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Where'd the weekend go?!
Or all of last week, for that matter.
Thanks so much for all the suggestions on how to deal with the Polly/Zoe problem! Even though we're a long way from having the situation resolved, the Feliway seems to working pretty well at keeping Polly calmer. Funny that I'd never even heard of the stuff before![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
textualdeviance and vampry brought it up... but when I talked to the folks at my vet's office about solutions, that was one of the first suggestions they had!
I had to take Zoe in for her third booster vaccination earlier this week, so she's now all caught up (which she may have been before, but we have no way of knowing for sure). So, while I was there anyway, I outlined the situation and had both Dan the Vet Assistant and Dr. J (the vet on duty that day) pipe up with the Feliway... both suggesting the spray version rather than the room diffuser (which apparently has extremely limited effectiveness and is quite expensive). They also gave me their standard printout of ideas and explanations of cat behavior (though they both said it sounded like I'd already worked through most of the list). They did recommend stopping the scent swapping thing for now, since it just seems to make Polly more paranoid.
Dr. J said the best thing at this point was to take it slowly and give Polly plenty of time... and to try the Feliway to reduce the feeling that Zoe is everywhere. And then, if it still doesn't seem to be working, they'd look at getting Polly some meds to help her relax. I made a joke about giving her Kitty Valium and Dan the Vet Assistant said that what she really needs are a couple belts of Kitty Scotch to mellow her out. At which point Dr. J's eyes lit up and she asked if Polly reacts at all to catnip... and when I said yes, she said "Well then, you just need to get her stoned before you bring her in the house." Hee!
So, Polly now has her "little friend" (an old sock with catnip in it) that I give her about five to ten minutes before bringing her in the house. It has helped her mellow out considerably, as has the Feliway. We still haven't had the two cats together at all... at this point, I'm just trying to get Polly used to being in the house again. Although she still has a tendency to only stick around for a few minutes before dashing back to the safety of the garage. At least she's acting more like her normal self.
I found another really good article about the "wi-fi cloud" over Hermiston, OR and the surrounding area. This one goes a bit more into the business model involved and into why it was set up there in the first place. Basically, it's a showcase... a place to show off exactly what can be done with this sort of a system, but still with a sound business model to make it a worthwhile venture. Much like the wi-fi network they've got running in Marymoor Park in Redmond, WA, this one can also be used for more than internet access -- e.g. for the city to read parking meters remotely, for farmers to control watering systems or to check weather conditions, etc. Very clever. I really need to remember to stop and try it out on one of my many trips through that area.
This weekend I finally got a chance to watch and record off some of the shows I still had on the DVR from last season (what can I say? It was a busy summer!). I can't believe I hadn't gotten around to watching the end of Numb3rs, which ties Veronica Mars as my favorite new show of last season. If they ever came up with some sort of arc-like storyline, it would win, hands down (no matter how much I love VM). You know, it just occurred to me that Navi Rawat has been on three shows with actors I consider to be the hottest on television... even sharing scenes with at least two of them (James Marsters on AtS and many scenes with David Krumholtz on Numb3rs), but I can't remember her ever shared a scene with Kiefer Sutherland when she was on 24.
Speaking of 24, this morning I started in on the last few episodes of last season, only to discover that I'd missed the last half of the finale (stupid two hour finales) and the DVDs aren't due out until December. Fortunately, I'm pretty sure I've tracked down someone who has just the last hour available for download. Yay! On the down side, they don't seem to have as fast a connection as I do, so I've still got another five hours on the download.
The latest tidbits of news we've gotten about Dresden Files have made me weirdly more optimistic than I had been before about JM getting the role. I still don't think it'll happen, but previously I had my doubts that they were ever even seriously looking at him for the part, and now I think that they actually were. So, on the theory that any amount of optimism above zero is, well, MORE... yeah, I'm more optimistic about it now. Still keeping the optimistically pessimistic outlook that it's not very likely to happen... then I can be happily surprised if it does, and just shrug it off if it doesn't.
