a99kitten's Musings

Been a weird day. Made some good (great actually) trades. Had fun in the snow with Shadow. But I felt weird too. Didn’t know why really. Then just received an email from our real estate agent that the our counter offer was accepted and the bay area house is now is escrow.

Funny./.same lady who made the very first offer that we rejected. We pulled it off the market in December for 3 weeks, painted it, put it back on last week and had 3 offers. OK. Same house….whatever. But then the lady who made the very first offer ended up making the best final offer.

I am happy. Cash money. Cash money is great. And I hate the bay area so good riddance.

But I got sad too. It was the first house my ex and I bought after being married for a year. The house we lived in for years and raised the huskies in. It will be always be Angelus’ yard – we hung out in that yard on his very first day and he always loved it. Always laid with his head in the fence, looking like the Prisoner of Zenda, as he surveyed what was going on. Even on his very last day.

And Stormy will always sleeping in the downstairs hallway and complain when I tell him it’s sleepytime. And on the upstairs deck…even in the foggy mist.

I won’t miss the house. Or the area. The view was great though. And the memories will be forever.

New Year’s Eve was a bit weird. First NYE spent without my (ex)husband in 17 years. And since Shadow was with his Dad last night, first without my doggies in 13 yrs. Picked up Angelus on New Year’s Eve in 2000 and spent the night sleeping on the kitchen floor with him (even though I was sick) as he was missing his doggie mom and puppy pack on his first night away. But I think our bond was created that night as he always loved me most :)

I had several invites for parties but didn’t feel like driving anywhere with any drunkards on the road. So I went to the closest friends home – they live about 5 minutes away. Super nice couple who decked out the house in NYE decorations. As the husband put it – Party City threw up on the house ;) Yummy Thai food brought in and champagne punch plus a lot of other liquor concoctions that I did not try. 2 tea cups of punch was it for me!

It was 6 couples – all with little kids or babies. And me. Doh. All the women started talking about babies and breast feeding and pregnancy (1 was pregnant with 2nd on way) so I mostly hung out with the husbands talking football. Then somehow the ladies all migrated into the conversation and the hippie lady started in on corporate greed and why the bay area is sooooooo much better than anywhere else aaaaaand so I had to chime in on those subjects…. Got the ladies to leave that convo and started talking football again! I was exhausted so left around 10:30 and ended up reading the New Year in.

I say good riddance to 2013. I won’t say it was an awful year. I moved up to Tahoe full time (yay!) Did pretty well in my trading (but didn’t hit my goal – boo.) Did a lot of hiking (need to do more.) Had fun with my friends (although not enough.) And most importantly, got my “annual” (every 5 yrs) physical and a clean bill of health.

But I also lost Stormy in August. And my divorce was finalized. For someone who isn’t a fan of change (that would be me), it’s been a bit tough. Sheldon (Big Bang Theory…if you don’t watch it yet, you should) is a big fan of homeostasis. And so am I.

But I’m also pretty tough. And I certainly do not have anything to complain about in my life. Other than I feel it is grossly unfair that dogs don’t live long enough.

So let’s go 2014. I’m ready.

Every day over the last 2 weeks, I have seen news “news” stories about why people will argue over Thanksgiving because of discussing politics, healthcare, etc, etc. Things are pretty polarized right now and the media loves nothing more than to stoke that even more.

How about this? Apply the old adage of do not discuss politics (or religion in some cases) at the dinner table. If you know people disagree with you, and you won’t be changing anyone’s mind just like they won’t be changing yours, why ruin a family holiday/dinner/get together with subjects you KNOW are bombs.

Yes, it’s nice to be right. And of course you feel you are (I know I do!) :) But entering into a losing battle is stupid. And throw in alcohol consumption and you’ve got yourself a doozy. So just stop. Even if that ignorant, know-nothing uncle, aunt or in-law keeps pushing your buttons. It’s not worth it. Because then everyone gets angry. And looks dumb. And there is a good chance those people will leave early anyway to make sure they get in line for their cheap junk because THAT’S what the holidays are all about – not enjoying the day spending time with family.

And all the kids listening to the bickering? They will have another memorable family get together. Which is why when they grow up, they have Friendsgiving.

….just took my wedding ring off for the first time since putting it on in 1999. Have never taken it off until now. Guess it was about time.

I guess it’s also time for me to go ring shopping for myself.

Still weird though.

