That weird rolly cage

Deluxe Cat Condo

Some of you are curious about the "weird rolly cage" that Bri mentioned in the comments of my last post, Right Place, Wrong Time.

Yeah - Mac had a giant cage on wheels. My mom called it the "Cat Condo". I guess "cage" sounded kind of harsh to her. Mac wasn’t allowed outside so she would roll the cat condo up to the sliding glass door with the sliding door open and the door to the cat condo open so he could go in to the cat condo and enjoy the fresh air. Sometimes she would close the cat condo door and roll him out onto the deck to keep us company if we were having dinner outside. But if we were sitting out there he would just stare at us. (Probably trying to think of a way out of the cat condo so he could kill one of us.)

I actually bought the cat condo 11 years ago when Chloe was a kitten. My other cat Fuzzy was older (and much bigger than Chloe) and was always trying to kick her ass. I bought the cat condo so that I could put Chloe in there while I was at work and she would be safe.

At some point I didn't want it any more so I gave it to my mom. Then, last year when Fuzzy had knee surgery and had to be contained for 2-3 months I used the condo again! This time I laid it on its side (with the shelves removed) and attached it to a large piece of plywood that I added wheels to. It was nice because we could have her in the den with us and when we needed to vacuum or something like that we could just roll her into another room. Also, the cat condo on its side is about 3x4 feet, so it was much larger than most of the other cages that you find at the pet store and the whole plywood with wheels set up was only about $30. To buy a cage that size we would have paid hundreds of dollars!

Let me know if you ever want to borrow it.

Right Place, Wrong Time.

I just read a post on the gallivanting monkey that reminded me of something that I did a few years back.

My mom had this cat named Mac that had cancer. He was hanging in there but needed to be medicated with human chemo drugs and human steroids twice daily. (We cut the pills up so they were the right dose.)

My mom had been pilling him with this cocktail for a year or so trying to prolong his life while he was still not in pain. She had the pilling down. Mac was a really mean cat - even before the cancer. He would tear into you any chance he got. Mom had this pilling system to avoid trips to the emergency room. These are the steps:

1. Take a large bath towel and drop it on Mac.


2. Wrap Mac in the towel like a baby.


3. Grab the oval cat bed and lay the swaddled Mac in the bed.


4. Pull the edges of the bed around the swaddled Mac.


5. Grab a bungee cord (no, this is not a joke) and hook it around the swaddled Mac and the oval bed.


6. What you have now is a Mac taco. Yes, a cat taco. Mac can't get his paws out so he can't scratch you while you are pilling him. Also, you can lay the Mac taco on the counter or table so you have both hands free for pilling. If you have ever pilled a cat you know how important this is.

My mom was going out of town for a week or two and I was on Mac duty. That meant coming over twice a day to pill him, feed him and scoop his litter box. My duty was to start on a Wednesday. I wake up on Saturday morning and realize that I have totally spaced out and have not pilled or fed Mac for 3 days! OMG - I probably just killed my mom's cat, how am I going to tell her? I have to rush over there and see if I can get him to the emergency vet if he's still alive. Shit, shit, shit, shit! I am normally so responsible - what happened? What was I thinking?

I jump in my car in my PJs and haul ass to my mom's house. I open the garage and bust through the door into the kitchen expecting the worst.

But what do I find? My mom, coffee mug in hand, standing in the kitchen in her robe looking at me like I am a complete maniac. WTF?

I was off by a week. OMG - I was off by a week. She wasn't leaving until the next week! Yay! Mac is alive and well! I didn't kill him. The end.

Gym Update - 6/22/07

I went to the gym 4 times this week. Since I have gone four times per week for the last two weeks, that makes up for the two weeks before that when I only went twice per week.

Public Service Announcement: Fish + Microwave = BAD!

Please do not bring fish to work for lunch. Please enjoy seafood at home. If you do bring fish to work, please do not microwave it! Yuck! This whole fucking place reeks of fish. Damn you fish eater!

Meme dos: Karma

The year is 2020. My husband DK and I are retired and raising our twin ten year olds Cassidy (girl) and Elliott (boy). I opened my own no-kill animal shelter that I help run and I also volunteer at the Seattle Children’s Hospital as a board game buddy and a puppeteer. DK works on ideas for new businesses and inventions. We split our time primarily between our tropical island home and our northwest island home.

