Category Archives: Diary

eyeballs

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It’s spring break.  On Tuesday, between rounds of snow, in what has become an every-two-years family outing, we all went to the optometrist.

The good news is, my vision has changed so little Doc P said I didn’t really need new glasses.  Woot!  I am getting them anyway.  I told him that, with my courseload, and so much work to do on the computer, I live with an almost perpetual eyestrain headache.  The computer screen is too far away for the reading portion of my bi-focals, and too close for the distance portion, so I mostly work with no glasses at all.  I especially do this when I am doing work that requires me to go back and forth between the computer and a text book, near to far, near to far.  The eyestrain headache is nothing compared to the headache I get trying to do that with my specs on.

Doc P said that since my problem is going from near to mid-distance, a pair of computer-specific spectacles wouldn’t help, which I already knew.  I told him I didn’t actually think there was probably a solution, other than tri-focals, which I adamantly do not want, which is why I have just been living with the problem.  He suggested that I consider trying no-lines, which he wears.  And since I had been watching, somewhat jealously, as he went back and forth from a paper chart to the computer screen, I took the suggestion seriously.  Last time, two years ago, I rejecteced no-lines because a.) they cost a hundred dollars more, b.) my mother told me she had a much tougher time adjusting to no-lines than to her lined ones, and c.) I thought the absence of lines was merely cosmetic.  It seems they’re not.

He explained that with no-lines bifocals there’s actually a gradient of vision (not his words exactly).  Somewhere in the gradient should be a range where I can see the computer screen clearly.

Yes, it’s a hundred bucks more and it might not work or I might hate them so bad I can never adjust to them.  But I hate having a headache all the time too, so.  And on the up side, I still have my perfectly good pair (and I still love the frames) that I can fall back on, so the worst thing that can happen is being out a hundred (and twenty, which is my frame co-pay) dollars for glasses I can’t use–but I’ll still be able to see.

So I’m going to try that.  I really didn’t find any frames (in my price range) as well as I like my old pair, but I found a pair in the not-too-hideous zone and only a few dollars more than the allowance.  I like to have wire eyes and plastic earpieces because I like the look of wire but my skin doesn’t play well with metal.  It eats the finish right off at the temples.  This pair has that, but I’m not so sure of the shape.  The glasses-picking helper lady kept suggesting these cat-shaped angular shaped glasses and saying how trendy they were.  I finally said, “I’m not really a trendy person.”  What I wanted to say was, “Do you see me in my sweat pants and man-tee?  Do I look trendy to you?”  But she’s a very nice woman so I curbed myself.

We’ll see how that goes.  The specs are supposed to be ready in two weeks.

Now for the bad news.

Mr Moth has glaucoma.  Mind you, they told us this last time, and he never followed through, but maybe the numbers were worse this time, but Doc P has laid down the law and Mr Moth is there right this second on his follow-up appointment.  He is probably going to have to get eyedrops, and hopefully that is all.

On the up side of the bad news, glaucoma runs in Mr Moth’s family and no one is blind from it.  It’s treatable.  His mother and brother have both had surgery, and only one of them (I forget which) still has to take the drops.  They both had my eye surgeon, and he is among the best there is.  So the bad news isn’t terrible news, only another little stress-ding in our lives.

Now I need to get cracking on some school work.  I haven’t accomplished much this spring break except dog-butt-care and sitting around nursing a backache (and not having eyestrain, which has been wonderful), but all good things must come to an end, probably because all things must come to an end, good or otherwise.

When you think about it, I choose the headache.  No one beat me and forced me to go back to school against my will.  But I still reserve the right to whine a little about the time pressure and the headaches…because it makes it easier to put up with them.

Thanks for listening.

on seasons and glasses

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Today we all have appointments with the eye doctor.  I don’t really need new glasses, but it’s that time.  Tim doesn’t think he needs new ones either, but I say it would be good for him to have a second pair.  He could leave one at work and not have to worry about forgetting them anymore.  Zor, well.  She’s suggestible.  Ever since I made the appointments she’s been complaining she can’t see.

We’ll be “trusting” Kelly to stay home and not destroy her own heinie–I hope that’s not a huge mistake.

Also there’s a huge weather situation pending.  Snow, sleet, your basic happy swell almost-spring fun times in Ohio.  8 to 10 inches worth!  It’s not supposed to get truly nasty until this evening though, so here’s hoping.  We have T-Moth to do the driving, which in nasty weather is always a plus.  And Berta has new-ish tires on the front and decent ones on the back.

