Ezekiel Day 13, plus other thoughts
The kitties: Well, Zeke has settled in very well. I am the preferred furniture, and Sophie is the preferred chaser-chasee. I think they're still negotiating territorial issues a little bit. The bed still seems to be under negotiation. Zeke still insists on sleeping RIGHT IN MY FACE, which leaves Sophie to the end of the bed or the crook of my knees. I prefer the latter, at least until MY FACE stops being optimal for Zeke. I'm trying to break him of this habit, but apparently he's aware that MY FACE is the primary communication vehicle (the hands being a close second) (and weirdly, MY FACE seems to be the best place to nurse upon, specifically my lip, my eyebrow, or the tip of my nose), and he wants to be where the action is.
Company: I've had lots of company lately. Last weekend was the first pre-holiday crafternoon, which filled the house with knitting, drawing, quilting, and jewelry-making companions. And on Election Night, I had several fine friends in to watch the returns. Sophie and Zeke both got lots of attention, and my house is tidier than it's been in a while. Also, the carpet's been vacuumed, which hadn't happened since before I went to Europe and was desperately needed. So things in the house generally are good. Having company like that is nice.
Side effects of living alone: One trend that I'm not so happy about is that occasionally--just occasionally, not always--after friends leave, I have a tiny, fleeting moment of panic, wondering if everything is where I left it. Because, of course, when you live alone (not counting the cats), things don't move unless you yourself move them. If they move by themselves, it's because the cats moved them, or someone not yourself moved them--and then it gets weird. I dislike this knee-jerk reaction though. Like I said, it happens rarely. I think it happens mostly when it's been a big group in the house and I'm tired. I don't want age and solitude to make me more peculiar than I naturally am already. I'm hoping that self awareness will prevent this creeping peculiarity to stop its slow slither into my habits.
Road trip: This weekend--in just a couple of hours, in fact--I hit the road for Portland. The cat sitter will be coming in to feed, cuddle, and entertain the cats, check the mail and so forth. I'm looking forward to getting out of Dodge for a bit. A change of scenery is always a good thing, and seeing my Down South Posse always makes me happy. We've got some cool stuff in the hopper for the next three days. Should be a good weekend.
Flying time: While I was in Europe, I did a little early holiday shopping. When I arrived back in the states, suddenly it was mid-October, everyone was preparing for Halloween, and the stationery and drug stores already had their Christmas ornaments for sale. Now that it's nearly mid-November, I'm having a hard time adjusting to the fact that it's nearly holiday time, and that I need to finish the holiday shopping I started in Paris. (Did you see that? I was in Paris! I need to finish processing the pictures and to post them. But there are hundreds, and almost all of them need to be cleaned up in Photoshop first. ::sigh::)
Europe pictures: As I mentioned parenthetically above, I've been slowly processing my Europe pictures. Why all the post-production? Because it turns out that I didn't clean my lens very well, and nearly all of the shots have spots that must be removed. I'm too much of a perfectionist not to clean them up, and too harsh a judge of my own work to let anything be seen until they're absolutely as perfect as I can make them. I have a lot of work yet to do. My goal is to have the best of them uploaded to Flickr by the end of the year. We'll see how I do.
Company: I've had lots of company lately. Last weekend was the first pre-holiday crafternoon, which filled the house with knitting, drawing, quilting, and jewelry-making companions. And on Election Night, I had several fine friends in to watch the returns. Sophie and Zeke both got lots of attention, and my house is tidier than it's been in a while. Also, the carpet's been vacuumed, which hadn't happened since before I went to Europe and was desperately needed. So things in the house generally are good. Having company like that is nice.
Side effects of living alone: One trend that I'm not so happy about is that occasionally--just occasionally, not always--after friends leave, I have a tiny, fleeting moment of panic, wondering if everything is where I left it. Because, of course, when you live alone (not counting the cats), things don't move unless you yourself move them. If they move by themselves, it's because the cats moved them, or someone not yourself moved them--and then it gets weird. I dislike this knee-jerk reaction though. Like I said, it happens rarely. I think it happens mostly when it's been a big group in the house and I'm tired. I don't want age and solitude to make me more peculiar than I naturally am already. I'm hoping that self awareness will prevent this creeping peculiarity to stop its slow slither into my habits.
Road trip: This weekend--in just a couple of hours, in fact--I hit the road for Portland. The cat sitter will be coming in to feed, cuddle, and entertain the cats, check the mail and so forth. I'm looking forward to getting out of Dodge for a bit. A change of scenery is always a good thing, and seeing my Down South Posse always makes me happy. We've got some cool stuff in the hopper for the next three days. Should be a good weekend.
Flying time: While I was in Europe, I did a little early holiday shopping. When I arrived back in the states, suddenly it was mid-October, everyone was preparing for Halloween, and the stationery and drug stores already had their Christmas ornaments for sale. Now that it's nearly mid-November, I'm having a hard time adjusting to the fact that it's nearly holiday time, and that I need to finish the holiday shopping I started in Paris. (Did you see that? I was in Paris! I need to finish processing the pictures and to post them. But there are hundreds, and almost all of them need to be cleaned up in Photoshop first. ::sigh::)
Europe pictures: As I mentioned parenthetically above, I've been slowly processing my Europe pictures. Why all the post-production? Because it turns out that I didn't clean my lens very well, and nearly all of the shots have spots that must be removed. I'm too much of a perfectionist not to clean them up, and too harsh a judge of my own work to let anything be seen until they're absolutely as perfect as I can make them. I have a lot of work yet to do. My goal is to have the best of them uploaded to Flickr by the end of the year. We'll see how I do.