Plans

There are plans afoot at the shelter.  There was a big announcement, and there are blueprints for a big, nice, and very expensive remodel.

Three contractors have been contacted, and are going to put in bids, which are expected to come in at around $125,000.  That's a huge chunk of change for a small animal rescue group to raise, but we raised enough to buy the building, we can do this.

It will be worth it.  One big problem now is that if people want to spend some time with just one cat, see if that is "the one," there's no separate space for them to get acquainted.  That will change.

We will also have two, count them, two, isolation rooms.  That way, if we have some with ringworm and some with upper respiratory, we can keep them separate and not end up with everyone sharing both.

An outdoor sink area for cleaning litter boxes will be much better than the current hose them in the grass system.

Crowning it all, besides three offices and three more colony rooms and a separate kitten room, will be a dedicated volunteer break room/kitchen.  No more having to worry about who cleaned what nasty stuff at the sink, there will be a separate place to go where no cat stuff will be allowed.  It will be nice not to have to sanitize the spigot every time you want to use it to wash your own cup.

"How are they going to raise that much, mom?" Bigger Girl asked when she heard.  Then she said, "I know, they can run a kissing booth!  Or is that a form of prostitution?"

Um, i don't think they are at all the same, and i don't know who would do the kissing, but thanks for the suggestion, i told her.

Sometimes it amazes me what goes through her mind.


Today is

10,000 Crestonians 4th of July Celebration -- Creston, IA, US (fun before, during, and after Independence Day; through the 6th)

Canada Day -- Canada

Caricom Day -- Guyana; Saint Vincent and Grenadines

Carnival Monday -- Saint Vincent and Grenadines

Constitution Day -- Cayman Islands

Creative Ice Cream Flavors Day -- a great way to start off Ice Cream Month; try a new one and you just might find a new favorite.

Day to Celebrate All the World's Creatures -- commemorates the day in 1975 that endangered species became internationally protected.

Distressed Elves Day -- Fairy Calendar

Doctors' Day -- India

Eastport Fourth of July and "Old Home Week"  -- Eastport, ME, US (bounded on all sides by the Bay of Fundy and Canadian islands, the celebration includes Canada Day and runs through Friday)

Emancipation Day -- Sint Maarten

Family Day -- Lesotho

Heroes Day -- Zambia

Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Establishment Day -- Hong Kong

Hug a Cowboy Day -- always on Canada Day

Independence Day -- Burundi(1962); Rwanda(1962)

Intact Day -- celebrating genital integrity, as far as possible from the Feast of the Circumcision on Jan. 1

International Chicken Wing Day -- some sites say the 2nd, celebrate today or tomorrow, your choice

International Joke Day -- as declared by many internet sites, but i can't find out why today; then again, why not?

International Tartan Day -- anniversary of the repeal, in 1782, of the Act of Proscription which banned the wearing of Tartans; celebrated especially by Scottish diaspora in Australia; New Zealand

July Morning -- Bulgaria (dates back to the '70s, young and old people hitchhike to the Black Sea in late June to greet the dawn of July 1 with Uriah Heep's hit song July Morning; began as a suble anti-communist protest, now in memory of the fall of communism and to celebrate the start of summer vacation)

Keti Koti -- Suriname (Emancipation Day)

Madeira Day -- Madeira

Memorial Day -- Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada

Mount Fuji Official Climbing Season begins -- Japan (through Aug. 31)

Moving Day -- Quebec, Canada

National Boating Day -- US

National Ducks and Wetlands Day -- US (presidential designation in 1990)

National Financial Freedom Day -- can't find how this one started, but it's as good a day as any to take a good look at your finances, and start learning how to better manage them.

