Ramble

To break with the general tone of this blog for a moment in order to make an appeal to my readers.

Many of you may have been aware of the recent wild fires in California. In fact one of those fires, the “Tea Fire,” hit near the last city I lived in and harmed some people I knew. Here’s the story. Lance and Carla were recently married. She works as a manager at the comic book store and he works as a security guard at a mall down the street. They were renting a bungalow in a town called Montecito. They had received the evacuation notice and were gathering some small belongings when they noticed the fire was moving very quickly towards them. They ran for the car, but were overtaken in a flash fire and burned horribly. Somehow they managed to drive themselves to the nearest fire station where some paramedics were present (luckily) who then transported them to the nearest hospital. Their burns were so severe they were transferred to UC Irvine’s hospital and put into a medically-induced coma while their burns heal. Lance’s burns are so severe, the doctors fear he may have burns on the insides of his lungs from inhaling super-heated air. They have lost everything and because they work for small companies, they have no health insurance to cover their medical expenses. They are currently being put through the medicaid system to pay for the expenses of their medical treatment and recovery. In the mean time, some other friends started a Yahoo user group to coordinate donations of clothes, furniture, gift cards and other things they will need once they get out - they are trying to avoid taking cash donations in order to prevent Lance and Carla’s disqualification for medicaid since those monies would be considered an asset under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (this provision allows the state to confiscate savings, trusts, and other liquid assets to offset the cost of medicaid). Please check out the user group and see if you can help in any way.

http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/lanceandcarla/

Hopefully, we’ll all figure out a way to help Lance and Carla soon. Thank you for your patience and assistance while reading this.

Sorry that my posts have degenerated to once a month events. But that makes them special, right?

Well, on to the topic at hand. Forgive me. I really really should NEVER leave my house without a camera. This morning, as the frost caked the ground, an entire clutch of wild turkeys haunted out field. I would estimate their number in the range of about 50 or so. They were pecking through the former corn field, finding bits and pieces of corn left over from the harvest a month ago. Though I have no pictures of these guys, a smaller brood has long called our yard home. Here’s a picture (crossing my fingers and hoping it works) that was taken of the smaller group in late summer. Enjoy!

Turkeys!

OKay, so my wife and I were looking at Craig’s list and just browsing for bargains or whatever when a very heartfelt, touching post about a guy needing a foster home for his cat caught our attention. The title was “Super Cool Mr. Patches….McGee” and it told the tale of a cat that needed to move on because ‘the guy’s’ wife was pregnant in the “voice” of the cat. It seems that the guy - let’s call him ‘Alan’ - was married recently and his wife was afraid that the baby would be smothered by the cat. Yeah, seriously. Anyway, we answered the ad (we were the only ones who did other than those who lambasted the guy for giving up the cat for such a flimsy reason.

Anyway, we arrive at the house and pick up the cat; who did not want to go quietly into the carrier. While ‘Alan’ chased the cat around, we made small talk with the wife.

“Who wrote the cat ad?” we asked “it was very cute and very touching.”

“Oh, he did” she said, indicating her husband.

“Oh, you must really be attached to him.” we replied.

“Well, he is.” she countered, pointing at her husband.

Hmmm….my spidey sense was tingling. While ‘Alan’ was chasing the Patches all over the house, we met the larger, older cat that ‘Alan’ was keeping; he was a psycho cat who loved on us, purred and meowed at us, but if we looked at him, he’d hiss and bite! Eventually, ‘Alan’ caught Patches and put him into the bag. We promised that the moment they wanted him back, they could have him. ‘Alan’ said that sounded great. His wife crossed her arms and left the room.

Fast forward 10 days later. Patches, now re-dubbed SuperCoolMisterPatches (one word) was slowly getting acclimated to our house and our largest cat, Nuck, had been exhibiting all the signs of a boy crush on the newcomer - wanting to lay next to him, wanting to touch him, sniff him, whatever. Nuck came in from a short stint outside and  saw SuperCoolMisterPatches….

And attacked him! We were alarmed, but since it was an exchange of swatting paws, didn’t think much. We put Nuck in the basement and were considering having to re-think this whole arrangement. Later that evening, after we let the two mngle again, Nuck took off after SuperCoolMisterPatches and attacked him again; this time there was much yowling, hissing, fur flying and it scared SuperCoolMisterPatches so much he peed all over the room. That sealed it; we called ‘Alan’ the next morning to ask him to find another home for SuperCoolMisterPatches because the cat’s life was potentially in danger. Initially he said yes. Then he told his wife. He called us back and said…

“My wife won’t let me take him back” Suspicions confirmed. It seemed that ‘Alan had gotten into HUGE arguments over the cats from the moment they were married (ah, wedded bliss) and it got worse once she found out she was pregnant. Now, at barely 3 months prgnant, she had delivered an ultimatum; either the cats go or she does.  ‘Alan’ compromised and rid the household of SuperCoolMisterPatches, but was sticking to his guns about Psycho cat. IMHO, it’s only a matter of months before that house is completely cat free.

