What Giant Jerks!

Someone had to say it!

On another topic:

King!

Thank you very much for your sage counsel (see comment on previous post). I bumped into a parallel sentiment on the Ann Arbor Reddit: someone saying that they found they minded the cold in winter much less if they made sure to go outside every day; at least one person concurred. I will do it! That is a very good point about there being more light outside than inside even if it’s overcast.

Moving on to the events of today, I had previously mentioned the dog of my neighbor, Digby, making unwanted visits to my back yard. 

On August 11, I sent her this letter; which I include here as pertinent to what happened today; identifying details altered. (I had mentioned the problem to her verbally two or three times before sending the letter.)

Dear Digby,

I am writing to express my growing frustration with Sam’s continued unwanted visits to my back yard, which in Ypsilanti qualify her as a “nuisance animal.” (Legally speaking, a misdemeanor.)

Sam was on my property at least three times in a recent two-week period. The first time, she was evidently looking for the woodchuck. A week later, she was chasing a rabbit and most recently, she startled / frightened a workman. 

None of these is desirable, but the reason this has now become a matter of utmost importance to me is that my cats will soon be living here. For the most part the best of friends, if they become agitated, they can fight seriously enough to injure each other.

For that reason, it is essential that Sam not trespass onto my property after September 1, 2026.

I will leave it to you as to whether to install a physical fence, try an electronic fence or come up with some other solution, as long as it is 100 percent effective. If you decide to install a fence, please bear in mind that the lot line is at the utility pole and ensure that any fence doesn’t go beyond that point. ([The previous owner] placed a number of rocks on my property; I intend to remove them one of these days.)

This problem aside, I have enjoyed having you as a neighbor and of course hope that our relationship will on the whole be cordial and peaceful, and that we will easily resolve any issues that may arise.

Sincerely,
Bugwalk

I had arranged for junk haulers to come today to take various things away, including the aforementioned rocks. Two friendly fellows arrived to do this work; soon one of them was banging urgently on my deck door. When I went to the door, he said that my neighbor was out there.

I had not gotten any response from Digby to my letter (not that one was expected), no fence has been installed, and, while I have heard her dog barking, I haven’t seen it in my yard. Since I was not sure what her reaction to my letter had been, I was pleased to have the opportunity to interact and went out there in a welcoming mood.

I joined the two junk haulers and Digby where the two yards meet, and then someone else walked up, loudly saying, “Hello, Bugwalk!”

“Who are you?”, I asked.

This proved to be Digby’s mother, who has a commanding presence. She walked up (on my property) to about six inches from my eyeballs and we sized each other up. I’ll bet we were both thinking, “Huh—rather like me.” We’re about the same height, same build, same (White) coloring, and same assertive energy. Thank god I got my bald fade yesterday! A definite edge for me; her gray frizzy hair (not unlike my hair) was longer and pulled back.

I had always understood that the lot line is at the utility pole, but Digby and her mother understand it to be somewhere else (about a foot closer in my direction) and showed me the marker, which looked like a cut-off plumbing pipe sticking about five inches out of the ground. Cool! I never saw one before. And fine.

I said, “Okay. Where do you think the line for rock removal should be, then,” and we worked that out, per the lot marker. Initially Digby was indicating a line that kept swerving toward me, but we were able to agree quite quickly, and the junk haulers set to work.

Digby or her mother (who I think is visiting from another state, but I’m not sure about that) said they would actually like to retain those rocks that I was having removed from my yard. I said they were welcome to them. I said that I was paying to have them hauled away, but if Digby would like to make a contribution toward the cost, I would be happy to have them placed on her property instead. Nearly rolling her eyes at this preposterous suggestion, Digby said she would not be making a contribution. I said that was fine and told the junk haulers to continue with their work as previously described.

I went back inside only to be apprised that Digby’s mother kept returning to the area to say she wanted the rocks put in her daughter’s yard, though she was standing right there when Digby and I had the simple exchange about this.

I walked back over there with one of the junk haulers. En route, I mentioned my plans to plant some things there. Digby’s mother called over, “Bugwalk, what are you planning to do here?” Even though I know perfectly well and the four ilexes (holly plants) are wending their way to my address even as I write, I said that I’m still thinking it over: none of her business. (Digby was nowhere to be seen at this point and was not seen again.)

Here the details get a little hazy in my memory, but I think Digby’s mother again said she’d like the rocks to be dumped into her daughter’s yard (pushy!) and she also advised that I write Digby a note letting her know what I was going to do in the vicinity of the lot line. Here I lost my temper.

Basically yelling, I said that whatever I planted was going to be on my own property and that I had no intention of apprising Digby regarding same. I said that if I were ever to do anything that affected Digby, of course I would let her know. And, just to make sure we were all on the same page, I said very loudly, “I am angry!” (I have often gotten good results by saying this to whatever vendor. Not, “You are a big turd!” Not, “I am going to come over and kick a dent in your garage!” Just, “I am angry!”)

(By the way, the junk haulers were deeply admiring of this. One said later on that I had put Digby’s mother in her place, and the other said he was glad I had spoken up.)

After I said I was angry, Digby’s mother said, “I am, too!” 

There was a pause, and then I said, “You know, Digby’s Mother, this really is nothing to do with you or me. If [the previous owner] hadn’t put rocks in my yard, neither of us would be angry right now.” (Subtly making the point, or such was my intention, that we would not always be angry.)

The junk haulers finished their work, and I came inside to describe the whole incident to my sister.

(Digressing to say that the first time Digby came to my attention in a not-good way was when she wrote the note to my plant-loving next-door neighbor to complain about his bush reaching its green fingers into her yard. (She should have simply cut off whatever was in her yard. I myself just had quite a bit of that neighbor’s pine tree removed for the same reason.) Digby’s note to my next-door neighbor caused an intense but brief brouhaha, as he thought the letter was from Digby the tree guy—different person—and for some reason suspected me of causing Digby to write this letter. We got past that, and then it was Digby’s dog treating my yard as its own, and now this. I hope we are not going to have endless conflict and legal wrangling. One of the junk haulers said they see this kind of dispute often in the course of their work, and he observed that there is always one bad neighbor. The person who put the rocks in my yard was also a difficult neighbor, so maybe it is something about that house itself.)

I said to my sister today on the phone that I don’t really care where precisely the lot line is and that I didn’t plan to call the City of Ypsilanti about it, and that I would just make sure to plant my ilexes definitely in my own yard, with enough room to spare that Digby wouldn’t later cut half the plants off if they crossed the lot line.

My sister, unfortunately, is not of the temperament to say, “What giant jerks!” (She is of the temperament to let things rest until any agitation fades away.) However, she did think it might actually be prudent to have the lot surveyed. I said maybe I should just put a fence in that area; she said there might be zoning requirements I should be aware of.

So I was soon on the phone to the City of Ypsilanti, after all, where a calm-sounding fellow said that if my fence is going to be right on the lot line, a survey is needed—that’s the whole problem: I don’t know where it is, which I had not been aware of until today. A survey is not needed as long as the fence is a foot inside the lot line (wherever that may be), and if the fence is going to be more than six feet tall, you have to speak with the engineering department. Good information! I asked about a surveyor and the fellow said they are not allowed to make recommendations.

