X-New York Gal

posted by Evi on Nov 27

posted by Evi on Nov 25

By Friday, after another series of accidents, my nerves were totally shot and I called the vet’s office for an appointment to have him checked out.  I then called Bill at work and informed him he was leaving early to go to the vet with me.  Turned out this was a normal nervous reaction and I was given pills to help. (For the dog, not me, though I sure could have used some tranquilizers at this point.)  

Since then things have gotten better. He’s a cute little bugger. Every time I get up he jumps up. When I walk he’s right on my heels. And I mean right on them. He’s so close that if I turn around I don’t even see him. This gets a bit old after awhile because I can’t move without having a dog up my butt. And here I thought the cat was bad. The other night I had taken my slippers off and next thing I know he’s carrying around a slipper which is almost as big as he is. Bill rescued it before Pistol carried his prize off into the cage.

Bill got weekend dog duty, walking and feeding him. He also put the dog on his golf cart and drove him all around the community. He doesn’t particularly care for the messier parts of dog ownership but I’ll make damn sure that he learns.

The Smooch has learned to tolerate Pistol and goes about his business. I’ve been lavishing extra attention on him so he doesn’t feel he’s been replaced by a dog, of all things, and Smooch has been rewarding me with clingier than usual behavior. It seems the only way to get any peace around here now is to lock myself in the bedroom.

posted by Evi on Nov 22

Like the time about 10 years ago my stepfather picked me up at the airport and smuggled me into the house then called her into the kitchen. The poor woman just stood there, stunned. She said that for a moment she couldn’t remember where she was.

Or the time my brother, Bob, came to visit for Thanksgiving two years ago. My poor Mom had no clue. I stopped at her house one day for a visit. A few minutes later there was a knock on her door and a “maintenance man” told her my car was in the way and had to be removed. After giving her a hard time, he finally took off his hat and sunglasses and revealed himself to be . . . my brother. Boy, was she surprised!

They tried to get me the following year, but every time they passed my house I was outside so that kind of fell flat.

This year my mother knew Bob was coming for Thanksgiving but didn’t realize he’d be here two weeks before so he and I planned another surprise. I called her and told her I was stopping by and asked if she’d go to the clubhouse with me because my friend, Dee, who lives in my Mom’s community dropped off one of my books there by mistake. I didn’t know the title but would know it when I saw it.

My brother followed me over to their clubhouse and parked around the corner. By the time Mom and I got there he was already seated, bare feet up on a table, wearing dark sunglasses and a hat and reading a book which hid his face. She and I started to walk over to the book section when she saw the feet and commented rather loudly, “look at that man with the dirty feet up on the table.”

“Shhh. He’ll hear you.” Me.

“I want him to hear me.” Mom.

“Why, do you want to lick my feet?” asked the Strange man.

She didn’t hear that remark, so I repeated it for her.

“Pervert!” Mom.

I walked over to the books with Mom nervously following me. Suddenly the man slammed the books on the table and made a loud, rude comment. At this point my mother didn’t know what to make of this. I’m looking at the books trying to find “my” book with Mom standing near me. The strange man strides over and puts his arm around me.

“My, you’re a pretty one, aren‘t you?” Strange man.

My mother just stood there. Finally the Strange Man turned around, took off his glasses and hat and revealed himself as . . . my brother. It took Mom a second to get her bearings, then they were in each others arms. Gotcha! The three of us then began laughing hysterically. The other people in the clubhouse probably thought we were nuts.

“Ma, why didn’t you try to protect me? You could have hit him with a cue stick.” (The books are right by the pool table.)

“I was waiting to see what he’d do next.” Mom.

“Like when he has me on the floor naked trying to rape me?” Me.

She didn’t have an answer and she probably won’t hear the end of that one for a while.

In the meantime, we’re all having a nice visit and seeing the sights.

posted by Evi on Nov 15

I’m not sure exactly how I found my way to the office since I wasn’t very familiar with the city, having been there only a few times with friends. My guess is that I met Mr. H. on the train and we rode in together.

My first position with GAB was receptionist which entailed phones, filing and more phones. The office was one moderate sized room with the insurance adjusters – all men – on one side and us gals on the other. At 18, or I could have been 19, I was very shy and wore braces on my teeth. My self-esteem wasn’t exactly up there with the rest of the world. I was pretty quiet and afraid of my own shadow, let alone all these people I had to deal with, but that changed pretty quickly. Working with all these men turned out to be great fun and my self-esteem began to soar. Too much so. I found out I was actually cute – braces and all – and all the guys liked kidding around with me.

I also found out that if you timed your lunch so that you got to the elevator when one of the guys was waiting for one, the chances of being treated to a meal were pretty good. Back in those days the guys always paid.

I even made friends with the women in the office. I guess they were more charitable than I, because every time a new young thing was hired, I started off by hating and snubbing her. Eventually though, we’d become friendly.

Much later on, I found out that there had been a bet going around the office when I first started working there as to how long I would last. Because I was so shy when I started, no one thought I’d be able to take all the joking.

The office was in the Fisk Building at 250 W. 57^th Street and a Chinese Restaurant – The Yangtze River – was located on the ground floor. This eventually became an after-work meeting place. A group of us would hang out at the bar for awhile and many a time my mother would be pissed off at me because I got home late, feeling no pain.

