Category Archives: our furry overlords

Right Back To Where We Started From

Posted by Tata on

Here at Poor Impulse Control, who the hell knows if we have our priorities straight. Let’s review:

Adorable grandchildren –
Learning about food preserving –
Potatoes, still without a glass bottom potato boat –
Cat blankets –

And on Monday, Pete and I start a three-day motorcycle safety course that either ends with our getting licenses or drastically rethinking the next thirty years of our futuristic and stylish lives.

Buckwheat: check! Panky: check! Destination: picnic!

Zucchini in tomatoes, pickled beets, red onions in red wine, Tata in 100 degree weather.

We've grown potato plants; no idea if we've grown potatoes.

Hey! Turns out cats like blankets!

Of Skin You Can See Through

Posted by Tata on

The packaging really sells this product.

Thursday night, I started feeling a little hinky. BP capped the gusher in the Gulf – if it is capped – and though my sense is strong that this thing is not done yet I was limp with relief and fatigue. On Friday morning, I woke up, called out and went back to bed but could not fall asleep. My mind ran in circles. I got out of bed and began tracking down recipes as a form of discipline, to prevent panic, which is only hilarious when you watch someone else do the silent-film-hair-stand, boobitty-boobitty-run-run and reeeeeewwwwww-faint. But you’re right. That is funny.

It's like the eye test of the damned.

Sometimes, when you feel like reheated merde, the thing to do is work for someone else’s good and quit thinking about yourself, by which I mean that it’s all about me when I think about you. I stuffed this pile of cat blankets into a space bag, sucked out the extra air – with a vacuum like other adults! – and wrapped all that in brown paper and half a roll of packing tape. This package sat in the little red wagon while I dragged it through the grocery store, where I remembered to buy gelatin packets but forgot cat treats. I shiver, just thinking about it. Then I mailed the package and felt a weight lift.

Please admire this festival of B Vitamin readiness.

For the past two seasons, Pete did most of the jarring and I ran around, peeling, scouring and scaring up recipes. Last year, I didn’t even boil water without him except to try a jelly or a jam that failed, as I recall. This year, Pete’s upstairs painting and I’m downstairs paring. Pickled beets are not my favorite nosh but that B Vitamin surge sometimes means the difference between my getting out of bed and my lying flat with cartoon X’s over my eyes. So it turns out jewel-like pickled beets are really easy to prepare, fresh pickling spice is a reason to live and little black cats will supervise your early morning photo shoot.

Me But I Was Only

Posted by Tata on

These cat blankets are Topaz Approved.

This morning, I bicycled to work and parked my bike in a rack. As I was taking off my helmet, I saw reflected in the library’s windows what appeared to be an impossibly large bird sliding out of the branches of a nearby oak tree and onto the ground. I turned around to figure out what I’d seen and inched toward a low wall, beyond which a very large bird did in fact stand. I stood there and stared at her. She stood between 18″-24″ tall, with motley brown feathers and a hooked beak. I asked her what she was doing there. She looked right, left and right again, but she didn’t answer. Birds and squirrels overhead shouted and squeaked. Suddenly, I had an odd feeling I wasn’t seeing the whole picture so I inched closer to the wall so I could see her whole body. She was standing on a squirrel, which was making a frantic effort to escape. Speechless with horror, I stood there until the department head I’ve referred to for decades as the Source of All Evil walked toward me on the flagstones, asking what I was looking at. I pointed. She’s got one of the squirrels, I said. The Source of All Evil gasped. The giant bird startled and took off, taking the helpless squirrel with it. The shouting in the tree stopped abruptly. It was more than an hour before I stopped imagining the giant bird tearing apart my flesh. Later, Lupe appeared in my cubicle doorway, having seen a woman jogging in rutched shorts, a tank top and no bra. I would have traded her visit from 1987 for my sticky corner on the Circle of Life.

Are those red carrots or carrot-shaped beets?

That Funny Feeling Has Me

Posted by Tata on

Topaz, perturbed by air conditioner-related water damage.

