Three Things Thursday – Things I Have Neglected
1. If you are a new reader, you may not know that in addition to having the most deliciously adorable baby in all the land, I also have three cats. Cat #1 – Jasmin – is the architect’s cat. She’s been in his life longer than I have. She is not particularly interested in Alvie Bean, other than to be pretty excited that we apparently suddenly bought her a lot of new furniture. She is 11 1/2 years old and has arthritis in her hips as well as a horrible allergy to flea bites. She tolerates me, will be affectionate if the architect is not around (because that makes me the feeding person), and the only time she’s ever really been interested in me was when I was pregnant. Our youngest cat, Lola, is also the architect’s baby. She’s curious about Alvie Bean, but mostly doesn’t understand why she’s not the center of attention at home any more. She has responded by avoiding Alvie as much as possible and making big sad eyes at the architect whenever he’s holding Alvie. Our middle cat, my baby, is Darwin. He is our emo teenager cat. I think he spends a lot of his days listening to My Chemical Romance and writing dark poetry about how no one understands him. His biggest neuroses involves the litter box. It doesn’t matter how clean that box is, it isn’t clean enough for Mr. Fussy Pants. He has been known to grab a plastic bag and bring it to either the architect or I as a sign that the box has been used. The arrival of Alvie Bean just intensified everything for poor Darwin. During my pregnancy, he got severe anxiety and starting compulsively cleaning himself until he was completely hairless on his belly, and the underside of his tail & hind legs. Although he adores the baby (see yesterday’s post with him baby-sitting), he also doesn’t necessarily think that Alvie should get so much of my attention. This led to some regrettable incidents of not properly using the litter box. So, I got him one of those auto-cleaning litter boxes. I’d been thinking of doing it for ages, but the cost always put me off. They are expensive. I cannot believe I waited. Darwin loves it. This morning, when I came downstairs for my morning coffee at about 5:45ish, he was staring at, willing it to clean (it is off from 8 pm – 6 am). When it came on at 6, he was so happy. He loves watching it. He is so weird.
Watching the wash cycle
2. The garden. My garden this year is crap. I was in a weird place when most things were planted, and didn’t take care of things the way I should’ve. I do have a booming crop of weedy grass. The garlic did well (as per usual), and I will have enough tomatillos & peppers to make 12-18 pints of green salsa this weekend. I will have to supplement my red tomatoes to get all the red salsa & marinara that I want. My cukes, as always, did nothing. My zucchini, which I thought was done, revealed two more giants this morning. I have a couple spaghetti squash, a couple acorn squash, and some adorable mini pumpkins. (Why did I plant mini pumpkins? I have no idea.) I planted the corn in the exact same spot I put it last year (I usually rotate with my bean crops), and then didn’t realize it in time to amend the soil to replace lost nitrogen, so they are regrettably short. The potatoes are likely awesome, they just need to be removed from the ground. I think I’ll get enough grapes to make jelly, though! Next year will be better.
ridiculous mini pumpkin
pretty slightly larger pumpkin
sneaky zucchini
tomatoes & weeds
peppers & weeds
grapes
3. I have been reading constantly. I usually have 3 books going at once. A Nook book for evening. A phone book for walking. A real book on management & leadership for lunch breaks. I originally made a goal of 52 books for the year, but when I hit 50 last week, I upped it to 75. Then I saw that Cat had a goal of 100, so I upped my goal, too, because that’s the kind of competitive spirit that I have. One of my current reads is “The Happiness Project…
