Bastet

The cat losing weight but eating a lot pretty much had to mean hyperthyroidism or diabetes; at his age, sex, and size, I was putting my money on diabetes. I wish they’d discussed diet (other than the owner's comment in the update about “once we get his diet figured out,” but even then she was still talking about insulin, too), because a high-protein, very low-carb diet could stabilize his blood glucose so he wouldn’t need insulin. But there was a lot of stuff about diabetes management I’m sure they discussed but didn’t show, simply for time, so maybe Dr. B did go over it with her and it just didn’t air. I wish it had, though – it’s good info to share with the audience. I hate those grass awns; they’re so hard to get out of anything (including paws). Bear’s “eyebrows” darting around under that cone of shame – what a cute face! And I laughed out loud when he sprawled out on the floor with his hind legs spread open. He is one lucky dog to have survived that injury! “There’s growling sometimes when they eat, but no aggression.” Um, that’s pretty much the definition of food aggression. If they love each other the rest of the time, separate them at meal time, and life will be good. I’m surprised Buster had to stay as long as he did; maybe the owner wasn’t able to take care of the drain at home. “He’s having his testicles removed. Probably not a bad idea on most males.” Hee.

Welcome, @Merrilin. Louise (one of the family cats when I was a teenager) would have approved:

LOL! Baxter had a saggy stomach, and I think was miffed he couldn't blame it on having had a litter of kittens. This is Bandit and Chester during the day, only they rarely wait that long to ask for more -- whenever they wake up from a nap or come in from checking out the yard, they must have a snack. Bandit (who eats canned food) you can only feed a little bit at a time, or he'll scarf down too much at once and it will come back up. And then Chester (who eats raw food) picked up the habit of eating all day long from him. So now there's a lot of meowing in that house during the day. At least they're quiet at night (most of the time - Bandit gets into an overnight ornery mood from time to time that involves "talking" [and he has no inside voice], but little Chester just quietly plays with his toys when he's awake in the wee hours [we know because they're in different places than they were at bedtime]).

Yes, it's snapshots of their relationship, times when the three of them were together and the dog wasn't exactly thrilled about it. The camping trip is, I think, the first time they are not in the dog's territory; the rest of the times they're in the house or the car. Once they spend some time together on neutral ground, that's when the dog realizes, "You know, this invader is actually alright."

It depends on how many calories per can and how much Captain weighs (general rule is 20 calories per pound of body weight [per day]), but in all likelihood, yes, that would be too much. If you were going to add a just-before-bed meal, you'd want to divvy up the amount he already gets a little differently rather than adding more. The only cat I've ever had wake me up for food was Baxter, and he didn't start doing it until he was about 11. I would just ignore him, but some mornings it took him a long time to accept that and go back to sleep. It could be very frustrating, but at least he was mostly trained. When I stay at my parents' house, Bandit and Chester both try to wake me up (in fairness to them, they are used to getting fed hours earlier with my parents [although they also ate dinner later with me the night before, so the time in between meals remains the same]), and no matter how many years I've been taking care of them, the first morning of each trip, I have to go through the, "No, remember we are on a different schedule when I'm here" routine for probably a good hour before they give up and go back to sleep. After that, they settle in. But fast forward to the next time my parents are gone, and we start over again. So sayeth every (good) pet owner ever. They certainly all have their quirks!

Yes; Brenda tells him, "I know you don't want me to respond to that" with one of Those Looks on her face. Brenda and Daniels are incredibly frustrated at the end, disgusted that there will be no prosecution. The show presents a bitter reality, all while acknowledging the bitterness (and sexism). I don't think any character comes out and says, "This happens all the time," but they don't need to, either; we've seen it play out time and again, and are hoping somehow our heroes are going to come up with a way to make it different this time, but also knowing they won't. Yes, that's what I mean about loving that Sedgwick and LaVoi are so dedicated to the wardrobe, despite their personal distaste for the clothes, because it's perfect for the character. It is how Brenda would dress, as a person, and as an investigator whose MO is to disarm suspects into underestimating her with her sweet, scattered, southern persona, luring them into letting their guard down so she can skillfully lead them into saying something they don't want to say.

Oh my, the "oh, shit!" look on his poor wife's face when she realizes what has happened and dashes in there to grab the kids, and then dragging them both out in about fifteen seconds (it would have been half the time if one wasn't on wheels) and closing the door while on her knees in the hallway. All silently.

