I was watching the Canadian Figure Skating championships last night...wondering what had happened to the artistry.The focus is on jumping. Male or female, if one doesn't execute a quadruple reverse backwards see saw, one is doomed never to gain fame. Even the couples are throwing each other far enough to make four twists - a sure gold. In order to accomplish this one whizzes around the rink looking backwards at some predetermined spot and prays. All I can say is thank goodness for the ice dancers who aren't allowed to jump...yet.

And then they announced that Toller Cranston had died and I tumbled back into another era when Mrs. Lane, the Strawberry lady of his paintings, was selling his work in Pointe Claire village so that Cranston could even get the ice time to practice. And I bought into the whimsy, literally. Age is a strange condition. He must have been twenty or close to that and I would have been thirty or close to that. I'm glad enough of us bought into the whimsy that he could go on to encourage the artistry. I hope someone looks back and says: Oh...that's what it is all about.

Another Season
Another Place
A Stolen Dialogue

T: There has just been SO much to celebrate this week.

Me: Oh? Like what?

T: Well, I got my cast off, my wiggly tooth finally came out, Evan did really well in Creating a Scene and the show was very good, I get to go to a sleepover, Jonathan and Renee Stevens are coming by on Saturday AND I get to buy some cards! (comic book cards)

Me: Smile....

And then, we were talking about how amazing it is that permanent teeth come in the way that they do and that for kids with Down Syndrome, they come in in a different order.

Theo: Oh? Why is it so?
Me: They don't know.

Theo: Fascinating, though. I didn't know! 
Then, with his hand on the door, he says, "So many 'o''s"

Me: OK, Theo!
We both laugh.

The problem with a blog is that one has to check back to see if one is repeating oneself...one might be...but whatever!!!

Years ago, my friend had an orange cat...a bit of a malevolent orange cat but then...one mustn't generalize. She loved him. She was also taking care of a fan-tailed dove...a beautiful creature. She went off on a holiday and when she returned much to her horror, the dove had escaped from its cage and was running around on the floor. The cat was...just...sitting...watching.

She screamed in horror and the startled dove ran to the cat for protection.

I can't tell the story that reminded me of this but...sometimes one is not as fragile as one would seem!

On another note...magic comes and goes. A friend phoned today to say that she had sold her cottage up north. I sit here smiling at some excellent weekends I spent there. But I have learned that there will be magic to replace it...

There's such a wind today and I realize that I am not willing to lose all the leaves on my tree. That will mean I will have to crawl through the living room room in the morning to make my coffee! I will have no "blind" for another 5 months!

The story crosses the threshold from my world into yours. We meet each other at the steps of the story. Jeanette Winterson

The trouble with a book is that you do not know what's in it until it is too late.
Jeanette Winterson

Plan Ahead!
That's my theme for today.
If I had planned ahead, I would have straightened this leaf before posting it...I know how to do that now and I have to admit that my friends would realize why there's a slight list to my photos...there's a slight list to me!

So the only child is suffering once more. She doesn't know how to confront her vet...
Actually she's trying to decide whether her Vet is:
A money gouger...which she can't accept. The Vet is too decent.
A what-ifer...that might be it but the only child is the ultimate what-ifer...
All of which is to say that after three months of experimenting, and one session of the only child explaining to said Vet that if the bills continued, she would have to stop buying her blood pressure medication, said young and earnest Vet that she would send out the culture for testing by a Lab. This was after it was confirmed in July with a culture that the cat had a skin infection not dandruff as a result of his being over weight. This was after two months and four rounds of antibiotics and one round of parasite treatment and an intermittent round of intestinal treatment for the effects of the antibiotic which did not work...That instead of our moving on to allergenic food, we would send a culture of said infection to the lab for analysis. And...yes...the cat had a skin infection which was resistant to all of the antibiotics so far proscribed...so now he is on the antibiotic which will address the issue...And I can't help but shake my head...Even an only child and Aries would have sent the culture to the Lab in July but alas and only child and an Aries complies with the powers that be. They are supposed to know what is happening.

There is nothing that peanut butter and a spoon cannot fix...

Why do I have an avocado slicer? I have never sliced an avocado...ever...I wouldn't know how to use it.