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

Guest Blogger: Oliver the Cat

This post is going to be a little different. Oliver, the boy cat in our house has a wealth of knowledge about living in the modern world as a housecat and he has asked to address the world (or at least the 3 people who read this). I wasn't on board with the idea but he promised a cease fire on the daily hairball bombings for the near future if he could do this. That's a pretty sweet deal if you ask me and you didn't. And so without further ado, I present the hacky premise of a cat blogging about cat stuff:

Oliver's House Cat Survival Tips

Barfing: One should barf only in convenient places. If you happen to be sitting on the couch when the urge to hurl comes on, it will take far too much effort to run downstairs and "deposit the item" shall we say, in one of the lovely piddle palaces that the people have provided. Why not just barf right there? It's a pretty big couch so you do not have to worry about ruining a favorite place to sleep. Only one small area will be affected and the people will certainly clean it up once they get home. Just pretend you have no idea what's going on if they seem upset at you.

Scratching: It really feels wonderful to come out of one of your multiple naps, arch your back while stretching out exaggeratedly and then get a really good scratch going on a lovely, textured surface. The people have insisted that this activity should only be carried out on the S-shaped scratching post thingie in the living room. Now this surface is quite wonderful and I must admit it is a pleasure to use but again, it becomes a question of convenience. As a cat, one cannot be expected to have to commute to the "designated scratching area" just to satisfy the humans when the intoxicating, delicious urge to scratch on something is swimming all through your head and clouding your thoughts. What if you find yourself upstairs? Are you just supposed to ignore all those record albums sitting there on the bottom shelf? I mean why else did they put them there if they didn't want you to use them? What of that bass amp? Wouldn't it be better to use it for something as noble as a scratching post rather than just let it sit there idly for years? It has this fantastic black felty stuff on it that I must say hits the pads on my paws juuuuust right when I tear into it. And I can't say enough about the area rugs. There is one in the kitchen that gets all my bullet points. I highly recommend it.

Fur and its many uses: Fur is amazing stuff. It keeps us warm, it looks sweet, you can shed any extra at will, and it fuels the barfing that we all enjoy so much. The shedding part is one of my favorites. I like to leave deposits on the stairs that lead from the first to the second floor. I especially like to do this after the human has just swept the stairs clean. It's hilarious. Also, rolling around on furniture and rugs will help slough off a whole shit-ton of fur onto said surfaces. Again, I recommend doing this after the fat one has put away the loud sucking machine with the tiny wheels. Fur can be used to mess up the people's clothes too. The most effective strategy for this ploy is to wait until they are ready to leave for the day (I have often wondered where do they go? Why don't they just stay here with us and nap in the sunlight all day? They are silly), and then rub up against their legs. I believe they think I'm just being affectionate or something so it works like a charm every time. Oh! I almost forgot to mention the fact that fur can absorb smells really efficiently. What I like to do is to hang out all day in the musty basement and then later, when the people are asleep, I walk across their faces. Oh man! That NEVER gets old.

Constant vigilance: This is critical. As a cat you are under nearly ceaseless threats of death from all sides. These emergencies can come at any time from any place. I cannot stress this point enough. ANYTHING can kill you instantly no matter how harmless it may seem. Luckily we have been blessed with excellent hearing which is one of the best early-warning systems one can have. Here is a short list of sounds that WILL foreshadow your death. When you hear these sounds you must bolt immediately out of the room and hide either in the basement or under the bed in the large room upstairs. These are the only safe places in the house.

• The doorbell
• A sneeze
• A car door closing
• The garbage disposal
• Any human's voice other than the two that feed us

This is not by any means a complete list and it may be advisable to become nervous and tense at the slightest sound or perceived threat. When you hear these sounds you must react and not think. You must be ready at any second to launch yourself into the air and skitter away like a lunatic. There can be no hesitation. You must be steadfast in your determination to escape. I recommend practice runs at random intervals during the day to keep your reflexes sharp. Remember, the thing can't get you if you hiss and growl loud enough.

Humans: Look, I don't like to admit it any more than you do but they seem to be necessary to have in one's life. They provide food, water and maintenance of the poopy boxes and bonus! they can be very comfortable to sleep on and/or against. The biggest complaints I hear most often is that they are quite loud (I mean they have no respect for a cat trying to get a nap in after being awake for nearly an hour) and that they always want to touch the fur that you just groomed. What's up with that anyway? I JUST fixed that side of my coat and here comes Chubby with his sausage fingers to mess it all up again. Soooo frustrating (Incidentally, by what names do you call your humans? Ah, I guess it doesn't really matter does it? They never come when you call them anyway). What I have determined is that one can keep the humans quite happy with minimal effort. Here's a few things you can do to entertain your human that won't cause you to lose respect for yourself:

