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Weekend Open Thread
81 thoughts on “Weekend Open Thread”
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“Good morning, and welcome to La Maison de Chat. We have your table waiting for you.”
Via Reddit.
Comments are closed.
Thank you sir. I would prefer a Bloody Meowy, hold the celery.
Today we are having breakfast with old friends and then we are all catching Gardians of the Galaxie : Vol 2 at a nearby cinema.
Hope everyone as a fun weekend!
That sounds wonderful!
Review please. 🙂
Not as good as the first one but still very enjoyable and baby Groot is a hoot !!!!
I’ll just take some snuggle time with the meowtr d’.
Going to see Beauty and the Beast stage show at Count Basie Theater in Red Bank, NJ today.
Seeing the Whitney Biennial.
Now that is one dapper little dude! I don’t drink, but I might start if he was my server!
We had a little bit of sunshine between thunderstorms this week. One of the storms was a real doozy, we don’t often get lightening and thunder like that! There’s a place a few miles south of me called High Rock that reportedly had half a dozen lightening strikes. Luckily, we’re continuing our extra-wet streak; it dropped a little over an inch of rain at my house and 3-4 times as much in the foothills.
Here she is looking out at the sunshine not long before the clouds started rolling in!
I’m glad Miss Lily got some sunbathing in! That coat isn’t going to sparkle without sunshine.
What a gorgeous window view. And your choice in accents for the windowsill, very meowstetically pleasing.
I feel like I’m channeling the cat puppet on the Mr. Rogers show.
That cat puppet used to drive me nuts! But I adored Mr. Rogers so back then (and still adore him today), even when we gently mocked something he did, like his *truly* painful “operas,” it was done with love. He was one of a kind. He could calm my kids down so quickly, with his gentleness. I miss him!
I would so tip this dapper little dude with all the tuna he wants!
No big weekend plans, just glad to enjoy the nice weather and relax!
Is it wrong that I just want to grab him/her and run?? He’d be the perfect gloomy weather snuggle companion today. We’re having a rare SoCal spring storm with rain, chilly temps and high winds coming in later today. And this after a very warm spell, guess Mother Nature can’t make up her mind.
My weekends are getting monotonous – packing, chores, more packing, and maybe moving some stuff over as I get the keys to my new place in a couple hours. At least I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, the move should be finished in 2 weeks. YEAH!!!
AJ, I feel your pain–my first winter in Santa Barbara was great until it rained for 2 weeks straight! I could barely make myself get out of bed. And moving sucks. There’s no other word to describe it. Glad your ordeal is nearly over.
If it makes you feel any better…I hired movers to move out of my apartment, but I didn’t have a place to move to yet. They piled most of my stuff in my parents’ garage, a few things went into the spare room/office, and I lived out of a few bags and a laundry basket
in my childhood bedroom for almost two months. Then I recruited a friend and her husband with a pickup truck and it took us three trips to get all the big stuff from my parents’ house to my place.
(I closed on my condo a few days after my lease ended, but the lease ended on the Sunday after Thanksgiving so we had to move the weekend before; then we had lots of cleaning/painting/etc. to do before I moved in…plus all this was happening over the holidays and then in January I got sick, plus a coworker was out on an unexpectedly-early-and-extended maternity leave so I couldn’t really take time off.)
Oh wow Allein, I think your moving experience trumps mine. I’ve done plenty of moves in the past and this is one of the toughest. I’ve also done moves on holidays and it really sucks. This time, I’m doing it on my own as hubby is on travel for his company and can’t get time off to come back to help me. I’m actually paying on two places this month but figured it was well worth so I wouldn’t have the pressure of trying to get it all done in one day. The moving company comes one day and then the following week, I’ll get the place cleaned before handing the keys over.
Moving out a week early was actually a good thing, since it gave us time to clean, and I was able to leave some stuff behind that I couldn’t pack properly but could take in my car later. I was supposed to close on my condo two weeks earlier but it got pushed back. Staying at my parents made it easier to clean and do stuff in the new place while it was empty, so it wasn’t so bad. The last thing to move was the boxes of books that were too heavy for me to carry (but the movers took ’em down the stairs two at a time!) After I emptied some boxes we brought them back and split the books up and then I took a half-full box or two whenever I went over there. Also when I got sick (respiratory infection) I had my mommy to take care of me. 😉
Off to the theater now. Have a good day, everyone!!
Moving is one of the worst things to do! I told my husband that after moving 9 or 10 times in our 21 years of marriage, once I got in this house, the only way I’ll leave is when the kids drag me off to the Home in my last years! And he knows I mean it, too!
Moving sucks, but there is a big part of me that would do it in a heartbeat right now if I could and not look back. Mostly because this place is so noisy sometimes (among other things, several of my neighbors don’t seem to realize the volume knob in their car also turns the other way), and while I don’t want people above me, being on the second floor is sometimes not so great.
