I know some people that remind me of this cat. Minus the shoe thing. Mostly.

A little while ago when I posted my financial woes, I mentioned My Stupid Cat, who got hit by a car and forced me to pay for her recovery on my credit card. So I thought I'd tell you about said Cat, because she was a Character. (Also the cat-ownership equivalent of birth control.)

(And as I'm writing this I'm realizing that I tell you guys a lot of stories about days gone by, but not much about my life right now. That is because MY LIFE IS BORING.)

My Stupid Cat's name was Horse.

I can't take credit for that little piece of brilliance; it's a direct ripoff of the NZ cartoon Footrot Flats. But it suited her.

She came into my life via Party Guy, whose parents ran a farm. Horse showed up at their door in -40C weather, obviously not "local" but the result of of someone dumping her. How could someone dump such an adorable little black cat? I wondered, as I peered into her deep green eyes, and fell in love.

Three days later, she went into heat and I totally understood. Maaaaaaow. MaaaaaaaaoOOOOW. Mooooaawwwwaaahhhhaaaaawwwhhh! Maow? MaoaoooaoaoaoaoaoOAOMGOMGOMGOMGAooowww! But by then it was too late; I had promised to keep this obnoxious feline safe.

One of her ears had been badly frostbitten during her trek to Party Guy's farm, and she shed the shrivelled skin in a spray of blood shortly after coming to live with me. It didn't do her any lasting harm, but I thought it made her look tough, so I christened her Horse after the farmyard bully in Footrot Flats.

(Actually, at first I think I named her Tequila, because I was 18 and that was cool. But I quickly outgrew that phase and moved on to Cinnamon Schnapps as a beverage of choice, which didn't sound nearly as badass for a cat's name.)

(I thought she was even more tough-looking after she lost a front tooth - not to a fight with a hellhound or anything but to gingivitis. I overlooked the fact that it meant she couldn't keep her tongue in her mouth so she would sit there, glaring, with the tip of her pink tongue sticking out and completely ruining her image.)

Anyway.

She was tough - she was an outdoor cat, against my wishes, and regularly hunted all kinds of birds and rodents. Once, she came home covered in a wiry grey fur that baffled me until I later spotted her beating the crap out of a possum twice her size.

Horse, who I pretty much just always called The Cat and my mother referred to as Stegosaurus Brain, followed me to the west coast when I went away to college. There, she and I moved in with Politika, who had a cat of her own. A Siamese.

I'm not sure if it was a class thing or if Horse just didn't like other felines in general, but the blending of our families did NOT go well. Horse, correctly identifying Politika as the source of this other pet, began pissing on all Politika's stuff.

Towels. T-shirts. Feather duvets that needed to be expensively drycleaned.

Horse left everyone else's stuff entirely alone, but it got to the point that Politika couldn't leave a laundry-related item unguarded for a nanosecond before that stupid cat dribbled ammonia-stench piss all over it. Eventually Politika had to keep all her things in her room, with the door closed, at all times. This workaround kept household harmony for many months, and Horse and the Siamese were eventually content to pretend the other didn't exist.

Until the incident with the car and the credit card.

A professional-sounding phone call woke me around 1am to inform me that my cat had been hit by a car, and some kind soul had scraped her off the pavement and taken her to the nearest vet clinic. Could I come and help them decide what to do with her?

Disoriented and upset, I raced to the clinic, where a tired-looking tech brought me to Horse. She was lying on the table, her eyes glazed, blood leaking from her ass. She stared me down, daring me to underestimate her, as the vet explained that both her hips were broken. He laid out my options:

1. Hip replacement surgery, which was some-exorbitant-sum-plus-a-baby-finger per hip,
2. A plaster diaper cast, which gave her a 15% chance of recovery at a slightly more manageable dollar amount,
and 3. Putting her down, which would cost approximately the same as the cast.

Horse and I took the 15%, and I unfroze the Mastercard to pay for it.

