31 July - Richelieu's Cats Update



Martha Norbeck-Wallingford, our director of planned giving, has kindly lent me a splendid book she received for her recent birthday - photographer Carl Van Vechten's The Tiger in the House: a Cultural History of the Cat. Originally published in 1920, it's been reissued in a handsome new edition by

With Richelieu the taste for cats was a mania; when he rose in the morning and when he went to bed at night he was always surrounded by a dozen of them with which he played, delighting to watch them jump and gambol. He had one of his chambers fitted up as a cattery. which was entrusted to overseers, the names of whom are known. Abel and Teyssandier came, morning and evening, to feed the cats with patés fashioned of the white meat of chicken...

History records that Richelieu with one hand caressed a family of cats which played on his knees, while with the other he signed the order for the execution of Cinq-Mars...

31 July - Flirtation

31 July - More Pirates

22 July - Summer Wear



Gus Norbeck, the museum maintenance man, models his new summer-weight smoking cap; he looks rakish but dazed.

18 July - Old Carmina Burana School


Harve Presnell (right) in Old School

What does Carl Orff have in common with Will Ferrell? That dry, understated comedy Old School (2003), starring Ferrell, Luke Wilson, and Vince Vaughn, was being played on

Mortuus in anima,
curam gero cutis.

(Dead in soul, I care only for my body.)

15 July - Remaining Calm



Cats Natasha and Leroy on the alert during this afternoon's catwalk; while lounging in the gazebo, they sighted a golden retriever being walked in Wallingford Park. Dogs are strange, unaccountable creatures, much given to barking and chasing, and it's wise to give them a wide berth. Like Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff, Leroy and Natasha have

14 July - Richelieu's Cats



Armand Jean du Plessis, Cardinal Richelieu (1585-1642) was a scheming Machiavellian megalomaniac of dubious or nonexistant principles. He tossed more chaps into

Ludoviska
Rubis sur l'Ongle
Serpolet
Pyrame
Thisbe
Racan
Mounard le Fougueux
Soumise
Gazette
Ludovic le Cruel
Mimi-Paillon
Felimare
Lucifer

14 July - Recent Acquisition



Imagine my surprise, following

14 July - Bastille Day


Characters of the French Revolution, gouache, Le Sueur Frères

Here's a tune to commemorate the fall of the Bastille Sainte-Antoine, 1789 - Edith Piaf sings

14 July - Talk to Me Update



I reported

11 July - From the Collection



Here's another treasure from the Janus Museum's galleries - The Voyage of Life, by

8 July - Recipe Corner



I've eyed these here crosscut beef shortribs (AKA L.A. style ribs) at the local Korean market for some time, but held off on trying making a batch of galbi, or galbee, 'til I came across

8 July - Wallingford Grove



Here's a recent acquisition - a wood engraving of

8 July - Squirrelly



It's a squirrel, I think; don't know why he's so angry. Chased by a cat, a dog? Forgot where he stashed his nuts? Possibly the heat? We're all a bit fractious, nowadays.

8 July - San Pascual's Cat



Here's another fine cat-related ex voto from eBay. It tells the inspiring story of a heaven-sent cat:

The kitchen was full with rats and I was afraid of milling in the floor, fearing that they bit me. I prayed to San Pascual asking him to send them Hawai [?] and one night I dreamt with the saint that had a cat in his arms and the next day appeared in the kitchen a cat exactly like the dreamed one and it put an end to all the then it disappeared. I thank San Pascual the miracle.

More ex voto gatos featured here:

6 July - Fletcher Hanks Update



My copy of the collection of Fletcher Hanks comics,

6 July - Cat Report



I'm a little late with this, but am very pleased to report that Tsarina Lisa

5 July - Andy's Gang



Thanks to Keith West for sending me

5 July - Holiday Snaps



We had good weather for our celebrations yesterday - not too hot or humid; a bit of rain, but too late to interfere with the parade, and too early to disrupt the fireworks. Above, His Honor the mayor, John Compton, leads the parade on the town tractor, a traditional feature of Grovian Independence Day parades.



A Power Ranger (I think) and a witch. Don't other towns do costumes on the 4th of July?



A boy and his ferret.

Our maintenance man Gus turned out with the Museum's musket and the Museum's

Elsewhere on the 4th, old Friend of the Museum Bob Lyon marched in the annual Gold Hill, Colorado parade. That's him on the right. From the left, daughters Gena in the liberty cap and

4 July - More Wildlife Sightings



Friend of the Museum Mark Taylor photographed this black zombie bear at the old footbridge at

At 8:45 this evening a bear ambled into my front yard. I was alerted by my cats, which hurled themselves against the screen door in panic. The bear was a biggy, perhaps halfway between the 235-pounder I recently shot and the 600-pounder that bedeviled Indian Creek Valley last fall.

The bear was about 50 feet away, headed toward my door. When I yelled at him he stopped, swiveled his head about for a few seconds, then ambled off. He was not shittin and gittin the way a normal wild bear does when it encounters a noisy human...

