Today I bathed our Cat!!!

Hello. This has been a very eventful week but I think the most bizarre event had to be today's cat washing. Our oldest cat, Rudolph, is a long haired cat we've have forever. At Christmas I noticed poop stuck to his tail and he obviously wasn't really able to clean himself. On top of that, he acted like his tail was all hurt and wouldn't let you touch him. Fast forward to the end of January. He hasn't really been able to clean himself off (still!) and his hair is soooooo matted, its horrible. There was this one clump of hair at his chest that i could pretty much clench in my entire hand (like bigger than an apricot or something).


So, I knew I had to do something. I had just come back from a run (wimped out after 5 miles-too dark and I'm a wimp) so I figured as long as I was sweaty and disgusting, I might as well do the job. I figured since my sister has a little 1/2 sized bathroom, I could just clear off the counters and floor and Rudy and I could duke it out until he was clean.



It turned out I got a helper. Brenda came over. I invited her into the bathroom for the cat washing mostly to keep me company, but she ended up helping too. I filled the sink with warm soapy water and got some scissors to cut off the clumps of hair. Rudolph of course freaked when I first set him into the sink, ("Claws come out, scene 1") but once I grabbed his arms (little scared of squashing him) and held him against my body with his butt in the sink, he pretty much calmed down. I'm sure it was the soothing, "Sshhh, shhhhh, its ok, Rudy, its OK" that made a difference. Yeah right. So after his initial shock I think he figured out that fighting wasn't going to help much. Brenda and I didn't know what to do so we started cutting off some of the clumps that we could sort of get to while we waited for his nasty tail area to soak for a while.



I really, really wish we had gotten a picture of poor Rudolph during the bath. He was really good, except for when he clawed Brenda ("Claws come out, scene 2") and then towards the end ("Claws, 3") when he was getting tired of being washed. We sorta tried to shampoo him a bit (he still needs to be like shaved or something) but at least he is cleaner than before. We wrapped him up in a towel and Nathan came to check on us. He started purring for Brenda right away and looking at us with these tortured eyes. We gave him some milk and left him in the bathroom for a while to dry off.



After a while we checked on him, he was dying to get out but still wet so we left him in there. Finally I let him into the laundry room and tried to cut off some more hair clumps. He got tired of that after a bit so I finally let him go outside. Poor guy. Then I decided to try to get a picture of his terrible looking tail, which, of course he wasn't too thrilled about the idea of me getting close enough to him again.

So finally this story comes to an end, here are a couple pictures of Rudy, the Bathers, and how horrid and mangy he still looks. (I might try again tomorrow).

1/2 Marathon Training, Continued

This has been an interesting week.

First of all, I am having this recurring dream of running through the airport. SERIOUSLY! The theme is usually that I’m going to Europe, meeting a friend or somebody at a connecting airport, I’m running late, and forgot my passport. So I am running back and forth between the car looking for my passport and the security line and it seems like miles and miles between the two, running with all the luggage. Strange.

So along the running theme, I am trying to test out energy gels. I figure with a run of 13 miles, I need to keep my body fueled properly. I am very into the science/technique of running (ahem, jogging) right now. I’m trying to read up on what a good diet is for runners, what to eat before and after a run, etc. The whole concept of a higher carb diet is fun and shocking since the Adkins push years ago carbs have seemed so off-limits. Not that I really diet or anything, I just usually try not to go on a carb overload.

So yesterday on my 6 mile distance run I tried the vanilla power bar gel. It was super syrupy. I don’t know if I really needed it, but I ate ½ on mile 4 and about ½ of what was left somewhere at mile 5 or so. I was pretty bored running on the treadmill. I was thinking, “geez what is the point of this??!!” I think I prefer running outside but LAX isn’t exactly an ideal area for that.

Lastly, here is the link to the web page in case anyone else wants to sign up. There is a rule of no ipods/music players, which apparently is new, and I guess not all races enforce it. I’m not sure how it’ll be happening for this race.

http://www.fleetfeetsacramento.com/shamrockn-half-marathon-5km

Oh yeah, and this week at work sucked. I tried to quit Tuesday but after getting some good food in me and a good nights rest and a resolution to not talk to the person driving me NUTS, I am starting to tolerate the project again. Wednesday I actually had to bring my regular misto drink AND a java chip frap (light) to work to nurse my attitude back to health. (That and some prayer.) 76 days until the project “go live.” Maybe in some other blog I’ll actually describe what some of these project terms mean. Booooring!

Christy is new to blogging

Well hello there. Sarah was telling me I should start a blog since I'm kind of tired of myspace. Today when I was running (I always talk to myself) I started to mentally write this blog so here I am, I guess, with a blog!

I just started running - um, excuse me, JOGGING, a lot more lately and so I also figured maybe I can track some of my experiences on here in an attempt to keep up with it. I'm training for a half-marathon in Sacramento on March 16th.

So why shamrock80 for the blog name? Well, because shamrock was taken. Why Shamrock? I dunno. I didn't want my real name, and since Nathan has an amazing puppy and it took 3 days to name him and during that time I thought, "gee, I'd like to name my dog Shamrock" and it kind of stuck. SO, here I am, permanently Shamrock80 the blogger.

I suppose I could try and get some pictures up on this but since I am still a newbie and I left my camera at my dad's house, that won't be happening. At least this is a start!