To be honest...

...today, i got nothing, really.

The ol' brain pan is empty.

After days of taking Sweetie to work early, then all the other stuff, and not being able to get the insurance company pinned down on the car situation, i'm getting weary.

My creaky lung is complaining about it all, and when i'm worn down this way, i have more SVT episodes.

Everything could be worse, of course, so i'm grateful we have a vehicle at all, and this hasn't done more than just create an inconvenience.

It's the not knowing if the car will be covered, repaired, replaced, etc., that bugs me. Such uncertainty has hanging over me the possibly having to go car shopping again, which i despise.

Meanwhile, today is clean the cat shelter day. We are up to an average of 40-50 cats and kittens in there at a time. It was designed to hold up to 30, if we held our breath, and kittens were not to be in there at all, but in foster homes.

They have had to revamp the whole cleaning system to have two caretakers per shift to get it all done, it was too much work for one. Naturally, i have no partner, nor a need of one, since i have a built in team. Others were struggling, some were even late for work a few times. That would make for an interesting conversation with the boss:

Boss: Why are you late?

Employee: Because it took me so long to do my volunteer job I couldn't get here to my paying job on time.

It would deteriorate from there, i am sure.

In totally unrelated news, because i have to end this ramble somehow, armaments expert Harriet St. Amant says that Ruger is coming out with a new pistol to commemorate senators and congressmen. It's proposed name is "The Legislator." It has a flaw, though in that it doesn't work and you can't fire it.


Today is:

Bonza Bottler Day

Chong Yang -- China (honoring elders and eating Chong Yang cake)

Chrysanthemum Day or Kiku no Sekku -- Japan

Day of the Victims of Holocaust and of Racial Violence -- Slovakia

Festivity of Our Lady of Arantzazu -- Oñati, Basque

Great Canadian Beer Festival -- Victoria, BC, Canada (through tomorrow)

Independence Day -- Tajikistan

Karasu-zumo -- Kamigamo-jinja Shrine, Kyoto, Japan (a distinctive local festival where the Shinto priests imitate crows)

Liberation Ceremony -- Petange, Luxembourg

Milk-Bathing Festival -- Fairy Calendar

Mushroom Festival -- Kennett Square, PA, US (the Mushroom Capital of the World; through the 11th)

National Day -- North Korea

National Sports Day -- Indonesia

National Steak Au Poivre Day

Norwalk Seaport Oyster Festival -- Norwalk, CT, US (through the 11th)

Onam Festival -- Kerala, India (start of a ten day festival celebrating the legend of King Maveli)

Popeye Picnic -- Chester, IL, US (through the 11th; celebrate everyone's favorite cartoon sailor in the town where his creator, E.C. Segar, was born)

Puyallup Fair -- Puyallup, WA, US (through the 25th, one of the top ten fairs in attendance in the world)

Rugby World Cup 2011 -- New Zealand (games in various cities through Oct. 23)

St. Peter Claver's Day

Synaxis of Ss. Joachim and Anna -- Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic Churches

Teddy Bear Day -- internet generated, but since it's so much fun to have one, celebrate your old friend

Wienerschnitzel Day

Wonderful Weirdos Day -- we all have a few in our life, give one a hug and remember how much fun it is to be weird sometimes


Anniversaries Today:

California becomes the 31th US State, 1850


Birthdays Today:

Adam Sandler, 1966
Hugh Grant, 1960
Angela Cartwright, 1952
Michael Keaton, 1951
Billy Preston, 1946
Otis Redding, 1941
Cliff Robertson, 1925
James Hilton, 1900
Colonel Harland Sanders, 1890
Alf Landon, 1887
Leo Tolstoy, 1828
William Bligh, 1754


Today in History:

William I, The Conqueror, dies in a horse riding accident, 1087
The New England colonies declare war on the Wampanoag Tribe, 1675
The first steam engine arrives in the US colonies, 1753
The first recorded black to graduate from a US college, Alexander Lucius Twilight, receives a BA from Middlebury College, 1817
Charles Durant, the first US aeronaut, flies a balloon from Castle Garden, NYC to Perth Amboy, NJ, 1830
The first plate glass photograph is taken by John Herschel, 1839
California becomes the 31st state and the territories of New Mexico and Utah are created, 1850
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
is finalized, 1886
Orville Wright makes the first one hour plane flight, 1908
J. Verdrines becomes the first person to fly at over 100mph, 1912
First actual case of a computer bug being found: a moth lodges in a relay of a Harvard Mark II computer at Harvard University, 1947
Hurricane Betsy makes its second landfall near New Orleans, Louisiana, becoming the first hurricane to do over $1billion in actual unadjusted damages, 1965
The four-day Attica Prison riot begins, 1971
The Palestine Liberation Organization officially recognizes Israel as a legitimate state, 1993
At exactly 01:46:40 UTC, the Unix billenium is reached, marking the beginning of the use of 10-digit Unix timestamps, 2001