I never look forward to Mondays

I'll take one shot for my pain
One drag for my sorrow
Get messed up today
I'll be okay tomorrow

Singing about liquor is not really a way  to progress, but it helps me  boot  on Monday Mornings.

Cause my job's got me going nowhere
So I ain't got a thing to lose
Take me to a place where I don't care
This is me and my liquor store blues("Liquor Store Blues"
(Bruno Mars feat. Damian Marley))

 Monday has always  been my worst as far back as is possible to remember.

 

Our music teacher wanted us to make musical instruments. We had options. You could make a flute from bamboo, shakers from bottle caps, burned in fire then straightened out. Or you could make  a wandindi- it is a kind of a guitar with a drum base made out of stretched  skin. A shaker  would  have been easy but bottle caps were hard to come by.

 The main brew then was Shibuku, which came in yellow  plastic bottles, the kind that is used for battery water now. I had rabbits, but mine were pets, about 25 of them, they had names too so slaughtering one  to get the skin  was out of the question. The only time  I had some slaughtered was  when  ants invade the hatches  and ate them alive. So I needed bamboo.

No one grew bamboo in my area. The closest bamboo plantation was kirangi. Kirangi was  part of the Aberdare  forest where some squatters planted cabbage interlaced  with ganja forest conservation they called it.

I had  a classmate lived in that direction nearby so one Sunday afternoon we decided to go search for  the accursed raw material that  could make music. To say it was a 50km walk would not be a big exaggeration, and by the time I got back home, grandmother wanted to skin me. Worse, the cows  had broken into the farms and fed on a good number of corn heads, the rest had been carried away by baboons. Two of the young bulls were bloated, and while the village vet was  basking in his glory after carrying out a major surgery-piercing their abdomens to let out the air, I run in horror to the back of the house to find my uniform wet from the afternoon rain. A calf had chewed on the sleeve of my good sweater too.

 In those days, children didn’t get depression and high blood pressure and such, it was simplified in one term- rung’athio- I got a  telling off from cucu for having- rung’athio- the following  Monday morning. I had barely finished my tea when the whistle went off- my neighbor always  whistled twice to say-ukaga- meaning unless you fly you will find us ahead.

If Damian Marley and Bruno Mars had had their liquor store blues single then, I’d have sold all my earthly treasure, rabbits  and library and bought a ticket. Coz you can imagine how it felt when I realized I didn’t pack my lunch, nor the hastily made flute.

strange thing, is that as I post this, about midnight, the egesa- the pub in the neighbourhood is playing that same song-... I bet I'll sleep  soundly then.

A Poem

Let them be as flowers Always, watered, guarded admired
 But harnessed to a pot of dirt
 I’d rather be a tall ugly weed
Clinging on cliffs like an eagle Wind
 wavering above high, jagged rocks
 To have broken through the surface of stone

To live, to feel exposed to madness Of the vast eternal sky
 To be swayed by the breezes of ancient sea
 Carrying my soul my seed beyond the mountains of time
 or into the abyss of the bizarre

 I’d rather be unseen,
and if then, shunned by everyone.
Than to be a pleasant-smelling flower
 Growing in clusters in the fertile valley
Where they’re praised, handled
and plucked By greedy, human hands
 I’ d rather smell of musty green stench
 Than of sweet, fragrant lilac

If I could stand alone,
 strong and free I’d rather be a tall,
 ugly weed.

 Julio Noboa Polanco-Identity

Excuse the term: Anal Glands

I washed them yesterday- the kittens. The sun was bright and I’ve been putting it off long enough. Mooze has been giving off a really bad smell. I see him cleaning himself and his sister helps but after a visit to the litter box, his exterior smells not so great. So this evening I’m concerned because, Goo Goo still smells fresh from yesterday’s scrubbing but Mooze? Phu phu phu. It is very unusual. I have a vet, but haven’t consulted him since the other cat died. And there was that period I couldn’t afford to have a pet and just looked after other people’s. So I consult Google, and trust this expert to know what I’m talking about. I’m surprised, the search results fill the page. Foul smell under cat’s tail? Pardon the expression-Anal glands in cats. How to excrete anal glands. I was doing this absent mindedly, replying text messages and reading – White Thorn Woods by Maeve Binchy but as I read about cats and dog’s anal glands, I stop the texting and reading. I have chills. So this really is a problem? Mooze is really laid back. He doesn’t fuss a lot, he’ll fall asleep anywhere. Not so with Goo Goo. So cute. I knew which was a boy and which one was a girl even before they agreed to come close. I always laugh when Googoo goes to the litter box. You can hear her clicking- nkt, when will some cats learn how to use the littler box!- then you’ll hear her scratching and digging furiously to put the sawdust all on one side before she can go then she’ll cover everything properly and lick her legs before getting back to the main area. Mooze just needs to get in the box. Now I’m fully awake. Apparently, felines and dogs, wait does feline stand for both dogs and cats? So anyway, the two have 3 glands around their anus filled with some fluid. It is used to mark territory. When in danger they’ll squirt that fluid and also after pooping. The smell is terrible when there is an infection in the sacs, or a tumor. A bad diet lacking in fiber can cause the sac to block, thus the smell due to congestion. I feel bad to think I might have contributed by the diet. I’m hoping it will get better. I wipe with a saline solution, now he’s dozing off on the couch and Goo Goo is playing with a roach that came through the bathroom door. Usually I can fix a lot of cats problems with a few spoons of amoxyll or piriton but this beats me. My furry ball could be in serious problems.