This has been a very tumultuous week at Downton Cabot. Here are the things you need to know if you want to keep up:
Lady Henrietta “Fussypants” Cabot has begun rising before 7AM every morning, insisting on being fed Whiska Temptations by hand.
Portrait of Lady Fussypants in the Powder Room, waiting for hand feeding
As there is no butler (I tried to hire one, but annoyingly, he wishes to remain with his current employer. Ungrateful wretch!), and I do not rise until 8AM (preferably 10AM) at the earliest, this is annoying.
The local surgeon (mobile vet) has been consulted to see if Lady Fussypants’ odd behavior can be explained (she’s also begun to express sympathy with a local street cat who claims to be the amnesiatic heir to Downton Cabot, and has had an affair with a married farm cat for which she’s yet to express the slightest remorse).
Lady Fussypants, caught in scandal!
Meanwhile, Lady Fussypants’s sister, Lady Gem “Slutty-McSlut-A-Lot” Cabot, killed a visiting Turkish noblecat with her vagina. Obviously none of us knew such a thing was possible, but somehow she managed it.
(Technically she might have done it with another orifice. The details are a bit sketchy.)
Like her sister, no remorse has been expressed, except remorse that killing a Turk with her vagina has made it impossible for her to marry the cat of her dreams.
GUILTY!
Just when we thought things were calming down, the Spanish Influenza broke out. The local surgeon (for humans) was summoned to Downton Cabot.
“My God,” the surgeon cried, looking at that weird thermometer they stick in your ear at the doctor’s office. “100.7? You’ve got a fever! Does your throat hurt?”
Me: “Wait. I’m actually sick for once? This is awesome!”
“She always thinks she’s sick,” He Who Shall Not Be Named In This Blog explained, and pulled a list from his shirt pocket. “Let me tell you the diseases she thinks she’s had in the past few weeks. Spinal meningitis, dengue fever, that thing you get from cleaning out the litter box, walking pneumonia, whatever kind of cancer it was that guy had in the movie 50/50—”
Me (to doctor): “SHOULD my throat hurt? Are sore throats going around?”
Doctor: “Here, take Tamiflu if your body begins to ache. How long have you felt sick?”
Me: “How would I know? I just sit in bed all day reading my own writing and hand feeding Whiska Temptations to my 20 year old demented cat. I always feel sick. Wouldn’t you?”
Doctor: “Good point.”
Husband: “—whatever they got in the movie Contagion, whatever all the people have in Rise of the Planet of the Apes, every disease anyone has ever had on Dr. G. Medical Examiner—”
Lady McSlut-A-Lot retires to her bed of Padded Envelopes in shame
Lady Fussypants is far from a saint, but that won’t stop her from acting holier-than-thou.
Armed with Tamiflu, on Saturday, February 18 from 12 noon until 3:30PM, I will be enjoying a champagne lunch at The Adolphus Hotel in Dallas, TX (1321 Commerce St). You are both welcome and encouraged to attend.
There we will be discussing Lady Fussypants’ scandalous behavior, among many other things, such as the joys of writing romantic, YA, and children’s fiction, as well as what He Who Shall Not Be Named In This Blog said when I forced him to go see the movie The Artist and he discovered that it was both a silent and in black and white.
(Actually we will not be discussing that because what he said is unmentionable in polite circles.)
The Saturday after that I’ll be in Long Beach, California, on February 25, for the Passion and Prose Conference, all day, at the Westin (333 E Ocean Blvd). Do sign up because the event has been moved to an even cozier room and now will be even more fun (and affordable) than ever.
At Passion and Prose, I will be discussing many things, including but not limited to whether it is indeed possible to kill a visiting Turkish noblecat with one’s vagina, and the thoughtful goodbye gift left by Lady Fussypants on the office floor upon my departure for this trip. (Spoiler: It was poop.)
In between these two events, it was He Who Shall Not Be Named In This Blog’s intention for us to go on something I have been told is called “a vacation.” I am, of course, unfamiliar with this term, as I always have some incomplete work to do saving war refugees finishing a book that is usually late, to the everlasting delight of my agent and editors, who adore my insouciant work habits.
But if we were to take a vacation together (to, say, visit Carmel-by-the-Sea to do research for the next Mediator book), who would hand feed Lady Fussypants her Temptations, or keep Lady McSlut-A-Lot from stealing someone else’s boyfriend, then possibly killing him with her vagina?
It is an ever present worry, and one that will have to be continued here, at Downton Cabot. Stay tuned!
More later.
Much love,
Meg
