And here we are

Fleur and Betty! Are they becoming buddies? (Tuesday, March 4)

    The morning routine. I get up around 6 a.m., usually being harrassed by cats who want the show to get on the road. For the past three weeks, Mrs. Random has been sleeping out in the living room on her recliner because she’s got one remaining post-op drain, and also to keep cats from camping on her still-steri-stripped chest incision. I get dressed and go to the bathroom. Then I go give Mrs. R a morning kiss, and head to the kitchen to fill our coffee-water pot, with the tap turned to hot (it runs cold for about a minute), put the pot on the burner, and fire up the gas flame beneath it.

    I get cat food bowls out of the cupboard and a can of cat food from the fridge and/or from the storage area under the stairs if I need a fresh can. Then I dish out cat food into the little bowls. Since ant season has begun, I put a little plate of water under each cat bowl as an anti-ant “moat.” By this time the tap water is running hot, and I dribble a bit onto each cat’s food, mushing it up a bit with a fork. Griffey gets stool softener, so I sprinkle a little of that onto his food with a small measuring spoon and then kind of spread it in a bit with the bottom of the spoon as it dissolves. By now all the cats are sharking around the kitchen near my feet. I carefully carry bowls and moats to their regular eating spots. Nom nom nom.

    With cats fed, I set up the coffee rig (big thermos, #6 cone and filter, 7.5 scoops of OG French Roast into filter), go back to the bedroom, make the bed, grab my laptop from the bookcase on my side of the bed (I usually browse the net and watch Youtubes before falling asleep at night), bring it out to the dining room table or the couch to check in on my socials and the “stupid news” while the coffee water finally comes to a boil. This morning I also did some journal typewriting on one of my Olympia SM9s.

    After the water boils, I pour it over the fresh grounds, a multiple-trip routine which usually takes a couple or three minutes, letting one pour drip through into the thermos, then repeating until all the water has been poured into the cone. About three minutes after that, the coffee is ready and I pour Mrs. Random a cup and deliver it to her side, also filling her water glass. Finally I settle down with my cuppa… and here we are!

    Oh, variation this morning: pre-heating the oven to 475℉ to bake a loaf of Mrs. R's sourdough bread, which had been slow-rising in the fridge overnight. When it was done heating, I popped it into the oven with the timer set for 33 minutes. In a little bit, we'll have hot fresh bread.