We have since been rotating the cats, not allowing Nuck and SuperCoolMisterPatches be in the same room together; the other two cats tolerate SuperCoolMisterPatches to a degree and there are no fights.

One night, about five or six days ago, we got a huge frost in the country here. SuperCoolMisterPatches kept meowing at my wife - who was on the phone with her sister at the time - and trying to get her attention. Eventually, she got off the phone only to see SuperCoolMisterPatches drop a dead field mouse in fron of her and purr loudly, squinting his eyes. Good cat! and not a fluke; he caught two more that same night! and one the next night. And another the next! SuperCoolMisterPatches - the always indoor, city-living cat was an awesome mouser! He truly is Super Cool!

Now we’re hoping htat ‘Alan’s’ whife has to deal with field mice and has no cat to rely upon. Yes, I’m mean and petty. But what kind of woman”falls in love” with a man, marries him, and then decides to change everything about him, including excising the things he loves in his life? How f*cked up is that?

I may have mentioned in my last post a little trouble I had with…er…starting fires.

Don’t laugh! It’s harder than it seems….

Okay, maybe a chuckle is okay.

Anyway, the leaves are starting to turn, the corn has been harvested by the farmer, and it’s only 87 degrees out today. ”

One of these things is not like the other, one of these things just doesn’t belong.”

Oh SURE, I finally master the ancient and delicate art of building an iron-stove-warping wood fire and it gets all hot on me! Ah well, what can you do?

So, I have these other side projects going on all the time; making money here and there a bit at a time and just kinda seeing what happens. I came across this whole sub-culture of people who make money from the internet and decided to drink the Kool-Aid. Well, needless to say I was surprised at what people get paid for, especially me! I was asked to write 20 different articles of about 150 words a piece on men’s jewelry. WTF? I have no clue about jewelry to begin with and I was surprised to learn that men even wear the stuff - well, other than New Jersey Italians and Rappers (not that there’s anything wrong with being Italian or a Rapper…it’s just I can’t think of anyone else who both wears lots of jewelry and is male)

Other projects have been far, far more interesting. I did an article on artists who specialize in Dungeons and Dragons art like Todd Lockwood and Larry Elmore. But I found some others who are less famous. I’m going to provide a link to an artist I who I think is pretty cool - tell her I said “Hi” if you visit her site:

http://www.nomadicbard.com/

Meanwhile, I’m going to go out and sacrifice a pumpkin to the cold air spirits and hope that autumn will retun.

It has come to my attention that I have been remiss in writing my little Blog. This is absolutely true. Unfortunately, I’ve occupied myself with other projects and have thus neglected all of you. You may notice a few changes in the coming days as I shift some of the older content to archives in order not to take up too much room on Jasmine’s hard drive (thank you Jasmine!). Now, on to the show:

Autumn is upon us and I have to say I really, really missed the seasons. First of all, the cool night air is WONDERFUL after the humid, hot summer. The smell of wood fires and the sounds of migrating animals make me happy. The farmer who rents the 7 or so acres near us harvested his feed corn the other day, so our view of the trees, bike trail and river beyond is absolutely breathtaking. The leaves are just beginning to change  and the squirrels, chipmunks, groundhogs, and various and sundry rodentia are busy packing away for the coming winter. Because the house is old, we heat the house by burning wood. A tenderfoot such as myself figured “oh, that’ll be easy” but a few test fires in the woodburning stove in the front room disabused me of that notion right away.

Who knew it’d be so hard to pursuade wood to burn? I did the whole tinder first thing, followed by progressively larger sticks and topped off with a nice seasoned, split log of Ash. The roaring miniblaze promptly went out.

Bastard!

Blowing on the hot coals re-ignited the fire, which burned merrily (if fitfully) for a while before going out again.

Damn you!

Blowing on the coals again resurrected the flames and this time I added another log with lots of protusions and whorls which, I assumed, would promote adequate burning. And I was right. For a while. It went out after the logs shifted and smothered the fire.

Gaaaah!

More blowing on the coals, this time topped witht he addition of more tinder brought the blaze back. I then added another knotty, curvy piece of wood. Finally, the fire was acceptable - if not terribly efficient. Slamming the door in frustration, I was rewarded with…

A massive, blazing inferno which created whirlwinds of fire and a hot, bright burn. Note for future reference: let the vents do their job as the fire seemd to be dying of an overabundance of cool, damp air.