An open thread for personal stuff, continuing from here.
As usual for these threads: no trolls, no MRAs, no I’m-not-really-an-MRA-buts, don’t be mean.
Categories
We Hunted The MammothBucking the Backlash
We Hunted The Mammoth
That is a great quotation, daintydougal! “Objectivity is Male Subjectivity” is so true.
I know I’m late with this, but I have to be a wet blanket: even young cats can be extremely expensive. Feline urinary tract disease is not an uncommon condition for indoor cats. My cat has it. I’ve known two other cats with it. It is extremely painful for the cat, and fatal within a few hours for male cats, and a few days for female cats. Treatment is hella pricey. My cat must eat a special vet-only food or she’ll die. She developed this disease when she was 2 years old and will have to be on the special food for the rest of her life.
The odds are with you! Not every cat gets it! Most wind up healthy! But I don’t know if you want to play roulette with a living animal.
There’s also the matter of desexing. If shelters there work like they do here, you can’t get an animal that hasn’t been desexed, but they’ll be expensive to buy.
All our kitties are desexed prior to adopting or at six months if they’re adopted prior to that age and yeah, there are a couple hundred bucks in adoption fees to cover the procedure and their initial vet checks and all their shots. That’s a lot cheaper than buying a kitty from a pet store though!
When I was living in a place where I couldn’t have pets (and couldn’t afford to move to a place that allowed pets) I started to grow citrus. If you don’t live in a citrus-growing state they can be pretty high-maintenance, and definitely benefit from daily fussing. It was like having a pet that the landlord didn’t mind, and which turned food into delicious lemons (instead of into cat poop).
I still have my citrus, more than 10 years later. I love them so much.
I would love to have a cat, but..if I mess up my life, I suffer. I could not live with making another creature suffer when I fall apart.
Got a post up at my blog that I think some might find interesting. It’s an analysis of some of the things going on under the surface of Meat Loaf’s Paradise By The Dashboard Light: Serious Thoughts About A Funny Song.
LBT, would Sneak’s need for a pet be met somewhat by volunteering at an animal shelter? The SPCA here has a pretty rigourous screening process for volunteers, but they always need walkers and petters. Zie could get zir cuddles in without potential hardship in case of emergency. If you have the time and energy for it.
seraph, interesting thoughts on Paradise By The Dashboard Light. You’re right, it probably sounds puzzling and a little dated to today’s kids, who don’t have to worry so much about shotgun weddings. The insecurity about “will he still love me/will my first love last forever” is still around, though.
I was in fifth grade when that song came out, and (thanks to Mad magazine and loudmouthed neighborhood kids) knew about the “baseball system” of making out. What I didn’t understand, though, was why it only seemed to apply to guys. Women, apparently, were just a series of bases to either be rounded one after another, or blocked by an alert defense. I remember listening to Phil Rizzuto’s interlude and thinking “Can girls play this? How come only the guy gets a play by play? What’s the equivalent of second base for a girl?” (Mad didn’t have much to say on the subject of the double standard.)
They don’t make absurd operatic songs (or album covers) like that anymore, which is too bad. Another one I used to love was Bohemian Rhapsody, which my sister assured me was about a group of people trapped underneath an avalanche, or “caught in a landslide”, singing to pass the time while they waited for rescue. She sounded so sure of herself that I totally believed her. It was so disappointing when I later figured out it was all metaphorical.
Good thing I remembered to get some Italics Monster chow at the store this morning…
I found this adorable gif for anyone who is wanting some puppy cuddles:
http://i.imgur.com/vFhsQ8X.gif
There’s a really interesting guest post on Jezebel from a researcher who makes the case that gamergate is a hate group.
For some reason either WordPress or my phone won’t let me paste links. I can do it when I get home tonight. It’s on the front page of both Jezebel and Gawker so it’s easy to find. Anyway, I recommend it. I haven’t gotten to the comments yet but there’s sure to be some entertaining whining.
