Woman in the Middle

Hubby does not like to be cold. Before Christmas he mentioned that he would like a throw blanket to use when he is on the couch that was longer than the one he has now. I went looking, and found  that most throw blankets are five feet long. I did manage to find one that is six feet long, and it went under the tree for Hubby. The blanket is made from that really silky soft slightly fuzzy material that science has come up with.  In other words, a delight to touch.

At some point, the blanket made its way from under the tree to the back of the couch. Dax discovered it there and liked to give it a good kneed once in a while. We were not impressed, since the blanket was brand new. What we did not realize was that we were witnessing the very beginnings of a love story.

One night, we were watching TV and, as usual, Hubby was on one end of the couch and Eldest Daughter was on the other end. Dax jumped up to take over the middle cushion on the couch, as is his usual practice when we are watching TV. The new blanket happened to be on the  middle cushion that night, and Dax gave it a few kneeds and then settled down on it. We thought he looked so cute, cuddled up on the blanket. (But then, we think all three of our cats look cute all the time.)

It was that night that Dax went from falling in love to being in love, or should I say IN LOVE, with that blanket! Now, a few weeks later, and that blanket is his! Night before last removed any doubt that may have been lingering in our minds that Dax and that blanket are buddies.

We were watching TV and Hubby was sleepy. Eldest Daughter was visiting Youngest Daughter and Dax was someplace else in the house, so Hubby had the couch all to himself. He took advantage and decided to lay down and stretch out.  The soft blanket was under him. Dax wandered into the room and was a bit out of sorts. He finally lept up on the couch and tried to get comfortable on the 12 or so square inches of the blanket right in front of Hubby’s face. While Hubby liked the fact that Dax was “cuddling”with him, I knew better and told him so. He was keeping Dax from his blanket.

Hubby tries to delude himself sometimes that the cats are just cats, and he didn’t move. Dax jumped down and tried to find another place to settle, but none suited him. Then Eldest Daughter came home. While we were talking to her about her evening, Dax jumped up and laid down on the back of the couch. Hubby then sat up, the better to engage in conversation. We were telling Eldest about  poor Dax’s blanket conundrum, when she reached over and scratched his back. That caused Dax to look back over his shoulder to see who was doing the scratching. When he did, Dax happened to see that the beloved blanket was once again uncovered. I am telling you, his eyes lit up like neon bulbs and he couldn’t get down from the back of the couch fast enough to plop down on the blanket. It was a sight to see, and we all started laughing, not at Dax, but in our delight at witnessing such unmitigated joy.

Needless to say, the blanket is now Dax’s, not Hubby’s, and no one, and I mean no one, is allowed to keep Dax from getting on his blanket. The joy he gets from that blanket is not to be interfered with!

As I was typing this , I snuck over and got this photo. Guess who is laying on HIS blanket?

Eldest Daughter has had a bad cold, since about last Wednesday. Yes, i tried to avoid it, but when you are living with a person, “avoiding” can only go so far. I was too nice to banish her to her room with a chamber pot and a hole in the door to pass food through.

The last time she had a cold I managed to avoid it. It appears I used up all my luck with that one and I am now coming down with a cold. Or should I say “another cold.” After the epic colds I had in November and December, it will take me a while before any cold I get won’t just be another one in that line of colds.

Sadly, it appears I have entered a new era in how I get colds. This era is the “chest, cough, bronchitis” time of my life, apparently. Even before I was getting any symptoms besides a tickle in my throat, I could feel the problems in my chest. Yee gads, not again! Just in time for Easter! Oh boy!

I need to have a serious discussion with my doctor about why this chest thing has become , well, a thing, and if there is anything I can do about it. Besides banning anyone with germs from my life, which, I have a feeling, I can’t do.

Cough, cough

26 years ago today, at a moment in the early hours of the morning, I realized a new member was about to join our family. Unlike the time two years before when our lives were upended by the arrival of her older sister, this time things were smoother and calmer. Well, after she arrived anyway!

How can it be that a baby is born and you feel like they have always been there? If there is such a thing as reincarnation, it is obvious that Youngest Daughter was always part of our family, through so many lives. She just ….was. She made our family complete in a way we never could have predicted.

