2020 Nutshells – Page 6 – Nutshellcity.com

Planning for the empty-nest middle school trip

So, let’s see. She has: Gloves. Scarf. Raincoat. Snacks. Toothbrush. Spare toothbrush, for when the first one falls in the toilet. More snacks. Compass. Notecard reminders to floss. Notecard reminders to set alarm clock. Notecard reminders to wake up for alarm clock. Notecard reminders to get on the bus. More snacks.

There’s a lot that goes into prepping for a week-long middle school trip to Washington D.C. That’s what my house has been undertaking for the past week or so: Setting up my 14-year-old daughter for a big bus trip to the nation’s capital.

There she will journey to some of our country’s most historic sites and museums: the White House, Mt. Vernon, the National Archives for the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, a side trip to Philadelphia for Independence Hall and, of course, the Medieval Times restaurant and jousting show.

If that doesn’t scream, “America!” I don’t know what does.

The ailing kitty and the happy new year

Because, why not? I mean, what better way to start the New Year than dealing with a cat who not only has a urinary tract infection, but also hyperthyroidism. And for at least the near future will need two different pills administered with her food. A cat who is already so picky about eating. To say that she looks disdainfully at food she doesn’t like would be an insult to the word “disdain.” An old cat, set in her ways. Stubbornness is hard-wired into her DNA.

The cat – Tea Grass – is up there in years already, and she had started losing weight. Pretty dramatically. Suddenly skin and bones. We thought she was just picky. Because she is picky. The kind of picky that says, “Hey, I’ll sooner starve to death than eat this slop you’re serving.”

And she’s not even our cat.

Only, I need to get past that. She IS our cat. Our adopted cat who is probably 15 or 16 years old, and with her fella’, Sunburst, was in need of a home when her owner passed away. We just happened to have a front porch perfect for them. And when I said, “sure, they can take up residence there,” I pictured going out each morning and pouring some food in a bowl and calling it a day. “Porch cats are fed,” I would proclaim to the world. “Normal living may resume with no impediments to enjoyment, regular routines or mental sanity. Hooray!”

Ah, that would be the life.