Our kids are wonderful. They are sweet, friendly, kind, generous, healthy, smart, and confident. They are really cool kids. They are good kids and lead responsible, fun lives and they are not at all concerned with status, material things or fitting in. They have admirable dreams and aspirations but they also understand the importance of living life to the fullest and not just living to work or succeed.

We were lucky to get two kids at one time. We wanted more than one child, but less than four so twins worked out great. Two kids and only one pregnancy. That was about all DK could take since he was constantly on nacho runs at all hours of the night and day.

We were able to retire in 2007 at the ages of 27 and 30. Everyone always made fun of me for buying lotto tickets, but one day that all changed.

DK and I were lying on the couches one evening zoning out on the TV after a long, hard day at work. The show we were watching was interrupted with breaking news. The excited anchor man on KING-5 reported that the winning Mega Millions lotto ticket was sold at the downtown Bellevue QFC. I glanced over at DK and smiled. That’s where I buy my tickets. More as a joke than anything else I grabbed my ticket out of my wallet. The anchor man read the winning numbers. 9, 3, 6, 27, 30 with a mega ball number of 7. I jump up and down screaming “HOLY FUCKING SHIT we just won! We just won! We just won Mega Millions!” That was the day that we became $300,000,000 dollars richer.

That night we made a list of things to do.

1. Get a good financial advisor
2. Give notice at work
3. Travel
4. Have kids
5. Go back to school
6. Pay off the house
7. Buy a motor home
8. Buy a boat
9. Buy a hot tub
10. Buy houses for our family members
11. Buy crazy gifts for our friends
12. Buy some more houses in places that we love
13. Volunteer for causes that we believe in

We checked the ticket five hundred times and each time the numbers were the same 9, 3, 6, 27, 30, 7. We both called in sick the next day and drove to Olympia, the state capitol and home to the lotto offices with our winning ticket.

The funniest part was that the day I bought that quick pick Mega Millions ticket a rude lady cut in front of me in line at the store. She was also buying a quick pick Mega Millions ticket. The day after we won I took out a full page ad in the Seattle Times. Here is what it said:

“Dear Mean Lady,

You cut in front of me in the lotto line at the Bellevue QFC on 6/20 at around 7:00 pm. You have long black hair and glasses. You pushed your way in front of my cart and bought a quick pick Mega Millions ticket. It was so blatant that even the clerk said that she thought I was in line first. I said not to worry about it; you must be in a rush to go do something important. Well I hope wherever you were going was really, really important because your rudeness and lack of regard for other people cost you $300,000,000. Yep, that’s right, a three with eight zeros trailing behind. 300 million dollars. That ticket would have been yours if you hadn’t cut in line. You know who you are, let this be a lesson to you. One word: Karma.

P.S. Why would anyone pay so much money for a full page ad like this? Why not, I am F@#$%&* LOADED! Ha ha haaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”

John for Cincinnati (Spoiler free)

Do you have HBO? If so, have you been watching John from Cincinnati? I have seen the first 2 episodes and I have to say, I didn’t like the first episode much. At all. But after episode 2, now that’s another story. I am hooked! Hooked like a small fish on 200 pound test! Hooked like yo’ momma standing on her corner, shakin’ her thang! I freaking love it! I especially like Ed O’Neill’s (Al Bundy from Married with Children) character Bill. He is so strange, but so loveable. After the way they left episode 2 I can’t wait for episode 3! I am going to think about it every single day until Sunday.

Has this ever happened to you?

Strange things happen to me. A lot more than to normal people.

Today I was in the restroom at work. Another person walked in and went into the stall next to me. I glanced over and noticed that the person appeared to be wearing men’s pants and shoes. All of a sudden I was thinking “Shit! Did I go into the men’s room on accident?” The answer is no, I was in the ladies room.

This made me think of one time when we were camping at Lake Crescent. Bri and I walk to the bathroom. There were two stalls. One was taken and the other open. I go into the open one and in the stall next to me I can see someone (again, wearing men’s clothes – and like size 15 shoes) lying on the bathroom floor. OMG – is this man dead? So we decide to check it out. We say stuff like “Hey, everything ok over there?” No response. Turns out it was just a really drunk woman in men’s clothing and shoes passed out in the nasty camping bathroom. I can’t remember how it ended but I think one of her friends rescued her.

