Beulah, ND: Small World IV

Posted on February 6, 2008 by Steve

Preface: I’ve been sick for a few days but I’ve regained enough strength to bang out this cool happenstance. It will definitely counter the rougher news coming my way for the next quarter.

All those Web 2.0 applications are pretty lousy in my opinion. Maybe if I were 10-15 years younger, single and had more time to waste on such “social networking,” they’d probably be great. A co-worker of mine summed up Facebook & MySpace pretty well, “they’re just spam gathering 2.0” due to all the intrusive information they collect; I guess AOL 2.0 was already taken. Hard to believe one was actually useful in having me re-engage with not just one person but two from Beulah High School (where I graduated from in North Dakota).

Originally, I was just updating my token Facebook profile because a friend bugged me to. Heck, I didn’t even remember having one of those stupid things. Then I saw some notice saying I had been “poked,” by Cindy. My immediate questions were “what the hell does poked mean?” and “how many jealous spouses go nuts over this?” It had been 11 years since we had communicated and I always knew it was fault why it ended (no, I won’t explain, it’s not an interesting story).

Initially, I wasn’t going to “poke” back since I didn’t care for the connotation. I decided to see if this Facebook jazz could contact her more directly, maybe she had forgiven me. It was only a “poke,” not a “stabbing” motion which is usually reserved for ex-girlfriends; a role Cindy never had. Surprisingly, I did get a response and I have been forgiven, phew! I received a synopsis of her life, whereabouts and 18-month old son. I’m a little puzzled as to what a Redneck suburb of St. Paul would be like after listening to hours of Garrison Keillor stories. We’re still in the explanation stages of what has happened in 11 years; she said my web site doesn’t cover enough. It is only two-and-a-half in its current incarnation with the goal of trying to be current.

The other funny story regarding Cindy was recent too. During our annual Meeting Anniversary dinner last month, Somara and I were talking about Match.com (what put us together). The conversation then led to when Cindy and her roommate Kami came to Austin over MLK weekend in 1997. Sonia and I went to pick up the Minneapolis-based duo from the airport, got them settled at my apartment and then off to dinner. Like all out-of-town guests, they wanted to see San Antonio for the Alamo and the Riverwalk; I guess Austin’s two million bats, statue of SRV and the UT clock tower aren’t as impressive. I think they had a pleasant time beyond the “warm” weather. Sonia was still in yenta mode then, trying to follow through on a quest to have me married off in five years. So after Cindy and Kami left, Sonia said to “marry Cindy!” This led to me being incapacitated with laughter for a bit but I wanted to hear Sonia’s rational yet futile explanation. It went along the lines of how I would light up around Cindy, common background, etc., pretty much the usual I had heard from others based upon observations in 1993; only Phil’s ex-wife Jill seemed to know better. Somara wanted to write Sonia a thank you note for trying despite being unsuccessful.

I said there were two though. The other person was the Danish exchange student Christian. I always felt bummed for him. He came all the way from Denmark to spend a year in the States and got placed in Beulah, North Dakota! When Europeans see America, they probably think of what our media shows: LA, New York, Chicago, Dallas and much nicer places. When an American gets sent abroad to Europe, even if it’s the backwoods part of a country, the cool stuff isn’t very far away by train. We were five-six hours from Winnipeg or eight to Minneapolis. Bismarck was closer but a poor surrogate for a metropolis. Christian made the best of it. He lived with a childless couple who were nice to him. If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t have earned a solid A in Pre-Calculus. I brought him back some gourmet tea from Winnipeg as a thank-you gift, I recall he found our tea, bread and beer rather lacking. Christian was a big Dire Straits fan too yet it’s not on his profile, I’ll have to ask him about that.

Not a bad string of coincidences in my life recently. Now if the one person I’m seriously trying to hunt down would reply, I’d be pretty thrilled before I turn 40 this Summer.

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14 years in Austin!

