Always the Watcher

 

He's home. 

End-of-Year Survival Plans

 Yesterday, Daisy and I went to the dermatologist. We had a long-standing agreement that when we could, we would go back in for skin checks and checkups on moles and/or any other issues. Our last appointment for skin checks was probably 2016, 2017 -- it had been a very long time. 

However, during the last appointment we had, I had a growth removed from my back and biopsied (it was not cancerous) and everyone on Daisy's side of the family -- from both parents to every one of her aunts and uncles -- has had some skin cancer removal surgeries. Everyone. So because of this it is very important that Daisy gets checks on a decently regular basis.

Both of us are fine; we were told we're good for another check in 5-7 years. They used liquid nitrogen to burn off a single benign growth on my back that appeared to be inflamed and irritated, but otherwise there was nothing wrong skin-wise with either of us. I'm a big proponent of skin checks -- go get a once-over done; I encourage you to do so. Especially if you're out in the sun a lot, have had bad sunburns over the years, or have any family history of issues. For my insurance, it's a $50 co-pay and if it prevents skin cancer for you or catches something early, all the better.

Afterwards, we visited with the parents for a while to discuss the fallout from Christmas and enjoy the sanctuary and silence of an otherwise extended-family-and-chaos-goblin-free house. We will be going back over there on Wednesday afternoon for a pre-New Year dinner. I say afternoon because that's what they requested -- the parents are senior citizens and are in no way staying up long enough to see the ball drop in Times Square. They'll be in bed long before that. 

I return to work tonight; I am currently typing this at 5:28 AM. I forced myself to reset my sleep schedule so that I will sleep most of the day in preparation of being up all night for work.

Gary is having pooping trouble again and appears to be constipated and straining here and there, and only poops once every 2-3 days or so. This is troubling to us and Daisy booked an appointment at our vet for this afternoon at 3 (again, she is still on her holiday vacation). Otherwise he doesn't seem to have any issues, but we want to get him checked out to make sure it's not something serious -- and if it is, get him the proper treatment. He's had gut issues since we adopted him, off and on. Most of the time it's very minor and disappears within a few days. I feel for him, though; I have gut issues myself quite a bit and I just want the boy to be healthy and happy, so whatever treatment we need to give him, I will do it so that he lives a long and healthy life with us. 

Yesterday was the 2nd anniversary of the day we adopted Empress. She spent the day getting love and snuggling up with Hank in the large cat bed in the front window. I can't believe how tiny she used to be compared to now. 

It has been blustery cold for the past few days; it was 60 degrees here on Christmas, and after that the temperature dropped sharply, the winds picked up, and we received a dusting of snow -- as if to remind us that not only was winter still here, it was going to remain here and make sure everyone was as miserable as possible after one of the nicest Christmas weeks we've had weather-wise in many years. 

Three days ago, while out running errands and before we went to spend more forced family fun time with the family again, we stopped by the local salon and I got my hair cut, short. Later that night, upon my return home, I shaved off the beard. I was really only keeping both of them for Christmas photos with the family (which, ironically, we didn't get this year -- only a photo of myself and the wife were taken). I will now enter the new year with far shorter hair and some stubble:

It also makes me look at least a decade younger, generally.

I don't like having short hair and being clean-shaven most of the time, unless we're in the hottest part of summer. And, generally, I don't cut my hair or shave off the beard in the winter, ever -- I like my head being warm and I like to grow my own scarf. But to be honest with you, I couldn't stand it anymore. My hair was getting too long to properly manage and keep colored without a lot of fade-out, and the beard was so long and thick that it was seriously irritating my face. It was also hard to manage while eating and keeping it properly conditioned and combed out was a daily nightmare.

Daisy really likes the new look but laments the loss of my beard. I reminded her that it will grow back and likely won't take that long to do so; it was one of the longest, thickest beards I've ever had, and it came in after I'd shaved my face clean upon returning from North Carolina in early September. Yes, that's right, the full beard I had in our photos in Canada were only from a little more than a month of growth. So no, it won't take that long to come back in. 

I told Daisy that the bonus of getting my hair cut this short and when I did is that about 95% of the dye was cut out of it, and she will now once more see my hair grow back in its natural color for the first time in about two years. I don't know when or how I will dye it again; it will have to grow out for a few months before that's even a possibility anyway, so for the time being I will look shockingly normal again, and decidedly not punk rock. I guess I'll also get to see just how much gray I really have in my hair, as I've been covering it up with blue, black, green, and purple dyes for a very long time now. There's still a little black left on the top where the hair was left a little bit longer, but in time that will quickly fade out and disappear. 

I don't necessarily want to become a new person in 2026; I don't really even have any resolutions or goals for the year. It's just survival at this point, really. The Brandon is tired. 2025 was a long, exhausting year where I lost two cats, gained two cats, left one job and started another, lost 25 more pounds and gained five back, traveled all around inside and outside of this country, spent thousands of dollars on things I didn't need to survive, watched several people I knew and loved die, got almost zero serious writing done, and ended the year at about where I started with no real change to the status quo. At this point, with everything going on in the world, status quo would be just fine with me for 2026. Maybe I should attempt to come up with some goals or resolutions. I might. I don't know yet. I fail in almost all of my actual goals in life, primarily because of the person that I am but also due to outside factors and influences. I just want to survive. That's an admirable plan, an admirable goal, is it not?

I have done nothing productive in the overnight hours. I haven't even done anything fun in the overnight hours. I have been writing here and I spent a little time with Mable, who was very happy I was awake from my nap and wanted all of the love and butt rubs and food. I am half asleep; I am fighting the fatigue because if I fall back asleep now, I'll be awake before noon. It is more difficult to fight the fatigue demons than most people probably realize. 

My vacation was okay. Just okay. I didn't win the lottery, but I got some really good Christmas presents that I appreciated. I didn't eat a lot of Christmas dinner, but what I had was good. I got to sleep with my wife at the same time almost every single night of my vacation, something that is a bit of a rarity these days. Mable has become a daddy's girl and now sleeps on me in bed on a pretty frequent basis. Gary and Charlie are wonderful little boys and I got to spend a lot of time with them. I got my retail therapy, I had a good birthday, and I don't have any evident skin cancers. So, I mean, could have been worse. 

I do not want to return to work tonight. I don't want to return to the grind, or return to the miserable darkness of three more months of cold and winter with no other holidays on the horizon that would actually feel beneficial to take a few days off around. Our anniversary in 2026 falls on a Sunday -- a working day for me (and after January 4, a working day for Daisy as well) -- as far as it can calendarily be away from Memorial Day. I guess that means I'll likely be working on Memorial Day too, in order to get an extra day off for our anniversary. I'm already slated to work MLK day and Presidents' Day (which are, interestingly enough, paid holidays in my new company). Maybe I should just chamber the comp days from those and take the whole week of our anniversary off after Memorial Day.

Nah. I can't do that. I want us to go visit my parents again in March or April if possible. I want to do it before it gets too hot down there, when it's outside the tourist season and before the threat of hurricanes, and I want to do it before all of the tornadoes begin firing up here in the spring and early summer. March or April are the ideal times to go. 

But, of course, we need to have money for that and we need to be able to pay down some bills first. Thanks to our American Airlines credit card though, that trip is basically free. Free. Because of points and miles. We just have to plan it out. I'll discuss it with Daisy in the coming weeks.

On that note all, it's time to leave you. Back to the things, back to the end of year doldrums in which I'm never exactly sure what day it is nor do I ever feel energetic and excited. 

Happy Holidays 2025, Part XI: Multiple Christmases

Well, well, well. Here we are. 

Christmas morning 2025

Christmas has come and gone.

Pete is back home with us as of the night of the 23rd.

Picking up his ashes was emotional. He was sealed tightly inside his cat-shaped urn, then wrapped in two decorative bags, tied with a ribbon, with a gold sticker with his name on it on the outer bag.

Daisy is saving the bags and the sticker. Pete himself now sits in his urn on the plant stand behind my work desk downstairs, as if overlooking the room he spent the most time in. It won't be his permanent location, but for now -- until all of the holidays are over and we can breathe a bit -- it'll work.

