november 1, 1998
"If you've been thinking you're all that you've got,
then don't feel alone anymore
'cause when we're together, then you've got alot,
'cause I am the river and you are the shore
and it goes on and on
watching the river run
further and further from things that we've done,
leaving them one by one
and we have just begun
watching the river run
listening, learning and yearning,
run, river, run"

Great song. Great words. If you've never heard it as performed by Loggins and Messina, try to. It's a really good song.

I'm going to start something new on my website. Where there is music, I will try to find it on CD Now and provide a link to the CD Now page with the for sale item. I get a lot of requests for the music that I put up. And the stuff I put up is usually songs that I am familiar with from real life, past and present, and that I think others will like. I will also be putting the links up on the midi pages.

Well, our Halloween was much, much better than last year. Brian helped with the decorations, seeing as my feet still hurt. (They've been hurting for a couple of weeks now. I must have bruised them jumping down from something, but I don't have a clue what it might have been. I say this because not just one hurts, but both of them.) What I need to do for my feet is to quit walking on them for a while. But hubby helped put up the spider webs, which was a big help. And of course, he did the graveyard and he had to run the extension cords for the lights. The little villages turned out nicely and the animated scarecrow and Tigger looked good in the front window.

I had picked up a headband that had cat's ears on it. I wore it around the house scaring the heck out of the cats. I thought it was funny, but Brian thought I was being very mean and nasty to the cats. Lisa's tail got huge. Mickey wouldn't even let me close to him. Knowing that we would be having company soon, I took the ears off to take a shower. Even though I still had to put up the spider webbing, (we were still putting the finishing touches up when our guests arrived and I hadn't changed into the clothes I was going to wear for handing out candy), I drew on my face, taking hints from the picture of a little girl in a drugstore ad on the back of a newspaper insert. I asked Brian if I looked stupid, should I leave it on or take it off? He though it looked okay, so I went back and put the finishing touches around my eyes and mouth, using liquid eyeliner to darken the lines. Then I put on the ears.

When our company arrived, Gail thought I looked pretty good. Chris, her husband, said I looked like a himalayan. LOL!!! We went inside and Gail got Sabrina dressed, I got dressed and we were ready.

Ashley and Travis (they live across the street, next to Chris and Gail's old house) came over and left with Sabrina and her dad to trick or treat around our neighborhood. I put the finishing touches on dinner and Brian, Gail and I all sat back and talked and handed out candy.

Then Sabrina and her dad came back, we ate dinner, and they left, to go trick or treating in their neighborhood.

One of the last bunch of *little* kids were Mexicans. There were five or six in the group and there were three young girls, dressed as princesses, of course. Each bag of candy we gave out had six *fun* sized (read that bite sized) pieces of candy, snickers, m&ms, starburst, rice krispy treat, reese's peanut butter cup, milky way, you get the idea.... Anyway, the children lined up at the door, with their small plastic pumpkins which held their booty. I would hand the bags to the kids to put in themselves. One very young girl looked inside the bag and held it up to her dad, her eyes very big "Papa" she said.... "Papa!!" (She said papa with the accent on the second syllable.)

Of course, they all tried to touch the water with the dry ice in it and took great fun in the way they looked under the black lights. As they left the entry way, the youngest, at the end of the line, again was saying "Papa", but this time she sounded a little worried. She didn't want to get left behind in the house of spider webs and spiders and scary sounds and that graveyard out front, even if she did get good candy....

*sigh*

So different than the American kids, some of whom actually walked out, turned around and came back for more. Hubby busted a couple of them, but gave them more candy anyway. We had our last kids a little before nine and I turned off the music and the lights out front and shut the gate. Halloween was over. And it was much better than last year's.

I came back into the office and scared the spit out of Mickey. The cats aren't use to all this company and people knocking at the door and yelling. I still had the cat's face and the ears, and he ran out of the room like a bat out of hell. I took the makeup off, took the ears off and washed my face. Now, Mickey was ready to be my friend again.

