Category Archives: People I love

Apr26

A Small Favour to Ask

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Hello, kind friends. I would like to ask a favour of you – just of some of you – just the ones who have been hanging around reading my blog for a year or more.

You stalwart readers know all about my best friend, Socks. I blogged about her pregnancy for … well, about nine months, give or take. It was a helluva ride for all, especially at the end!

Now and again I would mention her husband Bear. Usually to poke fun at him for saying something silly and/or revealing about his fears at becoming a dad.

He survived all that.

But now – he’s about to become something worse: FORTY.

Yes, I know – quite a lot of you (and me) smile at recollections of our 40th. But you know he’s a sensitive guy, and far from his family and friends right now, dealing with being a first-time home owner, business owner, new dad, and now the insult of being “old.”

I’d like to ask you to post a happy birthday wish in the comments, which I will send to Socks. She’s making a compilation of Happy to ease her Big Bear’s difficult transition.

Will you help?

Feb21

Birthday Begging, on iDJ’s behalf

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Hi there all you lovely people!

I rarely do this. But tomorrow is my dearest’s 40th, and tonight is his last Internet radio show as a 30-something! Please come and listen? High listener rates will thrill him to bits, and who wouldn’t want to be thrilled to bits?

If you’re on Facebook you can follow his show “Soul Shenanigans“. That’s good fun as he makes a new poster every week! Look at this week’s:

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That’s him, cute and blonde even then.

Otherwise, visit here: Radio23.org or errorfm.com.

He’ll be on Channel A, in just about an hour. He’s interactive, too, so you can send him a happy birthday message or tell him he’s an old, out-of-touch fart and to get off your digital airwaves, if you like.

I’m hoping for the former!

EDIT: show is over but available via podcast!

Jan23

On being a bad housekeeper, definitely

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Hubby’s closing in fast on one of those birthdays that ends in a zero. He’s got over a month to go, but he’s already been shopping for his desired big present. Actually, we already bought it on Sunday. I don’t even want to know how much research he put into this, but he is a very very good technology shopper and looks at reviews, energy consumption, warrantee, and pricing (in at least three countries). This is why he gets to buy his own prezzie. I’m just the one who says if it looks pretty or not. Yes, I’m nothing but a pair of educated and opinionated eyeballs – especially when we’re talking about a new TV.

I wasn’t going to say what we bought – I sure didn’t announce it in Facebook – because it’s kinda dumb to announce to the world you got some new stuff ripe for the stealin’. But I don’t think any of you are so hard up as to drive or fly over here, try to find my house, and then brave the dog just to take a telly you could probably get cheaper where you live. And trust me, with the amount of time it would take to unhook the umpteen things connected to the TV, the dog would have made good progress on removing bits of valuable anatomy. It wasn’t expensive (we are cheap and broke), it’s not huge, or even the newest model or anything, so it’s not worth it. Really. Disclaimer/discouragement ends.

I had one stipulation: that as we removed the old TV, we cleaned the hell out of the components and the corner the whole shebang sits in. This had not been done in the almost eight years we’ve lived here. It was well, well past time. I’m hairy, iDJ is hairy, and over the 8 years the animals have gone like this: 1 cat, 1 big dog; then 2 cats, 1 big dog; then just the 2 cats. Currently, 2 cats, one big dog. And both big dogs would blow their entire thick hairy coats twice a year, yay! So. Bound to be a fur-fest back there, despite my semi-monthly attempts to stick the vacuum hose behind there. Very half-hearted semi-monthly attempts. Probably bi-monthly. Maybe bi-annually. It wasn’t high on my list of stuff to do, in any case. And moving all the gear out of the way was never, ever going to be a job I did alone.

I was quite pleased when he agreed. It had to be hard to wait to play with his new toy until after everything was vacuumed, wiped off and tidied up. It did take over an hour, if not two. Here’s some of the evidence:

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Hahah, Christmas tree needles! No telling what vintage these are.

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I didn’t even know we had an extra Wii-mote battery thingie…

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What’s with all the spiderwebs? And I have no idea what this remote went to, I’d never seen it before. It says DVD on it, but we only had one and that was mine from the US. It’s a mystery-clicker!

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The worst one. This was what was underneath the Sky box, which was underneath my DVD player, which was underneath some stuff I didn’t know how to use. Note the nasty SCART cables: this could not have been good for the electronics. Yuck, yuck, yuck.

