Damn Dirty Apes!

.... at least, I think that's what Heston said (or part of it). And in line with that:

- Damn you, Verizon. Your connection sucks, you continue to bill me for random things that don't appear to even apply to me, and you don't send me bills for ages and then send me big fat bills demanding payment for services I don't even use. I hate you.

- Damn you, television pretty boys! I think I'm past the point of the remotest bit of interest ... and then you reach out with your pretty eyes and suck me back in!!! (You'll pay, CW. Maybe not now, maybe not in the near future, but you'll pay.) I'm supposed to be above this stuff. Leave me some dignity!!!

- Damn you, pogo.com! You offer nine zillion versions of solitaire, word games, arcade games, and now you add Monopoly??? Is there a job out there that requires me to play this stuff for a living? Because I would be a millionaire.

- Damn you, Con Edison! I'm turning off lights, leaving off the A/C, sitting in the dark - cut me some slack! Unless my cats are turning everything on while I'm gone, I'm pretty sure you owe me money.

That's it for today. Carry on.

Kids Are a Great Workout

Someday I will stop apologizing for being late, because I will no longer be late. Today is not that time. Tomorrow's not looking good either.

It's a beautiful day in NYC. Weight Watchers has been going well; the past two weeks I've recommitted to being healthy and active. This weekend I voluntarily chased two-year-old twin boys around the local playground in the heat and humidity for the sake of extreme calorie-burning, after it worked so well last weekend (if you want a "different" total body workout, volunteer to give "horseyback rides" to a group of small children, and then convince another adult to do the same and race you while doing it. The kids love it and the next day you'll be sore in all the right places - just make sure you're doing it on a springy surface or your knees will hate you). (Stop looking at me funny. I'm serious.)

Living on my own has been going well, although I still walk into the apartment sometimes or wake up in the morning and feel like none of it is real - I'm either dreaming or just visiting, and at some point the person who actually lives in my apartment is going to come back and it will be time to go home. I wonder when that feeling goes away.

On the plus side, everything is up to me. I pick what comes in and what goes out, from food to furniture to people. I don't have to fight anyone for the bathroom, I have four closets (FOUR!) all to myself, and if the place gets messy I don't have to hear about it, because it's MY place and MY mess.

On the minus side, I don't like cleaning any more than I did when I was living with my parents. Also, personal addictions that may have been a side issue when living in cramped conditions become full-blown under the microscope when you live alone and have time to face them.

That said, the following post will be my usual complaint/confessional...

... they're not centipedes.

They're silverfish. Really big ones. Which means that they're not even doing me the favor of eating roaches - they're just showing up to harrass me.

Other than that, it's a normal Thursday in New York. The weather's been unusually kind, which means I can leave the AC off and hopefully save some money on my next Con Edison bill (speaking of which, guys at Con Ed? Are you listening? I've been turning off lights and using my 2-cent an hour fan and such ... shouldn't my bill be lower, at least by a tad?).

Also, I really hate Verizon. (Although their customer service people have, so far, been the nicest and most helpful CSRs ever. Really. Mean it. Call me.)

Out, Out, Damned Centipede(s)!

Let's see now. Overall, things weren't going too badly. Oh, sure, I'm out one full-size Aerobed (thank you, "Gnat" - turns out he wasn't fully declawed after all. Not that I have a major problem with that, but the Aerobed certainly did), there are herds of cat hair balls, not unlike tumbleweeds, roaming through my apartment and occasionally attempting to escape, and the only working phone jack is in one of the front hall closets. Accessing the internet now requires me to hook up a bunch of wires and run them from the closet into the foyer, which now doubles as an office. But other than that, things were okay.

Until the centipedes.

I don't have roaches. I can take down any mosquito. I'm not saying I'm not grateful for my lack of insect issues. But the centipedes.

The first one was small, and not terribly bright. It was roadkill on my slipper within seconds. The second one was huge, and could have had a college degree for all I know. It took me about 10 minutes to get anywhere near it once I spotted it. I actually considered letting it have the apartment, packing everything up, including the cats, and moving immediately. I also considered calling my coworker and her boyfriend and begging them to come and kill the thing, which, I kid you not, appeared to be sprouting more legs as it sat there on my windowsill.

Reason (of a sort) finally prevailed, and I looked around for something to spray at it. The only options were Febreze and Oust. So I Febrezed the hell out of the centipede, while looking for something long enough to kill it with, preferably something that I could use from another room (or even another state). The Swiffer turned out to be a godsend (hello, product placement!).

Where were the cats during this episode? Cheerfully observing. Thanks, guys. You're sure earning your keep.

Get a job.

Are you SERIOUS?!

