It’s been a week since last we met, and the world has become a darker place. It’s been hard to find anything funny to write about, but I do have a couple of things, and I hope they take you away from the darkness for at least the five minutes it takes to read about them. Sending love to all of my followers who are struggling right now.
Anyway, Ken and I are back from our trip, having had a very lovely time. The last weird thing (I thought) that happened was that we stayed at the Glasgow Courtyard Marriot, and it was comfortable and clean, but in our room was something I’d never seen before.
Me: So, I have to ask you something. Desk Clerk (he’s Scottish): Certainly. Wha’ is’t? Me: I’ve seen bibles in hotels rooms before, but…The Book Of Mormon? Desk Clerk: Aye. Me: Um…why? Desk Clerk (shrugs): Just a wee tradition, I suppose. I don’t hold wi’ it meself.
So in my review of the hotel, I mentioned it, and the “General Manager” sent me this response:
“To clarify, for the Marriott brand standards, each bedroom will have a copy of the Bible and the Book of Mormon which is a tradition with Marriott for the past 5 decades.”
I didn’t realize that the Courtyard Marriot was owned by the Mormons, or that there were a lot of Mormons in SCOTLAND, but there you go. Make of it what you will.
And just when I thought things couldn’t get weirder…
I have a real obsession with losing passports, in that I’m terrified of losing them. Like, if you’re out of the country, you could literally lose ANYTHING ELSE and still be allowed to go home. So before we left, we did the passport check. When we got to the airport, we did the passport check. Then we were on the ship so they were safely stowed. Then we got off the ship and we did the passport check. The second night at the hotel, Ken suddenly starting going through his luggage:
Me: What’s wrong? Ken: I can’t find my passport. Me: WHAT?! Ken: Never mind. It was just in my pants pocket. Me: DO NOT LEAVE IT IN YOUR PANTS POCKET. Ken: It’s fine. Stop worrying. Me: I’m telling you, that’s a terrible place to keep it. Ken: I know much better than you. You are dumb. (He didn’t actually say this, but that’s what he was thinking.)
We made it through the rest of the week, and the airport, and finally we got home. The next morning, Ken came out of the laundry room. He looked perturbed. He was holding something very soggy.
Me: What’s wrong? Ken: I accidentally put my passport through the wash. It was in my pants pocket. Me: WHAT THE ABSOLUTE F*CK, KEN?
And now, he has to go through the tedious process of getting a new one. Hopefully before we go away in January. Otherwise, I’m taking the dog.
Will never launder his passport and is very sweet.
Recently, I’ve been binge-watching an old British TV series called Midsomer Murders. The show focuses on a detective named Barnaby who lives in this vast English territory called Midsomer (not to be confused with Midsommar, which is quite possibly the most INSANE and awful movie I’ve ever seen, nor is it a time of year like Midsummer, which in Canada, happens in October). Each episode is an hour and a half long and there are TWENTY-THREE seasons with between 4 and 8 episodes a season. It’s been on since 1997 and they’re still making new episodes. Right now, I’m in about Season 9, I think—it’s easy to lose track, but at this point, I think I’m qualified to make a few observations about this show.
1) How are there any people left in Midsomer? Because in each episode there are at least 4 murders, sometimes more. Midsomer is rivalling several entire countries as well as numerous American States to be crowned the murder capital of the world. You think Murder, She Wrote was a little over the top? Try living in Midsomer, where your life is in your hands every day because you own a relish factory.
2) How big exactly is Midsomer? In the first couple of seasons it seemed like it was a fairly small county consisting of two or three villages. But when all those people were murdered, they started adding on with places like Midsomer Parma, Midsomer Wellow, Badger’s Drift, Midsomer Worthy (not to be confused with Midsomer LITTLE Worthy, Midsomer Barrow—in fact, if you look online, there are SIXTY-TWO different towns and places where these murders all take place. It’s like Midsomer has its own continent. But I guess when you’ve been killing off your population for 27 years, you need to expand your victim pool.
