Having Fun Together (Feline Friday), Friendly Fill-Ins, Nature Friday and Flashback Friday

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Feline Friday was originally started by Steve, The Burnt Food Dude (may he rest in peace), and i'm going to believe it's because he liked cats.

He handed hosting duties off to Sandee at Comedy Plus, and now she's entrusting it to me.

Feline Friday is simple to join.  All you have to do is: Post a picture, drawing, cartoon or video of a cat (they may be silly or cute).  Then add your link!

One thing for sure is this is a fun and easy meme to do.  So come and join us in Feline Friday.

What better way to start the weekend than with a feline!

This cat toy, where the little gizmo inside moves around, attracted more than one fan the other day.  Both of them were batting at it, sometimes at the same time.

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Friendly Fill-Ins are easy to do. There are four statements: the first two statements are provided by Ellen of 15AndMeowing, and the final two are offered by Lorianne The Menagerie Mom of Four-Legged Furballs. They try to make sure the statements will be fun to both answer and share. The linky will be posted at or about 12:00 AM on Friday. Please head over to one of their sites, link up, and share your thoughts!      

Here are this week's statements with my responses underlined:

1. I used to think _________, but I was wrong.

2. Every time I plan to _________, I _________.

3. I'm already looking forward to the month of _________ because _________.

4. When it comes to social media, I _________.

1. I used to think   i'd be retired by now,  but I was wrong.

2. Every time I plan to   make time to do something which really needs doing,  I   get interrupted and not everything gets done.

3. I'm already looking forward to the month of _________ because _________.   Actually, i'm not particularly looking forward to any months this year, we have no vacation planned, and i just take each day as it comes, it's all i can do.

4. When it comes to social media, I   don't.  This is my only social media.

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Nature Friday is hosted by LLB in Our Backyard.  Simply post a picture of the natural world, and link up!   

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Flashback Friday is hosted by FiveSibes.  Come hop along memory lane with us!  

Hope was our "special needs" cat.  Here she is perusing one of her Daddy's guitar magazines he'd left on the bed.

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Today is:

Appreciate a Dragon Day -- share stories of your favorite dragons from literature; begun by author Danita K. Paul

Arbor Day -- Florida and Louisiana, US

Concordia --  Ancient Roman Calendar (honoring the goddess of harmonious relations)

Day of Offerings to the Shemsu of Ra -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate)

Inflatable Tire Day -- birth anniversary of Andre Michelin

International Hot and Spicy Food Day

Lailat al Miraj -- Islam (observance of Mohammed's night journey from Mecca to Jerusalem; began at sundown yesterday, local customs and dates may vary)

Laurent Kabila -- Democratic Republic of the Congo (Heroes' Day)

Lee-Jackson Day -- Virginia, US

National Day of Peace -- El Salvador (anniversary of 1992 peace treaty)

National Fig Newton Day

National Good Teen Day -- which really is most of them, isn't it

National Nothing Day -- created by newspaperman Harold Pullman Coffin in 1973 “to provide Americans with one national day when they can just sit without celebrating, observing or honoring anything.”

National Work At Home With Your Spouse Day -- internet generated; try if you dare, i won't, as much as i love him, i'd have to kill him.

National Religious Freedom Day -- US (in 1786, the Virginia legislature adopted the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom, a statute guaranteeing religious freedom to citizens of that state, and protecting them from discrimination for their religious choices)

Santos Tour Down Under -- Adelaide, Australia (professional cycling's first event of the UCI World Tour for this year; through the 21st)

St. Anthony's Eve -- Abruzzo, Italy (Fires of Saint Anthony -- Anthony the Great)

St. Honratus of Arles' Day (Patron for rain; against drought, misfortune)

Teacher's Day -- Thailand

There's No Business Like Show Business Day -- Ethel Merman's Birth Anniversary!

Uzhavar Thirunal -- PY, TN, India (Farmer's Day portion of the Pongal celebrations)

Birthday's Today:

Kate Moss, 1974

Sade, 1959

Debbie Allen, 1950

John Carpenter, 1948

Dr. Laura Schlessinger, 1947

Ronnie Milsap, 1944

A.J. Foyt, 1935

Dian Fossey, 1932

Dizzy Dean, 1911

Ethel Merman, 1908

Frank Zamboni, 1901

Harry Carey, Sr., 1878

Robert W. Service, 1874 (Poet, The Cremation of Sam McGee)

Andre Michelin, 1853

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Hello, Dolly"(Musical), 1964

"A Pastoral Symphony"(Ralph Vaughan Williams' third symphony), 1922

Today in History:

The title Augustus is bestowed upon Gaius Julius Caesar Octavian by the Roman Senate, BC27

The Ostrogoths, under King Totila, conquer Rome after a long siege, by bribing the Isaurian garrison, 550

A great storm tide in the North Sea destroys the German island of Strand and the city of Rungholt, 1362

The Medici family is appointed official banker of the Papacy, 1412

The first grammar of a modern language, in the Spanish language, is presented to Queen Isabella, 1492

