Asthma Cat Update

I am happy to report that Asthma Cat seems to no longer be Asthma Cat. I gave him one and a half steroid pills the day we visited the vet and he hasn't coughed since. Yippeee!!
He seemed a little strange on the steroids so I am glad he does not need them all the time. For a few days there he was very sleepy and hyper vigilant. I know, I know, this sounds oxymoronic, but it was true. He was either completely knocked out or he was jumping at every little thing...He would stumble around the house with eyes as big a bus tires to then finally collapse like the dead in my lap for hours. It was very strange.
He is completely back to normal now. In fact, I think the whole experience has actually brought us down to DEF CAT 4, as Saren and Solo are not initiating as many death matches. They are actually snuggling at night again and even *gasp* playing with each other sometimes.

365: Best of Week One

Week one of Project 365 has passed with success; I took a self portrait every single day. Overall the photos I took required some creativity and thought. However, I often found myself taking out my camera long after the sun had gone to bed. This produced a lot of noisy photos and made me yearn for a SLR camera. However, I still like most of the ones I have taken so far. Case in point...

My pick for favorite from Week One



I took this picture late at night while waiting around in the pouring rain. Although there were street lights nearby it was still fairly dark where I was standing. I noticed that I could see my shadow quite well. I whipped out my camera and started shooting pictures. This one was shot with a 4 second shutter speed, yoozzers!! I knew I would have to process it to get anything out of it at all. Yet all I did to this photo was increase the contrast as far as it would go. I didn't even alter the exposure or colour. It turned out fabulously!! Someone on Flickr said it looked like Mary Poppins evil twin :) Perfect!!

Sunshine

Oh how I am loving this brilliant winter sunshine...

The amazing adventure of Asthma Cat

Every year with no fail, sometime in November, my cat Solo starts coughing and proceeds to cough his way through the entire winter. He has done this since he was a kitten. It never gets really bad, a couple days, here and there, where he coughs a lot .
About four days ago he started coughing and just kept going. He has yet to stop. It has been agonizing to watch. You know when you have a dry hacking cough and you just cough and cough and cough. Your ribs get sore, your throat hurts, your super crazy annoyed.
See, you've got to understand about me and my two cats. The ARE my children. When I first got them my mom used to have dreams of my giving birth to kittens and being so happy. She used to joke that she hoped that got into a good school. I simply can not imagine my life without them (for this reason I have told them both that they are required to live forever).
I am a pretty au'natural kind of person (I used to be a herbalist for a living for heaven's sake). Like myself, my cats are pretty spoiled when it comes to a lack of chemicals/toxins in their life. They eat raw food, they are unvaccinated, they get herbs, and they have only been to the vet to get fixed (and even then I dosed them on arnica the whole time).
However, when your cat coughs for 4 days straight...it's time to go to the vet.
So, this morning off we go. Solo was pretty distressed that we were leaving the house. He spent the whole ride on my lap, purring and coughing. He didn't like the vet (who does?) There were loud noises (tow-truck outside???), and strange people (who didn't bother to say hi to him). While I wasn't there for it, I am pretty sure the most traumatic part was the x-rays. I know this cause the only way you are going to get x-rays of a cat in that position is if you grab all four limbs and hold him down. Poor boo...
Turns out he has asthma. I kinda think this is a good outcome of a vet visit. He doesn't have an infection, or pneumonia, or bronchitis, or heart problems, or etc...he's just asthma cat.
We got some kinda scary drugs for him, but luckily he doesn't have to be on them all the time and the dosage is up to me once we get the coughing under control. I plan to research other ways of keeping the asthma to a minimum, but at least I now have something to use when he coughs for four days straight.
We are all safe and sound at home now. Solo is curled up in the quiet dark bedroom taking a nap. Hopefully he will no cough as much tomorrow, and perhaps the next day he will not cough at all.
The amazing adventures of Asthma Cat continue...

~Sinor Solo Velvati~

hehehe, I love this photo of him, laying on a bed of strewn rose petals, like the lover that he is. Solo loves everyone and he is a suck for attention. We call him Solo Velvati (you must say this with an Italian accent) because he is so velvet soft.

The Unicorn and the Snake

Do you ever have those moments where you suddenly remember something from your childhood? Like a movie you haven't seen since you were 5? Or a particular dish your mom used to make that you haven't tasted in years? These memories might come to you because you've just tasted something remarkable similar or heard a few bars of the main theme from the movie. Or they might just pop into your head for no reason at all.
I often have these moments. I am nostalgic about my childhood. Perhaps it is because I am a Taurus. My parents have often looked strangely at me when I say how much I loved my childhood and I can see in their eyes how they are going over all the things they think they did wrong as parents. Still, I maintain that my childhood was fabulous. I mean, I grew up in the 80's, best decade to be under the age of 12 EVER!!

I often have memories pop into my head from childhood that immediately send me looking for something to maintain the nostalgic feeling. I rewatch that movie or I'll make that dish. Sometimes however, I can not find what I am looking for. Like that amazing cartoon version of The Seven Swans that I watched over and over and over again the Christmas I was four and I drank 2 liters of eggnog in half an hour and spent the rest of the day curled in the big chair puking my guts out and watching that movie. Or eating that $5 jungle peanut butter cup raw food goodie that tasted SO much like the chocolate I used to eat at home as a kid and that I can not for the life of me replicate.

One of these elusive memories is a poster that I had on my wall as a child. I have thought about this poster probably once or twice a year since I was 12. I LOVED that poster. I have no idea what happened to it, I was too young to really care about where my stuff ended up when we moved. I have often gone looking for it, in poster stores, on-line. All I remember was how much time I spent starting at it. You see it is a picture of a unicorn standing by a small stream in the forest. At the unicorns feet is a snake. They appear to be in conversation and I spent many hours telling myself stories about what they were saying to each other.

For no reason at all today I thought about that poster again. I went looking. And this is what I found.


Yippeee!! I will be ordering this poster soon.
I guess childhood memories do come true...


BTW~ If anyone knows of the version of The Seven Swans movie that I mentioned please let me know!! It was produced between 1978-1985, it was animated, it may have had a title that was a variation on this story (The Swan Brothers, 7/11/12 Swans, etc), and it had these awesomely horrid scenes of the sister picking nettles and getting blisters and being tortured with needles during her trial (these scenes stand out for me because no other "kids" version I have ever seen portrayed these aspects of the original story)

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1/365

I have decided to embark on a journey this year. I am commiting to take a self portrait every day for the next 365 days. I know to many people it may seem self indulgent and silly to take photos of one's self. However, I would argue that taking self portraits is not only very creative but it is also an amazing tool for self exploration and awarenss. It can be a fabulous way of documenting ones own journey through life and I am excited to be commiting myself to this goal.

The Rules:

1. a portrait taken every single day
2. i must be the one who manipulates the camera (settings and hitting the shutter button)
   
3. part of me must be in the shot

I will be posting my favorites, at least once a week, here on this blog.
You can also check out and follow my Flickr 365 Set to see the self portraits for each day.

Without further ado...(I ended up with three for today)

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Shovels

1/365

Start the year dancing...



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Parrot Cat