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ShinyHappy - Thoughts for May 17th - 31st
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05/31/05 'Nice' and 'good' do not go hand in hand.
I have a bad habit of saying to Mong, "What a good boy you are." I shouldn't say it because to be quite honest, it's not often true. The reason I say it, though, is because it's what I always said to Halo. Because Halo was a good boy, and it was so pleasing and admirable that I always said it with wonder. So when I'm feeling kindly disposed toward Mongo that is often what comes out of my mouth and then I realize that I'm speaking untruths and have to either rephrase or let it lie there like the insincere compliment it is. What I should be saying is, "What a nice boy you are." Mong is a very nice cat. He's just not all that well-behaved, as I think I probably say a few times every single day.
The joy and pure amusement he brings us on a regular basis more than makes up for the majority of his sheer naughtiness. We're really starting to wonder where he hides his beloved tinfoil balls since we can't seem to find any of the many that we've made for him. They're golf-ball sized and don't fit under the sofa or loveseat very easily, so they're lurking somewhere in the apartment waiting to be found and I'm nervous that that day will be when the landlord is showing the apartment to prospective renters and they shift or move something we haven't and an army of tinfoil balls comes showering out and roll around on the floor. I'm thinking we should start making softball-sized tinfoil balls so he can't hide them any more.
Something else he really enjoys doing is chewing on his bench. Yep, he chews on his Ikea Pastill bench for fun. He does it every single day during his rambunctious times. Here he is looking batshit freaking crazy chewing on his bench. It's just that one corner that he chews on, and he hangs from the bottom of the bench as pictured to do so. You can see under the bench a cardboard box he disassembled and the carcass of a paper bag. People coming in might look at that and think (rightfully), "What cluttered and untidy people," but you know what? He plays with that stuff and when he's playing with that stuff, he's not surfing on VCRs!
What a nice boy he is.
Andrew has been talking recently about an eggless omelette that he ate on the train a while back. It was made with tofu and was a major hit with Andrew. His being allergic to eggs doesn't get in the way of normal everyday eating too terribly much for us, thankfully, but he has mentioned from time to time that omelettes look like good food since they can pretty much be crammed with all kinds of delicious things and the egg is basically binder. It's true, too, although there are egg-eating people out there who don't really get on board with the whole omelette thing because they're just so eggy. I'm kind of one of them. I like them every now and again, but a little omelette goes a long way.
So I did a little Googling tonight and found myself what looks to be an awesome page full of vegan recipes for egg dishes, all made with tofu. Since discovering that I don't hate tofu I'm looking forward to trying some of these out for my poor eggless fiance.
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05/30/05 Andrew is the nicest and the sweetest and the smartest.
I started working on two masks today. When I started I realized that it's really been far, far too long since I did any maskmaking. I think that the last mask I actually completed was May and Dan's bonsai mask. I could be wrong, but it seems that way to me. Anyhow, I am reminded that I looooove maskmaking and I'm sorry I put it off this long.
I'm looking forward to being able to list my masks on Uncommon Things, since it's pretty sparse with only hairsticks for sale at the moment. When I have three or four masks finished I'll probably move on to the filigree eggs for a while. Of course, I'm not promising that it'll happen that way since I invariably change my plans when it comes to things like this and then some people (not naming any names) say that I lie about stuff in my weblog. People!
I didn't mention in my weblog last night that at one point while we were messing around down in the storage area Andrew came upstairs for the little broom and dustpan. When he came back down Mongo was attached to his shoulder and his claws were dug in so hard that Andrew couldn't get him off while holding the dustpan and trying to close the apartment door. So I peeled Mongo off and headed back upstairs with him to chuck him back in the apartment. As I was unlocking the door the Great Dane guy and his Great Dane came in the building. I was kind of freaked out, not knowing if Mong would go ballistic at the sight of a dog the size of a Shetland pony, and not knowing if the Great Dane would try to swallow my kitty in one gulp. Both Mong and the dog ignored each other completely, to my surprise, but the Great Dane guy looked at me and said, "Hey, is that the cat that's always yelling at the door?"
