the web is a funny place

... and that's a good thing because right now, our older cat Max is home recovering after a brief stay at the vet hospital. Sigh.

So, on to the funny:

Despite the fact that Roger Ebert no longer sits in a soundstage version of a theatre balcony to dish out reviews, he still posts them online and frequently makes me laugh out loud, like today's review of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. He sums it up like so:

If you want to save yourself the ticket price, go into the kitchen, cue up a male choir singing the music of hell, and get a kid to start banging pots and pans together. Then close your eyes and use your imagination.

I had never heard of the Voynich Manuscript before reading this xkcd panel... but it makes perfect sense to me now:

Calm between storms

Last week was a big bag of stress right up until Thursday when by noon I decided I'd had enough of the stress at work and took a half day vacation. Friday was my flex day anyway and I managed to get an appointment with my hairdresser for a cut and colour (I'm back to basic black and a shorter, bouncier cut for the summer).

This weekend, we made time to go to the Oak Bay Tea Party and at least it was overcast but it was still crowded and kind of sad (I so much prefer West Coast Amusements to the company they now have -- Shooting Star Amusements). At least I got some Grid photos in since Willows Beach is in this month's Grid.

Otherwise, the last few days have involved gardening, napping, hang-time with the family and other non- and anti-stressful activities.

This coming week will be B-U-S-Y: I will be attending the Digital Humanities Summer Institute again, this time taking "Multimedia: Design for Visual, Auditory, and Interactive Electronic Environments" which includes a project component (eep!). Meanwhile, Minnie goes in to be edited on Wednesday and Hubby will be at Open Web Vancouver on Thursday and Friday. I still haven't quite figured out all of the juggling to get Kiddo to school, etc.

Oh, and since I mentioned the cats, you'll be happy to know they are used to each other now; Max only complains when Minnie attacks his tail more often than not, they just coexist:

We just wanted a cat...

Ever since we moved in, we've been discussing the idea of getting another cat -- a younger cat to keep Max company.

So on Friday, we visited the local SPCA where we found a couple of cats that appealed to one or the other of us and we went to the desk to ask about taking the cats out of their cages. The staffer at that point spent 10 minutes talking us out of those cats and suggesting others. Fine, we took that under advisement and went back to look at other cats.

One I liked seemed to hate Hubby -- hissing and batting at him; one he liked hissed and yowled when I approached. So we looked at slightly older cats and found another couple of potential pets. Again, the staffer talked us out of them, spending so much time talking us out of taking -- well, pretty much any of the cats, that we ran right up against closing time for viewing.

I understand that the staff probably have a good idea of each pet's temperament -- and this was not the first time we had selected a shelter animal -- but she seemed overly concerned with the fact that we had another cat and a child. We knew going in that there was every chance that the visit would not result in our getting a cat but we never expected to be so dissuaded. It was very disappointing.

On our way out, we did take a peek in the small animals area -- two chinchillas, a rat, a couple of guinea pigs and a LOT of rabbits. I wonder if they would have talked us out of those too?

[photo by MendocinoAnimalCare]

Earworm of the day...

Thankful.

This morning, at 3:40 a.m., we were very rudely awakened by our car alarm making a succession of annoying sounds. Hubby was quick to his feet, got dressed and ran down to silence it, then check it out. He didn't see any broken glass or anyone lurking in the parking lot, so he came back inside, and once our adrenaline stopped coursing at full, we did manage to get back to sleep.

This morning, we found that the driver's side door had been opened (probably with a slim jim or similar, because there was no visible damage) but nothing had been taken -- not the stereo, not the digital camera accidentally left overnight, not even the coins.

Needless to say, I am very thankful that we have the world's most annoying car alarm installed in our van. I'm happy that we scared some desperate criminal off our property, too; hopefully no other vehicles got hit.

***

The other thing Im thankful for today is our cat. We took him in for dental work this morning; he had basically a tooth that was rotting from the inside out, which meant a day in the hospital, full anaesthetic, and other un-fun things. When he returned home, he was punchy but seems otherwise fine.