1. Play fetch for a bit with them using a favorite toy and then abandon the practice completely. This will keep them confused and may even have them buy you other toys in a sad attempt to recreate that "special moment" you both shared. Refuse to play with all of the toys when the human is around and then shove them all under the refrigerator when no one is looking.
2. "Adopt" a sock (or dish towel) as a representative of either a fresh kill or perhaps an imaginary baby kitten. This one is a classic that never fails to get the humans to either feel sad for you or completely charmed. Simply go to the laundry basket grab an item and walk around with it in your mouth while making loud vocalizations. You might get the human to pet you sympathetically in hopes of soothing your long-suppressed "animal instincts". The humans have weird guilt about "forcing" us to stay in the house for our entire lives. I'm pretty sure that's what's going on. Use this opportunity to shed on them.
3. Lick them. I know, that sounds gross but stay with me on this one. I'm telling you, cat to cat, humans taste great. I can't speak to actually eating one or even taking a chunk out of their arms but the surface of their skin is just the right amount of salty. Seriously, try it. Tonight when you are using them as a pillow, give their arm a couple of quick licks and see if you don't love it. What I like to do is to wait until they are about to fall asleep and then I crawl up and lick the tender inside of their arms. If they're sleepy enough you can get a few minutes in before they get all fussy and roll over. No problem. Most likely they've exposed a leg or something else that you can lick. Thank me later.

That's some of the helpful survival tips you need to know in order to live a long and nap-filled life with your human pets. These are certainly not all the things you will need to master but I simply do not have the time to list all of my feline knowledge here on this pathetic website. I hope to return as a guest blogger from time to time and maybe answer questions from the readers. If you do have a question for me, Oliver the House Cat, please leave them below in the comments area and I will do my bestest to answer them next time. Right now I gotta jet cuz I just noticed that the sun has moved onto the dining room table and god I love sleeping on so-called forbidden places. Peace out.

Cat Grooming and the Clown Problem

I think my stupid cats should stop throwing up in my basement. It's disgusting and I'm tired of going down there and discovering yet another hairball-infused spew on the floor. I'd gladly give the little fuckers some petromalt except that the main culprit Oliver (a.k.a Ollie, Awww-Lee, Little Bastard, L.B., Mr. ShitFucker, Lil' Bubba, Bubba, Lil' Buddy, Stinky BumBumBoy, Molly's Oliver, Captain Shithole, Freakshow, Hey You Get Offa There NOW!) doesn't like the malty goop and refuses to eat it. Molly loves it but she's not the one horking up every goddamn day is she? No, she is not. So because he's such a stubborn bugger and licks not only himself but Molly's fur as well, I end up with a veritable mine field in the basement that I have to navigate. Yes, I clean it but cat vomit has amazing bonding capabilities with bare concrete. If you aren't standing right behind Colonel Asslicker when he lets his vile, hairy payload go, well then it's gonna have time to absorb into the floor and make it nigh impossible to extract completely. I have barf halos everywhere down there. It's a problem.

What does he think, I'm running a circus down there? I mean, not anymore. Not since the permits were revoked and all the elephants escaped. Also maybe the sheer number of clown deaths may have been a catalyst for the eventual failure of The Amazing O'Malley Super Fantastic 3-Ring Traveling Circus Extravaganza That Never Actually Traveled or Even Existed circus. I still to this day say that the city was far too judgmental on that point. I mean, what is an "inordinate amount" anyway? It should be clearly defined. Is one clown death ok? How about a half dozen? Surely that can't be a problem. I need solid numbers if I am to understand this "law". I personally think we were providing a service for the community. These clowns have no self control and they breed like ... not rabbits exactly but maybe marsupials? Marsupials without the pouch thing. Come to think of it, I'm not even sure that they don't have pouches. Their outfits are large enough to conceal one. Man, wouldn't that be just like a frickin' clown to be hiding a marsupial-like pouch for their hideous offspring to climb into in order to latch onto a nasty, clowny teat. Goddamn, clowns are gross.

I'd feel better about the circus failing if the city had claimed zoning problems or something mundane like that as the issue. But the city was fully behind us getting the big tent up and filling it with thousands of cheering spectators and the pungent smell of elephant poop from the beginning, pushing the permitting process through quicker than anyone had ever seen before. At one time there had been a recommendation from the local government to make it mandatory for all school children to attend TAOMSF3RTCETNATOEE (as the circus was known to our fans) at least twice during the school year. We had become the go-to destination for school field trips for communities up and down the Massachusetts coast (and at least one Canadian elementary school too, but we didn't let them in on account of their funny-looking money). But the specter of the "Clown Apocalypse", as the local paper branded it, proved too difficult to overcome for us and so our dream died (along with a lot of clowns as it turns out).

Even if the grand jury votes to indict us (The Wiff was more involved in the talent management and book keeping where I was in charge of the day-to-day affairs and clown disposal), I don't think they have much of a case. Nor do I think they'll want to provoke us into "stirring things up". If we go down, we're gonna take others down too. I can give multiple examples of not only the police benefiting from our "practice" but also the local gardeners and landscapers (we offered the highest quality clown mulch at below-market prices). There's no way they didn't have an idea of what was going on (think about it....all that grease paint concentrated in one area there's bound to be some run-off and/or staining). We were just trying to keep the neighborhood safe from all the creepy, creepy clowns we kept hiring for our circus. We also needed to keep the show fresh and new. If someone came to the show more than once, I didn't want them seeing the same batch of twitchy, paranoid clowns running around in a tight circle that they saw last time. Everyone looked the other way for years and now that the numbers of missing clowns has grown to this supposed shockingly large number, they've all sprouted morals. I call bullshit.

