Welcome back to Links!
Firstly, thank you to everyone who commented with advice about cat introductions. We did apply for a foster position last year and never heard back. However, we did wind up adopting on Saturday.
TW: animal neglect and hoarding
The shelter had a cat named Sam, who came to the facility after being taken out of hoarding situation with 20+ other cats. He was kept with a few other of his buddies in an enclosure, but they had since been adopted. He was the last one left. You wouldn’t have even known he was in the enclosure because he was just curled up in a back in the of a carrier.
The MSPCA wanted to stress that he needs to be in a home with another, more confident cat to show him humans aren’t scary and ease him into interactions with us. We adopted this shy, 1 year old boy. He is currently set up in our spare room with his own food, water, litter, etc. For the most part, he just hides in the corner, but we know he is eating and using the litter box. We’ve also started to see him in other parts of the room when we go in to scoop or refresh his food.
Introductions are quite a ways off, but Linus seems mostly uninterested by whatever we’re doing in the spare room. He gave Sam’s carrier some curious sniffs when we were cleaning it post-kitty accidents on the way home, but that’s it.
Sam’s new name: Toast. He is a light cream and orange. Stay tuned for more updates!
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Sarah: This is so interesting – not only about the behind the scenes of one book (Spare) but of becoming a ghostwriter.
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I got a kick out of reading this annoying bits done by romantic partners. Do you or your partner have a routine bit you do?
https://www.instagram.com/p/CrLxqweSghv
For me, when I mention a person or place, my partner will interrupt with a celebrity name or popular brand. Example:
Amanda: We should invite Mary Kate and Brandon to din-
Brian: Oh Mary Kate and Ashley?
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Thanks to EC Spurlock for providing this proof that cats are just furry dragons.
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If you’re in need of a good cry from something sweet and wholesome, I recommend these videos.
TW: Death and dying
Miss New York has this really funny TikTok series of heavens’ front desk receptionist and sometimes she breaks format and does sincere ones for people who have lost loved ones and they’re so touching pic.twitter.com/MUOCBM6AnO
— Maladroithe (@Maladroithe) May 1, 2023
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Don’t forget to share what cool or interesting things you’ve seen, read, or listened to this week! And if you have anything you think we’d like to post on a future Wednesday Links, send it my way!
My bit is that our dog who is very vocal(husky mix) is talking and only I understand her. She complains about the cats a lot. My husband’s is that I’m afraid of squirrels, because I shrieked when one ran up my leg, so he will dramatically cover the tv when a squirrel comes on.
My bit is that I narrate cheesy 80s ballads to my husband. My favorite is I Want To Know What Love Is by Foreigner. “He wants to know what love is, Rob, and he wants YOU to show him. He needs to take some time, you know? He needs that time to think things over. There’s a mountain…and he has to climb it, and he feels like it’s the world on his shoulders.” It both makes him laugh and infuriates him. There’s also some Whitesnake and Journey in the repertoire, naturally.
This is going to be my favorite comment thread, I can tell. We have so many. SO many. “Rubber inner tube” or “rector” will cause immediate responses.
All of the other humans regularly make fun of this one time I was confidently, like massively 10000% certain, that one of my younger child’s preschool friends had been Teddy.
No, Teddy was the name of my sister’s preschool boyfriend, and my child’s friend was Walt.
But whenever anyone can’t remember the name of something, one will say, “I bet it’s Teddy” followed by, “No, it was Walt!” Even typing it out I’m embarrassed.
I would love an entire video feed of you narrating cheesy ballads, Crystal. How much eyeroll are we talking here?
Congratulations on the addition of Toast to your family!
My whole family when someone says “it could be worse”.
“It could be raining!”
Every. Single. Time.
We have so many bits—married 34 years, together for 36–usually based on family lore that only we get. However, one that never gets old (eyeroll) is that whenever there is a Jeopardy category involving planets, the solar system, etc., for every response, my husband will yell out, “What is Uranus?” (pronounced “Your-anus” of course, because inside the body of a man in his sixties beats the heart of a 12-year-old boy). Once, the response actually was “What is Uranus?” (pronounced “urine-us”—which actually doesn’t seem much better), and we cracked up. I couldn’t resist adding, “Hey, you were finally right!”
I hope your new kitty settles in well. My 16 year old house panther passed away Monday night. I’d had him since he was a kitten. It’s been a rough few days. I don’t have any other cats (he was the last one) and the house is too quiet now, but I can’t see myself getting another anytime soon.
@HeatherS, I am so sorry to hear about your loss.
My sympathies to you, @HeatherS.
