Robert Roy McFerret 2001-2007

Sunday morning, sometime around 7:15, our ferret Robbie died. I thought I’d get that out of the way first thing.

In 2001, our first ferret, Davey, died and by summer, we were ready to bring another little friend into our happy household. It was to that end that we stood in a pet shop in Richardson. Six pairs of eyes examined us---twelve tiny perfect jewels behind six little bandit masks. They were the biggest ferret kits I’d ever seen at the time, bigger in fact than Davey had been when he was full grown. The big baby ferrets were the colour of lightly burnt toast, with little pink noses that twitched adorably as they sniffed our hands to try to locate treats.

One of the kits, a gregarious male, had an odd white blaze on his head, shaped very much like a sword! As we had recently enjoyed Liam Neeson’s turn as the eponymous Scots hero in Rob Roy (for about the fifth time), the name seemed ideal for a huge, charismatic rogue*. That little sword really cinched it.

The word ferret derives from roots meaning ‘thief.’ You can see vestages of the Indo-European root (meaning ‘to carry’) in such words as pilfer and filch---it’s appropriate, because ferrets will make off with just about any damned thing in the house.

Robbie started his career in a big way---he started with our hearts.

*In the event that my estimable reader saw, and did not (for some incomprehensible reason) enjoy, this magnificent movie, he or she is cheerfully invited to pretend that I am talking about the 1953 classic, Rob Roy, the Highland Rogue (starring a young Michael Gough, no less!).

There is an axiom among the aficionados of small, domesticated mustalids that the “perfect number of ferrets is always one more.” The old timers call it ‘ferret math’ – that tendency to keep adding one more ferret to the household. We have never succumbed to the lure of four or five ferrets running all over the house---two is a pretty good number for us. Robbie had a chocolate-brown playmate named Indiana (named for Indiana Jones, of course) and later, a little scamp of a ferret girl named Ayumi.

He grew big---really big. Until I saw some ferrets who had been crossbred with polecats (their wild cousins), I had never seen a ferret as big or fit as Robbie. Turns out Rob Roy was indeed a good name for him, even though his little sword faded into a tiny pinstripe over time.

The word that comes to mind when I think of my little mustalid friend Rob is affectionate--- he was a gentle giant in the truest sense of the word. I never saw him bite anyone, unlike Davey, the juvenile delinquent who developed ridiculous nicknames like “Bitey McNibbles” and “Sir Bitesalot” … or tiny Ayumi, for whom play bites are her favourite way of saying “hello.” Robbie’s preferred greeting was licking, nuzzling, and cuddling. He was hard not to love.

In the span of a ferret’s life, six years is a long time---there are some health problems that plague older ferrets.

Monday night, a week ago, Robbie became weak. Past midnight, my stalwart best friend and platonic life partner, Suzi and I had to race down unfamiar freeways to an emergency ferret vet many miles away.

The diagnosis was not particularly cheery: insulinoma. Insulinoma, not rare in older ferrets, is a type of pancreatic cancer. The insulin-producing cells of the pancreas (beta cells I think they’re called. I’m too worn out to go look it up.) grow out of control, flooding the body with too much of the sugar-regulating hormone and leading to a blood sugar crash. It is treatable, but not curable.

Robbie seemed better for a few days, but this was a lot of strain for his little body to go through. Saturday night, he was very weak. We’ve had enough pets to know that this could be the end, we hoped not, but we tried to be realistic.

I’d love to leave this on an optimistic note, or say something clever and creative, but I really don’t feel like it. I’m a little numb. At least it was a quick end, something I guess most of us hope for. At least he had a good long life (six years is not a world record or anything, but it is pretty good for a ferret and the longest any of our four have made it so far). At least … at least … at least.

As with so many pets (and humans too), who have ‘gone before,’ he is gone from this life, but Robbie lives on forever in our hearts.

I close with a quote from a distant acquaintance years ago:

“You don’t own pets. You just pay rent on them until it is time to give them back to God.”

