Alert the AARP! I am NOT in Their Demographic!!

Call it peri-menopause. Call it empty nest. Call it anything like that and I'll feed your falling breasts to my blind dog!  Yes, my youngest child turned 18.  Yes, my "monthly" is far less predictable and I am most certainly not pregnant.  No, my inner 28-yr-old does NOT need a  reality check!

Maybe, I'm just confronting the fact  that I have no idea what to do with myself now that I have raised two kids and they have both left me for college (well, almost).  Ok, so they didn't leave me; I made them go to college.  Just ask them!  

I am, however,  46 and going to be living alone for the first time in....erg.......26 years! So, now what?  Well, I go back to teaching and the Desert.  I move into my perfect, newish condo.
 
(cricket)

So I can do anything I want...within the confines of money and restraints of my new kids-the pets.

(cricket)

Either I have adult onset ADD, or I have too many choices!  

Well, I guess for today, I will be glad that my daughter hasn't graduated high school just yet and concentrate on valuing the time we have left.  (I will forget and ignore that I am unstylish, annoying, and the nosiest, most controlling mother in the world!)

Why?  Because "I will think of that tomorrow!"

Smell the Coffee

I've been trying to stop and smell the coffee a little each day - and daydream that it is being delivered to me.  I sit on my little balcony and witness all the signs of life bouncing around  the apartment alcove:  the faraway lullabies of  the 57 freeway; the moans of love-making bellowing the impending arrival of great satisfaction; a petit, red-throated hummingbird rests on the branch of a sycamore tree and frantically calls to a lost mate. The  scream of a siren on its way  to UCI Medical Center wakes me from my Neil Simon moment.  

Okay.  Back to reality.

Psycho Kitty Revealed

Our cat came to live with us the same way other animals do; we rescued him from a trashcan behind the high school where I teach.  He was sick but after nursing him back to health, my son insisted we keep him and name him Milkshakes.  After many quibbles about naming an animal a food product, I agreed to Milkshake…just one. 

About a year later, Milkshake was a thriving cat with only one problem: nightmares. Now, I’m not talking everyday, run-of-the-mill nightmares; I’m talking paw thrashing, spit hissing, body throwing kind of nightmares.  I’m talking, “oops, sorry I just ripped your sheets to threads,” nightmares.

So, I made a video.  A video so the vet could see Milkshake’s nightmares. I posted the video on YouTube with a full 10-second disclaimer about the reasons behind making the recording.  Can I just say, that of the 500+ comments on the video, 427 are “Take that cat to the vet. That cat needs help.”  Mm-hmm.

Now, I admit it.  I went the dramatic route with the video.  But, what is a video without sound?  And what better way to make my point than to underscore my cat’s nightmares with John William’s score of “Close Encounters of the Third Kind?”  Ok.  Maybe people get lost in the drama of the whole thing.

But what matters most, is that after viewing the following video, our vet told us that our cat, Milkshake -who is the color of burnt milk- has epilepsy.

Psycho Kitty; the Cat that Shakes

On YouTube

Other stuff by jeniesk

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Genuine Fake Watches

As an English teacher, I am always looking for good examples of literary terms.  The Grand Bazaar in Istanbul, Turkey provided me with a perfect illustration of oxymoron!

Holding Tightly to Beliefs

I     c.a.n.'t    s.t.o.p   l.a.u.g.h.i.n.g!


http://tithenai.tumblr.com/post/3215186237/two-churches-located-across-the-street-from-each-other

Father's Day Treasure

Josh, 19, and Kelli, 17, traveled to Riverside today to celebrate Father’s Day with their Dad. Secretly, after a week of “but it’s my vacation,” “Can you take me to the beach?” and “I need the car to meet friends at Frank’s Hookah Bar,”…

...the silence is feeling a lot like Mother's Day!