3) Every single person who lives in Midsomer has a deep, dark secret. From the local barman to the local baron, they’re all hiding something. That’s why in every episode, there are so many red herrings. I mean, you can’t stretch a murder investigation into an hour and a half unless you have twenty different suspects who have a shady past/married their stepson/made someone drink hallucinogenic tea/had a secret lovechild fathered by the local Anglican minister/turned someone into a blood eagle/once shot a guy during a foxhound and claimed they were aiming for the fox/burned someone alive/urinated on a sacred tree (some of these happened in the TV show Midsomer Murders and some happened in the movie Midsommar and some happened in BOTH. Guess which is which?)
4) The same actor played Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby for the first 13 seasons and when he retired, his ‘cousin’, Detective Chief Inspector John Barnaby takes over, and the best thing is that the actor playing John Barnaby, whose name is Neil Dudgeon was in one of the earlier episodes called Garden of Death. The IMDB synopsis of this episode is: “When an arrogant aristocratic family’s decision to develop a memorial garden into a commercial tea shop has the villagers up in arms, murders past and present rear their heads.” People got MURDERED over a tea shop. And the guy who becomes the new Barnaby was the sexy memorial gardener. Also, in researching this, I discovered Neil Dudgeon has been a bit actor in every single BBC mystery series, so I guess he has a lot of experience at detective-ing.
5) The synopses get increasingly more random and bizarre as the years go on. Here are some of my favourites:
The bodies of former criminals are found in a cornfield. The cause of their deaths and the strange position in which they lay is rather bizarre. Rumours quickly circulate in the village that it could be the work of some extra-terrestrial force. However, Barnaby is far from convinced.
When one of the world’s rarest orchids is smuggled illegally into Midsomer Malham, it triggers a catalogue of passion, jealousy and death.
The unveiling of a newly-discovered novel by deceased Midsomer crime-writer George Summersbee at the Luxton Deeping Crime Festival is jeopardised when the manuscript is stolen and a woman is fatally electrocuted by a booby-trapped roulette wheel. Can new dad Barnaby untangle a web of jealousy and obsession to find the killer?
The annual harvest fair and the daredevil riders of the Wall of Death come to Midsomer village Whitcombe Mallet. When the owner of an equestrian centre is trampled by his horse DCI Barnaby and DS Nelson have to unravel a complex feud from the past, where nothing is what it seems.
Alien abductions, illegal orchids, booby-trapped rouletted wheels, walls of death—what more could anyone ask for?
But recently, all of my mystery watching came in handy when we had a murder in our OWN house:
Me: I have discovered the body of a mouse in the guest room. This crime shall not go unpunished. Now let me see. (*carefully appraises group of suspects and then points with a dramatic flourish*) Atlas!! Was it you?! Atlas: What? No! I have an alibi. I was outside at the time, barking at the squirrels. Me: Hmmm. (*points with another dramatic flourish*) Then it must have been Ken!! Ken: Why would I—what are we doing here exactly? I don’t remember this scenario ever happening… Me: Don’t break the fourth wall, KEN. All right, let me see…there’s only one other suspect—ILANA!! It was YOU!! Ilana: I didn’t do it, copper! I swear! Me: Then why did the mouse write ‘Twuz A Kat in its own blood on the floor? Explain THAT!! Ilana: Fine. It was me. But it was supposed to be a present. Me: Mystery solved.
The virtual book launch for my new novel Charybdis just finished and it was lovely, so huge thanks to everyone who came, to my special guests Susan Richardson, Lawrence Moore, and Paul Brookes, and an especially big thank you to my amazing publisher Jane Cornwell of JC Studio Press for organizing it!
