Vacation is the Cat's Ass

Vacation Diary Day One:

I am on holidays.

Like many poor people, I don't go to fancy resorts with palm trees and goat's milk in your latte, nor do I splat into trees on ski trips like Sonny Bono, nor do I even go snowmobiling anymore because it costs as much as a university education.

I am at home. 

Alone. 

Well, except for the cats and the dog. That is my cat's ass in the photo. I took it a minute ago. The weather is a little on the mild side, you know, only 20 degrees below freezing, so Ben thinks it's spring. He keeps sticking his nose between the cracks in the door, hoping he'll be let out to go woman-chasing. Fat chance of that, really. He has no balls, no front claws and very few teeth. Every time we take him to the vet he screams, "No, mother of god, no! What are they taking this time? My eyes? My ears? A leg?"

We rescued Ben from the animal shelter a few years ago. He has lived a tough life. He spent the first eight years living in an ice hut with three big dogs and a man with few prospects. When the ice hut burned down, the man was homeless and so gave his animals to a local shelter. When we took him to the vet the doc said he had the worst teeth he had ever seen in a cat. And judging by his skinny body, we figure he probably ate the same thing as the dogs ... god knows what that was. No wonder Ben always looks depressed. 

By the way, the photo of the doorway makes me feel like I live in a slum.

Let me just say, I do not.

And, since I cleaned the bathroom just now, it doesn't even smell like one.

The thing is, we are going to replace the front door soon but, in the meantime, I painted it last fall with the wrong kind of paint and now it is flaking all over the place. I try to wipe it up but the flakes are stuck firmly to the painted floor. Now the entranceway looks like it was painted by Jackson Pollock when he was first learning to paint. Or Jackson Pollock in his later years because, frankly, it's hard to tell the difference...

Now, where I was I.. the darn dog was "arfing" so I had to go see if someone was at the door because I'm sitting in my underwear and I don't need any surprises. 

Coast is clear. I can continue rambling, about what, I'm not sure... oh yes, holidays.

I am not sure what to do with myself.

I wanted a whole week free and clear but people keep filling up my calendar with "stuff."

Like, Dave's mother is coming for a visit, I think on Wednesday, and she's never been here so I have to clean the place up. Blech. Just what I want to be doing.

My mother and sister and Grandma Ruth are also coming. More cleaning.

I have a Remicade infusion on Friday.

Dave has taken Thursday off so we can be together.

The kids are coming on the weekend.

That leaves me tomorrow to go into town, change my driver's license address, get a library card, and do some research on the house at the land registry office.

I know, I was going to do that stuff today.

But I've been sitting here at this computer all day.

OK, so I have gotten up to clean the bathroom and do laundry and colour my hair (what an ordeal that was.. and it didn't turn out so well.. the streaks in my hair are inordinately red. I look like an aging punk rocker). I have to do something or Dave will give me "the look" when he gets home from work.

He is such a "goer" that I feel guilty if I spend time doing absolutely nothing.

Which is why I'm doing it today when he's not around to know! hahahahahah (evil laugh)

See, I've been reading everybody's flash fiction today. 

There are, like, 70+ stories to read.

At most, they are 1,000 words long. The shortest ones seem to be a few hundred. 

That's a lot of words.

And then, not only do you have to read the stories, you have to comment on the stories. Because people can tell when you've visited their site and if you've visited and don't leave a comment, that means your story sucks and telling someone their story sucks is just plain rude and, since I am Canadian, I hate it when I do something rude.

So I have been writing comments like a madwoman.

And because I am later than everyone else in reading flash (it's like a race, I swear to god), everybody has already said all the good comments. They're all used up. Just lame comment leftovers. 

Like meatloaf on its third day.

P.S. For those who don't know what #fridayflash is, it's an online writing "club" that isn't a club but is, if you follow. To join, you just write a story, fiction preferably, less than 1,000 words long. You post it on your blog on a Friday, you post it on the Friday Flash Facebook page, you Twitter it if you are into that sort of thing and you record it on a blog tracker (thank you Mad Utopia). Then you spend the whole rest of the damn week reading and commenting on everybody else's stories. 

I'm a fast reader and I think I'm only three-quarters through.

(I need more coffee.)

Thanks to Alan at Conversations at Land's Edge (conversationsfromlandsedge.blogspot.com), as well as his Townie Bastard friends (towniebastard.blogspot.com) for the Batman, which I thefted with much glee. (I'm not swearing, kids, that's the name of the website.)

Oh, and if you want to batman-ize your own thoughts, go here: www.batmancomic.info