Psychics, burritos.

If you missed it last time: I started a second blog, it's about food, and it's freshly updated! Check it out! This week it's about burritos and coffee.

When we decided to move across town one of my main concerns (obviously) was for the cats and their outdoor habits. In California Boy was notorious for getting himself stuck up trees and even M.I.A for an entire week. When we first got to North Carolina he behaved himself fairly well, only getting stuck up a couple trees and easily located. Our new neighborhood is packed in with houses, trees, dogs and fences. I had visions of Boy following squirrels up the ancient oak trees across the street, jumping head-first into a yard full of loud, viscious, tiny dogs, weaseling his way into everybody's garages. To my surprise, none of these things have happened. He prefers to climb one particular tree, conveniently located just outside the front door from which he can jump to the roof of the house. He's never even been in a fight!

Sunday while we were burrito-ing up a storm Boy came in, snacked a little, and headed back out. Then he didn't come back. We did a lot of walking, a lot of whistling, a lot of calling and came up empty every time. The weird part about this little disappearing act is that we couldn't hear him. Usually he gets himself up a tree, thinks it's cool for a while, then freaks out when he can't immediately figure out how to get down and starts bellowing. By Monday morning he still wasn't home and we still had no clue where he was. We pawed through some neighbor-yards and scouted things out from the roof. Finally we did what any pet owner would do: we called a pet psychic. AKA: an animal communicator.

She asked me his name, what type of cat he was. She asked if we lived in a place with lots of houses but also lots of trees, maybe some woods. She said he was about three years old. She told me he could see a deck post, and some tall grass - a field? unmowed lawn? It looked like there was a basement entrance to something, under the deck. He went there often, it's where he likes to hunt. She didn't see any impact, any dogs, any harm. There might be a sliding glass door.

This description was perfect for a house two doors over from us. George and I walked over, knocked, waited. The fellow took a while answering the door, we thought maybe no one was home, we were going to snoop in the backyard. When he did answer I said, "Uhm...we're missing a cat..." and he interrupted me - "Oh, yeah, he's right here."

Apparently Boy had jumped through an open windown, hung out, and curled up on the bed while he was asleep.

CRAZY!

I called the lady back, I told her she was dead-on, that it was amazing, that I was so grateful, what did I owe her? I'd make her cookies - anything. She said people don't usually call her back and never asked for any money.

Thanksgiving and beyond

Recuperating Lady
Originally uploaded by average lavender

The day started with me scrambling to complete some mix cds before heading to work. It's not that I minded working on a holiday, it's that I felt sort of used, taken advantage of. No holiday pay, no "thanks for working on this holiday that the rest of the company has off," no sandwich. Someone left the big hood vent on all night so the kitchen was about thirty degrees. The dough gave me little trouble.

The celebratory part of our day was spent with Hope, Mal, and her parents at their wonderfully secluded house outside of Asheville. There was amazing brined turkey, incredible dressing (my favorite part of the meal), brussel sprouts, green beans, gravy, rolls, and of course, pumpkin pie with homemade ice cream. Amazing. Delicious.

The exciting part of the day we spent at REACH, the emergency vet. Girl came in with us when we got home and she quickly settled down onto the bed. It wasn't until a couple hours later when I pulled the covers on the bed up that Girl freaked out: hissing, growling, yawling, and gently limping away. When she settled down again we notice one of her back feet clenching and releasing and then that whole side of her body clenching and releasing, along with her head wobbling around. After waiting a little over an hour in the exam room the vet agreed that Girl would need to be anesthetized if they were going to get a good look at her leg. We left Girl with her and headed home for some much needed sleep. At six a.m., after check-up phone call, after nine staples and one e collar later,we headed back to bring her home. All we could squeeze out of the vet tech guy and the copy of the papers he gave us was that she had "punctures" - whether they're from another animal or not, we have no idea.

Immediately after being released from her carrier the e collar (aka: stupid plastic cone around her head) scratched along the floor and scared her to her little kitty core and sent her rocketing around the house flailing her head around. She's quarantined in our bedroom, the e collar has been trimmed back so it doesn't drag on the floor, and she gets her pain killers and antibiotics every twelve hours. Boy is seriously uneasy about her. He looks at her as though she's completely off her rocker.