She is the one I can exchange glances with in the middle of a crazy vacation (Disney World anyone?) and we don’t have to say a world to each other to know what we are thinking. She is both so much like me and so little like me it makes me ponder and wonder at the way DNA combines to make such a person. 

Happy Birthday to my wonderful Youngest Daughter.  My engineer, my crazy work-aholic (only because she has to be), my social butterfly extraordinaire, the young woman with a thousand friends. May the next year be filled with wonderful adventures!

Call it a March Miracle, or maybe March Madness, but we are finally getting rain around here. We spent most of December and January in shorts and sandals.  I was forced to hear person after person bemoan the lack of winter and rain. I kept saying “We’ll see, ” When Hubby looked at the orange tree and wanted to cut off all the dead stuff caused by wind burn, I said, “Wait until after March. We could still get a hard freeze.”

And, sure enough, March brought rain and freezing temperatures. You know the old saying about March. “In like a lion, out like a lamb.” I am sure that was thought up by someone on the east coast. I am trying to think what So Cal could say about March.

Don’t count March out.

January may have been easy, but March could still be hard.

Pray for rain in March.

Rain may march in in March.

Or, of course, we can just say what we always say, “Who knows what the weather will be, it’s Southern California!”

I have bad news to share about Cloud, the neighborhood cat we began feeding a year ago last month.

That which we feared would happen did. A week ago last Sunday, Cloud was injured. We tried to take him to the vet, but we couldn’t catch him. He then disappeared. We have to assume the worst, as he has not been seen since. While there is no need to share the unpleasant details with you, nor do I wish to memorialize them in writing, I thought you would want to know, as you might notice me never posting about him again.

And now for my soapbox. Feel free to skip if hearing me rant for a moment is not what you want on your agenda for today. People, no animal meant to be domesticated should be allowed to become feral. This experience has been a lesson for my family. I don’t mean I will never feed a feral cat again. However, there are many things worse than a pain free death at an animal shelter, and, while we understood that before, we understand that so much better now.

Whatever you do, please get your pets spayed or neutered, and do your part to help others do that as well.

On February 18th, Hubby couldn’t resist taking yet another couple of photos of Cloud, asleep in our front planter.

Don’t you just love mystery dirt? We have a bit of that in our bathroom. For some reason, a dirty spot keeps appearing on the top of the lid to our master bath toilet. I finally dragged Hubby into the bathroom today to discuss the matter.   Come to find out, we each thought it was because of the other person. But we discovered it was not.

I thought it was from Hubby stepping out of the shower and putting first one foot then the other up to dry off his feet and lower legs. The resulting moisture would then have collected some dust. Nope. Hubby told me he doesn’t do that.

Hubby thought it was because I got out of the shower and then stood near the toilet and smeared lotion all over my self, and a drip or two ended up on the lid, and then caught some dust. Nope. i told him I never stand there and put on lotion.

So, as you can see, it is a mystery. Right now I am going to blame the cats, although how they could cause a dirty spot on the toilet lid in the EXACT same spot after every cleaning is a mystery in itself.

I cleaned the toilet lid once again today. Hubby and I have vowed to keep an eye on the lid to see if we can determine what is causing the dirty spot. Ah, sweet (or not so sweet, as it involves a toilet) mysteries of life!

We finally got winter weather! Yay! I even pulled out my favorite warm sweater. So soft and comfy and warm. Along with the chill we got a bit of rain, which translated into snow in the local mountains. The skiers are thrilled. I am content to see the snow from afar.

Hubby and I went to a local history symposium yesterday. I have been to several but this was Hubby’s first. It was very enjoyable and we heard some new info  on a variety of subjects. There was a speaker there talking about and showing photos of our local late and greatly missed auto racing track. Hubby is very keen on auto racing so he was very happy with that talk and bought a book by the speaker. It was so exhausting sitting there listening (not) that we came home and collapsed for the rest of the afternoon (that part is true).

Youngest Daughter moved about 40 minutes west of us, in other words closer to Los Angeles, but obviously into a whole new world of consumerism and sophistication that we lack here in my neck of the woods. She is working long hours and studying for an important test. A friend decided to be nice and sent her some cookies from a local bakery. People, they deliver these cookies (including gluten free) still warm from the oven to your door.  Eldest was there when they were delivered and reported that the cookies were big and delicious. Wow. I don’t even know what to say. I either have to bake them myself or go to McDonalds. As for that last choice, hardly the same.

