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Sunday, June 09, 2002 Well, I guess it's officially June! It's just busting out all over! (And so is my butt, out of my clothes; not good.) (I just love that musical "Carousel", with Shirley Jones (Mrs. Partridge) and Gordon McCrae. I first saw it as a kid, was entranced with it, I still am today.
One of the reasons I haven't been keeping up with the diary, is I'm spending too much time watching the Trial of David Westerfield. It's a local trial. Back in February, a seven year old girl was abducted from her bed in the dead of night. It was pretty much treated as an abduction from the get go. Suspicion quickly turned to a divorced neighbor man. His actions and things that he said to police and things that the police found in his home and on his computer, quickly made him the number one suspect. This took place sometime on the night of February 1st. They charged him with murder on February 27, still not having found a body. On February 28, the body was found dumped at the side of a rural road, badly decomposed. He exercised his right to a speedy trial and that's what's going on now. I found some forums where they discuss the trial and quite a few people aren't able to see the trial during the day, so I've tried to watch the trial and type what I see/hear. When the trial is on a break, I do housework. Doesn't leave much time for website work. And when I'm working on the website, I'm trying to get the renovated store up and running. It's slow going because there are so many details and, stupidly, I didn't keep any of the information from the old store, so I have to start from scratch. Even though I'll be offering more than I was (darker shirts, for one thing, which will cost more, because #1. the shirts cost me more, #2. I have to use a different much more expensive paper and #3., they are much more labor intensive for me. I've also printed up six different 110 piece puzzles, which will come in a box. I'll probably offer, for an additional charge, to offer a service where I'll make puzzles using other people's pictures.
The cats are doing fine (knock on wood). Benny went in for his annual shave Tuesday and Elena pointed out that he has fleas. Remember, I found a couple on Mystie last month and bought Advantage. Well, Mystie is the only kitty I'd applied it to. So, yesterday, I was scratching Sammy on the back of his head and caught a flea under my fingernail without even trying. Bad news. Yesterday was spent applying Advantage to the cats and to Junior. I made up an "Advantage schedule" form, listing all the cats and have columns next to their names for dates. I got all animals with the exception of Lonee and Red. I was very surprised to be able to get Jackson. He tried to run off halfway during the application, but I got most of it on him. I know it will do some good. I know this will sound really weird, but I love to see the dead fleas under the cats. I really do. I found three under Benny within a few hours. I just wish I could dose Lonee and Red. Lonee still hasn't forgiven me since I tried picking her up last year. She has started talking to me again, though.
Well, we haven't had any cats getting out of the yard since Brian redid the fence. I saw Richie climbing the fence a couple of times, but he didn't get very far. I hardly see him over there at all now. Spends most of his time around the pool.
Brian finally fixed the vacuum part of the pool yesterday. It hasn't been working since last year. All of this time, he thought there was something wrong with the vacuum itself. Then he realized that maybe there was a problem in the line to the filter, so it wasn't sucking properly. Yesterday, he cut the pipe where the valve is and found out what had happened. It seems the vacuum sucked up a rock. The rock went through and just past the valve (which closes when the pump isn't running to prevent backwash) when the pump shut off for the night. And the rock fell back down onto the valve. Preventing it from opening when the filter started up again the next day. It wasn't a very accessable area to work and he had to crawl under the deck where the pump is. Nasty, dirty. Anyway, while he was sawing at the PVC, the pipe broke. So, we had to go to Home Depot and get some fittings so he could finish his repairs.
I have to admit, it was really kind of fun, relaxing. I wanted to find some sort of form to put the shirts on to take pictures of for the store and I wanted to get some more fabric paint for the dark shirts (I told you they're more labor intensive) at Michael's (a craft store). So, we went to Home Depot, Michael's and then drove through Jack in the Box. My truck was having problems, so Brian's friend who works on vehicles had picked my Ranger up on Friday and left his Ranger in it's place and that's what we were in. It's stock, not lifted, the windows need to be rolled down, the doors need to be manually locked and the air conditioning doesn't work. Just like my pre-marriage vehicle, a Chevy Luv pickup. It was fun, gave me a good feeling. Just being with hubby on a pleasant June day, driving around, doing odds and ends. *sigh*
Every night for the past couple of months, I've been saying prayers that the out fronts make it through the night safely, even putting in a good word for King, as I've named our snake. I didn't even realize I was doing this until a couple of weeks after I'd started. And every morning, I say prayers of thanks when I see them out front, alive and well. Meezer and OC are here just about every morning. Occasionally, I'll see Meetoo and SpotTee out there. We do the headcounts at night. "Did you see Angus yet?" "No, but I saw Repete." I have to admit, my day goes much better when I see at least Meezer and OC in the morning. This morning there was Meetoo, OC and Meez.
