Orange tabby hell cat

Aussie was "welcomed" to the neighborhood today by a local cat. We went on a nice long walk around the block, to give herAussie some exercise so she will let me unpack rather than demand attention the rest of the evening (yes, I learned this trick in grad school: wear out dog => time to get work done).

As we were rounding the second block, there was a fluffy orange tabby cat sitting by a fence. It has a collar and tag so it clearly has an owner unlike the feral strays in our old neighborhood. Aussie doesn't mind cats. She was raised with one, so she generally either pays them no mind or tries to make friends with them (a hard habit to break her of in our old neighborhood). This cat proceeded to walk right up to the dog and smell her. Aussie, to her credit, just stood there. Didn't lunge, didn't move, didn't even lean towards the cat or try to sniff back. Then, unexpectedly, the cat changed attitude and proceeded to swat at my dog! And not just once, but multiple times!!

Aussie, again to her credit, didn't attack back. And we beat a path away from that cat, pausing about 20 feet away so I could assess for damage. When I looked up, the cat was RIGHT BEHIND US and proceeded to charge my dog a SECOND time and swat at her while hissing.

So we quickly moved around the corner. When I looked back, the cat was following us. It followed us around the corner and about half way down the next block. The orange tabby from hell was stalking me and my dog clearly with intention to harm. So we kept walking, checking frequently to see if was still behind us.

Shortly after the cat stopped and parked itself in a crouch under some bushes (lying in wait for it's next victim perhaps), a woman and her dog came around the corner. She promptly grabbed her dog and made a wide berth around the cat from hell exclaiming that she hates that cat. Apparently the cat has actually attacked her and her dog in the past, leaving her with some bite marks on her arm. Sounds like Aussie and I got of easy. Aussie is fine, a few tiny scratches around her nose, but nothing serious.

I hereby nickname the cat Psycho. We will be giving Psycho a wide berth from now on.

Rude awakening

At 4am this morning I was awakened by a crash. Specifically the crash of glass breaking. As I lay there, I heard another crash. Now, Monday is trash day, so my first thought was "what s.o.b. is throwing out glass at 4am!?". So I got up to take a look and possibly yell at them (it's 4am!). But I was wrong. It was nothing so benign as trash being tossed out, rather, it was drama.

Apparently one of my neighbors across the street and his girlfriend(?) had a fight. As I looked out my window, I watched her, in a black coat with the hood up, carrying two white plastic bags, pace briefly in front of his house, muttering about how he's wrong and she'll get him back. She then put down her bags, walked up onto the porch, kicked the front door, and smashed in the front window! She then left the porch, picked up her bags, and walked up the street, all the while muttering to herself about how he'll be sorry and how she'll be back and a bunch of other stuff I couldn't hear. Well then. I think it's safe to assume that she's quite pissed off.

Now, given that it was 4am, I honestly thought I had dreamed the entire thing. I did manage to fall back asleep until my alarm went off a little over an hour later. It wasn't until I left the house this morning to go to work and saw that instead of a front window my neighbor now had a piece of plywood that I realized it really happened.

This is the most drama my neighborhood has seen in a good long while. Why the drama always has to happen in the middle of the night when I have to get up early for work is anyone's guess. Next time, do you think we can schedule it for the afternoon?

A random encounter with a neighbor

I had an interesting experience today on my evening walk with my dog. One of my neighbors hugged me. Now, before you freak out, one, the dog was with me and didn't get upset so he must be non-threatening (she would have barked/freaked otherwise), and two, this is someone I see regularly. He plays his drum over by the Zoo for the zoo-goers coming and going to the main parking lot. My daily bike commute takes me along the path between the entrance and the lot, right past where he sits. I see him pretty much every day when the weather is nice. And every day he shouts a greeting and waves at me.

Now, when I get home, I change out of my biking clothes before I walk the dog. Often I see him walking home from his spot by the Zoo. Turns out he lives probably a block or so from me on another street. So I walk by his house everyday with the dog, and I know he's seen me. But he didn't recognize me as the same person who biked past him.

That is, until today. Today when the dog and I walked past him while he was standing there talking to another neighbor, he looked at me and said: "Hey! You're my bike chick!" I smiled and confirmed this and started to walk past him. And then he hugged me. No sh*t. Just hugged me. Needless to say, I didn't see that one coming and was stunned momentarily. Based on his breath I'm fairly certain he had started happy hour for the day a few hours early, so he was in quite the good mood. My neighbor that he had been talking to chuckled and told him to "leave the poor girl alone." I just smiled, pulled myself out of the hug, told him I'd see him later, and kept walking.

