Once again

I realize just how blessed I am. I was blessed with a beautiful friend for 17 years, and she will live forever in my heart. Someone told me yesterday that his theory is that sometimes when we lose someone we love it is to make room for a new love in our life. I suppose that's one possibility, and I suppose time will tell. I'm not looking for love, necessarily, nor am I looking for another pet. I have some wonderful friends in my world, some old, some not so old, and I won't even go into the whole silver/gold thing... I think most of mine are platinum or something. There's one in particular, we've been acquainted for, oh, about 5 months or so now, but I don't think really became friends until probably sometime in July. I think that this friendship has been the greatest gift of my year so far. I don't know how it will grow and change, but I do know that there's a connection there that is indisputable. A bit of joy is added to my world any time we talk, and I look forward to waking up knowing that we'll be able to have a conversation, whether it is about the hurricane, faire, or just hanging out. It's turning out to be a wonderful friendship, and I'm thankful every day for it, as well as many other friendships. The next 3 weekends I get to spend at faire, some days with the same people, other days without them. Either way, it should be a fabulous few weekends anyway! sleepytime!

Saying Goodbye

Saying goodbye always sucks. Somehow it seems that I do a bit of it in September. I think next year I'm skipping September. Today I had to take my 17 year old cat to the vet for the last time. Rhonda was feral when I adopted her. A few months later she adopted me as well. She was always moody, had enough attitude for a couple of dozen cats, and while she tolerated several people, especially in later years, but she never liked anyone except me, no matter how much they tried to be nice to her. I've had her for most of my adult life, and I hardly remember life without her sassiness, and her copious fluffs of white fur flying about, clinging to everything I own and piling up in corners, no matter how hard I tried to keep it under control. My beautiful princess, we had 17 years, and yet it seems only days. You came to me a tiny ball of fluff, full of sass and fire, odd-eyed. No matter how I tried to tame you, that wild streak was too stubborn to be tamed. You were as close to human as any animal could be. You listened to the answering machine and told me when your grandma called. You snuggled under the comforter in the winter. You kissed me when I needed a bit of comfort. You were never much of a lap cat, too wild, I guess, but you sure were going to be in bed with me at every opportunity. You weren't much for company, other than to accept compliments about your beauty, as long as they stayed out of arms reach, unless, of course, you'd had a drunk sock, in which case you pretty much didn't if they tried to pet you or not. You did your best to keep the other cats in the house, even the senior ones, in line. The memories go on and on. You were my first cat as an adult. You were my first baby. You brought me happiness, love, and perhaps a bit of frustration from time to time. I did my best to give you a good and happy life, plenty of catnip, and a warm bed, I hope it was as wonderful for you as it was for me. In the end, I waited longer than I should have, perhaps out of selfishness, to send you on, but knowing that you were in pain and rapidly becoming unable to get around on your own, and talking with you last night, I think this was the right time. Enjoy your days across the rainbow bridge, and know that you are forever in my heart. Love, Mama

