His Highness: Fuzzy people 54

12-year-old Maine Coon. Picked him up as a very tiny stray kitten on my way out of an orchestra gig in Bloomington IN around 1997.


He's not so tiny anymore.


Thanks to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

Fuzzy people 57

This guy might have the coolest job in the world: rehabilitating orphaned wolves and teaching them how to howl:

Thanks to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

How we do in West Texas and, Fuzzy People 56

Just back from the regular Thursday night jam at the auto-body shop. This is a serious west Texas institution which may require a bit of translation to those from other planets.

In west Texas, in the summer, it is too goddamned brutally hot to be outside any time that the sun shines directly upon you. But, along about 8pm, as the sun slants down toward the horizon, it doesn't get cooler, exactly--it's just not quite so hot. And, because it's flat as a griddle and we're at the absolute hell-west-of-nowhere-end of the time-zone, the twilight is very, very long: maybe 3 1/2 hours between when the sun's below the horizon and when it gets to be full dark.

And those 3 1/2 hours of twilight have led to the fantastic west Texas institution of the beer garden. It probably begins with the Czech, Bohemian, and German immigrants to the Hill Country (e.g., "Biergarten") but it continues in west Texas: if you're done with work, and there's only one more day--Friday--in the work week, and you're starting to slant in toward the weekend, then Thursday night is a very good night to go out, hang out, and listen to live music.

Outside of Ireland, I have never encountered a vernacular culture where musicians are so much respected, and where such a substantial part of the population makes going-to-hear-live-music their main leisure activity (to be fair, I've never spent time in West Africa, but even there, I think the caste/class things are stronger and more prohibitive). I have never been treated better, as a musician, by the person in the street as I have been in west Texas (well, with the exception of the west of Ireland, and playing for Portuguese fishermen's weddings in Gloucester, Massachusetts in my youth).

Usually, I have a regular Thursday night gig which prevents me getting out to do much else on that evening. But I'm taking the summer off from that gig, and so, when old buddy Coop emailed me with an invite to the Thursday-night jam at the auto-body place, I had the chance to attend.

It's old-school west Texas: this is the kind of party that the great Willie Morris described in North toward Home, and my deario Molly Ivins skewered and feted: beer in a cooler, sitting in folding lawn chairs on the concrete apron out front of the shop, most everybody smoking like chimneys.

But there is absolutely no self-consciousness to these people: the racists are un-selfconscious about their racism, the judgmental fundamentalists are un-selfconscious about judging you, the potheads are un-selfconscious about their attraction to weed, and so on.

But they're remarkably open people: they have all kinds of presumptions and judgments, but they're almost all aimed at people they haven't yet met. If they've met you--and even more, if you're a friend of a friend of the house, as was my case with old buddy Coop--then you're a person, and they're all about people.

The music had its ups and downs (lots of Eagles and Billy Joel covers), but it was a remarkably open and friendly experience: didn't matter just how badly guitarist A sucked worse than guitarist B, they were still going to give A his turn as the song-choice circulated around the table, and they can fall in and busk-along on the chords for almost anything. And, to an extent almost unimaginable in any other part of the country except maybe the Lutheran northern Midwest, or possibly Congregationalist northern New England, these Baptists and Church of Christers can harmonize like angels, and without even having to think about it. And would, generously making no-matter-how-rudimentary a guitarist or shaky lead singer sound pretty damned good.

And--another one my Yankee and Left-Coast friends might never anticipate--at the end of the night, the fiddler who's boss of the session pulls you aside, and thanks you for coming, "'specially 'cause I know you're a music scholar and everything," and starts telling you his recollections of a visit by the Dalai Lama to Lubbock way back in the 1980s. And they thank you for attending, and you find yourself telling the following story about Padmasambhava's 8th century prophecy:

“When the iron eagle flies and horses run on wheels, the Tibetan people will be scattered over the earth, and the Dharma will go to the land of the red man.”

And the old fiddle player with the white hair in a ponytail and the false teeth smiles and says,

"We know."

And, of course, they do.

Below the jump: Mama sea lion teaches her cub how to swim:

Thanks to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

Fuzzy people 55: why I like crows

When I was a small child, my mother adopted an American Crow who'd been injured--maybe fallen out of the nest--and had a crippled leg as a result. He was smart as hell, however, and quickly learned to recognize both the mauve plastic cup and the sound of it being tapped which meant there were chicken livers to be had. We called him Charlie.

It was one of the first close communicative bonds I'd ever had with an undomesticated animal, and there are still some old Polaroid snapshots, yellowed and curling at the edges, of my brother, myself, and Charlie. Eventually we had to have him (safely) relocated by the Fish & Wildlife folks, because he started pecking at my toddler brother's flaxen hair when he was outside in the playpen. But there's a Nisg'a raven tattooed on my left shoulder, to join the other totem animals with which I've marked my body. And my First Peoples DNA is only half the reason for that. The other half is Charlie.