We hit a restaurant supply store yesterday to pick up a few things that Alton says we need (*monotone* and we all must do what Alton says */monotone*). He was right, the prices were quite good on things there, and they had some items I'd not found elsewhere. For now, we just augmented our current stash of cooking supplies with some spring-loaded tongs, a micro-plane grater, a pastry knife thingy, and a flat metal scraper thingy (perfect for bashing garlic, among other things). Oh, um, I also dug out the old bongos I had up in a closet (a present from my friend Shakespeare, who sadly isn't on LJ, back when we used to host Bardic Circles at our house every other week), turned them upside down and shoved old dishtowels in the bottoms of each side for cushioning... and we're now using them as utensil holders (*cough*just like Alton*cough*). They work really well, though, and look pretty spiffy!
Thanks so much for all the suggestions on how to deal with the Polly/Zoe problem! Even though we're a long way from having the situation resolved, the Feliway seems to working pretty well at keeping Polly calmer. Funny that I'd never even heard of the stuff before
textualdeviance and vampry brought it up... but when I talked to the folks at my vet's office about solutions, that was one of the first suggestions they had!I had to take Zoe in for her third booster vaccination earlier this week, so she's now all caught up (which she may have been before, but we have no way of knowing for sure). So, while I was there anyway, I outlined the situation and had both Dan the Vet Assistant and Dr. J (the vet on duty that day) pipe up with the Feliway... both suggesting the spray version rather than the room diffuser (which apparently has extremely limited effectiveness and is quite expensive). They also gave me their standard printout of ideas and explanations of cat behavior (though they both said it sounded like I'd already worked through most of the list). They did recommend stopping the scent swapping thing for now, since it just seems to make Polly more paranoid.
Dr. J said the best thing at this point was to take it slowly and give Polly plenty of time... and to try the Feliway to reduce the feeling that Zoe is everywhere. And then, if it still doesn't seem to be working, they'd look at getting Polly some meds to help her relax. I made a joke about giving her Kitty Valium and Dan the Vet Assistant said that what she really needs are a couple belts of Kitty Scotch to mellow her out. At which point Dr. J's eyes lit up and she asked if Polly reacts at all to catnip... and when I said yes, she said "Well then, you just need to get her stoned before you bring her in the house." Hee!
So, Polly now has her "little friend" (an old sock with catnip in it) that I give her about five to ten minutes before bringing her in the house. It has helped her mellow out considerably, as has the Feliway. We still haven't had the two cats together at all... at this point, I'm just trying to get Polly used to being in the house again. Although she still has a tendency to only stick around for a few minutes before dashing back to the safety of the garage. At least she's acting more like her normal self.
I found another really good article about the "wi-fi cloud" over Hermiston, OR and the surrounding area. This one goes a bit more into the business model involved and into why it was set up there in the first place. Basically, it's a showcase... a place to show off exactly what can be done with this sort of a system, but still with a sound business model to make it a worthwhile venture. Much like the wi-fi network they've got running in Marymoor Park in Redmond, WA, this one can also be used for more than internet access -- e.g. for the city to read parking meters remotely, for farmers to control watering systems or to check weather conditions, etc. Very clever. I really need to remember to stop and try it out on one of my many trips through that area.
This weekend I finally got a chance to watch and record off some of the shows I still had on the DVR from last season (what can I say? It was a busy summer!). I can't believe I hadn't gotten around to watching the end of Numb3rs, which ties Veronica Mars as my favorite new show of last season. If they ever came up with some sort of arc-like storyline, it would win, hands down (no matter how much I love VM). You know, it just occurred to me that Navi Rawat has been on three shows with actors I consider to be the hottest on television... even sharing scenes with at least two of them (James Marsters on AtS and many scenes with David Krumholtz on Numb3rs), but I can't remember her ever shared a scene with Kiefer Sutherland when she was on 24.
Speaking of 24, this morning I started in on the last few episodes of last season, only to discover that I'd missed the last half of the finale (stupid two hour finales) and the DVDs aren't due out until December. Fortunately, I'm pretty sure I've tracked down someone who has just the last hour available for download. Yay! On the down side, they don't seem to have as fast a connection as I do, so I've still got another five hours on the download.
The latest tidbits of news we've gotten about Dresden Files have made me weirdly more optimistic than I had been before about JM getting the role. I still don't think it'll happen, but previously I had my doubts that they were ever even seriously looking at him for the part, and now I think that they actually were. So, on the theory that any amount of optimism above zero is, well, MORE... yeah, I'm more optimistic about it now. Still keeping the optimistically pessimistic outlook that it's not very likely to happen... then I can be happily surprised if it does, and just shrug it off if it doesn't.
