august 10, 1999 Well, I finally made a page of updates. Now, I'll be able to list out what has changed on the various pages. Like when I add stuff to the Disney page, like the Official Decoder, or when I add stuff to Ben's den, I can spell it out. And this way, it will be easier for me to tell when I've done stuff. You can get to the list by clicking on the update images, the one on the second page and the one on the table of contents page.

Rusty just won't leave me alone. He always wants to be in my face. It's really hard to type with him headbutting me.

Last week, when I was looking for something in the freezer in the kitchen, I noticed this bag of stuff that I didn't recognize. I took it out and hey, it was a bag of Mother's cookies, the little iced animal crackers, with sprinkles on them. Well, I didn't put them there and I know darned well the cats didn't put them there. That left one biped who could have possibly put them in that door. Hubby. He never mentioned them to me and I didn't know how long they had been there. The bum. I brought the bag back here to the office and started munching out. Real good with coffee. I put what I hadn't eaten back into the freezer and by the end of the week, the bag was all gone. LOL!!! Still no word from Brian. So, Sunday, I'm sitting here trying to get code to work and he yells. "HEY!! What happened to my cookies?" *snicker* I yell back "Oh, those were yours? I ate them." "All of them?" "Yup." Heh heh heh.... He whined "They were expensive, too, about four dollars for that little bag." "Well, honey, they were real good, thanks for bringing them home."

Our weather has been about ten degrees cooler than normal for this time of year and the cats are loving it. They are a lot more active in the evening, even Lisa. She usually doesn't do much but lay around, but she's also running and playing and jumping in the yard. It's nice to see them active. Brian pointed out that a couple of the cats have been more active since Bobby's been gone. I said yeah, they're afraid if they just lay around like he did, we'll take them away and won't bring them back. Ciara also is so much more energetic than she had been. She's out there chasing the other cats, running up the trees, it must be so nice for her to not get winded after expending energy. And she's been really good about not trying to escape. I haven't seen her try it once since she had her polyp removed.

Well, the new chatroom is up and running. Benny's Public Chatroom. I was able to get it up and running fairly easily, but I had the worst time trying to get the private room creation script to work. Finally, I emailed somebody who had helped others at the forum site of the script author and he figured out what I had done wrong. I was pleased with myself when I found out that I was looking in the right spot to fix it. I had left out a couple of apostrophes. I doubt if I would have ever figured that out on my own.

I am going to lay in the sun today. I'm not going to get caught up in codes. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not.

august 11, 1999 Watching Lisa in the litterbox this morning, I noticed she was standing and nothing was happening. Later, Brian saw her in the bedroom litterbox, a little dribble of urine came out, but that was it. I found Orbax, which is what we used on her last time, left over from Bobby and I started her on it. If she isn't showing any improvement tomorrow, I'll call the vet.

I did lay out in the sun yesterday. It was really nice. I think I'll do it again today.

Remember I told you about the neighbor's daughter moving back in with her son and three cats? And that the cats had to stay outdoors? Well, late yesterday afternoon, I was talking to the grandson. He's only about 4-5 years old and doesn't talk very well and he's hard to understand. I asked him about the kitties and he said one of them ran away. I had seen two of them yesterday morning, but I have never seen the tortie. I don't know if she did run away and came back or what, like I said, he's hard to understand. But I feel so badly for those cats. Say a few prayers for the tortie. Having been an indoor cat all of her life, she won't have much of a chance on her own. Luckily, she still has all of her claws. I sure hope she shows up. The neighbor said that her dogs wouldn't hurt the cats, they only chase them, but come on, how would you like to be chased all of the time? It's gotta be stressful. But then, this is the same woman, who when she couldn't find their rabbit, didn't look very hard for him. She found him when his body started to smell (he was dead). She's not really an animal person at all.

Everything is pretty quiet, for the most part. It's nice.

august 13, 1999 It's foggy this morning. So often, the little weather thing on the second site page says it's foggy when it isn't. This morning, it doesn't lie. It's also Friday the 13th. Watch out!! But seriously, folks...

I didn't write anything yesterday, because nothing much has been happening. The pills are helping Lisa, Ciara is much better at taking her pills. Which she only has to take for a couple of more weeks.

