Another Cat?!?!

*sigh* Why won't the cat issues all go away?????? Now we have another cat. A little baby kitty. Thankfully, just ONE orange kitty. Phoebe is a mommy. And the big black cat in the neighborhood is a daddy. Now what?!?!? Well, that's the first and LAST baby Phoebe will EVER have. Ta da. That's it. Gettin' fixed...or being sent away where they give shots and fixes before finding a new home. I still, seriously, don't want to pay for someone elses cat. However, looks like these are our cats now. :-P I don't want them!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Does anyone want a cat? Does anyone want two cats? We're getting guinea pigs next week. Don't need the trouble of cats! ACK! Too bad no one listened to me when I said that Phoebe couldn't come. Then we would have ONE black cat who didn't cause trouble. Oh well. Now we have two cats again. Whatever.

More news on Cats

*sniff* Sadly, this is not a silly story about our cats. It is a sad story. Go back a week or so. Miss Albee (the "good" black cat) was meowing like crazy outside our bedroom window around 5:00 AM. Yikes! That's too early. So, I got up and put her in the garage. Next day, same thing. Bill gets up and lets her out. Typically she is scared of everything and we expected her to hang out in the bushes by the house or under our neighbor's car. When we woke up at a more reasonable hour, she was gone. We figured that she couldn't have gone far and that she'd be back soon or we'd find her. No such luck. We gave her another day. No luck. The neighbor kid said that she thinks Miss Albee may have been seen in the street. :-( I did not see it with my own eyes, but this is one of the trusty worth girls on the street. She wasn't sure if it was Miss Albee, but all I know is that Miss Albee never came home. I'm not one to get too torn up over losing a pet. And I'm not mad at Bill for putting her out in the yard. It is just a little sad. Now we are stuck with "brat cat". Phoebe has claws and claws her way through the screens on the porch to run the neighborhood. Maybe she will meet her demise as well. Or not. We expect that she is expecting. I'm not really thrilled about this cat in the first place. We agreed to keep this cat while Jill's mom was in transition between homes. She hasn't moved to a place that takes pets yet, so we are "stuck" with this silly animal. I seriously don't want to spend money on someone else's cat. But if she does end up with kittens, she is getting taken straight to the vet to get fixed. She's been here nearly a year (I thought this would be a two week thing). I said to Bill the other day, "Bob Barker is not happy with us." Oh well.

Kroger Baggers Continued...

#5 - So I roll up my extra full shopping cart of groceries. Note - I am only pushing ONE cart to the checkout line. I use the bottom of my cart for things such as 12-packs of Coke and such. APPARENTLY, the bottom of the shopping carts disappear once all of the items are removed because the bagger guy decides to give me a second cart instead of putting stuff on the bottom. When a bagger ends up putting your items into two carts what would you expect to happen next? I would expect that he would offer to help me out to the car. Often, I decline such assistance for I am the only one who knows how to fit all of that stuff into the trunk the right way. BUT- on this day I was willing to accept the help. Umm...no such help was offered. The guys pushed my two carts away and started bagging the next customer's groceries. So I'm standing there in Kroger with a shocked look on my face for a moment. Then I begin rearranging the groceries (using the BOTTOM of my cart) so that everything, once again, fits into ONE cart. I didn't move my carts very far out of the way to do this, so in theory, this idiot could see what I was doing. He didn't care. After I had successfully put everything into one cart, I offered him my newly emptied cart for the next round. (Sometimes they keep an empty cart at the end of the aisle so they can start putting groceries in the cart before you are done unloading the current cart.) He said, "Yeah. Sure." And I said, "Oh. By the way, one person can only push one cart at a time." Or maybe I said, "Next time you give someone two carts, help them to their car." Don't really remember now. What an idiot.



Today I went to Kroger again. Same Kroger. Ah yes. The wonderful service I am used to. :-) Friendly fellows who know what they are doing! No need for assistance out to the car today since all we had was a Kings Island ticket, two things of ice cream and a gallon of milk. PLUS, I had 2 helpers of my own today.

Kroger Baggers

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, I dated a boy who I met through the checkout line at Kroger. Sometimes he was the checker. Sometimes he was the bagger. He had aspirations of graduating from Centre College and going to Med School.

Those days are long gone. I would not date a bagger from Kroger after my experience today.

Yes. It is July 4th and I'm sure these teenage boys have better things to do on a holiday than work, but that's life. They were really letting you know this by their attitudes and body language.

