Cat Update

So, "little kitty, big balls" (as Anne has kindly named the stray due to his not being neutered yet) and Gunner are duking it out for the right to be King. They have now crapped on the bathroom floor, on the rug outside of the bathroom, pissed on Ada's skirt, sprayed the entrance carpeting, and peed in my basket of scarves. That is on top of "little kitty, big balls" giving Otto Chlamydia and him and Gunner being treated for upper repiratory problems. You would think that soemone's head would explode (i.e. "someone" = me), but so far I've taken it very well, I think.

I used to live in Vincent's house on 13th Street, which, if none of you visited or remember, used to be the kitty pee mecca of the Western world. Before I had even moved in, Daisy had a UTI which caused her to piddle everywhere except in the litter box. Vince never had the carpets cleaned, so that meant that Daisy and Chi-Chi (once he moved in) urinated wherever they felt like it, because the whole house smelled like a litter box.

And I can see the two-story apartment as litterbox theory emerging here, but my hopes are up. It looks as though "little kitty, big balls" will be heading off into the great wide yonder on Friday. Vandra has agreed to adopt him and as the medication is running down for the respiratory problems, it's time to say goodbye. So, very much like the children in The Sound of Music, I will sing chorus after chorus of, "So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, good night..."

And where is my Christmas spirit, you ask? Well, my friends, it seems to have dimmed somewhat when I looked at the temperature today and discovered that it was 17 degrees outside and most of my scarves now smell like cat piss. (Oh, what is that you say? You hear that can put a damper on things...? How right you are!)

In other news, Anthony will be here to regale me with his presence tomorrow. We have a whole day and a half to watch all the Christmas movies he can stand! He promises to be enthusiastic, but he may be looking for the nearest exit after several versions of The Christmas Carol... mwahahahahahahahahahaaaa!

I can't believe it's only Wednesday.

Yesterday I bought a humidifier for George (a.k.a. simple house plant that Ryan feels the need to name - "I'm gonna love him and hug him and name him George," says the Abominable Snowman to Bugs Bunny in Looney Toons) and it turns out that I bought a cool mist humidifier. So what that means to me is that my room is now about the same temperature as it is outside, replete with the requisite breeze from the little fan on top of the filter. Oh, and the outside temperature? A whopping 35 degrees (Fahrenheit), although with the 14mph winds it feels like 26 (or so says my weather webpage).

On top of that, I purchased a string of Christmas lights for George, and after dropping a few branches - which by the way will never grow back - it now looks like I've strangled the poor thing. What a loving plant mommy I turned out to be.

So on Friday Anthony no longer gets to enjoy a nice evening of peace and comfort in the warm throes of my orange room. Instead he gets to have his nether regions turn into icicles whilst he unplugs the stupid humidifier and drags it back to CVS to exchange it for a warm mist model. And he also gets to help me get my Christmas ornaments and the like out of storage, and drop off a bunch of Vincent's things at the house on 13th Street. And he even gets to take me grocery shopping! Will the fun never end???

Christmas is coming...
Christmas is coming
The goose is getting fat
Please to put a penny in the old man's hat
If you haven't got a penny
A ha'penny will do
If you haven't got a ha'penny
God bless you...


So, we're ringing in the new round of holidays with songs from seasons past. I distinctly remember all the words to this song (above), despite the fact that the last time I sang it in concert was sometime in middle school.

Anyway.

As of today, I am completely finished with Christmas shopping and am on to Christmas wrapping. My family's gifts were all delivered by Thanksgiving, but it is the rest of you schmucks that took all this time to buy for. Well, actually, it isn't really so much your fault as it is the fault of the system that keeps me employed, but only pays me enough to barely cover my credit card bill these days. I now have to space out my holiday spending...which is something I don't think I have had to do since I was young, maybe even too young to remember.

