In Which Kat Discovers Just How Difficult It Is To Take A Simple Bath

Yes, and the conversation of the day is. . .

Yass: I don't think you two are going to work out.

Kat: What?!? Have you totally lost your mind?

Yass: You're just too. . .different.

Kat: Are you -

Yass: I mean, look at the Little Mermaid! She was in the sea, he was on land, yeah, that did NOT work out for them.

Kat: But they ended up together.

Yass: Yeah, with the help of a lobster! Do you know any lobsters!?

Kat: . . .

Some conversations should never, ever happen. Some people have never had a conversation with a certain two people, no?

Well, Kat has certainly had an interesting day today. Guess what happened? My dear children, I must tell you that our power went out. I had a very long lovely blog set up for you all, and then, well, the power went out. With Blake my cousin there, and Brad my uncle, and Ricky my aunt's boyfriend almost uncle when they finally get married which we're all waiting for with bated breath. Before all this, the Gorgon and I took the dog out for a walk. Do you have any idea just how many people will stop you on the street and tell you how cute/beautiful your dog is? Well, a bloody large amount. I'm not complaining, of course, I love being told that my dog is sweet, but I just found it funny. I mean, half the time they talk to the dog and not us. Half the time it's baby talk. Well, so long as they're coming on to the dog and not me, I suppose.

After this my mother full on screams at me, "No! Kathlyn! It is not five o'clock yet! It's only TWO!" Well, she was right, but I wanted to know what time it was for various reasons. So we went to buy the Sandman graphic novels, by Neil Gaiman. (Spencer, as you read graphic novels, darnit, you'd better know what I'm talking about.) Which we did, and I am out one Christmas present, but they are worth the ridiculous price. I have been buried in comic books up to my nose.

Erika: They're not comic books! They're graphic novels!

Kat: Kind of like, "They're not dolls! They're action figures!" Only even less mature.

No kidding. Anywho. Where were we? Oh yes, I'm buried in graphic novels up to my nose. And I have just started to run myself a bath. Yes, the bath is running, and I am reading a Neil Gaiman graphic novel. So there I am, engrossed in the tales of Morpheus and John Dee. Okay, so the bath is full now. I am currently proceeding as folks do in the bath, and I am sparing you the details most politely. Now, at this point, I am washing my hair. I have just put the shampoo in. I am quite content, about to rinse my hair, when -

BLACKOUT.

Seriously.

We're going to blackout now, take your exits quickly and go to blueout now so that the techies can see to move the scenery.

Shall we recap? I am sitting in the bath. The wind is really howling outside, in a completely non metaphoric way, and I am wet, and there is shampoo in my hair, and I am getting rather cold, and I am not happy. And I have to go to dinner with someone whose opinion matters a good deal to me in a half hour, and this is not a state conducive to looking my best. Not a happy Kat.

Now, we proceed. I am currently (attempting) getting out of the bath in the pitch, and I do mean pitch, dark. I am also trying to find my bathrobe. Without success. And now someone is banging on the door. I'm worried. I am seriously worried. "Who's that?!" No answer. "Who is that?" Silence, more banging. Actually, it's more like a soft thumping. I am now huddled on the floor, very wet, and very scared. I am reminded of the line in the Princess Diaries, "I am invisible, and I am wet." Only it's more of, "I wish I was invisible, and I am sopping." Okay, so that had no relevancy, but I'm trying. So yes, where were we?

Suddenly, the intruder crashes through the door! Kat huddles on the ground, terrified, and suddenly feels -

Dog.

Yes, it was the dog. And now the dog is on top of me, and I am wet, and I am desperately, desperately trying to find my bathrobe.

At this point, Luke came in.

"Luke, there really is an explanation for this. . .um. . .I. . ."

". . ."

Before all this, I had written a severely odd short story, which I present below.

---

A Day In The Life Of The Keeper Of The Universe

By Kat Kire

---

Eliza Tabea owns the universe. So she lives in the one in her mind. Her universe full of warm water and the mild heat that comes with sitting in a wet robe. Eliza Tabea keeps the universe in a tiny jam jar were she used to keep a spider named Lester. Lester died there, a long time ago. That was when Eliza was a child. She is fifteen, now.

She lies in the bath and feels the water on her skin, slightly greasy old bathwater, going slowly cold. The power is out. She sends out tendrils of hearing from her ears and feels the wind outside. She wonders how the universe is doing. So Eliza gets up, the water falling off her, dripping in slow, comforting droves, running off in forks down her breasts, widening as it hits her blooming hips, all of her body, like rats off a sinking ship. She does not drain the bath.

The jam jar universe is under a chair that is covered by a scarf that was once worn by a starlet. Covered in dust, but shining just the same, shining a new color in the spectrum. The color of complacency.

Eliza sits on the bed in her shapeless robe and feels the water fall off of her in tiny tongues, lapping at her back, gathering into a lake in the small of it. The wind lays hard into the trees outside her French window. She considers, as she has considered before, stepping out onto the balcony and letting the wind lash the lukewarm water from her thick, shapeless body in her thick, shapeless terry cloth robe. Let it be extracted from her, removed, detracted forever. She wonders, would she be dry, then? And cold, like a sunken Spartan desert with strange rock salt formations that a lonely god placed there a thousand years ago? That taste of butter and sharp city air in the arid autumn?

Raising one small fleshy child’s hand, she lights a red candle on the musty bedside table. Papers rustle and hot red wax drips onto one. The red candle stands precariously, almost falling. Eliza appreciates candlelight. It smells to her of warm water and the sound of one hand clapping, of a tree falling in the forest with no one around to hear it.

Eliza lets the robe slump off her body on rabbit’s paws of terry cloth. It falls into an inanimate heap on the carpeted floor, a bleak gray color like willing mediocrity. She slides moistly, still damp at the edges, into bed, stickily, her body warm, but the water in her hair turning to long brunette icicles, curving contentedly at their ends. Eliza winks at the universe, and it winks back.

And then they sleep.

Quote of the Day

"Yes, the saxophonist was very good."

- Ben

I remain, gentlemen, your faithful and obedient servant,

J.G.