Category: pets

I love having new toys!

Especially photographic type toys.

Yay plastic cameras!

After lusting and longing for a while, I finally broke down and spent some money on a Fuji Instax instant film camera.

It’s like a Polaroid, only a Fuji brand. You know, *coff coff* a financially solvent company?

Anyhow, this fabulous little Instax makes very small instant photographs, they are 2 x 3.25 inches in size.

I LOVE that I have an instant photo camera again!

It hearkens me back to my youth. One Christmas holiday, I got a Polaroid under the tree. Oh what a fabulous present!

I could spend my allowance on buying Polaroid film, which was fairly cheap back then, and then run around snapping photos of whatever I saw with *instant* gratification!

Ok, sure, these days digital cameras provide that instant look at the photo you just took, but there sure is nothing like the sound an instant camera makes after snapping a photo. The motor engages and it shoves out the cloudy photograph. Oh the sweet agony while you wait excitedly for it to develop.

Gah! I love it!

So as I do with every new camera I buy, I take it out of the box, ooh and ah over the features, load up the film or memory disk, and then turn it on and point it at the Feline.

She’s my test model for all new photo and video devices in the house.

Ah, the long suffering Feline….

(scanned photo, not actual size)

And yet, she always manages to strike a pose. I really do think she’s getting better at this job of supermodel.

“I won’t get out of bed for less than two scoops of kibble.”

Such a Diva.

Harumph!

And yet…she sure knows how to work the camera.

As for me, I’m still giddy with the fabulous gadgety goodness of it all!!

The things that matter

I had a really great time being in southern New Mexico over the weekend. I got to spend time with many of my old Ag College friends who still rely on the weather and the earth to make a good part of their living.

I got back to my rural roots. It was a fresh reminder.

While I whine and complain about all the rain we got this year in Northern California, I was reminded, plenty reminded, that water is still the heart of life in a town like Las Cruces.

Simple water. Yet not so simple.

As we drove out to my best friend’s house, which is well and gone north of Las Cruces, my old senses kicked in. I smelled the water before I saw it. We rounded a corner and could see that the main irrigation ditch was running high.

“Someone must have ordered water,” I said aloud to no one in particular.

“That looks like almond trees going in,” I pointed out to my husband.

“Whoa, that used to be a cotton field…looks like they put in chile,” I commented.

I greeted each pasture and expanse of farmland like an old friend.

“Chickens!” I exclaimed when we came to a traffic jam on the road (us and another car). The Good Man had asked, “um, why are we stopped?” and I had the better view around the car ahead.

There was a bantam rooster doing his strut on the warm asphalt of that rural New Mexico state road. We all waited for him to go by. He took his time.

Once at the party, The Good Man and I at one point talked with my best friend’s dad. He said that they were having trouble with a neighbor up the road diverting their water. They’d order and not enough would show up.

I’ve been reading a lot of Louis L’Amour stories lately. In those books, diverting someone’s water is a killing sort of offense.

I said to my dad-by-proxy, “you oughta weld that guy’s gate shut” and he laughed. Don’t think he hadn’t already considered it. (and by gate, I meant irrigation gate, not the entry to his driveway)

As the night wore on, it got to be about two o’clock in the morning. The evening dew, such that it was, was starting to settle. I said to my husband, “this is good hay cutting weather.” He asked why, and I said, “the dew makes the stalks wet and they bend instead of break.”

I used to date a guy in college who had to end our dates fairly early because he had to get home and cut hay. I learned to recognize that smell. It meant it was time for him to scoot on home. Time to work when the water is in the air….

The next day, out at my friend’s place, I learned the water in the irrigation ditch was running so high because it was a “free day” for the community. They got to water as needed.

I was wearing flip-flops and I tromped around the soggy yard helping my god-dog look for his favorite ball. The water made the air smell sweet. It also made the frogs come out and sing their sexy mating songs rather loudly.

We ate dinner outside with a chorus of humping frogs to accompany our meal.

All because of water.

Living in the city like I do, I take water for granted. I turn on the tap, and there it is. It falls from the sky and I curse the nuisance.

Yesterday, I was shopping at Nordstrom for a nice outfit to wear for a very important meeting today.

While I shopped in luxury, I looked down at my flip-flops. They still bore the dried mud from my friend’s home. I tossed back my head and laughed at the beautiful, grounding irony of it all.

May I never forget the land and the people who rely daily on the value of pure, simple water.

Rather out of focus photo of my cranky god-cat and the gate at my friend’s place.

A belated ode to the Queen Mum

I know that Mom’s Day was yesterday, and was well celebrated, but today, in searching for a blog topic on my favorite idea generator, this little bit popped up onto my screen:

“What happened in your mother’s life when she was exactly the same age you are now?”

So I thought about it. And then thought to myself…whooooa.

My mom’s life at age *mumblefortyonemumble* was quite a bit different than mine.

And by quite a bit, I mean a LOT.

Let’s see. Well, for one thing…mom and dad were juggling three kids aged thirteen, ten and six at the time.

For the record, when I imagine what that must have been like, let me just say…GAH!

On the fun side, back then we used to go bombing around the wilds of New Mexico in an 1972 blue and white Chevy Blazer (“Karen, get out and lock in the hubs!”). My dad was big on road trips.

