To start off with some sad news - Ziggy died. She was gone when I got up at 11:00 this morning. I knew yesterday afternoon that she was on her way out. I’m glad she went as fast as she did cuz with guinea pigs, it takes several days. She was my favorite mouse and sometimes I wish rodents lived as long as cats and dogs, but as Tom pointed out, that may make it all the harder. Tom buried her out back by the palm tree in the corner of the yard by the pool. There sure are a lot of animals out there. Two guinea pigs, two mice, a rabbit, a hamster, and a cat.

In better news, last night I got a great idea to pose Bailey holding a Barbie doll, so it looks like I’m gonna have a few Barbies after all. Up until last night, I didn’t think I’d ever get Barbies since they’re only 11½ inches long, but I like the idea of letting Bailey hold her at some point, and their outfits are just too nice to resist. But I’ve got a different idea of what’s collector’s Barbies and what’s not. Most adults collecting Barbies are getting ones that cost $40 and up and usually have their hair up in a bun of some kind or a French twist and gowns a lot like what the porcelain dolls wear. My brand of collector’s Barbies has really long hair that isn’t piled up in some form or another and that wears shorter, more colorful dresses, and costs only $10-$20. Also, I don’t leave her displayed in a box like most Barbie collectors do.

Barbies used to be basically white with blond hair, but then they got politically correct and made a variety of colors. I want to get a black Barbie too, and one of these days, probably after we move, I want to go to a regular toy store just to see what’s there, cuz I’m gonna have my own set of rules and decide what I think is a collectible doll for my collection. If I see a really nice doll, I’ll still get it even if it’s dirt cheap and made of vinyl.

Anyway, they had about ten different Barbies at the store. If I remember right, they were all blondes. One had colorful hair, but as much as I like colors and it would’ve been different, I just didn’t really dig it or its outfit. Barbies may have better outfits, but not every single one of them. There were a couple with pink dresses, but one had these tacky jewels on it, and they both had shorter hair that was about to the waist. This Barbie that I got has blond, straight hair almost to the knees. Her dress isn’t pink or mainly pink, but it’s beautiful nonetheless and shorter than any other doll’s dress that I have. It comes to the middle of the thighs and it’s got several different colors. Mainly purple. It’s short-sleeved and snakeskin-like. You can see the shiny scales. It’s got horizontal stripes of white, purple, red, pink, orange, and yellow. She had purple boots which I didn’t like, so I took them off. She has purple earrings and a purple ring. Since Barbie’s fingers aren’t separated, it’s kind of stapled on. More like an earring is put on.

She came with stud-like decorations in a cute little clear plastic case with flower, heart, and butterfly designs on it. That’s why the hair’s so long. To decorate it with beads of letters and jewels in four different colors - pink, blue, yellow and orange. I think this would look tacky, though, so maybe I’ll wait till I have a doll with a suitable dress to use them on. It comes with a thing that looks like a paper puncher that squeezes them together since little kids’ hands aren’t that strong, but I can use my hands with them. They go on like earrings.

I’ve got Barbie standing in the living room on the rack that holds the Nintendo games for now. I want to let Bailey sit with the little wolf for a while first.

When I realized that that’d make three dolls with long straight hair with bangs between Bailey, Barbie and Anne, I decided to give Anne a change for more variety. I didn’t have anyone with just one braid, but now I do. At first, I did the braid straight down the back which I wanted to pull in front so you could see it better, but it wouldn’t quite go. It was too stiff. So I braided it sort of off to the side so it’d go around the front better. I think I got it looking like a braid that’s pulled in front, rather than a side braid. I put a blue hair bubble in it since she’s wearing blue and no one else has a hair bubble. I’m building up my variety.

Bailey, Summer Dream, and Patrice look the most realistic. Out of my porcelains, Anne has the most colorful face. She has the brightest lips and eyes. Patrice and Barbie are about the same - 12” long, but Patrice is shaped and proportioned more realistically.

Been getting a lot of mail from Ashton Drake. They’re sending ads for dolls they have pictured in their catalog. A bigger picture of these dolls with more details about them.