My lawyer (Mr. Twinkles) tells me that I shouldn't comment since this is an active and on-going case but I suspect he may be part clown. I'm not worried though as I have every confidence that we will be cleared of all charges. Even if this does end up going to trial, there's no jury in the world that would consider convicting us. Clown population control is a public service. Would you really prefer that they be left to their own devices and allowed to roam free? What happens when they start infringing on our neighborhoods? Do you really want to throw out your garbage only to be confronted with a cackle of clowns (that's the technical term for a group of 3 or more clowns) rifling through your barrels in search of food and things to juggle? Or worse, what if they walk up to your house and peer in a window while you are sitting on the couch watching Wipeout (oh get down off your high horse. That show is fucking hilarious)? At first you'll just feel the hair on the back of your neck stand up a little but you're not sure why. You'll look around the room and suddenly out of the corner of your eye you'll see a tuft of bright red, fuzzy hair. Then you'll lock eyes with it and scream like you just got worst titty-twister ever. No one needs that. Let me handle them for you ok? Otherwise they'll end up infesting not only the woods and sewers systems but maybe even the walls of your house (they love fiberglass insulation. They use it for nesting material and replacement hair).

That's all I'm going to say about this. I will of course update all of you on the progress of the case periodically but for now I would like to get on with my life. Besides, I have plenty of hairball nastiness to deal with.

Is It Really Work If There Are Cat Beds Nearby?

I'm pretty fortunate to have a job where I can occasionally work from home. Not everyone can do this and certainly I have had many a job where I did not have this option. I guess you could call it a perk. However, when I work from home it's not all pickles and sunshine (what? You've never eaten a delicious dill pickle outside in the lovely summer-time air? It is just this side of heaven gosh darn it). I may be sitting in a much more comfortable and, even with the traffic noise from my busy street penetrating my shitty single-pane windows (can I borrow several thousand dollars to replace all 30+ windows in my house? Pretty please? No? Ok...fine), quieter environment; I do still have to actually get some work done. Let's do a Pros and Cons approach to working from home shall we? Why the hell not.

Pros:

• Super short commute. I mean...wow. Can't beat that. The worst that could happen is maybe there is a cat jack-knifed on the stairs but one can usually nudge said cat along and get down to the first floor with little hassle.
• The aforementioned quiet. I sit in a cube farm at work (high roller...that's me) and while I understand that there are other people on the planet, I don't like to hear them when I'm working. Ok, I don't really like to hear them at all. Am I a misanthrope? Maybe. 
• The coffee. Holy hell is the coffee at home waaaaaaaaaay better than the stuff I can get at the office. As a matter of fact, I have not had a cup of coffee at work in nearly 2 years. And this shit is FREE. I just cannot deal with bad coffee because I am a snob. I have my usual cup of home brew on the way into the office and then maybe I'll grab a diet Coke at around 10am. I still get my caffeine fix which I require in order to function but I'll tells ya: I'd much prefer it in hot coffee form. I can get this at ye olde homestead. Lovely.
• Dress code. It's not like I have to wear a suit and a tie at work but I do have to look somewhat presentable. However, at home...all bets are off. Now I will still get dressed because I am a professional goddammit. Plus, I can't take myself seriously when I'm in my PJs so how can I expect anyone else to? But my attire will be decidedly down from what I can wear at work. Old ratty t-shirt with what appears to be a grease stain across the chest? Sure. How about some shorts to show off those fabulous-good-lord-I-didn't-know-something-could-be-that-pale legs of mine? You betcha. Don't feel like fixing my hair? Not a problem. Go with the "just got out of the shower" look instead.
• Temperature. The office tends to be about 5 to 6 degrees warmer than I would like it to be. This does a few things to me. One, it makes me a little sleepy and I can get distracted more easily. Two, I'm already rather well insulated so I tend to become uncomfortable. This does not occur at the homestead. Even in the dog days of summer I can retreat to an air conditioned room and cool myself off. 

Cons:

• Cats. One might think that the furry little buggers would be a "pro" in this debate. That would be incorrect. Case in point: I was working from home and had staked out a nice comfy spot on the couch to sit. I had the laptop on the coffee table, my notes and stuff piled neatly next to the computer, and I was ready to go. A half hour later when Morticia decided that it was way more important for me to be a pillow for her rather than a productive member of my team was when I realized that this was probably not the best place to sit. When Molly came over and started licking my arm I knew I had to move. I moved all my stuff into the dining room and spent the rest of the day on a very hard and not so comfortable chair. These chairs are ok for enjoying a nice meal but not so much for sitting all day and trying to work. Then Oliver threw up right in front of me. I wish I was making that up. Nasty.
• Discipline. Because I am at home and NOT in the office, it is ultimately up to me to make sure that I get stuff done. Usually I'd say that this is a problem because I am quite lazy and can be distracted by pretty much anything. But for whatever reason, when I work from home I get very focused and I tend to get a lot accomplished. I actually think my company gets more work out of me when I'm not in the office than when I am. The reason this doesn't show up in the "Pros" category is that I don't want to work at all. But stupid reality says that I must. So, "Cons" it is.
• Lunch choices. At work I have a number of options for lunch. I can choose the sammich The Wiff lovingly prepared for me (I will 9 times out of 10...honestly), I can go upstairs to the cafeteria (or what I call "Cafe Fail"), or there are a number of restaurants, sub joints, pizza places and crap like that within a short walk of the office. When I'm at home it's just what we have in the kitchen. And that usually means a whole bunch of ingredients. See, The Wiff likes to cook so she has on hand many items with which she can conjure up lovely meals. I, on the other hand, cannot cook and so I'd rather just have some quick stuff available that I can slap together. Ok, this may be a weak example...are you still reading this?
• Communication. When I'm at work and I have a quick question for someone I can usually just walk over to where they sit and ask them in person. When I'm sitting in my house, my choices are calling them which I'd rather not do, emailing them which my be delayed since I'm on the VPN, or using our internal IM service. All of these choices are ok but they fall short of just being able to talk to someone face to face. Then again, I do prefer to not talk to anyone so maybe this is also a bad example? 

