the jmeoww diaries: V.15

We recently returned from a long overdue vacation, AKA Tiffany's tour of the East Coast locales in which Justin once lived. From Boston to Maine to New Hampshire (and then to Mechanicville, NY for me because of course), we saw friends and family and some of the most beautiful lands in our country. But not one damn moose, which I am still peeved about. We did, however, hear elk breeding which is a story I will tell you one day over some beers.

Boston

The one and only FALL tree in New Hampshire.

Lake Winnipesaukee, NH

Glorious, yes? This past weekend we visited my family for the first time since the trip and they could not wait to hear....

...about how jmeoww handled herself during this vacation and our return.

Yes, her life is far more interesting than ours and we get it.

Leaving our precious feline child for longer than 6-hours is a daunting and emotional production like no other. My little sister was conveniently unable to take on meow-sitting duties, so we turned to jmeoww's other entrusted human — Paul. Paul is the hero who took on this task over our honeymoon last year. And because sometimes I need a good cackle, I saved the email he sent from that time and would like to gift you an excerpt:

"I went into the kitchen to get her food and while I was cleaning her dishes I could hear her hissing.  I'd look over and she'd perk up and meow when I saw her, then hiss again when we couldn't see each other. It was hilarious.

So I got the treats and the toys and walked over to her. Gave her a couple of treats and petted her, and she would purr, then meow, then purr, then hiss, then purr...she was SO FUNNY."

FUNNY INDEED. And because Paul is a saint and fully aware of the commitment involved, he agreed to watch her again this trip. We only heard from him once (although I did make Justin check-in several times for my benefit), and his text said:

How kind of Justin to LOL prior to asking Paul is he was okay. I just kept saying, SHE IS SO EMBARRASSING. At this point I assumed that she had accepted her new life as a parentless cat living in a one-bedroom apartment with appliances she could never operate and clothing that would never fit her. But at least we left a light on. Oh, and the A/C because thank you San Diego for reaching temperatures that would surely cause an indoor cat to implode. And because she doesn't have thumbs, she HAD to depend on Paul for food but also she had to make sure that he didn't steal it. Which is WHY she overreacted, obviously. Who knows when her next meal would have been! 

Justin returned home three days earlier than I did (because, Mechanicville!) so he dealt with most of the overly-clingy animal recovering from her brief stint as an orphan. He reported that there was a lot of very loud meowing and a lot of staring at the door waiting for me to walk through.

LIKE SO.

I returned on Monday afternoon while Justin was still at work. Basically it was like she didn't believe I was home. I had to wake her up from her daytime resting place underneath the bed, and then she just stared at me. Clearly I must be dreaming! But then. Then she smelled the OTHER CATS on my suitcase and continued to smell every part of all the things until she was certain they weren't with me. It was only then that I was granted a very brief yet very drool-filled cuddle session. 

While she most certainly has her asshole moments, we can see a big difference in the recovery time after these earth-shattering events. But let's not discuss what happens when it rains. Because if you wanted to hear about it at 7:15 a.m. on a Sunday morning, she would be happy to tell you ALL about it. 

Now, if you have questions about the HUMANS' vacation, please let me know!

piles

Fun fact: I am a Whovian. What's that you ask? A Doctor Who fan, duh. All thanks to my husband, Justin *NERD ALERT* Dazet. I dubbed him that this weekend after he spent nearly 5 hours building a Lego Millennium Falcon. What's that? I don't have time to get into it.

When we first starting dating, we decided that we would make each other watch each other's favorite TV shows. I realize there is probably a better way to write that sentence, but I can't be bothered with that right now. I believe our first show was one of his favorites, Battlestar Galactica; which don't even get me started on that show because I will cry so many tears at you and I still haven't even fully processed the finale. My first pick was Lost; please see previous sentence for my thoughts on THE BEST SHOW OF ALL TIME. There has also been Spaced (amaze) and many more that I can't currently recall. So we watch a lot of TV, but that is not the point.

I did not fall in love with Doctor Who immediately. It definitely took time, but once it hit me it hit me hard. We knew that this would not be a quick watch, even though we started at the "reboot." I also needed to take an approximately 6-month break after the loss of the 10th Doctor who will forever remained etched in my heart as one of the best characters on television, ever. We jumped into the 11th Doctor very quickly and like most rebounds, he just wasn't cutting it. So I took my time to mourn, and we watched House of Cards in the interim (TEAM CLAIRE).