Posted on February 3, 2008 by Steve

Today is the 14th anniversary of my arrival in Austin and the weather is and will be fantastic! The forecast has the area peaking at 27 C (low 80s F). Certainly blows away the day I drove in: raining and slightly warm, well, warmer than Central IL when I left.

I’m fighting off the beginning of a cold thanks to a brief visit with my nephew Hunter; we had to go drive up to Georgetown for Somara’s truck and the lucky fellow was on the recovery end of a cold that kept him from attending school the whole week. Be prepared to see the updates on the site slowing a tad.

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This month’s musings and explantion to the banner

Posted on February 2, 2008 by Steve

I think I did a pretty good job with PhotoShop on the SpongeBob Valentine for my banner. Decided to go with the easy motif since I was stumped on anything else eventful in my life for this month plus I dislike both teams in Super Bowl XLII; is there a way to have both lose since their fans are very obnoxious types in most personal interactions?

What’s with the “busy” thing in the banner? I’m not terribly busy but I feel February is, as far as months go: There’s Presidents’ Day (or Lincoln’s birthday in my old home state, IL), Valentine’s Day, Black History Month, Groundhog Day, events related to the Texas Independence War, Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday happen frequently here, the NHL trade deadline, the NBA All-Star Game and recently, the Super Bowl. Then throw in a string of birthdays: a handful of Somara’s relatives and people associated with my college days; and it’s the anniversary to when I moved to Austin (14 years!). Phew! It makes me wonder why February only receives 28 days. Even that Leap Day isn’t helping this year.

Just something stupid to ponder and stir up a discussion with. Again, a quick clarification to let everyone know, I’m not so busy that I can’t reply or something. My Seventh Grade teacher Mrs. Schultz used to say people practically brag on how “busy” they were in Christmas cards or casual conversations; I’m not or at least trying not to. She was giving this litany in 1980. Little did she know how much crazier it would become thanks to all the technical and cultural developments which followed.

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The Austin Ice Bats will probably leave or fold now

Posted on February 2, 2008 by Steve

Cedar Park has finally given the Austin Ice Bats the kiss of death in the nearly finalized deal to bring the AHL via Dallas to the area. It could still be stopped through lawsuits or other legal maneuvers since government in Texas is as transparent as the gravy on chicken-fried steak.

I’m still of two minds on this but in the end, I’ll never be a (Dallas) Stars fan and I’m confident the new team will be called the Texas something because they’re based in Cedar Park (a suburb where they’re renaming everything after Reagan). Who knows, maybe Austin will be a two-team town like Phoenix, Chicago, Toronto and Philly.

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1958: Explorer 1 launched into orbit, take that Sputnik!

Posted on January 31, 2008 by Steve

From what I remember reading in other books, various agencies of the US government were planning satellite launches before Sputnik scared everyone. More of the details on Explorer 1 are on the link. I’m very impressed that the gang at JPL whipped it together in three months and this initial success remained in orbit until 1970! This milestone is also important to me because it proved the existence of the Van Allen Belts which were not so lethal, thus debunking the Moon Landing Hoax crowd.

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Who’s your favorite from the Bond movies?

Posted on January 30, 2008 by Steve

Entertainment Weekly or as I prefer to call it, Entertain Me Weakly posted their list of the Best & Worst Bond Girls in preparation of the upcoming movie, which may have the worst title yet. Sure, Webster’s can defend the use of the word but it would only be appropriate if we were living in then Enlightenment because physicists have taken it over.

Anyway, I can agree on the absolute worst Bond girl yet Diana Rigg will always be the best, she probably lost points on being in the crummy George Lazenby outing.

