This is one of those completely self-involved, totally uninteresting to anyone but me posts… I have a bad cold. I’m a human snot factory right now, and I have cold shivers. Fortunately I’m on vacation this week, and I was planning on hanging about the house anyway. But this sort of takes some of the fun out of it.
I’ll just be going through the medicine cabinet, trying to figure out what cold medicine will not give me a woozy feeling.
All I want to do with my life is to go to work, work hard all day, come home, and sit down with my dog and my girlfriend and read some books. And then later, take a walk around the block.
Why is it I can’t seem to make that happen? Why does everything always seem to get in the way of that?
I’m way behind in my Christmas obligations this year. I’m not done shopping, which I usually have finished before Thanksgiving. I haven’t got my Christmas cards sent, which I usually have in the mail the Monday after Thanksgiving. I haven’t got my house decorated, which I usually do the first week of December. This year, the decorating is going by the wayside, due to lack of time but after seeing this helpful home decorating blog, I got my form back to make this the best Christmas ever in my life. If I’m lucky I’ll have my cards out, and more of my shopping done by the end of the weekend.
After last year’s exhausting Christmas season, and the terrible, horrible no-good, very-bad year we’ve had so far, Stephanie and I decided we’d try to scale back on some of our holiday social activities in order to keep our sanity and health, and jobs and homes. So far it’s been pretty good, but the stray cat obligation and the repeat visits to the city-county building for Prop 622 are sucking up all the extra time we bought back. So we’re in somewhat the situation we were last year, only we’ve seen less of our friends, which is sort of the opposite of what we would like to accomplish with our Christmas season.
I keep writing “Christmas” as my favorite holiday on all of my friend surveys, but for the last two years at least, it’s been anything but. I’m thinking Arbor Day will be my new favorite holiday soon.
Shithead is a stray kitten that showed up on my girlfriend’s porch last night.
He’s currently residing in my bathroom until I can take him (her?) to a shelter. Want a kitten? We’re only calling it shithead because it’s a bit inconvenient right now for us to deal with it. But it’s a very cute, rambunctious cat.
This makes the second kitten that has shown up on Stephanie’s doorstep.
UPDATE: After calling the no-kill shelters and determining they were all full of kittens (I know the feeling; I’m full of them myself) I took cute little Shithead to the Humane Society of Indianapolis. They were kind enough to take him.
An article I happened to catch only because I have a google news search on RSS for the name “Mineart.”
So the other day, I was outside raking leaves, and Spike was chasing squirrels. If you’ve never seen my dog, look at a picture of him, because knowing what he looks like is somewhat key to understanding Spike’s relationship to the squirrels. You can click to read more here about the best dog services.
After he drinks water from his Lick mat dog, he thinks he’s chasing them once again. The squirrels, on the other hand, are composing entire comedy routines out of mocking him. They frequently park themselves on the tree just out of doggy reach and talk smack to the dog (you could look here if you wish to train them right), while he goes crazy at the bottom of the tree barking and jumping at them, which is what was happening while I was raking leaves. Ruffgers Dog Boarding Facility can be contacted if you need some advice on how to handle your dogs.
Then suddenly, as if to underscore the dangers of hubris, one of the squirrels lost his balance. He hung for about half a second in mid-air, flailing his arms trying to catch hold of something, then fell, flat on his back, right at Spike’s feet. It was the funniest thing, like something you’d see in a cartoon and not in real life. If you’re a squirrel, hanging on a tree is pretty much your job. How incompetent do you have to be to fall out of the tree on your ass?
The squirrel scrambled around to right himself and the scampered back up the tree just a second before the dog could pounce on him. Spike thought he’d gotten the best present ever. The squirrels took off to their nest on the neighbor’s roof, and that was the end of mocking the dog for the day. Now Spike keeps hanging out underneath the tree, waiting for God to drop him another squirrel.
I don’t know if that’s akin to “Bats in the Belfry” but it seems about right. This morning, while I was busy trying to get ready for our trip to Iowa to see my family for Thanksgiving, my cat Huckleberry came down the hall crying at the top of his lungs. His paws were black and dirty, so I knew exactly what the problem was; he’d been in the attic. And if he (the modern-day cowardly lion) had been up there, so were the girl cats. So I went to the other room, and sure enough, the attic door was standing open. Huckleberry led me into the attic, crying the whole way, and as soon as I got up there, he turned tail and ran back downstairs. Turns out that Drusilla was stuck behind a wall, also crying. I managed to get her out, falling and getting dirty in the process. Annabelle was downstairs playing innocent, but I’m not fooled. She was probably the one who opened the door in the first place. Thanks, kids!! I needed that.
