With the dog’s back injury, his very short lived obedience (and non-existent agility, though we did do a couple of small jumps and a tunnel in a class once) career is pretty much over.  What’s a girl with a clicker and some free time to do?  In my experience, effort required for multiple dog ownership doesn’t scale linearly.  Caring for two dogs seems to be about three times the work of one dog (two are a pair, three are a pack, so a limit is reached around three and above.)  So I did the unthinkable.  I got a cat.  My last cat died somewhat tragically ten years ago this summer, and I don’t think I was really ready for another one til now.

I went to the shelter to look for the most dog-friendly cat they had available.  I walked out with a 9 year old white male, who started purring and head-butting me and hopped in my lap as soon as the shelter worker left the room.  His profile said he chased dogs and thus I figured he wouldn’t be too traumatized by Foco, who will chase until he’s told to knock it off or (more reliably) has lived with the cat for a few days.  Kitty was situated in the Spare Oom for the first few days (during which time Chandra and I re-named him Tumnus.)  After attempting to beat the crap out of the dog for the first week or so, the beasts seem to have worked things out for the most part, and are even peacefully co-existing on the bed.

The cat is awesome, and has barely stopped purring since I’ve brought him home.  He’s affectionate, confident (demands attention from guests), mellow, and loves to play.  He hasn’t seen the need to wake me up, and he even wipes his feet on the mat I put under the litterbox.  And he has an adorable scraggle-ear (his previous owners gave him up because they couldn’t afford to fix a hematoma.)  As I write this, he is repeatedly dipping a paw into an unattended water glass and licking the water off his paw (this is probably the first circle of crazy cat lady hell, when you start to let them get away with things because they’re too damn cute.  I give up on trying to impress men.)

I started introducing him to the clicker a couple of weeks ago.  Tumnus was largely unmotivated by food until I switched from free-feeding to feeding him twice a day (at the vet’s recommendation.)  To my surprise, the switch was a non-issue for him.  This works out great for me, since it’s hard to train an animal with food if it never gets hungry.

Good clicker training is largely about sitting down, shutting up, and letting the animal figure things out.  Unlike with dogs, which you can physically compel into a sit or position with a leash, you can’t force a cat (or a chicken) to do anything.

As far as I can tell, the cat seems to think this is all some sort of elaborate fish-dispensing game.  Here’s a video of him after just a few sessions with the clicker.

I think he gets the idea, and is even throwing sits at me when I bring out the treats.  I’m now working on introducing him to the target stick and teaching him to “sit pretty.”

When did knitting, cat owning, and growing heirloom tomatoes become mutually exclusive with badassery?

I can (and have) caught fish, changed a tire, fixed toilets, unclogged sinks and garbage disposals, used power tools, grilled a steak, knocked out pushups, shot a gun, and built a one-match fire.  I also knit, garden (yes, clearly shoveling around several cubic yards of compost makes one soft), and enjoy fancy cupcakes.  What’s with the arbitrary false dichotomy of “ultra-femme” skills and “real woman skills”?  Even Sigourney Weaver in Aliens (referenced in the article as an example of a “tough girl”) had a cat.  How in the world are any of these things mutually exclusive, for men OR women?

This lady is utterly missing the point of feminism.

It’s a Sweet Orange Roma.

Better late than never.

This about sums up Sock Summit (Portland’s biennial* sock knitting conference.)  I’m about three rows from the front with a BRIGHT! PINK! skein of yarn.

* (Biennial in both senses of the word.  The event occurs every two years and many people also end up with enough fiber and patterns to last them til the next conference.  Having done more spinning and knitting in the last week than I have in the past six months, fiber equilibrium has largely been achieved in my household.)

I think this domain was renewed by accident, but it’s still here, and thus it’s time for my sesquiennial blog post.  I managed to pay off all my student loans in December, and I’m still debt free with a solid emergency fund.  I also started a 401k a while back and have been dumping 10% of my income in there.  And between moving into a place that’s a much better fit for us (a yard!  a living room that’s not geometrically impossible!  a gas stove!  neighborhood children with reasonable bedtimes!  WINDOWS!) and recently rediscovering my cooking mojo (I think I never really got used to cooking on an electric after Ecuador) it has been a decent year so far.

