Proud Moments in Adulthood: Fast Food

My cat is a great chef.

Yesterday I made pasta. I had forgotten where the pots were, but eventually I found them, covered in dust, and I went to work. The result was bland and uninspiring. My cat watched me cook, shocked by all this extra movement on my part. He’s used to food coming in paper and plastic containers.

Having been raised by people who grow vegetables, consuming fast food fills me with pleasure and then extreme guilt. I’m sure this isn’t an uncommon feeling, but I understand that children of hippies often experience extreme food rebellion/regression. Denied as a child, I still hunger for Lunchables and Gushers.

Are those animal fries?

I’m also a straight girl who lives in LA, so I know about calories. Sometimes picking a cheeseburger over a salad can feel like the difference between dying alone and walking the red carpet with Joseph Gordon Levitt. Of course I was also raised by a feminist, so the idea of watching my weight for men feels wrong. I ignore the fact that I might be watching it for myself and wade deep into the waters of fast food. I avoid most of the big chains. The elitist in me dislikes their popularity. Below is my neurotic’s guide to Pandora’s box.

DomestiCATing and Other CATastrophes, Part II

Besides naming our kitten Youngblood, we haven’t noticeably damaged him. Yes, that’s his name, although I voted for John or Arnold–I love a boring human name on a feline. But a name like Youngblood creates so many more opportunities for our kitten and his companions. For instance, Noah likes calling the vet just to ask questions about “My cat, Youngblood,” so he can listen to the receptionist snicker.

Although Youngblood hasn’t displayed any horrendous psychological disorders as of yet (no manic shopping or self-mutilation), he has been shitting all over the place. He used his cat box perfectly for the first week, and then he seemed to want to test the depths of our love.

He pooped in my dresser drawer, he smeared his butt on my white curtains and he left a little in the closet and right by my bed. There was poop on the bathroom door, under the couch, inside Becky’s sweater and on top of the toilet. Let’s just say it was everywhere. I will keep the poop talk to an absolute minimum. We lived it but you shouldn’t have to.

We needed one of these.

The debate began: how do we clean this? Normally we clean whenever family members threaten to visit or when  it’s finally impossible to find the remote. But this was a new kind of desperate cleaning. After an initial wipe, we read and re-read the instructions on the carpet cleaner. Did the foam, sprayed fifteen inches from the stain, need to dry completely before we vacuumed? I argued it didn’t matter and so did Becky, but Noah was pretty sure that those fifteen minutes of drying were crucial. In fact if we didn’t wait fifteen minutes, we might as well not even clean.

Becky tried to get to the bottom of his reasoning, even though there was no logic behind our argument, besides that the cleaning would happen quicker. It was midnight on Sunday, so we were in our PJs, feeling vulnerable and tired.
Finally Becky backed Noah into a corner (figuratively). She asked, “Well, have you ever cleaned anything?”

“No,” said Noah, “but I still think we should wait until it dries.”

Why did he have to target my Periodic Table sweater?

Becky went off to mop the bathroom floor and clean the toilet. Noah cleaned the carpet, using his method, and I tried to find hidden terdletts in my room. Unfortunately it would take putting on a certain sweater to find the last Youngblood gift.

We need the cat therapist!

YB (Youngblood) seems to be trying to tell us something: first of all, not to leave our shit everywhere so he can shit on or in it. Secondly, he wants us to learn how to clean and clean well. You can’t half-ass a YB clean-up. Thirdly, he seems to be acting out. I can see his little cat brain turning, “You think you’re adults? Deal with this! Adopting a wild animal! Are you crazy!” YB’s inner monologue suspiciously sounds like my own, which could say something about anthropomorphizing in general.

In the preceding discussions about the cat crap situation, I took a hippie, laissez faire approach. “We shouldn’t interfere with his nature!” Becky and Noah listened to me talk about YB’s anger and separation anxiety and his need for constant affection, and then they put him in the bathroom. With the problem barricaded in the bathroom, we started reading kitten taming books. What are his terds telling us? Is he marking his territory or is he really angry? Oh god, what could he be angry about?

