KITTENS!

We have kittens! And they're now in the box, in spite of Pixel's best efforts (and four time successful efforts) to have them under my bed. That's right, she had four of them under my bed. Damn cat. I think she's still in the process, she's still pretty chunky, so I'll bet she's got another one or two in there. So far we've got one fluffy reddish-gray kitten, and two that are dark dark gray with their momma's stripes, and one that's either black or another dark gray. I think that last one may be stillborn, it wasn't mewing when she was cleaning it up.

Moving the kittens from under the bed to the box was... interesting. I was walking to the bathroom and heard a tiny little mew, and looked under the bed, and there she was. Luckily, she was at the foot of the bed (she moved them, there are blood spots at the head of the bed.. Thank you Farmmom, for the shampooer....) When I flipped up the blanket that hangs over the foot of the bed, she growled at me, until I petted her. I'm not allowed to pay attention to the kittens until I tell her what a good momma she is. We've been through this before. Once I give her the proper praise and adoration, I can do anything I want to with the kittens, so I moved them to the box, and she followed.

Here's the current attractions, and their mom, who isn't entirely happy with the whole flash thing....

Part One of the Re-Write

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

Dawn rolled over and slapped blindly at her alarm clock, groaning. It seemed like she’d just gotten to sleep, and now the lying damn clock said it was time to go back to work.

There is entirely too much morning in the day, thought Dawn, as she swung herself up into a sitting position. She didn’t want to move even that much but she knew if she laid there and thought about how much mornings sucked she’d just fall back asleep and then be late for work.

“Ugh.” Dawn scrubbed at her face with her hands, trying to rub enough feeling into it so that her eyelids would work properly when she told them to open. Finally she pried her eyes open and glanced at the window.

Still dark. There ought to be a law against this kind of cruel and unusual work practice.

Levering herself up from her bed Dawn groped for yesterday’s jeans. Once she slid them on her brain started catching up with the fact that she was, in fact, awake, and planning to stay that way, and it functioned well enough for her to find the rest of her clothes.

These jeans will work for one more day, it’s not like I’m going to a beauty pageant or anything.

Stumbling out of her bedroom Dawn made a bee-line for the coffee pot, and breathed a sigh of thanks for the technology that let her set everything up the night before and have fresh, hot coffee waiting when she woke up.

Slowly, while sipping her coffee, Dawn gathered the things she’d need for work today. A sweater to put on before she left the house, her hat, a bandanna….

Crap, I forgot to bring the new bandannas in. This one is disgusting, I have to do laundry tonight. Oh well they’re in the car, I can grab one when I need it.

In the bathroom she avoided looking in the mirror while she was pulling her short blondish-brown hair into a pony tail. She knew from experience that nothing good came from looking at herself at this time of the morning, and preferred not to spend the rest of the day thinking about the bags under her eyes.

Third day straight was always the hardest, with her body and her mind worn down.

Draining the last of her coffee, she snagged the cooler she’d packed the night before and headed out the door.

Ice. Mt Dew. More water.

Driving to the convenience store- just barely open for the day- Dawn ran through the list of things she needed to get, and added an energy drink to get herself woken up some more before she hit the site.

I’m too young to feel this old, she thought, as she paid for her purchases and arranged the ice, water, and Dew in the cooler around her lunch and the drinks that already inhabited it.

Closing the trunk she pulled open the back door of her car and snagged the cord of the amber strobe light, drawing the light itself to her and attaching it to the roof of her car by the magnet, before she climbed back into the driver’s seat and headed for the jobsite.

Once she spotted the first of the bright orange signs on the outskirts of the site, the rest of her brain switched on.

Weird. That color seems to put everyone else to sleep, either sitting in line or coming up on it. It always wakes me up. Maybe it’s because I know that it’s more than just my ass on the line out there.

Dawn shied away from the morbid thoughts that followed that one, memories of accidents and near misses, horror stories and the looks on people’s faces when they talked about picking up pieces of people they knew.

Bad way to start the day, Dawn. Don’t think about that crap or you’ll be jumpy all day, and make mistakes.

“Hey, Twiggy!” As Dawn rolled up on the south end flagger, she saw that relief had been made here already.

“Sup. Boss Lady on site already?”

“Yeah, she’s around somewhere.”

“Where are we on relief?” One of Dawn’s responsibilities was making sure all of the night flaggers got to go home before they collapsed from exhaustion. If someone from the day crew didn’t show, she’d relieve the person left behind until someone could be called in.