Posted in Diversions | Leave a comment

Outbound Flight by Timothy Zahn

Posted on January 29, 2008 by Steve

If you read Heir to the Empire right away in 1991 like I did, you may recall Zahn’s earlier novel mentioning the Outbound Flight project: an expedition to the closest galaxy that disappeared without any survivors. It was only important to the plot because the story’s Force-wielding villain, Jedi Master Joruus C’baoth, was allegedly on board. I guess people had been bugging Zahn and/or the people who approve the novels to finally tell the story about what happened. Long ago, I used to be curious then Lucas made those awful three prequels killing my interest in his franchise. Then I received this paperback for free and needed something to read at the airport.

Set five years after the events in The Phantom Menace, a trio of small-time smugglers accidentally miscalculate their hyperspace jump and find themselves far outside the Republic. They’re quickly rescued by alien vessels from the Chiss Ascendency and quickly become prisoners. Leading the Chiss squadron is Commander Mitth’raw’nuruodo, the man who would become Grand Admiral Thrawn, probably Emperor Palpatine’s best commander. He becomes the New Republic’s strategic problem in the Heir trilogy.

Back in the Republic, Supreme Chancellor Palpatine is still plotting his coup through a moronic web of byzantine schemes and double crosses that the even dumber Jedi Council can’t figure out. I suppose the Council isn’t sweating it because things have been relatively peaceful after the Naboo affair. Then a dispute between the miners of Barlok and some corporation erupts. Fearing a repeat of Naboo (and probably another awful movie like Phantom), Palpatine dispatches Jedi Master Jorus C’baoth (yes, the one ‘u’ isn’t a typo) to negotiate a settlement. Why him instead of Yoda or Mace Windu? In the eyes of the Chancellor, he’s the “right” man for the job with nothing better to do; the Senate recently killed the funding for his Outbound Flight project. If he settles the Barlok squabble successfully, Palpatine promises to restore the funding. The Council isn’t pleased since assignments are their jurisdiction and some find C’baoth’s methods heavy handed. Enter Obi-Wan and Anakin to the story. At Windu’s orders, they’re sent to Barlok to assist in the talks but they’re primarily going to make sure C’baoth doesn’t exceed his position; he has authoritarian streak in him.

Eventually, the two dueling story lines converge with semi-predictable results but Obi-Wan and Anakin aren’t around when it happens. They do have to survive so they will appear in two crappy films. As for the fate of the Outbound Flight’s crew, it isn’t as tragic as Heir made it out to be, heck, it may have been a sequel or premise to some novel set after Return of the Jedi.

Zahn’s style of writing flows pretty well. He isn’t a chore to read thankfully. My problem mainly stems from Lucas wrecking Star Wars in 1999. However, just as there’s been a trend to make Darth Vader, Klingons and Richard Nixon into tragic, misunderstood villains, Zahn does the same nonsense with Thrawn. Back in Heir, he’s a brilliant, ruthless and cunning foe who is willing to do whatever it takes to restore the Empire; hence his risky deal with Joruus C’baoth. Here, he’s this well-meaning, practically invincible commander doing what he thinks is best for his race and gets duped by an agent of Palpatine. I have a hard time believing the seeds of his “evil” persona are planted in this. As for Obi-Wan and Anakin, they’re just placeholders since Zahn’s writing is focused on his creations. Obi-Wan is only a Knight, C’baoth easily outranks him which prevents countering any of the tyrannical Master’s edicts. Anakin is unsurprisingly drawn to C’baoth’s ideas of cutting through the bureaucracy and the means-justify-the-ends attitude. Neither really receives any development in this story other than emphasizing the ongoing struggle of Anakin’s disobedience.

Outbound Flight is a competently written piece of fiction and possible Star Wars canon but it will only interest the dwindling number of diehard fans.

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Kids, don’t let your parents try this at home

Posted on January 28, 2008 by Steve

Today was the first decent day we’ve had weather-wise in about two weeks and my father-in-law has been needing his ladder back so I got to climb on to my roof. I have done this before last year to assess the shingles after a nasty wind storm, we fared better than my neighbors thankfully. Why was up there like an idiot? I definitely kept asking myself this too as I worried about how much moisture the morning fog would factor into me falling off and landing on my head. On a more serious note, I was risking my neck for two reasons: I needed to use a snake tool to clear out the accumulation of lint in the dryer’s vent; find out where that blankity-blank rooster is. Yes, someone nearby keeps a rooster in his backyard like he’s still living in the Old Country or a farm.

