The World According to the Peevish Kitty
Oct
29
Here’s another photo from our walks in the woods. It’s Stinkerbelle’s bridge, which starts nowhere, meanders for awhile, and ends up nowhere else. She loves it.
Oct
28
My adventures with food and recipes and such recently have been well chronicled. I’ve gotten a couple of new cookbooks this year, and have been combing them, and some of the older ones I have that I have not used in awhile, for new and healthful and good meals to add to our repertoire. I’m trying new recipes. Some are successful. Some are not.
So I got a new crock pot cookbook recently, surprisingly enough from Crock Pot, the brand name of slow cookers everywhere. And there was a recipe for scalloped potatoes that I thought I’d try.
BDH really likes him some scalloped potatoes. Well, DUH, he’s a Maritimer. It’s in the blood. But I have never made scalloped potatoes from scratch, so he usually either has to settle for the Betty Crocker boxed variety (WHAT? DON’T YOU JUDGE ME YOU DON’T KNOW MY BETTY CROCKER LOVE) or wait until he is visiting at home for some actual, real, honest-to-dog homemade scalloped potatoes.
But this recipe? Looked TOTALLY EASY. It had, like, SIX ingredients. Easy peasy.
So on Wednesday, I prepared the ingredients and assembled them as instructed. The recipe said to cook for 3 1/2 hour on high, then once the potatoes were tender, another hour on low. So I set my timer and went about my business.
At the 3 1/2 hour mark, I checked to see if the potatoes were tender. And no, they were not. In fact, they were still pretty crisp. Barely cooked at all.
Okay, I thought, well maybe a little longer. So I let them go for another hour on high.
Still hard.
Another half hour.
HARD.
Now, it was just about dinner time, so I thought I’d check a little further down. And, as I dug down in the pot a little bit, below the layer of mostly-uncooked potatoes and some tender ham, what do you think I found?
That’s right. POTATO MUSH.
Everything below the first uncooked layer of potatoes had dissolved and become a gooey, soupy mess. My beautifully assembled pot of scalloped potatoes was a giant hot pot of EPIC FAIL.
So I got out the peanut butter and made SAMMICHES, DAMMIT.
But I am nothing if not CHEAP. There is NO WAY I was going to just throw away all the potatoes and ham and cheese — READ: MONEY — because things went badly. But after tidying up and putting Stinkerbelle to bed, I was too tired to think about it. So I scraped the entire mess into a covered pot and stuck it in the bottom of the fridge, and just walked away.
So, today, a couple of days later, I got to thinking… what to do with the mess sitting and staring accusingly up at me from the bottom shelf of the fridge?
I got out some onions, and carrots, and butter, and a bit of flour and milk… and suddenly TAA DAAAH! Potato Ham Fail soup!
It’s actually pretty good, too. Perfect for a day when there was a wind chill when we got up this morning.
I love it when a fail can be salvaged. Even though it looks like BDH will have to continue to wait for some homemade scalloped potatoes.
(And, in honour of my foodtastic adventures of late, I started a cooking/recipe blog.)
Oct
27
I’m a night owl. Always have been. I am at my best — in terms of energy, creativity, and mood — late in the evening and in the wee hours of the morning. And, the flip side of this being that I am absolutely not a morning person.
I blame it on being born at 3 am.
Anyway, the world is not made for night owls, for the most part. The nine-to-five life is not for us. When I lived in Japan, my schedule was actually almost perfect for me. I started work at noon, and finished at nine, and I never felt more like I was in my elephant.
But generally speaking, life’s not like that. We have to adapt to the regular work day, so we drag our sorry arses out of bed early for work, and we try to train our brains to go to sleep at a reasonable hour at night, so we can do it all again the next day.
Therein lies one of my problems. I don’t want to go to bed early. And consequently, sometimes my brain doesn’t relax. So I lie in bed, and while my body begins to relax and get ready for slumber, my mind isn’t ready yet.
And it begins to wander. To a lot of, quite frankly, stupid places.
Especially when I’m home alone with That Girl, like I am from time to time with BDH’s work or soccer schedule. As was the case last night.
For whatever reason, the dark and a quiet house seems to be excellent fodder for an imaginative, not-tired mind like mine. And it begins to wander. Every little noise is magnified into a huge, and largely implausible, crisis.
I KNOW THIS. And yet, does it stop it from happening? NO IT DOES NOT.
