Because She Went to Camp

I miss this furrball. Monday night my parents came down to the area for an exhibit opening (Oklahomans @ the Movies-go see it!) and to pick up their grandcat. Daphne is staying with her Grandmeow and Grandpaw while we're out of the country.

You never realize how much you miss your Bathtub Cat until she's not there judging you in the morning.

Cat Vomit

That pretty much sums up my day. And Daphne did puke four times tonight. The dental cat treats caused gastric pyrotechnics in a pretty green shade. Ew. And the funny thing about cats is that they can't clean up their own spew. Awesome.

Unless you live under a rock in a hut in some Third World underdeveloped country whose name has changed several times in the past ten years, you know that I love my job. I have my days, like any other person, when I wonder why I don't have a nice job behind a counter at Barnes & Noble selling books to people. So, for those times, such as today, when I have a bad day at work, I keep a mental list of reasons why I don't work at Barnes & Noble.

1. I would never manage to stay behind the counter because I would spend all day browsing. I tend to think my supervisors would frown on that.
2. I would never manage to leave the store with my full paycheck. Between books and music, I would never be able to pay my mortgage and bills.
3. I probably make slightly more in my paycheck than I would working behind the counter at Barnes & Noble. I probably don't make as much as a manager, but that's not the job I've chosen at B&N.
4. Really, all that standing? I don't think so.
5. While I enjoy working with the public on a limited basis (read: on my terms), I'm not sure how I would enjoy it if they came at me willy-nilly, constantly, expecting me to, I don't know, answer their questions and wait on them.
6. I do actually enjoy the challenges of my career. Finding ways around the little frustrations is another way to keep my mind sharp, right?

List making as a mental exercise to shape cognitions is sometimes helpful. It brings a smile to my face when one sometimes refuses to peek through. So, that's why I think about not working at Barnes & Noble. Not that there's anything wrong with working there.

Like Spaghetti for Cats

Daphne in my Christmas Tree, 2008

Just look at that face. Slightly evil, huh? She's really not, but when she does mean things like, oh, I don't know, chew through my wireless router power cord, it's easy to see her has slightly evil. Don't get me wrong, I love my cat, I just wish she didn't view the power cords to my electronics as pasta. As many of you know, this is not the first time this has happened. She chewed through the power cord for my laptop a while back, causing many different and various issues. There was that brief moment of panic before I realized, "Oh yeah, I can just plug the cord into the back of my laptop and still get on the internet" when I thought I was going to be unable to get online, but once that moment passed I realized that this isn't so bad, just inconvenient. Nothing like her last electronic culinary adventure. I just have these visions of Christmas Vacation running through my head--someday I will have a fried cat. In fact, she chewed through the Christmas light cords at my parents' house while I was home for Christmas.

Which begs the question: Any ideas for controlling this problem? I think I'm going to have to coat my cords in some kind of icky substance to make her not want to chew them, a la thumbsucking little kids (not that I have any experience with that...). If anyone has a suggestion of what to use/do, please please please let me know!