In restless dreams I walk alone, down narrow streets of coble stone.

My cat Bagheera lets me make kissing noises over his head, but pulls away if I come to close. He is in a mood tonight, the rain pattering on the glass makes him anxious; he cannot understand nor catch with open claws the source of the noise. I too am anxious, wanting, waiting, on a quiet rain soaked summer night, and fear I have been too long in waiting. A pile of graduate school applications lie next to me, half completed. I am not lonely; taken to staring out the window with blank eyes catching the chance individual drop of rain, yet plagued by a certain impatience. I cannot wait forever. Time to act. Bagheera and I will not be anxious tomorrow, when the sunlight comes again.

Lizards, and snakes, and spiders - oh my!

I am a lucky girl. Somehow, I managed to have a job that I love; doing work that I love, with people that I love. And get paid to play with tarantulas. The library system presented a program called “Grossology,” aimed at young boys at that special age where they are interested in all things gooey, gross and ultimately hilarious. With an ample dose of potty humor, and plenty of fake vomit, young boys would visit various booths set up around the library to be grossed out. (And secretly learning things like biology, but don’t tell them that. For the kids, it was all about the barf bags.) The Nature Lady was part of Grossology, and the only part that I allowed myself within ten feet of. My fellow sexy librarians and I took turns volunteering to work at different branches helping the Nature Lady out, after seeing the chaos that followed a table full of snakes, lizards, and little boys. I was extremely lucky to assist at two libraries other than my own. So were the animals. During the three Grossology programs, the spider was dropped twice (tarantulas have an exoskeleton that can shatter if dropped far enough), the frog almost stepped on, the ribbon snake dropped and screamed at, the turtle wandered through the bookshelves, and the lizard rescued from riding home on some forgetful boy’s shoulder. It was fun, but it was stressful WORK keeping 2 snakes, a tarantula, a lizard, a newt and a frog alive for 2 solid hours of squealing, hyper 8 year old boys. But, I loved it. And I discovered I have a deep, hidden love for tarantulas.

The Best Shoes Ever.

No, seriously. Just look at them. The shine. The sparkle. The. Best. Shoes. Eah-ver.

The Bahgeera Chronicles

Those who know me quite well can attest to the fact that I am utterly, inconsolably, ridiculously, and religiously afraid of cockroaches. I cannot stand the thought of them, and have had a battle with the evil creatures ever since I have come to live in my current apartment. So, you can all imagine my joy as I share the following narrative.

Tonight, Bahgeera single handedly (er, pawedly) hunted and captured a vicious, horrible, extremely large and Kafkaesque cockroach.

I was lying on the couch, finishing my tasty dinner of enchiladas, (I can make a mean enchilada,) and giggling quietly to the wit of John Stewart and his band of merry writers that make up the humoriffic Daily Show, when I heard a commotion in the kitchen. Bagheera had previously spent time this evening knocking over his water dish by landing in it, (picture an over turned kitchen stool for visual aid in how this might have happened,) and by trying to jump and reach the hinge of the kitchen door. (Tried so hard, and cried about it when he couldn’t reach. I finally picked him up and held him in reaching distance to the hinge so he could bat at it with his paws for a few minutes and purr appreciatively.)

After hearing the commotion, I called out to him, expecting to hear the sound of four little paws scrambling down from off the forbidden kitchen counter and to see his little face come trit-trotting my way. He did not come. I called him again, in a nicer tone, so that he wouldn’t think I was too mean, lest he decide not to grace me with his presence. He still didn’t come, and I went back into my TV stupor without thinking too much on it. When I heard nothing from him for a good ten minutes, I called his name again.

He still ignored my call. Even for a bad demon kitty, this was unusual. He usually comes when I call to him, unless he is doing something really bad, or knocked unconscious. Fearing that it was one of the two, I left the glow of the idiot box to go check on my kitty. I found him crouched on the floor of the kitchen in front of a paper bag.

“Oh.” I scold him, reaching down to give him a squeeze, “a paper bag is more important than coming when your mother calls?” I pick up the bag, intending to play the delightfully sophisticated game “torture the kitty,” and what should creep out from under the paper bag? You guessed it - the hideous cockroach from three paragraphs ago. I react in a dignified and worldly manner, by screaming like a banshee (that would be the “worldly” part,) and leaping across the room in a soaring arch which was quite dignified, I assure you. Bagheera, pleased to have his new plaything uncovered from the complexity of the paper bag, proceeded to pounce, chew and claw the hideous roach in a very un-vegetarian manner. Drawing my courage, I convinced Bagheera to let me flush the hideous roach down the toilet (a more humane death than death by kitten.)

Bagheera was then lauded with praise and special kitten treats, and many, many insistences that he was such a good, good boy, and that for every evil roach he captured I would in turn forget every evil deed Bagheera himself committed. So, tonight, he is my little protector and I am quite pleased with him. That is, until I went to take a shower and he crawled into my closet (again) and pulled more of my clothes off the hangers, and the towels off the shelves, and used his claws on all the delicate clothes I keep in the closet to be safe from said claws……sigh.

Nerdy Post

This month, part of my wonderful job at the library is having the honor of creating a poetry tree, a "PoeTree," to cover one of the ugly cement columns. Each leaf on the "PoeTree" holds a poem, and the kids are supposed to decorate their own leaves with poems and smiley faces and whatnot. April is National Poetry month, and being the nerd that I am, I eagerly volunteered to tackle the poetry displays, PoeTree, and suggested having a poetry open mike. The open mike is themed, a "Beatnik Cafe," where hot chocolate will be served as the kids read their poems and the audience snaps their fingers instead of clapping.

This is the "Before" picture - ugly brown paper.



The back of my head as I sketch, while my co-worker taking the picture scolds, "turn around and show your face!" Me: "no!"



Mid project - half finished braches droop sadly



And done! Tacking the 50 odd poetry leaves made the week before!
(The sign on the tree explains what it is, and why it is there.)



A young patron with one shoe on comes to "help" me towards the end. When I ask her if she likes my tree, she nods and replies, "I can tie my shoe." Not the enthusiastic response I was hoping for, but cute none the less.

The Way I See it #83

"They told you that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What they failed to tell you is that it is best seen with the eyes closed. What you look like isn't important. What is important is who you are inside and the choices you are making in your life."

- Tiana Tozer, 1992 Paralympic silver and 1996 bronze medalist, women's wheelchair basketball.

A Hollow Tree

It seems my only blogging is work blogging; but it is only in the quiet hours between carts of books and the evening show that it occurs to me to write.

I am frequently encouraged by all my co-workers to create a “myspace” account, but I am loyal to my sad little blog.

One warm day today – 74 degrees, with a cooling March wind. I sat outside with Sokha and Amrita and ate sushi while the wind threatened the red umbrella over our outdoor table with upward gusts. I was one solid grip away from being Mary Poppins, flying off into the sky. I hid in the sun during my break, and soaked up light. Too long have I sat in winter, this world of fragile things.

Kitten Blogging

Bagheera, the wild child, blends into the foliage of the dining room table.



He keeps a close watch on his domain.



Notice the oddly pensive look of a beast longing to leap and attack at any moment. Because, you may think he is trying to look cute, but he is really waiting for me to make a grab for the detergent in the bag beside him. Then it's all claws.



Enjoy.

And many more...

Happy Birthday to me.