Lying black wooly-bear caterpillar notwithstanding, this has not been a very ferocious winter.  And every season–we are blessed to have four of them–is welcome when it arrives.  But as we wear toward the end of each season, I am ready for the change.  At the end of spring, I am ready to stop sneezing and to sit outside in the stuffy dark and listen to the nightbugs.  At the end of summer I am ready for cool air and warm colors.  At the end of fall, I am tired again of sneezing, and I am ready to see the world blanketed in purest white. 

At some point the snow melts or turns gray, and we enter our second “deer season”, not a hunting season, but just a period of time where all of outdoors is the color of deer–which is probably why deer are that color.  And when this time comes around, I begin to crave color like it’s air.

I need yellow and pink and green and blue, and white in the sky instead of on the ground.  Bring on the violets and the robins and the cardinals and the jays.  I need gray to be a design choice and not a relentless sky color.

I need spring.

And maybe glasses, although perhaps I should postpone my appointment until July so I don’t come back with some neon green frames with rhinestones or something.

the epic adventures of kelly’s butt (TMI)

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This week has been all about Kelly’s butt.

In case you missed it, she had two abscessed (not impacted) anal glands.  After having them drained, and over a week of oral and topical antibiotics, they were not better because they were so deep, and the vet offered us two choices.  One, we could have her sedated and have the wounds packed, or two we could have the glands removed.

Angst, angst.

After a lengthy discussion with the vet, and some internet research, (which sources backed each other up, mostly) I learned that this is mostly a problem with little dogs, particularly overweight ones, or ones inclined to have loose stools.  Kelly is one pound over her ideal weight, and she poops rocks.  Seriously.  I never worry when she refuses to go out due to weather, because her poo is a matter of a single tissue to clean up.

However, this gives me nowhere to go with alternative treatments.  She doesn’t have that much weight to lose, and she hardly needs more fiber in her diet.  It’s one kind of surgery or the other.  The wound-packing procedure is one half as expensive as the gland removal, and it’s likely that it would have to be done again.  Often, according to the vet, three times a year until infinity.

On the other hand, removing the glands might leave her with nerve damage and bowel incontinence, either temporary (almost definitely) or permanent (not likely but still possible).

Well, see. I have had an abscess packed.  It is the worst pain I have ever experienced.  Literally blinding, literally screaming.  Agony.  And the surgeon’s tray afterward looked like something from the set of MASH.

I voted for the more expensive (in the short term) procedure that will be OVER with.  She will not have to go through having her asswounds packed over and over and over again…especially since there will doubtless come a time when we don’t have the cash for that.  Mr Moth agreed.

Never has it so infuriated me that I have no one to pray to–someday I will no doubt post on this topic, but today isn’t the day.

So I dropped Kelly off on Thursday.  Zor stayed with Cobie.  I spoke briefly with the head vet, who is also the surgeon.  A lot of people have told me that he is arrogant and overpriced, but I find him confident and…well, it’s kind of like how, when you need a lawyer you want the obnoxious shark who graduated top of his class at Harvard.  Except he doesn’t ever strike me as obnoxious.  As long as he really is as good as he thinks he is.

Pretty much any reasonably competent veterinarian can treat a broken toenail (Kelly’s last year’s medical drama), but for surgery near an important rectal nerve, you want someone very good.

One of the things we touched on was how I can de-sensitize her to going there, once she is better.  She is understandably developing a resistance to her harness, the van, and the vet’s office.

Still, walking out of there without her was so damn hard.  Nothing like leaving Cobie to have his ‘nads removed.  I was practically waltzing that day, because he was so horrible, biting and mauling and chomping me…and I was getting a break.

He sure has changed.

I took Zor to school/work…and Cobie rode along, because he is so jealous when I take Kelly places without him.  He doesn’t understand, of course.  But taking him on a long car ride was a roll of the dice, because in his younger days he always got violently carsick on any ride longer than a trip to the vet or the dog park.  On this day, however, he didn’t get sick.  And he was so excited!

Maybe he didn’t get sick because, since Kelly had to be NPO after midnight, so was he.