Ha! I love this from the return of Ray Wise’s attorney character in The Other Woman: Objection. On what grounds? The question is harassing, argumentative, and ends with a preposition. I remember Borderline as the first episode I got annoyed with Brenda. She was involved in a car accident while driving a city vehicle on duty; of course she’s going to have some paperwork to fill out! Not knowing she couldn’t leave the scene, okay; yes, she should know, but it was an innocent mistake and easily dealt with. Not reporting it? Much more dumb, but we're still in "I didn't know" territory. It's once we get to "I know, and don't care" land that I'm irked. Refusing to fill out the necessary report once all this was pointed out to her, even though she had 24 hours to do it? Come on. Running to Pope claiming she’s just too important to waste time on such trifling things and asking him to make the Traffic investigation go away was too much. Just fill out the damn forms and let everybody do their jobs – of course it has to be investigated and closed out! But this episode also gives me Brenda’s outfits at one of their most amusing with the combination of pastel blues and greens. I love how Greg LaVoi, the costume designer, didn’t go Ugly Betty-style overboard with her wardrobe. Brenda dresses in a way that isn’t at all typical, or even right, for a Los Angeles professional, but it’s not outlandish; she’s under-dressed a lot of the time, but she’s never inappropriately dressed. And I like that Kyra Sedgwick embraced Brenda’s fashion sense, despite how she disliked the clothes personally, as perfect for the character.

I love Heroic Measures. The actor playing Melissa Langner does a great job. And you can just see everything coming, because it’s all stuff that happens to women all the time – Gabriel is going to be a twit about Daniels making the call to lock down the OR as a crime scene, the administrator is going to, when he sees Brenda and Fritz arrive, assume Fritz is the superior officer, the mother is going to be dismissed as an hysterical woman, then suspected of munchausen by proxy, the DA isn’t going to want to press charges. And it all happens (Pope even outright refers to Melissa as an "hysterical woman," and then lumps Brenda and Daniels in with her). The actor playing the hospital administrator played the slimy psychiatrist in Silence of the Lambs; I wonder if he has ever played a good guy, because he’s extremely convincing as a sleazeball.

It's weird, because I think Lorrie Morgan has a great voice (I loved her Stand By Your Man tribute), but I hardly ever listen to her. I don't have any of her albums, and Something in Red and What Part of No are the only songs of hers I have on my iPod. Same with Pam Tillis, come to think of it. I don't dislike her for any reason, but I think Maybe It Was Memphis is the only one of her songs I listen to.

Obviously not, since it worked.

Because it's a camping trip, which is very much a dog-friendly outing? If the guy is going to date her, he's doing to have to learn whether he can deal with the fact her life involves a dog. And now that he and the dog have made peace, that shouldn't be an issue for however long the relationship lasts. (Unless she brings the dog absolutely everywhere.)

It does seem potentially counterproductive; they park that way because they believe their car to be oh-so-special (probably because it's doing double duty compensating for their penis) that it can't risk being touched by another car's door, but in so blatantly declaring themselves to be an inconsiderate jerk, they invite anyone around with poor impulse control to key their precious car.

Congratulations, @GHScorpiosRule! On the job, of course, and on scoring an office. Working without a door and window sucks. Working in the non-profit world, it's hard enough affording office space that allows each attorney an office, so the poor paralegals (or, paralegal, as in smaller organizations there's only a budget for one) are stuck in cubicle hell. My friend is a paralegal for a mid-size firm, and she and another paralegal share an office. Thankfully, they get along well, so it works out nicely. I can't wait to hear about the new job as you settle in, but first enjoy the hell out of your weekend. Since you'll soon have good income and benefits coming in, maybe treat yourself to a spa day to get good and relaxed.

Basil can deal a lot better with really hot than with really cold (which I love, because it means my plants produce year-round, as it doesn't get really cold here). I give it extra water in the heat so the leaves don't do their sad and droopy routine, and it's fine.

Cats across the world ask, "Yeah, and? What else would one do in those situations?"

But there are still people who are oddly obsessed with other people's schedules when there's no reason for it. Nothing about the "offender's" productivity, their schedule impacting someone else's, their hours being conveniently timed to not be there when the bulk of the work needs to be done, or anything like that. Just someone who comes in early and sees a co-worker arrive significantly later and grouses about it, despite the fact the one who arrives later also leaves later and thus works the same hours and is equally productive, just at different times (or the reverse, where someone who comes in later sees someone leaving much earlier than them, but doesn't account for the fact that's because they got there a lot earlier, but let's be real - morning people are more judgmental against those whose day starts and ends later than vice versa :-)).

