Will You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?

There are all kinds of people walking this earth. Most of them--like me--are fairly unremarkable. That isn't to say they don't have interesting characteristics. Everyone does. But the older I get and the more people I encounter, the more I realize just what a rare and precious commodity common sense actually IS.

There several different types of intelligence...depending on who you ask, there are anywhere from seven to nine specific types of intelligence identified within the field of psychology, and they really can tell us a lot about ourselves and how we learn most effectively. For example,  I tend to score highest on the verbal/linguistic and musical subtypes. But for some of us, these multiple intelligence subtypes can be generalized a little more simply.

Common sense. It SOUNDS like such a simple thing, doesn't it? It isn't. It's actually quite elusive and hard to come by, which is why when I find someone with any measurable amount of real common sense--be it friend or lover--I have an unfortunate tendency to want to hang on for dear life.

Anyone can pay money for a monkey education. They may go to a good school, they may study and make good grades and even graduate with honors and might excel in their field. They may make a killer salary and be good at what they do...and while I can absolutely respect all of that, here's the thing: they may still be practically helpless when they step out of their office at the end of the day.

What I really want to know is, do you have to have information spoonfed to you in a neat, organized manner, or can you pick it up in bits and pieces on the fly and put it all together later? Are you the type that asks if this will be included on the test? Can you pick up all of those random social cues and participate in that witty banter?

The ability to think quickly and abstractly is such a beautiful thing. To me, that's the very definition of common sense. Some people have a lot of it. Some have a little. Some have none. And maybe I'm wrong, but it does seem like practical intelligence is becoming somewhat less common. Here's the thing...if you have it, you need to be around other people who have it, too. Because you may not have very much patience for people without any. In fact, there are days when you may be secretly hoping for the Zombie Apocalypse just to hurry up and sort it all out.

Farewell, Old Friend...

In the early days of 1997, I was living in a tiny rental house on Hurd Street with my then-fiancé. The house was older and it actually had the mailbox attached to the house on the front porch...one day, I opened the front door to collect the mail, and in walked a tiny gray cat, who had seemingly been standing at the door waiting.

She marched into the little house, surveyed me and her surroundings, and after apparently deciding we would suit her needs, plopped down on the rug. She purred contentedly and I scratched her head. We became her people, because she adopted us.

She was an older kitten, according to the vet...probably 6-8 months old. We had her spayed immediately. She was the most affectionate cat I had ever encountered. She loved everyone, and lived to be around people. There was nothing aloof or arrogant about this cat. She was all sweetness...unless you were a mouse.

As a mouser, she was fierce and dedicated. She was small her whole life...about 6 pounds at her heaviest point. She had tiny, delicate feet and a pretty, dainty face. She looked so ladylike...and yet if a mouse dared to cross the threshhold of any of our homes, she would hunt them down like a trained assassin.

She was incredibly quiet, and said very little. She moved with her poor college-aged newlywed parents from pillar to post and lived in 6 different houses. She had excellent manners and a kind disposition. When we had our girls, she showed no jealousy, and rook right to loving them, and would curl up next to them for naps in their cribs if we forgot to shut the door..

She WAS exasperated 5 years ago when Santa brought a kitten to our house. She was far more exasperated in April when I adopted a Great Dane/Lab mix puppy as a watch dog. Still, there was no question of her gentle but firm authority. She may have been the smallest, most soft-spoken animal in the house, but it was entirely her domain.

In her senior years, she lost all of her teeth.  I bought her canned food and gave her extra love. She went partially blind, but her spirits and happy disposition never wavered.

This morning, or sometime last night, she left us for good. It appears as though she simply went to sleep. When she didn't come out to be fed or come when she was called, I knew something was very wrong. I was right.

Some parts of it I couldn't handle. I called my dear friend Adam to help me do the part I could not bring myself to do. I am so blessed to have such good people in my life.

And I was so blessed to have nearly 18 happy years with her. She brought me so much joy, especially in the past 2 years since my divorce. When I had double pneumonia, she knew. From the day I started to feel under the weather through my fever-induced delirium, she stayed by my side. When I was crippled by depression for several months that summer and fall, she was there, all the time. Her loyalty touched and comforted me. When I was laid up with a broken ankle this past summer, she planted herself next to me and refused to leave my side.