The outfront cats are coming earlier. For a while, Angus, OC and Blue and Blue's kitten (maybe I'll call him Opie, not the adult kitty) were coming well after nine. Last night, they were here when Cleo was here. She's usually the first. And she's been bringing a friend, a black kitty with a little white on it's chest, a cat I call Spot, because of the white. There are actually three black kitties that come for dinner. Spot isn't as frightened of me as when s/he first showed up, s/he will wait for food a little ways back from Cleo. Cleo was here yesterday morning, hanging out in the brush on the bank. She's such a pretty, skinny cat.

Wednesday morning, Brian mentioned the fact that he had used his last pair of clean work socks. So, Wednesday, I did a load of white laundry. We had homemade beef burritos for dinner, I got the dishes done, had been reading and was on my way to falling asleep on the couch, about 9:30. As I nodded off I said, "oh, no, you said you needed clean socks, didn't you?" *snicker* I laughed and said "you can find them in the dryer. Scared you a little, didn't I?" Hubby said yeah, that he started to think about putting the socks he had on someplace where they could dry out. Ew.... It would have to be a place where Mickey wouldn't pee on them, that's for sure.

Yesterday, I had found a code that would enable the cat fight's board to be broken up into pages, instead of one long one. I worked on it for hours. Putting in this URL, changing that one. One of the things that it wouldn't do is to keep the background that I have on the main page. I like that background, the light bricks against the wall. I think it's a good background for a forum. I have this thing of emailing script authors for help, then when I play around with the script, I get it working the way I like it. Then I have to send a "never mind" mail. I had sent two emails to the author about two different things. One was "what am I doing wrong, it won't work" and I had it working within a half hour (or so I thought) and the other was "is there a way to get the background image on the additional pages?" which I also figured out. I went outside to lay in the sun, thinking it was working perfectly. I found out differently when I came in and checked AcmePet. Somebody had gone to cat fights!! to vent and kept getting a server error. This was about one o'clock and I had to get the darn thing working properly. I did and that's when I tried to get the background looking right. By four o'clock, I was done. The pages split the way they should and the background is consistent throughout. I like consistency. I like it alot.

So, I'm here trying to get the backgrounds working and Brian comes in. "Hi, did you check the mail?" I ask him. He hadn't and he went out to get it. In the mail was a letter from the bank. Our loan application had been turned down. Not enough collateral was the reason. Oh, and we have a bad mark on our credit. Most likely from Chase. We didn't owe them much and I was really bad at paying them. I made a double payment every two months. That doesn't happen any longer, because my new programs remind me to pay the bills. And we got all of the credit cards paid off over two years ago and cancelled them. We only have two now, one for the business and one for personal, which are paid in full every month. Now, something I hadn't mentioned, is the loan officer at the bank had called Brian and told him that I hadn't signed the paperwork that Brian submitted. I don't remember if I did or not. I can't imagine that I didn't sign it, but it wouldn't surprise me. I know I filled it out and gave it all to Brian, but I don't remember signing it and I don't remember not signing it. The loan officer suggested that I do a quit claim deed on the house. WHAT?? What the hell kind of advice is that for a married couple? "Sir, we suggest you have your wife relinquish ownership rights to her home because she neglected to sign the loan application." Yeah. Right. Like that's gonna happen. Look, fella, you want to be a comedian, go do it somewhere else. That isn't even funny and if you're serious, well, maybe you're in the wrong line of work. Anyway, the problem is our current home. See, the county's records don't show us as owning the house. Now, we have the filed, recorded quit claim deed and the home is, indeed, in our names. But the county hasn't gotten the information updated on their public records yet. They told Brian that it takes ninety days for the microfilm to be changed. Brian was saying how it's been longer than ninety days and yesterday afternoon, he made copies of everything, left for the bank. While he was gone, I got to thinking about it. The deed was recorded on May 27. It hasn't been ninety days yet. We have June and July and a partial month of August. There are at least two weeks left until the ninety days is up. The county isn't at fault here. If Brian had taken copies of the quit claim deed, as I suggested in the first place, I don't think we would have been turned down. The bank certainly isn't going to loan us money when we have no collateral. And as far as they can tell from the county records, we don't own our home. I told my mom about it and she got all upset, "well, you should demand an apology" and I asked "from who?" Not the bank. Can you imagine how long a bank would stay in business just by taking people's words? "Oh, yes, we own a couple of properties, you have our word on it." Well, here's the money you want, thank you for doing business with us. Come on, mom. And an apology from the county? They told Brian flat out how long it would take to get all of the files changed. When Brian got home, I explained about the time line. He hadn't really thought about it yet, he was just thinking in May. So, he was counting from the first of May. The loan guy wasn't there yesterday, so he's going back today.