Errands, cleaning house, crafts, kitty-snuggling–a weekend like any other! Since I had a 2-day photo shoot this past week, I wish I could skip the errands, but the cats must eat. That means a trip to Petsmart, on a big adoption weekend. Please, everybody, send me the will to resist any kittens I might see!
HaHaHaaaaa
Go pet and snuggle ALL the kittens!
Aj, good luck with the move – I’m glad you have a new place – I hope you like it.
Our little Dapper Dan of a pussycat is just what I needed on a gloomy day – but I’m thrilled for the rain because even with all we had yesterday we’re still in a slight deficit.
I’ve been meaning to ask everyone – do you know about the Animal Rescue Site? Each day on my phone I click on the app I have there and you get three animal images, one at a time. You “pet” the screen with the animals’ image (dogs or cats) and they purr or bark appropriately when you finish petting. Each time you go through this ritual you earn a certain number of kibbles which go to feed shelter animals. It’s simple, brief and fun and actually does some good.
!!! I have not heard of this app but I will be looking it up later!!
I haven’t tried that site, Murray, but I start every day at Freekibble, where you answer a question and, right or wrong, kibble is donated to shelters. They have separate questions for dogs and cats, and then a page to just click to donate kitty litter. It was started some years ago by a 12-year-old girl (with her dad’s help), and she’s now all grown up. They partner with Ellen Degeneris’s pet food donation company, Halo, and the Animal Rescue Site, so it’s all becoming networked and amazing. I love all the simple ways we can help shelters online these days!
Not much going on here. The weather has been quite nice, which makes it hard to stay inside and work. ? But the dogs are doing great, which is what’s really important, right?
One amusing thing — our teenage dogsitter’s mom fell madly in love with the dogs while she were taking care of them recently, and now mom comes over to ask if we’ll “let” her take them for a walk! Let? Like we’d say no to someone who loves them that much??
Everyone have a great weekend!
Laura, I went on to the Freekibble site – what I was curious to find out was if they emailed you with a reminder each day or do you simply have to remember to visit the site and answer the question. I didn’t find a sign-up except for the one that’s $5 monthly – can’t do that, unfortunately – so wondered if you knew anything more.
I don’t believe they have a reminder email signup, but I’ve been going there first thing automatically for years now so that it’s ingrained. Why don’t you set your computer to send you a reminder email daily for a while? That’s what I do with almost anything I need to remember to do these days — if my computer didn’t remind me, I’d never remember *anything.*
And I don’t do the $5 monthly signup, either. They just started that program last year, and I hope it’s doing well; young Mimi sure had a great idea when she started the site. I have a bookmarked list of websites I visit daily, and I just put Freekibble at the top of the list (followed by the Breast Cancer Site) so that I see it there every day whether I’m on my desktop, my tablet, or my phone. (Too many options for going online these days — it’s hard to get away from the internet!) I figure I’ve probably fed several hundred meals to pets by now all by myself, and that doesn’t include all the special gifts of 5,000 pounds to this shelter or that shelter she does monthly. Working with Ellen has really expanded the site’s reach; they started just in her area in Oregon, and now they’re nationwide.
I love young entrepreneurs who do good things for the world!
Yes you can get a daily reminder without the Freekibble Plus. I was clicking at the site long before they started Plus and always received a reminder email everyday.
Did you have to sign up for it? I couldn’t find anyplace on the site to do that.
You’re right — I couldn’t find anyplace to sign up, either. How strange! I remember there being one once, but it doesn’t seem to be there any more, and searching using a variety of terms didn’t work, either.
But that’s what a computer calendar is for. Just set a daily reminder and you’ll be all set.
I am somewhat challenged in the setting up of such things but I will look at it as an opportunity to figure out something new on my computer – thanks for all your help!?
Here is where to sing up for a daily reminder:
http://www.freekibble.com/reminder/
Thanks, GiGi! I appreciate that so much. And I didn’t even have to sing. (?)
Dammit! I always do that! LOL!!
Thanks again for the info, Laura – I am now officially on the Freekibble mailing list and getting a reminder every day. I also just signed up for the whole gamut of sites – Animal Rescue, Alzheimers, Diabetes, Veterans, etc., etc., to get reminders everyday. The breast cancer site helps poor women get screenings, a literacy site helps kids get books – and all we have to do is click on it everyday. I used to have this come in but it somehow got lost in the shuffle.
I started the weekend with badly mixed emotions.
Hubby decided to take a personal day yesterday, so the weekend started early. Which made me happy.
