The Continuing Adventures of Kitten Bunnyfoot

[Voice over] From out of the Old West comes Kitten Bunnyfoot!  Protector of the unprotected, chaser of small beams of light, destroyer of weak-willed cat toys, she's Kitten Bunnyfoot!  Loyal to a fault, precious to the max, totally insane for about four minutes a day, she's Kitten Bunnyfoot!

Today's Adventure:  The Unexpected Surprise and the Unfortunate Event Which Followed.

Take it away, Kitten Bunnyfoot!

Yeah, ok, so, the other night, I barfed on the living room floor.  In three puddles of varying size.  My human noticed it the next morning when she got up to feed me.  She cleaned it up with a bunch of Kitty Mess Wipes, moaned a little about being late for work, showered, and left for the day.  Totally forgetting to feed me!  This sucks.  Whine, whine, whine.

That's it for Today's Adventure.  Join us next week for another thrilling episode!

Homework: Money, money, money

For this week's homework, Scalzi asks:

Weekend Assignment #36: I have a mug on my desk with $70.65 in change in it. What should I do with the money? The only unacceptable answer is "give it to me." Honestly. You can do better.

Extra Credit: If you've got a picture of your own loose change storage device, show it.

To which I respond:  $70.65, is that all? 

I have rather a lot of change, in various stages of rolledness.  Here's the change I've already rolled -- there's $87.50 of it, and it's only pennies, nickels and dimes.  (I've sold several rolls of quarters to my boss -- she gave them to her daughter for the coin-operated washing machines at college.)

I've also got coins that are partially sorted and waiting to be rolled (pennies in one jar, quarters in another -- the nickels and dimes are still partying together) ...

and, finally, the containers that haven't been sorted yet.  This assignment surprised me on this one, as I had the taller container in plain view on my shelf, but I found the stouter one when I was taking out the rolled coins to take pictures.

(That's, of course, just the stuff at home.  I also have a coffee mug about half-full of quarters, and a tin two-thirds full of unsorted other coinage, at work.)

As you might have noticed, I don't spend my change.

When I was in college, I needed to save my coins for laundry (the washers took quarters and the dryers took dimes -- I ended up filling my pockets with nickels whenever I went out and gave a few to the homeless people who'd ask for money).  By the time I was out of school, saving my change was a habit, and I then decided to make a conscious decision to never spend change and save up that money for charity.  (It's really easy to get in the habit of always paying with bills and saving the change.  It makes your wallet lighter, too.)

Once I made this decision, however, the two sticking points have always been rolling it (I hate giving up nearly 10% to Coinstar) and figuring out which charity should get it.

As it turns out, I now know what I'm going to do with my change this time around.  I doubt this will help John with his dilemma, but I'm happy to share my current project...

Last year at about this time, I was on vacation in Fiji.  One of the things I noticed there was how astonishingly expensive books were.  I mean, there was a paperback copy of the first Harry Potter book in the hotel gift shop (which wasn't the cheapest place to buy stuff on the island, but still) for, like, over $20.  Thinking about it, it made some level of sense -- I mean, they don't have a publishing house anywhere on Fiji, and probably have to ship everything over from Australia.

On my trip, we visited one little island and met the locals.  They were extremely poor, but very nice and welcoming.  And spoke English.  And I thought, "Damn.  My mom used to teach elementary school.  I bet just one of her classes would have enough gently-used copies of Harry Potter to give one to every kid on this island." 

So, we contacted the school and it turns out they're always looking for charitable things for the kids to do -- and they think a book drive for Fiji would be great.  And I contacted the cruise company who took me to the little island in the first place, and they said that if I sent the books to their main office in Nadi, they would take the books out to the island. 

The one sticking point seems to be the same one that keeps books so expensive in Fiji in the first place -- the cost of shipping books to Fiji.  Shipping heavy boxes of books out there isn't cheap.

But I bet I could send a lot of books with all my spare change.

Only Because I've Been Asked. Twice.

Yes, Jews celebrate Thanksgiving.

(As a rule of thumb, if the holiday has nothing to do with Jesus, we're good with it.)

(Besides.  It's an eating holiday.  Who doesn't like an eating holiday?)

Seinfeld

Am I the only one who is way not excited about the Seinfeld DVDs?

You might think I should be.  I watched the show regularly when it was on -- but I was a little late to the party, so watching the first and second seasons on DVD would probably fill in a few gaps.

But the fact is, I lost interest in the show after the last episode.  In a huge way.

I mean, here's me, tuning in to the antics of these four people on a weekly basis -- and then the show, in its last episode, makes a point of pointing out what lousy self-centered people they are.  And I thought, "You know what?  You're right.  Why am I wasting my time watching these losers?"  I mean, there's no point in quoting lines from the show when you're quoting lines from jerks.  And why should I feel sympathetic to them when they get themselves in trouble when, now that I think about it, they pretty much deserve what they get?

Prior to the final episode, I had enjoyed tuning in every week -- whether the show was new or in reruns.  But after that, I never watched it again.  Not in syndication, not ever.

I've never known a show to so clearly kill itself for me in a single episode.  Perhaps Jerry & the gang felt like it was necessary to point out to the audience that we'd been watching characters who were really just terrible people -- but it had the effect of chiding us, the viewers, for actually enjoying it.  Result:  an instant case of the "I don't care"s.

