What the Chuck???

So much going on. So much going on. . .

It's been a very eventful weekend.

Chuck the Pug

J.T., Karen's non evil brother, came to visit from Dallas. He brought with him both a girl and a dog.

Other than the fact that the girl stole my room and shut the door so I couldn't go inside and take a nap in her suitcase, I have no serious beefs with the her.

She seems nice.

However, the pug is a different story.

Chuck is a PUPPY. He kind of looks like a drunken Gargoyle. He runs about chasing things. Sometimes when he moves with stuff in his mouth he runs into furniture. He chews on things. Thankfully his attention span is nil, so he doesn't chew long enough to destroy or damage much.

Chuck chases his tail, that is, until he is distracted by something random.

He tried to eat tissue paper. I could not make this up. Who does that?

I can't believe Karen's parents would allow a DOG in their home. It just isn't civilized. The dog even pooped on the rug by the back door. That's utterly disgusting. Even Sadie wouldn't do that.

Sadie, by the way, is hiding underneath the bed in the spare room. She comes out only when she's sure Chuck is in his kennel. Period. Then she takes care of all her business at once and goes back into hiding.

Thankfully, Chuck has a healthy fear of me and is too small to jump on the couch. So I'm pretty safe as long as I stay on furniture.

Karen told me I needed to "be nice" to Chuck.

Whatever

Chuck ate some of my food, I think. I didn't actually see him do this, but I could sense his dog stench by the bowl.

So I ate some of his.

Done

Rush Limbaugh and the Celebrated Stalker

I've taken a slight hit at the blog counter. For this reason, we are returning to our original format of dropping the name of Rush Limbaugh in the headline.

To the right is a picture of my problem.

This is Sofie. She comes over during the day between the hours of nine and noon. During this time I live in the most serious fear for my life. Sofie is a dangerous stalker, obsessed with my celebrity status. She follows me around the house, squealing and shrieking with delight. She tries to pull my tail, poke my eyes, bite my ears, etc.

She licked Sadie. I could not make this up. This is even more disgusting knowing the fact Sadie sheds to the point it is amazing she has any hair at all. (Karen and I've discussed waxing her, but Karen thinks that would be "cruel"-- whatever.)

As a celebrated writer, it is very difficult to produce under such stressful circumstances. Due to Sofie's "cuteness" Karen is only minimally sympathetic. She did say that as soon as the house sold we'd buy another one and then Sadie and I would move back in with her.

Actually, I'm kind of digging it here at Karen's parent's house. The house is like four times the size of Karen's. They have lots of places to hide and Karen's mom does a far better job with fulfilling all of my general needs.

I just would like a restraining order against Sofie, who is probably planted here by her father, the evil Jeff, just to terrorize me.

Anyway . . .

Our House

Our house if finally officially on the market!!!

Karen asked me to use my notoriety for marketing purposes. I'm going to put some pictures in a photobucket slide show and display it on ye ole blog in the sidebar. Anyway, if you like what you see shoot me an email (penelopeandsadie@aol.com) and I'll get you in touch with the right people.

In the meantime, it's now five after nine. I have to get upstairs before Sofie gets here.

Go 'Stros

"Pimple on the Arse of Journalism"

I totally stole this from my good friend Billy Pilgrim, as I love "pimple on the arse of journalism" almost as much as "asshats", which I haven't figured out how to use in a sentence yet, but still I am looking for a way to work it into daily conversation.

Being that I am providing you, the educated reader of discriminating taste with a plethora of knowledge, I have decided that I am a journalist.

Karen begs to differ.

"At best you are a editorialist," she told me. "Occasionally you would fall into the category of satirist. Mostly, I'd say you are a critic."

"I can't call you a journalist because you offer too many opinions," she informed me. "Besides you do virtually no investigation and don't even leave the house."

"Furthermore, journalists don't sleep eighteen hours a day."

How does she know what a journalist does?

Whatever. But what if my opinions are right? Could that give me any credibility?

"An opinion can't be right. It's just an opinion."

Oh please. Karen clearly is misinformed.

So what else can I tell you???

Congratulations to Our Blogger Friend

Speaking of journalists . . .

Our good friend Reid Kerr, at Reid About It (see link list) just got hitched.

Isn't that great???

You guys should all go over to his site and send your kudos.

More About Me and My Troubles

I am still at Karen's parent's house. Sadie takes refuge most of the time under Karen's parent's bed. I prefer to hang out in one of the upstairs bedrooms.