Last night, Pete and I registered for a motorcycle safety course. A friend told me about it over a decade ago. Took me awhile to get to it, so sue me. Anyway, Pete’s confirmation email arrived in a hot New York minute but mine didn’t. First thing this morning, I called the safety course people and left a message. Shortly thereafter, a very nice young woman called.

Tata: His confirmation arrived, but mine didn’t.
Lady: Sometimes they take time.
Tata: This morning, I still don’t have it. I may pout.
Lady: It’s probably in your spam folder.
Tata: Nope. I have another address. Could I persuade you to send it there?
Lady: Will do.

The confirmation arrived, in all its glory, but two hours later, the nice young woman, who is a pistol by the way, called back.

Lady: In the medical section, where the form asks if you have any medical conditions, you wrote I AM A MIDDLE AGED WOMAN. That’s not really an answer.
Tata: The question is “Do you have any medical conditions that would prohibit you from participating in a fast-paced physical program?” And I am a middle aged woman. I will do nothing quickly.
Lady: It does say that, doesn’t it?
Tata: Yup.
Lady: What it means is do you have vision impairment, a heart condition, balance problems, anything like that?
Tata: Nope, but we’ve established that I’m a middle aged woman, and middle aged women have arthritis. I can’t stand for very long, and sometimes walk with a cane.
Lady: …You sometimes walk with a cane… Can you ride a bike?
Tata: Oh yes. I commute to work on a bicycle and ride a lot for fun.
Lady: Okay, then we’re in business. You can’t stand. Can you pace?
Tata: Sure. And watusi, but I’d be happy to bring a lawn chair.
Lady: Believe it or not, that’d be hazardous, but if you can pace through a 3-5 minute demonstration, we’re a go.
Tata: Excellent. Will you be calling me again when you notice I heard about your program from a Magic 8 Ball?

The Things We Want To Do Once

Posted by Tata on

Perhaps the happiest cats are colorblind.

Yes, I’m on vacation, and vacation time passes in the blink of an eye. Yes, I like to spend vacation time in ways that make workaday life better and easier; this morning, for instance, I took down the bedroom drapes and set up the honey-colored sheers to soften eastern light. Tomorrow, I’ll take them to the cleaners, where they’ll vacation for a few weeks. Life moves too fast. That’s not news. This afternoon, I nested on the couch and knitted a cat blanket, then took my yarn outside to sit on the porch, to soak up the afternoon heat, to watch the traffic and listen to dogs walking their people up and down the street. By 6, I’d finished the blanket and felt all the peace a peaceful afternoon had to offer. We had a fantastic dinner Pete whipped up and I fed the inside and outside cats. It was a lovely day.

Then I realized it was Wednesday and I’d missed my civic-minded meeting.

Getting Ready For the Next

Posted by Tata on

Lovely Topaz dreams of velvety cushions and fishy treats.

I’m on vacation, which is to say I’m skipping around my house fixing broken things and cleaning kitty noseprints from windows. This morning, I set up yogurt, made phone calls and hung laundry outside on the line. Between the warm sun, the pleasant breeze, the company of happy cats and the quiet of our house, which I simply adore being in, I did the Snoopy dance all day. Don’t get me wrong. I am fortunate beyond belief to have a job where my bad behavior is a bigass bonanza and my smart mouth is a surprising asset, and I work for people who’d laugh if I turned up dressed for scuba diving, but nothing beats doing the backstroke around my own house. Come to think of it, house cleaning would be more fun with flowery swim caps and sparklers – for the cats.

Since we are shedding a housemate, Pete and I emptied our closets and dresser drawers of everything weighing us down. Tomorrow morning, a truck will come take away bags of clothes that don’t fit and toys the housemate’s kids outgrew eons ago. The volume of stuff we are giving away is both impressive and discouraging, since until this morning, we lived with all this. I won’t be sorry to see it go.

One of my oldest friends recently disappeared into her addictions after years of sailing that horizon. Days ago, she crossed the line by wishing her sisters dead on Facebook, so I called her out. She said she’ll never speak to me again. Tonight, I saw her on the street. She’s become violent so I wondered if she’d attack me, but she walked on by. On this first day of summer, perhaps we are ready for more than one fresh start.