The Ants Go Marching.

When we lived in the crappy assed house that we were renting before we moved here I envisioned homeownership to be Super Duper Amazing. Super Duper as in no stupid back door ladies to scratch my car with the garbage cans, a bathroom large enough for more than one person to be in it, reliable hot water, sweet, sweet air conditioning and no bugs. But alas apparently mother nature hates me, and although we have this amazing new house we have an ant problem. We learned in the other house to make sure that your counters are really clean and that you have no food out on the counters, and I've kept up these good habits. However I do have pets and they do have food and the evil little ants love dog and cat food apparently.
Today in the span of a couple hours there was a trail of ants across the floor coming from a little divot between the floorboards and where two hardwood boards meet to the container of dog food. The trail was about 3 feet long and 6 inches wide of solid ants. Nasty. Adam and I were able to wrangle them and we sealed the little divot with clear sealant, but there are still a couple rouge little buggers roaming around, just to further piss me off.
A couple days ago they managed to get into the cat food which we keep on top of the drier to keep the dog out of it. There was a line coming from the window (which was closed) down the wall, behind the shelving unit, behind the drier and up the back of it and they swarmed all over the top of my white drier, so they were really obvious. (I didn't sleep well that night) Rather than kill them all, which gives me such glee, I bought some ant poison bait stations and scattered them all over the area in hopes that it would kill the whole colony, or family reunion of the little buggers as it may be. But alas that was $7.99 or so well waisted. Chachi had a great time finding the ant traps and running away from us as we chided him for playing with them.
So here we are at a loss. I hate ants, I hate how they swarm and give me the creeps. I have these horrible dreams that I will wake up and find the baby covered in them.
I've taken to feeding the pets several times a day rather than just in the morning so I can leave them smaller amounts so there is less left out. But I don't see much of a difference in the number of the ants.
The one thing that amuses me about all of this is squirting them with our ant killer which is an organic all purpose cleaner, grapefruit scented. It's probably a good thing that I'm not Buddhist!

Halloween Pictures

To please the masses. These were taken at home, but when we had Chachi at a party it seems everyone with a camera was taking pictures of him, when he was happy. So I'll see if I can find some of those and share them too.

Mr. Bonsai Kitty

Lately Bonsai has been a total ass. He's taken to yowling at all hours of the night, and day. He walks around the house yelling at unforeseen objects, and at times being really aggressive. I wonder if he is just really stir crazy and wants to go outside, or if he's starting to get old and losing his mind. No amounts of threats or dousing with the water gun seems to shut him up. We're leery to take him outside (supervised) because it will just promote more of the yelling. He's also taken to running laps around the house, like he did when he was a kitten. He does this in the middle of the night, which would be fine with a normal cat, except this one is a small elephant and you can hear him across the house thudding along. (And this house is not at all sound proofed, you can hear Chachi running too.) When he decides to rest at night he must be within inches of your face, which is not at all convenient for me, who has to get up a dozen times a night to pee. I understand that me not wanting him in my face is selfish, but once settled if he is disturbed he starts his running/thudding and yelling routine all over again.
Seriously I am at my wits end. As it is already I am having a tough time sleeping, so being woken from blissful sleep by my yowling cat is driving me nuts! Adam has the ability to either ignore him, or sleep through it, which is so unfair.
I've thought about getting him a no bark collar that you would for a dog, but I'm worried that his purring would set it off. (He purrs loud enough to wake me, but I won't begrudge him his purring.) In the middle of the night groggy with desperation I've wondered if getting his voice box removed would be an option, but I know I couldn't do that to him. I wouldn't get him declawed, so how could I put him through that? In any case I might lose my mind.
In our other apartment we would lock him in the far bathroom when he decided to have a yelly night, but we don't have a room here which works like that. In the new house he'll have his own room which should work though. However we don't move for months....
As for his aggressive behaviour, he's just been quicker with his claws with me. Mostly if he's laying on the ground and I step over him, he grabs my legs. I don't think he's trying to be mean, but his claws are close to three quarters of an inch long, and sharp. Then today he was sitting on the chair in the living room and he just freaked out and gave chase to something imaginary, leaving a huge gouge in the chair. (new. leather....) He's still patient with Chachi, and I'm not worried for the baby, and hopefully by the time she's a toddler he will have mellowed out again.
So does anyone have any ideas? I don't want to get rid of him. He's old and I don't think that anyone would love him as much as we do, and Chachi would be so lost without his big ol' buddy. Or am I destined to sleep with a water gun for another 10 years?
Hmm I wonder if this is just a kitty midlife crisis?