Bad Techno Day

Y'ever have a bad technology day? 

I'm not talking about the electric razor attacking you like in that Twilight Zone episode.  I just mean one of those days where every freakin' dial and meter is letting you down.

This happened to me on Friday.

Thursday night, I turned my cell phone off before bed.  Woke up Friday morning, turned the phone on, and it gave me the "low battery" alert.  Impossible.  The damn thing was showing a near-full charge when I shut it off the night before.

And then I got in my car to go to work -- and had half a tank of gas.  This, too, was weird, as I'd have sworn it was only a quarter tank when I left it last.  I'm not really complaining about extra gas, but how did it get there?  Did someone just GIVE me an extra quarter tank of gas for no reason?  Or were my dials messing with me?

And the worst thing of all -- when I turned on my ipod to continue my random stroll through every track I have, instead of picking up where I'd left off halfway through, it started all over again at song 1 of a brand new shuffle.  ARGH.

Not the day to operate heavy equipment, that's for sure.

Thank you, thank you very much

This week's assignment:

Weekend Assignment #35: Tell us something you should be thankful for -- but that you're usually not. After all, it's easy to be thankful for all the things you know you should be thankful for: Your family and friends, your home, the good things that come from living wherever (and whenever) you do. So try stretching a little and think about something that you're thankful for that you usually don't think much about at all. It can be serious or silly; it's up to you. You just have to be genuinely thankful for it -- once it comes to mind.

I'm thankful to Al Gore for inventing the internet.  Kidding!  Although I am certainly thankful for the invention.

But, when you get right down to it, as much as I love the internet (and I truly, truly do), I think I am even more thankful for, um, feminine protection.  And I'm not talkin' stun guns, people.

Hmm, I wonder which one is more likely to make Scalzi's list...

Huffy Kitty

The past few days, Jasmine has been extremely clingy before I go to bed.  I normally close the bedroom door and sleep by myself, while she goes off on her merry kitten way and does whatever she does (sleep a little, hunt down the treats I've hidden for her, and run psychotically around my apartment a few times). It's a good arrangement.

Every night, as I approach the bedroom door to let myself in, I am the victim of a "drive-by catting."  Jasmine comes tearing down the hallway and jumps in my direction -- sometimes managing to tap my thigh with her soft little paws -- and then keeps right on running.

But lately, she's been staying after the drive-by.  She circles through my legs and brushes up against my ankles.  An impromptu petting session doesn't make her leave.  She really, really wants to be let in the bedroom at night.

I've been petting her and loving her and talking sweetly to her and locking her out.  The other night, she wasn't falling for it.  I eventually had to throw a toy down the hall and let her scamper after it.  When she was down there, I sneaked into my bedroom.  I felt horribly guilty about this.  Jas had been so excited when I threw the toy -- she thought we were going to play!  And I was just distracting her so I could slip away.  Mean, mean human.

So, last night, I played with her a lot, and gave her extra treats.  And then I thought:  why not let the sweet purry little princess stay in the bedroom at night?  All she seems to do when I'm in there anyway is curl up under the bed.  Where's the harm in the aforementioned curling if I happen to be in there sleeping?  (Besides, she's gotten past her previous tendency to attack my water glass.)  It's been a while since I tried letting her in, and she REALLY wanted in, and she's so cute, and so sweet, and has the cutest little pink paws, and I just love it when she's all joyful and ...

When I hid the treats for her to find, I took one and placed it in plain view on my bedroom floor, and left the door open for her.  It was as engraved an invitation as I could come up with.  Jasmine couldn't believe it.  She was cautious at first, and kept peeking around the corner to see if I was really letting her in the bedroom at night.  When I spoke encouragingly to her, she dove under the bed, thinking she was hiding where I couldn't get her.  I said, "That's fine, baby.  You can stay there."

Well, lemme tell you.  Although she takes no interest in me when I'm awake, apparently a sleeping (or nearly sleeping) human is extremely fascinating.  During the first hour, I was twice awakened by little paw sounds near my head -- I opened my eyes and was staring right at kitty nostrils.  Things calmed a little after that -- and while I'm sure I got SOME amoung of sleep, cat action had me awake and looking at the clock on nearly an hourly basis.

She got under the blankets with me.  She's been playing on (or under) my bed for more than a year, and has always been afraid to go under the covers -- even when I lift them invitingly.  But not last night.  Last night, I was minding my own business when all of a sudden I was awakened by kitty whiskers tickling my thigh.  I love the warm little ball of fur all curled up next to me, but it's hard to sleep when, with every breath she takes, the little whiskers gently scratch up and down.

At about 5:30, she was back outside the bed, clawing the mattress.  "Jasmine, no."  Claw, claw, claw.  "Jasmine, NO!"  Claw, claw, claw.  Two hours till my alarm goes off.  I think about how valuable two hours of interrupted sleep are.  I pick her up -- wriggling -- and set her outside the door, and close it.  Go back to sleep for what I HOPE is two solid hours of snoozing, but (dammit) my nose is congested and it's hard to fall asleep.  I eventually get an hour or so.

7:30 alarm.  I open the door to let Jasmine in for our morning pet-fest.  She doesn't come.  I call out.  She doesn't come.  I peek out the door.  She's stretched out in the hallway, just a few feet away.  Staring.  Sulking.  Extremely peeved. 

Yeah, her and me both.