Angry days and dogfood

  

I bought my cat dog food last night. I’m not proud of it, but I did it. I’m going to have to complain a little to explain why; I’m not real proud of that either.

  My cable bill was due on the 4^th [1]. On the 3rd I realized they were serious and considered going; only it was snowing that real sleazy wet snow that just pisses me off. So I waited a day. On the afternoon of the 4^th proper I walked into Rogers, paid my bill in full, and…after they processed the payment, they informed me my account had been marked for disconnection a couple hours before, so there would be a 100ish $ fee to reactivate it. I have rarely hated as purely as I did in that moment.  I wanted to smash his gap toothed fucking face, with his clacky fucking keyboard, until you couldn’t tell one from the other. Instead I thanked him for his time, and informed him I would consider the information I’d been given.

 Upon my returning to work I was informed there had been a staffing change and my December vacation was being pulled. This gutted some happy plans, and required a few apologetic phone calls…which I could not make, since my little whore of a cell phone sold me out (see subsection A).  After work I hit the gym and tried to survive my trainer’s attempts to break me.  I then splattered my way home through two feet of scum slush, exhausted, cold, and dejected. So much so I forgot to purchase food for my cat[2].

 When I got home said cat was glaring at me with such loathing I was forced to trudge back outside, and down to the Quickie. They had no cat food. There was no reason they should be out; no cat circus bus broken down outside, they just had none. So I start thinking “Hey, Dog food is essentially cat food, only bigger. So that’s got to better, right?”.  Upon returning home I discovered that dog food is composed of an indestructible polymer, and smells of Owls left out in the rain. My cat fought her way through a few mouthfuls, glaring and hissing all the while, then curled into a desolate ball on my bed…abandoned by fate.

 I did my best to make it palatable: Smashing it into smaller pieces with ten lbs weights; soaking it in hot water, then microwaving it into a dog food stew; dumping it into a huge pot and sorting out the smaller catfood size pieces by hand. To her, it remained poison. Eventually I relented, walking the few blocks to a store that could provide real catfood, and lighten the terrible haze of failure surrounding me.

 That huge pot of Dogfood is now sitting on my trunk, a shameful reminder of my duplicitous feeding tactics, and generally shoddy day.  

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   Subsection A :  Nice things will only let you down

  My new pay as you go cell phone, also by Rogers, decided to stage a sympathy strike in support of its High Speed/Cable TV union brothers. This does not surprise me in the least: I never trusted, or really bonded in any way, with that phone. It stole minutes from me, sabotaged it’s camera, and always claimed I had two messages no matter how many times I checked them. When I called the company they told me my account was fine and I just needed to buy more minutes. I bought more minutes and the phone refused to accepted them, telling me only “EMERGENCY USE ONLY”. It wasn’t broken; it just didn’t consider my needs sufficiently urgent to bother with.  What the fuck is my cell phone doing that is so important that it can’t even take my money?!  I can only assume it was calling the main computer at Rogers and laughing about the sweet screw job they just laid down. The phone is an asshole and I am done with it.

  In contrast, I have returned to my beloved busted old party phone. It features consist of calling people, and occasionally allowing people to call me. And yeah, it doesn’t ring all the time (and sometimes that ring sort dies out into a pained wheeze)…and it might take two of three tries to turn it on, but goddamn if it doesn’t give me everything it has in it. This phone took a two hour hot tub soaking and was still sending text messages about how grateful it was to drown in my pocket. I never should have left it.

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[1] And by due, I mean “In 24 hours we’ll burn your whole life down if you don’t pay” , overdue.

[2] This took on special urgency as it had been two day since I possessed proper cat food. The day before she’d been given milk with roast beef floating in it; that morning peanut butter smeared on the edge of her bowl. Yes, I am shabby pet owner.