Saturday 22 November

It's cold. I did not unsnap my heavy parka today. Hat, and warm mittens. The dogs were frisky and vibrantly alive in the cold. We saw no one but crows, and not too many of them.

I was bone tired yesterday. I kept up the pace at work, but it was a measured, heavy pace, fully informed by deep fatigue. Late in the afternoon, J broke out some Vosges chocolate from the shop. I had to guess which kind it was. I got it on the first bite -- matcha. The chocolate is unevenly mixed, we have decided, the added flavors are not balanced throughout. She didn't taste the matcha until her second piece -- and neither did L. I simply got lucky on my first bite. But that chocolate revived me nicely and brightened me up a bit. It had felt like a very long day. We got all that we needed done, however, and that was the important thing. And next week is a short week -- 3 days -- with Thanksgiving. We go get M Tuesday night. That will be a long day. I have to clean up a bit here, to get her sleeping arrangements ready, and I'd like to get the bathroom cleaned up too.

I had to shut P in her monster box overnight. She went on a cold hearted rampage against any cat that looked in her eyes. And where usually if I call out 'Pee-duh-lee' in a high happy voice, she will come to me -- not so last night. PJ the vet said, Oh, yes, she will learn if you put her in the carrier when she gets like that. And last night I saw just what it was she learned: she learned not to come when I call her when she attacks the other cats, or she will be shut in the box. I had to employ wily coyote maneuvers to catch her and she was cozy in the monster box all night long.

Not that the other ones weren't monsters themselves. I heard all kinds of thumping and noise all night long. Because even tho I was so tired, and even took a hot bath to relax my weary muscles, I still did not sleep well. I had cat nonsense for one thing. Matthew wanting out, Topaz running in, me throwing him out, and Inca all night long with her intermittent periods of gentle restlessness.

So what anyway. I am walking down to the market today to load up on some necessary stuff. I am cooking a venison stew today with the last of the meat D&B gave me. It is, appropriately enough, stew meat. I plan to cook it with onions, brown and wild rice, and spinach. Oh, celery too. I have not yet decided if I will use chopped or leaf spinach. It should be very good.

And I am still hoping to continue to clean the church early Sundays, as it has been very dry weather, and so the floors should not be so bad. Once we have snow and ice and wet, and all the muck tracked in by that, especially salt, I will have to surrender my Saturday afternoon and do it then, because all that mopping takes a long time. But as long as it is still light early, and dry as it has been, early Sunday it is.

M called me at work yesterday afternoon, trying to decide if she should buy an additional suitcase. We decided she should, since the price and size were right.

I put out the bird seed yesterday morning. As I was doing it, Maya came along, demanding my attention, and when she didn't get it to her satisfaction, she climbed up the front of me, all the way up to my chin. It was alarming to be climbed like a tree like that. As it was I was having trouble getting the seed out of the bag, and in my frustration, I also did not need to be climbed by a cat.