The snake mission was a success. Our dryer completed a load of towels and whites in an hour (technically 1:03) which is fantastic. This type of laundry would take over two hours so I hope to see some improvement in our electric bill. My recon for the rooster yielded vital intel too. Turns out there’s TWO roosters in the yard behind mine in some kind of chicken coop. Now we need to research what the rules are on about keeping livestock because those blasted buckets of original recipe start crowing non-stop around 5 AM.

Oh yeah, I did climb down with Somara’s guidance without having to jump. Hard to believe my brother and I did this about 30 years ago as kids in our house in Champaign.

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Happy 40th Birthday Sarah McLachlan

Posted on January 28, 2008 by Steve

I’m not a big fan of hers anymore, she lost me with Surfacing which I found rather boring so I stopped buying her albums; maybe I should give her another chance through the 30-second samples in iTunes. One close friend blames the popularity she gained in the late Nineties for her material starting to suck. I don’t agree with that and you always hear it with REM, U2, the Cure, etc. Sometimes musicians take a direction you just don’t like. I readily admit there’s a loss of personal connection when a band you felt you had to yourself goes mainstream. Then you want to reach out and slap those poseurs or johnny-come-lately fans. It must be a sign of aging and/or maturity for me since I don’t have such feelings welling up in me over Plain White T’s. I do grouse over radio stations ignoring their better songs.

Despite the shift in style, taste or fame, Sarah will continue to have a special place in my heart for several reasons. Her second album Solace was a favorite in 1992. I only stumbled upon it from the video on 120 Minutes, MTV’s last relevant musical show. WXRT played this single too. Her sad tunes ended up nailing my overall mood at the end of 1992 (Dana, GDW). Then her single “Hold On” for the No Alternative AIDS-awareness CD became somewhat of an anthem for me as 1993 ended; would I leave for Austin, Milwaukee or remain in Central IL? I know, heavy and melodramatic. The final piece brings Sarah into a positive light though. Within a couple weeks of moving to Austin, I won a pair of tickets from KGSR (what we call K-Geezer) to see her at the Backyard (a venue I would never go to again if you paid me). Thankfully, it wasn’t sold out because Doc and I needed a third ticket for Eiko. Sarah McLachlan was a great live performer and she drew all the designs on the concert shirts.

This week, I think I’ll re-listen to her first three and maybe see if there’s any redeeming traits to her 2003 return. Who knows, I’ve been a defender of the later seasons of the Simpsons since the episodes have proven to be funny upon re-watching. Same thing could happen with her later material.

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The All-Star Game remains dull, but the deadline looms

Posted on January 27, 2008 by Steve

Not bad this year. We’re at the “official” half-way point in the season with the All-Star break. My Flyers now have five more victories than they had the entire season last year! They’re also tied for first in the Atlantic with the New Jersey Devils and have a decent spot in the Playoffs (#2), if they were held tomorrow. Still, the Atlantic Division is tight as ever (only five points separate the champs from the chumps). They’ve certainly held up under pressure, or their opposition can’t maintain their momentum.

Same goes for San Jose in the Pacific as they keep bouncing around against Anaheim and Dallas. Roenick is still helping out. Suck it Burnside and Melrose!

In other news, VS signed a new contract for three years with the NHL. I’m not super thrilled but it seems ESPN is never going to come around so maybe this could be the beginning of a new valuable Monopoly piece for the crooks running Comcast. Definitely tugs at my two loyalties: Media Reform and getting the NHL back to a wider audience. However, what puzzles me is this: There’s an NFL network? There will be a MLB network in the near future. The NHL network does exist in Canada, a country with 10 percent of the USA’s population, why isn’t it carried by the major American providers?

