Snow Days

I'm trying hard to recall the sweaty days of summer. Remember, waking up to the drone of the air conditioner? Remember, avoiding the Easy Bake attic at all costs? Remember, silently blessing the neighbors for their swimming pool and their open-door policy? I banked up all of those memories to get me through the winter and up until now they've been pretty effective. Until Tuesday, when the snow from the barn roof slid off in one slushy sheet, missing my head by a few inches.

Everyone's telling us this is a very mild winter, for which I am grateful. Still, it's cold. Californians are very familiar with snow of course; it snows a lot in the Sierras. Tahoe and Big Bear have some of the greatest skiing in the country. But the vast majority of us don't live with it; we just visit it. Big difference.

The snow didn't last very long. A nice long rainshower melted it into chains of street puddles and a quagmire in the backyard. If we're going to put up with snow at least let's get a serious storm that puts a few inches down. Give us a Snow Day, which for some reason my daughters are obsessed with. Let us walk outside with our snow clothes and our plastic saucers, so we can sled down the slopes at the cemetery across the street.

Then it can be spring.

Only Cat in the Doghouse

For almost a year our two Siamese cats have only seen New Jersey from inside the walls of our colonial house. There was the time Kristi squeezed out the second-floor bathroom screen and clung for dear life on the porch overhang...but it was brief. A few weeks ago it was Belle's turn to view life on the outside. She developed a weird smell on her fur that transferred itself to the freshly washed sheets of Elizabeth and Caroline. So I decided it was finally time for a visit to the friendly vet. My neighbor Hank told me to go to Hopewell Veterinary Group. I bundled her in her pet carrier and away we went. She was terrified from the first; the terror mounted on first sniff at the vet's. They always smell like dog and of course they are always filled with dogs. I sat down with a petrified, growling cat and saw that I was surrounded by a bull mastiff, Cavalier King Charles spaniel, a mutt and a little rugrat whose breed I couldn't identify. Every few minutes the bull mastiff would snuffle the carrier until finally, Belle snapped. I couldn't see what she was doing inside but the whole carrier jumped off the seat and settled back on its side. Everyone looked at me and the mastiff's owner pulled him back and explained that "the kitty doesn't want to play." I felt like a party pooper and was relieved to hear my name called.
We never figured out the cause of that smell, the vet and I. All he had to do was collect my $20 and tell me to give her a bath. Easy for him to say. Have you ever bathed a cat? That's a whole other story.