A couple of weeks ago, I picked up some samples of Nutro food for my mom. I also got a couple of Natural Choice Complete Care samples. I tried those out on our cats, and boy, did they like them. So, when my mom said she was going to buy some of the NutroMax Adult for her cat, I asked if she'd pick me up a small bag of the Natural Choice, because I thought it would be great for treats. Imagine my surprise when she showed up with a twenty pound bag. But since the cats like it so much, I think I'll give it to DeeJay, Lola, Boney and Lucky, because they're the cats that need help with their weight (they need to put some on).
On the first, we frosted my hair again. It's been awhile and it had grown out so that my crown was all dark hair. Brian did a wonderful job of pulling it through the cap. I left the bleach on for the full ninety minutes, used the toner (which I don't usually do) and I'm very pleased with the way it came out. The best yet, I think.
We went to Disneyland last Sunday, spent the night at the Paradise Pier. We had a pretty nice time. Went into the improved Abe Lincoln show. It was okay, I liked the original better. I was impressed with the sound system. It's earphones. Surround sound earphones. Kewl. We did Space Mountain and the Mark Twain at Disneyland, can't think of anything else we went on there and over on Disney's California Adventure, Brian went on the Maliboomer by himself and I visited the restrooms, then we went on the Sun Wheel, then Brian went on Screamin' and I went on the SunWheel again. I was hoping to have a car to myself, but I'd started chatting with the gentleman behind me in line and he and his two kids rode in my car. It was okay, nice to talk with someone, but I was kind of looking forward to being in the car alone. Just to take in the view in silence. We left early Monday morning to come home and were here by 10:00 am. The animules were happy to see us, even happier to have their doors opened up. They just love being in the sun.
Well, some kitty had soft stool last night and didn't get his or her butt all the way into the litterbox in the hallway. Looks like the poo was stepped in, too, by a paw that was used to cover up what had fallen outside of the box. It's pretty messy, so I guess I should go start cleaning.
Monday, June 17, 2002 Hahahaha!! Just to give you an idea of how out of it I've been, I just opened up the page to update my diary and I opened up May. *lol* I forgot all about it being June already. *grin* Summer fever, I guess. The days are longer, the days are warmer. The neighbors are swimming in their pool and I'm getting the urge to take this whale of a body out to the pool.....I bet it would sure feel nice to jump right in. Maybe tomorrow....
I don't know if I've mentioned before that Brian, my dearly beloved, would rather drive over to his mom and brother's house than call. Sure, it's about a quarter of a mile, but can't he just call? Well, last week while he was out running around in my little Ranger (remember, he broke the motor in his truck, still not fixed) he stopped by his brother's house, parked in his mom's driveway. Well, the boys were yapping and they heard a crash. Brian's sister-in-law yells out "Mama just hit your truck" to Brian. The boys ran out and were yelling at her to STOP! She said "I have to go pick up Joe from school". Mark had Judy go pick him up and Brian's mom had to get out of her van. She didn't know she'd hit the truck. *sigh* Her insurance is going to pay for it. She has the same carrier as we do, so it wasn't all that hard to file a claim. The one estimate Brian has gotten so far was $1200.00. But that wasn't definite. Since the truck will be away for three weeks, we also get a rental. He came home with the rental today. Puke. A Dodge Stratus. A car. A gold car. Brian doesn't do Dodge and we don't care for the gold. For $9.95 more a day, he could have gotten a Ford 150, but he said he's not going to pay for it. What on earth would we want a car for? We use the Ranger to haul stuff, we don't use the Mustang. So, he calls the insurance agency says "this car won't do it". And the claims person set it up so he got the 150. He doesn't like it either, but he doesn't like it less than he didn't like the Stratus. *lol*
Autumn is getting just a might more approachable each week. She doesn't always dash when we walk into the same room she's in. And she's quite affectionate in bed at night. She will come up to me when I go to bed (remember, Brian has already been in bed for a couple of hours). She lets me pet her, starts purring. If I quit, she'll move closer to my hand. But during the day, she still doesn't want to be touched. She's so cute. I want to smurgle her all over.