National Gingersnap Day

Republic Day -- Ghana; Somalia

Royal Nova Scotia International Tattoo -- Halifax, NS, Canada (through the 8th)

Skiraphoria -- Ancient Greek Calendar (festival of cutting and threshing the grain)

Sir Seretse Khama Day -- Botswana

St. Serf of Culross' Day (patron of the Orkney Islands)

Sts. Cosmas and Damian's Day -- Eastern Catholic Churches
     Holy Healers' Day -- Bulgaria (a special festival for the two saints/brothers who were healers; celebrated especially by all healers, fortune-tellers, witches, sorceresses and herbalists)

Territory Day -- British Virgin Islands

U.S. Postage Stamp Day -- first US postage stamp issued this day in 1847

Yukon Gold Panning Championships -- Dawson City, YT, Canada

Zip Code Day -- US (inaugural anniversary in 1963; when you mail that letter, zip it up! no zip, slow trip; wrong zip, long trip)


Birthdays Today

Liv Tyler, 1977
Ruud Van Nistelrooy, 1976
Pamela Anderson, 1967
Princess Diana, 1961
Carl Lewis, 1961
Michelle Wright, 1961
Alan Ruck, 1956
Dan Aykroyd, 1952
Deborah Harry, 1945
Karen Black, 1942
Genevieve Bujold, 1942
Twyla Tharp, 1941
Jamie Farr, 1934
Jean Marsh, 1934
Leslie Caron, 1931
Farley Granger, 1925
Olivia DeHavilland, 1916
Estee Lauder, 1906
Charles Laughton, 1899
Ignaz Semmelweis, 1818


Today in History

Tiberius Julius Alexander orders his Roman legions in Alexandria to swear allegiance to Vespasian as Emperor, 69
La Noche Triste: a joint Mexican Indian force led by the Aztec ruler Cuitláhuac defeat Spanish Conquistadores led by Hernán Cortés, 1520
Lexell's Comet passed closer to the Earth than any other comet in recorded history, approaching to a distance of 0.0146 a.u., 1770
American privateers attack Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, 1782
A system of the civil registration of births, marriages and deaths is established in England and Wales, 1837
U.S. Postage stamps went on sale for the first time, 1847
In the first instance of photojournalism, a French photographer's daguerrotypes of Paris riots were turned into woodcuts so as to be published in the weekly newspaper L'Illustration Journal Universel on this date in 1848
Keti Koti (Emancipation Day) in Suriname, marking the abolition of slavery by the Netherlands, 1863
The British North America Act of 1867 takes effect as the Constitution of Canada, creating the Canadian Confederation and the federal dominion of Canada; Sir John A. Macdonald is sworn in as the first Prime Minister of Canada, 1867
The Philadelphia Zoological Society, the first US zoo, opens; admission twenty-five cents for adults and ten cents for children, 1874
The world's first international telephone call is made between St. Stephen, New Brunswick, Canada, and Calais, Maine, United States, 1881
SOS is adopted as the international distress signal, 1908
Grant Park Music Festival begins its tradition of free summer symphonic music concert series in Chicago's Grant Park, which continues as the United States' only annual free outdoor classical music concert series, 1935
NBC makes the first scheduled television broadcast, 1941
Tokyo City merges with Tokyo Prefecture and is dissolved; since then, no city in Japan has had the name "Tokyo" (present-day Tokyo is not officially a city), 1943
The merger of two princely states of India, Cochin and Travancore, into the state of Thiru-Kochi (later re-organized as Kerala) in the Indian Union ends more than 1,000 years of princely rule by the Cochin Royal Family, 1949
Zip Codes are introduced for the U.S.mail, 1963
The first color television transmission in Canada takes place from Toronto, 1966
The European Community is formally created out of a merger with the Common Market, the European Coal and Steel Community, and the European Atomic Energy Commission, 1967
Sony introduces the Walkman, 1979
O Canada officially becomes the national anthem of Canada, 1980
German re-unification: East Germany accepts the Deutsche Mark as its currency, thus uniting the economies of East and West Germany, 1990
The People's Republic of China resumes sovereignty over the city-state of Hong Kong, ending 156 years of British colonial rule, 1997
Saturn orbit insertion of Cassini-Huygens begins at 01:12 UTC and ends at 02:48 UTC, 2004
Smoking is banned in all indoor public spaces in England, 2007