I texted my realtor to see if she could recommend a surveyor and she immediately sent a name. I filled out that fellow’s online form and am waiting to hear from him.

One thing I’m not sure about is the situation along the side, as opposed to the back, of Digby’s lot. The back of her lot abuts the back of my lot, but if I just put a fence along that stretch, could and would her dog merely walk around the end of the fence? Is there any physical object preventing that? Maybe the findings of the surveyor will be helpful here, or next time I see Digby’s own next-door neighbor, I can ask if I can take a peek at that area.

I plan to send Digby a letter (by the way, I politely included my phone number and email address in my letter to her, but I do not have either of those pieces of information for her, so it will have to be a letter) saying I have had my lot surveyed or that I am about to, and that I am thinking of having a fence installed (so as to forestall future disputes akin to that of today; I do not plan to include that reasoning in my letter), and that I will pause for at least a month before installing a fence to give her a chance to hire her own even-better surveyor. 

Sweet Skin Fade

Yesterday was gloomy weather again, and the first time this year I had to put on my base layer of wool leggings. Fortunately, there are only six or seven months to go before spring. (I have a friend who hates summer who said on about June first that, fortunately, summer was almost over!) I got up at 11 a.m. yesterday even though I had gotten only 7.5 hours of sleep. Seven and a half hours is for some reason sometimes a sweet spot when it comes to sleep even though it’s way less than I usually need. I got up at 11 a.m. because it feels gross to sleep any later. Also, sleeping as much as needed might take until 2 or 3 p.m., and that decisively throws off the next day and the next.

Seven and half hours of sleep was not the sweet spot yesterday. I felt draggy and decided to take a nap after breakfast, but then I began organizing a couple of closets, with satisfying results, and the nap never happened.

In the evening, I looked online to see how people survive moving from California to the Midwest and came upon a post from someone saying how miserable she is living here, and how she tried to move to a sunny area of the country but it didn’t work out. Her words were drenched in negativity and self-pity and I suspected there was some slight overstatement here and there for dramatic effect: Did she really cry the whole entire way to work and the whole entire way home? I thought, this chick sounds just like me! The kicker was when she mentioned wanting to kill her adorable kitten. Did I actually post that post while in some sort of fugue state?

My meditation teacher, Howie, said once that when he is making a decision, he takes happiness out of the equation because he knows he does not require particular circumstances in order to be happy. In theory, eating a tasty bowl of Szechuan chicken at Ricewood on Packard is no better or worse than seeing one’s mother ax murdered, if indeed it is our attitude that determines our experience. Yet those somehow do not seem equally delightful. I imagine there are people who are not profoundly mentally ill who could maintain perfect equanimity in either situation, but I think approximately 100 percent of us would feel that one of those was better than the other.

I guess there is quite a stretch of territory between “All things are exactly the same if you don’t let the mind choose” and “I cannot possibly be happy in this situation of [whatever].” I do notice that I feel more relaxed in this slower-paced area; it seems to happen by itself. I don’t know that I could ever feel as relaxed in San Francisco; by the same token, I don’t know that I could feel cheery quite as often in the grey as I do in the sun.

But I think I can have a good-enough and even a perfectly delightful life here. After all, other people live here. After reading that person’s post, I decided to man up. I read a little about how to cope with cold, grey winters. Light boxes were mentioned, and so was exercise, including enjoying winter sports. I have not ever done it, but I am going to go snowshoeing! And maybe even sledding, which I of course did as a child; I think it would be very fun and something a senior citizen could totally do. I asked three people if they’d like to go snowshoeing. No response so far from two of them, but the third said, “Sounds fun!” I also ice skated as a child, but I think that might be out at this point. The number of broken ankles I need is zero. Or heck, maybe I will ice skate.

I also looked yesterday on Yelp for a suitable barbershop for a lady to obtain a sweet skin fade. (I have been told in at least one establishment that they only cut men’s hair.) I ended up feeling a little overwhelmed, but today asked on Reddit and immediately got four or five suggestions. I went over to one of them this afternoon and the fellow there did a very conscientious job. The Redditor assured me that women are welcome at this barbershop, the place says over the front door that it is a unisex salon, and when I walked in, sure enough, a woman was getting a cut that involved a lot of bald skin. Minus those three things, I would have thought this was entirely a place for men. There was a football game on TV, football helmets everywhere as décor, and a pool table in the middle of the room. Besides the woman who was getting her hair cut when I came in, every other patron was a man (going by my eyeballs, Black, White, Middle Eastern).

This place had more product displayed for sale than I have ever seen in any other salon or barbershop. There were many, many square feet of one particular line I had never heard of, a small display of a second brand, and an even smaller display of a third thing. There was a giant gumball machine, and two vending machines featuring three kinds of candy apiece. There was a large monitor on the wall opposite the TV showing a restful video of underwater life (maybe that is for the ladies). There were ten barber stations, but only one in use.

It was another gloomy day today, but I have decided to prevail: to act as constructively as possible and to find ways to enjoy myself.

My sister said to text her when I got home so she could come over to measure the basement fireplace, which she plans to cover to keep Marvin out. She did a beautiful job on the fireplace in the living room. I told her I would text her after I took a shower, but by the time I had lovingly burnished every square inch, it was getting to be too late in the day for her to come over. It takes me a long time to take a shower. That’s why I don’t do it very often.

I invited Duckworth to sleep over again last night. He immediately draped himself over one of my ankles and fell asleep. He ended up staying in my room for several hours, later sleeping on my chest. When meowing woke me up, I let him out.

Warmer

As in the children’s game where your enemies / playmates say that word if you are—what? I can’t remember if it means you’re getting closer to a physical object or if you’ve guessed a guess that is more nearly correct or what, but I as of yet retain the concept of warmer and colder and have rather often thought of this in recent months and years: better. Worse.

Last night I came out of the bathroom after my evening ablutions to find Duckworth hunched outside the door: aww. I let him into my bedroom and closed the door. Often in San Francisco Duckworth spent the night next to me on the bed while Marvin remained cooly aloof in the kitchen until the following morning.

Part of the problem here is that the cats have their end of the house and I have mine, so I don’t see them doing cute or charming things. I mainly now see them at mealtimes, when there are various routine irritations, and when I hear a crash, also likely an irritating situation: Again with that shelf?!?

So the ratio of neutral / pleasant to annoying is way off. Also, Marvin used to sit on my lap when I had breakfast, which took an hour or so, which was a bonding dynamic, as an ex-boyfriend used to say. He said that when he one time made me laugh so hard that I peed my pants. (I miss that fellow still.)

I have salads for dinner here instead of for breakfast, and I read while eating them (yep) rather than just listen to music, so Marvin sitting on my lap for an hour, which was a sweet thing, isn’t happening.