I thought of him when I saw this: New Caledonian crow who figures out not only how to use a tool (a bent piece of wire that lets her reach food at the bottom of a narrow cylindrical tube) but--Jesus!--how to make it. This crow analyzes the situation, realizes she can't reach the food, realizes there's a bail on the little food canister, picks up the wire, realizes the straight wire won't help her, wedges the end so she can bend a hook into the wire (which is precisely the same technique that plumbers use to get clean bends in pipe), and successfully extracts the food.

The kicker? She repeated the task successfully, nine more times.

The Universe is a remarkable, magical place, filled with remarkable sentient beings.

That's why we shouldn't kill them.

Oneowe, Charlie.

Splort: Fuzzy People 53

Head-explodingly cute: guinea pigs grunting while they chow down on watermelon.

h/t to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

Fuzzy banjos

Fuzzy people 52

Hell, yes, I'll donate 40 bucks a year for this:




Meet Gracie (Urocyon cinereoargenteus): newest adoptee.

Hello, little Reynard. Welcome to the family.

h/t to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

Fuzzy people

Bounder of Adventure

h/t to Dharmonia
, and to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

Fuzzy people 51 (totem-animal edition)

Courtesy of Sunshine: my totem animal (there's one on the fingerboard of my bouzouki, because I worked with them as a kid):



Cute little devil.

Hat-tip to the Rev for the "fuzzy-people" appellation.

Fuzzy people 50

LOLTigger: I can haz snowman?

White Bengal tiger playing with a snowball. Guaranteed to put a smile on yr faze.

Thanks to the Rev for the fuzzy people appellation.

Fuzzy people 49

Lessons to be learned from fuzzy friends: never, ever, pass up a chance to seek joy.

Fuzzy people 48

Nice one from the General: elderly elephant and dog as best friends.

One more indication that animals are superior to people: they bond, love, worry, and rejoice. That's why we should care for them.

Not kill them.

Fuzzy people

As Dharmonia put it: absurd levels of cuteness.

Fuzzy people overdose

Prepare to write off the next few hours:

Wired magazine's top-10 animal videos.

Fuzzy people 45 (?)

No comment seems necessary:

You Are an American Bulldog

You are a very imposing, powerful creature... but deep down, you're generally good natured. You are incredibly energetic, and you like to blow off steam with sports and horsing around. You are naturally courageous. You would run into a burning building to save someone you loved. You intimidate people without trying to. Some people assume the worst of you when they first meet you.

What Breed of Dog Are You?

Quick hit: Fuzzy people 44

Younger Brother and his spouse are participants in the NEADS program, which foster-raises puppies being trained for assistive purposes; he sends along a snap of their newest, Nelly:


As YB says, "I dunno went wrong; we asked for a cute one!"

Thanks to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

Fuzzy people 43: Doggie zen

Why animals are superior to humans.
Thanks to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

Fuzzy people 42

Grizzer bars making a comeback. For as far back as I can remember, grizzlies have been a totem animal for me--a realization snapped into focus by Lanford Monroe's great grizzer portrait Surveyor.

Glad to hear it. He and we go back a long way:

Fuzzy people 41

More evidence that animals are superior to humans:

Dog Dials 911 When Owner Has Seizure

"Man's best friend" doesn't go far enough for Buddy _ a German shepherd who remembered his training and saved his owner's life by calling 911 when the man had a seizure...On a recording of the 911 call Wednesday, Buddy is heard whimpering and barking after the dispatcher answers and repeatedly asks if the caller needs help...Police were sent to Stalnaker's home, and after about three minutes Buddy is heard barking loudly when the officers arrived. Scottsdale police Sgt. Mark Clark said Stalnaker spent two days in a hospital and recovered from the seizure...Clark said Stalnaker adopted Buddy at the age of 8 weeks from Michigan-based Paws with a Cause, which trains assistance dogs, and trained him to get the phone if he began to have seizure symptoms. Buddy, now 18 months old, is able press programmed buttons until a 911 operator is on the line, Clark said.

We should cherish our fellow beings. Not torture and murder them for "fun".*

Thanks to the Rev for the "fuzzy people" appellation.

*Links to an article about Sarah Palin's support for the "sport" of aerial wolf hunting. WARNING: do not watch the accompanying video--it is pure blood-sport horror. This is the "hockey mom" who far-right religious fanatics want to be a cancerous heartbeat away from the presidency.

Fuzzy people 40

This is what a saint looks like:



"In the midst of chaos, take one positive action." That's what Lynnea Latanzeo did. No kill, permanent adoption, clean, safe, and warm.

This is one person who's going to be allowed to skip a few thousand cycles of rebirth.

http://www.cathouseonthekings.com/