Mostly things are very quiet. The spawn of evil Jeff hangs out with us only for a few hours in the morning and since she does not roam upstairs, I am very capable of keeping myself safe. Karen comes by every day or two to visit.

Sometimes I miss her. Right now I'm exploring other options though. I mean, Karen's mom does a pretty good job of feeding us and, quite frankly, she does a hands down better job of keeping the box clean. I'm not saying I'm planning on replacing Karen just yet, but if she refuses to take me seriously as a journalist, I think I might need to consider other options.

A really cool thing about Karen's parent's house: the birds.

They have these birds that are very arrogant and get right up on the front porch really close to the door. Karen's mom gripes about the bird crap on the door frame constantly. All I'm going to say is this: just give me just one shot at those birds and the bird poop problem is over.

Totally

Tim Russert is No Ordinary Cat

Today I am foregoing the shameless name dropping of Rush Limbaugh for the purpose of blog hits. I think it's important for us to recognize one of the greatest men in modern American journalism.

FYI: The photo is of Luke Russert, son of Tim Russert. It was taken by Alex Wong and provided by Reuters.

I did not pay for this, as I am a cat and have no money.

Now back to the show . . .

Tim Russert

For my entire life I spent almost every Sunday morning while Karen flipped between Face the Nation and Meet the Press. It's just what we do here at I Don't Pretend to be an Ordinary Cat.

Sunday's broadcast brought back so many memories. My personal favorite was Russert nailing Chertoff (who I swear looks like those Nazis in Raiders of the Lost Art when their faces are being melted off by the Ark of the Covenant) over the slow assistance after hurricane Katrina. I also like the "is there anything in your past which would make your nomination for presidency an embarrassment" question to ole slick Willie circa 1991.

I don't want to repeat what everyone else is saying. But let's face it: Tim Russert was by far the fairest interviewer in the American media. We have lost more than what we realize.

Youtube has the Sunday's show if you'd like to see it.

Anyway . . .

Have you heard about this?

http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/06/13/ap-sues-blogger-too-long-excerpts

Does this mean I can't cite articles from Associated Press anymore?

What happens if I continue?

Are they going to sue me?

What do they expect to get? I'm a cat. I own nothing, as I am far too important for property responsibilities.

I guess they could sue Karen.

"Don't even bring me into this," Karen said to me. "My name better not be affiliated with your blog if I'm going to be sued over a violation of fair use."

Whatever

S0, fellow bloggers, what are your plans? How do you guys interpret this ridiculousness?

Anyway . . .

More on My Circumstances

So as you know I'm temporarily living at Karen's parent's house. This is OK, except for one thing:

The small one.

Every morning the small one (who they call Sofie) comes over. This wouldn't be a problem except she is very predatory and I spend most of those hours looking over my shoulder, hoping that she isn't behind me, making an attempt at my life.

It just isn't fair. She's allowed to come after me, going for my tail or ears, but if I so much as hiss in response, I'm the "bad" one.

There are just some things I don't understand.

"And so we go on, boats against the current, borne ceaslessly into the past . . . "

Rush Limbaugh at Studio 54

The news right now is very boring. I am tired of HillBilly, Barack or Barry, or whoever.

But I caught this story right out of jolly old London and I totally think it's great:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/politics/threelinewhip/june2008/borisalcoholban.htm

Evidently, up until the beginning of this month it was perfectly OK to drink in the London subway. I was not aware of this. Although I've never been to London, I can't imagine that it would be a good idea to drink openly on public transportation.

Maybe that's just my puritanical American side coming out, I don't know.

Anyway, some Londoners, celebrating the "last days of disco" and posting it on YouTube, made the public transportation a real adventure. Some of the footage is put to Abba's "Dancing Queen" and some of the footage is just raw.


In the background of some of the footage you can hear drunken Londoners shouting "Boris is a wanker". (Boris Johnson is the mayor of London).

That's classy.

I wonder what Bridget Jones would say about this?

Anyway, so if you were planning a trip abroad this summer, just remember, leave you liquor back at the hotel, as you can't consume in the tunnel.

Sex and the City . . . Not So Much???

I read somewhere that the Sex and the City Movie, which was the number one grossing movie its premiere weekend, has an audience of 85 percent women.

Why is this surprising?

