This one's for Karen....and Becky too. :)

A Sweetie Chronicle

In which we divulge her illicit love affair.

As everyone knows, I am absolutely in love with my little tuxedo cat, Sweetie-pie. Don't get me wrong, I have loved and cherished all of my cats, they have brought me years of joy and happiness, but Sweetie is different.
She came to us an orphan, thankful to us beyond measure for every scrap of food and ounce of warmth she received, as I believe she was not capable of realizing that her new home was a permanent home, and therefore had to work at making us happy so she would not be put back out into the cold.
She never once caused issue, with the exception of unerringly finding even the smallest piece of plastic wrapping and hastily eating it so that we would not be able to take it from her. She has been with us six years, and still will take any plastic she can get her lips and teeth latched onto. That is my only fault with her; other than that she is perfect to me.
She makes me feel better than any human can, even those who are my closest and dearest family and friends. She looks at me and can see none of the vices which make me such a fallible human, she sees none of my bad traits, my wicked ways, or all of the bad things which prevent me from being the kind of person I wish she could see. Instead, she looks at me as if she sees pure love, and shows me this in return, which, on a good day fills my soul up, and on a bad day prevents it from emptying into nothingness.
Now before you all arrive at my home wanting to see the only cat on the planet with her own halo and set of wings, I must also tell you that my little saint is keeping her halo perched on top of her head by benefit of a devil horn or two.
I knew nothing of this until about a month or so ago, when I happened to notice her up in my bedroom window, acting rather strangely.
It was well after dark, and I noticed she was looking very intently out the window at something (I presumed) on the lawn. I was playing a game on my computer so I really wasn't interested in what she saw, I just took for granted it was a little animal that came out at night, and let it go at that. I found myself wrong.
She stood up, arched her back and assumed the position that all cats take when confronted by another cat; the one that says to the world "I am ready for battle, God save the King and country", and then she started~~ huffing.
I have to say, I have heard cats growl, I have heard them hiss, I have heard them meow in all manner from high pitched to guttural, but I have never heard a cat huff; until now.
I looked out, and to my surprise, a tom was looking in my bedroom window, with eyes and heart only for Sweetie. I 'shoo-ed' him, I hollered at him, I threatened him, but he was totally smitten by her beauty, and would have nothing except her, or would at least die trying. In other words, to put it a little indelicately, he was horny.
Not wanting any truck with her gentleman caller, she was huffing with every breath entering her body,(sounds which could put the huffs of an indignant teenager to shame) as if to tell her suitor that his very existence on this planet was an affront to all things Holy, and this only served to double his efforts in trying to reach his fair love, and thus putting a two inch by four inch hole in my window screen.
I decided that this love affair had to come to an end, and went outside in order to scare him off. I did just that, and gained a mosquito bite in the process.
When I came back inside, Sweetie was still in the window, showing great pride in the fact that SHE had single-handedly sent Mr. Hot-pants on his way, and was still emitting a short huff or two, just to prove a point. I took hold of her, with the intention of taking her out of my window so that I could shut the inside one, and there was no having it. She hung on to the windowsill with every toenail she was in possession of, determined that she was going to stand guard until daylight. I never realized she had that many toenails, or that she could hang on to anything that tightly with them, but eventually I got her down and I closed my window.
Giving off the air of a conquering hero that had been snubbed by her adoring masses, she settled down on the bed for a bath and then a nap. as I resumed playing my game, I looked at her, and I could swear she had a bit of a grin on her face. I am sure I was imagining this, but it looked to me that she was actually rather pleased with the fact that there was a broken-hearted tom, wasting away in the night, lost without her love to keep him sustained.
I gave her a lecture about being kind to others who were less fortunate, as she was in the same fix not all that long ago, and I also lectured her on the fact that it was wrong to be a tease. She took this all in stride, but still, I think deep down, she was quite happy knowing she still had a touch of the temptress in her, even if she did put on a big show that she wanted me to see.
Thomas has been back, at first quite often, and as time passed, less and less, he would still look in my window for her but I would go out and shoo him away, and no matter how many times I shoo-ed him away, Sweetie would still give the occasional huff, for good measure and good show, and then go lay down on my bed with that same little smile on her lips, very pleased with herself that she still had what it takes to drive the men wild. I guess I can't blame her for it, every woman likes to think of herself as a seductress, and my little saint is no exception. Thats my girl.

How the Dog Got His Name.

How the Dog Got its Name

When God made the earth and sky,
The flowers and the trees,
He then made all the animals
And all the birds and bees.

And When his work was finished
Not one was quite the same.
He said, "I'll walk this earth of mine
And give each a name."

And so he traveled land and sea
And everywhere he went
A little creature followed Him
Until its strength was spent.

When all were named upon the earth
And in the sky and sea,
The little creature said," Dear Lord,
There is not one left for me."

The Father smiled and softly said,
"I've left you to the end.
I've turned my own name back to front
And called you Dog, my friend."

- Author Unknown


I totally love dogs. of all kinds, and when I read this I wanted to share it because it is so awesome~~ enjoy.

Dignity and Grace.

