Miscellany of a Cheshire Cat

Monster Cat sleeps for us all…

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cats, comics, monster cat, naps, silly, sleep, tennyson

I’m apparently having one of those years that flies by. It seems like everything has gone very quickly and all the time I thought I had is also already gone. Such is life, I guess.

The Philadelphia area is threatened with promises of a harsh winter. The local news stations are adding to the hype, naturally. The Farmer’s Almanac actually has us on the border of the cold wet and the cold dry areas so who knows what we’ll actually end up with. I’d certainly prefer more snow to less snow but no one is surprised by this.

I didn’t get very far on Nanowrimo this year. I haven’t had a very productive month as it’s been whipping by. I guess the fact that we were away for the first week didn’t help. I finished a knitting project last night and played with some swatches for some lace patterns with varying degrees of success. I really would appreciate consistent terminology and notation in knitting. I’m told that’s a total pipe dream, but I dream of a day when I don’t have to decipher each knitting pattern according to author’s birth sign, region of origin, phase of the moon and account for current sunspot activity. (Hyperbole, it makes you funnier.)

I have successfully avoided malls all weekend! I did a little online gift shopping and a lot of browsing. I am taking it slowly but I expect the avalanche of the holiday season will hit me soon enough.

holidays, nanowrimo, random, winter

Hope you had a great Thanksgiving! Mr. Paw will come help with your leftovers if you need him! ;)

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cats, comics, gooshy food, monster cat, silly, tennyson, thanksgiving, turkey

Beware the “Sale” Price: I went to the grocery store today. I was only going in for a couple of things so I tried not to think about the pre-holiday craziness that awaited me. Clementines were on my list. Last week they were $5.99 and I was happy to see them on sale for $4.99 today. A dollar is a dollar, right? Right, except that my dear grocery store receipt claims that the original price was $8.88 and would like my “supercard” to claim credit for saving me $3.89. I think not. I’ve seen misleading sale prices at this store before – the original price goes up while the sale price goes down, creating the illusion of a 20% savings when there’s really only a 10% savings – but never quite as impressive as this one. I would have pointed out the absurdity to my cashier but the poor dear was having trouble with basic stuff and seemed to be (hopefully) nearing the end of a very long shift.

Given all the lovely economic factors we’re facing lately, I’m sure we’ll see a lot more “sale price” manipulation like this. So fun.

Thanksgiving: Cookies are baked, frosted and packed in plastic boxes for safety. Driving will happen tomorrow. Have a wonderful holiday and long weekend everyone!

Black Friday: Threadless is having a great Black Friday sale: all t-shirts will be $9. You can put stuff in your cart now and it will probably still be there on Friday, thus making the Black Friday thing even easier. (If you’re not familiar with Threadless, they make silly, strange and off-the-wall t-shirts.) My plans for Friday include pajamas and possibly cinnamon rolls. I will leave the hunting and gathering on the craziest shopping day of the year to braver, stronger, more foolish souls. I just don’t have it in me to deal with the crowds, chaos, questionable service and high-density of stupid that Black Friday usually entails. (And, having said this, the Fop will probably try to drag me out somewhere.)

Kittens and cats: The girls are truly growing into their mini-cat title. They’ve lengthened, gotten sleeker and gained quite a bit of weight. They’re starting to look more like cats than kittens but rest assured their kitten behavior hasn’t really changed. We are currently receiving broadcasts from the Cat Planet which have the mini-cats flying about the 2nd floor with great energy and bushy tails. Tennyson watches suspiciously. He keeps shifting where he’s watching from, though, probably in a vain attempt to not become part of the race track.

Yes, Mr. Paw, karma. He’s been retreating to the bedroom regularly for a few hours of peace and quiet so his napping might be back on schedule. I think the kittens are a little much for him some days. He is the Big Cat! and the Boyfriend! (sometimes with more than one exclamation point) so the mini-cats want to follow him everywhere and be as close as possible to him as much as they can. This appears to try his patience. For now, the mini-cats are still contained at night due to Terrible Tasha and her tinkling tendencies. Tennyson is just fine with this.