No Love Lost

A Tuesday---my day off. Cold, grey, windy … the perfect weather to make a pot of tea and spend the day playing Kingdom of Loathing, catching up on my friends’ blogs, and reading webcomics.

Oh yes, and there are hours of happy time that I can spend on Everything2, which has just done some improvements and is blazing along at relative lightning-speed right now. I have about four pieces that I’m about ready to ‘put to bed,’ including a history of Tarot cards, a bio on American beat poet John Giorno, and a … rather off-colour short story.

Oh, sure, there is laundry to do, bills to pay, catboxes and a kitchen to clean, but those are easy chores. A simple matter to fit them between fun tasks.

With my damnable enthusiastic optimism, I forgot to factor in Time Warner Cable Internet and their frightening unreliability. Silly me.

My housemate, best friend and platonic life partner is Suzi. She is the veritable Calvin to my Hobbes, Jim to my Artie, Ernie to my Bert … So Suzi has to work an extra-long day (she’s a floral designer, tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, ‘nuff said), she appeared in my doorway to awaken me with bad news:

“Time Warner has been called. With any luck you’ll be online in a few hours.

I slept another hour.

As I write this, I have been awake for about nine hours. The net was up for about three of those hours. Just long enough for me to get a few things done, then it went right back down, like some evil undead monster which only rises from the crypt for a brief time, then returns to its sarcophagus.

But, yeah, enough of such silly imagery!

Some months ago, after suffering through a horrible spell of having almost no Internet connection at all for over three weeks, Suzi wrote a letter to the local head of Time Warner Cable. It is as funny as it is acid, and I would like to share it with you. So here it is:

Mr. C----

(This is a long letter. I hope you read all of it, I'd like to hear a response. Or I could just post it on a series of public internet consumer sites. Your call.)

I want to share a bit of customer history with you.

Back in the summer of '06, we had Comcast cable and internet service. Our friends would gather at our home on weekends and we would watch Something Weird On Demand, TV Time On Demand, or just leave video music station The Tube on in the background while we talked. We were complimented on our digital cable television. The internet was steady and reliable, with only an occasional hiccup in service. During the week, my partner and I would peruse Discovery On Demand or any number of the wide variety of channels offering such service. It was a simpler, easier day. People laughed more then.

It was before the dark times. Before Time-Warner.

The changeover would be swift, painless, they said. Why, we would not only have the same quality, but it would be better! What marvels of customer service we were promised! Then, as I watched, my beloved digital cable turned into a stranger. I asked Something Weird on their website if they were to be included in this new regime. They thought they were. Alas, no. Also gone were TV Time, Discovery, The Tube and at least half of the On Demand channels.

What was left was a shambles.

Aside from incorrect listing information and uninformative program descriptions, what paltry remains of the On Demand service there were stopped updating. From, what was it? September? until now, there has been one update to the On Demand content I still use---Cartoon Network and Adult Swim. One. In nearly four months. Last I was able to check (did I mention that On Demand has gone down with my net service.. again?) Adult Swim Comedy was down to four single programs that have been listed since the summer. On Demand is now relatively useless to me and that makes me sad.

But I knew nothing of true horror until what has become known as "The Upgrade."

Junkill notes: Cue scary music, wolf howl, evil cackling, and thunder crashing!

It was a Wednesday back in October. The notice on the door announced that the service in our area was being "upgraded." This seemed wise, at first, because despite it supposedly all being the same equipment, since the Time-Warner takeover every time it rained our net service would go down. The flyer said that the work should be completed by that evening. Fine.

Of course, it wasn't.

The digital cable TV came limping back after three days and 5-6 calls to customer support. It was almost amusing how one person would tell me to switch the cables around in the back and then another would tell me I needed a technician. Yet another just had me turn it on and off a lot. I think he was new. A tech did eventually come to the house and fix the converter box. Then it only took 2-3 more calls to customer service to get it loaded properly. Finally, I could go back to taping a show I had already missed two episodes of due to the disruption.