This post coming to you from behind finger smudged glasses.

Hello, I am in fact, not dead. Hurray.

I would like to say I've been busy, and I have been kinda. But the longer I waited to post, the more pressure there was, and then I knew I had to have the perfect post and ahhhhrg. Here it is, I'm sure it won't be perfect. I've already dealt with it, now it's your turn.

So my dad and Gay were here for 10 days. We went wine tasting, went to SF and did all of the touristy things and tooled around here commenting on the heat. Fun was had by all, most days. I've discovered my dad is a picky eater, and authentic cuisine isn't to his taste. Which I've noticed in other people who are from a very Caucasian areas such as the Okanagan Valley. Chinese food there is greasy, and to my palate, nasty. Here it's much more authentic and tastes different that Smith's Chinese Restaurant, found down town Small Town British Columbia. My dad didn't like it so much. Oh well, it was amusing for me to watch him eat a cheese burger at a Mexican place because he's adamant that he doesn't like roll-ups (burritos in Dad speak). All in all it was fun.

My little brother turned 28 2 weeks ago. Frightening.

The Murp is all Murpy. I don't have much to report. I have been having interesting bouts of wicked motion sickness in the car. I've resorted to having a puke bag nearby at all times while in the car. This development is strange and it sucks! Let me tell you though, this baby had better be really cute!

Adam and I have been looking at some townhouses. They are painfully expensive, but so pretty. After dealing with the possessed shower (which oscillates between hot and cold all of the time) and all of the bloody ants, a new place is so welcoming. The draw back? Our favorite place, which is a 3 bedroom 1600 square foot place is nearly 800K! Sigh. I don't think I can sell a kidney for that much, even if I gold plated it! Also in the past couple weeks the jumbo mortgages around here have tanked, which makes getting a mortgage hard. A lot of lenders are being extra cautious, so lending to non-permanent residents isn't their top priorities. So it looks like we're going to have to wait a little and see what the market does and how the rates react. Hopefully the market will drop a little, rates will stabilize and we can buy. Then the market will skyrocket and we will rejoice.

Bonsai turned 10 this month. In people years he's like 50, him and my dad seem to have a lot in common. Okay I am totally kidding. Bonsai, has much more hair!

Chachi is the same, goofy as ever.

Hmm well there is the post that people have been begging for. I actually have another post planned all full of insight, but I'm tired and my head hurts.

cheers.

Hello world.

I know I've been remiss in my blogging duties, I have no excuses, or apologies.
Now on with the show!

Adam signed us up for the Netflix's beta program which allows you to watch movies directly off of your computer. Initially I was not to excited about it because the movies were clearly B rated, but lately they have been getting some much better movies. I'm most excited about the range of Jane Austen movies and the workout ones, which personally, I think is brilliant on Netflix's behalf to include them. You see, you are granted one hour of watch now time per dollar you owe per month on your membership. Adam and I have the 4 at a time membership which is $23.99, so we get 24 hours of watch now movies a month. If you watch a workout video a day, that would take you over your limit. See? Brilliant marketing Netflix!

