It is rumored that Gordon Ramsay is going to visit the cafe here, not to turn us around, but to study our methods. If he wants to garnish the foldovers, well, we’ll let him try. Of course, we’re thinking a dollop of jelly and he may be thinking parsley.

I am on one end of the sofa and Summer is stretched out with her little sick feet on my lap.We have the firestove going, warming up her. She has a comforter my grandmother made on her top half and a modern fiber-filled throw on her knees and feet. For a while Sydney was on top of her. He wasn’t sick, but I think he’s always a little tired.

Her sickie muscles may be achy because her sickie little legs are moving around on my lap and jiggling the laptop and, ahem, I have lost the home row twice already.

We have a doctor’s appointment for her this afternoon . . . and I’m certain I will have updates. Shane, by the way, is trying the ritual Wubba squeaking to drive out evil spirits.

I have a bunch of things to do and I am having trouble launching myself into them. A lot of these things I do over and over again and I think maybe other people should GET A CLUE. Also my nose hurts, from the inner part of the sticking out section on my face into the sinuses around it. I have scarfed an Alka-Seltzer Orange Zest dose and am waiting for relief. Also motivation, but motivation isn’t part of the old jingle: Plop, Plop. Fizz. Fizz. Oh,  what a relief it is.

I’m planning on starting a fire in the basement – in the fireplace, don’t get excited. The woodsmoke scent will filter up the stairs and the heat will chase any dampness away. Then I thought I would spray a nice bleach solution all over the shower down there. I am assuming nothing will blow up.

Housework. I don’t like it. But then I watched a Hoarder show last night which started with a lady making the same statement at the beginning of the show. And guess what? She was living in a house  you could not walk through that was full of cat feces and dead cats. Some of the cats were so dead, they were shriveled up and dried out.  And the house was so bad the cleaners were in HazMat gear as they picked up catting droppings with big shovels.

I don’t know if that motivates me or just plain scares me. Oh, and, she shops everyday at GoodWill. Now that scares me.

Then there’s dinner for the two rugrats here. I think we could have a little sporting practice – I’ll make foldovers and shout “go long.”

Aha! I forgot to say I now have a whistle. Yesterday Shane was barking like a total nutcase because some guy was on the roof. Okay, I just read that as I typed it and perhaps when someone is on your roof and you are a dog, you don’t have to be a nutcase to bark alot. But, anyway, I became irritated at his total inattention to my commands to stop and whistled. I don’t whistle well, but this one time it came out loud and piercing and he stopped in his tracks.

I thought, “Good God, you ARE an Australian Shepherd from real working stock. Did you hear whistles when you were a wee pup? We’re giving it a try. I think Quentin is a little worried this will be the start of a regime of the autocratic whistler, but I will try and keep myself in check.

I think the pressure is easing in my little nose and some drainage is occurring; that means I am supposed to get on the ball.

I am still sitting here. Obviously, there is a glitch in my plan.  Maybe if I imagine there is a cobra nestled in the cushions behind me . . . No, no, I don’t want to fool around introducing that thought to my mind. It come could back to haunt me. Do you know when I was a little girl, I had a fear of snakes crawling into the foot of my bed. I think that comes from being an early reader or old scary movies shown on TV. Having a tendency to be irrational might be an additional factor.

Later, alligator.

See this man. I really, really can’t stand him. I haven’t met him. He’s a big shot in the Democratic Clan. A lot of them can’t stand him either. They’ve met him.

This picture is from the CNN internet site; I go there because I want to see what the liberals are saying. It was on the FRONT PAGE of the news site. I wanted to puke.

I went to the Fox News site; they another picture of him but you had to click to politics to see it.

The word “abrasive” is used over and over again in articles about him, when the writers are putting the best spin they can on it. I think he is arrogant and mean and needs to be socked in the nose. And I’m putting my best spin on it.

*****

A little added bit: I typed in this guy’s name and the word nasty and got a lot of hits. Here’s one from Chicago: Right here.

Here’s a little article that Spikey and Festivus (you’ll meet him later) sent to me from the Ohio Redoubt of the West Facing Cave.

Want a hint before you click? OK.

Ah, yes, Collaboration Wednesday, has moved to Monday. I suppose they thought it would be better to start off the week with a 30-Minute delay, rather than interrupting it with one. I’m not so sure; Monday morning was always a bench mark. Make it up on Monday morning and you had done the hardest part of the week. Now, that steel in your backbone has been challenged by the 30-Minute delay. Trying to set your body in the right frame for the week? Forget it. Forget it. Forget it.