The internet service, on the other hand, had just begun its nightmarish plunge into a hoary netherworld of equipment failure, miscommunications, tech appointments and incredible frustration.

After the start of The Upgrade, it was a full week before net service was restored at all. I believe there were two techs in a couple of days that time. One dutifully checked the modem, replaced the cable indoors and checked everything before saying it was "a line problem." I already knew that. Everything had worked before The Upgrade. The second tech did something about the line problem.. I think... I'm not sure I even saw him. The only people giving me reliable information at that time were the subcontractors doing the actual Upgrade. I attempted to speak to Time-Warner supervisors twice, but they never called me back when they said they would and, hard as it may be to believe, I do have to leave the house from time to time.

The internet worked for us for a few days before conking out again, and again, and again, and again. If you look at my service history, you will see that we went to the office and got a new modem, which worked briefly until the switch over to the RoadRunner service. Then *pause to chuckle bitterly* the modem we had just gotten the week before was no longer compatible! So a tech came out on November 2nd, and replaced it. Yay. For fun, I started trying to keep track of the number of different people I had spoken to at your company. About then, it was up to fifteen.

Keep in mind that during this time, both my partner and I were attempting to conduct business over the net. As the weeks progressed, my partner was growing increasingly furious as he missed client emails and therefore meetings. I was having a hard time sending graphics to a new client. We spent forty dollars on T-Mobile service at Starbucks, just trying to keep up. I forbid my partner from speaking to Time-Warner representatives numbered 16-23, as he was beginning to froth at the mouth.

Junkill notes: Those of you who’ve met me will have a hard time imagine me that angry. It doesn’t happen very often. You shoulda seen it. Or, y’know, not!

I, myself, was close to snapping. It was the constant having to phone, wait on hold for ten to forty five minutes and restate my situation to a new, clueless rep (my name, address and last four digits of my social just started coming out as a stream). It was the inconvenience of having to try and scrounge net service at other places—not to mention paying $45 a month for the privilege.

Junkill notes: We have since found a wonderful little Mediterranean café in our neighbourhood which has free wi-fi, but the point is we should not have to do this at all!

Eventually, even though I was trying not to take it out on the poor saps who answer the phones (they didn't make the decisions), after being told that the soonest a tech could come out would be five days from then, my tone must have spooked someone around representative #27. She "escalated" the issue and, despite it being a Sunday, said someone from the administrative offices would call me back by 3 pm that day. When 3 pm came and went and we packed up the laptop for Starbucks, I called Customer Support. Rep #28 told me that those offices just aren't open until Monday and I had been misinformed. At Starbucks, we looked over satellite dish brochures. While we were away, Representative #29 from admin DID call and left a message at 5 pm. My partner wanted to ask him if Time-Warner would pay for us to install a competitor's DSL line, but I grabbed the phone.

Monday, November 20th, I eventually spoke to Admin Rep #29 and he said he would take care of it that day and customer service would give me a month's credit for net service. At long last, a "super tech" came out in the evening. He checked up and down the lines and finally located a problem in the ground block. He replaced it and both the tech and I, weary from each of our long battles with The Upgrade, wished each other well.

The two weeks that followed seemed blissful. Oh, sure, the digital cable service was still awful, but at least the internet service was working. Maybe it would stay that way... maybe it's not so bad.. or maybe I was just fatigued and hallucinating.

The Upgrade would not give up so easily. The Upgrade will not die so quickly. The Upgrade merely waited, lulling us into a false sense of security until a weekend neared, rubbing its allegorical hands together and cackling. I like to imagine that it also twirled its moustache.

This past Thursday, December 7th, the internet became intermittent. Okay, alright, no need to panic. It came back in the evening. Its not like that. It won't happen again. It can't!