Ivan IV of Russia aka Ivan the Terrible becomes Tsar of Russia, 1547

English parliament passes laws against Catholicism, 1581

The first edition of El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (Book One of Don Quixote) by Miguel de Cervantes is published in Madrid, 1605

The Continental Congress approves enlistment of free blacks, 1776

The Commonwealth of Virginia enacted the Statute for Religious Freedom authored by Thomas Jefferson, 1786

The refrigerator car is patented by William Davis, a fish dealer in Detroit, 1868

The Pendleton Act creates the basis of US Civil Service system, 1883

The British explorer Ernest Shackleton finds magnetic south pole, 1909

The British House of Commons accepts Home-Rule for Ireland, 1913

Writer Maksim Gorki returns to Russia, 1914

The US ratifies the constitutional amendment on Prohibition, to take effect one year later, 1919

The League of Nations holds its first council meeting in Paris, 1920

The first photo finish camera installed at Hialeah Race track in Hialeah Florida, 1936

Benny Goodman plays the first jazz performance at Carnegie Hall, 1938

Crash of TWA Flight 3, killing all 22 aboard, including film star Carole Lombard, 1942

Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 perform the first-ever docking of manned spacecraft in orbit, the first-ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another, and the only time such a transfer was accomplished with a space walk, 1969

Buckminster Fuller receives the Gold Medal award from the American Institute of Architects, 1970

The Shah of Iran flees Iran with his family and relocates to Egypt, 1979

First meeting of the Internet Engineering Task Force., 1986

El Salvador officials and rebel leaders sign the Chapultepec Peace Accords in Mexico City ending the 12-year Salvadoran civil war , 1992

The UN Security Council unanimously establishes an arms embargo and the freezing of assets of Osama bin Laden, Al-Qaida, and the remaining members of the Taliban, 2002

The Space Shuttle Columbia takes off for mission STS-107, but disintegrates 16 days later on reentry, 2003

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is sworn in as Liberia's new president, becoming Africa's first female elected head of state, 2006

New U.S. rules loosening trade restrictions with Cuba go into effect, 2015

The first ever flower grown in space, a zinnia, is announced; it was grown aboard the International Space Station using the NASA Veggie system, 2016

The city of Cairo, Egypt, is engulfed by a sandstorm, turning the whole city orange, 2019

Ten Nepali climbers become the first to reach the summit of K2 in winter, 2021

A to Z: H is for Hope and Horizon

Oh, you're here again.  Hello, I'm Hope, and you can learn a bit more about my name and about Horizon if you want to click over here.  The big man of the house belongs to me and Horizon and Kida.  We mostly share well especially since Kida doesn't come up the stairs any more, she's so old.

I'm happy right here!

I have only been out of the bedroom about 3 or 4 times since the last time I talked to you.  I get so confused out there.  It's better in here where the mama lady and the big man sleep.  I don't have to see any other cats than Horizon and Link and sometimes Little Girlie.  The rest aren't allowed in here, and I like that.  They are too much for me.

No, I just want to stay here where I can eat and sleep and sit by the window and see the bird things.  Sometimes a bug gets in the room and I get to chase it and eat it, and that's always fun, too.

The big man still leaves the water dripping for me, even though the mama lady turns it off when we are done drinking.  She turns it back on a lot too, now.  She says she might as well, especially since the "incident."  I don't like to talk about it, I had to go to the vet because I got "stopped up."  It was awful, and what the vet did was awful, and now I'm on different food so it won't happen again and I like this food much better.

It also means I have to drink a lot of water so it won't happen again, so the mama lady cooperates better about turning the water on and waiting for me to drink.  She says we shouldn't waste water.

Well, I guess it's time to get Horizon over here to talk to you.  He's going to be scared, but it's okay.  He's a bit less scared this year than he was last year.

Yes, I'm Horizon, and I do get scared.  I'm scared to drink the dripping water if anyone is watching me.  I'm scared to go in the litter box if I think another cat might see me go in or out.  I'm scared of outside the house.

I'm ready to dive under the bed if necessary!

But, well, I'm not as scared as I used to be of everything.  I've figured out that Mikey won't hurt me.  The first time I saw him after he moved back in, he ran up to me the way he does to every black and white cat to make friends.  He really does that!  It spooked me, but now I know he likes to be friends with every black and white cat he ever sees, so I sit with him sometimes when I go out of this room.

This room with Hope is where I spend most of my day, but I'm not as scared to leave it as I was before.  I go out every day now, at least once or twice for a little while.  I'm not thrilled about most of the other cats, but I have learned to knock on the door to be let back in.  The mama lady makes me wait sometimes, but the big man always lets me right it -- he's a well trained pet.

I still hide under the bed when someone I don't know well comes in the room, but last year when he went away (they call it vacation), Bigger Girl came in and spent time with me every day, and so did #1 Son.  That was good, I wasn't so wild with fright that I had been abandoned because they did that.

So that's about it for an update.  Maybe we will do this again next year.

