Post 350: phone-y callers and others

I probably frustrate family and friends who try to call me. I know I do! I hate telephones, got rid of my landline phone years ago, barely tolerate having a cell phone, and rarely answer the phone except under duress!

I HATE PHONES!

phoney

Part of my dislike of phones comes from the such things as endless solicitations to get me to “upgrade” my credit card to get a more favorable APR. I PAY UP BEFORE CHARGES KICK IN! Yes, I am one of those people who pays off his credit cards at the earliest opportunity, so the credit card company can charge 5000% interest and I wouldn’t know. Or care. Seriously. I wouldn’t be affected!

Part of my dislike of phones comes from the fact that I can’t get to the phone till after it goes to voice mail. No, I do not have my phone surgically attached to me. I try to leave it one place because if I don’t, I may hear it “ring” but fail to find it.

I rarely carry it, I often don’t know exactly where it is when it “rings”, and many times, it totally discharges and goes days collecting messages remotely till someone sends me an e-mail or letter (!) asking why I don’t answer my phone! Don’t miss it, charge it when I (rarely) need it and can’t call till I get a small charge on it.

If I don’t recognize a number, I won’t return the call most times. If it’s the same area code as mine, same prefixes, I might recall. Might.

Part of my dislike of phones comes from the way calls come in randomly and (usually) just as I sit down to eat, take a shower, or have a bowel movement and am cleaning myself off…. (Sorry, but it happens!) Sometimes it comes while I’m in the middle of preparing a meal.

Ice cream for breakfast might help!

I eat at odd times because I can, so I don’t fault people for calling me during my meal times. I don’t like it, though, because there is no nice way to tell people you’d rather not eat while holding a phone.

I have caller ID on my phone. If I have a number that pops up with a name, I will answer that every time. No name, I rarely call back because most times the number is a telemarketeer (sic). I’ve no patience with them!

If I could get away without having a phone, I would. I might make two or three calls a whole month, and pay a little over $50 to Viaero for the service.

When I travel, it is nice to have a cell phone, and having a cell phone has been helpful several times since 2008 when I changed to cell phone over landline. But I still hate it.

For those who live with their phones and try to call me, don’t count on getting me the first time. People who know me best leave messages on facebook or by e-mail telling me they tried to call me. They are the people who get the return calls!

Post 349: Against the odds, I celebrate my 66th birthday anniversary today!

I’m not a birthday person. It’s just another day for the most part. Of course, about this time in 2003, I had a guest show up for my birthday: Wegener’s granulomatosis (now called GPA). I thought I had a cold, but by December, the disease was full blown, and I was barely alive, riding to the hospital in an ambulance. After that experience, every day is special: I survived death!

This is what confronts me all day today: Google’s birthday greeting!

It snowed overnight. I think the worst birthday weather was the year my childhood pet, Peanuts the dog, managed to yank out the ground anchor to which his chain was attached. In a blizzard on my birthday, my dog went missing! And he was dragging a 15-20 foot chain behind him!

Happily, he was found by the animal control officer the next day, cold but OK, in the high school practice field only a few blocks from home. He still had his collar and tags on, and he was dragging the chain behind him.

As usual, when the animal control officer opened his truck door, Peanuts hopped right it. Peanuts had a history with the animal control officer. He knew the animal control officer as a buddy who took him for a ride in his truck, then dropped him off at home!

My Dad was Chief of Police then, but I think the rule of thumb was you didn’t have to pay a fine if you called the police to report a missing pet before the missing pet got picked up as a stray. Peanuts was a bit of an embarrassment to my Dad because of this “relationship” between the animal control officer and the Chief’s dog…! 😉

Yeah, snow on the ground. That’s a birthday tradition of mine, too…and a good excuse to stay inside and enjoy doing nothing!

My intention is to have a quiet day at home. Though I managed to get through all the things I needed to complete yesterday, the day ended with a great four-hour telephone call with a favorite cousin! We’d still be talking but my cell phone battery ran out of juice. Best of all, we made plans to get together to go out for supper one of these days when she comes to town!

Andy (above) and Dougy lurked in my bedroom last night, and decided 1:30 AM was a good time to wake me up on my birthday! (Notice Andy’s horn is showing. I guarantee there was another one on the other side, too!)

