There it is … the last breakfast of 2006! It was good too. I should make omelets more often.

The new year is sneaking up on us. I’m going to make a nice pork chop dinner in a little bit, and then Lin and I will try to find something worth watching on the TV until the New Year’s shows come on. Or maybe we’ll play a board game of some sort to pass the time. We’ve got a bottle of the bubbly stuff chilling for midnight, and being old folks, we’ll probably go to bed early. I know, what fuddy-duddies we are.

I was going to do a round-up post about 2006, but in the end, it was more depressing that not. I’m going to sit down later and try to write something profound and meaningful about this year and the one to come.

The weather is nasty and grey, Lin has a cold/flu/something, and our furry babies are working my nerves. The only good thing about today is that I slept most of it away.

I’m not feeling so great either. Not sick, just apathetic about everything. I can’t even work up a good rant about Saddam’s execution, which I would like to rant about. Reasons I would like to rant about that? I oppose the death penalty, not seeing it as a form of justice, and I’d have liked to have seen the conclusion of his trial for gassing the Kurds during the Iran-Iraq War. But like I said, I can’t even get into rant mode. Oh, I can feel it bubbling inside, but once the words get formed and my fingers start moving, I lose interest in bothering with it. Maybe tomorrow.

I’d like to DO something today, like make soap or paint, but even with all the sleeping I have been doing the last few days, I just don’t have any energy at all. Maybe I’m sick too and just don’t know it yet.

Meh. Don’t even know why I am posting at all. Habit, I guess.

The best thing I have read on AskMetafilter recently:

If you come to my house and it is a mess, it’s a compliment. It means I feel comfortable with you and close to you.

If you come to my house and it is immaculate, it means you freak me the f*ck out, your visit is causing me stress and I’m counting the moments until you leave.
–jrossi4r

Myu wanted to show you her scar. Who am I to argue?

I don’t know, but I think they went a little crazy with the clippers personally. A quarter of the cat is bald! Poor Myu! And what is Ronin doing with his face pressed to the sheet? Being a big, huge baby and sucking for all he’s worth. I thought for sure they’d have grown out of the Sucking When Happy thing by now, but no, they both still love to leave giant sopping spots of cat spit on the bed sheets and various other fabrics. There’s simply no dissuading them. I guess we’ll have to learn to live with “sucky” kitties and wet spots all over the place.

The weather today is gloomy. Matches the mood in the household perfectly. Actually, the mood around here isn’t nearly as dark as you may expect. I think we are both in a bit of denial at the moment.

I’ve probably written a dozen posts over the last two days and deleted each of them once I was done writing them. I guess I don’t really feel like talking about anything, or rather, I do feel like talking about it, but my own internal conversation is the only one I need right now. Contrary to popular belief, talking to yourself is not a sign of insanity. Neither is writing really long blog posts, proofreading them and then deleting them immediately afterward.

Since I don’t want to talk about anything else right now, let’s talk about kittens!

They are still teething, which means they are chewing, chewing, chewing on everything. Right now both of them have double canines and incisors, and they both have more molars coming through. They look like little mutants with all those teeth. It can’t be making them too happy either. Not much to do about it but give them things to chew on … things that I don’t mind being destroyed, that is. They’ll happily chew on anything, including human body parts.

And yesterday I was awakened by the sound of Lin screaming “What the hell are you DOING?!” Whenever either of us is heard screaming that phrase, it means one or both of the kitties is up to something that ranks extremely highly on the Unauthorized Cat Activity chart. You know, the sort of thing that is so insane you can’t imagine they are even attempting it. When I got to the living room to see what was up, Lin told me the tale.

One of the kittens, he couldn’t tell which one since it all happened so fast, had climbed up the oriental room-divider screen in the living room and was walking along the 1 1/2″ top edge while it wobbled around, and of course, it began to lean too far in one direction and started falling. It’s really tall, and cat’s landing on their feet notwithstanding, falling from that height would not be a good thing for a smallish cat. So Lin screamed and ran to catch it, a small furry blur running away as he did so. I didn’t even need to witness the event to know it was Myu that was guilty. First off, she was nowhere to be seen, which is always a good indicator of kitten guilt. They aren’t quite sophisticated enough to sit there after doing something insane and look at you like you are the crazy one for being freaked out. I’m sure they will develop that adult cat trait in time. Also, Ronin, while being an excellent jumper (there’s nowhere he can’t jump now), is not nearly agile enough to scale a room screen without knocking it over before reaching the top. He may jump higher than any cat I have ever had, but he is a total klutz and very noisy when he is up to something (thank heavens for that). My assertion it was Myu that had done the deed was confirmed today when I caught her balancing precariously on the top of a 1/2″ thick piece of foam board propped against the wall in the den. I was sitting not two feet away and didn’t even hear her making her ascent. She really is a Ninja Kitten!