I brought her home the next day and made her a comfy bed, and spent the day spoon-feeding her. With no use of her back legs, she was almost completely immobile, and I'm sure wearing a plaster diaper was humiliating, even for a cat. She would maaaow at me pitifully one second and give me a fuckoffanddie glare the next instant.

But the next day I had to return to school. I couldn't blow off an entire semester for a convalescent cat. I arranged her comfy bed in front of the television, left food and water and the remote control (shut up) within reach, and headed off for my 10 hour day, hoping she wouldn't be too bored. Politika, though sympathetic, muttered something as she headed off herself about, "At least I can leave my bedroom door open now, cat."

When I got home, Horse's comfy bed was empty.

Oh, god. She could barely move - where had she gone? Did she drag herself away looking for me after I heartlessly abandoned her?

I checked my bedroom, which was the first door down the hall. No cat.

Then I checked our other roommate's bedroom. Horse liked him fine, because he hadn't introduced another feline into her life and because he doted on her more than should be appropriate for a human-feline relationship. She wasn't there either.

Which only left Politika's room. Why would she have gone in THERE? She disliked Politika and the Siamese intensely, and it was the furthest room possible. There was no WAY she went in there, but I checked anyway.

And, yeah. She had. Horse had dragged herself all the way down the hall using only her front paws, through the door Politika now felt free to leave standing open, into the furthest reaches of her closet, and shit all over Politika's shoes.

Yeah.

Do I need to mention how that 15%-chance-cat not only recovered completely, but weeks before the vet had predicted?

No wonder I'm a dog person.

The ghosts of Christmas Parties past

I went to Party Guy's company Christmas party with him. Almost everyone he worked with was older than him, which is to say, WAY older than me.

I wore a top straight out of 1993, because, well, it was 1993. The bottom half of it was sheer fabric. I could get away with it because I had the flat stomach of a 19 year old, and because I also had the mistaken impression that it was less see-thru than it was. I got inappropriately hammered - did I mention I was 19? Later Party Guy informed me, rather acerbically, that during a rousing turn of "Shout!" (Lift your hands up!) on the dance floor, I had been flashing everyone my black lacy bra.

Well. No wonder I was so popular at that party.

*********

During the years I worked in restaurants, we never had Christmas parties at Christmas. Because everyone ELSE was having their Christmas parties and we were too busy. So we had them in February. They were almost always 'themed'. One year we did air bands. Four of us choreographed a dance routine to ABBA. I wore my Leggy Blonde costume.

We didn't win for the routine, but I won for the skintight red dress with the slit up to my hipbone.

What? I said it was my Leggy Blonde costume.

*********

While dating Pilot Boy I attended a few of his Christmas parties. For one of them he worked for a company that had its main offices in another city, and we flew there for the party, which was in the banquet hall of a hotel.

He expressed regret for choosing to sit where we did. He thought the drunken antics of the other people at the table would reflect badly on him. I thought they were the most fun people there. He made us move anyway.

I latched on to the most interesting person at our new table, who looked a little frightened when I proclaimed us to be BFFs and dug up a pen to write my phone number on her hand.

Later, joking around, he piggy-backed me up to our hotel room. The key card wasn't working so, unthinking, he bent down to inspect it, slamming my head into the door frame and knocking me unconscious for a few seconds.

He put me in bed to sleep and went back to the party. In the morning I had to lay on the floor of the plane as we drove home, I was so ill from the combined hangover and concussion.

Pretty sure I hadn't flashed anyone my bra though.

**********

Years ago, at the company I am with now, we organized a video scavenger hunt, broke out into teams, and drew straws to see which poor souls had designated driver duty. Then we roamed the city filming our 'items' and stopping at every bar we saw for shooters. We gathered at the boss' house for more drinks and watched all the hunts. The boss' wife kicked us all out in annoyance at 4 or 5am.

This year, the same company took us for dinner on a Thursday night at a local pub, and gave us a $50 gift card each lest we get out of hand on the company dime. I was home by 9:30.

Aannndd...I'm okay with that. Man, I'm old.