I am an avid watcher. I watch, I look, I see, I notice, and generally, when the wheels of this process are in motion, I will be thinking about what I see. Some people will view this process as being nosey, well so be it, I am nosey then. Most generally what I watch I will file away in my brain's filing cabinet for another look-over at a later time, and today was no exception.
I had to run some errands, the usual stuff, go to the bank, go get groceries, go to the pharmacy, and all of this happened with the usual amount of enthusiasm on my part, well, more enthusiasm at the grocery store, I like it there~ good nummies.
My final stop was to the pharmacy, and I pulled into the parking space with nothing much on my mind other than getting the prescription I came for.
A car pulled into the space to my right, and as usual, I looked to see who was driving, my nosiness kicking in, I guess. The driver was a very old man, and there was a passenger in the seat beside him.
A few thoughts crossed my mind as I glanced at him. I was thinking that I hope I am that able when I am that age, to do the necessary things needed to keep myself independent, and, slightly ashamed of myself for thinking it, I wondered if it was exactly safe for a person of that age to still be operating a motor vehicle. But I suppose when he needed to get things done, and there was no one else available to help, he had to fend for himself.
I kept glancing over, like I said, just from curiosity, and as I watched, I saw the old man get out of the car on legs that seemed to frail to support his bent body, and he slowly made his way to the passenger side where he opened the door for the other person.
The other person, a lady whom I took to be his wife, slowly made her way out of the car, using a body that also seemed too weathered to be able to do the job properly, and as she straightened herself, the old man shut the car door behind her and gently took her by the arm and guided her to the sidewalk.
The sidewalk in front of the pharmacy was a step higher than the pavement, and he went ahead and then turned and helped her make it up the step. Together, arm in arm, they went the few steps to the pharmacy door, where once again, he opened the door for her so that she wouldn't need to try. I was almost afraid the door would prove too much for them, but he held it for her and in they went, once again arm in arm.
They had no idea that I had watched them, and as I picked up my prescription, they were at the other end of the counter, placing theirs.
They seemed so tiny and frail, I suppose they were, really, their bones less able to hold up to too much shock, muscles tiring quicker and more often in need of a respite from activity, but there was something else I could see in them as I kept glancing their way; it was something I couldn't quite pinpoint until I was on my way home, and pondering this small event.
There had been a quiet dignity and grace in their actions, and mannerisms, and it showed in every thing they did.
Most people today have had this dignity and grace beaten out of them. It now is totally unacceptable to do a kind act for another. There is shame in holding a door for another person, it is a sign of weakness to let a person take your place in line, women won't allow men to help them because that would be too feminine, and men won't help women because that would be too sissy. Time and again we shun a kind act because of what it may mean for us, instead of doing it because of what it may mean for another.
If I had to try to tell this couple's age, I would say they were at least in their eighties, if they were that young, and still guessing, I estimated that they were probably married when they were in their twenties, so their lives and marriage have spanned two centuries. How many other couples can boast that? Most marriages last until the ink dries on the marriage licence, then sadly, the friendship ends and they go their separate ways.
I have to wonder if each sees the age in the other, or do they see themselves as they were when they were young? Does he see her wrinkles or does he see her when she was young like a bright penny, sparkling in the sunlight? Does she see him as old and bent, or as the strong young man that could lift her up in the air as if she were a feather?
This couple has seen decade after decade, wars, sickness, birth, death, and they have endured it all, and are still enduring it, still with dignity and grace.
All too soon they will no longer be here for us to learn from, if this can be called a lesson, there will be memories of them, living in their family and friends, but while they are here, I wish somehow that I could have every person look at them, or a couple just like them, and have them understand what it is to make it that far, through all trials and tribulations, and still have the dignity to hold open a door for someone, and the grace to hold another's arm because it was offered in kindness.

For Those Who Have No Voice.

