Monday: A Beginning and an End

Is Monday the beginning of the week or the end of the weekend?

Zoe and I can't decide.

We had a nice weekend, packed with activities and FUN. Plus some staying home to just pet Animals and have good conversations.

It all started on Thursday night with a visit to our local brewery called Brewerie for the bi-annual Arts and Drafts, which Zoe and I decided we are going to participate in this coming Spring.

Arts and Drafts consists of Art, Music, and Beer. How can you go wrong? You really can't.

Local artists hang their work in one part of the building, which coincidentally, is the old train station and a gorgeous building, and on the other side of the bar, some of our most wonderful local musicians played. Of course, the Heliotropes played, but also my friend MusicMiles (formerly known in this blog as HealthCoach) and his friend, Brad. I took some pretty substandard video of them playing, which you may get to see on Flip Friday this week if I can put it all together.

MusicMiles playing a shaker thingie.
Oh, and looking Super Cool.

On Saturday, the Blisschick and I went to see a movie-- Julie and Julia. We found it to be delightful! Funny, interesting, and a good story. Perfect for a rainy afternoon.

Saturday night was spent hanging out with more good friends and included a dip in a hot tub as well as a very cute poodle.

Now, I know you're wondering-- with all this running around, were the Cats and the Rabbit really getting enough Attention?

Well, that was our question, too. Which is precisely why we were glad to stay home on Sunday and do a bit of Resting and Creating.

Sunday held its own excitement, though, in the form of interviews. There was this interview of the Blisschick and me, which we wrote together.

Then, there was the Blisschick's interview on Dirty footprints Studio BlogTalk Radio with Connie and Andrea about their Creative Dig Workshop. That's coming up soon, but there's still time to register.

Zoe said it's all too much. She doesn't care if Monday is the Beginning or the End of the Week.

She just wants more attention.

Flip Friday

Friday is a beautiful thing.

Especially when you have the day off and both weekend days free.

YAY!!

So, to start off the weekend right, here is a video of all the Lilypad's Mammals featured one by one to a song called Mammal. It was rainy here yesterday when we made the video, so it's sort of a documentary of what the Mammals here in the Lilypad do when it's raining.

It doesn't get much better than this.

What are your plans this weekend?

Whatever they are, I hope they bring you Fun and Excitement.

Those of you out there with Rabbits may have more Fun than the others, but, then again, maybe not.

Without any further introduction, then here they are. ENJOY!!

Rainy Day Mammal Activities from marcy hall on Vimeo.

I'm Mooollttiinngg...!!!

It seems like everyone around here is molting.

Inside the Lilypad, Miss Zoe is molting:

Loose hair galore!

See the Molt Ridge across her nose?

Outside the Lilypad, while trimming the hedge, we found this little fellow who had molted.

Believe it or not, there's no body in there!

See the split at the top where the little dude crawled out?
Crazy!

And just blocks away, friendBob has a tarantula named Peter Parker who just molted. I don't have a picture of that, but hearing about it was pretty funny. He said it left such a perfect shell of itself that when he looked into the tank, he didn't even know which was the old skin and which one was the real tarantula!

That's kind of how it was with the cicada pictured above. He left his whole little suit behind.

Not so, however, with Miss Zoe. (Though, wouldn't you like to have an unused Rabbit Suit to pet? Can you imagine it just zipping off like a 1970's one-piece Leisuresuit?)

And, also, not so with my Etsy store.

Did you just get conversational whiplash?!? (I know-- you were still back on the Leisuresuit image. Me, too!)

I got conversational whiplash, and I even wrote it!

So what does my Etsy store, Ordinary Enchantment, have to do with molting?

Easy. It's molting, too. See the relation?

We're having a sale to shed off the old and bring in the new!! I have tons of new ideas for new WeeArt paintings, so Blisschick announced to me over the weekend, "Let's have a sale!"


Miss Zoe and Miss Lilly shouted together in their best announcer voices: "EVERYTHING MUST GO!!!!!"


Since Blisschick beat me to the punch by announcing this little sale on Monday, a few things have sold already. But not to worry!! There's still a few things left.

As for what's coming next, Zoe and I have plans to start this weekend.

I assure you. It will be hair raising. Or should I say hare raising?

Hair. Hare. Whatever.

No Regrets. Only Rabbits.

Not to depress those of you who absolutely love Summer, but the Canada Geese flying over the Lilypad in their big, honking Vs would say that Autumn seems to be on the way.

Ahhhhh....... and won't that be a relief?

