Bags, pre-felting. Bag on the left has some “issues”. :) 

Here they are, post-felting! 

But I heard a very strong rumor tonight that the big top executives at Crate & Barrel are looking at the space on the Plaza once occupied by Saks 5th Ave. (Hell, for all I know they’re still there? But if C&B is comin’ they best get their asses in gear and GIT OUT.) Anyway, I nearly peed with excitement. But I didn’t because I was on Beth’s couch and that would have been Very Bad Manners.

But hooooo doggies. I used to always say, “I’d quit my job and go work there again if they came to Kansas City!” But of course we know that would be Insane Talk, seeing how every cent I’d make would just go back into the store, and then JWo and I would be livin’ on the street (but with exceptionally nice furniture and barware!) I think I just miss being able to troll for deals and how great it is at Xmas and then Chicago’s got the Outlet, which is awesomer than awesome. (Now, when I was in Mpls. I worked at C&B part time, just for the discount. I’m not above doing it again, peeps. This pull might be more powerful than – gasp – yarn!) Plus, I’d feel like maybe, just maybe, if they moved here, our city would get that retail oomph, like we’re finally “making it” – I’ve said for YEARS this town would support it like crazy, just GET HERE already, and you know what seems to often follow our dearly beloved Crate & Barrel?

Ikea. Good thing I’m at home now typing this. Cleanup, Aisle 12.

Boy, let’s hope I don’t meet Blogger on the street. It might plummet into a scene out of “Fight Club” and let me tell you, I’ll be the one playing Edward Norton, stompin’ Blogger’s butt. I’m one of those incredibly selfish, foot-stomping 8 year olds, who expects her internet and websites to work ALL THE TIME, NO MATTER WHAT. Yesterday, I left SIXTEEN comments on Leah’s blog (sorry Leah, I’m not doing a link right now because Blogger will probably puke on my shoes if I get all “wild-n-crazy” with the html sheeit.) Today, I tried to leave one on beer girl’s (again, no links! Blogger is sensitive, like Nathan Lane playing a damn Broadway orchid!) and it was dayumned funny, and I got error message after error message. Rather than leave a comment there 110x, I decided to post a Blogger Bitchslap. Because I rely on this site WAY too much, probably falls under “addiction” in that big book they use for diagnosing all your mental problems. So when Her Highness doesn’t get her fix, Her Highness gets all schoolyard brawlin’ and sassy.
Oh, and beer girl? Here’s what I was trying to say: the good thing about the Banc du Jen is that a) the loan officer always forgets about the loan, immediately and b) the only interest is – you guessed it – beer points!
Now, let’s see if this bitch’ll fly and post or if I’m going to have to hold my breath & turn blue.

So, the Lady was all wrapped up in watching her tv, and Mister was off someplace, maybe in that bathroom place where the heater comes up under the sink, I like to lie there in the morning when Lady takes her shower, but what I was trying to write was that they were both doing things, you know? And so I did one of the good tricks I rarely get to do, which is stand up on my hind legs and get stuff off the counter or stove when I think noone is watching! It is so great. And I was very careful and quiet except for a little clicking of my nails, and a little jingling of my collar, I sure wish they’d make that jingling go away because Lady and Mister ALWAYS seem to know where I am, and what I’m doing, and where was I? Oh, yes, so I got a WHOLE FRIED CHICKEN wing or some part I don’t know it was fried and meaty and the outside was really tasty and it was going to be SO GOOD I thought I should try to just nonchalantly walk into the living room with it sorta hidden in my mouth so I could lie down and really, really enjoy it? But Lady already seemed to be on to me and I heard a lot of YAP YAP YAP POLLY NO YAP YAP YAP and so I slowed down a little and got kinda low to the floor, thinking, like, maybe she won’t see me coming in to get on my pillow and savor this chicken wing I’m hiding in my mouth?

But she did. She even took it away, like right, Lady is gonna eat something I had in my mouth but I think she just threw it in the garbage to try and teach me a lesson but I know I’ll forget it the minute something good-smelling is back on the stove or counter. And she kept on with the YAPPING and the NO POLLYing and the BAD DOGging and then I had to lie down on my pillow with only the memory of the chicken wing in my mouth and that really sucked because that was gonna be one tasty chicken wing. Oh well. It’s a dog’s life here. I will keep checking for good tasting things, no matter how much they YAP and NO POLLY me, because I’M PRETTY and Lady tells me that all the time.

The apartment building jacked up my rent and so instead of luxuriating in my break-in-able first floor apartment, we moved me up to the 8th floor. (Yes, there was an elevator. It was built, I believe, in 1812 in honor of the War, and Overture, and had lost all its charm, except when it didn’t work, and then it looked peachy compared to the stairwell.)