Fingers crossed on the upcoming trade deadline. Rumors abound on the Maple Leafs letting Sundin go, finally let him get his name on the Cup because they’re out of the running…again. Jagr’s name comes up yet I’m skeptical on this; the Rangers still have a decent shot to be in the playoffs, even if it’s a lower seed. Poor Nagy, the forward Phoenix bailed on to save money may get tossed off the sinking LA Kings ship. I wonder if Philly can reach a deal to regain Michal Handzus from the Kings, I miss his grit. The one my friend Brian and I aren’t happy about is Peter Forsberg returning to the NHL…wearing a Red Wings jersey. I certainly don’t want the Swedish Eric Lindros back in Philly. I think the feeling is mutual for Brian regarding his team. The center will cost a bundle, he’ll take away a decent roster position and then he’ll be “injured” half the time. Our fingers are crossed he returns to the Avs, aka Quebecarado to Brian. I think it would be even funnier if he’s caught in some contractual loophole forcing him to play for the Nashville Predators.

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Birthday cake for an MC Chris fan

Posted on January 26, 2008 by Steve

I doubt the birthday boy reads my site but this is Somara’s contribution to a party we are/were attending. She wanted to go with a theme or idea for the recipient yet all I could think about was his motorcycle, the FSM decal I gave him and his affinity for MC Chris, a frequent voice on numerous Adult Swim shows. Somara mulled it over, had an idea pretty quickly and when I came back from my writing time at the Blue Marble, she had the primary art work completed. I think she did a great job and I hope he likes it, everyone else who’s seen it thinks it’s pretty cool.

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Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Season Two

Posted on January 25, 2008 by Steve

By the second season, Sabrina the Teenage Witch was a hit and the network bumped it up to the 8/7 PM slot to kick off their Friday evenings while Clueless slunk off to UPN. I had only seen roughly a third of these before my part-time job with the movie theater forced me drop cable and sell my TV. So this DVD set was a treat. I avoided any of the reruns on Nickelodeon/Family to keep these unspoiled.

Sabrina is now a year older, more comfortable with her witch status and has earned her learner’s permit. For the next year, she must diligently study magic and be prepared for random tests from her Quizmaster. The two-part season opener gets her sent to a boot camp for failing miserably on her initial test; the Other Realm doesn’t take this lightly. Back in the real world, she still has her big crush on Harvey; Libby continues to be her primary tormentor; and Aunts Hilda and Zelda remain the “unreasonable” parental surrogates. Her best friend Jenny is replaced with Valerie since the former disappears with no explanation and the latter is the new kid. (I’ve never found an explanation on the Internet why there was a change in casting.) The same goes for Science teacher Mr. Pool’s absence. In his place, two recurring teachers join the cast: Principal Kraft (comedian Martin Mull) and Mrs. Quick (SNL alum Mary Gross). Yes, I know it’s only a TV show yet it would be nice to keep the continuity by making passing references to the fictional beings the audience grew attached to.

The string of impressive cameos established in the first season continue: 10,000 Maniacs, Erik Estrada, Donna D’Erico, Davy Jones, Terri Garr, Richard Moll, Loni Anderson, Edie McClurg, Tom Poston, Alice Ghostly (Aunt Esmeralda from Bewitched), Drew Carey, Bobcat Goldthwait, Johnny Mathis, John Ratzenberger, Jane Carr, Shelly Long, Paul Dooley, Fred Willard and Buddy Hackett. Some of them take a while to recognize but I know I laughed my head off when I saw who Bobcat Goldthwait was supposed to be. Some characters from last season also return: Cupid, Roland and the mean, spoiled cousin, Amanda.

