Pickles & Dimes

Sunny
Sunny has been a maniacal whining lunatic lately. She gets fed at 6:20 a.m., 5:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. almost every single day on the dot. And yet this does not prevent her from sprinting directly into your path of travel, carooming off your shin and meowing at top volume to be fed if you walk anywhere near her food bowl. On more than one occasion, I have almost fallen victim to her Believable Hunger Spiel, only to find that Jason already fed her five minutes earlier.

Her early morning begging is particularly annoying because it’s accompanied by closet-door pawing, exposed-claws face-jumping, dresser-pull batting, liquor-cabinet opening and bedroom-shade rattling. Any perceived movement results in her grunting loudly and galloping to the kitchen, and once she’s determined you’re not following her, angry thumping back to the bedroom so she can stare balefully at you and whine her displeasure. You’d think she’d lose some weight with all the jumping up and down she does to procure food, but no.

Abby
Abby has taken to voicing her displeasure at not getting enough attention by peeing on Jason’s sandal, the nearby area rugs and the hardwood floor. It is not a UTI, as she uses the litterbox just fine, thanks. It is behavioral and not the first time she’s done it. Since Sunny likes to be a douche and ambush her for fun and Abby dislikes Shorty, Abby stays upstairs every night. Apparently, that’s not cool with her anymore. So we’ve made sure to take an extra 5-10 minutes a night to play solely with her. It seems to be working. Last night, she came downstairs and napped in her bed, and then went over to her scratching post and looked pointedly at Jason until he came over and played with her.

Shorty
Shorty is in the process of learning a new trick: rolling over. He can do it, but does so only after much army-crawling to steal the treat from your hand. Also, he repeated one of his old tricks last week: jumping over our 6-foot-tall fence. Jason dashed around the block to search for him, didn’t find him, ran back to get his truck, spotted police cars screaming toward the park two blocks from our house, said a prayer, and found Shorty two blocks away (in the other direction) sitting casually on someone’s front step.

Luckily for all of them, they’re cute.

Not pictured: Abby, because she was probably upstairs peeing on something.

My car: Hey, there.

Me: What? You’re talking to me? No. Talking to me means bad news.

Car: I was just wondering if you noticed that weird marble-rolling sound when you turn the corner.

Me: Um…yes…

Car: Are you going to do anything about it?

Me: Besides telling myself it’s something rolling around in the trunk? N-o.

Car: You don’t have anything in your trunk.

Me: And until I actually check to confirm that, I can believe otherwise.

Car: You know it’s probably something to do with the rear passenger window.

Me: Lalalalalala!

Car: I don’t know why you just paid the mechanic to jimmyrig the window back up instead of paying another $100 to actually have it fixed.

Me: Money is tight!

Car: He used zip ties! ZIP TIES. The other cars mock me.

Me: It seems to be working though. And I think they’re mocking you because you’re a Chevy Cavalier.

Car: Then why are you afraid to go through a car wash?

Me: Well, the window seems to have opened a teeny tiny itsy bit and I’m not taking any chances. Besides, anytime I wash you in the wintertime, you refuse to open your doors.

Car: That was ONE TIME.

Me: Twice.

Car: Whatever. I just wish you took better care of me. I could use some new tires, maybe a new battery… a rear window that isn’t held together with 49-cent pieces of plastic.

Me: Dude. I spent more than $1,400 on you this summer. You got new brakes, a new alternator…that’s seven months of car payments!

Car: And I’ve given you seven months of good service since then so your point is moot.

Me: Grrr.

Car: By the way, it took your husband to point out that one of my tires is low.

Me: Uh-huh.

Car: And he’s the one who’s also telling you to check my oil.

Me: But I’m the one who always knows when and how to add the coolant, am I right?

Car: Do you care about me AT ALL?

Me: Dude, I’ve had you for 12 and a half years, why are you pulling attitude now?

Car: Don’t think I don’t know about your secret searches on cars.com.

Me: Oh, is that what this is all about? I’m just preparing a Plan B.

Car: Sure you are.

Me: Look. I want you to make it to 200,000 miles. Don’t you want that, too?

Car: That would be nice.

Me: Yeah. I’ll take your picture, and I bet you get a nice plaque or something for that.

Car: Ooh…a plaque!

Me: Think of how you can rub that in the other cars’ faces, huh?

Car: That would be nice.

Me: So just keep chugging along, OK?

Car, begrudgingly: I’ll think about it.

I’m sure someday I will write a coherent entry with a beginning, middle and end, but until that day, you get this.

My hip issue is still plaguing me, to the point that I think I tilt sideways when standing because my left hip aches. It is also prone to popping in and out of its socket (or whatever it does to make me grasp my hip in agony as I lurch sideways in front of appalled coworkers until it fixes itself), and I imagine it would be akin to having a giant wishbone for legs, one side ready to snap off and grant good luck wishes to the winner.

I dreamt a few nights ago that my teeth were falling out. First a tooth in the back, no big deal, and then a front tooth. I became concerned and while I sat in the dentist’s office gently pushing against my other teeth to see if they were loose, I pulled out whole bottom sections of teeth and gums. To say I am still grossed out about this days later is an UNDERSTATEMENT. I mean, WHAT THE HELL, subconscious???

Public Service Announcement: The song “A Really Cool Dance Song” by Bowling For Soup is awesome and you should listen to it if you want to be awesome, too.

Jason called out the fact that most of my meals seem to contain cheese as an ingredient, and at first I was chagrined, thinking, “Yeah. I should probably cut back on that.” But then last week, during an extremely stressful and busy day where I had to unexpectedly work late, I was moping around doing the “Why me?” pity dance when I suddenly remembered that I had a cheese stick in the fridge. And guess what? My mood improved tenfold. I call it Cheese Therapy.

What foods put you in a good mood?

When I was a kid and caught a glimpse of my face in a window or circus-like mirror so that it appeared I was deformed, I once got it into my head that my face really was deformed, and that my parents had bought special expensive mirrors that made me look normal and placed them wherever I might be. I also thought they had paid off everyone I came into contact with into looking at me normally rather than recoiling in horror at my disfigurement.

Whenever I am standing on the edge of something, whether it’s a dock at the lake or an upper-level deck or window, I get the urge to jump. To just leap out into the open. The feeling is so strong I can actually feel my muscles twitching in anticipation. It’s kind of creepy, but on the other hand, this instinct allowed me to bungee jump without hesitation.

When I’m driving underneath a bridge, if there’s a car overhead crossing that bridge at the same time, I always estimate whether or not my car would’ve collided with the other car if our paths had actually intersected. Also, when I pass a large object (wall, guardrail, etc.), I wonder how it would feel if I actually collided with the object at my present rate of speed.

Whenever I’m watching a movie and someone dives underwater, I hold my breath to see if I can last as long as they do.

How about you? Any weird things you do or think?