I'm so confused!

Normally we come home on Thursday afternoon.  So that made yesterday Friday, & today Saturday.  But it is not.  Yesterday i tried to do "Monday things" - like the knitting group at 9 . . . but i took the Jeep for smog too, planning to do errands.  Then i forgot the knitting, so just went to breakfast while the Jeep was being worked on.  Got ready to pay & discovered my wallet was gone.  ! ! !  Duane came & rescued me & we found my wallet had fallen out & was in the Jeep.  Profound relief.

So, today is not Saturday, it is Tuesday.  Normally we go down the hill on Tuesday mornings.  Duane worked extra hours on-site last week.  He also has a SAR event tonight he wanted to be here for, so he's not going down the hill until tomorrow.  I'm staying home this week.  I don't know if he'll come on on Thursday or Friday.  I think it is going to be a while before i know what day it really is.  
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More pics from the weekend.  The run was sponsored by the Navy, or something.  This last pic is of my sis (on the right) & her friends D & S who drove down from LA county to join the walk.  
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I'm thankful Mac won't have to go to the vet.  


Both our cats are long haired.  We believe that Mac is some mix with largely Maine Coon, although he could also have Norwegian Forest Cat in him.  But he is definitely a mix as neither of those long haired cats tend to mat; Mac mats severely - if not taken care of.  Not quite as bad as a Persian, but close.  Jazz is of Turkish Angora extraction (we got him from the folks who raised him & know more of his parentage & history than Mac).  He doesn't mat a lot, but will have some eventually if not taken care of. 


It had been our pattern to take them in once a year in the spring & have them shaved.  Then it was always my goal to be "better" at brushing them & avoiding the shaving.  I've not done so well with this.  

The last time we took them for grooming, however, Mac wouldn't allow himself to be messed with.  The groomer said he tried to "eat her."  As he is a big, imposing cat, i'm sure it seemed so.  We had trimmed his nails prior to this, but he can use his teeth.  At that point we bought an animal shaving thingy & tried to do it ourselves.  We did, kind-of/sorta.  

By January this year, he was heavily matted.  I was afraid we would end up having to take him to the vet & have him anesthetized in order to do the work on him.  From shoulders to hindquarters seemed to be on big, solid piece, also quite a lot on his tummy & around under his tail.  I was worried to shave him then, however, for we keep the house at 53 F most of the time.  It just seemed too cold to have him shaved in January.


Mac acts as though it hurts him to be petted or brushed below his shoulders.  He also HATES scissors.  But he doesn't mind the shaver thingy, however.  About a month ago we got it out & did some shearing of both the cats.  (Rebecca asked Jazz if he had walked in front of a weed whacker.)  It was a mess & they looked a mess.  The shaver thingy doesn't work on mats very well.  But it cleared out enough of the extraneous hair that we could see the mats we needed to work on.


So, i was stealthy.  Here & there once in a while i'd get the scissors & just work at cutting out some of a mat at a time.  If i was very gentle, i could get 1/4 of one done before Mac got impatient & upset & moved on.  He is now 100% mat free!  I think i have all of them off Jazz too.  They both are very patchy.  We need to get out the shaver & clean them up.  That shouldn't be too difficult now that the mats are gone.  

But i'm thankful to avoid the stress & medical intervention & expense of taking Mac to the vet.

Jazz, pre- & post-shave a couple of years ago.

Mac, just being Mac.

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I posted a while back about home-made deodorant.  Because it is so cool in our house, it works well to have it in the stick dispenser, but in OC it didn't work at all.  I came upon the brilliant idea of putting it into the gel dispenser.  Wrote i was going to give it a try.

Ok.  Not worth it.  So not worth it.  


First of all, the top of the gel container is a solid piece with a mesh at the top.  I hoped that the mesh thing would snap off, but it does not.  Duane removed the bottom of the dispenser for me, which is the only way to get into it.  It was a real pain to clean inside.  I then covered the mesh at the top with tape, inverted it & filled it with the deodorant & let it cool.  When it was partway cooled, we put back on the bottom piece.


Except the bottom piece doesn't really snap back on.  So when i turn the wheel to push up the "gel" the bottom piece instead pushes itself off & i have to hold it down on something firm to keep it in place.  So, it works ok, but it is definitely not worth the effort.


Also, as things get warmer in OC, it may just leak out all over the place.


My motel room in San Diego was really warm this weekend.  Much warmer than i'm used to.  When i got back in i would run the air conditioning long enough for it to cool some, but i hate the sound of the thing & didn't want to waste too much energy.  The deodorant i took down was in a jar.  The type i spread on with my fingers.  At home, it is a solid cake & works well.  In San Diego & the heat it totally melted.  Very liquid; well, not like water, but oil with the solid making it gooey.  Also the baking soda/corn starch which was blended into it settled to the bottom.  That's not an issue i've ever had before.  If my "gel" container does that when it gets warmer in OC, i will have a mess of blended oil & other junk leaking everywhere.  
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Duane says the cats are being antsy because they want him to leave.  "Leave?"  


He thinks they know it is Tuesday & we are suppose to leave so that they get the treats we give them as we are going out the door.  


I don't think they're that intuitive, but Duane swears that they're going by the calendar.  :)




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