On the surface this looks like the show is milking what happened last season while it recycles the plots of every other sitcom before it. Sure, but the larger story arc of Sabrina maturing as a witch, as an adult and her relationship with Harvey carries it. In its second season, Sabrina continued to blossom into a great program that also featured confident women being good at math, science or music; personally, I think they’re decent role models for my nieces.

During this year, ABC also did two gimmicks with their newfound hit; one was rather lame and the other was excellent yet couldn’t be repeated due to the syndication rights. The lame one was an episode set in Disneyworld under the weakest of premises. The excellent one was a cheesy tactic to get people to watch the three shows airing after Sabrina: Salem the cat eats a time ball and whatever era he dreams or thinks about, manifests around him. It begins with the Sabrina episode when he recreates the Sixties in which Sabrina thought was cool until she realizes that opportunities for women were still pretty limited compared to 1997. So Sabrina, Hilda and Zelda try to cure Salem to restore the “present.” He escapes, ABC shifts to commercials and the ending credits appear after the break. Initially, everybody thought, “huh?” Then the following program Boy Meets World began but first, a black cat runs across the opening set with Melissa Joan Hart pursuing. Afterwards, the surroundings shifted to another time period, in this case, the Forties. This was repeated twice more with ABC’s weaker sitcoms which only lasted a season. I couldn’t find any record of this on the Internet, you’ll have to take it on faith it happened.

Lastly, there isn’t anything special on the DVDs, it’s just 26 uncut episodes of the show but under the same limitations as the syndicated versions: most of the original music you remembered from the original airings were removed since it would raise the price considerably. Not a deal breaker but I know I lost all interest in WKRP when I read up on this. The lack of those special features is a bummer yet my primary motivation for collecting Sabrina is to build a nice video library for my nieces, nephews and other kids I know.

Posted in DVDs | Leave a comment

Superbad

Posted on January 23, 2008 by Steve

Judd Apatow, Hollywood’s current golden child of comedy, loans his production company and credibility to Seth Rogen (an Apatow regular) for this coming-of-age picture. It’s a fouler-mouthed version of Weird Science with Dazed and Confused‘s flow (or snapshot) of one day’s events. Unfortunately, its immediate legacy is the overplayed McLovin gag so it’s hard to tell if it will go on to be remembered like John Hughes’ beloved Eighties streak.

Seth and Evan are best friends trying to make their senior year eventful before they’re separated by college; Evan was accepted to Dartmouth while Seth made it into a local and/or lesser university. They’re not popular, they’re not successful with girls and hanging out with the dorkier Fogell kid doesn’t help. Thus, high school hasn’t lived up to their expectations, or more accurately, Seth’s because Evan is more ambivalent about life. When they’re invited to a party being thrown by Jules (a popular girl), the gears start turning in Seth’s mind about the possibilities of how this could be the biggest night of their lives. Evan only agrees to tag along since Becca (obviously, a girl he likes) will be there. He’s attracted to Becca and her friend says she likes him too, she’s just a bit shy. Fogell only gets included because he has a fake ID and can purchase alcohol, something Seth promised Jules he could provide.

After some more exposition, mainly why Seth dislikes Becca and why the DVD’s home screen had numerous doodles of “body parts,” the protagonists head out to the liquor store. The place is then robbed while Fogell is trying to pay; another scene played to death through the ads. When the police arrive, Seth and Evan flee on of the assumption that Fogell is being busted. The evening of misadventure then begins: Fogell riding around with two incompetent cops, Seth and Evan trying to find booze because they can’t go to the party empty-handed, life lessons about the opposite sex and friendships being strengthened through adversity.