I'm one one these "weird" people who uses the blue reusable bags. A typical trip uses 10 bags. 3 of mine have gone AWOL, so I only had 7. Baggers must not be trained on how to pack these bags. I've heard that baggers aren't trained to pack ANY kind of bag. Here are some tips for packing the tote bags:

Lesson #1 - PLEASE, do not put all of the cans in the same blue bag. Those things hold A LOT. If it is all cans, I cannot lift it.

Lesson #2 - Learn what to put in the insulated bags. I try to group my cold stuff together, so this is easier to figure out. However, I've gotten some really stupid stuff placed in those things before.

Lesson #3 - The insultated bags have zippers on top for a reason. SO ZIP THEM!!!

Lesson #4 - If I'm using these bags then obviously (or maybe not so obvious) I am trying not to waste those plastic bags. So PLEASE do not put only one item in each plastic bag you have to use since I don't have space in my blue bags. Let's not be wasteful. One thing of syrup does not need its own bag. It can share with the fabric softener refill.

Lesson #5 - ONE PERSON CAN'T PUSH TWO CARTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(Gotta go eat my groceries now. More later.)

Time "alone" at Starbucks

The kids went to VBS this morning from 9:00 am - noon. I learned on Monday of the week, that, even with the best intentions, if I go home after dropping them off, I end up back in bed. :-( So I've been trying to do other things during my "alone" time. Today, I decided to go to Starbucks and read. I really don't like their coffee at all. :-P Nasty. But I got a small decaf and a cheese danish (yummy). I found a nice chair in the corner and settled in. I'm currently reading "The Memory Keepers Daughter." It is an excellent book! I hope to finish it today.

So there I am with my coffee, danish and book. One cannot help but people watch at times, though. Especially in this age of cell phones. There was one mom there with her 10 y/o (ish) daughter. The first I noticed them was when they were ordering or waiting and she was on the phone blabbing about what time she had to pick up her other kid from soccer and maybe this or that time would work best for this or that activity. And so on. If you've never noticed, people tend to talk louder when they are on their phones. Well, mom finishes up her conversation. The two get their coffee and sit at a table next to mine. Seems like it would be nice mother/daughter time now. Wrong. Mom ends up on the phone again. Not sure if she placed or received the call but that doesn't matter. She was on the phone again. Talking about having frappuccino parties and everyone bring their favorite bottle of flavor. Whatever. The daughter slumped down in her chair, obviously annoyed that her mom was using up all of this time together on the phone. :-( I felt sorry for the kid. I wanted to get up out of my chair and knock the phone out of the woman's hand!!!! When mom did hang up the phone, the little girl perked up quickly. They got up to leave at one point, then mom checked her watch and realized that there wasn't enough time between Starbucks and soccer to really do anything else, so lets just sit back down for a few more minutes. This woman needs someone to knock her upside the head! I guess it's not just her though. Later in the morning, there was a group of women who sat at a table farther away from me. Sounded like they were comparing schedules to see who was busiest.

Then there was the saleman. Oh my. He annoyed the crap out of me as soon as he sat down at a table very close to where I was. Of course, the first thing he did was get on the phone. This guy had a loud annoying voice anyway, then he got on the phone! Oh my. (Remember, I'm trying to read a book.) FINALLY, he got off the phone. *whew* The person who he was to meet arrived. They shook hands and got the informal sales pitch going. Thankfully, this salesman talks a bit more softly than when on the phone. The man who had joined him had a much more laid back tone about him. I was sort of glad he arrived to calm guy #1 down a bit...well...not really...maybe neutralize the table or something. Anyhow, Mr. Salesman starts going on and on about his product/service. Guy #2 listens and asks questions. The company involves computers. The second guy said that folks at his company can still get computers with XP. :-) Lucky. Anyhow, I didn't catch all of what they were discussing (I was reading). But I tell you this, I wouldn't buy anything from that guy. Nothing. I don't care how good of a product/service it may be...I'd get it elsewhere.
Another thing I noticed while I was there is that this place seems to have a lot of "regulars." It was my first time, but many of the customers seemed to have developed "relationships" with the folks behind the counter. It was comforting.

Of course, there were moments during my time at Starbucks that I wasn't distracted. I can't believe that guy did that in that book! (Won't tell you though!) I kept and eye on the clock and when it was time to go get the kids, I packed up and left.
SO, I sat at Starbucks from 9:15 - 11:30 today. "Alone"