I had read and been told about a particular episode many times, and last night we reached that episode. And it was everything I had read and been told. I cried so much that I had to diffuse essential oils to be able to breathe again. It was beautiful, just absolutely beautiful and it was exactly what I needed at this current point in my life.

I have been unsettled. Unsteady. I feel like I am in career purgatory and desperately need to make a change. I am feeling the weight of the negative energy that comes from numerous relationships in my life and am constantly battling to rise above it. My husband has been a champ at navigating through this time with me, as we both go through these phases of "what am I doing with my life and will it all matter?"

And then Vincent and the Doctor happened. And it was one of the most beautiful and honest and heartbreaking episodes of television I have ever witnessed. I will just leave you with two quotes from the episode, because I cannot convince you to watch Doctor Who.

Source

Via Society 6

This certainly does not fix any of the aforementioned challenges, but it certainly gave me a heavy dose of perspective on a life that I am lucky to have.

!! shameless plug !!

This "coming back to blogging" thing has been much harder than I imagined. Mostly because the things that I am inspired to write about lately are all dealing with interpersonal relationships and social media and I am unsure whether or not blogging about it would perpetuate the things I am trying my hardest to avoid or not. VAGUE BLOG. But really, deciding what to share and how and with whom is the current struggle I am navigating.

THAT SAID. I have been working on another project that I am THRILLED to share will all three of my readers. My dearest friend, Jenna (you've met her here!), is a very talented jewelry designer. Jeweler? Jewelist? You know what I mean. She makes kick ass jewelry and long-story-short, I bullied her into opening an etsy shop so she would stop giving away her masterpieces for free and actually make a profit off her hard work. 

I have deemed myself her marketer (marketist? I'm really into making up titles right now) and her shop, Stay Golden Jewels, can be found on Etsy and Instagram. Her style is nature-inspired, slightly boho, slightly hippie, mildly trendy, and overall awesome. We are constantly adding new pieces and if you have an idea in mind for something you like, Jenna loves custom orders! Granted it is something in her wheelhouse. So like please don't ask her to make you a watch.

Even Figgy gets custom mala beads!

We will be having a Labor Day sale, so follow along on IG for updates (and also for darling pictures of SGJ mascot Figgy)! And because, beloved readers, I love you so much that if you so desire to make a purchase from this lovely shop you can use code BLOGGIST15 for 15% off your order of $15 or more. Because I love you. All three of you.

There's an oil for that.

In my quest to be more conscious of what I am putting on and in my body (except for beer, please don’t ask me about beer), I recently purchased a very highly rated organic-vegan-cruelty free face wash. Upon using it for the first time, I BURST INTO FLAMES. Okay, not actual flames. But when I looked in the mirror post-shower, I was terrified. Was I dying? Had the vitamin-C that was supposed to rejuvenate my tired skin turned against me? Maybe I overreacted just a bit, like that’s not unusual. But when something is labeled organic-vegan-cruelty free and is basically made of cloud whispers, I expect it NOT to burn off my skin.

This quest to avoid ALL THE BAD THINGS can be challenging and most of the time I take the easy way out. And most of the time I avoid getting roped into “things.” But let me tell you about essential oils…

No really! Please let me tell you. Because I am currently in a state of constant confusion and overwhelmed-ness about them. And as an educated woman with a biology degree, I *know* I shouldn’t let these magical oils BUT I AM. A large population of similarly well-educated females at my place of employment are into them. Like IN-TO them. And they have been so kind and generous with their samples and education and oil-party nights in which I get to smell all the things and do a scan test that told me my main life problems. And hot damn if that scan test didn’t hit a few (of the many) issues right on the head. For myself AND my friends. And perhaps maybe one or two of those scans showed weight management issues and I was like, I GET IT. Do I rub the oils on my fat to make it disappear? (The answer is no, especially since I learned the hard way that some oils are “hot” and will “burn” your skin...akin to the holy water facewash I tried this morning).

Yes, I understand multi-level marketing companies (Hi, Avon!). I also understand that essential oils are not going to cure cancer; but if they can help out with the blues and a bit of the sniffles (and a bit of the snoring) then I am SOLD. Also, some just smell really great. Also, some just don’t (meat marinade...you get it).

I sense that my issue here is classic avoidance. I know what is going on with my body. I fell off the wagon after the wedding. Nay, I leapt off the wagon screaming NO SALADS NO PAIN and never looked back. And here I am 10 months later chubby and constantly battling low energy and summer colds. If I could just get back on that stupid miserable wagon, I would be fine. I wouldn’t need any magical oils to cure my various ailments.

