Pets I have owned...
MEANWHILE, a list of Pets I have owned.
This, an exercise in memory, more for my impending AI clone I'm commissioning to haunt my Children, the undying father....
The earliest memory (one of a very few), living, Victoria, an apartment building with a balcony. I'm small, in a high-chair, I'm delighted because in my cereal ("Rice Krispies" I believe, but may be wrong) I've found the prize, a small plastic jet, red. A toy. I seem to think my Mom is a Stewardess, she's gone a lot, hence my delight with jet. On the small black and white TV placed conveniently to amuse me there's "The Wonderful World of Disney", I don't remember the episode.
Outside, sun shining, the balcony door is open, I'd been to the beach a few days before, collected a bucket full of clams and minnows and crabs, brought them home and filled my small swimming pool with them, and now, in the sun, they're all dead and turning and you can smell them wafting in....
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Moose Jaw, living at 911 1st NW, in the basement, a pet turtle. Popular in the early 70's, they came with cheap plastic palm tree and island and a tiny moat of a sea that surrounds them...
The turtle, one day it escapes, it's nowhere to be found, only a couple of weeks later we find it, far from it's moat, the island and the palm tree, dead under the carpet...
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A dog, "Mutt", small, black, forever jerking at the leash, impossible to walk, always trying to get away. One day he succeeded. I found out later that he was taken to the country by my dad and allowed off leash, where he went for a final run from which he never returned...
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"Archie", some mid-sized curly haired dog we had briefly, then disappeared, I remember as a child finding a decomposing dog over at Central School across the street that matched his description, ghoulish, victim of a traffic accident that managed to crawl off the street and find a place to die...
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"Cindy", a bitch perpetually in heat, Mom would set up with a pellet gun outside the basement window and waited to send off all her gentlemen callers. She apparently ended up on "The Farm".
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A hamster, that my mother tired of cleaning the cage for and so set free and I recaptured it in the neighbors garden only in it's brief taste of freedom it got sick and soon after my recapture died...
I never forgave my Mom for that.
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Others, a "Mugsy", named for "Mr. Mugs", a popular Scholastic Children's book, large, black and white, as well sent to the farm.
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The innumerable captured pets of childhood, frogs, snakes, a wounded bird, all to different ends, most released back where they were caught.
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Others, I'm not sure.Goldfish probably A small budgie, but I'm older now, in High School, and the budgie flew out the door one day and was never seen of again. My brother, I recall, was quite upset.
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In University, a daschund for a few days, supposedly in my keeping as the "Student Mascot" for the Arts Students Union. Not my idea, and after a few days not my problem. The dog, a lugubrious daschund, perpetually farting, incontinent, there was no way, and it went back to where it had come from...
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And in adulthood, nothing, gerbils, hamsters, mice for the children, and "Princess", a cat who made the trip to the Kootenays with me but proved to be a lousy traveler, gifted to a friends daughter who quite liked her and proved to be a good pet owner.
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And that's the carnage. You don't realize until looking back all the damage you've done, and while I'd like a dog, cat, fainting goat and a variety of others, a chance to atone the slaughter, these things will have to wait. None short of the dog would match my lifestyle, and there's no pets where I'm living.
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Star Jelly
A curious phenomenon not entirely explained away:
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_jelly
& BBC on "The Jelly Mystery".
I'm intrigued with the history and references in poetry/literature, as well as it's reputation for showing up after Meteor Falls.
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"Loudermilk" and "Spaceman"
Friends for dinner (thank god for friends or I'd be mightily lean!!), she's on to a new Netflix series. "Loudermilk".
At first it's "Meh", standard, sitcom "set" in the Pacific North West but filmed in Vancouver, with 90% Canadian Actors.
You can tell. It's "angle" is that of a recovering "Alcoholic" who leads a group at a church, and all the antics that he and his "flock" get up to. It's supposed to be "Funny" and "Charming" and "Occasionally Sad" but what it largely succeeds in is being entirely predictable (and never funny, and when it's sad I can't help but think of Oscar Wilde's quote regarding little Nell:"
"One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing."