We hit a restaurant supply store yesterday to pick up a few things that Alton says we need (*monotone* and we all must do what Alton says */monotone*). He was right, the prices were quite good on things there, and they had some items I'd not found elsewhere. For now, we just augmented our current stash of cooking supplies with some spring-loaded tongs, a micro-plane grater, a pastry knife thingy, and a flat metal scraper thingy (perfect for bashing garlic, among other things). Oh, um, I also dug out the old bongos I had up in a closet (a present from my friend Shakespeare, who sadly isn't on LJ, back when we used to host Bardic Circles at our house every other week), turned them upside down and shoved old dishtowels in the bottoms of each side for cushioning... and we're now using them as utensil holders (*cough*just like Alton*cough*). They work really well, though, and look pretty spiffy!
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Good news on the kitty front, hopefully everything will calm down shortly.
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You ever noticed what I use for utensil holders? There's this big ceramic jug that my uncle (of dubious tastes) gave Joe for Xmas one year, holding wooden spoons and spatulas. Then, whisks and metalworks are in a big silver water pitcher we got as a wedding gift. As I do adore it, and yet have never had an occasion to place a silver water pitcher on a table; it was the perfect solution. :)
And pastry cutters are the only place I part company w/ the Great One. Because I'm not getting my hands all mucky in biscuit dough, no matter how much fun he says it is.
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They do have a decent wood pattern though, so while they don't sound very good, they do look pretty... and I have to admit I'm rather pleased to have found a way to put them to good use.
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Though if you ever find one of those big, flat, paddle-like meat pounders like he has, let me know. I canNOT find one like what he has, and while the flat side of a tenderizing mallet works fine that looks like it would be better.
Oh, and the "flat metal scraper thingy" is probably what's called a bench scraper. Bakers use them a lot to pry dough off the work surface.
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LOL! Yeah, I know... it's just that we're both really enjoying his show (while wondering how in the world we could have missed it before now) and have started making quite a few of the things he's doing there, or even just changing some of our methods because he's demonstrated a better way to do it. As a result, we're finding a number of items that our kitchen is sadly lacking... it's mostly stuff we really could have used before now, but just didn't know what we were missing.
The bongo thing was because we happen to have some cheap bongos taking up space in a closet, and it just looked like a really spiffy way to put them to good use and get our utensils out of the drawer.
Though if you ever find one of those big, flat, paddle-like meat pounders like he has, let me know. I canNOT find one like what he has, and while the flat side of a tenderizing mallet works fine that looks like it would be better.
Oh! We just barely saw that episode... so you're saying that they're not easy to find, then? Darnit, that was one of the things I had on my list to pick up. I'll let you know if we manage to track one down.
Oh, and the "flat metal scraper thingy" is probably what's called a bench scraper. Bakers use them a lot to pry dough off the work surface.
Yep! That's the one! It just looked like it could come in handy for any number of things. Next up on my list is to invest in one of those measuring cup things, the ones where you can push stuff out from the bottom (they probably have a nice, clever technical name that I'm completely unaware of). I remember seeing them ages ago in a Pampered Chef catalog, but I know they can be found elsewhere.
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I have a bench scraper in my knife kit, and...well, I basically use it for dough, chocolate, etc. Anything that sticks to the table. Not much else.
That tenderizer/mallet he has is impossible to find, at least in my experience. Haven't found it, even at BB&B, not in Virginia, New Hampshire, or Michigan. Which is ANNOYING, because it does look useful.
I will take one issue with Alton--if you are trying to pipe rather than drizzle anything, skip the Ziplock. I tried it with cookie dough, and it was a PITA. I'd rather just buy the bags or, for something like chocolate, roll a paper coronet--also cheap and disposable, though it's not really suitable for thicker stuff. I want to know how the chef on 'Extreme Pastry' used one for sugar work, though--how did he keep it liquid but cool enough not to melt/ignite the bag?
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Yeah, that didn't look terribly effective... and I've got pastry bags already. I've also heard that he doesn't have a clue how to make chilli.
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(We've noticed that he's absolutely THE most paranoid guy about germs on TV...)