When we got home he was completely befuddled.  I suspect he thought he was going with me to go get Kelly.  I tried to play with him.  He fetched his ballistic boomerang exactly once, and then put it carefully and gently on the end table where Kelly stands to look out the big front window.

Not a very good shot, but:

Ever since I took down the vertical blinds and put up curtains to cut the glare on the television, there’s never enough good light in that room for photographs.  Anyway…

Late in the afternoon it was time to go pick up Kelly.  I had to leave Cobie at home by himself to do it, and I was worried, but he lay on the sofa like a big lump and barely raised his head to watch me go out.  Mind you, he was always good about staying home alone before we got Kelly, but that was (holy smokes) three years ago.

The vet’s was packed with people.  This one guy kept trying to do that Caesar Millan “touch” on his dog and he was doing it way too hard.  I wanted to touch him myself…in his eye…with my fist.  I couldn’t believe no employee said anything to him.  Maybe they couldn’t see exactly what he was doing because of the counter.  I bet that’s it.  I couldn’t say anything, because I was afraid I’d end up in jail, and who would take care of Kelly if I followed this jackass home, slashed his tires, and stole his dog?

I’d better not see him again.  I may not be able to contain myself.

So Kelly looked a mess.  Her butt was (is) shaved, and there was still some blood.  She was lunging and thrashing in the loop-style leash trying to get, not to me, but away.  Out of here!!  I couldn’t get her harness on.  I ended up carrying her to the van, along with our plastic baggie of medicine and an elizabethan collar the size of half a tire.

She huddled on the back seat while I drove through rush hour traffic, ridiculously thankful that the day’s snow could never work up enough enthusiasm to actually stick.

Ok, so dog is home.  She is not allowed to lick her butt, or drag it.  She won’t stop licking it.  So we have to put the collar on so we can like, yanno…sleep.  Except it won’t stay on.  Mr Moth drank two beers and is crabby about staying up.  I am crabby about the fact that he can’t stay up because he drank two beers.

Beer is never an excuse for anything.  I hate beer.  Beer enrages me.  And when I say enrage, I’m talking genuine rage.  This is not hyperbole, dammit.  I HATE BEER.  Just so you know.

So he went to bed and I propped my eyelids open with toothpicks so I can go, “Kelly, no.  Kelly, leave it.  Kelly stop it.”  Which apparently I have to do (by myself) non-stop for two weeks, which is how long until the sutures come out.

And how the hell am I going to go back to school?  Will I have to hire someone to watch her?

Finally it occurs to me to zipstrip the damn thing to her regular collar, and to cinch that collar up so tight…because I know I’ve mentioned it before, but Kelly’s neck is bigger than her head.  That’s why she has to wear a harness.  In order for a collar to stay on, it has to be in strangle mode.  Ugh.  But I desperately need to sleep.  And I can’t have her ripping her stitches out.

Photo, taken the next day.  Note the zipstrip sticking out:

It is so huge it protrudes beyond the end of her nose.  She can’t get a drink or eat anything with it on.  She spends two hours trying to get out of it.  She backs off furniture.  She got her claws caught in the snap holes.  She whined nonstop.

She kept trying to lie next to Cobie.  He kept getting up and moving.  I wanted to bawl, I felt so bad for her.

Finally she passed out in the corner of the sectional.  And, finally, so did I.

Next day I spent on the sofa, as seen in the above picture, watching nothing on TV, because every time she caught me not looking directly at her, she dragged her butt.  Mr Moth, when called upon to watch her, insisted she had not been dragging her butt because he had not seen her dragging her butt.

RAGE.

It’s probably hard to see an upstairs dog drag her butt when you’re, yanno…downstairs.

I ran my phone battery dead twice researching alternatives to e-collars.  In between trying to drag her butt, she lay around like life had become too much of a burden.  She couldn’t go down the two steps to the garage to go out, so I took the damn cone off, and BOING!  Old Kelly back in an instant.  Bouncy, bounce, whee whee!  Then of course, I had to put it back on so she’d stop trying to chew her heinie.

Finally, when it was time to collect Zor from work (she had been home and gone again; thankfully Friday was Mr Moth’s day off) I (with many misgivings, since he didn’t believe she needed to be watched because he had not seen her drag her butt, even though I had repeatedly told him I had seen her do it repeatedly, and so had Zor) went to collect her and to stop by PetSmart and buy an inflatable donut collar.