I closed the bedroom door last night after inviting Duckworth in, and he stayed for several hours. A couple of times, there was a meow. I got right up when I heard this to see if it indicated that Duckworth was starting to feel like releasing a giant fece. Is that the singular of feces? I guess feces is already singular, or neither, like “flour”? Straight from the internet: Flour is primarily used as an uncountable noun, so it is considered singular. However, in specific contexts referring to different types, the plural form “flours” can be used. My mother had many flours in her garage-ready chest freezer.

Duckworth did not appear to be on the verge of pooping the couple of times I checked last night. Another time, I heard a scrabbling sort of noise and turned on the light to see him—chewing on an electrical cord? No: Playing with a small tube of lip balm he’d knocked off the bedside table. Okay, good to know that is an attractive item. Somewhere in the wee hours I did let (or usher) him out of the room and close the door.

In the morning, I opened the door and he and his frenemy came in and looked around. Marvin was soon at the very top of a bookcase and, sure enough, reached down to fiddle with the items on the top shelf. (Clearly stipulating here that if he breaks my mother’s wooden metronome, I will kill him.) So: gathering information as to what can be gotten at and what can’t, what is or isn’t of interest, where they shouldn’t go and where they can. Looks like, in regard to those topmost shelves, one would want to make sure not to put anything but books there but could set smaller items on the shelf right below that, which is probably not reachable from the top of the bookshelf nor from the floor.

Next, my bathroom. Those holes near the sink are definitely of interest but neither cat can actually fit through. They could probably pluck the cupboard doors open—the holes are above the cupboard doors, which in turn are near the floor—so I rearranged the contents of the cupboards so it doesn’t really matter if they get in the one that is behind the holes. 

Oddly, they are extremely bad at plucking things open. The cupboards in my bathroom have magnetic latches that barely stick to each other, but I think that, with one exception, it’s good enough. When they were kittens, if they were in the bathroom, they could not get out even if the door was open a quarter inch. They simply could not figure out that they could pull a thing open even if there was an obvious crack, and would sit there indefinitely, trapped.

There is just one cupboard in my bathroom here where the magnetic clasp is as good as nonexistent, and there are things in there that I don’t want them to get to that would not be convenient for me if located elsewhere, so that is the one place a new latch is needed. I left the bathroom door open when we exited, and that immediately lifted my spirits, as it is now light when I look down the interior hallway instead of dark. I see the bathroom window and the greenery outside rather than a blank closed door.

Several mornings here, I found that Marvin had unrolled some of the paper towel on the roller in the kitchen—one day quite a bit of it—without disturbing a single one of the many small nearby items on the counter—but I haven’t seen unrolled paper towel for several days now, even though I didn’t do anything to secure it. With this heartening observation in mind, it was on to the shower curtain in my bathroom. In San Francisco, I had to put the curtain up over the shower curtain rod when it was not in use to prevent it from being shredded.

All I had in San Francisco was a plastic shower curtain, but here I also have a nice more clothlike curtain, so there is more to get out of the way, and also the shower curtain rod here has only a small gap above it. I don’t want to wad a bunch of wet shower curtain through that small opening where it would sit against the gorgeous new paint. My first thought was to have the rod here lowered. It is certainly terrible looking, but so far I am having trouble finding a nice permanent-mount shower curtain rod, and if I did find that, the old one would have to be taken down and the screw holes patched, sanded and painted, which is not the end of the world, but I am now thinking I will dispense with the clothlike curtain, stick with the rod where it is, and get a pile of plastic shower curtains and just let the cats shred them. When one is letting in too much water, I can replace it. I can delay this by draping the shower curtain not over the rod itself, but over the fixture the water comes out of.

Next, the spare bedroom, which currently has piles of my parents’ papers covering a third or so of the floor. I plan to put a lot of stuff in the closet in that room, which was my mother’s bedroom, but need to wait until after the horrible folding closet doors are replaced. I figured there wasn’t much the cats could do to those piles of paper, and that seems to have been a correct assessment. I did soon hear a crash: my suitcase being knocked over against the wall, where it—yep—slightly damaged the new paint, but no big deal. So that door is now also open, another source of light and view of green leaves fluttering in the breeze.

Warmer!

Also literally warmer, or at least sunnier. Yesterday it was overcast—not raining (not raining too much—raining, but the kind where you do not see a single person in a raincoat), not hailing, not chilly, not tornado-ing, but grey almost all day, which does affect my mood adversely.

Down in the Dumps

Possibly because of the overcast weather, at least in part. Also not enough sleep last night. Today the tree guy came back to pick up the debris left from the work yesterday. In the afternoon, I went to pick up a couple of my father’s death certificates that the attorney had left over, to drop off the lockbox at our realtor’s office, to deposit a check at my credit union here, and to Whole Foods to get some olive oil.

I am using the garage as a “cat lock,” which was my sister’s excellent idea: I go out the door from what was our parents’ TV room into the garage; that door uses the same key as the front door, which is handy. I close the door and then open the garage door to exit. When I come back, I wait for the garage door to close before I open the door into the house.

I am in the process of having a screen porch installed outside the front door, having a door installed between the front hall and the TV room, having a door to the laundry room installed so Marvin doesn’t go into the room with the boiler and the water heater, replacing two storm doors, and having the door to the interior hallway replaced with one with glass panes so I can see what’s going on in there when a cat is detained there. (Every bit of this is necessitated by having cats except for replacing the storm doors.)

There were a number of smaller things I was going to have the contractor do as long as they were here, but the process of picking doors and hardware and agreeing on the details regarding the screen porch has been so laborious and frustrating that I have taken all those lesser items off the list. Last night I was ready to dispense with the door to the TV room and just go in and out via the garage forever, but hopefully things are going to fall into place.

I have said at every meeting that I want doors that are made out of wood, not composite, and that I don’t want any formaldehyde and such, so I was surprised and disheartened when just a day or two I got a list of possible doors that included composite ones, but that seems to have been a miscommunication. I think we’re on the right track now.

One of the contractors recommended wrapping the soffits in aluminum coil, which requires much less maintenance than just scraping and painting them periodically. It also requires $13,000, so that will not be happening. After all, the soffits have been painted only once in the past 20 years if that—probably not that—and since my parents both died at age 85 and I am 64, I reckon I will be painting those soffits just once.

Today Marvin broke into the utility closet and easily plucked aside a board that was covering a hole within which was some grubby plumbing-related equipment. Annoying. This evening, as I was cleaning the two litter box areas, I was reflecting that it was much more pleasant to live here without cats. I could have all the interior doors open, and there weren’t litter boxes to clean, and there weren’t cats in the utility closet, cats repeatedly knocking the same shelf down, cats hurling my favorite lamp to the floor, cats (or a certain cat) tearing the endpiece off the baseboard heater, cats (or a certain cat) plucking a ceramic piece off the base of my father’s toilet, cats hopping on the kitchen counter … .

The living room has become the cat room. I almost never go in there, because I know that sitting on the couch will require first removing cat hair, and it just seems like too much work.

