Musical Interlude

Talented violin virtuoso David Garrett plays Czardas, a traditional Hungarian folk dance.








And simply because it's so very beautiful, Garrett playing Debussy's Clair de Lune.





--Cat

Hottest Day

July 29, 2009

Air conditioner alert!



We aren't used to temperatures this high.
We don't like temperatures this high.


There's something oh so quiet about a hot-hot day. You can almost see the flowers wilt. Birds make liberal use of the birdbath -- wish I had a picture for they truly frolic in the water like exuberant children.

Birds being birds, they always return to the feeders.





Cute birds aside, too many more days like this and I'm going to Antarctica. I hear Antarctica is melting. (sigh)

Okay. But it's still cold on Mars.



Mind you, once it's colonized by humans and they carry on as is their habit, Mars is bound to heat up.
Martial Warming?

--Cat

Adding PS: the heat wave is over for now (for the summer, we hope.)
Mars will have to wait.

The moment I saw him ....

I had to have him!

Yes, a Teddy Bear. But not just any bear - this one had the exact face shape of the Teddy I had when I was very young.



My first Teddy had stiff brown "fur" and when turned upside down and righted again he grunted what I presumed was a bear-like sound.

Unlike the old one, this new Teddy is cuddly and soft and machine washable. But it was the face, that dear, fondly remembered face that tugged at my heart.

I don't recall what happened to my first Teddy bear; lost in transit, perhaps. Or the girl believed she had outgrown him and packed him away, along with her other childhood toys.

The trouble with packing things away is that they are seldom if ever seen again. And often forgotten, until fate bestows a reunion of sorts.



Now and then everyone, no matter what their age, needs a Teddy bear to hug.

--Cat

The Weather Channel

Truly one of the more interesting channels...

Not merely for the weather reports, but for weather news and related tidbits.

Recently it was reported that because of global warming the snow packs enjoyed by skiers will gradually decline.

Seventy years from now the ski season will be half what it is now, and this will of course impact the future of the winter Olympics. No snow, no Olympics.

This got me thinking. Seventy years from now no one will remember how it was in 2009 or before. The winters of yesteryear will become a novelty. Quaint pictures, old movies and tv shows will be of passing interest to young people, much like when our studies took us to previous ice ages.

Seventy years from now my grandchildren will be in their seventies, eighties, and nineties. Perhaps they will reminisce about skiing, snowboarding, tobogganing in the olden days.

I might be a memory, the grandmother who sat at her computer and wrote things.

And after that I'll become a name on a genealogy list.

I need to stop projecting.

This really isn't about me.

I truly hope snow is abundant for Olympics into the year 5000.

--Cat

In search of the sweet stuff

And didn't "they" say Hummingbirds return in April?

My husband was coming out of the garage when he, literally, came face to face with a hummer.

Where's the juice, the little bird seemed to demand.

John hustled in and mixed the syrup, hung the feeders, and a short time later the customer arrived.

It's uncanny how they remember from year to year






--Cat

Musical Interlude

You know how some tunes stick in your mind and refuse to leave?

I had a flashback to a song by Roger Miller. (Jan 2, 1936 - Oct 25, 1992)

Namely: You Don't Want My Love - (In The Summertime When All The Trees And Leaves Are Green)

From 1960 (gulp) Was I even born then? Well, maybe, but I was very, very young.

I found it on You Tube but couldn't embed it, so here's the link


Here is a hilarious version by The Muppets (Oh, how I loved them!)






--Cat

Snow, Snow, Go Away

Yes, yes, it was a lovely sight. One should have the privilege of seeing this at least once every five years. Seven or eight years would be better.



It's been heralded as the biggest dump of snow in the area since sometime in the sixties.
I believe it, though I've lived here only since 1980.

The solid flaky sort of rain first hit the ground December 17th. After one or two clear but icy cold days it began to fall in earnest on the 22nd. And it fell, and fell, and caused incredible hardship for people counting on all forms of transportation.

Truly, people here don't like/fear/can't/refuse to drive when it snows. Warnings not to drive blared across the airwaves.

Because of bad road conditions on Christmas Eve, we delayed the stuffed bird meal until the 28th. (It was just as good.)

It's warmed up (but only slightly) and rained (a lot). But dang it, the snow has not disappeared.
And today -- horrors -- it snowed a bit at noon, dancing, swirling fluffs that seemed to smugly leer, "You ain't done with us, yet!"
.
I say enough! We've had our fun, and our White Christmas.

This makes me wonder why people dream of a white Christmas. What's the big attraction? I think we've been brainwashed since that song came out to believe snow at Christmas = perfection.

No, snow just causes messy trouble and means that it's cold.