It cost–holy smoke–thirty dollars.  (I also bought some Nature’s Miracle pet stain remover and a hamster bottle, because Algernon’s has been leaking like crazy.)  Anyway, Here’s Kelly, modeling the collar:

Does she like it?  No.  Does she like it better than the cone?  Yes.  She can drink.  She can eat.  She can navigate steps.  It attaches to her regular collar without zip strips.  She has a thirteen inch neck, and the medium goes up to thirteen inches.  Amazing that a 16 pound dog can almost wear a large, huh?  Miss bull neck.

What she can’t do is scratch her face or neck or ears, so when she comes up to me, I make sure to give her a full rubbing over.

Oh, the other thing she can do in this collar?  Chase Oliver.  He’d been going up to her and sticking his face down her cone.  I could almost hear him whispering Nyahh nyahh…  Because Oliver’s a bastard that way.

She can also jump on and off the sofa, get in the window and bark, and find cookies I have pitched into the yard.

Things were looking up.  Then, like the colossal dumbass I am, I gave both dogs their heartworm pill.

Let the diarrhea begin.

Which is how Saturday became the worst day so far.  Poor Kelly, leaking from her butt, not allowed to lick it (but she can almost–almost–reach it, which nearly causes her to do cartwheels with trying), not allowed to drag it.

Me, trying to watch like a hawk and clean up runny doggy doo from the house and her backside.

Lesson:  If you ever have a dog’s anal glands removed, give them their heartworm treatement before, even if that makes it a little early, or after, even if that makes it a little late.  If it’s skeeter season, I’d go with before, but it’s snowing here.  I should have waited.

Thankfully the runny poostorm passed by the next morning.  She still has this issue where little poos just kind of fall out at random times, and they are not as rocklike as before, but they are not tremendously difficult to clean up, either.  I can handle this.  The only issue is keeping her butt clean when I’m not allowed to scrub at it.  Might as well let her drag it as scrub on it, right?

I try soaking it, but you can only soak a terrier’s ass for just so long before she loses patience.  As a result, well…it could be cleaner.  Could be worse, too…

Anyhow, that’s where we are.  Picking up arbitrarily dropped poos and soaking the dog’s butt with wet rags.  Other than that, and the unreachable and thus unscratchable ear-itches, and her frustration at being able to keep herself clean by either licking or dragging, Kelly seems more or less her usual self, personality-wise.

And Cobie?  A saint.  Apart from not really wanting to cuddle up to the plastic cone, he has not bullied or blustered or reacted to her in any way different from how he always has done.  Truth be told, I was a little worried about this; when they remove a dog’s anal glands, they remove his or her identity in the doggy world.  When they buttsniff, that’s what they’re sniffing.  But he’s been perfectly ok with it.  Perhaps a little more affectionate than usual, even.

He hasn’t even tried to lick her.

They’re good dogs.

Mostly.

thankful thursday

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Today I am thankful for my old man, my old van, and my plain old ordinary life.

Today I am thankful for my new laptop, a couple of new pairs of jeans that fit and are comfortable, and my new (-ish) dishwasher that gets everything so much cleaner than the old new-ish dishwasher did.

I am thankful for parents still living.

I am thankful for a stove that works!

I am thankful for the vets at Northside, for medicine to cure Kelly’s butt, and the money to pay for it.

I am thankful for breakfast.  Thank you, chickens, for the delicious eggs.  And thank you, Kroger, for the free peanut butter coupons.

I am thankful for winter, which will make spring all the more welcome.  (Soon would be good.)

thankful thursday

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Today I am thankful that I survived our project presentation yesterday, and that our characters got selected for the final go.  I did my best to sell them, because I really did think ours were more appealing to a larger number of people.

I am thankful for Mr Moth, who went out into the arctic nasty to get me mints, because if I don’t have my bedtime mint I have a hard time falling asleep, and Cobie is disconsolate.

I am thankful for critters, even mean little albino hamsters.

I am thankful for stories.

I am thankful for pizza, which I never used to  like, but now I appreciate it for the myriad ways it can be prepared so that it never gets boring, and all of the picky picky eaters around this place can fix it how they like it.

