Please do not expect this blog entry to tell a smooth story or to make sense. I don’t even know what will flow out of my fingers as I type this now. I did not plan anything special for this post, nor did I intend to miss nearly two weeks of writing.
After mere days of tracking my sodium and “eating normally” as the dietician suggested, my constant lightheadedness and episodes of low blood pressure significantly decreased. My physiatrist (who is also a neurologist, you may recall) saw me last Thursday afternoon for my post incident follow-up. She’s excited about my approval for the service dog, sorry that I’m losing my job, has promised to buy Not an Able-Bodied White Man with Money, and she and her nurse both appreciate the way I advocate for myself and try to do as much as I can to improve my body and my health.
Speaking of which, tracking food had led me to discover that when “eating normally” I was only getting 1500-1800 mg of sodium AND drinking 100 ounces of water in the humid, hot warehouse. I can only imagine how little sodium I was eating while sticking to “heart-healthy,” “low sodium” choices. And it might explain why I really love me a bag of salty potato chips.
The physiatrist and I had a lovely conversation about B-vitamins, apparently she’s low and had to start getting B12 shots so I mentioned that I sprinkled nutritional yeast on everything. She googled it and she plans on buying a jar.
The teenager also asked me to organize her bookshelf, a calming activity that brings me much satisfaction.
In a future blog, I hope to write The Saga of the Quail, now that the birds have gone home and I can no longer get in trouble for illegally housing game birds in a residential area.
Somewhere in the last two weeks I deadlifted 120 lbs– which is three-quarters of my current body weight.
And the “tube” to the outdoor kennel the teenager built for the cats has been popular.
She even put a cat door leading from the porch to the kitchen so the cats have access 24/7. Touch of Grey, our foster with a hysterical and sometimes volatile personality, has made the back porch/mud room her new domain.
I had a mental health therapy appointment and will have a job coaching session next week. Speaking of which, we are having a Women’s Outbound meeting at work on Monday and everyone is having their break after regardless of whether we normally break at this time. I’m guessing Stitch Fix has either decided our official end dates or they will be announcing more information regarding when and how we will receive this information.
We had a massive pot luck yesterday at work for our team and another roster, and I ate so much food I didn’t eat again for 24 hours.
I woke at 6:30 this morning but despite having ten hours of sleep, my eyes had dark circles and my mind spun with a bizarre sequence of dreams. I fed the fat cats on their diet kibble, went downstairs to make my coffee, checked book sales and suddenly realized one of the foster cats appeared to be missing.
A missing cat caper?
Foster Cat Touch of Grey has claimed the bathroom sink
I did a quick sweep of the house, as the missing cat was Touch of Grey, known for her clumsiness. She once managed to crawl into the heat ducts and get stuck almost in the furnace. Touch of Grey, or Tiggy as we call her, can be a jerk. My cat, Fog, also known as Meatball in his obesity, can also be a jerk. I caught Fog intimidating Tiggy as she used the litter box, so I removed her from the fat cat room.
She promptly took up residence in the bathroom sink. So me, being me, laid a towel in the bathroom sink so it would be cozier for her and brushed my teeth using water from the tub.
It seemed extremely odd that I couldn’t find her now.
Introducing The Phulasso Devotional
Seeing no signs of calamity, I decided to have some coffee and dig into my publishing company’s latest work-in-progress, The Phulasso Devotional. Lots of people texted, and seeing some familiar names felt good to my heart. And Maryann Riker, the mixed media artist who contributed to Not an Able-Bodied White Man with Money, emailed with samples of work she had come across in the style that she thought would be nice for Phulasso.
They touched me– even before Maryann told me the series had inspiration in Tao. Before I started work on The Phulasso Devotional, I sent a rather thorough, elaborate spiritual statement to the author (yesterday!). I wanted to be upfront with him about my own formerly Christian, agnostic, animistic and pagan beliefs. As a publisher and editor dedicating myself to a very Christian project, I needed to cement that we would be comfortable and trust one another. And I believe we do. But to quote one line of that treatise on my own religious background: “(I also took Religions of China and Japan and fell in love with Taoism.)”
And I loved the miniature watercolors depicting a sunrise and an open path that glows with openness and potential.
I ended up buying them.
Maryann said she would be in my area later today so she’d deliver.
Continuing the Cat Hunt
The Teenager did a sweep of the house and the outside. She went to work, and sent me a text saying one of us should check the coal bin in the basement. I put on shoes and headed down, found no cat but carried some garbage from the basement outdoors. I checked the cardboard boxes we have piled next to the garbage cans for recycling, because if I were an indoor cat suddenly outside on the coldest day of the year, a cardboard box would look so good.
