A Master of Distraction

 So this is the moraine of paperwork on my desk I'd sworn to get to this evening; some of it goes back to December.  Taxes to file, bills to pay, snark to snark.  But first I had to find the camera to take a picture of it and then Saki wouldn't get off the chair and then I had to go get some cookies and then I remembered that when Secret Agent Fred and I were watching reruns of RuPaul's season 4 Drag Race, I had meant to find a picture of Fred's favorite member of their Pit Crew, Shawn Morales.

So obviously I had to get all that out of the way and now Saki is back demanding I make a lap for him to sit on.  Who knows if, or when, any of the paper beast will be tamed.

And once again, Saki commandeers the good chair.  Am I supposed to file taxes standing up?

Super Seven

What do you mean it's August?  The hell?   How do these things happen?

It's true I've been rather distracted lately by hosting guests for their own wedding and visiting New Orleans on a retail spree and competing with the cats to see who can sleep the most in one day, but that doesn't excuse missing two important (to me, and who else counts?) anniversaries in July.

The first was Saki, the Evil and Adorable cat's birthday, his seventh, on July 7.  Yes, 7/7/07 and now it's number seven, so maybe this year will be lucky for him.  Having ripped up both white leather chairs in the living room, he is now turning his attention to converting the back guest room into a spare cat box, so he's probably going to need all the luck he can get if I catch him pooping in there one more time.

And my blog, this title piece of heaven, also turned seven a few days ago, but again, I was sleeping, so, oops.  In case you wondering, here is the first post, from all those long years ago:

But who is mrpeenee?
I’m a nice guy, that’s who. I hide it successfully under a mask of brittle bitterness, but I would be happy to save orphan kittys and old ladies from burning buildings if I just weren’t so darn busy downloading porn and staring out the window. My long suffering lover, R Man, and I live in San Francisco where I work for the federal government making wildly inaccurate statements to the press and running the training program for entrepreneurs for the SBA here. I am occasionally surprised to realize how respectable I am.

I grew up in Texas, but never understood what white trash I am until I left. How was I supposed to know nice people didn’t put mayonnaise on their French fries?

I gotta go.

So seven years later and all I've learned is how to include photos of muscly young men.  Hmm.

Cats and Muscle Porn; It's a Gay Life

When Secret Agent Fred dumped his fatuous boyfriend a few years ago, he asked if he could stash his terribly sweet, ancient cat, Asizzi, with me since Fred was renting his apartment out on Air BnB and somehow the listing of "affectionate cat" under the amenities was not working.  It was fine with me, I like Asizzi (I should mention, veterinarian offices are universally unable to handle his name and kept calling Fred up to the counter as "A Sissy."  Oddly accurate, but sort of confusing, so the cat's name has morphed into Steve.)

So Steve has been a resident here for all this time and Saki still has not warmed to it.  To keep them separate, Steve stays in R Man's old room, which sounds cramped, but since it's about the size of Fred's studio apartment, he doesn't seem to mind it, but occasionally will make a break for it.  Fred has been holed up in his own apartment slinging his excellent calligraphy for the tons of wedding invitations that are his bread and butter this time of year.  Exasperated at Steve getting out yet again (he is fast for an old codger) I decided to see how the two cats would get along.

Turns out much better than before.  They're sort of tense, stiff legged around each other, but a real minimum of hissing and no actual fights.  The amazing part is that Steve, America's Sweetheart, tends  to be the instigator of any rumpus.  He will occasionally let loose this prolonged low growl and tentatively poke his paw towards Saki who hunkers down looking baffled like "What is with you old man?"  Of course, Steve is so senile it's possible he thinks he's imitating a can opener.  There's no telling.

Also, having Fred out of the house means not just cat acclimation, but Porn Festival!  Not that having the old dear around really cramps my style much since we have separate bedrooms, but still, having the house all to myself is so poignantly reminiscent of being 14 and trying to rub one out before mom gets home from the store.  Whee!

Scrutiny of several new sites as well as some old faves has resulted in a conundrum.  A performer dear to my heart and my right hand has popped up on two sites and I can't decide which version I prefer.  So let's vote, shall we?