I tried to argue that he’s angry about being locked in the bathroom, and since he continues to poop on the middle of the bathroom floor, right between the two cat boxes (one for number one and one for number two), maybe I had a point. But he was pooping everywhere before his seclusion in the toilette.

Soon our carpet will tell a story.

There are so many factors in this equation, and it’s hard to know which ones to eliminate. I started devising a scientific experiment. My hypothesis was that his cruel and unusual imprisonment was causing him to defecate in the middle of his prison cell. Unfortunately the only way to prove this theory involves letting him loose on the unsuspecting beige carpet.

Besides, YB’s an angel in the bathroom. He sits between your legs while you pee, purring and staring fondly at your genitalia. He also loves to watch you shower. Sometimes I’ll drink more water just so I can spend extra time with him. I ask him, “What’s the matter, Dr. Poopie Pants?” In response, he claws my hands and bites my wrists, and I start to rethink my “accept his nature” style of parenting.

Cats enjoy some LARPing.

Noah has taken YB to the vet a total of three times to try and identify any sort of digestive, medical problem that could be causing this shit storm. Our half-wit vet, who “isn’t a cat person,” says “it’s behavioral.” She also ominously says things like, “He’s going to be trouble” or “He’s a fighter. It’s in his blood” or “His mama taught him how to kill.” Becky now thinks we’ve forced her to adopt a wild, dangerous animal that also shits everywhere.

Soon YB will be a star.

It was time for professional help. Noah called a cat trainer and left a message. She hasn’t gotten back to us; she’s probably busy trying to start her own reality TV show. Meanwhile, we are stuck in the before part of  some wretched Animal Planet show. People ask us how we are and we say things like, “He’s having some behavioral issues, but that’s normal with feral kittens.” He’s our special needs cat. Noah did say something about how YB might be the product of an incestuous cat alliance. With a name like Youngblood, popular with inbred hillbillies, what were we expecting.
It’s YB’s second week in the bathroom, and some days he does utilize his kitty box to the full extent. That’s when we put a star on his calendar and give him a treat. Positive reinforcement is very important. Other days require a flurry of Febreze and all-purpose antibacterial cleaner.

"Children should be weened naturally."

I keep suggesting that we let him out of the bathroom and test my hypothesis, but by now Noah and Becky know that my cat advice stems from my childhood in Santa Cruz, where children have been known to nurse until the age of seven, so they ignore me. I’m the crazy aunt who rolls into town and buys the kitten booze and then doesn’t clean up the vomit. Noah and Becky, however, are the loving parents who spend every night and morning in the bathroom, gently placing their progeny in the cat box and praying.

Proud Moments in Adulthood: The Cat Baby, Part I

Downright untrustworthy.

It took us three months to decide not to get a kitten. Our landlords (if you are reading this, our sink is clogged) forbid pets unless you fork over a $500 deposit. Plus Becky didn’t know if she liked cats–could she trust them? Would it scratch her eyes out during the night? I assured her this was most unlikely, if anything the cat would go for the neck. So we weren’t getting a cat and then Noah, Becky’s boyfriend, moved in.

We figured we were already breaking our lease, so why not break it again? Plus our lease expired on July 15th, and although we intend to continue paying rent, doesn’t this make us lawless squatters? I would call our property manager for some clarification, but everyone in that office seems to know one thing, and that one thing is never what you need to know, so they pass you around the office until eventually you hang up. This seems an inefficient way of getting people off the phone.

I could also consult our lease, but it seems to have disappeared. For a while Becky thought it might be in the trunk of her car. It was not, which was both reassuring and upsetting—on the one hand Becky isn’t using her trunk as a filing cabinet, but on the other hand, we don’t have a copy of our lease. Oh and it costs money to get another copy (the fifth “property manager” I talked to imparted this singular jewel of wisdom, the only one in his possession).

Feral cats can be dangerous.

