Say a prayer for Coffee on Friday.

This is Coffee, The Prettiest Cat Ever. I adopted her in Dec. 07 from the Ottawa Humane Society. She is a real suck and Daddy's girl, and gives me a million laughs.
On Friday, I have to take her to the vet's for her annual check-up. She turns into a starfish when I try to put her in her carrier (it's like a sports bag with mesh sides), and freaks out in the car. Good thing the vet is less than a two-minute drive away. She also freaks out in the vet's office, and becomes very clingy.
Whenever I go away, someone comes over every day or two to make sure she's properly fed and watered, and even spend a bit of time with her. But when I come home, she's super needy for about a week. She also has a way of showing how unimpressed she is that I actually had the audacity to leave her. It usually involves pooping on the carpet at the bottom of the basement stairs.
Other than that, she's a treat to have around.

Like, what's like wrong with like saying "like"?

On the bus on the way to work today, I was sitting on one of the side seats, with my back to the window. The bus was pretty busy, so two teenaged girls sat beside me. I had to turn my iPod up much louder than I usually like to, because their conversation was making me crazy.
Honest to Pete, every second or third word was "like". If all of a sudden, the word disappeared from humanity's vocabulary, they wouldn't be able to string three words together into a sentence. What's this world coming to?

Me, a crabby old fart? Like, what's like wrong like with like that?

Welcome to Basic Bob

This is a "by popular demand" kind of thing.
It arises out of several comments by several of my friends -- mostly on facebook -- who say they enjoy my status lines and comments. "You should have a blog," many of them have said.
Truth is, I do have another blog, but I don't publicize it much. It's known to a small group of friends, many of whom have their own blogs which are actually the basis of our friendship.
So, I have finally decided to expand my blogosphere a bit, and follow the advice of those friends. I'm not sure how often I will blog here, or what it will evolve into, but it will be largely about me, and use a lot of the type of rants that I've become known for among my facebook friends.

I guess I'll start at A for Abby. She has been occupying a lot of my thoughts the past couple of weeks.
Abby is my honourary granddaughter and Little Niece. Her Dad, Dan, is my Little Brother. We were matched by Big Brothers and Big Sisters in Timmins in July, 1993.
We quickly became very close, lifelong friends, and members of each other's families.
I was Best Man at his wedding to the woman I refer to as Pretty Christine, last April in Jamaica. Abigail -- or Abby -- was born February 26 in Timmins. I spent last weekend up there, getting to know Abby, and celebrating her birth with both sides of her family. Abby and I spent Saturday and Sunday evenings bonding, by cuddling with her sleeping on my chest. I am head over heels in love with the 6+ pound bundle, and look forward to being part of her life as she grows up, and having her as part of my life.

So, that's it for the first-ever instalment of Basic Bob. Your comments are welcome, be they compliments, criticisms or suggestions for future posts. Let's see where this takes us.