Two of the aforementioned kittens ended up staying with us, despite intentions to find them [...]]]>
Whatever holiday you celebrate in defiance of self-important nitwits, there is always one thing to remember: make the cats happy. However, I’m not going to participate in the whole “Caturday” or phonetic spelling nonsense, as my gift to you.

Two of the aforementioned kittens ended up staying with us, despite intentions to find them all homes, and while this still may not be a permanent situation, that didn’t mean we could neglect them come christmastime. One of them is named “Kaylee,” for a couple of reasons. She is a calitabby-point Siamese (or Snowshoe) mix, and in the beginning we simply referred to her as “Cali” to differentiate her from the others. Later on as her adult coat came in, she developed numerous random blotches of pale brown in her coat, making her look as if she’d been wrestling in the garage, so the name morphed to “Kaylee” since we’re Firefly fans here. If you don’t get it, just begone with you.

Anyway, a few days back at a thrift store we spied the pile of stuffed animals and wondered if the girls would like something like that for christmas, and since 69 cents wasn’t a serious risk, we went ahead and got a choice one for them and presented it this morning. After some curious hesitation, Kaylee realized what such things are best used for. No, that’s not an adorable hug at top; she’s kicking the ever-loving shit out of the toy, which was just what we intended. Kaylee does kind of lose her mind when the playful mood kicks in…

What we didn’t foresee was her turning jaguar and carrying the toy around the house like it was fresh kill, at times running selfishly down the hall with it to protect her food from opportunistic scavengers. Because of the size of it, this usually required straddling, lending her gait a hilarious waddle. The other kitten, unoriginally named “Little Girl” until we find something better, showed distinct interest in the toy too, but soon got outclassed by Kaylee’s vicious enthusiasm. They still have plenty of other things to share, as well as treating one another as stuffed animals most evenings. And whenever that fails, the tables (that they seem to keep forgetting they’re not allowed upon) serve as handy sources of pens and fiddly bits.

One of my presents to The Girlfriend was a (personally) hand-carved manatee with calf, which I wanted some pics of. While I was setting the lighting levels to get the best detail, Little Girl decided it was time for attention, and when I wouldn’t pet her she hopped onto the table to see just what was demanding all of my attention. She thus provides a little scale to the piece.

By the way, this (and another figure) were my first attempts at working with soapstone, and my third at carving anything. I’m kind of a stickler for accuracy, so the end results aren’t exactly to my liking since the proportions are a bit off, making the figures a bit… ‘stylized,’ I guess you could say. The Girlfriend’s happy with them, so I’m cool with it, but like just about any project I tackle (or any image I’ve shot,) I can find ways to improve them, and will be aiming for that in subsequent pieces. The positive side of being critical of your own work is that you’re always seeking to improve, which can never hurt, but the negative side is that you can be pretty hard on yourself too. Though it’s still not art.

Anyway, here’s to hoping your own celebrations are entertaining, and that you’re remembering that “mellow” is a pretty good thing to aim for too. Cheers!

A year ago, I reposted a comic from Calamities of Nature, created by Tony Piro, one that achieved a certain amount of notoriety (not due to my efforts by any stretch.) This wasn’t a humorous comic, nor did it involve exaggeration, misstatement, caricaturization, or many [...]]]> How often would you get this kind of opportunity?

A year ago, I reposted a comic from Calamities of Nature, created by Tony Piro, one that achieved a certain amount of notoriety (not due to my efforts by any stretch.) This wasn’t a humorous comic, nor did it involve exaggeration, misstatement, caricaturization, or many of the other things that people could take offense at if they, you know, had too many hangups to take humor as humor. Instead, it was an observation listing simple facts that was satirical in the usage of a pious scene from a well-known christmas special. Bringing facts into the matter always pisses off a lot of people – something to remember, by the way.

Anyway, the comic went around a lot, without proper attribution, with changes to the words, and so on. This is, not to put too fine a point on it, copyright violation, and intentional too – the proper attributions are embedded in the image, so they would have to be removed willingly for it to appear without them, not to mention that changing the words is simply stealing the artwork. As Tony points out:

My use of the Peanuts characters, in a comic that I drew and wrote myself, is allowed as a parody. But when people grab my art, change a few words, and label it as their own, it amounts to theft.