There wasn’t as much fur as I expected, and only one sticky spot on the floor under the stand itself (we believe this may have been beer at one point, spilt at an impromptu get-together). One thing I am proud of – yes I can still have some pride after sharing this disgusting mess – is that me and the Dyson kept hubby from having an allergy attack during all this. Usually dust gets him sneezing like a donkey.

Perhaps new television sets are a placebo cure for allergies?

Jan18

I am definitely 18mos +

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Amongst his other lovely habits, Spot likes to drink water out of cups. We humans also like to drink out of cups, and we both have a glass by the bedside for quenching our middle-of-the-night thirsties. These used to be just a regular kinda glass, until I discovered at 3am that my glass not only contained water, but a skin of cat fur and a chunk of cat litter marinating at the bottom. After I was done gagging, I changed our water containers to ones with lids.

These were plastic Rubbermaid containers that I had brought over from the States, and they just couldn’t keep up with years of nightly use. They have died, one by one, over the last eight years. The most recent and final death was my cup, dammit.

And we had nothing to replace it. I couldn’t find anything suitable for sale around here, either. You see, essential to my 3am thirsties is being able to open the container without waking up fully. Screw tops are too hard for me. If I think that have to wake up that much, I’ll choose to go back to sleep. No matter how parched I am.

For a while I had a regular glass with a post-it sitting on top as a Spot-blocker. But I got lazy about putting the paper back on, and Spot found it, and I ended up drinking cat hair again. Nothing extra, thankfully.

iDJ knew well of my tribulations. He also does all the grocery-shopping. Without making an announcement, he had been looking for a replacement water-glass for me! That alone is pretty impressive (the no-announcement bit).

He brought me home this.

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It’s a sippy-cup. For babies.

Um.

Thanks?

Actually, as he explained to my bemused face as I unpacked the shopping bag, he spent a lot of mental effort on picking out my sippy-cup. He wanted to get me the one with cats on it, but the cat one was meant for babies below 18 months. He had to at least get my age range right, even if it meant no kitties. This one is robots, which he knows are also acceptable to me. Better, it’s no-spill, so I won’t have a recurrence of the time I spilled water all over myself, my pillow, my side of the bed, and – of course – Spottie. I can drink from this thing while flat on my back! Even better than that, it’s insulated so my water might still be cold by the unreasonable time I want some. That’s a massive plus in my book, I hate water. I hate warm water even more.

I don’t think I have ever owned a sippy-cup. Pretty sure these didn’t exist in any form back in the early 70′s. Prove me wrong if I’m wrong, I’m kinda interested to know for sure.

I haven’t quite figured out the mechanics of the thing; it seems you have to bite it to get the water flowing, and there’s a vacuum problem that prevents a really good draught. But if an 18-month-old can figure it out, I might have a chance.

Jan16

Professor Spot

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I can’t do the dishes unless iDJ is home, too. This is because when I would get home first I would immediately try to do some cleaning up. The sound of rattling silverware became a cue that ‘daddy’ would be home soon, and Spot would start in with the caterwauling. So I wait, now, to save me from murdering his little furry ass.

He finds other things to get over-excited about, however. The church is close enough to us that the 6pm Angelus bells are very audible. ‘Daddy’ also gets out of work at 6. Both Spot and Neko get a bit crazy and a lot annoying when the bells start to chime; they know when the bells are about to play, too, and get wound up in anticipation. I hate hate hate this behaviour.

But I’m helpless. No matter what I say and how many times I repeat it, I have never been able to convince hubby that this excitement is bad. Bad for me, bad for him, and bad for the furry kids. I’m totally ignored: every day when he comes home he greets Spot and Neko at the door and gives them tons of attention, and then feeds the cats their special wet food after giving them massive love and affection – as they SCREAM THEIR HEADS OFF for both. And the dog bounces around the house, and drools, and whines, and brings innumerable toys to him, and then also gets a food treat.

Makes me want to vomit.

Nevertheless, I think at least some of my long experience and expertise with animals (that has now become constant bitching) has rubbed off on himself. He noticed tonight that Spot is trying to train him to do a new trick.