Now, don't get me wrong. I love Summer. I love sunshine! I love hot, humid weather! I love waking up at 4:30AM and it's sort of light out already.

OK, that last thing might just be proof of psychosis. Whatev.

The point is, we here at the Lilypad love Summer, yes. But we also love the hibernation that comes with the rest of the year. And this year, we are super-extra looking forward to it.

Remember a couple of months ago, when I said I was going to forgo painting for while to concentrate on writing? To really, really buckle down and work on my novel?

Of course I had a hard time not painting. It's a part of myself that I really cannot forgo just for the sake of convenience. But the point was to write more. I even took unpaid leave hours at work to come home early everyday and get right to work.

Did I do it?

Well......

The Deadly Rabbit Stare

(Oh, no, the STARE!!)

Well you see I tried, but I was... I mean we were so.... I mean....

OUCH!!! IT BURNS!!!!

Well, Zoe has every right to Stare at me. I didn't really fulfill my promise to myself to focus. To concentrate. To work my butt off in an effort to do my thing. Or things, I could say.

But, I'm not going to take it too hard. We had a strange Summer. Even as I write that, I know that that's not necessarily the reason. Every Summer is strange. Full of events and festivals and parties and visits from friends and family and just wanting to sit out in the yard for goodness sake and relax in the Sunshine.

I could spend my time feeling really bad about this fact. Feeling like a loser.

But where's the fun in that?

Maybe the lesson I could learn from this is that it's just that it's Important not to judge Oneself for... well.... resting. That it's Important to take a deep breath, think about what direction I want to take now, and just start again.

With no regrets. No judgments of Self.

Leave the Judging to the Rabbit.

It's kinda what they do.

I mean come on. Did you see that Stare?

Just in case you missed it the first time!

Now, that's a professional. Leave it to her. You? You just go about your business.

Flip Friday

Is it Friday already?

Miss Zoe has been a little dismayed not to have been the star of all the movies on the most recent Flip Fridays.

We have featured Guy Dancing at Jazz and Blues Fest.

We have featured our new fave band, the Heliotropes.

We have even featured Zoe's own Beautiful Cats.

All good stuff, I think. Entertainment.

"The thing is," she said to me as we were meeting to plan this week's cinematic features, "I thought this was Ordinary Enchantment, Starring Special Guest, Miss Zoe. The Rabbit. You know-- ME."

I gave this some thought. I got Zoe's brush down off the Red Cabinet and began to brush Her slowly. I took off enough fur to make a new Rabbit, and then I stopped. She sat quietly, eyes closed. But I could feel the pressure of Her Stare, nonetheless.

"So, what were You thinking?" I asked.

I know. I'm bad. But she sets herself up for this kind of teasing. She really does.

She sat up and began to wash Her Ears slowly. The left Ear. The right Ear.

I waited patiently.

Without looking at me, she sighed. "I think you know what I mean."

She hopped to the hay, took a long, stiff drink from Her Critter Canteen, and then squiggeed Her extremely cute self down into the soft, edible Nest.

She made her point. She has a way of doing that quite effectively.

So, feature #1 is for our friend Marnie, who has a Rabbit named Penny, who loves figs. She gave me one the other day when I saw her at the Whole Foods Coop. They are Penny's favorite thing. What did Little Zoe think of fig? Watch and see:



And second, after a little fig, Miss Zoe needed a palette cleanse. Willow Ball pieces always fit that bill:



So, it looks like Miss Zoe got Her way. Aren't you glad?

I thought so.

Miss Emmie

Miss Emmie busts a move.

OK, I think Miss Zoe and I have beaten around the bush here and there about our Crazy Cat, Emmie for long enough.

Shall we Begin at the Beginning?

Yes, we shall.

We have an unwritten rule in this house. Actually, it may be a written rule. I'm not sure.

The rule is this: Don't look a Stray Cat in the Eye.

You may ask, "Who made up this rule?" Well, that would be the Blisschick.

Which explains why (or, maybe it doesn't explain why) I was at work a few years ago and I got a call from a very anxious sounding Blisschick, who yelled into the phone, "Frog! There's a cat in the hedge in the backyard with seafoam green eyes, and I looked right at her!"

Well, I knew what that meant, didn't I?

After spending days trying to catch her and finally doing so, we took her to the vet and got her de-everythinged. We had a friend who was all set to take her. We brought her home from the vet, unzipped the carrier, and the Blisschick said, "Welcome home, Miss Emmie!"

Emmie and her friend, Woolly Ball.

WHAT?

The other cats couldn't believe it. They did not want another cat. Not in the least!!