Quite simply, if anyone wanted to do their own parody, they could draw their own artwork. I’ll leave it to you to contemplate how many good religious folk were the ones stealing the image for other purposes. I’m sure it wasn’t many…

This year, in response to the various uses of the comic, Tony has a simple deal: Link to the original comic directly on his site, and he’ll donate $1 for every 500 page views to Doctors Without Borders.

So here’s the original, which is still quite appropriate and will remain so indefinitely.

If you’re one of them good christians, this is also my gift to you. Get enough of your friends together, and you can drive Tony into the poorhouse! It’s really okay, since it’s not about you being nasty, it’s god acting through you, and giving that heretic exactly what he deserves! [Did I nail those internal rationalizations down? Should I have used a different term than "nail"?]

Or draw your own comic, and give $2 per page view to Whining About Respect or some other. I’m sure there’s some organization that helps support the self-righteous when the real world intrudes into their fantasy. I mean, besides churches.

Otherwise, celebrate the holidays as you see fit, and have fun!

Click for the complete comic.

Scenes From A Multiverse should be a regular stop in your browsing, if it isn’t already. Jonathan Rosenberg wields the tongue-in-cheek incisiveness that makes webcomics much better than most syndicated fare. On top of that, I happen to [...]]]> If you’re interested in accuracy, however, that’s a whole different story…

Click for the complete comic.

Scenes From A Multiverse should be a regular stop in your browsing, if it isn’t already. Jonathan Rosenberg wields the tongue-in-cheek incisiveness that makes webcomics much better than most syndicated fare. On top of that, I happen to like his artistic style, which produces very distinct, expressive characters without clutter or muddiness, and always has an appropriate background – a lot of comic artists out there never accomplish this. He also has a lot of fun with pop culture references, though I suspect I miss more than a few of these because I’m largely out of that loop.

He has a book, of course, and you know christmas is coming up, as well as Festivus, the Feast of Saturnalia, and FGOAF (Fuck Going Outside And Freezing.) If you are in one of those situations where you’re obligated to get something for the pious religiocrat that you know, you can always send along a copy and see if they get the message. Alternately, it is a great way to show you appreciation of your favorite wildlife photography and critical thinking blogger. You can order it online, which means you’ll miss out on the camaraderie of holiday shoppers, I’m sorry to say, but you can usually duplicate this good cheer by having someone slam your fingers in a door a few times. Joy, schmoy, tears are tears…

Since the last report, things have proceeded apace. While the fourth still remains very spooky for some reason, three [...]]]>
Imagine looking down at your lap and being greeted by this? Freak you right the hell out, wouldn’t it? But no, we’re haunted by the cutest little wraiths any medium has ever seen. Noisy, though.

Since the last report, things have proceeded apace. While the fourth still remains very spooky for some reason, three have now gotten used to hand-feeding, and through some unabashed sneakiness, we now have them getting used to petting as well. Roast beef can accomplish a lot (and it also creates monsters, so be warned.)

We still haven’t named them, since we’re still resolute about placing them in other homes, as well as not really making the effort as yet. However, the calitabby-point we’ve started to simply refer to as “Cali” for convenience, and since we’re ridiculously unoriginal. She is clearly older than the others, and based on some evidence discovered yesterday, we’re fairly sure all of them were abandoned by the neighbors when they were evicted (yes, we’re in a stellar neighborhood.) She’s pretty forthright, and my first attempts at petting were greeted with slaps, but she’s also far too curious and hyperactive, so people have simply been a fascination with her. When she was out exploring in the house yesterday evening, we were moving about as normal and pretending not to notice, to let them get used to our presence without feeling they were watched or threatened. Cali, however, repeatedly darted back and forth past us, as if trapped by our moving from room to room, yet she never went very far away and kept returning – we soon determined that she was actually enjoying this game of keepaway, and liked it even more when I reached down as she darted past and tried to touch her. Even when I was successful, she turned around and came back immediately.

Later on, as I ate my dinner of ravioli and meatballs, she came up onto the chair beside me and actually talked to me in a quiet voice. I thought she was getting a little more people-oriented, but this just goes to show that we tend to be too self-centered when observing: she was after the food, and soon slipped onto the table to help herself. Yes, we’re discouraging that. But she’s gotten used to petting enough now that when I tiptoe in during down time and visit them in their bed, she’ll actually start purring loudly before I’ve even gotten to her.

