Lack of a Living Room

... Well, actually it's a 'front room', a salon or Parlor.

Mountain Dews: 2
Mountain Dew: Code Red 1 (v. long day)
Massive Quantities of Supah Chinese Buffet 1 (ugh, I have Buddha Belly)
Trips back and forth to Ashland 3 (it was a lot of small trips in a tiny pick-up)

Almost the new year and I spent almost all day today hauling furniture down from Ashland in small, pick-up sized loads. My front room is full of stuff and there's barely a path through the huge lawn bags full of clothes and stuff. It'll take a few days to get through all of the stuff and get some sense of order but I'll get it taken care of soon.

For those who might actually care, I've got a new roommate for a while. A friend of mine is going back to school and needed a place to stay for a while - probably just for the term. I have a guest room that's not being used and he was in need. So, voila.

The Lime Green Leisure House is no more, but my place is always a haven for wayward travelers. I'm glad that I can offer my friends a place to stay as the need arises. I've offered people three-nights sanctuary from time to time. Friends from Huntington, Columbus, Parts-Unknown in Kentucky, etc.

"If I have it to give, then I must."

Sometimes I don't have much to offer but what I have is there for those who need it.

The last go-round was a few weekends rest for a friend who needed to talk, before that was a summer escape for a friend who needed to escape, and then before that was a few years of weekends for a friend who needed to game. It's not exactly Rivendel but hopefully it's been a place where people can come and relax and get their feet back underneath themselves once more.

Ok, it's late and I've been hauling furniture all day.

Talk to ya later.

Postcards from the Edge...

... of Eastern Pennsylvania.

I'll admit it. I'm a junkie.

I like getting letters and postcards from my friends; it's the analog side of me.

Some people keep secrets about what they wear when no one's around or if they like to get spanked, but not me. Nope, I wear my Analog Pride button proudly; it's called a journal.

When I'm not writing in my journal I'm writing letters to friends. As not everyone is as 'anaglogically gifted' (yeah, say that one three times fast) as I am, I often get postcards from them. They're short and to the point but it's the thought that counts.

Recently, I received a card from a friend while she was on her way from Connecticut. The trip was cut short with some adventure while she was in Eastern Pennsylvania. I'll leave her to describe the details, but I thought that I'd post the card here.

So if anyone's out there and can grab a postcard while they're out and about - I'd love to hear from ya.

-Tom

Pilgrim / Seeker

While doing a search for lanterns last night, I came across this image of a medieval watchman. There was no reference given to where the image came from on the site and I doubt that I'll be able to track down the mysterious author of the painting by the symbol in the bottom left corner. However, I'll be sure to keep an eye out for it.

The image of the watchman in his cloak and carrying a staff and lantern is mixture of symbolism. The cloak protects him from the wind, cold and the rain. The lantern allows him to see through the darkness - as he is charged to seek out any crime in the city - but also it proclaims his location like a ship's lantern. The staff, a simple object, is also a form of protection in that it can be used to defend one's self from attackers or the occasional large rat.

So the image conveys PROTECTION, SEARCHING, and ASSURANCE.

Because of his search, people can feel assured that they are marginally safer with people like this watchman doing his job. Though given the simplest of tools to aid him in his search (Lantern, cloak and staff), it is none-the-less a Quest. It could be a quest for crime, or fire or just anything out of the ordinary. I would imagine that the nightly quests of the Watch were quite boring, but if they weren't out there there would be little sense of assurance or protection. This lead me to the writings of Edmund Burke.

"All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing."
-- Edmund Burke

I would take Burke's idea and expand upon it to say:

When people speak of evil, they speak of all the bad forces that affect our life. Fear, Doubt, Anger, etc. Evil is then the collective effect of those things which we can't control in our lives and that limit our choices. Freedom to make one's own choices is a cornerstone of most works concerning civil rights. The restriction of freedom, slavery, has brought nations to its knees. So i simplified the association to state: "If freedom is Good, then restriction as it's opposite, must be Evil." And what, generally, restricts our choices more often than any other force if not Fear. Fear of the unknown, or fear of an unwelcome eventuality.