When your child is born, you look at the tiny miracle in your arms and see so many things. There is the baby, all pink and perfect, with the proper number of fingers and toes, a little mouth like a rosebud and the most beautiful blue eyes on the planet. There is the kid with the heartbreakingly beautiful smile, the scraped knees and elbows and the hair that has been bleached golden by the sun. There is the adult that all to soon will leave your care and make a path to walk on that was only meant for him or her.
In between there will be diaper changes, doctor visits, baby food stains in the carpet, legos down the toilet and a host of other things that will make you smile, frown, cringe and wonder at how this little person ticks.
Each milestone will be marked in many ways. A photo, a scrapbook page, a video, an item for the memory box, and all will record the things that you are so proud of, and have told every relative within listening distance. No other baby ever walked that soon, or spoke that big word at that age, or ever roller skated, danced, ran, colored, jumped, counted, tied or sung as well as your child.
With this joy also comes some of the hard parts of parenting. There is the sickness and injury that every parent prays will never attack, but knows, in reality, will happen. As hard as you try to prevent it, your child still gets the flu, mumps, ear infections, sunburned, scraped, cut and broken. You would give your own numbered days to see your child well, and would gladly take the pain of their injury to see your child whole. The best you can do is whatever makes it better for them, so they can get through it.
There are also the bad days when things just do not go right. No pair of underwear will do, the socks itch, the cereal doesn't taste right, its too cold, its too hot, there is a meltdown in the store because dinner has to come before candy, and these things all add up to the times when you may wonder if it was worth it.
For most parents, the answer to this question is a resounding YES. There is nothing your child will ever do that could possibly cause you to love them less. But for some, they have shown their answer to this question in horrendous ways, including abuse and death.
A child cannot help themselves stave off the bumps and bruises and the broken bones. that, as a parent, is your job; your sacred duty. A child needs protection from harm because they are too tiny and fragile to be able to do it themselves. They need you as their shield and suit of armor, their warm coat and their wall.
A cut can heal, a bruise can fade, but these things, when handed to them by the people who they have to trust, will leave marks on a place much more fragile then their bodies; the marks will be left on their soul and in their spirit. Those marks won't fade, they will not heal. They will just stay open and sore and painful in ways we can only imagine.
I ask you, as you read this, to take a minute to see your child. Not just look, but SEE that little person. You are their whole world, their universe. You are the ones that make it better when they don't know how. You are the ones they need to see show acceptance and approval, love and happiness.
So the next time your child does something that makes you angry, please stop and think about the little ones who can no longer say they are sorry for the things that made their parents angry. The ones who suffered hard and paid the ultimate price for their crimes, and then see your child again. Please; SEE your child again.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I found out today that a friend of mine, Adam, who had to give up the foster daughter that he had fallen head over heals in love with and hoped to adopt, has been given the opportunity to foster another child who apparently has come from horrendous conditions. His heart knows no limits, he sees the good and the worth in those who society has thrown away, or set aside, and he uses this gift to bring life to these children who have endured more than they ever deserved, and more than we, as adults, would be able to.
I wrote the piece at the top as a response to one of the most horrendous things that has ever entered my life. A child that I knew, that we ,as a community, most all knew, was murdered by her mother and left on a river bank.
The mother is now in prison, probably for the rest of her life, many hope so at least, and this act of hate rocked us and left us wondering what would lead a mother to this. What had snapped in her to turn on her own flesh and destroy it; animals do that, people are supposed to be better.
I often think of that child, Karissa was her name, and what must have gone through her mind when her mother choked the life from her. I don't think I have what it takes to encompass what her thoughts must have been. Help never came in time for Karissa, but others, by the grace of God, have been rescued.
Thankfully, there are angels in the form of foster parents that have the ability to take these children that have been rescued and start helping these little souls piece their lives back together.
I know I do not have what it takes to do this. But Adam does, he and so many others have the ability to bring these kids out of a world of horror and into a place where they can see themselves as the beautiful souls they really are.
I am hoping that two things might come from this message. One, that you, dear reader, will understand what a gift a foster parent truly is to a child who might otherwise parish in their own despair, and two, that someone who feels that they have reached their limit of endurance, will just walk away before the first punch, the first slap, the first cut or burn is leveled onto a small, defenseless child, walk away and get the help that is needed so that another child will not be a victim of abuse.
It isn't much, but I can hope.
Goodnight Karissa, and thanks Adam.

These are the Days.

I always think there is a reason why I have crappy days. There are days when I wonder just how I am going to manage to get myself where ever it is I need to go without having a total meltdown. There are times when the blackness just seems to blanket me with no hope of escape.
I believe the reason I have such crappy days is to show me just how wonderful a good day really can be, and that good day, my dear friends, was today.
There was nothing special about today, nothing to celebrate, it wasn't a holiday, nothing out of the ordinary going on, in fact, when I woke up this morning things were quite the opposite.
I had a filling fall out yesterday and between then and now it has gotten progressively more painful, and as luck would have it, I cannot get in to the dentist until at least Monday; maybe later; yay for me.
Seems funny that a day starting like that could do a total one-eighty, but believe it or not, it did.
I won't kid you and tell you something magical happened to perk me up this morning, truth be told, the magic was in the copious amounts of Tylenol I took to deaden the pain. I should probably not use the word copious, I took one more than the recommended amount for an adult, but it got the job done, and instead of having a crazed lunatic with a chainsaw and a bad hangover taking up residence in my upper jaw, I found all that remained was one little elf who lazily tinked a tiny nail with a tiny hammer.
Ooooooooooh; relief. I found that the pain was deadened enough that I could go about my day, getting chores crossed off my list, eating lunch (which I never thought would happen) and I even decided to go do the most dreaded task of all~~ grocery shopping.
So off I went with no other earthly intention than to get some fresh air and snag a couple of bargains while getting some nummies for the following week. I found everything I wanted, and as I was putting the groceries on the conveyor belt at the checkout, a very nice thing happened. The store manager, who is an extremely nice man, came over and got the heavy items off the bottom of the cart and put them up with the rest of my groceries.
Small thing, you may well comment, but it was the start. Small things lead to big things, (remember this the next time you see an oak tree) and while I was loading the groceries into the trunk of my car, another nice thing took place. I happened to look up and see a sea gull.
I might mention, for those of you who are not from the Atlantic provinces, that sighting a seagull is really not an amazing thing. They are a dime a dozen around here, and are generally looked upon as a nuisance, especially when they leave their calling card on your freshly washed and waxed car.
It was not so much SEEING the seagull that was nice, but just seeing it lazily flying, going wherever it is seagulls usually need to go at that time of the afternoon, and I thought to myself just how nice it must be to be able to do that, and just be so....I don't know, I guess in tune with everything going on, feeling the breeze, seeing the earth from up there, and feeling the sun warm on it's back.
I don't know if the seagull was happy, but it made me happy thinking that on a nice day like today that it was having a good day too, and once again nice things just seemed to...happen.
I must stop my story for a moment and mention a TV commercial I remember from a couple years ago. I forget what car company made the commercial, but it showed a man and a woman in a nice vehicle, driving down a street, and they were playing music on the car's stereo system, and there was a man on the sidewalk bouncing a basketball and it seemed that it was keeping time with the song, and then it started to rain and the windshield wipers also kept time with the music, and the whole thing just became an exercise in synchronicity, all the while extolling the virtues of this very lovely car in hopes that the viewer would run out to that dealership and grab one right off the lot in a fit of consumer frenzy.
Well that is sort of the way today felt once I took the time to notice the happy things. I guess synchronicity wasn't really the right word, or idea, maybe it was more like layers. I noticed how wonderful the sun felt, how pastel blue the sky was due to the fact that there was still a bit of haze off the coast, and that in turn made the ocean look calm and peaceful, which made it a good day for people to play at the beach, due to the fact that it was a warm day, and each happy thing just kept layering itself on top of the previous happy thing to the point where I just had to sit and try to capture it all in my mind.
I arrived home and just sat in the car with the door open, looking at what was familiar to me, thinking about how nice the doves sounded as they cooed on the roof of the church, and how if I took a deep breath I could smell so many different things like mowed grass and flowers and salt air and even diesel fumes, and how all these things just came together and somehow smelled 'right', and how it seemed that there was a small, cool breeze that washed across my face each time the sun pulsed down on me, and how even voices down the street seemed to sound right, or maybe even feel right, although I couldn't make out what it was they were saying, or even needed to, for that matter.
All these things, and the thousand other things that I know happened, but being a mere mortal I failed to pick up on, just kept layering one on top of the other until I was totally blanketed in a most awesome day. It was wonderful.
I had a friend tell me, just a couple of days ago, a saying that his mother told him about the importance of saving even your pennies~~ 'pennies lead to knickels, knickels lead to dimes...' and so on, and I thought about that today when all this was happening. A helping hand leads to a seagull, a seagull leads to a beautiful sky...and so on until you have something so good that you need to share it with your friends, and to also tuck away in your secret heart place for when the black comes again and covers over your sun.
And so, my friends, I will leave you with a present. It won't look like much, just a button, but it will be what you can use to help transform a very bad day into a very good one.
When it seems like your just overloaded with a day that is fast spiralling downward, please feel free to come back right here and push my little button you saw at the top of this story. It will unleash all the layers you will need to turn a bad day into a wonderful one. Use it as many times as you need to, it is free for everyone who needs to see a seagull.