Last night, here’s what I imagined: BDH getting into some sort of accident driving home after midnight from work. Me getting the call to go to the hospital in the next city, and having to pack up myself and That Girl to go to the hospital. Me getting into an accident going to see him in the hospital. Me having a hassle from police at the scene of the accident, who keep me from my poor injured spouse in emergency…
You see where this is going, right? Now. Imagine me, in bed, thinking of all this, and PLANNING WHAT TO DO IN CASE ALL THESE IMPLAUSIBLE THINGS HAPPEN.
I know.
Now, as you can imagine, none of this DID happen. And BDH was home shortly after midnight and up with Stinkerbelle comforting her during a bad dream.
So what gives, drama llama brain?
Other nights, it goes something like this: someone’s going to break into the house and take my sleeping child out of her bed. Now, bear in mind that my daughter’s room is on the second floor, and she’d holler blue murder if you tried to wake her from a sound sleep. And pity the fool who didn’t know to bring ALL her favourite friends and blankies with her…
Yet, here I am, LEAPING OUT OF BED AND INTO THE HALLWAY at the sound of the house settling. Like a Crazed Kidnapping Psychopath is going to come THROUGH THE FRONT DOOR and UP THE STAIRS. Of Our House, in the Middle of Our Street. And, dumber still, be stopped from committing his heinous crimes by a FAT HOUSEWIFE IN HER UNDERWEAR.
You see what I am saying?
But that’s okay, because the next noise has me leaping and checking out the window. IN CASE THE KIDNAPPING PSYCHOPATH HAS A LADDER AND COMES THROUGH THE WINDOW. IN ZERO DEGREE WEATHER.
And like I wouldn’t hear it all happening THROUGH THE BABY MONITOR WE STILL HAVE.
Yeah. So. That makes sense.
But that’s okay. Because when I run out of far-fetched scenarios to worry about, I’ll just rehash life’s everyday worries, stressful events, and horrible news stories. OVER AND OVER AGAIN.
You’d think, after a few thousand of these nights, I’d learn. And yet? Not so much.
So, after a night of irrational worry, I wake up the next morning having less than optimal sleep time, and before my brain’s best time for being awake under the best of circumstances. So I spend much of my morning sucking back more caffeine than should be allowed by law and stumbling about in an irrational stupor.
I’m a treat, I can tell you.
So what I need is this: a fabulously-paying creative job with flexible work hours, and the staff to keep tabs on my family while I sleep. And maybe guard the place. Just to be on the safe side.
Oct
25
Ever have a “meh…” kind of day? Yeah. Me too.
Oct
24
We’re just about over our collective cold here at the House of Peevish. It seems it hit me the hardest. Or maybe I am just a giant pansy. Probably I am a giant pansy. Either way, I seem to be the only one still hacking up a lung.
But we’re all tired. We’ve all been kind of overextending ourselves, each in our own ways. BDH has been working like a crazy person, because, well, work has been crazy busy. And when he’s not at work, there are soccer games to play, and around the house, there are Things To Be Done.
Stinkerbelle is adjusting to her new schedule of go, go, go all week long. School, swimming, dancing, and other activities, coupled with the New and Improved Non-Napping Attitude means she has been pretty tired, a lot of the time. So much so that today, she heartily approved when I suggested that maybe she might want to have a little nap post-lunch. And then crashed Like A Boss.
And me? Well, I am the Stinkerbelle Event Chauffeur. And this year, that means not only transporting her to her various events, but sometimes participating too, like in her speech therapy classes, or in the first of the scheduled field trips and volunteering for her school. So that’s new. But also, my work workload has increased and I have been doing my best to max out on my hours, which equates to about two hours a day.
But I’ve also been trying to do some extracurricular things too, for fun, but they do make for a time commitment. I am doing eleven knitting projects this year, which is doable… except who thought it was a good idea to make a couple of those projects blankets? There was also the movie nights we had going for awhile here but that seemed to die out as people got busy. And the book club I joined last year is starting up after summer hiatus, and I am continuing the fine tradition of OMG THE MEETING IS WHEN? I HAVEN’T EVEN READ THE BOOK YET. And then there’s regular everyday life stuff, like sewing projects and fitting in exercise and menu planning (NOW WITH ALL NEW MEATLESS RECIPES OH MY DOG WHAT HAVE I DONE).