I've been going nuts getting CDs. I'm so bad. One of the latest I've gotten, that I really like is Standard Time by Steve Tyrell. I saw an ad one night on TV and decided to go for it. If you like the old standards, this guy has a great voice. I really like "Baby, It's Cold Outside". He has another one out that I'll be getting shortly. A New Standard. It came out before the one I've got. Like I said, I like it so much, I'm gonna get the other one. The one I've got only has four and a half stars. The other one has five!
All the outfronts are around and doing well. I'm still amazed that Meetoo hasn't started to fill out. I can only surmise that she's not pregnant. I'm pretty sure Angus was never snipped and I don't think SpotTee was ever neutered. For the past few mornings, I've seen Meezer (who seems to know the name "Kitty"), Meetoo and OC out front in the mornings, waiting for their Fancy Feast. It's nice. Brian also saw SpotTee this morning.
Heh heh heh...I got a form to put teeshirts on. To take pictures for my store (which isn't up yet). Well, it's plus size and just the front part of the body, about three inches down to the thighs. And I was looking at it, thinking it was missing something. Then I got this perverted urge to decorate it. That hairless area that needs hair, well, that mat that came from Jackson last year would be perfect. *lol* Brian said "don't you do it. Don't even think about it." Well, I won't do it, but I'll still think about it. *grin* You can't make me stop thinking about it.
The catnip is doing quite nicely this year. I had to spray it last night because of the aphids and the ants. It's a weak solution, only lasts a couple of days, but it kills what's damaging the nip. Yesterday, I finally got all of last year's crop put into baggies. Sat on the tile (on an exercise mat) and had newspaper down. I had a box of nip on either side of me and I'd strip all of the good stuff off and set the branches to the side. Some of the cats (who of course, just had to help) preferred the sticks to the nip. At one point, I had one of the boxes emptied and started putting the stripped stalks in there. Kirby climbed into it and settled down under all of the twigs. That lasted until Katie Blue checked it out, figured it would be a nice place to urinate. So, she backed up and sprayed the box. Well, it wasn't a tall box and some of her urine went over the top. Boy, Kirby can move faster than I thought. *lol* Luckily, the newspaper caught the bulk of the urine, so there wasn't much cleanup. I ended up with two very full gallon size ziplock bags of catnip. Which are now in the freezer. We had a couple of cats who really got ripped. Lola couldn't even walk straight. *chuckle* She spent quite a bit of time rubbing her face on my foot and drooling. When I set up the store, I'll charge for them. Just little bags with the purchase of a shirt. Prolly charge a buck for them. I think good homegrown catnip would be a good seller. Nip without the twigs and stalks. Most of the store bought stuff I've had just seems to be the entire plant, processed. The stuff I have is leaves and flowers. Maybe a few stems from the leaves, but not many. I told Brian it would be a good thing to grow at the sticks. But it would have to be hand processed. So, I don't know....
Well, there's really not much to talk about right now. I guess that's nice, since I usually only feel like writing here when I'm upset for some reason or another. It feels good to not be angry or hurt. But I notice a lot of places I check out seem slower, so maybe it's not just me. Oh, well. Can't think of much else to put in here right now. I'm thinking about stuff for the store.
Friday, June 28, 2002 June 28th? Already? I haven't made an entry since the 17th? Geez, this getting old is for the birds. The days are just flying by. SLOW DOWN!!!!!
I was a little scared yesterday. For the first time in over a month, Meezer wasn't here in the morning. Didn't see him all day. He's been spending the majority of the day on Brian's dump truck, which is here while he works on his truck that's broken. That's at his shop and he used to store the dump truck there. As a matter of fact, I've gotten so used to him being here during the day, that I went and picked up some Program at the vet's office yesterday. I planned on adding it to food I prepare for him during the day (I process it like I did Pepper's and add water; it's really easy to lap). I tested this earlier this week and he liked the food, only let a small amount in the bowl. And in this small amount were quite a few blood drops, that look like the kind from wet flea waste. And where he lays is just full of flea eggs, so I figured I'd try something to help reduce the massive amounts of fleas he must have. But I didn't see him all day and I was very, very nervous. Luckily he showed up last night for dinner and was here again for breakfast. Now he's gone again. I guess that I shouldn't fret, because Brian is going to have to start using his dumptruck again, anyway. Right now, he's using the loaner while my truck is in the shop getting worked on. I'm driving the Mustang if I have to go anywhere. But I really wanted to make sure Meeze got the Program. I'll try today, if he's around.