As I suspected, the Pros clearly outweigh the Cons when it comes to working from home. Not a surprise at all. I need to figure out how to become independently wealthy so I don't have to go to work. That's the goal. How I get there is a mystery I'm afraid. 

Disjointed Ramblings With No Discernible Thread (a.k.a. "Normal")

I just can't seem to get around to updating this site on a regular basis. I start out with good intentions and positive thoughts about how I'm going to post at least once a week or maybe even twice a week! Holy shit! And then I get all mixed up in my dumb life and I neglect the site. It's not like I forget or anything. In fact, it's quite the opposite. I become keenly aware that it has been X number of days since I last updated and I'm disappointing literally 10's of people (ok, maybe just 10). Before I know it, I've created this mad pressure in my own head about what the next post should be and how it should be a hugely funny/interesting story about how I did whatever with whomever (awww, yeah. Homey whips out the "whom". boo-ya).

But the days pile up and I still can't think of anything even remotely interesting to write about so I....don't. I simply don't write anything about anything. I even went so far during one of my "whooo-hoo-look-at-me-I'm-gonna-be-all-super-creative-and-I-have-all-these-ideas-and-they-come-out-of-my-head-so-fast-that-I-can't-write-them-down-quickly-enough-and-I-need-to-have-some-sort-of-way-to-get-these-great-ideas-onto-the-internet-so-that-people-can-ignore-them" that I went and bought myself a micro-recorder thing. No, seriously. The idea was that I could simply just record the thoughts that are too precious, fragile and fleeting to try to get onto paper or even a computer text file (or, gasp! a fucking blog post) because of course I'd ALWAYS have this recorder thing with me at all times right? I mean, look how small it is! It's totally not inconvenient or unrealistic at all! So I bought it. I've used it as I had intended exactly zero times. I'm a moron. I did record my cat snoring once though. So that's a win right?

Speaking of cats, Molly has a problem. A pretty big problem actually. She has a tumor in her little head. In her right eye specifically. I may have mentioned (I can't remember and god knows I don't actually read this) that her eye changed color last year and although the doctor said, "Meh, that happens, no worries", we were worried all the same thank you very much. Her behavior was different (more aggressive than usual) and The Wiff took her back to the vet to get some scans and shit done. Turns out the eye is cancerous. Lovely. So tomorrow (Feb 1st) she goes in to surgery to have it removed. I'm going to have a pirate kitty. Poor little girl. I'm actually really worried about it but since I'm also completely shut down emotionally and don't know how to express how I truly feel, I shall minimize it and move on. Hold on a sec while I turn this stress and angst into a little hard ball that will eventually eat its way out of my chest....there we go.

So, winter. Can we talk about winter for a paragraph or two? The snow has been such a fucking asshole this year. I know that in '94-'95 and '96 here in Boston there was more snow than blah blah blah I don't fucking care. Back then I didn't have a car and I lived in an apartment where it was someone else's job to shovel this shit. Now it is my responsibility (unless I'm in Miami, right Amy? Wheeeeee!). I am old and decrepit and quite honestly I have run out of places to put the stuff. The snow piles on my sad little postage stamp of a lawn are taller than I am. The snow bank at the end of my driveway is the size of one of those huge SUV's. And this week we're supposed to get even more snow. Great. I give up. Just keep snowing on me. Make my roof collapse. I don't care anymore. I can't fight you Mother Nature, you win automatically. I can't even flip the board (which is a great tactic usually when losing a game).



Last week it snowed too but I didn't care because I was in Miami (ok, technically I was in Coral Gables but fuck you, that's close enough). I never "got" Florida but I moved a little closer to being able to understand it. It was lovely I must admit. The weather was in the mid-70's with moderate humidity. Not oppressive but just enough to let you know that yea, the air might be a little "thick" fat boy. I won't bore you with details about the conference because quite frankly you will not care. I'm in this industry and I had a hard time caring about all of the lectures and presentations. There was one presenter who we were told who's journey to Miami from South Africa had taken 40 hours. Well I can tell you right now that that motherfucker should have stayed home. Holy shit. I've never experienced something that mind-numbingly dull in my life. And this from a guy who read The Simarillian on purpose.