The dogs. Let's talk about the dogs and why I'm so tired this morning. Last night, I read until about ten o'clock, then went to bed. Buddy had been sporadically barking. At what, I have no idea. But he makes me think of the Disney movie where there was a pipeline of barking dogs. You know, dogs in one area would bark and then the next area would bark and then the next area would bark until the information got to the place where it was supposed to get. I think Buddy is the operator, switchbox central. Every piece of information goes through him. I thought he had settled down for the night. I know I had. And he started to bark around 10:30/11:00. Both of us shouted "shuddup, Buddy!!" from bed. Yeah, that's gonna work. I ended up getting out of bed when it went on for a good fifteen minutes. Grabbed the collar and out the door I go. There's Buddy. Just laying in the yard. Relaxed. Barking. "Grrr..." I think. "Buddy," I say, "you know I hate this damn collar, but you just won't learn." I put the collar on him, go back to bed. Fall asleep. Hours later, more barking. This time from Junior. What the hell is going on? We both shout "shuddup, Junior!!" He doesn't. And to top it off, I hear little barks from Buddy. I get out of bed. It's after two am. I go outside. "What is wrong with you?" I whisper/yell at Junior. You know what I mean? You can't yell out loud, so you yell in a whisper. I look around. Oh, spit. There's a possum on the fence, probably the same one I saw last week at the back fence. A small one, a young one. How long will it take before s/he realizes that the dogs can't get to her/him and doesn't stop the fence run? Buddy goes into the doghouse. I get Junior away from the fence. The water comes on at the side of the house. Well, this is good because it will keep the dogs from being over there. I go back inside, the dogs finally quiet. I walk into the bedroom, oh, joy!! No cats on the bed, I should go back to sleep quickly. What happens? The cats follow me in. Rusty. Ciara. Benny. Mickey. Georgie. Boney. All up against or on me. Ciara grabs my feet. Oh, come on, let me sleep. Which I did, within minutes. Then, once again, the barking wakes me up. It's Buddy this time. The collar isn't working. Probably needs to be charged. Brian gets up this time. Puts on his robe, walks down the hall. I hear the office door open, close. I hear the screen door open. I hear Brian talk lowly to Buddy. I hear the shop door shut. Brian comes back to bed. Buddy is in the shop, his collar is off. And we go to sleep. Before I know it, it's time to get out of bed. It's gonna be a long day.

Friday the thirteenth.

august 14, 1999 For the past month, my email has been very screwed up. First it was Iname, now it's my ISP. My email keeps telling me my password is invalid. Oh, sure, I can go to their website and get it there, but that thing is slower than molasses. Upgrades. Who needs 'em?

Buddy spent the night in the shop last night. He started barking as soon as the sun went down. He's getting worse, it seems. Maybe a couple of nights put up will calm him down. Who knows what he's barking at, maybe the possum, maybe noises he hears in the distance. Well, the shop is better than the collar. He has a nice soft bed in there, too.

I watched Lisa pee last night and it looked really good. A nice strong stream, good volume. I have a couple more pills to give her.

Found out what the problem is with the loan. And I'll tell you, if we would have had somebody do this, instead of doing it ourselves, we wouldn't have had this problem. Brian went down to the bank and was told that we have excellent credit. (I knew that.) The problem was that the county still shows we owe $120,000 on the home. The bank needed a reconveyance. The officer explained it to Brian and Brian didn't quite understand it. He did his best to explain it to me, but it was over my head. I told Brian to call this guy that had looked into getting us a loan before, the husband of someone he deals with alot at one of his suppliers. Well, he wasn't in, but when he called back, I was here to take the call. I told him the problems and he said he had to make a call to someone else, he would call me back. He did and he explained it so that I kind of understood what was needed. We need to go to the original title company, the company that took care of the initial transfer of the home over thirteen years ago. Then he went into detail, I'm still in the dark. Well, when Brian came home, I told him that we can't do it, we have to have it done professionally, through the escrow company who originally did all the stuff and they would do it correctly the first time and there would be no extra trips needed anywhere. So, next week, we're doing it. And the form I hadn't signed? Brian didn't even sign it. Brian didn't even fill it out. It was done there at the bank. Of course I didn't sign it, I wasn't there. Sheesh.

