oh shin

ouch. why might my shins be sore one would ask? i had a scuffle with a grocery cart and i clearly lost. today was the bbq/garden party which was quite nice... i ate too much. getting ready for the event i had to make an emergency run to the store for pineapple and some other odds and ends. not so many things that i couldn't carry, but at check out they gave me a cart even though i didn't have one upon entering the checkout line. ok, i thought, this will be easier than juggling everything. sure, why not? i drove my cart out to the car and started unloading. but apparently for some reason the parking lot in the flattest town you can imagine is deceivingly slanted and my cart rolled away without me. it wasn't going very fast, and it was actually heading straight for the cart return. amused, i watched for a second, then realized that it was veering for a parked truck. so i ran, no sprinted, after it. in flip flops. and flung myself at it at the last second smashing both shins into it somehow and landing and skidding on my butt. and then we crashed into the truck anyway. hopefully it was already dinged there... i still don't understand how it could pick up speed like that. that shopping cart was joy-riding i say. confounded cargo-bearing contraption...

and by the way... sorry, no good nephew-related stories to share. they ended up not being able to come. such a let down, i know. but look on the bright side, i didn't have to grow a mustache.

My Cat Twinkletoes

i found this recently ... and i have no idea what grade i wrote it in, but it's kind of funny.

My cat Twink is a mixed cat in color. He has a pink nose with a black spot. Most of him is covered with long black fur. He has white paws and some white on his face and chest also.

He acts strangely sometimes. He rolls in dirt, chases his tail and always wants in when he is out, and out when he is in.

Besides all his weirdness and cuteness he is a good cat. He doesn't try to get food from the kitchen counter or the dining room table. He doesn't get in the way or under your feet. He doesn't get on people's laps unless they invite him up.

A great thing about him is that he is hardly any work at all. All we have to do to take care of him is to fill his self feeding food dish when it runs out, take him to the vet, and occasionally give him medicine, clip his nails and clean out his sandbox. We don't even give him water. He drinks the cool water from the toilet.

I suppose there is one more great thing about him. We can take him to Ketchum when we need to. He just sits on his cat-napper the whole way.

namesake

movies rarely make me cry, but the right one at the right time can have that effect. nicki came out to ketchum this weekend to visit me and another friend of hers. we rented namesake, which i had never heard of. it was a movie that i would normally like and then forget. it was a rich visually, which i appreciate. i liked the characters, you have to feel for them. but something about their story hit home with me right now. certain parallels, as you often find in others' lives or narratives. i had a hard time fighting the lip quiver. i cried, and though the plot meandered and might even leave you wondering where the climax might be, it resonated. there's not much you can do when something resonates with you. usually its just a small piece you see somewhere else that makes you think, 'i know that exactly, and i thought it was just me.' and for a second you're stunned and comforted and unsettled. the old becomes fresh as if it were new, just for a moment.

mystery solved

there has been a strange odor coming from somewhere in or around the bathroom for some time. it isn't really bad, but definitely not good, and most disturbing is that i can't explain it. i clean, and clean, and each time the bathroom is sparkling and practically glowing with cleanliness, i think 'good, it should smell that way.' but then i walk by, and it's still there. is it me?

well, today i finally figured it out. there is a laundry chute right outside the bathroom. and downstairs at the bottom of the chute there is an open bag of cat food which permeates the air up and out of the chute with a greasy cat food aroma. not the most appetizing, and probably from now on the smell of cat food will make me think of bathrooms.

fruit, calendars, and romance

i think there is something about a single gal that makes some people nervous. especially here. i went to get my hair cut several months ago, and when the gal cutting my hair learned that i have no children and am not married the conversation sputtered and died. she didn't know what to say to someone like me. you know, female, mid-twenties, and unattached. the horror. i'm an unusual phenomenon here. and what's really a mystery is that i am not especially concerned and not actively going out and trying to find myself a man. something must be done.

roscoe started years ago, trying to get me up to canada to meet his grandson. that failing, he tried to get us to meet here in twin. alas i happened to be out of town when the canadian lad arrived. it would almost seem as if i were trying to thwart his near fail-proof plan to marry me off.

never to fear, the next attempt soon followed. except this time my next-door neighbor is scheming. whenever someone prefaces what they are about to tell you, it usually means they ran over your cat or they are trying to set you up with someone. "you might think this is really weird, but i'm going to say it anyway. i know it sounds crazy, but..." ok, ok i'm thinking, who is he? ah, her nephew. hmmm.... "it's no big deal, just dinner, or maybe coffee," she says. dinner!? dinner no big deal, since when is dinner no big deal? i mean, it is no big deal. if it's your mom, or business, or an old friend, or even someone nice you meet. but dinners with nephews, or grandsons, you've never met seem too much.

apparently the nephew knows very little about his aunt's plot, and apparently he's coming to our barbeque with her in a few weeks so that we can be coincidentally introduced. wow. the best part is that lisa and mike, no matter what drama unfolds or doesn't, are sure to make fun of me for the rest of the summer. oh boy. something must be done.

thyroid revelations

i was flipping through some old journal entries today. i was surprised when i noticed how many times over that last couple of years i said something to the effect of how tired i felt. one entry was so short that i pretty much said, i'm tired, too tired to really write anything. that is pathetic. of course, now with all kinds of normal thyroid levels coarsing through my veins, i feel relatively superhuman. you know, pretty good. and it just got me to thinking how that's like life. when you have some problem in your life, and it's just a part of life, you don't necessarily notice that anything is wrong. the status quo is accepted, it's normal, so why complain about it or try to improve anything? maybe it was always there, or maybe it crept up so slowly that you never even noticed that anything was wrong until it became much more serious. a thyroid problem is about as easy to fix a problem as they come. just take a pill... well in this case, it's actually true. i was scraping together all my strength to function mentally and physically by the time i got around to seeking help. so thinking about dealing with scarier and more difficult problems, like drug abuse or domestic violence, for example, i can hardly imagine trying to find the strength to deal with it. there is no social stigma attatched to having to take thryoid like there is for going into rehab or jail, or being in an abusive relationship. to an outsider, the problems seem obvious, but maybe to that person it isn't so obvious that things could be better.

memorial day

today kathleen and i went to decorate the graves with some flowers from the garden. i said hello to the georges, cora lee, ruth, muriel, and william. later on today we are going to see indiana jones. hope it's good.