Friday: The net works sporadically. The Upgrade waits until I am talking with someone about a banking issue and checking my account online to flatline. It comes back in the evening. A migraine begins to roost behind my right eyeball.

Saturday: I call Tech Support and speak to #36, who passes me to Tier 2 #37, Andrew, who obviously knows what he's doing, but finds the diagnostics "puzzling." He says I need a tech there and transfers me to #38 who tells me that it will be next Thursday before a tech can come out. Perhaps I could go to a local office and replace the modem? Oh. They aren't open on Saturdays.

That evening I determine that it isn't the modem. On Demand, for what little it is worth, is also out at the same time, giving only an error message. I call Customer Service back and attempt to get the name of Admin Rep #29 and his phone number. They can't find it in my customer history and tell me someone from the records research department will call me before 10 am Monday morning. Sure. Sure they will.

Sunday, December 10th, 2006: I sit here, writing to you. The modem blinks the ready light at me impudently. Later, my partner and I will go out to a local Arabic cafe that offers free wireless.

My partner has decided that Time-Warner internet service is a contender for the most shoddy product he has ever paid money for. (Keep in mind that the closest competitors are a 1975 Toyota Corolla he got for $200 that had the ceiling stitched back on with leather cord and a $10 naughty video tape he bought in college that was so bad it now travels the world as an absurdist party favor.) Myself, I'm trying to think of any product or service I've ever dealt with that has been this stressful, slipshod and unreliable.

So, at this point in my saga of the War Against The Upgrade, out of a month and a half to two months, I have had uninterrupted internet service from Time-Warner for two weeks. Tell me, would you pay for a car that only started one third of the time? Would you be happy with electrical service one quarter of the month?

Would you pay over a hundred dollars a month for all of this? Would there be any reason to stay with such a company? Any redeeming feature to the service at all?

Tell me.

I'll be here. Waiting.

Only, don't try and email me---my net service is kind of unreliable.

For the record, he never got back to us. Maybe we were a little slow, but SWB, came out today and installed a DSL. It is marvellous!!!!

Their other competitor, DirectTV is coming out next Wednesday to install a satellite dish.

I think I’ll send Mr. C. another copy of Suzi’s letter. I’m going to attach a Post-it Note that says “DirectTV and SWB DSL thank you for not responding to this letter 2 months ago.”

The date was 3 December, 1981, the movie was entitled An American Werewolf in London, the setting, a grubby little theatre at Northtown Mall, a place which had certainly seen better days. My date was a bright and eccentric young woman whom I’d met at school.

Twenty-five years later, she and I rented An American Werewolf in London on DVD and JP, DL, Ben and JCP came over to watch it with us. The next day, Suzi and I paid a visit to Texas de Brazil, a Brazilian-style steakhouse. Men in crisp, white uniforms brought around skewers heavily laden with steak, chops, bacon-wrapped chicken breasts and picana – garlic-marinated beef roast. It was magnificent and extremely filling!

All this is really just a rather sneaky attempt to introduce you to my group’s (utterly absurd):

THREE LEVELS of FULLNESS

You see, when you eat, you will eventually reach a level of satiety – when you feel just full enough to happy and contented. This level of fullness is called the “Rundly-Trundly Kitten” phase (also known as the “Roly Poly Kitten” stage). You’ve eaten enough, your parasympathetic nervous system kicks in and you feel like it might be time for a nap.

Now, perhaps the food is better than all that. Perhaps you can’t quite stop yourself in time and you find yourself just a tiny bit over full … Afrah Mediterranean Restaurant anyone? You may not be in pain, but you are a little bit past that cute little kitten. This level of fullness is called Plump Mary (a/k/a Plump Merry). This name comes from a T-Shirt that Dave Barry saw when he was visiting Japan.

Okay, got that? Now – it gets a little bit weird from here out.

