When you have a cat, every day is filled with moments like this.
(I can tell she’s purring just from the way her stomach moves when breathing.)
(Compare this to a very similar clip I made of Dolly six years ago to see how far I’ve come with video.)
(Turn up the sound!)
I never have a lot of it, but when I do, it means I can scratch my cat with my chin.
Once again, taken with my iPhone.
Joel and Charlotte agreed to take care of Dolly while I was in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, the combination of another cat, a dog, a new environment, and my absence, stressed her out. She started marking her territory (on their couch), even with her own litter box in a secluded area, so they decided to bring her back to my house, and let Julie take care of her from then on.
I found this drawing on my white board when I got back. Along with an especially affectionate cat, it was a nice little thing to come home to.
I’m in Toronto right now, at John’s house. He has the cottage for his birthday weekend, so I took two extra days off work to see him. It’s kind of strange how much I’ve been seeing him lately. In the past, we’d go over a year without seeing each other because he was in Windsor for law school and I was in Ottawa without a car. But now that he’s been called to the bar and I’ve obtained the Civic, things have worked out.
We plan on going to the Ontario Science Centre today — something I’ve wanted to do for a while1 — then driving up to the cottage tonight. We’ll spend two days at the cottage2, maybe take a day trip to another town, and drive back on Sunday. Aaron also called me yesterday about his co-ed baby shower on Sunday, which i’m not sure if I’ll be attending yet, since I’ll have driven eight hours that day.
The drive was absolutely amazing. The weather was perfectly cool, and the sun took its glorious time setting over a few hours. I think the most satisfying part is getting to the section of highway where the 417 splits to the 416, and one can stay in the left lane and accelerate through the turn, leaving all the traffic behind.
I listened to some audio CDs of Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking on the way over. The concept is that our first reactions (made within a few seconds) are often intuitively correct, and that even after thinking about something for a long time, we end up going with our gut feelings anyway. We’re made to believe that the more important something is, the longer we should take to make a decision. I’m especially guilty of this3. Wally lent them to me in an effort to help me act faster so I don’t miss any opportunities. Not sure if they’ll help me, but the way it delves into processes of the human psyche is a very interesting listen nonetheless.
Left Dolly lots of food, and I’m hoping she doesn’t eat it all. The reason why I feed her by hand is because she doesn’t have any sense of how much to eat, and balloons up if not controlled. In either case, I expect a lot of poo in the litterbox when I get back.
I bought John a copy of Assassin’s Creed for his birthday, which thankfully was on his list of games for which to watch. It was developed by Ubisoft Montreal, the same studio who made Prince of Persia, and plays very much the same way. An open-world concept with lots of stealth elements. Certainly a game I could get into. We take turns playing, and it’s made me realize that I haven’t been playing much myself in the last few months.
Life has been somewhat overstimulating lately, and I can’t blame anyone but myself. After spending a day shopping for housewares with Julie last weekend, the house is a big mess, with things scattered over the counters and floors. I haven’t even had a chance to write about the last time I came to Toronto. It seems like life is going faster than I can keep up. I’m just trying to enjoy it, especially when the weather is this beautiful.
After all, life is for the living. This won’t last forever. I get to look forward to some time alone when everything is settled.
When you live with a cat who sleeps on things to mark her territory, you never wonder why your clothes are covered with hair.
One of the advantages of having such a lovable cat is that people want to buy her things. I make a conscious effort not to spoil her with human food, so she happily accepts toys and treats from people.
Like this bunny filled with catnip that Louise bought for her.
One thing she really likes to do is grab her catnip toys by the teeth and shake them to release the scent. I don’t give her catnip very often, so in stoner terms, this meas she’s a lightweight.
And oh how she loves it; within a few minutes, the fur of the toy is covered in cat drool.
I drove home from class tonight with the windows down and the music cranked. It’s not the songs, it’s not the singing, it’s not the speed, it’s the air that affects you. That smell.
The Operation by Charlotte Gainsbourg is the ultimate night-time driving track when you’re feeling single and electrified.1 The baseline drives you.
I had The Operation by Charlotte Gainsbourg playing here.
i want to explore you
i’m gonna get under your skin
so you can feel me running through your veinsi want to examine
every inch of your frame
the pressure points that cause your joy and pain
When I got home, I showered, got into in my PJs, took Dolly in my arms, and stood out on the patio. I wanted her to feel what I was feeling under that night sky. She clung to my arms, but didn’t make a sound. It was unlike her, because any time Dolly gets picked up she immediately begins purring. The night was too much for her.
I think it’s too much for me sometimes.
