Raising the Rafters

Or, rather, the roof trusses on our guest house and photo studio. Notice, too, that the interior studio walls have been installed prior to raising the roof.

Well Look at That

This morning my mailbox was full of comments on recent posts. Reams of comments make the morning bright, even ones like today where the clouds hang low in the sky. I clicked on the first one and was disappointed to discover it was from an ad bot. Indeed, they all were. I must have frowned because Dr. Buster popped up and came trotting over to lie against me and purr.

So, wishing to delete this spam from the blog I opened up my handy dandy app to see if I could "manage comments." There is still no such function via the app but I do now have the ability to set the default photo size! Hooray! No more postage stamp sized phone pics.

Or, in this case, cartoons lifted from the ether via Facebook.

Committing Violence with Violins

Dear readers,

It sure is nice to see that you enjoy Chet's posts. He was so moody there for a while that he didn't want to write and then, as he puts it, "it got dull." Thank you, P of KY for forgiving his impertinence. Cats have no respect for us humans. (sigh)

Lausanne, there are, indeed, THREE violins in the house, if you count the funny little fiddle stick There is also now a lovely new black walnut dulcimer by Warren May which Mr. Fuzzy purchased after spending a pleasant morning with him in his Berea, KY workshop / storefront. I love to hear him fooling around with it as he has so much more rhythm than I do. I am considering acquiring other instruments as "functional decorations" for the guest house.

The recital video was shot by a friend using my camera. It is just as it came from the device... blissfully short. The song is Wildwood Flower and I let Chet post it as evidence that I did not lie to my friends or husband, who was at a mediocre reenactment that weekend. (Serves him right.) 

The Floyd Music School (at Mitchell Music Co. ) is joined by Bernie Covey's students to give their spring recital at the local Bluegrass and BBQ Festival held just outside Floyd on Chantilly Farm. (Therefore justifying my Facebook post about "playing my first festival," tee hee!) We take lessons with Mike Mitchell who is a very patient and knowledgeable teacher. He asked me to consider the idea of performing my first piece along with "all the little kids who are also just a few months in" to prove that adults can learn too.

What I didn't know until that day was that no other adult student had the hutzpah to look less than perfect in public. Nope, not one. Not even the guy who spent the hour leading up to the recitals asking the kiddos "Are ya nervous yet? Huh? Huh? They'll ALL be looking at YOU."

Wimp.

The experience was a good one. I got over myself and stopped caring that 'people would notice me.' Everybody clapped. I was complemented on my bravery.

And now I'm thinking that I need to bully talk other adult students into doing an annual Adult Recital. Perhaps with the kids sipping grape juice from wine glasses and making it into some sort of fundraiser. People will often make fools of themselves for charity, after all....

Mr. DelGatto is Back!

Dear SuSu and Teddy,

It's me, Cheddar. Sorry I haven't written in a while. I just didn't have much to say cause it's been mostly pretty boring. Girlie and Annie decided to move out several weeks ago so we don't see them very often, though Girlie came over for a late night snack the other day. Somebody takes real good care of her- she was BRUSHED! Shiney, even! The humanz seem to miss them but the rest of us say Good Riddance! They were a pain in the tail, hissing and bitching all the time. Life is sooooo peaceful now!


People Mama tells me that SOMEBODY has demanded we post bout things other than "dirt and chickens." I agree with the chicken thing- all they do is eat, poop, and cackle and all they are GOOD for is bowling. Bowling for chickens IS fun but it's not really news. I mean, EVERYBODY does it! (But only us cats really get away with it.) Mr. Red and Rooster Rooster attack the dogs but never us cool catz. It's funny watching the big black dog cower when that little red rooster attacks. People Mama says I shouldn't laugh because Rufus could get hurt but it's HIS FAULT they don't like him. Everybody knows that only Buster gets to go in the coop. DU-UH!

Dirt is a pretty cool subject. We have LOTS of it and it is way better than the stuff you have. Almost no stickers! Tell your dog that. We have grass and NO cactuses! Papa asked this nice man to come over and give us even more dirt to play in over by the car building. First they, and People Mama, put sticks in the ground and tied strings to it for us to play with for a few days. THEN This other man came and dug the whole thing up with a loud machine. We kept away but watched those chickens walk right beside the scary thing eating bugs and the other gross stuff chickens like to eat out of the dirt. At the end of the day there was this HUGE hole with nice soft DIRT to play in. Oh it was GLORIOUS!!!!!!!!! Rocky Dog just kept running victory laps and attacking the soft clay. You've never seen a dog so happy!

But it got better! The NEXT day the man came back and made the hole really deep. So deep we couldn't jump off the edge in some places. It was fun playing Daredevil and seeing who was bravest. Rolling in the dirt was AWESOME during the day but the BEST part was the easy hunting. Man, a mouse should Know Better than to run across open ground like that bare dirt. We've all been having fun hunting in the cool night with that big light in the sky.

Every day the cool hole changes. First they dug long skinnyish holes in the bottom of the big hole. Then they filled them with concrete. (I asked Papa for the word. We call it Sunstone.) There are these little pipes you can crawl through too but they're kinda tight. This week these guys came with ANOTHER big truck and put up these walls. They are weird, though. They put two walls where one would do. I like to play inside them at night. The walls were in sections and are held together with these funny pins. People Mama says they are going to fill the gap with more Sunstone. I don't see why. You can't stretch out on a wall. Maybe this is going to be a jungle gym for us?

Inside, nothing good is happening. BOTH humans now have these funny shaped boxes that make sounds like Annie and Girlie caterwauling. People Mama has been doing it since JANUARY and won't stop even when I ask. At least she is getting better. She can play three or four tunes now. Papa just started so we animals have to endure until he can make tunes too. People Mama says the 'instruments' are called "violence" which I think is a good name!!

I guess that's enough news for now. I hate reading long letters and bet you do too. I hope you are far from all those fires. I read on Fecesbook that there was rain and everyone was happy.

Your friend,
Chet

The Fourth

From tonight's fireworks at the Floyd County High School.

World's Smallest Chicken Egg?

I found this in the same impromptu nest in which I found a double yolker yesterday. Coincidence?

recent storm

Dear concerned readers,

The Fuzzys wish to inform you that no serious damage befell Stratheden during the recent rounds of devastating storms in the area. Some of the county is without power, however, fortune has smiled on us and there has been no lack of electric power. In our immediate neighborhood, straight line winds must have struck given the number of downed limbs hither and yon - but none in the driveway or on the house. We are most thankful.

Leaves were ripped from their limbs and some fair sized limbs were torn asunder, however, we have only seen a couple of trees toppled.