Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Etsy

I've finally opened the Etsy shop!

http://www.fussykitty.etsy.com/

Saturday, June 21, 2008

When will this madness end?

This has been an ongoing drama for the past two weeks...

We feed stray and feral cats in our neighbourhood. We have a small food bowl set up on the back porch where it is accessible to cats passing through. As of last count, we have 6 cats consistently eating from it, only one of which do we have any "relationship" with, the others are simply to skittish to approach. This one cat allows us to pet her, she comes and sits in our laps when we're in the gazebo, she drinks from our water ponds, she suns on our driveway... she can hang around for hours at a time. Sometimes in the middle of a rain storm I'll glance out the window and see her hunkered down on our back porch, other days (rain or shine) she'll be passed out in one of the lawn chairs we have set up in the gazebo. In short, she has become a fixture of sorts, and we are very attached to her! : )
But other critters are eating from the bowl as well, which was not a problem at first. Squirrels, birds, slugs, snails, reptiles etc. The birds have progressively (slowly, but progressively nonetheless) started causing trouble. The mourning doves and Everett birds (not sure what they're real name is, we always call them Everett birds... but that's another story for another time...) weren't so bad at first, they nibbled a little, usually taking only one piece at a time. But the finches were a huge pain in the neck... bitty birds equals bitty food, right? Their solution? To take all of the food out of the bowl, piece by piece, and fling it across the porch until they find a piece small enough. My every morning began with picking all the food off the porch and putting it back in the bowl for the cats.
And then the grackles showed up. They are absolute pigs, they come swaggering up onto the porch, cramming 5-7 pieces of food in their beaks, and fly off. Sometimes the same grackle will come back repeatedly. As you can imagine, we began going through food much quicker. Our solution was to move the food bowl into the gazebo for a few days until the grackles gave up... in the gazebo, all of the cats would be able to find it, but the birds would be less likely to go to the trouble of finding the passage through the mosquito netting (we leave a small section of the netting unzipped). Sooooo, the next morning I come out and there's a bird stuck in there. I unzipped the netting, let it out, and refilled the bowl. Less than an hour later, I pass by the window, glance out, and there is another bird in there!
After the third bird, I tried liberally sprinkling bird seed in a large mound near the gate, away from the gazebo. After the fourth bird, I put a small pile of bird seed in front of the gazebo. After the fifth bird, I placed a large boulder in front of the gazebo. After the sixth bird, I pushed the boulder closer to the gazebo, and pulled the zipper further down.
The next day, we were out of ideas, and just kept letting birds out. On the third day, we simply could not take it any longer, and one of the feral cats was unable to locate the food bowl, so we put it back on the porch. A few days ago, we began leaving an oversized plastic lid upside-down on top of the bowl, where the cats could easily push it off, but the birds were not smart enough. Unfortunately, this confused the cats too much, but fortunately this seemed to have discouraged the birds, and after we'd taken it off they'd been leaving the bowl alone... until today.
This Morning , I step outside to visit with the cat, and there are a bunch of Everett birds dive-bombing her!!! >: [ Apparently they have reverted to territorialism (yes, I know this is not a real word). I spent the greater part of the morning spraying them with a squirt-bottle. They finally quit caring, and so I put out a saucer full of birdseed. But now, apparently they don't want any stinking bird seed, they want catfood! I repeat: When will this madness end?

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Western New York! PART 1

So, I've been sick for the past two weeks, overlapping by one week with my two week vacation to Buffalo, New York. Here are some photos from Niagara Falls:

We started out around noon driving around an looking at some lighthouses (will post photos later), then headed on over to Niagara Falls. Here you can see the mist from the falls at a distance:
Through the Car Window

Before we went over to the park, we had lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe (I picked up a cute T-Shirt in the gift shop). After lunch, we made our way over to the park and to the falls. Here are some preliminary ripples along the bank of the Niagra River:
Ripples


The rapids as we get closer to the falls were amazing... this is only the second time I remember ever being near a waterfall, and the first was (in my opinion) not nearly as impressive:
Rapids


Pretty cool, huh?
Rapids at Niagara Falls


And the drop:
P5270147


Here you can see the falls themselves, at last:
The Falls Side View

And a little woodchuck right up near the falls:
WoodChuck

Woodchuck2


I snapped this shot from the observation deck:
The Falls From the Observation Deck2

A little bit extreme in my opinion:
Going to Extremes...