Further, I am not sure that even now I could say I actually love these cats. They infuriated me so often when they were kittens that it would be most correct to say that I hated them, or at least Marvin. Things slowly and eventually became easier, and I assumed I would come to genuinely love them, but I don’t think I ever have. Even now, Marvin pisses me off every single day, and so does Duckworth, pretty much. Is it out of the question to rehome them at this late date?

Little fantasy of this evening: I rehome the cats, they end up with people who truly love them, and I sell the house and return to civilization. I could not see moving the cats back to San Francisco, but I could very much see moving myself back there without them.

I am annoyed with these cats often, and I also take absolutely excellent care of them, but that is because it’s my responsibility to do that.

Up in the Clouds

And now I am indistinguishable from a person at Home Depot swooning over the potted azaleas. I bought a heavy-duty wheelbarrow, to be delivered tomorrow, which just seemed like something a serious gardener (weeder) should have. I also bought a jumbo-size container of Green Gobbler, a small metal trash can with a lid specifically for cat poop, and the extension cord I will need for my garage-ready freezer. (What is a garage-ready freezer? One that is meant to withstand ambient temperatures from very cold to very hot.)

My parents had a chest freezer in the garage that was completely crammed with stuff, including about 15 different kinds of flour. My mother liked to have every possible thing for the activity of interest: every kind of flour, markers in every tip width and every color … my mind is kind of going blank as I try to remember, but anyway, that freezer was dauntingly full. You had to dig for whatever you wanted out of it. It is gone now. I announced to my sister that I would not be having a chest freezer in the garage. She smirked when I announced that I am now shopping for a chest freezer for the garage. 

This is because Arbor Farms does not stock the three-pound bag of Stalhbush organic frozen blueberries, but will be happy to do a special order, but only of a case, which in this instance is six bags. So the new chest freezer in the garage will be for 18 pounds of frozen blueberries, mainly. 

Nightly, I scoop the poop and pee clumps out of two litter boxes and clean the areas where the litter boxes are located. In San Francisco, each night I dropped a bag with cat poop in it down the trash chute outside. Here I had been putting the bag in the giant trash bin in my driveway, which sits in the sun, so when the lid was opened, the smell was pretty overwhelming: gently toasted cat poop (I think you can get more for it if you call it sun-dried). I brought the trash bin into the garage, which will probably help, as it shouldn’t get so warm there, but my sister suggested having a little metal trash bin with a lid just for this purpose, and I think that will be even better. I can transfer the contents of the little metal trash can to the giant trash bin before I put the latter at the curb each Sunday.

Today the fellow who periodically does heavier or more time-consuming yard work came over with his crew. They spent a few hours and got a lot done. I had been waiting for the tree guy to come; he ended up coming today, as well, with one other person. The main thing they did was to start the process of taking out two dying hawthorns. I really like the tree guy and also his crew member. The latter has an exceedingly still, alert air about him. He once pointed out to me a bird’s nest I would never have spotted that was about six inches from my eyeballs. He seems very grounded, not missing the smallest thing, but at the same time, there is something very light and airy about him, as if, should you turn your back on him for a moment, you might turn around again to find that he had drifted up into the clouds.

Not to Do

Last Tuesday was packing day in San Francisco. I assumed I would be up until four in the morning, but it went surprisingly quickly, affording nearly seven hours of sleep before the next morning, even with having to encase a lot of cat-related things in bubble wrap. The vet tech came over that evening to give Marvin squirts of compounded gabapentin and trazodone. He foamed at the mouth afterward but did not vomit. The vet tech said she had put the doses far enough back in his mouth that little should be re-emerging even with the hypersalivation. I was able to do Duckworth’s medication myself. Both cats appeared obviously woozy soon after.

The next morning, the vet tech came back and gave Marvin another dose of each medication. She said that was the most medication she’d ever given one cat at one time; it was what Marvin’s vet said to do: 300 mg of gabapentin plus 50 mg of trazodone. Arranging to have the vet tech come was the most important thing I did in regard to getting the cats to Michigan, except for paying (a fortune) for the cat transport professional. He arrived in due time—I liked him—and got both cats into their harnesses and carriers without difficulty; he put an AirTag on each harness. He wrapped the cushions in the carriers with disposable pee pads, and used cable ties to make sure all zippers were secure.

We took a cab to the airport, arriving a bit later than planned because the first cab driver went to the airport instead of coming to my place. I went through the scanner while the cat transport professional waited outside the scanner with the cats in their carriers. When two personnel were available, they came to get the cats, and my co-traveler went through the scanner himself, and then we all went into a little room where one cat was taken out of his carrier so the carrier itself could be scanned. The cat transport professional emphasized that the cats should be removed from their carriers one at a time. The cats themselves were not scanned, which suggests an obvious and dreadful security vulnerability. The cat transport professional had to hang onto Marvin tightly while the employee temporarily left with Marvin’s carrier; Marvin put a couple new holes in the cat transport man’s t-shirt, but it generally went fine in that both cats ended up back in their carriers, and off we went to the Sky Club. 

The transport people are members; this was my first time being permitted to enter, as a plus-one. One floor up was a lovely airy space encased in glass with a bounteous buffet and selection of drinks, all free. Free food! One of my many favorite things. Plus someone brought over little bags of crunchy treats for the cats. I was just enjoying an unseemly amount of extremely greasy pork when we discovered that we’d been upgraded into not the same row with each other, so we went to talk to the person at the desk in the Sky Club, who concluded that we would have to speak with someone at the gate, so off we went to straighten that out. Goodbye, Sky Club!

We ended up in the same row, with an empty middle seat between us: perfect. The cats were nearly silent the whole time; there were maybe three or four little meows: “Does anyone remember I exist?” I thought there would be loud yowling all the way across the country, so that was great.

I read the last three issues of Decibel magazine, and then we landed at DTW. Though it was well past her bedtime, my sister kindly met us at the house. She had set up a bathroom apiece for the cats. She, I, the cat transport professional and his wife and a cat went into the first bathroom—where the cat immediately discovered a hole I had not noticed; this house is full of weird holes. Off to the next bathroom, which is hole free, but also windowless and not very large; not really a nice place for a cat to spend a whole night. The cats seemed perfectly calm, so we let them look around part of the house. They also seemed fine with each other at first, but then Marvin began to hiss repeatedly, so he spent that night and the next night in the long hallway in the center of the house. I let Duckworth have the run of the house (or did I leave him in the tiny bathroom the first night? Can’t remember) and could not see any sign the next morning that he had touched anything.

It was Wednesday evening when we got here. I had to get up Thursday after only about three hours’ sleep, for a series of appointments. A new water heater was installed. The guy showed me how to drain it. I think my father did this monthly; I plan to do it quarterly. Next, annual inspection of the boiler, which provides part of the heat for the house. Next, a third arborist to look at the silver maple. I think he might end up being the person, as he used the words “old school,” and it sounded like he planned to destroy less of the yard than the previous two arborists.

