seeking justice

Two men were executed yesterday; neither death brought closure or justice or made anything better.  It is a sad time for our country when lives are thrown away, and the very throwing away is cheered and casually joked about.   Murdering a murderer is just as wrong as murdering an innocent man.  

Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause.  ~Isaiah 1:16-17, English Standard Version

sometimes i can't even believe it myself... and now, with updates!

I just finished knitting a super adorable capelet for a friend of mine to wear to a wedding this weekend.  Unfortunately there were no super adorable, yet super grown-up looking buttons to attach to make it totally complete.  And because I am the Sort Of Person that I am, I bought boring buttons and knit slipcovers for them.  And now they look like FABULOUS! CUSTOM! BUTTONS!!!

So I was sitting on the sofa, feeling just a teensy bit clever and smug about my fabulous custom button slipcover nonsense, watching completely ridiculous things on the Netflixes, and also feeling a little smug.  Did I mention I was thinking that I was a bit great?

THAT'S WHEN BAD THINGS HAPPEN, people.

Our old-ish and somewhat sickly cat, Sebby-Sebastian, jumped up from a sound, snoring sleep, and knocked over a lamp.  That was odd.  He's not really into jumping, see, and this was pretty spectacular.  A minute of scuffling and scratching ensued, follwed by one of my most unfavorite noises in the world:  THE I AM THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD AND KILLER OF PESTILENCE MEOW.

It makes my tummy hurt.  Especially and also for example, when I am curled up in the corner of my sofa in the corner of the living room and there is no room for escape.

Sebby-Sebastian jumped up on the huge pile of laundry on the  other sofa, and shook his cousin-to-a-lion pretend mane.  The recently deceased mouse in his mouth flopped merrily.  Or something.  Sebby-Sebastian walked across the huge pile of laundry on  the sofa, meowing the Killer of Pestilence meow, and every muscle in my body cringed and clenched with every step he took, because I knew.

He was coming for me. 

Getting up from the sofa would only put me closer to Mr. Awesome and his Floppy Dead Mouse.  There was no escape.  He jumped from the other couch to the comfy chair.  The Floppy Dead Mouse was less than six feet away from me.  I curled up into the fetal position.  Sebby-Sebastian hopped off the comfy chair and onto the floor.  Five feet.  He dropped the Floppy Dead Mouse next to my clogs.  I threw up a little.  And all the while?  He meowed the Conquering Hero meow that sends the grotey-induced chills down my spine.

He jumped up next to me.  Floppy Dead Mouse was still on the floor, THANK GOD.  I told Sebby-Sebastian that he was a good, marvelous, wonderful kitty and that he was the bestest kitty in the world and that if he loved me he would take the mouse outside and dispose of it properly.  Sebby-Sebastian meowed knowingly, as if he understood that while I was terribly proud of him for saving our lives, I was also horribly skeeved out by Floppy Dead Mouse.

He jumped back down to the floor, and crouched next to Floppy Dead Mouse.  And just to prove that indeed, he was a cat, and that also he does not actually speak English, he loudly ate Floppy Dead Mouse.  Crunch.  Squish.  Crunchy-crunch.

And then?  Because the whole Floppy Dead Mouse crunchy-crunchy-squishy-crunch wasn't enough?  He leaped onto the other sofa and barfed Super Messy Floppy Dead Mouse onto the arm of the sofa.  And because regurgitated mouse bits is STILL NOT ENOUGH?  He jumped to my comfy chair and barfed a whole bunch of other unidentifiable schmuckus on the arm of the comfy chair.

So instead of going to bed feeling quite satisfied with myself, I went to bed feeling squeaky clean after sanitizing my furniture.  

*Please know that I do recognize the cat probably has an actual medical condition and I did call the vet. 


Update:  Sebby-Sebastian did not eat the tail. And also?  Thanks be to God for boy-children.

i'm just going to skip to the interesting part.

Day Two of the second camping trip of the year.  Everyone had swum (what? is that even right?) until they could swim no more.  Each had eaten his or her fill of whatever hot dog/marshmallow/snackity things he or she could put his or her grubby mitts on.  

It was time for bed.

The Mister slept in the tent with us the previous night, but he had an appointment in the morning, and needed to go home.  The five of us snuggled down in our respective sleeping bags, and The Mister kissed each of us goodnight, said goodbye and hit the road.