First, Gianluigi from Men at Play

 So very distinguished and distinctive, don't you think?


And then a sleeker version from MuscleHunks

Typically I would always go for the fur bearing beast thang, but I have to say, the MuscleHunk scene wherein dear little Gian his spanking his personal monkey and his giant shaved and waxed man tits are rocking gently back and forth is pretty darn mesmerizing.

And those lips.

I think I have to go do some more research.

In Which a Small Cat has a Big Time

I was returning from taking the trash out and in the tiny, tiny window of opportunity when the house door and the garage door are both open, Saki, the adorable and evil, but mostly evil, cat made a break for it.

I gave chase (always such a good idea) but tripped and fell, scratching both palms and banging up my knee.  By the time I had righted my creaking old self, he had disappeared.

I wandered up and down our tasteful and quiet street, making the the little "tch tch" noise that is the only thing he ever pays attention to, but sort of hopelessly.  Our neighborhood has big stretches of wild, open canyon and I figured he was off paying the coyotes a visit, and, really, what are the chances of finding a cat in the dark?

One of my neighbors popped up, a sweet lady who, I'm sure, is not responsible for her Crazy Hair, and offered to help.  She asked what "her" name was, I told her "He probably thinks it's 'Get Off the Table' cause that's what he hears the most."  She didn't seem to get it, so I relented and explained it was really Saki, which she allowed was a cool name.

We shared lost cat stories and she looked around for a while in the most inept manner possible until I finally thanked her and sent her on her way.  I leaned against the garage door, mentally composing flyers:

LOST CAT

No collar

No brains

Answers to absolutely nothing.

If found, approach with caution.

I was already comforting myself with the realization that at least I wouldn't have to worry about finding to someone to take care of him while I was in New Orleans when he scurried back in, his tail huge, as big around as it can get, so it would seem he had run into some adventures.

Serves him right.  I want it clearly understood I did NOT greet him with baby talk and chin scratches.  Maybe a little.

House Party

Oh, hello, there, how nice to see you again.  I had to dash off to New Orleans last week to meet up with the architect handling the plans of the renovation of my house there.  I was sort of dreading this, in part because my previous experiences with architects have been very much of the "I am an Ayn Rand sized diva and you had best watch out" type of soul withering punishment, and also because I assumed all the ideas I had for revamping the shabby little joint would be kicked to the architectural curb.

Instead, Katherine, Queen of Architects, was supportive and interested, complimentary about my ideas and made all of them work and improved even the most crack pot ones.

So now, demolition is proceeding with speed and my friend Stephen, who is running the project, and whom I think we can refer to as Sister Mary Legs in the Air from now on, is a genius.  He's very practical and so energetic about getting this crap done, I have to go lie down after watching him dervish around, ripping and tearing and nailing and all kinds of other butch things.

He and my friend Magda whipped up a pair of temporary gates from some scrap fencing in an afternoon.  This was after some riff raft had busted into the house the night I got in town, so some more secure access seemed like a good idea.

I also had dinner with Jason from Night is Half Gone who was down with pneumonia just a couple of weeks ago.  Everyone should go tell him they wish him well, although I have to say the whole story sounded suspect to me.  He just happens to have pneumonia the night my house is burgled and then is up to (not particularly outstanding) dinner and drinks on the town?  Hmmmm.

Anyway, photographic proof:

Before

After.  Or actually, during.  We'll see about after in a few months.

Also, Saki has sort of tentatively decided the cat tree is not an instrument of torture from the devil.  Sort of.  Yay.

Up a Tree

During a recent spate of homo decorating madness, I had to move a bed and wound up standing its mattress and box springs on end against a wall, with a quilt bunched on top of it.  It was just temporary (I'm sure some of you were wondering if I planned on leaving it as an Art Statement,) but Saki was so thrilled with climbing up on top of it and hiding out in his new little lair, I left it up for several days.

Actually, that is an outright lie.  I was just too lazy and disorganized to finish the project, so the mattress stayed where it was and Saki got to perch up on it to his heart's content.  When I discovered that I didn't have to share my bed with him because he liked being up in the aerie, I thought about making it permanent, but instead decided to buy the little terror a cat tree.