I was so shamed. This guy with an unreasonably large canine asked me about our unreasonably loud cat. Sigh. He looked more amused than anything, but still ... it's official that Mong makes a nuisance of himself.
We have some good news! Andrew got a new job for the summer. He'll be working for a historian doing historicial research for her. It's good work for him with regards to what he's working toward in Canadian Studies and hopefully it'll be very interesting for him. You know, so he's not bored silly all summer long. If I can manage to find a job that pays a half-decent wage things will be just fine. So wish me luck!
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05/29/05 A day in which our love for the animal kingdom is severely tested.
Today Mong went surfing down the back of our television set on the VCR into the fake fireplace pit. He survived the trip; the VCR did not. It will not play tapes. I peeked through its tape flap and things don't look so good inside. Poor VCR. It still turns on and changes the channels and whatnot, but its main function has been disabled. What really sucks is that I was sitting on the sofa just about to watch the season's finale of Lost when this happened. Lost! My favourite show. Now I am mocked by the presence of the tape that holds the episode, sitting there on the impotent VCR. Life is cruel.
I broke the news to Andrew when he got home from his train meeting today. I'd already worked out my anger and annoyance at Mong so was in protective mode, holding the purring little ingrate while I told Andrew what had happened, first making him think about what a cute and sweet kitty Mong almost always is. He wasn't too mad about it, thankfully, but we both agree that Mong is really a very naughty cat. Whether Mong thinks so is another matter altogether.
In other horrid animal news: Today we went down to the storage area of our apartment building. There were a couple of things I wanted to find in some boxes I have down there. Now, last week our superintendent 'jokingly' said to me, "Hey, mind if I borrow your cat? There are a couple of mice in the basement." I wasn't horrified by this news. Mice are everywhere, after all, and we suspect we might even have one in our kitchen, although we've never seen any evidence that our actual food has been visited by a little furry thing. Just one drawer that has a teatowel in it and what look like mice doots scattered around. Anyhow, it kind of went out of my head since the super made it sound very negligible, like there might have been mice, oh ha ha.
Let me tell you: THERE ARE MICE IN THE BASEMENT. AND RATS. YES, I AM YELLING. We went into our storage space and Andrew discovered piles of mice poo on the tops of boxes. And also rat poo. I can verify what both look like since I have owned pet mice and pet rats in the past. I can also verify what their urine smells like. IT SMELLS LIKE OUR BOXES DOWN IN THE BASEMENT. Upon opening some boxes we found that they'd gotten inside them and used them as toilets. I can understand the boxes that were open at the top being invaded, which they were in a very severe way, but it seems they also got into other boxes.
The fortunate thing about being packrats and holding on to things that quite honestly have little monetary or even sentimental value is that if those things get ruined it is not the end of the world. However, there were some packets of photos belonging to Andrew that are in a questionable state, and probably some other things that are not in the junk category as well. It's pretty gross, all in all. I wonder how many other tenants are aware of how awful and invasive the problem is down there.
Sigh. So those were the most major events of the day. I should report that for the rest of the day (up to the time of this writing, anyhow) Mong was an awfully well-behaved kitty. He might have dimly realized he was in trouble for the VCR thing after all.
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05/28/05 Wow. There are a lot of links in this entry!
We are home! Again! From our last trip for a while! Yay!
It's nice to be home. I missed my bratty fatty catty a lot and felt really badly this time for going away and abandoning him for the third weekend in a row. Jen called me tonight with a report on visiting him while we were gone and it sounds as if she and Colin had a very good time with him. Apparently Mong quite enjoyed playing with Colin and they had lots of fun. Mong has a giant Glebe Emporium paper bag that I gave him before we left in the hopes that he'd enjoy messing around with it more than destroying our other possessions. He loves paper bags and had previously exhausted the smaller Glebe Emporium paper bag I'd given him. It's very flat now and he usually just lounges on it.
He really freaks out on these bags, though, when they're fresh. After we got home he had an extended romp with it to work off some of his joyous energy and the bag is definitely now looking the worse for wear. If something climbed inside of you and scratched and jumped and wiggled at high speed I bet you wouldn't look so hot, either. (That is neither a pregnancy joke nor an Alien joke.)
