fivecats journal

Tower Innards
March 2010 Greensboro, NC
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A Few Things

28 in 28 was dropped about the same time keirf (who wrote up the list) dropped it. This was coincidental, as it was apparent that my beloved cat, Ani, wasn't doing well. My attention turned elsewhere, as it should have, and that's that.

Ani is doing pretty well, all in all. The open wound is still there on her leg, but she's getting around alright, thanks to some pain meds. The lump at her shoulder hasn't grown any and the wound isn't getting any worse. (We were told one side effect of the pain management med was that it can slow down the form of cancer she most likely has)

I still hear the clock ticking on my time with her. Each day is, quite literally, a gift to be with her.

More? ( Click on through to the other side... )
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Creek
January 2010 Raleighwood, NC
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Day 29 → hopes and dreams for the next 365 days.

I suppose much of the next 365 has to do with the events of yesterday.

( Click on through to the other side... )

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Lake Johnson Reflections
January 2010 Raleighwood, NC
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Day 26→Your week, in great detail

See, here's another "in great detail" that just doesn't work. Even I am not all that interested in reliving my week in great detail, especially since much of the things in the week that stand out are problems encountered at werk (which, as I've said, I don't write about).

My week thus far? In brief? (Since it is only Tuesday, after all) ( Click through to the other side... )

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Open
January 2010 Raleighwood, NC
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Day 23→A YouTube video

Easy. Here's Part One:

Lengthy rant follows. If interested, ( click on through to the other side... )

Now they don't even need to take the new president into the smoky room and show him the film of the Kennedy assassination shot from the grassy knoll any more.

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Lake Johnson View
January 2010 Raleighwood, NC
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Day 21→A recipe

A recipe? Oh, yeah, sure. Like I don't know you're just trying to get the family Pumpkin Pie recipe out of me. Like I'm really dumb enough to fall for that innocent "oh, it's just Day 21's blog topic!" kinda stuff. Right.

Not having been born yesterday I'll have to come up with something else. How about tonight's dinner?

If you're not interested, the top part of this LJ cut was for you. If you are interested, simply ( click on through to the other side... )

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Night Welding
January 2010 Raleighwood, NC
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Day 19 → A talent of yours

Merriam Webster Online says a talent is

3 : the natural endowments of a person
4 a : a special often athletic, creative, or artistic aptitude

I'm guessing that means, "things you can do that don't make you any money."

Let's see... I juggle. I can play a passable rhythm guitar. I cook & bake.

Oh, and I take pictures occasionally. And write.

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Raleighwood Bus Stop Sunset
January 2010 Raleighwood, NC
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Day 16 --> A song that makes you cry (or nearly)

I remember first hearing John Denver's version of Casey on the cheap, single speaker cassette deck I had as a kid. I was surprisingly moved by a song, about people and actions that i couldn't relate to, but understood through the power of Kris Kristopherson's words and his ability to portray two lives in a simple, quiet song.

Listening to it again, after 30+ years, I still think it's a great song and a great version.

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Open
January 2010 Outside Raleighwood, NC
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Day 14→A non-fictional book

I grew up reading fiction. Standard kidlit transformed into mysteries (many passed along by my father as soon as he finished them) and then a bit of scifi and fantasy as they were passed along by various friends. The closest I got to wandering the non-fiction stacks in the library I grew up going to was during a time when I was reading Plays.

Other than that, non-fiction was the stuff of text books, which meant school, which meant invariably dull, dry resitations of facts, dates and events. No thanks.

In recent years, thanks in part to Bonn's influence, I've been reading more non-fiction than fiction. And of those non-fiction books, the ones written by Simon Winchester stand far and above the rest as not only the most informative, but the most well-written and the best at putting an event/thing/whatever in a full context. Winchester clearly knows his history, but even more importantly, he knows how to tell a story. And that's the beauty of all of his books, they're all stories, they're told in ways that make the times, the people and the bare facts come alive.

I started with the audio version of The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary a story that starts off with a senseless murder and matches it up with the creation of the OED. I followed that up with The Map That Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology, A Crack in the Edge of the World: America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906 and Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded: August 27, 1883. Each book is very different from the other, but each book was told just as well and each held my attention throughout the story.

Winchester is one of the few authors I feel confident about reading whatever they've written with the full expectation of learning something new and enjoying whatever he's writing about.

(NOTE: I've listened to Winchester read the unabridged versions of each of these titles and definitely recommend the audio versions)


Oh, and I should mention that the non-highway use diesel pump is only a few miles away from the local mini auto race track. They race on Friday nights and one night I'd like to take my camera and head over there sometime.

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QWERTY
September 2009 Outside Raleighwood, NC
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Day 13→A fictional book

Meaning a book in the fiction genre or a book that does not exist, that is fictional in and of itself?

It must be part of my nature that I'm getting Gramatically Grumpier as I get older. Why can't people just write clearly?

So, taking my cue from nalsa I'll believe this means A Book That Does Not Exist in Our Plane of Existence.

And that can only mean The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

I wrote about Adams' H2G2 a few days back so I won't go into it all again here. Suffice it to say, as a fictional work, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy cannot be topped. Even if you tried, they'd send something back into the past and sue to into submission before you could ever try and write your competing guide.

As a Guide, it should be noted that perhaps the most helpful bit to The Book is the phrase, "Don't Panic" which is written in large, friendly letters on the cover. That sums things up rather nicely, I believe.

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Self Portrait
September 2009 Raleighwood, NC
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Day 11→A photo of you taken recently

When I was a kid I was fat.

There's really no other word for it. Fat. There were times that it didn't bother me, times I didn't notice it. Then I'd have to go clothes shopping with my mother and we be in the "Husky" section where all of the fat kid clothes were. Or the time I was at a birthday party and the mother of another "husky" kid was talking to my mother, looking at me, and saying, "It's so good to see another boy... like my son."

In the summer months between 6th and 7th grade (the transition summer between Elementary school and Jr. High, back in the day) I shot up several inches. My weight redistributed and suddenly, without doing anything intentional, I slimmed down. By my late teens/early twenties I was even skinny.

For years before that growth spurt, the only photograph of my my mother had was one taken at the beach during a summer vacation. I was walking back up from the ocean to our umbrella and towel demarked piece of the beach and saw her pointing the camera at me. I quickly put the inflatable raft I'd been using in front of me, giving her a photograph of the blue raft, my ankles and feet.

Yesterday I wrote that I still see myself, in my mind's eye, at about 22 or so, and how it's still a shock to not see that younger face whenever I look in the mirror. It's a big part of why there are so few current photos of me that either don't have a camera covering most of my face or have me obscured by... something. (psychedelics, hair, my hand while I'm sleeping, etc)

I'm sure I'll get over it one day. Eventually.

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