About 220 Cats

So the son and I are riding in the car when we start talking about our new cat Cody, or as Aidan calls him, my BROTHER Cody with the emphasis on BROTHER. We weren't discussing Cody's apparent death wish at this point because the identification of this predilection wasn't made until his most recent attempt to choke himself by wrapping a balloon string around his neck repeatedly. Fortunately, he announced his act by banging the still attached balloon against any object he could find in a remotely taiko fashion. Apparently, he got rhythm versus any measurable intelligence which makes him all the more fun. After all, I do like Japanese taiko.

Now, this act followed Cody's attempt to put his head in the oven when I opened it to take some food out even while I yelled, Cody, hot, Cody, hot, CODY, I TOLD YOU IT WAS HOT!!! Little sore on the paws but otherwise intact. He sat there for a minute contemplating his paws and I suspect he was probably just comparing the pain in his paws to how he felt a couple of days earlier. That time, he went running with great gusto to launch himself in a flying arc right off the back of a chair and over the second floor guardrail landing on the hardwood floor below. But, not so gracefully. That one left him off for a bit as he worked to regain his ability to breathe and remember where he was.

So, in any event, the son wants to know if we should get Cody a brother to play with as Cody does quite a bit of chasing, catching and killing figments of his imagination, rounding corners on the hardwood floors approximately 5 mph faster than physics will allow which leads to Cody spin-outs, and springing out from under the couch repeatedly with great hopes that there will be something for him to attack despite any record of success. I do have to admire his perseverance or lack of short-term memory.

I explained to the son that I do think it would be a good idea but that I first would have to make sure that we had the adoption fee and the money for downstream veterinarian visits and all that jazz. Being the inquisitive child that he is, he wanted to know how much it was so I let him know that it was $100. He thought that was fair, especially since he didn't have to come up with the money. But then the obvious question came - How much did Mia cost?

Now, that is a question that I have long been prepared for, having been asked the same by a fishmonger yelling down the aisles at Walmart the second week I had been back. The answer - priceless. But, this is the son I am dealing with. Priceless isn't precise and precision is key. So, the next obvious question is asked - how much, exactly, is priceless? After futility trying to explain that it is an existential concept that he wouldn't understand now because he has not yet developed the ability to think in the abstract, I decided to give it a go.

I used the approved adoption speak to carefully explain to him that Mia didn't cost anything. Rather, mommy and daddy paid some money to some nice folks who could speak Chinese and who could help mommy and daddy fill out a lot of papers so that the people in China could see that we were a good family that would take good care of a little girl. And, of yeah, we paid some money to the US government to get permission to fill out another form later that we would also pay for, none of which was apparently paid for by the obscene amount of income tax we pay each year. So,that's great, he says but exactly how much is that? I throw the trump card and let him know that it was about the same as it would cost to have a baby in the hospital if you didn't have insurance, assuming that 1. they would admit you and 2. you had no complications and 3. the baby had no complications and 4. you didn't use any of their toilet paper which they most probably bar code so they can scan that cost into the total cost of supplies.

For some reason, this doesn't do it for him. He thinks for a moment and carefully crafts his next question to make sure he asks a very specific, closed question that can only have one, precise answer as he has apparently discovered that asking his mother an open question allows her to provide superfluous information merely for her own amusement.

After some deep thought, he asks did it cost more money to adopt Cody or Mia and instructs me to give him only one answer - Cody or Mia. He was indignant when he was told that we spent slightly more getting Mia even though I pointed out that he should consider travel costs and the dollar's slide againt the RMB over the last four years before making any judgements. He let me know, in no uncertain terms, that there was a problem. In his vernacular, that wasn't fair. Cody is his BROTHER and Mia is his SISTER, so what was up with that.

A couple of minutes later I get the follow up question - if we didn't get Mia, just how many cats could we get?

Told him it depended on what country they were coming from, the travel costs involved and the exchage rate of the euro, peso and ruble at the time of said adoptions. Seemed to do it for the time being.