This is my favourite shot, I can honestly say that Niagara Falls is one of the most amazing things I've ever seen in my life:
The Falls From Below- Full Size


The Maid of the Mist boat tour:
Maid of the Mist Boat Tour


Lol:
Modern Ashtray


Canada:
Canada

The Falls again:
The Falls From Below


I took nearly 400 photos on this trip, so stay tuned for more! : )

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Always Check Your Receipts!

So, we went to _____ on Friday, and found some nice boxes and a tube of wrapping paper (vintage beer and ale label print). Two of the boxes were of similar design, but one was slightly larger than the other. The smaller one was marked down from $8 to $3, and the larger from $9 to $3. When I get up to the counter, everything rings up at the marked price except the larger box which comes up at $4, so the cashier calls the manager up. The manager goes over it a couple of times, then loudly comments on the fact that it is larger than the other box. Um, what does the one box have to do with the other? Are they not two separate objects? She then proceeds to inform me that the box should have been marked down to $4, and the $3 label was incorrect. I considered it, was it really worth saving just the $1? After a brief pause, I decided that the money had nothing to do with it. It was strictly a matter of principle. The label said $3, I think I should have gotten it for $3. I stated as much, and with many dark looks, they acquiesced. I'm afraid I tend to be a bit of a push-over in areas like this, so I was quite pleased with myself as I marched out of the store with my finds. I should have looked at the receipt.
That afternoon, I'm going over receipts and I pull out the one for this store. I purchased four items all total, and I notice that the receipt lists five. Much to my annoyance, I found that the cashier had not removed the item from the first time she rang it up. So in addition to paying the $3 for the box, I had also payed the $4 it originally range up at! I was so furious... as paranoid as it sounds, I know she did it on purpose.
So, next day we had to go back down to the store. Fortunately, I did manage to get my money back with little dispute.

Moral of the story, don't forget to check your receipts. : /

Monday, April 28, 2008

Gator Pics.

I love gators.

Other Gator

Second Gator:
Gator Full Length

Someone dropped a flower in the water:
Gator Swimming Towards Flower 1 of 2

He annihilates it:
Gator Ripping Up Flower 2 of 2

And the ducks look on, unperturbed:
Ducks

You can see more photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/paperbouquet/sets/72157604343957368/

Saturday, April 26, 2008

Bwahahahaha!




Your Vocabulary Score: A



Congratulations on your multifarious vocabulary!

You must be quite an erudite person.



I love blogthings.

Friday, April 4, 2008

Have you heard...

... About the "Mad Crafter's Tea Party"? The Altered Art Appreciation Society on Flickr is holding a global tea party from the 12th to 14th of April for all artists to participate. Check out the Altered Art Appreciation Society's blog here for details: http://www.alteredartsociety.blogspot.com/.

Just thought you should know...

Fruit-flavoured marshmallows are nasty.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

What I read in a year...

I know, it's been a while since I posted... so, want to see what I read between last March and this?



Spring 2007:


"Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Life" by Alison Weir
"The Princes in the Tower" by Alison Weir
"The Wars of the Roses" By Alison Weir
"The Phantom of the Opera"By Gaston Leroux
"Queen Isabella" By Alison Weir
"The Children of Henry VIII" By Alison Weir
"Thomas Cardinal Wolsey" By Nancy Lenz Harvey
"Of Mice and Men" By John Steinbeck
"The Six Wives of Henry VIII" By Alison Weir
"The Sisters of Henry VIII" By Maria Perry
"Nine Days Queen" By Mary Luke
"The Poisonwood Bible" By Barbara Kingsolver
"The Wars of the Roses" By Desmond Seward
"The Wars of the Roses" By Robin Neillands
"Royal Blood: Richard III and the Mystery of the Princes" By Bertram Fields
"To Kill a Mockingbird" By Harper Lee
"Mary, Queen of Scots, and the Murder of Lord Darnley" By Alison Weir
"Elizabeth I: Collected Works" By Elizabeth I
"First Lady of the Confederacy: Varina Davis' Civil War" By Joan E. Cashin
"The Grapes of Wrath" By John Steinbeck
"Confederate Heroines: 120 Southern Women Convicted by Union Military Justice" By Thomas P. Lowry
"Women in the Field: America's Pioneering Women Naturalists" By Marcia Bonta



