Steve got his lion cut today. He was pissy and irritated the entire drive there, crapped all over the groomer three times, and gave me an earful the whole ride home, but now he is happy as can be.
Cat Blogging
Maxwell Update
A quick Maxwell update:
His royal fucking highness has decided that he wants salad.
Saturday Night Maxwell
Been a while since I have given you all an update on Maxwell, and he is basically just part of the pack now. He likes to go outside and he likes to sleep on the bed on the third floor looking out onto the yard, and he basically thinks he owns the house now. He also can get places that I am not used to having to think about protecting, like, for example, the kitchen countertops:
His favorite thing is to be held like a baby, though. He will sit in my arms for an hour while I am working, just being a good boy.
Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Sometimes Life Gives You… Pollen
For me…never really had spring allergies (except for when the oaks leaf out) until this year. ??????????
— Jeremy Reiner (@jreineron7) April 11, 2023
(TBH, I thought it was the ferschlugging oak trees!)
Allergy seasons are getting longer & more severe. Climate change is the reason & the U.S. Dept of Agriculture says allergy seasons feature 21% more pollen than 3 decades ago. Also, airborne pollen starts 20 days earlier & lasts 10 days longer than in 1990 https://t.co/275nic5M1m pic.twitter.com/c3ikIECa4N
— delthia ricks ?? (@DelthiaRicks) April 7, 2023
I retreat to my happy place…
— place where cat shouldn't be (@catshouldnt) April 11, 2023
he refused to elaborate upon questioning https://t.co/aqQdXEqVoz pic.twitter.com/mvEoXoGjO2
— Fishtopher the Cat (@mrfishtopher) April 10, 2023
Sandal sees all your sins and forgives them. he is unbothered by your worst. truly, all humans are equal in the wide, yellow eyes of pobrecita chancleta.
by "equal" i mean "oafish and vaguely disappointing," but the point stands pic.twitter.com/3iZNhlWMIf
— Dave Wagner (@Dbwagner104) April 11, 2023
Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Sometimes Life Gives You… PollenPost + Comments (47)
Saturday Morning Open Thread: Murphy Sanctifying the Weekend
Algerian imam allows brief paws in Ramadan prayers ?? pic.twitter.com/cMxTawNDe7
— DW News (@dwnews) April 6, 2023
It’s a major ceremonial weekend for all three of the Abrahamic faiths, and of course Murphy the Trickster God would never miss such ripe targets.
Most American possible version of a religious celebration: Hallelujah, the Muslims have *money*!
For this year’s Muslim holy month of Ramadan, Target rolled out its first dedicated Ramadan and Eid collection, including decoration kits with crescent and lantern-shaped cutouts. It’s one of the latest signs of big U.S. retailers catering to American Muslim shoppers. pic.twitter.com/Z225cgjeNJ
— The Associated Press (@AP) April 4, 2023
During the “Burning of Judas” celebrations that take place every Holy Saturday in some Mexican neighborhoods, people gather to light fireworks that destroy colorful figures embodying evil. https://t.co/r6Qz7QDpve
— The Associated Press (@AP) April 8, 2023
After two months of hard work assembling and painting devil-like cardboard figures popularly known as “Judas,” Mexican artisan Marcela Villarreal is eager to watch her creations burn.
Villarreal and dozens of fellow crafters created the figures ahead of the annual “Burning of Judas,” a celebration that takes place in Mexico every Holy Saturday, when people across the country gather in public plazas to light fireworks that will destroy these colorful figures made as symbolic embodiments of evil.
This festivity — filled with satirical humor — is not associated with the Holy Week celebrations led by the Catholic Church in this mostly Catholic country. The practice is common in several Latin American nations and in some parts of Greece.
Originally, the burning figures were effigies of Judas Iscariot, the apostle who betrayed Jesus, according to the Biblical account of the days leading up to Christ’s crucifixion. Nowadays, though, Mexican artisans shape their Judas like red, horned devils or other characters considered evil by society…
Researcher Abraham Domínguez, in an article published by the National Institute of Anthropology and History, wrote that this ritual originated in Europe during the Middle Ages and reached America with the Spanish conquest…
“They are burned because of what people are accusing them of,” Villarreal said. It is a way of expressing disagreement with humor, she said.
Villarreal has spent more than a decade working in “cartonería,” as the craft of creating papier-mache sculptures is known. Most notably, “cartonería” creations fill Mexican streets during the Day of the Dead celebrations in late October and early November.
Inside each figure lies a reed skeleton covered with newspaper and cardboard. Depending on weather conditions and how fast the glue dries, it can take several weeks of work to be ready…
A reed skeleton covered with newspapers & gaudily painted cardboard would be the perfect representation of SO MANY reprehensible American figures in this moment. Not just TFG and his political followers, but all his media enablers; the Apartheid Princeling; the (other) Silicon Valley jeeniuses like Sam Bankman-Fried…
(Of course, the MAGAts would demand their own ‘judases’, stuff the figures full of fireworks or black powder, and incinerate whole neighborhoods in their attempts to exorcise Dark Brandon and the Woke Monster. Bad news for first responders and innocent bystanders!)
Saturday Morning Open Thread: Murphy Sanctifying the WeekendPost + Comments (117)
Friday Night Cat Update
My parents are cleaning out a storage unit so we got to take some furniture from it. We got a nice leather armchair and a matching ottoman, and we’re going to get a couch later too. The armchair is great. I’m working on a reading/writing nook in the office, and it’s perfect for it.
No sooner had I gotten it set up, when…
I’m ambivalent about the protector I put on… it’s ugly, but I can shore up the fit, which should help. More importantly it will keep the chair from getting ruined in a month. But now I never get to see most of the leather… choices, choices.
Open thread! I’m playing Return to Monkey Island, which is really fun and also good homework for the adventure game I’m working on. What are you all up to?
Saturday Night Maxwell Update
It’s been a couple of weeks, and Maxwell has really made himself home. His favorite place to be is WHEREVER I AM, and he especially loves being on the desk to the right of my keyboard, where he knows he has a captive arm on a mouse:
All in all, I think he is adjusting well, and everyone has sort of settled into the new reality that there are now four of us here and there is room and food for everyone, so It’s pretty calm and casual these days.
Maxwell is far more social than Steve with strangers, too. Normally it takes a sitter 3-4 days before they see Steve, but when I drove to SC on Wednesday to load up my parent’s stuff, Max was out and about with the sitter on day one. Thurston of course is draped all over anyone who walks into the house.
So things are well.