I mentioned to Brian last night that we don't seem to be yelling at the cats as much. I wondered if maybe the cats are being better because we aren't yelling as much (the little fights they get into, the backing up to urinate in inappropriate areas). Whatever the reason, it's sure nice and the cats sure like it.
Autumn is getting a little more relaxed every week. For the longest time, if she saw me walk into a room, she'd run. Now, she mostly stays right where she was when I came in. I don't even have to walk around her. And yesterday, she was up in the front window and I started petting her, then quit and started petting Mickey. She stood up and came over closer to me, so I could give her some more rubs and scratches. It's really nice when she does that. She doesn't look so frightened all the time. And this morning, I saw her going after Mystie on the cat tree in the living room. Yup, Autumn is starting to find her niche.
Well, I've got ten sample shirts made up. I have to get some fabric paint for around the border of a couple of the images. I think they need something a little more than just the picture. I'm heading to Wal-Mart to see what they've got and from there, Michael's craft store. I've already got quite a few different colors of glitter, but I'd like to check out more alternatives. I really want to see the black glitter. Throughout the years, I've purchased sets, I guess you could call them, with different colors. But none of them has the black glitter. And according to the Duncan website, they also have a crystal type fabric paint. I'd like to see that, by a few bottles and test them out. I was hoping to have the store back up on the 15th of June, but that didn't happen. Maybe by the 15th of July.
We've been really good about walking. Icky Hill has gotten much easier for me. I know my heart is getting stronger. I feel much better during the day. Where Icky Hill used to take a half hour to walk, it's only taking about twenty minutes. So, we have to walk farther to keep pushing our bodies to get stronger. We haven't done fast food in almost a month now. And when we did, we didn't have fries with that. When we go out to eat, I was surprised to notice that I started feeling full about halfway through the meal. I haven't cleaned my plate in weeks, leaving at least a third of what I started out with. I'm sleeping much better, too. I've also been drinking quite a bit of water, with the occasional soda. My skin isn't as dry as it was, I don't remember the last time I put Oil of Olay on my face. The scales aren't showing very much of a loss, but I'm getting into those pants I bought last year. I don't even have to lay on the bed to get them zipped up. We eat an awful lot of salad, but it fills us up. We just have to make sure we don't fall back into the fast food routine. There are some nights I don't eat at all, because I'm not hungry. That's a really good feeling. I know that I'm in this for the long haul. I didn't get this way overnight.
Last Friday night, I found blood in my bathroom. There was blood spatter on the wall in front of the toilet, on the floor and behind the toilet. Not a massive amount, but a good amount. I figured it was either a paw or something on some kitty's head. I did a quick check of the cats and couldn't find any injuries. Saturday morning, though, I did see the injured party. It was Richie and it was his other ear. It had scabbed over, just a little at the tip. Brian said that Richie had been wrestling with Daniece, so that's probably when it happened. Poor little guy.
Benny is loving his haircut. The only problem is it hasn't really been all that hot so far this year. At night, he's into snuggling, which is okay with me.
Last week, I opened our AT&T long distance phone bill. They had raised their rates again. Now, we were paying over $11 just to have the service, then being charged over .24 a minute for out of state calls, over .14 a minute for long distance in state calls. Well, we don't make many long distance calls at all. Last month, it was 45 minutes for the whole month and that was a lot for us, since I'd spent much of that time on the line to the Disneyland Resort making reservations (not a toll free call). So, with their base charge added in, we averaged .55 a minute per call! What a rip off. So, I called our local telephone carrier, Cox Communications and asked about their charges. There is no monthly charge for long distance and we will pay .05 a minute for instate calls and .10 a minute for out of state calls. There is no peak usage, the same charges apply to any day of the week, any hour of the day. We switched.
Woohoo! Just did the Program for Meezer and he's lapping it up. I hope it helps him. I don't know what to do about the other cats, how to get it to them separately.
Well, I have some paperwork to do and checks to get out in the mail. Guess that's what I'll do next. Then, wait for the new fax machine to get here (the old one sends out pages that aren't readable at all, they're all black). This one will be kept covered so that the finer things in life, like cat hair and cat kibble, don't affect its sending resolution. Cats. Gotta love 'em. After that, I'll go check out the fabric paint and then, hopefully, I'll have enough time to lay out by the pool. Ten years ago, I would have been on the way to a pretty good tan by now. Not anymore. *lol*
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