So, we (we meaning me and my first two cats) have finally adjusted to the latest addition, "Gnat" (not his real name). I've adapted to being shrieked/squeaked at whenever he sees me; I'm getting used to his need to chase invisible insects all over the apartment, knocking various items and small appliances around at random. I'm even coming to terms with his latest habit of hurling things at me from my dresser at 6:00 AM, when he thinks I should be getting up to feed him (and, to be fair, his two other furry housemates). I am NOT overjoyed about the fact that he likes to hang out on top of my fridge, however, and I'll tell you exactly why:

1 - There's cat hair on the stove.
2 - There's cat hair on the sink.
3 - There's cat hair on the dish rack.
4 - There's cat hair on top of the fridge.
5 - There's cat hair in my freezer.

Yes, the other day I discovered cat hair IN MY FREAKIN' FREEZER. I haven't figured out yet if it's somehow managing to leech its way in through the freezer door because he loves to sleep up there, or if this cat has now figured out how to open the freezer door and has been hanging around in there to cool off. I wouldn't be surprised if he was holding martini parties while I'm out. It might even explain why "Miss Cranky" (also not her real name), my elderly tabby, seems to be getting along better with "Gnat." She kind of seems like the type who'd smoke cigars and slop martinis in her old age.

So when I do my cleaning, I now have to remember to scrub out the one place I thought was safe from all things "cat." I don't know why I'm surprised about this. My family always ends up with the weird animals (psychotic hamster, exercise-fiend guinea pig, junk food addict guinea pig, female Pekinese dog obsessed with men and human food...).

I should have gotten a fish.

Where to begin?

First, Weight Watchers. I went to my meeting (Saturday AM) but didn't weigh in and didn't track until Monday (I figured the first day of the month was a good day to get started again). My WW leader, Ricardo, who has been my leader since I started my "off-again, on-again" WW pattern, just left (he was at WW for 6 years and he's SO NOT REPLACEABLE).

Second, there's The Cat.

I have two cats. I don't know why I thought getting a third one would be a good idea. Maybe I really am a crazy cat lady already and just don't know it yet. But as a result of too much time spent on Craigslist, and the fact that I am a Royal Sucker, I now have a third cat.

He's huge. He's hairy. He's all black with big gold eyes. He hates my other two cats and has staked out the top of my kitchen cabinets as his current living space. I'm not completely sure this thing is even a real cat. He makes one of the highest-pitched sounds I've ever heard in my life. It's not a meow or even a mew - it sounds like a gnat with an amplifier, shrieking for help.

On the plus side, he's reasonably affectionate (when he's not snarling at my other cats). I'm hopeful that eventually he'll reach a point where he and my other two cats will be able to be in the same room without an "I can hiss louder than you can" match taking place. But in the meantime, I've got a very confused blind Snowshoe cat wondering where all the noise is coming from, an elderly, angry tabby refusing to cede any turf, and a gigantic, furry black blob living in my kitchen.

I'm staying the hell off Craigslist.

Here I go again, on my own ...

Okay, so it's not "again." It's the first time. Well, the second time if you count the 10 months I lived with a roommate back when I was 23. (Yeah, that didn't work out well. I have a short fuse and she had a short supply of sanity. Seriously. She told my sister that a stuffed pig I had in my room OINKED at her one day when she was home alone. You'd question her sanity too!) Anyway, for the first time in my life I have my own apartment. It's slowly developing into something resembling a home. I actually refer to it as "home" although some part of me still thinks of my parents' apartment as "home," too. The cats have settled in and claimed the majority of the place for themselves, although they've left me some room (part of the bed, most of the kitchen, and the foyer).

My weight loss, on the other hand, crashed and burned. As did a significant portion of my schoolwork. I've regained at least 15 pounds (I'd lost 25), and I barely passed a class that should have been reasonably simple. But I knew that learning to live completely on my own wouldn't be easy. I can only deal with one major life change at a time, and something (or in this case, "things") were going to fall by the wayside.

Anyway, it's time to get refocused. I'm slowly getting used to having to drag my laundry to the (incredibly busy) local laundromat; I've adapted to the bathroom that, shockingly, is even tinier than my parents' bathroom; eventually, Verizon may even get around to activating my DSL and phone service. I like my neighborhood, and it's time to get to know it a little better. Before this year's New York summer humidity REALLY kicks in, it's time to get some walking down, some visits to the local farmer's market made.

If you live in Flatbush anywhere, maybe I'll see you there.

It's been THAT LONG?

Wow ... I can't believe I haven't posted here since last August. Well, it's 2008 now, and some things have changed for the better. I'm down 21 pounds from the last time I posted, and I'm working on the other ... how many ... you know what, I'm working on the other pounds. Let's just leave it at that. Gotta love Weight Watchers.

I've also discovered some fabulous blogs written by other people with some of the same issues. I'll have to include links to those here at some point, but I'm feeling a bit lazy at the moment.

I wish I had something a little more clever to say, and I'm sure I'll think of something at some inappropriate time later today. But in the meantime, I'm happy to be back.