A lesson learned.

You know, I really hate it when my own conscience kicks me is the ass. Up until now my conscience has been a decently good friend, every once in a while giving me a tweak just to say it was still on the job and earning a paycheck, but recently , it started taking the job seriously, and this is the result.
I had found a website that was called POWM, or better known as 'People of Walmart'. It was a collection of pictures that had been taken of different people, in Walmarts all across the U.S. and Canada, and when I say different people, I mean exactly that; D~I~F~F~E~R~E~N~T.
Now, before I go any further, I will just stop for a second and tell you about myself. I am, what is called in pleasant circles, pleasingly plump. Now considering the fact that I have never ventured near a 'pleasant circle' in my life, I will translate this into laymen's terms~ I am fat.
I am not bothered by this, I get my fair share of fat jokes and such, and as far as that goes it never bothers me, simply because the good Lord has graced me with a tongue that is just as sharp, often times MORE sharp than those who make comments about me. If I hear these comments, you may depend they will be the ones embarrassed, not me. My view is, if you are going to make it open season on me, then it is open season all around.
So having said this, I have looked at page after page on this Walmart site, looking at pictures of all manner of people, from goth, to hill-billy, to pimp, to just plain straaaaaaaaaaaaange. There have been pictures of mullets that I never knew could even be fashioned, pictures of people with their pet monkeys on their shoulder, and as a side-bar, these were not helping hand monkeys, they were pets, which I was very surprised to see actually in the store, but what ever, people with clothing on that didn't necessarily belong to their gender, colors beyond the rainbow gracing clothing I never knew could stretch as far as it did, animal print in places it had absolutely no business being in, well, you get the idea. It was just a total education.
I would look at picture after picture, some not too bad, some totally unbelievable, wondering how these people could actually do what it was they were doing.
And like I said before, being a person who's conscience worked on a part time basis, I also laughed, more out of sheer dis-belief than out of cruelty.
But~~ after a while the pictures became less and less funny. There was the odd one that was an eye opener, mostly younger people dressing the way they did for shock value, but those were becoming few and far between, and even those became, well, I guess I would have to say not funny or shocking any more, just sad, somehow.
And then came a picture that I looked at for a long time, and all of a sudden this site lost all of it's appeal to me. It was an older woman on one of those little scooter things that Walmart supplies people who have difficulty walking, and she was dressed in every color of the rainbow that you could possibly wear; hair included.
She was reaching for a food item off of the grocery shelf, and you could see she even painted her nails in rainbow fashion. I looked at her for a long time, reaching for whatever it was she wanted, and that's when it hit me~ she was trying her best to look as good as SHE could see herself looking, with what she had to work with. She may not have had a lot, or she may have been stinking rich, I don't know, but she was doing what made her feel like a worthwhile person, and by me looking at that picture of her, it was as if I was leaching her pride and self respect from her. By even being on this site I was throwing big stones at my own very glass walls.
I hate it when this happens, when my conscience kicks into full gear. Not because I have had my knuckles rapped for being bad, but because I was not able to see the human being in the weird and wacky bodies in the pictures. I was not seeing a person doing their best, I was seeing what was supposedly funny, but in reality, not funny at all. And I was very mad at myself for being one of the ones who was laughing AT instead of WITH another person.
I don't know if I have made any sense about this, I know what I feel, it just seems to not come out on (cyber) paper the way I feel it in my heart, but needless to say, the site has been sent to the recycle bin, and I have never gone back to it after seeing the lady in the rainbow.
Keep in mind that I will always have a comment for those who want to make themselves look good by zinging the fat woman, but now when I see a mullet, or odd-ball hat, or animal print that has gone so wrong, I will remember that the person who put that on, and looked at themselves in the mirror, saw something good, and I will too.

