Two weddings last weekend, one downtown in a campus park with me shouting over the construction of condo's above, one at Hart House in the courtyard with clouds above fat with promise that revealed itself as the last photo's were being taken, sending everyone running for the great hall within. Only time I've seen a woman cry prettily, the bride beamed with tiny tears bouncing off of her cheekbones and landing on the bouquet. Also last weekend, author appearance at a fundraiser for Sick Kids and reflexology on a Sunday afternoon.
Job is going well.
Miss cat.
Last night after a wedding rehearsal and an adventurous escape through the Ex (I seem to have developed a fear of carny rides) I hoped in a cab to get home before ten. The cab driver was Mr. Geography of the Tonight Show and David Letterman. His thing is if you can answer his first geography question correctly, your cab ride is free. I didn't answer any of his questions correctly and when he finally coerced me into asking him a question (what is the furthest westward down in Canada) I got that wrong too (you are thinking of Tofino. That is incorrect). He did let me see the laminated news articles about him and sign his guest book - this guy is awesome and a big part of why I love Toronto. And why, as a course of my University studies I might take a geography class because I am a dumb ass when it comes to the political and physical splits on this planet.

My brief co-workers have been great about the job change and I know I'll miss them terribly. However, it's great to be off to the new gig where it's not just a job I feel like I'm going to, but possibly the start of a carreer for me. I've never worked in not for profit before so we'll see, but at least I'll know.
On the Cat front: there's people who've died where it hasn't hurt this much. I'm trying not to do anything rash, like get another cat, too soon. Miss her doesn't cover it.
On the wedding front: ambush weddings are a growing trend, for certain. The couple had family from Ireland who'd been staying with them for three weeks who didn't know that the garden party was actually a wedding. I've said it before, I'll say it again - I love conducting weddings for mature couples. Hope is good but it's no substitute for certainty. This weekend I also got to do my first wedding in an actual church. The staff member there to let people in kept asking me what church I was from, and anything other than United or Unitarian just didn't seem to process. At one point he said "well, surely you must know what denomination you are" to which I responded "whatever the couple needs". He said he was seeing a lot of call for that and asked for the web address of my organization so he could refer me.

There is a special sort of hang over that comes from drinking an entire bottle of liqueur in the morning, eating a bag of marshmallow, sending out a rather drunken email notification of your cat's death, passing out and then moving on to port and Chinese food upon regaining consciousness.
I don't recommend it. Fabulous husband, having selected all day Frangelico milkshakes as his poison of choice (fill blender with chocolate ice cream, pour in Frangelico until liquid is halfway up, top up with chocolate milk and sauce and blend till frothy and deceptively tastey) seemed to fair a little better. I'm beginning to suspect marshmallows aren't actually food.
The word for the weekend is Kummerspeck: German for grief bacon, literally the excess weight gained from emotion-related overeating. How fortuitous Taste of the Danforth is on.

Cat

? - Aug 11 2006

Beloved.

So long, and you're welcome for all the fish.

This morning I looked at the syringes of insulin, pedialyte, and mashed up food and oil. Kept the insulin but emptied the others and gave her tuna for breakfast. She's purring now, having eaten her fill and cuddling my foot. Likely she's wondering what brought this on, this sudden sanity on the part of the talky one, to have finally given her what she wants. It's complicated. What's brought this on is the gift of 11 years on her part to us when we got her as a 5 yr old rescue. Crapping in the beds of room mates who didn't pull their weight - what land lady has had a more brutal enforcer? Ruining 8 takes in the studio in a row when she worked out what the record light meant, and that noise in the stick came back out the boxes. Playing with echoes while sliding into rooms, or piling plastic bags just so to make a toilet. Sitting up at the table and demanding a plate, purring us to sleep on troubled nights, herding me toward the sofa and placing a paw on my lap once I'm sitting to stop the pacing. Tuna for breakfast is the least I can do. Fabulous husband will likely give her tinned oysters for lunch. She's dying anyway, and the palliative lessons I've learned over the last five years of volunteer work are these: eliminate all reachable pain, fulfill all attainable dreams, keep them laughing hour by hour.
Update - vet is on vacation this week but taking and returning our calls - she's ruined his golf game with the wound she gave him last weekend, so he's got her on his mind too. I am perversly proud of her.