And I am thankful for this cozy house, and for having extra socks.

a day in the life

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wake up cursing and shut off alarm

stumble to bathroom and pee

put on slippers

take down baby gate, stagger to kitchen, let dogs out

empty dishwasher

microwave coffee water

let one dog in, let cat out

make coffee

let other dog in

take first round of pills

spill coffee on my night shirt  (hence why I don’t get dressed until later)

let cat in

race down the hall trying to bet dogs to the bed

fail

pet dogs on the bed instead of making it

to to office, turn on light, and check to make sure no hamsters are caught in the bars of their cages

feed hamsters while thinking about starting a recycling container for uneaten hamster food but decide (again) there isn’t enough of it to do the wildlife any good.

internet w/ coffee

wake up zor

breakfast, usually a whole wheat english muffin with peanut butter, a banana, a boiled egg, and a glass of vegetable juice

pack my lunch

morning ablutions, dressing, and departure

drive to school

drop off zor at the main campus, drive to the other campus

attend school

pick up zor

drive home from school

homecoming with dogs scene where Cobie always has a nylabone in his mouth and a helicopter tail going on, and at some point he lets me (T-Moth also, when he comes home) take the bone and pretend to gnaw on it, crunch crunch crunch

let dogs out

avoid the sofa because there’s obviously a pygmy with a tranquilizer blow gun in it who shoots me in the ass every time I sit down

let one dog in and cat out

forget and sit on the sofa, and get shot in the ass by the evil sofa pygmy

fight off effects of blow gun dart, sometimes more effectively than others

let other dog in

family members who are not yet home begin to arrive, which inspires a nylabone-with-helicopter-tail scene re-enactment, and they almost immediately disperse to their separate dens and lairs

hate life because I have to get off the sofa and cook in spite of having been shot in the ass with a tranquilizer

let cat in

cobble together some kind of food (loving and admiring Regan the possessed stove in spite of everything)

chase cat off kitchen table a hundred and eleventy million times

family begins to emerge from dens and lairs

eat

clean up and load amazing dishwasher that actually fits things and gets them clean

retreat with husband to sofa for an hour of tv and companionship

let dogs out, in, out, in, out, in, out, in, out

go outside to see why dogs are barking

make dogs come in

award carrots

play indoor fetch with the ballistic boomerang

go to bed

award more treats

award self a sugar-free mint

read

break tiny remaining scrap of mint in half and share with dogs

sleep

everything might not be eventual, but stoves are

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A lot of people have suggested I escalate the matter of the possessed stove I recently purchased.  Here’s why I haven’t.

For one, I wasn’t able to track down any details on Ohio and a lemon law as applies to non-vehicles.  For another, I figured court/etc. would take so much longer than just letting the Sears repair crew try to fix it.

Also, I wanted this stove.

Well actually…I wanted the stove I had in the first place.  I wanted to get it fixed, because of this sad fact:  It was the first oven I’ve ever owned that worked right.  I’m 47 years old and I’ve had two ovens that made heat, and  only one that kept the right temperature.

Sad fact or no, Mr Moth was not so much into spending potentially hundreds of dollars to fix a stove that was here when we moved in.  He tried repeatedly to repair it, but to no avail.  So we bought the used stove.  It worked for what, a week?  Two weeks?  Until I broke off the oven knob and got it stuck in the ON position.  I really thought I would lose my mind, because there was so much else going on, in addition to being buried in school projects all the time, things like the Post Office arbitrarily deciding Zor doesn’t live here and returning all her mail to the senders, and the diabetic supply house deciding not to send me any diabetic supplies for weeks at a time, and some jackass pretending to be me and repeatedly getting my cell phone canceled.

Oh, and don’t forget the dishwasher had to be replaced also.

Anyhow, I decided it would be faster and cheaper to buy another stove.  I didn’t want to, because I hate change.  But I also was sick of dealing with Stove Drama.  (Little did I realize!)  So I went to the outlet store to get a particular stove I saw on their website, but when I got there, I hated it.  The burner racks were super tall, and I imagined pots of boiling liquid sliding off them like burning Chevies falling off a cliff.  Then I saw this stove.  It was love at first sight.  Naturally this stove cost more.  And no, I’m not saying how much more.  I will say the total sticker price was twice what I thought a stove should cost, but.

What price stove love?

I took pictures of Mr Moth loading it in the truck.  He worked as a Sears appliance delivery guy back in his salad days, so we brought the stove home and he installed it.  It worked once, sort of.  We assumed the malfunction was user error related to the electronic timer.  As it turned out, not.  It never even tried to work right again.