In the above paragraphs, I have indulged several tangential thoughts, for which I deeply apologize. I seem to be using a very adult, formal voice in this post. Perhaps I am compensating for the obvious immaturity demonstrated by my story. Anyway, Noah wanted a cat, so one Saturday morning we drove to the parking lot of his work, where a feral cat had recently given birth to kittens.

We tried to think through this whole process of catching a feral cat, but none of us could decide on the proper way to go about things, so we decided to plan nothing. I crouched behind a dumpster, that smelled like human piss, for an hour, coaxing the world’s most adorable black kitten with tuna fish. He wasn’t too impressed by my offering, so I started to tempt him with a leaf, hoping he felt like playing. He did.

Redneck Cat Carrier.

I dispatched Becky and Noah to buy a cat carrier (at least we realized that was necessary). When they came back, I had my hand right near the kitten, ready to pounce. So I did. Of course, I didn’t realize the cat carrier needed to be assembled. Little baby black kitten fought for his life. Becky retreated to the car. Noah assembled the carrier like a mad man and I bled profusely.

We got him in the carrier. We were probably as traumatized as the kitten. He may have feared for his life, but we were all afraid we had permanently damaged him psychologically. Our neuroses whirred to a nice speed, and all of us experienced a taste of parenthood.

I tell you, those flour babies in elementary school do not come near to a kitten. Well, also in elementary school, I hadn’t had enough therapy to identify the damage being done to me by my parents. Now of course, I knew we could royally F things up for this little feline.

To Be Continued……

Proud Moments in Adulthood: Directions Are Hard

Thanks Facebook for the photo.

Becky proudly announced that she’s been using my egg test (dunk them in water–if they float they’re rotten). I was proud of us. I felt like we were making progress, and I thought Excellent Notion was part of that. Then I watched Becky do the egg test. “Hurray, they floated!”

At first I thought she was being sarcastic, but then I realized that Becky thinks that floating eggs are fresh. She got the egg test backwards. I explained to her that the eggs float when they’re filled with noxious, rotting gas. I really rained on her parade, and I was feeling a little guilty because my egg knowledge was making me feel superior.

Then she decided to eat them anyway. She confessed this was the second time she’d done the egg test backwards, and she didn’t get food poisoning before. Maybe she’s built up an immunity to rotten food. I know I have.

One of my finest moments.

Proud Moments in Adulthood: Is This Still Edible?

“Do Soy Dogs go bad?” asks Becky as she thrusts the fake meat in my face. “Yes. Yes they do,” I say pointing to the white spots growing on her dogs. Most of our conversations in the kitchen involve expiration dates. After all, if your cheese takes on a greenish hue, who’s to say that’s a bad thing? Isn’t cheese supposed to be moldy?

Maybe it’s our microwave mentality, but we expect our food to wait for us. Who does spinach think it is, demanding to be eaten within the week? Plus we both have eaten outside the expiration date. When do you draw the line?

According to my mother, companies air on the cautious side with their expiration dates. They don’t want to be sued. So I perform basic smell and taste tests before consuming expired food. If no one claims the hummus in my office refrigerator, I’m going to take it home and eat it, never mind that it expired last week. I live dangerously.

Turns out I do live dangerously–I’ve had food poisoning twice in the last six months, which is an unusually high rate (according to an informal poll of myself). Now I know that salmon, even if cooked, should be eaten promptly. But I don’t want to be rushed and bossed around by salmon or any other fish, so I’m sticking to canned tuna (botulism only happens in movies).

I wish I could argue that Becky and I eat expired food because we’re dedicated conservationists, and we don’t believe in wasting food. But we’re just really lazy, and most of the time we eat out or microwave. When we remember that we bought groceries, it’s too late and our food has died, which reinforces the behavior that led to the food going bad in the first place.

Not our fridge. Not that bad, yet

It’s an endless cycle, but it’s probably my closest connection to nature. Weather isn’t really a factor in Southern California, and I sit in a florescent office all day, so my closest encounter with the wild is my refrigerator. I open the door with a sense of dread, armed with gloves and prepared for battle. Sometimes I feel like a scientist, monitoring specimens of cottage cheese and tofu. Tofu actually turns gray and creates a pinkish, viscous fluid as it goes bad. Cottage cheese turns the expected green. It’s like our refrigerator has its own table of grocery elements, and we watch them vaporize or solidify.