So, Spike is going to the Good Dog Hotel, and Stephanie and I are going to Iowa. We’ll be back Saturday.
Remind me to tell you the story about the falling squirrel when I get back. It was pretty funny.
Looks like I’m not going to get a chance to blog about New York, because I’m going to be working late for a while. But you can get the general idea of the trip from my photo gallery on flickr.
But I do want to say this: the reason the trip was great was because of Stephanie. She is a very competent and accomplished traveler; much more so than I. She’s great at navigating and plotting out trips. She doesn’t get stressed over details that bother me, and she’s a genuinely fun and interesting companion to spend time and see sights with. She’s also much more observant than I am; she will notice the sign I missed telling us where to go, or the piece of information we need to have a fun time. I, on the other hand, will always spot the monkeys.
I had a wonderful time in New York, entirely due to Stephanie, whom I am so grateful for.
Stephanie and I are home from New York. It was quite a trip; we had a wonderful time and her cousin Kerry’s wedding was beautiful and fun and amazing. I met most of Stephanie’s mom’s side of the family and they are such nice, fun people.
I have a lot to write about because we did a lot of stuff, but I’ll get to that when I can.
I still have to pick up Spike from the doggie hotel, which I will do in the morning. But since we didn’t get any emergency calls from them, I presume he’s doing just fine.
I did discover that my heart valve repair ring and sternum wiring don’t set off the regular walk-through security sensors at the airport, but they do set off the wands. I got selected for a random search, and they did the whole pat-down thing, so I had to explain my surgery to the airport security, who were very helpful and understanding. But that’s helpful to know for future reference.
Passed along from my friend Matt. Typically I add these to the big fat list I’ve compiled of quizzes about me, but right now I don’t have time to merge the two. I should also link a bunch of the answers below to pages on the site, but no time for that either.
1. What was the first car your family had?
A 1957 Chevy. It was blue, and I barely remember it. Then we had a succession of volkswagens which my dad drove, and my mom hauled us around in a Pontiac Bonneville. Then my dad drove a VW Rabbit, and my mom had a Ford Country Squire station wagon, brown with wood panel sides.
My own first car was a 1977 Audi Fox station wagon I bought in 1988 from my girlfriend Peg’s dad for $300.00. It was a stick and was a pretty good car for that amount of money. Nothing worked on it except the engine, the brakes, the steering wheel and the headlights. But it had tons of room that let me haul all my crap around, and I think I actually was stupid enough to drive the thing to Dayton, Ohio (to go to 1470 west) a time or two as well.
2. What was the name of your first pet and why?
We had a poodle named Puddles that I got when I was five or six.
3. What did you want to be when you grew up?
A knight in shining armor. Yeah. I read King Arthur stories when I was really, really little and I didn’t understand that all that was in the middle ages. And that all the knights were boys.
4. What was the name of your elementary school?
I went to North East Elementary in Ankeny, Iowa for the first few years, and after we moved I went to East Elementary. I think.
5. Who was your first best friend?
Sherri Castle and Kay Kaufman, who lived on either side of us.
6. Are you still friends today, and if not, what happened?
They moved when I was still a kid.
7. What was your favorite board game?
Clue, as you can tell if you look at my board game collection.
8. Did you play house or other make believe games?
Yep, we played house. I had a tiny kitchen with a stove, sink and refrigerator, kitchen table, and even a kitchen cupboard my grandfather made for me. We also played cowboys and Indians and tons of other stuff.
My brother Paul used to dictate what the make believe games were all the time, and he always chose what he thought were the best characters. He had to be Bert, I had to be Ernie. He had to be Kermit, I had to be Grover. He had to be the Lone Ranger, I had to be Tonto. Looking back, I was always the cooler character, and he was the dork, so I guess he picked that pretty accurately.
9. Were you a Dungeons and Dragons geek?
Nope. That was after my time.
10. Did you sleep with stuffed animals as a kid?
Yep. I got a teddy bear for my first birthday, which I still have, and then later I got bud the bear, and mom made this corduroy dog that I loved, too.
11. Do you still sleep with stuffed animals?
Heh. I have an entire monkey collection, people. I don’t sleep with them, though. I occasionally will grab blue flat bear to lean against if my heart surgery pillow isn’t around, but that’s to support my sternum at night.
12. Who was the first person you looked up to when you were younger?
I’d say my mom and dad pretty much equally.
13. Who was your favorite relative?
My aunt Chris, who was young and really loved playing with us. She’s one of those people who is just genuinely good-natured and happy all the time and a lot of fun to be around. And she was hot.
