The World According To Me

I have, however, been thinking of how I said I would post a photo of Esme in all her kitten-cuteness, just to show off a bit. So I got my camera out this morning before I left for work to see if I could get a nice shot to post on there here blog.

I have about 15 photographs of a light grey streak whizzing through the frame. The little thing just would not sit still for even a millisecond.

I will persevere however, and promise to come up with the goods.

So I've been thinking about what to write here for a few days, writing is so cathartic however blogging is so public, I'm not sure what I should do. To respect the parties involved (including myself) I think I'm going to write how I really deeply feel right now somewhere else, not published, the release is just as effective.

The bottom line is that I'm now a single mum to three furry dependants. Another chapter in my life closes, another one starts. Doors closing, water running, fish in the sea, whatever. I'm past the crying now, the wondering, the questioning. I'm not angry anymore, I'm not sad or lost. I just am. The hardest part is to try and get used to the little things about being by myself, the things I took for granted. Making my own morning coffee, remembering to take the bins out, changing "we" to "I".

I spent my weekend revelling in myself. Taking long baths, napping whenever I felt tired, cooking for friends, eating at a fancy restaurant with my family, drinking champagne while people-watching, sitting out in my lovely garden letting the sunlight wash over me, eating chocolate for dinner. All the good things, with the promise of more to come. I have such amazing people around me, and I feel so, so blessed.

I feel neither vindicated or guilty from this whole thing, I'm neither glad or miserable. I don't want to shed any more tears, I just want to get on with it. That's the best thing to do.

Fridays. Goodness me I like them. But not this time of Friday, when you've just been for lunch, had a taste of the air outside and now you're stuck for another 4 hours in an airless, noisy, cluttered office. That doesn't do much for the spirit, let me tell you.

The news - I relented and have found Agnes a little sister. She came home last night. I will post an appropriate photo over the weekend so you can vomit at the saccharine cuteness that she - Esme - is. I know, I know, Esme. I think I'm trying to get all the weird names that I like out of the way so my real kids won't get stuck with them. Esme hasn't really 'bonded' with anyone apart from Pom and myself yet. There is a lot of hissing and spitting when she comes into contact with the other animals. She is very young, only 6 weeks old, and loves to be held and cuddled and sooked over. She's just a baby.

Ugggh, bring on 5pm!

So my boss is away at the moment. He and his lovely other half are slumming their way around Thailand for two weeks. Lucky buggers.

So before they left, but after I'd instructed them not to come back unless they were engaged, I compiled a list of 'Animals to Eat' while away. It's okay, they were receptive to it. I wouldn't have done it otherwise! So the list goes something like;

Pig
Chicken
Cow
Sheep
Duck

Pretty standard.

Onto;

Dog
Cat

(That broke my heart, but it had to be done)

And then;

Crickets
Scorpion
Buffalo
Goat

Which is, I think, within reason. For Thailand.

And then;

Dolphin
Eel
Dugong

Etc, etc. All the weird ones at the bottom. There's heaps of bizarre animals just to make it a challenge.

I spoke to my boss earlier in the week, he rang me to tell me that they have photographs of themselves eating crickets. Excellent. From what they can gather, the Thai like cats and dogs, but not in an eating kind of way (phew). They've ticked off about 8 animals, and he suspects they've inadvertently eaten rat. This wasn't on the list.

*vomits*

But the best thing is, he tells me they were playing pool with some English backpackers they met, and produced the 'list'. And apparently the backpackers thought the idea was marvellous and started their own.

*sits back*

*awaits world-wide phenomenon*

*checks letterbox for payment from Thailand's Tourism Board*

It's Saturday afternoon, the sun is shining, the birds are making those slightly irritating cheeping sounds, you've run all your errands and have no plans for the rest of the day. The sensible thing to do? Smoke a joint, of course.

I don't usually advocate drug use, but just listen to this story. I'm sure you're familiar with the concept of the munchies, yes? Goodo.

So the Pom and I had had a special smoke, descended into a pleasant state of relaxedness, smiling inanely at the good in the world and generally pleased with ourselves for no particular reason.

