Operation Pink Herring

Four posts in one

Can someone please shut my cat up?

Henry has never been a quiet animal. The politically correct term is “vocal”. He does a lot of meowing. He meows to announce his entrance into the room, he meows while he’s jumping onto the couch, he meows when I come in the door.

But he also does this very, very loud meowing. It’s more like howling. Yowling. Screaming like he’s stuck in a bear trap. He used to do it from time to time, maybe once a day at the most. It’s a little weird, but cats are strange animals. He also perches himself on the banister like a goat and plays fetch with a keychain. Whatever, right?

But lately, oh my god. The howling is every day for HOURS. He’s howling while we watch TV. I go up to make sure he’s not actually stuck in a bear trap and he’ll just be sitting on the floor, staring at the wall. Sometimes he’s in his cat condo, pulling himself around in a circle. What the hell? Does he miss Max? It’s not exactly like he and Max were cat-BFFs. Our cats are not friends; they largely ignore and just barely tolerate each other. So why the mourning? The very loud, very annoying mourning? Or is he just having a heated discussion with the brick wall? I don’t know what to think.

I feel guilty because he must be sad to be howling like that all the time, right? Or maybe something is just broken in his brain? He also spends a large amount of time pushing around the water bowl in the bathroom, eating hair elastics and chasing his own tail. At least those activities are QUIET.  Now he’s like a screaming baby, he just cries and yells and oh my god I don’t know what is wrong. Have some food? Some treats?  Head scritches?  Want to chase a toy mouse?  Want to get picked up?  Want to bite my hand?  Eat this hair elastic?  Here, there’s some dental floss you can pull out of the garbage!  Tip over the recycling? Chew on some plastic bags?

Nothing. Works. I am going crazy.  If I can find a cat psychologist, what do you think the chances are it will be covered by pet insurance?

The knee bone’s connected to the other thing

Some rare yet serious side effects of knee surgery:

I’ve become so used to treating my left knee gingerly (and being reminded quite indelicately when I forget) that I can’t help cringing when I see people on TV doing things that would hurt it. Jumping on trampolines, are these people crazy? Running through an airport? Sliding into second base? People, you’re going to hurt yourselves! Be careful!

My right knee, by comparison, now feels like a bionic super-knee. I’m constantly amazed at how far and how well it can bend, how I can sit with it tucked under me and go up the stairs and use it to kick the laundry basket out of the way and it doesn’t even hurt! It’s insane! The human body, it’s a miracle, you know?

I get a lot of dirty looks riding the elevator down one flight to my office. I used to similarly judge the people who were too lazy to take the stairs down one flight, so I deserve it. Judge not, lest ye become that person punching the button for basement while all the other people in the elevator sigh and eye-roll.

And it's even pink 

After carefully waiting until both of our contracts were up and then waiting again for the new crop of phones to be released, I have a new cell phone. It has internet and email and it is the best thing to happen to me, technologically speaking, since Tivo.

The one bad thing is that now when I log on to the computer in the morning, all the fun of checking my email/twitter/facebook/Google Reader and seeing what the world has been up to while I’ve been offline is gone.  It kind of makes mornings less fun, if that's possible.  But I forgive it, because it's just so cute and smart and I can't stay mad.

I kind of liked staying home better

One of the things I learned while I was at home with absolutely nothing to do is that, if left to its own devices, by body would like to get no less than 10 hours of sleep a night. At the time I felt like a lazy slouch for spending so much time in bed. What I realize now is that’s how it feels to be rested. Weird. For reasons related to circadian clocks and the conspiracy of the working world against non-morning people, I usually get about 6 hours of sleep a night, and I can manage on that pretty well. But my God, it felt good to sleep right on through to 11am. My brain, like, worked. Faster. Like I said, it was weird.

The thing about Maine

I support gay marriage.  Having just been married a few months ago, I can tell you there are a lot of legal benefits afforded to married couples.  We are now eligible to be covered by each other's group insurance policies at work, which saves us over a thousand dollars a year. The day before we were married we'd been living together for six years, we owned a house together, but we weren't eligible under each other's policies.  The day after we were married, we were.  Our insurance rates went down; our taxes will be calculated differently.  Just because we have that marriage certificate.

There are a lot of legal benefits that go along with marriage, and I don't think it's fair to deny these to citizens on the basis of sexual orientation any more than it would be fair to deny them to people based on skin color, age, or religion.  That's what I believe.  That's what I will vote for.  Not everyone agrees with me.  Many people disagree.  Do I think they're misguided and misinformed?  Yes.  Am I disappointed over the election in Maine?  Yes. 

Do I think that everyone in Maine is a stupid idiot who doesn't deserve a vote? Absolutely not.  It really saddens me to see all the hatred being thrown around.  People are saying that everyone in Maine is an idiot.  The "why" explanation in Brizzly yesterday said Maine was the "land of cretins."  Here's the thing: most states do not have legalized gay marriage. If you're calling everyone in Maine an idiot because gay marriage is now outlawed there, what does that make you, if your state doesn't allow it either? 

And here's the other thing: the election was very close.  Nearly 50% of the voters were for gay marriage. 