In other kitty news, they must have gotten a little too carried away with the play fighting this morning. When I was checking Myu’s tummy, I noticed a new scab on one of the ends of her soon-to-be scar. It doesn’t look terrible or anything, but I really wish they’d cool it just a little longer so it would heal well. I’d like to avoid having to go to the vet with a ripped up or infected cat. I can’t watch them 24/7 though. A person has to sleep sometime! I guess I’ll spend some more time each day wearing them out playing, and tonight I’m going to clean her “wound” and put a little Neosporin on it … and then try to keep Ronin from kicking his sister in the gut. Little monsters, I tell you!

Well, the trash truck is finally here picking up our trash. Since it’s not raining right this minute, I better go bring the bin in and check the mail.

Speaking of mail, with all that happened earlier this week, I forgot to mention I got Xmas cards from Dawna and Felinevamp. Thank you! I swear, one of these days will get on the ball early enough in the holiday season to send out cards. I am such a putz when it comes to things like that.

Pre-menopausal women who did housework were 30 per cent less likely to develop breast cancer than pre-menopausal women who did none, while post-menopausal women who did housework were 20 per cent less likely to develop the disease than those who did none.

Take that, all you rich women who never do a speck of housework!

Personally, while I wouldn’t mind having someone come in a few times a year to help me with massive house detailing, like doing the floorboards, ceilings, walls, and in all the dark corners, I can’t imagine having someone come in once a week or more often to do all my housework. I say that as someone who spent a little time as a personal maid and has some experience with rich people who don’t even bother to wipe up their own spilled soda. “Well, the maid is coming in day after tomorrow.” No, really. We’d show up at this luxurious lake house (mansion), and if they spilled something on Monday, it would be there on Wednesday waiting for us. Bits of the onion they chopped on Sunday night would be on the counter and floor. Crumbs would be everywhere. A hundred lipstick-stained glasses would be stacked in the sink right by the massively expensive and easy to use dishwasher. Dirty clothing would stack where it fell in the bathroom, closet or bedroom. It was crazy. Why wouldn’t you immediately grab a sponge or paper towel and wipe up the soda you spilled on the counter which is now dripping down to the floor? How do you avoid stepping on onion bits for the few days they lay there before the maid comes in to do the floor? How the hell hard is it to at least put your own dirty dishes in the dishwasher, even if you can’t be bothered to learn how to turn the thing on? And you have a laundry room larger than most middle class bedrooms, and you can’t even manage to toss your dirty clothing into it?

Sure, if I were wealthy enough and had a large house to maintain, it would be nice to have someone come in once a week (or two) to do the floors, maybe do the laundry, wash windows, wipe down appliances, and clean the house itself. You know … dusting, vacuuming and mopping, sweeping the ceilings, and the really basic stuff. I would never expect a maid to be responsible for cleaning up my spilled soda from two days past … or cleaning up the clippings from the dinner I decided to cook for myself. It’s stupid to leave stuff like that laying around harboring germs and making a mess. It always made me wonder if one of them had gotten sick and vomited in the living room if they’d have just walked around it for four days until we came in to clean. I honestly believe they would have done just that.

How do you not do any housework at all?!

Anyway, sorry for the rant. I’m still a little hostile after my brief stint in servitude to the wealthy. Hostile and still dumbfounded by how utterly juvenile and piggish the rich can be. I have to go clean the kitty litter box, feed the munchkins, and take out the trash now … all in the name of avoiding breast cancer!

Went through the few photos I took this Xmas. Not many to go through seeing as everyone in my family hates having their photo taken. Everyone but one person … my favorite cousin in the whole world, Rodney. In fact, he’s one of my favorite people in the whole world! I thought I’d share it, because looking at his silly grin always makes me smile.

It also made me smile when I walked into the house and saw him wearing the hat and scarf I made for him last year. He makes me smile a lot. He’s really silly, and if he’d let his freak flag fly a little higher, I’m sure the rest of the family would accuse him of being weird too. He was cracking me up at the dinner table by humming Xmas songs and then acting like he didn’t know he was humming … and pretending to be senile and not knowing how old he is (ten years my senior). He’s such a goofball! I wish we lived closer so we could see each other more often, and if Lin and I really don’t go to my family Xmas gathering next year, I’m going to have to find some excuse to get to see him. I’d miss him horribly if we didn’t get to connect at least once a year.

So see, my whole family doesn’t make me insane after all.