What's on the radio? Urthalun and Abba, baby

Imma do a shout-out tonight for frog Julie/Urthalun She writes a daily blog that includes a draw from her oracle cards, and adds her own insights to it. She's a radio! Radio to the stars! Telegraphing messages from the beyond, and always in a positive, healthy, helpful way. She does card readings too, so if that's your bag, check her out. Here's a review:

Wow, that was intense.  I’ve had cards read for me before, but not usually with such accuracy as to what’s currently going on in my life.  Now, instead of being scared of what’s going to happen, I am excited about the possibilities. (Other testimonials here.)

Most importantly she's a beautiful person--kind, humble, wise, always striving to grow and learn and help others with their journeys. Definitely someone you can trust.


____LOVE SONGS OF THE DAY____

Monday
The first thing Swiss Girl and bonded over when we met was Abba. "They're my favorite band!" "They're one of my faves too!" Grade 7 baby. Here's Swiss G's love song contribution.
There's a shimmer in your eyes
Like the feeling of a thousand butterflies 


Tuesday
And here's one of my favorite Abba love songs. I like love songs about people being all scared and running from love!
I hardly dare to think of what would happen
Where I'd be
If I fell

Pupcicle

We have a new roommate this weekend. We're sitting Fernando's friends' dog--a big lab-Saint-Bernard mix.

DAY 1
Minion's finally met her match. Even though she's generally a bold cat, she's not used to strange visitors, including furry ones. When Shooter first arrived she came out... her tail PUFFED... and then she arched her back! Just like those Halloween pictures of cats! It was very cute, wish I'd had my phone-cam. Now she's just hiding in a closet in my room. There were dogs where she lived as a baby, but it's over a year ago.

Haley's being the brave one. When Fernando took the dog on an apartment stroll, Haley just gave him a look that said: "This is not the cat you're looking for." Then she hid under the bed for awhile, but I sweet talked her, and she's come out twice to explore.

When Haley was at my mom's there were several little dogs. She'd wait til they were all asleep and then c-r-e-e-p across the floor between them all. She gets outshone by Minion's crazy antics, but when the rubber hits the road, she's got grit.

DAY 2
The kittehs were still total scaredy-cats Sat morning. But we brought them, one at a time, to the Kitteh Tower so they could see the dog. They didn't stay, but it seemed to help. When I took out some treats, Minion was so excited she deigned to eat them two feet from the Monster (who was sharing in the cat munchies) whereas last night she wouldn't even come down the hall for the same food.

It wasn't long after that, sitting again in the livingroom with Shooter, I saw this:

And then this, from the other side of the livingroom... (You can get to the livingroom from the hallway, or the kitchen.)

And once she saw he wasn't going to attack she got bolder...

The rest of the evening passed without much fuss. Minion relaxed and started to frolick and play again, and catch up on all the mischief and finger she missed while cowering in a closet.

Haley still kept her distance, but came as far as the sideboard in the entrance between the living room and kitchen.

DAY 3
The cats acted a bit skittish again this morning, I don't know why. But I made Haley eat her breakfast on the sideboard, and Minion's been acting normal.

I don't know what the turning point was for Minion. Maybe it was after she and Shooter ate cat niblets together, and she recognized a fellow kindred pig-out spirit.

Above is Shooter enjoying the Bullwinkle (bull penis) that Fernando bought him. Minion has her own small Bullwinkles.

...Though Minion likes her kong better--she's finally using the tougher red one I got her. Last night she was kicking it around the apartment like a misshapen soccer ball.

And that's it for the weekend animal drama. Shooter is an exceedingly polite dog, because he's a retired "Mira dog." Mira is the seeing-eye-dog charity in Montreal. So Shooter doesn't chew ANYthing, rarely barks, is very calm and obedient, and doesn't react to the cat he lives with. (Or to Minion taking swipes at his ear.)

IN OTHER NEWS:

Here's the beautiful quilted purse I bought from Urthalun-Betty (she's off on the other side of the continent, in Oregan.) Isn't it fabulous? It's really well made, and perfectly fits my purse organizer. It will be the perfect accompaniment to blue jeans.

And finally, some random Minion cuteness. Her specialty (after torturing fellow companion animals.)

(As I posted those photos, Minion started attacking Shooter's ear again. He LOOKed at her. She backed off. ...Now she's going for it again.

Have a nice week. Peace out.

Mabel discovers her inner New Age girl (turns out she's a Butterick pattern)

When witchyfriend Mae was over last week I was giving her le tour of le apartment, and when we reached my office corner I had to explain something to her.

First there was Le School
I graduated from my MA in 2008, the goal of which was to teach Cegep. (In Quebec you finish high school one year earlier, go to a sort of community college for two years called Cegep, and then only do three years to get your BA. Or you do a 3 year technical program.) I've been applying for jobs, but nothing yet.  <-- Mae knew all that already.

But when I graduated I'd just done both an MA and BA, so 5 years of political science reading, and I was tired of nonfiction books. (I already had an earlier BA in English Lit.) In the intervening years I've kept up with what's going on in the world, but in terms of thicky-books I dove back into fiction. I also write fiction, so that side of me was really starved. AND I worked in a book store, so it was part of my job.

Mae knew all that too.

Then there were Le Books
What I pointed out to her was the sorry state of my school book shelves, which house the kinds of materials I would want to eventually teach. Mind you, at Cegep you don't assign material at this level; but I would need to refer to these books to plan lessons, to review my own knowledge, and so forth.

I said to Mae: "I'm generally not a New Agey sort of gal, though I don't look down on these beliefs because I do, after all, believe in God. But overall the sciencee part of my brain tends to fight against most of it, and some elements--like extreme "law of attraction" I find downright distasteful.

"BUT. But. There is a teensy, tiny, wee mystical voice in my head... that says I will not get a teaching job until I clean up these book shelves."

And Mae just gave me a pitying look that said: Well, um, YES. But out loud she said gave it some sort of rational patina to make me feel better. I confess I don't remember what she said, because I already felt better just admitting it. I felt ready to embrace my inner mystic.

Then there was La Powder Puff
Later Mae--she of the scenty things--was showing me some special perfumes coming soon to her online store, and we found that my skin tended to turn perfumes to a powdery-flower smell, like something from my childhood.

So I figure she's this 1970s Butterick pattern that I'm pretty sure my mother made me a costume from  when I was a kid. I remember the gold rope belt.

Practical uses of La Butterick
So far my Butterick Mystic is doing a good job. Today I wanted to move one lamp, and ended up cleaning up the entire mess of cables that connects our TV, internet etc. to make it all cleaner and nice. Then learned in Julieland that Mercury is in retrograde which screws with communications and machines. (Her husband accidentally kicked off the surge protector while she was writing about it, and she lost her whole post.)

I'm not surprised BM was in tune on that one. Mercury in Retrograde reminds me of Swiss Girl, who first read the term in her Young Miss horoscope when we were 13, and thought it was the funniest thing she'd ever heard. She brings it up to this day and we're 37. So I have fond, friendship feelings about Mercury in Retrograde.

I'm ready for the new New Age me. :-)

___
PS - Remind me to tell you sometime about The Idiots Guide to Astrology. Most hilarious and accurate astrology book.