Wednesday

Stephenie Meyer : inspiration to millions.

This is just a caring, periodic reminder to all my aspiring/frustrated/undiscovered writer friends: you can do it.

You can get a book published or a screenplay purchased. You really, really can. Even if it's terrible. Even if it's the worst thing you've ever written and the embarrassment prevents even you from reading it. Even if you drop acid beforehand and forget to write a conclusion. Even if you just print out pages from your blog and bind them.

You can.

You can because this woman did.

Fun fact: she published this book with the intention of donating a portion of the proceeds to charity. Then offered it for free on the internet. Of course, I'm sure many will still dish out some cash for the opportunity to capture so rare a gem as this and fund another measure like Prop 8. (Probably.)

Friday

Photo Friday.

Yes, this was a Polaroid.

While my father is convalescing, I'm taking the opportunity to clear out his apartment. Among such sundry items as tape deck wipes, expired batteries, neck weights, old shoes, and 20-cent stamps, there are some things worth finding.

Sunday

Happy Easter!

Or: This is now a baby blog, but with kittens. Sorry!

Last year on Easter, you may recall, my beloved cat died and it was very terrible and sad. This year, we decided to go, instead, with a box of kittens. Upgrade, basically.



Box of kittens. The smears you can see on the sides are from their eye medicine. Their eyes look pretty good!




This is tabby and the girl black one. We call the black ones "the twins" even though they are no more twins than the rest of them. Tabby is a girl.




The twins. The girl is biting her brother, but normally they love each other. They stick together most of the time. He has a few white hairs on his chest, and they both may or may not have eyebrows.




This is gray. She is kind of a loner. Also these next pictures are post-eye goo.




This is orange. This is the clearest picture I could get of orange, because he is bad. He likes to fight with his siblings. But he also loves to cuddle, and will bite his siblings until you pick him up and cuddle him.




He fights with gray a lot.




She does not take his crap.

And no, they don't have names beyond their color designations, and a few nicknames (such as "Pretty Face" or "The Whiner"). Three or four of them will eventually be living elsewhere, and there's no point in calling them something so that I can get annoyed when their new families give them far stupider names. Probably.



... And oh, right! My father. He's doing very well, thank you. I am going to bring him some colored eggs tomorrow. On Monday he will find out if they will admit him to their affiliated rehab clinic. He'd stay there for about a week. That may not sound desirable, but it totally, totally is. If you'd like to cross your fingers for anything, be it for not sending him home soon. He really needs to be monitored and worked on to get him on his feet again, and if they send him home it will be very difficult and frustrating. For him, but, I mean, for me.

Also all my bills are paid up for like, the first time this year! Holy shit, I hope the irony fairies aren't gearing up for something.

Tuesday

So.

The kittens have colds/eye infections. All of them. The colds have just about run their course, but the eye infections necessitate eye goo. Penny is not thrilled about this turn of events, but she needs to get used to it, frankly. They're old enough now that we don't need to stress about them getting cold, so tomorrow we'll move them all out of the furnace room into a place that's actually clean and acceptable for kittens. Penny.

Oh, and also tomorrow I'm escorting my father into town to get a little spinal surgery.

You could say that I'm feeling anxious and that would not be inaccurate.

Sunday

Kitten piles.

Penny is a good mommy.





Even though she's a girl, I kind of want to call tabby Bowie.


Halfpennies!!

So you'll recall, about a month ago, I acquired a cat. My household has had a long and illustrious history of acquiring cats, stretching back before I was born.

As a bit of trivia, we've never managed to acquire one that was knocked up, even though apparently cats are knocked up all the time. When Penny showed up, though, the sentence "I hope she's not pregnant!" was introduced almost immediately. I don't even know why! She didn't look at all pregnant. But the what if was overwhelming.

I checked in with Stephanie, because I know she's had a couple cats show up with a surprise inside. I asked her how to be sure if a cat is pregnant. Her reply was pretty much, "When kittens start coming out of them."

Oh man, you guys. By that definition? My cat is totally pregnant.

I'll have to get back to you on this.