Aside from that, it’s been a lovely week because I’m currently kitty sitting my grand-kitty. Kate and her boyfriend are on the West Coast visiting his family, so we’ve been left in charge of the delightful Ilana. The delightful and furry Ilana. Did I mention that I’m very allergic to cats? So while I’m loving taking care of this tiny monster of joy, I’m also stuffed up to the gills, which is being compounded by all the pollen in the air now that spring is finally and definitely here, because if you know anything at all about Canada, you’ll know we actually have something like 13 seasons here, and I take this from the several many memes about Canadian seasons that one can find on the internet:
Winter Fool’s Spring 2nd Winter Spring of Deception Third Winter Pollen Spring (this is where we are now) Construction Summer False Fall Second Summer Fall Winter Is Coming Hello darkness my old friend
So you can only imagine how difficult breathing is for me right now, but I can’t help it. Ilana is adorable and sweet and a total little goblin who likes to wake me up in the middle of the night by punching the back of my head and then rubbing her face against my nose until I wake up:
Me: What the hell? Ilana: There may be a mouse… Me: Well, go get it. That’s your job. Ilana: But I want you to know about it. If I catch one, I will bring it to you. Me: Please do NOT do that.
There is a mouse down here, I’m certain
Like most cats, she’s also very fickle about how and when she receives attention:
Ilana: I present to you my tummy. Please rub it. Me: Awwww. Such a cute—ouch! Why did you attack my hand?! Ilana: Changed my mind. Wait. Rub my tummy. Me: Will you attack my hand again? Ilana: No, I promise. Me: Okay. You’re so sweet—ouch!! Damn it!! Ilana: One more time? Me: Sigh. Alright.
Of course, she’s still not comfortable around Atlas but she’s getting more used to him, and he still regards her as a wild woodland creature:
Atlas: That skunk is back. Me: Not a skunk. But don’t bother her regardless. You think a skunk is an issue? Wait until you try to rub her tummy. Atlas: Fair enough. Will you rub MY tummy? Me: Will you attack my hand and bite me? Atlas: What do I look like—a psychopath?
At any rate, we have her for over another week, and I’m thoroughly enjoying everything about her, because, as you can see by the pictures, she is the most precious little kitty in the world—no matter how much of a psychopath she is, and I’m single-handedly keeping the allergy medication people in business.
First the good news: After the shuttering of Potters’ Grove Press and their decision to unpublish all their titles, I was left with 2 short story collections that were no longer available. I’m happy to announce that my first short story collection, Feasting Upon The Bones, has been republished by Baxter House Editions and I even had the chance to correct a couple of minor typos that had always bothered me. So if you’d like a copy of the new and improved Feasting Upon The Bones, you can buy it here!
As I write this, much of my body is aching thanks to an incident earlier in the week, which was terrible at the time but which, because you know me and you know I can laugh at just about anything, seems funny in retrospect:
I woke up early on Thursday morning because I had an online meeting. OK, the meeting started at 9 am but I’m retired and I spent the majority of my career getting up at 5:45 so 9 am IS EARLY AND I WILL NOT BE JUDGED. I got ready, but because it was an online meeting, I did what any normal person would do and I put on a nice sweater and also some pajama pants and my old woolly slippers because my bottom half wouldn’t be visible. The other person logged on right at 9 and we began to chat. Then she wanted to share something on her screen. At the same moment, my phone, which I’d left upstairs, began to ring. It was taking her a minute to get the file up and I was worried about the phone because Ken had gone out with Atlas and I’d heard sirens just a little while before the phone started ringing and again, if you know me at all, you know that I’m the Queen of Worst Case Scenarios. So I said to the other person, “While you’re getting that ready, I’m just going to grab my phone” and then I ran upstairs.
I was in a bit of a panic, thinking that someone was calling to tell me that poor Ken had been hit by a car chasing after Atlas, who had broken his collar AGAIN, or more ludicrously that he had been attacked by an angry swarm of bees and I was picturing Atlas snapping at them all and praying he didn’t get stung (which has happened in the past and I’ve tried to soothe him while simultaneously trying not to laugh at his chubby cheeks), when I hit the third step from the top.
