Hiding Kitty and Acrobatic Baby

Our little black kitty is hiding these days. I don't know what happened to scare her so much but for the last couple days she has mostly been hanging out under the couch. She still comes out for snuggles and to eat (of course) and apparently early in the morning gets her early morning belly rub from Kevmo's foot before he goes off to work, but other than that we're not seeing much of her. If I'm sitting with her and the mailman comes, she freaks out and dives back under the couch... weird. I've felt her all over and she seems to have no painful spots or broken bones, she's got bright eyes and does not seem to have a fever so I think she's not sick. It bothers me that something could have happened to make her feel so scared and I think about how that would feel if she were my child and not a cat. That would make it about 100 times worse I guess. She can't tell me what happened but something clearly has her spooked and there's nothing I can do to fix it or explain. All I can do is try to help her feel safe now and hope she gets better. She probably will.

Meanwhile, the Little Dude keeps getting bigger and stronger and even MORE active, and I've been having a lot of fun playing Name That Body Part Making a Lump in My Belly. Is it a foot? An elbow? A shoulder? A butt? There's no way to tell, but I love having this little "interaction". He sticks a foot (or whatever) out and I poke/massage/rub on it until he moves again. In between having to pee all the time, not being able to sleep much and all the other normal pregnancy stuff, it's nice to have some fun going on too.

Who Needs TV? We Have Cats!

If only you could hear me now, chortling gleefully as I discover that this year for Advent Sara will once again entertain us with her great eye for crappy Christmas stuff that we can giggle and snort over. And perhaps if we have any of this in our house, we will never ever admit it. At least not here.
Stay tuned this Advent Season to Going Jesus for Angels We Have Heard Are High.

It's Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving. I am thankful for lots and lots of stuff. There. That's the Thanksgiving part of my post. Gratefulness abounds, as usual.

In other news, Hobbes is unusually playful this morning and played for a full 5 minutes with a little mousie I have tied to the end of a string. Then he hid under the bed, ashamed to have been caught displaying such kittenish behavior. Mocha quickly picked up the trail, since she has no shame, and began to entertain herself with same mousie that is now tied to my desk drawer so that I can type with two hands. Soon the mousie that Hobbes no longer wanted to play with became much more attractive to him and a fight broke out with both cats hissing and growling and tussling over little purple and pink mousie. These are fun times in the office of Captainwow, it's almost unbearably exciting around here.

Yesterday I sacrificed both blood and hair. The first was 3 or 4 vials at the lab altar for a glucose tolerance test to see if I have gestational diabetes and the second at the altar of vanity and convenience. I gave up about 3 or 4 inches of hair, paid it to the salon broom goddess, who respectfully gathered it up and ceremoniously placed it in the receptacle with all the other offerings of the day. I once again resisted the urge to chop off the bangs, in honor of the months and months of growing them out that I endured. I am very proud of this heroic feat, and I also am very happy to have a great deal less hair to bother with.

Well, Kevmo's got the day off today. We're going to go out and play. Have a great Holiday!

(help me! I'm RHYMING!!)

Isn't That a Daisy?

I like this that Sara at Going Jesus said on her blog post yesterday: "My heresies are boring and unoriginal in the grand scheme of things. It's fun to think of myself as provocative and dangerous, but it's impossible to maintain for long without giggling."

Right on... me too...what she said.

In other news, when asked recently what about my 19th year I might wish for now, I could only come up with 3 things:

The effortless 23 inch waist.
The killer metabolism.
The ability to drink without getting a hangover.

Hm. And this reflects my values in what way!?
It appears my hypocrisy knows no bounds, as Doc Holliday would say.

Captainwow Does Dallas

Captainwow (the little blue and pink mascot, not me) has been travelling again. I forgot to mention this, but my dear friend Just Pat has been kind enough to take Captainwow to Texas where he met a new and unexpected friend! You can see a photo of Captainwow and his beautiful Lady Francesca here on Finding Femme Mode. There may be more photos in the photo album soon, I'll let you know.

