About Cats

When I was a child my parents had cats. Usually there was only one, but there was always one. I grew up thinking that a cat made your home complete.

After Rebecca was born I decided it was time for me to get a cat. I found a little white cat that is mean. I love this cat.

After I moved out of the apartment I was having trouble taking care of the cat, so I called a friend and asked him to take the cat for me. He wasn't happy about it, but took the cat as a personal favor. That was last November.

Well, this summer I decided I was ready to take care of a cat again, so I called up my friend and asked if he wanted to keep the cat, or would he like me to take it back? He told me he would think about it and let me know.

After a week I hadn't heard back, so I started asking around to see if anyone I knew had a cat they wanted to get rid of. One of my friends had a stray black cat she had been feeding for about 3 weeks.

The night of Rebecca's party I went to her house and picked it up. I took it home and gave it a litter box, some food and water, and a little bed to lay in. When I tried to lock it in the bathroom with all that stuff she ran out the door, into the sun room, and was gone. Really gone. We looked everywhere and couldn't find her.

Then next day I received a call from my friend telling me he had decided that if I wanted the cat back, I was more than welcome to come and get it. He didn't like her because she is mean.

I went over on Saturday and picked up my white cat. I couldn't have been happier. She came home and seemed to fit right in.

Things were going great until last Monday. I was in the basement doing the laundry, and there was a spider in the basket. I screamed! Then I ran upstairs and grabbed Ryan to kill it.

Upon returning to the basement I hear a frantic "Meow, meow, meow!" I look at Ryan in horror and open the closet door. Out runs the black cat. She had been in that closet for 10 days!

Now before you start thinking I'm uncaring and mean, please note that we had checked this closet, not once, but 3 times since the cat dissappeared! She was hiding and wouldn't come out!

So I am now the proud owner of 2 cats. Mean white cat, and nice black cat. Go figure.

Best Boyfriend Ever!

Saturday night was one of those nights that you hope will never happen again. I go in to work each weekend and hope that tonight isn't "the night" and when it isn't, I'm glad.

Saturday was busy. Crazy busy. Run, don't walk busy. Can't catch your breath busy. Busy.

I was serving a table, and as is the Amanda tradition I wasn't using a tray jack. Instead, I was balancing the edge of the tray on the corner of the table and holding the other side. This usually works well enough for me, but at this table I made the mistake of trying to set a plate on the table behind the one where I was holding the tray.

While my back was turned I lowered the end of the tray I was holding. I might not have noticed this but for the pint of warmed maple syrup that spilled down my arm, onto my apron, down my pants, and all over my shoe.

Now, I know that if I work in a restaraunt I'm going to get dirty. It's par for the course, and it's why they give you aprons when you hire on. Those aren't decorations, they are practical. I know this, and can accept it. Ketchup, fry sauce, chocolate sauce, I know it will happen, but this was too much.

I couldn't handle being sticky. My pants were stuck to my shoe, and my apron was stiff with the sticky goo. It was muy no bueno. I did the only thing a girl can do. I called Ryan.

"Hello?" said Ryan.

"Hey, are you still awake?" I said.

Short pause. "I answered the phone."

"Oh. Well, I was wondering if I could beg a favor of you?"

"What's that?"

"Can you bring me some new clothes? There was a terrible accident at work, and I'm sticky!"

"Ok, I'll be there in a few."

That was it. He didn't make fun of me, he didn't ask questions (ok, he asked where my pants were). He just brought me new clothes so I wouldn't have to work sticky. He even found my shoes!

Best boyfriend ever!

Fun Night

I can't always complain about work, and now seems like a great day to show some of the good things that happen. Here we have a picture of Ferrari, showing off the most beautiful piece of Strawberry Pie we have ever seen. In the back you can see Tyler trying to hide.

9:45pm: Here are the first 2 Banana Splits of the night, aren't they nice?

10:30pm: 2 Shakes, one Root Beer, one Oreo; 1 (more) Banana Split.

10:45pm: Chocolate Cream Pie. Much easier and more server friendly than ice cream.