Looks mighty like a fox to me. They do NOT always carry their brushes high (a google image search will net you a remarkable number of low-brushed red foxes), and I ain't never heard of no coyote having no bright white tail-tip like that. As for the spindly gams - seems to me they're pretty much in keeping with his scrawny body, in fact he don't look any too healthy overall. Somebody oughta give him a nice square meal. Or not.

I'm no expert, but I say fox; I saw one a few blocks from my house recently running around someone's front yard. He was sharp eared and bushy tailed and a bright red orange. He saw me and we regarded each other unmoving for about 30 seconds, then he went back to gamboling.

So I'm no expert, and don't quote me, but I say fox. And, though I didn't see it, there are reports of a dead coyote found about four streets north of here.

2 July - Bold Reynard?



Spotted crossing

Definitely a fox: note the white tip on the tail, the long nose. These little guys only weigh about 17 pounds, but with their wonderful coats... they often look more imposing. Coyotes, while graceful, are somewhat sturdier and don't have the near-sighted squint that fox eyes often seem to suggest (even though they are very sharp of vision!).

A coyote, Sir, albeit a mighty rangy and skinny one. The long legs you noted are diagnostic, as is the clamped-down tail. Foxes carry their brushes high. An astonishing shot, given the coyote's normal shyness. I think some of your neighbors have been leaving pet food (or their pets, which amounts to the same thing) outside. Have you counted your cats today?

"Science has discovered where you came from," I said to Miss Mocha, who was curled at her ease in the chair upon which I had intended to sit. "Would you like to hear about it?"

"I am the cat who walks by herself," she yawned, displaying her formidable fangs. "All places are alike to me."

"Oh, so you're a fan of Kipling?" Her eyes grew fierce. "Sir," she snapped, "I'll have you know I have never kippled in my life!"

"Sorry. Let it drop. I just thought you'd like to know you share the bloodline of lions and tigers."

"I knew that."

"Of course," I said. "Let it go."

There was a silence.

"We were worshipped in Egypt, you know."

"Yes," I said. "Cat mummies all over everwhere."

"Standards have fallen since then." She licked a paw reflectively. "Humans now talk about 'Not having room to swing a cat' and other vulgar expressions. You are a gross species."

"Well, I've tried to be good to you."

"Oh indeed," she said. "You drink wine and eat venison. I get water and Purina Cat Chow. How very, very kind of you."

"The vet says that's the way to keep you healthy."

"That's rather risible, coming from someone with your lifestyle."

"Well, let it go. I just thought you'd be interested."

There was a silence.

"Lions and tigers?" she said.

"Yes. According to the July Scientific American, all 37 living species of cats are descended from 'a pantherlike predator that lived in Southeast Asia 10.8 million years ago. One of them mothers weighed upwards of a thousand pounds."

"You will have noticed," she said, licking her chops, "that I am more than a little pantherlike."

"That's what the scientists say," I agreed, reading aloud: "Under the skin, one cat species appears pretty similar to another. They look like big cats, midsize cats and small cats.... They are also extremely skillful predators and quickly explore new regions as opportunities arise, so it is not surprising that they can move into unexploited areas successfully."

Miss Mocha examined me speculatively, then shrugged. "How'd we get here, exactly?"

"Well, it says you guys evolved in Asia, crossed the Bering land bridge into North America, then crossed back to the Middle East. Your line hooked up with humans in Mesopotamia, feasting on the mice that bedeviled the grain bins of the early agriculturalists. Since then you've gone wherever we have, and now there are something like 600 million domestic cats here, there and everwhere."

"What about the lions and tigers?"

"Well, according to DNA and fossily analysis, they split off from your protopanther about 6.4 million years ago, and the line came on down through baycats, caracals, ocelots, lynxes, pumas, leopards and whatever until about 3.4 million years ago, when you guys differentiated into wildcats, sand cats black-footed cats and jungle cats."

"So, of course, we are the most highly evolved."

"Yes. And also, it is noted, you're the only cat species that's not threatened with extinction."

"Of course," she purred. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I need my beauty nap."

1 July - The Art of Fletcher Hanks



I'm not what one would call a huge comic book fanboy, but when

1 July - Roadable Cubism



Inspired by Picasso's

"It hasn't lost any of its speed - it can still reach 65mph. Eventually I hope to sell it and maybe it will be bought by the Tate Gallery or the Pompidou Centre in Paris.

"It's hard to put a value on it now, but as it's a work of art I reckon it might sell for about a million pounds.

"However, if museums or art collectors won't buy it, I think I might have to stick it in Auto Trader."

1 July - Warlike Preparations



Our maintenance man Gus Norbeck worked over the Museum's flintlock musket in preparation for his traditional attempt at a feu de joie during the town's Fourth of July observances. As shown above, he was able to achieve a respectable test flash in the pan (he didn't load a charge for the test because of last year's threat by a neighbor to call the cops when he let off a very loud bang). Here's the exciting video:



Very nice; he singed his eyebrows. But despite