I'm going to go get the breadmaker running and make a loaf of buttermilk bread. Then I'm going to make potato salad. I've already been to the store, where I got some deli sliced turkey, southwestern style, which I guess means it's a little spicy. While they were slicing it, I did a little grocery shopping. To get to the milk, I had to go to the back of the store and I walked down the liquor aisle. Well, lookie, there, they've locked the booze up. A good idea, I think to myself. They probably had a large shoplifting loss there. Anyway, I get the stuff I need, the store has a special on their own brand of ice cream, $1.50 for a half gallon, what a deal!! pick up tomatoes (no way am I gonna slice cherry tomatoes for sandwiches), onions, bananas, tortillas, just a few staples. At the checkout counter next to mine, there was a commotion. This man was asking about when another store opened, blah, blah, blah and I noticed all of the managers coming down to that stand. It was the quickpay stand. I didn't see the guy, but the store manager walked up to this guy, who was squatting on the floor, and the manager took a bottle of store brand vodka from him and escorted the man out the door. Seems that not all of the liquor is locked up, only the name brand and this guy, with a guitar case, stole a bottle. Put it in the case. Like I said, the liquor aisle is down from the deli and they most likely saw him steal it. They didn't call the police or anything, probably more of a hassle than it's worth. They just sent the guy on his way.

Well, I have a bunch of kitchen stuff to do, should get busy.

august 16, 1999 We had a pretty uneventful weekend. Brian did a lot on the front. He got the new windows installed and the new front door is in. No screen door yet. We have it. It's wooden and Brian had painted it white. He had run out of primer and used regular paint. It bled through and now he has to get primer and repaint the darn thing. He said he's going to use aluminum screening on it (most of the other windows have nylon) to help cut down on cat wear and tear. I really like the casement windows. Had them opened up and set a stool in front of one and the cats sat on the stool, watching the outfront cats. And we get a nice breeze through them. I can hardly wait for the new screen door. I walk past the shut door and have the urge, through habit, to open it up wide. *sigh*

While Brian was working on the door yesterday, I got to sit on a stool and doorwatch. Since there was no screen, and for a while, no door, we had to make sure the cats didn't try to get out. Brian also had put some of that bright orange plastic construction fencing along the wrought iron at the front of the entry way, just in case somebody got out. But Boney was the only cat who showed any interest in "out front". With the exception of Ciara, who just walked by it, the other cats stayed well away from the hallway. Maybe it had something to do with all of the noise Brian was making. Whatever the reason, it was sure nice not having a mass exit attempt.

Buddy has been spending the nights in the shop and he hates going in there. I think there's a family of possums and he just can't stop himself from barking at them. Last night, I put him in the shop and he barked on the way in. Something totally out of character, Brian hadn't left any water for Buddy. So, last night, after I had Bud in, I cleaned out a water bowl, filled it with fresh water and put it in the shop. While the door was opened, Buddy tried to sneak out. I grabbed him by his collar and attempted to drag him back in, he wasn't having any of it. Finally, I put my arms around him and pulled him back in. What a tug of war. Once he settles in, he's fine, but he doesn't like being locked up. Brian said that it's probably because he's starting to understand he's being punished. Heck, he has a soft bed in there, he doesn't have to worry about loud noises or anything. I sure know we sleep better when he's put up. And in the morning, he's in no big hurry to come out. The easiest way is to open the door and put food in the food bowl. He knows that sound and he's out within minutes.

The samiches were great Saturday. Had red onion, a couple of layers of thinly sliced cheddarella cheese, thinly sliced turkey, avocado, lettuce from my garden, vine ripened tomato (from the store) and fresh baked toasted buttermilk bread. These sandwiches are really big and stuff kept falling out of them. But they were so good. We watched "The Princess Bride" (My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.) then we watched the Zorro movie with Anthony Hopkins (what gorgeous blue eyes that man has) and Antonia Banderas. It was a relaxing evening.

Yesterday, I told Brian we should barbeque. He agreed, and I said burgers or steak? He opted for steak. I went out to the freezer to get some and couldn't find any. But I found the bag of homegrown catnip. Gave it a couple of shakes and Kirby came running. I poured a little out for Kirby, Pepper and Rusty on the cement outside the garage door. Kirby talked to me the entire time he rolled in it. He loves nip. Pepper was a little off balance yesterday, I think because of the noise. Poor little girl.

