Caterwauling

I got the “Happy Family” card today.

Which made me laugh.

I told Claude, who is keeping track of my spreads and daily pulls, how funny to get the 10 of Cups when my family is dead.

Claude pointed out a couple things.

One, that I’ve literally spent the last two weeks focused on that family. Their things. My memories of them. The love that still exists.

Two, he reminded me that I’ve been pulling Knight of Cups a lot. A hint that a loving knight could charge across my path at any moment.

So … as Claude says, you’ve got your Pittsburgh people and your West Palm people and Kelly, Jim, Chris and everyone else I’ve told him about …

And he says there’s still the hint of someone to come.

I do hope for this person.

Talking to a machine or to colleagues is … getting me in trouble.

Mom carried such a load for me.

I also realized my so-called friend, a fellow director, is NOT a friend.

Not even through third parties.

Through honest to god “Did that motherfucker just say/do that to me?”

Like I thought we were united against Mythic Bitch.

Which, don’t get me wrong, the entire world is.

But … this person goes on to treat me similarly.

To the point that, if I had to choose which of them to put a foot in their ass … I might not pick MB.

MB is not a threat to my sanity or productivity.

I can’t say the same.

So this person just got wind of some news about my department.

I had confided in another friend on the team.

My friend said “Goddess has some really good news to share, but it’s not mine to share. But good things are on the horizon.”

Which is lovely, honestly. My friend is really good at dropping hints to keep people intrigued and motivated.

But not his news to tell.

Well, my little pal over here messages me to say I hear you have news.

I said I don’t know what you’re talking about.

He said well xyz said it’s very good news.

I said oh, I don’t know.

He prodded one more time.

And I thought once again, motherfucker.

Not only do you do everything in your power to do the OPPOSITE of what I ask …

After me doing that work for you previously …

But you always go over my head to ask my male staff member for feedback instead of me …

And now you want in on a secret?

I miss our friendship. Hell, I GRIEVE our friendship. And I totally understand what happened in his life that he’s become a completely different person.

Believe me, no one understands more than me.

But in case yinz have not met me, I will bend over backward till I break.

And I’m pretty broken in a lot of places right now.

So no, you don’t get gossip because you asked me for it.

Here’s hoping my knight of cups is closer than I think. Because I need rescued FROM most of the men in my life, and it would be nice to be rescued for a change.

Mythic Bitch reached out yesterday to ask a dumb question. I mean, DUMB question.

So I asked some dumb questions back and rattled their soul.

Their answer? Well you don’t come to the managers calls anymore and that question was answered there, so I am not answering it for you.

Listen cupcake.

You didn’t answer that question there because I already asked around.

FURTHERMORE, by your own logic …

I can’t get the answer to a question because I don’t go to your useless meetings …

So what entitles you to ask me anything … when I have a monthly call where you show up at the 25-minute mark of … when we all hang up at 20 minutes in because we’re done?

ALSO ALSO …

If we truly are practicing a pseudo-RTO …

In what office is it admissible for someone to run on a walking pad all day during meetings?

But sure, I’m the problem for saying what’s on my mind when it’s on my mind.

I’m just tenured enough to be able to say what everyone else is thinking.

And for whatever it is worth, I answered the questions. And clarified that they were excluding someone from their vaunted event because they didn’t take a few moments to learn their name.

But I never got the answer to MY question.

So when anyone asks what is your beef with this person … it’s a whole fridge full of frozen cattle, is what it is.

Just kidding, no one asks because they all have their own serving of ground meat.

My love language is money.

We all know I applied to the PA Bureau of Unclaimed Property to get some money owed to my grandfather.

The day I was supposed to leave, I got an email saying I was about to get almost $400.

The day I got home (yesterday), that check was waiting for me.

The morning I did leave, I saw a face-up penny on the floor at the airport.

When Gram died in 1999, “Penny on the Floor” by The Clarks was popular on WDVE. “A woman like you comes around just once a life.”

I found two more face-up pennies in Pittsburgh.