We also have his paw prints in ink and plaster, and we got two very nice cards from both the vet's office as well as the Rainbow Bridge (crematorium and post-life services) folks. Those I have up here in my office, and they are sitting right next to Maggie's own prints. 

So. It's a couple days after Christmas. Let's recap the past few days.

We did not win the lottery. Nobody did, until Christmas Eve, when someone in Arkansas won the jackpot. Of our $24 of tickets, I had two numbers on one line and one number on a few lines on various tickets and absolutely nothing else.

Daisy's car is fixed. It was indeed the purge valve they thought it was. During those repairs, the mechanics also noticed that Daisy's serpentine belt was badly cracked and ready to fail on her, so we got that replaced too. The car seems to be running far more smoothly, but maybe that's just my imagination.

Daisy's sister, our brother-in-law, and their four boys arrived early in the afternoon on Christmas Eve, stunning everyone. They'd made what was, essentially, a 10-11 hour trip in 7-8 hours. I was not going to ask questions, but there was absolutely some balls-to-the-wall criminal speeding involved during that trip, to be sure. But, this ensured they were here for the Christmas Eve church service, which for once everyone was looking forward to. We got a text from Mama saying "they're here, meet us at the church at 3:40." With about...two hours' or so worth of notice.

Okay. So, between Daisy organizing the stuff for Christmas Eve finger foods and making a new dish for that -- stuffed artichoke bottoms -- she got ready, I got dressed in decent-enough clothing, and we got ready to go.

Look, I don't really have dressy clothing anymore. I've mentioned this before. Since the pandemic I have rarely needed to leave the house on anyone's accord but my own, and have basically gone feral. Because we keep the house climate-controlled, I now wear shorts and flip-flops year round, and a good chunk of the time when I do leave the house it's in sweatpants because I have simply given up. However, even though I'm not religious, I believe wearing sweatpants to church should be a sin in itself, so I opted for a nice pair of jeans, a plain black tee with a sweater vest over it (yes, I own a sweater vest) and my leather jacket. It's not real leather, but it looks classy-ish.

That'll do, pig. That'll do.

Anyway. 

We got to the church to find that this year's afternoon service was not just kid-oriented, but it was completely for the kids -- it was a kids' birthday party for Jesus.

No, I'm not kidding. Party hats, karaoke, glow sticks, and singing happy birthday to Jesus was all part of it.

We looked good though:

Pictured: party hats for Jesus.

Our nephews, as nephewy as ever, were thrilled to have a party involving treats, singing, and "pin the baby on the manger" games. It was very, very cutesy -- and I'm glad the kids were there, because it would have been very awkward to go to this church service as middle-aged adults and senior citizens with no kids in tow.

The Christmas Eve service at this particular church every year is wildly different; we've been to some very formal, very religious-y solemn services, we've been to some with a little Sunday school session for the kids and then some hymns and candles, we've been to some that were all about community efforts and family and togetherness, and we've been to ones that were all fun and all about the kids. They don't put out, like, an itinerary beforehand that tells us what it's gonna be each year -- we roll the dice, essentially.

It's usually very fulfilling and peaceful and fun. I thought this year's service was hysterical and entertaining, and by far one of my favorite services I've attended there. Daisy's sister outright hated it and said it was the worst Christmas Eve service she's ever been to there, or perhaps ever.

To each their own, I suppose.

We returned to the house, where we began prepping the Christmas Eve Finger Foods Dinner™ as is family tradition. 

I don't know if I've fully explained this in the past -- in Daisy's family there has always been the tradition of Christmas Eve dinner being snacky treats and finger foods. Hors d'oeuvres, etc. This is the case regardless of whether it's just me, Daisy, and the parents, or if we have other family in town too. The main meal is always Christmas Day. On New Year's Eve the same rule applies -- always a finger foods thing, with the exception being that there's not usually a huge meal to follow on New Year's Day. The object here is primarily to have people graze and to have leftover snacks around the house, but also to lessen the endless cycle of cooking and dishes and major meal prep over and over for multiple days on end.

To those ends, Daisy and I had gone out a few days prior and had gotten some vegan-friendly nuggets, pizza rolls, cauliflower wings, etc for not only us to share, but for anyone in the house who wanted some to partake in. Other finger foods prepared by everyone else were things like mozzarella sticks, chicken wings, jalapeno poppers, etc. The usual fare. 

It was all fine; we had our little dinner as a large, combined family unit, and afterwards -- once we could make a graceful exit, we did so. We returned home and Daisy began wrapping presents both for me as well as for the parents. I was incredibly exhausted after the long day, and I don't think I made it past 10pm that night before I was in bed and dead to the world. I was joined by Mable for the beginning of it, sleeping under her watchful eye and companionship.

When I awoke on Christmas morning, using the term "morning" in the loosest sense possible as it was around 4am, Daisy was in bed with me. Mable was sleeping on me, on my legs, and I could not move. Charlie was wedged in between us, stretched out and snoring, out like a light -- essentially sleeping in Pete's old favorite spot. They are, generally, the only cats who consistently sleep with us these days. Occasionally Hank will sleep with me at my feet, and occasionally Gary will come up and sleep on my chest or on my legs, but those are rare times. Empress would love to be able to sleep with me again, but every time she tries, Mable chases her back downstairs. The upstairs, the bedroom, has been deemed Mable's domain. I feel bad for the fluffy girl; she just wants to be with me and Mable won't let her. 

It is what it is, I guess.

I got up and went to my office, letting everyone sleep, with the intention of watching some Tiktoks on my phone to wake me up for the day. This failed, and within fifteen minutes (I can only estimate, of course) I was once again passed out in my big lounge chair. I was awakened sometime after 8am by Daisy, very gently urging me to get up so we could go back over to the parents for breakfast and presents with the kids.

Both of us were very tired. It is very hard for me to wake up and just start running. I really can't do it. Waking up for me is a process, and it generally takes a few hours. It requires caffeine and nicotine and time to prepare my brain for the day. I never understood people who can wake up to an alarm clock and be raring to go for the day -- to go from dead asleep to ready to take on the world in an instant. Hell no. I hate being awake enough to make it everyone's problem for the first two or three hours I'm awake, and I promise you it's not as intentional as that makes it sound.

By 9 or so, we were awake and ready enough to go over to the parents' again. Daisy so graciously loaded the car with not only the presents, but with the food we were taking over there to prepare for the Christmas dinner. And, of course, we were able to get our new tradition accomplished -- Christmas photos with my favorite cat:

Surprisingly, Emmy does not mind this.

So we ventured over to the house.

Look...I do love Christmas with the kids, but I am very much an old man now, a cynical and bitter adult who is technically a Millennial but am right on the cusp of Gen X and identifies way more with Gen X. I like quiet and peace and relaxation over the holidays, and I feel like everything is far too capitalistic and commercialized these days. I am polite, but I also have a very low tolerance for social interaction and chaos, and three of our four nephews are what I would describe as, mostly, chaos goblins. The fourth is a junior in high school and he is very much a normal human these days, able to hold full normal conversations and interact with the adults of the family in a matured fashion.

But, as I've always said, Christmas is about the kids. It's not about us anymore. It's about creating memories for the kids, about seeing the looks on their faces when they open their presents and while they play with their new, loud toys with flashing lights. My experience as an adult matters not; I had many Christmases of my own with my own memories and nostalgic feelings. 

So, when I enter a room filled with kids running around, wrapping paper flying everywhere, and am immediately bombarded by chaos and noise, my adult-onset autism flares up and I immediately want to run screaming out of the house never to return. While I adore those boys, being essentially trapped in a house with them for hours on end during a holiday is the best mental birth control I could ever ask for. That's not a slight against them in any way, but it makes me very glad I chose cats instead of kids.

In the midst of all of this, we found seats and distributed our gifts to the parents and family, and received our own.

Here's what we got:

• A new, giant quilt for us from Mama -- we knew we were getting this well in advance and she let us pick which one we wanted out of two different ones
• A car emergency kit from Daisy's sister and family -- including a jump box, blanket, first aid kit, window smasher hammer, and seatbelt cutter, amongst a few other things 
• A black t-shirt with a cat on it resembling Pete, from Mama to me -- a special gift that was very sweet of her.