For now, I’ll live vicariously through Maggie. Except I won’t be getting drunk on Sparks (the orange kind), I won’t be going dancing, I’ll just keep running into my crushes at every turn, and I’ll keep meeting the asshole, idiot guys they go out with. And like Maggie, I’ll refuse to be that guy. The one who talks shit about other guys, the one who flosses his cash money, the one who drives fast to prove he’s got a dick.
Yes, I’m breaking my post order because of Maggie. It’s like she made me write this. I would totally hoolahoop and make Dragon Ball Z poses with her. I just found out that I don’t know how to spell hoolahoop. Hula hoop. There we go.
Maybe this dry spell is making me loopy.
I think I’ll sleep with the windows open tonight.
Well it wasn’t so much my fault as hers for walking by one of my candles as I was lighting it.
Before giving her food, I use to ask Dolly to shake or beg or give paw, and she’d lift one paw up (always her right one) for me. Now she’s associated the paw-lifting action with being fed, so she skips the step of me saying anything and automatically does it.
She’ll do anything for food really.
New layout. Back to my old grayscale style, because that’s how I’ve been feeling lately. Neutral. Took me about three days, mostly from scratch. I was satisfied with the old one, until two months ago, when I began reading several design/typography/colour books at work. The powers that be let me spend around $300 on educational material, and as I explored each one with fervor and thirst, I began to notice all the fundamental design mistakes I made. Ignorance is bliss.
It’s Friday night, and with my legs curled under me, Dolly sniffs at my feet, looking for an opportune space on my lap. Fall is approaching. The window in my room remains open as soon as the sun sets. I’ve been overwhelmingly busy, and as a result, I haven’t quite caught up on any sleep in the last two weeks.
Yup.
The Canon Speedlite 430EX flash lets me take advantage of a 1/200 X-sync speed, which means that high-speed shots such as these are now possible in low lighting conditions. I picked one up this week, so most of my free time has been spent learning the capabilities of an external flash unit. The tilt-and-swivel head means that I can bounce the flash off a ceiling to soften the light, or take advantage of the surroundings, such as bouncing it off my stove (the picture on the left) or off my fridge (the picture on the right). There’s also a low-profile AF assist beam that’s a huge improvement over the seizure inducing on-board flash unit.
I decided to go with a Canon brand flash so I could have full E-TTL metering support (which fires an undetectable low-powered pre-flash for evaluative metering done through the lens) to match the Rebel XT shell. One of the coolest things about the 430EX is that a set of motors automatically adjust the zoom range to match the lens, and it can be used as a slave unit that can be optically (which also means remotely) triggered from a master unit for up to four light sources.
Even though there are tons of other accessories I’d like to have, such as a Sunpak hand strap (which would be a good compromise between the safety of a neck strap and the convenience of no strap), some Kenko extension tubes (for macro photography), or a portable microdrive, I thought that a flash would currently best serve my needs. This isn’t even to mention the options for some sweet glass, like a lens with image stabilization, a telescoping range, or even something from the L series which I’d have to put a second mortgage on my house to afford. I think that I’m only beginning to understand how expensive a hobby photography is.
Dolly’s new nickname is Butterball. Kat’s christening. She sure hasn’t lost any weight lately. Dolly, that is, not Kat.
I’ve tried many times to capture the actual size of Dolly’s current girth, but the camera doesn’t really do a good job of it. I figured that the only way to accurately show how large she’s gotten is with stereoscopic images. That way, one can actually tell how much Dolly is coming off the couch with a bit of depth perception. It’s never easy to take stereoscopic pictures of a cat. Usually they’ll move or twitch when the alternating photo is being taken, so it almost always has to be done while they’re asleep. Even a twitch of the camera strap, or a shuffling of feet will be enough to pique the curiosity of a cat
Dolly’s head looks small in comparison to the rest of her body, but her head is actually normal for a cat her age, and it’s her pot belly that’s grown out of proportion. Every time someone comes over, I usually get a comment on how much she’s grown. Outward.
There once was a kitten who enjoyed sleeping in a little wicker basket on the top shelf of my desk. I bought her a green pillow that had a removable case, and stuffed it in the wicker basket so she would be more comfortable. She was very happy in there, with her birds-eye view of the entire room, and would spend hours upon hours in the lofty enclosure.
Soon, however, she noticed that the basket was getting smaller. It got harder and harder for her to jump in without knocking other things over. Eventually, she stopped sleeping in there altogether, as she outgrew the basket and wouldn’t fit in its sheltering walls.
Eventually, I moved the pillow to my bed, without the wicker basket, and the cat, no longer a kitten, resumed her naps there. The pillow, on the other hand, remained the same size, and no longer supports the sheer girth of the once tiny feline. However, she continues to enjoy sleeping on it, and has no problem accomodating for space restrictions with an uncushioned limb or two.