Front of my house

My nostalgic inner child remembers sledding, building snowmen, having snowball fights, dressing in twenty layers of clothing (ugh). My inner artist sees the beauty in dark pines and cedars webbed with white, branches bending low beneath the weight...

What am I saying--during such delightful events the power could go out at any time!

--Cat

Merry Christmas

My favorite Christmas song - O Holy Night, performed by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra


(no longer available)




My thoughts exactly:




-- Cat

Music

Il Divo --

Operatic pop quartet. Interesting Wikipedia info here

I love the way they blend their voices and the wonderful songs they sing.








This is my favorite, done up in a pretty collage:






--Cat

Oct 3 - In Memoriam - Kevan F Hartwell

Remembering my father:

Kevan F Hartwell Dec 21, 1920 - Oct 3, 2001

He who has gone, so we but cherish his memory, abides with us,
more potent, nay, more present than the living man.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Always remembered, always loved-- --the Family

--Cat

The Birds and the Bees

The bird ---



Who needed a place to build a nest. She found a lovely, flowery spot --



And proceeded to build her nest inside --


In due time two speckled eggs appeared --


~Updates to come


The bee --


The flowers and the trees --




And the moon up above --


Hmm, sounds like a song doesn't it?

I'll stop here. The rest is up to you.


--Cat

The River God

It snowed today. Snowed!

On unseasonably cold days like today I'm reminded wistfully of the time two summers ago when I saw the River God in the (total) flesh.

Nikomekl River

There's a shortcut we take driving home over a one way bridge on the Nikomekl River, a placid little stream that flows to the sea. As this is in a tidal area, the bridge is part dam, opening and closing for flood control and to allow fish to travel up and downstream.

Until that particular day we had seen only the odd seal swimming in the lower part. One warm evening when the sun was low in the western sky, we were halfway across the bridge when "he" unexpectedly appeared.

First there were hands on the concrete wall that served as a railing. Then arms, a head, dark hair streaming rivulets of water. His muscles strained as he pulled himself up to the top of the rail. And there he stood in all his brazen glory, a handsome Adonis maybe in his mid-twenties, shaking water droplets from his hair and body, laughing, as gods might, at the stupefied expressions on the mortals' faces.

We did not stop--there were cars before and behind ours--but I can still hear the laughter floating in the golden air, both his and a split-second later that of all who'd been startled by this apparition.

Yeah, yeah, it was probably like my husband said, buff young guys playing a prank, or carrying out a dare.

I prefer to believe I saw the River God.

--Cat

Kitaro

Kitaro - Japanese born "New Age" composer/musician

Love this music. I was listening to an internet radio station and was reminded of how marvelously grand Kitaro sounds.












--Cat

Sign of the Times

Overheard at a supermarket check-out:

Cashier, handing customer his purchases in a plastic bag: "This is the last month you'll get one of these in plastic. Next month we're going back to paper bags."

Customer, distressed: "What am I going to use for the garbage?"

Cashier, with a sigh: "It's a problem, isn't it?"

Cat, to herself: It's really true--what goes around, comes around. I remember the switch from paper to plastic. At first we had a choice. We chose paper, for the very reason the bags fit nicely into the kitchen garbage container--the plastic ones just flopped there. Soon, though, there was no longer a choice. So we adapted. Isn't that the great strength of mankind--our ability to adapt?

Yes, this too shall pass. "This" being the temporary inconvenience of learning to love paper garbage bags.

The secret is don't throw anything wet into them.


--Cat

Sucker for a French Accent

I called the bank the other night because I couldn't reach their online site. I patiently went through five minutes of "press one for English...etc." tripe, and sat for nearly twenty minutes with phone to ear, for if I were to hang up I'd lose my place in the queue and need to start over. Who wants to do that?

Finally a voice came on the line. Imagine my surprise to hear a lovely male accent that was not from some third world country, but Canadian, likely Quebecois.

I could have spent a lot more time listening to that fine voice, but alas, the problem was quickly fixed, the call was at an end.

After I gave my thanks, I blurted, somewhat foolishly in hindsight, "I like your accent."

To which he replied, in true Gallic fashion, "I like yours, too."

He was only being polite, I know.

Because I do not have an accent.


--Cat

Neighborhood wild things

My husband came in last night and said he heard the neighborhood owl hooting. The owl is big and beautiful, white or gray, and has been around for some months, probably because to him this neighborhood is like a smorgasbord--all his favorite dishes can be found.

The owl's spooky who-who-who certainly invokes shivers. And we talked about the times we camped in the wilderness and at night heard owls and coyotes. Such lovely times.

Hah, my husband said, we hear owls and coyotes here all the time.

Of course, that's true. Wilderness, it seems, has come to the city.

And it's justified, right? We encroached on their lands, so they return the favor. Only they have no chance here.