Clearwater Casino

DK and I went to the Clearwater Casino this weekend. It was really fun! We didn’t win big, but we didn’t lose big either. In my book that’s a win!

The hotel is beautiful. The beds are like giant marshmallows. All white, soft and squishy. Very nice.

Overall it was a great trip. My one complaint was that the hostesses at the steakhouse were very rude. The wait staff was great but those hostesses were horrible. Everything was a one word answer, not helpful at all. Also, one of them was looking at me like I had a giant hairy wart on my face or something. That was interesting because our friends CJK and AJ were looking at the Clearwater as a venue for their upcoming nuptials. They said that the event staff was rude and hard to deal with. (That is the polite version.) Too bad because the Clearwater could have great marks all around if it weren’t for those hostesses and the event staff.

Here is my review:

Hotel: A

Hotel staff: B

Hotel value: B
Steakhouse food: B
Steakhouse wait staff: A
Steakhouse hostesses: F
Steakhouse value: B
Buffet food: C
Buffet staff: B
Buffet value: B

Casino games: A
Casino staff: A
Calculated average grade: C+
Perceived average grade: B

Gym update - 6/15/07 + June Measurements!

I went to the gym 4 times this week! I am trying to make up for the last 2 weeks that I only went twice per week. So next week I am also going to try to go 4 times.

The big news:

I got weighted and measured today. My weight stayed the same but I have lost 3 more inches in the past month! Most importantly I lost 1/2 inch from each arm (upper arm). That’s the one area of my body that I am really unhappy with.

(That's a gold star for me!)

Since I started going to the gym 3 times per week in mid January (exactly 6 months ago) I have lost a total of 14.5 inches! It’s interesting because I have only lost 4 pounds in that same time period so I must be a lot more muscular than I was when I started.

I have not been dieting at all. I eat whatever I want. But my tastes have started to change and I like salad a lot more than I used to. In fact, if I go a few days without a salad I start to crave it! But don't get me wrong I still eat nachos every week and pasta with alfredo sauce and chocolate. I have been trying to control my portions. I am by no means starving myself; I just eat normal sized portions instead of super-size portions. Even cutting my portions in half, I still feel full.

Tracy Morgan - Wasted?

Paris in Jail Spoof

Sheets

We put our new summer sheets on our bed. They are GREAT! 800 thread count baby!

Last fall/winter after the wedding we had all of these gift cards and coupons for the Bon - sorry, Macy's - home store. We decided to get all new sheets. (We registered for the sheets but didn't get the whole set so we spent our gift cards on the items we didn't get.) Sheets and a good bed are really important. If you sleep 8 hours per night you spend 1/3 of your life in bed! After the wedding we also had some cash so we bought a new bed that is AMAZING!

Ok - back to the sheets. We had signed up for a Macy's card when we registered there. With that you get 15% off, plus coupons in the mail. We happened to go in to buy the sheets during the big white sale that they do at Macy's. This is how we got our luxury 800 thread count sheets so cheap:

35% off (White sale discount)

+ 15% off (For having a Macy's card)

+ 20% off (Coupon we got in the mail)

---------------------

70% OFF!

So we ended up getting super nice sheets that we would never normally buy for ourselves for the price of Target sheets that we would normally buy for ourselves! Yay!

We have summer and winter sheets. Flannel for the winter and Jersey knit cotton or fancy 800 thread count sheets for the summer. That's why we have had them for 7 months and just now put them on our bed.

The Meme Begins

Bladio requested that I write 3 fantasy stories about myself. This is the first.

Meme Uno - Captain Ash

I am a marine salvage captain - a modern day treasure hunter. DK and I live on a big salvage vessel called the SS Abrahamious Yetious with all of our friends and we all travel the world in search of our next big find.

The crew assignments are as follows:

Me: Captain. I decide which wrecks to search for and plan the expeditions.

Chris & DK: Technology specialists. They keep all of the high tech equipment running.

Bri: First mate. She helps me keep the ship and crew running efficiently and smoothly.

Brent: Parts specialist. He makes sure that we have all of the parts we need for our ship and equipment.

Ty & Ann: Cooks. They keep us well fed with yummy food.

Carolyn K: Buyer and wine steward. She picks the wine for our dinners and buys all the supplies we will need for each voyage.

AJ: Personal trainer. He keeps us all in good shape.