That was when my slippers, being old and woolly and having no tread, went completely out from under me and I landed hard, left-side down, on the stairs. But that wasn’t the end of it. Thanks to my super-comfy yet non-grippy pajama pants and sweater, I began sliding DOWN THE STAIRS AT BREAKNECK SPEED. It sound like this: Thunkthunkthunkthunkthunkthunk and I could go on for another 7 thunks but I think you get the point. About halfway down, I screamed at the top of my lungs—why, I don’t know, because there was nothing and no one who could save me, and I wondered if it was true that if a woman who’s falling down the stairs screams and there’s no one there to hear her, does she make a sound? And the answer is yes. Yes, she does. A very loud and terrifying sound. I hit the bottom of the stairs and lay there for a second, trying to figure out if I had broken anything, and then I suddenly remembered that I was IN A MEETING. So I had to limp over to my office chair and sit down very carefully.
“I’m back. Are you ready to get started?” I asked between clenched teeth. And the meeting continued like nothing had happened, except that I was in agony.
But the best part is that, even though I didn’t break anything, I have some huge bruises, and while that might not seem like an upside, it’s certainly getting me lots of sympathy and maybe even a nice get well present KEN (hint hint—I like wine). Speaking of wine, the only other time I’ve fallen down a set of stairs was when I fell down our attic stairs almost 20 years ago. I was at the bottom trying not to cry and Kate, who was about 8 at the time, immediately ran and got me a glass of wine. Because she’s the best daughter, aren’t you KATE? (hint hint—I like wine).
Well, I guess the most exciting thing that happened last week was the eclipse. And it WAS truly exciting, I have to say. Ken and I drove to my aunt’s boyfriend’s place (it’s always so weird to say ‘boyfriend’ when people are in their late 60s, isn’t it, like he’s not A BOY, he’s a grown-ass man with grandkids, but I digress) and the whole fam had gathered to witness the event. I’d ordered those special glasses from Amazon, and I checked very carefully to make sure that they were legit and not going to render us all blind (as a side note, one of the larger towns near here ordered eclipse glasses also off Amazon and then had to recall them when they found out that they were knock-offs and not approved by NASA or whatnot but mine WERE and it’s been almost a week and I still haven’t gone blind). When we woke up on Monday morning, it was quite cloudy and Ken was being his typical gloom and doom self, going on about ‘cloud cover’ and wind speed and ‘chance of precipitation’ like the Weather Channel was paying him to give me his opinion, but I would not be dissuaded. “It’s going to be perfect,” I said, with all the confidence of a late-middle-aged woman who has never given a sh*t whether or not she was wrong about anything.
We left shortly after lunch to drive down to the lake, and on the way, there was blue sky on the horizon. “See,” I said. “It will be FINE.” I said this with all the confidence of a late-middle-aged woman who recently ran outside and across her front lawn in the pouring rain in her stocking feet and screamed “Get the f*ck of my street!” to an asshole in a pick-up truck who was trying to deface our Pride crosswalk by doing a burn-out on it. I got photographs of the truck AND his license plate—the jury is still out on whether or not the cops will do anything about it.Also, we had to leave Atlas behind, and a friend was going to give him lunch and let him out, but I had to message her and remind her not to let him out between 2:30 and 3:30 because he’s such a dope that he’d probably stare at it barking until his retinas burned out. She responded by sending us this picture of him on the couch, safely relaxing in the house:
At any rate, the closer we got to the lake, the more sporadic the cloud cover was, which filled me with incredible optimism. We arrived and hugged the family—Mom and Dad were there, along with my other aunt, and a couple of friends. We had snacks and wine, because what the hell is the point of watching a phenomenon of nature without ‘nature’s more fun grape juice’, and then sat on the deck. Waiting. It was still cloudy. The eclipse was supposed to start around 2:30 pm and right around then, the wind picked up and the clouds began to move. By 3 pm, the skies were blue and clear. We all had our glasses on, breathless with anticipation and freaking out that the clouds would return—but THEY DIDN’T, KEN, JUST LIKE I SAID.