First of all the guy was super nervous, so right off the bat he got my sympathy vote. I feel you mister. This is gonna suck for you. Don't worry about it. Head down and press on through ok? I'm here for ya. Then he started speaking in that weird sort-of-German-but-wait-isn't-that-more-of-an-Australian-vibe accent of his. His stutter was so profound that it was painful. I get it mister. Stutters suck. No worries though, we're not going anywhere. Move through it. Keep yer chin up! He then proceeded to go through each of his slides bullet point by fucking bullet point in such soul-crushing detail that I slowly moved from sympathy, to boredom, to indifference, to finally bare knuckled hatred in the span of 50+ minutes. At the end I didn't want to be glad he was done because I thought I might have been hallucinating and he'd be going back up to go through the thing all over again. I might have died if that happened. I certainly lost all interest in the next speaker I can tell you that much.

The take home messages are that I should be more open to going somewhere warm during the winter months (something I've literally never done before) and that air travel still sucks ass. American Airlines is equivalent to taking a city bus for 3 hours (except a city bus doesn't have the potential to fall out of the sky). I spent the bulk of the flight home wishing foul, awful things on the family seated behind me and their 4 screaming children. If any of the wishes have come true then I'm sure I would have seen something on the news by now. I also wanted to stab the guy seated next to me several times. Why? Well I had the window seat and he was jammed in the middle seat between me and one of my co-workers. He clearly wanted to have a window seat because he kept leaning forward and into my space to look out the window. Dude, look, we're on the right side of a plane that's going up the east coast of the United States. Guess what's out that window? If you said "a shit-ton of water and not much else" then you are correct. Sit the fuck back and I'll let you know when we pass over some land that you couldn't identify if you absolutely had to, ok? He was also one of these guys who when the plane finally came to a stop he bolted out of his seat so he can get into the aisle as quickly as possible. Yea, um...you know that we're basically in the back of the plane here right? It's gonna take a while skippy. Ah people, how I loathe them.

Get Offa My Foot, You Little Freak

Well, it looks like what I had planned to post will be delayed a couple days. No worries. I hope to have it up by Monday (or maybe Tuesday).

In the meantime I want to address a pretty serious topic. Sexual harassment. Over the years there have been a number of famous cases of sexual harassment in the media from Clarence Thomas to Bill Clinton and the workplace environment has been drastically changed by the introduction of sexual harassment policies and laws. The public's awareness of this issue has also changed the way that victims are treated making it easier for those hurt by these acts to seek justice and support. However, what if you're being sexually harassed and/or battered by your own cat? This is my difficult story.

Our cat Mugsy died last year. During his life he did his best to be the tiniest diplomat in the world by working tirelessly to unite our feline-dominated household. His work in struggling to break down the long-standing sectarian turf battle between Molly, who's territory is the Second Floor (with her headquarters located in our bedroom), and Morticia who runs the First Floor from her vantage point of whatever chair she decides is most advantageous at the moment (usually this depends on which seat has been recently vacated by a human's bum and is now quite warm and toasty). This conflict has been raging for years now and although he never quite got them to sit down and hash out a cease-fire (or a cease-hissing/spitting at each other), his very presence bestowed a certain level of calm and dare I say civility amongst the rest of the furry little assholes. When Oliver was introduced to the household 5 years ago, it was Mugsy who tried to help him ease into what can be a potentially highly volatile dynamic.

As Mugsy's health declined and he became less active in the day-to-day political negotiations, the tension between the First Floor and the Second Floor factions escalated. After all, the food and water as well as the access to the basement (where we keep the piddle-palaces) are all located in what clearly is Morticia's territory. This area had long since been designated as a DMZ but it was a very fleeting and tense peace. Since his death, clashes in this region have intensified including minor terrorist attacks being observed in the form of unprovoked tail swatting and barfing directly into the water dish. Sources close to the Morticia camp indicate that Oliver may be a not-so-secret sympathizer with the Second Floor tribe. Mugsy would never have stood for such derision. In his mind, Oliver was the clear choice for successor to his legacy of peace-keeping. But this, sadly, does not seem to be what Oliver wants. The number of perceived infractions from Molly on Morticia's turf have gone up significantly since Mugsy's passing.

My praise of Mugsy and his own death have made the decision to share with all of you the dark side of his personality all the more difficult. I can no longer overlook his flaws. I don't know how to sugarcoat this so I'm just going to come out and say it: Mugsy was a catnip spray addict and serial foot rapist. There, now the truth can be told. I loved Mugsy and maybe that's why I never confronted him and told him how his actions made me feel. It made me feel dirty and it kinda tickled. This is how these "espisodes" went down. When I went to bed, Mugsy was usually curled into a little ball near the footboard. I would slip under the covers which would disturb his slumber and he'd walk around the bed for a couple of minutes before settling back down near my feet (usually using them as a pillow). And then, not every night but often enough, he'd wake up and with a weird primal cry he'd mount my foot and proceed to bang the fucking shit out of it. And this from a dude with absolutely no balls at all. This would wake me up and it may take a couple of seconds for me to process that my cat is furiously humping my foot before I'd shove him off me. This is where it turns really ugly. He didn't care at all. He'd just get right back on that horse and continue to rape my poor tootsies. Granted, the Wiff and I were enablers on the catnip spray front but that does not excuse his abuse of it.


