Saw Defiance. I knew absolutely nothing about it until one of the guys in it came on Conan to promote a different film. When I learned it was about WWII and was made by the same guy who did Blood Diamond I was almost certain I was a goner. Then I saw it was almost 2 ½ hours long. I was pretty sure it would beat me. But no. I watched it. All of it. Well. Kind of. I made lunch while I was watching it and just let it run while I was in the kitchen. But I listened to it. Honestly, not so bad. Plenty of violence, yes, some bad accents, yes, but still watchable. But I’m glad Adam wasn’t around while I was watching this one. I did a whole lot of yelling at the TV. Not so embarrassing when the only ones around to hear you are the cats.
We also rented Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist. Cute, although that Alexis Dziena chick needs to start looking for better roles. Unless she likes being cast as the stuck-up bitch all the time… It had its funny moments, its gross moments (hello piece of gum dropped into a toilet full of puke!) but all together, not a bad way to spend 90 minutes.
All that’s left of my Oscar list is Gran Torino, which arrived today. Not looking forward to it. But I know it’s one Adam wants to see so I’ll probably end up suffering through it. After that’s done I’ll do a final recap.
Bells:
Bells started practicing a little early this year because St. Mary’s 150th anniversary year culminates in a big hoopla concert/mass thing this Sunday. We figured if we wanted to be part of it we’d better practice a little beforehand. Even though we’re playing three pieces we’ve played many times before, it can’t hurt to polish them up a bit since we’ve been away from the bells for a few months. We managed to recruit two new members. We’ll see if they stick around. We’re a full crew now and Nancy can direct and not ring. One of the new ladies seems to be picking it up pretty quickly. The other suffers from what I like to call “silly syndrome.” In talking with her before the first rehearsal we learned she reads music, played the clarinet. But put two bells in her hands, stick her down at the bottom in bass clef, and all that knowledge seems to disappear. She misses notes, plays when she’s not supposed to, and giggles about the whole thing. *sigh* Hopefully that will stop once she catches on. I seem to still be stuck in my previous position. No one wants to move. Boo. I think it’d be fun to switch positions each year, but with the number of people who survive simply because they highlight and mark the heck out of their music I don’t think that’d be too popular of an idea.
IMA:
Our first IMA meeting is next Tuesday. We changed the RSVP deadlines a little so we’ll see how many people I catch this first time. It doesn’t help that the newsletter was wrong… The editor plans to send out an “oops” email with the meeting reminder on Friday, but I hope it doesn’t cause any problems. We’ve got some good programs this year. Just one meeting not completely confirmed yet. We’ll see if we can improve on last years’ dismal chapter rank.
Kitties:
Carly had a vet appointment today. Nothing special – just her yearly wellness/distemper deal. (We joked that perhaps they should have doubled or tripled up on the distemper and maybe she’d be nicer.) She’s still crabby. She still hates everyone. She still pees outside the litter box. Since we’re having the carpets cleaned pretty soon we’re trying to break her of that last thing. Adam brought back the old-school box we had downstairs and we’ll keep it in the closet and take it out only when she’s alone in the cat room. We’ll see if it works. I get tired of cleaning up cat pee.
She also managed to create quite a mess the other morning. I put her in the cat room around 1, when she woke me up by parading up and down my body. I went back to get her when I woke up again around 3. (On a related note: I’ve been getting no sleep lately.) At first I didn’t notice it since I was looking for pee spots, but when I turned around to pick her up I saw that she had somehow broken into the container of catnip and dumped it all over the floor. She had also been rolling around in it so it was all over her fur. Argh. So I scooped up as much as I could back into the container (didn’t want to vacuum at 3am – you’re welcome Adam), brushed her off, but decided to leave her in the room since I didn’t want to A) bring her back to bed all hopped up on catnip and B) didn’t want the other cats all hopped up on catnip. Sometime around 4 Adam went to go get her so I had to get up again and explain the situation. It’s never dull.
After almost two years, Ted has finally started to warm up to me a little. Under normal circumstances, he still runs away and avoids me. But it seems we’ve got a new routine. Every night I empty their litter boxes before I head to bed. For about a week now, Ted follows me around while I do that and then I sit on the floor in the cat room and he’ll let me pet him. He does laps around me, rubs his head on my knees. He still is a little skittish if I move too quickly, has a tendency to drool, and bites me sometimes, but it’s progress. Adam’s still had little luck with both Connor and Ted. But at least someone’s able to make some contact with them. They’re hard nuts to crack.
JC is a nut of a completely different type. For some reason he likes rough-housing with Adam. He likes being tossed around, man-handled, rubbed vigorously. He purrs up a storm when Adam bounces his head around with his foot. It’s weird. But I figure as long as he’s purring, he’s having a good time. He seems to have lost interest in being in any way cuddly. I guess it’s too boring for him.
Miscellaneous:
Seafood Fest is this weekend. It looks like we’ll be going Friday night. If you’re in the area (that’s Menasha in case you don’t know) you should stop by. It’s good food and the prices are reasonable. Hopefully the weather isn’t too bad.
We went to the comedy club again last night – Adam won free tickets this time. We’ll be regulars in no time. We’ve already got our tickets for Mitch Fatel. We’re going December 3rd (that’s a Thursday) so if you want to come with us, get your tickets now. I expect it will be a full house.
We’re throwing around ideas for our holiday party. Seeing as how our attendance has been…unimpressive…we’re thinking about how we could improve on that. My idea is to have it early. Before every else has theirs. Before people leave town. We’ll see what ends up happening. After last year part of me just kind of wants to forget about it. But I like the planning, the cooking. I just don’t like the disappointment and leftovers. It’s a balancing act. Tentative date is December 5th. Perhaps we'll make this the last ditch effort and if it doesn't go well we'll throw in the towel for good.
That's all for now. This has gotten a wee bit long. :)
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