Is it funny though? Not really. It’s more amusing like past movies Apatow has directed (40 Year Old Virgin) or produced (Anchorman). The dialog between the teenagers is pretty accurate, crudeness and all, since most males are obsessed with sex at their age. I did enjoy the sequences of Seth and Fogell reliving moments of selective memory. Yet I was rather disappointed in how unlikable the two policemen were. They’re just corrupt, lazy cops who patrol the suburbs. I will admit, I was gasping for air while laughing too hard at the closing credits’ gallery of Seth’s childhood “etchings. In the end, Superbad is only worth watching to kill time, catch up on Pop Culture references and see how Apatow and Rogen have updated the misadventures of Gary and Wyatt in the form of Seth and Evan. Meanwhile, I’ve discovered that the first and second season of the USA Network’s series Weird Science, which did a fantastic job stretching out a 90-minute movie into a clever sitcom, is out on DVD.

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At least the Icebats won yesterday

Posted on January 21, 2008 by Steve

The Bats are having a lousy season and are pretty close to last place but they’re currently on a winning streak. Thankfully, they didn’t disappoint me while I used our new digital camera to catch the scoring action (click on the picture to see). Goals two and three weren’t captured because they happened on the other end of the rink; I usually sit on the side where the Bats shoot twice. I promised to have this posted by today so I hope my editing choices look decent.

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Bloody Caturday

Posted on January 20, 2008 by Steve

Molly planned to eat Nemo's liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti serve.

Nemo and Molly decided to ratchet up their hatred this morning instead of letting us sleep. Normally they get uppity around 5-6 AM because they want to eat. On workdays, not a problem, feeding them is part of the daily ritual but there’s no such thing as a non-workday for the troublesome trio. This results in them being kicked out of the bedroom until we’re damned good and ready to roll out the food. Why? Molly has a bladder condition requiring special food which is expensive and just like children, the other cats want to eat it. This stuff has a higher fat content too so Molly the butterball is also rationed. Life was easier with the all-they-could-eat buffet yet I don’t want a huge cat-food bill or another $800 operation to remove stones from Molly’s body.

We figured this Sunday would be no different than any other with them. They’d start making noises, one of us would get up, trick them into leaving the bedroom with false hopes and then close the door. Usually, they proceed to bang on the doors of Somara’s office, poke a paw under the bedroom door or whine. Instead we heard a blood-curdling scream from Nemo. This either meant Molly was hurting him (Miette prefers to run away) or his bum leg is caught on something and he was injuring it further. Somara arrived first to find him Nemo hanging off the cat tower upside down, hind leg entangled, extended like he was caught in a snare trap. Meanwhile, Molly was attacking him, probably exerting her Alpha status. Then Somara foolishly approached him, forgetting what happened the first time they met. Nemo lashed out, cutting her foot in multiple places, sending her back into the entertainment stand. While she tried to stem the bleeding, I fetched a towel to blind Nemo, then I could free him. Molly jumped in for another round and I knew she was serious; when the base of her tail is thick, she’s not playing, she plans to hurt somebody. Once I had her shoo’d away, Nemo attacked me and I had no other choice but to cut the string.

Somara hobbled to the bathroom with a trail of blood. I rounded up Molly, confined her to the carrier as if she were Hannibal Lecter. Nemo fled to hide under the bed, his standard tactic when the couch isn’t available. Miette joined him, she’s not terribly smart. Then I proceeded to clean up and put bandages on Somara’s cuts the best I could; they’re doing fine, we’ll be redressing them one more time tonight, thankfully she doesn’t need stitches. Meanwhile, Molly kept banging on the carrier’s door in protest until she grew tired. Nemo was pried out from under our bed and given a bath because he crapped on himself during his ordeal. This resulted in another round of his screaming, biting and clawing since he feared we would drown him.

As of now, Nemo is sulking under the couch. Molly is staring out a window, letting the sunshine warm her up. Miette is walking on eggshells probably out of fear she’ll be caught in another fight. I need to take Molly to the vet anyway. Maybe Dr. Todd has some advice about her heightened aggression after Wicca’s death. Somara is fine too. She took some pain killers, called in sick at HEB and is wearing a couple of my mateless socks because her shoes hurt the affected foot. I hope this remains an isolated incident between those two cats or else Somara will have to wear steel-toe boots just to feed them.

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