Comprehensive information about the hurricane and resulting devastation are available at the Wikipedia Hurricane Katrina page. I don’t know who put this page together, but it’s an impressive source of up-to-date information.

Violetismycolor asked in her comment to my previous post: “How did your dog learn all that?” I think she was referring specifically to the number of words he understands, and maybe to his insistent communication with me about my cat’s behavior on one occasion. But there’s a lot involved in both, and it has to do with our overall approach in how we live with and train our pets. My answer went long, so I decided to make it a new post. (more…)

Pics added 08-18-2005

He doesn’t speak English, but he understands quite a bit of it, mostly words related to food. He knows how we spell b-o-n-e, and one of his favorite words is soup.

His version of soup isn’t the canned or homemade variety we eat, but the stuff that results when we deglaze the pan with water after cooking plain meat, then let it cool. We eat lean cuts of meat, so it’s not full of fat, just meat flavor and water. Sometimes we add a bite or two of leftover meat. He adores it, and it’s one of the few human foods he’s allowed, because he has a touchy stomach. Actually it’s not a human food—we never eat plain weak broth, ourselves. But because we call his version “soup” every time he hears the word “soup” he hopes for some. (more…)

Several years ago, while listening to a classical music radio station at my workplace, I heard a recording I knew I had to own. I scrambled to jot down the name of the piece when it ended. As soon as the opportunity arose I bought the album. This was the era just prior to CDs. When I got the record home and listened, I read the cover carefully. I noticed a name I didn’t take as anything extraordinary at the time.

The recording was Joaquin Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez, performed by The Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, with Neville Marriner conducting, and guitar solos by Pepe Romero.
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Every now and then the subject comes up on DorothyL (DL) of whether authors should be, or ever are, paid to include real product names in their fiction. A few authors jokingly ask who’s getting paid to mention products, so they can find out how to get paid too.
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