When I got up yesterday morning, I found small brown cubes all over the place. My first reaction was that hubby had somehow smuggled home a baby wombat, and it had left little poops all over the place. I was so thrilled, until I saw hubby removing his work boots in the living room, and realized the “poops” were really mud from the bottoms of his boots!
He’s lucky I love him.
I bet every single person reading this saw “brown cubes” and thought YOU GOT A WOMBAT!!!
You bettcher boots we did!
oh yeah. Then we were going to flood Duckie with requests to come visit!
I know I’m in the right place with the right people who know brown cubes signal Wombat possibly.
Yes. I’m thinking that wouldn’t be the reaction of the average person.
I had a slowdown the past two weeks. No drawing or reading. Vegged out with Millie and tv. The result being my room is a total mess. For example, sleeping on the bare mattress under the quilt, clean clothes all over to be hung up. Ugh. I did keep up with laundry.
So. Room cleaning, clothes hanging, vacuuming and arranging all day. Drawing all day tomorrow as a reward.
In the Millie department: she is fully pad trained but would chew the wet pads if I didn’t take them right out! Yuck, plus very costly. So I sprayed her twice with small water bottle.
Her reaction was hilarious. She spent the next two days barking and growling at the bottle. But she has stopped chewing the pads!! Lol.
Fast learner.
Enjoy your weekends everyone.
I sympathize about no drawing or reading – that’s the story of my life. I always feel I can’t do that sort of thing ’til I get my work done – as a consequence I only work (and nap because I’m so tired a lot of the time) and don’t get much drawing and almost no reading time. I love to read in bed but it keeps my husband up!
Happy Saturday, all! I just got back from an all day excursion with the teachers from our school. First we went to an oil pressing factory where we got to taste all of the different products they offer (including pumpkinseed oil which is the local specialty, and camelina oil which I had never heard of but it tastes a little like fresh green peas and garlic – I bought some to make an asparagus salad for the coming week). Then we went to an herb farm, which let us pick and make our own herb dips to eat with their fresh baked brown bread. They also had lots of dried herb mixes, salts, teas, syrups for sale. We finished the day off with dinner at an orchard that produced its own juices, ciders, schnaps, and vinegar (their specialty is made from a type of snow pear). Tomorrow I’ve got to do some real work, but today was a delightful distraction!
That sounds like a fabulous tour! I’m happy to hear that the camelina oil wasn’t made from pressing camels, tho’.? It sounds delicious. Nothing like I’d imagine pressed camel would taste like.
I wondered about the name, too, MurrayC! It is from the Latin, camelina sativa. It is really unusual, but it may be “the next big thing” because it is high in omega 3 and vitamin E.
Just hearing about your day makes me hungry! What a fun tour — I bet everyone really enjoyed it.
That sounds so awesome!!
I stayed up until 4:30 am (I usually am up til 2 am anyway) to take my brother to the bus station to go visit his grandson in Denver. Then I got up at 8:30 because my youngest daughter and I go to the Hospital Auxiliary rummage sale every year. We went there and then went to some garage sales. I didn’t buy much, some brooches for my collection (I have about 500 brooches), and a cardigan sweater. I spent $10, so not a bad day. I am kind of tired though. I probably won’t do anything tomorrow.
Happy weekend All! This week has been full of ups and downs, good things and bad things too.
Last weekend I picked up my bee packages! Two of them! 3lbs of bees each, that is about 18,000 bees. But drama with the Queens – lemme tell you. I was so excited until I got home and found that in the one package the queen was dead. Very sad. So Sunday I drove back out to Kingdom Come to pick up a new queen so I could install that package. On Tuesday I opened the first hive to release the queen and found that she was dead! So I had to hustle back out to Kingdom Come again pick up another queen so that the hive wouldn’t a) swarm and disappear or b) start laying eggs even though they are not queens. Which would be really bad. Thank goodness on Thursday when I opened the second package to release that queen she was already out and wandering around inspecting things. I will look in on the first package tomorrow morning before bee class. Hopefully that queen is ready to be released to her hive. Bee class tomorrow again – now we learn what to look for in the hive – eggs, mites, nectar, honey. Whee! Its a great class.
As if that wasn’t all enough drama my allergies flared up with a vengeance last Friday. I caved on Sunday and went to my pharmacist and said – give me everything strong you got! She gave me some things and then said, “as a last resort, if none of these work, you can try these eye drops. They are the best, even though they are the most expensive.” Well Monday morning the eye drops were calling my name so I picked them up. Turns out – I’m allergic to them! Yup – gave myself a terrific case of non-viral conjunctivitis from those drops. Lucky me, I’m 1% with that reaction. Didn’t figure that out until Thursday though. I’m still riding out the last of the side effects but healing. Thank goodness.
Thanks Murray C. and Laura for mentioning those apps – they sound amazing. Shall look into them immediately.
