Friday, December 28, 2007

Cats around Town

As I got off the bus from work yesterday, I saw a small cat colony near an apartment building. Camera bait!

Here they are, with a lovely tuxxie in the middle:

Three cats

Play-wrestling:

Wrestling match

The tuxxie lifting a forepaw:

The tuxxie

The sweet tabby winking for the camera:

Kittywink

The Friday Ark. The Carnival of the Cats, which will be hosted by the king of catbloggers, Laurence Simon, before he hands it off for the new year.

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Eighth Night

Eighth night, 5768

Until next year!

Check These Out

Yes, I realize it’s pretty late in the holiday, but it isn’t over yet. So:

Women and Wonder: A Family Hanukkah Website. It has great stories from Jewish sources and features terrific music, too.

Lights: The Miracle of Hanukkah, an outstanding short animated film now available on DVD. (Full disclosure: I know the creator of “Lights.” But I saw the film, and fell in love with it, long before I met her. When I finally did meet her, it was in a context that had nothing to do with the film, and I didn’t find out that she had made it until some time afterwards.)

Monday, December 10, 2007

Sunday, December 09, 2007

Who Guards the Garden Hose?

Gray and white cat guards the garden hose

“I do. That’s who.”

Check out the current edition of the Carnival of the Cats, up soon at Bad Kitty Cats.

My Unexpected Hanukkah Present

It’s one I hadn’t exactly planned on, but...

Broken glasses

Good thing I have my computer glasses. The world is in a bit of a soft focus right now, but it’ll do until tomorrow morning.

And they’re bifocals, too.

Rats.

UPDATE: Got an eye exam, the old frames soldered and the new frames and lenses should be ready in a few days. But by the time all that was over, I was feeling so dizzy and ill that I couldn’t go in to work. I guess the computer glasses didn’t work so well as spares after all. Oh, well.

Sixth Night

Lights, camera, blog!

Sixth night, 5768

Saturday, December 08, 2007

Parakeet in the Park

I walked home through the park the other day and saw Mr. Parakeet, who graciously allowed me to photograph him.

Mr. Parakeet

Making Up for Lost Time

Now that Blogger has gotten its act together once again, here are the photographs from the last several nights of Hanukka, including this one.

Second night:

Second night, 5768

Third night:

Third night, 5768

Fourth night (taken in daylight, before Shabbat):

Fourth night, 5768

Fifth night:

Fifth night, 5768

May we have an abundance of light this year and every year.

Tuesday, December 04, 2007

First Night, First Light

First light of Hanukkah 5768

Blogger’s not letting me post photos for some reason. (Its Preview feature is also not working.) So I’m using Flickr and getting used to a new way of doing things.

In the meantime, Happy Hanukkah!

Toot, Toot

I never thought I’d see this happen.

Wow.

But of course this isn’t just about tooting my own horn. Yesterday was Ray’s yahrzeit. It’s been two years since he died.

If there’s any accomplishment here, it’s mostly Ray’s. I had the easy part; all I had to do was sing and skedaddle. Ray was the one who put the whole thing together, note by note, breath by breath and track by track, working extremely hard for hours, days and weeks, putting his whole heart and soul into it.

And it’s not only that, of course. Ray was my friend.

I will always be grateful to him. And I will always miss him.