And, not to be the type of person who learns from her mistakes, I have already committed to a 12-knitting-projects-in-2012 project, and a The West Wing watch-along. And I’m going to take another stab at a Project 365-type photo project of Stinkerbelle once again, since we are kind of regretting not having as many photos of her as we did last year.
And doG knows what else. It’s not even 2012 yet.
So really. REALLY really. Is it ANY surprise we’re run down and getting floored by colds? No, it is NOT.
Life is busy, but it’s a pretty good kind of busy, most of the time. As long as we can keep the colds and flu to a minimum, anyway.
(And as long as the snow hasn’t come yet. But that’s another whine for another day.)
Oct
21
Weep with me, dearest Interwebs peeps. For my daughter is starting to give up naptime.
::sobs quietly to herself::
My Stinkerbelle, who used to LOVELOVELOVE naptime, is now beginning to decide that she does not want to nap. Not all the time — on days when she swims or has school, she’s usually tired enough that a nap is still welcome — but on days like today, when we’ve only gone grocery shopping and she’s inside all day, she has started to vehemently insist that she is not tired and she does not need a nap.
I knew it would happen, eventually. And she IS three and a half, which is about the average age when kids begin to give it up for good. So I knew it was coming.
And yet? Still not ready.
I have a schedule! I have things to get done in the course of a day, like actual paying work! The disruption that no nap will cause! It does not bear thinking about.
And yet, I must.
So, we’ve embarked on a few trial runs of “quiet time”. Lots of parents have a version of quiet time. For us, it means that she can lie down with her pillow and blanket and favourite loveys, and watch a movie. And she stays quiet and still, BUT NOT OMG NAPPING as she will insist, and I can be relatively free to get a few things done.
Here’s the problem we have: Because she’s got some receptive language delays, it’s hard to ensure she “gets” what the rules are. And judging from the shrieking and talking and faffing, it’s pretty obvious on some levels that she kind of doesn’t. And I also can’t do anything that she might think OMG I DO IT TOOOOO? because then she will be up and ready to participate and nobody gets anything done.
So, we’ve got to approach things from a different angle.
Fortunately, my work is by and large tied to the computer, so theoretically I can sit in the same room with a laptop and do some work. So that might work well. But it screws up my regular routine of doing any calls for appointments or work that I did when she was napping and I could focus. I may be able to do some cooking or cleaning in the kitchen, if quiet time is in the playroom. Exercising during naptime is now a thing of the past, as is gardening and yardwork and baking. So is any of your more exciting-to-kids housework tasks, like vacuuming or sweeping or laundry.
And when all else fails, I could just sit and knit… but while enjoyable, it’s hardly productive.
So, it’s time to adapt. I know, parenting a growing and developing child is basically about ongoing change, right? But as a household, we do well with routines, so that adaptation period is always a bit trying, until we get a new normal established.
And I have to be honest: I am going to miss naptime. It was two, sometimes three, hours of uninterrupted “me” time. I could have a guaranteed block of time in which to work. I could get things done. I could listen to podcasts, or exercise, or get some housework done… or sometimes all of the above. I could do some things for ME.
Not anymore. Well, not consistently, anyway.
I know, it’s just a matter of time until she gains more independence, and then she will be able to do things on her own and unsupervised, while I do mine. And then, before we know it, she’ll be off to school and I’ll miss having her around all the time, and the constant interruptions in my day.
But not for awhile. Now our days are in a bit of flux.
Truth be told, there IS a trade-off. Not napping in the day will mean a consistent bedtime at night time, which means she won’t be in bed talking and faffing for two hours because she isn’t ready to sleep yet. And that also means we will have consistently free evenings.
And yeah, if I am honest, it’s hard because it’s just one more step that my girl is taking, away from being our little baby girl. and becoming that big girl who is independent and no longer needs me.
WHAT? I KNOW. DON’T REMIND ME.
So we will work to find a new routine. And while she seamlessly, happily moves through all these developmental phases, she’ll just have to learn to be patient with her mother who is cranky because she didn’t get a naptime.
Oct
20
We’re on day, what, FOUR?? Of this cold. And I have had enough of a cold to say that I Have. Had. Enough.
My sinus are bubbling and whining in a disconcerting manner. I wheeze when I walk from room to room. My nose is sore and peeling. And now, BDH is home with it, too.
But… do you know what this MEANS?? It means… THERE IS SOMEONE ELSE HOME WITH ME TO ENDURE “TOY STORY 2″ FOR THE ELEVENTYBILLIONTH TIME.