Here's what we gave:

• I finally delivered the 50+ tie-dyed shirts to Daisy's sister, brother-in-law, and their boys, the shirts I'd made them for last year's presents, multiple colors and patterns in individual boxes and their own personal sizes, shirts that they didn't get last year because they did not come back into town for Christmas. They loved them. The boys wore them every time I saw them for the remainder of their visit, changing them out every day.
• Two fire blankets -- this was Daisy's gift to everyone this year. One went to the parents, and the other went to her sister and family. She also had one sent to her other sister and their family. When say "fire blankets" I mean the kind you'd use as a fire extinguisher, like, to put out a kitchen fire.
• A set of multicolored wool socks for Dad -- I think five pairs came in the box
• A mug with a length of rope and instructions on how to tie multiple kinds of knots for our brother-in-law -- he performed our wedding ceremony and a big part of the ceremony was about knots
• A skullcap beanie with a wildly bright headlight on it for Daisy's sister so she can wear it while jogging up and down the canyons in Colorado -- Daisy thought she would absolutely hate this. Daisy was wrong; she really, really loved it and appreciated it. I told her it was so that the mountain lions can't sneak up on her. 
• Multiple pairs of slipper socks for Mama, since she really loved the ones Daisy got her a few months ago
• A box of English Breakfast tea K-cups for their Keurig, for both of the parents
• A box of Black Rifle coffee K-cups for their Keurig, for both of the parents
• Jam and jellies for Dad that Daisy found last weekend when we were out doing Christmas shopping on my birthday

Those were the big things anyway. When Daisy made the canvases for me for my birthday, she made a couple for the parents as well. We still have those here at the house and have not taken them over there yet. 

The kids got a decent assortment of toys and clothing and educational items, though I don't know which ones were from "Santa" versus their parents and/or Daisy's parents.

After a quick breakfast and cleanup -- remember, it's like 10am at this juncture -- we began prep work for the big dinner. Most all of the adults pitched in -- our brother-in-law made the turkey, I peeled carrots and some potatoes and tore up all the bread for the stuffing, and Daisy made the mashed potatoes, gravy, and most other assorted items. Once my services were no longer required, or what I was doing was...well, pretty much done, I dozed off in Mama's chair in the living room for a while, feet up, the parents' cat on my lap (she loves me). 

I have an amazing amount of trouble staying awake for long stretches these days. Without a continuous flow of caffeine, I become nearly useless after about six to eight hours of being conscious. This does not change whether it's a normal work week or whether I'm on vacation or over the holidays; my brain, after a while, just goes you're done, time to sleep for a bit now. It's gotten worse as I get older. I don't know if this is a natural thing that comes with aging or what.

And, when I say "continuous flow of caffeine" I mean exactly that -- like, I will need something caffeinated every 2 hours or so, maximum, or everything just starts wearing off and I begin powering down. I started the day with energy drinks, then two hours later had a cup of strong coffee at the parents', then had a second cup of strong coffee, and then I went 2-3 hours without any more caffeine and I ended up passing out in the chair. It is what it is at this point. Am I just so constantly exhausted that my body takes every opportunity it can to shut down? I don't know.

Anyway.

Dinner was prepared and consumed by everyone with little issue. We cleaned up and then had the desserts -- Daisy made oat bars, Mama made key lime pie and various other items -- and we ate them on paper plates. We then cleaned that up, and as we were tired and it was long after dark, we took our cue and made our graceful exit back home to the quiet, childless sanctuary that was our house. 

After all, we had not had our own Christmas yet. The entire day had been spent in service of the children and of the family for dinner and presents and dessert and entertainment and...we were done. We were both very tired and we just wanted to be home where it was quiet and where we could put our feet up -- our tired, aching feet.

I was so exhausted that for a time I considered just going straight to bed and doing presents the next morning. I'm sure if I would've suggested that Daisy likely would not have argued it. The previous two days had been draining not only for our energy, but for our social batteries. Given my own issues with getting quality sleep for long stretches of time, it would not have mattered anyhow in the long run. So, once we had put things away and could change clothes, we finally had our own private Christmas. 

Here's what I got from Daisy:

• A large custom-made wall calendar with not only pictures of us on it, but pictures of all of the cats (living and dead) and customized markers for special dates -- like the cats' birthdays, the days we adopted them, and personal milestones for us. It was amazingly well-crafted and made by the same company that made all of the canvases.
• The Tragically Hip: That Night in Toronto DVD
• The Tragically Hip: A National Celebration 20/8/16 Blu-ray -- the final Hip performance -- still on its way here in the mail as I write this, sadly
• Two card games
• Uncle John's Know It All Bathroom Reader -- 38th edition, the newest one for 2025
• Mick Rock's Rocky Horror: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Cult Classic 50th anniversary book

Here's what I gave Daisy -- essentially all the secrets I've been keeping here since earlier this fall:

• A filtered showerhead and a box of filters for it -- she had asked for this ever since I got a filtered removable showerhead earlier this year.
• Safe and Sound: A Renter Friendly Guide to Home Repair by Mercury Stardust -- even though we own our home, she had been wanting this book for a while.
• A jar of vegan and gluten free hot fudge sauce
• A 3-pack of Cocomels (this is standard in our house for any gift-giving holiday)
• A 3-pack of her favorite natural patchouli bar soap 

I know that doesn't seem like a lot, but here's what we got from "Santa":

• Two brand new Fire HD 8s with cases for them

On Black Friday, Amazon puts their devices -- all of their devices -- on sale on deep discounts. It's why we have three Alexas in the house, it's why I have a Fire TV stick (which has remained unused for a few years now) and it is why I purchased each of us a brand new tablet for Christmas. I got a green one and a black one, and two cases -- one was a blue galaxy full of stars and the other was a purple galaxy full of stars. The tablets themselves were $39.99 each and the cases were $9 each. Normal price for the tablets are $100. I wrapped them both in one box and said they were from Santa, and allowed Daisy to pick which one she wanted. She chose the green one with the blue galaxy case, and therefore I got the black one with the purple galaxy case.

I did this because, well, I've never had a tablet before. Well, I should take that back -- I won a high-end iPad from my old job one year for the Christmas raffle, way back when I was on days, and I immediately gifted it to Daisy's parents because at the time I had no use for a tablet. It still marks the best Christmas gift I've ever given them, and they used it for years until it aged out of usefulness (because Apple). But, it's now 2025, and I've been passively looking at the Fire HD tablets for years as they'd be great for trips. Plus, I've always sort of wanted a Kindle. I much prefer physical books, but I can get a lot of books for free on Kindle. 

The other reason is because Daisy has an original Kindle Fire...from, like, 2010. She had it before we were together. It works, yes, but I can tell you it's not updated, not fast, and does not possess the best battery life or the best media capabilities anymore after fifteen years. 

In addition to the Fire HD 8s, I got us each a 128GB microSD card to expand the storage a day or two later. I've set up mine and have it running, with all the updates it needs and all of the apps I wanted to put on it. I've even gotten a few books for it. Daisy has yet to set hers up, though she will within the next day or three, I'm guessing. 

My dad reached out to me after Christmas to tell me my mother got him a Fire HD 10; I don't know the difference between the two, honestly, but he was also delighting in messing around with it and scanning through all the free comics available on the Kindle store. 

I guess I should list what I got for them as well, as by now they will have gotten their box (hopefully) or will by the end of the day today -- and it's not like either of them read this website anymore anyhow:

• Six different comic-book related t-shirts for my dad, acquired at different times from different places and various prices; I collected them over the time between we visited NC and the week before my birthday.
• A new Columbia jacket for my mother, ordered in October-ish during one of their deep discount sales and socked away as soon as it arrived.
• A six-pack of multicolored socks not dissimilar to the ones I got Daisy's father; I originally ordered them for myself, but they were not comfortable on my giant sasquatch feet after I wore the first pair, so I washed that pair and stuck it back in there with the rest of them and gave them to my parents.
• A new WVU flag for the flagpole in front of their house in NC -- I got them one a few years ago, and when we were there this fall, it was completely ragged and threadbare, ready to fall off the pole. I told them I'd get them another one for Christmas, and I did. 
• Two large bottles of La Victoria Salsa Brava hot sauce, which they can't find down there anywhere, and have been looking for for some time. I ordered a 3-pack off Amazon, kept one for us, and put the other two into their box. 