12:15am: 1 Banana Split. Not looking as nice as the first 3.

And here is the best part! Our empty ice cream freezer! Seriously, we ran out of ice cream! I couldn't have been happier!

Allergic to Work

I think I may be allergic to work. I know this seems crazy, but I have proof!

1. Each night as I begin my "bedtime routine" I start sneezing, and my nose starts running at the same time I start thinking about the work to be done tomorrow.

2. I have had to take a benydryl each night for the last 3 nights in order to stop the afore mentioned running and sneezing.

3. The sneezing sometimes gets so bad that co-workers tell me (from across the cube walls) that they "are running out of 'God bless you's"

4. This only gets worse on Friday, the one day of the week that is 26 hours long!

So maybe I'm not really allergic, perhaps it has something to do with fall, and changing seasons, and all that. Who knows, but until I see snow on my mountains I know things will be bad.

Marco's Birthday

At some point in the last year (ok, really in the last 2 weeks) I have realized that I can no longer deny that my child is a girl. I have been told that I am no longer alowed to buy her boy clothes, unless she asks for them, and I have to start buying pink (that will never happen, you can't make me buy pink!). So as a compromise I started calling her Marco.

Last year at about this time I started teaching her how to play "Marco Polo" (you know, in a pool with closed eyes?). She tried to get it, but after a while she just started looking at me and saying "what" when I said "Marco."


So now I call her Marco, and it almost makes it easier to buy little girl clothes instead of little boy clothes.



As you can see from the above picture we had a good time with cake, and what you can't see is the chocolate rice cream they got too. Below is a picture of how Rebecca felt about said cake and rice cream.

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Happy Birthday Marco!

Mother Of The Year

I have now been a parent for 3 years and 6 days. In this time I have done my best to be a decent mother, to love and care for my child and help her grow. At no point have I ever tried to be the "best Mom", or even the "great Mom". No, my ambition is to be a mediocre-at-best mother. My experience has been that all my friends who had mediocre-at-best mothers had the funnest childhoods, and those mother escape child rearing with their sanity intact.

I have really outdone myself now. For Rebecca's third birthday I: worked, glared at my boyfriend (because my daughter wasn't there), and worked again. Now, a week later I have decided (today) to have a party for her.

Did I mention that I decided to have the party tonight? Did I mention that because of the moving going on that my house is a mess? Did I mention that most of my immediate family is in California? and I'm having the party anyway.

Yep, mother of the year, right here.

Not Doing So Well

I saw Shaun of the Dead, I usually do well under pressure, I'm a born-and-bred city girl, you would think I would have a better chance:


39%

ok, not so much.

We Don't Care

Having worked in a bank for a few years now, it comes to my attention that sometimes people are confused about what to send in. Here is a simple list of what NOT to send:

1. Your Book.
Don't send us your book, we don't care, and reading it is not going to make us magically approve you loan request. I'm glad you were picked up by a publisher, but we don't care what your book says, or how great you think that makes you.

2. Your Picture.
Don't send us your picture, we don't care what you look like. We don't keep surveillance videos of who uses your card, so we don't know if they look like you or not. We aren't Big Brother, we don't live in a New World Order. We don't care.

3. Your Picture with the President.
This would seem to be a repeat of the last one, but it's not. Don't send us your picture with famous people, and then think that will substitute for what we really asked for. If we need a copy of a utility bill, George Bush isn't going to make the cut.

4. Thank You Cards.
Don't send us a thank you card when you are approved. We don't know who specifically approved you, and usually it was several people working together. Don't send a thank you, we just throw them in a box. (Banks don't believe in garbage, everything is saved in boxes and sent to storage. Including your pictures, books, and thank you cards)

5. Gifts.
This is one we get frequently, people send us gifts, thinking there is just one person who helped them, and surely that person wants a pearl necklace, or cash, or whatever. These get sent back to you with a nice note that says we can't accept gifts. We can't. We won't. We just send them back.

The moral of today's story is: When the bank sends you a letter, asking for something, send in only what they asked for. They don't want or need or care about anything else. Yes, we do like looking at copies of your power bill all day.