2001
| July 26, 2000 Speaking of e-Mail - Mine is down now - the dial-up access authentication server crashed but good - been flaky for months. I am not pleased. Not at all. And they "Have no estimated time for repair". Love that. All night long I felt like my arm was severed. Has this creation entered our lives to the extent that we are somehow incomplete without it? It controls us? It obviously controls me and mine. My younger son, still in the hospital, has my Mac 3400C laptop hooked up to e-mail and the net. Of course. Makes it hard for them to get him out with other teenagers. I had fixes to make to the web (took TOO many graphics down! Housekeeping! Botched up my websites!) but not as a long distance call! I needed to check on book orders (well - I get one every now and then). Communication from the others I am doing this project with. Little things like that. Not to mention the support group that e-mails me regularly. Keeps my chin up. Any higher and I would walk into doors. Maybe tonight my normal dial-up will be up to accepting me. I am wandering around - useless. I drink coffee and stare at the kitchen cabinets. Wondering why I am in the kitchen. I walk in and out of rooms - forgetting from instance to instance what I was doing or about to do. I can't even e-mail myself a checklist. (See? Useful!) For when I am at work and need to do something that I don't remember until I am home. I tell myself by e-mail - which I get at the office. And when I am at work, it's pretty much the other thing. I send e-mail home to remind myself of things I forgot until I got to work. Like mail the check for the business license. Find a mail-order whatever. And read and sign the Banta contract. And the letter from Ingram. I know ---- it's the end of the month. Hormones do that to you. I know ---- I need to take a week and clean house - mow the lawn (what lawn!) - kill snails (eating my squash and tomatoes -NO NO NO MINE!) - but first..... I know ---- I have to do the ad for Starlog - for October - and the centerfold for Romantic Times - also October. I am clueless at the moment. Must review mags. Must get an idea. I am blank. I know ---- I have to pay bills - always painful! And the hospital bill hasn't even started! 90% is covered by insurance. It's that 10% I worry about! (Don't worry - I own two houses and lots of stock - I'd rather have my baby home. I can always be a writer in a garret. Sort of a romantic image that! An d where is this man they keep predicting will "walk into my life"? For that matter, where is Fabio? I need a hug!) I couldn't figure it out - I am normally so efficient that I squeak - then it registered - tomorrow they do bone marrow etc. procedures on my very ill son. I will be out of the office tomorrow - I want to be in hospital for the procedures. And this will give the first indication that the treatment is working. So I am in cotton wool. Because nothing else has the importance it once had. And my son is still throwing a fever. I am concerned about that. You can die from fevers and their viruses caught in the hospital just as much from what put you in the hospital in the first place. Makes me nervous. (New antibioitic dropped it.) Got the proof (corrected) for the Extreme Troy calendar. Romantic Times is treating him like a celebrity. We get to say we knew him when.......I don't think he has a clue as to what might happen to him! I am planning on replacing the bathroom sinks - after bitching for five years! Must measure cabinet. Must go to Dale's hardware. Must get new kitchen sink faucet. We currently have pedestals - gross! Impossible to service and impossible to keep clean. I also need to have a large storage unit near the house if I can find one. Must remember to call around. Must warn the other storage place I am shutting them down (they are too far from the house). In the midst of all this, my big orange blob of a cat, Ranger, has devised new get-even games - pissed that his food is in the garage (I will move it back once I scrub the floor). He bolts into my bedroom - I've been keeping him out of it in deference to the dog - and I have to chase him out with the water gun. He will turn and hunch down and defy me when I say no. I spray him. This results in a chasing game. He knows I will get him. He leaps on the bed. A 12-lb cat is not delicate. He leaps to the side and watches and listens - for me pumping the water gun. Then he races down under the bad and bolts out the door. Think he'd learn. I always leave him wet! When I lock him in the garage - like I've had enough of that - he crashes the door with his paws - sounds like the thundering herd is arriving - and bolts between your legs if you open the door to spray him. I have "Sticky Paws" tape on my bedroom door. Ha! Like that will save the paint! Yesterday he pitched the dog bones everywhere in the kitchen. Fortunately I had not yet scrubbed the kitchen floor. Still haven't. I grabbed the gun and chased him around the house. Got him good! Little pest! He resorted to purring while climbing up behind me while I sat at the computer (on the edge of my seat). Of course he was shredding the seat back at the same time! I leaned into him. He purred louder. So I strangled him. Softly. Seems he misses being cuddled. My son occasionally comes out, chases him down, slings him over his shoulder (he sort of drapes there) and carries him off for forced petting. Ranger of course purrs the whole time, He sounds like a buzz saw.With my son out of the house, and me too, Ranger has been ignored. Today I got him with a full wine glass of water - how else do you take your vitamins? Of course, since the floor is scheduled to be washed.....I had no compunctions about drowning the little beast. I have a pump-action water pistol - and I use it - so picture me - an overweight middle aged woman running barefoot and maybe dressed (usually in a thin nightrail) pumping up the watergun and chasing the orange fur ball around the house - usually in the middle of the night, sans makeup with my wild hair flying. If it's morning, I may be in a towel or just my underwear. Not a pretty sight! When he is home, my younger son comes out and scolds the two of us for making so much noise when we play. |
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