Although I did finally get a tree, my friends. With all of Vincent's former rants about live Christmas trees being a terrible thing, and Anthony and Corinne's "Bah Humbug!" spirit, I bought a Norfolk Island Pine yesterday. These trees are native to Austrailia and New Zealand, and in their home environment grow to be about 100 feet tall. However, when kept as indoor trees in a planter, they grow to about 6 feet. My tree, George, is currently a 2 1/2 foot wonder. Today I plan on getting him a humidifier and some Christmas lights. He will be beautiful...!

Last night I also initiated my kind of Christmas season by watching the first of a whole series of Christmas movies! Vincent dropped off some CDs for me while he was in town and I talked him into a little bit of Frosty the Snowman. So I have had a half-hour taste of what my holidays will be like... Anthony, watch out! You are in for a whole slew of movies...Muppet Christmas Carol, A Christmas Carol with George C. Scott, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Dr. Seuss's How the Grinch Stole Christmas, It's a Wonderful Life....all the Ryan-proof classics. And now that he has a cold (although he will insist he is well), I will be forcing him to sit down, relax, and do nothing but eat, drink, watch movies and be merry like Christmas!!!!

I am considering closing down my blog now after two years. I've actually stuck to writing in this weblog longer than I've ever staid with any one career. Now that's what you would call "irony."

Maybe I'm just tired of writing about my life in so public a format, or maybe I'm finally giving in to my own rhetoric about the bastardization of the English language through the use of technology, but no matter what, I know that I am tired of feeling compelled to write on a website that I don't know anyone reads (other than my Masshole, occasionally Yael, and my Mom). It would be just as easy, and a lot more personal, if I just took to handwriting letters to the two or three "readers" I have.

I don't know, we'll see.

In other news, my roommate Corinne took home a stray cat over the weekend. Yup, my apartment is now bedecked with FOUR cats. While I do think that it is incredibly benevolent of her to be actively protecting the lives of our furry little friends, I don't remember being asked if I wanted to turn into a crazy cat lady. And the potential for diseases, fleas, etc., etc., is huge. Even with isolating the kitty in our bathroom, that still leaves us all (including the three cats) open to contamination. I hate to be a hard-hearted, evil crust of a human being, but the kitty needs to go! Corinne promises me she will be on the phone today looking for a shelter for the kitty, but Anthony and I are making bets as to when the cat will actually be out of the house. Any takers?

I also just celebrated my 25th birthday. For most of my friends, who tend to be in the above-30 bracket, that means nothing, but for me, it means I survived a quarter of a century! We celebrated quietly, with a subdued dinner at Mr. Martino's Trattoria in South Philadelphia - Mark even threw in a free bottle of Martinelli's Cider as a gift. Most of the gang was there: Jason, Jimmy, Lisa, Erik, Tom, Javier, Corinne, and Vince (Anthony was delayed due to work, but made up for it the rest of the weekend)... It was good to see everyone sober.

I didn't do anything else all weekend. Anthony made me breakfast two days in a row and we also shared some special romantic time in the apartment on Saturday afternoon; I watched a bunch of Netflix movies; Derek Lee, his girlfriend Kat, and JJ came out to visit me on Sunday afternoon; and Anthony treated me to dinner at Friday, Saturday, Sunday last night (and I just finished the leftovers for lunch today). All in all, it was pretty quiet. Which is exactly the way I wanted it.

And now, there is nothing else I have to say. I'm still looking for that great next job, and planning for the holidays...

Happy birthday to me,
Happy birthday to me,
Happy birthday deeeeaaaaar meeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...!
Happy birthday to me.

Andrew and I spent Saturday night discovering just how low my tolerance for alcohol has really become. Three drinks into our delicately planned evening of sin and debauchery at the eighth annual Fetish Ball and I was already hammered. On Andrew's suggestion, when we left the Ball we headed out to Woody's, one of the premier destinations in the gay-berhood. And we called Anthony to come pick up the pieces.