It was an awe-inspiring moment. I’ve never in my lifetime seen a total solar eclipse and holy sh*t, let me tell you, it was worth the wait. And the best part was that Ken had his really good camera, and he got some amazing shots:
This week, I had to do something that I’d been dreading for a while—get a mammogram. My original appointment had been in July, then I had to change it and the earliest I could get was December. But then, in a surprising turn of good luck, we were going to be away on a cruise in December and I had to change the appointment once again. The earliest new date I could get was in July—again. It seemed like a good thing but then I started thinking—is it? What if there was something wrong with one of the “girls” and I wouldn’t even know until next summer, by which time it might be too late? But there was nothing, seemingly, that I could do, given that the clinic where my requisition was sent was notorious for never having any appointments. Then two weeks ago, I was getting an ultrasound on my shoulder at a new place in the same building as my physiotherapist and they had a big sign that said they’d just become partners in the government screening program. I enquired—they could give me an appointment almost right away. I would have rejoiced but if you’ve ever had one of these done, you’ll know it’s nothing to get excited about. And for those of you who’ve never had the pleasure—imagine taking a rubber ball and compressing it in a machine like this:
You get the idea? And guys, we all know if the test for testicular cancer involved smashing your scrotum in this torture device, some science dude would have figured out a different method YEARS ago, involving no contact, soothing music, and ice cream at the end. Not to say that men don’t go through very painful and invasive routine medical tests…cough cough. At any rate, I approached the day with a sense of doom and found myself subconsciously crossing my arms over my chest at random moments. Then the morning of the mammogram (sounds like a horror movie doesn’t it—The Morning of the Mammogram From Hell) arrived and I drove to the clinic, heart pounding. See the last time I’d had one of these done, it was two years ago, and you may remember I wrote about it then, more specifically how the technician told me, after I was securely and excruciatingly clamped, “Make sure you don’t pass out.” I mean, what the hell does THAT mean? How exactly am I to prevent myself from passing out? And then the nightmarish thought—What if I DID? Would I just dangle there from my boob until…it didn’t even bear thinking about.
So with much trepidation, I entered the clinic and was called in almost right away by the same woman who had done an X-ray for me not too long ago, which didn’t bode well. But then we started chatting:
Me: Hey, I remember you from that X-ray a while back. Tech: Yes, I do X-rays too but mammograms are really my specialty. I’m a jack-of-all-trades, I guess. Me: And master of all of them, right? Tech: *laughs* Don’t worry. Did your last one hurt? Me: A little. Tech: Well, we’ll make sure it doesn’t this time.
And true to her word, it was easy peasy and relatively painless. I even let her do a couple of extra shots “just to be on the safe side”. So fingers crossed that the “girls” are all right, and I don’t have to do this again for two more years.
In other news, Atlas is coming up on 4 years old now, and I have to say that he’s become the BEST dog. He was a holy terror as a puppy, as a 1 year-old and a 2 year-old, but over the last year, he’s just really settled into his role as a good boi. He has such an endearing personality, and you always know what he’s thinking about, which is mostly food. In fact, that’s when he’s most human—when it’s time for a meal. A while back, I started giving him a teaspoon of soft food with his kibble at every meal—we call it his “special”—and he goes nuts for it, jumping into the air like a baby goat when he sees me get the spoon, which I like to hold aloft like a beacon as I proclaim “The special spoon!!” It’s become such a thing that the last time we went away, my parents took care of him and my mom called, concerned:
Me: Hey, what’s up? Mom: Atlas won’t eat. I don’t know what’s wrong with him. Me: He won’t eat? Mom: He’s just standing in front of the refrigerator. He keeps looking at it, and then looking at me. Very pointedly. Me (laughing): That’s because his special is in there. He wants a dollop on his kibble.
A while later, she messaged to say that he gobbled everything up just like a good boi would.I love him so much.
And I’m glad I have him because he’s a real comfort when things are sh*tty, like last week when I got an email telling me that the company who published both my short story collections was dissolving. And not only are they not publishing anything new, they’re “unpublishing” all their other books, as in they will no longer exist in the public realm, and it was like a gut punch, or worse than a mammogram in terms of pain. So if you know anyone who publishes reprints of well-reviewed spooky stories that did as well financially as one could hope, let me know. In the meantime, I’ll just be over here, hugging my chest and cuddling my dog.
