The fun continues

I took these videos yesterday. As you can see, the kitties are still quite enthralled with the cat tree. Based on their extreme affection for the tree, I think maybe the pet store guy used an entire gallon of catnip oil on it.





This morning I was shocked and amazed to see Chloe actually get on my desk (she never ever does that, this is truly a first) and then get on the top perch of the cat tree. While these pictures aren't great photography, they show Chloe doing something other than curling up in a little ball. Eddie didn't like it that she took the top perch, so he chased her off and he's up there now.



Finally, I thought these pictures were pretty cute, too.

Plan B

We would have liked to have waited for the very cool cat tree I mentioned in my last blog entry, but Wally has a real need to climb now. So I headed out to Target to see if they had any cat trees that would work. No luck there.

But we do have a pet supply store near Target that carries a lot of stuff; I'd seen at least one tree there before so I stopped by. Obviously I found one otherwise I wouldn't call this Plan B. I took these short videos this morning after I got the tree in the house. Wally is still literally drooling over the catnip oil and generally warning off the other two cats from the tree.

Someday we'll eat at Toro's

Yesterday we tried again to go to Toro’s. We’ve heard such good things about the restaurant and according to their website, they are open for lunch. So we braved the mid-20s cold and headed down there. They may be open for lunch sometimes but they sure weren’t yesterday. So we tried Tremont 647 instead. I'm not providing a link because their web site has music and it bugged the crap out of me this early in the morning. Brunch was quite good, nothing ultra fancy but all very well done. They make a pop tart that is just amazingly rich and good—and get this, it had blueberries in it and I even sort of liked the blueberries.

On the kitty front, my lap became contested territory between Chloe and Eddie yesterday. Normally when Chloe realizes my lap is (overly) full of Eddie, she moves on. Not yesterday. She stayed perched like this for probably five minutes. That’s a long time for a cat.

Wally now opens the cabinet doors in the kitchen, but only the ones on top of the fridge. We’d heard him banging around in there a couple of nights ago, and yesterday when we got home from brunch, one of the doors was wide open and the French press was sitting out on the top of the fridge. Clearly he’s bored and needs to climb so we scouted around online and found a cat tree we may end up getting (it’s the one on the right). It’s not available yet but at least it doesn’t look horrible and is no more expensive than the ugly cat trees.

I knew this day would come

As you know, Eddie is a large cat and has struggled for a long time to stay on my lap when he wants lap time. He'd tried Kent's lap but Kent generally changes into slick athletic pants and a sweatshirt when he gets home from work. Eddie slides right off those pants and after trying a couple of times last year, he gave up on Kent.

It's chilly enough in this apartment that Kent has gone into what he calls his granny look: he drapes a small blanket over his legs for warmth. In addition to keeping Kent warmer, it also provides a nice soft spot for Eddie where he can stay put. I'm kind of sad because in addition to being warm, Eddie is very soothing to have on your lap.

I sent off my graduate school application today but had a little scare first. I tend to procrastinate on deadlines and while I wasn't quite at the last second, I was close: the application is due on Sunday, February 1.

My plan this morning was to work out, review my letter of intent a final time and then get cleaned up and head out to send the packet overnight to UMass Boston. I had no sooner put the work out DVD in the player than the power went out. I'd already put my documents on a flash drive so I knew I could go someplace else to print them, but I was still frazzled. Fortunately the power was off for only about 20 minutes, just long enough for the apartment to get pretty chilly. As I headed out to mail my application just now, I learned from a neighbor that the electric company had told her we would be without power for two to four hours. I'm really glad I didn't know that at the time!

I miss our 75 gallon hot water heater

Yes you read that correctly. In Kansas City we had an old 75 gallon hot water heater. That thing was ancient, the installation date was sometime in 1978, and we figured when it went out we would get a smaller one, although not as small as the one we have here in Boston.

Actually I don't know what the size is of this one. All I do know is that it runs out of hot water by the end of one shower. Yes, one shower. With the cold weather we've had, those showers end up being shorter because the hot water goes away even faster. I'm sure it's not as costly to keep the water hot but right about now I don't care. I want a hot shower that doesn't get tepid right as I'm ready to shave my legs. Brrr.

Saturday night

Saturday night Kent and I had dinner with another couple. We’d originally planned to go to Toro, which is in the South End. We’ve heard good things about this restaurant and wanted to check it out. We’d also heard that they fill up fast and don’t take reservations so we figured if we got there at 6, we would be OK. We were wrong—even at 6 PM the restaurant was packed and we faced a 90 minute wait for a table. So we switched to Plan B and tried Persephone (warning, their web site uses music), which is close to where Kent works. I must say the food was amazing, and I even found a really cute wool hat. I’m still looking forward to trying Toro but we’ll go there on a week night when (hopefully) they aren’t so crowded.

When was this taken?

Hoping my mother knows and if not her, perhaps Uncle Doug? This is my G'Pa and if I had to guess I would say he's in his late 40s, early 50s? That would date this picture in the late 1950s or early 1960s if so.