Also, determining if something’s still edible is the only time I need to use the scientific method. All those years in school, when I was forced to come up with science experiments, why didn’t I ever attempt to come up with a way to conclusively answer this question? Instead I busied myself answering questions like, “Which fabrics are most flammable?” or “Which insulation acts as the best form of sound proofing?” These are two questions I have never had to really answer, which is probably for the best because according to the data I gathered, cotton spontaneously ignites at seventy degrees. Can you imagine how weather forecasts would change? “Folks it looks to be a hot one out there today. Better put away those cotton blends!”

If small people can see in the dark, they would make ideal soldiers.

Of course these days I don’t need the scientific method because of Google. After frantically trying both my parents and getting answering machines, I googled “how do I tell if eggs have gone bad?” It’s amazing how many things Google knows about me. I’ve asked it questions I would never ask anyone, amd apparently I’m not the only one because when you type “Can midgets…” the suggested searches include, “See in the dark,” and “Warts on…” comes up with “Penile shaft.” Anyway, I quickly found a video of a fresh egg test. Rotten eggs produce a gas which causes them to float in water. So I took my eggs and floated (felt like a witch trial). Some of them were rotten, but the rest I used to make a lovely batch of chocolate chip cookies which I then fed to my nearest and dearest friends. Good thing for Google.

If you ever dine at our house, which is a slight possibility, do not be alarmed. We will have mostly purchased food specifically for the occasion (or made pasta which doesn’t go bad), so it will be fresh. However, I’ve written this post as a disclaimer and reminder. Ask me “Is this still edible?” and enjoy watching me try to answer.

Proud Moments in Cooking

I made meatloaf, but I made it at 9pm after I came home from yoga. I’d been fantasizing about a juicy slice of meatloaf through the whole class–I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to be thinking about meat during yoga. After I was done grocery shopping, I realized I should probably look at a recipe. I’d done this before, so I assumed I could just wing it. Isn’t that the idea with real cooks, they can just throw stuff together. According to the recipe I found online, you have to cook meatloaf for an hour.

I wasn’t willing to accept this, so I checked on the sleeping beast every two minutes. After thirty minutes, the meat in the center wasn’t pink anymore. Sweet. I decided to go ahead and eat, even though the bacon I’d put on top was still a little pale.

I ate raw bacon. It wasn’t even cooked enough to become rubbery. This bacon sacrifice wasn’t even worth it, because I’d bought lean beef. You need that extra fat, turns out, to keep the meat juicy. The actual loaf of meat was dry and chunky, but flavorful. However, I was too busy trying not to think about the bacon to enjoy any remnant flavors. I didn’t get physically sick, but psychologically, the bacon took its toll. Every stomach twinge was the swine flu, even though, apparently, the swine flu has nothing to do with pigs.

What’s worse is the next day I did the same thing. I microwaved the meatloaf, assuming the bacon would become more cooked in the microwave. It did not, and now I’d dried the meatloaf to a cardboard consistency. I ate it, because I had cooked it. I had made that meatloaf and bacon, and I wouldn’t discourage my fledgling adult inclinations by not eating it.

I told a co-worker about my meaty efforts, and she said, “It’s a process.” She said I should try bbq-ing, but when I said, “Yeah, I’ll get some lighter fluid and just fire that baby up,” she seemed worried.

Proud Moments in Adulthood: The Light Bulb

I'm not the only one who thinks this looks like a breast, right?

After waiting a week, I was finally forced to change the light bulb in the ceiling fixture in my room. Now, I had waited so long because I’m about to move, so I relied on a bed-side lamp, figuring it wasn’t my problem anymore, but today I packed the lamp, so I had no choice but to change the bulb. No one was home. I made my roommate change the bulb last time, but it looked easy when he did it.

This picture was photoshopped, but the danger I experienced was 100% genuine.