The bolder lynx point is also getting quite social, and frequently greets us with interest in the morning, though he’s not quite ready to come up for attention yet – give it a day or two. He’s extremely playful, as was seen in the last progress report, and at least twice a day starts tearing around the living room, whether he’s accompanied by playmates or not. Just minutes ago, he was involved in a three-way with Cali and the flame-point, thundering between rooms and trilling excitedly (if you’ve never had kittens, I can’t describe this sound in print adequately, but it’s an excited short burst of purring, comparable to a raccoon’s call – of course you know what that sounds like.) Because of his photo at top and the ability to produce more noise when playing than a cat should, I think I’m going to start calling him Marley, after Dickens’ Jacob Marley from A Christmas Carol, of course.

Earlier today, I decided to play hardball, and sat at my computer with the roast beef and made them come to me. Only Cali and Marley accepted this, but both were coaxed into my lap and received some petting between snacks. The weather has turned a bit chilly recently, a blessing in that I was wearing jeans, the first time I’ve not been in shorts since March; this gave them something to climb, which I’m hoping they get out of when they gain confidence, and will simply jump up when seeking attention. Cali soon lost interest once I put the food away, but Marley liked the petting and began to feel comfortable, so much that when I inadvertently spooked him from my lap, he returned a moment later, then began a quick game of tail chasing. He tried a brief game of “Hang From The Knee and Bite The Denim,” something one of my previous cats used to do on the arm of the couch – I refer to it as a squirrel-killing routine, simply because they appear to like hanging upright and biting the hell out of something. Marley then explored the computer desk a little, but came back and actually began playing with my fingers. He even looked up at me and meowed for attention, the first time I’ve heard him make noise other than during Mortal Komcat. And as I type, he and the flame-point just thundered across the room to my feet, oblivious to this looming human presence. They’re coming along just fine.

By the way, the pic at top was produced when I failed to give the flash time to recharge. I’ve been using a strobe bounced from the ceiling for most of these shots, since it produces very natural-looking light without the dreaded redeye, but it means lots more light is needed than for direct flash, so the strobe takes a moment to recharge. Marley, however, refused to hold still during the longer exposure required by the dark corner where I sat.

In my youth, GI Joe was [...]]]> Scott Meyer of Basic Instructions fame speaks with the insight of the classic philosophers:


The Nerf designers may actually be missing the point – part of the skills of childhood is repurposing toys to your own ends. Things that are too specific cripple kids’ creative (and destructive) powers.

In my youth, GI Joe was a nine-inch (metric wasn’t invented then) fully-articulated dude with fuzzy beard and blue Speedos, perhaps a step up from my older brothers’ Joes, who were clean-shaven, plastic-haired, and conspicuously neutral in the nether regions (the action-figures, not my brothers.) I had a six-wheeled ATV “Banana Buggy” and a Schweizer 300 helicopter, though I did not know this at the time, for him to chase semi-military adventures within. Both of these were cool, but they didn’t provide half of the amusement of hurling Joe out of the third-story attic window with his homemade parachute. Joe, it must be said, was more accident-prone than YouTube stars, and curiously, his chute failed more often than it worked, especially when my friends and I figured out how to tie the knots for only momentary security. Joe would often regain consciousness on the front walk, limbs splayed at traumatic angles that the animators of Family Guy are quite familiar with; they know. But Joe never grimaced, never hesitated, never shirked his duty of running his ATV at full speed under the couch, which the ATV cleared but Joe did not…

Stairs are an important part of a child’s development, I am sure – we had four flights of stairs in the house that I grew up in and look how I turned out. The flight of sixteen steps in the main foyer was an excellent acceleration ramp for the Hot Wheels tracks that I inherited from my brothers. The orange plastic sectional tracks, able to be bent vertically but not horizontally, retained a bit too much warpage from being curled into loops, so it was hard to keep the cars on the track in the bottom third, often flying clear before reaching the jump we had placed at the end. Ah, but when they stayed true, we could send a Deora (without surfboards) or Whip Creamer sailing out the front door without touching the floor. Those that collect Hot Wheels in vintage condition nowadays, still in the original packaging even, are total dweebs – a Hot Wheels has not been christened until the paint is chipped or a wire axle bent down a bit. Ones with heavily-damaged front ends are true classics, bearing the history of numerous childhood experiments.

