Cats and a Canary

MeOW!


It's Boxing Day, or December 26, as we call it here in the States. Yesterday was kinda' relaxed, Los and I were like two purring cats, warm next to the fake-log gas-fire fireplace. I cooked brekkie, then my family called from 'Bama. All four of us haven't been together on Christmas Day since Christmas 1996. I was happy to catch up with them though and always wish them well.

I just read for a while yesterday, contentedly purring, while Los tried valiantly to progress in his ongoing hunt for the mousy Diablo (II) on the computer. He cooked a late, late lunch/dinner which we ate while we watched THE LION IN WINTER, a longtime Christmas video favorite of mine, crackling with Yule dialogue to chill your familial bones. "What family doesn't have its ups and downs?" The great Kate rules.

Late in the evening, we snared a friendly canary from the sky at the airport when we met up with Los's friend, Brad, who had a two-hour layover on the ground here while flying from Providence on the East Coast to San Diego on the West.

Other friends of mine are in the States from Japan, but I won't be able to see them this time around. I miss all my ol' buds from Nihon and that whole gypsy existence catting around Tokyo, pocket full o' yen, making friends from all over the world. That was a nice three years, kinda' a second kittyhood for me since I missed my first one, hiding away from myself. Good time, good pals, cool cats.

A couple friends are in Phoenix from San Diego, but we haven't run into each other yet. Perhaps soon we'll meet up at the local scratching post.

Now, I'll just say it, been avoiding it. I DO realize that putting my old poems and quotations I like on here as a web-log entry is a bit of a cheat; but at least it gets me typing, if nothing else. Meanwhile, I still do get to share a bit of me with you. I apologize though and will try to keep it mostly original from now. I look at some of those old poems and think, "Did I really write that? Did I really feel so strongly?" It's cool though, and Ben and I are the best of pals now after a rough stretch from May to September of 1998. "Obi Wan" reflects the way I feel now, while, happily, the feelings vomiting forth from me during the writing of "Origins of War" have been abandoned to the past. It's like another person wrote those old poems, but it was I, I have to admit. I did try to write a poem back in July of this year, after feeling totally betrayed by a supposed friend. Oh, it was catty, catty, catty, vicious, the rhyming dictionary was chock full o' rhymes for "tiny-tooled, self-hating cheater."

Oh, I'm laughing out loud, just found the worksheet for the poem I just mentioned. The working title was "Croc Clerihews." Working sub-titles were "Cynical Crocs vs. Chirpy Crocs" [gag] and "Offensive vs. Defensive" [only a slightly smaller gag]. A clerihew is a poem type. The first line is a thing or person's name, the second line rhymes with the first, the third and fourth lines rhyme, and the second through fourth lines make a pointed comment about the thing or person named in the first line. For example, a portion of a poem I wrote a while back called "In the 25th Anniversary Year of a Television Show" or "Clerihews at Warp 9"...


The U.S.S. Enterprise
is a clever guise
for the human condition
shown as an adventurous five-year mission

where Captain Kirk
tries not to smirk
as the alien female
falls under his spell

[each character is decribed with a clerihew and then the poem ends with another clerihew]

STAR TREK
is a bizarre speck
of pop culture
that eats fans up like a maternal vulture. (August, 1991)


Anyway, earlier this year I went to write a similar poem about the disappointing break-up of my softball team and, in particular, the very disappointing ending of a personal relationship with one of my teammates. I've listed the team roster on the poem worksheet and have put X's next to the villains and O's next to the heroes. To be perfectly honest, my own name has an X and an O next to it. I was going to be very honest about my impact on the proceedings. I've listed one name and some rhymes under his name. After only thirty minutes or so of work, I abandoned the poem--it was gonna' be too chirpy, sing-songy, which was definitely not gonna' match my feelings, which were still too raw to mine a few months ago. Perhaps, I'll try again soon.

I really have been reading quite a bit though. Still enjoying the Highwater book and have picked up some old resource books on a comic-book favorite of mine. A fantasy story is bubbling to the surface--I think royalty, divine right to rule, leadership, and heroism will play a part. There will not be any car chases, no two guys carrying a window pane that is crashed into, and no villains/heroes running upstairs/to the top floor of a building to escape their pursuers. There very well may be a blood feud and certainly more than a bit of personal destiny involved. I'll keep you updated, along with a book report on the Highwater book.

Christmas Eve at Nino Eddie's was really cool. I love suddenly having a huge, new family. Now, "nino" does mean "godfather," but Eddie is also Carlos's real tio (uncle, great-uncle actually) as well. "Nino" takes precedence over "Tio" though. He, his wife, and daughter are really nice and showed us some wonderful holiday hospitality, as well as giving us some woooooooooooonderful sangria to get a bit tipsy on. I ended up actually telling the whole story about my uncanny ability to put female cats in loud, wailing heat--twenty-three documented cases thus far. Good God, a bit o' punch, and I tell the most embarrassing things. What else can you say though when a host's cats start rubbing against you while they (the hosts, not the cats) exclaim, "Oh, my God, they're never this friendly to anyone at first!"? You just gotta' say the truth. Truth--cats have absolutely not one iota of gay-dar.

What else can I say?

--Michael Adams
(All writing contained in the web-log entry above is COPYRIGHT 2002 Michael S. Adams.)