Therefore, I can begin to re-interpret Burke's maxim about evil to read:

"All that is necessary for fear to succeed is that good men do nothing."
-- Edmund Burke (modified)

To continue my interpretation of Burke's work, I examined the last phrase: "Do nothing". According to Burke, all we (good men) need to do to defeat fear (evil) is to do something. Well, how do you conquer fear? There are far more things in this world that we do not understand than what science and religion have attempted to answer. Therefore, fear of the unknown would seem to be the most crippling, the most limiting, the most powerful form of evil.

Knowledge is the best weapon against fear. As children we are afraid of the dark because we don't know what's "out there". Our vivid imaginations crawl with media-induced phantoms and specters and we succeed in terrorizing ourselves with vagaries of perception. To combat this fear, it is important to learn from ourselves and our environment. A tree which terrorizes our dreams by night can be seen to be little more than a twisted-trunk by day.

So educating ourselves about our world and our own minds is the key to combating these phantoms of shadow and crumpled jeans. Many different religions and philosophies would describe the process of educating one's self as the process of Enlightenment. The path to enlightenment, an understanding of yourself and your world, is the quest for awareness.

"All that is necessary for fear to be defeated is to encourage the search for enlightenment."
-- Thomas Riley

Or, to be put simply:

"Always, the Quest."

or in another sense, "Always seek Enlightenment"

My gods, I think I just said I'm a Buddhist.

A curious tale of Ancient Gods

Ok,

I've heard about the Cthulhu mythos and its author, H.P. Lovecraft, from many of my friends over the years, but I had never read any of his work. I, generally, don't like to read fiction. I'm more of a researcher and fiction leaves me wanting more. I want it to be real.

This past weekend, after a trip to Athens, I was allowed to borrow a book about H.P. "The Cult of Alien Gods: H.P. Lovecraft and Extraterrestrial Pop Culture" by Jason Colavito.

One of the descriptions of H.P. caught me a bit off guard.

In a description of Cthulhu's author, Colavito stated:

"While Lovecraft himself stood in awe of the Eighteenth century, the Enlightenment, and pure reason, his anachronistic love of the past was itself a manifestation of the Romantic spirit. Lovecraft would often fantasize about living in the colonial world and he adopted the mannerisms of an eighteenth-century Georgian gentleman. "

I'm reminded of how I like to write Franklin-style letters to my friends and I wonder...

Some people looked at the writings of H.P. Lovecraft and have adopted them into their own curious religious and magical practices.

Will the "Diciples of Tom" (aka D.o.T.s) turn into a quazi-religious movement? Will there be conspiracy theories about ancient gods that escaped Atlantis and founded Avalon? Will black and silver banners of Spiders unfurl over a new empire?

Hrm......

Grinchy-Poo

Snowy Campus

Campus was a cloaked in a snowy white blanket of fluff yesterday. The flurries in the air stuck to my jacket and tie when I walked from my car to Massie Hall (where my office is).

The University was quick to salt, scrape and clear the walks so that it was easy to walk but there were some icy patches here and there. The campus, though not as scenic as Ohio University, didn't look too bad in the snow.

The trees on the Green (the patch of grass down the center) kind of gave the illusion that the campus was a bit larger than it is. They need some benches around the trees - someplace where you can sit in the warmer months.

I think that Shawnee has potential. It could be a very nice, small campus in time.

-Tom

Snow Fall

Today marks the first day of Snow Fall, the first real snow of the year.

The calls began early this morning as everyone called to tell me of the white death that fell from the sky. The roads were slushly and the ground had a bit of a covering but nothing that would affect any kind of city-wide problems.

However, every school shut down because it was still coming down rather heavily early this morning.

It's now around noon and the snow continues to fall but the roads are clear and everywhere there is concrete or asphalt the snow has melted. It's almost as though the shell of an egg had developed cracks or faults within the frosty white surface.