Summer 2007:

"Titus Andronicus" By William Shakespeare
"Marie Antoinette: The Journey" By Antonia Fraser
"The Life of Elizabeth I" By Alison Weir
"A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" By James Joyce
"King Henry VI Part I" By William Shakespeare
"Love's Labours Lost" By William Shakespeare
"The Comedy of Errors" By William Shakespeare
"The Sound and the Fury" By William Faulkner
"Two Gentlemen of Verona" By William Shakespeare
"Crime and Punishment" By Fyodor Dostoevsky
"King Henry VI Part II" By William Shakespeare
"The Stranger" By Albert Camus
"Henry VI Part III" By William Shakespeare
"King Richard III" By William Shakespeare
"Romeo and Juliet" By William Shakespeare
"King Richard II" By William Shakespeare
"King John" By William Shakespeare
"The Merchant of Venice" By William Shakespeare
"King Henry IV Part I" By William Shakespeare
"Great Expectations" By Charles Dickens
"Elizabeth of York" By Nancy Lenz Harvey
"Go Tell it on the Mountain" By James Baldwin
"Henry VIII: The King and His Court" By Alison Weir
"The Wars of the Roses" By William W. Lace
"Absalom! Absalom" By William Faulkner ***
"Henry Plantagenet" By Richard Barber
"The Last of the Plantagenets" By Thomas B. Costain



Autumn 2007:

"A Tale of Two Cities" By Charles Dickens
"The Wars of the Roses" By Anthony Cheetham
"Innocent Traitor" By Alison Weir
"Macbeth" By William Shakespeare
"The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" By Washington Irving
"Julius Caesar" By William Shakespeare
"The Taming of the Shrew" By William Shakespeare
"The Young Elizabeth" By Alison Plowden
"Hard Times" By Charles Dickens
"A Midsummer Night's Dream" By William Shakespeare
"The Book of the Duchess" By Geoffrey Chaucer (Edited by Gerard NeCastro)
"The Boke of the Duchesse" By Geoffrey Chaucer
"Othello" By William Shakespeare
"Much Ado About Nothing" By William Shakespeare
"King Lear" By William Shakespeare
"The Tempest" By William Shakespeare
"Pride and Prejudice" By Jane Austen
"Cry the Beloved Country" By Alan Paton
"The Greatest Gift" By Philip Van Doren Stern



Winter 2007-08

"Emma" By Jane Austen
"The Remarkable Case of Davidson's Eyes" By H.G. Wells
"Complete Sonnets" By William Shakespeare
"Sense and Sensibility" By Jane Austen
"Persuasion" By Jane Austen
"Jane Eyre" By Charlotte Bronte
"Jurassic Park" By Michael Crichton
"Ivanhoe" By Sir Walter Scott
"Northanger Abbey" By Jane Austen
"The Lost World" By Michael Crichton
"All Quiet on the Western Front" By Erich Maria Remarque
"Jane Austen Juvenilia Volume I" By Jane Austen
"My Antonia" By Willa Cather
"Wuthering Heights" By Emily Bronte
"Anthem" By Ayn Rand
"Old Man and the Sea" By Ernest Hemingway




As you can see, I really slowed down over Autumn and Winter. Autumn was IQF and I was working on my TOGC project, I also had three clocks-in-progress. Winter I was suffering from a severe case of earring-making mania. So sad. But I expect to pick up the pace this spring. ^_^

Tuesday, February 26, 2008




You Are 84% Intuitive



Your intuition is so spot on it's scary!

You can learn a lot about people and situations, simply by listening to your gut.

And you've even wondered if you can predict the future at times.

Just be sure not to always listen to your intuition... someday it could be wrong!

Monday, February 25, 2008

Returned from hiatus...

Actually, I wasn't really on hiatus until I realized how long it had been since I last updated my blog. : )
A belated Happy Valentines Day, everyone! Valentines Roses:


Look at the candy heart I got:


What is the world coming to?