The cats were pretty good last night. Brian had most of them in and I got the remaining few in before Sabrina and Chris got back and got them fed. Buddy wasn't good, he had to be put in the shop because he kept barking, but that's to be expected. I let Buddy out of the shop around ten, when it sounded like the neighborhood was done for the night. Brian and I both fell asleep in front of the television, covered in cats.

You know I've been letting the dogs in for a couple of minutes a day. Well, today, Brian was sitting on the ottoman in the living room, when both dogs came in to see him. I didn't say anything and he kept asking them "Are you supposed to be in the house?" all the while, he was scratching and loving them. He said "Is mom gonna have to start giving you baths each week? Are you gonna start spending the nights in the house?" I told Brian, well, at least it would smell like dog and not cat pee and he said "hhmmm.....this is something to think about." *grins* I have a feeling that we will allow the dogs in like the cats someday. I'm glad.

So, tomorrow I will put all of my Halloween ornaments back in their boxes to be put away until next year. Normally, I would have done this this morning, but I'm giving my feet a rest. Brian already took down all of the webbing and put the plot markers away. We expect no more relatives visiting and I think I can finally go back to not having a life. It's about time. I like not having anything except housework and paperwork to do.

november 3, 1998 Well, I got up this morning, came into the office and Maggie got locked in here last night. There was no food in the feeder. I guess she got hungry. Sandy's biscuit is gone. *sigh*

I've mentioned Benny's latest annoying little trick, I think. The one where he goes into the masterbath and starts pulling on the screen and meowing. He even jumps up on the screen and just hangs there. So, I get out of bed, go talk to him and pull him down. It's not a fun game to be playing at 3:30 in the morning. I told Brian, maybe we should just shut the bathroom door before we go to bed. It worked. Benny didn't wake us up until 5:55 this morning. He was sitting on the dresser and meowing.

I still haven't done Halloween clean up. And we vote today. I couldn't find our voting stuff, was looking for it at 10:30 last night. Brian has a pretty good system of voting. Don't vote for incumbents and vote no on anything that will cost money. *grins* But we still read all of the information in the voter's information we received, discuss it and then make a more informed choice. We don't even look at the advertisements we get in the mail. Those are immediately routed to the trash can. So, hey, any of you candidates reading this, keep this in mind. Your campaign dollars at work at the local landfill.
Vote. It's your right. And if you don't vote, don't complain.

I got the pictures back. Oh, there are some excellent ones, ones that will make great lake effect postcards. More sunsets, too and I even got a few nice ones of sunrise. And I have a few of the rat and the cats from Ben's latest advenchur. I'll add one of those to the story. Hubby is working out of town next week, so I'll do that then. Last night, I got into my jammies and laid on my spot on the couch, against a folded up afgan. I had to get up for something and I noticed that my butt was wet. I felt the couch, nothing. Then I felt the blanket, sniffed. AAARRRRGGGHHHH!!! The blanket peeur strikes again. The blanket had a small wet urine spot on it. I bet it was Mickey, I just bet it was. Or maybe Boney, but I think Mickey. I have to shampoo the furniture one of these days. Get that smell out. When my feet are back to normal. And that's gonna be an all day job.

I have some typing to do today and I have to finish the laundry. I'm going to go through my email and try to make the updates that people have sent me. I just wish I didn't get sidetracked so easily.

Speaking of my feet, they felt much better yesterday.

november 5, 1998 Well, the elections are over. Good. Maybe now our *leaders* will get back to work, taking care of the *country*. At least that's what the newspaper infers this morning.

