A Kitten Witten Scare!

Yesterday, during a very chaotic day, I noticed that Witten's chin was swollen. He is eighteen years old and slowing down, so any kind of infection worries us. While I had hair cut appointment yesterday, and with Cheryl needing to study, we realized that we had to get him in to see Dr. Hong our vet.

Cheryl, the ever-amazing planner that she is, decided that I should quickly mow the lawn, take a shower, and then go get my haircut -- there was just enough time. She took Witten to the vet, along with some books so she could try to study while making sure Witten could be seen.

Of course, Cheryl was right. I mowed the lawn and grabbed a quick shower. As I was driving to my haircut appointment, she called to say that indeed Witten had an abcess. Dr. Hong drained it, gave us antibiotics to give Witten, and gave us instructions on how to care for his abcess. He's going to be fine, thanks in no small part to Cheryl's quick thinking! I just love her so much! And I am so lucky!

Be safe,

Kooth

A Magical Night ...

Congratulations to Barack Obama and Joe Biden! What a campaign we Democrats have had! Lots of firsts: The first African-American presidential nominee; the first female candidate to win numbers of races for president: It's awesome!

Be safe,

Kooth

Fay Fizzles Here ...

TS Fay hit land in south Florida this morning and quickly shifted to the east where should keep going until it hits the Atlantic ocean. It will probably strengthen then. It is forecast to turn back over Florida on Thursday, but it should be north of us and pose little if any threat.

Whew! Have we dodged another one?

Be safe,

Kooth

Fay is on the Way ...

Well, well, well. We might be getting a good chance to experience a hurricane tomorrow. Lucky us.

At work, we are closed tomorrow because of TS Fay. I get to work from home! Oh joy.

I was here in 2004 for Hurricane Jean. Cheryl hadn't moved here yet -- I was staying at an extended stay motel out east of town. That hurricane felt like twelve hours of a continuous thunder storm. Luckily, the motel never lost power. I was working at Verizon. That seems like another century and I was another person ...

I'll keep posting as the storm passes. Cheryl thinks that it will move east of us and dissipate. She's probably right. But if the storm moves over either the gulf or the Atlantic ocean, it could intensify.

We are all set here -- we have taken down our wind chimes, moved the plants on the lanai closer to the sliding glass doors. We have plenty of batteries, water, propane, and food. It's all good.

More later ...

Be safe,

Kooth

16 August 2008

I should be out mowing, but it's raining ...

At work, I'm learning more about ASP.net for a project I am coding. It seems pretty easy to use and powerful, but, alas, it's proprietary. But that's OK, my job uses ASP.net for internal applications, and it's good to be versatile.

I'm primarily a C++ coder. At SDC, I primarily work on our gateways and proxies products. These are written in "C" or Java, and run on UNIX and Windows platforms. I like working in UNIX more than any other OS, but as I said above, it's good to be versatile.

OK, I managed to get the damned lawn mowed. Geez, it's hotter than a bitch wolf out there! Time for something cool ...

Be safe,

Kooth

10 August 2008 1012 EDT

It rained a lot yesterday, so I couldn't mow. I usually mow on Saturdays and clean the pool on Sundays. Now I have to do both today. There seems to be no time for anything else. That's OK. All of this work keeps me off the streets.

I should have been out there by now. It's gonna get hot soon. But, with only a 20% chance of rain, I guess I can give up on hoping of being rained out (damn!)

At work (Southern Data Comm), I'm part of a project where I need to code something in ASP.net. On the Web side, I know Cold Fusion, and PHP. In IT, one has the chance to learn the "flavor of the month". Well, I bit the bullet and downloaded MS Visual Studio 2005 and started playing with it. I also viewed several videos that Microsoft has about using the Visual Studio and ASP.net. I have to admit that it's pretty cool.

On the flip side, anything in .net is proprietary. But, Microsoft is not going away, so it's good to know how to do things several different ways.

I'm still a UNIX guy at heart, and there is plenty of UNIX at work.

...

Wow, it's hot. I just finished mowing the lawn -- weeds --- lawn. It's mowed. Whatever.

As I sit in my office under my ceiling fan trying to get cool before I work on the pool, I realize that I'm pretty lucky. My bad back isn't bad enough to keep me from doing my share around the house (yet), and it really doesn't take that long. The pool is in good shape, so it won't take too long either.

Sarah likes to come out on the lanai on pool cleaning day. She's very confused about this weekend. As I mentioned, I didn't mow yesterday, and that really threw off the ol' girl. Witten is sleeping in my closet, lying on my auxiliary shorts. You know, the shorts one wears around the house. He rarely goes outside anymore, which is good. This neighborhood has a bad flea problem right now.

But, we are lucky. We aren't occupied by another country in an unjust war. We haven't been invaded by a former superpower. The best country on the planet needs work, but I wouldn't trade her for anything.

Be safe!

Kooth

08 August 2008 2300 EDT

Hey anyone,

A lot happened today. The olympics started. Georgia (the country, not the US state) was invaded by Russia today. I'm afraid I'm not quite up on this situation. It seems bad, obviously.

I listened to several new songs on Artist Weekly. I'm a musician, and I have two tunes posted on that site. My stuff just isn't what they viewers and shakers of that site are looking for. Fair enough. A group called "The Orange Lemonade" posted seven songs there this evening. The first one I heard, "My Baby Knows How to Rock It" was damn good! So I was excited to listen to the others. Bad mistake. But it's probably how everyone else felt after hearing my tunes.

My cat Witten has the snookles (a cold -- I hope). He has been lethargic all day, according to Cheryl. We gave him some antibiotics and will keep an eye on him.

I haven't seen Marty (my youngest daughter) since her wedding in 2006. I haven't even seen my newest grandson Caiden, Marty and Jason's first child. But, I have a few pictures. He's getting big now. I'm hopful I can go for a visit soon.

I do speak with Brian (my son) and Marty often; however, I rarely speak with Vanessa (my oldest daughter.) I love them all very much, of course. Maybe some day ...

OK, this has been good for me.

Keep your fingers crossed for our country, our economy, our environment, and our world. Vote for Obama, early and often! ;)

Be safe.

Kooth

Hello to nobody and anybody ...

I hope this finds you well. I mean as in "good health."


I need to put Witten to bed, floss and brush my teeth, put on my C-PAP mask, and hit the hay. Right now Witten is howling for some company. He is much too loud!


Witten is our cat. He was born 21 April 1990. On our way to St Louis that morning we discovered that our cat Cindy had given birth to two kittens (one was still-born). All had been contained in a brown paper bag. No muss - no fuss! The dead kitten was simply tossed out in the bag along with the spent placentas.


You might wonder who "we" is. We are Cheryl and Keith. Cheryl is my wife and right now she's sleeping on the couch, as she does most every night after supper. She'll wake up around 0230 and come to bed.


I know this is pretty damned boring, but, I'm new at this. I promise there will be more interesting stuff. At least interesting to me. Also, I guess there should be some sort of glossary, or history, or something, you know: to set up the characters -- explain who is whom.


Well, I'll do that some day soon.