Girl's incident comes on the heels of another sad cat incident: my mom's cat, Yoda, suddenly died a few days ago. We adopted Yoda after my cat Annika was put down due to leukemia when she was a year old. Yoda was named Yoda because when she was little her ears tended to lie flat and my family is kind of nerdy. Yoda is survived by Mischief, adopted at the same time as Annika and Elizabeth, who happened into our lives a grumpy, stand-offish cat (hence the nickname, Elizabitch), and who has found a home and chilled out, finally.

So on this Thanksgiving I'm thankful for cats, vets, good family, good friends, and the roof over my head. Also, food.

Oh! AND after at least a year of waiting and probably many many years of meaning to do it it's finally happened: my mom has gained Irish citizenship!

Progress

Garden
Originally uploaded by average lavender

It's a little late to be starting a full garden, but somehow I maintained some misplaced confidence that we'd be able to find a few cherry tomato starts around here. We managed to round up four pepper plants (two banana, one green, one yellow), brussel sprouts, broccoli, squash and seeds for kale, carrots, beets, basil, and chives. We also found some thyme and parsley. I mean, it's not my dream garden (no little tomatoes, and no, sniff, cucumbers), but at least we'll have some edible things.

It sounds like George will be headed north in the beginning of August, to see Jesse who's visiting home from China, to see his family, to go to some dude's wedding in Maine, and (hopefully) wrangle up some furniture and plants that'll fit in the car. Meanwhile... I'll be staying in Asheville to play with my consolation prize: the new scooter we haven't got yet! Which will take me to be trained at: my new job I haven't started yet! I've managed to land a part time gig with City Bakery & Cafe making bread; I start Tuesday.

The cats are way happier here than they were in California. They have a yard to play in, so Boy isn't getting chased by dogs and stuck in trees, and Girl is comfortable and not always slinking around afraid. They spend their afternoons sleeping and the late evenings being pissy because they're not outside.

George is washing the car.

Four days

That's how long the collar lasted on Boy. Seriously. Four days. What is this cat doing?! This makes the third one! He's putting himself on the fast track to microchipping. I don't have anything against microchipping pets, it's a fairly good idea, it's just that if someone picks this little fella up with no collar what's to say they're going to take him somewhere that can read the chip?

The Lost Boy and Rambling On

I went to my second acupuncture appointment on Thursday for my carpal tunnel and she decided to use my left arm (the first time she used my left foot.) She stuck a series of five needles in the underside of my forearm and said that I could move my hand, but that it would feel pretty weird. Not only did it feel really weird, but it felt like a deep aching soreness. I closed my eyes and tried to think of other things, make lists of stuff to do, come up with an idea for dinner...and slowly I felt lightheaded and dizzy. I opened my eyes and stared at the wall in front of me, breathing in and out slowly and with extra care. After about a half hour she came back and took out the needles, we both agreed that I'd had my fill and that we'd work with the foot from now on.

Boy still isn't home and it's truly breaking my heart. I feel like mostly all I can do is just keep taking deep breaths; like the needles in arm: "It's okay it's okay it's okay..." As crazy and ridiculous as it sounds, I believe (I like to believe) I have an extra preceptive intuition. Feeling it when someone close is in an accident or is seriously ill, like the day Ollie became suddenly and inexplicably ill and the few days later when Jenna showed up in the middle of the night to tell me he'd died - I just knew it. The last few times Boy's been up a tree there's been this feeling of urgency - I have to go home from work because I know I can find him, I know he's looking for me. This time I can't feel anything, he's my best little bud - sleeps on my legs every night, wakes up with me every morning, enjoys being carried to the food dish when he's too sleepy to that early, comes running for a little cream when we pour the coffee - and I can't find any sure feeling to latch onto. It's like he's just...disappeared.

I can't tell whether to be confident that he'll just come back because he's a cat and can fend for himself, he is and animal, or accept that he's gone and that's that, or frantically scavenge the bushes for him in his possibly injured state. Girl is absolutely no help and has peed on the couch twice. Our current working theory is that he got shut in a garage or someone's house and they went away for the weekend (our theory changes about every hour.) Sometimes we think that one of the little brats that walks by and likes to yell "KITTY!!" and chase after him managed to drag him off or their parent, noticing he had no collar, decided that he was fair game for the taking. (And I mean it when I say brats.)

