Did I mention I hate plumbing? Nothing but grossness!
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Ewww. That brought to mind the studio apartment I had in Chicago. The bathtub drain wasn’t flowing well, and the super brought up his shop vac and sucked out a slimy hairball as long as my arm. Apparently, some longhair had occupied the apartment before me.
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Spent the morning trying to track down Murder Cat at the municipal shelter, the humane society and a couple rescue groups. Murder Cat was the neighborhood cat, abandoned about a year ago by the awful renters across the street, that three or four of us were feeding and taking care of. My daughter had made him her project, and he had warmed up to her over the last six months or so, becoming a friendly yet still aloof semi-feral cat who liked company, cuddles and scritches on his terms. He hadn’t been around in about a week, so she put up “Have you seen me?” posters in the neighborhood. Gossipy neighbor said that the neighbor across the street had been trying to civilize him, and when that was unsuccessful, he took him to the shelter. Not a word to us or the other family with kids who were tending him. I ambushed the neighbor yesterday to confirm, which he did, but also gave me conflicting information about when and why.
Murder Cat is not at the shelter, no one remembers him coming in or recognizes the photo, and there’s no record of him. That was such a dick move; there was no problem with Murder Cat until that neighbor tried to bring him indoors. Had he bothered to ask, we could have told him that wouldn’t work because that had been tried before.
Kiddo is absolutely gutted.
Update: After much wrangling with the neighbor, I got him to give me the surrender paperwork from the shelter. He had surrendered the cat under a false name (WTF???), and with that info, the shelter was able to track down what happened to Murder Cat. He was adopted two days after being brought in. So, as happy an ending for the cat as could have been hoped for, but Kiddo is still beyond sad and righteously (IMHO) pissed at the neighbors.
I realize that the fate of a cat is minor in the scheme of all the really shitty things going on in the world and in people’s lives. But he was a bright spot in Kiddo’s constrained and upended life, and she had done so much to make him pet-worthy. It just killed me to see that little joy snatched away.
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This has been a medium shitty week. Not quite as dire as some of the posts I’ve read from @knoxblox so I know I need to count my blessings.
I used to roll with the punches better before. Chalk it up to 4 years of living under Cult45, with a non-zero possibility of more of the same but of course, so very much worse in Round Two.
So… in between looking at belongings I can liquidate on craigslist, “fridge and cupboard roundup” dinner, and a sloppy meditation before bed… this. I started writing a bitchy list of most of the crap that has gone wrong but then I erased it because even I didn’t wanna read through it. People bailing on agreements, unexpected big expenses, getting our sophomore back to college (he’s GTFO of a very hot COVID county in Texas, heading to a decent well-run part of the U.S. I hope). Our fam’s close-precariat; we’re looking at where that financial edge meets the abyss. We still have our living quarters, I’ll take that for a win.
Things are gonna slide 
Slide in all directions
Won’t be nothing
Won’t be nothing
You can measure any more
I feel a minor temper tantrum coming, which in our 100°F+ temperatures (~38°C) costs almost more time and energy than it’s worth.
And I thought, why not turn it into a fucking dance party?
Admittedly this party would play some really downer music on the playlist but your patience shall be rewarded. Plus, I don’t smoke and I don’t drink, so this may be as good as it gets for me now.
Here’s Hayes Carll to start us off with KMAGYOYO1 which feels very “lightning in a bottle” in 2020. Remember when crowds of people did not induce a creeping horror of sharing a semi-lethal virus? Live from Austin, Texas in 2011:
R.L. Burnside got the message. I thought he was really on to something2 when I heard this in '98. Looking back, he was trying to warn us all, IMO.
Leonard Cohen says it for me:
Thank you so much friends.
We’re so privileged to be able to gather in moments like this when so much of the world is plunged into darkness and chaos. So…
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in
- KMAGYOYO = Kiss My Ass Guys, You’re On Your Own
- Nice story about him here in the New Yorker
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One of my projects for lock-in was to get a faulty Oculus Rift working.
Hopefully it will still work without paying the Zuckerberg toll, at least until 2023.
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Damn you, Kevin.
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Damn kid had the chance to take out Trump in '92 and botched it…
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I saw the headline and thought it was real.
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Really, fuck yesterday as well as today.
I woke up to a thawed and warming refrigerator/freezer. The best part was I blew my entire food budget stocking up last week, and that’s not even considering the bags and bags of frozen veggies and fruit, because instead of canning I freeze stuff. And all the extra dairy, and extra eggs, because I was going to start baking again. And homemade blackberry ice cream.
I cooked all the bacon yesterday and we rage-ate it for dinner. I’m currently boiling all the bones for stocks, and I will be canning that. I guess my easy way of storing food only works if you have a reliable freezer.
Thru social media, the husband found a friend who does refrigerator repair work. He was supposed to stop by last night, but due to crossed signals that didn’t happen. So now I wait to see what happens. Without homemade blackberry ice cream.
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Ugh… that really sucks! Hopefully, the fridge itself is fixable. Loads cheaper than a new fridge…
Breakfast for dinner at the marcence household yesterday… (sorry… couldn’t help it… not trying to make light!)
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Exactly that. Pouts and all!
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Sorry to hear you had to deal with that. With the storms coming this way after Hurricane Laura, you’re making me rethink getting more perishable food this weekend. 
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Bummer! I’m especially sad for the loss of the homemade ice cream. 
We used to have an extra freezer in the basement for the same reason. One year we bought a bunch of lobster when it was a good price, then did all the work of cooking and “picking” them so we had a few bags of ready-to-use lobster meat in there. We also made a HUGE batch of gumbo for Christmas and had all the extra in there.
There was some kind of power surge, but nothing we noticed upstairs I guess. A circuit in the breaker had flipped and when we next went down to get some food it was a wet, soppy, warm and depressing mess. It was so disappointing.
We got rid of the freezer and are now more into drying.
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I don’t feel well today. Last two years were extremely stressful to me and due to that I frequently had abdominal pain. For the last 2 or 3 months there’s also some gastrointestinal bleeding and it’s getting stronger instead of going away, and I’m kinda worried about it.
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IANAD, but I’d advise consulting a medical professional. (When I was in a super-stressed place in my life, I was diagnosed with ulcers, and was told that an ulcer attack didn’t need anything but calm, better eating, and no caffeine or alcohol - unless there was bleeding, and then get to the doctor ASAP.)
Take care of yourself, please!
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Thank you! That is interesting, since recently I started drinking lots of coffee and things got worse since then.
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Oh yeah, coffee is horrible for the stomach.
@marence I think there’s something doctors prescribe now that’s stronger than omeprazole? Nexium, I think?
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