Tonight I am heartbroken beyond words, and have cried so many tears, I'm surprised the well is not yet dry. But I am also grateful for the kindness and love shown to me by so many. Ashley, Sarah, Levi,  Adam, Deanna, Adrienne, Emily, Chani, Todd, Cari, and my parents, in particular...not to mention everyone who reached out on facebook and in text messages. So many people made me feel loved in the face of sorrow. I am blessed beyond measure to have had this sweet fur baby in our family for so many years.

The girls are taking it hard, especially Sara...she's taking it every bit as hard as I am. I'm sure there are people out there who think it's silly to make such a fuss over a cat. But she was mine...before I was even married. Before I had my girls. She was mine, and she was beloved.

Farewell, Sweet Sam. I hope you're walking around in Kitty Heaven with a full set of teeth and restored vision, enjoying a tuna sandwich. :)

Plumbing Fail.

It happened a little over a week ago. I got up at 2 am and went to my bathroom to pee. Had I been more awake, I might have noticed the suspicious little wad of paper sitting in the bottom of the toilet, but that didn't happen. Half asleep, I emptied my wine-laden bladder and flushed. Water rushed into the bowl, all appeared normal, and then....

Nothing.

It didn't overflow. It didn't go down. Nothing.

Instantly awake and alarmed because of an irrational fear of plumbing irregularities, I grabbed the plunger and plunged. Twice. Three times.

Nothing.

Tired and irritated, especially because there was no visible reason for this to be occurring, I padded down the hall to the kitchen and grabbed the dish soap. (Every college girl has used this trick at her boyfriend's house at least once, whether she admits it or not.) I squeezed a substantial amount into the bowl and closed the lid, figuring I'd try again in the morning, and went back to bed.

The next morning, I'd forgotten entirely about my middle of the night plumbing woes. I opened the lid and saw the pool of bright red slime coating the mostly-empty bowl. What the.....?

Wait. Dish soap! The bottle sat innocently on the back of the toilet in its unassuming pomegranate glory. Right. Surely this did the trick....I flushed again.

Nothing.

I plunged, to no avail. Now I'm just pissed...which I remembered I still needed to do. I use the girls' bathroom and head back to my room to wake up Sara, who had fallen asleep watching TV in my bed.

"Noooooooo!" she protests.

"Sorry, Kid. You have to get up."

She starts to walk into my bathroom, and I stop her, telling her the toilet is messed up, and to use the other bathroom.

"Yeah. It sounded funny when I flushed it last night," she says.

Wait. What??!

Awesome.

I made several more fruitless attempts at plunging and dish soap application over the next several days. Finally, I bit the bullet and called my sometime-beau and Handler of Household Problems and admitted my toilet was broken.

This was a rather difficult thing for me...for although we have known each other for 9 months and are extremely fond of one another, our relationship is not exactly serious. He has never seen me first thing in the morning...and I would prefer him to think I have no need for a toilet at all, thankyouverymuch...but alas, my standbys had failed me and it was time to call in a professional...and by that, I mean my contractor non-boyfriend (NBF).

"My plumbing is jacked up..." I inform him.

The pause is a long one. "Okay........so, when you say that, what exactly do you mean?" He sounds amused.

"Oh, for heaven's sake! It's not a euphemism!" I explain the series of events that has brought me to this lowly state.

"Have you plunged it?" he asks.

"Come on, Levi! Do you really think I'd be calling you about a clogged toilet if I hadn't already tried plunging it?" I'm getting pretty impatient with him, but he seems to have a point to make, so I cut him a little slack.

"Okay, but when you plunged it, did you really get in there and put a lot of pressure on it and move it around so the pipes rattled when you did it? Or did you just kind of shove it in there and pull it out a few times and it didn't work?"

It was my turn to pause. Surely I've been properly plunging toilets for the past 30 - odd years...right? "I think so......?"

"You think so? Well, did you or didn't you?" Now he sounds impatient.

"I don't know! I'm a girl! No one has ever specifically pulled me aside and taught me how to plunge a toilet, but I've been relatively successful up to now!" I retort.

"Okay.....you may just not be putting enough pressure on it." Is it just me, or does he sound a little condescending now?

"I don't know!! Maybe not!! Are you really telling me I need a boy to come and rattle my pipes properly, because I've been doing it wrong all this time? Like the plumbing equivalent of just lying there?!!"

Clearly, I've frightened him a little, but he laughs anyway and promises he'll bring his tools over tomorrow, including a snake if he needs to use it........................

Still. Not a euphemism.

****Update. I do not, in fact, know how to properly use a plunger. And Levi can be incredibly smug.