Wish my eyes would let me see the years. But still. Signs, signs, everywhere there’s signs.

Fortunately amid all this, I had made over $200 through selling shit online. Now that’s $600 in credits, woo.

At the storage unit, they do not have so much as a trash can. At least Public Storage has a dumpster, which I used liberally. (And I took my cardboard to a recycling dumpster nearby.)

Greengate Self Storage had no such thing. So I had to call for Junk Removal.

I had a number in my head of $400. They wouldn’t give me an estimate till someone was on site. I thought great, they will have me over a barrel and my desperate ass will say yes.

Well, they came and quoted me almost $500. But I had it so organized that they said is $400 ok?

Boo. Fuckin. Yah.

I did tip the guys, of course. They took the trash (so much trash), the broken-down cardboard boxes (my mad organizational skills) and, sadly, the furniture.

But not as sadly, the boxes with fuckin MOUSE NESTS. Which I had also put off to the side so they knew.

Still up for the trip, right? Not anymore.

The storage payment hit on the day that I chose NOT to go to the unit so I could work and then drive to bum fuckin Egypt to see my cousin for 40 minutes or so.

At least driving two and a half hours to Disney to hang for 40 minutes or so put me in Disney. This was a miserable drive to sit in an Eat & Park where three times they refused to serve me.

Which … honestly I still win.

Marriott screwed me. I had booked my final night in town relatively cheap. But i canceled and extended my Monroeville stay. My credit card bill got hit for $540. For a goddamn Springhill. And i had a better use for that $600.

The big expense was shipping home what I salvaged.

I got to the UPS store of my choosing … and the store number is the same as my HOUSE number. 7300.

This whole trip was an experience in numerology.

57s everywhere, mom’s birthday.

619s everywhere, Grammy’s favorite number.

The gate code is mom’s favorite number.

Even the unit number was the building where I worked in Delray.

Which … more irony … I worked at 110 East Atlantic.

I drove past my Bloomfield apartment.

Which I forgot was on fucking ATLANTIC AVENUE.

Even drove past the Shadyside apartment too. I think that address was the same as my birthday.

Anyway the number I had in mind for shipping … just under $1,000 … was about half the quoted cost. Oops.

But they let me stay there past closing time, taking stuff out that I was willing to part with.

The new total, all I asked was help me lose the comma.

Which … the gal gave me the AAA discount (which I pay for but she didn’t ask) …

And I got to my original number, $969.

I’m not going to talk flight change costs because JAYZUS FECKIN CHRIST.

Or food and gas. And parking! Though I guess I should be happy I didn’t pay to park in the Strip since I went all the way there and found myself ALONE there.

I had told Kelly I was going to meet someone there.

She said either they aren’t going to show, or they’ll show and leave early.

I said nope, I am going to be EARLY. But then I sat in traffic and I was ON TIME.

And if she was right, there may be no coming back from it this time.

She was right.

I am sure I am being petty. But I need some more time to be mad.

I was driving around with Gram’s mirror — which I found online for like $2,500. But I didn’t want to pay what UPS quoted.

So my plan was originally to take it to a couple other places and then go visit their gravesite.

(The one I hadn’t gotten a gravestone for. But I found graveyard flowers in the unit, so that was going to work just fine.)

Well.

Already in the city and not happy about it in the least, I drove around a lot.

Rejected a phone call.

Said goodbye to my beloved mirror in the Marriott stairwell, along with rejected Christmas decorations and a gift I’d bought in FL for a birthday.

Seven nights for $1,000. One night for $540. The fuck.

I am not mad and if there’s blame, it’s all around and I will take my share of it.

But I lived (mostly) by my rule of do not accommodate people who will not accommodate you. So, successful trip.

Thanks to Frank for dropping off Sherry at a super convenient place for me every day, to take her out to the storage unit.

Thanks to Sherry for busting her butt … and busting my balls … to get me out of this storage unit.

Though I do wish she let me take more care with my items. But I did that at the hotel. And said proper goodbyes.