It was $38ish to mail their box to them on the Friday before my birthday, with delivery set for Tuesday the 23rd (via Priority Mail). Last I checked, it had still not arrived on the island, but it is traveling through the postal network in North Carolina. 

My parents had problems getting our stuff to us as well. Apparently this year the postal service is fucked. My mother mailed my birthday box to me on the 14th. Today is the 29th, and it still has not arrived. It is also untrackable, apparently -- the tracking number she gave me stopped being updated on the 18th. So, it'll either get here or it won't. Their Christmas gift to us -- a new Curtis Stone cooking pan that is very similar to the one we loved and used for years -- arrived here two days ago. I was not informed it was coming (I have informed delivery and should be told any time a package is coming), and it arrived multiple days late. 

So, Christmas ended and life moved on. But that's not the end of the story....

Happy Holidays 2025, Part X: Home for Christmas

Days until Christmas: 3

 Around noon today, Daisy got the call -- Pete's ashes are ready for pickup. He will be home with us for Christmas. 

"I want you to come with me to pick him up," she told me.

"Of course, my love," was my immediate response. I wouldn't ever assume otherwise.

Daisy is dropping off the car in the morning, with Dad, so that she can get the EVAP part replaced by the mechanics. Once it's done and they call her to come pick it up in the afternoon, I will be awake by then and we can go pick up Pete. Daisy is working a modified schedule tomorrow in order to accommodate an extra day off with me and will likely have to put in a little PTO in order to take a longer lunch to get the car back and to get Pete.

It's sad and bittersweet. For the past two weeks since he died -- and it will be two weeks to the day -- he has just been gone. Now knowing that his remains will be back in the house with us will give us a sense of final closure, but in a way it's like we now have to fully acknowledge that he is, indeed, dead and gone forever, with the ashes in the urn all that's left to prove he was once here. 

I don't know where we're going to put him. I feel like we should clear some space somewhere we can constantly see him and have him there with us, and at the same time also feel like that's intensely creepy. 

But then again I also think ashes in general are strange. It was important to Daisy that we get him back, and I was never going to fight her on that.

In ten or fifteen years I will likely feel differently; I can't imagine not wanting to keep the ashes of the other cats now, as strange as that is. I let Maggie and Sadie be scattered in the park because I loved that idea of letting them both be one with nature again, but there's a small part of me that wishes they were here with me in the house in urns of their own, and I can't reconcile that or even fully understand why I feel like that. 

I know for a fact that the ashes of my parents' dogs -- the old dogs, the ones they had when I was still living at home and growing up, but who died after I moved out -- are in the closet in the house in West Virginia, where they have sat in boxes for many, many years. I never understood that; why go to the trouble if you're just gonna keep them in boxes in the closet?

I couldn't tell you what they did with their multiple cats when they died -- they had three cats who died before ours did. Yes, there was a time where that house had three cats, two dogs, and a bird all living together with my parents -- a veritable zoo.

It's not much different now, as they now have three dogs and the same bird, but I digress.

Everyone grieves in their own ways, I suppose.

Moving onward, we are now in the home stretch of the holidays. Tonight, Monday the 22nd, is my last night of work until the 30th. My holiday vacation starts at exactly 7am -- twelve hours and twenty-nine minutes from this exact moment. I have had two energy drinks and I am about to go downstairs for the night and make a 20oz cup of strong coffee, log in for the night, and put my head down to power through it. The last night I work before any long stretch of vacation -- especially before the holidays -- is usually brutal, as if the job knows it won't be able to punish me for a while, so it has to get all its beatings in all at once. 

If it's not brutal, it drags on and seems like it's five times longer than it should be, and I stare at the walls and the clock trying to make time move faster. This is also why I didn't want a large painted canvas of my three dead cats on the wall staring back at me. It's not exactly the best motivational material.

The Powerball jackpot tonight is $1.6 billion. Yes, billion with a B. We have $24 worth of tickets sitting on my desk in front of me awaiting the drawing. I told Daisy yesterday, when she went out to run errands, to take the money I had left from the Canada trip to the gas station and to dump it into the lottery tickets because I do not want to have to go back to work after the holidays and winning even $1 million -- one of the smaller jackpots -- would be my ticket out of there. It would give me the leap I'd need to quit that job and dive into the multiple writing projects I have been waiting my whole life to finish. 

If we win the full jackpot, bye, y'all won't hear from me again for a very long time, not until well after our financial status and that of our families and likely multiple friends have been secured. 

But, let's be real, that's not going to happen. None of it is. I'll check the tickets when I get off work in the morning to find that someone in some giant state like California won the jackpot and I won't even have two or three numbers across all of my tickets. 

Birthday Forty-Three

 Days until Christmas: 4

So folks, here we are. At 6:22 PM ET last night, I officially turned 43 years old. 

The following is the story of my day. It did go mostly to plan, and I would rank it as one of the best birthdays I've had in some time. As I get older, I tend to appreciate the little things more than the huge, grand gestures, and I've found that my space, time, and energy is more at a premium now than ever before. So, let's tell the story -- but to do that I have to backtrack a bit to Friday first.

On Friday, we were quite busy. Daisy took the day off work for what her job calls a "volunteer day," a free day where you go volunteer to help out the community. Now, mind you, Daisy has been a volunteer at the Humane Society, as have I (sporadically) since March. This is nothing new. But we did have a set list of goals for Friday -- it included mailing my box to my parents and to get groceries and finger foods for Christmas Eve/Day dinners with the family. We didn't want to exhaust ourselves because, honestly, both weekend days for us were going to be long and full of errands and other activities. Our plan was to mail the box, go to the shelter to volunteer for a bit before they opened for the day, then go get the groceries we needed and come home to relax and do a special pre-birthday dinner for me, since we were doing actual birthday dinner with the parents on Saturday. Pretty basic stuff, nothing too taxing, just a day off together getting things done.

Well, we got up fairly early, and I finished packing my box for my parents before we drove down to the local Hy-Vee grocery store to mail it. You see, Hy-Vee is unique in that it has always had a full post office within the building, by the customer service desk. It's also right down the street from us and it is not anywhere near as hard to get to or get in and out of as the actual post office is, so for the past few years whenever I've had to mail out a box, I've taken it there and shipped it off. It's just been way more convenient. While we were walking up to the building with the heavy-ass box for my parents, one of the employees who was headed out to his car stopped us to tell us that the post office inside had closed and had been removed earlier this year -- and wanted to give us the heads up since he saw us carrying the box in there. I guess the USPS didn't renew their contracts with a lot of independent locations such as grocery stores and the like, and they just pulled out without giving reasons. Well, shit.

We made the decision then to find another post office at some point during the day -- it was still pretty early in the morning, around 10 or so -- and in the interim, we may as well go to the shelter to "volunteer."

I say "volunteer" because generally you get on a schedule for specific jobs, you wear your "shelter clothing" which is to say a uniform t-shirt and your badge, and you go do something specific. Well, I wasn't scheduled for anything, I just slung my badge around my neck and clocked in. What are they gonna do, fire me? I'm not getting paid to be there. My badge gives me special backroom accesses to everything. It's basically like having a backstage pass to the inner workings of the Humane Society.

To be fair, there are probably a lot of do-nothings at the shelter who only use that badge and title to go back in the back rooms and loiter and play with the animals -- and while we do fall into that category at times, both Daisy and myself have done a lot of labor and actual work at the shelter since we've been in the volunteer ranks there. Daisy goes over there every weekend to feed baby kittens, unless they tell her she's not needed. They have a system for that.

Anyway.

We badge in and there's barely a soul around -- there are a few ladies cleaning kennels and cages and mopping floors, etc., but otherwise it's pretty empty. We wandered around to look at the cats, because of who we are as people, and we came across this little black-and-white baby boy, nine weeks old, about the size of a coffee mug.

And Daisy fell in love with him. 