I'm headed down to campus soon to see if I can get some pictures down there. Class will not be canceled tonight but I have a feeling that no one will show. With a single snow flake in the air most of southern Kentucky shuts down.

So, there should be more of a blog later once I get to the office.

-Tom

New Look

I went with a new look for the blog because I was tired of the old one.

This is a lot cleaner than the first but I'm not sure how I'm going to tweek it just yet.

-Tom

Kitten Update

And finally there was none.

"White Nose", the last of the kittens from Cinder's litter, is gone.

I conveyed the 'Vessel of Sacrifice' (a plastic crate) to Ashland to make the exchange. So long as it's gone I'm fine.

The kitten was the instigator of so many messes in the house it wasn't funny.

-Tom

Corn dog Blues

It all began with a flaming corn dog. However, let me take you back...

Last week, on Black Friday, I was up in Huntington visiting my buddy Chris. It was a cool day and we were deeply involved with a game of Halo 3 on his new X-BOX. And then, in the middle of a mission to liberate a small air base, my phone rang.

Another buddy of mine, Josh, was calling from just outside his apartment. It was somewhat that he called since it was barely 3 p.m. and he usually works (at a bank) until 6. (BTW: He's a collections agent for the bank. Talk about evil.) He was calling me to ask for a favor; I could tell by the sound of his voice.

He asked if he could crash with me for the weekend.

It was no big deal for me since whether the house is known as the "Lime Green Leisure House" or the "Khaki Shack" it's still "Tomcat's home for wayward guys". So I told him how to get into the house (since I was still in Huntington and wouldn't be able to get back in time to let him in myself) and figured that I would get the whole story later that night.

His story begins with a tale of a Corn Dog.

The older man who lived next to him in his apartment complex was a bit absent minded. He was attempting to cook some corn dogs in a skillet. However, he walked outside to talk to the complex's handyman. After a few moments, a lady who lives above the older man came outside to say that she smelled smoke in her apartment. Within a few minutes, they had deduced that the old man had left the corn dogs cooking in the skillet when he went out to talk.

The old man's apartment was gutted.

The apartment above his was severely damaged.

Josh's apartment had the adjoining wall get scorched and a lot of soot damage. Everything smelled of smoke and he had to get most of his stuff out because the fire department obliterated his front door and windows.

The weekend became the week because the apartment complex couldn't find him a new apt to move into until later. So we spent the week washing everything he owned and then this weekend I went back up with him to move him from one building to another. This gave me the opportunity to grab pictures of the damage to the apartment next to his.

So a week with a house-guest, about a dozen or so loads of laundry and a visit from the 'Amazon Moving Company'.

And all for a damn corn dog.

-Tom

Journal - update

From: An earlier post


Though the video is longer than the scene that I'm referencing, you can see what I'm talking about in the earlier post.

What I find interesting is when the teacher, Miss Tingle, reads the entry from the diary and at first is all but scoffing at the idea. Then, as she finishes the last line you can see how the weight of the words -almost- gets to her.

-Tom

Baraka

I was looking up a song from Dead Can Dance "Host of Seraphim" on YouTube and found a clip from the movie / documentary called "Baraka".



Just...

Wow.

-Tom

Journal Entry

The writings of the Salem Witch Trials are fairly well documented as a matter of history and of law. There are several websites that document the actual trials, but I've always wondered if there were any journals /diaries kept during the time period.

I would imagine that if someone wrote anything other than full support of such actions they could be accused of any number of things so it was probably not something that would have been common. However, as we have seen in several instances, the threat of discovery does not stop a true "Diarist" (saying 'journalist' creates a different image).

The above entry is a work of fiction. It represents a plausible entry that a girl could have written during the trials.

It makes me wonder and want to research early American diaries / journals even more.

-Tom

And then there was One

This, is the last of Cinder's kitten - tentatively given the nickname of "White-Nose". Her twin sister, another black&white, was called "Black-Nose". It was the easiest way to tell them apart.