Richard: Researcher. He finds info and clues to the location of the big booty we are looking for.

Shannon & the Millers: On board writers. They write short stories to keep us all entertained. They also write in the log documenting our journey.

Colin: Mechanic. He fixes shit.

Other Friends: All of our other friends are divers and/or just along for the ride.

We are a happy crew that spends a lot of time enjoying nature and just relaxing. The SS Abrahamious Yetious is the only salvage vessel in the world with a hot tub on deck. We have a pet dolphin named Flipper that lives in a big salt water pool.

None of us have to work but we really enjoy what we do. We are so good at our jobs that we never have any trouble raising funds for our recovery missions. Most of the time we just fund the missions ourselves. We are all loaded because on our first try we found the Spanish Flagship La Capitana which sank off the coast of Ecuador in the mid-17th Century. On that one we raked in truckloads of treasure – gold, silver, jewels and porcelain worth an estimated 3.7 – 7.5 billion dollars. Much of our half went to museums or was donated to charity but there was still plenty left over for all of us.

Update: I thought of something else… We have a little submarine that we use to explore the wrecks before the divers go down. It just so happens that it’s yellow.

We also like to play a little joke on other sailors. When we encounter another ship far out in the ocean we raise the Jolly Roger and blast the cannon and video tape the other crew’s reaction. Yes, we have a cannon. I found it on eBay.

And they all lived happily ever after.

The end.

Gym Update - 6/11/07

I only went to the gym 2 times last week. I was sick. I might try to go 4 times each week for the next 2 weeks since I have only gone twice per week for the last 2 weeks.

Car crash update

They opted to run the accident through their insurance. I am happy with that. It will be an easier process that way. Also, my neck is feeling much better. But now I have a head cold. Sad.

Shadrac gets smacked

On Saturday I was sitting at a red light in Bellevue. I was on my way to pick up nachos to go from Baja for dinner, minding my own business. All of a sudden my head lurches forward, my seatbelt locks and my head smacks back into the head rest. Oh shit someone just rear ended me. Great. I pull over and get out, so does the other driver, a kid (I will call him Stony Baloney) in a nice, fancy, new Denali.

Here's what followed:

Stony Baloney: Oh man, what happened?
Me: A red light "happened".
Stony Baloney: Are you ok?
Me: Yeah, what about you?
Stony Baloney: Yeah.
Me: Ok, get your license and insurance card so we can exchange info.
Stony Baloney: Ok.
Stony Baloney: Your car isn't very nice, are you even going to get it fixed?
Me: (Mouth hanging open in a state of total shock and disgust.) Um, no, I am not going to fix it, YOU are going to fix it.
Stony Baloney: How much is this car worth?
Me: I don’t know, maybe $3,500 or so.
Stony Baloney: Oh, ok, maybe we will just write you a check for it?
Me: Whatever, as long as it gets fixed or replaced I don’t really care how it happens.
Stony Baloney: Do you mind if we settle this without insurance involved?
Me: Like I said, as long as it gets fixed I don’t care how.
Stony Baloney: Ok, cool.
Me: Well, this looks pretty strait forward, you hit me. I am not going to call the cops, do you want to?
Stony Baloney: No.
(I coach him through what he needs to write down for me.)
Stony Baloney: Hey, can you wait to call my parents till tomorrow?
(At this point I guess that he is trying to hold off on getting grounded or losing his car privileges until Sunday, so his Saturday night doesn't get ruined.)

I head off to Baja to get my nachos which are now cold of course. Not only did Stony Baloney wreck my car, he also ruined my nacho dinner which if you know me well is almost as bad as effing up the car.

Luckily he hit our shitty car, the 1994 Nissan Pathfinder that I call Shadrac. We also have a BMW, and two classic cars. So he hit the right car. I am 99% sure that he was ogling a group of girls that were hanging out at the park when he slammed into me.

I woke up on Sunday with a seriously stiff neck and a headache that would not go away. I am trying to ice it a lot and that seems to be helping.

I took Shadrac in for an estimate this morning and the grand total is $1,731.50.

To be continued…

Gym Update - 6/4/07

I only went to the gym 2 times last week. It was closed on Monday for Memorial day and I had a pinched nerve in my neck so I didn't want to over do it.

June Announcements

Happy Birthday to:
KT - 6/26