He had the personality we loved -- a mix of Pete, Hank, and Charlie -- and was very vocal, a loud purrer, an attention seeker. he was very lovey and wanted to be held and rubbed, wanted to be loved on. And to be fair, he was adorable. Daisy felt the pull.

I really did not. He was very sweet and cute, yes, but..we just lost Pete a little over a week ago. My heart is still raw. I don't necessarily want another cat right now. I am still in mourning, sad and stressed and all up in my feelings, so to speak. And for me to fall in love with another cat, it would have to be a spectacular cat I could never live without, that I would refuse to leave the shelter without. He or she would need to be worthy of the title the Final Cat™ because, honestly, that's what the cat would be.

This cat was very cute and very sweet, but he was not, to me, the Final Cat.

But as I've said before, it is not up to me. 

Ultimately the Final Cat will be chosen by Daisy herself -- who I have given free reign to on this subject -- or by both of us knowing fully that it's meant to be. And I told Daisy that could honestly take years -- it could happen next week or next month but honestly it could be years before we find another cat we would want, fully, to be the Final Cat -- if ever.

Daisy renewed her application and we decided to go mail my box to my parents and discuss it some more, and come back to see if the feelings were really there or if we were just getting emotional. I told Daisy that if she really wanted him and she was very, very sure, yes, we could get him and bring him home. This was entirely her call, she has the final word on the Final Cat. 

Internally I was very torn on the entire subject. I have, ahem, denied cats to Daisy in the past, cats that I just didn't want or wasn't entirely on board for, and we'd had discussions before getting the other babies that we had to know, we had to be sure. For Charlie, she originally wanted him and I had no interest, and then I met him and I knew I could never leave that shelter without him. For Gary, I was absolutely not ever going to leave him there in that cage, with his pooping problems and his sister who had been taken from him. He told me I was his Dad and I was his Dad. Daisy did not want Gary originally; when she knew how passionate I was about the little boy, she allowed it because that's what she'd done to me with Mable, who she was never, ever leaving the shelter without no matter whether I wanted her or not.

All of those were good decisions. But, it's Daisy's turn again. Pete was her baby even though he was always my cat, and I'd chosen the boys. For the Final Cat she gets all the choices and I told her I would not interfere -- no matter what, I would still absolutely love any cat she chose whenever she chose it. 

In the end we decided not to get him; there were families there who were filling the cat rooms and multiple people who had that look in their eyes of not being able to leave the shelter without him. We sort of mutually decided no at the same time, because there will always be more beautiful, loving kittens that roll into the shelter every week and if we pay close enough attention, as volunteers, we will always get first picks. As such, we withdrew our spot in line to see him and let the next folks in line take our spot. That beautiful boy was adopted an hour or so after we left and I'm sure he's got a great home now. 

We were slightly sad and Daisy said she had a few regrets, but both of us were on the same page. That's what's important. I also just don't want to rush out and get another cat to try to fill the hole of Pete, because even if that's explicitly not the intention, that's what it will become no matter what. It's going to take a long time for that Pete hole to heal closed, and while I'm still hurting I just...I don't want either of us to possibly end up resenting a new cat because he's not Pete, whether that would be conscious or unconscious. Bottom line is that I personally am a mess of emotions right now and likely shouldn't even be around any kittens because of it. I'm like a Vulcan; I feel very deeply and passionately, even if I don't outwardly show it. And the grief from Pete is such a slow burn. 

Anyway.

From the shelter we hit up three different grocery stores one after another and got all of the stuff we needed for Christmas Eve and Day. Every single store was a nightmare, with Trader Joe's being the worst. Then we came home and I fought like hell to stay awake, but lost the battle by 8pm.

So.

I awoke and became conscious for the first time on my 43rd birthday around 3am. I was very groggy and disoriented, and just wanted to sleep more, but my body had decided no sir, you are not allowed. I was, however, pretty well rested -- it was the best sleep I'd gotten in several days and had been aided by the Advil PM I'd taken before bed to facilitate that and to help get rid of the aches in my joints and feet from running around all day on Friday. 

I got up and went about my normal morning activities; I played a game on my computer, let Mable and Gary into my room to get their breakfasts, and generally began caffeinating myself to wake up and become somewhat less of a slug poured into a bathrobe. By around 7, I had showered and shaved and was beginning to feel more like a person, but there was deep trouble brewing down in my guts and I had several horrific bathroom trips to, ahem, attempt to alleviate said trouble.  

By this time, Daisy had awakened and we received a call from our vet with more detailed results as to Mable's workup. Her stool sample came up clean -- no parasites or abnormalities. She possibly has a UTI, something we knew, and it's likely she's in residual aches and pains from her hip surgery. We're keeping her on the antibiotic and adjusting to a pain management regimen of, you guessed it, gabapentin -- just like Pete was on for most of his life -- to help ease that pain and control her anxiety. Anxiety and stress is likely the cause of her elimination in the cat tree, which we can only attempt to manage and help her with. Emmy isn't doing her any favors and has only escalated her war on Mable since Pete's death. Still, since we've put her on the meds and put a calming collar on her, she hasn't done it again. We're about to put a calming collar on Emmy too because earlier tonight, she went after Charlie. Charlie, of all cats -- the sweet, innocent lovey boy. So yeah, that's going to have to be managed at some level. However, Mable has become very, very sweet and so much more intentional with us and with her love over the course of the past week or two, and it seems very much like the calming collar and meds are helping her personally. I love spending as much time as possible with my little black goblin. 

Anyway, moving onward.

We got a later start than we wanted to and were on the road around 9:30ish. It was a mostly overcast, spottily-sunny morning, with temperatures in the 40s and no rain or snow to snarl our plans. I honestly couldn't have asked for a nicer birthday morning if we're being fully honest. Weather here in Omaha has been really wild so far this season -- we've had days where it's been zero or below zero, we've had significant snowfall, we've had windstorms that howl for 12 hours straight...and we've had days in the 60s brushing up against 70. Christmas Day it could hit 60 degrees in Omaha. Wild stuff. So honestly, in the 40s and pleasant for my birthday is greatly appreciated. 

We got to Shadow Lake before 10 and started off in HomeGoods. I think it was probably the store we got the most in overall; I found some cat toys for the children, we got a lot of snacks and a few little Christmas presents for the family here and there, etc. None of it did we really need, but, it's Christmas shopping and retail therapy. We don't go all willy-nilly on anything anymore. 

We then hit up Burlington, which was...incredibly disappointing. They had a couple things I was vaguely interested in; I got a new pair of pretty nice sweatpants and two thermal tops, which always come in useful in the brutal midwest winters, but nothing I couldn't live without. I got some shea butter soap for my dry skin, too. I'm not sure Daisy got much of anything there; if she did, I can't remember and it wasn't something that really jumped out at me. 

From Burlington, in a line down the plaza, we then hit up Ross Dress for Less, where we found thermal socks (a pair of which I'm wearing right now) and not much else, and PetSmart, where we used our $20 in bonus credit to get two giant tubs of healthy treats for the kids. 

There were other stores I wanted us to visit as well, but by this time I was already getting quite tired despite all of the caffeine I had ingested. I had told Daisy I wanted to visit Torrid with her, as it's the only Torrid store left in the area and she can always find things in there, but she declined -- she stated that she'd done really well to avoid Torrid this year and that it was my birthday, not hers. I also wanted to go to Old Navy too, as I can occasionally find some great stuff in there in my sizes (but, usually, only on the website). We decided not to do either, though, in hopes of just getting back up to Omaha and getting dinner with the parents. I was feelin' it. I probably walked 4,000 steps in Shadow Lake.

So we went to the grocery store to pick up the fries and a protein for my poutine dinner; Mama had already made the gravy and had picked up cheese curds. We also got some Christmas Eve finger foods (as that's generally the family tradition for Christmas Eve dinner) and a few other small items, and we went over to the parents.

Dad was not feeling well; he had been having some heart issues all day and was just trying to power through it, I think, for our sake, but he was not bad off enough to need to go to the doctor or hospital. Mama took a phone call at the table from my youngest niece, who had just gotten the very pretty little dresses that Mama had made for her for her birthday/Christmas (her birthday is a few days before mine, I think the 15th or 16th). It was during this call she learned it was my birthday, and she personally sang the happy birthday song to me via the video call. It was so precious I could have cried, and was likely the best part of my birthday -- of my entire day. 