Sweetie and Thunderstorms.

I believe I have mentioned to you about my cat Sweetie. She is the love of my life and she supplies me with an endless stream of little stories, of which I WILL make you sit and listen to, or in this case, read. Be forewarned, here is another Sweetie story.....stop rolling your eyes~~ I can feel a change in air currents when you do it.
Onward. Sweetie has the most gentle nature, she has never once ever scratched me from anger, I personally do not think she has it in her to hurt anyone. When she is scolded (which is very rare) she will look at you with a mixture of broken-heartedness and tolerance, as if she is trying to say that she will try to do so much better, but please don't stop loving her.
Sweetie needs a certain quota of kisses every day, too. I do not exaggerate, she will sit on the bookcase, or on the bathroom counter, or where ever else she can be level with your face, and put her head down so you can kiss the top of it; time and time again. She loves her kisses, and in return she will give you tiny little licks back, I suppose the cat equivalent to a peck on the cheek.
She also needs some 'nug' time. That would be short for snuggle time, every morning. She gets up on the bed around 3:00 a.m. or so, and pats me and the blankets until I wake up and tuck her in under the blankets beside me. Let her find her way under the blankets herself, you say? I think not~~ that would be her 'Mum-cat's' job. (me in case you were wondering)
Having extolled the virtues of this delicate flower, there is one exception I have to mention to you; that would be in the case of a thunderstorm. She, as apparently with all animals, can hear a thunderstorm coming two hours before it actually hits, and her demeanor changes considerably.
She changes from my sweet, good-natured 'Pooh-cat', to the most arrogant, unbelievably sanctimonious little beast I have ever seen.
The transformation will start with the sky darkening. She will commence roaming the house, from room to room as if she is on sentry duty. Up in windows, to the doors to see from there, and back over her route, time and time again.
Then it starts~ the small gentle rumble off in the distance. She will hear this and immediately growl back, as if she and Mother Nature are playing their own version of dueling banjos.
Once the rumbling becomes more ominous, she will then add what I call 'squalling' to the mix. That would be the sounds you hear when one cat is trying to out-threaten another cat. The high-pitched, screamy, guttural kinds of meows that mean 'I am pissed off that you are even in my NEIGHBORHOOD'.
Once the storm is in full swing, so isn't Sweetie. She will march from room to room, growling and squalling and generally trying to tell the storm that she is aghast that it even DARED to impose itself upon her and her family, and that she will DAMN well be letting someone know just what she thinks about the whole situation.
This goes on until she realizes that nothing she says will deter the storm in the least, so, while summoning up as much righteous indignation as one little cat can manage, she retreats to my mother's bedroom where she sits in the dark behind the door, making a mental list of all the organizations that will be receiving a stern message from her.
I made the most unbelievably crass mistake of peeking around the door to see her sitting there, and without thinking about repercussions of any sort, I laughed at her. Well boys and girls, she stomped out of the bedroom, I am sure calling me an unmentionable name or two, and the fury of this was just coming off her little body in waves.
For about a half hour, she made it very clear, by sitting in the same room as me, but BACK TO me, that she did not appreciate my attitude toward her efforts to put an end to a most inconvenient weather situation.
I would call her~ nothing. I would pet the top of her head~ it was the same as petting a block of ice. I was to be punished for my attitude and that was all there was to it.
After about a half hour, and coincidentally, about the same time the storm wound down to nothing, she decided that I had been punished enough, and came to me and rubbed against my leg. She told me she forgave me my human frailties, I apparently could not help it seeing as I was born a human, not a cat, and I accepted this from her as a sign that I was no longer on her 'poop' list, and I breathed a sigh of relief, glad that I was once again back in her good graces.
The storm is now over, my little cat is laying on the bed all curled up and tired from her battles. She is no longer 'Sweetie Storm-Crusher', the scourge of all things tempestuous, she is now just my 'Sweetie Pooh-Cat-Rooh', a cat who loves to be kissed on her head, and who loves to nug with Mum-cat under the covers....until the next thunder storm.