All day Sunday was ruined for me - ruined I say! The kind of day I had was yet another reminder of why I hardly ever drink anymore. I slept on and off until four in the afternoon, in the hopes of outwitting my hangover, but silly me! My hangover must have lifted sometime during Sunday night, while I was attempting sleep again. And today I feel like I didn't sleep at all while some little sprite beat my body all over with a tiny, sprite-sized baseball bat. Ugh.

So for my birthday this weekend, just like I had originally planned, your favorite girl named Ryan will not be partaking of the alcoholic variety. As the owner of Mr. Martino's promised me a free bottle of Martinelli's Cider for my birthday, I will be partaking of that slightly bubbly beverage instead.

Enough said. I have to go pretend I can make it through Seventy's monthly Board Meeting. Good times had by all, I swear.

It's just another day in the office. I have a terrible headache, and have had it since I woke up this morning, so I am in no mood to do any work today. Unfortunately, an office of 3 isn't exactly the kind of situation in which you can totally slack off. People tend to notice things like me trying to catch up on sleep underneath my desk and other such stuff.

Yesterday I had the treat of some lunatic coming into my office and wanting to break into a board meeting so she could get the address of the law library. She thought the meeting sounded too "friendly" - as if that is a reason for her to be rude and interrupt the meeting.

No matter, I got rid of her after a half hour and now it's Tuesday. And it's 30 degrees outside. Yesterday I thought it was cold as I was walking to the gym, but this morning I felt like my head was going to freeze and then crack open (remember the headache?). Not so pleasant.

So what have I been up to lately, eh? Corinne (really, I was barely involved) held a Halloween party at our apartment, at which I only spent an hour before attempting to go to sleep (the elections had me working weeks straight, with no days off). Let me note the key word there: "attempting." At some point, for whatever reason, the party moved from the spacious upstairs living space to the stairwell outside my bedroom door. And drunk people are not quiet so I ended up being awake until about 2AM when I sent poor Anthony out to be my Enforcer. I was so pissed off (mostly due to the fact that I had work in the morning).

Other than that, the past few weeks have been devoted entirely to the elections process here in Philadelphia, where it was my job to organize a crew of volunteers, prepare them for their nonpartisan pollwatching activities, and then loose them on Philadelphia on November 2nd. What a pain in the ass! Need I say more?

This year we had the largest volunteer turnout we've had in the past 30 years or so, which is probably enough to say that it's the largest group of people we've had in the institution's history! I had no idea what I was doing, nor do I now really understand what happened, but it's all over now so I am attempting to recover. I still don't think I've caught up on sleep, and I may potentially be coming down with a cold but I'm fighting it every step of the way like the little hellcat I am.

Last weekend was my first few days off in a while. Just for spite (or perhaps because I really deserved it), I took off Friday as well. So, on Friday, I went to a spa and treated myself to 3 hours of pampering. Anthony had given me this spa certificate when I finished rafting the Grand Canyon (how sweet!), so I returned the favor and got him a drool-filled hour and a half aromatherapy massage (Swedish!). It was his first professional massage ever! (Oddly enough, after practicing for so many years on my mom's feet, I gave Anthony his first first massage - period.) I was so happy to provide him with something so special...

Then we spent the rest of the weekend in NYC, where I did nothing but eat, sleep and watch movies. We saw "Capturing the Friedmans," "Bob Le Flambeur," "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," most of "The Fellowship of the Ring," and then went to the theatre with hundreds of squirmy little children to see "The Incredibles." Oh how I love lazy weekends where my boyfriend cooks for me!

The only other thing to report is the upcoming events (in the case that you're paying attention and actually want to know): this weekend is the Fetish Ball and, as a birthday gift to me, my friend Andrew is purchasing a ticket for me - last time I went as a naughty schoolgirl and Andrew once went as a priest, what will we think of next?; the following weekend is my birthday and my friend Derek Lee is coming into town to see family so we get to play!; Thanksgiving at my mommy's brand spankin' new house in MA with Anthony; Christmas in North Carolina, and a winter's end visit from the lovely Christy!

What fun!