Kitten tally = FIVE PENCE!!!!:
1. All black
2. Orange
3. Penny-colored (tortoiseshell)
4. Gray tabby
5. Dark gray? Black? It's getting hard to tell at this point. Tabby!

They are, of course, adorable, but we told Penny that's quite enough out of her.


VISUAL AID!

I feel so bad putting up this picture of Penny, because she looks like she's made of pure evil. She's actually ridiculously sweet. I just interrupted her five-second meal break to get this, and the babies were all crying. So she was like, "Look what you fucking did." Also: Jesus hell, all those were inside her yesterday.

Penny says: BURN THIS PICTURE.

L to R: black (?) one, back of other black one's head, orange one, gray tabby, regular tabby (last baby)

LATER!



You can only see maybe two and a half in this one, but they're all in there. Plus omg look at tabby baby. Penny is still looking a mess. She is very tired and has not had a bath.

Wednesday

Am I a narcissist? PLEASE COMMENT.

VALIDATE ME OMG

Man ... pretty much. Poor Robin Quivers, though.

Thursday

BREAKING NEWS ON BREAKING DAWN!

Guys. You guys. Guys. It's official. It's been confirmed.

It will be two movies.

You know what this means, right? (Actually, I hope none of you have read it so I get to horrify you right here and now.) In order to get even one movie out of this god-forsaken aborted mess of a book, they will not only have to keep in everything, they may have to extend some parts. EXTENDED PREGNANCY/BIRTH SEQUENCE MAYBE?

I am trembling in terror and excitement.

PS - fingers crossed that "high-end director" means Uwe Boll.

Tuesday

Cat photoshoot!

With bonus vistas of my basement floor.


Blurry



Arty



Pissy

(I didn't know the flash was on. Sorry cat! I colored in her pupils with photoshop, hence their lookin' all funky.)



Done with this.

Monday

Cat!

In a relatively recent development, I have a cat. Or rather, I have a cat in my house. I hesitate to claim any ownership, authority, or kinship, because she doesn't seem entirely thrilled about her circumstances. At least when she's not getting tuna.

Let's backtrack! Shortly after Christmas, my neighbor asked if we'd seen a little cat hanging around in back of the houses. I said "No," while mentally amending "...yet." Because, seriously, if there's a cat nearby, you can bet it will come to my house.

And so it did! She showed up a couple weeks later with that "I heard this was the place" look about her. We gave her some food. A lot of food. Then she would come back every few days or so. One time she brought a friend: a tom cat who has been around for a couple years. Only I don't actually know if they are friends, because she wouldn't let him eat anything, and he eventually went under the car and waited until she finished. We hope he's not her baby daddy.

For the past few months, it's been consistently below freezing. And this poor girl is seemingly terrified of everything in life. She was scared of a plane flying overhead. So, this sealed the deal on moving her inside. She'd been taking her meals on the porch, which is enclosed, but still well chilled. And the only napping I'd seen her do was scrunching up her eyes while sitting tense and contracted.

On Thursday evening, we decided to move her into the basement. This involved a carrier and no small amount of ingenuity. Unfortunately, it was completely traumatic for the cat. Like, "curling into a ball and shaking" traumatic. But, you know, at least she's not going to freeze to death. Which is progress.

So now she's in the basement. And she's not entirely convinced that we don't plan to eat her. We've made slow but sure progress in building a little trust back (food helps), but it's totally weird because I've never had a hiding cat before. Of course, the other cats I've had have either been from shelters/other homes, very young when we found them, or in Bert's case, special. Apparently this is not atypical. But seriously cat, when are you going to start doing cute crap?

I'll try to take a picture in the next few days, when she's in a relatively gregarious mood.

She's a mostly black tortoiseshell, with little bits of white on her eyebrows, front paws, and chest. Her name is Penny.

(PS Stephanie - I don't want to comment on the litter situation, because apparently there is still a learning curve.)

Friday

Part 3.

Isn't it crazy how much I'm posting? All on the same thing! I haven't even told you about my cat!

can you see my soul?