What surprises me is how passionately men feel about:

a. Not seeing this movie

b. Sarah Jessica Parker being positively unattractive

Actually, I get A. It was a television show geared to women; why would the movie be any different? Karen, who saw all of two episodes during the entire run of the series, isn't planning on seeing the movie because she never identified with the characters.

"It's like the seventies came back and bought expensive shoes," Karen pointed out, regarding the promiscuity.

Operation Rush Limbaugh
OK, I'm working on the email.

Does anyone have Mr. Limbaugh's address?

When it's finished I'll be sure to let you see it.

Enough about other people who really don't matter-- I want to talk about me

Karen is almost done with the house-- finally.

This has been very uncomfortable for me, by the way. First of all, she's packed up a lot of our stuff. Second, she keeps moving the cat box around the house, so it doesn't "mess up" the part of the house she considers "finished". So basically, when I have to go, I have to hunt down the box. Since the carpet guy is coming Saturday morning, she decided that Sadie and I needed to stay at her parent's house.

I am so put out.

So here I am like a refugee in the home of Karen's parents-- indefinitely. Karen will come and visit half of the time.

"So who will feed us?" I demanded from her before we left. "Who will take care of the box? Who will clean up the Sadie vomit?"

Karen promised her mom would feed us regularly. She also promised to see me at least every day or two and promised that she would clean the box and any vomit that may occur.

On the bright side, Karen's parent's house is four times the size of our old home. They also have lots of places to sunbathe and their bed is set up in a way so that when I crawl under it, Karen can't drag me out easily.

Karen told me that she expected me to "be nice and helpful" during my time visiting. This is obsurd, obviously. First of all, I've never been "nice" at Karen's parent's house. Why should I "be nice" now? It would confuse them. Furthermore, Karen's parents don't want my help any more than I'm willing to offer it. They should be greatful that I'm honoring them with my presence. I'm sure their life will be much more enlightened now that I'm staying with them.

A Request from Karen
Several months ago, Karen read about a saint you were supposed to bury in the yard for good luck when selling the house. Which saint was it? Where can she get one?

Operation Rush Limbaugh: We Shall Perservere

OK, so this is what happened Friday:

6 am: I woke Karen up and told her that today was the day. She turned over and told me that Rush Limbaugh wasn't at all interested in hearing from anyone at six in the morning.

7:30 am: Karen is up and around and dressed. I again reminded her of what needed to happen. She told me if I mentioned this again before nine, she would go to the mall and not come back until three.

9 am: I gave Karen my well thought out plan: she would start calling at ten-- an hour before the show begins-- and she would tell him that she was calling for me, Penelope the Cat, and that I wanted to thank him for bringing so many readers to the blog. I also told her to SAY the web address on the air as well. Then I mentioned that she should suggest being his honorary mistress in Texas.

That might of been a mistake.

9:05 am: Karen told me that all bets were off, as she was not property to give away to a conservative radio host (Karen can be so haughty sometimes).

9:20 am: I told her she didn't have to suggest mistressdome if she got the blog address on the air.

9:21 am: She agreed to call

9:55 am: Karen began calling

10:03 am: Karen continued calling.

10:10 am: Karen continued calling

10:15 am: Karen began to get testy. She told me this needed to be much simpler.

10:20 am: Karen went to the bathroom (much to my dismay). She continued to call.

10:23 am: Karen took a "break" from calling. This break included reading part of the new David Sedaris book and loosing my place.

11:00 am: We began listening to Mr. Limbaugh's show. This didn't last long, as when he said "skewl teachers" it kind of pissed off Karen. Oh you should have heard her:

"Skewl teacher my ass. I give him one day at my job and he'd drown. How dare he use such an insulting pretentious tone," she said, once again waving her hands all around.

At this point the calling stopped.

But for some weird reason, Karen continued to listen.

And then was the song.

Mr. Limbaugh featured the song "How to Handle a Woman". This wasn't good. I'm not even going to repeat what Karen said here, as I don't want to upset Mr. Limbaugh.

So basically, I think Operation Rush Limbaugh will have to change forms. I think I might send him an email instead (when I do I'll publish it for you), as I just don't think Karen will spend another Friday attempting to make those calls. Besides, even if she did, I don't think anything positive will come of it.

Anyway. . .

In Other News:

I heard about this on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me. And again, I could not make this up:

http://www.youvebeenleftbehind.com/

This is an Internet service that will, for forty smackers, leave messages for your loved ones who are not taken "first round", so to speak, a la Left Behind style. Basically they have like six people they feel won't be left behind and if these guys don't log into the system for six days straight the emails start going out.

