Do the Yak

...of Sockington , the cat who has 1.5 million followers on his Twitter feed . Milo would like you to know that he's a lot more interesting than Sockington. Just this morning, in honor of the Winter Olympics, he had a particularly lengthy game of drop hockey. This is where he jumps into the bathtub right after someone has showered, sits near the tap, and catches the drops as they fall from the faucet every few seconds. He swipes at them sort of like you would hit a hockey puck, then licks his paw. Did I ever tell you the story of how we picked him for adoption from the crowd of potential pets at the cat shelter? We looked at many cats in their cages and read their cards, immediately eliminating any that said the cat was not good with kids (at the time, Sarah and Becky were two and a half and 12 months old). I liked the look of this cat as soon as I saw him, with his tabby markings nicely interspersed with white. But we had to see how he would behave, so we took him for a test dri...

Oh my God, the agony of suppressing shrieks of laughter... For anyone who's ever had a cat with Issues, this one's for you: I live in a world of fur – Not the sexy 70’s porn kind either ...and then somehow I found this picture of The World's Most Disgusting Tattoo That Doesn't Even Involve Human Private Parts (but the cat, well...). That is all for today.

For some reason, I've seen several funny blog posts lately that are written from a cat's point of view. The best is probably Finslippy 's highly aroused feline, just before the cat's nascent sex life is about to come to a screeching halt. There's also Blueloggy 's cat's nighttime ritual. As an owner of Milo, the very large and very vocal part Maine coon cat, this all sounds terribly familiar. If I were to record Milo's nighttime chatter, it would probably be something like: "Hi! Here I am! I love you, which you can tell by the high-volume purring! Mind if I make myself comfortable? Fine, whatever. Getting comfortable, as you know, requires me to stick my butt in your face, or at least in close proximity thereto. Yeah, well, same to you, buddy! Oop, you just tossed me off the bed. That's gonna cost you a 3 a.m. visitation, compliments of the house. OK, so now we're done with the button-ing )as in 'button the face'), we're ready t...

Plastics. I have found plastics Nirvana . I can now fully indulge my bizarre fascination with Things for Holding Other Things. I have found little squeeze bottles in all sorts of sizes for shampoo when traveling. And big plastic jars for flour and sugar. Not to mention all manner of buckets, pails, bins, barrels and drums. AND! Did you know that we ordinary mortals can also satisfy all our pump , valve , and pipe/duct/blower needs from the privacy of our own computer? Take a deep cleansing breath... OK. The rest of life pales in comparison, but for the record, it's been the usual whirlwind of grocery shopping, taking the kids to the dentist, a family outing to go apple-picking (SO New Englandy), and visiting my dad, which was really nice last night because my brother from Texas was in town, so we stayed and talked until the kids sent a registered letter to the dining room that said WE ARE DAMN TIRED AND CRANKY – WOULD YOU PLEASE BE RESPONSIBLE PARENTS AND TAKE US HOME AND PUT US T...

I guess this blogging thing has started to affect my brain, because I’ve jumped another blogger bandwagon. What the hell, like I tell myself about the rest of this drivel, at least my kids will have something to know me by, assuming the North Koreans don’t nuke the Internet. My herbs and spices are in alphabetical order. I cut the ends off bay leaves so they’ll fit in my jars. I love starch, dairy foods and melted cheese (not raw). Fettuccine alfredo is almost ideal. My favorite food in the universe is Pizzeria Uno deep-dish cheese and tomato pizza. I can’t stand stupid people who don’t care that they’re stupid. I converted to Judaism in 1998 even though I’m an atheist (my rabbi said it was OK). I love Macs and deplore Windows. I especially enjoy desktop publishing. I am a huge Boston Red Sox fan. I’ve watched the Oscars every year since about 1978. One year I had to watch it in my father’s car on a little TV that ran off the cigarette lighter because our power was out. When I was 10,...

I’m a little tired today for several reasons: two awakenings and eventual parental co-sleeping by three-year old, spousely sound effects resembling an intermittently clogged dental suction device played over a loudspeaker, and of course the nightly symphony from Milo, who feels love only when it’s dark and quiet. Milo brings a lot to the table: excellent facial stripes, an extremely mellow disposition, enjoyment of tummy rubs, etc. But he also has a habit, as many cats do, of checking in with us several times between midnight and dawn, which involves a scenic tour of the bed accompanied by various vocalizations that can be translated roughly as: “I’m here! Hi! Hi! What’s going on? Wanna play cards? Are you sleeping? No? How ‘bout some ear rubs? Fine. Mind if I look around? That side looks comfy -- lemme stroll over this abdomen to check it out. Not bad... it’ll do... Ahhh! [THUD] Hey, this comforter looks suspiciously like bread dough. I hope it’s been kneaded enough... [WOOTEN WOOTEN ...