Today is:

Appomattox Day -- US (marking the end of the US Civil War on this day in 1865)

Astronauts' Day -- web generated by someone who wants all these brave people honored

Baghdad Liberation Day -- Kurdistan, Iraq

Bataan Day/Day of Valor -- Philippines (Araw ng Kagitingan)

Dita e Kushtetutes -- Kosovo (Constitution Day)

Dry Milk Day -- the first patent for powdered milk was issued this day in 1972 to Samuel Percy

Feast of Jalal (Glory) -- Baha'i

French Quarter Festival -- New Orleans, Louisiana, US (celebrate all that makes the Vieux Carre special, antiques, food, and 275 hours of musical entertainment; through Sunday)

Independence Restoration Day -- Georgia (formerly Day of National Unity)

Martyr's Day -- Tunisia

Name Yourself Day -- an internet holiday allowing you to change your name for a day, if you want to.

National Alcohol Screening Day® 2014 -- US (find a way to get screened if you need to)

National Cherish An Antique Day -- hooray for old fashioned quality!

National Chinese Almond Cookie Day

National Former Prisoner of War Recognition Day -- US

Observation of the Nazi Occupation -- Denmark (anniversary of the Nazi invasion)

Public Library Day -- US (anniversary of the opening of the first "publicly funded" library -- i.e. a tax based, free library -- in the US, in 1833 in Petersborough, New Hampshire)

Remembrance for Haakon Sigurdsson -- Asatru/Norse Pagan Calendar (Haakon the Great, one of the Jarls of Hladhir)

St. Casilda's Day (Patron against sterility)

St. Mary of Cleophas' Day (one of the Marys in the Bible who was present at the Crucifixion)

The Masters Tournament -- the matchup for the Green Jacket is the first of golf's major championships in 2015, running through the 12th

Verruca Day -- Fairy Calendar (Goblin Celebration again)

Vimy Ridge Day -- Canada

Winston Churchill Day -- commemmorates his becoming an honorary US citizen

World Konkani Day -- Goa (Official language of the Indian state of Goa; on the death anniversary of the pioneer of modern Konkani literature, Vaman Raghunath Varde Valaulikar)


Anniversaries Today:

Sophia Loren marries Carlo Ponti, 1966
Wayne Newton marries Kathleen McCrone, 1994
Charles, Prince of Wales, marries Camilla Parker-Bowles, 2005


Birthdays Today:

Elle Fanning, 1998
Kristen Stewart, 1990
Jesse McCartney, 1987
Leighton Meester, 1986
Taylor Kitsch, 1981
Keshia Knight Pulliam, 1979
Rachel Stevens, 1978
Gerard Way, 1977
Austin Peck, 1971
Jacques Villeneueve, 1971
Cynthia Nixon, 1966
Paulina Prizkova, 1965
Dennis Quaid, 1954
Michael Learned, 1939
Avery Schreiber, 1935
Jean-Paul Belmondo, 1933
Paul Krassner, 1932
Tom Lehrer, 1928
Hugh Hefner, 1926
John Presper Eckert, Jr., 1919
Ward Bond, 1903
Paul Robeson, 1898
Efrem Zimbalist, 1889
Frank King, 1883
Eadweard Muybridge, 1830
Charles Baudelaire, 1821
Tamerlane, 1336


Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Ticket to Ride"(Beatles' single), 1965
"Diamond Lil"(Play), 1928
"Shadow of a Gunman"(Play), 1923
The World, the Flesh and the Devil(Film), 1914


Today in History:

The Mongol hordes defeat the Poles and Germans in the Battle of Liegnitz, 1241
Robert Cavalier de la Salle reaches the mouth of the Mississippi River and claims all the land drained by the river and its tributaries for France, 1682
The African Methodist Episcopal church in the US is formed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1816
The oldest audible sound recording of a human voice is made, 1860
Robert E. Lee surrenders the Army of Northern Virginia to Ulysses Grant at Appomattox Court House, effectively ending the US Civil War, 1865
Passing by a single vote, the United States Senate ratifies a treaty with Russia for the purchase of Alaska, 1967
The Hudson Bay Company cedes its territory to Canada, 1869
Jumbo the Elephant arrives in the US, 1882
The Titanic leaves Queenstown, Ireland for NYC, 1912
The first full color film, "World, The Flesh, and The Devil", premiers in London, 1914
Mae West makes her NYC debut in "Diamond Lil," 1928
The first Japanese built aircraft to fly to Europe, the Kamikaze, arrives at Croydon Airport in London, 1937
The Suez Canal is officially opened for shipping, 1957
NASA announces the selection of the United States' first seven astronauts, whom the news media quickly dub the "Mercury Seven", 1959
In the first game in the Astrodome, Houston beats the Yankees 2-1 in an exhibition game, and Mickey Mantle hits the first indoor home run, 1967
The first British built Concorde makes its first flight, 1969
Georgia declares its indepedence from Russia, 1991
The funeral of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, at Westminster Abbey, 2002
Facebook purchases Instagram, a photo sharing application, for $1 billion, 2012