I received the below email today from the rescue organization where we adopted Shadow. They typically do not send out donation requests other than quarterly newsletters with the info on the back page. They are not an alarmist organization that asks for money every other day or sends out horrible “this dog will die if you don’t adopt now” notices like so many you see on Facebook or twitter. And I appreciate that because I know always they need the money and I know there are too many dogs in shelters.

But if you can spare even $5.00, it can add up to help Boscoe, who is still a baby who clearly had a horrible home but can be fixed up and find a good home from early on.

I didn’t include the pics of the injury because yuck. But am including Boscoe’s little face :)

Boscoe at vet

I hate when people ask for donations so I don’t this easily. But this guy needs our help. We might not be able to help every dog, but we can help this one.

http://www.norsled.org/how-to-help/

Hi friends – I want to let you know about a wonderful three-month-old Siberian puppy I pulled Friday at the Delano, CA, Shelter (central valley/middle of nowhere!). Shelter folks picked him up in a woman’s yard in town where he had laid down to rest, with a horrible gash on the inside of his right rear leg (photo attached) and with the femur on his other back leg out of socket! With no possibilities in store for him except the shelter, I took the 4 hour drive to Delano, and pulled Boscoe. By 4 pm I was at Fourpaws in Dublin and Dr. Tripi was looking at Boscoe (see attached photos)

Whoever said “money can’t buy happiness” never paid an adoption fee.
Save animals three times a day – breakfast, lunch and dinner.
What have you done today to make the world a better place?
Torturing one animal is cruelty; torturing many is science.

It’s been a month since Stormy left me. Hard to believe it’s been a month already really. I still get sad and regularly think, for just that split millisecond, that I hear him moving around.

But when I start to feel sad, I try to remind myself that most people didn’t expect him to make it much past 8 once he was diagnosed with Cushings or past 9 when his 2nd liver tumor (and 2nd surgery) was diagnosed as cancerous. But instead he not only survived those things, he got to go to the beach, play in the snow, have fun, eat freshly made cheeseburger, make and play with friends, and bring everyone who met him smiles every day until he was 11.

When he could no longer stand on his own (late June), I knew our time was limited. I’d help him up and use one of those slings but then he didn’t want that after awhile. But he was still a happy guy every day. He loved to sit on the deck and watch chipmunks and birds. He loved his regular ear rubs, still ahrooed for his breakfast and loved his cheeseburger and cookies. I told him that I wanted him to stay as long as he wanted, but if he started feeling sick or in pain, he had to tell me.

On August 2nd he did tell me. But I do know that he was happy up until then. And I have to remember that is what counts: all of the time that I got to spend with him. I was lucky to have been able to bring my guys to work every day all of their lives, take them to the beach or snow every day, and then work from home and spend the extra time taking care of Storm when he needed it.

I miss my boys. I spent more time with them every day for 12 years than I did anyone else in my life. It’s hard to have that gone. They made me smile every single day. They were the best friends you could ever ask for. If you are lucky enough to have a critter in your life, make sure you hug and love them every day. They deserve it and don’t stay with us long enough.

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.

Author unknown…

No, not me. My kitty. She was the original a99kitten. Back in 1999, when I would work on my computer at home at night as my husband (well, fiancee back then) and I started a company at night while I worked at a hedge fund during the day and he was in business school at Stanford, Gypsy would demand attention by laying across my keyboard and knocking the mouse around. She was a cyber kitten and she got the nickname a99kitten when she wouldn’t let me type as I was choosing my username :)

I was signing up for Yahoo and needed a username. I came up with a99kitten for her. It’s been with me since then and I can’t imagine ever changing it. But usernames seem to last longer than kittens :(

We got Gypsy to keep my other cat Jack company. He predated my husband. Jack was a good kitty but since we worked so much and were out of the house a lot, he seemed lonely. We would come home and he’d be in the window looking out and meowing :( So we got him a sister. He liked her right away but she would hiss and swat at him. Jack was a BIG kitty and she was a small kitten but she really wanted no part of him. Her first weekend with us, Jack was sitting on my lap and she was sitting next to me on the bed. She would hiss at him for no reason, and he would smack her in the head with his tail. They kept this up for about 20 minutes. Was pretty funny actually.

The next day, she was still hissing and swatting him at him all the time, even though he wasn’t doing anything. I left them alone for about an hour in the house. I figured, they will work it out. Came back home and they were sitting next to each other. With NO hissing or swatting! They were best friends and inseparable from then.

