Get Down! No just kidding, you can eat that.

Fisher has recently taken a liking to people food.  I realize that it is a bad habit to give animals people food.  I typically don't make it a habit of giving other peoples pets people food, or wild animals either.  But Fisher is small, and when he becomes annoying, it is easy to lock him in a room.  It is also interesting to see the different things that he will eat versus what he won't.  For instance, he loves chips (especially tortilla), but he doesn't really like beer (import or domestic).    

Not surprisingly, he likes meats and cheeses.  But, he also likes broccali, salted nuts, bread pudding.  I never would have thought he would eat bread pudding, which is why I didn't think twice about leaving a piece out one morning when I went to take a shower.

I was pissed about this one, and after I put the camera away I gave him a beating he didn't soon forget.  I swear, that Gatorade was almost full too!

Gina isn't very happy about all the people food I give the cat.  She says it isn't good for him.  She told me once, "Do you want him to have a heart attack?".  After I got done laughing, I told her "No, cats can't have heart attacks silly."  But, I don't want him to live forever either.  My mom has a cat, Orbit, who is going to be 22 years old in September.  That is too old for a cat that has never had a run in with John Coffey.

Orbit is deaf, near blind, and I have no doubt it will live another 2-5 years.  That is why I am going to try and feed Fisher foods that will allow him to live 8-12 years, a fine life span for a cat.

Have you seen my vacuum?

One of the things that I find unfortunate about Corporate America is that it is frowned upon to write on the wall in the bathroom stalls.  Often times when I am sitting on the can, staring at the floor, I reminisce about college and the funny little things that would take up the time.  I can still remember some of these lines.  "Flush twice, it's a long way to the kitchen" was a good one.  There was also someone who identified themselves as "The Bathroom Poet" who wrote some very catchy poems.  At one point during my freshman year, there was a dorm controversy in which someone stole the vacuum cleaner from our janitor, Juan.  Someone drew a very accurate caricature of Juan on the wall with a blurb, "Have you seen my vacuum?".  It's unfortunate that this type of behavior needs to end in college.

Last night was our first softball game of the year.  We won, although I have no idea what the final score was.  I don't take the games very seriously until the playoffs.  Even then, I don't take them that seriously, I just start paying attention more to things like how many outs there.

Weekend Recap

I got home Friday after work at about 6pm.  Gina walked in the door about 2 minutes after I did and snapped, "Why didn't you answer your phone?"  I did not have a good excuse except that I still had it on silent mode (from work) and soon realized that my stupidity caused her to not pickup pizza from our favorite pizza place, Pinocchio's.  "No big deal," I said.  "We can go down there now".  This would give me an opportunity to play around with my new camera that I purchased last week, my first digital SLR (Nikon D5000).  

Two minutes into our walk, it became obvious that Gina had another beef.  She informed me she couldn't find her Charlie Card which still had a balance of $50 on it.  For those of you unfamiliar with the Charlie Card, it is the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority's (MBTA) answer to subway tokens.  

You put money on the card and it is deducted every time you ride the T.  Soon after I started my new job, I realized that it was easier for me to drive to work.  At the time, I had a Charlie Card with a value of about $80.  I sold this card to Gina (we keep a running tab).  Well, due to the fact that I drop her off at work every morning now, and have saved her countless hours riding the #1 bus, she has been unable to go through the $80 .  In fact, given the fact she still has $50 on the pass, I'm calculating she's only ridden the bus about 20 times in the last 3-4 months.  Well, Gina was mad at me because she lost the card I made her buy.  Sometimes I am such an asshole.

After we got back and finished our pizza we combined all of our money, which turned out to be $6.  This would be enough to get us a large frozen yogurt from Berry Line, which opened it's second location this past week literally about a 90 second walk from us.  It has been open 5 days, and already we have been 3 times.  In fact, I'm thinking of going there as soon as I post this message.

It could be a very delicious summer.

The rest of the weekend included me running 17 miles, blowing my nose every other minute (bad allergies), walking around taking pictures with my new camera, watching SNLs latest Digital Short several times (www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/clips/digital-short-motherlover/1099491/), buying a cheap charcoal grill, and coming to grips with the fact that Fisher is not nearly as cute of a cat now as he was as a kitten.

Kitten

Cat

CPI

So I just got of the phone with my grandmother.  I talk to her once or twice a week.  She is usually good for saying one or two things that make me think, "Jesus, I am glad I am not an 85 year old lady".  When I talk to her, I try to play devil's advocate with whatever she is saying.  I find it usually makes for a more entertaining conversation.

Tonight she told me about how many times she played bridge this week.  Then she asked me what I was doing for dinner.  The conversation led to her telling me how much groceries cost these days.  When you're talking to an 85 year old, you have to be very careful with the term "these days".  For all I know, she could be referring to the period 1982-2008.  I asked her to be more specific.  "What do you mean these days?".  "Well, in the last two years".  So I told her I thought she was full of crap.  I logged onto the Bureau of Labor Statistics website to try and dispel her theory by looking at CPI stats.  For the record, she is right, things are more expensive than May of 2008, but the logic she uses is because the orange she bought at the grocery store today was 95 cents instead of 50.  I told her to give me another example.  She started talking about blueberries and apples.  It's nice to see that she is eating so much fruit.

Then we started talking about our backpacking trip to Montana.  She doesn't understand the term "backpacking" so I had to be very specific in describing what we were going to do.  This led to "Are you going to be able to buy food there?".  "No Grandma, we are going to have to cook for ourselves."  "Over a campfire?", she asked.  "No, we'll be bringing a stove".  "YOU ARE GOING TO BRING A STOVE?".  I think that for a split second she thought I'd have a regular sized oven strapped to my back.

The conversation then turned to fishing.  Specifically, would I be doing any fishing out there?  "No, I don't like to fish", I told her.  "Me either", she said.  "Well maybe you should consider it", I told her "it sounds like you could use a little supplemental income".  She said she would rather starve.

Speaking of starving, Gina is down in New Jersey this weekend and I am starving, which means I need to get up off my duff and go get a burger.  I am glad the Bruins are on tonight.  Against my former team, The Whale.