Anyhow, we're happy to be home, but also sad to have left our lovely Toronto friends yet again. It was a quiet weekend compared to the shenanigans of Jonhnstock, and we really didn't go out and do wild things this time. We mostly hung out at May and Dan's place with them having good chats and watching good shows. They introduced us to Dead Like Me which looks to be a pretty good show overall. I think I need to see a few more episodes to really make up my mind, but anything with Mandy Patinkin in it can't be all wrong.
May also took me with her on a trip to the mall today and bought me a fantastic lipstick with wonderfully awful Victorian postcard kittens on it. May rocks. That is all.
Some highlights of the trip for me, however, involved things that might not seem very exciting. I took some time on Friday afternoon to go out in the backyard with my book and enjoy the sunshine. I was distracted by a fat black squirrel that was making a circuit of the yard on the fences and didn't see me until it got very close because I sat so still. When it did see me it leaped like it thought it was a flying squirrel onto the trunk of a tree and scolded me in the way of irritated squirrels. It then made another circuit of the yard, but this time through the treetops, which involved a lot of acrobatic jumping and manoeuvering on skinny branches.
Later that same day Andrew and I watched a beautiful cardinal hoppping around in the front yard. It took its time, too, and I was happy because I haven't actually gotten to see many cardinals that close. They have black faces and bright red beaks, which I'd never noticed before. Like I said; this may not sound that interesting to you, but believe me, the cardinal was awesome. If you click on that cardinal link make sure you appreciate the picture of the baby cardinals with the daddy cardinal. The daddy looks like he's thinking, "What do you want me to do about it?"
To end things off, I will return once more to our highly entertaining cat. Last week we caught him doing something interesting while he was playing on the Ikea stepping stool we have. He was sitting on the first step and when he looked underneath it he noticed that he could see his tail dangling down from the other side. So, he tried catching his tail with his front paws. The whole thing looked very precarious and like it would end up with him somersaulting right off the step, but he didn't. I managed to snap only one poorly taken picture before he quit, so I will share it with you as the only piece of evidence that he's as crazy as we say he is. Enjoy seeing Mong take tailchasing to a whole new level
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05/25/05 Only the best and tackiest for my kitty.
I am disappointed in my black stain. It's still very sticky after way more than 24 hours and I don't think that people will want sticky hairsticks to put in their hair. Sigh. I will seek a better alternative, I guess.
I had an appointment downtown today and walked there and back since it was so beautiful outside. On my way home I passed a pet supply store and figured I'd go in to see what the prices of their kitty carriers are since we really need a new one. While I was in there I happened to see a collar that was just perfect for Mong and had to pick it up. While I love his zebra-striped collar, the white parts are looking decidedly dingy and gray, so I've been thinking of picking up a black collar for him after all. Andrew had once joked about buying him a diamond collar, so when I saw this one ... well, I knew it was meant to be.
Here it is. Isn't it snazzy? That's right; that's a (fake) rhinestone pawprint, baybee! Plus lots more sparkly single stones, too. He's got bling! I was talking to Marcus on the phone tonight and described it to him, but he didn't sound very impressed. He actually sounded more amused (and kind of appalled) than anything. You know, I don't think I ever once said that I wasn't going to act certifiably insane about this cat. Deal, people!
When I put the collar on Mong for the first time, though, it felt weird to him because the buckle is metal and hangs differently than the snap on his zebra collar. So he got a bit freaked out by it and sat up and waved his front paws around while tucking his chin way down to try to catch whatever he sensed was bugging him. I was too distracted by laughing at him to grab the camera and snap a picture while he was acting like a freakshow, but I really wish I'd done it. It was not quite as funny as Chrissy-dog and the rubber doggy boots incident (a wee in-joke for La), but it was close.
We leave in the morning for yet another trip! Holy crap! We go away a lot, don't we? Well, this is our last wee trip for a while and it's a fairly short one. We're gone from Thursday morning until Saturday night sometime and Jen will again be checking in on poor old Mongo and making sure that our apartment hasn't been raided by people who want to steal second-hand furniture and out-dated computers. We're starting to consider getting a second cat to keep Mong company when we're not here since he really does seem to find being left alone a traumatic experience. And I'm just talking about while we're walking to the Loeb. There's no estimate on when exactly this will be, but as Marcus says: Sooner is probably better since Mong is still young. My mom also says that it would be good sense to get a cat with a similar personality to him since Siamese can be very domineering. Two Mongs in the apartment ... well, it would be interesting, to say the least.