Cat trees, in case you've missed them by paying too much attention to bootleg copies of East Enders, are those shag carpet covered totem pole affairs that feature so prominently in many lesbian decorating schemes.  I did not want a lesbian influenced look here, so I researched the subject and came up with one that seemed like it would be minimally offensive.  Ta dah:

And truly, it's not bad.  Saki, of course, refuses to have anything to do with it.  The two times I put him, firmly, on top of it, he immediately jumped off with an air of combined disgust and wariness, as if he had barely escaped from an assignation attempt.

Naturally, he is much more attracted to the box it came in.  Ingrate.

Out of the Darkness

So I meant to post on Wednesday, Sept. 25 that it was the fifth anniversary of my wedding to R Man, but before I could get around to it, the power went out, so instead Secret Agent Fred and I wandered around the house, lighting candles and tripping on things.

I was going to whine about living without R Man, but you know what?  I don't want to.  I'm doing better now than when he died then and I expect to continue that way.  Instead of writing some droopy, sad little post about missing R Man, I went to bed early.

Then this afternoon, I took Saki down to get his claws clipped on Castro while I went across the street to get my own nails done at Handjob.  I don't know why he pretends manicures are so traumatic, I like them.

I have no idea what's going on in the photo above.  I just find it amusing.

In Which mrpeenee is Repeatedly Disappointed

Secret Agent Fred and I went out to lunch with the Fashion Sensation this afternoon.  I was  confused (which is no rare thing in the peenee Universe) because a couple of weeks ago, the Sensation had told me she was going to a silent mediation retreat somewhere up in Lesbian Land and then when she rescheduled lunch to today, she said it was because she had injured herself water skiing.

The idea of a combo meditation retreat/water sports event seemed unlikely, but vastly appealing, certainly more than just standing around being told to zip it, which is how I envision a silent mediation spree.  Turns out the two things were separate.  How cruelly disappointing.

Physically inept as I am, water skiing is the one sport I'm actually ok at, or at least I used to be.  When I was 11 years old and first learning how, I was so skinny, I could have probably been pulled up by a rowboat.  Fashion Sensation's injury just makes me think I should just let my past glories lie.

The Sensation wandered off somewhere or the other after lunch and Fred and I retired to the tastefully charming bar at the Fairmont Hotel.  We had only sat down when Fred was summoned away by a series of increasingly frantic calls from his old neighbors in Baltimore about some guys who claimed they were trying to change the lock there.  At 7:00 at night.  On a Sunday.  The calls escalated to a chat with the cops who showed up and who were sceptical about these guys' story, which I think showed real perception.

While Fred was outside dealing with all his Maryland based drama, the waiter obviously decided I had been stood up by my date.  He was a very cute waiter, as so often happens here, but before I could figure out how to finagle his sympathy into possible pity sex, Fred returned and we settled into simple drinking.

This is not Cookie schvitzing in Baltimore.  I'm pretty sure.

Speaking of Baltimore, Ask the Cool Cookie sent me a self portrait he had snapped while packing up Fred's house earlier this weekend and then asked that I not post it here.  I'm not going to (even though it had a certain naive charm) and I want full credit for my restraint.

Get out the way.

And speaking of bloggers who should be restrained, MJ, from Infomaniac, sent me a perfectly lovely card for my blog anniversary.   Saki has claimed it for his own and now sits on it blocking the view of all the good porn.  Life is so hard some times.

Saki Time

When R man and I picked the Evil and Adorable Saki out of the lineup at cat jail (aka Animal Care and Control, aka the pound,) the technician there estimated his age to be about three years.  That seemed really unlikely to me, his face still looked almost like a kitten and his complete lack of restraint seemed very adolescent.

Our vet backed me up and thought he was about nine months.  Since that was April of 2008, we decided his birthday was July 7, 2007: 7/7/7.  What could be more lucky than a kitty who had moved from the streets to jail into running the lives of two middle age poofs?

So happy birthday to Saki, destroyer of white leather chairs, hogger of the best place in the bed, and absolute terror of anyone foolish enough to try and pet him.