Now you had a bit too much food. You’re in trouble. You’re huge, bloated, uncomfortable …

The many creators of Dungeons and Dragons came up with a LOT of monsters. They went from the sublime to the ridiculous, and sometimes the ridiculous was pretty sublime. One of the silliest things they came up with was a ghastly and powerful giant frog called (aptly enough) the froghemoth. It seemed funny, until your D&D characters encounter a two-story amphibian with a really nasty attitude.

How humiliating is it to have your characters eaten by something like that?

So, when you get to that stage beyond the adorable, fuzzy kitten, beyond the oddly named and merry Ms. Mary. You’ve reached a challenging pinnacle of gourmanditry (just made that word up! Like it? Feel free to use it as often as possible!)! Congratulations my friend, you have reached the FROGHEMOTH LEVEL.

Nasty customers, those froghemoths (but what a great name “frog+behemoth=froghemoth … say it with me “frog-HEEEEE-moth”). As a parenthetical note, after I hit forty, I resolved that I’d swear off being a froghemoth ever again. It’s just too obnoxious of a feeling.

After Texas de Brazil, I was plump, quite merry, not unlike our friend Mary. Suzi said she felt the first traces of amphibian characteristics sneaking in. Perhaps her arms were waving around (just a tiny bit) like the tentacles of some huge frog-monster. I think she called it Tentacle Mary.

Wherefore the blog?

“Gentlemen, I have been BLOGGING!” --- Supervillain The Monarch, to his henchmen (from the Venture Brothers)

Kyle was one of a kind – a wildly creative, intelligent and highly silly young man at my high school. He had the enviable combination of looks, brains and friendliness that made him popular and academically successful. Every high school in the world probably has a Kyle or two, and yet Kyle was one of a kind.

Kyle could make up stuff of such exceeding silly strangeness that we would be paralyzed with laughter, simultaneously wanting to scratch our heads and say “What the HECK???” On time, Kyle talked our friend Jon, good-looking, popular athlete, into playing Dungeons and Dragons with our gang. Jon wanted a caveman character – the dungeon master (me) allowed it. Jon looked to Kyle for a suitably Stone Age name.

“Throgg Blogg!” Kyle exclaimed. The name stuck. And we were stuck with a caveman named Throgg Blogg (at least until some ogres cut his career tragically short).

The first time I ever heard about blogging, it brought my mind back to our friendly (but doomed) caveman with the silly name. Despite the odd name, I love the idea of the blog. It’s like one of those family newsletters that people send around on the holidays, but frequently updated and voluntary. It doesn’t get thrust in my face, I can go to it whenever I please.

It seems so recent that I first heard of blogs, and now EVERYone seems to be keeping an online journal: grandparents, kids, families – there are so many of them it is hard to know where to start. There are political ones (galore), ones based around online games, ones related to hobbies … one day I fully expect to find that my cats have been blogging (and how aggressively CUTE would “Kenny’s Corner” be?)

If our ferrets had a blog, every entry would go something like this:

“I just ate a snack!!!!

Snack! Snack! Snack!!!!!”

And that would be all.

A couple of my dear friends keep blogs – Wendy shares adorable pics of her little girl and cracks me up with her offbeat observations on everyday life. JB offers his own sort of News of the Weird and best of the web alongside his own notes. And Ben – a guy I’ve known since we were both teen-agers, provides his readers with remarkably wry and well-written slices of life and succinct, wonderfully interesting factual pieces. A couple of my editors from Everything2 have online journals too – is it any wonder that I’m reading fewer books than I used to???

With as much as I love talking about myself, can it possibly surprise anyone who could conceivably be reading this that I am starting a blog?

So, this will be a space for my musings, mutterings, and all manner of missives. The general populace of E2 doesn’t necessarily want to hear the story of Throgg Blogg, but I’m betting that my friends will. I’ll probably update weekly or fortnightly, in between work, E2, and, of course, the ever-important Kingdom of Loathing.

So, as my favourite waiter at Besa’s Italian Café always says:

“…aaaaaand …. ENJOY!”