Especially when they found out that Miss Emmie was crazy! Absolutely NUTTERS!!

But, it seemed we had a new cat. Emily Dickinson. The Woman in White.

I wish I could say that she wasn't crazy right away. But, she was. She would stare in the most unsettling way at all the other animals. I remember spending more than a few almost sleepless nights downstairs on the couch in some strange effort to protect the other animals at night. I would drift off in fits and starts only to to open my eyes and find myself being stared at by a totally psycho looking animal. Miss Emmie had found a home.

It wasn't until a couple of years later that she first bit her tail.

We had gone out of town and left Miss Emmie and the others (Miss Zoe did not live here yet) in the care of our Trusted Catsitter. The day after we got home, Miss Emmie started growling and hissing and totally wigging out. All of a sudden, she bit her tail squarely on the tip, almost biting it off, as she proceeded to run around the house painting everything in sight with blood and her tailbrush.

It was NOT pretty! Like a live cat-painted Jackson Pollock.

We took Miss Emmie to the vet ER, where she got her Cone:

The Cone!!

The Vet explained that Miss Emmie has is a neurological disorder called Wiggle Cat Syndrome or some such. He said that to her, her tail feels numb and that she probably doesn't realize it's even there. Her back muscles all along her spine get twitchy, she gets agitated, and then-- BAM! The tail goes into the mouth, and the rest is history.

Bloody Tail Massacre.

We even have special clothes deemed "Blood Clothes" for those times when the world seems extra dark to Little Emmie.

Luckily, after many years of this, we have a good system in place. We use Bach's Flower Remedy (or Cat Whiskey, as we like to call it) to take the edge off when Emmie gets extra pissed off at her tail. A few drops behind the ear and she passes out like a baby after a big lunch.

Besides that, we've learned how smart she is. When she feels poorly, all you need to do is hold the Cone out toward her, and she practically dives into it. The limited space seems to comfort her.

Sometimes, when she doesn't have her cone handy, the Cat Tent does just fine:

Look at that cute little cat.
She is hiding from her tail. Will it follow her anyway?
Hmmmmmm.... poor Miss Emmie.

And of course, we also keep her shaved, because, besides being a little crazy, she's also a bit lazy about grooming.

And, of course, by lazy, I mean she doesn't groom at all.

This regular shearing process has earned her her other nickname: The Lamb

We love our Lamb very much, and it is for this reason that we feel the need to explain her. If one can explain such an Animal.

Miss Zoe would like a chance to explain the Lamb. What was that, Zoe?

"That Cat? It's just a Crazy Cat.
But, we love Her.
I'm just sayin'."

Right you are on all accounts, Miss Zoe. Right you are.

CelebrateErie!

This weekend was our city's annual festival to Celebrate Itself-- CelebrateErie!

Zoe is now convinced that there should be an annual, or even weekly, festival to Celebrate Herself--

CelebrateZoe!!

I think that might already exist.

"A Rabbit deserves a Festival in My Opinion!"

Anyhow, we went down to the fest yesterday to see the sights and to hear a little music, so we thought we'd share some pictures.

First, a few shots of some of the ChalkWalk art pieces. Local businesses sponsor artists to draw awesome chalk renderings of all kinds of scenes right on our main street. If it doesn't rain, you can sometimes see these drawings for weeks after! Here's a few of our favorites:






And second, I shared a video about two weeks ago of a guy dancing at the Jazz and Blues Fest, and in that post, I said that usually, he is dressed in more of a suit and playing the trumpet. Here is that guy in his alternate outfit:


If you haven't watched the video of him dancing, it is certainly worth your time. Zoe has watched it more than once.

After doing some strolling, we plopped down at a table in the park to fan ourselves and listen to the Heliotropes play in the park's gazebo, while we munched on some artichoke dip from one of our local restaurants.

It was approximately 1,000,000 degrees with matching humidity.

As we sat there fading away, I kept thinking of Miss Zoe, back at home in her Air Conditioned Rabbit Room. She was resting comfortably, far, far away from the noisy crowds. What a good Rabbit.

We didn't stick around after the music was over. The main Sunday night act was Country Music, which is something neither the Blisschick nor I are particularly fond of. On Saturday night, it was Three Dog Night, which we had planned on going to see, due to the fact that the Blisschick loves their song Joy to the World, or the Bullfrog Song, as we call it, because it reminds her of being little.

But then, somehow the Cats and the Rabbit talked us into staying home that night.

I wonder how that kind of thing happens?

It can't be that we are under Their Control!

It can't be!!