Really, what else could I do?

Grumble

Are some people just oblivious to the fact that they share the planet with other people? Seriously. How can you not realize that what you do has an impact?

Case in point. Last night I had trouble falling asleep. This is not unusual. Especially when I have lots of stuff on my mind. I tossed and turned, listening to my dog snore and cursing her ability to sleep at the drop of a hat, for a good hour after I crawled into bed. I finally fell asleep.

Less than an hour later, I was woken up by the sound of a car horn. My first thought was damn car alarms. Shortly, however, I realized that this car horn was not coupled with an alarm. This was someone intentionally honking their horn repeatedly at 1:00 AM. No sh*t. 1:00 AM. Honking their horn, then hanging their head out the window and screaming for someone, then back to honking the horn. This went on for 20 minutes. I had just gotten up to find my shoes (I was past the point of rationality and was about to take my dog for a walk and sic her on the jacka**) when I heard one of my neighbors yelling at the idiot. Informing him that this was a neighborhood, with KIDS, and it was a school night, so stop laying on the horn like an idiot and get your lazy a** out of the car and go knock on the door.

A brief moment went by, then I heard the car drive away. I don't know if the person they were honking for ever came out or not. And frankly, I don't care. I was just glad they left.

Of course, it took me another hour to fall asleep again. I think today is going to be a two cup of coffee day...

On our daily walk

Every day Aussie and I walk around the neighborhood. At least one block, sometimes more. There's always a few random things seen or heard, but in the past week there's been more than usual. Like a LOT more than usual.

Seen over the weekend by the curb: a can of Colt 45 with a drinking straw in it. That one made me wish I had my camera with me.

Overheard today as it was shouted across the street: "I just spilled butter all over my toes!"

I've also received multiple offers to either buy my dog or breed her. People ask me about her all the time, but the offers to buy and/or breed her are a new thing. All offers are politely declined (duh!).

I've had several offers for dates, many questions if I'm single and if I live around here, and a litany of requests to "get to know me better." Most of them have come from guys in their cars. And they don't get out, instead shouting at me through an open window, a rather common activity in my neighborhood in general. I know my neighbors, and they know me, so these are people that are not from the neighborhood. I answer these questions all the same..."I'm around" and refuse to give any info beyond my first name (and only when they introduce themselves first). Do not worry, I am not stupid, people.

I guess this should bother me more than it does, but random people have always asked me for directions or general information (I seem to have an invisible tattoo on my forehead that says "Information here" and I appear non-threatening), so I don't think too much about strangers talking to me and I can be polite and keep my distance at the same time. I also have a dog that would rip their throat out if they tried to hurt me, so that helps.

Today someone even got out of his car and gave me his phone number. He backed away a bit as Aussie put herself between us and eyed him warily (good dog!). Needless to say, I'm going to, um, "lose" that slip of paper right quick. Thanks, I'm flattered, really, but I don't think so.

Last night I was asked if I wanted to go out roller skating (no joke). Points for creativity on that one.

Now I know that a white girl in my neighborhood is a bit of an anomaly, but I really think the heat is getting to people.

Of neighbors and careers

My neighbors have been very neighborly lately. I can think of several possible reasons for this:

a) After 7 months they've realized that I'm not going anywhere, despite the "transitional" nature of the neighborhood (Mom, Dad, don't worry, transitional as in an UPSWING) which means they've "accepted" my presence (I think this is a good thing, personally)

b) They've seen more of me lately since the weather is nice (YAY! Spring!) and I've taken to sitting on my porch after work [although it appears Spring has decided to take a nice little vacation to the South for Easter weekend so this practice will be suspended until the temperature climbs back into Spring-like temperatures]

c) I look like I need help (this is entirely plausible)

I think it might be a combination of all three. They've been talking to me more lately: saying "hi" as I walk the dog, walking over to talk while I'm sitting on the porch, offering to tell me what the "good" take-out and delivery places are, offering to draw me maps to the local grocery stores, etc. One even offered me BBQ chicken the other night. I have one neighbor that keeps telling me he's going to send his sons over for tutoring. He's been saying this ever since he found out I was a librarian. Apparently librarian = teacher for him. I don't quite understand this, but ok, it's better than other things he could assume.