After dinner -- which was great and everything I could have hoped for, by the way -- I started feeling a little ill myself from the combination of large amounts of salt and carbs, and it took me several hours to digest and start feeling somewhat normal again. I was, regrettably, too full to partake in the special dessert of homemade rice krispie treats made with Trader Joes' generic version of Trix, though I did try some later. They're straight diabetes in a glass dish, and I loved them.

The birthday gift from the parents was a one-pound bag of gummy bears (Mama really, really knows me well) and a super-powerful rechargeable, adjustable, multicolor pocket flashlight. Dad carries one on him at all times, and it's a really neat little device. I haven't, unfortunately, had time to mess around with it or play with it since, but I plan to examine it and check out all its features over my holiday vacation. 

 Eventually, we came home; I was very tired and I told Daisy that all I wanted to do was sit on the couch with her and watch more Mad Men again -- HBO Max recently acquired the remastered series in its entirety, and I haven't watched it since it went off the air -- but I was far too exhausted and I would need to take my nap to help reset my sleep schedule for the last two nights of work before the holidays. And, of course, because we'd left so early in the morning, I had not opened my own personal presents from Daisy. 

Here's what she got me.

Are you ready?

On a 24x36 canvas.

It now hangs on the wall next to our bed upstairs, and is...actually a really accurate representation of me when I have shorter hair and have it dyed blue. 

I immediately pointed out that this is the original TOS Enterprise and my captain's photo is wearing the TNG uniform (specifically the second TNG uniform) so the eras are mismatched, but I do not care in the least. This is a wildly good present. 

But wait, there's more.

These are also on canvases now as well. The bottom one is on a 24x36" and the top one is on an 18x24". 

Daisy spent hours and hours on creating these, working via Copilot and via uploaded baseline photos for likenesses, and then edited the results of the renderings for hours on end to get the likenesses right, the markings corrected and shadows aligned, the sizes and shapes accurate. This was many hours of very technical, deliberate, time-consuming work and effort. 

In case you didn't recognize them (and you likely wouldn't offhand, unless you'd met all of them) -- these are our three departed children, the dead cats of the household. My favorite of the two is the top one, the renaissance-painting-style picture of Pete, Sadie, and Maggie from left to right. It is so wonderfully done, so detailed, so very classic. It is also my computer background and lock screen at the moment, and likely will be for some time. I really like the cosmic look of the second one too -- all of the babies in whatever cat heaven is, so to speak. The afterlife. The hereafter. The great void. It's respectful and energetic all at once and really captures them well.

I was almost speechless. I didn't know what to say.

We have yet to hang the cat photos at this juncture; they are so large that we will need to find places for them where they can not only be displayed respectfully, but actually enjoyed. Daisy wanted to hang one of them over my desk in the living room. I told her no -- I love the pictures but I absolutely cannot stare up at my three dead cats every night I'm working for eleven hours straight. So we'll find somewhere for them, somewhere that warrants their display. 

There were other canvases she made too, smaller ones, to hang around the house -- pictures of rainbows we took in Nova Scotia and a photo of us from our trip to North Carolina two years ago. The photo of us now hangs in our stairwell, and we'll figure out where to put the others as well over the course of the next few weeks and months. 

I went upstairs shortly thereafter and went to sleep in my chair for my Saturday evening nap. I set my alarm for exactly midnight so that I could wake up and my actual birthday would be over, but honestly it was a good time to end the nap so that I could reset my body for the night. 

And so, my 43rd birthday ended. It was one of the best I've had in several years. My birthdays aren't always great; frankly, some of them have been very frustrating, depressing, or otherwise forgettable -- but this year, this year was very nice. I had close to 100 people end up sending me birthday wishes on Facebook, Messenger, LinkedIn, text messages, and Snapchat. I'm always surprised by how many people come out of the woodwork and take time out of their day to send me well wishes for mine. 

"That's because people like you," Daisy said. 

I guess so. I never really thought about it before. I try to be a good person. I try to take time to care about others, to help others, to befriend and be there for people when I am needed. I think everyone deep down wants to be well-liked, even if they pretend they don't care. 

Daisy asked me in the car, on the way up to the parents' for dinner, what wisdom I had to share that I've learned in my 43 years on this planet. 

I had to think about it a bit. In the end, I came up with a list -- only some of which I can remember enough to relay here, below:

• Be kind and try to help everyone. Love people. Life is hard for everyone.
• You don't need every salami sandwich you want in life.
• Never smoke, never touch anything nicotine-related or you will never be rid of it.
• Cherish animals and love them. Adopt many cats. Treat them like children. 
• Money is just money, and it's not important. What's important is to be happy. 

Etc. I'm sure there were more, but those were the big beats. 

So, there you have it. In another year, another trip around the sun, we'll do all this again if we're all still here and alive.

Onward with the rest of the Christmas season!

Happy Holidays 2025, Part IX: Hard Plans

 Days until Christmas: 6

 Days until my birthday: 1

Over the course of the past few days, despite all the minor crises exploding around us, we have solidified some plans for the actual holiday season. These plans could not come quickly enough, as we are a day away from my birthday and less than a week away from Christmas. We are now in the thick of it, as they say. 

The parents have relayed to us that Daisy's sister will be here for Christmas and through the week, and will arrive in town from Denver with husband and four boys in tow on Monday. Ish. That final day is in the air, but they will be here before Christmas. At least, that is the plan at the moment; it can always change at a moment's notice with their side of the family. 

The selfish part of me is not a fan of this; I was looking forward to a quiet Christmas with Daisy and the parents and not being rushed through anything and everything by the family from out of town that everything must revolve around. It makes the holidays harder for both me and Daisy, as Daisy's role becomes "acts of service" to help prepare the meal and help entertain the kids, help with the dishes, help with the table in general, help, help, help. And I fall into that role as well -- I try to do everything I can in the background to lighten Daisy's load as well as lighten the load of the parents. While I love the family and the kids, make no mistake, it is a load to bear when all of them are in town. It makes a total of ten people in the house for the holiday and all of the noise and chaos that entails with four younger boys. Our oldest nephew is, I believe, almost 17, and he's pretty normal given the circumstances. His younger brothers...let's just say I love them but I can't wait until they grow and mature as much as he has so that the reign of chaos can soften to a much duller roar. 

Of course, that's just the selfish side of me talking. As I've said before here, many times, Christmas is for the kids -- and those kids are so very excited to come into Omaha to spend Christmas with us and their grandparents. It is a great thrill for them, even if it means a ten-hour, one-way drive from Denver to Omaha.

So, now comes the hard plans for the rest of the month. You've seen this before -- I plot out what's happening every single day from around now throughout Christmas and thereafter as possible, every year. This is what we have on the docket so far. So far. As of approximately 7am on Friday, December 19, anyway. 

Friday, December 19:

• Day off. Shower, feed the cats, wake up wife if necessary (wife is also off today).
• Reconcile bank account, as today is payday for me.
• Mail my parents' box to them.
• Visit the Humane Society for "volunteer day" -- i.e. why Daisy is off work today -- for an hour or so.
• Go to grocery store(s). Purchase normal groceries as necessary, but mainly get holiday items for Christmas dinner. 
• Possibly, if there's time and energy, take cardboard boxes to recycling center for recycling.
• Depending on mood and energy, do a fancy-ish carryout or delivery dinner as a special treat for my birthday being tomorrow.
• Take care of cats for the night, wind down, and go to bed as early as possible -- my birthday tomorrow will be a long day.

Saturday, December 20:

• Day off. My birthday. Set alarm for early and make sure Daisy is up, mobile, and coherent by around 7:30 at the latest.
• Shower, dress, and leave the house by 8. Stop for coffee at Amateur Coffee if possible.
• Head down to Shadow Lake and be there as stores start opening for the day at 9. 
• Hit up PetSmart, Burlington, Ross, HomeGoods, Torrid, and maybe some others to see what is there and available (i.e., this is my holiday retail fixation in action; I may not get anything, but it is about the experience more than anything else). 
• Return to Omaha once we're finished, go to parents' and have birthday dinner (poutine). 
• Take birthday photos with Daisy and the family.
• Return home, open whatever present(s) Daisy got for me, and wind down for the evening. Perhaps nap as normal, as Sunday is a normal working day for me. 