Adventures in the Northeast

It’s taken a week, but I’ve finally managed to set aside a bit of time to tell ya about my trip to PARF over Labor Day Weekend. I left work early on Thursday to catch my flight to Dulles, then on to Rochester. D/FW drives me crazy, and given my preference, I fly out of Love whenever possible. Unfortunately, this time, not possible. I was like WAAY early, being the Queen of Early, for my flight, so I got all checked in, with my boarding pass, and my carryon bag. Knowing that I wouldn’t hit NY for another 8 hours, I went in search of caffeine, and lucked out, because right by my gate was a McDonalds. For those of you who don’t know it, I’m a PEPPER, and while Mr. Pibb is an acceptable substitute, if necessary, Pepsi has no such option, and Pepsi is the official soft drink supplier for DFW airport. McDonalds, however, sells Dr Pepper, and lucky for me, one of the I don’t know, like 3 or 4 of them on the whole property was near my gate. I finished my infusion of caffeine just about the time they called us to board, and started the spiel about gate checking carry on luggage as we were on a regional jet. I’d thought ahead, and brought my cool Marc Gunn To Love is Human, to Purr Divine bag inside my carryon, JUST IN CASE they made me gate check, because the laptop was NOT going under the plane. I didn’t need to GC at that time, but I had my laptop, a book, and a magazine in the other bag, since I knew the carryon would never fit under the seat. We took off about 10 minutes early, and landed in Dulles about 30 minutes early…. hmm, don’t know if we had a good tailwind or if we were speeding, but at least I didn’t have to run to find my gate in the other terminal. I was in line at the little pizza place to get a bite to eat, and there was this creepy older guy (I would say close to 60, which, granted, isn’t particularly old, but to my 40, older than I’m interested in for sure) checkin’ me out. Now, I fully expect, when I’m wearing full wench gear to be checked out. Or if I’m wearing a low-cut or very fitted top. I had on jeans and a loose t-shirt. At any rate, I got my pizza, and glanced about for an empty table, there are none, so I am going to go sit at the gate instead. Creepy guy starts winkin’ and motioning me to his table. EWWWWWW! They called us about 20 minutes early to board, and told us we’d have to gate check anything bigger than a breadbasket, pretty much. In this case, it was a good thing, because we boarded using stairs, and I would have hated to have to manage the smaller bag, plus tote that wheeled carryon up those stairs! We got to Rochester early as well, by just a few minutes I think, and I think Robin & I contained our squeals pretty well, although we were hugging and bouncing up and down right there in the doorway. By the time we got to her place, had a bottle of wine… some YUMMY pineapple wine, and decided which Loki to introduce to PARF, it was after 3 a.m., and I’d been up, literally, 23 hours! The 6 hour drive to PA was beautiful… it’s been a LOOONG time since I saw real mountains… sure we have a few mountains out in west TX, but they are largely brown and uninteresting. Big trees, beautiful shades of greens, yellows and oranges as some had already started changing. Saturday dawned warm & muggy, pretty much like a late May day in TX. We met up in the parking lot with MaidenFaeSnow & Freebird, and the first place we visited in the shire was the hostel at Emporer’s Needle, where I met Betty, and then we went on to Mayfaire Moon to look at her corsets, and meet more wenches… Ysobelle, Surlz, Jayde, Artemisia (and of course Jack the Flying Monkey was with her), Nicole, Cricket, and I’m sure others I’ve forgotten, and rogues… Bryan, Crimson, Bob, Dave the smoothie guy, crap, my brain has lost the rest… 3 days of wandering about the shire, meeting new people, seeing new acts, finding new and beautiful things for myself and friends! I spent way too much money, but I brought home (or shipped) some fabulous things. Sunday I had a bison burger for lunch… YUMMY, OMG, will definitely be buying some bison the next time I need ground meat! The trip back to NY was truly an adventure… yeah, we got lost in the mountains, sort of. I guess not really LOST, so much as we were on a smaller highway, which ran pretty parallel to the one we needed to be on, so we took the ummm scenic route. It took us about ½ hour out of our way, but we made it, and there was lots of giggling, snorting & wheezing along the way. Yes, I snort when I laugh too hard, and you KNOW I’ve gone over the edge when you hear the Arnold Horshack wheeze! It happened, I swear. The trip home started a bit late, mostly because we giggled and such too late and didn’t get up as early as we could have. We got to the airport at just before 9, and my flight was at just before 10. I was seriously sweating it standing in line to check in. This time around, I paid the $40 to check 2 bags, and just had my laptop & other essentials in my kittybag. Experienced, in Chicago, Chicago style pizza… yummy! normally, I’m a thin & crispy crust kinda girl. I don’t want a bunch of dough under my cheese and pepperoni, but sometimes I do like a bit of dough at the edge instead of the hard crunch of the thin crust. Yep, that’s what I got… my crust wasn’t exactly thin, but it was thinner I think, than "hand tossed" that is offered down here, but the edges were nice and doughy, like a pan pizza down here. My flight was scheduled to leave at 12:30, so about 11:45 I headed for the gate. When I got there at 11:50, they were saying "last call for flight whatevernumberIwason. The doors are being closed in 1 minute" WTF???? I made it, fortunately, but I HATE being the last one on, even when I have a reserved seat! We took off about ½ hour early, and landed at least that early, but by the time I got my luggage… yeah, it was right about on time for my ride to pick me up. I’ll never understand how they got my 2 bags at the same time, yet when they give them back to me, one of them is like in the first 5 items unloaded, but the other is the very LAST! UGH! Hopefully on Thursday I’ll get my boxes that Robin shipped me, full of garb & goodies. Wash the garb, and next week ship it back off (at least some of it) to MFS for the next adventure…

Cast

Ok, in all likelihood, there will be a relatively recurrent cast in my blog, and just for the record I thought I'd provide a little information about who's who:

The People:

• Darla, my soulmate and best friend. We've been through a lot together, and there is nothing that either of us doesn't know about the other. Drives the men in our lives crazy sometimes, but such is life. We met 20 years ago in beauty school. We are identical twins born 10 days apart to different mothers, but that's ok.
• Helen, my roommate, and one of my oldest friends. We met in Mrs. Ward's senior English class, a year or so ago *g*. She's just moved back to TX, and is rooming with me until she can get back on her feet.
• Nathan, Darla's older son. Also known as The Boy. He is deaf, and 5 years ago received a cochlear implant, which is, in our opinion, the most amazing thing that could have happened to him. He knows that his impairment does NOT have to stand in his way of doing whatever he chooses with his life. The past 2 summers he's worked as a lifeguard at the pool down the street from their house.
• Nicholas, Darla's baby. Also known as Noodlebutt and The Baby. He's almost 2, into everything, and recently reprogrammed the answering machine all by himself. Yeah, we learned about that when Autie Rae called 42 times and kept thinking someone had given the baby the phone to answer. We believe him to be my mom's cat come back to us, as Nick has many of the same habits as the cat did.
• Erin, fellow wench, born 1 day shy of 10 years before me, she is our identical triplet, except she was born before us. She's got awesome kitties, and bred designer cats for awhile until she started working for the Humane Society.
• Countess Mary, fellow wench, Madame for Local 13 of the IWG. Also known as Countess or Doc. She's a college level English teacher.
• Laura, fellow rennie, my assistant and friend. She & Mike live about 5 minutes from me.
• Mel, co-worker, our brains are frighteningly in tune with each other.
• Craig, another co-worker, love him, think he's kind of a pain in the ass sometimes
• Lea Ann, my big sister. She's 9 years older than I am, has 2 grown boys, Jimmy, who just got married in Cancun, back in June, and Joe, who is hoping to return to Alaska, apparently. Her husband Jim thinks I'm a total wack-job, and I'm ok with this.
• Jon, my big brother. He's about 5 years older, and has 1 grown son, Johnny, an almost grown son Stevie, and a daughter Jamie. There was a time that his wife Sindy & I were VERY close, but we've drifted apart.
• Mom, should be self explanatory. She's been gone for 6 years come September. I still miss her, but she shows up from time to time. Apparently she thinks Joe needs to pull his head out of his butt, because when he's been doing things he might better avoid, she seems to go along behind the car he's riding in, popping streetlamps out as he passes them
• Edie, my late grandmother. She's been gone since '92, but pops up in stories periodically.
• Tony, probably my oldest friend... I've known him since we were about 12. He was the first male with whom my mouth had absolutely no filter... I have no qualms about saying ANYTHING to him. He's married to His Darla, (not to be confused with My Darla, pictured above), and they have 2 precious little boys. He should also not be confused with Erin's Tony, who may or may not be included in the cast.

The critters:

Rhonda, my oldest, and bitchiest cat. I've had her since about '91. She's all white, with one gold and one blue eye. Feral to the bone, despite having a cozy house to live in since she was about 3 months old. Also known as Princess and Gorgeous. Firmly believes we should all worship her

• Bow, my second and brattiest cat. I've had her for 11 years now. Pastel calico, grey, beige & white. the fat cat of the family. Also known as Huzzbucket, Babycakes and The Brat. Firmly believes that anyone who comes through the door is there to hold her and/or scratch her.
• Leo, my baby, is almost 10 years old. He's a beige/yellow tabby. The big sissy of the family. Also known as Handsome and Honeyboy. Firmly believes that anyone who comes to the house is out to get him.
• Sable, my best boy's dog. She is a pit bull mixed mutt. Dumber than a rock. sweeter than you can possibly imagine. I've learned that it's just better for me to go in Nathan's room when I arrive at the house, let her out of her crate, and roll around on the floor with her for a minute, so that we can get on with life.
• Mr. Moro (currently known as Nicholas), Muffin, Mr. Tears, Boots-all are late cats