I claim my cooing at him in my old lady voice "Who's the babiest baby in babytown?" is an attempt to civilize him.  In fact, I just do it to fuck with him and his air of general annoyance when I do so is payback for all the scratches, bites and scars I carry from him, the adorable little shit.

Guns and Kitties

I was absorbed by stumbleupon (much like the various Star Trek characters were absorbed by the Borg.  I swear that site is like crack for web browsing) when in the midst of apparently endless number of sites comprising lists of odd facts (or "facts."  I'm never sure how credible they all are) I stumbled on a page that had downloaded the video shot by a dashboard cam in a cop car that recorded some crazy ass Ohioan who stepped out of his unfashionable car at a traffic stop, turned and starting unloading like 50 bazillion rounds into the cops' car.  You can see it HERE

Amazingly, even after this hail of lead, neither cop was seriously wounded.  The crazyass, on the other hand, wound up just as dead as you might expect some guy standing fully exposed shooting at a couple of cops would be.

Of course, a lifetime of American TV has so inured me to these scenes from various police shows that I was only mildly struck by it, mostly along the lines of "This guy really wanted to be sure he got killed. Thoroughly."

Studying AK 47 marksmanship

Saki, on the other hand, was riveted by it.  He's usually oblivious to whatever is happening on the computer, even when it plays four goddam Smiths songs in a row.  Something about this video, though, got his full attention.

It's possible he's planning something I should worry about.  This is particularly worrisome since he has developed the skill of appearing in my lap without me realizing how he's gotten there.  I'll be leafing along through worthless internet sites and looked down only to discover I have a lapful of cat.  How do these things happen?  If my leg didn't go to sleep and if he could ever refrain from farting (please god,) I'd never even know he was there.

Stealth cats, that's how the world ends.

Sunday Evening with the Cat

"What are you eating? Stop that, stop that this instant.  Spit that out, don't swallow it, if I have to take you the vet again I swear I will leave you there.  Spit that out, goddammit, stop it.  What is that?  is it plastic?  If you can't pass it, don't eat it.  Goddammit, goddammit, goddammit."

Repeat until  exhausted.

Everbody's a Critic

Whilst cooking up a big pot of lentils tonight (because I am apparently a lesbian,) I was overtaken with the urge to burst into a rendition of Boogie Fever (because I am actually a fifty-something gay man.)  Who knows why?  These things are beyond a mere mortal's ken.  More annoying was my cat's annoying reaction.  He turned tail and bolted from the room, before I even got to the first chorus and way before I started shaking my groove thang.  Bitch.  We'll see how tough he is on Friday when I take him down to get his claws clipped.

Also irritating is the reappearance of the dread Blogger's Comments Spam.  I had eliminated the requirement for word verification from my commentors because I like comments and I wanted to make placing them as easy as possible.  But now that They have found me again (Here's the comment from earlier today: We [url=http://www.onlinecraps.gd]free casino bonus[/url] be suffering with a corpulent library of unqualifiedly free casino games for you to challenge opportunely here in your browser. Whether you pine for to practice a table encounter strategy or scarcely sample exposed a occasional late slots before playing for legitimate filthy lucre, we procure you covered. These are the rigid uniform games that you can with at veritable online casinos and you can play them all representing free.   Uh, thanks.) I need to go back in and crank the security level back up to Def Con Orange.

Also, I think I saw Wade Neff, porn mega star and all round hairy guy, at my coffee place this afternoon.  And I downloaded an app to play Yahtzee on my phone.

So, all in all, not a bad day.

Cat Tales

Secret Agent Fred has been staying at Chez peenee for a while and I'm helping him take care of his elderly cat, Steve, by administering doses of antibiotics while Fred is out being a SLUTTY, SLUTTY JEZEBEL WHORE FUDGEPACKING STRUMPET.  Not that I mind of course.