When we got Angelus, he would chase them up into their cat trees if they ran from him but was generally he didn’t care about them. Then we got Storm. All of a sudden there was a pack. And prey. Storm taught Angelus how much fun it was to chase the cats and try and get them and shake them. If we were home and awake, everyone could live together without incident but at night, the dogs stayed in the bedroom with us. And if I had to leave the dogs home for some reason (they typically went with me everywhere), then I would put the cats in the guest room.

But they got Jack and Gypsy each once. Each time it was for only a second or 2 and the cats were always OK since we separated it quickly, but it was not OK for them to live in fear. So my husband found this company that made outdoor cat enclosures that you build in your yard. They were the size of small rooms. He drove out to the middle of nowhere California and picked up the kit the weekend after the dogs got Gypsy. He built it and put in several cat trees and shelves. I filled it with their beds and blankets. Had tarps on it to close when it got stormy. We ran electricity from under the house to it and put in an electric water fountain (Jack refused to drink standing water) and moved them in.

They actually really seemed to like it as they got sunshine in, could watch the birds, etc. But it also meant they couldn’t snuggle with me anymore :( And from pretty much that point on, I felt like a failure of a cat mom. Sure they were safe, dry, well fed, etc but still. I recognize a lot of cats live outdoors and don’t get that much care but mine always had. I would go out and see them daily. Give them fresh food, water, etc. Pet them, brush them. When I went out of town, friends came by to check on them or I hired a local woman who did pet care to come daily.

We considered finding them a new home but that’s pretty much impossible. There are so many cats and dogs in shelters that I couldn’t ever ask a friend to choose my safe and cared for cats over a shelter cat who would be put down if not adopted.

Several years ago, Jack died. So that left Gypsy alone out there. Then I felt really horrible. I would try and visit her more but it was still not the same for as having her kitty brother or living inside with her humans. But it also wasn’t right to bring her inside so she could be afraid every day.

When I moved up here full time last November, I brought her up with me. I made the upstairs her domain and the dogs were not allowed up there ever. She seemed so, so, so, so happy. I have 2 guest rooms so she had numerous beds to sleep on and under (of course she didn’t want either of her beds that she had.) She would cruise downstairs at night when the dogs were asleep and I went upstairs numerous times during the day to pet her and brush her. She seemed like a happy little kitty.

About a month ago or so, I noticed that she wasn’t eating. After 2 days of that, I took her in to the vet hoping for a simple, fixable problem. Nope. She was in renal failure. Now, that can mean a day, a week, a month, a year. You just don’t know. I started giving her sub-cutaneous fluids daily, extra potassium and put her on a special diet. She seemed like she was happy again. Yay. But kidney failure isn’t curable. Just manageable. And she is 16.

Yesterday morning she didn’t want to get up to eat. She’d ate like a champ if I brought it to her but she didn’t want to walk anymore. I brought her out into the sun with me on the deck and we hung out. Storm stayed in the shade and said we were crazy.

But then she didn’t want to eat last night. I brought her bed into my bed last night and she slept there. This morning she doesn’t want any food or water. She doesn’t get up from her bed. It’s her time. We are now hanging out on the deck in the sun. She has always loved the sun. Every time I pet her, she purrs and purrs. It’s a very hard decision to make when you see them looking at you and they seem like they are “there”. But her body is betraying her. And I do not want her in pain or feeling very sick. She deserves better than that.

I called the vet this AM and she agreed that beyond giving her fluids, there is not much to do at this point. It’s just deciding when. I had to with Jack and it was awful. Angelus took that decision out of my hands, which I am frankly still not fully recovered from. Gypsy will need me to help her. We are sunning for the rest of the morning and afternoon and I am taking her to vet late this afternoon. It’s not fair. She finally gets back inside and is happy and nature takes her away.

Gypsy has been a great little kitten who always just loved people and attention. She is the true a99kitten.

Gypsy

Looking at the pictures of devastation in Oklahoma is just plain awful. The scarier thing is that all that destruction took only minutes. Nature does not mess around.

Years ago while in Florida for work, the day started out sunny and blue sky. It’s Florida. Weather forecast was the same as it always was, sunny with a chance for rain in the afternoon. This is the daily forecast from March to November. Literally. Every day. Unless there is a hurricane warning.