It does feel like this needs to be resolved quickly and definitely because we've decided to move to North Carolina for real. I'll be flying out June 22 to hopefully find us an apartment and possibly scout around for a job (or two). If everything goes as "planned" we'll be driving out sometime in the beginning of July. We're 80% settled on packing up all our stuff in a pod-thing from Door to Door and having it shipped out to us, it's a little pricey, but frankly not that much pricier than a U-Haul would be much less of a hassle (we think.) We're also trying to convince James to fly out to California and hang out, help us pack, and drive with us. It sounds like he's not so keen on the driving, but I'm trying to persuade him, we're hoping to make it in just a few days maybe stopping in Albuquerque and...oh..say... Garland?

We're excited and sad. I don't really want to leave without Boy or at least knowing ... where he is? what happened?

Any support/advice welcome.

P.S.- The acupuncture is helping the carpal tunnel, my wrist doesn't feel as swollen, most of the shooting pains have subsided and there hasn't been any numbness and only manageable aching. I'm optimistic.

Gone Wandering

Boy has decided to take a vacation - we don't know where he went or when he's coming back or even if he's coming back. We scoped out all the trees he's been stuck in and have found nothing but leaves.

(Based on the neighbor cat's recent yawling-which he never does-I feel like something is ... amiss.)

In the meantime we're trying to be patient and respectful of his need for space and listening intently for meowing (that isn't Rusty.)

Three lives down, six to go...

We just spent the last two hours trying to get Boy down from a tree. He weaseled his way about thirty feet up a tree that has one branch on the way up. He was fine for a while, then started meowing, then started panting, then started circumnavigating the trunk, then started drooling...

Meanwhile, we're all pacing and making phone calls to find someone with a ladder long enough for us to get close to him. (FYI - the fire department will not help you in this situation. Neither will the police. Neither will anybody.) We tried calling a couple tree services, the one man we got a hold of said that he would help, but he'd thrown his back out and had to go to his father's eighty-seventh birthday party. We finally got a hold of Yannick who, in fact, had an extension ladder at home, so George took off to get it.

Meanwhile, our neighbor Johann and I stood under Boy with a blanket, ready for the inevitable fall. (Girl tried to help by jumping up into the tree also - which is amazing because she doesn't even like to jump onto the table, it was completely out of character for her.)

Only...he didn't fall. He shuffled his way down, panting, drooling, sideways. It sounds all calm and anti-climatic now, but let me tell you, when he decided it was a good idea to move from the branch and scoot around the trunk - big pieces of bark falling, him teetering on the skinny little branch he came to...it was a little difficult.

One of our other neighbors thought it was pretty ridiculous to be so worried and the guy who owns the Buddha store next door (who noticed Boy up the tree) couldn't watch.


Pictures to follow after we eat some dinner. Along with more news and photos.

Stay tuned!

Manic panic

If only this had been the case.

No, no. We ended our Thursday and started our Friday with some manic panicking - well, no, that's not accurate, only I panicked. We let Boy and Girl out last night around dinner and by 9, 10, 11...only Girl had come in for the night. By 8:30 this morning Boy was still unaccounted for; the last time this happened Boy was waiting eagerly for breakfast. I came home from work and we scoured the yard - under the house, by the creek, under the cars, in the bushes, in other parking lots - nothing. We were 99% sure that Boy doesn't wander beyond the houses on either side of us and occasionally across the street, so we tried across the street. Out of no where comes mysterious, nervous and loud meowing! With the help of our well honed deductive reasoning skills and ears we tracked him up a tree, where Boy was poised between two branches, eyes as big as golf balls. George climbed the tree, plucked the my-claws-are-still-embedded-in-the-bark cat, brought him inside and we promptly stuffed him full of cat food and half and half and put eye drops in his scratched cornea. He's been sleeping for about five hours.

Continuing our automobile epic: the transmission has yet to be installed due to having the incorrect transmission mount, I think. Luckily, the fellow George bought the transmission from has the correct one and is being nice enough to drop it off tomorrow morning, so by afternoon we should operating on all five speeds. The real auto excitement takes place tonight though - when we look at a 1985 Mercedes 300D! It's true, we're considering a different car. Why? Well, something to do with safety, reliability...etc. Apparently the owner of this particular Mercedes is leaving for 10 months starting tomorrow, so this one may not work out.