But my time at the GAB was the most fun I had at any job. Unfortunately I left there and took another job, this time in downtown Manhattan. But that’s another story for another day.

The last time I made a trip to NYC, maybe 10 years ago, the whole area had changed. The Yangtze River was gone and a store – I’m not sure if it was The Gap – had taken over.

But at least I still have my memories to fall back on. And every once in a while I’ll visit them again in this blog.

posted by Evi on Nov 13

“Smooch, Smoochie Cat, where are you? Here kitty, kitty.” No reply.

I was getting panicky. What if he got outside and met up with a gator? No competition there. My Smooch would be gone for good. I was all set to go out and look for him when I heard a faint mew.

“Bill, I just heard him. He’s in the house someplace.” I turned toward where I thought the mew came from. In front of me was a bookcase placed catty-cornered (no pun intended) against the wall. I peered behind it and there he was looking helplessly up at me with his big green eyes.

“You dopey cat!” Bill said, moving the bookcase and setting him free.

Apparently he had jumped up on it and slid right off the other side. But did he learn his lesson? Hell, no! Not too long after that, he did it again. But this time we knew where to look.

Another time someone came to our door and we let him in. Smooch was hanging around, checking the visitor out. About an hour or more after the person left we, once again, asked each other, “have you seen the cat?”

Well, we searched the entire house, every place we could think of – no cat.

“Oh my God, what if he got out when that guy was here?” I said. I grabbed a pair of shoes and set out to scour the neighborhood. I got to the end of the driveway and happened to turn around to look back at the house. And there he was, squashed between the door and the screen door. He had to have been there, standing in place unable to move, for well over an hour.

Another time, after one of our searches, I found him shut in the dryer. I have no idea how he got in there and – no – it wasn’t running.

One evening we sat down to dinner and I heard the kitchen cabinet door banging. I didn’t think we had ghosts in the house and opened the door. Out he strolled, nonchalant as ever.

Below is a picture of one of his more recent hiding places. The towels on the floor gave him away.

posted by Evi on Nov 10

The other day Bill and I were taking things out of our camper which is parked in the RV lot in the community in which we live. He was going through stuff both inside and outside of the RV while I made trips back and forth to the car with armloads of camping junk. On one such trip I returned to the camper and when I tried to open the door found it either stuck or locked.

“Bill, open the door.” Me.

“Where are you?” Him.

“I’m outside. Open the door.” Me, while knocking on the door.

“Where are you?” Him.

“I’m right outside. Open the damn door!” Me, knocking harder on the door.

“Outside where?” Him.

“Right here!” Me, screaming and banging on the door, wondering what the hell’s the matter with him. Has he gone deaf?

“What?” Him

“Open the friggin’ door!” Me, again, while banging away.

“What door?” Him.

“There’s only one door!” Me, totally frustrated now, pounding on the door. Has this man gone daft or something?

A few seconds later he showed up around the side of the RV, shaking his head.

“You dopey broad, you’re at the wrong RV.”

I looked around. Oh. Right.

He just walked away, still shaking his head.

The following evening we met our friends, Al and Dee, for dinner and, of course, he had to go and recount the whole embarrassing saga for them. Well, at least someone got a good laugh out of it.

Kind of reminds me of that old Abbott and Costello routine – ‘Who’s on First’.

posted by Evi on Nov 6

Well, Bill finally got his way and this past Sunday morning the bedroom fun began.  No – not what you’re thinking. I’m talking about moving the furniture around.

“It’ll only take 15 minutes,” he said. Sure, tell me another one, I thought.

“We’ll move the bookcases across the room to the other wall, move the bed to this wall. . .”

Bookcases?!? Did he have any idea what moving the bookcases entailed? I mean, I arranged everything on those shelves by category not too long ago. Did he think I was going to start all over again?

I guess so, because there I was pulling books and piling them on the floor in stacks trying to keep them together in some semblance of order. Smoochie Cat was running around the room exploring books and all the other stuff now laying about on the floor, just getting under foot in general. I finally shut him in the closet so he wouldn’t get crushed by falling furniture.

About three hours later -15 minutes, my ass – after pushing, pulling and lifting, everything was in its new place. Actually, it didn’t look half bad. The room appeared twice its size and I even had a little office area next to a window which was really kind of neat.

But now another problem arose. Next to my side of the bed sat Bill’s armoire, which meant he’d be waking me at 4:00 every morning scrounging around in there getting ready for work. And even worse than that, I would lose the window near my side which came in handy for an afternoon of reading in bed. What to do, what to do?

“Why can’t we just change sides,” he suggested.

“But I always sleep on this side.” Me.

“So try it out. It can’t hurt.” Him.

“Oh, alright, if it means keeping the window.” Me.

We turned the mattress around and that night I slept on – what to me – is the wrong side of the bed. Well, turned out Bill tossed and turned all night while I slept like a baby.

I’m getting used to the room now and actually love it – especially my little office corner. I have to hand it to Bill though; he’s a better interior designer and decorator than I’ll ever be. Actually, I kind of suck at it.

My only problem now is, when looking for clothes to wear, I end up turning around and around in circles trying to remember where my dresser is.