Katherine was right to assure me! Turns out I have an ordinary (though sizable) chunk of whatnot floating around in my vitreous humor. Nothing is torn or sagging or broken or otherwise in danger of blinding me. So for the next several months I can just expect a little extra bling in my visual field. Optical razzle dazzle, if you will.

In other eyeball news, I mentioned that I was concerned that my vision has seemed less sharp in the past few years, since all the thyroid stuff. The doctor was very nice, but he glared at me through his spectacles with an "i hate you die" vibe that I have gotten lots of times in the past (and which, actually, I'll probably be getting from you in a moment!), before telling me that my vision is 20/15. Yay!! (Sorry.)

Then he got up in my grill about my scleral show. Not saying that there was anything of concern, just that it was weird. And man, whatever. Haters gonna hate.

Thursday

More on all that.

Today I am out:

[-] One-tenth of a unit of blood.
[-] More bucks.
[-] Of patience with the doctor I saw today. His parting suggestion to me was: "Why don't you try losing some weight? That should make you feel better." He means the weight that I gained after he lowered my thyroid dosage to an amount that he doesn't even remember, which I reminded him of several times, probably. WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THAT EVER. He also asked how things were working out ("Good?") with the medication that I stopped taking over a year ago, because it was completely ineffective. I tried to be helpful by bringing in a typed list of my symptoms and complaints, and he told me he didn't have time to look at it. Gotta bounce! Call me next week sometime!


But I am in:

[-] An ophthalmology appointment tomorrow morning! Woooooo!!

Wednesday

A day in the life.

A while back I wanted to write something conflating the state of health care in the United States with my personal health care and insurance experiences. It was godawfully depressing, so I scrapped it. TL;DR: Health care reform doesn't only benefit the uninsured.

Anyway, here's a story.

Yesterday (It's Groundhog Day!) was my father's birthday. Just for reference. Shortly after waking up, I noticed a gray spot floating in my vision. If you'd like to help diagnose me, I will tell you that it's in the middle and slightly to the outside of the field of vision of my right eye. The best way I can describe it is that it looks like a sequin. It's perfectly round, with a hole in the middle, and sort of blinky. I can also see it when I close my eyes. My vision is not otherwise affected. I waited for it to go away or develop into a migraine or something, but it just kept on as is.

I hit the internet and learned all about floaters. From what I could tell, I was either perfectly fine and had nothing to worry about, or my retina was about to detach -- a completely painless process that might cause me permanent blindness. I think this is not likely based on what I've read, but you never know.

The best idea would be to call up an ophthalmologist. But of course, it is generally hard to get an appointment with a specialist in short order, which I figured is what I would need if something gruesome and irreversible were happening to me. So I opted to make an appointment with my primary care physician, who could at least let me know if I should start panicking and seek urgent care, or calm down and wait it out.

My doctor, it turns out, is on vacation for the next several weeks. I was able to secure an appointment instead with one of his associates. While this fellow may not have been the tooliest tool who ever tooled, he was still a real tool. I told him I had a spot in my vision. He then immediately told me that there was nothing he could do for me.

"Why didn't you go to your eye doctor?"
"Um, I don't have an eye doctor."
"Oh, so you need a referral."
"I don't know what I need. That's why I came here."

Before he scuttled out the door I asked if he could at least tell me whether or not my retina is detaching, and he told me know he has no way of knowing that. I did not, at that point, ask if I could have my money back. I should have though, because, seriously.

The referral actually came from the girls at the reception area. And, they are nice, but they are not doctors.

"Do you want someone in [the town where I live]?"
"Uh. I want someone who's good."
"Oh, they're all good. Here, this one's in [the town where I live]."

So I called this guy for an appointment when I got home. His receptionist kept trying to get me to specify a time window, and I tried to get her to specify a date. I mean, I can guarantee that I have more openings in my schedule than a doctor's office does in theirs. So you tell me what you have available, and I'll see if I can make it then. (I mean, seriously, is it me? With these people?) Anyway, the earliest appointment I could get is two weeks out. Which I now have, tentatively, booked.