Please excuse the shitty quality of the above video. It was taken by a crappy camera in low light conditions. It is basically my attempt to capture Mugsy playing on a chair while he was stoned out of his gourd. He had rolled himself off the chair a couple times previous to my video taping him and I was glad to capture his most embarrasing and from the sound of it, most unprepared-for tumble. He sobered up after this one and pretended that he meant to do it all along. I think he bruised his pride a bit.

Since I have forgiven Mugsy for this transgression (and subsequently outed him in this public forum) and he has passed on to meet his maker (or more specifically to reside in ashy form on our mantel in a wooden box), I assumed that the abuses would stop. But a disturbing trend has begun and I refuse to play the role of victim again. Oliver has been sexually harassing me. This started with "innocent" arm licking. He would come over when I was lying down and lick the inside of my arm while "making biscuits". I thought it was cute if not someone painful (the dude can really get into it and if we haven't clipped his nails recently his little talons can fuck your shit up) and relatively harmless. But lately he's been trying to shove his ass in my face just before and right after the arm licking thing. And last night I noticed that the little pervert had a fucking boner. Seriously. He did the licking thing, stood up, swung his butt around and into my grill and then sat down with his legs open. And there, standing at attention like a fucking evil gum stimulator from hell was his frickin' cat wang. "Oh DUUUUDE!" I exclaimed and tossed him off (ooh, poor choice of words..) the bed. "That's it," I said. "I'm filing a complaint."

I have not yet been able to find a proper authoritative source to whom I can submit my complaint. Would it be the SPCA perhaps? Would they offer some relief from the onslaught of cat dong that Oliver is trying to rub on me? Can they tell him to stop trying to shove his goddamn asshole in my face? Is there some recourse I can take? I'm just saying for the record that I will not stand for being sexually battered by my male cats anymore. This shit ends now.

Only 8 More to Go

'Sup bitches? 2010 all up in yer grill. Woot WOOT! ... Sorry about all that. It sounded funny in my head. How's things? Oh right, I'm supposed to be telling y'all (hee! "y'all") how things are with me. That's kind of the whole point of this blog nonsense. Blogs are stupid. Why do I do this anyway? Oh yea, my ego.

Wanna hear how I spent New Year's Day? No? Then stop reading and go do something constructive with your life. Go on, shoo! Git! ... Are they gone? Good. On New Year's Eve we had my sis Mary and our friend Chris (a.k.a. CK43) over to eat chinese food and hang out, watch TV and (literally) ring in the new year. It was pretty mellow. On New Year's Day since sistah soul-jah stayed over-night, we all had a lovely breakfast that the Wiff made for us.  Fabulous. After Mary left, Oliver the cat made an appearance finally and all was well. Oliver is really not a friendly cat when it comes to visitors. He likes us OK, he tolerates us and will allow us to pet him occasionally. He's just super jumpy around everyone else. Dunno why exactly but I suspect it has to do with when we had the plumber guys in the house for 3 weeks replacing our heating system. We had all the cats corralled in the Wiff's office on the first floor and all the noise and strange people might have fucked him up.

So the bulk of the day passes with nothing out of the ordinary happening. I went upstairs to work on the design for the label we need for the beer we brewed (details forthcoming). Suddenly I hear this huge crash of what sounded like a bunch of plates hitting the floor (it sounded very much like when the piece of the ceiling fell down). I called out to see if the Wiff was OK but she didn't answer. Uh oh. I went to go downstairs and met a very scared Oliver coming racing up the stairs at full throttle. He tore past me and went immediately under our bed. I went downstairs and into the dining room to see the Wiff standing in front of the china cabinet with a couple of broken bowls on the floor in front of her. "You hurt?" I asked. "No, I don't know what happened. They just slipped. Oliver lost his mind though", she said. "Yea, we ran into each other," I said.

And that was it for awhile. We cleaned up and went back to whatever it was we were doing before the mini-drama. Later we had dinner, played a couple games on the Wii (which I totally lost by the way. The Wiff schooled me in Wii Frisbee golf). We had opened a bottle of wine to have with dinner so I had a couple of glasses. At about 11pm or so I noticed that Oliver had not come down since the incident. Now I know he's a big weenie and all but usually he'll get over his fear enough when his dinner time comes along. But he hadn't this time. Uh oh. I decided to go up and check on him. I went upstairs and turned on the light in the bedroom. There he was sitting on our bed, bleeding. Oh fuck! I picked him up (carefully) and took him into the bathroom where the lighting is better to see what I could see. First thing I noticed when I put him down (gently) was that he was favoring his left, rear leg. I looked at it and there was a nasty deep cut right at the heel of his left foot.

I called Amy up and we tried and failed to put a gauze bandage on it to stop the bleeding. When we realized that wasn't going to work she went to call the vet hospital in Woburn. Did I mention it was snowing? Yea, it was snowing a lot. It took about 35-40 minutes to get to the place and he didn't make a peep during the entire ride. Poor lil' dude. They showed us to an examination room and after a couple of minutes the doctor came in. She checked out his foot and noticed that one of his nails was also damaged (most likely in his mad scramble up the stairs). She said that he's going to need stitches but they could not do it right that moment. Um, ok...then when? She couldn't say exactly since there was a staff shortage with this being a holiday. Oh crud... forgot about that. The doctor said we could leave him there and come back in the morning or we could wait there but she couldn't say what time they'd be finished. Sigh. So yes, we stayed.