I need to take a closer look at the schedule before I go to bed, but my quick glance when it was first posted didn't show anything I don't already have on DVD, let alone anything I haven't seen. That will not stop me from having the TV tuned to TCM all day tomorrow, though. (I'll be working out of my home office; no one will know, as the cat won't tell.)

Yeah, the heat is really doing a number here, too. Things are just getting going, when normally I'd already be handing out excess to neighbors. It was only this week that I had my first BLT of the season! (Granted, that was because, while I finally had some tomatoes, it took me another couple of weeks to go get bread and bacon.) My parents grew corn this year for the first time since I was a kid, and it's coming in pretty well now. I'm not a huge fan of corn, but every once in a while fresh off the stalk corn just hits the spot.

Because the show asked me to, and it worked. If you want me to list specific examples of how many of them were awful to Brenda when she first took over, how Julio was a creep towards women, how Provenza and Flynn spoke about women, gay people, etc., you'll have to wait until season one comes around in the rotation again. (With how many episodes they're airing per week, it won't be as long as it sounds.) Flynn ("The bitch hates my guts" or something to that effect when he was talking about her to ... Taylor?). I'm glad you mentioned that -- a few days ago a friend and I were talking about the positions everyone held prior to the formation of Priority Homicide (or Priority Murder Squad, heh), but we couldn't remember Mike's ("something techy, surely" is as far as we got) and I've been forgetting to look it up. Good timing!

That reminds me of an episode of Seinfeld - Jerry knocked his girlfriend's toothbrush into the toilet, and was frantically washing his hands after getting it out (he's a germaphobe), so he didn't see her come back in and pick it up off the counter -- he stood up to see her brushing away. He wouldn't tell her (at first), but he also wouldn't kiss her, because all he could think about was the toilet toothbrush.

I doubt that very much; the point of taking a kid to see Santa is to get a picture of said kid on Santa's lap, so I'm sure plenty of parents put their kid in their "holiday best" for the occasion one year (or more).

Yeah, that it's no longer the '90s is a non-issue for the Murphy Brown revival; it was a hit because of sharp writing about current events and general trends in politics/media/society.* That's something that can be replicated at pretty much any time. Happening again now, with all the usual shit turned up to a million, and filmed practically in real time? *(and cast chemistry, which will be replicated because almost all the original cast is returning)

We always tell Chester, "You know, Bandit was here first." The one time I brought Maddie over to my parents' house after Chester had arrived, he ran her off every time she came out of my old bedroom. He is apparently one of those "Bar the gates behind me; I'm the last one in" types! I love when cats allow belly rubs! Riley loves them, but when I first adopted her she was thin enough that there really wasn't much to rub. The first time she flopped over and presented herself rubbing and there was a nice little tummy there, I teared up. Bandit and Chester both like them, too (and good thing, because Chester, having had an ultrasound recently and having the world's slowest-growing fur [he still has bald patches from the IVs for his teeth cleaning in February], has a belly I particularly want to rub*), as did Maddie and Baxter. It has been a long time since I had to respect a "Don't touch the belly" attitude. *My poor cats - by which in this instance I mean those belonging to me, my parents, and the friends to whose cats I am Auntie - have to deal with my love for fur that is just starting to grow in following a shaving, as I squeal "Fuzzies!" and rub away. Just as I often say, "You're lucky you're cute" as they do something obnoxious, they must look at me during such sessions and think, "You're lucky you feed us."

No problem if you don't want to discuss it further, but with the primary arc of the first season being how difficult it was for her to lead a squad of resentful people who don't want to accept her, and who say and do the kinds of problematic things she was brought in to rectify in the wake of recent scandals, blown trials, and public mistrust, and thus how both surprising and gratifying the mass resignation (contrasted with the mass "I want the fuck out of here if this 'bitch' - as she was called at least twice - is running the division" mass transfer request) in the season finale was for the progression it shows, I'm comfortable having canon on my side -- Taylor and Flynn are the most blatant in their disrespect, certainly, but they're not the outliers as the show gets going; Gabriel is, and then as the season progresses, his acceptance and then respect for her becomes more common among the squad as they see her work/get to know her.