What's striking is the difference between Steve and my cat Saki.  Saki is a vicious little shit (he has a permanent big red "CAUTION" on his file at the vet's and two of my Thanksgiving guests ignored my sternly worded warning to leave him alone, to their later bleeding regret.  In their defense, he is adorable.  But vicious.) Steve, on the other hand, is the most amenable, affectionate, sociable cat I've ever run across.  But while I can always get medicine down Saki's gullet with nothing more than a general air of irritation from him, Steve turns into a whirling dervish, bucking and astonishingly adept at keeping the dropper out of his mouth.   He's fast for an old codger.  At least he doesn't try to scratch.  I shudder to think of the damage that Saki could dish out if he disliked getting dosed the way Steve does.

Also, I have a hard time blaming Steve; the medicine smells strongly like old bananas and seems to be upsetting his stomach.  Antibiotics do the same thing to me, so I'm sympathetic.  Still, his coughing sneezing fits sling cat snot widely, so the sooner all this is behind us the better.

Anyway, here I am granma peenee pottering around with the cats in a frumpy cardigan while Fred is out terrorizing queer bars.  NOT THAT I MIND.  Of course not.  It's just when I pictured minding pussy in my dotage I was thinking more along the lines of this.

I love the astonished look on that big lug's face when things get out of hand, so to speak.

Or this

Or something.

Bang It

So I bought a gong. Yeah, it's pretty cool. What, are you trying to say you've never wanted one? As if.

When I was a very young little faglette, I was in band in junior high and high school. I was a band fag. In every band room, there was a gong and an absolute rule against hitting it. Of course, the need to do so was equally absolute, but the thing is, striking a gong is not something you can do covertly. It is in the nature of the beast, not going to happen.

So lo these many, many years later I was noodling along on the internet and suddenly recalled my long suppressed desire for a gong. I am not good at suppressing much of anything, let alone when I have a credit card at hand and a website called gongsunlimited.com singing its siren song. And now I have a gong.

It's lovely, hammered brass on a tasteful elm stand with a beautiful resonant tone. It's pretty badass. I hit it every time I pass it. The down side: it alarms Saki. The best thing: it alarms Saki.

I really am a bad person.

Cat Tales, Cat Teeth

Saki, the Evil and Adorable Cat, had to go in for his annual check up (which, I'd just like to point out in passing, costs more than mine does.  Not that I mind, no of course not.)  The very cute vet pressed vigorously for me to bring him back and have his teeth cleaned.  Possibly he needed to make an extra mortgage payment this month, maybe his membership in the transvestite hooker gambling morphine ring was coming up, who knows?   R Man and I had always resisted having our cats' teeth cleaned since it requires general anesthesia and that seems to involve so many more risks than reward.

But this time, Dr. Curtis batted his blue eyes at me and added that Saki had a ginormous cavity in there and needed to have the tooth pulled.  Oy.  Coincidentally this was the same time NormaDesmond and  Designing Wally were both suffering through dental crises and their pitiful cries were still echoing in my pointy little head as I thought about Saki putting up with a toothache for who knows how long.  So I gave the go ahead Thursday.

It's been a rough couple of days for both of us.

Saki

Designing Wally

Norma Desmond

Some other guy.

When I picked him up after the procedure, I noticed a huge handwritten "CAUTION!!!" on his chart.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Oh, he was not happy about this," the receptionist assured me airily.

I had no trouble translating that "Who did he bite?"

"Everybody."

When we got home he was growling and crazy, and I could barely get him to settle down long enough to take the stupid little plastic cone collar off.  I was going to take a picture, because I am a bad person, but it was already traumatic.

 The vet also sent home some pain medicine that I'm supposed to shoot from a syringe onto his gums, but the two times I tried that only got him more freaked out and didn't seem to help, and now he seems to be recovered so I'm thinking of using the leftovers on myself or shipping them off to Norma and her dry socket.  Cause I'm a giver.

Focus Darling, Focus

This is my life in the shell of a nut: I just spent much too long crawling around on the floor of my tastefully decorated bathroom trying to find an ativan I dropped on the white marble tiles, which, while I think beautiful, are the perfect camouflage for a small white pill, all the while Saki the cat, agitated by a really bad youtube video of the 2009 Night of a Thousand Stevies drag show, darts around trying to figure out what the game is.

Really, the only thing missing was porn.