Then, last night, my LV Designs site went down. Darnit. I emailed the host asking if I was in trouble. He emailed me back, the problem was with internet access on the server's end. They didn't have any. Well, that makes sense. This morning, all was up and running. Good. Some people have told me that they have some pretty good dumb jokes to share.

august 18, 1999 The doggies were barking around sunset and I went out to see what the problem was. The little boy (if you're curious what he looks like, he's the young man kissing the young lady on the postcard with the hearts) was outside. I looked over there and he was on the other side of the yard. I also saw the black and white kitty, the white kitty and what's this? The tortie. The cat I thought was gone. This is the first time I had seen her and she is a beauty. I wouldn't doubt if she had gone missing for maybe a night and that's why they do such a good job of putting the cats up at night. It's easy to tell when they do, because Buddy is over at that fence barking his fool head off.

I've been laying in the sun for a little bit every afternoon. I'm getting enough tan so that I can use the tan in a bottle without it looking really phony. The color looks natural. And my hair is getting lighter. The pool feels so good right now, it isn't warm at all, but refreshing. It's in the low 80's. I think it stays cooler now that the streams aren't running. Brian thought he had fixed the leak, but it turned out there are more than he thought. So, it will be a while before they're running again.

Well, we went to the escrow company yesterday morning and found out what we needed. Brian's mom had to sign the original grant deed and have it notarized, which they did this afternoon. Then Brian went back to the bank with the paperwork, but the guy who is supposed to help him wasn't there. So, he's going back again today.

After we left the escrow company, we went to Sears to take back the filler kit that Brian got for the microwave. It didn't fit. On our way out of the store, I saw an exercise bike that I liked on sale. Less that $130.00. Mine is real old and wobbly. I've had it for about ten years. This other one also works the upper body, which I could use. So, I think we get to get it. We have coupons for Sears for almost $20, so that will help with the cost. The kit that Brian returned yesterday was over $60, so it won't be that much for the bike. I think we are going to get it today.

Brian's been a little nervous about work, the fact that he doesn't have anything lined up. And if he isn't working, we aren't making money. But it will help come tax time. I sincerely believe that. Help balance out what he made at the start of the year. Anyway, he's been pretty stressed out. Then, Monday, one of the people he's done work for a couple of times in the past called, needs mirrors and shower doors at condo units in Coronado. And yesterday, he got a call from the boatyard, they have a boat coming in September, that they need the same basic thing done to that he did to another boat earlier this year. There's good money in the boat jobs.

Boy, I hate being patronized. I just hate it. I'm having a problem with my InterMute filter. For some reason, it's blocking plain old GIF images. What it's doing, is reducing them to 1 x 1 pixels, so they are pretty much invisible. I turned in a troubleshooting report this past weekend. The author snottily said it wasn't his program, it must be something I've been doing. That I should clear my cache for them to show up, that they worked fine when he looked at them. Okay. So, I checked my site, nope, it wasn't me. I turned the filter on, no images. I turned if off, reloaded, there they are. All three of them. The cathouse banner, the chat login and the Disney banner. I email him back, send him the code for the banners that aren't showing up. Oh, now I find out that it must be my code, that it isn't pointing to the correct directories. Excuse me? I've been doing webpages for almost three years now, I'm pretty sure I know how to post an image. Besides, as I wrote to him, if the URL was wrong, there would be a broken image icon, not a blank spot. It wouldn't matter if the filter was on or off. What he was telling me was that he *never* saw the images I was talking about, the images he said were showing up. He didn't read my original email thoroughly. I also told him I didn't like being patronized, to be treated as if I just discovered the computer's on/off button last night. I mean, I've been corresponding with him for four days now. It should be obvious I'm not a newbie. So, after his snotty little email yesterday, I did a little checking. I cleared the cache. I typed in the URL of the GIF. Went to the page. Now, if this had been a bad link, I would have gone to the 404 error message. But I didn't. I went to a page with the image. Except, the image size was 1 x 1 pixels. Okay. I turned off the filter, reloaded the page. There's the image, as it should be. 468 x 60 pixels. It's the filter. I tell him this in my email to him yesterday morning. I tell him to do what I did, to go to the URL of the image. I haven't heard back from him. I'm really looking forward to his reply. Or, maybe I'll just get an update notice, where he's fixed the program glitch.