Then started the series of calls to Sears.  The first call was epic, as I got shunted from English as a Second Language call center to English as a Mystery Language call center.  Finally, a native speaker!  Oh wait…wrong department.  The moron kept trying to sell me an extended warranty.  I’m like, “I bought a brand new stove that doesn’t WORK.  I am not giving you any more money.  FIX MY STOVE.”

“We’re not in the business of fixing stoves,” this charmer informed me.  “We sell protection.”

I snorted.  “Yeah, YOU AND THE MAFIA.”

“What?”

“Look, just let me talk to someone who can FIX MY BRAND NEW STOVE.”

Eventually they sent out the first asshole stove guy who came right at quitting time, acted like he didn’t want to be bothered, and told us–erroneously–that our house wiring was a death trap and the entire place needed rewired. 

Anyhow…eventually we got that sorted, and then I called the repair people again.  This time I got caught in the EVIL VOICE MENU LOOP FROM HELL.  Because, get this–the Sears Appliance Warranty voice menu does not recognize the word stove.

That’s right.  No stoves.  And here in the Middle, we don’t say RANGE.  Range is something people on The Price is Right say.  Kinda like sofa.

Anyhow, I ended up screaming into the phone, STOVE, STOVE, it’s a mother-fuckin STOVE you FUCKING MORON.

Yeah, not my finest moment.

Here’s the part I won’t be able to make sense of to anyone, and that’s that I still loved this stove.  I still wanted this stove.  In a way it was like Cobie.  He’s not all that good of a dog, but I adopted him, I committed to him, and I’m keeping him even though he’s a pita, because he’s mine and I love him.  Crazy of me, I know, but I didn’t so much buy a stove, as adopted it.

Even Mr Moth and Zor, neither of whom are as prone as I am to forming emotional attachments to non-sentient objects, agreed that the stovetop of this stove is amazing.  Water boils timely!  Things cook evenly!  Fewer things burn!  We never knew there could be a difference from one gas ring to another, but there is, there totally is.

They sent a different stove guy–Larry.  Probably one generation out of a Holler somewhere, judging by his speech, he filled me with utter trust.  Larry was obviously one of my people.  After Larry’s first failed attempt to fix my stove, the warranty guy (the one on the phone, IT’S A STOVE, GODDAMMIT) told me it was up to the repair guy when or if to “compensate.” The thing is, they don’t make this stove anymore, so they couldn’t just hand me a new one, it was either fix this stove or get a different one.  Similar stoves on the Sears site are currently going for about a thousand bucks, an amount substantially more than the too-much I already paid, and I was pretty sure they weren’t going to give me one of those babies.

Larry still thought he could fix it.  I wanted him to fix it.  Mr Moth was agreeable.

On his second trip out, Larry ordered a gas valve.  My faith in him wavered, because internet research had convinced me it had to be the computer that was wrong with it.  And where else would a demon live but in a computer?  Ten days later (long delays due to my impossible schedule and not theirs) Larry came, at six-thirty at night, and put the valve in.  He apologized repeatedly for the delay.  He didn’t act like he was doing me some favor, or like he’d rather be somewhere else (although I’m quite sure he would have).

He put in the valve.  He declared the stove fixed.  He showed me the old valve, which was visibly but subtly off/bent/crooked.  It seemed kind of unlikely that something so minor could cause such trouble, and after all, my burners and the broiler still worked.

I said, “Well, no offense, but I hope I don’t see you again,” although since I still thought the computer was the problem, I was pretty sure I’d be seeing him again.

“Well not here at least,” he said cheerfully, and we said our goodbyes.

We made pizza rolls as an experiment.

They cooked.

We left the oven on for two hours.  Every time the igniter clicked, it was followed by the soft and glorious FWUMP of lighting gas.  Just how it’s supposed to work.

Each time we heard it, Mr Moth and I exchanged hopeful but wary glances across the table.  (And one time the ice maker filled, and Mr Moth’s eyes got all wide and alarmed.  This amused me, so I thought I’d share.)

A lot of people tell me me I write like Erma Bombeck–well, people who haven’t heard me swear say that.  So on the upside of all this, I can now write a Bombeck-with-cursing book.  I think I’ll call it “Tuesdays With Larry.”

Larry the Stove Guy.  Larry the Exorcist.  Take your pick.

