I don't know what to do

I had another post written in my head but that got put off by this morning's events. Chloe has peed on the rug again.

When she did this last fall, we took her to the vet immediately to rule out any health issues. She was fine although the vet couldn't get enough urine to run tests. She suggested that we look for ways to increase Chloe's water intake. So we got that fountain I mentioned and we started incorporating some canned food in the cats' diets.

I know she's hydrated; that's not the issue. I suspect she peed because Eddie was picking on her again. So I don't know how to solve this problem. I'm left with
four untenable options:

• Get rid of Chloe (I can't live with an animal that pees in the house but she's completely bonded to me and I don't think she'd re-home very well)
• Get rid of Eddie (he does bully her but he would not do well without his litter mate and honestly I don't want to get rid of him)
• Live with the pee (uh no)
• Or we could get rid of all rugs. That isn't very appealing either since we live on the bottom floor and the floor is quite cold.

This is awful. I used lots of Elimin-Odor on the spot but I do wonder if she's doing this elsewhere. Unlike most cats, her stuff really doesn't stink so it's hard to track down anything.

For FreshHell

I didn’t used to like lentils; in my 20s I thought they tasted like dirt. It was probably because of how I cooked them—to death with almost no seasonings. Hey, we were poor and I was learning the ins and outs of cooking.

But I love them now. I have fantastic recipes for lentil soup and dhal and as of last night, I have an amazing recipe for lentils with shitake mushrooms and greens from Food & Wine. We’ve had a subscription to the magazine for probably eight years. Every now and then, we’ll stop and reevaluate if we get enough value to justify the price and the hassle of a physical magazine (remember, we live in a small space). And so far, the magazine more than pays its way.

Here’s a link to the recipe (I imported it to Springpad, which is an application I use and love): linky

I will make two changes going forward. First, I’ll cut the oil by 2/3. You just don’t need it and I don’t think we’ll miss it. Second, I think the recipe calls for too much water to cook the lentils in. So I’ll cut that down to a more normal 2:1 ratio.

Also, no I didn’t use the Swiss chard. I hate that stuff. So I used argula.

Poor rug

We got this area rug almost eight years ago, right after we got married. Kent had talked me into creating a wedding registry, which I thought was both silly and inappropriate. After all, both of us had been married before and really who would buy us gifts? I reluctantly agreed with the caveat that we'd register only for small things and only at two places; we chose Williams-Sonoma and Pier 1.

As part of the wedding registry scheme, stores generally give you discount coupons when you register. We used the one from Pier 1 to buy a 5x9 wool area rug made up of color blocks. They don't make the rug any more alas, but it sort of looks like this, only the colors were more muted.

Even though it was 100% wool, that rug wasn't the highest quality rug ever made. I wasn't surprised that when we flooded in 2009, it didn't come back in great shape. It was still usable but the binding along one edge had come undone which made vacuuming quite challenging.

The second water incident earlier this year has ended that rug's life. We managed to get it folded up and outside after the frozen pipe burst, but it was soaking wet and of course it froze solid once we got it out there. It's still out there, six weeks later, folded and frozen and waiting for a thaw so we can get it out to the trash.

I think the rug helped us avoid more damage this time, though. I think it acted like a giant sponge and soaked up water that might otherwise have shorted out all our kitchen appliances again.

An interesting milestone

Today my older son turns 30. I have to say, it's strange to realize I am the mother of a 30 year old. Yeesh. He's been having kittens about getting older which makes me giggle now since if he's 30, what does that make me?

Anyway, here's what he looked like at five days old; his eyes were so big he sort of resembled a tadpole:

Pics please

Here's the necklace with the dress. I need longer arms to do the self picture thing. And yes, I should have smiled. Oh well.

A (true) story by Kent

Kent frequently works from home, which the cats like and which also helps keep them awake during the day. Yesterday, not only did I leave on another trip--always unsettling to the kitties--Kent went into the office. That meant the cats had free range of sleeping spots and plenty of time to snooze and snooze during the day. What follows is his account of last night's shenanigans.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chloe nearly became an only child again last night.

I go to bed around 10 pm. We have the typical tango of cats cycling through to get their petting which ends with all the cats leaving the bedroom to torment Chloe in the living room. Except the tormenting never stops. (note: when Kent says torment, he's not exaggerating. Eddie turns into a mean bully sometimes with Chloe and has even bitten out some of her fur. Generally we have to put him in kitty time out in our room to break his fixation.)

After about 15 minutes I get up to separate Eddie. After I go back to bed he goes right back to torturing Chloe. We do this cycle about three times.

Eventually I get Eddie to come to bed. He gets his petting and he even curls up under the covers. I'm ready for sleepy land and then I hear Chloe yowling because Wally is tormenting her...which rouses Eddie.

After a few more cycles of separating cats I eventually get Chloe to come to bed so I can protect her. She gets nice and settled on your pillow. Except now she's wired and won't fall asleep. Every time one of the boys get within 15 feet she starts yowling. I'm not sure, but I think the boys are ready to kittie pile and go to bed, except every time they hear her yowl they think the game is back on. For a brief moment all the cats were on the bed and settling in when the boys decided to start wrestling each other. Chloe eventually bolts and we are right back to square 1.

At 11:45pm I am so frustrated I grab a bowl of food and a litter box and lock Chloe and myself into the bedroom/bathroom and leave the boys out in the living room area. This works great until the boys start clawing at the bathroom doors making a clatter. After Chloe fell asleep and the boys had been quiet for about 5 minutes I opened the bedroom door. The boys cycled through to see what was going on and then decided to punish me by sleeping in the living room. But it was at last peaceful at 12:30.

The rest of the story

My mother emailed me yesterday after reading my blog entry from Sunday and told me that the necklace I'm wearing in the picture was actually hers. I'd assumed it was from Grandmother Lockett mostly because the jet jewelry came from her and also I would never have imagined my mother buying a piece like that.

But she did--for the sum of $25, which was a lot of money then. She didn't recall if there ever were earrings or if maybe they were out of reach financially. She did say that my bio dad made $20,000 a year, which was a very large income for the time.

I love getting a glimpse into what things were like when I was a tiny girl.