Monday, February 11, 2008

Masterpiece: The Complete Jane Austen

Everyone is entitled to my opinion:

I missed Persuasion, but thought Northanger Abbey was rather poorly done. Mansfield Park was pretty good, but had some issues as well. Firstly, they don't follow the books very well, and several violations of the etiquette of that period arise. Under no circumstances would Mr. Tilney and Catherine Morland have kissed, neither would Edmund and Fanny... this would have been a great impropriety, very inappropriate. Also, Fanny would not have permitted Edmund to enter her bed-chamber, nor would Edmund have presumed to enter... much less when Fanny was washing her hair. Speaking of hair, did anyone else notice that her 'do' was not correct to the period? But everyone else was fine.

As for the drama, "Miss Austen Regrets", that was absolutely ridiculous. She was portrayed in a very undesirable light, in my personal opinion. I would also like to point out the extreme inaccuracy of the piece. Firstly, Mr. Brydges did not propose to Jane Austen, and never had any such relationship with her. This proposal-acceptance-refusal scenario took place instead with one Harris Bigg-Wither. Where Mr. Brydges comes into the story is Jane Austen's relationship with his wife's cousin's son (or something of the sort) Tom Lefroy. This relationship came to nothing. And, in respect to Mr. Hayden (the 'apothecary'), Jane Austen had no such interest in him, but instead had been encouraging a relationship between him and her niece, Fanny. And nowhere is there any evidence to indicate that her sister, Cassandra, discouraged her from accepting any proposal...

Please, no one think I'm being critical or a wet-blanket... this just really smoked my shorts! It just isn't right to portray someone so inaccurately, especially when evidence, history, records etc. point in an entirely different direction.

All that aside, Pride And Prejudice has been pretty good so far. : )

Friday, February 1, 2008

Altered Art Group Sea Challenge

I'm Admin for the Altered Art group on Flickr, we decided to begin doing a monthly challenge, and January's theme was Sea. Check out the entries in the slideshow:

Make a PhotoShow Full Size


Participants:

PaperBouquet
(Me)
Bettysoo
Vintagepix
Decorating4
Playingwithbrushes
Peregrine blue
Heyjupiter21
aLiCia PeLLon
Gardencandymosaics
Lisa templ-cox
Flowerpistol
Crazyfish_666
Creationsinglass
Eclecticelements

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

A Place To Bark- Animal Rescue

Any of you who are in to Altered Art/Mix-Media Art are probably familiar with Bernie Berlin, author of "Artist Trading Card Workshop", and owner of "A Place To Bark", a no-kill animal rescue she runs in Tennessee. Please, for any of you who can make donations, she is trying to win a $50,000.00 dollar grant from the "American Giving Challenge" so she can build a shelter for her animals. Right now she holds the third place out of the top four, if she gets knocked into fourth she'll still be okay, but if she gets knocked into fifth, she won't get the grant. Words cannot describe how amazing her work has been. I wish I had read about this sooner, the contest ends tomorrow. There is very little time left!
Here's a link to her blog:

http://aplacetobark.blogspot.com/


To the "American Giving Challenge" page: http://www.sixdegrees.org/Top.aspx

To the donation page: http://tinyurl.com/3x3c3m

Monday, January 28, 2008

T-Rex

This is my pet T-Rex:

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Cat Food

So, we keep a bowl full of food on the back porch for stray cats (squirrels, birds, and an assortment of reptiles and amphibians also reap the benefits) and yesterday night I went out to re-fill it. I took one look on the bowl and started to have a fit. At first I thought a cat had made a messy-messy in it, and I started to get really mad:



Apparently slugs are omnivorous.

Monday, January 21, 2008

Changes



Video from YouTube. Title: Changes - Presidential Candidates feat. Bowie

Monday, January 14, 2008

Why Tea Should be Decaf.

I think tea should not be caffeinated. I'm about to go to bed, and I thought I'd make myself a nice hot cup of tea. But all of my favourite flavours I have on hand are caffeinated. : /

Why would someone need caffeinated tea? Coffee is caffeinated and you can have that in the morning. You can also purchase decaf coffee, which I can understand if you are going to have a biscotti late in the evening. Then you can drink water, iced tea, and coke during the rest of the day. But tea is for the afternoon (when you don't need caffeine) or for the evening (when you also don't need caffeine).