As there's only one kitten left, I've let White-Nose out of the box (aka: the cardboard prison of doom) and let it wander around the house with its mother.

You can see here the white flash up the nose of the kitten that SHOULD make it easy to give away.

And even though it's eating solid food and has for several weeks now, it can't resist grabbing a quick snack from Cinder.

Yes, this is the obligatory cute kitten shot. I couldn't resist grabbing the picture once it was half-asleep and nursing.

And... one last thing.

But be prepared...

Do not watch if you have problems with your sugar.

Do not watch if you have a stomach that doesn't handle sweets well.

Do not watch with others around you if you don't want to hear the obligatory "awwwwwwwwww" sound.

No really,


Don't do it.


Just ignore it.

Ok,

Last warning.

What's in a Name?

Happy:

Harvest Home
Harvest End
Get the Hell Outta My Damn Kitchen Day
Why Aren't You Married Day
Dead-Bird Day
Leftovers Day
Invasion Day
Conquest Day

oh yeah...

Thanksgiving.

Free Kittens

No really.

Free.

Got a lab experiment and you need a subject?

Need to pay off a Sherago demon?

Just need something to torment you for a while?

I've got your solution RIGHT here.

I have 4 kittens; 3 females and 1 male.

The two, all black kittens are both female.

Take them

Remove them.

Or I will.

@&%)@($*!~_)@)*@#$)(*~+)_(@#$)(&*!)(&~@)#*(_#$)(*!@#$) (ancient curse)

... And I hate chaos!

FEH!

Golden Leaves-01

Golden Leaves-01
Originally uploaded by Green Pilgrim

Just a tree in Greenlawn Cemetery that had an awesome display of yellows and golds. I couldn't resist grabbing a picture of it.

Cemetery walk-01

Cemetery walk-01
Originally uploaded by Green Pilgrim

A walk through Greenlawn Cemetery this Veteran's Day Weekend.

I needed this

From Myspace:

I haven't checked how my students are reacting to me this term until today. When I looked it up and saw that there was only one posting I was both disappointed (at first) and then relieved. At least the students had more important things to do with their time than to comment about my teaching style.

Then, once I read the comment, I was all warm and fuzzy (at least for 2.5 seconds).

I love my job.

-Tom

Class:
intro to psych

Date:
10/11/2007

Grade:
A

Comments:
Riley is fabulous!!!! He is a teacher and a comedian... but doesn't distract he is great at mixing it up!

Daylight's waisting

Shawnee Park

I think I've watched South Park a little too much.

Yes.

It hurts.

I'll stop now...

-T

Final Verdict

23:36 hrs
Someone play taps.

Ok, so it's not the 'FINAL' verdict, but it's at least going to hold until the end of winter. This is the old house; the Lime Green Leisure House, Tom's Home for Wayward Boys, etc.


The house (in its many shades of green) served me well for many years but I've finally caught the "House Bug". As soon as I finish one project, I see three more and realize how broke I am and probably going to be for the next year - especially on the salary of an Part-Time Professor.


And behold the birth of the new place. I already want to fix the front pillars, move the front lights and install a lamp post at the top of the stairs, etc., etc., etc. I think that the trim around the attic window and the three corbels need to be painted white to draw them out as architectural elements.

It may not be much, but at least it's home.

Home to many...

For above all things in this earth - a Maltharian is a most impeccable Host.

There, in a tower on a hill, lived a Monk.
Not a damp, moldy tower.
Nor a dry, bare empty tower.
It was a Monk tower,
And that means...Comfort.

A bit cheesy perhaps, but that's what makes it good.

-Tom

3 It's the Magic Number

"Triangles, Triangles, Triangles... Why is it always Triangles?"

-B. Winner, circla 1995

Year of the Horse

WELCOME TO THE YEAR OF THE HORSE

(Draft)

Years of the Horse
2007
1995
1983
1971
1959
1947

Concept: The Horse is a symbol of freedom; a wild, white stallion running along the planes. Following the Serpent, it symbolizes the energy of breaking bonds and new freedom.