But at least we didn't have to master driving on the opposite side of the road

A few years ago - okay, like, SEVEN, good gawd I'm old - my friend Fashionista and I took a little tour of the South Pacific. And by 'little' I mean many months long, living out of a backpack and making money doing things like killing our souls picking oranges.

One of our first major stops was New Zealand. Having booked our flights through a travel agent, she also suggested a bus called the "Kiwi Experience". It wasn't a tour bus, she assured us, we could get on and off where we wanted. It was much cheaper and easier than having to navigate NZ Rail, and though it stopped in pre-determined locations, NZ isn't that big and hit all the ones we wanted to go to, anyway.

So, starry-eyed and refreshed after Singapore, we arrived in Auckland with only the lingering stench of German armpits to remind us of our flight.

(I have nothing against Germans. Just THOSE Germans. The ones that apparently had a personal vendetta against underarm deoderant, who insisted on reaching up to the overhead bins oh, at least 30 times in that flight, their overhead bins which were inconveniently located right next to ME)

We spent a few days in a cute little hostel, adjusting to the time zone and travel and spending 24-7 with one other person. There may have been some growling, and the realization that I left the fucking charger for my digital camera in Canada, but we survived. And when we were ready to go on, we called up Kiwi Experience and told them to send the bus. They'd pick us up at the hostel! How awesome is that!

We figured it was only, at most, a 2 hour drive to our next stop. The bus was arriving early in the morning, we could be there by lunch, and on Hot Water Beach by 2.

The bus pulled up and the driver hopped out. He was kind of...bleachy. With an orange tan, and one large earring. Fashionista and I glanced at each other. Was there a pirate theme we were unaware of?

"Hi girls!" he chirped. "Let me get your bags!" He fired our backpacks into the belly of the bus and ushered us up the steps. We glanced around. Everybody looked...well, youthful. And kind of hungover.

"One more stop!" the driver announced. We chose our seats, picked up a few more travellers, and we were on our way!

Um...weren't we?

Apparently not. The driver switched on the microphone and started narrating cheerily. In an "I'm still young and hip oh aren't I cool you guys can relate to me right?" kind of way. And then we stopped, to view Auckland's dormant volcano, which was interesting as a narrative but in practice was a grassy hill with some cows on it. Everybody piled out of the bus to take pictures except for us. I glanced at Fashionista. She had her eyes closed and was rubbing her forehead and chanting something. It sounded like, "It's not a tour bus it's not a tour bus it's not a tour bus".

But it was. The drive that should have taken us two hours at the most took ALL DAY. We stopped at every nook and cranny and lame point of interest between Auckland and Whitianga, all narrated in an irritatingly upbeat tone by the pirate bus driver, complete with tired jokes. When we finally arrived at our destination he announced, "And we'll be staying at the XYZ hostel downtown!"

Um...no we won't. We'd already booked ourselves into a hostel that sounded FAR more appealing. I quickly looked up the XYZ hostel in our "Let's Go" travel guide, which confirmed that, OH HELL NO NO WAY were we staying there. And there, in black and white, something I'd totally missed: "The XYZ hostel is the usual stop of the infamous Kiwi Experience bus".

Infamous?

I dashed to the front and informed the driver that he had to drop us off at the hostel we'd chosen. He didn't seem thrilled, but apparently it was in his contract, and he silently piloted us (and one other person) to our hostel after dropping everybody else off. He didn't help us unload our bags. Like we'd somehow personally insulted him.

We stayed a few days in our hostel of choice, which was fantastic, and made friends with the other girl the bus had dropped off there. The hostel owners informed us that the Kiwi Experience bus was locally referred to as "the Fuck Bus". It's main function, it seemed, was ferrying 19 year olds from party to party.

Fantastic.

Now, Fashionista and I weren't there for antiquing and shuffleboard, but we weren't intending to be unable to remember our travels, either. This little turn of events was casting a sour shadow over our original itinerary.

As it happened, a friend of ours was travelling NZ at the same time. Having intended to work, stay, and surf, he'd done the sensible thing and bought a used vehicle. He and his rattly, leaky sleeper van picked us up and we spent some time touring around the North Island.

