Who's Your Grammar?

I posted a status on Facebook today that sparked a record (for me) 18 comments.

What would incite such scintillating conversation?

Grammar.

Oh yeah. I live on the edge.

In the process, I learned of this website. (Herein is the link to the particular issue that plagued me.) If you want to learn some dirty little literary secrets, go take a peek.

Looky What the Dog Dragged In...

To those of you who remember me remotely, I have not, as otherwise suspected, fallen off the face of the earth.

And....good news:

We now have the computer of our (my husband's) dreams. The iMac has come.

*cue the heavenly choir*

But.

He doesn't want it on the internet. That lasted about a day. Or less. As a consolation prize, he purchased an iPad for me. A wi-fi iPad, to boot.

I knooooow!!!!

I don't need his ole stinky computer anyway.

Except to edit photos and stuff.

But that's all.

I promise.

*snort*

Just So You Know I'm Still Here...

Life, since I last posted, has shifted into fast(er) forward.

We are borrowing a laptop, so we still don't have the (end all, be all) Mac yet. It's coming, one day...

In the meantime...

This year we lost all three of the cats we'd had for the last 15 (ish) years. We have CoCo left, whom I rescued out of the middle of the highway a year ago. A week before we left for vacation, we put down our last old cat. We had a week to enjoy the relief of being a one pet family. And we were not even home.

On the last day of va(stay)cation we went to a friend's house to "play" with the puppies her dog had.

You know what's coming don't you...

We now have a 2 pet home. But I swear a dog is like having

6 cats. Except 6 cats would be a WHOLE lot easier! (I've never had to walk a cat.) All I do anymore is, take the dog potty, walk the dog (2x a day!), get the dog out of the trash, tell her to get down, stop biting, etc. I've also never washed a cat.

Dogs, are clearly high maintenance.

But then I see this face.

Exactly.

Looky who posted on her blog...

So, in addition to my normally spotty posting recently, I now can't post much even when I want to. Lightening struck a couple of weeks ago and took out the only computer we had. It wasn't much, I admit, but it would still surf the internet when it took a mind to. We are now in search of a computer. Definitely getting an Apple this time, but we can't just run pick one up in the same way we do when we run out of milk.

In addition, the riding lawn mower has bitten the dust. That doesn't have a whole lot to do with this post other than to point out that my house and everything in it seems to be crumbling around my ankles.

On a brighter note, we got a puppy. (IS that a brighter note?! Doesn't seem so when I get up at 1am to let her out to tinkle.) I have tons of photos on my phone, but can't upload them...ya know...no computer. If I figure out how to do it from my phone, you'll be the first to know. I promise.

Peace out.

Love and Loss

This has been a hard year for us where cats are concerned.

Last fall, we began putting our cats outside. One of the cats thanked us by promptly leaving. For good. That's always hard because there's no closure. Did the cat go somewhere and die? Get hit by a car? Take up with someone else? I'll never know what happened to my beautiful golden eyed, silver Monaco. But it seems appropriate that, just as she walked into our lives 14 years before, she would walk out as well.

We got Monet as a kitten, and not too long afterwards, were given her half brother, Tiger. Monet was the "alpha" cat, not only bossing around the other cats, but us, as well. A couple of months ago, a pack of three dogs came through my yard and killed my girl.

Last year, a white cat started skulking around and helping himself to my cat's food. He was very skittish and I was torn between chasing him off and trying to tame him. Guess which won out? I put food out for him so he'd leave my cat's food alone and began the slow process of taming him. Turns out he was a huge mushpot who, while he never let me pick him up, sure did love being petted. Earlier this year, he got sick and a couple of days later died of an unknown cause.

Tiger was just happy to be here. Content to sleep and eat, he did nothing to rock the boat, but he sure didn't appreciate anyone rocking his boat. Once he got comfortable (wherever that was) he didn't want to be messed with, thank you. Unless it was time to eat. Again. That's why, last Saturday, I knew something was wrong when he turned up his nose at his breakfast. I immediately took him to the vet. After a week of tests and finding what was NOT wrong, we realized there was nothing more that could be done and made the difficult decision to euthanize him.

So now, we have gone from 4 cats, to 1 in rather short order. God knew exactly what I would need when he had me pluck a "black sock" from the middle of a busy highway a year ago. My little tripod legged Coco is just a year old and full of love, affection and playfulness.

A balm to my grieved heart.

Ride 'Em Cowgirl!

Summer seems to be sweeping me away...

We have been busy with day-to-day things that somehow consume every available moment so that there is no time to blog about potential bloggable moments.

I have a new worry that has developed in the last two days: my oldest cat, Tiger seems to be very sick. I took him to the vet Saturday and he has fluid in his abdomen. Why or where it came from seems to be the big question. Could be anything from an inflamed liver, to a virus called FIP, which is untreatable. He has refused food since Saturday. I lost Tiger's half sister a few months ago to some dogs who attacked her in our yard.

To say my heart is heavy and distracted would be an understatement...

If Self Loathing Could Be Raised to an Art Form

Discipline.

The word makes me cringe. Only because I lack so much.

Do you ever just step outside yourself and take a good, long look at who you've become. Yeah, I try not to, either.

But today I did.

Frustrated by the many good things I want to do...and don't, mostly because of a lack of discipline.

Writing, painting, running, homemaking, gardening, cooking, knitting...blogging... I have so many interests, yet it seems that all I can accomplish is going to work and spending a few short minutes/hours with the family in the evening.

If I do find time to devote to my pursuits, I find myself meandering around getting ready to do it until I actually run out of time to do it.

I look at men and women who lived 40-60 years ago and didn't have the advantages or shortcuts I have today, yet they accomplished so much. (Maybe because, many of my advantages have turned into more distraction than anything...)

I envy those who are driven by their creativity.Those who create almost compulsively. I have just enough creativity to make me crazy. I want to create, then, if I have opportunity, I sit like a lump wondering what to do and where to start. If I happen to have an original, creative thought, it usually arrives at the most inopportune time. Like when I'm in the middle of working.

You want to know when I find myself the most motivated?
When I either get disgusted enough, or guilty enough with myself. "Ooooh, haven't been running or exercised in 3 days! Aaaand you're not eating well! You're thickening up there! Better move it!" *Cue guilty panic.*

"Just do it." Says the now cliche advertising tag line.

Some days, that's easier said than done.