Luna

Sick days, the mighty hunter and "this hole in the ground"

I've been a little under the weather the last couple of days. Actually, more than a little. Mostly just resting and recuperation, with Luna?s help, of course. That is, when she?s not too busy looking out the window or hunting bugs, which she spent a lot of time doing yesterday and today. There was one large fly in the window that she became quite obsessed with, tracking it and swatting. Took a while for the mighty hunter to finally catch her quarry.

I did read some more from Hofstadter's Metamagical Themas (which I briefly discussed in an earlier post). I would like to share some interesting thoughts from that as soon as I feel up to the task.

Of course, one can?t spend the entire time on intellectual pursuits, however recreational; so Luna and I also caught up on some DVDs:

I pretty much use the TV as a DVD viewer, I don?t have any television service. So I?m not really up on either current popular programs, nor what?s going on in TV and cable news. Aside from the occasional good drama that I can rent on DVD anyway, it doesn?t seem like I?m missing much, especially when it comes to television news. However, TV news does intrude into other domains however, for example, I found several references online to this commentary by Keith Olbermann. As a follow up to my [post from a few days ago], I provide the following quote which mirrors not only what I have been thinking with frustration not only about the big empty space in New York, but about what happened (or failed to happen) politically in the past few years:

Five years later this space is still empty.

Five years later there is no memorial to the dead.

Five years later there is no building rising to show with proud defiance that we would not have our America wrung from us, by cowards and criminals.

Five years later this country's wound is still open.

Five years later this country's mass grave is still unmarked.

Five years later this is still just a background for a photo-op.

It is beyond shameful.

I strongly recommend reading or viewing the whole article in its entirety.

Like I said, I'm pretty out of it when I comes to TV and cable news personalities, so I'm reading a lot of this for the first time. Seems like he?s a bit of an anti-O?Reilly but a bit more civilized. His recent commentaries have earned him a fair amount of praise at several internet outlets that I read; but not surprisingly a lot of flak from the right. He even has his own anti-fan site, though who doesn't these days?.

I'm also curious about this whole “worst person in the world” thing…does he take suggestions?

cat
kitty
hofstadter
9-11
September 11
New York
olbermann

Weekend Cat Blogging #65: Luna in stained glass then and now

WCB this week is being hosted by Bonnie Loves Cats, featuring Darlin' Darla, a purebred Himalayan kitty who is available for adoption in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Last August (2005), I got a great shot of Luna basking in the light from our stained glass window:

This is one of the images featured on my Art Photography page, which definitely needs to be updated with some recent (and not so recent) selections.

This August, I managed to get a shot of her in nearly the same spot by the window again:

It's amazing to see how she's grown up in a year. But she'll always be a kitten to me.




Weekend Cat Blogging #64: Luna and laptops

Luna gets distracted while checking whether the battery on our iBook is subject to Apple's recall.

Apple has determined that certain lithium-ion batteries containing cells manufactured by Sony Corporation of Japan pose a safety risk that may result in overheating under rare circumstances.

That is Apple's gentle corporate-speak way of saying “may burst into flames.” Fortunately, it looks like we dodged this one. My Dell Latitude at work was not so lucky, and is now relegated to desk duty while awaiting a replacement battery. Ironically, my home Dell Inspiron whose warm and toasty characteristics I described preparing for my August 6 performance was not on the recall list – indeed, since installing the fan-control software things have improved significantly.

Thanks for boo_licious and her cats Ms. G and Fluffy over at masak-masak for hosting this Weekend's Cat Blogging.

It looks to be a pleasantly lazy Saturday for all of us.

Luna joins Weekend Cat Blogging…

at least if I'm not too late already. Weekend Cat Blogging, or WCB, is being hosted this week by Heather along with her adorable cats Pause and Carmel. Hopefully, I get this post in time. If not, it's a good excuse to post a recent action shot of Luna enjoying a new gift from a friend:

I have also added a separate category for Luna alongside the existing cats category for those who want to see more of her and less of the other stuff…

shades of luna

As I was writing the previous post, Luna poked her head out the glass door leading to the patio. I can't help it, just had to snap a pic:

Cell phone pics aren't particularly high quality, but they're creat for moments like this. Plus, the image inspired a few variations. Enhancing the reflection of the patio in the glass gives us a cat as mirror to the world:

And I also like this highly processed version in red and black, done with some of the new image-processing tools I've build for Open Sound World:

Luna and table in black and white

Tonight, I just have a photo of Luna to share. I am pretty sure the original was taken by my dad last July (i.e., 2005). I was just playing around and did some work with the contrast and lighting, and converted to black and white. I am quite pleased with the results. Quite the artsy urban kitty, don't you think?

It's been a nice evening. Quiet and clear, and warm – it usually doesn't stay this warm at night around here. A great night to go for a walk…and then come home, sit on the couch and manipulate digital photos.