In my very early childhood, kids still actually stuck playing cards in their bicycle spokes, something I’d better explain because I suspect a lot of readers no longer know what the hell this is: the rattling made a sound reminiscent of motorcycles. Bikes are anything but bikes at that age, becoming motorcycles, aircraft, and even spacecraft. The physics that we learned from Hot Wheels we carried over into bicycles, or at least tried to, making ramps of various sizes when we couldn’t find our own in natural conditions. Bear in mind that this was the Golden Era of growing up, when playground equipment was metal and concrete and there was no such thing as helmets and pads – I still have a scar on my knee from wiping out in gravel, a scar that carries the fond memory of having banged the scab a week later and reproducing the tears, only to find a stone still embedded in my skin and now adhering to the scab. Fun times! I did a lot of bicycle jumps, learning that steep ramps often cause the bike to want to pitch forward on landing. You get over the pain quickly because your friends will only laugh that much harder if you moan or cry. Had we continued to use playing cards in this manner, some of our bikes would have sounded like Harleys at idle from the missing spokes (budda budda budda – blap – budda – blap blap…)

As I got older, model kits took over, and as most boys know, there’s a period of time that they don’t turn out how they were intended; this is coupled with those that get knocked down and obtain too much damage. At such times, their appearance is improved with the time-honored application of gasoline, usually anointed well out of the presence of stodgy uncreative adults. Several of my kits became masses of blobby plastic out Behind The Barn, which is another important developmental area. This achieved new heights of awesomeness when my brother-in-law brought over his 12-gauge shotguns and we attempted to extinguish the flames with birdshot. One gains valuable scientific knowledge of atomization and vapor ignition from watching the USS Constitution with full rigging, after having been damaged by pirates (tumbling it from the top shelf,) take one in the powder magazine and vanish in a classic fireball. Much is said about the joys of children’s laughter, but past a certain age, it means you better check to see what they’re doing.

Actually, just a little older than that, it then means you probably shouldn’t…

It is worth noting that this is a period in time when reality, and what your friends tell you with utter confidence, are two entirely different things, often polar opposites. My sister convinced me that the air freshener in the bathroom with strawberries all over the can actually tasted like strawberries, from her personal experience. I can save you that experiment: it does not (c’mon, I was four.) One of my model rockets was destroyed because a friend told me that a two-stage engine and a single-stage were pretty much the same, and a two-stage would successfully pop the chute. I watched my carefully built model return earthward at a high velocity with its chute aflame, never to fly again.

Oh, yeah, I should probably say that model rocket engines are a source of very useful chemicals. Split open the compressed cardboard casing with an X-Acto knife and you get a cylinder of varied packed powders that ignite easily. They smell terrible, of course, which makes them very useful for twisting small amounts into buds of toilet paper and sneaking into cigarettes. When you do this, you dump out several cigarettes and place the loaded one well into the pack, so it’s not found until sometime later – helps cover your tracks. The bottom charge flares brilliantly, because that’s the propellent, but the middle charge (we’re talking single-stage here) is the bit that produces the smoke trail to spot the rocket, and it works quite well. Being careless at one point, I ignited an entire cylinder of this stuff in our living room (on the fireplace hearth – I had a little sense back then)… right before my dad came home. The living room was filled with smoke about halfway down to the floor, but I suspect my dad got too much of a kick out of my sheepish and terrified admission of guilt and merely told me to air it out before my mom got home. Or maybe I’d given him ideas of his own; come to think of it now, some of my rocket engines went missing soon after. I’d always blamed my brother…

So, yeah, with all that, especially for the women reading, you can begin to understand where Mythbusters really came from. Even Homer Hickam, one of the pioneers of rocketry and author of the book Rocket Boys (later to become the movie October Sky,) engaged in shenanigans of this sort – if you’re lucky, you never grow out of it.

One free internets to everyone that knew what a “Banana Buggy” was. It’s the least I can do now that that song is going through your head… ;-)