Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Pictures of Cats

Now I can call this sucker a blog.

We have two cats, which came to me by way of the aunts I lived with in Orlando. They are generally good cats, affectionate with us and appreciative of attention and food. Always up for a snuggle. If we had to divvy them up as such, Marcie would be Josh's and Josephinée would be mine.

Marcie is a gray tabby shorthair, Josephinée is a fluffy... cat.

Marcie loves, loves, loves Josh. I get jealous sometimes, but it's really cute. She wants to sit on him whenever he's at the computer and if he won't let her do that, she'll curl up under the desk. I tell people she's built like an opera singer: big middle, with a tiny head and tiny feet. Marcie will headbutt before she'll yowl, and she has a low meow. She's a very affectionate cat but she seems to
really love Josh and he's been charmed ever since she first got on her back feet and pawed at his leg.

She'll do it whenever you pat your leg. She's a bit of a whore for bellyrubs and head skritches.

Josephinée is very catlike when it comes to people, though. She's sky of new people and not half so friendly as Marcie (when new people come over she hides on top of the kitchen cabinets). But she does love me, and that makes me really happy.

Like I said, snuggly. When we're not doing something together it's usually Josh at the desk and me on the couch, and the cats know this and position themselves accordingly. I wish I could fall asleep with my neck at weird angles as easily as my cat does. Josephinée gets in this I GOTTA BE ON SOMEBODY mood a few times a week and she'll jump on me, walk on me, settle, and get up after a few seconds to go do the same to Josh. She's a pretty cat, usually very elegant, and she's got the neatest little trill to her voice.

But she drools when she is happy. It's the damndest thing. I thought she'd gotten water on her face the first few times she dripped on my shirt, but no: my cat is so happy she salivates sometimes.

Even though she's not my favorite cat, Marcie is pretty damn cute. It helps that she's usually in close proximity to Josh.















They seem to get along well enough together. They usually snuggle in the same place without snuggling together, exactly. Both with be on the loveseat, or on opposite ends of the couch. They do go crazy on one another a few times a month, but we have enough biff mice and cat toys that they each have plenty of things to play with. Marcie, surprisingly given her size, is a really good laser dot-getter. She'll also chase one of our iPhones if we slide it across the carpet.

Marcie starts it, when they do fight. Just saying.




Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Drums keep pounding rhythm to the brain

January was a hard month at work. Lots of year end stuff right up against the end-- I went in for a few hours on Sunday of the last two weekends. The weekends are so much easier to work in-- no interruptions! I think I'm catching back up but there's still so much to do and I'm a little nervous about some things... Hopefully I can keep productive and things will smooth out.

Finally did a discussion post tonight (the discussions are open until tomorrow night). Just kept putting it off each night, I think in part because work's got me so beat and in part because I felt so one-sided in my response: "this dude is a whiny old fart who needs to get with the program!" or, you know, a more scholarly approximation of that sentiment.

I can't stop listening to "Stupid Hoe." Luckily for the love of my life, it's playing into headphones. He's Final Fantasy XIII-2-ing. It's really, really pretty. Ooh, I just heard a chocobo sound! And my heart is full and glad. You a stupid ho, you-a-you-a stupid ho. And now I've moved on to DJ Khaled, who drives me crazy with that "We the best!" shit but pretty consistently puts out songs I like. The things we put up with.

Don't mean to be so random. Having this time at the end of the day to do as I please is very nice, and I've been giving in to guilty pleasures to make the most of it for the past few weeks. Looking forward to St. Valentine's day and especially to the cruise, which canNOT get here fast enough. Vacation, Calgon, something, anything-- take me away!

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Thankfully, I'll never want for things to want.

It's very cool that I can do things in the order that I want-- get engaged get into grad school get married finish grad school get job make babies, or get married work work work get into grad school make babies, or some other combination of these opportunities. The point is, there's nothing I have to do. I get to be with Josh and that's my favorite part. And since we've got that lined up, well... Future details can be dealt with as we get there, I guess.

But (there's always a but, and I'm sure it only gets butt-ier with babies) while this freedom to do things in whatever order I'd like is nifty, I find myself wishing sometimes that there were a guide to follow, some sort of benchmark yardstick (zounds, nouns!) against which to check progress in the things we're planning and working towards.

I guess there is, really. The plan now is to get into graduate school, get married this fall, get house (! -- this is a Josh idea that mostly thrills but slightly terrifies me, since my expectation of graduate school is that it will be wonderful and impoverishing all at the same time and a mortgage seems so adult and responsible and even though our lives are adult and responsible I'm not sure I'd italicize them yet, you know?), finish school, get library job, work library job for a while, get down to the babymaking. Eventually I would like to meet our kids. The "eventually" of that is something I waffle on. I want Josh all to myself forever! I want a kiddo! I want more than one kiddo! I want to be able to sleep in on weekends! I want to clutch at whatever semblance of skinny I possess at the time! Sheesh.

But back at the first point, I like that there's really only whatever plans we make that we have to stick to, and we can change those plans if we want. I think what we've got going on makes sense and is a good sort of schedule for life. At the same time, there's no rule we have to live by or deadlines we have to me. Really it comes down to there not being a deadline I have to meet.

I'm always late, is all.
____________________________

Volunteered at a library last night and it went swimmingly. Was nervous, people were nice, quickly felt like things were falling into place in a pleasant just-so way. After as much polite badgering as I could muster I got a voicemail from the library where I tried so hard to volunteer basically saying "Thanks, we'll call you when something comes up." One phone call to second library, BOOM! Volunteer opportunity. And I'm glad.

Graduate school application is in. I've been blogging so infrequently I don't remember if I mentioned that. Have good feedback from summer instructor and classmates that I've got in made in the shade to get in this time but because, well, I was hoping for that last time, I am less than convinced. At the same time, I see what they're saying. Certainly I am a better qualified applicant this go-round. Application committee, if you are reading this: let me in, let me in! Please!

Cruise later this month (!). I am so looking forward to a week away with my sweetheart.

That's all the news that's fit to print. That's all the news that's fit to print that I can remember or feel like divulging, at any rate. Make stuff up for the blanks, I'd be flattered if you thought of me.