Cable

While I admit that I do have cable TV, I always qualify that by adding that I only get 20 channels. It's the cheapest thing you can get on my cable system ($12/month) called Lifeline. Time Warner doesn't even advertise it on their website...I think they're ashamed of it. I get the big three networks (of course) as well as PBS, UPN, Fox, the WB, TV Guide, QVC, HSN, C-Span, MTV2, CMT and some local access junk that's basically painful to watch. The sad part is that without my little Lifeline hookup, I can't even get the local channels. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around the whole concept of paying to watch TV....and I simply cannot bring myself to pay the $55/month for basic cable. So I suffer. But still I bitch.

What really grinds me is that my sister is constantly telling me about some show she just watched about some fantabulous faraway place, or the secret life of circus freaks, or the Top 20 inanimate objects that have been surgically removed from the human body; and I'm all like, well it must be nice to watch some circus freak show every now and again. When I get jealous, which is what invariably happens in these conversations, she tells me she has a hundred channels and there's never anything to watch, and it's just so not worth the money. Easy for her to say, after she's already had her fill of Headline News and AMC movies and E True Hollywood Damn Stories.

So the other night I was babysitting at Sissy's and spent the hours after I put the kids to bed with the digital remote glued to my hot little hand, flipping from channel to channel. E! completely disappointed me with a Paris Hilton video shoot documentary, followed by back to back Simpletons, I mean The Simple Life.

I had to pursue other avenues, like Discovery Health:

The Shrinking Woman - Okay, this show is just a train wreck. A 619 lb woman who had weight loss surgery and lost like three quarters of herself does not need to be nekkid on the TV, even with her privates pixilated. They kept surgically sawing away at her mountains of excess flesh; and yes, it was as horrific as it sounds.

We Lost 800 Lbs - Okay, they're not just obese, they're Super Obese. As near as I can figure, they both lay around in hospital beds wearing backless gowns all day, getting oxygen and feeding tubes and stuff. And that makes me wonder if those backless gowns had to be special ordered, or if every hospital has a few backless gowns on hand that can easily wrap around a 500 pound woman.

Frankly, I see more than enough cellulite and stretch marks when I look in the mirror, thank you very little.

I tried Food TV, but I couldn't really get into it after watching all the dang fat people so I flipped to HGTV for a while, thinking I could find Candice Olson (did she ever have that baby??) or Design On A Dime. I kinda hated the couple on House Hunters, but I thought The Junk Brothers had promise. It was kind of interesting for a while, but they kept showing the brother's muscles bulging in closeups as they picked up large hunks of wood and lugged them around. It was kind of like a Ty Pennington show without the hysteria.

After flipping through a hundred channels trying to find something interesting to watch, I determined that the best bet was probably American Masters on PBS about Albert Einstein's life.

And I could have watched that at home.

Kitty

I don't come from a cat family. We were a dog family. My mother hated cats and while my dad liked them well enough, he was always more of a dog person. Pop never wanted to have a pet that wouldn't come every time you called it.

My son is and always has been a cat person; his father is a cat person that comes from a long line of cat people. Dan wanted a cat all his life and I said no all his life, with every move, "because we live in an apartment and we're not allowed to have a cat". When we bought this house, the apartment excuse was dead in the water of course. I should have thought it out better....but how in God's name was I to know I'd buy a house at age 42, when that kid was a sophomore in high school?

To do his share for the family, kitty has occasionally left us his little "contributions" over the past four years; a plump little mouse here, a tiny baby mole there....usually outside the back door to make sure we know it's from him.

Eewww.

This summer kitty kicked it up a notch. I'm not sure whether he's getting better at hunting or what, but one night he came swinging through the yard with a baby chipmunk in his mouth. I was horrified. I ran to the house ahead of him and barrelled in the back door, slamming the storm door in his startled little face. Poor bastard....he was all proud of his hunter-killer instincts and there I was in tears, telling him through the glass, "Mama loves you kitty and she's very very proud of you....now take that little chippy and put him back wherever you found him. Go on....good cat....go on." And kitty was all WTF??

Kitty's finale was the week of the 4th of July, while my son was home from school. There was a mouse or mole (or half of one....eewwww) at our door every single day that week. It was gruesome. He even brought us a baby bird that turned out to be sill barely alive....which we found out when it tried to escape by flying up the girlfriend's skirt. Good times.

Since Dan went back to school, there have been no tiny dead animals on my doorstep. It was obvious that kitty was tying to impress him and not me...but c'mon...what am I? Chopped liver? I'm just the one who cleans your dang litter box and feeds you and pays your vet bills and buys your dang Frontline and keeps you in cat toys and lets you sleep in my bed. Gawd.

