Let there be art
2019
Holidays, La Posada, Kitties, and a Doggie
Yes friends, we’re still alive. We might just survive the season. The smoke was better for a while, then the stuff from So. California moved in. It has been a busy month with La Posada, holidays, and busy work hours. Here’s a bit of holiday cheer. Lastech took this pic at night.
We took advantage of a lull in Lastech’s training schedule to enjoy the La Posada celebration at the Martinez Adobe which is located at the John Muir National Historical Site.
La Posada is a 400 year old Christmas tradition and has an interesting history which you can read about here.
They had a procession and music. Traditionally, it takes place over 9 days, but this one just had the one day. There were piñatas, snacks, and music. It was delightful
Here is a slide show with the rest of the pics.
No we haven’t forgotten the critters. While we don’t really celebrate the season, we still get into the groove a wee bit. We got a hammock style car seat cover and seatbelt for Pepi to ride in the back seat where she can look out at the world. The hammock style prevents her from falling into the gap between the front seats and the back. She seems to like it.
Titanescu has been posing for us lately. The others have been napping.
Bleeping weather, fecking smoke, and Pepi
The smoke from the fires has blown in and is awful. Back to that in a minute. First, the weather
A very odd thing happened Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. It was hotter in Concord, CA than in El Centro, CA. El Centro sits near the Mexican border in the Sonoran desert and is below sea level. These temps are normal there. Not so much here. San Francisco broke an all-time record with 106 degrees on Friday and we topped out at 109. Blech! We did the same on Saturday. In plain English, the weather is hotter than hell.
The fecking smoke was almost worse than the heat. It was blowing in from the fires up North. Then it blew in from the fires to the East. I couldn’t get two feet away from the inhaler, but I was ok. I used it when I needed it.
Continue reading “Bleeping weather, fecking smoke, and Pepi”
Caturday: Holiday edition 2016
Some of my friends celebrated the solstice, while others are celebrating Hanukkah and Christmas. We want to wish all of you the best and happiest of holidays. Lastech will be working the holidays, but we’ll have a bit of celebration on his days off. I have some Cornish game hens to bbq.
It has been cold (for CA, mind you) and we’ve been getting quite a bit of rain. You won’t hear us complaining about the rain. We haven’t gotten out as much as we like, but that’s because we were both fighting the flu. I caught it back in November and Lastech caught it this month. Mine took forever to go away and then decided to start a secondary infection in my ears and sinuses. I’m hoping that it’s finally going away now. Once my ears open up again, we can go play on Mt. Diablo.
And now, here are the furry ones.
I was looking for a vid when I came across this one. I follow Angry Ram and I’m glad to see this update. Angry Ram lives on a mountain in New Zealand and they’ve had some awful earthquakes. And no, it’s not sad. 🙂
Until next time, have a wonderful and safe holiday season
Rudha-an and Lastech
Caturday: Chills, thrills, and rain
Yes! It’s raining! We’re now well above average for the month. That doesn’t mean the drought is over and we may still be very short of our needed rainfall for the season. Still, it’s giving the hills a good boost and they’re greening up already. We missed last Caturday due to performing our bi-yearly move-out-move-back-in thing. It’s a royal pain in the posterior, but at least the weather was nice and no rain.
Anyhow, the move thing was relatively uneventful, though Murphy’s Law did manage to kick in though as poor Lastech went to go to work and the car wouldn’t start. Lucky for us, we have AAA membership and they came and changed out the battery and made sure the starter and alternator were working correctly.
In the midst of everything, we took a trip up Mt. Diablo. I’m still sorting those pictures, but Lastech used some different settings on his phone with Halloween in mind. Here are the pointy eared people and the floppy eared one mixed in with some creepy pics. Happy Halloween everyone!
We do hope that everyone has a wonderful and safe Halloween this year.
Caturday: An Anniversary
Yes, it’s an anniversary. Last Labor Day weekend, Miss Pepita was found in a dumpster. We went back to the pier and picked her up that night. You can read her story here. Since then, she has made friends with Tito and Miss Jenny. Titanescu regards her as his personal punching bag and has her properly cowed. She and Tito play together. Miss Jenny merely sniffs noses with her. She also does it when Pepi is at the end of her leash so that she can dart away if she wants. We have since discovered that her biggest enemy is a plastic bag. Oddly enough, when I handle the bags indoors, she’s fine. If it’s outside, it’s a giant NOPE for her. She was laying at my feet earlier and heard a plastic grocery bag blow by outside. OMG! You would have thought it was a home invasion robbery. She never saw it. She just heard it and went all wonky and barky. Titanescu merely looked at her in disgust. Titanescu may not be celebrating this anniversary, but the rest of us are 🙂
And here is our little dumpster doggie
Now it’s time for the pointy-eared people to shine
Just for something different, here’s an angry froggy
OMG! It’s been a whole year already
Yes, a whole year! On this day in 2015 We moved about 30 miles from San Francisco to Concord, CA and took up residence in our little trailer. What an interesting year it has been.