So there’s that.
Plus, I had to call in dead for work, so I spent the morning knitting, even if the dulcet tones of Tom Hanks will haunt my dreams. There’s a crock pot of pea soup simmering away on the stove, so we’ve got healthy comfort food for dinner. Right now, as That Girl is napping for all she’s worth in the other room (GO SLEEP! REST OFF THAT COLD!) I am sitting and sipping hot chocolate with Bailey’s. And contemplating more knitting. So it’s not all bad.
But still. I miss breathing. I LIKE breathing. So I am kind of over the Whole Cold Experience already.
Depending on how BDH and Stinkerbelle do, we may yet make it to the scheduled Adoption Lunch thingy this weekend. Although I am guessing it will just be a “quick drop in to say hi and then bugger off” kind of thing. Well, although technically it’s a luncheon, we never get within a stone’s throw of any food substances at these things. And my food-issues kid isn’t going to find much to eat OR be much inclined to sit still for the hour and a half it takes her to eat lunch when there’s eleven zillion other children shrieking around the place. Even on a good day, with NO cold. So probably a quick visit is best. AFTER lunch. If she’s not sick.
But that’s still a couple of days away. I still have a whole lot of hot chocolate and knitting to get through before then.
And cold meds. Let us not forget the cold meds. Last night — well, this morning, actually — I finally had a great sleep. And cold meds give the BEST dreams. I dreamed I was with Benedict Cumberbatch (or, as we refer to him, “Englebert Humperdinck… no, Zingelbert Bembledack! Yingybert Dambleban! Zangelbert Bingledack! Wingelbert Humptyback! … Slut Bunwalla!” Thank you, Eddie Izzard.)
Okay, sorry… Wait. Sidetracked.
Yes. Dreams. So. I dreamed last night I was with Benglebert Humptysmack and Martin Freeman in “Sherlock” — have you SEEN it? GO WATCH IT NOW. — and I was all dressed in black and svelte and cool and we were in some darkened monastery-type place solving crimes… It was AWESOME. So I look forward to more cold meds and more adventures tonight.
(Yes. All that to sing the praises of cold meds. SHUT UP DON’T YOU JUDGE ME HUMOUR ME I AM SICK.)
Oh DANG. That Girl just woke up. Okay, off to commune for the afternoon with her and Tom Hanks and Tim Allen again.
I wonder if I can knit earplugs?
Oct
18
Today’s randomness is brought to you by Kleenex, Advil Cold & Sinus, and general lethargy and peevishness.
Oct
17
Bah. It’s COLD AND FLU season. Time for little petri dishes to share as many germs as toys they play with. Time for work colleagues to come into work and cough endlessly all over everyone rather than miss a day of work. Time for people to sneeze all over the shopping cart they’re using, thereby passing it on to everyone else.
I hate cold and flu season.
Because, invariably, I get sick. Like I am doing. Right now.
YES I AM SPECIAL IT IS ALL ABOUT ME THIS IS A BIG DEAL SHUT UP.
I hate getting sick. I am not a good sick person. I take getting sick VERY PERSONALLY, like somebody did it TO ME. ON PURPOSE.
I grumble and I moan and I glare peevishly with watery eyes out at the world from behind endless mugs of warm beverages.
I frump around in the warmest of sweatshirts and then complain how hot I am.
AND THIS IS JUST A COLD. You don’t want to be around for a flu.
How do you know the difference, anyway? Is there a difference? I had a flu once, and it was one of those flus that can kill people. (NO REALLY. Sydney A flu. Look it up — it was one of those mega flus where the Powers That Be say OMG GO GET A FLU SHOT NOW WE’RE SUPERSERIOUS.) I was sick for two weeks and felt like I had been taken out and beaten with PVC pipe. But they can’t all be like that. Can they?
Anyway.
I am thinking this is just a cold. It’s in the back of my throat and my head and my chest. It started a little this morning, on Stinkerbelle’s class field trip, niggling in the back of my throat. And now?
PEEVISH GLARE.
BDH is sick too. We’ve been feeling run down, so it stands to reason. Stinkerbelle seems fine, but you know how long THAT will last.
So I’ve got to see how it goes. This is the busiest week we have had in a very long time, with school and field trips and classes and volunteering and adoption lunches. We’ve got a lot on the go, but how much we get to will depend on how well medicated I can be.