Sunday, December 21:

• Normal working day for me. Sleep as long as possible, get up, watch the Chiefs lose.
• Maybe begin wrapping presents.
• Daisy may or may not need to do her kitten feeding in the afternoon.
• Decompress and prepare myself for the last two days of work I'll need to do before the holidays. 
• Get traditional Christmas photo(s) of me holding Empress in front of our decorative trees if possible.
• Work.

Monday, December 22:

• My last working day until December 30. Sleep as long as possible, get up, work. There are no other plans; with me working this day there can be no other plans.
• Put up OOO at end of the night and set voicemail to business-appropriate "go fuck yourself" message before setting work phone on do not disturb. 

Tuesday, December 23:

• Holiday vacation: day one. It starts with sleeping until I am awake. 
• Daisy takes the car in to get the EVAP part replaced early in the morning, shortly after I go to bed.
• Begin wrapping Christmas presents for Daisy, her parents, and the family. This is my only real day/evening to get all of this done unless I get any extra time over the weekend prior. 
• Finalize any extraneous Christmas Eve/Day plans with Daisy and the family so that we know exactly how the following 48 hours is going to play out, at least as much as possible. 

Wednesday, December 24:

• Holiday vacation: day two. Christmas Eve.
• Finish wrapping whatever hasn't been wrapped by this point, because this is the endgame.
• Go to Christmas Eve church service, as long as everyone is willing and not sick. If not, then..
• Return to parents' for finger foods Christmas Eve dinner.
• The kids will probably watch a Christmas movie after dinner to wind down. It will be at this point where I strongly suggest we return home to decompress and get some rest.
• I will likely go to bed early, or at least early enough to try to get some solid, actual rest.
• Daisy will likely be up half the night wrapping presents for me and the parents, as she will always wait until the exact last minute to do so. This is who she is as a person.
  
  

Thursday, December 25: Christmas Daaaay!

• Because I know how our nephews are, I would assume we'll both be up early as possible as they'll want us there to open presents with them, and they want to do that at, like, 7am. This is well-known and one of the major drawbacks of Christmases with them in town; both Daisy and I prefer a much more leisurely Christmas experience.
• So, we'll go to the parents' at the asscrack of dawn or as close to it as possible because the kids will not wait no matter what. Daisy may make muffins or something along those lines for breakfast, as is generally tradition. 
• Presents and breakfast, followed (likely) by whatever the kids want to do for the day, while the women of the house (and me, if they let me so I can stay occupied) begin prepping the Christmas Day feast.
• We will eat the Christmas Day feast as a family, followed by dessert. Usually about 1/3 of the way into dessert one or more of us quietly gets up to start taking care of the dishes and putting away the food. I usually try to be the first one to start this, just because I can do a lot of it quickly and efficiently and the sooner it is done, the sooner Daisy and I can go home to have our own actual holiday.
• To those ends, there will be a point in the evening hours where we will both be so very ready to return home to the quiet peacefulness of our cats and our own presents for one another, and when I recognize that point I pull the trigger and make sure Daisy is aware it's time to jet. So, we'll say our goodbyes and make our exit.
• We return home and finally, finally get to decompress and open our own presents.
• Very shortly thereafter, we go to bed. Usually.

Plans past Christmas Day are a bit more iffy. I work this coming Sunday and Monday, and Daisy works Monday and Tuesday -- after that, I'm off until the 30th and she is off until after the new year. We don't exactly know how long the family will be in town, but from all accounts they'll be gone before New Year's Eve. That still leaves a several-day-gap in activity times during which those children will need to be kept occupied so that the parents' cats don't maim them or so that they don't destroy their grandparents' house. 

Yes, both of those things are concerns, and I'm sure if you have kids or a bunch of nieces and nephews, you understand. 

So that's where we stand. I'm sure we'll have some more concrete plans over the course of the next few days, and I'm sure some of these will change. 

Happy Holidays 2025, Part VIII: The Never-Ending String of Crises

 Days until Christmas: 7

 Days until my birthday: 2

I think Pete may have been our good luck charm, because ever since he died it's been nothing but one bullshit thing after another that we've had to deal with. 

It started on Sunday, when all of a sudden, water began dripping through our light fixture in the upstairs bathroom. Not like, a lot of water, but steady dripping through the fan/light fixture on the ceiling for a couple of hours -- signifying that we likely had a hole in the roof or a leak up there somewhere, and were just now seeing it due to melting snow from the previous storm.

Daisy immediately called the roofing guys who had helped us repair the siding on our house after the severe storms last year, and on Monday afternoon they arrived and went up on our roof to check it out. According to them, there was absolutely nothing wrong; the roof looked good, no shingle loss, no holes, no leaks anywhere to be found. They chalked it up to condensation along the vent pipe in the attic above the bathroom, but didn't even need to look -- they checked the vents and could tell they were venting just fine and that the attic seemed normal based on that assessment.

"So what if the next time it rains, water pours down through the ceiling?" Daisy asked them. 

"Then you call us back, and we come out and fix it. And stick a bucket under it and pray."

No joke there, that's verbatim what they relayed to Daisy and what she told me a few minutes later.

It rained all night last night, and no leaking. So, likely condensation. I thought it could have been condensation all along and told Daisy as much, but the entire situation greatly stressed me out and I wasn't able to really sleep until the guys were up there on the roof.

Daisy wanted to open the fan cover (or otherwise pull it off) to clean it anyway -- it's a bathroom vent fan/light combo, and we haven't used it in over a year because the fan buzzes really loudly like it's going to blow out and the light flickers and strobes like our bathroom is the hottest new rave club, so we've just left it off. Well, with water leaking out of it we figured it was time to get that looked at, as we figured...if water is condensing up there, probably not a great idea to ever try to use it until we can get it assessed and/or fixed. Who knows if the condensation was causing the problems. 

So, Daisy opened a ticket with our home warranty people to have it looked at and assessed, along with the one in the downstairs bathroom as well -- that one hasn't worked for years, it's just been dead. They immediately scheduled a repairman to show up between 9am and 11am yesterday.

For those of you who are unaware, the hours of 9am to 11am are essentially the equivalent of 3am for you day-walking folks. It's the time of the day where I am generally getting my deepest sleep and where, if for any reason I am awake during those hours on a working day, shit has gone wrong and I am going to be straight up not having a good time, bro twelve hours later when I'm forced to work all night. 

Because we knew he was going to be here during a time I would absolutely be sleeping, Daisy asked if I planned to sleep in my chair or the bed. I chose my chair in my office because if necessary, that would allow Daisy to close the cats up in the bedroom without disturbing me, and I could maybe sleep through whatever work the repairman needed to do. It did seem to reassure Daisy when I told her those vent fan/light systems are mostly modular and basically plug and unplug, they're not as complex as one might think. I.e., if it needed to be replaced, it would be fast and pretty easy. 

I don't know what time the repairman came; Daisy took care of it and always would have been the one to take care of it as she doesn't start work until 12:30. He was here for less than ten minutes, but still woke me up with the noise. Once I'm awake, it is impossible for me to get back to sleep again without medicinal assistance...which I can't take when I have to be able to get up and work again in the overnight hours. So, from the time he left, I was awake from that point forward.

Both fan motors need to be replaced. The parts are on order, and he'll give us a call to set up a time to swing back by and swap them out. There's no ETA on the parts. I'm guessing it'll likely be well after Christmas, given that Christmas is nearly upon us. He unhooked the motor from the fan upstairs so if we need to use the light, we can. The light bulb got replaced too -- apparently the bulb in there was going bad and that was why it looked like the ultimate rave any time we flipped the switch. 

That night, Mable pooped in the cat tree again. 

Sigh.

Mable and Emmy have basically been at war with one another for months. They are the only cats in the house who do not get along, but simply tolerate one another. We've never been able to understand it fully, as when they were younger Emmy adored little Mable and treated her like a daughter. Once she grew up, that stopped, and both of them view each other as rivals now for love and territory. 

