Sitting alone in the cube farm - it's Thanksgiving Eve, and I'm doing the grunty crapwork of cleaning up email. This is not at all interesting.

The (Arizona) family has decided to drastically reduce Christmas - no more multi-hour wraptacular sprees. Instead, we'll draw names for a single big gift and do a white elephant on the everyone-home years, and send gifts only to the youngest in the individual families (David and Tatianna) on the off years. I hope this is taken in the spirit with which it is proposed (by D&T, that is).

The big question: will it hold up 'til next year?

Last night Java: shat in the middle of the dining room rug at 11; woke me at 1:30 for food; threw up said food at 2:00; woke me at 2:30 for more food; and sprayed the wall in the living room at 3. [I had given up and moved downstairs to sleep on the sofa at 2:30.]

I'm exhausted. His gastro issues are challenging, but the rest are all pointing to feline dementia. And that makes me really sad. He's 15, and he's been alone in the house for the last 4 years.

We're working hard to avoid that conversation. But at what point do we fail him by not acting? When does the loving thing become the hard thing?

Okay, here goes nothing.

Gaslighting Java. Java's our cat. He gaslights us, for crying out loud. He tries to convince us that he hasn't been fed, isn't running around like a dervish all night long, and isn't really in charge of us. Which he is. Of course he is. He's the cat. He's the man. He's Java.