Tuesday, January 8, 2008

The letter "U" is ruined!

It has now reached the point where I can no longer stand the mere site of a stand-alone "U". Whenever I see it, I think of all the people who use it in the place of 'you', and I want to scream. I can understand minimal abbreviation, such as TX, FL, NC etc. for the states, I can even undertake (on very rare occasions) to use "lol" when it is fitting, as an expression. But when people begin using '2' in the place of 'to' or 'too', 'R' in the place of 'are', 'Y' in the place of 'Why', and (most specifically) 'U' in the place of 'You' , that is just plain unbearable to me. It is denigrating to the English language and derogatory to the gifts of speech and communication. : (

Monday, January 7, 2008

Poll Results: "Which One?"

Thanks to everyone who voted!

25% voted "Yes".

37% voted "No".

0% voted "Either".

37% voted "What?".

Friday, January 4, 2008

13 Things About Me: Week 4

  • I have eight cats.
  • I love literature... Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens and William Faulkner are my favourites.
  • My all-time favourite book is "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver. The first time I ever read it was March of 2006, and I've read it seven times since then.
  • I almost never take off my cross pendant.
  • I love animals.
  • I've always wanted to travel the world, particularly Africa.
  • I bought 3 packages of 165 head-pins the day before yesterday, and I only have about 75 left... : /
  • I'm collecting the state quarters and I'm up to 44... I'm missing Utah and the five for this year.
  • I want to visit Colorado some day, I'd love to do photography there.
  • I rarely wear any jewelry besides earrings.
  • I have 12 clocks in my studio.
  • I have so many decorative objects crowded into my studio, there isn't much room for me to work.
  • I'm too tired to think of anything else right now.

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Leftovers, anyone?

Look what I found smashed in the lower oven:



A smashed Bagel Bite (mini pizza) leftover from Christmas. It must have fallen off of the baking sheet as we were pulling it out of the oven. In my defense, I want to say that we hardly ever use the lower oven, which is why it was only recently found. Needless to say, we threw it out. :)

Tuesday, January 1, 2008

How Many Forum Members Does It Take To Swap Some Lightbulbs

Thanks to a comment on my earlier post containing the "How Many Forum Does It Take To Change A Lightbulb" (Not Written By Me), I was inspired to write a continuation of the lightbulb saga, in which someone gets the idea that they should swap some lightbulbs! Everyone likes a swap, right?
Here goes:

*1* To post announcing that they would like to host a lightbulb swap.

*8* To post announcing that they would like participate in the lightbulb swap.

*2* To post announcing that they will be shipping their lightbulbs late.

*1* To not ship their lightbulbs at all.

*10* To post, blowing up into a heightened state of rage at the inconsiderate people (they didn't notice it was just one person) who dropped out of the lightbulb swap.

~~~
Right about here is a lull in which the swap host
receives, swaps, and ships out the lightbulbs. And it
begins again.
~~~

*1* To post and politely inquire as to the whereabouts of their lightbulbs... not meaning to cause any trouble of course...

*3* To post and announce loudly that they see no reason why the above should not have posted, seeing as the lightbulbs had "supposedly" shipped a month ago.

*5* To post, calculating exactly how much money the host had made off of them in the lightbulb swap (shipping fees etc.)

*13* To post protesting this revolt and declaring the above posters to be inconsiderate, and to proclaim that the host is such a wonderful talented person.

*The Host* To post and say that they did ship the lightbulbs some time ago, everyone knows the mail has been slow lately, and to please be patient.

*1* (OP) To post and say they didn't mean to cause this controversy, they just wanted to know where their lightbulbs were!

*3* (Mods) To post and announce that everyone needs to stop discussing this, and that if they have anything they want to say about the lightbulb swap, to please contact the host.

*11* To post, completely ignoring, (or overlooking, I cannot say) the mods' posts, and continue bickering over the lightbulbs.

*4* To post and try to change the subject.

*5* To post more about the stupid lightbulb swap.

*1* To post and announce that their lightbulbs have arrived.

*8* To post and announce that they knew all along that the lightbulbs were on their way (at least 2 of them had earlier stopped just short of condemning the host as a theif and a liar.)


PS Happy New Year everyone!