One of my many obsessions. ;)

I have a very good friend, Nicole, who indulges me far more than I warrant or deserve, and recently she let me borrow the movie 'Cirque du Freak, the Vampire's Assistant' which is based on the twelve book series written by Darren Shan.
Well, considering my penchant for horror movies, and the fact that I think vampires are absolutely H~O~T, this movie immediately went on my 'favotite vampire movie' list; actually it sped right to the #1 spot.
I have always liked the horror genre, I have never been one for romance or touchy-feely stuff, (brrrr, ugh), comedy is OK, but being the evil creature I am I prefer comedy that is a little on the mean side,(think Ricky Gervais), westerns and war movies just send me into a fit, with the exception of 'Hunt for Red October'(who wouldn't sit and watch Sean Connery and Alec baldwin as long as they possibly could?), and most Indi movies just go straight over my head. I don't want to decipher a movie, I want to get lost in it. If I have to constantly try to puzzle my way through metaphor after metaphor, then I will just fall asleep and dream a better movie for myself.
Anyhoo, apparently I must have mentioned about 'Cirque' more than I can recollect, because Nicole, Bless her heart, bought the movie for me to keep. Needless to say, I have watched it several times..............OK, OK, even more than several, but I am not going to disclose the exact number, and each time I watch it I can't help think that you just can't go wrong with a guy dressed in goth. Mmm, mmm, mmm. So what if he has an annoying little habit of drinking your blood? Small price to pay for all that hotness, I think.
So, my friends, I have left a slideshow for you, of the guys I think are uber-hot in their vampire roles, there are more, but I just couldn't find the pictures. Hope you enjoy, I think I will watch a movie. ;)

Not a great day.

There are times when I really do believe that I am being punnished for daring to be happy, so I am given a bad day to suffer through just so that I will remember not to ever get too pleased with the way things are going.
It started out as being such a good day too. It rained this morning just enough from one little cloud that there was a rainbow for us to see. That was awesome. I love rainbows. We looked at it until it was no longer there and I thought 'There. Happy times'. Then SLAM BANG. Ah-ah Sue, your being too happy, can't have that. Then before the day was done SLAM BANG twice more. Fine. So I won't be happy, if that's what the fates want. Wouldn't want to piss any of the fates off and give them a bad day. Maybe tomorrow will be better.

First Love by John Clare.




I ne'er was struck before that hour
With love so sudden and so sweet,
Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower
And stole my heart away complete.
My face turned pale as deadly pale.
My legs refused to walk away,
And when she looked, what could I ail?
My life and all seemed turned to clay.

And then my blood rushed to my face
And took my eyesight quite away,
The trees and bushes round the place
Seemed midnight at noonday.
I could not see a single thing,
Words from my eyes did start --
They spoke as chords do from the string,
And blood burnt round my heart.

Are flowers the winter's choice?
Is love's bed always snow?
She seemed to hear my silent voice,
Not love's appeals to know.
I never saw so sweet a face
As that I stood before.
My heart has left its dwelling-place
And can return no more.

I found this when I was noodling around and decided I liked it. I am far from being a romantic person, but this seemed so sweet and truthful that I decided to keep it. Hope you enjoy it.

Good Morning.

Wow!! I must be channeling June Cleaver or something. Here it is the crack of dawn and I have the garbage out, a load of clothes on the way to being washed and a loaf of bread on the go...I must not be feeling well or something. (haha)
Before you go and nominate me for any awards tho, I do feel it is my duty to tell you I am making bread in the bread maker. I CAN make real bread, but I am allergic to flour on my skin, and by the time I am done my hands look like hand-burger. (haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahaha.....oh that was bad. ...I should delete that. Oh hell, I'm keeping it, I like it.)
If anyone does make bread in their bread maker, this is a really easy and simple recipe for plain white bread that is very good. I will jot it here for you~~

White Bread~~
(all ingredients go in the bread maker canister in the order you read them)

1 cup milk
1/4 cup sugar
2 tbsp. margarine
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp.salt
3 1/2 cups flour
3 tsp. breadmaker yeast

Place the canister in the bread maker and set it on the dough setting if you want to cook it in the oven like I do, or set your bread maker to 1 1/2 lbs, the plain white bread setting and the setting for whichever darkness you like and then push the on button.
There, done.
Oh yeah~~ If you do want your bread cooked in the oven if you used the dough cycle, then knead the dough for a minute or so to shape it into a loaf, put it in a greased bread pan, let it raise 15 minutes covered with a tea towel or something, and then cook it in a pre-heated 375* oven for 35 minutes. That will give the bread a decent color, but if you like it a bit paler then cut the time down by a few minutes.
Wow. I feel like I should go re-arrange a bouquet of flowers that I just brought in from our extensive, immaculately kept garden. Maybe I will get my gloves and high heels on and go shopping; oh yeah, can't forget the string of pearls either...oh crap~~ thats what I did yesterday, so that's out.
One of the things I will watch on TV is the Andy Griffith show. It comes on after supper, and I just love it. Before it comes on tho, there are some extremely annoying time fillers that I seriously could do without, and this June Cleaver thing reminded me of that. Can anyone remember back to highschool when we used to have to sit through those gawd-allmighty inane little films they used to have in health class? You remember, they were the ones on personal hygeine or your posture or even better~~ 'Why isn't Jane going to the party?', and you'd watch the whole thing only to find out she smacks when she eats or something, and no one would sit by her. Well, the films they put on before tha Andy Griffith show were like those, only from the '50's, so they were even worse than what we watched.
In a way they were funny, but I really couldn't believe that anyone would let a school subject their children to that. I mean really~~ Mother has to 'dress' for dinner? Give the poor bugger a break!! Let her sit in the livingroom in her jammies with a tv tray and watch the Andy Griffith show while she eats. Oh yeah, and since Dad's sorry ass has been behind a desk all day, let him wash the dishes.
I would, seriously, just love to see one of those videos with a wacky ending where Mom gets up from the table, leaves the room for a second, and comes back dressed like a biker-babe with a huge big tattoo on her arm and the leathers to match, and then tell Dad not to wait up for and leave the house.......pearls in place of course.
All this because I made a loaf of bread :)