Born:


Year: The year of the Horse is all about stretching your legs and enjoying a bit of freedom. The Horse is a creature of the wind and wants to get out. Like the butterfly that has just emerged from the old cocoon, the Horse wants nothing more than to go experience some of the newly found freedom.

Those who can't game - give in

Ok, so there's this game called the "World of Warcraft" out there. It's one of the largest and most popular games on the grid these days with millions of subscribers all over the world.

Since I haven't really had the time or the people around me to find a good game, I gave in and decided to give it a whirl. I've played other characters on the game before, but normally I play for a month and then back off and go back and forth so I can convince myself that I'm not addicted.
This is Malhezra, my Blood Elf character on the server called "Turalyn". A friend of mine talked me into playing this race with only three words. "Aristocratic. Magic. Addicts."

Malhezra is a Warlock, he controls curses and things that cause damage over time rather than direct damage. One of the benefits of having a Warlock is that they can control demonic servants. Yes...that's the small, school-girl squeal of glee.

I have minions.

The most used demonic servant is called a Void Walker (shown here), but you can also have an Imp, a Succubus, etc.

Oh... I also found the screen shot function over the weekend. I couldn't resist posting.

-Tom

Pumpkin Butchering

The poor thing didn't know what hit it. I snuck up on it with drunken, cat-like grace and stabbed deep into it's top. Oh, the screaming that could be heard (if you imagined that I could sneak up on a pumpkin, then you can definately imagine it screaming). I left the blade in the wound for a moment to snap this picture and then begun to scalp off its' top-knot.


The Huron were known for their ability to remove a man's scap before he fell dead to the ground. I wonder if the pumpkin knew what had hit it when I pulled off the 'lid' and gazed down into the bowls of its guts.

Once I had pulled out all of the insides and set the seeds aside to dry slowly in an oven (yes, I'm just that sadistic), I began to wedge the corpus. This is what came from a medium-sized pumpkin. I'll have plenty left over once I dice the body up into bite-sized bits.

Overall, the pumpkin yielded about two-quarts of inch-thick chunks of punkin. I've bagged 3/4ths of them and used the remains to brew up some pumpkin soup.

The soup wasn't bad (thank god for the roasted red pepper to give it something other than a bland flavor), but I would consider it a base; something to add veggies to it to make a stew.

Half and Half

The last of the green was covered this weekend as the remnants of the Lime Green Leisure House fades into memory.

The tan and tan combo almost makes it look like some version of desert camo, but anything is better than the Green.

Let me repeat that:

ANYTHING was better than the green.

The only thing to be done now is to spray the rail white and look into some outdoor carpet for the porch.

-Tom

Night and Day

Over the past week and a half, I have been working on painting my house. The house, formerly known as the "Lime Green Leisure House" was painted a very minty green for years.

Ivy coated almost all of the north side of the house and the combination of forest green foundation and minty green house just was painful to look at.

Well, this fall - after the house next door was painted - my dad, the family's house painter, was "convinced" to help paint mine.

Step 1) I had to remove all of the ivy from the north side of the house. For years, this ivy was the source of bags and bags of decoration for the Winter Rose event for our Shire in Ashland. Even with me whacking off lots of the vines, it still grew back with vigor every spring. So this was a big step to try and kill it.

I've found that you can't really kill ivy unless you engage in chemical warfare. All you can do is destroy most of what you see and hope that you've encouraged it to grow elsewhere for a while.

So once I had all of the ivy off of the house, I had to deal with all the tendrils that clung to the wood. These things are a pain in the ass to remove even with a razor blade.

So that took me a very long time to be able to have the side of the house ready to be painted - even if only just to cover what couldn't be scraped off.

One hundred and fifty dollars in paint later, I have the front three sides of the house completed and trimmed and now my dad is adding the foundation paint to remove the last shades of green.


I'm going to have completed pictures once I get the foundation done, the hand-rail spray painted and all of that completed.