I also managed to spend something like 10% of this year’s annual gross earnings on my dog, who is 100% worth it.  We had a brush with IVDD in January which could have resulted in permanent paralysis of his hind limbs had he not gotten emergency spinal surgery (did you know they have doggie neurosurgeons?  and doggie physical therapists?) Several months later, in May, the little dude had a nerve sheath tumor removed from one of his good legs.  The vet said the margins look clean and that she’s cautiously optimistic.  He’s healed up now and back to running around happily, although a little wobbly in the rear.  The vet also noted with amusement that he seems to have no clue whatsoever that there is anything wrong with him.

Happy dog in the park

Now that life is somewhat more under control, clearly the next priority is preparing for the zombie apocalypse, as recommended by the CDC.  Here are some of the things I’m doing to get ready.

Growing food

There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance (this whole essay is really awesome)

I know of nothing that makes one feel more complacent…than to have vegetables from his own garden… It’s a kind of declaration of independence.

- Charles Dudley Warner, My Summer in a Garden

This wasn’t the best year to become a farmer.  Spring used to be my favorite season, but the spring of 2011 has been one of the crappiest in Oregon’s history (the calendar says it is summer now, but thus-far summer is largely a lie.)  All of the crops here are currently 2-3 weeks behind schedule.  Despite the weather and the fact that I have minimal gardening experience, I am growing ALL THE THINGS (though my basil looks super emo.)

If zombies become our most prolific import (and presumably export), there will likely be no more fruit from Chile or tomatoes from Mexico.  That’s easily a disaster in itself; fully two-thirds of the fruits and vegetables consumed in the United States are imported from other countries.  Even if our internal supply chains were to remain intact, continuing to rely on domestically grown produce from the supermarket is probably not the best solution.  Many crops grown in the United States (e.g. tomatoes) are associated with some really questionable practices (not to mention that if you’ve ever actually eaten a garden tomato you will likely be instantly and irrevocably converted to Tomato Snobbery.)

Growing some of my own food seemed like a workable solution.  In addition to helping weekly on a local CSA farm, I have a 20′x20′ community garden plot to myself this year.   Last year I was paralyzed by perfectionism and indecision so I didn’t start planting til mid-July.  This year I have been slowly working out that consistency is much more useful than perfection (in several areas of my life), and thus I started preparing the plot in early February.  I divided the plot into two 8′x18′ beds and single dug the whole thing by hand, mixing in a few wheelbarrows worth of compost for good measure.

The "early" half of the plot. From this.. (2/7)

To this.. (2/22)

To this! (6/27)

I’m growing pansies, carrots, two different heirloom lettuce blends, onions, garlic, celery, potatoes (in bags and in the ground), snap peas, shell peas, leeks, strawberries, rosemary, oregano, mammoth leaf and Thai basil, parsley, four different kinds of peppers (two hot and two sweet), two different varieties of beans (yin yang and cannellini), edamame, and three different kinds of heirloom tomatoes.  Just about everything was started from seed, except for the pansies, onions and celery.  I had a row of prolific spinach behind the lettuce, but it bolted and is now blanched and in the freezer, waiting to be turned into a Palak Paneer.  I am still in awe at the concept of growing edible FOOD from DIRT.

So far the harvest has largely consisted of an inordinate amount of snap peas, but the little strawberry patch has also managed to produce quite a few berries.  Along with the peas (which love cool weather), the lettuces have been quite prolific.  I also managed to dig up a bowlful of new potatoes underneath one of the flowering plants, which went into a tasty soup.  Shell peas are following behind the snap peas and should be ready soon.  The onions are bulbing very nicely (they went in really early; I think March.)  And today I noticed the very first two little green tomatoes setting on my tomato plants.  There is hope for this season yet.

Les pois et les fraises. Ils ont un terroir!

Lettuce and more snap peas

Bulbing onion

Beans are mostly up, and the peppers and tomatoes are hanging in there waiting for the weather to get nice.

