Paul's Infrequently Updated Blog

This afternoon we got a knock on our door. Once again, a person was at our door trying to sell Kirby Vacuum cleaners. If you don’t know about Kirby Vacuums that is because they are not sold in stores, instead they are sold by sales people going “door to door.”

I do not like people coming to my door at the best of times trying to sell me stuff, but it does seem that the Kirby sales people seem to turn up in this area every six months trying to sell their ridiculously expensive vacuum cleaners. The first time it happened was about eighteen months ago when someone came to my door asking me if I wanted an “opinion” on a consumer product. He was pretty pushy and I ended up letting him in. He then spent the next TWO HOURS demonstrating a Kirby Vacuum cleaner to us. By the end, I had to almost push him out the door as I had an appointment at the Orthodontist that I did not want to miss.

After this experience, I googled Kirby Vacuums and their sales techniques and discovered a ton of complaints about Kirby both from people who had to put up with the demonstration and also from former salespeople. I actually felt sorry for some of the former salespeople. Many of them were just regular people who needed a job to pay the bills and support their families and were/are getting duped by Kirby. If you want to find out more about how Kirby scams customers and salespeople you can do a google search for yourself and find out.

So, this afternoon a young guy comes to the door with the exact sales pitch I heard eighteen months ago and also six months ago and I immediately asked him if he was selling Kirby Vacuums. His response was “so you’ve heard of us” to which I responded that there was no way that I was going to spend $2000 on a vacuum cleaner and that he might want to consider getting another job. He tried to tell me that his job  was the best job in the world and, as he did so, I closed the door.

If you ever have someone at your door and they ask you if you want an “opinion” on a consumer product or if they ask you if you would like a free carpet shampoo and cleaning, then do not let them in the door. Kirby Vacuums start at about $1200 and, if you buy on their installment plan, this can double with interest. Better to close the door to these people and go to the store and buy a perfectly good vacuum cleaner for $200.

Today during my 3-Blue class at school, three of my students came to me with a big box saying that the box was for me. I peered into the box and, at firs,t could not see anything. When I opened it some more, I saw two little yellow-green eyes looking back at me. The eyes belong to a little black cat that my students decided to give to me because they were sorry I lost D’Argo.

I had to spend the rest of the afternoon with the cat sitting in his box with a blanket the students bought for him. He could not get out of the box. He is very timid and shy. This second cat has been named Harvey after John Crichton’s neural clone out of the science fiction television show Farscape. Since we brought him home, Harvey refuses to leave the upstairs bathroom or indeed leave the litter box we have set up for him there. I am hopeful that he will settle down and adjust in a few days.

Meanwhile, Puck is doing much better. He is running around the house and does very well considering he has just three legs. He is not too fond of Harvey and keeps hissing at him. From what I have been reading, this should subside as the two cats get used to each other. It will just take a little time.

Today at school I got a message from one of the school secretaries saying the Humane Society had called and that they were ready for pick up. This meant that they had cremated D’Argo and we could bring him home.

We went to the Humane Society to pick him up after school. He is in a little stone urn and if you take the lid off there is small bag and covering that is a tissue paper bag. That is, of course, D’Argo. When we got him home we put another bag in the urn, which contains some of his fur, two whiskers, and part of one of his claws that he shed. We have also placed his three collars in the urn and closed it up. We now have the urn sitting on the computer desk next to his picture.

We still miss him and wish that he was still with us. We only had D’Argo for 14 months, but we treasured the time that we had with him.

Today is they day after D’Argo died. We did not go to school. I did not feel like going to school and we needed to go back to the Humane Society. When we took D’Argo to the Humane Society yesterday, we forgot to bring any money to pay for his cremation so today we went back to pay. While I was there, I wanted to go see D’Argo one last time. While I was in the back of the Humane Society saying goodbye to D’Argo, Irene stayed in the front and while I was gone the staff brought out to Irene a cat called Puck.

Puck is a Flame Point Siamese about eight months old. The Panhandle Humane Society thought that we would give Puck the ideal home and wanted us to adopt him. Puck had been found out on the street in Scottsbluff in November and, when he came to the Humane Society, he had a broken back left leg, which had tried to heal itself and had fused in the shape of a hockey stick, hence the name Puck. Unfortunately, his leg could not be saved and had to be amputated.  After we left the Humane Society, we thought about Puck for several hours and have decided to adopt him.

I am not so sure about getting a new cat so soon after losing D’Argo. Either way, we now have him and have to make the best of things. Puck is a pretty cat. He has long, white fur with a orange and white tail and ears. Right now, he is hiding under the bed upstairs, probably because he is in a new environment and not used to us just yet.

I am sure that you can guess from the title of the post that today we lost D’Argo. Late last night, Irene let him out of the back door an he never came home. When I got up this morning, Irene told me he had not returned so I walked around the block looking for him, but did not find him.

I had been fearing the worst all day and would have been happy to take the day off school to look for him, but Irene said we should go to school.  When we came home there was an envelope on our door and, when we opened it, it contained a note and his collar. I was hoping that it was a note from someone saying they had found him but sadly the lady who found him was out jogging on Highway 71 and found him on the road. He had been struck and killed by a vehicle some time in the early hours of Thursday morning, about a half mile from our house.

We never thought that D’Argo would wander so far away from home. He had never gone so far away before and we did not think he would head towards the highway. If we had thought for a moment he was going to head off to the highway we would not have let him out.

After we got the note, we immediately drove over to where the note said we could find him and we picked him up. We wrapped him up in a towel and brought him home. Irene made some calls and we were told to take him to the Humane Society because they can cremate the body. We are going to have a private cremation so that we get his ashes back in a little urn. We also plan to put his little collars with him in the urn and then seal it when we get it back.

Right now, I can not express how had I feel. It is as bad as losing a family member. D’Argo was very much a part of our household and I cannot help but see him everywhere. I will miss not seeing him waiting for me when I get out of the shower or giving him my oatmeal bowl to finish. D’Argo we miss you!!!!