So one night last week, after a loooong and frustrating day, I found half a baby mole (the tail end....eewwww) on the sidewalk between the garage and the house.

Kitty threw me a bone. So to speak.

"Quotes"

My life is so quiet now, with just kitty and me rambling around in this big old house. I'm not saying I don't like it....I'm just saying it's different. My son and I are still in pretty close touch with Sunday phone calls and an email every few days, but I'm getting a taste of what it'll be like when he really does have his own life.

Here are a few examples from recent email of why I think he needs a blog of his own.

And I quote:

"Last night I went grocery shopping, and I hope you are sitting down for this. I did not buy one...I didn't buy 2...I bought THREE items of the fruit/vegetable variety. I got a big slice of seedless watermelon, 5 ears of corn, and a little bag of apples. On top of that, a half gallon of milk. Ok...I'll give you a little break to stop your heart from racing over the sheer amazement."

On boredom at work:

"We are severely understaffed and as a result when I wasn't baby sitting the water leaks I was sitting at the main desk for over 4 hours today ready to stab my eyes out with a dull pencil just to feel something."

On justifying buying a digital camera:

"The camera is so cool and 'ultra-compact' and I think a good investment. For example, right now they have Mirror Lake completely drained and they're cleaning all of the crap out of the bottom of it. It's really crazy...all the ducks are like WTF?"

Responding to my request that he check out free AOL:

"Ummm....what AOL for free gig? AOL is Satan wrapped in pretty clothes trying to entice people to come party, then turns out to be a date-rape murderer...."

Kitty and I miss you, baby.

Kids

Tonight I went to a church festival with my sis and her daughter. Under protest. When they called and asked if I was up for it, I was napping. Cuz I'm a thousand years old and that's what thousand year old women do, dammit.

I digress: I had emailed my son earlier in the day and asked him if they would dare have this particular festival without him, because when he was a kid it was in our back yard and he was pretty sure they put it on every year just for his personal amusement. He responded that he told them they could go ahead with it this year without him.

So two and a half hours later, after tromping around with the sun in my eyes, I'd totally had enough. The dragon roller coaster, the fishing game, the other fishing game, the two foot beach ball in my arms, won by picking a yellow duck out of a tub of typhoid water by an amazed three year old, we bellied up to the sno cone stand and watched as a grimy carny poured ice into a blender with her bare hands and made us a couple of germcicles. Good times.

And good Lord in heaven it all brought back such memories. Wasn't it just last summer that my kid was that three year old? Thrilled to be riding the dragon coaster over and over? And over?

Another friend hooked up with us on the (excruciatingly) long walk home. Her kids are teenagers, and she thought maybe a beer later would be a good thing. And I'm like....cool. I'd kinda been hoping I could sneak off to the beer tent at the festival all evening and no one would notice. Not.

So after our walking, riding, standing around, watching, germ drinking adventure, I ditched my sis and my niece and went out for a beer.

The first place we went had karaoke. Loud karaoke. Terrible karaoke. We had one drink and left.

The second place we went was an old haunt I hadn't been to in years and years. And the owner was all like, where have you been?? Such adventures I had at that place. So stinking long ago. It's nice to be missed, you know?

And then my friend's cell phone rang. Her kids were fighting over the computer and required an intervention. So she told them to knock it off and go to their separate corners. Then her ex-husband called and told her that the fighting children had called him, and he was going to go to her house and find out what the heck the problem was, and she told him that she could handle it. And then my friend called her kids back and told them they were both in Big Trouble. And then we finished our drinks and went home.

And now I can't stop thinking of the days when my son was growing up. Of church festivals when he was tiny; and being out when he was a teenager and having him call me and want me to come home...even though as soon as I got there he would just go to bed and sleep like a little lamb, knowing his mama was home with him. Not caring that he ruined my fun...not caring that he wouldn't say anything to me except, "Good night," when I got there. And that I would be up for hours; hang time, alone, laying on the couch, wired and watching TV till I could unwind enough to go to sleep.

Like my seventy-something friend says, "It's nice when your kids have their own lives."

Raising kids is a much better thing to have done than to actually do. It's work and it's sacrifice and it's lonely and it's sweet and it's bitter...but if you do it right, the reward you get at the end is a kid you can be proud of. An adult that is interesting and funny and smart, and such a blessing to your life.

Being out with two moms tonight reminded me that having a child is the only miracle you will ever get to be a part of.