I am not prepared to declare this saga over just yet.  Zor and I are about to put Regan the Possessed Stove through her paces by baking some sugar-free pumpkin pies.  If that’s a success, I have a ham and a cobbler on the schedule for tomorrow.

If all is still functional next week, I plan to contact Sears and see if I can negotiate a little something-something for my aggravation.

We shall see.

Meanwhile, Happy Pie Day, everyone.  And may none of your stoves become possessed in the near future!

why this term sucks like an electrolux

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This probably won’t interest anyone but me, but I believe I have had an epiphany as to why this semester has sucked so hard and been so long (apart from the fact that semesters are long, compared to the quarterly term system of last year).

This term sucks because I now spend the  most creative, productive part of every day getting ready for, and driving to school.

How much does that suck? 

It sucks like a chest wound. 

It sucks like a Filter Queen Dream Team.

It sucks aliens through a crack in the hull.

Okay, I’ll try to stop using the word “sucks” now, but let’s face it.  THIS.  SUCKS.

Royally.  Vigorously.  Relentlessly.

It sucks in all the colors of the spectrum.

Ordinarily I would get up in the morning, pee, let dogs out, empty the dishwasher, make coffee, take meds that have to be taken on an empty stomach, let dogs in and cat out, drink coffee while checking facebook, let cat in and dogs out, and in, out, and in…  Up to here, my day has not changed much, but here comes the difference.  After all this–still in my p.j.s, sorry Fly Lady–I would do things.

Once upon a time, “things” =ed “writing.”  As recently as spring quarter, “things” =ed futzing around with Adobe, sketching, brainstorming, surfing for ideas.  If I’ve been wrestling with a problem, the answer will often come to me as I wake up or soon after, and this is when I can get these solutions down or even start implementing them.

Not anymore.  First class starts at eight, so I spend this time making breakfast, getting dressed, brushing my teeth, driving…driving…driving.

And, four hours later, when we finally get to lunch break, I’m so desperate to get the hell away from the computer, forget about playing a game or chatting with friends.  I go sit in the crappy lounge with its unusably low tables and wait for the break to be over.  I could read, or play a game, but my eyes are tired and my head usually hurts.  I eat my packed lunch, stare at nothing, and try not to think too much about how much I wish I was at home, preferably on the deck with dogs.  (I also try not to think about how I can’t go that long without peeing, and neither can Kelly.)

I would like the work better if it started at, say, 10:00.  Like there’s a job out there with those hours.  So I’m muddling along.  My work is not as good as it has been during previous terms.  At least now I know why, although it’s small consolation.

Blargh.

friday five

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One:  I went to the eye surgeon yesterday and got dilated, which I abhor.  He found a “thickening” at the back of my right eye.  It’s not something he can zap, so now I have to take drops.  The instructions on the bottle don’t match the instructions he told me, so now I have to call and find out which are the correct instructions.  Also I need to ask, “A thickening of what?” because I have no idea.

Two:  I get to take Cobie back to the vet today.  T-Moth took him on Tuesday and Cobie had such a conniption he had to be muzzled, and even then they couldn’t get blood for his heartworm test because of all the thrashing, during the course of which he fattened T-Moth’s lip.  The vet thought Cobie tried to bite, but I think it’s unlikely he was he meant business.  He does this warning air-snap when crowded, and I’m betting that’s what they observed.  A guest at a party once pursued him until he hid under a lawn chair, reached in after him, and inflicted unwanted petting upon him.  His eyes rolled and his flanks heaved with stress, but he didn’t bite, or even warn.

It probably helped that she was young and female.

I once had a big goofy dog that never previously offered to bite anyone, yet who bit a pizza driver, so I would never say a given dog would never bite. I’ve been on both sides as the dog owner and the pizza driver, which is the source of my belief that any dog will bite, given the right circumstances.  So the muzzle is probably a good idea just to keep everyone safe, especially since Cobie’s teeth are enormous, rather like the rest of him.  People who feel safe probably give off calmer vibes than ones that are worried about having their face removed.

Anyway, his mommy will take him.  Kelly will go too.  And he has pills to make him happy.  I hope not too happy though, because no one wants to carry a hundred pound dog.