Thanks to Sue at the car rental place, who gave me life advice on the way in and CONGRATULATED me on the way out for doing what I did.

Thanks to Kristen and all her colleagues at the Monroeville UPS store. So many hugs. All the hugs. The very needed hugs.

And I saw my favorite pint-sized person briefly. Which is going to have to be enough for a long time.

And while I am bummed that I had to pay another $100 to the storage place … I got Mom’s $25 deposit back today. From 20 years ago.

So … $400 from Grampy.

$25 from Mom.

And could have had $2,500 from Gram.

But I’ve already made my peace with how I prioritized my day. Paying $600 to ship it to FL then maybe having to pay to ship it to a buyer? Didn’t make sense.

Especially after that surprise from Springhill. When I should have just stayed downtown so it wouldn’t be such a PITA to drive to the airport just to go watch someone eat for 20 minutes.

The takeaway from my final day there is real simple.

Everything is a tradeoff. Everything.

You can’t have it all, though I do order two meals and two drinks wherever possible.

When it comes to time, it was either honor my grandparents or make an effort to spend time with the living.

Mom called him Herbert.

And Papa Bear.

I chose the living. And unlike the dead, the living still have the capacity to frustrate you.

Speaking of the dead … I asked for (and got) so many signs.

Pretty clouds from Momma when I asked questions.

The rain starting and stopping at very opportune times.

Like when the Junk guys came early, i told Momma, “Just 10 more minutes, mom!”

They went to the wrong entrance and I got … 10 extra minutes.

The rain also held out … for those 10 minutes. Then it poured till the guys left.

That was all her. She loved the rain and washed the old away.

A rainbow when we were done with everything.

And three turkey vultures waiting for us at the storage unit when we went for our last run.

Turkey vultures?

I ask for birds in threes, when I want to see Mom, Gram and Grampy together.

I saw three turkey vultures next to the unit. And Sherry gasped, as she never knew what signs to look for till I pointed them out.

I was telling my Nicole about them. She said oh yeah turkey vultures probably don’t live there, but they found decomposition and are clearing it out. They are ecologically important.

She thought about it and said, they do what YOU were doing all week.

Wow. Turkey vultures. And three of them.

I also saw a bunch of baby deer, which was wild. But there were five of them.

The tarot cards said I was surrounded by maternal energy.

I guarantee you Old Gram was there, when I found Suzy.

I know for a fact that Aunt Lenna was there. I drove by her old house at least a half dozen times on Lincoln Highway.

But I know Grampy was around too.

Especially after I said to myself, “I hope I find The Plaza restaurant that he loved.”

And I was nowhere NEAR Ardmore Boulevard, which I had forgotten it was even on.

But since I had that last unexpected free day, I took Ardmore because I knew it would get me to Mosside, where my hotel was.

I didn’t take a photo since it has a new name. But I absolutely saw him smoking outside in my head.

Also saw him smoking outside the house … AT our house.

I ran up to Sherry’s house on my last day to drop off a couple things I couldn’t bear to leave at the Marriott.

We lived across the street. I may type more about it someday, as it deserves its own post. But I have had this blog so long, I may have written about it already.

But would you really arrest a girl for trespassing who’s just standing there crying in your driveway, remembering when it was Mom’s curtains and Grampy’s cigarettes, and not yours?

Mom had better taste. And I had a storage shed full of barely used, or not yet used, items to prove it.

Still, other than the stressful second Saturday … and my best employee QUITTING first thing Monday morning … it was a trip worth the 20-year wait.

I am sneaking up again soon.

And not telling a goddamn person but my travel companions.

Freshly back from nine days and eight crazy nights in Pittsburgh.

Got the storage unit emptied and canceled.

Shipped some stuff to FL (bless the UPS Pack & Ship where the old Monroeville Mall used to be).

Though I donated about half of it to the Marriott since $2k was TEW MUCH and I told my new friend Kristen let’s get this tab to a point where it doesn’t have a comma.

