The Sweet Scent of Cat Fur

And what could she say she learned at the end of the day?

That there were exceptional creameries in the area that could put the taste of burnt banana on your tongue.

That toymakers were still striving to keep the spirit of imagination alive.

Jewelery could still equate art.

That a Sphynx's coat feels like warm suede, and they leave an affectionate amount of cat oil all over your fingertips.

Okay, yes...a champion purebred cat is an extraordinary creature that really does deserve all the talk they give it, and I'm not referring to any physical traits, here.

Sometimes it really is all the little trivial pieces of knowledge and experiences that make a day. Plus it was exceptionally warm and wonderful this weekend.

My eyes also finally arrived in the mail, so finishing the last leg of this crochet set will be a blast.

Specks of existence

If anything, outside their social flaw of destructive behaviour, human beings seem to be the primary operatives on their planet in bringing about the universe's tendency toward equilibrium.

It's a bit disappointing, considering all the struggle every other terran life form makes to break this norm.

I suppose we are merely a universal solution to the so-called obstacle of chaos brought about after the Big Bang (if you go for that sort of theory—bringers of the Apocalypse if seen otherwise). In this instance chaos (life on the planet) is neutralized by more chaos (our habit of destroying everything for the unsuccessful sake of avoiding the struggle of survival, which is the core of our existence in the first place).

Strangely enough, we have a say in the matter, and yet most of us tend to avoid making a decision at all, letting someone else do so for us from the start.

The Neverending Story

Tomorrow, again, I see the doctor.

Perhaps he will replace my entire respiratory system. Hell, I don't care if it's made out of Jell-O® and PVC pipes, so long as I can breathe like a fucking normal (not "average"—normal) human being again.

Farewell to Fatty

Little Fatty Fingers was given up to the San Francisco Animal Care and Control today. It was an extremely tough decision to make, especially when I have failed some previous pets in the past by my own ignorance or horrible circumstance (or both).

The thing is, I couldn't get around her biting. And if I wasn't so horribly allergic (fatally depending) on rodent bites, this wouldn't even be a thing. I'd do it myself and keep her. Bleeding and being bitten or scratched is not a big deal to me. On the other hand, anaphylactic shock is, especially when it pairs up with my asthma to cut off my breathing.

It was so frustrating, having her cheerfully sniff at my face and greet me with chattering, only to try just about every sort of advice given to have her bite my hands and fingers, my clothes (not a big deal), and really bite and tug/wrestle with any gloves I was wearing. At the very least, I gave her a good home where she socialized and learned how to enjoy the company of other rats, and at least came to understand that humans are friendly...the part of their body that breathes and blinks, at any rate. And the joy of good food (she never bit me if she was taking food from my fingers).

If anything, even though she's at the ACC, it is better than being at the pet store I found her in. So things can only look up for her. I am confident they will find her a home, and have time to make her friendly. It may sound like it's coming out of left field considering it's county work, but in California (or at least in San Francisco, and I believe in Lake County, as well), they actually take care of the animals that get brought there and work to get them adopted. My name was still in the database from when I adopted Rory, and they wanted to know Ursa's background history, diet, how she lived at home with me, her free time, and any other information. It's also reassuring to see that on their website they detail the personalities of the rats they already have for adoption, and that they were less tame when they'd first arrived.

Either way, I feel this is better all around, though reluctant to have to "give up" on Ursa. They spend much time with them, and I'm confident they'll help her overcome her biting issue, since I was unable to.

Cows!

These have been finished for a while, but I'm pretty slow at documentation because I don't enjoy it much (the positioning, lighting, photographing, image editing...). The red one is the first one made, which goes to my grandmother since she loves oxen, and I've been meaning to make her something related for years.

...I love the planning and conciseness of knitting, but damn is crochet great for making up 3-d patterns while in the process. I have that squid done, too, and more major plans in this vein of "amigurumi". ...There's also a blue oxen I finished today, available for any interested party.

More angles:






...The end!

Fiction and Open Letters

I skimmed through Padgett Powell's Edisto today, after it having sat on the shelf for a few years following college. Like most books I read for class, it tasted much better through a second reading without having to break down all the subtleties and meanings for the sake of an essay (for my own desire to analyze is an entirely different story).

It's hauntingly nostalgic to me, this boy playing an adult's game far too young to understand the full meaning behind each word he uses. One can't understand their own ignorance or innocence until it is overcome or lost, and then those two words have full meaning. A situation becomes clear.

Part of the reason why I enjoy it has to do with its setting in the Savannah coastside, but mostly somewhere it strikes a note from my own childhood that is so intimate a perspective on my past that I would never want to share it—not in a personal journal, anyway, so much as in another fictional work. I feel a lot of fiction stems from the author's need for honesty, honesty that is not accepted as an autobiography as it is in a story. The dark and the sorrow, and the secret joys we all share in what we know society at large disapproves.

And the boy reminds me of someone, I think it is you, Sean. At least, you at a fully-grown fourteen years old and writing poetry and declaring your wish to become an ex-patriot soon in the face of declining government.