O.K.. I'll be back on Sunday!
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Today I was on a mission to find a stain of some sort to make some of my hairstick blanks black. I wasn't sure what the best way to go about this would be, but I did recall seeing Hilde using a dark black stain on Trading Spaces one time that was a wax of some sort. I wanted that wax. It looked very easy to use and it made the colour of the furniture they were working on very dark and beautiful.
So, off I went to Home Hardware in the Glebe. I went in and tried to get into the area where paints and stains are kept but it was all blocked off with crates of what looked like new merchandise waiting to be put on the shelves. So, I asked the guy who was kind of puttering around the crates.
I said, "Do you have wax-based stain?"
He said, "No."
I said, "No wax-based stain at all?"
He said, "No."
I said, "Do you know of any other stores that would carry it?"
He said, "We don't sell any here."
I wasn't quite sure what to say in response to that since it wasn't a direct answer to my question, merely a reiteration of the one fact he'd communicated to me thus far. I felt that perhaps he didn't feel comfortable telling me which of their competitors would carry the item, and I didn't want to press the issue too far. I also feared that there was no such thing as wax-based stain and he didn't want to point out that I was making things up. I felt that I should leave. I felt awkward.
But then he spoke again, surprising me. "Maybe Randall's has some."
W00t. I'd never been to Randall's before and had always wanted to go. So I went later in the day and was thoroughly pleased with my visit. For some reason when I go to hardware stores or other places where the vibe is all DIY-like I fear that I'm seen as a pitiable character, one who obviously knows nothing about ... well ... anything that involves assembling or building or staining or sanding. I liked that nobody rushed right up to me the minute I walked in the door, too. If I wander around for five minutes looking kind of lost and confused I appreciate the, "Can I help you?" but until then I do like to have the chance to get where I'm going on my own.
Anyhow, I didn't exactly find what I wanted, but I found something close. A molasses-like substance that the saleslady assured me is applied like shoe polish, but isn't really like any shoe polish I've ever used (and I have used some, yes). It doesn't cover up the brown wood colour of the blanks with one application, and I'm supposed to leave them sitting for 12 to 24 hours between applications, but if I paint the sticks black with acrylic paint and then put on a layer or two of this stuff I achieve the effect I'm going for. I'm still going to try to find that wax, though. Hilde had it. I swear.
In Mong news, yesterday he upped his cuteness quotient by climbing inside Andrew's MEC backpack and sitting there for a while. He's been getting into absolutely everything lately. He climbs the shower curtains, he climbs the clothes hanging in the closet, he gets in behind my monitor, he gets on the dining room table and messes with my art stuff, he knocks stuff off of shelves, he knocks stuff off of bedside tables, he steals socks and races away with them to kill them in the living room, he slices, he dices, he terrorizes! I'm still a sucker for him, though. All he has to do is climb up on me and purr and rub his nose on my face and I melt.
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05/23/05 We should just install a revolving door!
We are once again home from being away on a lovely trip. For a few days, at least. We are making one more trip this month, to Mong's future distress. We leave on Thursday for Toronto again, but this time only until Saturday and Jen is once again going to visit Mong to assure him that he's not forgotten.
Jenny's wedding was beautiful! Every detail was just right, and Jenny herself was an incredibly beautiful bride. As anyone who knows her should have known she would be, of course. We all had a great big get-together the night before the wedding (we all being all of Jenny and Andrew's side of the family) at the hotel we were staying at, and Jenny told me when she got there that she had a special job for me. I was instantly terrified, and even more so when I found out what my job was. I had to pin the corsages and boutonnieres on the family members and members of the wedding party who were being given them.
So, I had to come at people with long pins. I was more nervous than anyone else, I do believe, but I was relieved when the last one was safely pinned on. I was also the only person to get stuck with a pin, as it turns out.