14. Were you short or tall in elementary school?
I was pretty tall, and inconveniently, I was about six inches taller than my older brother, who I think still resents me to this day for it.
15. Were you teased in school?
I had a terrible time in junior high, especially the two years we lived in Ohio.
16. What was the name of your favorite teacher?
My kindergarten teacher Mrs. Forsythe was great, and I loved my fifth-grade teacher Miss Verban. My six-grade teacher Mrs. Wilson was cool, too.
17. What was the name of your least favorite teacher?
My second grade teacher, who’s name I can’t remember, was my least favorite. She yelled at me for reading ahead of the rest of the class in the reading workbooks, and constantly gave me a hard time about daydreaming. I was SO BORED in her class because I was so far ahead of everyone, and she wouldn’t let me move on. I remember she also yelled at me once when I was raising my hand in class, and I was goofing off snapping my fingers, because she thought I was snapping my fingers at her. She also threatened to shove my pen down my throat if I didn’t stop chewing on the cap. I chew on pens to this day. So there.
18. What was your best subject in school?
English, social studies, history.
19. What was your worst subject in school?
Probably math, because I hated it, although I did well.
20. Did you do well in Physical Education?
No. I think it was taught really poorly. I wish they hadn’t emphasized competition so much, because it didn’t allow people like me, who didn’t participate in sports, to find a physical activity that was appropriate. I was always so overwhelmed and dominated by the kids who had more experience competing that I never got in touch with my physical self.
21. Were you clumsy when you were younger?
Nope. I was pretty well coordinated.
22. Who was your favorite band as a kid?
Oh god. Do i got there? I loved Olivia Newton John. And the Bee Gees. And Barbara Mandrell.
23. What was your favorite movie as a kid?
The Wizard of Oz, because I was in love with Glinda. I also loved the Sound of Music, because I had a crush on Julie Andrews. For a long time, I thought I wanted to be a nun, because I didn’t want to marry a man, and that seemed like a good way out. (I know, I wasn’t paying attention to the plot of the movie, people.) Turns out I really wanted to be a lesbian.
24. Did your parents read to you?
All the time. You can see the results. My mom reading to us was one of the best gifts she could have given us, and I am so grateful for that. I love books.
25. Did you have a favorite book?
Way too many to name.
26. What was your favorite restaurant as a kid?
Pizza Hut, or Godfather’s Pizza.
27. What TV or movie star did you have a crush on?
This will take a while. Julie Andrews, Lynda Carter, Olivia Newton John, Carrie Fisher, the bionic woman, the chick who played Isis. Okay, I have to stop, because this will take all day.
28. Do you now wonder what you were thinking?
Hell, no, they were all hot.
29. Who was your first crush in school?
Jamie Reyhons, who lived down the street, and later her friend Shawn Hoffman, who lived a block over. I also had the inconvenient problem of having crushes on some of the same girls my older brother did. He didn’t get them either.
30. As a child, what kind of car did you want when you grew up?
I didn’t think much about cars as a kid.
31. Did your parents spank you?
Let’s not go there.
32. Did your parents fight a lot when you were a kid?
Some.
33. Did your parents get divorced or stay married?
They divorced when I was in college.
34. If they got divorced, how old were you when it happened?
20, 21?
35. Did you ever run away from home?
I wanted to. Growing up as one of six kids can get pretty unbearable at times.
36. How old were you when/if you first got glasses?
Second or third grade.
37. Did you need braces or a retainer?
Yep, in late high school and college.
38. If you’re male, how old were you when you had your first wet dream?
N/A.
39. Both sexes when did you start shaving?
Who knows.
40. Girls when did you start wearing a bra?
Who knows.
41. What was your first kiss like?
It was icky, and with a boy. I made out with a boy named Rob Fox (?) in my friend Linda Griggy’s basement, in eighth grade, when I lived in Ohio. I was probably 13. Linda would have me stay over, and her mom worked the night shift (my mom did not know this) so we did whatever. I can honestly say it was the most boring make-out session ever. I was totally uninterested.
Linda was the one who later helped me figure out that I was gay (no, not THAT way) by explaining what it felt like to make out with her boyfriend. It dawned on me that what she was describing was the way I felt about girls.
42. What did you do on your first date?
Made out in my friend Linda Griggy’s basement. Yeah, fun.
43. How old were you when you first drank?
13 years old. Again, with Linda. Her boyfriend was 18 (!) and could get liquor, so he bought whiskey, and we’d walk around at night drinking and hanging out.
44. Where was your first house?
810 Belmont Ave, Ankeny Iowa. I visited in 2001 on a vacation and took pictures.