Wake

The wind on my face, sun on my back. I close my eyes and fight to hide a grin, barely unable to hide the satisfaction. The water splashing on my hand as I lean over the side is an almost forgotten sensation. It is cold, but frighteningly comforting. The sound of the engine roaring behind me resonates deep in my chest. The jerk of the rope as Andy cuts across the boat wake feels dangerously familiar. I missed it terribly. In all of my daily routines, papers, books, and meetings, I forgot where it was that I had hidden my soul. But I found it now, and I will never lose it again.

This is the story of the hurricane

So it's been a few weeks. I would like to assure you all that we're all okay down here. Hurricane Ike came through last Saturday with a vengeance, bent on being at least as destructive as Rita. I think, at least in places, it succeeded. Our house weathered the storm quite well. Despite being nearly 100 years old and on pier and beam, it didn't budge even against the worst that Ike had to offer. Only the clattering of an occasional window screen gave a hint that anything was amiss. Until one looked out the window, of course. By 9 am we had lost power. By 11 am, Ike claimed its first victim, our red bud tree. The cats, nervous because of the pressure changes and antsy because they wanted to be outside, were the only active beings on the property. Sierra, under the influence of benadryl and a homeopathic anti-anxiety, sat comfortably in the garage workshop. Mark and I slept through most of the storm. We ventured outside a couple of times to take pictures and video of the happenings, but none of them turned out well at all.

After the storm, we packed up our freezer and the dog and braved the roads to get to Dad's. He, of course, had a generator. We stayed the night there and the next day, helping clean up a vast amount of debris. We finally ventured back home Sunday night and stayed there with no power until last night. The lights finally came back on around 5:00 pm yesterday. So here we are, almost a week later, with no redbud tree and a yard full of leaves and oak limbs that we're saving for firewood.

I don't hate Bob Geldoff either.

So my title has nothing to do with my actual post other than the fact that I don't, in fact, hate Bob Geldoff.  *It's an inside joke, deal with it.*  What I do hate, however, is this god-forsaken Mac that I'm working on.  It's a travesty of cosmic proportions.  Really.

Now that that's out of the way.  Um.  Hi.  My name is Angela, and I am an internet addict.  I discovered this recently, after being deprived for over two weeks.  I did get my DSL line hooked up to the box at the house, but no one bothered to inform me as to whether or not I needed a modem or anything of the sort.  So I assumed it would all be taken care of.  Apparently I was wrong.  The guy shows up this morning, and I greet him in my night clothes (which luckily did include shorts this time).  He runs the phone and DSL line to the box on the outside of the house.  He informs me that he's done, and that apparently someone else is going to have to run the wire to the jacks on the inside.  No mention of a modem.  Clearly, he has no idea.  So I call Mark.  Which reminds me, I need to search for a number for him.  Hold on a sec.  Ok that's done.  So hopefully, Mark will call them and find out everything he's supposed to know.

Well.  That was annoying.  It is also annoying to have to trap your own cat at midnight on a Monday.  So here's the details on that mess.  My semi-feral kitten, Irina, who lives in the hosue exclusively, decided that it would be fun to climb out the window.  I, like the genius I am, left the windows open and left one afternoon, not bothering to secure the unsecured screens.  Irina pushed one out and out she went.  Upon getting outside, she discovered that she didn't really like being outside after all and flipped.  She hid under the house in a corner by the chimney until last night, when she ventured out to see her Roman and then ran angrily back to her spot after she discovered that Roman's appearance was all a scam by us to get her out.  I tried food.  I tried tuna.  I tried those Greenies cat treats.  Nothing.  So I finally set the live trap with some tuna in it and left it.  About midnight, Mark heard the trap set, and went to see if she'd managed to get in.  She had.  So I now have a semi-feral, scared to death British Blue in a trap, sitting in her tuna, mewing so loudly that I'm sure every one of our neighbors thought we were sacrificing her to the Great Pumpkin a month and a half early.  My carpet still smells like tuna, and so does, apparently, her ass.  I coaxed her out and held her close to me so she would calm down while Mark fixed a pink SafeCat collar with a perdy little silver heart name tag on it around her neck, so that if this ever happens again she has some ID.  She has been eyeing me angrily ever since.  Moral of the story.  Don't trap your own cat.