I did love Montreal! It's the most gorgeous city I've ever been in. That's not to say I want to live there right now, but I wouldn't be entirely opposed to the idea if it came up for whatever reason. The architecture blew my mind. Everything is charming and full of pretty details. Sigh. Toronto still holds my heart, though.
We got back home yesterday evening and ended up going out for pho and ice cream with Colin and Jen. We all kind of compared wedding notes, since it's looming in all our minds and especially theirs since theirs definitely comes first. In fact, it appears that Andrew and I will be changing our wedding date again since the September 9th date conflicts with some of his family moving out of the country. Anyhow, it was nice to sit and chat about these things with our friends. We went to Pure Gelato for our ice cream and I have to admit that they have a wider selection of delicious flavours than my beloved Greg's does. They don't have toasted marshmallow or Grape Nut, though. I ended up getting a cone with egg nog and creme caramel ice cream.
Today Andrew appears to be coming down with an illness of some kind. It's Victoria day and nothing is open around here, and we'd planned poorly. We have very little in the way of edibles around the apartment since we've been going on trips and things. So, instead of being super-creative or energetic we just walked to McDonald's and had burgers. While I waited for the food Andrew went to sit down. I regret staying at the counter because I had to witness one of the most uncomfortable things I've seen in a long time.
The employee working the only cash register was nice but clearly not doing so well at his job. When we arrived there were two orders ahead of us and the fry bin was empty, with no fries even cooking yet. There was a manager in a white shirt who came to the front to help him out right after we arrived. The guy who ordered after me got two burgers. After he paid he kind of paused and said, "You overcharged me." He pointed to a sign and said that the total sum of his two burgers was less than what he'd paid. The manager pointed out that he'd gotten extra cheese. The man said that even so, he was paying more than he should be paying. The manager went through the paper bill to show him that everything was accounted for correctly. The man said that despite it appearing that he was paying correctly, he was doing the math in his head and it just didn't add up.
I was watching. I saw the manager getting more and more frustrated as this man stonewalled his every effort to explain why he thought there was no overcharge. I knew how the manager felt. I have done my time behind those cash registers, and have been made to work on a holiday. For some reason on holidays these places are always understaffed when there should rightfully be more people working. So I watched the manager, who'd already been steaming about the fries and the fact that there was no chicken down in the kitchen (chicken takes a long time and it was what the people ahead of us were waiting for) and no pies baked. He was losing his cool. The customer, while not shouting, was using his 'the customer is always right' voice and saying, "I don't care what the computer says. I know what's right and I expect better than this!"
This went on and on until the manager totally snapped. "You need to calm down before I can do anything for you!" he suddenly snarled, then rushed to the back. This left me standing beside the complaining customer. I turned my head to my right, away from him, and couldn't bring myself to look at him as he began a soliloquy on how he was overcharged and didn't deserve to be treated in such a manner and it was all making him very unhappy and he might never come back.
I wish I'd said something. I wish I'd said, "You know, you're probably right but this place is fairly busy and he's doing lots of work up here while trying to manage the kitchen as well. It's a holiday and the store is understaffed and he could probably use a break. Maybe you could cut him a little bit of slack." I didn't do that, though, and I had to remain standing there when the manager returned with a calculator and said that yes, the customer was correct and that the computer was charging the wrong price for single burgers and that he'd refund the man right now. He also said that he was sorry. This was all spoken while he looked down at the cash register, eyes red and face flushed and everything about him screaming that in that moment he hated being where he was more than anything in the world. I wanted to hug him. I've been right there and it's a lonely, awful place to be.
The customer carried on talking about the whole thing, but became more gracious and even thanked him for the apology. The somewhat inept cash register guy handed me my food at around that point and I had no reason to stick around, but I told Andrew much of what traspired and realized more and more that I wish I'd said something to the overcharged man. Even if he'd been mean or rude to me; so what? I would have loved it if anyone had ever done the same for me back in the day.
In conclusion, here is something entirely for May: Nanabush and the Giant Beaver. I love you, May!
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05/19/05 I have to say it: Jen's hot buns!
