Happy Earth Day

The first official Earth Day was celebrated at colleges and schools in the US in 1970 ... I was there, just starting college :) This was back in a past so distant and different, that it was actually President Richard Nixon, a Republican, who that same year proposed the creation of The Environmental Protection Agency and signed it into existence with an executive order. All these years later, I still love animals and plants and want to preserve the our environment. I wish everyone else did too.

Happy Easter

I tried to take some photos of the new grape leaves in the yard for this post -... you know, a sort of Jesus the true vine thing ... but none of them turned out right. Fortunately the pic I took of Hansel was at least in focus :) ...

Good Friday

I don't like Good Friday. I don't like that Jesus got tortured to death, and I don't buy the atonement message of the necessity of that torture and death. So let's dwell instead on how Jesus lived. Here are some clips from my favorite Jesus movies.

This one is from Jesus ...



And this one is from The Gospel of John ...



And this from Jesus of Nazareth ...

Not a tragedy

As Rich Lavish Cash on Notre-Dame, Many Ask: What About the Needy?

The response to the fire at Notre-Dame has been strange, at least in my opinion. And it's not just that all the rich are getting in each others way trying to fund the repairs. It's the religious outrage. While conspiracy theorists try to place the blame for what appears to be an accident on Jews or Muslims, others treat it like an unbelievable tragedy. At America magazine, a comment to an article compares the fire to the terrorist attack of 9/11 in which thousands of people were killed, Fr. Martin has an article there too asking where God was in the Notre-Dame fire, the same question originally asked by David Bentley Hart about the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 which killed more than 200,000 people.

Get a grip, guys. It was an accidental fire which damaged but didn't destroy the medieval structure, no one was killed, most of the important stuff inside was safely removed, and all will be rebuilt with the outpouring of cash gifts. It's not a tragedy.

Happy birthday, Yoda

It was about a year ago that Yoda first appeared in the yard as a kitten :) ...

Mayor Pete on coming out

Pete Buttigieg was on Rachel Maddow's show last night. There were 4 or 5 segments of the interview, but one of the most interesting parts was this one below in which Rachel challenged Pete on why it took him so long to come out publicly as gay ...

Notre-Dame Cathedral

the cathedral has been burning ...



On my one trip to Europe, Paris was the last stop of our tour and the cathedral was one of the places we visited. I think it will be ok. There's not a lot of famous artwork there. There are some relics, which were rescued, but what makes the cathedral special is the architecture - the flying buttresses, the rose windows, the gargoyles, etc., and those survive. They will rebuild.

Pete Buttigieg announces

Today Pete Buttigieg gave is speech announcing he's running for the Democratic nominee for president in 2020. It was a really good speech that actually gave me hope about the future. If he wins I think he will be an excellent president. Here's the speech (Pete begins speaking at 1:35;07) ...

Finally ...

After a long wait, the Bohemian Rhapsody DVD came from Netflix.

Bohemian Rhapsody is a 2018 biographical film about Freddie Mercury, lead singer of the British rock band Queen. It follows the singer's life from just before he joins the band in 1970 to their 1985 Live Aid performance at the original Wembley Stadium in London ....

Bohemian Rhapsody received numerous accolades, including a leading four awards at the 91st Academy Awards for Best Actor (Malek), Best Film Editing, Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing; it was also nominated for Best Picture. The film also won Best Motion Picture – Drama at the 76th Golden Globe Awards, and was nominated for the Producers Guild of America Award for Best Theatrical Motion Picture and BAFTA Award for Best British Film, while Malek won the Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild and BAFTA for Best Actor.

The film had some problems .... some historical inaccuracies and the fact that Bruan Singer was the director for most of the film before being fired ... but overall I thought it was good and worth a watch.

For one thing, there were cats :) ... Bohemian Rhapsody: Freddie Mercury and His Cats, a Love Story

But it was just interesting as a slice of music history. Here's the trailer ...



As is mentioned, Freddie died of AIDS a few years after Queen's amazing appearance at Live Aid in 1985 ...