On Friday night, I couldn’t sleep so I started composing this week’s blog post in my head. As you may recall, I’ve been seeing this acupuncturist/chiropractor type guy for my chronic shoulder pain, and I’d given up on the acupuncture on the grounds that lying on my stomach with needles in my back for an indeterminate amount of time was stressful. So a few weeks ago, I went and asked to resume shock wave therapy (which is NOT electroshock therapy, just to be clear—it’s a type of air-compressor driven jackhammer that’s theoretically supposed to break up the calcium in your tendons), and his response was “No problem, kid.” And let me just remind you that the acupuncturist/chiropractor type guy is probably in his early thirties if that, and I am a woman who is quite beyond middle age and in no way, shape, or form, a kid. (Slight tangent: as I was composing this in my head, I was calculating how old I would have to be if 58 was middle-aged and realized that there was NO WAY I would get to see 116 years old unless there was some kind of modern medical miracle that occurred during the next few years, and then I started calculating how much time I had left and the answer to that was BEST CASE SCENARIO 25-30 YEARS and then I freaked myself out at how short a time that seemed and then I had to wander the house in an existential panic until I could go back to bed. Second slight tangent: I have a very dear aunt who has always called me “kiddo” ever since I can remember, and that’s fine because she’s older than me and she’s family and also she reads my blog and I don’t want her to think I don’t like it when SHE calls me kiddo).
At any rate, I’ve become increasingly—I don’t know, it’s like a simultaneous combination of amused and annoyed—by his constant sobriquets and Peleton style encouragement:
“You did amazing today, kid!” “You’re a trooper—great job!” “Fantastic work today, milady!”
And so on. And it would be awesome and cool if I actually DID anything aside from lying on my stomach and counting to 600 very slowly until he comes back to take the needles out; otherwise it just seems like hollow praise. But then last week, I arrived just as he was coming out of his treatment room and he greeted me thusly: “Uh oh, here comes trouble!”
I looked behind me to see who he was talking to, but it became quickly apparent that IT WAS ME. Me? Trouble?! Does he not know me at all? As we all know, I don’t have a single real bad-ass bone in my body! But then, at this point in the mental composition of this blog post in my bed, I started to fall asleep, and dreamed that I was writing about a couple who made cute pet videos and in one of them, a cat got mad at a dog for sniffing her, and the caption in the video read, “Stop touching my genitalia with your nose!” and then it occurred to me both in the dream and as I began to wake up again that the word “genitalia” doesn’t sound anything at all like what it is; in fact, it sounds like an old-fashioned word for something very festive, like if you said that “the whole regiment was decked out in their best genitalia” or “the halls were festooned with merry genitalia” or whatnot. And the whole thing was so funny when I pictured it that I laughed out loud, and Ken rolled over and muttered, “What?” and I said, “You’re snoring again” and he went back to sleep while I kept silently giggling just like a little kid and maybe my acupuncturist/chiropractor guy is right about me being trouble.
Things are relatively back to normal around here. Ken recovered, having a very mild case of the ‘vid and I never did get it, mostly because I’m convinced that I had covid already at the end of January 2020—right before everything started to get shut down. I was incredibly sick back then and lost my sense of taste, so I’m convinced that I had OG covid, which has made me immune to all these new strains, plus I’ve had all my boosters. Plus plus, Ken has the immune system of a big baby:
Me: I didn’t get covid from you because I have a kick-ass immune system. Ken: You didn’t get covid because you weren’t in the direct line of fire of that woman at the art auction who sounded like she was dying. Me: I was sitting next to you!AND I LIVE WITH YOU!