On Friday, a well-known local plumber came to look at a leaky faucet in the basement laundry room and at the kitchen sink faucet, which I’d like to replace with one that my Multipure filter will connect with in an easier and more aesthetically pleasing manner. This fellow quoted nearly $700 for installing a faucet—if the customer supplies the faucet. I soon got a quote from another plumber for less than a third of that. (My father said that the well-known local plumber once screwed something up at my childhood home, but that they are probably fine for basic operations. I had to call them a couple of years ago for a slow drain here. They fixed it, but since then, I pre-emptively use Green Gobbler, which seems to work well.)

On Saturday, my sister and I went over to Home Depot and I picked out a gorgeous new faucet for the laundry room sink, and a hose to use for draining the hot water heater. She and I have fundamentally different approaches to many things, one being that she enjoys figuring things out herself while I enjoy paying someone else to figure things out, and another being that, in a store, she likes to find the needed item on her own while I like to ask a store employee for help, so she is the person striding off resolutely, soon to disappear around a corner, and I am the person shrieking “Help!” at the nearest person who appears to be wearing a uniform.

Accordingly, I was having a long conversation with an employee about various things, including where the thing was that we needed, when my sister came back and said, “I found it!”

We were planning to put together one of the cats’ new towers, but were out of steam after going to Home Depot, so we deferred that to Sunday. I had ordered two towers from Mau; my sister paid for half the total, as a catwarming present. On Sunday she put one of them together while I stayed out of the way. It is a stunning thing, quite beautiful as cat towers go, taller than I am. Then we sat down to enjoy the sight of the cats frolicking on it, and waited and waited and waited. Finally, my sister had to go home for dinner. Later in the evening, Marvin was spotted in one of the four faux rattan baskets.

This morning a junk removal company came to provide a quote for removing undesired items. There is only one spigot providing water for the yard, so my father had a system of garden hoses snaking around the property, just as he had extension cords strung around the house because many rooms have not enough electrical outlets. For the same reason in both cases, which is the finished basement, which makes plumbing or electrical work very expensive, there will never be more spigots outside and there will never be more electrical outlets inside, unless, regarding the latter, I break down and pay for metal boxes to be stuck on the exterior of the walls. It is not so much the money as the way it would look. As for the water in the yard, my sister suggested that one could cause someone to bore a hole underground to a place where a second spigot would come in handy; I added it to my to-do list. I would love not to have a massive I’m-never-actually-going-to-do-this list, but it’s genetic; I have that list and will always have it.

We used a couple of our father’s hoses to water some new grass earlier this year. (Results: so-so.) I retained those proven good hoses, but today gathered up the rest and put them in the pile for the junk people. They probably work fine and I could practically hear my father yelling from above, “What are you doing? Those are perfectly good!”, but after having lain outside untouched for at least four years, they are not inspiring-looking objects and I don’t know if they will ever be used again.

Next, I drove today to Dearborn to have lunch with a friend, one of the women who took care of our mother when she was in memory care. This was one of the private caregivers, not one of the facility employees. We met at The Great Commoner, on Michigan Ave. It was delightful getting caught up, and the food was delicious. Shortly before I arrived there, a warning light came on for low tire pressure. After I got back to the car after lunch, I used the new little gizmo to pump it up. It took ten minutes or less. I was very glad I had tested this thing in the driveway and written down detailed instructions.

It was a beautiful day. It feels good to be here. Before I bought the house, on trash day, I would pretend I was a person taking her bin out to the curb. Now I am an actual person taking her bin out to the curb. My sister was worried that the cats would not have a good hiding place, but they found three right away: Underneath a chest of drawers in the living room, underneath the couch, and alongside the upholstered chair, underneath the slipcover my mother made.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday night, I let both cats have the run of the house (except they cannot go in my bedroom, my bathroom, the office or the spare bedroom) and all was well in the morning except for Marvin unrolling the paper towel in the kitchen. After I was up, he knocked down a single shelf, easily replaced, and they also knocked over my favorite lamp and broke it; I think it can probably be repaired.

On the whole, they seem notably calmer here. In San Francisco, they often pestered me relentlessly when I was eating, trying to get at the food or leap onto my lap even if there was already a plate of toast there. It was annoying and stressful. They are not doing that here at all. They have become the kind of cats where you theoretically understand yourself to have cats, but don’t see them all the time. They also used to greet me at the door every time I entered my apartment, but are not doing that here. I of course did not object to that, but it’s nice not to have all activities happening in the same tiny space, where someone coming in the door would be a completely unignorable event. 

Maybe they are calmer because I am calmer. That is in part because the giant decision finally feels done. It is also because I am far, far from my neighbors in San Francisco, and I think because this place in general is way more low key. The room I sleep in here feels like a sanctuary. I never bother to open the curtain because it’s not also my living room, office, library and yoga studio. My mother made the curtain. A bit of light comes through it, so when I step in there in the day, it’s pleasantly dim, and thanks to the HEPA air filter that runs all the time in there on its lowest setting, the air feels wonderfully fresh. When I go in there at night, I turn on the overhead light, which is not very light—no overhead light in this house is; I plan to address that—but then I turn on the bedside lamp, and the immediate warm glow always reminds me of my mother, who made things cheerful and bright and colorful. It’s like she is there for a split second when the light comes on and the room is suddenly pleasant and cozy and the colors become vivid.

It is also nice to have my parents’ things here and there but not everywhere. It’s nice to use my father’s yellow bowl for my strawberries in the morning and my own blue and white bowl for matcha.

After I got back from Dearborn this afternoon, I met online with the renovations people. They have moved the start date up three weeks, which is great, so we are now working on selecting materials and items. There are six doors to be picked out, among other things.

The guy said the door to the screen porch outside the front door will freely swing open or shut, or could certainly be locked shut from the inside, but I explained that neither will do. The entire impetus for working with the renovations people was to install that screen porch, and the number one purpose of it is to prevent a cat that gets out the front door from getting into the street, so it can’t be possible for the cat just to nose the door open. But the number two purpose of the screen porch is to have a place to set deliveries so that they are invisible or less visible to passersby, not that there are many, so it can’t be that the door is latched shut from the inside such that someone from the outside can’t open it. We will need a door that securely latches shut, but isn’t unopenable from the outside; this should not be a problem.

It now seems perfectly clear that coming here was the right decision. The idea of stuffing the cats full of medication, forcing them back into their carriers and flying them back to their little apartment now seems ludicrous. While San Francisco is absolutely a wonderland, so is this place. Every place is, if one looks around. It feels incredibly luxurious to have a whole room for nothing but sleeping, and another whole room for nothing but sitting in front of a computer. But then there is also a yard! And some other rooms! And a car to drive up and down in! I didn’t really feel cooped up before, but now I feel space all around, and it feels good.

Particularly Stiff

Last Friday I went to the graduation of this past year’s CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) students in the meditation room of the hospital where I was employed until quite recently. (So far I have not regretted the decision to leave.) It has been years since I’ve been to a CPE graduation, though there is one every year, but this group was special, and I also didn’t want to miss the chance to be with the Spiritual Care team. I was trying to figure out what made this group so great and I think it’s because, of the four students, two were people that everyone automatically and immediately loves. That is an excellent percentage. 