But the end credits of the movie show the real Freddie and Queen doing another of their songs, and I think it was a good chice as a way to remember him ....

Black holes

In the news - we finally have an actual photo of a black hole. Here's a segment about this from tonight's PBS NewsHour, featuring physicist Brian Greene (I've actually read one of his books about parallel universes, not that I understood everything). ...



I'm pretty challenged science-wise, and what I do know about black holes comes from science fiction. Here's an example from Stargate SG-1, in which Jack and Teal'c impatiently await a viewing of a black hole at an off-world observatory :) ...

"This guy is chicken soup for my soul"

On Deadline White House today they talked about Mayor Pete Buttigieg and a recent speech he gave about being gay. As Nicole Wallace commented, "This guy is chicken soup for my soul". I think it is wonderful that at last in our country a gay man can not just run for president, but be doing really well in the polls. I can only imagine how hard it has been and still is for LGBTQ people in our society, but thank God that is changing. This despite the bigots (Catholic church among them).

Orange cat # 3

Today I managed to get a photo of one of the two stray cats in the yard who still need to be neutered. He's very afraid of me so I had to get the photo from inside the house and through the window. I wanted the photo so I could blow it up and see if he had a tipped ear, which might show if he was already neutered ...

Eartipping

Eartipping is the universal sign of an altered feral cat. 1/4 inch is removed from the tip of the left ear in a straight line cut. Eartips are readily visible from a distance, making it easy for caretakers, trappers and animal control personnel to immediately identify a cat as spayed or neutered. The procedure is performed under sterile conditions while the cat is anesthetized, is relatively painless, involves little to no bleeding and does not significantly alter the cat's appearance. No other means of identification has proven as safe or effective.

Almost all the cats I've gotten spayed/neutered do not have an eartip because I was worried that it would make it harder for them to get adopted if that option ever opened up for them. Also it seemed like it would really hurt. But lately I've come to the conclusion that it's probably best for the cat if people know right away that they are spayed/neutered, given the level of animosity many have for feral cats.

I will try to catch this guy in a trap at a time when my sister can drive him to the clinic on her way to work. I couldn't do any of this without her help. It's not just that I can't drive, but I'm so feeble that I actually can't pick up the heavy metal trap once the cat is inside ;)

The SPCA has a clinic where you don't need an appointment beforehand, but can bring in one cat per person at 7:30 am, fill out forms, pay, and pick him up around 5 pm to go back home. You are supposed to keep the cat separated overnight so he can recover. The price is usually somewhere from about $30 - $70. So much cheaper than the regular vet!

We have now spayed/neutered 14 cats from the yard. This isn't like my avocation in life - it's actually kind of an ongoing nightmare, really. There just seems to be an unending supply of homeless cats in my neighborhood and the cats all end up here. The neighbors hate me for this and I think they believe I'm collecting cats on purpose. Not true - if there was a place for them to go where they would not be killed, I'd take them there. The fact is, there's really no effective plan in place for these animals and the County seems to be relying on individuals to fill in the gaps, while they themselves try to find an alternative to killing ...

From The Washington Post, 2014: Shelters destroy millions of animals each year

It's not all politics

Believe it or not, politics isn't all I think about. So what else is going on?

I'm reading the third book in the Murderbot Diaries - Rogue Protocol ... Rogue Protocol is the third entry in Martha Wells's Hugo, Nebula, Alex, and Locus Award-winning, New York Times and USA Today bestselling series, The Murderbot Diaries.



And I've been watching a new (to me) tv series from Netflix called The Event ...

an American television series containing elements of science fiction, action/adventure and political allegory .... The plot centers on a group of extraterrestrials, some of whom have been detained by the United States government for sixty-six years since their ship crashed in Alaska, while others have secretly assimilated among the general populace.



And there's so much I'm supposed to be doing. Yard work for one thing. Everything is growing exponentially now with all the rain and warm temps ...



And there's the book of short stories I want to self-publish at Amazon, but it's taking forever to retype those ones that I can't get off my old computer. And there are all the cats to watch over (and two to catch to neuter). And I have a cold ;)