There are so many complicated issues to be discussed about this little scam, theologically, spiritually, ETHICALLY, etc. But mainly in my circle this just provoked a conversation about souls.

Basically, the debate was not "do all dogs go to heaven" or "do all cats go to heaven"? No, the debate was "does Penelope go to heaven"?

Being that I am a cat and have no schooling in Christian theology, I haven't given this much thought. I would assume however, being that I am Penelope the Cat, I would gain entrance to whatever establishment crosses my path.

Karen said that she could not find any evidence about pets in heaven or not. She was not willing to commit to the idea that all animals have souls, but she did say that "her pets do".

Isn't that sweet? And this was right after I jumped out of a cabinet and tried to kill her.

Karen's mom said outright that she didn't think I was going to heaven. Basically she cited my "behavioral issues".

Evil Jeff not only said that I wasn't getting into heaven, but he also thought I would be guarding the gates of Hell.

Oh what does he even know?

Updates on Operation Rush Limbaugh

Karen told me that if she could find Mr. Limbaugh's number and if I would stop driving her crazy she would consider calling Mr. Limbaugh today. This meant no fighting with Sadie.

Anyway, check your local radio listings. Limbaugh plays in Houston 11-2. I'm assuming one adjusts this to meet the time zones.

I've given a list of things I want her to say. Anyway . . . those are our morning plans.

Tune in, dear readers, tune in. . .

Rush Limbaugh Engulfed in Flames

Dear Canadians:

Yesterday, during a moment of delusion from the heat, I mentioned that Canadians suck. Right now, yes, you Canadians suck. This doesn't me I don't love you, but right now I am freaking hot and well, it is what it is. I am currently sitting in front of the refrigerator waiting for Karen to wander into the kitchen and open the door, so that I can hop inside briefly, or for her to drop a piece of ice onto the floor for my enjoyment.

Granted, I don't go outside. But still it's freaking hot. You guys suck for the next nine months, or until you are knee deep in the misery of snow.

Whichever comes first.

Anyway . . .

Karen is mean.

In our home, we have three pools of water which are constantly full and cold. Karen was working on one of them this afternoon and still would not let me drink out of it. She said that drinking from the device she calls a "toilet" is disgusting. When finished she put the lid down, like always.

It simply isn't fair.

Anyway . . .

Flipping Out

OK, Bravo has this "reality" show about a house flipper who I'm guessing is a tad OCD. That isn't a big deal-- I would think that OCD and house flipping would be complementary. But, oh it gets so much better:

The dude is mean. He's got a crew of assistants who spend most of their time freaking out about being fired, which he's known to do very randomly. He also hires them back a few days later.

Tell me this: what's the point? If you are going fire someone, it's a lot of trouble to hire them back. Lord, if I wanted that kind of drama, I'd fire Karen three times a day.

Anyway, the show is called Flipping Out. Catch it, as it's totally great.

A Funny Thing Happened at Super Target
Have you bought chicken recently?

Karen picked up a package of chicken which read "family farm raised". This struck Karen funny. So basically, the chickens have a lovely family home, that is, until said chicken is decapitated.

Karen mentioned this to the lady behind the chicken counter. She told Karen that she personally buys the free range chicken, since family farm chickens are kept in pens before decapitation, as opposed to the free rangers who get to roam the earth before their decapitation.

How lovely.

I asked Karen about her feelings regarding chickens. Her response was that chickens are called foul for a reason. As long as said chickens weren't pooping on the front porch, she really didn't care.

She did purchase the free rangers, though.

When You are Engulfed in Flames
David Sedaris' new book came out yesterday. I've read the first two essays. So far, it's a riot. I'll let you know more as I get further.

Sedaris was on The Daily Show yesterday. Catch on the repeat.


Operation Rush Limbaugh
OK, we've got more news:

Karen's class didn't make as of today. This means unless they dig up five kids for English, she is free for the summer.

Karen, despite really wanting a new refrigerator, would prefer that five kids not be found for summer school. It's worth 2,000 bucks not to work so she can chill out and drink margaritas in the backyard.

That is, except it's too freaking hot to go outside.

Anyway . . .

If Karen is free, I can't see any reason why she shouldn't spend Friday taking care of Operation Limbaugh. I've mentioned this once again to her. She told me "we'll see", which is better than the "hell no" I expected.