The Wiff and I went over to the waiting room and watched some TV (Iron Chef and then some Doctor Who episodes...honestly not much of it registered. I think the mystery ingredient was the Ood or something). I tried to take a nap on the Most Uncomfortable Couch in Existence. Seriously. I don't know who thought that it would be a good idea to have a 3-seat couch that has little humps in between each of the cushions. Try lying on that shit for a while, it blows. We opted to have Oliver wait with us in the TV room until they were ready to take care of him and around 2am (yes, 2 fucking AM) someone came in and off he went. They sewed him up and gave him some pain meds. The meds made him all loopy and sad and he had the dreaded cone of shame on over his head. We finally got out of there at around 4 in the goddamn morning. The snow was still coming down. That ride home sucked. Rt. 128 was almost completely covered in snow and I couldn't really see where the lanes were. We creeped along and made it back safely by 4:40 or so.

Now the poor little guy is isolated in one of the spare bedrooms and he keeps walking into stuff since the cone messes up his navigation. Here's the kicker: we're leaving for Ireland on Thursday so now we have to board him as well. It's just going to be Morticia left in the house (oh, and our friend Val too. She's going to house/cat sit for us). I feel bad for him but it was such a freak accident and there's really no other choice at this stage. He needs to have his meds every day for 14 days so off to the cat boarder he goes. At least Molly will be in the same facility, just not the same cage. I feel bad but not bad enough to cancel my trip. Fuck that shit.

And that was how 2010 started for us. Not so great but it really could have been much, much worse. The doctor said that he managed to cut the skin all the way down to the sheath that covers the tendon in his heel. Just a tiny bit more and it would have cut the sheath and perhaps the tendon itself. That would have been potentially crippling for him. He should recover completely in a couple of weeks. Right now I have to go and head over to the dentist to get my crown installed finally. Lay-tah!

Good-Bye Little Buddy

Tonight I have to do one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. Mugsy, our 15-year-old little fuzzy boy (who was the first cat that The Wiff and I got together) has been very ill for awhile now and after failing to respond to treatments, losing weight because he will not eat, is going to be taking that final trip to the vet. I can't even bring myself to write it out. I've helped my sister when the time came for one of her cats a few years ago and that was hard enough. But this is my bubba. My little fuzzball. My Mugsy-boy.

I can rationalize this decision up and down, left and right. He is clearly not healthy nor happy and is only going to suffer and not improve. I know that it is the "right" decision for him and us as well. However, since I must like to torture myself, I can't help but think that there's something left that we could do to fix him. Of course there really isn't. He's done. He's just done. What sucks the most right now is that I know that we have to go do this thing tonight and I'm sitting here at work trying to keep it together. So far, so good. Tonight all bets are off though.

my little bubba, circa 1994 in our Allston apartment.

Just look at that face will ya?

I'm All On My Own...Someone Alert the Authorities

Since this past Friday (the 5th) The Wiff has been out in the Berkshires with her friends doing some crafty things and then spending a day at a spa. This leaves me to my own devices, rattling around our house and farting at will (wassup ladies? sorry, this prize is taken). I've never actually lived all by myself (like with no roommates or y'know, a wife) and so I was kinda looking forward to having the place to myself for a few days. Plus, I'm a reasonably mature adult so how hard could this be? I mean, at my age my father had 4 kids and a horribly difficult job driving a truck around Boston all day. Surely I can make my own lunches and throw food at the cats, all without burning the house down until Wednesday right?

Day 1: Technically not a full day since she left on Friday and she was still around when I left for work, but whatever. That night, after getting home from work, I treated myself to a pizza and a couple of beers (ok, 3 beers), plopped myself down in front of the ye olde boob tube to watch some TV. I had thought briefly about maybe going into town to see if there were any interesting bands playing but then I remembered who I was and dismissed that idea as ludicrous. I blasted around the channels, flipping so fast that I barely had time to process what show may or may not have been on that channel before zipping on to the next one. That got old faster than I had anticipated and so I settled on something that would have bored The Wiff to tears and made a night of it.

That night I spent rolling willy-nilly around on the bed since I did not have to stay on my assigned side (the right-hand side of the bed Nosy Nelly). "Whole-bed" privileges mean that I could in fact sleep however I saw fit. I lounged across the bed at a truly radical angle and set about trying to fall asleep. No go. I ended up back in my usual spot with Molly the cat adhered to the back of my knees. Go away Molly, your girth will push my whole back out of alignment silly animal. Molly usually smashes herself against The Wiff, you see.

Day 2: Saturday morning came and I was awakened by four hungry cats making their case known. Morticia, a.k.a. the "bowling ball with feet", sat on my chest while keeping an keen eye on Molly (whom she hates with the white hot fury of a thousand suns). Molly of course thinks this is funny and will taunt Morticia. So, Morticia hisses at Molly and I am subjected to evil, evil cat breath at 7am. I guess if you don't brush your teeth for 15 years you end up with really horrible breath. Morticia has it in spades.