Before the formal part of the program, we had lunch together and several people ad hoc told me what they appreciate about me. An array of stellar qualities was mentioned. I felt seen and loved. Then one person whose first language is not English warmly told me that what he likes about me is that I’m “stiff—very stiff.” Also, I’m a “perfectionist” who insists that “the chair be in the right spot.” (I swear I never said anything about a chair.) I asked, “Are these compliments??” I think everyone in the room was getting quite a kick out of this, but I knew he meant every word to convey love and admiration, and I sincerely thanked him.

Between my co-workers telling what they like about me and the graduation itself, the room was overflowing with love and good vibes.

Afterward, I walked all the way back home. It was a beautiful sunny afternoon.

The next day, Tom and I went in a Zipcar to the house of a relative of his for a Labor Day weekend gathering in Sacramento. We detoured a bit to pick up one of Tom’s brothers. The playlist I had made for the drive was Electric Light Orchestra and Average White Band, music from when Tom and I were in junior high. Tom’s brother was still in the shower, so I got out of the car—it was hot—and I danced in the street like a Las Vegas stripper, all by myself, to “Work To Do.” I danced like no one was watching, or like everyone was, knowing it was possibly my last chance to dance like that on a stunningly hot late summer day in the middle of the street in Sacramento. 

The gathering was wonderful. We sat around, we ate, we chatted; some people got in the swimming pool. I told people that I am moving to Michigan on Wednesday but added that they might hardly notice the difference; I am already planning to be in that exact same beautiful house for Thanksgiving. Thanks to Tom’s family, I have attended countless lovely gatherings and been to many gorgeous places over the nearly 30 years: Sacramento, The Sea Ranch, Mill Valley, San Rafael, a succession of very nice retirement communities. I remember a wonderful birthday party for Tom’s mother’s husband, whom I loved so much, on a searingly hot day near Santa Rosa.

Saturday evening, we gave Tom’s brother a ride back home under the dazzling purple evening sky.

Yesterday Tom and I made a last trip, for now, to Orphan Andy’s for lunch. The cute server was there, but a different server came to take our order. Oh, well. However, he then got called away and was detained elsewhere long enough that the cute server ended up taking our orders after all. After I said that I wanted a turkey melt, onion rings, and a huge amount of butter on the side, he said, in the tone of voice someone would use if they were squinting a little, “I know you.”

He brought the butter right away, in the kind of thing a cup of soup is served in. I began daintily eating it with a fork, as no spoon had been provided. After a while, he passed by, murmuring, “You’re going to spoil your lunch,” and he set down a second cup of butter. (I think I could have finished both, but I was also getting a little worried that I might vomit when I got near the bottom of the second cup of butter. I said to Tom that I hoped I was not going to barf and he said he hoped the same thing.)

Twice I saw the cute server do a charming thing: A table evidently would ask if he could take a photo, meaning a photo of them at this well-known Castro restaurant, and he would take the phone, walk over into a flattering beam of light and pretend that they had asked him for a selfie. So toward the end of our lunch, I told him we would like a selfie of him. (More me than Tom, I would say.) He said he was just pretending to take selfies of himself and he said he actually feels awkward taking them, so he handed me back the phone and I took several photos of him, so now I have several completely adorable pictures of the cute server! A very wonderful last-time-for-now outing to Orphan Andy’s.

Today, by going over there with two heavy boxes, I discovered something that may be of interest to others, as well: The post office is not open on Labor Day. (And nor is P. O. Plus.) Oh, well. It is another gorgeous afternoon, a nice day for two boxes to enjoy a pleasant cab ride to the post office and back.

I still can’t believe that I might be leaving San Francisco, but my mood is one of equanimity: The fickle finger of fate has spoken, as it were; with its knuckly gyrations, its pointing this way and that, somehow the day of departure has nearly arrived. 

Rwake!

I did get together with my friend at Papalote yesterday; she treated me to lunch since it was also a goodbye lunch. I saw a fellow in there with an inscrutable band logo on the back of his hoodie. After I studied it for a few moments, I realized it said Rwake. All excited, I said, “Rwake?”, thus giving myself away. A more confident metalhead would have said, “Rwake!” The fellow plucked the earbuds out of his ears, studied the 64-year old lady in sensible shoes who had addressed him, and said, “You’ve heard Rwake?”

Well, yes, I have, as their 2025 album was among Decibel magazine’s top 40 albums of last year, and in fact, among the top five. It didn’t super grab me, but it wasn’t work to listen to it, either. The man in Papalote said it is one of his big regrets that he missed a certain show of theirs. Given their elevated position in the top-40 list, he may get another chance. As he left, he waved his hand and I realized too late that he must have been flashing devil’s horns. I’ll be ready next time!

Nothing Ventured, Nothing Lost

I have been yawing back and forth between feeling like I’ve been remanded to the gulag and having some excitement about moving to Michigan, with the former being the majority of the experience because that is my natural temperament.

However, at the moment I am feeling pretty excited about the move. I am kind of noodling along, at one moment thinking of doing this, and at another moment thinking of doing that. If there is sufficient momentum, then the next step happens, and so I actually now have an appointment at the Michigan Secretary of State office to get a Michigan REAL ID and driver’s license. I have been there a few times now and have found them to be wonderfully efficient. I love Jocelyn Benson. I think she is running for governor. She has my vote. I also hope to be registered to vote in time to vote for the United States senator from Michigan.

I went through a pre-registration process, including identifying the two documents I will bring to establish my residency. It turns out I would have a pretty hard time establishing my California residency if I had to, despite being here for 44 years, since I don’t have a car or a mortgage. Fortunately, I put the DTE bill in my name quite a while ago; that will be one of the documents. And the car registration / title will hopefully be the other. I see that the registration itself has my Michigan address on it, but I have to take a look at the title. If that has my San Francisco address on it, I’ll have some additional steps before I can get the new ID.

If the title does have the Michigan address on it, then Michigan has a slight problem in their process—don’t tell them I said this—given that the only thing I had to show them to register the car was a DTE bill, meaning that, really, you ultimately only need a DTE bill to prove residency as long as you go to the trouble of registering a car; this works better if you have a car.

Thinking about the car’s title made me think about the house’s title. Do I have that somewhere? Is it like a car’s pink slip, where if I leave it in plain sight and someone else walks off with it, they now own the house? I don’t recall anyone handing me a handsome embossed document with touches of gold leaf on it. Seems like after you put that big of a crater in your 401(k), you should get something like that.

I guess this is as good a time as any to mention, regarding my Deadguy-athon, that not only did they produce only two albums in the course of 30 years, the first is 30 minutes long, and last year’s is 36 minutes long. That was extremely thoughtful of them.

Pursuant to my move to the Midwest, I am letting various supplies dwindle. At this point, I likely will not use up 96 rolls of toilet paper or even two entire containers of toasted sesame oil. I put one of the latter in the lobby and it disappeared right away.