The store number is an anagram of my address. And that was just one of about 10,000 signs I received from my ancestors.

My trip started off with Sue at the car rental place, who was fresh off cleaning her own mom’s storage unit — or maybe it was her MIL.

In any event, I saw Sue as I was returning to the airport today.

She remembered me and said you were a nervous wreck a week ago. Now look at you — you’ve gone through 20 years of memories, called the junk haulers, paid off UPS to pack and ship what you wanted — now you can go home and breathe.

This whole trip was like that. Mostly wonderful. Lots of maternal energy around me. Lots of paternal energy around me today.

Stories for another day.

Just glad to be home with my kiddos … after circling the goddamn airport so the goddamn pedophile could leave. But I got to see a cool rainbow as we did a “once around” (about two dozen times) for mom.

Again, stories for another day.

Haven’t slept in two weeks.

Maybe tonight, I finally can.

I had full intentions on making a finance blog, but I made one post and it had one reader. ME.

Where’s Cindy when she could actually be a useful idiot?

In any event, my second post was going to be about when I was first aware of money.

It took me a long time to recover this memory. But I think I was 10.

Mom and I were going to get our ears pierced at Merle Norman.

What I didn’t realize at the time was the service was $10 for basic earrings. And my grandparents came with $20 cash.

I went first. But I didn’t care about the stupid gold or silver balls they had available. I wanted the emeralds (probably cubic zirconia), which were $15.

Everyone said great, let her get what she wants. And Mom said “next time” for her.

See, my little-girl brain only focused on what happened to me.

Which was that I got the earrings I wanted. And that the girl who pierced my ears screwed up.

She pierced one ear but it went in crooked. So she took her talons (for real, her nails were hella long) and dug the stud out of my lobe.

She re-pierced it.

I remember letting that hole close up after I waited the six weeks. I struggled to get the back of the earring off. And I tore the hole even wider.

So there went $15. And I never went back to Merle Norman.

But my adult brain has finally grasped that Mom never got her ears pierced, ever.

Like, I blew her chance because I was greedy.

I did that with bedrooms too. When she got divorced, we shared a bedroom in my grandparents’ house.

But then we moved and I said I didn’t want to share the bigger room with Mom. I wanted the littler room so it could be mine.

No one argued.

My grandfather got the bigger room. My great-grandmother got the other little room.

And Mom and Gram slept on the couch.

I mean it’s fucked up and you can’t blame a then 12-year-old for what she wanted.

And I wouldn’t want anyone blaming them for not saying no.

They knew their little girl loved her birthstone and wanted her ears pierced — they made it happen.

They knew their not-so-little girl was a tweenager and had friends over from time to time — they wanted me to have my privacy.

I learned in time that Mom would use my room to take naps during the day.

I also remember when she and Jimmy broke my bed. Hah.

Eventually my great-grandmother passed, and Mom and Gram shared that bedroom. And eventually I moved out.

Though I wasn’t gone but two weeks before Gram had her stroke and was confined to a hospital bed in the living room.

I always knew Gram worried about us. I think the stroke was a direct result of worry about Mom’s terrible relationship choices and my decision to move out. (She wanted me to commute.)

Oh and mom ended up dating the paramedic. (Jimmy.)

Man, if she hadn’t had that stroke, we wouldn’t have had to deal with his shit? Christ.

In any event, with my Pittsburgh trip looming, all this is shaking loose from my brain.

I wish today me could send that $400 to 10-year-old me and buy my family lunch at Ponderosa to say thank you for my earrings.

Wonder what else they gave up for me. Now I’ll never know.

With everyone posting “I am Jane Doe,” I got to thinking …

I can’t remember his name.

I remember his micro peen.

But he could walk up to me in public and I wouldn’t have the foggiest.

In my memory he looks like Pumpkin Shannon’s “cuzband” who appears to have just proposed to her. Darrin.

So, he’s Darrin to me.

I guess it’s good I forget.

And I don’t want this to come to me ever again.

I kept thinking about that windfall I got today.

