Category Archives: Kid Substitutes

The weird weather has continued in these parts, with a dramatic thunder and lightning storm on Saturday morning and then sun in the afternoon — as if all the morning weather drama never happened. I had chosen to sleep in that morning, and Tony, who was on his way back from the gym and was quite relieved to see that I wasn’t lap swimming at the time. Since the lightning sounded like it cracked something about 10 feet from our house (I was awake after that, for sure, although we didn’t see anything amiss), I decided it might be best to delay my swim to later that afternoon when the sun came out.

We decided to spend last Saturday morning driving around and running errands together. There are some pretty, tree-lined roads in the back part of our county and the roads curve around each other. Somewhat maddening if you’re used to a grid-like city pattern of roads, but beautiful in a simple way if you’re just out for a drive together on a rainy Saturday morning with your heads stuck out the windows of your car like a pair of oxygen deprived dogs inhaling the fresh smell of just rained on earth!

I’m not a huge follower of things like LivingSocial or Groupon, but occasionally they have a pretty good deal… like super cheap movie tickets and that awesome Amazon deal back in January. I was pretty excited when this week they had a pay $10, get $20 to spend at Whole Foods. There’s a Whole Foods pretty close to my work place (meaning I can zip over there on my lunch hour and be back at work with time to spare), and they do have bins (we all know about my affection for bin food, right?), so I was pretty tickled to get in on that deal. I love when I catch deals for things that I love.

It’s quarterly audit time at work, which means the outside auditors have come in and are sitting in the work spaces near me. As usual, the one closest to me is sick with a cold (or something, it’s always something). She sits over there and complains about how she doesn’t feel well, all the while sneezing, coughing and sniffling her nose. As usual, my immune system holds out for a week and then succumbs. It’s so frustrating to me. I’ve made mention the last two times this happened to my co-worker about this maddening pattern, but this time I made a bit of a bigger deal over it. So, they moved the ill culprit two desks over — which is great! But sadly it was too little, too late. The bug had already started settling into my immune system. I lost some pay this week because I went home sick… the whole thing just frustrates me (in case I haven’t mentioned that, like, 12 times).

This week, in case you didn’t know, there was a full moon. Or a harvest moon, the farmers call it. Or in our house, the Crazy-Ass Cat Week.

Our two alpha cats hate each other all the time, although the one just can’t comprehend the constant hate of the other and is constantly sticking his face in the other one’s face to be sure, or mosies by him, or just gets in his general vicinity when there are other, faster paths to his destination he could take. He always gets swiped or hissed at. So, lately, when he does that, I’ve taken to saying to him, “Slasher, Tug still hates you!” Slasher then looks at me with an aggrieved look on his face and goes on his way. But this week, and all weeks with a full moon, the hate is taken to an all new level with constant late night yowling, growling and feline yodeling. The hate, it’s really quite impressive.

I’m looking forward to the weekend as if it’s a reset button. To my health and to our cats’ sanity. Here’s to a new us next week!