Diaries I Read:
So, I told you how H is bummed out that we won�t let him go outside anymore. Well, it turns out that he�s more than just depressed. He�s actually suicidal! Seriously. I got home from work last night and all I wanted to do was grab a quick nap, so I�m upstairs in the bedroom, and H is out on the balcony overlooking the backyard. It actually crossed my mind that it was pretty sad that was the only way he could enjoy the outdoors now. But it never crossed my mind that he would jump from the balcony onto the open patio umbrella and then, upon discovering that the umbrella wasn�t exactly solid, leaping to the ground. See, he�s suicidal. Not only did he try to leap to his death, but he�s also willing to risk becoming coyote bait!
And it�s not the first time the cat has tried something like this. He jumped (or fell?) several times from the top of our stairwell to the first floor in our old place. Picture this: B lives alone and feels free to leave the door open as he uses the downstairs bathroom. H has a bell on his collar, so there�s a constant jingle jingle whenever he moves around. The stairs are next to the bathroom. So there�s B just sitting there reading the paper, when all of a sudden he hears, �JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE THUMP!� and his cat comes falling from the sky and lands in front of the bathroom door.
Another time, we were upstairs lying in bed and heard some commotion and the �JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE-JINGLE� and B ran to the stairs only to find H hanging on to the banister for dear life. He actually left claw scratch marks in the wood.
He did it another time, too, but it wasn�t quite as dramatic a scene. I can�t believe he�s never hurt himself, because he�s not a small cat. He falls hard. And far. I think the falls have shaken him up a bit, and maybe stung a little, but so far no broken bones or anything. So far.
D has peed on our carpet twice and pooped once. She�s much too old to be doing these things still. So now she has to stay inside her crate whenever we�re not home. Which is actually no big deal. I don�t think she minds it all that much, especially when we�re not home. All she�d be doing is sleeping anyway. Or peeing. Or pooping. Or destroying a shoe. So I think it�s a good solution all around.
During my lunch hour, I was going to go run some errands (as I�ve been doing during my lunch hour all week long), but as I walked to my car, it occurred to me, �I could just go home!� It�s only a 10-minute drive. So I did. I went home. And nobody was there! It was the most beautiful surprise! I actually had my house to myself for about 30 whole minutes. Of course, everything�s a mess. But I was there in the peace and quiet without having to worry about anyone else. It was so wonderful! I put a few things away and basically just wandered around. I should have taken a nap. I�m so exhausted.
Speaking of running errands during lunch, don�t you hate it when you go to Target to pick up a few things and you find a bunch of other things that you didn�t know you needed and hadn�t planned on buying, but you put them in your cart because they�re a pretty good buy, and you walk around the store and you find more things like that and then you get to the register and the total comes to $65 or $115 or $140? I hate that. But I like the stuff I got.
This is what I want to do when I get home tonight: I want to take a nap for an hour. I want to eat a dinner that B cooked. I want to put away my clothes and organize my closet. I want to get the house straightened up enough that I won�t be embarrassed when some of our friends come over for dinner tomorrow. I want to go to bed at a decent hour and watch TV while I fall asleep. Is that too much to ask? I think not. But I also doubt it will happen.
I have to say that I think this visit with B�s parents has gone remarkably well. Despite my complaints about the other night, I think everything is fine. In fact, it�s better than fine. I think his mom is starting to warm up to me � she�s even initiated a couple of conversations this week! And his dad has always been fine � he�s just a very sweet man.
Have I told you how much I love the new king-size mattress B and I bought? It is really big and really great. Now, B, D, H, and I can all fit in there and still stretch out and be comfortable! Plus that, it�s just a better mattress. Our old one was really old and really saggy and it had a dip in it that you�d sort of roll into during the night. Of course, I could sleep on just about anything right about now.
We have some really cool neighbors on our street. We�ve met several of the couples, and they�ve all been really nice. Nearly everyone has kids, though. Not that kids are a bad thing � it�s just that I don�t think I�ll have as much in common or as many opportunities to spend time with the other women since I don�t have kids. You know how it goes � they all get together and take their kids to the pool or the park or they just hang out together during the day while their kids play and they all know each other from school or soccer or ballet or whatever the case may be. They�re already talking about getting me pregnant, too. (Well, THEY wouldn�t be the ones to do it, exactly, but you know what I mean�) But I�m not going to get sucked into all that. At least, I�m going to try to avoid it. Just a couple more years.
But anyways, the neighbors. I haven�t had a chance to really get to know anyone, but we got brownies from one family and cookies from another and zucchinis from the backyard garden of another neighbor. Those were all very nice gestures. And one guy let us borrow his ladder. And the family across the street had a birthday party on Sunday and B went over there (while I was shopping) and had a beer and hung out with all the parents. He said he especially liked the couple that was throwing the party. And the other night when we were walking D we came across another neighbor (who knew our names but neither B nor I could remember hers!) and stood outside talking with her for probably 30 minutes. I really liked her. She was very chatty and down to earth and she told us about all of the different groups you could join � running clubs, biking clubs, you name it � and I think she and I could probably be friends. If I could just figure out her name.
But one thing I noticed is that all the neighbors like to talk about each other. It�s not spiteful gossip, but it�s gossip nonetheless, and I�m going to try very hard to avoid getting caught up in that. And I�m also going to be careful about what I share and with whom I share it. We did get some interesting news, though. Our next-door neighbors to one side are selling their house. It turns out they�re selling it because they�re getting a divorce. And that�s not all. They have cats. 17 to be exact. (At least that�s what they tell me.) And apparently the woman never comes outside. Weird. I went in the open house on Sunday just out of curiosity and I smelled it. I thought it was dog I smelled, but it seems it was the cats. It�s not an overpowering or especially foul odor, but it�s there. I wonder if it will affect selling their house. (Not that I should be casting any stones what with my pooping peeing dog in her crate at home.)
So that�s the scoop. Now, for something you don�t know about me. I sort my M&Ms. I dump them all out, or at least several of them, and I sort them by colors. I like to eat them two at a time, and I prefer to eat two of the same color together. If you end up with an odd number, of course you can eat different colors together, but you should take care with the combination. Like, red and blue is a great combination. Green and blue is also good. Red and black is good. Yellow and black is not so good. I also definitely have a preference when it comes to colors. I eat them all, but I like to eat the ugly ones first and save the best ones for the end. In order of preference, they go like this: Blue (best), red, green, black, yellow, orange. If there were purple, it would probably fall before green. But most of the bags I�ve had lately don�t have any purples. I know I�ve had purples before, but I haven�t seen them lately. What�s up with that? They also seem to have gotten rid of the light brown. That doesn�t break my heart. It was pretty ugly. Is that a weird practice? I�m not compulsive about it or anything. If I�m in a dark movie theater, I�ll just eat my M&Ms two by two (maybe I�ll even cut loose and eat three at a time) and I enjoy them just as much. It�s just that when I�m looking at my pile of M&Ms, I want them to look pretty, not all mismatched. I like order.
Bzzzzzzzzzz.
Working at home - Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2004
Toronto - Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2004
On the way to Toronto... - Tuesday, Nov. 09, 2004
A Good Day - Monday, Nov. 08, 2004
Another letter - Thursday, Nov. 04, 2004