The pointy eared people not only adapted well, they have thrived. Of course, I suspect that they take great joy in carefully shredding our once lovely interior. Oh well, it’s what kitties do. They’re little furry little Klingons.
Then, on Labor day weekend, someone found a dog in a dumpster just before the arrival of the trash truck. The dog came home with Lastech and has been here ever since.
As the year progressed, we watched the hills turn from brown to green and back again.
We’ve managed to discover lizards, all manners of ducks, geese, hawks, strange flowers and plants.
We even came across a big rattler on one of our hikes.
To top it off, we’ve managed to look out from on top of the world, or at least our teeny little corner of it.
While we had to deal with a few emergencies, like ER visits for Lastech and Pepi, life has been good. Our lives are much better here than in San Francisco. All in all, it has been a very good year.
Caturday: Catgirl edition
It’s been two years already! Catgirl (Miyuki) and Carolyn got married two years ago. We were late with our anniversary wishes last year as we were in the middle of moving, but we didn’t miss it this year. Our favorite catgirl has a wonderful little blog called Neko Neko’s Movie Litterbox where she writes wonderful reviews on horror films from all over the world. We love her blog.
As for us, our one year anniversary of the move will be coming up. The last year has been interesting, with the last 4 months being the wrong kind of interesting. Lastech, Pepi, and my mom in the ER/Hospital and other pain-in-the-tuchus events. It was all capped off by someone backing into our car in the parking garage. Lucky for us, they were insured. We got our car back yesterday.
The pointy eared people are doing well, at any rate.
NoooooOOOOOooooOOOOOOoooooo!
Caturday: Ode to The Pootie Queen
I’ve heard that online friendships just aren’t real and all kinds of other malarkey. Lastech was an online friend and we’ve been married for twelve years as of today. Our anniversary aside, I lost a friend on March 5th. I found Tricia at a political website. As everyone knows, politics can be vicious. She had a love of cats and she posted what came to be called “The Pootie Diaries”. “Pootie” was the name of someone’s kitty. The name stuck and Tricia became known as The Pootie Queen. Her posts were a safe haven from the political fights. The fights had to be left outside. Inside was a mass of Cheezburger posts and pictures of pets posted in the comments. The posts weren’t limited to cats and included any and all animals. That safe haven provided people with a place to share the joys of their pets and to also share their grief on losing them. When we lost The Boober to lymphoma she did a memorial post for him. She did the same when we lost Kitsy. Her funeral is today, so we are dedicating our Caturday post to The Pootie Queen. I’m sure she was greeted by a throng of critters at the Rainbow Bridge. Orange flowers were her favorites. Rest in peace my friend.
As for our anniversary, we celebrated that on Lastech’s day off (Wednesday) We relaxed and grilled some good food and had a glass of champagne. It was good.
Caturday: Endurance’s 1st orbital mission
This week the crew of the Endurance spent 36 hours under “flight conditions”: restricted space (trailer slide in) and environmental controls at minimum (running on battery power and partial water tank). The catonauts handled stress fairly well, thanks in large part to Feliway.
All three sought to spend time under covers since their favored “fort”, under the couch was greatly reduced by the trailer slide being pulled in. Traffic noise was also much greater and put them on edge a bit. Pepita required more exercise than usual to take the “edge” off, but the entire crew did very well otherwise. As usual for Tito, he would defer to Titanescu and Jenny, letting them eat first and claim humans’ laps before he would.
Tito also checked regularly on Pepita on his rounds. As for Jenny, unless she went straight for a spot under a tented cover between our knees, she would pace slowly back and forth between the pillows and the wall, purring and rubbing against us. Titan mostly slept through it all…
As time goes on, it seems clearer that they are happier here in the more confined space of the trailer than at the old apartment. And much of that I think has to do with the environment, which is quieter and allows them to enjoy more air moving through, and even more direct sunlight, through the screen door or skylight. They raise their head up to sniff at the breeze and go right back to their nap, apparently very contentedly.
The addition of Pepita to the crew may even have helped in some way. Jenny, in particular, is seen more than she was at the old apartment, where she tended to hide in a cupboard. While she still has some spots where she could hide if she wanted to, she chooses instead to come visit and spent more time with us on the bed.
Rudha-an here: The little move was harder on Pepita than it was on the cats. She was confined to her crate a lot more than usual. We’ve been trying to make up for that. Oh, and a miracle update. Titanescu still likes to go smack poor Pepi for no reason other than she exists. However, Pepi and Tito touched noses yesterday. They’re coming along nicely. Pepita is a tad too exuberant, so I have to keep her on a leash indoors, so that I can control where she goes. She could injure a cat without intending to do so.
Yesterday, they trimmed all the mulberry trees. Today we found this.
Now for a bit of Halloween fun
This is just funny. It’s also a brilliant way to get pets adopted. 🙂