I also now actively hope I get there with both cats, whereas I had often half hoped that the inability to achieve this would prevent me from having to move at all. After spending quite a bit of money in the past few weeks on medication that will never get used—not enough to buy a yacht, but enough for a pretty nice rowboat, I would think—I am hoping the vet tech will be able to medicate Marvin, and I am also thinking of other means of ensuring that we all get there, such as asking Tom if he thinks this will happen. He said he does think that. That pretty much guarantees it, then, though I also asked my friend whose prayers always come true to pray for this. I ask her to pray for something for me only once in a great while; I don’t want to abuse my privileges nor drain her supply of cosmic good luck. Regarding our move, I went ahead and asked her, and she seemed amenable, though she also texted, “Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” which had a slightly ominous ring to it. In the context of traveling with cats, what does that mean? (I hope it does not mean I will end up in Michigan with more than two cats.)

I lately came upon someone’s notion that there are people who say yes, who are rewarded by the adventures they get to have, and people who say no, who are rewarded by feeling a sense of safety; I don’t think the person was saying one was better than the other, but that it depends on people’s psychological makeup. I’m definitely a no person, which is why all these giant yesses have been so hard.

There are a lot of people who don’t even know I’m moving, the process has been so riddled with chaos. A coherent process would have been: Make decision. Then tell people. Accordingly, I just mentioned next week’s move to the friend I’m having lunch with tomorrow and got back a texted “Whaaaat?????!”

I forwarded my note to my work team to a very early chaplaincy mentor and soon received an email with her best wishes for good luck in the future, as if this was the end of our relationship, but since a whole lot of connections these days are maintained by text and / or email and / or Zoom and / or phone, anyway, it kinds of seems to me it hardly matters where you live, except for that small (in my case) handful of relationships where you do need to meet up in person now and then.

So I wrote back saying I hoped that we will still keep in touch and emphasizing that I was not saying goodbye. My letter to my team mentions weeding, and it turns out that this friend also finds weeding therapeutic, so we are at the moment having a very engrossing exchange via email all about weeding and gardening. On her recommendation, I ordered another couple of weeding tools. She said you do not need to use Roundup; Wirecutter in The New York Times had lately averred that you do. She said that she weeds all winter and for a second, I thought, “I’m going to do that, too!” Then I realized my friend can weed all winter because she lives near Seattle. I will not be weeding all winter in Ypsilanti. That’s when I’m going to sit on my sister’s couch and read the many unread novels that have been patiently waiting for me to get to them.

My weeding friend suggested that I volunteer at a community garden and / or join a gardening club. She said I will learn a lot and will enjoy hanging around the kinds of people who do these things. She also said to be careful of my hands (and back and knees ... ). This was a good reminder. My hands are increasingly arthritic, with various knuckles taking turns having painful flare-ups that so far abate after a bit. I actually had been wondering how all the snipping was going to affect my hands, so I will now look into how an aging weeder takes care of her hands as well as the rest of her body. My mother had a fantastic wheeled thing you can sit on while gardening, but it is gone now. Maybe I will end up getting one.

So I am excited about weeding and about all the lovely Midwesterners I am going to meet at the community garden and / or in the gardening club, and about my new weeding tools that are coming, and also about doing some cycling there, though I have not decided whether to ship my one bicycle there now, or ship it later, or just buy a bicycle there, or buy an e-bike. One way or the other, I will need a rack for the car, so I have been discussing this with a knowledgeable friend. There are also two houses on my little block that have lately changed hands, plus one more than is maybe on the market now or will be soon; I am excited about going to welcome all my new neighbors. Maybe I will join a rowboating club! (Say its name: Lake Ontario.)

ROTM

Marvin did meet with the animal communicator yesterday, via Zoom. He remained in a carrier under the bed the whole time, but this did not impede the flow of conversation. I have no idea what actually happened for him, but I found it weirdly relaxing to sit at my desk and listen to the animal communicator’s side of the discussion, and it was also oddly touching to hear what Marvin was (or wasn’t) saying.

After that, I went online to order a new iPhone. My current one is a 13 Mini, which I love a lot for its little size, but the screen is increasingly unresponsive. I set out to order a new phone a couple of months ago, but, nearing the final step, got an error saying that Apple could not find my phone number at Verizon. I called Apple and they said I would have to discuss the problem with Verizon. (Which is not what they should have said. I’ll tell you what they should have said.)

Since, like any rational human being, I would rather eat a razor blade than call Verizon, I waited until yesterday to see if the problem had magically resolved itself, but it hadn’t. I knew Apple would again say to call Verizon, so I didn’t bother calling them and just called Verizon, and had the usual enraging experience of being asked, “Would you like to talk about your shoes or would you like to talk about the Knicks?” If the answer doesn’t happen to be either of those, you soon hear, “Sorry you’re having problems. Goodbye,” and it ends the call, as opposed to saying, “I’ll connect you with someone who can help.”

It’s possible to hear the latter, but it takes a lot of hit and miss, and of course I am irate by the time I’m talking to a person. The people who are in that role at Verizon must encounter a spectacular amount of verbal abuse; I’m sorry to say I was pretty unpleasant with the person I spoke with yesterday. He said the problem is that I have a prepaid plan and that what I’d need to do is go to a Verizon store and get a contract, if I understood correctly. (Which is not what he should have said. I’ll tell you what he should have said.)

I actually did not know that I had a prepaid plan, and was waspishly adamant that I do not have a prepaid plan. Here’s what I have: a prepaid plan. (Which is likely the best thing to have at Verizon, costwise. With taxes and fees, my monthly bill is less than $42, with more data than I can possibly use.)

I then called Apple to say that Verizon had not solved the problem of my number not being findable at Verizon vis a vis the purchase of a new iPhone. The salesperson set out to place the order for me, and was stopped at the same place by the same error. While I was on hold, I discovered that the problem is having a prepaid plan, regardless of carrier, and that the workaround is to not choose a carrier and to indicate that you will do that later. So when I called Apple a couple of months ago, they should have just told me that, and ditto the fellow at Verizon yesterday, rather than saying I’d need to go get a contract. It is true that if I had a contract, Apple would presumably have been able to find my phone number at Verizon, but that’s the long, most expensive and wholly unnecessary way around.

The Apple salesperson placed the order yesterday evening. He asked if a delivery window of 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. today would be fine. I said I really didn’t need for it to arrive at that particular time, but that that would be fine.

I got an email saying the order was being processed; I saw that my landline was listed, so this morning, I called to update that with my cell phone number, since they had said they were going to email and text a PIN for the delivery. The automated assistant answered. I emphatically expressed my preference not to speak with an automated assistant, and a human being updated my phone number.

A bit later, I got an email saying that the delivery was unable to be completed and therefore my order had been canceled.

This was shortly after I was getting ready to do today’s medication testing for Marvin. I discovered that Wedgewood had sent me an orange-colored syringe, which made it completely impossible to tell how much medication was in the syringe! Also, if there is or isn’t an air bubble? Can’t tell. I called them and had a completely unhelpful conversation with a pharmacist. He said the reason the syringes are orange is that the medication is light sensitive. Quite understandable that the bottle itself would be orange, which it is, but the medication is only going to be in the syringe for 30 seconds. Not long enough for light to have any effect on it, as far as I can tell.