Also I've discovered this new product that I am all a-rave about. It's castile soap. (I would link to a definition, but my linky abilities are a little disabled at the moment.) Anyhow castile soap is a pure vegetable product soap, no animal fats in it, so that's great for vegetarians. I love it because it's a pure soap, not a detergent which is loaded with other stuff which are irritants. Castile soap can literally be used for EVERYTHING in the house. I use it for laundry, and it's been making my towels fluffier! I love it. I prefer it over detergents because I have crazy sensitive skin. Last summer I used a national brand which comes in a bright orange package, and it left me so irritated, I itched and itched until I bled. Bad news internets! So I try to buy sensitive kinds, but they still have the "stuff" in them, which bothers me. You can also use the castile soap to clean everything in your house (with a few exceptions). If you search it online you can find lists, I won't bother here. Some marketers sell it as a body cleanser or a shampoo, but I am a little leery about that because it has a higher PH than your hair and can be drying. So be warned. Also I've found it in peppermint and lavender scents, we have the peppermint and it's nice.
Oh and we mustn't forget that it's much more environmentally friendly than other detergents.

So that concludes my consumer report for today.

Onto other notes, I finally got all of the weeds pulled from my back yard which is nice. The citrus trees are blooming and the yard has this wonderful smell, it reminds me of jasmine tea. The past few days have been really windy and there are petals all over the yard from the flowers, and it kinda looks like a light snow! The neighbour has a tree that has flowers that grow in a ball, and several of the branches hang into our yard, it's really pretty. I'm really enjoying spring in California, although it's getting quite hot.
Next I aim to tackle my front yard, which the landlord have covered with large ground cover shrubs and trees, but there are still weeds which have infiltrated the plastic under the bark mulch. I hate that our yard looks so ghetto on such a nice block. Adam think it just looks like greenery, but I think it looks bad. I hope our neighbours see it like Adam does!

The pets are good. Chachi rolled over on command the other day and I was beside myself praising him. Bonsai is turning into an ornery old man, but he's still happy and healthy. I've started both of them on a new kind of pet food which lists meat as it's first ingredient, and contains no grain. Chachi loves it and pulls big mouthfuls out of his bowl and spits them onto the floor to pick out the new brand and leaves the old stuff behind. No matter how often I clean up the kibble around his bowl he perpetually has a radius of a couple inches of kibble around it.

Well that's all I have for now. I'm off to make Adam dinner.
ciao!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Their shirts say "Luck of the Irish".

Politics.

Today in my blog world I read some stuff that made my insides sizzle in a not happy way. I wanted to talk about the issues here, but alas, I couldn't word it right and so, instead I will link you to the articles.

On HPV Vaccines for men.


On Fox News and how they are idiots.

For the record I think that the HPV vaccine should be made available to men also, especially since it is in Australia and the EU. I don't know where I stand on vaccines in general, but I think that they should be made available to everyone, regardless of their sexuality. Also I think that we should all buy stock in Merck, the vaccine, Gardisil is $360 per patient. It's one of the most expensive vaccines ever.

About Barack Obama, I can't believe that Fox won't apologize. And I am happy that Obama stood his ground and defended himself. I commented on that entry that only middle aged, upper middle class white men can be a president and anyone who isn't that get to be smeared. Sigh....

Now something cute to make everyone happy. Here's a picture of Adam and Chachi after Chachi's surgery. He wasn't a very happy puppy and wanted nothing more than being cuddled. Which is normal, but he prefers his cuddles from me, and since I couldn't cuddle him while I cooked he was more than happy to cuddle with Adam as opposed to sitting at my heels.

My Superbowl Picks.

Team #1- The Teddies
















Team #2- The Ponies
















Since I am married to an NFL nut (and the daughter of one) I generally find that I need to pick a winner. Normally I go by the colours of the uniforms, but this year they are both have blue, which is the colour I usually choose. So to overcome the dilemma, and since I don't know anything about either teams, or care to, I devised a new solution.
















I let Chachi pick. Clearly he prefers the Ponies, so I will cheer for the Colts!

Now really, I do want to pay homage to the favorite team of Chez Berkan.
















(get it, cheese head! HA!)

The pets are also all for the Packers.

Random Bonsai picture.

Bonsai clearly loves to dress up....

Random Pet Picture.

Yummy Reeses Pieces!

New Camera