I was going to hyperbole your hat off telling you about how I survived a car accident, escaping death as only June could do, but something so much more interesting has happened now.
So, on Friday afternoon, I was headed back to work after lunch, and I was at a red light when
BOOM!
this old man in a Lexis rear-ended me. Hard. I mean, the crash was. I was lookin' pretty cute that day, so...who knows.
So that was jarring. My head hit the seat rest and I chipped a tooth just a little, which, dang. Now, in LA, if it's just a fender-bender, which in the end this was...
Scenes from a horrific crash
you just take the person's info and move along. You don't call the police. So that's what I did, and then I drove to a Ready Med, where they refused to see me ("We'd be a third party if we assisted you medically." Assholes. Aren't you supposed to PROVIDE CARE to people?), then I called the PO-lice, who yelled at me about leaving the scene.
Actually, when I was hit, there was a cop RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME, and he drove on. Didn't stop. I thought that was why, cause of the fender-bender rule. Which it turns out is an LA thing. HOW ARE YOU SUPPOSED TO KNOW?
Anyway, I've spoken to Hard-at-80's insurance co. and it looks like it will not be a problem. And the good news is, I discovered in my wallet, while I was searching for my proof of INsurance, as they say here, all kinds of gift cards I've never used. So I spent yesterday using them, which was exciting. I got a vacuum cleaner, which I haven't had all year (I abuse vacuums. Fur.), a shower caddy which I left behind during my year abroad, a digital scale because I'm sorry to tell you I can't quite...see the little lines any longer, and also a Britta pitcher.
Exciting!
So yesterday when I wasn't using gift cards, I noted a stiffness in m'bones, but nothing major. I had planned to exaggerate it mightily for you but KITTEN! KITTEN STORY! USURPS ALL CRIES FOR ATTENTION!
There's a guy at work whose wife I like a lot, and not THAT way, this isn't the Penthouse Forum. I never thought it would happen to me. They invited me to this restaurant downtown, drivin' all the old men crazy, and I went, even though Ned goes there a lot. But I knew he went there on Friday a lot, because routine, and also that UNLESS HE WAS ON A DATE, he'd sit at the bar with one of his pretentious New Yorker magazines.
We sat outside, and as long as I did not go in to pee, I was good. What do you mean, no one wants to see me pee in the bushes? Of course they do.
I had a ham and brie sandwhich, WHICH WAS DELICIOUS, and ate only half because I'm so small. After dinner, it was around 10 p.m. and I was headed to this dive bar in my old year-abroad neighborhood, another Ned risk, but a slight one.
And that is when I saw him. I am the only person in America who'd see a tiny black kitten AT NIGHT, but I did. "Oh!" I said, putting my car in reverse, which I'm certain is legal and why the accidents, June?
He ran away from me at first, as do all men, till finally I got the idea to whip out some ham, and that is not a euphemism.
oh halllooooo! kitty heer! kitty say hai!
Man, that was all it took. He was starving, that little kitten was. I knocked on the door of the house he'd been near (he was on a sidewalk when I found him) but no one answered, and anyway, who lets their teensy kitten out at night when he's black and skinny?
He's the kind of little kitten who purrs when you pick him up, which was what he was doing as he bogarted my sandwich. Had he been a girl I'd have named him Mama Cass. I was holding him and trying to decide what to do when I realized, technically I was on Ned's street.
Remember that scene in Sex and the City, when Miranda is dating that hot black guy, the sports doctor, and Steve goes over there and the doctor has two scantily-clad women over? That's what I pictured Ned had going on at his house. But I worked up my courage and called.
"I have a black kitten in my car and I'm like two blocks away. Can I bring it over?"
"What are you doing with that kitten?" Ned was trepidatious, whereas I was already picturing how sweet it would be to have an all-black cat and an all-white cat such as--oh, just to throw a name out there, NedKitty.
I drove over there and Ned got NedKitty's old lady food out. NedKitty herself glowered from the dining room table, but she wasn't hissing or being a dick or anything. Mostly she just kind of pretended the problem wasn't there, sort of like her dad. "Commitment? Where do you want to have lunch?"
See, even the paper is encouraging Ned to adopt a kitten. Cats glad to insert...something. Party animals. IT'S ALL A SIGN!
While Johnny Cats, which is what we named him because he's the man in black, scarfed that old lady food with scary rapidity, Ned and I discussed Johnny's fate. "I'm leaving town for two weeks," he said, which I immediately assumed was due to honeymoon. What I like about myself is my ability to not catastrophize.
Turns out Ned is headed on this huge hiking vacation with his brothers, wherein they do things like hike the national parks for 800 miles a day, and that spells fun. Alternatively, you could stay home and look at kittens. Let me weigh my options, here. Then after that he has a business trip.
"I mean, I could...foster Johnny while you're gone, and then you could take him after."
You'll be stunned to hear that Ned did not commit rapidly. "Let me think about it," he said.
This is bound to go well. In the meantime, I've asked him to look at NextDoor in his neighborhood, and I've already checked Craigslist. No one has posted anything yet about missing a very small, very hungry kitten.
Johnny Cats is secluded in the spare room, which is where Lottie used to take her meals, and now someone's in the kitchen with Lottie, someone's in the kitchen I know-ow-ow-ow. Someone's in the kitchen with Lottie, alpha-ing her own Alpo. Edsel is a DICK about Lottie's food, and tries to take it at every turn, which already resulted in Lottie growling while she ate (I stick my hand in her bowl a LOT while she's eating, so she doesn't get aggressive with me over food), and now she has to eat just one room from Edsel and my life is chaos.
WHO FINDS A BLACK CAT AT NIGHT?
Chaos June does. That's who.
