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October 13, 1999 |
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October 13, 1999 61 black ducks dozens of monarchs Bring on the Yankees! Today's Starting Pitcher: Kent Mercker vs. El Duque Today's Reading: Danube by Claudio Magris
Copyright © 1999, Janet I. Egan |
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When the dishes are nearly done the sink is so full of
water that my T-shirt sleeves are getting wet. I pull the
strainer out to drain the sink before I start in on litter
boxes. Suddenly there's water all over the floor. It's
heading for the laundry room where a The flood happened so fast I'm still not sure how the trap got opened. All I know was one minute the water was in the sink and the next minute all of it was on the floor. Talk about excitement. Jaguar looks better today. His color isn't normal but it's pinker than that ghostly white of last week. Nobody mentioned any more green bile. He's not particularly interested in being petted, as he is making his rounds inspecting every cage. This is a good sign. He hasn't been doing his daily inspection patrol lately.
There's an animal control officer floating around, and a
new cat, and Kendra takes a dirty cover off one of the cozy cat beds and sets it down on top of the big yellow bucket. Cubby starts kneading the foam rubber and tearing out chunks with her claws. She licks the shredded foam rubber off her claws and eats it. Yuck! I grab several pieces away from her but she keeps going for more until Kendra takes the cat bed away. Eeek. Too much going on. Time to take a break and change out of my wet shirt before taking pictures of the new cats, or in some cases the old cats.
It's a good thing the only item on my agenda for tonight is Kent Mercker vs. El Duque. |
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There
is entirely too much stuff under the sink. We used to have
only one bucket to put under the drain when we empty the
trap, now there are about 6. And how many buckets do we need
for the wet food cans to be recycled? Dish pans. The
community litter boxes. Two of those huge bulk containers of
dish soap. A huge trash bag full of insulation. Insulation?
From the ceiling? Why is this under the sink?
I
brought a cup of coffee for Chloe to drink and Benjia to
spill but they're not interested today. The sink is full of
dishes and folks are already running out of clean litter
boxes and I got here early! We have more than the usual
number of people working today even though Roy called in
sick with a terrible cold. We are getting in each other's
way. There's plenty of work to be done but not much space,
and if you don't coordinate well you get collisions
involving clean laundry.
I'm
scrubbing away trying to avoid bumping into anyone when I
look under the sink, mainly because things keep falling on
me. I notice a hole in the plastic bag of insulation. Then I
notice Benjia paying a lot of attention to the hole. She
looks like she's about to start eating it. Bonnie thinks
Midgee was the one who tore open the bag because she has a
fascination with plastic bags. I didn't see who did it, only
that Benjia is way too interested. Kendra puts the bag out
into the hall.
basket of dry clean towels fresh from the dryer is about to
become a basket of dirty wet towels. Cynthia rescues the
clean towels and puts them up out of harm's way. Bob screws
the cover back on the sink trap. Everything under the sink
is wet. The community litter boxes, the recycle buckets,
everything. We use up almost the whole hamper of dirty
towels to mop it up. Heck of a way to wash the floor!
Things
are starting to feel really chaotic. It seems like there are
thousands of people coming in and out. Bob is trying to take
the air conditioner out of the window for the winter, when
the landlady comes in with a guy to fix the ceiling. We
can't find the insulation. Turns out Bob took it down to the
dumpster with the trash. Well, it was out in the hall with
the bags of trash, and it was in a trash bag. The ceiling
guy insists it won't still be in the dumpster because the
trash company has already come, but Bonnie and Kendra assure
him that the trash people come really early and Bob only
just put the insulation down there. Sure enough, they
retrieve the insulation.
some other people. I have no idea what's going on. I'm still
shaken from the flood. I set the wrench down on the counter
and then can't find it. Bob points out that I'm standing
right next to it.
I
finally get a good picture of Meowster in the office, and
a
good one of William, who is not nearly as shy since he's
become interested in Sprite. Now Bonnie can replace the
one-eyed William picture on the web site, so people will
know that he has two eyes. In my zeal to photograph all the
new cats, I accidentally let the new new cat out of
its temporary cage and it makes a beeline for every other
cat it can sniff. Kendra catches the newbie and doesn't give
me a hard time for letting it out.
There
are hordes of monarchs all over the place and it's too nice
a day to be indoors. Even after lunch and coffee and
fabulous monarch sightings I'm not fully recovered from my
overflowing morning. I want to lie down and sleep on the
platform off parking lot 6. Just feeling totally
overwhelmed. I start wondering if I have some kind of acute
onset chronic fatigue?
As
I'm walking back to the car, a flock of snow geese pass
overhead really low, coming in for a landing at Stage Island
Pool. Then, on the way out of the refuge I spotted a bittern
trying to look like a reed - it's neck stretched straight up
and stock still. I brake for bitterns. This is the first one
I've seen all year. They're there, but they're so secretive
it's hard to get a glimpse. The snow geese and the bittern
gave me enough of a mental lift to enjoy the ride home
through peak fall colors.