Kitten Pics

Now that I've gotten them into a box and Cinder has accepted that we're not going to play the "hide and go seek the kitten" game, I've got a pic of the remaining 3.

This morning, my mother came over to pick up one of the kittens, one of the all-black ones, and take it to her house to keep the first one company. So now I have three kittens for Cinder to nurse which should be easier for her. A running theory between my mother and myself is that Cinder may have pushed the first kitten away and ignored it because five kittens were just too much on her system.

That's a theory at least.

-Tom

Ref: Phantom Kitty, Phantom Kitty My Ass

Phantom Kitty My Ass

Ok,

So it's 1 am and guess what I found?

Not one,

Not two

Not even three

but FOUR kittens in my living room.

I left the basement door open enough that Cinder could move them through and they all decided to mew at once and I heard them.

So apparently when Cinder just watched the first kitten with distaste, she was being all catly or something and refused to give up the location of the others.

Pics to follow.

Kittens.

Ugh.

FIVE of them.

Ugh.

-Tom

Ref: Phantom Kitty

Papers and Ink

It's that time of year again. The second week in October should have a note in it to make ink. The walnuts have fallen in suffecient quantity that they're easy to find and it's not too hot outside that you can't boil the bejezus out of the slurry to reduce it down to a good concentration. With fall in the air and the pumpkins ripe, it's time to throw some strange ingredients into a pot, stir with a stick and enjoy the moment.

And that's what I did.

Yesterday, my day off, was spent grading papers for my Intro Psych and Soc classes. It was also the day when I put a pot of walnut ink on to boil. As walnut ink takes at least three hours of simmering to reduce in volume, I try and plan something so that I'm able to watch it fairly easy and stay with it so it doesn't boil dry or froth over in the early stages. The process of making Walnut ink is fairly simple; much more simple than grading intro Psych exams.

Preparation of the Walnuts:

1. Gather non-rotten walnuts, at least half a satchel full.
2. Get a veggy grater from Big Lots - one that you don't mind never using for anything else.
3. Find a rubber / latex glove for at least one hand.
4. I use a shallow, plastic plan to collect the walnut shavings when I grate them. I think this one is a cheap litter pan also from Big Lots.
5. Shred up half of the satchel's load of walnuts if they're small.
   
1. With the drought this year, the walnuts were very tiny.
2. You're looking for about a fourth of a gallon of shredded material.
3. Toss the walnuts (not the hull that you're shaving off) into the woods to 'recycle' them.
4. I use the largest side of the shredder otherwise it gums up too fast.
   
6. Add the shredded hulls to about three-quarters of a gallon of water and let it soak over night.

After the slurry soaked over night, pour it into a large pot over a medium to low fire and stir occasionally.

So while I was watching the slurry cook down, I started grading my papers.



Let me give you some background about the Psychology assignment that I was grading: It's a combination extra-credit assignment and take-home test. My students didn't do so well on their first test so I assigned them to take a copy of the test home and using their notes and text book, answer the questions. It was designed to give the students some free points to help bring their grades up since some didn't have their text books until a week before the test. I assumed that I would get a few mistakes here and there but nothing too terrible since it was OPEN BOOK.

What I got back from my students can only be described as laziness. Most of the students missed between 8 and 9 questions out of a 50 question test. This is technically the second time that they should have reviewed the materials. In my opinion, the students shouldn't miss more than four or five to get full credit and no less than 10 to get any credit. Thankfully, over half of the students who actually turned in the assignment, got partial or full credit. However, I caught two students cheating.

Cheating, on a take-home assignment.

I saw that one of the assignments was poorly photocopied. What makes it worse, is that they student photocopied the test AFTER she wrote her answers. (they were mostly wrong to begin with) The copy had a pen used to poorly cover the original answers in hopes that I wouldn't notice the similarities.

As if.

Once I discovered the cheating, I put the tests down for a second to strain out the shredded hulls from the slurry.

