A Moment's Break

I don't know where I left off over a month and a half ago, so I'll just say what's going on now.

Work:  I presently have a long-term sub assignment teaching special education math at a high school.  The students are not the sweet mildly retarded kids one thinks of when one hears "special ed".  Now, these are mainly the emotionally disturbed kids who will suddenly go from calm to punching in 5 seconds for little reason.  They can be nice, they can be horrible -- it makes life interesting and stressful.

Art:  I have a couple of commissions I need to get to work on.

Cats:  Well, most are okay.  Clancy, who I thought was going to die from chronic renal failure (CRF) is much improved to the point of no longer being CRF.  He has thyroid issues.  Maggie is okay and gaining some weight, as you can see from the photo above.  The 13th was her 6 month Gotcha Anniversary so we partied with sardines!   Isabel has the sniffles -- pollen allergies?  And, well, I have a new cat -- Olivia.  She's a black Persian and totally adorable.  She's also incredibly hard to photograph -- only her eyes show up!


Books:  I'm working on several.  One is Bach Flower Remedies for Cats.  I have several cats with emotional problems (either fear or aggression), so I'm reading through this book to try to figure out which remedies to use.  I'm great at helping others pick the right remedies, but terrible with my own cats.

I'm also reading through the Markham of the Marine Series by Tom Connery.  There's only 3 books in the series and all follow British Marine Lieutenant Markham through a siege on Toulon (that's A Shred of Honour), then an attack on Corsica (Honour Redeemed), and, well, I'm not sure what the next adventure is (Honour Be Damned).  It's set after the French Revolution but before the Napoleonic Wars, as Napoleon appears as a gun captain, I believe.  I like reading the Napoleonic naval novels, but these aren't as interesting, probably because a lot of the land-based war at that time dealt with sitting and waiting, digging trenches, waiting, and then some fighting.  Connery, who is really David Donachie, doesn't fill the waiting times with much of interest, in my opinion.  I'll finish the series as I'm OCD in that respect, but no more Napoleonic marine stories for me -- I'll stick with the Navy!

Now off I go and we'll see how long it will be before I make it back!