Were you consoled by the fact that Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man” is literally about a man made of iron?
@katz It is? Oh, dammit!
Kitteh’s: a cheaper fix than the wedge is part of a 2×4 under your mattress on the side you sleep on. It only has to be a few inches high to get relief.
Here’s the Jezebel story WWTH references:
http://jezebel.com/gamergate-trolls-arent-ethics-crusaders-theyre-a-hate-1644984010
Pretty interesting.
Yup! I’m addicted! I have trouble making myself write throughout the year, but I can consistently manage NaNo.
Cool. Need someone to periodically kick you in the pants? I’m very good at it.
@katz, the biggest time I need the butt-kicking is in december; I stop writing @ 50k, even though the novel is never actually finished.
RE: WWTH
We were considering getting an older cat, because I don’t think I have the energy for a kitten, and I know older cats tend to have a harder time getting adopted. I would probably prefer an indoor cat too just because then there would be less worries about it getting into trouble or lost. (Plus make it less likely they bring in fleas from other cats.)
RE: katz
I would advise you not to get a pet at this point, while your situation is so unstable.
Oh, nonono, I didn’t mean getting one NOW. I mean possibly getting one after we move, if it looks like we’ll be there for a long time and are financially stable. (Of course, I say ‘long time,’ but have yet to live anywhere longer than two years since reaching adulthood. *sigh* I really hoped Boston would be my endpoint, but then Shit Happened)
RE: Kittehs
Well, you should have annual checkups for shots and possibly getting teeth cleaned,
Is that something a vet does, or the owner does? I can’t imagine a cat willingly holding still while I brush it’s teeth…
RE: Unimaginative
LBT, would Sneak’s need for a pet be met somewhat by volunteering at an animal shelter?
*sigh* Zie actually tried that, but to get the required training, zie would have to go to a facility outside of town, which is only accessible by ONE bus that ONLY runs at 6AM. We would then have to loiter until 10 or 11, which is then the training, and then somehow persuade someone to give us a ride to the NEXT training facility, which we CAN’T take a bus to because like I said, the only bus runs at 6AM.
If we are late to either training meeting, Sneak would get the boot. So yeah, zie was defeated by public transit fail. Which is so annoying, because the SPCA is RIGHT BY US. It’s just the training is way out elsewhere, and the person running them isn’t allowed to ask people to give us rides, probably due to safety/security issues. And since we don’t know anyone else volunteering…
hellkell: I did that last night, as it happens! I’ve got an old shaped pillow I haven’t used in years, and shoved it under the mattress. It’s a single bed, so the pillow takes up most of the width. Worked quite well, with a gradual incline.
LBT, if a dog or cat will tolerate toothbrushing, it’s good to brush their teeth at least once a week.
Since most kitties and puppies won’t tolerate that, a dental cleaning by a vet (usually under mild sedation) helps keep them healthier, longer.
And helps them keep teeth into their old age…
No dentures for kittikens!
I always worry I won’t end up capable of taking care of an animal. Admittedly, part of the reason we’re considering one is that living alone, some of my fellow system members are worried I’ll just seal myself in my home and not really interact with people. (Which is reasonable. I don’t like people seeing me in a bad state, and what with the whole SURPRISE INCEST horrorshow, I haven’t been seeing that many people. Plus, I just don’t have that many friends here.)
Plus, I like animals. I haven’t been able to have a pet since becoming an adult, but we were always around pets as children, and a bunch of my roommates have had cats. I miss having them around.
LBT: some people do manage to clean their cats’ teeth, though I can’t imagine any of ours letting us! But the sort of cleaning I’m thinking of is scaling bad teeth and it’s done under an anaesthetic. Fribby’s had to get it done because she’s had lousy teeth all her life. It’s less of an issue for cats who live on dry food, though that has its own issues: it needs to be good-quality food or it can lead to kidney and urinary tract problems.
*is now paranoid that he would blow a cat up through sheer incompetence* Living beings are COMPLICATED.
(I know, news at eleven.)