Saturday, May. 23, 2020 - 6:35 pm.
Our cats are getting old. We took our black cat, Marla, to the vet this week, and it turns out her she has pain in the hip and the knees, her bones are wearing out. She's now on drugs for life, and we also got her a lower litter box. Hopefully this treatment will also help her with her compulsive licking, which she's had since we arrived to the UK, four and a half years ago(!), and continues to this day. We tried to control it in the UK, she was even on anxiety pills for dogs(!). They worked for a while, but she developed tolerance eventually.
I feel both our cats have been a bit restless lately, but it can be a combination of things. The stress for having us around so much; The fact that they don't always tolerate being around each other (get over it already, you've lived together for nine years since you two were months old!); And personality-related grievances. Marla seems to be perpetually hungry, and our ginger cat, Nico, seems to be perpetually cold. The latter, though: fair enough these days. Winter is coming in harsh, and the precariety of heating options for the population is borderline cruel.
(This building doesn't have heating, so we bought three heaters. We move them around the apartment, but also they're not always on because it's too expensive. Our electricity bill will go up these months, what with the winter and the working from home. Anyway, Nico manages. Sometimes we just cover him with blankets and he stays there for hours. He's currently napping on clean, warm clothes fresh out of the dryer).
Andrew and I went out twice this week, once to the vet, once to the farmers' market because we were running out of fruits and vegs. Andrew has been the one going out to run errands these past two months, but now that the pandemic measures have relaxed, I go with him to share the weight, literally and figuratively. I am concerned about going out, yes, specially because outside life seems to have returned to normal and that might be just a dangerous illusion. I understand a lot of people do not have the luxury of being able to stay at home, so I don't feel like I can judge. I'm just concerned. I pinch myself when I notice I'm getting too relaxed about this, too.
It was a good week. It was also a productive week. Just on Monday morning I accomplished so many things that I felt like coming in here to write about it, but by now I've forgotten. It's mostly academic stuff. Actually, the rest of the week wasn't as productive, but Monday morning made up for that. So yeah, I'm gonna go and say I had a productive week.
I'm still talking to G everyday. G, my lesbian girl-friend. We chat about our day, and share stories from our lives. I told her my story with Joseph over the course of a week. She has plenty more stories in the heartbreak/anguish department, and way more rough (i.e. friends queerbaiting her or using her, workplace harrassment). I appreciate her trust to tell me all this. Maybe, hopefully, it's therapeutic for her to talk about all these things; she said she's never tell them in a narrative the way she's telling them now. It's nothing short of traumatic. I guess that's another marker of queer friendship, trauma disclosure.
I kept thinking this week that in my last entry perhaps I was too dismissive of our flirting. "Oh, that's what queer (girl)friends do". I mean, it probably is. We certainly do. I'm not fantasizing about a relationship with her, but I'm not sure what Andrew would think if he saw the "how was your day, babe?" that she sends me at 10 pm. Nothing scandalous comes after that, though, it is usually followed by a mundane description of academic activities from me, and then a horrifying account of sexual harrassment in the workplace from her. We do flirt in between, though. She laid some catchy words last night that were to be easily responded with sexual innuendo*, but I didn't bite. I wished I could. I like her, I'm enjoying our friendship, but I know my boundaries.
(*I know "sexual innuendo" from a VH1 segment about Aeromith that I watched when I was a teenager. "Sexual innuendo and hellacious guitar". One may ask why I remember this specific phrase, and it's because I taped that segment and watched it over and over again).
Anyway. Things are going well here. I think I am getting a little restless sometimes, and Andrew too, but it comes and goes. We thankfully remain in a comfortable position with little to complain about, individually and as a couple.