Well that was an adventure

[Cally]

It's sort of sad and more than a little amusing (... samusing? amusad? hmmm) that some people consider climbing mountains an adventure and for me and my homebody life some new soapmaking is as adventurous as it gets!

I saw a post on here about using eggs in soap (yes... blame it all on the person that posted that one!) and I thought... hey I want to try that! Then I was out shopping today and found some vegetable shortening for $1.50 and thought, Hey! cheap soap! Little did I remember that 'vegetable shortening' is not on the soapcalc list unless you get Walmart shortening which is not pure vegetable. However checking the numbers for walmart shortening and crisco the lye/water is not that much at that size. So hell its either a little under or a little over superfatted.... That was my first small hurdle. Yeah I know it's not much but I'm out of shape and I'd prefer to soap or crochet over jumping hurdles, especially in the rain...

So I'd had no plans on actually soaping today (as evidenced by the unclean kitchen, but I've never let dirty dishes stop me!) but the bug bit my butt and I figured what the hell, I've put less thought into a lot of other things I've done. So I booted the cat off my lap and headed into the kitchen to put the shortening on the stove to melt. Then I grabbed my lye and my water and got that going. (Then I took a small bathroom break but nobody needs to know about that) So far so good, if you ignore the first hurdle. Though I did need to measure my lye twice as my scale turned itself off, that I'm used to however.

So with everything going swimmingly, my shortening melting and my lye water cooling in the sink I thought hey! I'm going to make a swirl soap. Because yes, trying to make a swirl soap when I've never done THAT successfully in my life (I over trace and it gloooobs) was a great idea while trying to make egg soap for the first time. So off to get my dye, black and what ended up being an orangey reddish colour. Then back to the kitchen. THen back to my supplies because I forgot the glycerin. Then back to the kitchen. Then to the door to put the cat outside, and then back to the kitchen. Then to the recycling because heck, I don't have anything to mix my dye in and I had to root around for some yogurt containers. (Yay for single serving yogurt!). Had to wash those out, get them all spiffy, then mixed up the dye. Put that aside and started tempering my egg yolk. That worked perfectly. Adding the whites to the lye water.... well I had to pick those snotty globs out.

With the shortening ready and my lye water reaching the desired temperature I finally got around to getting my mold (thanks grampa!) ready. Then feeling ontop of the world I mixed my soap to a light trace, separated them into their containers and dyed two very pretty colours. Even if the egg white that I remembered to add to my black at the last moment did seem to cook a little and speckle it. (New idea! Snack in the shower soap!)

Then feeling OH so proud of myself for managing a light trace rather than the super duper pudding that I usually stop at, I headed over to my mold and realized the **** thing was freaking huge for my one pound sissy batch of soap. Crap. I wasn't really looking forward to a thin fruit leather type of soap. So out comes the freezer paper, out come the snippers. Three tries later and I finally manage a decent sized freezer paper box and slip that in place. Then realize that the weight of the soap might pull off my crappy not so sticky tape and decide that I need to fill the end of the box with something. Empty coke can and a thing of tomato juice later and I figure I'm set enough.

Pour my still at light trace! (did I mention I'm REALLY pleased about that?) black soap into the mold and grab my pudding cup of rusty red soap and proceed to start pouring (high, and I aimed right!) it into my soap, not realizing that the angle was wrong for getting it low enough to colour the top and I kept banging it against the side of the mold and upending more than I meant to. (I am so SMRT, just like Homer) So the top of the soap doesn't end up being too colourful, just a few lines and a dot or two of rusty red. However once I use my trusty skewer to swirl it I decide I'm actually very happy with it.... Even if now I've noticed that my craptastic freezer paper box was more crap than tastic than I thought it was and it's starting to leak a little on one side. Hmm.... Still I will not be deterred and I stand back to admire my gorgeous work of art.

Then with the kitchen rather full (it's small and dirty dishes take up a lot of real estate!) I decide that I shall take it to the living room and put it on the shelf with all of my lovely soaping supplies. (You know the ones I actually keep there rather than scattered all over the place...) I want to say that I walked like an elephant but honestly if you've seen those buggers walk you know they can be super sneaky and quiet. No, I walked...hmm... perhaps like a drunken pirate, on land, with a cat trying to wind itself around his ( or her!) peg leg. Suffice it to say that my once beautiful design sloshed around (thanks to the light trace I FINALLY managed to achieve!) and now looks like that pirate couldn't hold his liquor after all.