Weird: A couple guys in a big, old, piece of shit car just pulled into our driveway and either deposited a lot of glass bottles or took a lot of glass bottles from our recycling.

more rain.

the rain's even bigger today. and windier. jenne called me at 7am to have me rescue the outdoor plants. lucky me, she also stole the car. i put some leather goop on my shoes, so i should be all set unless i step in a knee deep puddle. (quite likely). the cats are totally bored. 55mph winds on the bridges. a panel truck just got blown over on the richmond - san rafael bridge.
time to go to work. wish me luck.

scrappins and mitch

last weekend my boss made a big cake that looked like a wine bottle and had tons of cake scraps leftover, so i took them and made scrappins the polar bear cake.



george thought he looked silly without a mouth, so he gave scrappins one. at first the cake was going to be a tower, then a panda, and finally a polar bear, but he looks most like a dog. regardless it's pretty delicious.

yesterday as i went out to do the laundry this little bird started making noise at me and fluttering around and i figured i'd just spooked him. later when i went out to put the laundry in the dryer boy and girl were harassing him in front of our neighbors house. i picked him up with a towel because it looked like they were more toying with him and less eating his flesh at that point.



after calling george and george calling susan we took mitch (i named him mitch) inside and cleaned up his feathers with rubbing alcohol which really woke him up and he started flappin' around. we put him back in the area where i'd first seen him, up in a box that houses electric meters and gave him a little food. i checked on him later and he was up and walking around making noise...and being stalked by the neighbor cat, rusty. i didn't bother to move him or shoo rusty because unless mitch jumped he would be safe. hours later i went to check on him again...and.. he...was face down in the dirt with flies around his head. i blame rusty.

in less morbid news, at the end of the month i'll be going to north carolina! hope and her husband are buying a house in west asheville and she'll be going down to do the closing and some cleaning and invited me along!. i'm looking forward to some time away from here and the adventure of travel and new places.

morning kill

jenne's baking... i'd don't really know how to work this blog thing. but, girl brought me a gift this morning that i thought everyone should see... her first kill! ugly bugger, eh? the penny's pre-zinc w/ copper coating. but, if you have a new penny...

looks like she hasn't posted in awhile. things are pretty quiet around here. aside from the traffic. they're tearing up all the streets to replace drainage pipes, so the morning traffic backs up for miles. bikes are good.

the rabbit's still resting. i think there's a drain on the battery that i haven't found yet. today however, i'm messing around with the fuel injection. "hillbilly tuning". the site seems to be down right now, but i've been learning from a vw diesel guru. hagar (i think his real name is sven). he's a 75 year old "scanderhoovian" (as he calls himself) from the birthplace of the diesel engine. his english is quite poor, and sometimes he claims he went to hogwarts with harry potter, but he knows more about tuning diesels than anyone else... 70-80mpg is pretty good.


george

birthday weekend

george's birthday was pretty quiet and strangely exhausting. he ended up with the poached pear and almond tart, which turned out not perfect, but better than expected-and it's delicious! he spent the morning working on the dashboard and the display for the rabbit and in the afternoon we went into san francisco to say bye to karl and lindsay and to track down the elusive krylon spray paint for plastics in the color orange (we were hoping it'd be perfect for the dash.) driving through san francisco is always stressful and irritating (always), but more than just driving, parking is a nightmare. being that it was george's birthday and i was already exhausted he did all the driving, which he soon regretted.

karl and lindsay sent us home with various householdy things (like a totally sweet salad spinner), then it was back to marin and off to dinner with the boss & co. at the pub/brewery up the street. which only lasted until about nine but felt like two am.

yesterday was quiet. ish. we drove all over looking for a seatpost for my bike, never found it, had sandwiches in sausalito, and finally picked a color for the dash. the color is a nice light green (more like a celery and less like a mint), we think it'll be perfect.

the bike is coming together well; we've got everything we need save for bar tape and a seatpost. because the frame is old it uses a post with a smaller diameter-26.0mm as opposed to 26.2 mm. we went to six different bike shops yesterday and none had the correct size. we did discover our new favorite bike shop, the village peddler. george ran all of the cables for me and has been working on the brakes because after fighting with them and being defeated three or four times, i just couldn't bring myself to work on them. hopefully today we'll be doing some derailleur alignment.

as for the cats:

more exploding tires!

after trying again and having the tube explode again george and i decided to just set the project aside and wait for some more informed help. i did, however, get the bottom bracket, cranks, and some pedals put on yesterday:



Rivendell's wheel-builder, Rich Lesnick, emailed me yesterday to say my rear wheel was all assembled and ready to be picked up. this morning we headed out, with a box full of pastries, to get the rest of the missing components.