I take ____ as my wife

So during the Redtop Celebration we hold a mass. This year was particularly special as the archbishop of Atlanta was coming up to say the mass for us. Not only was he going to say mass but he would be helping us renew our wedding vows. Except the wedding vow thing was a bit of a surprise to those of us who either were chasing screaming kids or did not read the program, which should not be taken to imply, even if it conceivably is 100% true, that one of us doesn't ever, for any reason, read the program or instructions provided to him for any reason. When the shelves fall off the wall or the grill blows up, it is one thing but when it is the marriage vow gig, quite another. Now, that is not to say the grill has blown up. Well, at least not this one. Yet.

So we wore our very best mud covered jeans for the big event. When we realized what was about to happen, we got so excited we could hardly contain ourselves as our efforts were going into containing Mia. After all, the archbishop has only two ranks between him and the ultimate CEO and our original priest had five so these vows had to have some real superpower and, in my estimate, were probably 50% better than the original so we were good to go.

Meanwhile, the very dignified archbishop had come in and began the mass. Against all Catholic tradition, we came to a part where there were actually some people singing along with the incredible music that was presented. Would have thought the place was full of Lutherans, Baptists and Methodists it sounded so good. Which, of course, gave me the perfect cover to tell the son that we had just noticed that very soon we were getting married again and wasn't that exciting? He, of course, wanted to know why. I let him know that since he hadn't been able to attend the first ceremony, we were going to do it again so he and Mia could be there and share in the momentous event. Which led the husband-to-be-again to state, "Uh, actually you were there in Mommy's tummy."

Of course, my not so darling husband-who-needed-to-sleep-with-one-eye-open-to-be was using his "talking over the music voice" for his statement when the music had stopped abruptly. I immediately knew that quiet but effective communication of my thoughts was most appropriate for the setting. Again, being very conscious of not wanting to cause any disruption of the services or causing any undue distraction to others, I used the well-known quiet communication method of gaining the husband-now-maybe-to-be's attention by wacking his upper arm with my fist thrown at a 90 degree angle while muttering "shut up" in my best whispering-pretty-loud-in church voice. Which, of course, caused the ever vigilent son to exclaim, "Mommy, you said a bad word!" in his best in-case-you-haven't noticed, heck-yeah-we-are-actually-in-a-barn voice. So, I'm praying for singing but nope, the only voices that are lifting are the archbishop's and, unfortunately, our little clan's.

We notice the couples-to-be rustling around while I am, ever the diligent positive role-modeling parent, stating, "Robert, I am sorry I said a bad word to you. I was wrong. I will give Aidan the quarter I owe him for using a bad word on our return home. Could you find it in your heart to forgive me?" And, as the folks began turning to one another, the son again asks, apparently for addiitional clarification purposes what we are doing and I tell him we are getting married again, isn't it exciting, and couldn't he just turn around, be quiet and go along with the glorious program for Pete's sake?"

We notice folks picking up programs and would have done so if the son hadn't continued with his line of inquiry about the situation. He first needed to make sure I, and anyone within a 20 foot range understood that "there is a problem. First, who and where is Pete? Second, where was my dress? How could I get married without a dress?" And, as the folks opened their programs and we grabbed ours to begin, I told him in my best-imitation-of-a-viper's-hiss voice, don't need it, just getting married again, apparently now, how about just being quiet, and Robert begins to solemly repeat after the archbishop, I ....take....as my wife, apparently having missed the instructions that were cleverly hidden in plain sight and bold type in the the program that stated he was to fill in our names so that that he, Robert, would take Joan as his wife and so on.

Meanwhile, the son had one more, very important question that needed answering before he would participate. He just needed to know just who we were marrying? I noticed him eyeing one of the very pretty and nice gals there who he is a bit sweet on. I could see the glint in his eye as he considered the fact that I was apparently being pawned off on Pete and he might get to spend some quality time with the other gal. Didn't have time to answer him before the archbishop asked the kids to get up and give their parents some applause. The son stood up and looked at us like we had grown alien heads while Mia just clapped along.