Long weekend: I don’t really have a lot of plans for the weekend. I want to get some organizing done in my closet and my office and figure out some holiday stuff. I know, I’m super-exciting.

black friday, kittens, sales, tennyson, thanksgiving

More comics at: The Chronicles of Monster Cat

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boxes, cats, comics, monster cat, silly, tennyson

More comics at: The Chronicles of Monster Cat

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cats, comics, kittens, monster cat, paper towels, silly, tennyson

I saw these at Acme and thought of Ted and all the other Tastykake addicts I’ve met.

Yes, my local grocery store is named Acme.
Yes, I think that’s very cool.
The store leaves something to be desired but it’s close and convenient.
And named Acme!

(No Wile E. Coyote sightings yet, but I will keep my eyes open.)

If anyone actually wants a Tastykake USB mouse or holiday ornament, yes I will go pick one up for you.

But a Tastykake mouse? Seriously?

A *collectible* Tastykake mouse?

The world has always been a strange place tbut this just makes me giggle.

A lot.

acme, silly, tastykake

Napping is serious business. Some of the higher-end techniques require a lot of practice.

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bengals, cats, comics, kittens, mini-cats, monster cat, napping, silly, tennyson

So we went on a cruise the first of November. It was the first time either myself or the Fop had gone on one. Overall I’d say it was a fun experience and something I’d consider doing again in a few years. Going with a bunch of friends definitely improved the experience! SPF 70 (applied 3 times) did not prevent me from getting sunburned at Cocoa Beach. The Bahamas are rather nice though their pirate roots do show. I had a great tour guide in Nassau (while the Fop was off snorkeling) and learned lots of cool things and was generally amused by staircases and flamingos.

The culture on the boat was not what I was expecting. There were some things that definitely could have been improved. The nightly parade through the professional
photographers and their jazzy backgrounds was something I’d totally not expected. Sure, maybe on the formal night but the whole cruise? I guess you’re on a boat and you have the photographers so you might as well make them available. Still, as someone who views formal photographs as something best left behind along with the rest of high school, it was odd. However, now I have a cheesy 8×10 of the Fop in a suit. He’s adorable. It’s already in a frame.

Assigned seating for dinner on the boat? Not a bad thing for our group. We got a table to ourselves, all the better to reduce the trauma to other passengers, and had excellent service from the dining room team. Arriving to a cabin decorated for your anniversary?
Totally awesome! Towel animals in the cabin each night? Frickin’ adorable.

The food for the dinners was pretty yummy – feta and mint go great together on salad by the way. I don’t know why I’d never tried it before. There were a lot of tasty things that came across our table! We also, as a group, ordered a lot of the infamous chocolate melting cake. The food at the steakhouse on board was amazing. The rest of the food on board was average at best. I admit it: I’m a food snob. The pizza wasn’t pizza but it was tasty warm bread with melted cheese and sauce. The coffee was horrible but I fear that I started to get used to it after a couple days. Luckily the lemonade was quite tasty!

There were some problems… cabins weren’t ready when we boarded so we had to sit
around a crowded deck with our luggage. Open seating the first night at dinner when we’d all planned to meet up at our assigned table was a bit of a problem. The questionable competency of the Carnival representative we all used to book our cruises was cursed quite a bit… Personally, I’d love to go on a non-smoking cruise. Even with designated “smoking sections”, plumes of cigarette and cigar smoke made for unpleasantness.

That said, it was a pretty fun trip! I’ve decided that cruises are like road trips on a boat (and on the ocean) where everyone gets to hang out together and even drink (since we don’t get to drive the boat) and generally have a good time.

I love road trips.

I really liked the Bahamas. A startling amount. Perhaps it was the tour guide who himself was so enthusiastic about the Bahamas. Perhaps it was something they put in the popcorn. (Oh the fabulous popcorn!)

There are more photos over on flickr. No, I did not scan the cheesy photo of the Fop. I was tempted though. ;)

carnival pride, cruise, travel, vacation

Everyone needs a vacation, even Monster Cat!

More comics at: The Chronicles of Monster Cat

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bengals, cats, comics, kittens, mini-cats, monster cat, napping, silly, tennyson