The "late" half of the plot, with beans, tomatoes, peppers, etc.

Lifting heavy things

Work it harder, make it better

Do it faster, makes us stronger

Zombieland suggested that Rule #1 is cardio, but I figure it’s equally important to be able to move obstacles out of the way of your sturdy vehicle so you can get the heck out of dodge.

I am steadily working on being able to do pull-ups, because even most fitness models cannot perform them without help.  Also, maybe we will luck out and the zombies won’t be smart enough to climb trees.

Preserving food

I dug my cellar in the side of a hill sloping to the south…I took particular pleasure in this breaking of ground, for in almost all latitudes men dig into the earth for an equable temperature.  Under the most splendid house in the city is still to be found the cellar where they store their roots as of old, and long after the superstructure had disappeared posterity remark its dent in the earth.”

- Henry David Thoreau, Walden

It’s not a whole lot of use growing food if you can’t take it with you when you’re fleeing the zombies.  Or at least make it last through the winter, assuming your home has been secured against the onslaught of undead.

To this end, I obtained a combination thermometer/hygrometer ($12 on Amazon) to determine the best place in my rented house/garage/yard to McGyver a root cellar setup.  Vegetables are fussy about the temperature and humidity in which they are stored, and some are more fussy than others.  Clearly summer isn’t the best time to find cool and moist spots (aside from poking your head in the freezer), but the difference between ambient temperature and sampled temperature should grant a general idea of which areas are best insulated.

Thermometer/hygrometer with max/min values for the past 24 hours. For science!

In addition to exploring root cellaring, I have grand plans (and recipes) to can a bunch of convenience food (soups, stews, spaghetti sauce with meat and without, beans, applesauce) for this fall and winter.  I’ve blanched and frozen a lot of food in the past few years, but I like the idea of trying the canning route because it turns out that you’re more likely to actually eat the homemade food if it doesn’t take three days to defrost.  Since fruit and vegetables are cheapest in season, I expect eating more homemade food will have an impact on my grocery bill, but pure food snobbery seems to be an increasingly motivating factor.  Locally grown comestibles like tomatoes, potatoes, and grass fed beef (though sadly my HOA prohibits livestock; I checked) are just appreciably better.

For a gentle introduction to canning, I started off with jam.  Fruit is generally acidic enough that it can be processed in a big pot of boiling water, without the “OMG I need adult supervision” intimidation of canning things under pressure.

During the zombie apocalypse, sugar may become scarce.  Thus I suggest using a low sugar pectin.  I tried using the low sugar version of Surejell last year for some freezer jam, and was not terribly impressed (plus “low sugar” Surejell means 4 cups of sugar instead of 6 cups.  My teeth are aching just from reading the instructions on the box.)  This year I’ve switched to Pomona, which relies on monocalcium phosphate to set up, rather than ungodly amounts of sugar.  My adult supervision friend Tammy and I were able to use just 1.5 cups of sugar for 8 cups of Hood strawberries.

A flat of Hood strawberries from Unger Farms

Strawberry jam or brrrraaaains?

Quilting

A lot of human hobbies, from knitting sweaters to building model airplanes, are probably rooted in the same human desire to control an entire process of manufacture.  Karl Marx called it the antidote to alienation.

- Barbara Kingsolver, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

How are you supposed to stay warm during the zombie apocalypse with only a 22-pound dog for company?  Besides hand-knit socks, the answer is clearly blankets.  Lots and lots of blankets.  Scraps of fabric may be the only materials you have to use after the zombie invasion, so it’s best to learn how to work with them now.

Sewing room, complete with decorative dog

It’s important to have a dedicated space for sewing.  Even if you don’t have any roommates and thus won’t bother anyone by leaving your sewing stuff out, not only will you eventually want to eat/game/hull strawberries at the dining room table, it’s also not ergonomically correct for either sewing (which requires a low surface) or cutting fabric (which requires a surface high enough to stand at.)  Your back will thank you for taking it into consideration.

Blocks from my first quilt arranged in the traditional "barn raising" pattern.

