DementedBlogger

Fred our in and out male cat has adopted Misty the kitten, it’s funny to watch as he washes her while she is trying to instigate playtime with him. He is only about five times her size, but he is always gentle with her, carefully batting at her in slow motion and being silly for her benefit.

The queen came out just to hiss and howl her displeasure at their antics, but they really didn’t even bother a glance in her direction. The queen got temporarily expelled from the bathroom tonight (bath time) and stood outside the door demanding that both dogs move so she could get by. She really isn’t the brightest monarch around as they both are about a 95 pounds bigger than she is…. Somehow I doubt if either one would really care if she abdicated her self imposed rule.

Thomas H. Forthe

I popped in on the Scale Auto Enthusiast magazine website (www.scaleautomag.com) to see what amazing new work was taking place. I try to detail my cars and armor, but these guys go nuts! Window webbing in stock car models, Scaled down books, tools and tool boxes, wiring and brake, fuel and even vacuum lines. They cut them apart and customize them, creating virtually any customization you can on a full sized car or truck.

There are even several that if the pictures didn’t allow perspective you are very hard pressed to tell they aren’t drivable!

They raise them, lower them, swap parts around and generally do almost everything the full sized automotive industry can.

There is even a large cottage industry making add-on parts and conversions and even photo etched parts to add realism. Some builders even scratch build parts they need for detailing a project, tough to do on so small a scale.

Worth a look at the web site, just make an account and look through the forum there, especially the muscle car, race car and hot rod threads.

Thomas H. Forthe

Stuffing as in stomachs not the bird. What strange dementia comes over people to make them think that once or twice a year they can eat four times their normal amount and come out unscathed?

I remember the bloated whale syndrome well, to full to even get up much less move once up on the sorely abused feet. Moaning and groaning about the extension of tissue unused to such crazy punishment.

Then some one hands you a piece of pumpkin pie, do you put it down? Tell them there is no way you can force it in? Of course not, it goes in the digestive tract adding insult to injury as it waits its turn in a very long line….

I finally came to my senses a few years ago, maybe age does have a few advantages since I can say no to the gluttony of yester year. I still get full mind you, just not to the point of feeling wounded with food, eyes glazed over, trying to find a position my body can actually be in without exploding like an over filled balloon.

Thomas H. Forthe

Happy Thanksgiving day! Don’t eat till you’re miserable, ya right! Have a great day and I’ll be back tomorrow.

Well here we are, about to celebrate Thanksgiving 2008. Oh the misery of overfull stomachs! My younger brother was convinced he could shower to relieve the extension of the stomach when he over ate as an early teen. He would disappear into the bathroom after gorging himself miserable at the holiday spread mom laid out. I doubt it worked as he never made it to the leftovers any sooner than the rest of us.

Mom would spend days cooking, making sure we had a feast of epic proportions and wound up too tired to eat most of the time. It was always appreciated even when we were too young and dumb to realize how hard she had worked on it.

 My mother did her best to create a magical childhood for her children no matter how horrid her own life was at the time. She ignored many of her own wants and needs, tending to our own instead, Mom should have earned saint hood status by now for selflessness in mothering if nothing else.

Life was not all roses for my mother, yet it could have been without her entourage, she could have been anything she wanted, her intelligence and spirit would have earned her any degree she could have sought. She could have married any man she chose, her beauty never a question, but a statement for all to see.

Mom put off her own life, casting it aside like an after thought, giving it freely to her children instead. In a perfect world we would have noticed then, yet it took me quite a while to realize just what she lost in doing so, having children of my own helped see to that.

Thanks Mom, I know what you did for me and what it cost you even though you would argue the point that it was worth it. Raising four children alone, working two and three jobs to do so, wearing shoes with holes in them, retaining your dignity and your sanity could not have been easy for you. Thank you, you are one of the precious things in my life that I am thankful for!

At class today the instructor informed us that a guard had killed a man who attacked the guard with a sword. That is all we knew about the incident at the time, yet what she said next really struck a cord.