in order to get to walnut creek from here we get to do exciting things like go over the richmond-san rafael bridge and through the caldecott tunnel; at these two places we realized what is wrong with california drivers: they can't merge! that's right, all these instances of traffic being jammed, backed up, out of control and ridiculous are because people can't grasp the concept of merging- preceded, i suppose, by sign reading. by chance, we thought our car was making a terrible burning smell so we got off the interstate to check it out. it turned out to be someone else's car and when we got back on the interstate, just before the tunnel, we managed to miss almost all of ridiculous waiting.

once there we picked up the wheel, a saddle: the women's b.17 because it really does suit the bike better, two burrito wraps, new brake pads, and little nut/bolt combo missing from one of the brakes. they took a look at the wheel and tires and determined that (surprise!) a smaller tire would hold to the rim better and more safely than the ones they'd previously given me.

all that's missing now is bar tape and a seatpost (which we'll have to scrounge around for, apparently this frame requires a fairly skinny one.)

george installed his new, wider handlebars and got some red bar tape for them which turned out to be a pale red so it looks kind of pink. he's pleased, but may shellac them to try and redden them up. it's a good look for his predominantly silver and red bike.

in cat news: it's true and confirmed, the cats have fleas and ringworm. this means lots of baths and anti-fungal cream for them, which by this point they're fairly okay with. they're not clawing our eyes out, but they're really not happy about it. there's been floor and laundry bleaching and scrubbing all around. i mean, it's not like we're living in a filthy hole or anything, we clean and launder regularly, the windows are always open, they get advantaged regularly: what the fuck?

saturday is george's birthday (the big 2-5) and hopefully we'll be going to the beach with liz and mike. i think he's decided that instead of a cake (i had suggested carrot cake with strawberries and whipped cream filling, frosted with either whipped cream or buttercream) he'd like a tart. and quiche. but not at the same time.

cats!

the cats have been sleeping on the couch a lot lately, probably because it's soft and out of the hot searing sunlight. it's been ridiculously warm lately-up into the mid-90s. i see people around wearing long pants and shirts and...jackets. yesterday and today are nice and cool due to the morning fog we're getting; it was actually cloudy this morning.




while sleeping on the couch boy's been sleeping in some funny positions that rival the funny positions ollie used to sleep in. this one is my personal favorite-showing off the snaggly tooth and his enthusiasm for life.




and even when i lay on the couch he's still determined to sleep on the couch.

meh.

clearly someone's a better nose-licker.

we're back in california after a visit home. the travelling back went without incident except for george's weird-pain-in-sternum-might-collapse-lays-down-in-the-airplane-and-feels-
better-in-five-minutes thing. it was good to see the kittens and nice to not be flying or driving, but i can't say that i was glad to be back. the last three days i've been feel crappy physically, mentally, and emotionally. it's like living in someone else's apartment and going to someone else's job. george and i decided to try and think of it as having summer jobs in some great costal place.

rose is in town for a wedding in berkeley and hopefully we'll get to see her along with liz o. and mike. and at the end of the month dyani will be visiting for the sake of visiting and to nail down some housing in davis where she and conor will be moving in...the fall i think and to visit friends in santa barbara.

girl is pretty pissed at us-literally. she's taken to doing her business by the door and on our messanger bags. we reassure her that we're not going to leave her for good and that she's a good cat, but not when she pees on things other than cat litter.

recipes of the week!
- chilled avocado cucmber soup, from Horn of the Moon Cookbook
- coconut milk cupcakes with coconut cream cheese frosting and pineapple, from the blog Vanilla Garlic

chilled avocado cucumber soup

4 c. (2 medium cucmbers), chopped (reserve 1 cup, peel only if skins are waxed)
2 ripe avocados, pitted and peeled
3 large cloves of garlic
1/2 packed cup fresh parsley
2 c. yogurt
1 c. water (or 1 c. ice cubes to chill soup quickly)
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. chopped scallions

- in a medium bowl combine 3 c. chopped cucumbers, avocados, garlic, parsley, yogurt, water or ice, and salt.
- puree mixture in a blender in batches until smooth.
- when everything's blended stir in the reserved cup of chopped cucumber and scallions
- chill 1 hour

my note: i think i would go ice cubes as a cooling method-the water seems to....water the soup down a little more than i would like. or maybe i wouldn't use either of these and would just chill it longer.

also, today i swiped some big, healthy wandering jew clippings from home depot-suckers.

pictophotos

girl's newest mouse trick.



we deicded to put the soda in the freezer to chill it faster as it was warm and we were out of ice, then we forgot about it and it 'sploded.



cat wrastlin' 101