Stacy Horn

Starting at about 5:30 in the morning, an hour before their feeding time, Buddy starts doing things to get me to get up earlier and feed him sooner. These things include: shredding paper, eating books, knocking over books, knocking over anything I was stupid enough to leave out on the desk the night before, batting me in the face with his paw, nails extended, and eating plants.

The eating plants one is pretty sure-fire, because he always throws up the leaves later, and that can’t be good for his stomach. This also means it’s time to trim back the plant. Normally it’s hanging in the window out of his reach.

This strategy has been so successful over time that I now feed them at 6:30 in the morning instead of at 7:30, and 4:30 in the afternoon instead of around 7:30 at night. And, because their dinner was so early, they start bugging me again later in the evening and I’ve added a later-evening-snack meal! I am so owned.

I think I have posted about this before. Oh no. I’m the 21st century equivalent of the person who tells the same story over and over again.

Sundays are usually the most depressing day of the week, but for some unknown reason I feel depressed today, on a Saturday, and that’s after seeing Cabin in the Woods! It makes no sense. (Cabin in the Woods: Not great, but funny, entertaining, a fine movie for a Saturday afternoon.)

What will cheer me up? Lots of cheese? Because I have some. What do you do when you’re having one of those days, when you’re feeling lousy for no good reason, but nonetheless, there you are?

I passed by this photo shoot on my way to the movies. The girl on the left in the yellow heels is the subject.

Although my day began in the most unpleasant manner possible. My toilet was clogged, I didn’t know how to fix it, but I googled how, ran to the hardware store, came home, and voila! I felt tremendously elated at the time. Like I’d conquered some incredibly difficult task. Mwah-ha! You did not win, toilet! Yeah, try and wreck my morning. I’m watching you.

I’m going out for a walk and to run errands. I have a feeling I will be drawn back to the basement where they are searching for Etan Patz. I read that the Patz family, in addition to never moving (so their son, if alive, could find his way home) kept the same message on their answering machine. So sad.

Anyway. I took this the other day for my “Dress I Can’t Possess” series, except I’d have to go back in time to possess this one. It’s a child’s dress. There’s another in the window, just as pretty, but this is astounding, isn’t it? Lucky little girl who gets to wear this dress.

As I type this the FBI is searching a basement on Prince Street for the remains of Etan Patz, the six year old boy who went missing in 1979. If you were living in New York at the time, this case probably still haunts you. The building they’re sifting through is within a block of where Etan lived at the time he went missing. The FBI must have a new lead or new information (I read that they’ve searched this building before).

When I was writing my book about the NYPD’s Cold Case Squad, I also interviewed the head of Missing Persons. I’ll never forget it. In my book, I wrote about how detectives keep their case files in brown, accordion-style folders that look like something school children might carry. Most cases take up only one folder. If it’s a complex case, and the folders start piling up, eventually they’re moved into a cardboard carton. As the case grows, the detectives start stacking cartons. A big case might ending up filling one to six cartons.

The cartons for Etan Patz filled an entire wall, front to back, and from floor to ceiling. It was a dramatic representation of just how hard they worked that case. They’d done everything they humanly could, and they were never going to give up on Etan Patz.

Here are some shots of what’s happening down there right now. The blue canopy is covering the entrance to the building they’re checking.

It’s a mob scene of media and neighbors and people like me, who never forgot Etan Patz. Such a lovely street, to be the site of something so horrible. But I guess every place on earth was once the site of something horrible.

Regular readers of my blog know about my cleaning rituals, but for those who don’t:

Every May and November I clean my apartment from top to bottom. Although I’ve given these yearly rituals the rather ordinary names of “Spring Cleaning” and “Holiday Cleaning,” I look forward to them the way other people look forward to vacations. I’ve managed to infuse the thorough burnishing I give my home with all the clean-slate promise these generally hopeful seasons can bring. Twice a year I feel like I’m getting another chance, and I make it fun. While I’m scrubbing the place down or laundering every piece of clothing I own, every simple pleasure is granted and indulged. I light my favorite scented candles. I freely eat whatever I want. Dark chocolate, potato chips, bread, cheese, more bread, it doesn’t matter. I work so hard I always come out calorically ahead. The cats also get all the catnip and extra treats they desire.

These cleanings typically take three or four days, and all throughout there is music. The music of my childhood, (Snoopy’s Christmas) music I fell in love to (Baby, Now That I’ve Found You), my favorite music to belt (Oh Darling) my favorite music to dance around the apartment to (Rhythm of Love) and all my favorite choruses (everything from the Bach Mass in B Minor and many, many others). For at least three days straight I’m singing. Afterwards, when my apartment is sparkling clean, I’ll buy myself a very modestly priced new outfit; I’ll carefully scrutinize all the new nail polish colors and get a pedicure; have my hair done; find the most affordable flowers of the season and fill my apartment, and only then will I finally sit on my couch and bask and bask and bask.

This year, spring cleaning is going to be super-duper. I’ve made appointments to get the windows, rug, and couch cleaned. Woohoo!

People lining up to eat at Red Farm, where I will be sitting outside, doing a thousand loads of laundry. I am the 1%!