She told us she couldn’t't kill someone, she would have to shoot him in the hand…. I wonder if she has any idea how hard that would be to accomplish? (she does not carry a gun, and I think she has little knowledge of them.) Having some person charge up to you with two swords (as I found out later), intent on doing you harm is not a great time to play trick shot! Not to mention the number of other unintended targets that might intercept a bullet that missed.

Hitting a target  the size of a human hand with a pistol in an adrenaline pumping situation would be tough for even an expert marksman/woman let alone a moving hand.

I recall a time with four seasoned hunters trying to hit a snake with pistols at close range while it was moving, the snake survived unscathed…. It was a good thing it never tried to retaliate, the score would read snake four, great white hunters 0.

Thomas H. Forthe

I appologize for not having an entry today, other duties called. I will try to keep content up, writing at night as usual and posting it in the morning.

Thomas H. Forthe

Misty has all the traits of a larger feline, getting into things that we would really rather she stay out of, climbing objects to reach those mystic realms of her curiosity and biting the cheek that feeds her (the little ingrate).

Misty still tries to nurse, cheeks and chins, drawing blood instead of milk. Not much fun for the ‘donor.’

Misty has met the Queen, surprisingly no blood bath there, the younger cat accepted her warning, subjects do not merely request an audience unannounced!

Fred has decided Misty is alright, washing and playing with her. They even occasionally allow us into bed at night, though grudgingly. I tried to explain that I am to big to sleep on the floor, they really don’t seem to care.

Fred has also met the Queen, who glared intensely while he intruded upon her domain, and enforced her monarchy only after he had the audacity to attempt a nose to nose introduction.

Regal audiences keep everyone’s nerves on edge, two very large attendants would be more than willing to prove their allegiance to Prince Fred over the hissing Queen. Her human subjects do try to keep the Queendom peaceful.

The demands of her highness can grow tiresome, removing her bodily from the porcelain throne to ease her shattered nerves before using the heat fan in the throne room which causes her to scream in displeasure or preparing the silver (Polystyrene) platter to proffer tidbits of delicacy to entice her palate, while offering nectar of the gods from her favorite chalice to sooth her savage thirst! Ah, the life of servitude.

Thomas H. Forthe

Some of my earliest memories are truly enveloped with the cloudy fog of disuse, they come and go of their own accord, unable to form a complete picture of the day yet disbursing teasing bits of information about it.

I remember watching our dog Terry swing our cat around by its neck and throw him high into the air. That cat would walk over and offer its neck to Terry, enticing another “ride.” Terry and that cat were the best of friends which was a good thing. That tom cat liked nothing better than to shred every other dog in the neighborhood and excelled at doing so to more than one at a time.

There was an old horse whose fenced pasture bordered our backyard, the horse loved to be fed and petted, he or she would visit often when we were out.

I had a pet frog given to me by a nurse, he escaped confinement one too many times and my Mom suggested (strongly) we release him unto the wilds of a nearby pond.

Those were the memories’ of a five year old, maybe four, the simple facts from a young boy’s life of around 45 years ago.

I find myself trying to write this post by trying to reach back into the dregs of my foggy memory. Not that there is a shortage of it you see, actually it is the opposite. Too many memories file past, forming a mental movie of what once was; some good, some are bad and some a waste of space.

It amazes me that at times I can recall vividly scenes from early childhood yet what I had for breakfast yesterday is a mystery. While writing a word presents itself and in a very few seconds is gone for the duration of said writing only to reappear later in the day, randomly and at a useless point in time. Yet when I need it, the word vanishes like fog in a wind storm….

There are more than a few memories I wish I could erase from the gray matter, expunge them into the void, forever lost to time and memory. Without them would I remain who I am? Would it change me in ways I would be unable to fathom? Probably.

There are memories that started out good enough only to end up nightmares, festering tumors of mental matter that become painful in passing during a review.

Some mental movies would kill me to lose; the  birth of my sons, my mother’s face, my beautiful wife, brothers and sisters, friends, sunrises and sunsets and needless to say beauty in all its glorious  forms.

Memory it makes us what we are, what we become.

Thomas H. Forthe