The other cats (look, I know ok? Four cats is borderline crazy town. Lay off it ok?) don't do the sit on you and stare thing. No, they cry and cry and cry. Especially Mugsy. Oliver does this thing where he finds a really vulnerable part of your arm and licks it until you toss him across the room and/or get up. All of the above tactics are incredibly effective in at the very least waking the sleeping human. Usually it is The Wiff who will get up and feed the little beasties so that they'll leave us the fuck alone for maybe another hour or so (and I get the glorious whole bed for a little bit while she does so), but since she's not there, I had to go do it. And by the time I had finished dealing with all that nonsense, I was wide awake. Stupid cats ruined my sleep-in Saturday time.

So I make coffee and some breakfast for meself and now what? Hmm. Got the whole day here to do whatever I want. Yep. Mmm hmm ... [crickets] ...Video games on the new giant TV? Well now! Don't mind if I do!

And that was an entire Saturday. Some people would call that an entire Saturday "wasted" and I call those people "women". I had a grand old time. I think I bathed but I honestly don't recall. And does it really matter? Nope. Oh, and did you know that cats demand to be fed more than once a day? Well, they totally do. When is The Wiff coming back anyway?

Day 3: Ok, this "Feed us!" rigmarole is really getting on my nerves. Don't you fuckers have thumbs? Get yer own food. Marky sleepy time now. Sunday came up way faster than I had expected and I kinda felt a little guilty for not doing anything on Saturday. I know! I'll purge some junk out of my office upstairs! Oooh! Maybe I'll even go up into the attic and try to make that somewhat organized (a chore I have been steadfastly blowing off for going on 6 months now). Plus, I should totally install the window unit air conditioners now while it's nice out so that when the icks of summer finally get here and punch me in the balls I can retreat into one of the A/C rooms (we now offer 3 different air conditioned rooms for your convenience by the by).

Yea, I didn't do any of that stuff. Oh fuck you Mugsy, I'll feed you in a second. Jeez.

Day 4: Monday, and so back to work I go. Hmm, maybe I won't make a pot of coffee instead opting to wait until I get to the office to partake of the lovely free gruel we have there. Wow, I kinda like the fact that The Wiff likes to cook. She will whip up a tasty little egg sammich in the morning that sustains me all the way until lunch. Oh yea, and she usually makes me a lovely lil' sammich for my lunch too (PB&J or maybe ham and cheese and a snack! Saving cash! Lookit us!). Wow. I'm a child. I am a giant, cranky child with a driver's license and a taste for scotch. How the hell did I convince her to talk to me let alone marry me? God, she must have been really fucking desperate. And thank jeebus for that! Whoo-hoo! Here's to lowered expectations!

For dinner I had planned to make myself a couple of buffalo burgers but of course I forgot to take the stuff out of the freezer. Awesome. What did I have instead? PB&J of course. Isn't that the obvious choice for a substitute? That night Molly finally figured out that if she doesn't lay across my legs she won't get flung off the bed in the middle of the night when I roll over. Sorry Molly, it's a little thing called inertia. Look that shit up.

Day 5: That would be today, Tuesday. This morning was another exercise in intricacies cat nutrition (hey, they sure do drink a lot of fucking water...didn't know that) as well as the always difficult decision of whether or not a particular shirt was ok or should be ironed. You've probably figured out by now that the shirt was determined to be not that wrinkled. Another victory for time management.

So what's for dinner? Yea! The buffalo burgers that I was going to have last night! That'll be great! Oh, except that I didn't think of it until I was in the goddamn Sumner Tunnel. Stupid tiny brain failed me again. Luckily for me, The Wiff knows full well that I'm just this side of retarded and had stocked the freezer with all kinds of simpleton-proof dinner choices. Mmmm, frozen turkey sausage Stromboli monstrosities. Yummy (they're quite good, for realsies)! Oh fer the love of Pete, I will FEED YOU IN A GODDAMN SECOND you frickin' cats you. Must prepare this stuff now before something shiny distracts me and I forget to heat these things up. Just relax and fight amongst yourselves. And will somebody please fill that water bowl already?! Oh, right, that's me too. Dammit dammit dammit.

Day 6: This will be tomorrow morning only and then The Wiff will make her triumphant return later in the evening. I just have to remember to wash all my dishes before she gets home so that she doesn't sigh all disappointed-like at me. Ooooh! I hope she brings me a toy!

He Likes to Push the Handle and Watch the Water Go Down!

Fire Good, Cat Snot Bad

Yesterday was the first real chilly day where it was cold enough (41°F outside when I woke up) to have a fire going all day. I still haven't seen just how this fireplace insert will perform when the temperatures outside get seriously cold but it'll be interesting (to me anyway). I thought I'd shoot a quick video of the fire going but Oliver (one of our cats) decided that rubbing his face on my hand was way more important.



For whatever reason, he is terrified of the Wiff when she walks down the stairs. I dunno why exactly. I think it's her shoes. They make a clunk-clunk sound and it freaks him out. He's a bit of a weenie. That's why he takes off at the end of the video, she dared to come down the stairs.