No cat.
And then I had a thought: did anyone check my room?
Tiggy was lying peacefully on my bed. Apparently when I left my room at 6:30, she silently crept in.
Sweet Fruity Doughnuts
During my last visit to The Grocery Outlet, I bought some weirdly glazed doughnuts. When The Teenager got home from work, I asked if she wanted to try them. She was game. The glaze was not merely glaze but a thick, hard icing that tasted like fruity candy. I had purchased a mango and a strawberry.
Decorating the House
The Teenager got her baby cousins window markers and window crayons for Christmas, in addition to procuring some for herself. So we decorated the windows for Yule after I showered and donned my Christimas Flamingo sweatshirt.
A Bagel Big Surprise
Little Dog’s Mom brought bagel-themed presents for The Teenager and I and a new toy Christmas Llama for the Bean dog. The bagel theme included a gift certificate for one of our favorite places in the world, New York Bagel & Deli, in one of our favorite local shopping plazas. We also received everything-bagel-flavored pretzel chips (which are one of The Teenager’s favorite snacks) and everything bagel seasoning which has been on my shopping list forever. And Little Dog’s Mom remembered The Teenager’s favorite candy!
Plus, Little Dog’s Mom and I were twinning.
Maryann called and said she was on her way.
Another Artist in My Collection
At Parisian Phoenix, we incorporate original photography and art into our books. We aim to support visual artists as we do those who share the written work. Heather Pasqualino Weirich, of Heather Pasqualino Fine Art, whose art adorned the cover of Not an Able-Bodied White Man with Money, joined Maryann and other artists in that anthology. Maryann commented that the cover painting from that book should be released in prints.
When Maryann delivered her art, I asked her to come inside my home and decide where to hang them. She hung them beside Heather’s original piece in my central room.
And the nicely wrapped art pieces came with a Ghiradelli packet of hot chocolate and a shot of peppermint vodka. The Teenager took the hot cocoa. I claimed the peppermint vodka. Now I need a candy cane.
Magnetic Ransom Notes
I returned to work on the devotional until The Teenager’s Dad arrived to play Ransom Notes and have dinner with us as I had bought the Teenager shrimp. Ransom Notes is like Cards against Humanity using magnetic word pieces like those in a magnetic poetry kit. We mixed it all our magnetic poetry kits, too. We also listened to Gabriel “Fluffy” Iglesias.
The Teenager made shrimp, broccoli, rice and potatoes, but since I don’t eat shrimp she cooked up some Spam so I’d have some protein. That’s right. My Christmas dinner was a pile of broccoli with some diced up Spam.
As I write this, The Teenager and her father are downstairs playing video games. All in all, a simple but soulful, joyous Christmas.
Fostering cats with Feline Urban Rescue and Rehab involves a lot of love, a lot of patience and, often, a lot of common sense problem solving skills.
It’s like babysitting— having responsibility for someone else’s living creatures.
Touch of Grey
Touch of Grey has some balance issues and can be very agressive. She can also be a sweet cat, but she has several triggers which lead us to believe she may have been abused or mistreated. For instance, she freaks out when you are handling blankets.
Yesterday, as I was bringing the laundry up from the basement and Touch of Grey ran full force into my legs and bounded down the stairs.
Now if TOG doesn’t want to be handled, she will attack. So I tried to coerce her upstairs. She didn’t want to.
There’s a big tote of old blankets in the basement and she likes to sleep in there so I figured she would take a nap and come up at meal time.
But she didn’t turn up.
So we checked around the basement and didn’t see her in any of the usual spots. But it’s a basement. Cats have expert hiding skills.
We put out a bowl of kibble.
In the morning, still no TOG. We heard a rumbling in the ductwork. Now we know there is a spot under the stairs where the cats can get into the bottom of the hardwood floor and make their way into the cool air return.
In the past, I have already lifted the grate in the living room to let her out. But even there we couldn’t find her.
And we heard metallic grumbles.
The teenager asked our firefighter neighbor to come help her check the ducts.
Touch of Grey was in the bottom of a duct, with a freshly dead mouse. We suppose she chased it and fell into the lower ductwork.
Thank goodness, she is safe.
In other news, one of our other FURR cats, Khloe, decided to attack the vacuum cleaner while I was tidying today. I immediately turned it off. Let her think she defeated the large plastic mechanical animal.
For a while, I was writing everyday on this platform. Recently, life has gotten busy and I shifted my focus to more organized blog entries than random posts.
