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Meet my cousin Sue's latest diversion:
This little one got left behind in the barn when her mother moved the litter, so is being raised by humans. Or, perhaps the humans are being raised by her.
When that first photograph came up on my computer screen, I put out my hand to rub her tummy. I've never even met her, and I'm captivated. I made myself count the creatures for whom I am currently responsible: 2 dogs; 2 cats; 2 budgies; 9 goldfish; many squirrels; countless wild birds. Repeat after me:
No, I cannot have a kitten. No, I cannot have a kitten. No, I cannot . . .
For further critter coveting, try:
UPDATE: My aunt sent another shot of PeeWee -- I know, this could go on forever. I promise to devote some future Friday Cat Blogging posts to this exceedingly cute critter:
blinded, overcome, wrapped in reams of colour
she untwirls her dark cacoon, becomes
a kubuki dancer
in small poems | Permalink | Comments (0)
I sleep beneath a shaved,
clouded moon. My dreams
are crowded & evasive. I try
to catch them but they pass
me by like geese, invisible
in morning fog. All the news
forecasts disaster. My bookis filled with blankness. I forget
to wind the clock. The geese
call again. Ducks reply across
the darkly misted river. Dry
leaves whisper down from
pale-limbed birch trees.
The houseplants wither.
Via Daily Kos -- It's long, but it's worth it:
[This report may be distributed or republished with attribution to Strategic Forecasting, Inc. at www.stratfor.com. For media requests, partnership opportunities, or commercial distribution or republication, please contact [email protected].
...© Copyright 2005 Strategic Forecasting Inc. All rights reserved.]
GEOPOLITICAL INTELLIGENCE REPORT 10.17.2005
The Importance of the Plame Affair
By George Friedman
There are three rules concerning political scandal in the United States. First, every administration has scandals. Second, the party in opposition will always claim that there has never been an administration as corrupt as the one currently occupying the White House. Three, two is almost never true. It is going to be tough for any government to live up to the Grant or Harding administrations for financial corruption, or the Nixon and Lincoln administrations for political corruption -- for instance, was Lincoln's secretary of war really preparing a coup d'etat before the president's assassination? And sex scandals -- Clinton is not the gold standard. Harding was having sex with his mistress in the Oval Office -- and no discussion was possible over whether it was actually sex. Andrew Jackson's wife was unfairly accused of being a prostitute. Grover Cleveland had an illegitimate child. Let's not start on John F. Kennedy.
in Current Affairs, Politics | Permalink | Comments (1)
Noun 1. cat sleep cat sleep - a short sleep (usually not in bed)
. . . cats sleep about 16 hours a day, which equates to about two-thirds of their life. In fact, cats get more sleep than virtually any other animal, about twice as much as most mammals.
Being nocturnal predators, cats tend to sleep during the day and keep awake during the night . . . If you provide plenty of stimuli during the day, in the form of cat toys or a companion cat, the cat is more likely to keep awake during the day and then spend the night sleeping.
Why would you want to wear your cat out in the daytime?
There is something about the way autumn
light enters this room through the yellow
leaves of the birch. Low and soft, it pads
through this house;this house with its masks and its china,
its paintings of horses and skies. It touches
my face in the morning. I know it is not you
that I miss,but loving you, wanting you. Spooned mornings
and naked afternoons, running like children
in the grownup house. The waiting for you
to come home.
This exotic creature was crossing the path the other day -- does anyone know what it is? Yes, I realize it's some kind of -- or something like -- a caterpillar. Maybe. This photograph does not do it justice; those little circles are lined with an almost neon blue.
I've also had a number of far less beautiful creepy-crawlies cross my path lately, and because of them find it necessary to implement comment and trackback moderation on all of my sites. This means that, when you leave a comment or trackback to one of my posts, it will not appear on the site until I have personally approved it.
This feature, and Authentication, have just been added to TypePad's spam fighting arsenal. I had hoped to not use them, but am finding other efforts increasingly useless, and deleting spam after spam is tedious.
So I hope that you, gentle readers, will not find this a discouragement. I love receiving real comments; it's an important reinforcement for me.
[& I see that TypePad's spellcheck is not working . . . ]
in About This Site, Blogging, Critters | Permalink | Comments (3)
The roses begin to fade and I consider
closing the windows at night but choose
blankets instead. I dream that an old friendhas taken to drink again, and the pain of it
blooms in the dark cavern of my chest, a deep-
red lily, a beautiful wound. Berries ripenon the bushes. Uncountable birds. One bright
morning I find a kestrel in the dogwood,
eyeing the well-fed sparrows. Flowerbedshum with gold wasps, black wasps, grass-
hoppers, a black-and-white cat crouched
beneath the clematis. Old friend, how is itthat people are at ease with one another?
When I return from my walk by the river,
a hundred finches fly up from the gate.
in Poems | Permalink | Comments (1)
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