Now that I’m wide awake, as of 1:30 AM because of the cats, where are the cats and what are they doing? Well, they are both curled up, warm and comfy, asleep! Did you expect anything different? 🙂

Post 348: busy day

Yesterday was a nap day for me. After feeding the cats, medicating Andy, playing feather with the cats, and sitting down to watch the news, I conked out in my chair.

Falling asleep in front of a television is no big deal for me. I’ve seen parts of thousands of programs over the years! But to fall asleep in my chair before five o’clock in the morning…! I went back to bed, where I slept till 10:30 or so. Those dang cats just have to stop waking me up so early!

Andy in his hidey hole

Yesterday was my military museum day. I actually had a couple of visitors, which is nice. They were from a nearby town, had stopped by other times but it was closed. We need more volunteers to open it more than a few times a week. Right now, it’s open Tuesdays and Thursdays, from 1 PM to 4.

When I got home, I had mail and telephone messages that reminded me even retired people have responsibilities and moments of stress. Today I “get” to work through those messages and stresses. Ugh.

Oh yeah. Andy hasn’t let me give him his medication yet either, and we’ve been up for two hours.

=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=

Oh yeah! Andy got his medication shortly after I wrote this…no struggle or flight. He was a very good boy!

=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=##=(^+^)=

I’m getting enough back on my state and federal taxes to just about cover the cost of having professional tax preparation. That’s taken care of.

Then I did grocery shopping. I treated myself to some Mounds candy bars, tiny size, and just ate the equivalent of one regular Mounds.

I also like Almond Joy, which (for those who are unfamiliar with this candy) is cocoanut with a whole almond on top, and the whole thing is coated in milk chocolate).

If I had my way, the Mounds bar would have the almond. (It is cocoanut coated in dark chocolate, again, for those unfamiliar with the candy.)

I also bought some C-cell batteries for the boys’ Cat’s Meow toy. They, of course, are ignoring the toy now that it works again. Cats!

Post 347: Andy was very playful this morning!

I pulled out a new peacock feather to play with Dougy. When I sat down on the glider, Andy hopped up on his favorite front room perch, the light stand. His interest piqued by what I had in my hand, he soon began playing the old game of “Feather” like he did as a kitten.

“I have to make a video of this,” I thought. It’s one thing to tell people Andy’s feeling a lot better. It’s another to show him playing, proof of it!

Andy sees the peacock feather…

Andy definitely was wound this morning, as this video shows:

There you go. Andy was very playful this morning!

Post 346: Snow! Oh no!

I agreed to drive a veteran to Scottsbluff one sunny, warm day last week, a day very unlike today!

snow 3 18 2014

What did I expect? This is the forecast.

In a cliché moment in the front doorway, Dougy sees it’s snowing, again! Oh no!

dougy in snowy doorway 3 18 2014

Maybe this afternoon it’ll be better…!

Yow! I guess not.

!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!+!

Only later happy note, the guy I was to take to his appointment called the VA clinic and cancelled his appointment because of the weather!

I was not unhappy about that!

Post 345: Andy’s veterinarian appointment.

After a bad start (Andy didn’t want to be captured to be transported to the veterinarian’s), the appointment went well. Andy’s making good progress on blood pressure and his heart, though he needs to continue the medication till his next appointment in May, perhaps longer.

He’s acting like he feels better, and the examination supports that observation! Thank you all for your thoughts and consideration while we work through Andy’s medical issues!

Post 345: Andy’s check up day

The boys began the wake up harassment around 12 midnight, continuing up through a quarter till three. As usual, I gave in to Andy and Dougy’s hints. Dougy ran off to the dining room to wait for breakfast.

The day started out surprisingly well, though. Andy likes to rest on an atlas on a bookcase by my bed. There’s a fan on the bookcase next to the atlas, and Andy likes that for whatever kitty reason he has.

“This will be a great start to the day, if he doesn’t run off when I turn off the fan,” I thought. Fan turned off, Andy still on the atlas, I snatched him up! He wouldn’t turn medicine time into a hide away game today!

Andy doesn’t struggle (much) if I hold him on his back, cradled in the crook of my arm, so I carried him that way into the kitchen to get the medicine from the refrigerator. He started to wiggle, though, finally getting the hint of what was to happen next!