Cat's are pretty miraculous things. On Satuday when we took her to the vet, she could not stand but could still fight. By Monday, she was managing stairs again. She doesn't seem to know that there's anything that's wrong in a lasting way, but it appears - at least according to the voice mail I just got from the vet - that this may well be the game, as it were. Her kidney's are "near the end of their use" and her thyroid is failing as well. I'm not sure what to do. The Dr. is off until Friday, and from the voice mail I don't know if she'll last that long. I guess I'll keep doing what I'm doing. Even if it's not really helping or healing her, at least I know I'm doing all I can. That, and crying like a little girl. I'm good at multitasking.

Update - the three of us just spent some couch time together, Cat's favorite time of day. Although I carried her up and down the stairs she did some walking on her own. Fabulous husband had the genius idea of the evening - all things considered, even if it's bad for her, tuna makes her happy. Cat is presently under the computer desk wearing her perky ears.

Update 2 - what kind of vet calls you at 10pm to ensure you know where you stand? The best kind, that's what. And where we stand is on the brink of never never for the cat, keep her comfy so long as she seems to be enjoying life. If she ceases to enjoy life before it's done with her, bring her in to be put down. He's leaving info for his staff until he's back on Friday in case we need anything before then - if she's still around then we're to give a call. This really sucks, but it's great to have a good, communicative doctor on the team. I'm going to get her some more tuna.

Our vet is fabulous. We love our vet. The cat, we are sure, hates him.
In sword fighting, fabulous husband often talks of something called "Time of the Hand". This is where you present a threat (the sword) before a target (any other body part) and is called moving in "true time". I think that time of the paw may count as ten times faster than time of the hand - this is the third time she's opened up her doctor. The first time was when they first met, years ago, and he was trying for a blood sample. She was overweight and the vein hard to find. On the second try she growled and on his third try - blood everywhere. When she was diagnosed with diabetes we left her in for a day so that they could test her sugar levels over time. After two tests they phoned me at work and asked me to come and get her; he had a couple of bandaids and one of his tech's looked shaken. I pretty much know she'll be all right if, when we take her in, she and the doctor look at one another for a while and he folds his arms and takes a step back. This time, even after she got him he still bend down and got close - hence the concern. He smelled her. You can get useful (as well as disgusting) information from a cat's breath and he's sent off her blood work for some rather involved tests. For now he's told me to keep doing what we're doing - Pedialyte every few hours, half insulin dose in mornings and mixtures of food/cranberry/maple syrup as I can get it into her. The one draw back so far is I think she's developed a taste for Pedialyte and mere water may no longer be good enough.

Cat is having a rough time in the hot weather. She's stopped eating and drinking, although tonight I managed to get some electrolyte solution into here and this morning she got a table spoon of liquefied food (some nutrients), cranberry juice (urinary tract health with reduced fluid intake) and a dollop of maple syrup to keep her sugar up. Kind of going be internet directions and feel, but it seems to be working. She can make it up and down the stairs but is showing signs of dehydration - sticky skin, nose on the dry side, bit out of it. Tomorrow her fabulous vet is opening on a long weekend and can see her. And the heat has broken, so that helps. More news later, for now here's a photo of our girl on said stairs. Yes, they need to be painted. No, her eyes are not yellow, I'm just bad with camera's.

So. The written offer arrived. Should they be okay with some wiggle room on the start date (two weeks is civilized and I'm a civilized girl), I'll be doing something I've never done tomorrow - handing in a letter of resignation to a job I don't hate with people I actually quite like, in order to pursue an actual goal. A career choice, as it were, instead of floating around taking whatever job comes because it pays the bills. Fabulous husband is very supportive and although it's a bit of a dip in pay, no matter. It's with an organization that fights cancer, which utterly rocks.