I decide to have a little lie-down, as I am wont to do without any specific excuse. I go into the bedroom, lay down and stare at the ceiling, and suddenly the munchies attack. Viciously. I make a mental inventory of what we have by way of stores, and conclude that aside from actually getting up to cook something, we have nowt. And especially nothing sweet, which is what I tend to crave. Sweet, sweet, sweet. Chocolate, lollies, cake. Anything.

"God, please let Pom offer to go to the supermarket to get chocolate. Please please please" I think to myself. I want sweet, and I want it now.

So this is where it gets weird. I am laying on the bed, praying for something to happen so that I can get a sugar rush. Anything. And the doorbell rings.

I get up and answer it, and there's this young man standing on my doorstep.

"Hi, we're doing some fundraising for my church youth-group, just wondering if you'd like to help out?"

I stare at him, thinking that I probably have no need for Jesus fridge magnets.

"We're selling boxes of Krispy Kremes"

I nearly fell over. Once recovered, I promptly purchased a box, much to the young man's delight.






Oh Lordy, Krispy Kremes. How wonderful are they? There's not a Krispy Kreme outlet for 200kms, so this surely must be divine intervention.





They went down a treat. Not all of them, due to logisitcal diffculties with the size of my belly, but we had a bloody good crack at it.









Yum!


To summarise, and my take on this turn of events;

God (who is not usually one of my homies) saw that I was bent, He listened to my plea for sugar, and personally delivered a box of donuts to my door. The message could not be any clearer. He is cool with the scoobie.

Yesterday, whilst eating my chicken and salad roll from the bakery up the street at lunchtime (yes, it was very nice, thanks) I was skimming through the local rag and saw an ad for kittens that someone is trying to re-house. They are six weeks old. I am very tempted.

I know, I know, I just got one, right? Well, this is my point. When I was thinking about getting Aggie, I said to Pom that I wanted to get two kittens at the same time, so they could grow up together and I'd have lots of Anne Geddes type photo opportunities to bore everyone with, or some kickarse Youtube material when they battled. Kittens in plural are complete entertainment. But then, Aggie was the only kitten at the pound with no brother or sister to complete the set. And I don't know about anyone else, but I would find it very difficult (read: impossible) to go to the pound and then turn down taking an animal home purely on the basis that if I didn't, it would almost certainly die. As a direct result. The guilt would be terrible. God, I'm a sook.

So of course Aggie came home with us and yes, she is a complete delight, the way she terrorises Lucy one minute and the next she lays around my head when I'm in bed like a furry U-shaped hat. When she's really naughty we threaten to take her back to the pound (or 'death row', as it is known). And Lucy has taken to her, in a manner. By 'taken' I mean when they rumble on the lounge-room floor, always at Agnes' instigation, Lucy could quite easily use some force and actually hurt the kitten but she obliges with the play-fight and gently deals with her in a way which is quite touching. Agnes has also been known to take over Lucy's bed, her own obviously not being plush enough, and Lucy will either try and squeeze herself in there too or curl up in the corner, defeated. It's a bit cute really. They will chase eachother around the house and backyard for hours, and when they're tired will snuggle up together, touching paws.

So we've got the Lucy/Agnes dynamics worked out, and that's going quite nicely, but now there's the possibility of completing the set and I'm trying to be rational about it, quite unsuccessfully.

I'm currently compiling a mental list, the tactic which keeps my life loosely together, in relation to why I should or should not get another kitten. It looks sort of like;

• For: Kittens are cute.
• Against: Another mouth to feed (albeit cats don't take much feeding. Is that a 'for' now?)
• For: I would call her Esme.
• Against: Possibility of upsetting one of the existing furry family members.
• For: Kittens are cute.
• Against: I will probably never have a holiday because the kennel fees would be higher than my accommodation costs.
• For: A kitten is not a snake, rat, or any other weird pet. (I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel here).
• For: Kittens are cute.

And also, at 25 with only one cat, I am obviously way off schedule for becoming the crazy cat lady I aim to be by the time I'm 50. You know, lives alone, 82 cats for company, house overrun, local school kiddies scared, Today Tonight crews hanging around....you get the picture? That's my dream/inevitability.

I will have to continue thinking about it.