Sometime in the middle of the afternoon the sky turned green. Wizard of Oz scary green. The winds were picking up. A lot. Our office was on the 3rd floor of a small bank building. Huge windows around the whole thing. The winds started getting heavier and heavier and it started to rain. We saw a newspaper dispenser machine rolling down the sidewalk. Then the bank sign from the top of the building went flying by and landed in the parking lot. We all got away from the windows and the power went out. The building was literally shaking. Florida, not California – no earthquake. Just from the wind.

I called my Mom at work and she was fine. Called my brother’s school and there was no answer. My boss said we could all leave, no power anyway. I drove to my brother’s school and there were huge trees, oaks or some such not palm, all ripped up and seemingly thrown everywhere. In the street, etc. A huge one was across the entrance of my brother’s school but luckily everyone was safe and they were getting the kids out of there.

I got him and we went and got my mom from her job and went home. It took a while as power was out everywhere so no traffic lights and branches and trees were laying everywhere. No damage at my parent’s house luckily but no power or phones. We found a Denny’s several miles away that was running on their own generator and, along with I think every other person in town, got some dinner after a 3 hour wait (truly was THE only place with power.)

Our power came back on the next day. Of the surprise storm, the news said it was a freak storm (how can you NOT see that on your gajillion dollar radar storm tracking radar?!?!) that sprouted numerous tornadoes. They showed my office building on the news and they mentioned that corner as a spot one twister touched down. Wonderful.

Obviously it was NOWHERE near the strength and destructive power of the Oklahoma storms. But that scared me. You have no warning or prep. I have gone through 2 Cat 5 hurricanes, one in Mexico where I do not recommend being in a big storm, plus the big 1989 SF earthquake (I was at the World Series game for it…fun times.) None of those things freaked me out like that Florida storm. Tornadoes can just come out of nowhere and strike. Blow apart 1 house and leave the neighbor. Or wipe out neighborhoods. Sure you don’t get warnings with earthquakes either but there is also no such thing as earthquake season every year.

I was born in New York, lived in Illinois, and moved to Florida before moving out to California. Even though I was one, I say now you East Coasters and Mid Westerners are nuts. I’ll take the risk of an occasional earthquake any day.

Today is my brother’s birthday. He would have been 30. Wow. He would have been old. I still think of him as the 6 or 8 yr old I took to Disney World on numerous trips.

I would have made so much fun of him today. Crusty. Krusty the Clown (he loved the Simpsons.) Would have been relentless. He did to me so it’s only fair. But I didn’t get the chance. I lost him in November of 2010. I loved that kid like he was my own and always will.

Happy Birthday Jonathan.

This story is sickening. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-05/obama-budget-calls-for-cap-on-romney-sized-iras.html

“Under current rules, some wealthy individuals are able to accumulate many millions of dollars in these accounts, substantially more than is needed to fund reasonable levels of retirement saving,” the statement said.

Who exactly are YOU to say what is a reasonable level of retirement savings for me? You don’t know my life, my responsibilities and IT’S MY MONEY. That I worked for and saved and invested smartly, not spending it, so that I have it for me and mine later.

I am the one working my butt off for years to make sure I have enough because unlike government stooges, I don’t have a tax-payer funded pension plan and health benefits to live off of for the rest of my days.

For every “Romney-sized” retirement account, there are tons more of “regular” people who socked money away for years and watched it grow. Doing nothing wrong. Doing the right thing which is saving for their retirement so they are NOT dependent on the government or anyone else.

And since there is *NO* way Social Security, that I pay into all my life (and might as well burn the money in the driveway for all the good it will do me), will be around to help me, shouldn’t I be doing everything I can to make sure I (and my family) will be OK?

I think the thing that makes me sick the most is this class warfare rhetoric is used over and over by a government that spends so much more than it can take in and sees nothing wrong with it. Just tax people more. And more. And more. Take. Take. Take. All the while these same guys are SO corrupt.

And people who have no intention on saving since they know the government “safety nets” will take care of them, and have no drive to change their situation (in no way can you argue that everyone wants to work as hard. No. Way.) are the ones who vote these idiots in. Repeatedly. Because why wouldn’t you?

The government continues to take steps that make being successful a bad thing. To strive to be successful is becoming more of a detriment since you can just live off your fellow citizen’s hard work while working much less.

This is not the American Way.