Playing Possum

Last night we took Excalibur for a late night walk, as usual. Ex shot out of the door to the end of  his leash and snatched a poor opossum out of the shrubbery, all in the few seconds it took us to shut the front door. He got a few mortal shakes in before obeying Ron's command to "DROP IT!"  Ex left the poor lifeless opossum curled up by the garage door while we went on with our walk, chattering about this surprising event. How could our lovey dovey Ex have killed something? In just a few seconds? We were proud and repulsed at the same time. We felt safer, knowing that Ex might protect us from an intruder (well, if the intruder were an opossum). But what about the body? What does one do with deceased wildlife? Bury it? Throw it in the garbage? Say a blessing before casting it off in a fiery funeral pyre on the canal? All Ron would confirm was that it would have to wait until morning. But not before I could take a picture, I told him. We returned home from our walk, and the opossum was......gone. Apparently it was not actually dead, just "playing possum". How interesting to have witnessed this "playing possum" tactic, used by an actual opossum.

This morning I had to do a little internet research to learn more about this.  It seems that the opossum is not actually carrying out a conscious defense move. It's a reflexive action more like passing out from sheer terror. The whole body goes limp, the tongue hangs out, the eyes roll back, the heart rate slows, breathing is very shallow, the whole bit.  After perhaps 15 minutes with no further activity, the animal's body knows that the coast is likely clear, so it wakes up and walks away. (Thank you, aaanimalcontrol.com .)

Now Alyssa thinks the opossum in question is going to gather up all his friends and attack us during one of our evening dog walks. I assured her no, the opossums run away when you open the door, much like the Monty Python knights running away from the Killer Rabbit. This particular opossum was just too slow to outrun Excalibur!

Talk to ME

I emailed information on an account to a company underwriter. It was precise, concise, and informative. My name, address, phone number, fax number, and email address were included in my email signature. The male underwriter responded…..to my boss. My male boss. What the hell? If I have sent you something, reply to ME. If you have a question on my email, speak to ME. If your question is something only my boss can answer, I will forward it to him. All you have accomplished with this maneuver is pissing me off and moving yourself to the top of my “Dickhead” list. You have just shot yourself in the foot because I am not inclined to send any more accounts your way.

This is not a work bashing comment. My rant applies to anyone who doesn’t reply directly to the person who asks the question: doctors who share medical results or information with family members other than the patient directly and sales people or customer service people who circumvent  the client with the issue. Yes, there are times when I have neither the time nor desire to deal with a particular topic and I will tell you, “Please discuss that with my husband.” Otherwise, please afford me the common and/or professional courtesy I deserve just for reaching out to you in the first place.

Keyboard Kitty

I am a forceful typist. By forceful, I mean I type so hard or so fast or so resolutely that I wear the letters  off my computer keys. I have done this on every keyboard I’ve ever used at every office I’ve ever worked.  My employers are always trying to give me new keyboards because THEY can’t type on keyboards with letters missing. I just don’t see the point. I know what the letters are, whether they appear on the keyboard or not, and I will just wear off the letters on a new keyboard, so why bother changing it out?

We’ve been doing some computer upgrading at my current office, with a lot of the work being done after hours or on weekends so as not to keep us busy little worker bees from our appointed tasks. I guess the boss and the computer guy finally got so frustrated with trying to type on my keyboard with the missing E, R , I, O, S, D, K, L, C and M that the boss finally went ahead and ordered a new keyboard.  A white box arrived from Amazon for my boss and I brought it into his office.  “Wait, one of these is for you,” he said and passed a shiny new keyboard my way.

I got started changing out the keyboard at my desk.  After a few moments, I noticed a red smear on some of my paperwork and realized I was bleeding. Somehow I had cut my finger during the opening of the box, or the hookup of the keyboard….I don’t really know where or how. Not to worry. I just dug around in my handy Mary Poppins bag and pulled out a bandaid. Expecting a typical beige bandaid, I was surprised to find a “Hello Kitty” bandaid under the wrapper. Who knows where that came from or how long I’d had it, seeing as my daughter is now 20 years old.

 And then of course, looking at “Hello Kitty” on my finger, I couldn’t help but sing.

Soft kitty, warm kitty, little ball of fur.

Happy kitty, sleepy kitty, purr, purr, purr.

Thank you, “Big Bang Theory,” for placing that obscure song in my subconscious. It tickled my day.

Crunchy Cookies

We recently planned a Saturday visit to Alyssa’s school for her Alpha Omicron Pi BBQ. She had mentioned in passing that she would like to have some homemade cookies, so we decided to surprise her with some chocolate chippers.

Ron was off from work the Friday before we left so I included “cookies” on his “honey-do” list before I went off to work. He just laughed when he saw that on the list and said he wasn’t going to make the cookies. Although he does most of the cooking, I am the baker in the family, and he lends the muscle when I need some thick dough mixed.

After dinner on Friday evening, Ron took the initiative and got the cookie dough started. Maybe I should have been a little more hands on when I saw him take his glasses OFF to read the recipe on the chocolate chip bag.  I went into the kitchen while he was mixing and washed all the utensils and mixing bowls. My only request was that he mix the dough with a wooden spoon and not an electric mixer.  Once he was done mixing, he commented “this doesn’t look right”.  I went back into the kitchen to spoon the dough onto cookie sheets. The color of the dough was fine but the texture did look a little off. I tasted the dough. Sweet and crunchy!  I was sure that Ron had used all the right ingredients. I began going through the recipe. “How much flour did you use?” “How many eggs did you use?” “How much brown sugar did you use?” “Two cups.” “How much white sugar did you use?” “Two cups”. Therein was the problem. Instead of ¾ cup of brown sugar and ¾ cup of white sugar, he had used 2 cups of each.

With no idea how to fix that ratio of ingredients, I threw that batch of dough into the trash. Alas, no cookies for Alyssa on this trip!  We did take her clothes shopping as a birthday present.  Nothing a little retail therapy won't fix, right?