Three:  Someone is coming later to install one new properly grounded outlet so I can plug in the broken-ass stove Sears sold me and they will then deign to come fix the damn thing.  We discovered that only the outlet the stove is plugged into reads as reversed polarity, and then only when the stove is plugged in.  So the lack of grounding is on us, but that reverse polarity is on the stove itself.  The brand new $600 stove.

They better fix or replace that sumbitch, that’s all I’m saying.

Four:  I’m not doing NaNo.  This should not come as news.

Five:  Oliver has emerged from the wall.  He hurt his passenger side rear paw, and when I got out the cat carrier he vanished.  We had to put food near his hidey hole, the wall where he went to ground after we moved here.  It took three adults and a teenager to stuff him into the carrier to bring him here.  People bled.  I knew I would never be able to get him to a vet unless he was at death’s door.

Mind you, I don’t want Oliver dying at all, but especially not deep inside a load-bearing wall.  I put the cat carrier away.  He still wouldn’t come out except occasionally at  night.  It’s like he knew I wouldn’t take him to the vet at night.

Previously I kept Oliver’s feeding station and litter box in the utility room, and kept dogs out of there with a baby gate.  Now Oliver can’t jump the gate.  It has been a huge unending pain keeping dogs out of the cat food and litter box, especially Kelly, who is smaller than Oliver and so can get into any space he can.  She can climb gates too, but chooses not to, I think because Cobie disapproves of gate-climbing.

Aggravatingly, Oliver has resumed jumping onto the kitchen table and my desk, where he clears space for himself by flinging anything in his way onto the floor where dogs can get it, but he still won’t jump the gate.  He will walk on anyone who sits on the sofa though.  Endlessly.  Back and forth and back and forth.  Limpy, but seemingly content.  I missed his vicious butt while he was living in the wall.  I guess I’ll have to go back to clearing off the table though.  And maybe change his name to Chester.

why I must now shop for plates

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My life lately has not been a comedy of disasters involving several dead or dying friends, medical supply houses that refuse to ship medical supplies, the post office refusing to deliver Zor’s mail, an insane number of assignments from my college’s sink-or-swim graphic design program, an inability to receive personal phone messages because (mostly) the GOP fills up my answering machine more than once per day, multiple dead appliances, bad house wiring that would cost roughly the Korean war debt to fix, and personal illnesses.  No, it hasn’t been hellish at all.

Oh wait, yes it has.

So it will come as no surprise that there has been a latest minor disaster.  The only surprise will be the nature of the minor disaster.

Last night I was stuffing a second day’s worth of dirty dishes in the (new and miraculously still working) dishwasher.  Both dogs were crowding around, drawn by the “dirty clink”, hoping to lick plates.  With my head full of a tidal wave of mucous that changed directions every time I bent or straightened, I was not consistent with shooing them away.  Then, well…  As they say, it happened so fast.

I think what happened was, Cobie got his collar caught in the bottom dishwasher rack.  He panicked and dragged the rack, full of all my worldly china, out of the dishwasher, where it hung up briefly between the dishwasher door and the (not working GODDAMMIT)  oven.  He plunged and leapt like a cayuse, yanked the rack free in a hailstorm of silverware and plate, saucer, and bowl shrapnel, and dragged the rack into the kitchen, scattering broken shards as he fled.  There the rack came unattached, allowing Cobie to take cover in the living room.

Kelly hid under the dishwasher door.  As soon as the noise stopped, she came out and started inspecting the wreckage for tidbits.

Both dogs were barefoot, obviously, and so was I.  I was trapped by my bare diabetic feet amid all this unbroken glass, and I was too close to the sink to bend over and scoop up Kelly.  I scanned the ground for blood, and didn’t see any.  Right about then T-Moth (husband) and Zor (youngest spawn) showed up to see what the racket was.  “Could you get her before she cuts herself?  Could someone bring me some shoes?”

Eventually we got it all cleaned up, and as far as I was able to determine, nobody was cut–thank goodness.  However I am down two plates, a saucer, and a bowl.  Perhaps I can replace them, as I bought these open stock at Odd Lots a couple of years ago, and it’s Christmas (blargh) so maybe they will be carrying red dishes again.  Although the way my luck is going…

Dishes were not in the budget at all, nor time for a shopping trip.  But I could also look at Goodwill, where they might have some plain white plates that, while they wouldn’t match, at least would not clash.

Of course I sold my old dishes at the yard sale.  I suspect this is how hoarders get started.