Thanks Lady Francesca and Femme Mode for showing Captainwow and Just Pat a good time!

Liquid Color

I just finished washing up after painting. Messy messy painting. Paint is a fascinating thing to me because I love color. Color is like music for me. It can be put together in an unending variety and cause a different effect every time. Over time I've learned that if I like a certain artists it's usually because I like their particular use of color. Every tiny nuance makes a different harmony. When I paint things I love using the paint. I may feel the urge to bathe my soul in it, but I don't want it all over my hands forever, so I usually wash it off.

Anyway, I painted a dresser and a changing table to match the crib we bought for the Little Dude. Kittery Pointe, this color is called. Whatever. I call it minty sage green. It's all shiny when it's wet then it dries to a nice eggshell and looks very yummy. It took two coats because the original color on the dresser was a dark dark blue and the changing table was a dark wood stain. The dresser was left in the basement by the previous owner and the changing table we picked up cheap at a second hand store. I bought cool brushed nickel knobs for the dresser and I'm very excited to have this small stage of "nesting" done.

But I sort of hated to be done too, because there's 3/4 of a gallon of paint left - all that wonderful color should be put somewhere to be looked at and drunk in, not tucked away in the paint closet. ::sigh:: Oh well.... someday an opportunity will present itself and I will slather it somewhere.

While I was working I listened to a program on WYCE called In the Spirit. They play songs with a spiritual tone to them on Sunday mornings. Then every few songs they ring some tibetan prayer bells and read a spiritual type quote. Several years ago I hate to admit that I would not have even listened to such a program. I might have thought that tibetan prayer bells summoned evil spirits and that the show was "Too New Agey".

But anyway, I listened to this radio show today and today they quoted people I never heard of. Which doesn't mean a lot because I don't know a lot. But the quotes were good. Like, one was about how forgiveness is a release for both parties, and a gift. True. Not earth shatteringly new or anything, just true. Most people who've been paying attention in life know this, so it is an Amen kind of statement, not an AHA! statement. And after that quote they played a song that said something like If you found you were wrong would you change? If you knew that you would really rock the boat by believing something else would you change? Or would you stay in your safe place and miss out because you had to be right?

Sounds like something Jesus might have said, if you ask me... and he probably would have said it to a religious person. Maybe to me...

So, even though I wasn't in church in the traditional sense this morning, I heard a good "message" in my basement while I spread yummy, minty sage green shiny liquidy paint on old wood and listened to the radio.

Mawwiage!

I've had a cold for a while now and every day I think I'm getting better until I go to sleep at night then I wake up in the morning and feel worse until about 10 AM then I finally feel OK again. It's like taking 3 steps forward and 2 steps back.

Why don't I just stay up all night and then maybe it will be 4 steps forward 2 steps back.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So, the Kevmo - aka Amazing Man - has been writing up a storm in his blog lately - his link is on my links over there to the right. I am too lazy to link this right now and can't remember his site by heart. He makes me sound really great on there too. Which is fun. And of course, since it's not all about me, he also has some really thought provoking things to say. He's a good thinker and a good writer, that Kevmo. Go see!!

I get to be married to this guy. Can you believe that!? How cool is that? I still have those moments where I am doing something around the house or ruminating about how great it is that I don't have to take out the trash, and I go "Man! I can't believe this is my life! I can't believe I'm married. HOLY COW!!" Pile on top of that the fact that I still can hardly believe we're actually going to become parents - and it's just about too much.

There was no doubt in my mind he was a super good guy or I would never have married him. You have to know me to know how very true this is. I was always fond of saying "I'd rather be single my whole life than marry some shmuck just so I don't have to be alone." And I meant it. Parenthetically - if I am to be perfectly honest - there is a whole stack of other reasons I did not get married until I was 35, but we won't get into that today. Some of it might have been God sparing someone else from marrying a shmuck, but it suits my ego better if I just say how smart I was to wait for this one!