Still haven't mentioned the honorary mistress thing. Once again, we're taking it one step at a time.

I'll be able to give you official notification tomorrow.

So as of now, keep you midday open.

Schools Out for Summer, but not for Rush Limbaugh

It's Official

I'm sick and tired of politics.

HillBilly will continue or not. Period. Either way, we don't need to hear day long speculation.

Karen is also boycotting The View, as they spent like FOREVER talking about this and gave Colin Firth all of five minutes.

You don't shorten the Firth's time. That is, unless you want to hear about it from Karen.

Interesting fact: Firth has FIVE movies coming out this summer. Karen is in heaven.

It's Official Again

Karen got a three digit reading on her car thermometer yesterday.

Summer has begun.

Canadians suck.

My Novel About School Teachers

If I ever write a book about teachers, I would include one of the following:

1. Teachers desperately wanting to check out and go home and administrators desperately wanting them to stay until three.

or

2. Administrators desperately wanting to leave and teachers not ready to check out after five minutes of arriving in the building.

Either is pretty funny.

This concept is inspired by Karen, a decade plus veteran of public schools. She's been in three educational settings and this issue has been a small annoyance each year.

Small in that how mad can you be? IT'S THE LAST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!

One school let you leave whenever you finished checking out. You got the checkout sheet like a week ahead of time, so you could do some of it early. If you weren't done by ten, someone was out looking for you, tapping their foot impatiently.

Although technically, you had until four.

Another school had a big assembly at eight, which lasted until about tenish (announcing retirees, teachers of the year and such), a breakfast shortly following, and then you got the check out sheets.

And the administrators disappeared

And reappeared for five minutes

And disappeared again

And reappeared for ten minutes

And went to lunch

And the principal wouldn't do the final sign off until three.

I asked Karen which was worse. According to her, although she really wanted to be home by noon, she'd rather spend a few more hours at work than to have someone breathing down her neck being all impatient, as that person booked a flight she should have scheduled later than noon on a workday.

Hypothetically speaking, of course

Other Funny Things About Teachers:

Elementary teachers, as a whole, are perky. At the assemblies announcing important things that happened during the year at individual schools, they do one of the following when anything related to their school is announced:

A. Whoop

B. Stand up and shout

C. Bring instruments, such as cowbells, and use them LOUDLY

They also have a tendency to match.

Karen said it takes too much energy to be an elementary teacher. She says that if she wrote a book about elementary school teachers she'd have someone sampling the Ritalin.

High school teachers are a little more dry. Some of them cross the line from dry to sarcastic. Some of them cross the line from sarcastic to bitter.

Many of them want to jump the elementary school teacher, who just ingested three cups of Starbucks, ringing that wretched cowbell.

Some of them are just plain crazy.

Speaking of just plain crazy, someone, sitting in that assembly, is hungover, at least in my book.

Someone has a deep seeded hatred towards the newly named teacher of the year. It could be for a number of reasons, it really doesn't matter. But the great part comes when the name is read you can vaguely hear that person, five or six rows back, say, over the cowbells and thunderous claps:

"Oh, HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL no."

At least in my book.

NOTE: None of these things happened this year to Karen. In all honesty, according to her it was a fairly tame end-of-the-year check out. She was even home well before three. Some of these things have happened in the past, not exactly in the shape or form I presented them. Some of these things were modified from past events in the to protect the idiots who behave like asses FREQUENTLY. But all events have some grain of truth, as relayed from Karen.

Update on Operation Rush Limbaugh
I'm still working on Karen. Now she's saying she might be teaching summer school. Since she doesn't get out of summer school until 12:30, calling Mr. Limbaugh becomes an impossibility.

I told her to blow off summer school.

She told me she wanted to buy a new refrigerator and summer school is easy money (7:30- 12:30 five days a week 25 bucks an hour-- you do the math).

Whatever

Summer school ends sometime before the fourth of July. We might have to delay operation Rush Limbaugh until then.

However . . .

We're getting a lot of hits out of South Palm Beach. I KNOW that Mr. Limbaugh is reading this. He needs to cut us a break. Other celebrities get breaks. They don't have to ask their assistants to sit on hold for hours on end. He needs to give us his PRIVATE number and allow us the luxury to call in at our leisure.

I still haven't mentioned the mistress thing. I figure one thing at a time.

I'll get back with you tomorrow

Go 'Stros