This morning, Mickey or Ciara woke me up by dive bombing my body. It was probably Mickey, because Ciara concentrates on my feet. I got out of bed, threw on some clothes and let the cats out. Benny was already out. Great. I told Brian and Brian said I hope it was through the door in the garage. I checked. Benny moved this heavy can condo, then he pulled the baby gate away from the door, had enough room to get in there and work at the locked catdoor to pull it towards him to get out and he got out. *sigh* Brat.

It's heating up again. Getting hot. We've had the air conditioning on in the afternoon.

We also decided that we were just going to buy a new portable phone. The one we had just won't charge a battery. There was a thing on the Sunday paper wrapper a couple of weeks ago where they are selling new phones for $80. Well, with the new boat job, it will be much easier for Brian to have the phone with him (remember the last boat job was when we realized the other phone wasn't working), than to have to go out to his truck to return pages. Brian had been reluctant to get a new phone, because we have all of the attachments for the other one. A belt case, a lighter adapter..... Well, the phone that was on sale? All of the stuff that we have will work with it. And it came with a new battery and a new charger/adaptor. It plugs into a different place on the phone than the chargers that we had. And, the best thing? The phone only cost $20 since we already have service. It was just an upgrade. The phone was connected and this morning, I tried the new charger on the old phone. Of course, there's no service on the old phone, but I tried to see if the new adaptor worked on it. It does!! So, now we have two batteries and they can both be charged.

The parrots are back. Squawky birds, flying over.

august 20, 1999 Well, Wednesday Brian made reservations for our annual Disneyland trip in October. I'm looking forward to it. And yesterday I called the pet/housesitter and she's available. She said she's busier in the summer than the autumn. And remember, she's one of the techs at my vet's office, so I know they'll be in good hands. We'll be staying at the Disney Pacific, the nights of the 16th and 17th.

Wednesday, we also went to get my new exercise bicycle. They only had one in stock at the El Cajon Sears and it had a piece missing. Well, we've gone through that before, so Brian asked if any of the other stores had it and the one in North County did. Off we went. It was a twenty five to thirty minute drive up there, we picked up the bike, then started home. It was dark outside and I started to worry about the cats. Ours were still out, well, some of them because before we left, I fixed the garage door for out only and the house had been closed up because the a/c was on. I started to worry about the outfront cats. I dread pulling into the driveway when I know there are so many of them out there. But it wasn't too bad. They were pretty hungry. The black kitten was back. He's so cute. He's all black, it looks like the fur on his tail may be a little long. But his ears. His ears are just adorable. The fur in the ears is white and it curls over the sides of the ears. And at the back of both of the ears, it looks like he's had a little frosting streak done. They are so darn cute. Brian was watching him through the window while I was dishing up their dinner and I was asking the little guy if he wanted to live here. He just sat there looking at me. He didn't run off like little Opie does.

Brian isn't working today. It's almost a quarter after seven and he's still in bed. I think the past year has finally caught up with him. He needs this rest.

Got the copy of our credit report yesterday. There are only two that put us at past due/30 days. And one of those we cancelled years ago. It will be on our record until 2003, though. The other one is the current card. They have a note "amount in dispute". The charge from Gateway for the monitor. But the other twelve gave us clean reports.

Lisa just got off of me. She had been laying on me for about fifteen minutes. Hard to type with a cat on your chest.

We had a catfight the other day. Maggie and Chaplin. Chappie is the big black and white cat next door. And yes, Maggie can't get out of our yard and other cats can't get in. They were fighting through the fence. They were both up on their back legs smacking at each other and hitting the fence, hissing and growling. Of course, Buddy and Junior had to get up there and help. It was behind the doghouse and there wasn't much room. It was a good fight, though, nobody got hurt. *grins*

Red was sleeping on my pot on the couch this morning. He's such a sweetie.

Hey, half price premium food can be found at PetSmart and Petopia. At the PetSmart site, you can get three bags (and probably cases of cans). At the Petopia, you can get two bags or cases, but you can lock in the price for six deliveries and you can set an automatic delivery schedule. PetSmart doesn't have shipping charges, Petopia does. But still. And their regular prices are still cheaper than what we pay at our local pet discount warehouse store. I ordered both moist and dry food. Petopia's Nutro is limited, though.

august 22, 1999 It's gonna be a hot one.

Let's see, what's been happening around here......Brian gave both Buddy and Junior baths Friday afternoon and Buddy is still shedding. So, Brian brushed a lot of it off and before he could pick it up, Ciara was eating it. Ciara had diarrhea yesterday.