I totally meant to write a weblog entry last night, but Colin and Jen surprised us with an invitation to go see the Star Wars Episode III midnight showing with them, so we got in at a ridiculously late hour and it just didn't happen. That's O.K., since not a whole lot else happened during the day or anything.
Episode III sucked a little bit, but it wasn't as bad as Episodes I and II so I didn't hate it. Andrew and I were talking about it tonight and he made the point that from now on, this is how it happened. Since the first movies came out people could imagine what happened, but now there is this canonical telling that takes away anything anyone's imagined and it probably doesn't really live up to that. I'm not a Star Wars nerd so I hadn't actually imagined anything very exciting or special to me, but I have known some Star Wars nerds and I can see how it's very possible. I feel bad for you, nerds.
Today was relatively uneventful as well. I did some shopping for food, plus I needed to buy a shirt to go with my skirt for Jenny's wedding this weekend. I went to Phase 2, which is handily located just a couple of blocks away from us. I really love that store. I also made a big batch of hairsticks today, my favourite of which is a set of goofy dangling skulls. I'll have to wait until we get back from our weekend away to update Uncommon Things, though, since it's very late right now and we're leaving first thing tomorrow morning for Montreal. I'm excited because I've never actually been to Montreal. It should be nice to see what all the fuss is about, since pretty much everyone who's spent time there seems to love it like they've never loved a city before in their lives. I'm more excited about being there for Jenny's wedding. She's probably going to be one of the most beautiful brides I've ever seen.
Tonight we went over to Colin and Jen's for Andrew's Chez Jen Christmas present dinner. He'd asked for a lobster dinner and so we had to wait until a good lobster eating time, which apparently was this week. I was mildly horrified to see the lobsters waving their legs frantically around in the air just before being introduced to the boiling pot of water, but it really wasn't that bad. I found the actual process of disassembling and eating the big old bugs to be more fascinating and creepy. I did try a bite of lobster that Colin gave me and I proclaim it to be the most inoffensive water creature I have ever eaten. It didn't taste terribly fishy (which I was afraid of) and if anything it was the texture of it that put me off, not the flavour. If I had to, I do believe I could eat more lobster. It's a good thing I don't have to, right?
The rest of the meal was delicious and wonderful. Jen very kindly made a hamburger for me to eat since I wasn't partaking of the giant bugs. It was a very gianormous hamburger which ended up becoming two hamburgers on Jen's special 'Buns Flambé'. Ask her for the recipe. Tee hee. For dessert there was apple pie and fruit with whipped cream. No butter shenanigans this time, though. The (real) whipped cream came from a can.
I feel badly for Mong since he will be staying at the apartment while we're gone this time and will likely be quite lonely. We just couldn't afford the boarding costs at the animal hospital again so soon. Thankfully, Jen S. is going to be coming over on Friday and Saturday to visit Mong and let him know that he hasn't been abandoned to live all alone in the apartment. It's also a shorter period of time, but I still feel guilty and sad for him. He's such a gorgeous boy. I snapped an awesome picture of him today. I have a metal cat decoration that sits in our dining room window and he was sitting beside it, so I decided to grab a picture of him posing with them. Check them out.
Once again I'm not going to be updating for a few days. We're back on Sunday; probably around midday, so I'll definitely be doing a weblog entry then. I hope everyone has a great weekend!
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05/17/05 Home is where the bratty cat is.
We are home from Toronto. I had such a good time. I don't even know how to tell you. I don't think I've ever said what our major purpose was in TO this weekend. We and all of our friends were having a conference. A conference entitled Johnstock 2005. The title comes from Jen's habit of giving her friends John names (a reference from The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension). There were committees, presentations, swag ... apparently all the things that make a conference a conference! Really in the end it was all about getting a bunch of friends together to hang out at the end of the school year and decompress together. Even those of us who aren't in school right now, working or otherwise.