I stood on a stool, hovering above certain death and the piles of my unsorted clothes. I resorted to yogic breathing and concentration, carefully unscrewing the glass fixture. I replaced the bulb in a second, but the fixture wouldn’t screw back on. I thought about leaving the glass off, waiting for my roommate, but I had something to prove. Finally, I got it to stay in place. “This is really great,” I thought, “a proud moment on my path to adulthood.”

In this situation I would just walk around.

An hour later the glass fell, covering my floor with glass land mines. Still, I thought about leaving the shards on the floor (I was really tired after changing the light bulb). Eventually I cleaned up what I could, but I can’t do a thorough job because I don’t own a vacuum cleaner. I guess the moral of the story is that  part of being an adult is accepting you need help. Whatever.

Cars Are Sexist and I’m an Adult

I don’t recommend driving 350 miles in the rain to get your windshield wipers fixed, but that’s what I did. I was forced to make this treacherous journey because my car started making a mysterious rattle. I knew from listening to “Car Talk” that I would have to imitate this sound, but I couldn’t master it. Every man I talked to about the problem started making car sounds, but I couldn’t correct them with my own version. How do boys learn this sound-making talent? Instead I used metaphors. “It’s like a glass of ice rattling, or it’s like a quiet blender, blending a banana smoothie.” I used these metaphors while talking to my dad on the phone. He had always been in charge of car malfunctions. In fact he had pretty much been in charge of all malfunctions.

Living 350 miles away from him means that I have learned to live with broken things. Heater doesn’t work, get another blanket. Printer only prints when it wants to. Sure, no problem. The car problem, however, was something I couldn’t ignore. Without my car I would be stranded in North East LA, lose both my jobs, my sanity, and eventually live under a freeway overpass. Even facing this grim prospect, I couldn’t take the car to a mechanic by myself. I know nothing about cars.

I only realized a couple years ago that you have to feed the thing oil as well as gas. How would I know the mechanic was giving me a fair price? But facing a life on the streets, alone and with dirty underwear, I was willing to pay any price. I would even bake the mechanic cookies. I was vulnerable, so I asked everyone I knew for advice.

These dolls would have also been educational.

My coworkers suggested I take a male friend with me. My closest male LA friend is a flaming homosexual. When I turned to him, he said take a man, other than me. The feminist in me was angry. Why did straight men have a corner on all things automotive? As a child someone should have prepared me for this, perhaps with a mechanic Barbie. She has a dream car, but I don’t remember the hood opening.

I decided to prove a point and go to the mechanic alone. I would march in, ask for an estimate, and then call my dad to ask if I was being ripped off. Maybe he could even talk to the mechanic over the phone. Just as I was leaving to find a mechanic, my housemate offered to take a look at the car. He’s a man. It took him five minutes to locate the problem. The reservoir of windshield wiper fluid had corroded off the side of the car and was hitting the fan belt. He pulled the reservoir out, tied some wires to the side of the car, and the sound was gone.

The fuse (I think) that was hitting the belt.

I had studied my car for obvious problems multiple times, examining the diagram of the engine provided in the manual. Of course, I did always look at the engine when I got home from work, and it was dark. I decided this was the reason I hadn’t noticed this obvious problem. Now I could drive my car without worry, so long as it didn’t rain. The windshield wipers didn’t work. So, I thought I’d go home for Easter and have my dad take the car to our trusted mechanic. This seemed like a great plan until it started to rain. My dad, though, seemed optimistic. “Just pull over if it starts to rain. The worst thing that will happen is you’ll have to spend the night in a motel.”

“Sure,” I thought. I can do this. Adults spend nights in motels alone. I turned my phone off, to preserve battery power. I didn’t want to be stranded on a back road without a way to call for help. I was on top of things. I got over the Grapevine with only slight drizzles. I called my parents to celebrate, but they were both in a panic. It was pouring in Santa Cruz, and they wanted me to turn back. I wouldn’t do it. I was determined to make it to Santa Cruz; I wanted to prove my adulthood by driving recklessly and having my dad take the car to the mechanic the next day.