Sadly, I may be forced to boycott my local Subway. I went last week and they had a sign up about “Manager’s Specials.” Corporate Subway is promoting a deal right now on three of their sandwiches, a foot long for just $4.99. The “Manager’s Specials” were each of those three sandwiches, with something additional. The one I did the math on was a spicy Italian sub with bacon added for $6.49.  A spicy Italian was $4.99 and extra bacon costs $1.50. I did the math and figured out the “special” saved you a whole penny.   Not cool, Mr. Subway Manager!

Cookie clipart courtesy Clipart Panda

I don’t take my carmera every time I go to Room 8. The last time was a month ago, but I kept forgetting to post the photos. Here are a few from that visit. I took most of my photos in a room that happens to have quite a few black and white cats. Look closely. Aren’t their intricate color patterns amazing?

Last but not least, it is tough not to just take someone home, when they lay all over your foot!

On Monday I went to get the mail and panicked when I saw the mailbox was empty. My first thought – Our mail had been stolen! But, I then remembered it was President’s Day and so no mail service. Whew! It is amazing how quickly all that can go through your mind and how quickly your heart can start beating fast!

In the “We can’t ever have anything nice” category, I was at our local Target yesterday. I found something that was 70% off, but I didn’t know what the original price was. I sent Eldest Daughter off to use one of the scanners they have, but it said it was out of order and to find an employee. Sigh. We found an employee, but she didn’t have a scanner. Thank goodness one was within eyesight that did have a scanner and he came over to tell me what the price was. The first employee mentioned that all the price scanners in the store had been out for several days. Really? Sigh.

On Saturday night, as we got closer to home from our visit to Downtown Disney, we all decided we wanted a milkshake. It was about 9:15. First we hit the Del Taco near our house. The shake machine was down, we were told. Hum…by then we all had our heart set on a shake, so we headed for our local McDonald’s. They could produce soft serve ice cream, but no shakes there either. i settled for a smoothy and Hubby and Eldest Daughter each got a McFlurry. We were getting the impression that 9 p.m. on Saturday night was “shake machine cleaning time” in our fair city. Weird, as I would think people, lie us, might want a shake on Saturday night, about that time. I think a good time to clean the shake machine would be around 8 a.m. I am thinking they get a lot less requests for shakes at 8 a.m. than at 9 p.m. Just sayin’

I got a hankering for a little Disney in my life so Hubby, Eldest Daughter, and i went off to Downtown Disney on Saturday evening. Downtown Disney is the shopping area outside the parks and is free to enter. Well, free except for the $12 an hour parking. More on that in a minute.

The California freeways were kind to us on the way down, and only a bit of slowing was encountered. That made for a good start to our evening. Unfortunately, Disney has some weird parking nonsense going on nowadays. Every visit is different. On Saturday we followed the (permanent) signs to Downtown Disney parking, only to find out, after it was too late to make a different choice, that they closed off the entrance all the signs are pointing us to. A temporary sign directed us to go passed the posted entrance to the next stop sign to make a u turn and go back to  the street we had come from. If they had posted the temporary sign on THAT street, we could have just gone straight, and missed the turn, u-turn, and turn again. Grrrr….

Anyway, we eventually parked and walked over towards Downtown Disney. On the way, we passed the Disneyland Hotel. I realized I had never ever been inside the original hotel at Disneyland, so we wandered around there for a bit before going over to Downtown.

If you spend $20 or more on a meal or purchase, you can gt a minimum of three hours of free parking. So we ate at the Earl of Sandwich (guess what we had? LOL!) and got our three hours of free parking. That was just enough for us. Downtown Disney isn’t that big, and I have feet that tire quickly. Besides, it was really crowded, and it was reminding  Hubby and I of some of the less pleasant moments of our Disney World vacation. Strollers and more strollers, crying kids, and a whole lot of tourists stopped and staring.

In spite of it all, we did enjoy ourselves. But three hours was plenty, and then we were happy to head home, our Disney needs met once again.