The back seat was bench style. I’d cram in the middle between my brother and sister.

Mom would pack up a lunch of cold fried chicken with all the sides and we’d head up to Cuba, New Mexico, in the Jemez mountains, to spend the day.

It was on one of these trips that the now infamous piñon nut up the nose incident took place…I’ll spare you the details.

We’d spread a blanket under a tall, shady tree and eat. After lunch we’d all head off in different directions to explore.

Dad would bring a portion of his vast gun collection and each kid would take turns learning how to load and shoot every one. Our target was an old, soft tree that had been felled by lightening.

It was important to him that we weren’t scared of any of the guns kept in the house, and we weren’t curious about them either. We knew what they were and what they were for, and were very respectful of them.

Yes, I was shooting guns at the age of six. It was big, huge fun!

Mom wasn’t much for shooting. She’d participate sometimes, but mostly she’d be off to the side keeping a wary eye on us.

It had to about that time in my mom’s life, too, when we were taking a hike up in at our Cuba property. My mom, who was always looking down at the ground in search of a geode, instead found herself a genuine arrow head.

No, not one of those you find in a tchotchke shop in Arizona.

A real, honest to goodness, genuinely used by an actual Native American, arrowhead. The land we were on was once the hunting grounds of the Jicarilla Apache, among others.

Let’s see…what else was going on in mom’s life at that time….

She cooked dinner every night. Homemade tortillas and venison burrito meat were faves. (At the time, I would balk and get weird about eating Bambi meat. But in honesty, it tasted pretty good. Ssssh, don’t tell mom, okay?)

She volunteered as a librarian at my elementary school so she could be out of the house, but still around for her kids. She was running my sister and me to our ballet and tap lessons. She would proofread my homework, too.

A career secretary (now known as an executive assistant), she was hell on a typo or misspelled word.

Back then, life at our home wasn’t always perfect. It wasn’t always bad either.

So at the age I am now, Mom was managing a constantly in motion family focusing on kids and husband and work and home and putting a lot of effort into her days.

Me, I focus on work, my still fairly new husband, and spoiling my overindulged pets.

You know…in comparison…I have it pretty easy. And I owe my fairly easy, happy life to my mom. She worked hard so that her kid’s lives could be better than hers had been at the same age.

And in that, dear mom, you are a resounding success!

Thank you!

P.S. to mom: I’m sorry we couldn’t be together on Mom’s Day this year like last year. I hope my stinky brother** took good care of you this year. I’ll bet he didn’t give you a hand crafted present like I did last year.

I’m still your favorite…right? Right?

** (because all boys are stinky)

And so it came to pass….

….that living in the Land of Schwarzenegger, in the area of the Bay, there came to be a fish. A small fish. A fish who was filled with faith and hope.

A fish purchased under the accursed impulse-purchase vexation.

The fish was of the Betta clan, and was given the name of Benito, meaning “blessing” or “blessed one” in the Spanish culture (and meaning tiny little dictator in the Italian tradition).

And so it was that Benito came to live in the house of The Good Man and true to his name, blessed us all.

Benito swam and ate of the bloodworm. And it was good.

Until it wasn’t good.

And forsooth, Benito ceased to eat, and lay on the floor of the tank, flat on his side, and took on a gray pallor.

Which only raised memories of Frank, also of the Betta clan, who came before Benito and expired so painfully.

And so it was that The Girl wept, felt necessary to rend her garments, gnashed her teeth and howled to the heavens, “Why! Why must I have the curse of killing helpless fish?”

Then The Girl resigned herself to the knowledge gained that she was not meant for fish ownership.

Another matchbox coffin was prepared, and sadness befell the house of The Good Man.

In the last, desperate hours, The Good Man proclaimed, “he who believeth in the bettas shall never die.”

Thusly, The Good Man brought his mighty hand down and created freshly treated water and added the miracle of the antibiotic powder.

The limp body of Benito of the Betta clan was deposited into the fresh, medicated water and hope was not held out.

In the break of the morn, The Good Man, in his grace, went to the tankside of Benito of Betta, and proclaimed, “Yea, tho I believe this crazy fish is hungry!”

And chopped up pieces of bloodworm were deposited in the tank, and verily Benito of Betta did eat.

“No %$&#ing way!” came the cry from The Girl, who stared in disbelief at the miracle The Good Man had wrought.

“Yeah, don’t get your hopes up,” The Good Man admonished, but despite his downplaying the whole thing, The Girl did ignore him and did in fact get her hopes up.

And forsooth! Benito of Betta did continue to eat. And became more upright, and began to flap his fins in a normal manner.

And Benito of Betta was thusly nicknamed the Lazarus Fish, having risen from the dead.

So it is that some two weeks from coming to the house of The Good Man, Benito of Betta continues to live and eat and could almost be described as thriving.

And with the focus on a new, recovering fish, The Girl finds the sadness over the loss of Frank is beginning to ease.

With the help of The Good Man, guardian of the broken pets, The Girl may in fact learn to be a suitable owner of small helpless fish.

And for the moment, it was good again.

But don’t get your hopes up.

P.S. Margaret, female of the Betta clan, and The Good Man’s fish, continues to thrive quite nicely, thankyouverymuch.