Later...

Just cooked some ground beef and added sloppy Joe sauce to it for Tom for when he gets up at 11:00.

Today’s the first day in weeks where I’m stuck. This is typical PMS, though. I knew my period, which is starting now, would be late cuz of how easy my PMS was going. A few days ago, it got bad, though. My back’s killing me, I’m super bloated, and my tits are really sore. I’m not gonna get any real relief for a few days, though, cuz of course, I’ve got to spot for 3-4 days first. Can’t I just go back to getting my period normally? God, what a pain playing this spot game! I can’t wait for menopause.

My weight’s not doing too well. Part of it is cuz of water retention, but I also ate too much these last few days. I’m trying to back off the calories and get back to around 108-109 pounds. I’ve been 110-111.

Tom insists I’ve got a better body now than when we met. I’m glad one of us thinks so.

I was wrong in saying the smallest vibrator couldn’t get me off, cuz it did. I also further checked out the thing I’ve got that’s supposed to simulate sucking and it didn’t feel too bad at all.

We were gonna screw around Monday, but I just couldn’t get into it. We finally talked about my lack of appetite and all that. He took it well. I was afraid he’d take it personally and think that I love him any less cuz of it. I love him more and more every day. I’m just bored with the sex. I told him I wondered if it was due to my not wanting a kid anymore, or cuz of its predictability, and he said he’d think about some ideas to help. He seemed confident and not worried at all about it, which helped to relax me, although I myself wasn’t overly worried cuz Tom’s sexually tolerant. If we couldn’t screw for a year, he’d handle it just fine.

The next day he told me he had a possible solution, which is going back to basics. Meaning that we don’t need to change the sex (not that we could or he would be willing to, which is fine cuz our sex is fine as it is) but we need to be more physical with each other. Go back-to-back rubs and stuff like that. That sounds like it may be a great idea. I guess all couples need to do this every now and then. I used to think that only couples who were falling out of love needed to do this, but I see I was wrong. I’m not sick of him. I’m just sick of the sex. Better that, though than of him.

Evie got a full-time job at a daycare center. Great. I’m happy for her. I know she wanted to get the hell out of the house and make extra cash.

Porky decided to stay home last night, I guess, unless he went climbing around on the top and outside sides of the cage and I didn’t know it. He’s such a cutie. He’s not quite all brown. I describe him as having a chocolate body with vanilla feet and a tail tipped with vanilla. Yes, he has white feet and a touch of lightness on the tip of his tail.

I really hope we can look for land during his vacation and get out of here before June’s out! Of course, we’re gonna have to lie a little to anyone that we show the house to if they ask about noise. It’s quiet most of the time as far as music and people go, but not dogs. At night it’s usually OK dog-wise, but if they hear the collies, and they probably will, and ask if they bark much, no will be our answer. If they ask about the neighbors, we don’t know them. I’m certainly not gonna tell them, “Well the city bum next door’s a real sick bitch and God help you if the boyfriend moves back in, cuz if he doesn’t pummel these walls with his bass, he’ll do it with his car doors. He’ll slam them over and over again several times a day that you’ll think something was thrown up against the house. In fact, they’re both so rude and selfish what with the way they harassed me, that I had to complain to the city to shut them up.”

Another thing I noticed about the houses in Arizona is that their driveways can also fit two cars parked in them, but bumper to bumper. Not side by side like the driveways in New England. Guess that’s just part of how obsessed they were with getting these houses so close. Anything to save room width-wise to jam the houses together almost like teeth.

Later...

The renters were a little bit of a problem Monday night, but not too much for too long. It’s still nice to know they’re across the street and not next door. I’ve seen two women, a guy, a teenage girl, and a little girl, associated with that house. However, I don’t know how many people live there. There’s usually a red car and a white car there.