And then I felt really bad because I had MADE Ken go to the art auction on the cruise ship on the grounds that ‘it would be fun and also there is free champagne’. So we went, neither of us having any intention of buying overpriced art. Just like I went to all the jewelry events even though I had no intention of buying any overpriced jewelry. But again, there was FREE CHAMPAGNE. And yes, Ken and I both had beverage packages so we didn’t have to pay for any alcohol, but isn’t there something about ‘free champagne’ that just draws you in every time? The art auction was hilarious because it wasn’t really an auction at all. I’m used to antique auctions where the auctioneer is one of those guys with the incredible patter and it’s worth going just for the excitement. But the cruise ship auctioneer was very obviously not schooled in auction patter and the auction went like this:
Art Lady: This painting by this guy who did a lot of trees is valued at $111 000. Do I hear $50 000? No? All right Marco, put it back in the gallery. Now it’s time for the mystery painting! It is also trees, but it’s by a different guy and THAT’S the mystery!
The most expensive thing I saw get bought was a resin pig. It went for $3000 and everyone in the audience cheered and clapped for the guy, who was super-old and with a very young blonde woman that Ken insisted was his daughter. He assumed that because she called the old guy “Daddy” and I was like “Dude, you’re so naïve.”
At any rate, we sat through the auction next to a woman wearing a mask who kept taking off the mask to cough phlegmatically and blow her nose noisily then either fell asleep or died, but I’m not sure which, because we left right after the resin pig.
And things finally got back to normal and everything was good and covid-free until three nights ago, when Atlas ran in the bedroom and immediately jumped up on the bed and wouldn’t look at me…
Me: Hey bud—OMG WHAT IS THAT SMELL?!! KEN!!!
Yes, he got sprayed by a skunk AGAIN. That’s five times in the last three months. Luckily, Ken has a very good de-skunk concoction and we got Atlas before it had really soaked in. So Ken set up the live trap, and on Saturday morning, he called me outside:
Ken: There’s something in the trap. Me: Is it the skunk? Please let it be the skunk! Ken: Nope. But it’s very pissed off.
It was a possum. And it was the most annoyed and embarrassed possum I’ve ever seen, like it couldn’t believe it fell for the old peanut butter and cat food trick. But we like possums and they don’t stink, so we opened the trap and left it alone to make its way back to its possum home. Safe travels, little guy, and if you see the skunk, tell him how good that peanut butter and cat food tasted.
Well, we’re back from our trip. The second last day was my favourite, I think, mostly because we toured around Halifax in an ‘amphibious vehicle’, which is to say that our tour bus turned into a boat at a certain point and we literally drove down a ramp into the water and then we were floating and it was supercool. I’ve done that once before, many years ago, but it wasn’t made clear to me that the bus BECAME a boat—I thought we were changing vehicles halfway through, so imagine my terror as we headed straight off the pier into the water. But this time I was ready, and I really enjoyed it. Overall, the cruise was pretty good—at least the food, wine, and destinations were great. It was just the crew that was chaotic, like tiny animated characters in an old-time video game just zipping around without any seeming purpose and bumping into walls and getting stuck and whatnot. The last day was pretty exhausting, having to get up at 7 am, eat a quick breakfast, and then wait to get called for our airport transfer. Once we were off the boat, Norwegian basically washed their hands of us and we had to find the bus to the airport on our own. We eventually did, and then had to battle all the other passengers who were equally desperate to get away from the ship and had NO F*CKING IDEA HOW TO LINE UP, CAUSING INCREDIBLE PANIC AND DISORDER WHEN THE BUSES FINALLY ARRIVED.
At any rate, we arrived home later that day, and Atlas was very pleased to see us; in fact, he stood up, put his paws on my shoulder and then licked my neck and face, something he has never done before, and it was very sweet. And sloppy. We unpacked, I did a little prep for the presentation I was doing the next night at the local library on writing, and then we went to bed. The next morning, I woke up and Ken was already downstairs. When he came up, he looked terrible.
Me: What’s wrong? Ken: I was up all night with a fever. Me: Oh f*ck.
So I gave him a covid test and guess what? IT WAS POSITIVE. Which meant I had to cancel my presentation, cancel work on Saturday, and pretty much spent the next few days taking care of him. Fortunately, we’ve both had all our boosters so he’s not as sick as he could have been. I tested negative, and so far, I still am, fingers crossed.