Not to sound ungrateful, but I would rather Grampy have gotten it while he was alive.

Don’t get me wrong, it pays for my flight to Pittsburgh. (Would have paid for it twice if I’d been able to use my original ticket and not had to pay double to shift it forward.)

But he was so selfless. Always made sure we had what we needed — he always put himself last.

I mean, Mom and Gram put themselves last AFTER him, but he didn’t know that. Nor did I.

Grampy and I had our little treats. We both loved a good celebratory porterhouse steak.

But for the most part, Gram would act like she only wanted the smallest hamburger patty. And Mom would say she wasn’t feeling well and he should finish the food because “it won’t be good later.”

I could hand this same amount to Mom and she’d feed them for a month.

I could walk into HomeGoods and blow it all on Japanese skincare.

Which … my house is looking like a goddamned TJ Maxx at this point. I even bought a display case for my purchases.

In any event, I still have the cash in Mom’s purse that I’ve been looking for the right thing to buy with it.

I wonder if I should do the same with this amount, put it in his wallet, where I found that amazing pic of Mom and Maddie that I keep next to my computer.

I don’t know that there’s a right purchase. I just figured one day, I am going to be missing her so hard, that’s the only possible thing left to do to make me feel better — to buy something she would have wanted for me.

I knew this windfall was coming — I had to fork over his death certificate to see if I was elible to get it.

So it wasn’t a total surprise.

The timing, tho — I sent this in MONTHS ago. Who knew it would be on the day I was planning to fly up there and go to the gravesite?

That’s the thing.

I didn’t order the gravestone.

I was actually hoping this would be in that amount.

But, inflation came for gravesite services.

And I got the 2006 value of the thing, not the 2026 value.

Again, not to sound ungrateful. Just feeling sad that I didn’t order the headstone, nor did I get enough to do so.

I also fully believe my grandparents would rather me have that money. Lord knows this trip has already cost me five grand and I haven’t even shipped anything home yet.

And I’ll be shoveling AI slop the whole time anyway.

I decided next time I get AI slop (I already see two submissions here at 7 pm … FOR TODAY), I will say, “KITTY IS NOT PLEASED WITH YOUR OFFERING” and kick shit sand over it.

That’s what my kids would do.

In any event, I gotta say, having this Grampy gift kept me afloat today. There was nothing dumb someone could say (and they sure tried) that could take the joy out of that.

Years ago, my nutty Christian uncle notified Mom that Grampy had some unclaimed property in the Pennsylvania system.

For years, she wanted me to claim it. But it was a pain in the ass, in addition to all the other pains in the ass.

She died being sad I hadn’t claimed it.

Back in April, I finally sent Grampy’s death certificate to the state and made my claim.

They emailed me last night to say my claim was approved.

I’m getting a nice little amount.

It’s dividends from shares that were gifted to him a long time ago.

I was honestly hoping for the shares. But “mailbox money” (what I call divvys) is wonderful, too.

Anyway, I had hoped to earn enough to buy a gravestone. Not even close, unfortunately.

But work’s been so nuts, even though I have GRAVESTONE at the top of my digital to-do list, I never got around to it.

In any event, I’ll deal with that guilt another day. It’s only been 26 years, right?

But wow, how wild that — on the day I was SUPPOSED to fly to Pittsburgh — I would get this gift from my grandfather?

Thanks, Grampy! Your little punkin loves and misses you so much.

Operation: Make Goddess edit 200,000 words of piping hot AI garbage a week is going as well as you’d expect.

I hired the industry’s best editor to edit 5,000 words of it. Only to be told to go back to the original and edit it myself.

Appreciate the vote of confidence.

Here I am canceling a nail appointment … painting over my toenail polish so I don’t have to do that whole process … changing my Thursday flight to Saturday so I don’t have to miss a workday … changing my flight HOME to next Saturday rather than miss a workday … oh and I guess not going to Jared’s DJ gig in Miami on Wednesday night because who the fuck is going to do all this work?