TLDR: I made soap! (And have a crush on my exclamation mark!)

 

[Dennis]

Are we related? Could you be that long lost sister something told me must be out there somewhere? If nothing else, age has taught me not to pursue these feelings with much more than a momentary nod. Too much dirt can be dug up with little effort and quite often it isn't what you thought yet it is sticky and grows. So with that possibility left alone and behind me, I will point out the obvious error that was no doubt seen immediately by so many here but they have all been too polite to point out. I have never been accused of that myself.
Regardless of what is going on or what you think needs to go on, you NEVER ever disturb a warm kitty in your lap. I know it's difficult to accept, but if you seriously look back at some of the less pleasant things experienced in the past you will very likely find they could have been avoided had you NOT forcibly removed a kitty from your lap. There are people all over the world who yearn for the comfort of a kitty and you have callously ignored what has, until yours truly had the nerve to point out, completely ignored. The secret of an organized, happy, soaperific experience and all other aspects of life is a sleeping lap kitty. Now, you should be able to turn this around if you...

uhoh, here he comes. Busted! Dang, thought he'd sleep later than this! I'll get back to you...


ManKatt

 

[kazmi]

You both are seriously a riot!!!!! I think you must be long lost siblings

 

[Saswede]

Agree about the sleeping kitty .....!


Sent from my iPad using Soap Making

 

[djk17]

Oh ain't that the truth. Let sleeping cats lie!

 

[judymoody]

Dennis, you're back!

I did have that Dennis feeling when reading about your soaping adventure. Hilarious!

 

[TVivian]

Hahaha.. I very much enjoyed this read.


Sent from my iPhone using Soap Making

 

[Cally]

It is quite possibly we are related. I wouldn't have put it past our cats who are obviously in cahoots to have arranged something like that. And I always did have this odd feeling that I was someones misplaced science experiment and that someone being a cat makes an awful lot of sense given my fondness for tuna.

It's also very obviously to me that they got together and formulated this scathing attack on my choice to put the kitty off my lap. Anytime I have to do that she gives me the most disgusted glare (after of course jumping back on three times before I can get up) and saunters off to scratch the chair. No, it obviously doesn't matter that she has a two scratching posts and a mat that she's supposed to use.

I did have two small questions for you that have been quite puzzling to me. 1) Your cat allows you to have a picture of a dog? The only answer I can come up with is that it is a promise to all other dogs. "You come near my human and I will blind you and make you work as a train conductor, where your pay will come home to me!" (Looks like a conductor had to me)

My second confusion stems from your cat saying uhoh. Your cat actually cares enough about what you think that the idea of stopping even enters into the equation? When I catch my cat doing something wrong she just gives me this look that says "Yeah, so what? You can't stop me I'm a freakin cat!"

 

[Neve]

Hilarious and true. My kittty is on the other side of the world, and I would give anything to have her sitting on my lap again.

Shame on you Cally

Are we related? Could you be that long lost sister something told me must be out there somewhere? If nothing else, age has taught me not to pursue these feelings with much more than a momentary nod. Too much dirt can be dug up with little effort and quite often it isn't what you thought yet it is sticky and grows. So with that possibility left alone and behind me, I will point out the obvious error that was no doubt seen immediately by so many here but they have all been too polite to point out. I have never been accused of that myself.
Regardless of what is going on or what you think needs to go on, you NEVER ever disturb a warm kitty in your lap. I know it's difficult to accept, but if you seriously look back at some of the less pleasant things experienced in the past you will very likely find they could have been avoided had you NOT forcibly removed a kitty from your lap. There are people all over the world who yearn for the comfort of a kitty and you have callously ignored what has, until yours truly had the nerve to point out, completely ignored. The secret of an organized, happy, soaperific experience and all other aspects of life is a sleeping lap kitty. Now, you should be able to turn this around if you...

uhoh, here he comes. Busted! Dang, thought he'd sleep later than this! I'll get back to you...