The Next in the Bat Story Series: We had returned from a big road trip through Iowa, visiting my freshly-divorced parents, separately, of course, so that was fraught with all sorts of excitement and nerves. I will tell you what I remember the most about that trip? James gamely ate potato salad at my mother’s apartment, despite being a person who does not eat mayo-based salads, and then when the a/c went out in my car and we were forced to drive in the summer heat with the windows down, we coped by waving wildly out the window at EVERY SINGLE VEHICLE we passed on the two-lane highway. Anyone waving back made us giddy with delight. But it was hot, and it’s a long drive and so we got back to my apartment and collapsed. The next morning, I trailed behind James towards the kitchen, desperate for coffee, and not wearing glasses. He was making the coffee, and I stood in the dining room, blinking. Something in the corner caught my eye. Way up high. A dark blob on the crown molding.
“James?”
“Yeah?”
“What’s that up there? I don’t have my glasses on.”
James: shuffling, looks up at the corner in question.
“Oh. That’s a bat. Leave it alone and try not to wake it up.”

WHA HA HA HA HA WHAT? Well that was not an adequate solution or answer. I commenced with the Freaking Out Over the Bat Presence. “GET IT OUT OF HERE!” Screw coffee, a live bat in the house is enough to make me get my glasses on and move at speeds ordinarily associated with 2 in the afternoon.

James got his trout net out and stood on a stepstool. Unfortunately, the crown molding posed a problem. And at that moment, the bat woke up, and began hissing at James, showing a lower set of icky teeth.
“Just leave the room, Jennifer.”
And the bat was, unfortunately, sent to the Big Batsoteria in the Sky.

I love bats, when they’re outside and catching bugs and skeeters and flopping about, with their sonar and amazing dips and dives. I’m not afraid of them at all – but when they’re inside, I turn into a shrieking basket case, and that, dear internet, is what happened on an even grander scale with the NEXT Bat Story.

And yes, I did eventually figure out where the hell they were getting in.

“Stupid risks make life worth living.”
You love adventure. You’re quite spontaneous,
and will do anything for a little thrill.
You’re certainly not boring. However, sometimes
you get a bit carried away, and could wind up
doing something incredibly stupid and die. Tone
it down a bit.

Which Advice Quote said by Homer Simpson are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

I figure it’s time to start sharing the Bat stories. Oh yes! I have bat stories. Do you have bat stories? Do you like soft rock the way WE like soft rock? (sorry, some bad 90’s ad for a cd compilation crept in there.)

Let’s start with Bat #1. This one made it out alive, and I’m still convinced, to this day, he flew off and told the entire Bat Colony about me, and that’s why my particular plague of bats continued. I was living in the 1st floor apartment off the Plaza, and had been burgled a month or so earlier. So my paranoia was still on “High”. My bedroom window faced the driveway that went to the basement garage, so it was elevated almost to a second-story level, but that didn’t always leave me feeling safer. One night I woke up and looked at the window sill by my bed. My window was open a couple inches.

There were black-gloved fingers fluttering back and forth along the sill! HOLY SHIT! In the time it took me to get air back into my lungs, it became clear, even without my glasses, that it wasn’t actually a piano-practicing burglar, but the wings of a bat fluttering about. And now? Now it was climbing up the INSIDE of the screen, which meant it would be able to get INSIDE my bedroom through the gap in the window at the top. Apparently the screen had a gap in it. Zoiks, Batman! I’m still not exactly clear on what happened, or how this happened, but as the bat climbed higher, I knew I had to do something. It was almost at the top of the gap. So I slammed the window down. EEEK. I caught a little bat toe in between the two window frames. Did you know bats can scream? They can. EEK EEK EEK! I collapsed and went back to sleep. And the next morning? There was no dead bat, anywhere to be found. I felt a little relief, because I’m basically pro-bat, and I didn’t want to kill the thing – I just didn’t want it in my bedroom.

Just a little smidge of blood on the window and I’m sure if I could read Batglish, it scrawled out, “We’ll be back for you later, bitch.” But I don’t know Batglish, and so I thought, “Whew! That’s the end of that!”

So naive.