I will note that precisely none of the boys are like this. Pete, when he was still with us, used to be highly territorial when he was younger, but as he got older that slowed down and eventually ceased. He wasn't a huge fan of Sadie, and even in their older years would bully her, but even that stopped too when they both got geriatric. Hank, Charlie, and Gary are some of the least territorial cats I've seen -- all of them just want to love and be loved. Hank wants love from us and from Emmy, and he can dominate her at times, but that's about it. 

But these girls, man...sigh.

We were pretty sure it was behavioral for her to poop in the cat tree, as a way to mark territory. Emmy bullies Mable around the litter box, trying to be the poop police. Mable, of course, does not like this and has been sneaking to use the pans when nobody else is around. In times of high anxiety or when she plain does not want to deal with Emmy's bullshit, we figured she was just going to the cat tree. 

And then two nights ago, she got into the cat tree and peed. Which she has never done before. 

Daisy immediately booked an appointment with the vet and took her in this morning, where she found that Mable may possibly have a UTI because of blood found in her urine -- but also he did not negate that he could have nicked a blood vessel when getting the sample from her -- and also is likely a high anxiety cat from Emmy's bullying and maybe even from losing Pete (we can never be sure about that one). It's also quite possible she's in residual pain and aching/arthritis from her hip surgery, as colder weather can exacerbate that. Any/all of those could make her act out and eliminate outside the box. Our vet put her on antibiotics in the event that she does have a UTI or anything else going on in there, and prescribed her gabapentin for pain and anxiety (just like we did for Pete, for many years). I am lucky in that Mable is almost as easy to get pills into as Pete was. She came home looking like she'd just been through an alien abduction experience and spent a lot of time in my office with me, essentially clinging to me to protect her.

On the way to the vet, the check engine light came on in Daisy's car.

Like, come on Universe, shit can stop going wrong or being expensive now.

Daisy took the car to get the codes run on it and it came back as an EVAP (emissions) canister purge valve that needs to be replaced. It's a $30-40 part for her particular car -- not expensive, and it won't kill the car to drive it until it can be fixed -- I drove for years with far worse shit wrong with my Monte Carlo and Silverado -- but it's still yet another bullshit inconvenience that we have to deal with. Daisy has an early morning appointment at our car repair place to get it done on Tuesday -- two days before Christmas. For however much it costs, because she checked around other places and everyone else was booked solid until after Christmas. And we're both off on Tuesday -- though I do have to work the night beforehand.

We are, of course, lucky that it was not something worse or more expensive to deal with, and we are doubly lucky that we don't leave the house anymore unless we have to most of the time -- simply because we both work at home now and as such we're driving the car a lot less. But, it's the holidays, and in two days we're planning a big birthday trip for me down to Shadow Lake and back, and tomorrow we have a lot of errands to run, and then Christmas and New Year's and all the back and forth driving that entails. 

Today is Thursday. I am finally of and can get a little breathing space on my birthday weekend. And I get paid tomorrow too, so that's good. But I am always wondering what the next crisis is going to be. Are we going to wake up one morning to find the power off and the pipes frozen? Will one of the boys eat something in the middle of the night and choke to death? How many family members are knocking on death's door for one reason or another this winter? Etc. Between Pete dying and all of this other stuff happening one thing after another, both of us are beginning to fray at the seams. None of it is world-ending on its own, none of it is even anything but first world problems on their own, but all of them hitting one after another after another is really wearing us down a lot. It's gotten to the point where I am not sleeping much, or I am sleeping when I can. It's gotten to the point where I feel constantly overwhelmed by stress and bullshit and have had trouble, sometimes a lot of trouble, thinking straight or making plans or answering questions. Truthfully, I've been getting there for a while, too. I told Daisy a few weeks ago that this may be what a midlife crisis is like, at least for me. I'm sure it's not the same for everyone, of course. I don't know how to reconcile everything with reality anymore when reality has become so measurably awful. Not our marriage or the household or anything like that, but just in general -- government, politics, people starving, ICE, people dying, celebrities being murdered, etc. Then add that to the stresses of normal daily adult life like pets dying, home and car repair inconveniences, doctor's visits, vet visits, ramped up responsibilities for the holidays, etc. It's all reaching a tipping point to where, once it hits it, I don't know that I'll be able to care or care for any of it anymore. I'm getting there much sooner than Daisy is, but Daisy is on the way as well. 

But, as I have said here many times before, it is what it is, and life goes on.

Happy Holidays 2025, Part VII: One Week On

 Days until Christmas: 9

 Days until my birthday: 4

It has now been a full week since we lost Pete. 

There are times where it seems like it was years ago, and there are times where it feels like it happened just this morning. 

I wanted to share a few photos here of the better times from his last few days and weeks:

October 14
Pete and Charlie

November 17

Pete and Empress

December 5 -- four days before he died
Pete and Empress

December 2 -- one week before he died

Pete and Gary

Pete so loved the other cats. He loved being the center of attention and loved that they wanted to snuggle with him and love on him, and all of them also loved having him there to love on. I'm sure they have all noticed his absence in one form or another. Interestingly though, as when Sadie passed, none of them seem to outwardly express it. Not a single one of these cats (the ones we had at the time, anyway) looked for Sadie once she was gone. It was as if all of them knew yeah, old lady is on the way out and then yep, old lady is gone, we expected that. With Pete, aside from them looking around for him on the morning of his death after we returned from the vet, and Emmy's where is he stares at me for around 24 hours afterwards, it was also like they realized pretty quickly that he was gone and wasn't coming back. 

They say cats can't reason, that they don't have the cognitive abilities for it, but I am sure they have the logic skills of "oh, he's sick, we can smell it" and then "oh, maybe he's dying" and then "oh, he's no longer here." You can't tell me they don't make those logical leaps because I've seen it, and I think some animals have more of an ability to express their emotions than others. As I've mentioned here before, when Maggie died, Pete lost his mind looking for her throughout the house, wailing and trying to get into any closed door to see if she was possibly in there -- while Sadie and Hank didn't seem to care that much. Interestingly enough, Hank was the shadow of each of the old girls in their final days and months; he used to lay with Sadie and watch over her when she wasn't feeling well -- he could tell. He wouldn't like, cuddle with her or anything, but he would sit or lay next to her pretty closely as if he were her protector. In Maggie's final days, Hank was still a little guy (only about six months old), but he formed a bond with her and would lay with her at night as she was there on the couch with me, as her body was slowly shutting down:

January 2024, a few short days before Maggie's death on January 19.

So yeah, I'm convinced they know, in at least some capacity.

How are we?

I won't lie, it's been hard and sad. Pete was such a fixture of this household that it does not feel like we just lost a cat, it feels like we lost our son. You can try to steel yourself against the upcoming pain of loss all you want, but no amount of preparation will ever truly prepare you for when it happens. 

Truthfully though, at this point, it's been a little easier for me because I'm used to it. Pete wasn't the first cat to go, of course -- the girls went before him -- so I knew what to expect from an emotional perspective and from more of an acceptance perspective. I say acceptance perspective because I knew the aftermath of losing a cat. I knew from previous experience with Maggie and Sadie that it hurts and it sucks, but once they're gone, they're gone and life moves on. I don't say that to sound cold or callous, but that's what it is. There has always been a hard line of distinction between before a cat passes and then after it happens. Suddenly they're just no longer there and you realize and accept that, and then to an extent it is out of sight, out of mind -- almost as if they never existed.

That sounds like a shock, I'm sure, but it is what it feels like. 

What is left is the empty hole of where they used to be, where those feelings persist and linger -- but even then your mind and soul have to slowly heal; you can't mourn forever. I sometimes feel pangs of guilt, like I am not mourning enough, as if I am forcing myself to move on before I naturally should, but...even then, I have to remind myself that I am human and I feel things, but I am also allowed to let my life go on as it should be going. 

Sometimes that gives me comfort, and other times it does not.

Anyway.

We do not have his ashes back yet, nor have we been called to retrieve them. I'm surprised they're taking this long, but...holidays.