Yesterday's newspaper had a little blurb about a local school board race. One of the candidates signs kept disappearing. So, she and some of her campaign workers got together and did a little undercover watching. They sat in cars, in the dark, watching one of the corners that had been regularly hit. They were sitting there for about four or five hours, when a van pulls up with its lights off. The two occupants leave the van and go about removing campaign signs. The *undercover* people used their cell phones to alert local law enforcement and the two in the van were arrested. Turned out to be one of the opponents. And her husband, who was also running for a seat on a different school board. In the van, the police found hundreds of campaign signs, from all other opponents. Oh, my. Like campaign signs really make a difference in who you vote for!!! LOL!!! The husband was on probation for something else, so they arrested him. The wife was charged with a misdemeanor and released. Geez. Due to our high volume of junk campaign mail (who believes this stuff anyway? it's just candidates trying to make themselves look good or the opponents look bad) I think next elections, I'm going to save them all, put them in separate piles. Whoever sent me the most junk mail, won't get my vote. The money could be better spent on something else. And on controversial propositions, like the Indian Gaming initiative, here in California, I'll look to who's spending the money. I guess Las Vegas was spending millions so that Prop 5 would be defeated. That's where the reservations *could* have Vegas style gambling, which is illegal under California state law. I guess I'm not really sure of what a *sovereign nation* is. I always thought that they made their own laws on their own land. It's nice to see the Indians able to support themselves, and bringing new jobs into the economy. One ad against, even said that this proposition would allow the Indians to pollute the land. Yeah, right. Like the Indians *would* pollute the mother earth. Geez, haven't the people that were against this proposition ever seen "Dances With Wolves"?

Benny has been great about not trying to escape. I love going outside and calling him and here he is!! Now watch. He'll be someplace today he isn't supposed to be. I made him kind of mad last night. It almost time to get the cats in, he came in to nibble and I blocked the catdoor so that he couldn't leave. He was extremely vocal about his displeasure. Heck, it was only five minutes to go anyway.

There's a new tortie in town. She's been coming over in the evening with OC for dinner. And she's been here during the day. I can't imagine she's a feral, because there aren't any fertile feral females on that side of the street. So, she either belongs to someone who just lets her roam (bad idea) or someone dumped her (worse idea). She's really small, I don't know if that equates with young. Lonee Gail sure fooled me, I thought she was pretty young when we got her and she turned out to be about three years old according to the vet. OC sits out there at night, just looking at the front door. I ask him does he want to come in yet. He hasn't answered yet, but I sure hope he's thinking about it.

This morning, we heard a cat fight. What woke me up was a cat running across my legs. Brian said the fight was out front. I thought it was in the house. He said he heard the noise the front gate makes when the cats run through it. I thought about it, wondered if maybe a coyote had been waiting and gotten a kitty as it left. But, we have those tall trees out front for escape and I can't imagine that a cat would leave the entry way with a coyote outside. Coyotes can't get in. I got out of bed, grabbed my robe, put it on and went outside and looked around, didn't see anything. I climbed back into bed and went back to sleep. We were both awakened by growling. Lisa. At the foot of the bed. She growled. And growled. Brian told her to stop. I told her to stop. She growled. And growled. I told Brian "you take care of it". He got up and moved her and shooed away the kitty she was growling at. A little while later, Benny went into the bathroom and started crying (we forgot to shut the door). I got out of bed and brought him in with me. He laid down next to me, purring. Maggie climbed on my side, purring. Only problem is, every so often she lets out a little meow. Except when it's quiet and her mouth is at my ear, it doesn't seem so little. Then Mickey climbed onto me below her. Rusty decided he wanted my pillow and he put his face into mine. His whiskers tickle. Get out of my face. I just wanted to sleep. And sleep? I finally did. And then it was time to get up. Yawn.....

november 7, 1998 Oh, I got some new graphics programs and I'm having a blast!!! If you are looking for backgrounds, I've got a bunch. Not many cat backgrounds, but lots of others. More to come in the (near) future.