I was therefore already quite disgruntled when I called Apple to see why they’d canceled my order just after collecting the money for it. This time I said, “Go fuck yourself, automated assistant,” and was soon speaking with a salesperson, who, like many persons at Apple, has a Southern accent.

She explained that you should never agree to the first possible delivery window, because if the driver shows up late or doesn’t show up and it appears they can’t deliver during the specified window, Apple will indeed cancel your order. I totally didn’t care exactly when this item arrived, but I’m sure there are many people who care strongly enough to cancel their phone order and switch to Android for good measure, so I guess Apple is just beating them to it.

Somehow, the saleslady mentioned that her husband is on a fishing trip today but had called her three times. She said she asked him where his brother is. Her husband said his brother was taking a nap, so the saleslady joked to her husband, “So I guess you just want to bother me.” I said it sounded like he missed her and just wanted to hear her voice. I asked how long they’d been married, assuming it must be no longer than two weeks, but she said that their youngest is 29, or something like that.

Then she told me, in detail and at great length, the story of their courtship, which began before either of them was a teenager. I was in tears by the end of her story, and also worried that Apple was going to fire her once they heard the recording of this call, so I made a point of thanking her in detail for every element of customer service and making it clear that I was utterly delighted by this conversation, which I was. It made my day. (By the way, she said the secret of a relationship that lasts this long with the affection still alive and well is being willing to discuss difficulties. She said too many people want to run away when something goes wrong, but they will have the exact same problems in their next relationship. She said it’s not easy to do, but is what is necessary.)

As for the medication, fortunately, I had a clear syringe from Chewy and was able to offer Marvin a tiny amount of fish-flavored liquid gabapentin mixed with tuna juice, which he more or less ate most of, but not all, so that test failed, as have most of the previous tests, so I have arranged for a vet tech to come the morning we travel and the evening before, to give him two squirts of liquid medication on both occasions: gabapentin and trazodone.

It’s been a very big day in metal in these parts. I course have been listening to Decibel magazine’s top 40 albums of 2025, as published in their January, 2026, issue. There have been some hard slogs—I really hate Blackbraid—and some pleasant surprises: I thought I would hate Castle Rat, and I don’t know that I will ever listen to them again, but their album gave me goosebumps at moments.

Up until the final (top) three albums, the time-to-pleasure ratio was pretty far off. With honorable mention to NyreDolk (#38!—practically at the bottom) and Species (#21), the only band I fell completely in love with was Morbikon (#33, also pretty close to the bottom), who fortunately have just two albums, so I didn’t have a huge amount to work through. I have listened to their two albums many, many times, with great pleasure.

I think I was not posting regularly last fall, so did I mention that I was Decibel’s READER OF THE MONTH, in October, 2025? I was! By far the deepest honor of my life. I know I have mentioned great honors a few times very recently, but really, being Decibel’s ROTM was truly the most exciting and satisfying thing that ever happened to me.

Number three on Decibel’s top 40 list was the latest from Paradise Lost, one of my favorite bands. I assumed I would love the new album, but it’s actually going to take some getting used to. I am not far enough into my Paradise Lost-athon. An “-athon,” in my lexicon, is when you listen to every studio album of a given band in chronological order. However, one thing has a way of spiraling off in another direction, so I am in the middle of -athons for Paradise Lost, King’s X, Carcass, and Cathedral, and actually have not even quite finished my Darkthrone-athon.

With Paradise Lost, I began with Shades of God, which I loved immediately. I went back to their first album after a while, and to this day, have not gotten past Draconian Times. It’s a ways from that to the latest—more than 30 years and a bunch of albums. As with many metal bands, the guitar solos can sound so far out of the pocket—completely outside the entire outfit, possibly—that you wonder if the guy is soloing over a different song than everyone else in the band is playing.

For a prime example—and I am not dissing this song; I completely love this song, including for its guitar solo—try “Caesar’s Palace” by Morbid Angel.

When it comes to Paradise Lost, it happens routinely and is actually kind of heartwarming. You can clearly see the thought bubble over that one guy’s head: “I don’t care if the rest of these blokes are in the key of C. I’m in the key of F sharp, right on.”

Yesterday, on to the album that was the runner up: The Spin, by Messa, an Italian band. Their name means “mass,” in the sense of the religious ritual. I don’t know how often I’ll listen to the whole album, but at moments, it completely stunned me.

And so today, the big winner! The band: Deadguy. The album: Near-Death Travel Services. Per the review, their genre is a mix of metal and hardcore. In 31 years, they have produced precisely two albums; the -athon is 50 percent complete already! For such obnoxious music—perfectly consonant with my mood today—it’s surprisingly catchy. Kinda perfect. They deserved to win.

The review says this is the finest comeback album since Carcass’s Surgical Steel, which once upon a time was also Decibel’s record of the year. I happen to already love Carcass (who have produced only eight albums, depending on how you count) and am well into that -athon, but had not gotten to Surgical Steel, so I leaped ahead to that today, and also set out to find the answer to a question that had been perplexing me for some months.

Now, when it comes to guitar solos, Carcass’s do not fall into that previously described category. They are delectably, deliciously, perfectly, heartbreakingly in the pocket. Now hear this: “Buried Dreams.” It has never in my entire life been the case that a guitar solo was the first thing I liked about a band, but the guitar solos were the first thing I liked about Carcass, in “Buried Dreams.” I heard it / them, and I vaguely thought, “That’s rather pretty. I’d like to hear that again.” I have heard the song many times since then, and still practically black out when I hear that solo—or solos.

Carcass has at times, but not always, had two lead guitarists at the same time; the vocalist plays the bass. There’s a drummer. So the question that had perplexed me was who was playing that solo; it did sound like two people taking turns, but was it? There is one guitarist that has been in Carcass every year it’s been active: Bill Steer. Look him up. He is darling. But in that song, while Bill Steer plays the first part of the guitar solo, which is wonderful, I established today, by watching a live version of the song, that it is Michael Arnott who plays the second part, which is the part that nearly makes me fall on the floor every single time I hear it.

As for Surgical Steel, it is thoroughly excellent. Like the Deadguy album, very heavy and also very catchy.

I walked over to the vet’s office to pick up some clear oral syringes for the vet tech to use—is this plan really going to work? It was a gorgeous day, the kind of day on which I keep thinking, “I can’t believe I’m going to leave this best place on earth.”

Leaving my job has landed like a psychic ton of bricks, despite it being my choice and despite my having been thinking about it for some time. It is shocking to have something so big and important suddenly gone. It feels like a lesson about the impermanence of other large things, such as my good health and life itself, and even the somewhat lesser but still pretty big thing of my rent-controlled Mission District apartment. The message seems to be: Don’t hold on. You cannot. Let go. Let go. Let go.

But I’m not sure how “Let go” applies to my apartment. Does it mean to let go of the apartment itself, or to not to cling to the money it would take to pay my rent for however long? Perhaps for a year; I imagine I would know by then if I had made a giant mistake.