Sometimes, it’s the small stuff that’s just very difficult. For instance, right now? I seem to be going through a phase in which I cannot feed myself with regular utensils. Yesterday, we went to Thai 2000 for their Sunday brunch – and let me just pause to say there is nothing like this brunch. And you must say “Thai 200!” in slightly inflected tones with urgency every time you say, “THAI 2000!”. Because that is how we do it. Their brunch is exceptionally authentic, and yet also caters to the 5 Anglo people who go there, unaccompanied by someone of Asian ethnicity. I do draw the line at tripe soup and the beef soup which has been flavored with anise, because licorice beef broth and giant hard-boiled eggs and leathery mushrooms in soup is not my cup o’ – well – soup. But the mussels? On all that is sacred, I swear, these mussels are the best mussels in the city.

But I digress, as usual. I tell you, I am one of those people who start out on a journey and then end up in the ditch, trying to find that shiny object that caught the sunlight. I emerge 12 hours later with many chigger bites, some bits of tin foil in my hair and some garbage I picked up, and a new journey idea. So. Back to it.

I could not feed myself a bite of food yesterday without some portion of it flying on to my shirt, dropping onto the table, etc. I apparently had pad thai sauce all over my mouth. I was beginning to feel like a special needs person, who should not be allowed to use a fork, for fear of quadruple-piercing my nose with a vigorous jab towards my open mouth, and finding myself off by three inches, again. Usually these episodes go away, but today at lunch, I sat at my desk eating a gyro from the deli, and I am not kidding about this, I am wearing tzatziki sauce and gyro juice and every single f’n bite meant something was falling down the side of my face, into my cleavage, onto my desk, onto my shirt, and I’m seriously surprised I didn’t just eat the blasted napkin by accident, as I kept wrapping my pita with a napkin, trying to stem the fountain of flotsam cascading onto me. I went through 6 or 7 napkins, too.

I AM A MESS! I need to be hosed off. I need my co-ordination back! Lord knows I wasn’t given a generous amount to begin with, and if this keeps up my hypochondria will kick in, and I’ll be convinced I have a brain tumor (TU-mah) or some degenerative disease I never even thought to bring up at the doctor’s office this morning. GOOD GRIEF. I must now go wash the tzatziki sauce off my body. Give me a very wide berth, I may trip and crush you.

On Saturday, the doggie girls went to the vet. They were VERY pissed at me, having been promised a spa morning, and instead were victims of an evil bait & switch. Polly weighed in at 42 pounds, Suzy at 84. Both were pronounced in excellent health, despite their roundworms (damn feral cat poo) and now they’re on a regimen that includes regular de-worming on top of their heartworm dosing. They were relieved to leave, and our bank account was just, well, relieved of money. I confess, I gave them an extra milkbone each from the free bowl. Sheesharoo it costs some serious coin to take the dogs to the vet! My friend Shelley was my helper, and we ran a few errands afterwards, the highlight being a stop at Sheridan’s Custard, where they give you a free pupcone if you bring your dog. Polly and Suzy LOVED the pupcones, except for the fact they’re SO SMALL and where is the NEXT ONE?

Then I had my doctor appointment this morning, nothing like starting Monday with an ill-fitting paper shirt & a disposable speculum. Oh yeah, and getting blood drawn. I always request the baby needles, it may take a little longer but it doesn’t hurt as much. I was very impressed with my phlebotomist, she was rapido and got the needle in without any problem. I showered her with compliments, because one of the last times I got my blood drawn (at a different location) the person kept exclaiming, “Your veins are SO RUBBERY!” as she proceeded to poke the needle up, down & around under my skin. That is one visual I never need to see again, because even though I’m pretty sturdy and try not to be wimpy about stuff, I had to say “Hey now. Maybe we should try one of those baby needles?” while looking away and trying not to pass out. I think I even gave her the Hairy Eyeball, which is supposed to strike fear into the hearts of every living thing but mostly makes me look funny.

So all of this means that the ladies of the house have been pronounced healthy & only one of us really needs to start exercising more, so dammit Suzy, get on that treadmill!

I got a Diet Coke at McD’s afterwards, and they screwed up – I knew instantly that it was regular Coke, which always tastes good for the first few swigs? (especially if you’re hungover, but I wasn’t.) Then, as a Diet Coke purist, it just gets to be too much. Have you ever been in those little boutiques? Where they have 800 scents and everything’s sweet and heady and a bit overwhelming? Well, if you could take that environment and make it into a beverage, then that’s what drinking regular Coke tastes like to me. I gave up. As I came into work, I scammed a Diet Coke from a friend who was setting up for a client meeting. Yay! Normalcy is returning.

Knitting update: I’ve got two buttonhole bags ready to felt, and will follow up with before & after pictures tomorrow! I started Anouk from Knitty.com, and then there’s still the Folly. I feel a surge of energy comin’ for the Folly. It must be done while there’s still a remote chance I can wear it before next winter…..