Sweetie's Story

Have I told you about my cat Sweetie? I have repeated this sentence to just about anyone who has been within earshot, and for the most part, anyone who hears me say this will roll their eyes (when they think I can't see them do it) or magically find something they need to go do at the exact moment that sentence leaves my lips. It's ok tho, there is always some poor soul who hasn't been caught in the Sweetie net, and I guess for now, that will be you.
Her story isn't a happy one in the beginning, so if you are tender hearted, like me, stop reading now or get a couple of tissues; but don't worry, it all gets better by the end.
Her story doesn't start with her, it starts with my previous cat Satin. Satin came to us after the cat before her passed on. Our house was pet-less and very empty, and I could no longer stand not having a fuzzy face to look at, so I stopped at a house that had kittens advertised and looked them all over.
I watched as they all played and tumbled, and I tried to picture how each one would be if I took it home, and then it happened. Satin (who was nameless at the time) wandered over to the side of the pen and looked up at me and told me she was ready to go home. One thing you should learn now~~ my cats talk to me......yours don't talk to you? Strange. Are you really listening then?
Anyway, I was sure she was the one who was going to be my next pet friend, and seeing as we had always had cats that lived a long life, I had the same expectations for her, so, away we went, happy in the knowledge that we each had a void in our lives filled.
we named her Satin because she was so soft. She was white with different colored spots and ripples all over her, and she had beautiful wide eyes that took in everything. And she smiled. She had the most beautiful, happy look on her face, and always looked like she was smiling.
Satin was very energetic. She loved life with all she had. She never walked anywhere, always ran, everything was fair game for her sharp little claws, including my legs when she wanted to get up to the counter I was standing beside, and everything, Everything was a game to her. I watched one day when she was trying to puzzle how to get to the counter by climbing the rungs of the stool we have beside it. She would try and fail, try and fail, and then sit and look it over, then try again until finally she found the way up, and once she was there she smiled her beautiful smile as if to tell me that she knew she could do it, she just needed practice.
She was a source of anxiety, a source of frustration, and a boundless source of joy, and she lived like there would be no tomorrow.
Sadly, that came to her and us all too soon. One day, just after her first birthday, she had an upset tummy and proceeded to prove this to us on the hall carpet. This wasn't so unusual, all our cats had been indoor cats and therefore we had to deal with that type of thing, but this one day with Satin, it went further. She started panting and she wouldn't leave me. The look of happy that usually resided on her face was replaced with a new one; a look of fear, and one that was begging me to make things better.
I immediately bundled her up and took her to our vet. The vet could find nothing immediately wrong, but asked that she stay there for the night just in case. That was the longest night of my life. The next morning I called her and received the news that Satin was gravely ill. I could hear her screams in the background and immediately felt the earth tilt. I made the trip to the vet's in way less time than was legally prudent, and arrived hoping against hope that there would be something the vet would be able to do to help her, but no, Satin's heart was apparently giving out on her and there was nothing that could be done. It was a birth defect, the vet said, and it had just been a matter of time before it took her from us.
In the last few minute I had with her I tried so very hard to make her understand just how much I loved her, and how much she had meant to us. I took every ounce of love I had and tried to pour it into her frail body, so that she would leave us knowing she was loved, and finally, I gave her back to the vet so that she could be given the peace she needed.
My heart broke into very small pieces. Each one was sharp, and dug into my soul and left rips that I never thought would mend. With tears in her eyes the vet told me that Satin could never have survived; there was probably a defect from birth that caused this. She reminded me that what time was given to her had been good, she had been a happy cat, so full of joy, and yes, life. I think she packed everything she could into every minute, because I really believe she understood that her time was limited.
I also believe that satin's last act of love for us was to have this happen just at the time when another cat desperately needed a home and someone to love her.
The vet asked if I would be interested in looking, just looking mind you, at a stray that had been brought to her about two weeks previously. Even though my heart was broken, I agreed, more to keep the vet happy than anything else, and she took me to see a pathetic, skinny little tuxedo cat who was nothing but huge eyes when I first looked at her.
She immediately went to the vet and put her paws up to her chest, as if she needed the contact, and then she came over to me and did the same thing. She put her paws up on me the way a child does to a parent when they need to be picked up, and looked not into my eyes, but into my soul.
She had been a stray for about 8 months, living in a crawl space under a church, and the minister and parishioners had been feeding her, but the minister had to move away, and someone decided that she would be better off if she was given a chance for adoption, so she was taken to my vet.
The vet agreed to keep her for a week, and after that there would be 'the question' of what happens next, but once the week was over the vet couldn' bring herself to put her down. She was too loving and beautiful so she kept telling her one more day; one more day.
That 'one more day' came on the day I had to lose Satin. Even though my heart was in pieces, I looked at this new cat and I knew she would be coming home with me. She definitely needed me and I needed her too.
The vet was so pleased that she offered to have her 'fixed' for free, and also gave her her shots, just so that I would give her a home. There was no need, I knew she would be mine.
I came to get her when she was able to travel, and the vet's assistant said her good-byes, glad to see she had a home, but sad that she would be leaving. She asked me what I was going to name her, and truthfully, I hadn't given it much thought. Since she was black and white, tuxedo being the proper term, I guessed that her name would probably reflect that, and I told her so, and the assistant said that no matter what, we were getting a wonderful cat, and they would miss her a lot because she was such a 'sweetie'.
That became her name from then on, and she has lived up to it every single day we have been blessed to have her. I miss my Satin, as I miss all my cats that have passed through my life, but in retrospect, I have to think that this is the way it was meant to be, this was what was planned for us, Sweetie and I, and if things hadn't happened the way they did, I would have missed out on one of the most beautiful treasures that I have ever had the pleasure of being with.
well that is her story of how we she came to us, I have to go now and get myself a tissue, and go find my kitty and kiss her a few times.