This assumption that I am or have been a teacher is a theme in my life lately. I've had what I consider to be two careers in my life: 1) Student/grad student (which equals taking classes while desperately trying to scrape together enough money to take more classes and eat without going too far into debt), and, 2) Librarian (which equals trying to pay off said debt and eat on the typical salary of a librarian, which is lower-than-the-average salary for someone with the same level of education that a librarian is required to have - a Masters degree. One does not become a librarian for the money, trust me.)

I'm very lucky to have found a career right out of the starting blocks that I enjoy and makes me happy, that I have a talent for (at least a talent for my chosen field within librarianship, which has many many diverse fields in it), and that I'm passionate about. I watched my dad go through 16 jobs covering several different careers in the first 20 or so years of my life, trying to find that fit. He did find it, but it obviously took him awhile. I found my career with a perfect "fit" right out of college.

Lately I've been doing a lot of teaching (I use the term loosely). My library is migrating to a "new" software this summer not by choice, but due to merger. This software has always been there, but no one at my current library has really been using it, they've always used that "other" software. In contrast, this "new" software is all I used at my previous jobs, dating all the way back to my days as a student worker and intern (almost 10 years ago now). So I was asked to put together a series of sessions to train the people that will have to start using this software (whether they like it or not). Kind of a "software 101" type thing for everyone, from the basic "all I need it to do is x and y" users to the "power users" (not an easy thing to accomplish, FYI). This morphed into 2 basic topics for all user levels, doing 4 one hour sessions on each topic to break the 70+ people up into manageable groups, PLUS more sessions on other topics for smaller "power user" groups in the near future. Whew.

And lets not forget the handouts, all of which now need to be put on our internal staff web pages. Somehow, me sending a message asking who I send the Word docs to so they can be put online translated into me getting a password to the staff pages so I can create, post, edit, and maintain a page myself. Apparently I blinked. Oops. [Notes to self: don't blink ever again at work and dig through boxes to find that HTML for Dummies quick reference book this weekend, I'm a little rusty on my tags.]

Fortunately, the sessions have gone well so far. The flip side of them going well is that I do still have to do more on specialized topics. In addition, after these sessions, I've had various people come up to me and tell me some combination or pieces of the following: I speak clearly and with authority (thanks, Mom and Dad, the authority thing is all YOUR fault) but while not being intimidating, I also stay approachable so people don't mind asking me questions, and I break things down well so they're understandable. I'm good with this information (or complements, whatever you want to call it). It's great to hear and those are all things I strive to do well, so the affirmation that I'm succeeding is really really nice.

Then things get weird. They ask me if I used to be a teacher. Um, no. Not ever. I've tutored, and I've team-taught a workshop or two, but no, I've never been a teacher. That's usually answered with a "well, you could be, you'd be a good one." Um, thanks. The first time I was asked about my "teaching" background I was surprised and a little frightened, by person number 5, not so surprised anymore, but still a little frightened. Even more weird and scary, when I've shared this with various friends, they've all AGREED with it and told me it's occurred to them, too. Hm. Interesting. And frightening. At the same time.

I guess if this librarian shindig stops working for me, I could have a third career, as a teacher.

The joys of city living

There are lots of things I like about living in the city. The proximity of the things I like to do. The ease of getting around. The diversity of the residents.

There are, however, things I could do without. Most notably: CAR ALARMS. Specifically between the hours of 1AM and 6AM.

Last night a car alarm went off and woke me up around 4:35AM. This was not one of those whistle and bell alarms that stops after a couple of cycles. No, this was the kind that is the incessantly honking horn of the car. The kind that keeps going and going until someone actually turns the bloody thing off or the car battery dies.

What's more irritating, this is the second time in less than a month that this particular alarm has gone off between 3 and 5AM. Last time, it took the owner over 30 minutes to turn the damn thing off. Last time I couldn't get back to sleep. This time I finally got back to sleep after 20 minutes with several pillows over my head to muffle the sound of the horn. The problem with this approach: I almost slept through my alarm this morning because I couldn't hear it through the pillows!

This defies logic to me. Isn't the point of a car alarm to notify you if someone tries to break into your car? And if you ignore it in the middle of the night or don't hear the alarm, or worse yet have no intention of responding to it in the first place (which is what I suspect with this particular vehicle's owner), then why torture the rest of us with the noise? Doesn't this fall under "noise pollution" statues in the city? I'm going to have to look into/research this and see if next time I can call the police and have the person/car ticketed for disturbing the peace (and my night's sleep)!