Andy is a good kitty.

I returned to the dining room, where I leave a bath towel on the table to swaddle cats for medicine or eye drops, when needed. Andy is very supple, with a long, sleek body that he can turn and twist in ways that defy belief or attempts to wrap in a towel. (Dougy is more squat and thick of body, less supple, so easier to keep wrapped!)

Holding a struggling towel-wrapped cat with my left arm, I somehow managed to fill the medicine applicator using just my right hand. I couldn’t do it if I thought about it!

Poor Andy! I got the medicine into him in less time than it took to write about the process.

Now, I somehow have to capture him for transport to his 10 AM veterinarian’s appointment. Today is the day I find out how he’s responding to the medicine for his heart. I am hopeful. He’s been more interested in cat games and toys lately. Though he’s played with Dougy right along, the cat toys didn’t prompt much reaction.

Post 344: Unintended consequences can be good!

I’m waiting for Andy to stroll by me so I can snatch him up and give him his medication.

The game’s more involved with each day, where to just reach down and grab him while he gets a drink at the fountain no longer works, and I’ve had to set up a crisis room where my colleagues and I (…me, myself, and I) strategize best ways to disarm the wee rascal with charm and diverted attention. Kitty, I am retired! I have the time to outwit you!

Andy begs to differ! He’s a cat. Cats have no time sense. He can outwait me because he lives in the now, not as a slave to a clock!

Yesterday, to completely change the subject while I wait for Andy’s grand entrance, I was in the mood for poached eggs and toast. I opened the cabinet door, the one Andy likes to open, to get the poacher out. Couldn’t see or find it!

After having a little tantrum, I decided then and there was the time to do something I’ve meant to do since my brother was here a year ago: clean out and reorganize this dang cabinet! How long could that take, and, besides, I couldn’t poach an egg without the poacher, buried somewhere in the clutter in the cabinet? [I always mess up actual poached eggs, but not the steamed ones the “egg poacher” makes.]

I pulled out plastic lids without plastic bottoms, plastic bottoms without plastic lids. I pulled out a pan that had once been coated with Teflon (TM) that now was mostly worn off. I pulled out mystery plastic thingys that had some indiscernable purpose. I pulled out gizmos that either my mother or I bought because they looked like a good deal for some small task but proved to be more effort when you used the gizmo or the gizmo proved to work less well than a simple knife or one’s hands.

That's the egg poacher on the far right, bottom shelf, the pan with the glass lid. Yeah, the eggs and toast were yummy!

That’s the egg poacher on the far right, bottom shelf, the pan with the glass lid. Yeah, the poached eggs and toast were yummy!

In time, I pulled out a waffle maker that had been inaccessible because of the clutter, cookie baking sheets and cooling racks, a new set of frying pans I’ve never used that have non-stick coating of some sort that supposedly is better than Teflon (TM), a roaster I forgot I had, and…the egg poacher! Mission accomplished!

While pulling things out, I sorted them into toss/save piles. “Toss” items filled a large trash bag. “Save” items barely filled a suddenly large cabinet!

So, because I wanted poached eggs and toast for breakfast, I got a cleaned out and organized cabinet I’ve intended to work on since a year ago plus poached eggs and toast.

Unintended consequences can be good!

Post 343: What Andy saw…

What captured Andy’s attention yesterday while monitoring the error check I had run on my computer? Why was he transfixed?

The error check screen, of course!

Andy thought the computer error check screen was fascinating. I made a video showing how file data flashed by, the sort of thing a cat is bound to get wrapped up watching! It’s short. I’m pleased with how it turned out. Take a look!

“Mrow!” Andy said, which I’m pretty sure means he wants you to see it. Dougy might pull your leg, but Andy is as somber as a Presbyterian. Watch it, please. Don’t make a kitty cry! Those big Persian eyes will rip your heart out when they fill with tears!

Andy thanks you!

Post 342: Home Guard

Andy and Dougy serve a useful function. They aren’t “just cats”! Here, you see Andy on my computer. The warm sun may have something to do with it. Lazy boy in the sun! See how his head glows?

Or is there something else on Andy’s mind?