Not long ago we saw two coyotes just outside our back yard, warming themselves in a sunny spot in the greenbelt. I wanted to write a poem about them, about how wrong it was for wild animals to pad along concrete streets, they should be free, yadda, yadda, yadda. I planned to write it in the style of a sonnet.

Well, there are sonneteers.
And then there's me.

But I will prevail.

Here are the first few lines I wrote:

City Coyotes

Beyond the fence, beyond the grass-banked stream,
I saw coyotes bask in morning sun.
They slept until the warming light was done,
Then wakened from their atavistic dream.
Their slitted eyes stared at encircling homes,
At fences slicing land that once was free.
Yet I believe their hearts can only be
On ranges where their untamed cousin roams.


A picture of the backyard coyotes:



-- Cat

in Memoriam

Kevan F. Hartwell

Dec. 21, 1920 - Oct. 3, 2001

Remembering always,

"If the people we love are stolen from us, the way to have them live on is to never stop loving them. Buildings burn, people die, but real love is forever.”The Crow (1994)

--Cat

That day AGAIN!

October 2 -- an auspicious day.

So I'm one year farther from my birth and closer to my mortality.

-- Cat

End of an Era

Luciano Pavarotti (October 12, 1935 – September 6, 2007)

I was reading some of the tributes given to this man by the people, ordinary people from all over the world who loved him, loved his voice, and was moved enough to cry.

Though I've listened to classical music since young, I came late to the lavishly-set opera table. It used to be something I endured as I waited for the next Beethoven, Strauss, or Rachmaninoff on the classical radio channel.

I knew of, but paid scant attention to, the Three Tenors. Knew their names, knew Pavarotti was the big guy. I rather liked the more "pop" sounds of Josh Groban and Il Divo. I could listen to Sarah Brightman sing anything.

Then I heard the music to a song identified only as from the Puccini opera Turandot. It was the type of music that stays in your mind (playing over and over) and I needed to learn more about it. Thank goodness for Amazon and other internet music sellers that let you hear samples from each work. I identified the song as Nessun Dorma and then trotted my fingers over to YouTube. I listened to Andrea Bocelli's version. Lovely. I listened to Pavarotti and was ... electrified. I listened to his other arias. Really listened. What a splendid voice.

Inspired, I purchased a mix of various opera songs, and I've found many that I truly enjoy hearing. Some, I still only endure (too lazy to skip to the next), but I feel my life has been, maybe only in a small way, enriched by the super voices of opera singers.

Especially Pavarotti.

May he rest peacefully, and as someone said, the man with the voice of an angel now sings with them.

Here is my favorite aria Nessun Dora by my favorite tenor:







--Cat

Dream du Jour

Here's one for the dream projector --

I dreamed I was at a gathering of sorts -- all women and children.

I held one woman's little one, a chubby-cheeked cherub, smiling, jabbering away.

"That's his happy talk," the mother said.

And as if this were a Broadway musical and that was my cue, I began singing Happy Talk, from South Pacific. In the dream I had a pure and lovely voice; in real life let's just say I might know the lyrics, but can't carry a tune, not even faintly. (Ah, that's the nature of dreams.)

A chorus of beautiful voices joined in -- all the others at the gathering, I reckon.

What makes it more peculiar is that in the dream the chorus got one line wrong. I began the song again with the correct words.

Happy Talk is a charming song from my favorite musical. My father had a reel-to-reel tape player and when I was a kid, I played South Pacific over and over again. The words to the song are no doubt burned into my subconscious.

Here are the words. In my dream we sang the first four lines:


Happy Talk

from South Pacific.

Music by Richard Rodgers, Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II

Happy talk, keep talking happy talk
Talk about things you like to do
You got to have a dream, if you don't have a dream
How you gonna have a dream come true?
Talk about the moon floating in the sky
Looking like a lily on the lake
Talk about a bird learning how to fly
Making all the music he can make!
Happy talk, keep talking happy talk
Talk about things you like to do
You got to have a dream, if you don't have a dream
How you gonna have a dream come true?
Talk about the sparrow looking like a toy
Peeking through the branches of a tree
Talk about the girl, talk about the boy
Counting all the ripples on the sea
Happy talk, keep talking happy talk
Talk about things you like to do
You got to have a dream, if you don't have a dream
How you gonna have a dream come true?
Talk about the boy saying to the girl
Golly, baby, I'm a lucky cuss
Talk about the girl saying to the boy
You an' me is lucky to be us
Happy talk, keep talking happy talk
Talk about things you like to do
You got to have a dream, if you don't have a dream
How you gonna have a dream come true?
If you don't talk happy, and you never have dream
Then you'll never have a dream come true!

A dream about a song about a dream. Is this a message of some kind?

--Cat