Because My Photographer Quit Without Even A Two Week Notice...

In November the Murph got a new job and we packed up two homes and three cats and moved down to the Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida area to begin our new lives. I was very excited and love it down here and everything so don't get me wrong.  I guess I didn't realize that with his new job keeping him busy, the Murph wouldn't have time to do his old job anymore.

 Old job = being my Chief Fashion Photographer/Athletic Supporter/Nutrition Consultant.

With no photographer, I am having trouble doing my Fashion Friday blog posts or any other fashion related blog posts that may require a picture of me in some fashionable or not so fashionable outfit. I've made some sad but serious attempts at selfies, but the photos turned out like this....

and these... not much better photos....

How can a person who generally has trouble with picture taking be coordinated enough to take selfies?

The Murph did agree to take this photo, but I never managed to do a fashion post on it.  It was a cute dress though. I wore this one to see Wynton Marsalis in Sarasota play a fun Christmas jazz concert.

Please excuse the photo bombing cat! He is seriously attached to me in a weird way. I always believed he was taken from his mom at too early an age. Bless his heart!

Dress: Mark & James by Badgley Mischka;

Shoes: Nine West

These days most of my pictures are of the cats so if you love cats you're in luck! If you love fashion, well, I'm sorry but until I can come up with a better plan, there just might be a bunch of cat pictures on my blog again.

Also, with no Athletic Supporter, my triathlon endeavors are nonexistent, but I have hopes for the spring and summer. If I can still swim and ride a bike without training wheels that is.

With no Nutrition Consultant, I've been sneaking to McDonalds to get sausage biscuits and hash browns several mornings and I'm lucky to get in one green smoothie per week. Not good for the detoxing, but I do get an occasional salad passed on from the Murph when he doesn't want to eat his lunches.

I'm still thinking I should become a vegan, but I've tried that before. It was the toughest 2 hours of my life!

Don't worry about me though. I'm tough! I'll figure it all out and be back to normal in no time. Hopefully, I will be better than normal because my normal could use some improvement. (or so I've been told)

In the meantime, here's some cute kitty pictures and some random home interior pictures because those I can manage to take all by myself.

Enjoy....

Stop taking pictures and give us the food!

Phantom 

Ed- The Good Kitty

Reminds me of Cadence and Phantom only they wouldn't be rubbing on each other like this.

Deluded Disillusioned sperm painting.

Cool Jazz Paintings.

Cadence showing his flexibility.

Also, I have job openings available for fashion photographer, athletic supporter (aka cheer leader) and nutrition consultant (aka food nazi).  Please apply here if interested.

Back Home And Already Behind On The 70.3 Training Plan!

We drove back home from Birmingham yesterday and I have to say it's great to be back. The sunset last night was incredible as well as the sunrise this morning. Phantom is doing great, but I'm an anxious mess. I've developed a huge, painful cold sore (I call it fever blister) from all the stress and worry about that cat! I've been putting Abreva on it in large amounts, too large according to my husband. It's suppose to work fast, but I can't tell right now that it's done anything.

What do you do when you have a cold sore? I'm getting desperate!

One good thing about the fever blister is that my lip is all nice and plump. That's a bonus! It's not going to be nice when it gets all crusty and scabby though!

Cadence and Ed are sure glad we are back! Here's Cadence looking at me right now as a type. This is where he hangs out except when he's on my lap, walking all over my keyboard, sticking his tail in my face.

Why do cat's love sticking their butts in your face? Or swatting their tail at you?

The vet shaved the hair off Phantom's belly to do the ultrasound Tuesday. He doesn't seem to mind though. It's probably cooler for him with all that hair gone. Also, less hair to cause hair balls or in his case, hair logs. Huge ones!

This week starts week 1 of my 18 week Ironman 70.3 training plan. I've already missed two swims and a bike ride. Not starting off so good! I don't even have my Google calendar all filled out with the work outs yet. This may be a good thing because I'm not getting email reminders of all the work outs I'm missing!

I may need to look for a 16 week to Ironman 70.3 training plan!

The Boy And The Cats

Yesterday we drove the Boy back to school after he spent the weekend here with us. Saturday night I took the Boy out to dinner, but forgot the camera so I don't have pictures. I tried to take some pictures with my phone on Instagram. I posted some out on Instagram, so if you're following me on there (Click here to follow me) you may have seen some of them, but I don't know how many posted out because I was having some trouble with the app on my phone. One day I will figure it out and my pictures will come out straight and focused. Probably.

Anyway, we had barbecue and there were fireworks across the street as we were leaving the restaurant.  Then we stopped at a convenience store on the way home so I could get the Boy another Dr. Pepper (the real deal, not the Dr. Thunder Walmart stuff). As usual he wanted to stay in the car and as usual I hit door lock with the car key thingy, forgetting that every time I do that and he's in the car, he sets off the motion sensor in the car and the alarm goes off.