And here's the third and last thing: People in this country are allowed to disagree.  I don't enjoy being called an idiot because I support gay marriage.  Name-calling is completely unproductive.  Calling someone stupid is not going to help them see things from your point of view.  It's certainly not going to make them change their mind.  It adds nothing to a discussion.

Let's grow up, people.  Calling each other names isn't going to move us forward, no matter which direction you consider forward to be.  

Not as awesome as I thought it was going to be

So!  Surgery.  It went well, in that I didn't wake up in the middle of it, they operated on the correct knee and I lived.  That's all very, very good.  Surgery on the whole, however... not as cool as I thought it was going to be.

"How much fun did you THINK it was going to be?", NPW asked when I proclaimed this on twitter last week.  Well, I thought it was going to be kind of... fun?  I mean, not the surgery itself, obviously the surgery was a last resort.  But after ten months of orthopedic surgeon visits, physical therapy and rest, it was a necessity.  So, since I didn't have much of a choice, I was more focusing on the fact that I was getting an official order to sit on the couch for a week and do nothing.  No cleaning!  No going to work!  Nothing but me, my couch, my Tivo cache and a giant stack of library books. 

But it wasn't so much "you don't have to do anything" as "you CAN'T do anything."  Let me tell you, there's a world of difference between the two.  Not having to cook, clean, or do laundry sounds quite nice.  Having to smell what your cat has lovingly deposited in the litterbox all day because you can't bend down far enough to scoop it, watching the pile in t the hamper slowly grow and eventually start to spill over the sides... it's, um, frustrating?  Maddening?  Worthy of crying a few times?  All three, if you're me.   

I also forgot to factor in the whole feeling like hell part. I spent the first two days asking Joel if it had been four hours yet and when I could take more painkillers, although I stopped even bothering with the hydrocodone after day two because it did nothing but give me insomnia.  It certainly did not help that I simultaneously had a cold, and when I say cold, I mean one night I coughed so hard that I threw up.  In the bathroom sink, because I couldn't bend my knee enough to barf in the toilet.  So.  Yes.  That was both enjoyable and attractive, as you can imagine.

And on top of this whole pity party, I was bored out of my mind.  I reached the end of the Tivo cache and my Google reader on the same day and from that point things started getting desperate.  I absolutely love days at home by myself, but it turns out that's contingent on my being able to, like, do stuff.  Sitting around all day, getting absolutely nothing done (because I'm recovering, I tell myself!) is difficult for me.  It makes me grumpy.  I didn't start this post to complain about my tragic state of boredom.  I'm just saying, surgery: not as awesome as I thought it was going to be. 

What is awesome, however, is working from home.  People, it's got to be the most glorious thing on earth, the perfect balance of yoga pants, coffee and productivity.  Technically I'm still on sick leave, but I felt so guilty pushing all my work onto my coworkers -- especially just three months after I happily dumped a stack of work on their desks and took two and half weeks off to get married and go on a honeymoon -- that I brought my laptop home.  I'd normally be opposed to this -- if I'm using sick time, I should be devoting all efforts to sitting in bed with a cup of tea and a book -- but this has actually provided a perfect reprieve from the boredom and the guilt.  I'm still at home with my knee propped up, ice pack in place for twenty minutes every hour, but the anxiety that everyone at work is mad at me is gone.  I don't need to worry about all the things that might be going wrong in my absence.  I don't need to have a panic attack before starting up my email, wondering how many red-exclamation messages will be waiting for me.  Oh, internet, if only this were an option without having to have surgery first.  Do any of you get to work from home?  Is it as fantastic when you get to do it all the time?

Sea lions, surgery

I was on yet another business trip this weekend, this time to San Francisco. My god, I am happy to be home. But I had a pretty fantastic time in California. Want to see?

On Holly's recommendation, I went down to the Ferry Building for brunch. I actually have similar pictures from the last time I was in San Francisco, about a year ago. But, uh, I didn't realize you could go inside. Turns out, you can!

I made myself a little picnic and sat outside to enjoy my gingersnaps and iced coffee (I could definitely get used to 75-degree weather in October), overlooking what I’ve now determined is the Bay Bridge. As in, not the Golden Gate Bridge. (The whole time I was thinking, wow, I really thought I remembered it being more… orange.) 

 

Then I moseyed my way down to Fisherman’s Wharf, saw Alcatraz, the real Golden Gate Bridge (It IS orange!), and saw the sea lions.

Now, the last time I was in San Francisco, my sole mission was to see these sea lions. I walked all the way to Fisherman’s Wharf, looked all around, and could not find a single goddamned sea lion. Maybe they’re only here part of the year, like whales that migrate! I told myself. Or, maybe I got the neighborhood wrong. Maybe they’re actually in San Diego.  Maybe they're in a zoo. I was walking, dejected and bitter, back to my hotel when this creepy dude jumped out of what I thought was a bush and scared the living daylights out of me.  (Later, I learned this guy is somewhat renowned for doing this to tourists.)

Anyway, this time I had the address (even though I’d left my hand-drawn map in the hotel. Along with my room key, for the second time that day), and I saw me some sea lions. 