@HeatherS-I’m so sorry for your loss.
We do have our family bits, not really stuff that irritates the other but things we say so much I’m always surprised other people don’t get it.
When something good happens-“feed the chicken” complete with hand gestures. We got that from the sadly short lived series with Bradley Cooper- Kitchen Confidential. I work at a school, and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said this after something good happens, hold my hand upright for the chicken to be fed, and having kids look at me like I’m nuts!
“You were too busy kicking it with Nicky at the Moulin Rouge”-I think this is from Will and Grace? My sister introduced it into my families lexicon-said when someone was doing something fun and you are doing hard work.
“Ahhhh…salmon skin roll.”-from an episode of Friends, when Rachel is making fun of Ross for something, and sounds very wise over something silly. Said when a person thinks they are being smart, but just being obvious. Also had the hand gesture of pointing to your temple.
For as long as I can remember “As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted . . .”, I have five brothers, we had an aunt stay every weekend when I was little too, so conversation round the table was often contested. I still use it on Mr J who will interrupt part way through an explanation to ask a question, when if he just wait to the end he’d not need to ask. But “fish?” will make both of us smile as it’s an offer to make hot chocolate, neither of us can remember why.
@HeatherS I’m so sorry for your loss! House panthers are such special cats.
Amanda – congratulations on adding a “creamsicle” cat to your household. They are the most ridiculous cats, somehow more so even than solid gingers.
I read some of the comments to my partner, who said “It’s great hearing about all these other people that love each other!” We definitely have “bits” but damned if I can think of any now…
That video definitely gave me happy tears and I’m agnostic. It just felt like it was done with such kindness and care and I loved how she was still so 100 percent New York.
My husband and I have our share of “bits” but my parents specialize in this! They’ve been married 50 years and are both eccentric and silly. There’s a million songs, quotes, references etc but the one that sticks in my mind goes something like this:
MOM (trying to butter up my Dad): I was really hoping my big, strong man was going to (insert some annoying chore here).
DAD: You always say your big strong man is going to do this stuff, but I get stuck doing it. Where is that lazy bum?
MOM: (laughing) please?
DAD (chuckling, exits stage still grumbling about the worthlessness of Mr Big Strong Man).
We have so many and, of course, my mind goes blank when I need them. I realized after Mr. D and I had been married for a while that my parents never reminisced, never said “Remember …?” They had no silly shared language, afaik, and that explains much about their relationship while also being ineffably sad.
After seeing The World According to Garp, whenever undertow is mentioned in conversation, we both pipe up with “Oh, no, it’s the Under Toad.”
When making a left hand turn in the car, the driver is required to say “Hold on” and passengers must respond with “Ho’d on” or be prompted to comply if they don’t. I think “ho’d” came from my husband’s lifelong best friend who couldn’t pronounce his Ls as kid.
Mr. D’s mom never drove and frequently walked long distances home carrying large objects, including a Christmas tree one year. When asked if she wanted help, she’d reply, “No, I have a boy,” which meant her then nine-year-old son. Today “I have a boy” is the response when one of us offers help that is appreciated and not needed.
All these comments are about love, as @OuchOuchOuch’s partner said. Love and, imo, glue, the stuff that holds us together. I hope this thread keeps going.
My parents didn’t have a shared language, but my husband’s family did, and once you learn your spouse/SO/Life Partner’s family language, it’s usually a good in.
We have our own, and we have a family language with our kids, too.
…and there are the things I do which drives my kids crazy. They can bring up a subject or food, and I can sing (badly) a song lyric for it, usually from the 80s, but sometimes a show tune or something older. If they dare say it’s not a real song, I’ll find it on youtube and they have to listen to the whole song. It’s a GenX gift.
Love the 777 heaven series on TikTok!
Jill Q, that reminds me, Mr J is “usefully tall” 🙂 he can change most of our and our friend’s home light bulbs with out having to stand on anything. He isn’t that tall, just 6′ 2″ (well a little shorter than that now, age does that) it’s just that all of the rest of us are shorter than him, and he can change light bulbs at arms length. But usefully tall comes in handy for all sorts of other things too.
Every time my husband bends over to look for something in the fridge, he says “Watch my BUUUUUUTT.” (We use the term schtick instead of bit – “a gimmick, comic routine, or style of performance associated with a particular person.”
My husband and I have said “Viola!” instead of “Voila!” for years. This year is the year that our daughter had to choose an instrument for band or orchestra at school, and, yep, she picked the viola. Nine months into the school year, she has finally (and reluctantly) accepted that he and I are simply always going to call it her voila.