Remember how I said the guy played music for a while when he was working on the white car? It was nothing compared to what I used to get regularly from the freeloaders, but it was annoying enough. I got the same thing from the guy with the white car Monday evening, a little louder, for about five minutes. This time, though, I looked out at the guy, and with it being dark, he saw me. Hopefully, his seeing me sent the proper message to him, but time will tell. That’s what they want, though. They want you to notice them. That’s the purpose of owning one of these stereos. So others hear it.

That I know of, there’s been no music since, but I don’t have a bad vibe from these people. I mean, maybe once in a while I’ll hear their music, but I don’t see it ever becoming like the freeloaders. If I hear them as much as a few times a week, though, I’m not gonna bother complaining to them. First of all, it won’t do me any good. Secondly, we’re out of here soon enough. They’d have to play it loud enough to be heard over the fan and wake me up before I’d make them shut up for sure, do it real loud many times a day like the cock did, or for long periods of time. Meanwhile, a few minutes a week won’t kill me.

They’re so fucking weird, though. Both cars, but especially the white one, are in and out several times a day. Who knows when they work? I saw some weird shit yesterday, too. A woman I’ve never seen before loaded the back of the white car up with God knows what. I saw her make two trips. She seemed to have a long bag of some kind on the first trip, and a big empty red pail or basket on the second trip. Then she got into the car, started the engine, but sat there for about five minutes before pulling out. I thought I saw her swaying as if music was playing, but I couldn’t hear anything. Then a few hours later, she returned in a whole different car that I’d only seen that one time.

In the late afternoon, the white car was parked on the street with something pretty indescribable hitched to it. It was like a long, rectangular cart. It was about ten feet long and three feet deep.

In freeloader news, that’s another weird topic, cuz I’m totally lost on what the latest routine is. Usually, it’s pretty obvious, but now, I don’t know what the fuck they’re doing. It used to be obvious enough who’d pick up the bitch and bring her back, but now I don’t know.

The cock, who would sometimes visit with some other dude, are the same guys that went from the cranberry car to the silver car. At least I think they are. Guess the cock felt it was time for some car changes and that maybe explains why I haven’t seen the dark gray car he’s had for a while.

Anyway, Bill left at the usual time of 4:30, but did he leave the mistake at home alone till the two guys pulled in in the silver car a few minutes later? And did these guys pull in with the bitch? Anyway, the silver car played music today, but it was very soft. Totally acceptable. I saw a guy holding the mistake by the driver’s door when I glanced out and thought the guy had just gotten out of the driver’s seat and taken the mistake out of the back and into the house, but obviously, it was someone else and the driver never left his seat. I don’t remember who the guy with the mistake was, but the bald passenger, which I think is the cock, came to the passenger side of the car, took out something that looked like a black cloth briefcase, then went into the house. Then it came back, hopped in the passenger seat, and off they went. The bitch must’ve slipped out of the car before I noticed them, but why are they leaving the kid alone like that? Well, these people are sick, after all. It’s something they’d do.

Later...

The sales calls had backed off cuz I took a day out to tell them all to fuck off, but this evening, they started picking up again. I don’t want sales calls distracting the hell out of us during his vacation. His vacation is at risk as it is, with God making sure things come up to fill his time up with things we’d rather not fill up his vacation time with. The fucking calls are so distracting as it is in the evenings when I’m trying to write or read.

Anyway, I thought I’d put some effort into backing them off for the vacation, not that they won’t happily harass us again soon afterward if I can manage to back them off throughout the vacation. A guy called from someplace offering bullshit vacation deals and I told him to fuck off. I knew, though, that he’d call right back. I could tell by the tone of his voice and just my good judgment of character, that he’d try calling back for the last word. I threatened him too, and a male’s ego feels threatened when challenged physically by a female, so he called back twice, but as soon as it rang and I saw it was him, I quickly picked up the receiver and placed it right back down again. I’m sure he’s only given up just for tonight, though.

I know God is doing this to me for all the people I harassed via phone, but what about the music? Were the freeloaders to pay me back for people I’d bother in apartments with my stereo? I guess I must’ve bothered more people than I realized with my music.

I started a book called Nightmare’s Child, so I think I’ll do some reading now.