I’d say something like, “I can’t believe I missed them; there are so many and you can hear them barking their heads off a block away,” but… I was sincerely confused about the color of the Golden Gate Bridge, so I do believe it.

Anyway! I had a fabulous time on my own, managed to get back to my hotel (on the cable car, no less!)without getting lost even on and now I’m back home. Oh, and did I mention that I got to meet Holly in person? I did, and she is even more lovely in person than she is online. I also managed to get myself locked in a cage on the street before meeting her, but that’s another story for another time because I have to and shove as much food in my face as I can in the next twenty minutes because I’m not allowed to eat after midnight, in preparation for my knee surgery tomorrow.

I realize I’ve neglected to mention this surgery here, and I’m not really sure how that happened, but here’s the really, really short version: remember that car accident? Yeah, well my knee is still messed up. Hopefully it is getting fixed tomorrow. I am very nervous, mostly about the whole no eating or drinking after midnight thing. And also, the needles and scalpels and what if they accidentally operate on the wrong knee (dear doctors: it's the left one!) and such. But really, I’m sure it will all be fine, and hopefully I’ll be able to do things like walk normally and do yoga again after this.  So, it's a good thing, I'm scared anyway because I'm a wuss, and I have to go eat an entire pizza right now.  

Pack mule, pumpkins

Although I consider myself a relatively seasoned traveler, I’ve never mastered the art of packing.  Depending on my mood right before the trip, I either woefully underpack, telling myself it’s perfectly fine to wear the same sweater for an entire week or I end up lugging a suitcase filled with ridiculous just-in-case items and four potential outfits for every possible type of weather. 

I wish I find some sort of a balance, and before every trip I tell myself that this is going to be the time I get it right.  But instead, I found myself on a train to Boston on Friday with the following items in my suitcase:

• Five (5) books.  Two were being returned to NPW, so I guess effectively I only brought three books with me. Three books for one weekend it totally acceptable. I was halfway through one when I left, so I definitely needed a backup. And what if I didn’t like the backup?
• One (1) Laptop, whose only use was to type up a draft of the post you're reading now. Theoretically, I could have found somewhere with internet at some point and… done work? Checked my email? I am not really sure.
• Two (2) DVDs, which I brought just in case the backup book and the backup’s backup both end up sucking. Plus, the DVDs justified the bringing of the laptop.   I watched neither. 
• Two (2) faux-down coats. OK, a coat was actually a smart move since it’s October and it was Boston and it was SNOWING on Friday, but I probably could have gotten away with just the puffy faux-down coat and left the puffy faux-down vest at home.
• Three (3) pairs of shoes. I actually wore two of the three, so I guess that's actually  not bad. 
• One (1) flat iron, which I have used approximately five times in my entire life and did not use on this trip.
• One (1) hat, in case my hair still looked bad after flat-ironing, I guess.
• Enough travel-sized toiletries to last me a month

If I had to choose one packing personality for the rest of my life, it’d surely be The Underpacker.  At least when I underpack, it makes my return home that much sweeter.  My moisturizer!  My pajamas!  A clean pair of socks!  My toothbrush charger!  They all seem so novel and wondrous.  But if I’m in an overpacking mood right before the trip, I just can’t talk myself out of packing twelve of everything.  I mean, I wouldn’t want NPW to think I’m lame and gross because I wear the same sweater two days in a row! I wouldn’t want to be stuck without a cute pair of shoes if Joel and I are on vacation and decide to go out a fancy dinner! And certainly I need to bring a hairdryer, two hairbrushes AND my flatiron just in case.

I’m thinking of trying out the idea of a packing list for my next trip to see if that helps, but somehow I doubt it.  I think this is just one of those ingrained personality traits, like always being anxious about missing a flight or train.  I mean, if packing and traveling were too easy, there’d be no beauty in coming home.

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So, speaking of Boston, it's lovely!  And so are NPW, Heidi and Janssen and Bart, who I traipsed around New England with this weekend.  I've had the pleasure of meeting both NPW and Heidi before, and Janssen and Bart were exactly as I'd picture them (except Janssen talks faster than I'd imagined.  It's funny what ends up fitting your mental image of someone and what doesn't, isn't it?  I certainly never sat around postulating about the speed of Janssen's speech, but that's what struck me at first.  Heidi tells me that she thinks NPW and I both have accents.  I agree that NPW has an adorable accent when she says "about", but I didn't think Heidi had one at all.  And clearly, I don't have an accent.)  We went on the world's worst ghost tour, which was so bad it was hilarious, we saw the 25,000 pumpkins at the World's Largest Pumpkin Festival, we gossiped and twittered like the nerd maniacs we are.  It almost made me want to move to Boston, except for the whole IT'S REALLY COLD THERE part. 

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Some of my favorite photos from the weekend:

NPW "participating" in our "interactive" "ghost hunt" in Salem, MA.  

Keene Pumpkin Festival in Keene, New Hampshire

 

Best pumpkin there, hands down.

I respect their creativity, even if I don't agree with their lifestyle choices.

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Instead of me moving to Boston, I think instead we should all just pick up and move somewhere more temperate.  Like, say, Hawaii.