We eventually hooked up with the Fuck Bus again, since our friend showed no signs of moving further south. It had a driver that was a clone of the first, and passengers that were mostly clones as well, but it wasn't ALL bad. We met some great people, and we did some things we wouldn't otherwise have done (like climbed a glacier, and went inner tubing in a cave).

We also went places we wouldn't otherwise have gone. Like a whitewater kayaking resort in the center of nowhere, which would have been fantastic if the country had not been in the middle of a drought. And a mining town where everything but the one hostel closed after 7pm. And a 'hostel' that was really a bunch of trailers by the side of the highway, with nothing for miles but a bar conveniently owned by the same people that owned the 'hostel'. And nowhere to eat but the steak dinner they offered (for $12). And nothing to do but sit in your trailer OR participate in the fun 'garbage bag costume' activities that the bus drivers made up.

Ahem. Anyway. Bygones.

We DID have fun despite ourselves. But we still got refunds on our tickets for the AUSSIE Experience bus.

(Totally claiming this as my Driving Spin Cycle for the week, too)

I remember when "Are you dissin' my man?" was something people actually SAID. Well, okay, no, just this one girl. (Part 2)

(continued from yesterday)

I glanced at Pilot Boy, confused. "Uh - what?"

"My girlfriend is going to kick your ass," the guy repeated. "Hey, Cheryl!" he yelled over his shoulder. "You coming?"

"Hang on, I have to get my shoes on!" a disembodied voice replied, from the general location of the semi truck. Momentarily a girl stumbled out of the darkness, carrying a beer and pulling on a shoe, with tall hair shellac'd into place. She looked around at the assembled company and then back at the dude for confirmation. He gestured at me.

"Are you dissin' my man?" she demanded, pointing a finger at me.

I stared at her, taken aback. Not because of the accusation, but because someone had actually used "are you dissin' my man" in conversation. I looked at FoN and Valentina, who were equally stunned. Pilot Boy was gazing back and forth between the guy and the girl like they were in a tennis match, a look of astonishment on his face.

"Wh-what?" I managed to reply.

"Are you dissin' my man?" she repeated. She looked a little put out that we weren't already trading punches. Apparently this wasn't how the script went.

FoN and I looked at each other. And then we burst out laughing.

"Am I - what??" I managed, through hysterical laughter. "Am I DISSING your MAN?"

She sneered. "You told him to fuck off!"

"He told me to shut up! You guys are setting off the air horn on a semi truck, and you're telling ME to shut up?"

The conversation (I use that term loosely) continued in that exasperating vein for a bit. Apparently my earlier rage wasn't as settled as one would hope, because eventually she goaded me somehow - I don't remember, but FoN says she called me a "fat bitch" - and suddenly I really DID want to kick her ass.

Or, y'know, try. Considering I'd never been in a fight in my LIFE.

FoN, who I've often thought was born a couple of decades too late, was trying to placate both of us by saying things like, "Hey, we're all happy here, it's all good, peace and love and groovyness, you guys!". Neither of us were responding well to that approach. Meanwhile, Cheryl the Ass-kicking Redneck's "man" was smirking at the sidelines, saying things to Pilot Boy like, "This is gonna be good," and "Do you think they'll end up rolling around in the mud? I hope so."

Class. Act.

Anyway, he was disappointed. At my core, I really didn't want to fight, so I let FoN and Valentina drag me away, leaving Cheryl and her Man standing around our tent with Pilot Boy. He claimed later that he offered to fight in my stead, but that really wasn't what the Yokel Couple was after. Eventually they wandered off and climbed back into their semi, which ran all night. FoN and Valentina talked me down and returned me to the tent.

In the morning, Pilot Boy and I were at each other's throats with renewed vigour as we realized the Datsun Z was lodged firmly in the mud. We had to track down some people we hadn't pissed off with our fighting to help push us out. I think there were maybe 3.

The semi truck was nowhere to be seen.