At first, quilting involved rather a lot of swearing, but now I find it kind of peaceful and relaxing.  Quilting is extremely precise in exactly the way that people generally aren’t. And since I generally have the habit of making a lot of things for other people, it’s nice to make something just for me.

Oh boy! A year with a real income! Let’s see how we’re doing..

• Paid down $9700 worth of student loans. All private loans are now dead and buried.

• Saved up five months worth of expenses in the bank

• Bought a $1100 car last March
  

  Which as we all know, frequently turn out to be more like $3000 cars, in hindsight. Oh well. His name is Sheldon, and he is a 1988 Volvo 240 DL wagon.

I also learned a Very Important Lesson about getting a car throughly checked out by a mechanic before you take it on I-5.  No one got hurt, but I was pretty terrified of driving up until a few months ago.  I (mostly) fixed myself with the same logic I use for dog training..

Conditioning is some pretty strong stuff.  This was my theory:  Something scary happens, and you associate fear with a certain situation.  You encounter a similar situation (or something that reminds your brain of it, whether it is something that is actually dangerous or not.  Your brain is too busy being all “OMG SCARY!” to be logical about the whole thing.  Like the dog drooling when the bell rings.)

You run away. The anxiety is gone as soon as you’re away from the scary thing.  The fear is reinforced.  This is negative reinforcement in the operant conditioning sense – you take something away (the fear) which reinforces the behavior (avoiding the scary thing.)  The next time you see the scary thing, you have an even bigger fear response.  Which gets reinforced yet again, because you run away from it, which relieves the fear.  Repeat this enough, and you’ll end up with panic attacks (for some people at least, I think this is how agoraphobia starts.)  I didn’t want to end up hiding in my house for the rest of my life (which was a distinct possibility.)  So I started small.

Even though I was Very Scared, I drove to the grocery store down the street.  Nothing happened.  Then even though I was Very Scared, I drove a little further.  Nothing happened.  And then to work.  And to the gas station.  And to knit night.  And then on the highway during the day in the right lane.  And then at night.  and in the rain.  And then to the airport. And to the coast.  And before I knew it, I was passing people on 217 on the way to Corvallis.  If you go long enough without reinforcing a behavior, it will extinguish itself.  I also bought myself a car GPS, which helped immensely, and worked on establishing some incompatible behaviors (like singing in the car.)  So I am a huge clicker training nerd.  However, it worked, and I’m immensely proud of myself.

Other things I did this year:

Cooked a ton of food in my kitchen.

Ate cake on an enormous boat.

Hung out with the very best dog in the whole wide world.

Hunted dinosaurs in Costa Rica

Played with vacuum tubes

I may be the only person in the Portland area who starts yelling when they see that Kapok fiber yarn is now available on the market, but who can blame me.  I lived in Ecuador for a year and a half, and had the opportunity to observe this lovely tree in the wild several times.  I had wondered if the fiber it produces was spinnable but from my research (ok, from some Googling) it appeared that it needed to be mixed with at least 50% cotton for stability.  I never imagined that it might be commercialized in yarn form one day.  Until I walked into Twisted and saw this:

85% Cotton 15% Kapok

I’m curious to know where they source the Kapok and if it is harvested in a sustainable manner – the manufacturer’s web site says “grown on the equator.”

yay!

For now, I have plenty of yarn and fiber to keep me busy, but perhaps there is a Kapok sweater in my future.

I’d like to conclude with a revolutionary new personal finance method:

Although I recently graduated and was able to procure a great job, I have found it hard to shake the student mentality.  My goal is to live on half of my income and pay my student loans off, as well as have an equal amount of savings in two years.  I created this blog to track my progress and to ponder some of the more interesting things that I see available for purchase while I’m out and about.

spinning wheel

At the moment I have neither a car nor a TV, but I do have a lovely spinning wheel which I nabbed off of Craigslist for $100.  Fiber arts can be about as economical or as expensive as you want to make them.  Right now I’m working on spinning up a pound and a half of mystery oatmeal-colored wool and a chocolate brown alpaca fleece.