A couple of hours later, I heard the sound of unfolding tarps next to my head, outside of the tent.  It had been threatening to rain, so we stacked our firewood on tarps and covered it all up so it would light.  Honest to goodness, I thought someone was stealing our firewood.  Why would I think that?  WHO KNOWS.  It was after midnight, and I'd been sound asleep.  So I just laid there, because if somebody needed to have my firewood that bad, they could have it. 

BUT THEN.  That somebody sneaked into the screened-in area of my tent.  And started going through my things.  I reached for my flashlight, and as luck would have it, the windows on the doors between the screened-in area and the sleeping area were not zipped up, and I could see what was going on.

I did not like what I saw.

A skunk was eating cookies.  Cookies that I made.  I do not like to make cookies, people, I really don't.  Cake? Yes.  Cookies?  NO.  I made a lot of cookies for this trip, and I stored them in a Tipperware container that clearly was left uncovered.

I slowly zipped the windows closed and laid back down on the air mattress.  I tried to go to sleep, really I did, but as it happens, the cookies were crunchy, and skunks are noisy eaters.  

FINALLY.   I heard the rustle of tarps, and the skunk was gone.  Peace and quiet had returned.  I think I dozed, but only for a moment, and for no reason at all I opened my eyes.

Something was moving inside the tent.  Except that I was laying very still, and the short people were all sound asleep, so really nothing should have been moving around the tent. 

I saw it clearly as it walked between Jack and Miss O.  THE SKUNK WAS INSIDE THE TENT AND IT WAS WALKING NEXT TO MY BABIES' FACES.  Precisely twelve million gazillion thoughts blazed through my brain.  I know this because I was laying very still and counting my thoughts because I needed something to do so I didn't FREAK OUT LIKE AN INSANE PERSON BECAUSE A SKUNK WAS WALKING AROUND IN MY TENT AND PLEASE, JESUS, DON'T LET THE CHILDREN ROLL OVER OR SNORE OR SNEEZE OR FART OR ANYTHING THAT WOULD CAUSE THE SKUNK TO SPRAY AND THEN WE WOULD GO BLIND AND DIE.

And because I was exceedingly awake by this time, I listened to the skunk exit the tent through the door that wasn't zipped closed when A Certain Someone exited the tent earlier on his way home.

When I was convinced the skunk was really gone, and my heart had started beating again, and I could, you know, STAND UP, I gingerly stepped over my babies and zipped the tent closed.  Then I texted That Certain Someone a message that isn't actually suitable for print.  He didn't respond.  Just like a man.

it's been a while.

So.  It was summer.  And now, it's still technically summer, but summer is actually over.  I'll tell you how I know:  I had to wear socks last week.  Three days.  I never wear socks in the summer.

The Mister was home all! summer! long! because he had an emergency back surgery situation that rendered him lump-like and unable to do things like LISTEN TO HIS BOSSES MICROMANAGE THINGS and WEAR A TOOL BELT.  Doctor's note and everything, y'all.  He did take the short people to swimming lessons every day, and after a while he started wiping keisters again, which was nice.  But mostly he cringed when the short people ran in his general direction and beat them off with a cane used an actual cane to define his personal space bubble.  It was very effective.

We took up camping, which means I spent many moons laying on an air mattress in a tent away from my veryown bathroom.  Most of the time it didn't suck, but when it did suck?  It really, really, really sucked.  I know, spoilerish alert.  Believe me, I didn't ruin the story at all by letting you know it sucked.

Jack turned six, and he's quite old and tall and he does Boy Things.  For example, Henry says to Jack, I think you should drop this croquet ball on my head.  And Jack says, That's the single most brilliant idea you've had all day, old chap, I'm happy to oblige.  And then DROPS THE CROQUET BALL ON HIS LITTLE BROTHER'S HEAD and also WONDERS WHY I'M NOT HAPPY ABOUT THE SITUATION.

And since I'm ratting out the short people, one of my children approached her father at a party and said, Pops, I have a string that's bothering me.  Be a dear and allow me to borrow your Swiss Army knife to remove it.  To which Pops replies, Sure, darling, anything for you! and opens the Swiss Army Knife to the itty-bitty scissors, hands it to the short person, and stops paying attention.  Short Person sneaks off and GIVES HERSELF A HAIRCUT.  And then THROWS A FIT WHEN I MAKE HER A RECTIFYING-THIS-GOD-AWFUL-MESS APPOINTMENT at an actual salon and also WONDERS WHY I'M NOT HAPPY ABOUT THE SITUATION.

We are making a solar system out of balloons for our next astronomy lesson.  I'm not sure how that is going to work seeing as how balloons aren't actually shaped like planets.  

Remember this?  I think I can top it.