Kind of anti-climactic, I know. So I'll leave you with the moral of the story: Don't date conceited pilots.

Oh, and don't tell people in semi trucks to fuck off.

(I forgot to mention that this was all inspired by the topic over at the Spin Cycle this week)
(Also, Google Reader is not showing my last 3 posts for some reason. If ya'll are using the feed to keep track of me, you may have to res-subscribe?)

I remember when "Are you dissin' my man?" was something people actually SAID. Well, okay, no, just this one girl. (Part 1)

My BFF and platonic life partner FoN is posting the story of FoN vs. The Fucktard Sisters, in which SuperKeely plays a minor role, so I thought I'd take a stroll down Memory Lane too. I used to spend a lot of time drunk and my memory is not fabulous, so I asked her what SHE thought I should post about.

Do you guys have a friend with whom you share 20 years of history? It's awesome. And fucking terrifying, sometimes. She replied immediately with "Are You Dissin' My Man?".

Oh Dear Lord, I know I'm a heathen atheist, but please give me strength.

*deep breath*

Okay.

This may be a shock to some of you, but I have not always made the best choices in life. I know! Me! I seem so rational!

Anyway, at the time of this incident I was dating a guy I shall dub Dickhead
Cheater
Conceited Motherfucker I Wouldn't Cross The Road To Piss On If He Were On Fire Pilot Boy. Pilot Boy and I had plans to attend a weekend music festival in which FoN's husband's band was participating. Obviously, FoN and Valentina and a whole host of other friends were there too. None of them really liked Pilot Boy because he was a manipulative fucker who cheated on me constantly but they tolerated him for my sake.

Since the music festival was being held on a patch of turf that was normally used to grow wheat, we were all camping for the weekend. Some people were lucky or organized enough to bring an RV, but most of us were just pitching tents.

Heh.

Anyway, Pilot Boy and I eschewed my sensible 4x4 Toyota truck for his vehicle, a Datsun Z, because clearly that is the rational choice while attempting to camp in a muddy field. We pulled into a spot that (unbeknownst to us) would be semi-permanent, and, rather than unpacking our gear and putting up our tent for later, we elected to begin partying post-haste.

Located somewhat close to us were some people who thought themselves above both tents AND Winnebagos. They had arrived in their semi truck. Which, okay, had a sleeper, but apparently no bedding or power or comforts of home whatsoever, because they left the thing running constantly. And they occasionally set off the horn, just to maintain good neighbourly relations. We rolled our eyes a bit, but assumed they would shut off the truck and stop honking the horn once all the music was done and people were ready to pass out.

You know what happens when you assume, right?

The evening pretty much progressed as most evenings did with Pilot Boy; that is to say we both got drunk, he got more asinine and I got more sensitive, we fought the whole time and overreacted and generally made each other miserable. And then, when they stopped serving booze, we realized that we had nowhere to sleep. So at 2am, still yelling at each other, we began a futile attempt to drunkenly and uncooperatively put up a tent. In the dark.

FoN and Valentina came to see what all the yelling was about, and I turned on them, too. I can't remember why but I'm sure I felt justified at the time. Then the evolutionary U-Turns in the semi truck honked their horn and I screamed at them as well. FoN, with typical humour, said something to nicely inform me that I was being an idiot, and defused the whole situation. She didn't do it to save Pilot Boy from my verbal tirade, she did it to save me from myself, because I was tired of yelling.

Also, there may have been people trying to sleep at that point.

So, in better spirits, we kept trying to get the tent set up. The idiots in the semi truck, in a somewhat delayed reaction, yelled "Shut the fuck up!".

Coming from someone that had set off a foghorn moments earlier, this seemed ridiculous, so I jovially hollered back, "Fuck you!", and Pilot Boy and I continued figuring out the tent in the dark, on speaking terms once again.

A few minutes later, a strange guy strolled up and stood next to us, a smirk on his face.

"My girlfriend is going to kick your ass," he informed me smugly.

(I know! I'm sorry for the two-parter. But it's getting really long and I need to confirm a few details with FoN)