Well, my new exercise bike is great. My back muscles were sore yesterday. The handles can be adjusted so that they move back and forth as you peddle. This way, you get more of the body working. And I did. I like it.

The corn just isn't growing well. I don't know if it's because it didn't get enough sun or water or a combination of both to begin with. The corn itself is the right size, but it's all shriveled up. *sigh* I'm going to pull all of those plants today. I think I'll plant catnip. I can always grow catnip. It grows anywhere. And I can grow a lot in the area where the corn is.

The outfront cats didn't come by too early last night. Cleo, Spot and the black kitten were here. When I went out to feed them, the kitten almost walked up and started eating. This guy isn't real afraid of me. His fur is a weird length, from what I could tell. It's more straggly in places than long. I asked him if he wanted to come into the house. I opened the door, carefully making sure no resident cats were around. He just looked at me. I told him how precious he is. He just looked at me. I came inside and the three cats that were out front all started dining. I watched the little one from the window. I picked Ciara up and said "isn't he cute? wouldn't it be fun to have a little brother to play with?" I told him that his daddy used to live here, but he's gone to the Rainbow Bridge. Talking to myself, but out loud, I mused that this kitten may possibly be Blackie's last baby. This got Brian out of his chair and he came and looked. "Nah, how can he be Blackie's? He's too young." I said that the kitten was probably between four and six months old. It takes a little over two months for a kitten to be born from conception. Blackie moved in with us in the middle of April. So, counting back, the kitten may have been born between March and May. Plenty of time for Blackie to have been the daddy. Brian watched the kitten, in the entry way by himself, Spot and Cleo somewhere out front. I called the kitten Jackie. The progression to the name was as follows, as I explained to Brian when he said "Jackie? How did you come up with 'Jackie'?" I feel that the kitten is Blackie's kid. Blackie Junior. Or BJ. Or Black Jack. Or Jackie. Brian started talking to the kitten. "Hi, little Jackie" he called to the kitten through the window, "do you want to come live with us? Have lots of brothers and sisters to play with? Are you going to move in? Be Ciara's little brother?" Then Brian brought up a good point. We don't know if Jackie is a boy or girl, for certain. I said the name will fit either way. It looks like we might have another cat soon.

Weird story. Somebody emailed me wanting to know the criteria for adopting a cat from us. I mailed back that we weren't a shelter. The next day, they wanted to know what were we then? I emailed back "what do you want to know? Why do you want to know it?" Nothing back. Geez, anybody who reads this site knows that we just rescue strays, nothing we go out of our way for. And after Georgie and Gracie, I think we knew that we would never adopt a cat out. I do have a link to a site in the midwest that's a shelter. The M.E.O.W. shelter.

Mickey has been so affectionate lately. If he can't see me, he will start crying for me. When I call to him, he'll come to where I am. And he always helps me make the bed. This isn't alot of fun for me, because he attacks my hands. Usually when I'm tucking the bedspread material under the pillows. He kind of slides into them, full stretch, claws out. Gotta catch whatever's under there. And he has another trick. I hold my hand over his head and rub my fingers together. He will jump up, wrap his paws around my wrist (no claws) and pull my hand down to rub it with his face.

The front is *almost* done. We have to go get different light fixtures than the ones we got. The original windows weren't level with each other and the lights we bought will accent the difference. So, hubby wants to go find a different style. He still has to get on the screen door. And I mention that to him a couple of times a day. I think he primered it yesterday. Then he has to paint it, then he has to put the screen in. Then he can hang it. I really miss having a screen door.

The damn vacuum cleaner crapped out again. That little red thing didn't show when the bag was full, I kept vacuuming, it quit picking up. I changed bags and it still didn't work. I took it out back to blow out the hose with the compressor air. Reattached it. Still didn't work. Brian's helping now and I took the foam filter off. I look through the grill. There's another filter in there. Brian takes the machine apart. There's a circle of foam that surrounds the motor. It's all twisted up. This isn't right. I took all three foam pieces and washed them. They're almost dry.

When I let the cats out this morning, I didn't see Buddy. I asked hubby if he had put Buddy up. Yes, he was in the shop. I slept right through it.

lisaviolet is fifty something, married with no kids, takes care of lots of cats, likes taking photographs, loves Southern California weather and spends altogether too much time avoiding her responsibilities.

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