AND THE CATS ARE UNARMED

KILLER BEASTS?

     Natalie Angier of the New York Times reports that cats, our domesticated pets and their feral cousins, kill 2.4 Billion birds a year.  They also kill 12.3 Billion mammals, like chipmunks voles and gophers.  At least I hope they are getting the gophers, but that's another issue.

     Well, our three are among that killing squad, though they look like a civil group here.  Luke, front and center, is the Alpha and is true to his tiger/leopard ancestry. Little sister joy with the pink heart is following her tiger DNA coding as well.  She is tenacious for such a cute little thing.

Hemingway, the orange polydactyl doesn't seem to be the hunter type. He's more interested in napping, playing and sitting on a lap.  We haven't seen him express much curiosity in hunting, so maybe he'll help lower the curve. Can't get a bird from a lap, or in a nap.

A DAY WITH A WEIRD VIBE

     The San Luis Obispo Tribune's "Flashback" listing of this day in history was almost enough to send me back under the covers.  
    January 30th has been besmirched by human endeavors.  Consider the history:

-1933 Adolph Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany

-1649 King Charles I is beheaded

-1948 Mahatma Gandhi is assassinated
-1962 Two of the Flying Wallendas hire wire act die in an accident during a performance in Detroit
-1964 Ranger 6 is launched. It crashes on moon but fails to send back images
-1968 The Tet Offensive begins in the Viet Nam war
-1972 "Bloody Sunday"-13 Catholic civil rights marchers are shot to death by British soldiers in Northern Ireland
-1973 KISS performs its first show
     This is also the birthday of Dick Cheney. But it too is the day that brought us Boris Spassky, Gene Hackman, Vanessa Redgrave, Phil Collins and Christian Bale. On reflection, that is a group of intense folk.

MOUNTAIN WAVES

 Looking toward the Pacific from Highway 46 between Paso Robles and Cambria 

      So we end this brutal post with something soothing. As the old sarge used to say on Hill Street Blues, "Be careful out there!"

       See you down the trail.    

THE WEEKENDER :) THE KISS

CONSTRUCTING AND DECONSTRUCTING

ICONS

Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt Life Magazine

It is one of the joyous scenes in the quilt of American History.
Times Square at the end of World War II and an improbable embrace captured by
photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt. For the millions for whom World War II is 
something in a history text or file, this picture has relevance.  A moment, a chance, a legacy, and a piece of pop Americana

Photo by Rich Lam Getty Images
Then came this.  Spread around the world on web sites, tweeted, and 
the focus on enormous social network interest.
Rich Lam captured the image the night Vancouver police confronted rioters after
the locals lost the Stanley Cup to Boston.
I was struck by the early references to the "original kiss photo." It was asked,
could this image become the 21st Century version of the Times Square kiss?
Sad if that is so.
It is a dramatic image.  As a journalist and news manager I would have 
been grateful if one of my shooters had captured the image.
But a kiss in the jubilation of the end of a world war is a 
far different moment than what appears to be a passionate moment 
in the midst of violence.
Both are extraordinary images, capturing dramatic moments, but the 
mitigating circumstances put the former and the latter into different
levels of significance.
Still there is a curiosity.
It took years to identify the nurse as Edith Shain, who lived to be 91. The sailor was just a guy in Times Squares who had reason to celebrate.  His identity has never 
been learned.
And as perhaps you have noted on this blog there has been the ongoing revealing of the particulars of the
"Vancouver Kissing Couple."
There is a new video that now seems to verify the explanation that it was not a moment of 
passion, rather a boyfriend coming to the aid of his girl friend who had been
clubbed by a Vancouver riot cop.

And we've always thought
"a kiss is just a kiss..."
Kiss someone this weekend.
Ignore the cameras.
See you down the trail