It was a total success. I was on the swag committee and we ended up getting some pretty sweet swag, if I do say so myself. On Friday Andrew, Jen and I went off to the Yorkdale mall to search out something suitable for swag. It was a difficult search, but we eventually found some hideously wonderful personalized keychains in the It Store that said 'John' on them. There were only six and we needed nine, but the lovely and kind female employee informed us that they actually make them on the premises and whipped up three more for us. I loved her. I had no affection for the male employee who'd simply informed us that the ones on the rack were all they had, obviously not wanting to trouble himself with people who were there to spend money. Jerk. Here's my keychain, hanging from my purse where it will likely stay until it falls apart. Or until I find somewhere more appropriate to hang it. We all had different beads with pictures on them; for some reason I found the mustachioed devil hilarious.
We got to see Noah a whole lot, which was fantastic. He's so talkative now, and carries on actual conversations with people. His second birthday was on Sunday and we had cake and celebrated his two years of adorableness in the outside world. I got to spend some time just holding him on my lap a couple of times and having him not want to jump down and run away somewhere. Good times. When he's happy and excited now he does this awesome running-on-the-spot dance that is so Flashdance it's uncanny. Oh, Noah. I miss you.
I also miss all the other friends that we got to see and spend time with. Dan, May, Michelle, Jen F., Hilary, Marcus ... fun, wonderful people that now live so far away. Sigh. Marcus got me to cut his hair again this weekend, since the last time I cut it for him didn't go horribly, terribly wrong. This time I tried to give him The Sayid. Sayid (Naveen Andrews) is a total hottie and a random lady somewhere asked Marcus if anyone had ever told him he looks like Sayid. Woo woo! I ended up just cutting his hair up to about shoulder-length and all seemed well. I hope. I was pretty stressed about getting it even this time, since shoulder-length hair is more unforgiving of unevenness. Marcus is still his hottie Sayid-looking self, though, so no disasters there.
We arrived home very, very late last night (this morning) so didn't go and get Mong from the animal hospital where we were boarding him until today. Andrew and I went over together and when we went in the vet tech said, "You're here to pick up your kitty?" I said yes, and she said, "Good!" She kind of laughed afterward and said she was joking, but that he wanted a lot of attention. So, not so much with the joking, I suspect. We went back to see him right away and as we walked to the back we could hear him talking at the top of his lungs to the people back there. He seemed happy to see us and as I was getting him out of his cage one of the techs was telling me that while she had him out for a bit of a run-around in the back room earlier he'd been up to his usual bratty shenanigans, trying to jump into the garbage when she took the lid off. Par for the course.
I was sad for him at various times while we were gone, imagining him imagining us gone forever, but he seems fairly calm about the whole thing. He's been super-affectionate all day today, but that's not a huge change for him. He's also been hyper and mischievous and curious and hungry. Speaking of which, he actually looks even fatter now. I think that not being able to run like a freak all the time had him put on a few pounds while he was there.
Something funny; I was talking to Jerome on the phone tonight and was talking about how Mong might be a bit older than we thought, since his weirdo baby teeth growing alongside his adult incisors might not be a true indication of kittenhood. I pulled back one of his lips to look at them again and the one on the left side was gone! There was just a bit of a hole where it had been. I looked on the right side and that one was gone too! Weird! I mean, it's not so weird that they'd fall out, but I'm assuming it happened while he was at the vet since I kind of had the habit of checking them every day before we went away to see if he had anything caught between them (which happened often and can lead to tooth decay). I guess our little boy is getting all grown up. *sniff*
This afternoon I caught Mong sneaking off of Andrew's desk with a foil blister pack of Reactine in his mouth. So, Andrew says he's also part magpie. The Reactines do make a rattling noise in their little blister pack, so that's probably why he wanted it, but still ... Have I mentioned before that he's a bratty little thief? Yes? Well, I'm sure I'll mention it many times more, so get used to it. Anyhow, I finally have some pictures that show the pretty blue of our little kitty's eyes, so check them out. Here's the first picture, when he was lounging lazily and pleasantly on the bed. I wanted some more pictures since they don't all turn out great. As I took the pictures, though, the dangling camera cord caught his attention and he started getting a bit playful and wild. Hence the look on his face in this picture. It might not look much different to you, but he's clearly in attack mode in the second picture and I started to fear for my personal safety and stopped.
I also have lovely pictures of him looking at the lilacs out of our living room windows. Check out the lilac point Siamse as he looks at lilacs. Or bugs.
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