SLEEP

I'm getting very near the point where I will be totally sleep deprived! Week before last got all thrown outta whack on Monday night, when I stayed up until my new roommate arrived safely from Colorado, at 1 fucking 30 in the morning. Fortunately, I had made arrangements at work so I was able to sleep in and didn't HAVE to be at work until around 1, so I slept until about 8, had a shower, hit a restaurant for lunch and a little flirt, and took my tired ass to work, and then went home and picked up my roomie, and drove over to her workplace so she could see the route before she had to drive it the next day. By the time we had dinner and got back home it was almost 9. Wednesday's my day of torture at the gym, at 5 a.m. (yes, this is MY choice), so once I finished doing whatever I had to do before bed Tuesday night, and crawled in, and settled down to sleep (with 3 cats), it was about 11:30. Yay, I got 5 hours before the alarm went off at 4:15. Came home to pick up a couple of things, picked up the roomie at a meeting point, and off we went for the southwest side, for dinner with our crew. By the time we got back to her car and home, it was 8:30, and I needed clean underwear.... Finally crawled in bed about 11... don'tcha just LOVE 19 hour days??? Thursday was pretty much a blur and I had to take my car in for new brakes and leave it there. Friday I was supposed to go to Grapevine for the show, but by the time I hit Walmart for a handful of things, got home, picked up the roomie and had to go BACK to Walmart, I was pooped. Saturday, after about 4 hours of sleep, I did my first bellydance workshop. 3 hours of tribal with Rachel Brice. She, by the way is awesome! Some of the ways she can move her body are almost disgusting, but she puts on a helluva workshop. I was registered for hers and another on Saturday, plus 2 on Sunday. By the time we were down to about the last 1/2 hour of Rachel's, I was DONE. My arms & shoulders were burning, and my twice broken in the same place foot was screaming 'STOP NOW BITCH'. I went home for a nap, then back up for the show that night. Sunday was the show I was dancing in, and I knew that if I tried to do either workshop, I would not be able to dance in the show, so I just took a leisurely morning and early afternoon, then went up in time to get checked in for the show. Monday night Darla, Nathan & Nick arrived for a few days. More about that in my previous post... Friday we giggled more, as they came back around 11:30 that night, with Nathan STILL sick. I missed Beginning day because I was having a bout of whatever Nathan had. Roomie & I managed to get to the grocery store, Walmart, the hardware store, and church over the weekend, but damn were we wiped out... we both slept for like 2 hours yesterday afternoon. I went to bed about 10, hardly able to keep my eyes open, and with a RAGING migraine, so I took a hydrocodone, and flopped into bed, thinking I would be out in no time (as is fairly normal when I take the hydrocodone). notsomuch this time... I think it was 11:30 before I fell asleep, and THEN I woke up at 12:45, 1 something, 2 something, 3:30, 4:15, and finally at 4:55. So yeah, I'm going on like 5 hours of sleep... not good zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

ok so I'm not so good

Ok, so yeah, I suck at this blogging thing sometimes. The last month has brought a lot of activity. The beginning of August, I hosted a house concert for Marc Gunn’s latest cat CD. Big fun for about a dozen folks. I think the cats had a good time too. Princess Rhonda sprawled where everyone could see her, but wouldn’t try to touch her. Leo hid, as it is his firm belief that everyone was here to get him. Bowbits, little attention whore that she is, just wandered about the room from person to person, collecting all the rubs and scratches she could. The weekend after that, I acquired a roommate when a friend moved back to TX and needs a place to get back on her feet. The last time I lived with anyone other than my mother was 1986. Fortunately there’s enough space in the house for both of us. We are still adjusting, but we’ll get there. Last weekend, I had my first public bellydance performance. Happily, I didn’t have any problems, other than a small last minute change to my costume in order to cover up my backpiece and not be breaking the ‘no visible tattoos’ rule that our studio has. My sister, roommate, cousins, and a couple of friends made it out to watch me, which was cool. This past week was crazy busy. On Monday night, my very best friend, Darla, and her 2 boys came in for a couple of days before going on to see her stepmother. 3 adults, a 17 year old, and a 20 month old make for a full house!!! Tuesday night Darla & I got a wee bit toasted. Note to self, Bunratty’s Meade is AWESOME, but dayum it will kick your ass!!!! We had to go shopping for school clothes on Tuesday and Wednesday, and then Thursday they headed east to the next stop, which was supposed to be a 2 night stay near her stepmother. Turns out that she was lied to about accommodations, and therefore needed to get a motel room, at $75/night. Between not being able to afford more than one night, and the fact that the women she was visiting chain smokes despite her COPD, emphysema, and 24/7 oxygen tank, which made Darla & our big boy sick, it was a 1 night stay and they were back here by Friday night 11:30. This next week will be a busy one as well, since I’ve still got to pack for PARF next weekend!!!! Coming, hopefully in the next few days, a handful of reviews on the CD’s I’ve gotten lately…. Teribus, Killdares, Rathkeltair, Marc Gunn…..

A little better

Ok, so I did better on Saturday with the food/calories burned thing. It helped I'm sure, that I spent a few hours outside at my nephew's reception. I even had a small piece of cake. I didn't meet the protein goal yet, but I got closer. I will get it figured out soon, I hope. I didn't totally blow the fat grams either. Maybe I'll try mixing low cal/fat italian or something with my bleu cheese dressing. The reception was lovely, got to see family that I haven't seen in years, which is always fun. I've gotten nothing accomplished today, other than a bit of kitchen damage control and a couple of loads of laundry. I'm awful tired the last few days... perhaps changing my eating habits has something to do with it... either that or my cycle has gone nuts and I'm anemic? I dunno.