We had a scare with Bart yesterday. Late in the morning, I noticed him all hunched up on the couch in the living room I went in and felt him (warm) and tried to rub his belly. He didn't like that at all. My first thought was that he was constipated again. I called and made an appointment for yesterday afternoon. He's okay, had that nasty "fever of unknown origin" again. While we were *visiting* he told me about a cat that had many, many bladder problems and nothing that he did worked. Not that the cat was blocked (although that had happened, the cat even went into beginning kidney failure), but the vet said his bladder was like a hot water bottle, just flacid. The doc finally operated on him and he said the bladder was thick and rubbery and scarred, it looked really bad. Even after the surgery, the cat piddled, as if he had no control over what he was doing. The vet, as a last resort, tried DMSO, the same thing that worked so well on Benny. He was giving the cat a treatment every five days. He said the day after the first treatment, the cat's owner called him and told him that the cat was already acting much better, jumping and running where he hadn't been in so long. We talked a little about Sandy and he said that a woman had brought her cat in earlier that week, an indoor only cat, because he wasn't acting right. (I know how that goes.) The doctor did all sorts of things to try to find out what was wrong with kitty. He even took x-rays that didn't look *quite right*, something was off. He finally did a needle aspirate of the lungs and looked at what he got under a microscope. Kitty had lung cancer. The kind smokers get. And kitty's owner was a smoker. That's just so sad. I'm not a smoker, I don't like smoke. I wish my mom wouldn't. I don't say anything to her about it, it just makes her defensive, so I keep my thoughts to myself. But when my aunt and uncle were here, and Brian had gone with Tommy when Tommy returned the rental car, my mom lit up in the house. And she did something I hadn't seen her do before. She smoked one after the other. I was having a really hard time breathing and I walked out onto her porch. I said I just wanted to see how nice it was outside and she said "smoke getting to you?" and I said, well, yes, it is. She said "well, the fan's on" and I didn't say anything, it would have been pointless. My lungs are much bigger than a cat's or a dog's and it was hard for me to breathe it in, I can imagine how bad it would be for some animals. To top it off with my mom, she has a Pug, a breed that has respiratory problems anyway, because of their flat faces. Anyway, the cat at the vet's had to be put to sleep. I feel really sorry for the owner. I bet she feels so guilty. I wish people just wouldn't start smoking. Then Gwen (I like her now) told me that she got some of the Rescue Remedy I had told her about. She said it seems to be working on her kitty. That was good news. And Sheri brought her baby cat out to me. What a little sweetheart, he looks like he has a lot of Maine Coon in him. He has the classic tabby pattern and he has lynx tipped ears. And he has his claws. I hope he gets to keep them. I don't think Sheri would declaw. He was giving me love bites on my chin. He's a real little cutie. I want a kitten!!!!

Bart and I got home and he was glad to be here. He was quickly twining around my legs, wanting to be picked up and loved, so I know he was feeling better. He's on antibiotics for a week and I saw him poop last night (the vet said he had a little in him, and Bart was extremely uncomfortable when the doc took his temperature), so I know for sure that he isn't constipated.

And then Lonee wasn't acting like she felt well last night. She stuck her head into the tv room, squinting, like the light hurt her eyes. I went to see if she was okay and she hid behind the water heater. I stretched as was able to pet her. She liked it and purred. She was okay. I think the problem was GRACIE. She just won't give Lonee a moment's peace.

Saw OC and Angus last night. Saw alot more of Angus than OC. But OC was in front this morning. I think he might sleep in the entry way.

I have to take all of the Halloween decorations down today. My feet are feeling much better, since I've been trying to stay off of them and when I do walk, I put sandals (Birkenstocks-they have support) or shoes on. And I really want to have this stuff done by Monday, because Brian is gonna be gone for a couple of days and I don't want to have to do clean up then. I have so much stuff I want to do for my website. New postcards, I have email from people with tributes, guest photos, more links.... I would like to add to the family album page and of course, make new background and border graphics. I don't want to have to stop to clean house. *grins* Heck, I almost forgot to get the cats in last night, I was so immersed in the Eye Candy graphic program. Bad news....

november 8, 1998 After I finish today's entry, I'm going to take the remaining Halloween decorations down. I want to get it done before my feet start hurting and have it out of the way. I'm usually really good about taking it down the day after, but this year it was just too painful.