You may pick up the book one day, perhaps sooner now that I have mentioned it, browse through it, and scoff. Roll your eyes, and maybe even go so far as to write me a scathing reply, or call me and hang up (speaking of fiction...speculation). Or maybe, somewhere, my thoughts aren't far off. I wonder how someone who comes across the book and somehow incidentally this entry will think of you, this otherwise perfect stranger in their world to whom I am writing.

No matter. I'm sure I've embarrassed the situation enough. Pavlov bath time.

On Details

I'm at my parents' house, riffling through a literal mountain range of papers in front of my mother's computer in a frantic search for some tax return documents that she hasn't had the time to find yet, but I need soon.

Pausing between stacks, I pull out the keyboard tray, which conveniently holds office supplies and not keyboard, to search for a rubber band to keep all the statements I've found so far together.

There, in the midst of pens and erasers, is an old Russ® Troll pencil-topper, barely taller than an inch, with its hair threaded into seven neat little braids.

Food and Thought

It's as if the past few months were rolling slowly by, frame by frame, tableau after tableau, following the kink in my hand as I rolled my wrist, every beat of the bee's wings.

And in the span of a few days, BLAM, it all catches up, blurring so fast my eyes are tearing as all hopes, plans, thoughts come colliding together, kaleidescope of life. Two jobs given me, delayed and prolonged for months suddenly need resolution, there is closure to questions long pondered and important, and oh yeah, that's where I placed my sex drive.

There is so much going on it is almost an insult not to be caught up in it, or affected by it, or at the very least aware of it. I have been zoned out for far too long, and now any small action seems unbelievably vibrant. There have been a multitude of ridiculous assaults in the area the past few days—five homeless men at church in accidental crossfire (one dead), a boy getting shot in a school bathroom, two men dead from a shooting after having an argument over pizza in the restaurant. And apparently a six year old brought two loaded guns to school today, having forgotten that he placed them in his backpack. Did I mention the apocalypse is occurring tomorrow? But none of this is really surprising in the long run.

And the Board of Supervisors approved a resolution to show their disapproval of China's treatment of Tibet when the Olympic torch gets passed through San Francisco. The Bay Area is pretty out there sometimes; freedom of speech and opinion is taken so seriously, which is at once both great and goofy. (Take a look at the position Berkeley took regarding the US Marines not too long ago, for example.)
Around here, people will respect you if you're a humbum who likes to pee on rocks in public, if that's what you tell them you do and like doing and have a right to do, goddammit. There is no better showcase of the responsiveness of local government versus national, versus globally over a situation (which is more akin to saying "duh" than anything else).

So I'm back in the land of the living, having been gone far too long recently believing that the occurrences around me define who I am and not the other way around, and the weight that I didn't realize I'd placed upon myself has lifted. Can I really be surprised that the majority of my respiratory problems have done away in the past two days? (Excluding the mistake of leaving claritin at the apartment while going to help catsit Boutros again, lovely, dandruffed Boutros.) I couldn't attribute it to spring, not all of it, with these bouts of frigid cold weather in brilliant sunshine that San Francisco is so famous for.

And making and finishing, there are little crocheted cows sitting in the apartment staring at me, possibly begging for documentation. So, no proof of my recent achievements for now, though there is much more on the way (sets and strange creatures and who knows what else); the miniature giant squid I made from some hand-dyed yarn is off in Atlanta with Jon, now that the latter has achieved nationally registered EMT status, leaving me with this giant slab of beef (and is it chuck or round) that I have no experience cooking with. At least, not to its potential.
Aside from the cheesesteak I made the other night, but slicing down any beef thin and keeping it in the pan just long enough to cook is always successful. It doesn't hurt to grill the onions in some bacon grease first, and add a good chunk of Velveeta after.

But much food has been made lately, including what surprisingly turned out to be the best loaf of banana bread I've ever made, which can only be attributed to chance. I have made it the same way nearly every time, so I can only guess it was that I hadn't let the butter sit out long enough to blend well and become gooey, making me add a lot more applesauce than I usually do (I never use eggs) and put the excess batter in the muffin tin. It tastes sinfully of bananas. A successful duplication will yield a recipe yet.

I finally visited my grandmother today after almost a month of not seeing her; I hadn't seen her since she was transferred from the hospital to rehab. She is amazingly well, and that again sealed my return to the human race.

There really has been an overwhelming amount of activity in my brain and my life quite lately, and in it are plans big and little, to do lists both mundane and fun, and thinking again in terms of improving the general quality of life, starting with mine.

And in accordance with that, I make chocolate pudding, browse a comic, then go straight to the third X-Men movie that I checked from the library (just so I can say I saw them all, as I'm pretty sure of what garbage I'm getting into...) while doing a bit of yarnwork.

But more on my desire to dye and spin roving later. And on this crochet project I have in mind. And this shirt I need to paint. And the ethics of "diy" shall we say regardless of its trend factor, and why I am technically an anarchist though I don't believe in its execution as a possibility, and so on...