I was in the store and heard an alarm going off in the parking lot.  I soon realized it was my car when I saw a group of teens looking toward where I had parked. I could just imagine what the Boy was thinking at that moment. When I walked out of the store, he was smiling and shaking his head. "MOM!! You did it AGAIN!!"

Oh well, I couldn't help but laugh at him. Next time maybe he'll get out of the car with me and go inside the store. He knows how to grocery shop now. He told me he mostly eats Ramen noodles now because he can get a 12 pack for $2 and 1 individual thing makes a really big serving. He actually likes them. Who knew!

Phantom seemed much better all weekend. I think he liked having the Boy back.

Cadence and Ed, on the other hand, freaked out and ran and hid every time the Boy walked into the room. He did look pretty wild and in need of a hair cut. I tried to cut it before he left, but he wouldn't let me near him.

Cadence trapped in the kitchen looking up at the Boy

Cadence jumped up on the counter to find an alternate means of escape

Is the wild hair Boy still over there? I'll stay here until it's safe!

Tonight Cadence is much more relaxed even though he's been whacked on the head a couple of times today by Phantom.

Poor Phantom! Missing the Boy again.

Music And A Happy Place

A couple of days ago we moved the last two of our three cats down to our beach home. I'm still recovering from it! Our first mistake was not doing our normal routine that morning and the cats instantly picked up on it. They know by now what it means when suitcases are loaded in the car. Cadence immediately runs and hides. Ed usually does too, but this time for some reason he didn't.

We loaded everything in the car and then it was time to get the cats last, but where was Cadence? I looked in my closet because that was where he was last week when I was looking all over the place for Phantom, who had run and hid because he probably thought he was about to go to the vet again. He doesn't really like that.

This time, no Cadence. That would be too easy. After looking in all his normal hiding places I finally found him up under the guest bed, tucked away tight up inside the box springs.

I couldn't reach him through the hole in the cover. I reached down and pushed on the bulge that was him at the bottom of the bed. He moved further away. I couldn't get him to scoot to the hole and grab him at the same time. It was a two man job. I called the Murph for back up.

Ed came to check it out. He was really creeped out by me on the floor half under the bed with the camera in my hand.

After all, that was his hole that he chewed in the box spring covers many years ago. His hiding spot too! The box spring cover that was on the Boy's bed was cut away many years ago for exactly this reason. Once Cadence is up in there it is almost impossible to get him out.

The Murph came and pushed on the Cadence lump and guided him to the hole where I was ready to make a grab for him.

Finally he got close enough and I grabbed him.

I had him for about a minute before he managed to get away. I had him by the back leg but had to let go because I realized he would just as soon lose the leg than let me keep him. I was screaming, he was meowing, it was chaos.

I finally cornered him downstairs and managed to cram him in the cat carrier.

 Ed was easy to get in his carrier, (sorry, no pictures, we were tired and an hour later leaving than planned), but not a very good traveler considering he hadn't been in a car in 10 years. He started meowing and continued for about 2 hours. It started out a low meow, but by the time we got on the interstate it was a loud, angry, fangy face meow.

I couldn't get a picture because I was driving. Take my word for it, it wasn't good!

I didn't hear a word out of Cadence. He zoned out the minute the carrier door was closed.

Jazz music playing on the radio didn't work for Ed like it works for Phantom. I finally figured out halfway through the trip that Ed likes rap music or music with a little more beat. He loved Flo Rida and was pretty fond of ABBA too.

It's always good to know the music choices of the cats because it makes traveling so much easier!

Phantom loves jazz favorites by John Coltrane, Lester Young, Ben Webster and others. He likes mellow, moody jazz. He also loves the sax and the trumpet! Phantom is a romantic at heart.  Here's one of his many favorites.

Ed loves rap and music with some beat. He loves the drums! He likes rhythm! He freaking LOVED this song. The fangy faced meowing ceased immediately!



And Cadence is so traumatize that he hears nothing while in the car. He goes straight to his happy place!

They are both doing great in their new home, especially Ed. He's 13 years old so we decided this is his official retirement home. The Murph says it's his Boca and all he needs are some black socks and some Bermuda shorts and he's all set.

The trip over to pick Phantom up from the Boy's apartment the next day was another "adventure". I'm pretty sure that Phantom was ready to get the heck out of there! He planted himself by the front door and looked at me meowing. No problems getting him in the car this time!

The only problem was I didn't have a carrier to put him in and suddenly while we were getting on the interstate, I heard the back window going down. I looked back and there he was propped up looking out the window with his paw on the window lowering button.

I managed to get the window back up before he made a leap for it onto the interstate.

And then I had lots of wine when I got home. LOTS of wine!!

The scenery helped too!