I think Boney drinks out of the tub faucet too quickly because he sits on my toilet sit and hurks. I just hate that. Partially eaten cat food all around the toilet on the floor. And he gets it on my bathmat. Guess you could call it a "throw up rug".

A couple of other things the vet said while I was there Friday. I was telling him about Sabrina asking about Sandy and I mentioned that we had them over for dinner on Halloween, I made spaghetti. He said "you handed out spaghetti? I can just see it", he said, "you're really cute, little girl, how about a meatball". My vet. The comedian. A word of advice to him...Don't quit your day job.

Boney was chasing Gracie last night. Big time. I don't know what the deal was, but she was very unhappy. I found her and held her and petted her and talked gently to her, to calm her down.

Lonee Gail was extremely affectionate last night. She even noserubbed me a couple of times. I wish she would come into the house for love.

Brian started in again about me being on the computer so much last night. Yeah, that's why our electric bill was down $75.00. (When I'm not at the monitor for hours, I turn it off. The bill was also down because the A/C hasn't been running, but I know turning the monitor off helps.) What gets me is the first couple of years we were married, he use to tell me to find a hobby, not to expect him to be home all of the time because he works so much and to find something that would keep me occupied when he wasn't around. Ten years later, I finally find something I really like, something I really enjoy and he hates it. It makes him nuts. He has no problem with me looking stuff up for him and I've really helped him out by doing so. And he brags to others about my website, too, even hands out the lisaviolet business cards I made. He said "well, other stuff doesn't get done". AARRGGHHHH!!!! This really gripes me. Since my mom went to Vegas and I hurt my feet trying to get Miss E off of the bank (I know that's when I hurt them) it's been hard for me to walk or spend any amount of time standing. And he knows this. We've been on the go for four months, it seems like (remember the comment I made earlier about I didn't like having a life?), and I always have some project to do for him, like the paperwork for the sticks. When I got up this morning, I cleaned the kitchen. He stayed in bed til after 8 and I was just finishing up when he came into the kitchen. "You work so hard" he said. Yeah, right, I responded. "Well", he said, "you work hard sometimes". (See, when he started in again last night I told him he was a real nag and I wished he would stop. He apologized.) Now, what kind of life would it be if I worked hard ALL of the time? Excuse me, but that's not the life for me. Huh-uh. Not gonna happen. I've never been highly motivated or ambitious and I see no reason to start now. And I'm not gonna. I have been taking better care of the house, until I hurt my feet. And I intend on keeping it up. I can't help it if our carpet has big holes in it. Heck, the carpet is the original that was put in this house, back in the early 70s. It never looks good, but it's okay right after I vacuum. But, it's done, the carpet is history and it makes a big difference on how the house looks. And then, the other day, he compared me to his ex sister-in-law. She would go out and buy new clothes so that she wouldn't have to do laundry. We had just gotten him more socks the day before because I complained about him running out so quickly. First off, when we bring new clothing or sheets or anything like that into our home, I WASH them before we use them. So, that shoots part of that comparison down. New stuff isn't clean until I wash it. And I also told him that his laundry wasn't the only thing I washed. I have the throw (up) rugs, I have the couch covers, I have *his* vehicle washing towels to wash as well. Oh, yeah, and my clothes. And I don't think, since there are only two of us, that I should have to do clothes laundering more than once a week. Well, Brian wears two pairs of socks at a time. That's every day. Now, if he changes when he gets home, before we go anywhere, there's another two pairs of socks. The minimum amount of socks he wears in a week, is 14 pairs. Sometimes there's more. Well, he also throws out socks as they become worn. So, yes, we do occasionally need to get him new socks. Maybe he's been so pissy because he's nervous about the sticks. I don't know, but I don't like it. If you're gonna be pissy at something, if I'm not the cause of it, then don't be pissy at me.

Well, I guess I should go clean up Boney barf and take down the decorations.

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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