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Losing the Red Queen's Race
May. 13th, 2003 02:05 pmBut still stubborn.
On that same Saturday in May we have been drifting through for so long, Eric and I arrived at my mother's house. No cat was in sight. Eric immediately went out on the deck to look at the stars. I called the cat and then joined him. It was late twilight, and very quiet. A faint rumble of traffic from the horrific four-lane mess they have made of quiet little 169, and a jumpier one from I494, but really nothing else. We revelled in it for a bit, and looked at the stars. Presently I glanced through the sliding glass door into the living room, and saw a dark crouching cat-shape, signalling serious interest and wariness.
I went inside and said, "Hi, Abby," and when she heard my voice she dashed for the den, which is where she has deemed Petting Must Happen. She rolled on her back and purred extravagantly, showing me the white spot on her belly. She is a tidy little Siamese with long legs, a winsome face, and a will of iron. I petted her and brushed her and gave her some "treats." These are actually bits of weight-loss cat food that my mother picked up a sample packet of by mistake, but since they were first presented to Abigail as treats, she won't eat them out of a bowl or in quantity. They must be presented in small heaps of three or four.
I went back out onto the deck, leaving the door open a bit, and she came out and sharked all over the furniture and twined around our ankles.
We had a very quiet evening. Eric dived into some of my mother's bird books, emerging literally hours later with the remark that they had eaten his brain. I attended to the cat and sat staring into space. Abigail approved of Eric as long as he sat still or patted her, but every time he coughed or stood up, she made her neck very long and craned it at him warily.
Around eleven we got very hungry and, as urged repeatedly to do by the refrigerator's owner, raided the refrigerator and had sandwiches and raw vegetables and pickles and olives.
Abigail twined around our ankles and then took a look at her full food bowl and made a discontented sound. This alarmed me a little. She was so stressed out when her family of five years gave her to the Humane Society that she stopped eating and got hyperlipidosis, whereupon my mother adopted her and spent six weeks feeding her by hand until she decided maybe life might be worth living after all. So if she doesn't eat, we get twitchy.
We went to bed early, leaving the window open. My mother often has to close it this time of year because the geese are so noisy, but they were only passing a few remarks now and again. Abigail jumped into her bed and purred for a while, but eventually decided that things were just not right, and went and slept in the den.
I couldn't sleep but didn't mind much. Eric got up at eight and went to watch birds. I got up around eleven, and we had breakfast. Abigail still wouldn't eat, but Eric pointed out a hairball that she had considerately left near my mother's accustomed place at the table, so I was less worried. (She did eat on Sunday, the other cat sitter reported.) Then we drove back to my house, and then took a bus towards downtown. Eric got off at his stop and went home to work on his paper, and I went downtown and picked up one of my prescriptions. It's a mercy the pharmacy is open on Sunday.
Then I went home, took a shower, put on clean clothes, and went to see the new X-Men movie with Raphael. We tried out the new (to us) movie theater in block E downtown. The theater is fine, but I had forgotten how terrible downtown is if you are driving. Bad signage, really like something in a Dr. Seuss illustration with arrows all over the place pointing to things you can't get to; one-way streets; construction; no indication by the theater of which parking it actually was willing to validate; highway entrances looming menacingly at you when you only want to go around the block. It was raining in a desultory fashion.
We liked the movie. At this point I've seen it twice and am getting my initial reactions mixed up with my later ones. I am not very cinematographically inclined. Film is not only not my native language, it is not related to any family of languages I am comfortable with. I'm a very stupid moviegoer. It usually takes me two viewings to get the characters sorted out -- I can miss plot points because I don't realize that the same person has done X, Y, and Z at separate points in the movie.
It's easier when a lot of the characters are mutants and look distinctive, I must say.
In any case, I thought it was beautiful to look at, and I was childishly delighted with the special effects, and I liked seeing the characters again. I liked the things that were done by implication or largely visually. If I noticed them, perhaps they weren't subtle, but I liked them anyway. There wasn't that much dialogue. I usually like adaptations of plays or dialogue-heavy movies, but I liked this one a lot anyway. Of course, I could watch Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart all day if they were only sitting under a tree with apples falling on their heads.
We came home in the rain, and I found David and gave him a big hug and talked a bit with him about his weekend.