I use a strainer that is just for making ink and remove most of the cooked, shredded hulls. Once I remove the material, I can let it boil down to about one-fifth of its original volume.

So then I went back to my papers and finished up with Psychology. There were no more cheaters found but I wasn't happy with the number of students who just didn't put in the effort to get any points. They're just not getting it. Then later, I worked on Sociology and enjoyed myself a lot more.

I've found that this term, my Sociology class is the 'good' one. They're more willing to discuss the topics, debate the issues and generally come prepared. Psych - not so much.

So now I'll be turning in the students for Academic Dishonesty and sealing up the ink for later use.

-Tom

Phantom Kitty

So there I was on Friday afternoon working on the house so that it can be painted. I was scraping and ripping down ivy and all that while trying not to think about my tooth since there were no dentists in or any who could see me until sometime next week.

I hate not having insurance.

So when I sat down that evening, I heard a very odd sound. A kitten was mewing in the basement - in that "I'm lost come find me" kind of way.

So I went downstairs and figured that it was coming from the same place that Cinder had her litter back in August. I knew that she had two and one was dead immediately and the other died within a day or so. What I saw was a black and white kitten around two weeks old. So then I thought: "Did she have another litter?"

Well, I pulled it from the basement and found a box for it. Since my cats are quarantined into the basement for a while, I left the kitten's box under a table so that it would be somewhat out of the way. After about two hours of it crying, I started to wonder where Cinder was. Since she can't get out and she has plenty of food - I couldn't figure out why she was letting it whine so much.

I went down to check on things and saw Cinder and Rusty looking down on it as though it were some kind of alien life form that was disrupting the harmony of their basement kingdom.

So I picked up Cinder to try and coax her into the box, and that's when it hit me. She's not lactating. Her nipples are flat and dry.

This was somewhat confusing but since I don't know that much about the care and raising of cats I called in my expert; my mother.

Since the 'Time before Times' she's been caring for animals. It is this quality of hers that earned me my first nickname while I was still en utero. She had always been taking home stray cats and such and nursing them back to health so I was simply another 'Tomcat' that she had found. At least that's one of the stories I've heard on the topic.

She suggested that I show some attention to the kitten in hopes of getting Cinder to take care of it - some kind of maternal jealousy thing I think. That didn't work. The kitten mewed and cried all night long without so much as a five-minute break between bursts.

Saturday morning came and it was still screaming for attention or food or both. I went down to check things out and Cinder was no where to be found and Rusty looked like a new father who had been up all night long with a screaming baby. Not a happy camper. I got a hold of my expert and asked for some advice. She said for me to bring it over to her house so I bundled up the meow-machine and headed over.

She has a few cats at her place (to put it mildly) and one of them had just finished nursing a litter of her own. The hope was that she might adopt this new kitten. While we were waiting to see if her cat would adopt the strange kitten, I had a chance to look through my journals to find out some dates. There was simply no way for Cinder to have gotten pregnant after her litter and had this kitten that fast. It's only been a month. Maybe 5 weeks at best and the kitten is, itself, at least two-weeks old (due to its eyes being open).

So I have no idea where the kitten came from. I did have a hole in my basement window's screen for about three days so it's possible another cat dropped it off down there - but I would have thought that Rusty - who almost never leaves - would have informed her that it was a bad idea. Also, I sealed the screen gap on Wednesday morning and didn't start hearing the kitten until Friday afternoon.

So where did the thing come from?

Phantom kitty.

My Week

Monday All-Day:
Grading papers for take-home psych tests for extra credit.

Tuesday Morning:
Changed mind on house color from light gray to Tan (Coffee + Cream / Khaki)

Tuesday Evening:
Forgetting to pay cable: Last-minute payment.

Wednesday Morning:
I replaced the water pump on my car.

Wednesday Evening:
My buddy goes into the hospital with some heart problems.

Thursday Morning:
Another friend calls to tell me that she's in the hospital after an emergency Appendectomy.