Catgas

Isn't this precious? As someone once commented here, "As long as you have a cat, you're never really out of blogging material." So true. Here we have a quiet evening with Saki and mrpeenee, playing solitaire and eating peanut M&Ms as mreenee's foot slowly goes to sleep since Saki refuses to move.

The only thing missing is the soundtrack of Cyndi Lauper's Shine (an excellent, underrated tune,) Saki purring, and mreenee shrieking "Goddamit, what is that stench? Stop farting. Stop FARTING. Immediately." Giving orders to a cat: that always works out, doesn't it?

It's my own fault, I recently accidentally bought salmon cat food for the little tyrant and he seemed to like it so much that I've added it to his diet. Side effects include gas like the fucking Hindenburg coming in for a landing. Dear god. Maybe he's making editorial comments about the porn I watch, I don't know. All I'm sure of is that I found a gasmask site that has them on sale for $164.50 and I'm thinking strongly about ordering one.

More adorable Saki stuff.

Cat Tales

I named our adorable and evil cat "Saki" after the writer H.H. Munro, who used that as his pen name. However, I'm pretty sure the cat thinks his name is "Goddam It, Get Off My Nuts," since that's what he hears the most.

All of the cats I have lived with have been lap kittehs. That's part of the appeal, ten feline pounds curled up purring and keeping you warm. But all of them have always stepped squarely on my testicles when climbing on board. What's with that? Are they asserting dominance? Saying hello? And while it's been annoying with past holders of the Cat of the House title, Saki is the one who moves with the least amount of cat-like grace. When he pounds his lead-foot way across the boys, there is no ignoring it.

Lucky for him he's adorable.

Vermontino

Super Agent Fred and I are off to Vermont tomorrow. Have you heard of Vermont? I understand it's this adorable little state, popular with lesbians and cheese enthusiasts. And then, at the other end of the spectrum, I'm going to visit my father in the old folks' home he just moved into in Houston. Whee. In fact, Super whee.

In unrelated news, the woman who trims the nails of Saki, my Evil and Adorable Cat, warmly recommended giving him a bath the last time we went in for is pedicure. A cat. A bath. A catbath. Doesn't that just seem to be asking for trouble. After all, Saki barely tolerates going in to have his razorlike talons nipped down. I'm sure washing him off would only lead to sulking and cat turds in my bed. We have filed this under "Ideas, Bad."

Here's a good idea:

Hell in a Handbag. A Nice Handbag, but Still...

Sweetums, once again mrpeenee begs that you bear with me. We're fighting back the world of chaos on multiple fronts. Before we delve into the sordid details, here's some houseboy bits to make us all feel a little cheerier.

Chaos, the one: Project Runway begins shortly and I have given up cable. What a fool I was.

Chaos, part deaux: Saki, the evil and adorable cat has gone on a hunger strike over the kitchen renovation. It's too disruptive, I've moved his food bowl, the kitchen is sealed off, he's mad. He hasn't eaten since Monday night. Today, in case you haven't been paying attention, is Thursday. Consequently, Nursemrpeenee has loaded up a syringe (oh, I just happened to have it lying around) with chicken broth and am occasionally blasting it down his throat. Yes, we're living in a kitty nourishment shooting gallery.

Chaos III: the side effects of my AIDS medicine, Atripla, which I had long since overcome, have decided to rear their nasty little heads. It's possible this is related to the fact that I was absentmindedly taking two of the pills each night instead of the prescribed one. I have no idea how long I have been stumbling along like this. Last night I looked down at the dose in my hand and thought "Wait a minute...."

So now that I'm not poisoning myself semi-accidentally, maybe things will get better. Till then, I can look forward to waking up each night in an agitated panic, gasping for breath like a crazed poodle and, worst of all, in the middle of a hot flash. Yes, it's true; my HIV meds bring on the menopause.

I've looked this up, out of the almost 800 men participating in a test on this drug, only one reported this side effect, feeling like he was nailed down beneath the french fry heat lamp at Burger King. Great, I win the lottery.

In happier news, the widely reported birthday of internet malcontent NormaDesmond (Happy B.D., old girl) has reminded me that Jason, over at Night is Half Gone posted recently that his version of Aries, my own sweet, sweet horoscope identity is this

God love you, Jeisean.