Caution...

An email exchange between me and Tomie a year or so ago:

Me: I HATE hearing a cat yarking his fucking intestines out, from the sound of it, but being unable to locate the results. You KNOW they're there, all but invisible. You look around, trying different angles with your eyes, hoping the light will help you by reflecting a certain glisten off a spot on the carpet somewhere... but nothing. But it's THERE, dammit.

Tomie: ...And though I'm sure you'll find the cat-yuck sooner or later, don't kill yourself over it. The smell will lead you right to it eventually, if the other one doesn't eat it first. EWWWW! Grossing myself out over here...

Good morning and welcome back. The preceding nuggets were background for this:

Last night, I could hear my cat - we have only one now - yarking her fucking intestines out, from the sound of it. I was pretty sure the sound was coming from the kitchen, and was appreciative of the fact that she chose to do it on a wipeable surface. I can't tell you how many times I have caught her decanting a hairball onto the carpet of the living room while her enormous ass was parked on the cool linoleum of the kitchen floor. Just making a point to barf right over that dividing line between rooms.

Anyway. I made a mental note to look for that cat barf first thing in the morning when I got up. As it happened, Kyle got up first and I remembered to tell him, "I think there's a hairball somewhere in the kitchen, so tread with caution."

I listened as he made his coffee, but heard neither a disgusted sigh and rumpling of paper towels, nor an unmasculine shriek of dismay as his foot skidded into the pool of sick. Hmm, I thought. Well, sometimes those hairballs sound worse than they actually are - maybe she just had the dry heaves.

I got up a short time later and came over to the computer, intending to check my email. And that's when it happened. A decidedly unmasculine shriek of dismay as my toes found the pool of sick on the carpet under my "workstation" (read: the end of the dining room table) - this was no ordinary hairball. Chilly after hours outside the cat's body and oh-so-copious, it certainly woke me in a way coffee never has.

And that, my friends, prompted me to sit down and tell you all about it. So you can thank poor old Jezebel for my return to blogging.