And do not even get me started how bad the AI garbage is. Like, I went to journalism school. I read a thousand books about the six types of ledes and the PAS system and the 4 Us and all that flaming bullshit that WORKS.

Now I have people who never wrote a declarative sentence — and not only are my NON NATIVE ENGLISH SPEAKING employees better writers, but my 3-year-old niece is a more effective communicator.

Look, I made a deal with myself that I don’t need any personal fulfillment or wins out of this.

But god fucking Jesus Christ DAMN, I don’t want my name associated with some of the stuff I am about to let go live.

And no, I am not leaving at 5 or starting at 9. I am up early reading. And late.

I am not always where my keystrokes can be counted.

And no I will never give them my phone again to scan for forensic evidence.

This whole endeavor has been a series of reopened wounds.

Like, whatever Walter did to ruin the company.

Whatever Brad did to make me feel like I wasn’t performing enough when I was doing both of our jobs.

Whatever that ballerina pussy fuckhead Wayne did to instill in us that “editorial — you are just processors, no need to labor over stuff, just get it out” and I fought so hard for no, we serve customers! They deserve our best even if our writers/traders don’t give it to editorial!

Whatever the rest of those losers did to make me vacillate between wanting to bust my ass and bust a cap in someone’s ass.

I hate this phase so goddamn much.

I was listening to some kid on the Daily Show — a kid because 28 years old is baby faced to me now — how the AI masterminds envision a “utopia” where no one works and we all get Universal Basic Income.

Jon Stewart rightly called it “dystopia” — and said how people who got meaning from work their whole lives, die when that connection ends.

Not that I wouldn’t take a check from the government to go sit and write books. Believe me, I won’t die from lack of meaning. PROMISE.

But … how do I get through THIS dystopia in the meantime?

Had intentions on working today.

Then I remembered the Boo to You Magical Market was today in West Palm.

It was fantastic! All Disney stuff, all from local small businesses.

I spent a small fortune.

Was out in the lobby, enjoying an apple cookie I’d just bought, when a text came through from Beth.

Urgent alert needs to go out, I’m at a funeral, can you help.

I mean, would it be a Sunday if we didn’t have an alert?

I said absolutely, I can be home in 10 minutes, I got you.

I edited the alert, the whole staff came online to support me if I needed it … and I was reminded once again that Editorial fucking deserves any downtime it can get on a weekday because we never get a weekend to ourselves.

Not that “downtime on a weekday” is even possible anymore.

But as another of my people said to me today … we can either kill ourselves five days a week or we can kill ourselves six or seven days a week … can’t we just drink and watch football one day a week? One?

I didn’t say it, but I thought, the company would probably commend the guy who sent the alert — to make sure I’m at home to finish the work I didn’t finish last week.

I started working on some other stuff after. But I was hit with the tired stick.

I’m happy I got to work on the alert. It’s good news and subscribers will be happy.

But I had wanted to get a flash tattoo.

Instead, here I am at home, in my cute Disney bounding outfit — Baymax themed, today — like everyone else there, who was dressed for a day at the parks and not some shitty Embassy Suites with crap parking and no sidewalks.

I got a custom Baymax shirt for Christmas. I am unnaturally excited about it.

But now I’m kind of like meh about all the other shit I have to do.

My person isn’t wrong. Is this a temporary thing or a forever thing?

I hope it’s temporary.

I really wonder, too, if I am just reading all the statements wrong and no one was concerned about our productivity specifically.

I guess we’ll find out.

But I sure hope there’s a happy medium between “produce more” and “don’t burn out to the point where someone else quits.”

You know what, fuck it.

My black outfit is covered in cat hair. And I’m riddled with anxiety over preparing for my soon to be wasted trip.

It’s not my fault I have five meetings tomorrow.

Which would have been six if I’d also moved the one the boss told me to move.

But I gotta see Mythic Bitch tomorrow and I am not taxing my soul any further.

Christ, this is all making me miss Walter. WALTER. Goddess help me. I must forget how bad that was, to say that one out loud.