Monday morning fortitude is a time-released thing and it starts to wear off quickly. You suck it up and go, or you start sliding into the “I’ll just rest my head for a moment” pitfall and the next thing you know your system is being shocked by the viscous counter-vibrating forces of an amusement park ride in Hell.

Oh, well.

Sydney and Shane parked at every single person we saw on the way to school -Every Single One. Sydney barked because Shane did, and Shane barked because he was, in fact, shouting, “YOU ARE NOT WITH THE HERD, YOU NINNIES!”

On the way back we waited for three adult women early morning walkers to steam across the intersection. There was Big Strides with Strong Legs, Tries Valiantly to Keep Up, and Huffing and Puffing.

Big Strides ignored Shane; Tries Valiantly glared at him for breaking her focus, and Huffing had these pleading eyes that begged him to stand on the electric window button, leap out, push her to the ground and bark for the shepherd to come.

Oh, and Summer did not go because she almost threw up on the driveway. It was kind of sad – when I got back from taking Cameron, she was sitting there with her nicely-completed poster assignment on a possible career choice. Hers is veterinarian. Well, maybe Sydney and Shane will sleep with her today.

I feel nervous and anxious and as if I want to move, move, move. My grandmother used to say she felt like she needed to jump out of her skin. My mother said, “Mom used to say she felt as if she wanted to jump out of her skin.” That’s my documentation; I don’t remember my grandmother saying it. But, anyway, that’s the way I feel.

I think I am going to call it Body Cabin Fever. BCF. I’ve got BCF, or in the vernacular, “the BCF”. I messed up today something awful; I wanted to go to Mother’s and then I didn’t go because it really did look like rain. Also I was having trouble getting out of my rut. Then I ate some nachos and openly took a three hour nap. It was so windy today with a front coming through that had I actually gotten out and done something, I would be feeling exhilarated right now.

Thunking my head on the wall sounds like a half decent idea right now. That would be moving, burning up some chemicals. I am, however, like one of those “sitting figures” they have for holidays – witches, Santas, Pilgrims, turkeys, elves snowmen. I have this psychological box lodged between my abdomen and butt holding me down.

Well, I’ll never be able to put one of those on a mantle of windowsill again. I’m sure their eyes will follow me, sending the message, “You know our pain . . . Get us off here.”

On top of everything else I have been thinking today is Saturday instead of Friday because Der Bingle came in last night. Oh, yeah, NEXT weekend, not this one, is going to be the Great Migration of computer files since we don’t have the right cable. That should be fun. I abhor moving things around on the computer. Over a decade ago, Quentin got this program called Spring Cleaning and my font that looked liked it was clipped from a newspaper for kidnap messages, disappeared forever.

Actually, I probably have most things repeated three or four times as I fooled around getting new computers and using external drives and really being paranoid about losing something. You just can’t get down on your hands and knees and look around a computer’s insides the way you can look under a sofa.

I have actually done cleaning work today, including moving soda pops into the garage from the vestibule and organizing all the sodas in the garage already. Guess who is a soda pop hoarder in our establishment? It’s Alison. I could throw a big, big party with all the soda we have, not to mention the on sale chicken breasts and hot dogs.

Then I got the blower and windswept the garage and the vestibule while Sydney and Shane watched through the little windows. I did laundry and dishes and then I showered and made the potatoes and carrots for a stew.

Then I showered and put on clean clothes and started another wash and  . . . I am not certain I am myself. Then I realized I was sitting here savoring my bare feet and the light from the oil lamp and I knew it was I, AmeliaJake.

However, I have been considering dabbling in multiple personalities. But it might be dangerous, like the fooling around with your heartbeat during intense yoga. I think I will settle for closing my eyes and imagining myself with different traits. Some of them will be a stretch and might make my brain start vibrating. Maybe the vibration would get out of control and Scotty would have to yell, “Cap’n, I canna hold her.”

Come to think of it, it might be fun just to have my family imagine me with various personalities and then watch them fall down laughing.

Maybe AmeliaMotherTeresaJake.

But wait, AmeliaJake, didn’t you leave  your computer in Indiana? Yes, I did, but now I have a new computer and I finally managed to remember the password to get into the Peanut Butter Cafe & Roadhouse. I am also going to have to remember to remove AJ passwords from the computer which is being passed on to Cameron. That computer will, no doubt, become a devotee of The Drudge Report. I think it is genetic – it is one of Der Bingle’s favorite sites.

I drove all the way down here listening to my all time favorite, Count Your Blessings. I don’t know what I will listen to going home. I’ll sleep on it.