that I was not going to be doing any work for the next couple days. I took more pills, popped my arm in the sling, staked out a spot on the couch and tried not to grumble too much. I was fairly successful on that last one. The thing that helped was the Vicodin. Holy shit people, if you have never been on this drug then I feel sorry for you. I'm not one to say "Go do drugs" but if it is mothatruckin' Vicodin, take a dip, I won't tell anyone. Weary of the pass-out scenario of the previous night, I cut the pill in half and just took that. It left me with this lovely little buzz that I can only equate with having 2 glasses of really good wine and you are just about to reach for your third. Super mellow. Super Chill. Wow. I now understand why people abuse and get addicted to this drug.

Here are some things I thought about while under Vicodin:

• How come I can't taste my teeth? Or am I always tasting them and I'm not aware of it? How can I tell?
• How come I don't like turnips?  
• I wish I had had my teeth cleaned today. I love that freshly cleaned texture. 
• That freckle on my right pinkie is weird. Why is it there? Is it sad that it's all alone? 
• My forearms are hairy. My knuckles are not. Is that a good thing?
• I want to paint the stairs. Not the treads though. That would be ugly. Or would it? Yea, it would be.
• What if I got addicted to Vicodin? Would I lose the house and have to sell my booty for cash? Ugh. That's a horrific idea. Quick, think of something else.
• Blank. 

As I sit here now typing this up on day 7 of this thing I can truly say that I'm in the high 80% to low 90% better. And I haven't had any pills today either. I plan to not have anymore if I can handle it. There is still work to do over the next few weeks but Dr. Friedman says that I should make a full recovery by Christmas. Awesomesauce. He also does not like turnips.