And N. Fritz – I am so envious of your day – I’d like some of that camelina oil for pesto. Thanks! 🙂
Oh, and PS – I didn’t think the pic would work – but this is my Swee’Pea, my couch companion, purring away.
What a cute boy! And he sleeps with his paw over his eyes like my Mia.
Wow Tara! I learned a lot in your post about bees. Do bee packages cost a lot? Will a new queen be accepted if introduced to an existing hive? What happens if bees start laying eggs without a queen? I am imagining apian anarchy. Do keep us updated on your hives!
Tara – I’m so happy for everyone on the planet that you are beekeeping! Thank you!!
Sweet thang! I do love it when kitties sleep with their paws over their eyes. Perhaps the light is too much? Can we get little sleeping masks for kitties?
I’ve finally decided to take the plunge and self-publish a non-fiction book, “Fairies in Cabs”. It’s a compilation of extracts from the nineteenth-century newspaper The Era, a goldmine of information about the theatre, music hall and popular entertainment in general. I’ve concentrated on the comical and bizarre snippets from the gossip columns and small ads – dancers hurtled into the orchestra pit by centrifugal force, punch-ups in the wings, the perils of public transport, servant girls impersonating actresses, etc. I’m waiting to see the final cover design, then with any luck the book should be for sale on Amazon in a couple of weeks.
Sounds like something I would be interested in, I love fun quirky tidbits from history.
*Hugs potential customer*
Alice, I want/need to know more about this! I have performed English Music Hall for years (our troupe is now defunct because everyone has moved to various parts of the country and it’s no longer feasible to get together) and your book sounds like it’s right up my alley!
If Mike doesn’t object to me sneaking in a free preview, Murray C, here’s a little sample from 1892:
“AN amusing incident, illustrating the craving amongst a certain order of playgoers for strong dramatic fare, occurred the other night at West Hartlepool. Three solemn-looking seamen presented themselves at the pay-box of the Gaiety Theatre and enquired of the money-taker the name of the piece. “’Kindred Souls'”, by the Milton-Rays,” was the reply. “How many murders are there in it?” asked one of the men. “Not a single murder,” responded the money-taker. “No murder!” exclaimed the man in surprise. “Then is there a suicide?” “No.” The sailor turned to his companions, and, after holding a brief conference with them, remarked to the money-taker, “All right, mister; we’ll not go in tonight.”
More details as and when available!
That’s GREAT! I do love the sentence structure in pieces like this.
Oh, wow — that’s great!
There’s approximately 140 pages of this stuff, and that just covers the years 1890-1900. If all goes well I hope to publish at least three more volumes plus a book devoted entirely to pantomime.
Wow! I was Principal Boy once in a very truncated version of a pantomime. We did
“Puss in Boots”.
OH my gosh, I want a little bowtie for Beau!! 🙂 This cat was extra adorable!
So uh… do you guys remember Beta the dwarf hamster from a few weeks back? You know, the one who was teeny tiny when standing next a a mug? Wellll… it turns out she was pregnant… Boy was I in shock when I found pink wiggly little alien blobs in my hamster cage!! They are now 11 days old and are actually pretty darn cute little buggers. If any Canadians in the Vancouver area would like a baby hamster, I’m gonna need homes XD
Eep! I’m too far away or I’d be tempted.
I’m not in Canada, but I’m not that far away from Vancouver. I’d be tempted except for one teensy weensy little problem… Lily’s prey drive! Those little guys would be kitty snacks in no time!
Congratulations!
Mazel tov! I am on the other side of Canada plus yelly-flappy lips would drive me even further bonkers if we had a caged rodent in the Pond abode.
SO CUTE!
So my mom and I had a nice day with a bad ending. Beauty and the Beast was great (there were at least 5 little Belles in the audience, one of whom had a Beast doll with her; they were too cute), then we had dinner. On our way home my dad texted her and said to have me come inside the house because he had something for me (which wasn’t untrue; it was just a piece of junk mail). The real reason he wanted me to come in was to tell us that my cousin died. We don’t know the cause yet and I won’t get into details, but he was too young.
Oh no! 🙁 I’m so sorry for your loss.
Thanks, Mike.
So sorry Allein.
*Hug*
Sorry to hear about your cousin, Allein. Peace and understanding to your family.
Allein, I’m so sorry. Hugs coming your way.
So very sorry for you and your family, Allein. We lose people too soon.
Thanks, everyone.
Still not quite real, yet.
I’m sorry for your loss. It’s always too soon isn’t it? Regardless of age. My brother died at age 31. It didn’t feel real for a very long time and even now, 15 years later, I still sometimes feel that way.
He’s 56.
I agree, 56 is way too young. (Although I may be additionally influenced because that’s only a couple years older than me…)
I’m sorry.