It's as if it were written by the most liberal, understanding arm of "MADD", but, given addiction rates there's doubtless an audience. Meh. And I can't help but think that friend is showing me this as my own little 12-Step program.
But at least I'm fed.
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And "Spaceman", Adam Sandler, again outside his box, and while it's good that he's outside his box you might want to pass on this. "Lonely man in Space with Giant Talking Spider discovering that Everything he was looking for was left behind at home..." sort of bollocks.
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So, 2 new shows, 2 X Meh.
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These Days....
Joomla, far from a stellar migration, things have changed, have to be updated, in for a graphical and otherwise makeover.
The old modules, working fine on the old installation, no longer working, there are no "updated"modules and so I'm finding other modules that work in varying degrees - most are not what I'm looking for, trial and error is still the only way and this is time consuming. FTP'ing files, installations, dropping new databases & tables, a lot of shit that I'd taken pains to forget about and now am having to remember and upgrade.
Don't get me wrong, the site is long overdue for a makeover, but there's something about having change forced upon you vs finding it out and seeking it for oneself.
And all the old modules, still, despite numerous de-installations, remnants clutter the file server, find, delete, try another, try again....
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So these are the things keeping me busy, problems with form, not content. And as my mind rather leans into problems before creativity the blogging's a little behind...not that much has happened.
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Chess, as of late my game has shown some trifling improvements, I'm no longer level 3, I could beat it with too great a regularity. Now I'm on level 4, and instead of winning I'm (generally) finding myself a move behind. Or, in other words, losing. Play and play again and sooner - or later - I'll get it. One problem - (not really, not in the scheme of things or in the world of Trump, Russia & Israel) - is that there are 8 levels. But chess has some 3000 points available - meaning there could be a 400 point spread in the levels - that's a big difference. It would be easier - handier for me at least - if there was a more graduated climb in progress...
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and BB, a longtime local, coffee with. An older lady (nearly 80) but proper Nelson resident, moved to the Valley from the US in the early 70's escaping the draft, communes, free love, farm, hippie-dippy life-style, an original founding father ("mother") of the town as it is today. She's published a small book of poetry, sold it out, limited runs, we're out for coffee simply to get better acquainted, these first residents, think Dag, M****** from the Thrift Shop, Stormy, all these people, they're the reason it's such a cool town. They wrote the constitution, the charter, they're the feminists and activists and she's still writing letters, books, volunteering at the radio station, ....
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The stories, they're all episodic, short, the train is frequently derailed or shunted onto other tracks, all taking the tangents of "Grandpa Simpson" "In the year...when I was .... my true love...except for my professor..." all the various segways, detours, tangent and skirting, short anecdotes, the long ones trailing off and vanish with irrelevance, nothing is arrived to directly, you need a conversational map. I've made it onto her mailing list, in which daily she lets me know what she's been up to, doing, she's time on her hands and is filling it as best she can.
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And the car, that paperweight of winter, that Albatross I have to cut from my neck to make room for another. Parked for 2 months up on ...., accruing snow, filling with winter...I have to move it. I check the mail, my monthly routine, there's a warning, 2nd notice. So I go up and move it, 3 expired tickets cemented to the windshield with ice, all in the past week, once they find you they don't stop, keep the tickets coming, threats of towing...where does it say "72 Hour Parking" but apparently that's a rule that doesn't need writing down.
Miracle of miracles the car starts and I move it a few blocks away.
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The weather, snow, winter come in March, crisp mornings, or bitterly cold. And snow, the first foot melting, the second largely staying as does the third, but the sun has warmed and melted a lot, the air is cold but the snow is still vanishing...
Word has it - through customers, that the restaurant is opening Friday. I'm not going back, but I need a job ASAP.
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