I’d rather curl up on the couch and watch gentle things on TV and drink hot bevvies and knit chair socks. But that’s not going to happen.
Oh well. Better me than That Girl.
Oct
12
.
So, I would have called it “September Movie Night” but… we’re halfway through October already. So we’ll just call it “Fall” and leave it at that.
Our fall Comfy Couch Night movie was the Hitchcock comedy, The Trouble With Harry. And the trouble with Harry was that he was, rather inconveniently for all involved, DEAD. So that makes for a lot of hijinks and shenanigans, as they would have said in the 50s.
Now I’m guessing not a lot of you opted to watch this one, but I’ll open the discussion up — because it’s the first “older” movie we’ve watched, and I’m interested what everyone thought of it. Around here, we’re making an effort to check out classic older movies, and we were pleasantly surprised by this one — it was a gem, and we really enjoyed it. But, I’ll leave the rest of my assessment for the discussion (if there is one!)
So leave your comments below, and let us know what you thought!
Oct
11
Happy post-Thanksgiving hangover, Canuckistani peeps. If you’re anything like me, you’ve got turkey-induced haze, likely to last as long as the leftovers do.
Also, reminder!! Tomorrow is Movie Night Discussion Day! And after the week of glorious fall weather we had, this movie was a PERFECT addition, so I am looking forward to the discussion!
Oct
6
There’s this tree which I love. It’s in a neighbour’s yard (which I hate). But I can look out my back window and see this tree. And it turns the most gorgeous colours in the fall. I can never resist taking a photo.
Last year it was almost pink:
This year, it’s red and gold (note the neighbour’s new Titanic deck, which almost obscured my view OH NO YOU DONT LADY I WILL COME OVER THERE IF YOU BLOCK MY TREE):
I long to have this tree in my yard. I covet this tree. Although, maybe it’s prettier over there, where the light hits it differently. And where I don’t have to rake the leaves.
Oct
4
Hello there. I would have written earlier, but I’ve been busy.
The fall sunshine has finally come, and we have been outside. The weather is sunny and warm, and apparently will be all week long, and we are going to make the most of it. I have been out walking with the King of the Jungle.
She’s a small, benevolent king, but a ruler nonetheless. She likes to go for walks in the woods — hence the title, “King of the Jungle”. Why “king”, and why “jungle”, is anyone’s guess, but lest anyone get confused, she announces to anyone we happen to meet on any trail in any wooded area that “I’M THE KING OF THE JUNGLE!!” So there.
I like that my kid likes walking in the woods. It’s cool and quiet, and we can talk, and share lots of time for discovery. Sometimes, we see deer, and ducks, and cyclists and joggers. Today, we saw a snake (fortunately alive and moving for all he was worth off the trail and into longer grass, unlike the one we saw last time which was dead like a dead thing), and a fuzzy caterpillar, who was all OMG WHAT IS THAT GIANT NOISY THING and decided it was best for all concerned to stick his head under some pine needles and play dead. We encountered another family with a little one out exploring nature. We found a really long wooden bridge that started in the middle of nowhere, crossed nothing, and ended, similarly, nowhere.
I let her choose where we go, once we get on the trail. The network of trails through the woods behind our home branches off in all different directions, so when we come to a fork in the road, I let her choose. “That way!” she will point triumphantly, and off we go. We do that on other trails we’re not so familiar with, too, but in a more limited fashion, but behind the house, where we’re familiar with the area and can’t get too lost too quickly, it’s all up to her. Fortunately, she is not old enough to have much of a sense of direction, so it is easy to loop her around and head for home when it’s getting late or the walk is getting long, and little legs are getting tired and tummies grumbly.
Today was lovely. The weather was warm. We had lots of time for walking. The mosquitoes are (mostly) gone for the season. And everywhere we walked, through the trees, there was a cloudless blue sky. We did about 4 km or so, walking and talking, running and stopping to look at things. And it was nice, just spending time with my girl, without distractions and TV and other kids and places to be.
There are lots of trails in our area. I hope we get lots of time this fall to explore some more. If I get some pictures, I’ll show you my little outdoorsy girl, the King of the Jungle in all her glory. That is, if she’ll let me — if she’s not too busy announcing her Royal Presence to all and sundry, or pointing her little pointer finger in whatever direction she commands me to go.
It could be worse — she could have decided that she’s the Regent of the Yardwork instead.
Designed by Tim Sainburg from Brambling Design