Thursday Evening:
My tooth cracks and I end up accidentally swallowing it while giving a lecture in class.
It's broken off at the gum line.

Friday Morning:
Plan on buying some paint for the house
Find a dentist to pull tooth?

Saturday All-Day:
Painting the House?

Sunday All-Day
More painting?

A pen can save your life, no really.

My grandfather had mentioned a favorite fountain pen to me the other day when he saw me writing in my journal with my Pelikano. He told me a story of his mother buying him a fountain pen before he went off to war and how it never failed him even when he carried it with him to Spain, Africa, Germany, etc., during the War.

A few days later, he mentioned that he found it again in his desk and asked if I wanted it. An antique, vintage, war-era fountain pen that has been in the family for a few generations and was used to write letters back to my grandmother when he and she were dating?

To say that I wanted to snatch the pen like a pack of dingos in a maternity ward... would be the most polite way of describing my eagerness.

So I got it and held it tight and immediately began to search what it was.

From Penspotters:

The Parker Vacumatic is one of the most avidly collected of all vintage pens. They're fairly numerous (and more new-old-stock examples seem to crawl out from under rocks every day), and they range in price (and desirability) from the smaller, later models up to larger 1930s models, or those with special finishes or other unusual features (like the gold-fill metal caps on some later models). Collecting Vacs is an ideal avocation for those who like to impose order on chaos, since you can spend decades tracking down one of each color, style, and model name produced (and there'd probably be a couple more lurking out there in the bushes that you hadn't counted on).

In about 1938, Parker introduced a “Split Arrow” clip with the name PARKER written vertically. (The pen shown here is actually from the 1940s.) Shortly afterward, some Vacumatics appeared with this clip modified slightly by the addition of a star at its top.

The pen has a refillable reservoir inside that's filled by a pump at the base of the cap.

As with any old pen, I assumed that any Vac that survived the War will require some restoration. According to all the websites I've been able to find, his is emphatically NOT a job for a first-time do-it-yourselfer. The diaphragm replacement is not straightforward and requires a special "vac tool" for wrenching out the filler unit


Though I really wanted to dunk the nib into some ink to see if I could get it to write for me, I'm looking around to see if there are some tips for cleaning it. The nib is bent a little but that just gives it character. According to my grand dad, that's the only thing that's wrong with the pen - he dropped it on the floor of the destroyer he was serving on when they got hit by something. When he reached to get it, something flew over his head and "damn near killed him".

Karma pen- thy name is Parker Vacumatic.

-Me

Bladejester?

So here I am reading through my blogger hits to see if anything odd popped up and what'ya know...

One of the links was from the Chillicothe Gazette; a forum post actually.

So I looked it up and someone named Bladejester made this comment:

"mr. natural -

Contact the person who has the following blog.

http://tomsdigitalnotebook.blogspot.com/

Book binding and script are hobbies of his. He knows what he's doing, and if he won't do it for you, chances are that he will point you toward someone who will. He's a decent sort as a general rule"

So... I'm curious as to who would Bladejester be.

According to the forum profile, they're in software development.

The post was from November of last year and the guy, Bladejester, mentioned me by name.

How... curious. :)

I'm on forums now!

-Me

The Cigarette Diaries

From MSNBC:

"This book contains notes of a nature meaningless, I believe, to anyone else but myself. You are perfectly welcome to read them; however, don’t say I didn’t warn you."

Cigarette Diaries
On Sept. 13, 1944, the B-24 with bombardier Second Lt. Frank J. Pratt was shot down by the Germans over Poland. These are excerpts from the diaries he kept in captivity—many of which were written on the backs of paper wrappers from cigarette packs.

I love hearing that another 'survivor' journal has been found and made public. Though the contents may not be displayed for all to see, the fact that someone held themselves together and made record of such a traumatic moment in their lives with a journal is the closest I think I'll ever come to understanding a religious moment.

A journal is a prayer you make to yourself and to those who come after you. It says within its pages that there was hope and that history shall not be forgotten.

-Me