Ken on the left, me on the right
So you were right, ‘Mole, my friend—cruise ships really are a hotbed of bacteria. But the upside to all this (aside from having a readymade blog topic) is that it’s quince season and the quince on the bushes in my backyard are ready to go. It was a bumper crop this year, so I’ve spent the last couple of days making quince jam, quince crumble, quince juice (which is what you get after you poach the quince to get it ready for cooking). Quince is labour-intensive, more so than any other fruit in existence I think, but it’s worth it in the end. I have so much quince that I posted it for sale on Facebook Marketplace which obviously meant fielding stupid questions from people who don’t read ads and want to know where I live (it’s in the ad) and how much the quince is (it’s in the ad) and do I deliver? (no, I am NOT bringing quince to your house—I picked it for you so if you want it, get your ass over here).
So wish me luck—I’m usually a positive person but right now, I really need to stay negative.
Every once in a while, we get a mouse in the house. Of course, it’s usually more than one—you know what they say: where there’s one mouse, there’s usually more. In the past, we’ve tried everything—live traps, sonic devices, a cat—and eventually, they stop coming around for a few months. We hadn’t seen any sign of a wee rodent since last winter, but a week and a half ago, Ken and I were standing in the kitchen talking and suddenly Ken interupted me with, “Look! A mouse just ran across the floor and disappeared under the cupboard!”
We have an old postmaster’s cupboard in the corner of the kitchen that we use for a variety of things, but in the bottom we store Atlas’s food in the right-hand side, and rice and a rice cooker on the left-hand side. Ken opened the left-hand door, which is where the mouse seemed to have disappeared into, and there was no sign of it. But the bags of rice had obviously been chewed into, and there was mouse sh*t on my rice cooker.
As you may remember, we gave up on live traps when it became obvious that the mice had figured out how to get the peanut butter without getting stuck in the trap, and as much as I hated to do it, we went out the next day and bought one of those snap traps. Ken slathered it with peanut butter, much to Atlas’s delight, because that meant he also got some peanut butter (Why? Because otherwise, he would pout and complain), and then Ken slid the trap very carefully under the rice/dog food cupboard with me all the while repeating, “Careful, careful!” in case it snapped his finger off. The next morning, we came downstairs and sure enough, there was a mouse in the trap. It was a late mouse and it made me sad. We repeated the same steps two more times and caught two more mice. But then…
On Thursday morning, I came down for breakfast.
Me: Did you check the mousetrap? Ken: Oh, not yet, I forgot. Hang on. (*gets down on hands and knees to peer under the cupboard*). Uh… Me: What’s wrong? Ken: The mousetrap is gone. Me: What are you talking about? How can it be gone? Ken: I don’t know, but it’s gone. Me: But…the whole mousetrap?! Ken: I know. Maybe the mouse’s tail got caught and it dragged it somewhere else? Me: I don’t hear any squeaking. Ken: Maybe it got free.
So we spent a lot of time on Friday searching for the trap to no avail. It has completely vanished. And I know there are a lot of places in any house where a mouse might disappear into, but a whole mousetrap??!! It’s kind of terrifying, to be honest, like where could it possibly have gone?! And now, I have no mousetrap, and potentially a mouse with magical powers, half a tail, and a thirst for revenge. Wish me luck.
In other news, I’m happy to announce on behalf of DarkWinter Press that our second publication, the novel The Dogcatcher by Sean Patrick Carlin, will be available for pre-sale starting tomorrow! It’s an awesome book if any of you are looking for a fun, spooky, and cleverly funny fall readand it’s available to order here!
Ivory Towers is one of Canada’s leading drag queens. With over 18 years experience she has won many titles including Miss Gay Toronto, Crews and Tangos drag race and many more. She has been featured in commercials with Sephora, Visa debit, Molson Canadian and Ikea.
Living life with a chronic illness is definitely not easy. But I do my best to push through all the barriers this illness puts in front of me! In my heart and mind, I believe maintaining a positive outlook on all situations in life will carry us through to much better times! I hope you find the information that I provide both helpful and inspirational!
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