Sometimes I think I got more than I even asked for. A friend wrote a post a while back pondering about if we get what we signed up for in life, in marriage, in becoming moms and dads, in our jobs - in anything. And I'll have to say that when it comes to getting married, even though I knew it was the thing to do to marry this guy, and I was pretty sure he'd be a terrific husband, I had no idea how much he would blow me away with his being a Top Shelf Husband.

Hey Man

In my Age of Empires Game that you've heard me exalt and revere, there are lots of different types of people you can "build". Villagers, soldiers, scouts, and priests, etc... They all respond when you click on them to direct them what to do. They each say something different, according to their type, in some odd language that no one knows but them. The priests in this one civilization that I use a lot are these little old dudes dressed in white robes that toddle around and heal your injured people or convert enemies. They are a very powerful character to have.
The best is when you click on him it sounds just like he's saying (in a monotone) "Hey Man." It CRACKS ME UP!
I loves to take time out of my plunderings to click on all the little priestses and listen to them say "Hey Man. Hey Man. Hey Man!"

www.booger.com

Wouldn't it be funny if Blogger.com was called Booger.com? Booger.com, incidentally, lands here, if you're curious. No boogers there.
Darn.

Ok why am I talking about boogers this early in the morning? It occurred to me I hadn't blogged about boogers. Not EVER!

And that's hard to believe, coming from me.

It's All About Me

So I've noticed that there's thing where on TV the shallowness and self absorption is kind of endearing in some characters. Like Elaine on Seinfeld. She's so stinkin' CUTE! She gets away with all kinds of stuff. She shoves Jerry hard in the chest and says "GET OUT!!" when she's heard some shocking gossip from him. I think that's hilarious. On TV, that is...
Or, Here's one:
Woman: I can't believe somebody pulled the top off of this muffin.
Elaine: That was me. I'm sorry. I don't like the stumps.
Laughtrack: HAHAHHAHAHHAAAA!

I wanna know: why it isn't all cute and adorable when I'm self absorbed and immature?
What's that about, huh?

Potpourri of Thinkings

Someday, I'd love to turn my cats loose with the paint set. Hey! Maybe that's an idea for decorating the baby's room!

ooooh....... We might be on to something here....

In other news, thar ain't nuthin' like a good strong cup of coffee in the AM!
Morning routine:
1. Pee
2. Feed Cats
3. Get Coffee

WHEN is the last time I got up in the morning and got right on my blog? I don't know, but it's been a while.

Anyway - so It's November already? And I'm 6 months pregnant.... dude. That is some wild stuff. Wild enough to make me wax - um. Sentimental or something like that... I'll let you in on a little of it:

For me, November has some somber days in it. It contains my dad's birthday, who passed away in 1999, and the anniversary of the death of my brother who died in November of 2001. Most years so far, I've skimmed right by the dates, remembering it afterwards and kicking myself for not calling Mom on those days. I'm the odd wife too that could (hopefully will not) forget her anniversary date... Any of you men out there who've gotten raked over the coals for this one - I understand your pain. I really do. It isn't that I don't care. It's just that dates don't stick in my brain very well and if I don't consult my calendar or I haven't reminded myself what's happening or what has happened on that day - I may or may not remember.

This year, these two dates are sticking in my brain more solidly and I'm not sure why that is. Maybe it's that it's been a few years and I'm getting the hang of remembering. Maybe it's having this baby boy kicking around inside me who will never know his Grandpa or his Uncle Jon. Maybe it's because I recently had another one of those confusing dreams where Dad is hanging around alive and well and there's some part of my dream brain that knows this isn't right but can't quite place why. If I think really hard about it sometimes I remember - and remembering is like hearing it for the first time all over again. How that dreamland grief can still be so fresh is amazing to me.

But I'm also remembering that November contains some birthdays of some very good friends, and some very good Family. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, and this year probably the first snow will come, and there is Pumpkin Pie to eat and the Kerosene heater to fire up and snuggle in front of, and a baby boy to grow, and lots of other good stuff like that.

It seems that remembering loss helps me remember what I have, and when I'm paying attention, it helps me live with more presence and gratefulness. If I can't find God where I am, I may not be able to find him anywhere else.