Pumpkin Seeds & Cat Naps

The best thing about carving pumpkins in October is toasting the pumpkin seeds after. (Okay, maybe it's the glowing, flame filled pumpkin-bellies, and orange hot faces and such...) The other day, after a rousing gut scraping fest, we ripped out the innards and separated the seeds. Delicious snacks. :D

Toast at 250˚ for an hour (we used this to help heat the house). Melt a little butter, toss. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar mixture. Toast for 20 mins. Seeds should be lightly browned & crispy.

As the weather turns colder, on those days when we forget to turn on the heat, Spike likes to climb in bed and shimmy his way into the sheets. His favorite spot is a hip-perch or belly curl. I had to lift up the blankets to photograph him, then we took a midday cat nap. The cuteness is quite overwhelming at times.



My dogs usually jump in my bed and drool on the pillows. There's something to be said for the delicate nature of felines, particularly when you're trying to sleep, too. (Drool pillows are a shock to the system.)

Now back to the regularly scheduled grad school crazy. (Hence weeks between posts.) Brief notes: grad school overloads are silly. Don't do that. Henry James is evil. Emily Dickinson's letters to Susan are amazing. Creative writing pedagogy goes some weird places, and abstract theory sometimes makes a person want to smack a scholar. Novel writing is as arduous as it is glorious, and isn't an endeavor for the "pansy assed," as my father would say.

Lazy Days

Though I was meant to bake a few cakes for a bunch of Leos in my life, it's been too hot to cook. Instead, the animals and I have been working hard on writing and revising, and hanging out in the AC (not that it works very well). Spike, pictured above, has been known to sneak into my room with one or both of the dogs. That works out ok as long as Momo doesn't get too amorous. Paco usually squishes himself onto the floor for a nap. Lively bunch, yes. Yes, we are.

Lumix

Spike is doing well a few weeks after his surgery (what we've come to call the "mister sister" event). He's perked up, getting into trouble, knocking things over, and teasing the dogs. Business as usual. His fur's even started growing back in.

Shot with the new Lumix on auto settings in a yellow room with tungsten bulbs. It could use a color balance when I get the software loaded onto the new computer. Or I could just suck it up and read the manual to learn all the menu functions and do that in camera.

I'm loving this little point and shoot so far. Spike's got his eye on it too. He likes things with dangly straps.