…seem an unlikely form of medication for a condition that involves a sore throat, but horse pills are what I have, nevertheless. It’s only been two days of medicine taking, and I still feel blechy. My ears don’t hurt quite as much, but swallowing is still really painful, and I just feel achy and off-kilter. I’ve slept more in the last two days than I ever do in a week, normally.

The dogs keep guarding me, pressing their small furry bodies as close to me as they can, and growling if I sneeze or cough. They’re not accustomed to me being horizontal for this long. Fuzzy, of course, relishes any excuse not to have to be awake.

The bright spot in the weekend was the arrival in the mail of the DVD of Superman Returns, accompanied by a “mystery pack” of Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab imps purchased from a delightful member of the BPAL Madness forum. I think they smell good, but until I can actually breathe, I won’t be certain.

Nothing much else to say tonight. Gonna go eat something soft and soothing, and then go back to sleep.

Shh! Yes, I know it’s Saturday.

Filched from Janet.

1. Sea urchin is the grossest thing I ever ate.
2. I like to put peanut butter or brie on my crackers.
3. I crave cheesy salty snacks at night.
4. I always add apples to my pancake batter.
5. When I think of comfort food, I think of Stouffer’s Macaroni and Cheese, baked til there’s a thin crust of cheese over the top and everything’s all bubbly underneath.

It’s official. I DO have strep. I blame Fuzzy for bringing it home (his co-worker caught it from his wife, who had scarlet fever), and giving it to me, though he doesn’t seem symptomatic at all. Spent the morning getting the back of my throat prodded, buying drugs and mushy sore throat-friendly food, and had a croaky chat with my mother.

Am now going to go back to sleep, as I’m confined to quarters til Monday.

And I have nothing to read.

Argh!

Have been nursing a sore throat (again) for two days – determined however that this time it’s most likely strep. Oh, joy. Being sick sort of makes everything around me feel surreal and disconnected, as if I’m looking at someone else’s picture book, or seeing someone else’s movie. Everything exists in a sort of watery haze.

It was, therefore, appropriate that Fuzzy and I watched Lady in the Water tonight. We’d missed it in theatres, and so brought it home with a free coupon from Blockbuster. I expected a weak thriller. I got a beautiful, haunting, moody, fairy tale. Shyamalan calls the tale a bedtime story and explains that he based it on made-up bedtime stories he shared with his children. As always, he’s crafted a wonderful mood, a delightful modern fable. If I had kids of my own, I’d totally buy the book for them.

My brain isn’t functioning enough to add more to this. Have a good weekend everyone.

I mean, I like them, but close proximity to them makes me all sneezy, which is never good. Nevertheless, I love watching big cats – you know lions and tigers and panthers, and such – so when I saw the latest shapeshifter scent at Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab, I had to order it:

From the BPAL website:

BAKENEKO
In sharp contrast to the stark sterility of Hunger Moon, we present a carnivorous chaotic charmer: the bakeneko. The Monster Cat is a shapeshifter, and is empowered to take the form of a beautiful woman (to entice lonely gentlemen) or a winsome young maiden (to the peril of childless couples). Though some bakeneko are benevolent, and only wish to find someone to care for them, or to show gratitude to a mortal that has done them a great service, others are furry balls of malevolent mayhem. Their mischief ranges from simply destructive — knocking over lamps and destroying property, tossing ghostly, freezing fireballs from their hands — to horrifying acts of carnage.

(Warm amber musk, Satsuma tangerine, black tea leaf, cardamom, cherry blossom and cinnamon.)

And speaking of watching cats…

My friend Rana is an amazingly caring cat-mom. So much so, that in an effort to both save cash and not torment a recently-ill kitty, she’s trying to do a natural capture of a urine specimen. I know this because our relationship is generally limited to online exchanges and the occasional sharing of coffee and conversation in person, but today she actually called me. Why? Because she had errands to run, and needed someone to watch the kitty cam and see if the cat used the litterbox. I was happy to help.

She made me promise to not make her seem like a moron. I don’t think there’s anything moronic in caring for your pet that much – I mean, I learned how to give Zorro rectal injections of valium when he was seizing, so HE wouldn’t have to sleep in a cage.

Of course, that wasn’t televised.

I didn’t sleep well last night. I woke around three from a nightmare in which my decades-deceased uncle was partially transformed into a panther, and was being interrogated, while I and someone I couldn’t identify held paperbacks, and argued about whether the pages flying around were loose because of a ghost or because spilled vinegar had melted the glue in the binding. I was on the side of vinegar. The dream sounds funny, now, I know, but in the dark, in the night, it was creepy and left me awake with my skin tingling, and while the details faded, the terror lingered. Poor Fuzzy tried to soothe me but the only solution was to be awake, so I pulled the laptop in bed with me, and left the lights out so he could sleep, and finally went to sleep again around five, waking when Fuzzy nudged me to tell me that he was leaving.

Only after I’d worked for an hour from bed did I realize that it was cold, and grey and damp outside. I looked out to the mailbox to see if mail had come, and couldn’t tell, but a very pale golden retriever was hovering around the mailbox (not surprising, as it’s Zorro and Cleo’s favorite spot to leave messages) and it saw me and wagged its tail. I went out an hour or so later to check the mail, and it was across the street. It sat and wagged at me, and I decided that if it was still out and the damp turned to rain, I would bring it into the garage and give it water and a blanket and see if its collar held id tags that were of any use. But when I checked again when the rain started, there was no sign of the dog.

I’ve seen it before, in the neighborhood, but can’t remember where it lives. Poor thing. I could tell it wanted to be home.

My throat is all raw again today, and I feel kind of blechy. Not sick exactly, just…blechy. As if the grey damp day has settled into my mood in a bad way.

This afternoon I wrote about 300 words about Honda Accords. My first official work. Still don’t have the manual I was told about. Must remember to check on that. I like these little 250-ish word reviews. They’re quick and snappy and since it’s just content there are no funky keywords to embed. Also, it’s informative.

Had pumpkin I had to use, so made pie this afternoon. We hadn’t made it over Christmas because I forgot to get the evaporated milk. As it is, Fuzzy brought me back a can each of evaporated and condensed, so I used them both (recipe calls for two cans of evaporated), and used the dregs of the condensed milk to sweeten my mug of chicory-laced coffee from Cafe du Monde, a present from my cousin Stacie in Louisiana, whose birthday is TOMORROW. (Must remember to call her.) She’s got this gentle Southern accent and as sharp a tongue as I have, though her humor is kinder than mine. We’re just getting to know each other after a lifetime of really being just names to one another, and it’s been a great experience.

And now? Now Fuzzy is home, and I made his favorite vegetables, and I’m going to putter and do laundry and maybe be in bed by one.

I’ve had a reprieve of sorts from my first day of work, as the manual that we were supposed to receive before Christmas is not yet here. Boss says I should have it tomorrow. My plan is to bring the laptop out by the fire and read in comfort.

Granted another vacation day, I spent it revamping my blog. I do this from time to time, anyway, but today’s revamp includes the addition of a second column, mostly to hold adsense and amazon links, a completely new color scheme, and oh, yes, I changed all my various IM id’s as well (so if I’m on any of your lists, you probably got a re-auth request).

My archives and category listings now appear on the archive page, and eventually other links will go live. In the meantime, pardon the dust – it generally takes me a couple days to do all the tweaking I want to accomplish.