But like what IF they work, you know? WHAT IF? Don't worry, you'll be sure to hear back from me about this either way.

the jmeoww diaries: V.14

I know you all are wondering about Justin and I and the wedding and everything that has happened since. But I really know that anything that has happened in our lives is far less interesting than anything that has happened in hers...

It's totally okay, I accept that you all are here for her. While she did not actually make it to the wedding, she was there in spirit in the form of cardboard cutouts at the photobooth. She was a hit, as always.

Probably the next biggest thing to her unofficial marriage to Justin was moving to a new apartment. The entire process of finding a place, packing, moving, and unpacking is incredibly stressful for the humans. But for the meoww, she has her own story to tell.

Justin and I both had requirements for our new apartment. Must have a washer and dryer. Must have A/C. Must feel like a castle. And so on. But the one qualifier that got us the oddest looks from the apartment managers was an enclosed patio on the second floor. For our cat. A CATIO, if you will. Imagine us telling eight different apartment managers that their patio/balcony was in fact not good enough for our cat. We knew that for our sanity and hers, she needed to go outside in a safe, enclosed space. She had spent nearly three years expending pent up energy and anger out on that patio and also creeping out the neighbors. She LOVED that patio. And the thought of taking that away from her made us feel like terrible humans. So our new place would have to have a catio.

Well, turns out human needs trumped hers for once and she did not get the perfect catio. There is a small balcony, but it is concrete rather than fencing or railing and we imagined we could make it work. We will build a weather-proof cat tower that is tall enough for her to see the world! We will make this work and feel like less terrible humans!

But we haven't needed to build said dangerous cat tower because this glorious apartment has one thing that our old place didn't have for her: WINDOWS. The cave that we previously lived in had a sliding glass door and two bedroom windows that were blocked by our TV and dresser. But this castle? ALL THE WINDOWS. She can see the world from the air-conditioned indoors and peep on the neighbors just fine! Windows completely eliminated the need for the actual outside world. And us humans could feel a little less guilty.

The one tiny hangup with this perfect situation? Her fatass didn't know how to jump up on windowsills. Three months later, you guys, she still takes a spill every now and then and I die. Just die. Her intial attempts at getting up on the windowsill involved jumping straight up and using her claws to cling on to the ledge and just hang there while I scrambled to try to get a photo. Which was great for the new coat of paint. Then she learned she needed to launch all 14-pounds of her bad self up and onto the ledge but at the right speed as to not slam her face into the glass. I TRIED TO FILM IT, I DID. It was quite possibly my favorite part of moving. Jmeoww learning how to use windowsills, who would've thought.

Justin just discovered this picture on his phone and I can't stop cackling about it. It could not be more perfect.

To ease her troubles a bit her non-legal husband Justin decided to purchase yet ANOTHER piece of cat furniture which he said he would never have in his home. A nearly four foot tower that is her vessel of relaxation but also used for creeping on the neighbors. You guys I swear 6 nights a week she is up in the tower either watching us or watching the neighbors. I legitimately thought the neighbors were going to complain because she just. sits. there. And she doesn't just sit. She loooooounges. Full meow relaxation in her queen tower. Limbs poking out of the climbing hole, leg stretched out over the side. Sometimes she clings to the edge and looks down like she has never been up that high ever. And every now and then she gets in an epic battle with her tail or the tower or both. And we will pause the TV to watch it play out, because marriage.

So basically, jmeoww's life has been pretty darn great. Her only complaint is that we aren't in the same room with her at all times, and also where are the kibbles?

Until next time, jmeoww fans!

Step 1: Insert title

Approximately one hour and nine minutes have passed since I sat down to write this. Rather than write something, I have spent: 45 minutes on Amazon looking for a birthday gift; 10 minutes scrolling through my Facebook feed and rolling my eyes; 5 minutes applying to volunteer for the cat adoption center at Petco; and 9 minutes watching jmeoww kill dead the toys I place on her tower just to get her riled up.

Basically what I am trying to say is THIS IS HARD. I have every intention of writing again and sharing our ridiculous and sometimes mundane lives with you but you should see how hilariously violent that cat gets when the sushi toy is on her tower.

I have intentions and things to say. Can we call this a baby step? Yes, lets.

ps - can someone tell me how to make my blog titles UN-green?

pps - yes, jmeoww has moved into a tower and we can't wait to tell you more about it.

testing...

...is this thing on?

STAY TUNED (the three of you that still maybe possibly have me in your blog reader!)!!!!!!