Pamela
On that same Saturday in May we have been drifting through for so long, Eric and I arrived at my mother's house. No cat was in sight. Eric immediately went out on the deck to look at the stars. I called the cat and then joined him. It was late twilight, and very quiet. A faint rumble of traffic from the horrific four-lane mess they have made of quiet little 169, and a jumpier one from I494, but really nothing else. We revelled in it for a bit, and looked at the stars. Presently I glanced through the sliding glass door into the living room, and saw a dark crouching cat-shape, signalling serious interest and wariness.
I went inside and said, "Hi, Abby," and when she heard my voice she dashed for the den, which is where she has deemed Petting Must Happen. She rolled on her back and purred extravagantly, showing me the white spot on her belly. She is a tidy little Siamese with long legs, a winsome face, and a will of iron. I petted her and brushed her and gave her some "treats." These are actually bits of weight-loss cat food that my mother picked up a sample packet of by mistake, but since they were first presented to Abigail as treats, she won't eat them out of a bowl or in quantity. They must be presented in small heaps of three or four.
I went back out onto the deck, leaving the door open a bit, and she came out and sharked all over the furniture and twined around our ankles.
We had a very quiet evening. Eric dived into some of my mother's bird books, emerging literally hours later with the remark that they had eaten his brain. I attended to the cat and sat staring into space. Abigail approved of Eric as long as he sat still or patted her, but every time he coughed or stood up, she made her neck very long and craned it at him warily.
Around eleven we got very hungry and, as urged repeatedly to do by the refrigerator's owner, raided the refrigerator and had sandwiches and raw vegetables and pickles and olives.
Abigail twined around our ankles and then took a look at her full food bowl and made a discontented sound. This alarmed me a little. She was so stressed out when her family of five years gave her to the Humane Society that she stopped eating and got hyperlipidosis, whereupon my mother adopted her and spent six weeks feeding her by hand until she decided maybe life might be worth living after all. So if she doesn't eat, we get twitchy.
We went to bed early, leaving the window open. My mother often has to close it this time of year because the geese are so noisy, but they were only passing a few remarks now and again. Abigail jumped into her bed and purred for a while, but eventually decided that things were just not right, and went and slept in the den.
I couldn't sleep but didn't mind much. Eric got up at eight and went to watch birds. I got up around eleven, and we had breakfast. Abigail still wouldn't eat, but Eric pointed out a hairball that she had considerately left near my mother's accustomed place at the table, so I was less worried. (She did eat on Sunday, the other cat sitter reported.) Then we drove back to my house, and then took a bus towards downtown. Eric got off at his stop and went home to work on his paper, and I went downtown and picked up one of my prescriptions. It's a mercy the pharmacy is open on Sunday.
Then I went home, took a shower, put on clean clothes, and went to see the new X-Men movie with Raphael. We tried out the new (to us) movie theater in block E downtown. The theater is fine, but I had forgotten how terrible downtown is if you are driving. Bad signage, really like something in a Dr. Seuss illustration with arrows all over the place pointing to things you can't get to; one-way streets; construction; no indication by the theater of which parking it actually was willing to validate; highway entrances looming menacingly at you when you only want to go around the block. It was raining in a desultory fashion.
We liked the movie. At this point I've seen it twice and am getting my initial reactions mixed up with my later ones. I am not very cinematographically inclined. Film is not only not my native language, it is not related to any family of languages I am comfortable with. I'm a very stupid moviegoer. It usually takes me two viewings to get the characters sorted out -- I can miss plot points because I don't realize that the same person has done X, Y, and Z at separate points in the movie.
It's easier when a lot of the characters are mutants and look distinctive, I must say.
In any case, I thought it was beautiful to look at, and I was childishly delighted with the special effects, and I liked seeing the characters again. I liked the things that were done by implication or largely visually. If I noticed them, perhaps they weren't subtle, but I liked them anyway. There wasn't that much dialogue. I usually like adaptations of plays or dialogue-heavy movies, but I liked this one a lot anyway. Of course, I could watch Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart all day if they were only sitting under a tree with apples falling on their heads.
We came home in the rain, and I found David and gave him a big hug and talked a bit with him about his weekend.
Pamela
