My cat Chester, who is about 11 years old and whom I’ve only had the pleasure of company for the past three years, has recently become the neediest animal alive. He’s always insisted on following me from room to room and whenever I sit he either wants to be in my lap or relatively near it. I personally prefer when he just sits near me since he weighs about 20 pounds and has this remarkable way of cutting off my blood supply whenever he puts his full weight on me. About three months ago I had to start showering with the bathroom door opened a crack otherwise he would stand outside the closed bathroom door and cry so loud I could actually hear him above the sound of falling water. He would do this nonstop until I got out of the shower and opened the door for him.

As of last Friday, he now insists on being in the bathroom with me while I shower. He hunkers down on the floor, and as soon as I step out of the shower he lets me know how much I was missed by shedding cat hair all over my slightly damp calves and ankles. I don’t think I’m worried yet. Not really, but if in three months I end up with a cat in the shower with me then I think it will definitely be time to start asking the vet questions to determine if Chester has completely gone ’round the bend.

I noticed an increase in my site traffic so I thought maybe my grandmother or someone had ventured here … but oh no. Much to my dismay and incredible surprise it seems Big Brother has linked to me. I haven’t yet figured out whether I should be flattered beyond compare or burning with embarrassment. There really isn’t anything going on here … except me blathering on about my victory with mashed potatoes and a certain disregard for proper punctuation. Maybe the possibility of having people who aren’t related to me viewing all my nonsense will inspire me to actually put real content here.

Curses to you, Jeremy! You may actually have found a way to motivate me.

Today I made mashed potatoes from scratch. Quite an accomplishment really. When I still lived with my parents my mother made them on a fairly regular basis, but usually the only contribution I made was making sure the potatoes were good and peeled. Basically she gave me the job she didn’t like to do. Today, however, was an entirely different story. I did the whole thing myself, I even got out the wriggly looking potato masher that has been silently sitting unused in one of my kitchen drawers for the past two years. And I have to say that even though I didn’t really have much of a clue about what I was doing, my mashed potatoes came out tasting delicious and were better than I remember my mother’s being. (Sorry mom. There are some things I do better than you.) They were remarkably fluffy and lump-free.

Things have been on the crazy side of busy since last Thursday. Thursday I had enormous problems with the computer. For some reason … still unexplained, or perhaps just very complicated … I was completely unable to connect to the internet. When our ISP was contacted, we were told no one would be able to take a look at our lovely DSL setup until Monday. I guess I shouldn’t be so upset about the poor response time since I was involved in total Chaos this weekend.

Saturday morning we helped Paul’s mom move to her new house, it was super-duper-sweaty work, and I was thrilled with all the cloud cover. In the afternoon Paul, his brother Dustin, Dustin’s girlfriend Shannon, and I drove an hour and a half to get to the Rangers game in Arlington to sit in our fantastic seats. That last half hour was us trying to park the darn car. The Rangers played the Yankees. Everyone booed A-Rod. Sometime during the third inning, the sun broke through the clouds. Shannon was the only one to escape without turning a shade of red. Dustin probably got the worst of it. Sometime around the sixth or seventh inning we watched in horror as a fistfight almost broke out right in front of us. The game was won by the Rangers in the ninth inning. Happy stuff. After the game it took us about 2 hours to get back. Namely because traffic was reduced to one lane on I-30. I also temporarily got us lost on the way back because I decided I could figure out a short cut. For some reason I landed the job as navigator on the way back. In the process we got to see both a really seedy side of Dallas … and an incredibly rich residential area that are practically side by side.

Sunday was slightly more leisurely, no running around or going back and forth for hours at a time. And oddly, by Sunday afternoon the DSL was once again working properly, so on Monday I got to turn the worker guy away at the door. I omitted a lot from the weekend, but that’s just because I know no one actually comes here and since I lived the weekend I’m kind of beginning to bore myself.

It’s amazing. I can forget about this place for a week at a time.