Musings

When I was a kid we had a cat for a long time that was commonly called Fat Cat*. Actually, he was large, but not fat. And he was a black-and-white with semi-long hair. He adopted us after Dad fed him the leftover Thanksgiving turkey carcass Mom was saving for soup, a cooking strategy Dad wasn’t aware of, so he thought he’d give it to the clearly hungry stray.

I don’t think the cat ate quite that well after that, but he didn’t leave, either.

The Flat Cat, shown here, arrived later, I think in a Christmas stocking (but I may be artificially creating another commonality—a holiday connection—for these two Ef Cats). This one is also quite similar in markings (less so body type) to the famous JRB family cat, named TinTin, pronounced correctly (tan-tan). And the JRB family gave us the Flat Cat…so we would have a cat that wouldn’t trigger any allergies.

Actually, this was one of a pair of Flat Cats, but the other one got chewed on by Baby B, the offspring member of JRB, and thus it wasn’t pristine enough for long-term preservation. Of course, it looked like their other cat…Mieze (pronounced, by me anyway: mee-zuh).

* Fat Cat’s real name was Omar Ben Sufi, named by my bro for the cat in Edward Peple‘s lovely A Night Out (1909). As the Project Gutenberg version shows, the first sentence is: “Omar Ben Sufi was a cat.” Nice.

This year’s crop of Arum maculatum is fading; this photo is from 10 days ago. Delay seems to be my speed these days….

We stirred up the dust today. Flinging. That term should be patented (in a manner of speaking) by the infamous Super-Flinger, KW.

Domesticated tiger; the wife’s tiger was the “real” kind.

I finished Obreht’s The Tiger’s Wife (2011), and never became as seduced by it as the many reviewers I read were. Lukewarm. Interesting details here and there. But.

Recipe; check.

Mint; check.

Lime; check.

Ice; check.

RUM!

Yeah, you guessed it; we celebrated Cinco de Mayo plus 24 hours….

Cruising through some pictures the Guru took the other day—whaaa?—reverse. Note that this vent is at the level of the first-floor ceiling.

Special Friday meal: chili. Non-standard chili. Smoky and pretty warm but not overwhelmingly hot. Mmmm.

Classy way to welcome the end of the week? (Standard work-week, that is….)

We call this German prosecco. It’s bubbly. It’s from Germany. And made from Italian grapes. Therefore, EU vino special? Ehhhh, German prosecco has a better ring.

I promise when I find a non-tinged magnolia bloom, I’ll take the photo with some kind of scale…. Love ’em.

I found out today there’s a variation of a sort to notarization called a medallion (or, I suspect a banker would say: they’re oh so different). Both are signature guarantees, though. And neither are an apostille.

Not so delicate to gaze upon as the azaleas, yet the scent of the gardenias totally eclipses them.

Perspective of a fancy Inman Park home from the street during last weekend’s festival.

When this house was built, I’m betting the owner never conceived of the street in front full of moseying folks in cargo shorts and tank tops, baseball caps and hiker sun-hats, pushing strollers in myriad forms, and carrying plastic water bottles and cans of beer.