Tomorrow I'm going to look for someone else who may have a closer appointment available. I called a place today called Retina Associates which seemed like a good bet, but was informed that, despite the fact that all the doctors there are listed as ophthalmologists, none of them are actually ophthalmologists. They deal exclusively with retina and inner eye issues, so unless I already know that's where the problem lies, they are not my best bet.

I'm seeing my endocrinologist tomorrow, and I'll ask him if he knows anyone, on the off-chance. Endocrinologists usually know people, I've found. He called me this morning to ask if he can bump my appointment up an hour. I agreed to it, but ... hell. That throws off my whole morning.

Basically, multiply this day by every 4-8 weeks or so, and you have what I do with myself all the time and where all my money goes.

Saturday

Oh, right, my blog!

So, I made sauce today. It's quite good. I mean, I think it is. As far as I can tell it is. It's sort of hard to taste.

Incidentally, it's almost the 17th of January and I have not been well a single day this year. Impressive! I currently have a sinus infection, which came at the behest of a strangely intense flu. I don't know if it was the swine flu. Maybe! And this was after I rang in the new year with crackers and ginger ale for stomach virus.

There are things that I was going to say! About what I've thought about television shows, or the cat that doesn't want to be our friend (yet), or the stuff I've made with my hot* little hands, or ... well, probably not that, or Comcast, or this and that.

Hi, internet.

*my hands are usually cold.

Friday

omg omg happy birthday to me:

eeeeeeee

I consider it a draw.

Yesterday, my niece asked me: "So, um, do you like ... Twilight, and stuff?"

My reaction in full:
[I read the newspaper.]
[I look up from the newspaper.]
[beat]
"No."
[I read the newspaper.]

She does, she says. And on the inside I wept and rent my garments. But on the plus side, she doesn't actually seem to know that much about it. She's Team Jacob, she tells me, and seems mostly interested in Taylor Lautner's bazillion abdominal muscles. Also, she heard Edward dies or something. Oh honey. If only.

So today my sister is taking her to see New Moon. "I can't help it. I love this Twilight shit," she told me a few weeks ago. (We were in a supermarket, and she expressed concern at a tabloid headline suggesting the terrible breakup of KStew and RPattz. "Oh that's sad! They were dating?" "[beat.] No." The level of knowledge I have about these thing is truly unGodly and is impairing my social functioning.) I was not surprised because, frankly, I expect this sort of poor judgment from her. Whenever there's a desperately painful-looking comedy out on the market (like, say, that new one with Robin Williams and John Travolta), she deems that it "looks pretty funny!" I don't ... please. Anyway.

On another hand, my mother was the one to tell me about this outing. She said they were going to see "that 'Dark Moon' or whatever the hell it is." My mom =/= a Twimom. <3<3<3<3<3<3

Thursday

In a related story: Goddamnit, Michael Sheen.

Michael Sheen, what were you thinking? You are an excellent actor. You were going to be set playing any and every English person of note that you even vaguely look like. You were even in all three Underworld movies and still managed to hang on to your good will.



But frankly, sir, your career deserves what it gets.

And I see you in the back, there, Grindelwald. You're young, and you're pretty, but don't think you have an excuse.

PS ... lol.

Tuesday

Oh, in case you were wondering.

Twilight is still completely ridiculous.



THE REALISM.

Friday

Nostalgia is stupid.

So, yesterday I discovered that Rainbow Brite is getting a makeover. Today I saw the story picked up by a couple other places.

Oh, God, I didn't even know about the Care Bears. No one give me details.

Of course my primary reaction is "kill it with fire," but I keep being distracted by what I'm seeing in the comments. No, I don't know why I'm reading the comments. They must contain tar and nicotine. To wit: "What's next, Jem??" and "They better leave Jem alone!!!"

Really, internet? Really? A few things.

1. You meant: They better leave Pizzazz alone. I've always been a Misfits girl. (Don't pretend to be surprised.)
2. Where was your rage over that singer chick from five years ago? I was alone then.
and
3. Jem is already trampy. That's, like, the point of Jem. Whose virtue will you protect next, She-Ra? Who fights the Horde in a lamé bathing suit?