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This is Spot, sitting in the sink after I’ve finally managed to do the damn dishes. Or as many as I can because the damn dish drainer fills up before I’m done – hence all the crap still sitting around my sink. Anyhoo, Spot did this for the first time ever last night. I was not in the room. I got to hear about it in detail, however, as iDJ narrates everything. Everything.

“Hey, Spottie, whatcha doing? Whatcha doing in the sink? Hey, hon, guess where Spotty is? He’s sitting in the sink! Awww, how cute is that? Hey Spottie! What do you want, buddy? You want me to turn the water on for ya? Do you want a drink? Here you go, Spottie-Pants! Now, I need to put my headphones back on, so I won’t hear you when you’re done… Hon, he’s drinking from the tap! Awwww, how cute is that? I love it when he drinks from the tap!” (giggling sounds more suited to a 4-year-old)

Tonight, Spot got in the sink again. And right away hubby realised he was being trained! And told me so in great detail. Of course.

As he turned the tap on.

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Who, me? Bwah ha ha ha haaaa!

Dec18

Let’s talk about…Pee!

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I am SO going to bring the overall mood of my blog back down into the childish, scatological range. It must be done. Come along, if you dare!

I’m sure most if not all of my extremely intelligent readers know of the phenomenon known as ‘asparagus pee.’ I like to call it “asparapee”. This amazingly unique scent isn’t produced by everyone, however. I have understood for years that there’s a genetically inherited enzyme that lets you excrete this special odor after eating asparagus (I call it ‘special.’ I really don’t find it offensive, just pretty damn identifiable).

But…that’s not true. We all have asparagus pee! It turns out that only some of us can actually smell it. I have a super-sniffer so I am not surprised to know I am one of the supposed tiny fraction of 22% who can tease this odour out of the air. My challenge to those of you who know that you have the smell in your own pee, and have a partner who swears that they don’t: smell their pee. It won’t take much effort! It might take some bravery on the part of those (Socks, I’m looking at you) who keep their bathroom habits very private. You don’t have to look or observe, just sniff!

I don’t have the option of keeping private potty-time habits. Not in my own house with one tiny bathroom for two people. My guts are “not right” so when I gotta go, I gotta go and right now. I can’t afford to wait until he’s done with his shower. Or his shave. Or sometimes, horribly, his tooth-brushing. Disgusting but unavoidable. So! Being already accustomed to way too much personal intimacy, we agreed years ago to a green way of toileting; one used on ships, and probably a lot of other places where water is a premium: If it’s brown, flush it down – if it’s yellow, let it mellow. Hence my theory that hubby (who has no sense of smell whatsoever compared to me) only learned to recognise the scent of asparapee after he was informed in advance, by me, loudly and gleefully, that I had asparapee and he had a potty visit shortly afterward. It only takes about 15 minutes to come out: how cool is that? A science experiment right in my own bladder!

Moving on from asparagus. I have noticed for a while that my pee occasionally smells exactly like coffee. Not pee at all. Fresh-brewed coffee. I don’t drink that much coffee either. Just in the morning, maybe the equivalent of a cup and a half, and I use sugar and cream. But it is pretty damn strong coffee. It doesn’t happen every day – but when it does? whoooo, stanky! I’ve remarked on this to hubby but he seems unimpressed, uninterested, or unbelieving.

Last week, iDJ asked me if you can pee garlic. This was after he told me that a co-worker could smell garlic on him, the morning after the night we had split a bulb of roast garlic that was cooked with our Sunday chicken (if you haven’t had roast garlic, do it, do it now). My response, “Well, not in my experience so far, but I suppose it is possible?” I was rather unimpressed, uninterested and unbelieving. Until tonight when I opened the bathroom door to a mellow yellow and the reek of garlic about knocked me down. Wow. Took two flushes to clear the room (it’s very, very small). So how come he can pee garlic and I can pee coffee and neither of us does the other? I’d love to sign us both up for experimentation. I wouldn’t mind peeing in a cup for the answer to this question!

Dec15

Why iDJ shouldn’t be allowed to shop alone

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I let the hubby go shopping alone today. He face-timed me at least a dozen times to ask my opinion of possible presents for family. But he didn’t ask me about a present he brought home for me.

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Aww, it’s a Santy lighter. No big deal, right?

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…until you get some size perspective.

I might have trouble fitting that in my jeans pocket.

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I couldn’t light it with just my thumb! It takes two hands!