ManKatt

 

[Dennis]

It is quite possibly we are related. I wouldn't have put it past our cats who are obviously in cahoots to have arranged something like that. And I always did have this odd feeling that I was someones misplaced science experiment and that someone being a cat makes an awful lot of sense given my fondness for tuna.

It's also very obviously to me that they got together and formulated this scathing attack on my choice to put the kitty off my lap. Anytime I have to do that she gives me the most disgusted glare (after of course jumping back on three times before I can get up) and saunters off to scratch the chair. No, it obviously doesn't matter that she has a two scratching posts and a mat that she's supposed to use.

I did have two small questions for you that have been quite puzzling to me. 1) Your cat allows you to have a picture of a dog? The only answer I can come up with is that it is a promise to all other dogs. "You come near my human and I will blind you and make you work as a train conductor, where your pay will come home to me!" (Looks like a conductor had to me)

My second confusion stems from your cat saying uhoh. Your cat actually cares enough about what you think that the idea of stopping even enters into the equation? When I catch my cat doing something wrong she just gives me this look that says "Yeah, so what? You can't stop me I'm a freakin cat!"

Sorry for the delay in responding to your questions.

ManKatt has quite a history. He adopted us as a 5wk old after witnessing his mother's fatal attempt to intimidate a speeding truck. He was mostly typical with a dose of insecurity thrown in, probably as a result of losing mom so early.
The worm turned after about 6 months when he became a teenager and I caught him using my computer on this website. That was really ok, but he didn't seem to want to listen concerning other changes made or questionable use of the computer. Imagine that.

"No, it doesn't matter how mad you get, if I'm using the computer you'll just have to wait." He tried that with me just once. Lacking opposible thumbs, he couldn't figure out how to plug in the computer. Claws are good to have but...

Things rocked on ok for a while, but then one day there was a knock on the door and we were escorted to the federal building downtown and questioned at length. Long story short, Mankatt maintained his aloof attitude, refused to give response to questions but apparently nodded in my direction. After several hours of questioning about my activities over the last months it finally came out that SOMEONE had hacked into the Purina Corporation's computers and changed ingredients in certain recipes at certain manufacturing plants. I was released but Mankatt was held for further questioning and to this day I suspect waterboarding.

He is a bit jumpy now when on the computer but his usual superior attitude is beginning to reappear.

As for the dog, Nelly and Mankatt have pretty much agreed to coexist. That is the result of Nelly running up on Mankatt when in the yard performing #1 and knocking him over then running away. After 3 times, Mankatt was getting a bit paranoid and began to swell. I think the brain became flooded, shut down and Mankatt agreed to a truce but would prefer that Nelly sleep with the fishes. His growing anger is sometimes vented on Pinky who will have none of it. She usually puts him in his place quickly.



Mankatt has no idea that I am aware of all this and I say NOTHING.
Peace is maintained with some compromising more than others at times. If you watch closely, they're not that much different from humans.

Nelly wears the Mountain Dew hat to keep her hair in place. She doesn't like it being ruffled when riding in the car with the windows down. Of course it's ok to drool down the side of the car and just ignore it.

 

[Saswede]

I've chuckled at few of your other posts, Dennis. But this one had me laughing out loud!!! (Disturbed DHs teleconference this afternoon, in fact. So am lucky he's still talking to me!)

The kitties are beautiful, btw.


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[cerelife]

Pretty sure one of our cats is in cahoots with y'alls...maybe they have their own forum, like "Feline World Domination" or something?
We found our Minou in the backyard as a newborn (hours old) kitten covered in ants. Much drama ensued over the next few weeks of bottle-feeding him including 2 near-death experiences. One was eventually determined by our vet to be a self-induced head injury from playing and hitting his head...I mean, come on! It should have been obvious to us THEN that he had a master plan. But no; suckers that we are, all we saw when we came home was this tiny sweet kitten who couldn't move his front legs or head. Frantic phone calls and emergency vet visit. We were over the moon that he made a full recovery with zero brain damage.
In hindsight, we're pretty sure that he set the whole thing up from the beginning.
He now rules our household with an iron paw...our 200lb Mastiff and 75lb pitbull rescue babies serve as his minions. "You want pork rinds? Of course I can reach the cabinet door and drag them down for you."
Despite it all, life with Minou is nothing if not interesting and we adore him