“Everyone but 116, but it’s not quite six yet, and I think I see that one coming right there.”

Dawn glanced in her rear view mirror, and saw a car pulling up with its hazards on.

“Yeah, that’s her. Cool, I get some more time to wake up. I’ll go find Boss Lady and climb in with her so I can take a nap.” Dawn smiled beatifically at the flagger, who gave her a mock glare and a one-finger salute before she drove off.

Dawn glanced at the sunrise as she motored off, seeing how it silhouetted the equipment on the east side of the road and painted the stuff on the west side in reds and golds. These were her favorite moments of the work day. Before the noise and the diesel smoke, before crises and politics. The site almost looked pretty at sunrise, like it didn’t any other time.

Somehow today it just wasn’t as peaceful, though. Dawn looked back at the road and saw the turkey vultures circling, and repressed a shudder.

Stop it. There’s road kill all over the place. They’re just coming in for their morning snack of whatever got killed overnight. It is not an omen, a sign, or any other superstitious nonsense.

Dawn glanced again at the circling scavengers, and the thought she’d been trying to avoid snuck in.

The last time I had this feeling, I broke a radio from ditch diving and landing on it, because some idiot in a pickup “didn’t see me” and danged near hit me.

She shook off the bad feeling as she saw the bright orange truck, and pulled in beside Boss Lady.

Deal with it when… if… It comes.

Ugh

Ok, I was wrong. Tomorrow is going to suck.

But I have one question for my neighbors in the building.....

Why in the hell are your children running up and down the stairs at one o'clock in the freaking morning?!?!?

No, really. Children. Up and down the stairs. Shrieking. One in the morning. I thought there was a fire.

Put a leash on them or something, people. The adrenaline rush from hearing an about eight year old girl shriek and thunder down the stairs will have me up for another hour, which I really appreciate since I have an eight o'clock class anyway. And as for her brother, or cousin, or whoever the hell he was... all I can say is: beat him until he shuts up.

Yelling in the hallways of a badly soundproofed apartment building at this gawdawful hour should be a capital offense.

Edit: Those kids were running around again at two, and three thirty. I'm a zombie, I'd just be dozing off and hear the Screeching Elephant Twins coming, and bam! Wide awake. If they pull that crap tonight I'm catching them in the hall and beating their butts myself.

Getting Tough

Today a few classmates cornered Marilyn, and had a talk with her about how a lot of them didn't feel challenged. Of course, some of our class still don't know their leads, which she brought up. So, she's going to start being tougher on all of us, and maybe coming up with new things for us to do.

I've been pretty ok with what we do in class, because I've had a lot of battles with Monkey to fight, but he's improving, so new challenges would be nice. We'll see what she comes up with tomorrow for us.

Some of the students could use the toughness, though. As well as some personal attention, which I don't think Marilyn has felt right giving them at the expense of the rest of the class. We'll see how it goes.

In other news, I flaked out on the couch to watch tv while I was waiting for my laundry to dry, and fell asleep for an hour and a half. Now I'm awake. No rest for the wicked, I suppose.

Although a mixed drink will probably fix that....

Victory!

The bug guy has been here and gone and there was no kitty discovery, yay!

I'm going to leave Pixel cat in the bedroom for the rest of the day, because I don't want her getting into the bug stuff. Meanwhile, that was the most cursory exterminator visit I've ever seen. Considering that he's spraying the entire building, I can't really blame him, though. Besides, with as much bug spray as is floating around this place the little suckers are bound to get got somewhere.

Good Workout, and Crossed Fingers

Monkey and I had a good workout today, we practiced loping things in class, a quick start to a lope, and then a circle, and then a quick stop from a lope, and then I took him out on the trail and we loped three circuits on the back loop of the trails. Which means absolutely nothing to anyone who hasn't been on the trails. Suffice to say it's about a quarter of a mile around, and we loped three of them straight. He was actually blowing some when we stopped.

Tomorrow the exterminator is coming at ten. I'll stash all of Pixel's stuff and Pixel in the bedroom and cross my fingers that she doesn't make too much noise while they're here. And also that I'm home when they come. I don't need the manager finding my cat, really I don't.

Writing...

Still working on the adaptation of the accident story, but it's being postponed until I can finish my Lit paper.

Plus, it's proving more difficult to re-write than I had expected. Third person omnipotent is kicking my skinny white butt. I keep lapsing into first person.

And yet, I can't stop beating my head against it. Just goes to show that I may be too stubborn for my own good.