My Best Girl. Sweetie

Food~~ Gotta Love it!!

If anyone knows me, they know just what a love affair I have with food; well, I should ammend that~~ most food. The following list is the top 6 things I will not KNOWINGLY put in my mouth, due to the fact that it will be taking a more direct route to the outside of my body than what would be classed as ladylike:
1) all seafood with the exception of scallops
2) peanut butter
3) turnip
4) grapefruit
5) peas
6) liver.
These six foods represent my idea of what food 'hell' is. I, for the life of me cannot understand how anyone can possibly put those things in their mouth and not go immediately insane from the sheer nastyness of it all. (is nastyness a word?...I will have to check that out)
Anyways, everything else, as they say, is fair game. I have the habit of going shopping to places like Yarmouth and Halifax just to eat, and buying things just to prove I actually DID shop, not just work my way through a buffet line.
I have to say tho, that I was very disappointed in artichokes. I have seen them prepared on various food shows, and I literally had myself believing that I was going to go directly past liking them to absolutely loving them. I was positive. They just looked soooooooooooooooooo good when they were all prepared. People would put a piece of one in their mouth and I would sympathy-taste it with them, immagining something a hundred times better than anything I have ever eaten in my life. (sounds of car breaks inserted here) REALITY CHECK!! The damn things taste like thistles. Just like those little flowers that grow in fields that livestock munch on. YES I know what thistles taste like, NO I have never eaten one, I just KNOW!! I was devistated. I did get over it and move on, but I have to say it did leave an emotional scar.
enuf of that. On to the good stuff. I think my all time new favorite type of food to eat is anything HOT. I never realized I like this sort of thing until my friend Nicole (hope she doesn't mind me using her name...) and I went to the show and ate at Boston Pizza first. She was the one who introduced me to 'cactus-cut' potatoes. (potatoes, potatos...hmmmm...well, what ever)
These little gems are potatoes that have been cross-sliced into thin slices and marinated in jalapeno juice for a while and then deep fried. I never would order anything like this because all my life my parents, who were not extremely adventurous when it came to culinary endevours, would tell me I didn't like that sort of food; so I took their word for it.
Nicole offered the cactus cuts to me, and I have to say, out of politeness, I took one, wondering how I would get the little bugger down. ( I hate to refuse something someone offers me for fear of mortally offending them) I popped it in my mouth and after a few bites, sure enough, my mouth started to heat up~ but that was it. Where was this fabled burn I was supposed to encounter? well boys and girls, that came after the 6th or 7th piece. Sure enough, my mouth was on fire, my lips were on fire, every pore in my face was wide open and I was sweating, AND I was LOVING it!!
Where had this been all my life?? It was amazing how good this was. the pain was glorious!! Well, I have to say that sounded just a bit on the kinky side, but you know what I mean. It was just awesome. I absolutely fell in love with hot foods. Thai chilis are the best. They deliver a heat that is very deceiving. It starts out feeling like a warmth, but in the end it delivers a crippling heat that just melts your eyeballs. Gotta love that!! :) Habaneros ( I KNOW I just spelled that 8 ways to wrong) deliver the heat, but I am not a fan of the taste. They taste too much like a green pepper which really doesn't appeal to me.
Anyways, a good meal topped off with a slice of cheesecake and I am yours forever. (I am so easy it is pathetic)
Two more of my favorite places to snag food is 'The Bulk Barn' and 'Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory'. Miles and miles of candy~~ need I say more?? Oh yeah, and 'Freak Lunchbox'~~ retro candy up the wazoo.
What's that, you say? You never would have guessed I like food that much? Oh just stop~~ you make me blush.
Any hoo, I have rambled enough on this topic for mow, needless to say I will have more to say about it in the future, but for now, toodles.

Here is the beginning.

I have been wanting to do a blog for a long time, but I always have trouble with setting up a layout page for these things. Just so many decisions that I just get freaked out and save it for another day; hence no 'Myspace'
Today is the 'Another Day'. I think this is fun now that I have gotten into it, and I am sure it will look better as time goes on.
I am a 12 year old in a 46 year old's body, I seriously have never grown up, seems like too much work and effort....everybody is so .....I dunno..... adult and serious I guess. I like it better this way. Don't get me wrong, I have a job and do the bill-paying thing and all, but I just enjoy keeping things fun.