So I slowed my writing down to times when I am rested and focused— which sometimes isn’t that often. But seriously, this week brought me great joy and also sorrow. In those emotions, I revisited some favorite life lessons. Many, but not all, involve cats.
First, there is Louise, the freshly amputee cat. She spent two weeks under my bed. Probably still confused and uncomfortable from her surgery, but also scared and scarred from her experiences before someone contacted Feline Urban Rescue and Rehab to get this injured apparent stray some help— both material and medical.
After two weeks under my bed, she’s trusting me. She’s super affectionate, cuddly, purrs like a machine and playful. She’s gentle and sweet and doesn’t have a mean bone in her body.
Louise tested my patience and rewarded me with her love.
Hermes, yes another foster, got adopted yesterday. He came to us as a very sick kitten on July 31, 2020 as part of the Greek Pride. His sister Hades sent me to the hospital. But that’s another story.
Hermes was terrified of human hands for most of his life, and he’s still a quirky cat. His new family knows his flaws, but they are confident that he should be their cat.
Hermes reminded me that some growth is slow, but can transform everything about how you live your life. And that we are all on a different timeline.
Touch of Grey, a four-year-old owner surrender, has been with us about two weeks because of her tendency to be bitchy and nasty. She’s been an angel with us, even going so far as to try and convince Hermes’ parents to take her home instead.
Sometimes we only thrive in certain environments. What nurtures me might not work for you.
The hardest part of this week was caring for the Ten Little Kittens who were starving and probably have distemper. Only two survived the week. (More on that here: Ten Tiny Kittens) To see some kitten cuteness: Parker Playing.
Sometimes there is beauty and divinity in the briefest of lives, and knowing you did something, even if it leads to heartache, is better than doing nothing.
Okay. No more cats. I had a conversation with someone whom I’m known for a long time— decades. She has had a good career with the same employer the entire time I’ve known her. She’s my age. She asked where I landed after last year’s job loss. I mentioned the Stitch Fix warehouse and expected the conversation to drop or to get that sense I get from people that my job makes me less important or less of a person now.
Instead, she asked if we were hiring and if I thought it was a good job. I explained the pay, the good and the bad. Apparently she has no holiday pay, no paid time off, and ten hour days. Her job is taking a toll on her body and she just wants to move on.
This country places too much emphasis on our jobs and careers as the definition of who we are. And it’s upsetting how basic quality of life items like health care and paid time off are regulated by/ reliant on corporations and small business owners. Your worth is not based on your occupation.
I went to the diner last night to have pancakes and see the charming teenager #1 at work. One of her regulars asked her to help with his dogs so he and I have been talking. He’s a conservative Christian Trump supporter and I am a liberal with socialist leanings. I told him right off we probably had very different opinions on a lot of issues. But we had a polite discussion and did not attack each other.
Listening and sharing information has to be a polite and earnest exchange. People can have different opinions but respect each other and, even so, cooperate.
I have been trying to jot down this entry for at least 24 hours. We got the exciting news that Hermes has an approved adoption application!
His new parents found him on Petfinder and will be coming to get him next weekend. They live north of the Bronx and fell in love with him via photos and YouTube videos.
And this cat who once wouldn’t let you touch him now let me hold him!
Not a flattering photo but proves my point.
Handsome Hermes of the Greek Pride
Hermes just turned one. He is the last of our Greek Pride litter, which was our first litter fostering with FURR (Feline Urban Rescue and Rehab).
His sister Hades bit me and I ended up in the hospital. She eventually went to a barn home. Of the 12 kittens we’ve fostered, she was the only one that would not be domesticated.
Their brother Artemus got adopted first (by Jim West— yes like Wild Wild West). Apollo and Zeus were adopted together.
The Roman Pride and The Norse Pride came within a week or two of each other. The Norse Pride kittens were long-haired and found homes quickly because they were so goofy and lovable. They would have gone even quicker had they not contracted ringworm and then I contracted Covid.
The Norse Pride
Vesta of the Roman Pride found a home first. Those kittens are all tuxedoes. Jupiter is being adopted today. Mars and Minerva are still at Petco in Phillipsburg, N.J.
Two weeks ago tomorrow we got foster Louise, an adult cat of the sweetest, gentlest temperament. She had her leg amputated the first week of March and gets spooked very easily. She likes to hang out under my bed.
Louise
And today we took on Touch of Grey. She looks a lot like Louise. She can be moody, we are told. So we’ll do our best to win her trust.
Some of these cats have seen and been through so much.
Touch of Grey
Maybe next time I’ll do a brief update of our actual pets…
Angel Ackerman 