kochleffel

You might be interested in this report on the new, faster trains Amtrak is having built not so very far from where I live. https://www.washingtonpost.com/transportation/2022/09/22/amtrak-acela-high-speed-trains/

It's somewhat hard to find rentals with automatic transmission in most of the world. I particularly want one in the UK since it is hard enough to drive on the left without having to shift with my left hand.

This morning the Junior Cat asked for food! She didn't eat as much as I hoped, but more than she has at one time in the past week. After that she went upstairs and hopped onto my bed, her favorite napping place when the house isn't cold (when it is, she has a heated bed). She seemed to want me to join her, so I did for a while. Today I have a Zoom interview for a research project on caffeine reduction, then an acupuncture appointment and, in the afternoon, an online meeting sponsored by NASA to communicate research to artists and educators.

The Junior Cat has been more active yesterday and today, and more like herself, but has stopped eating again. I'm not sure whether she's taken a set against the prescription food, or whether the anti-nausea medication she received in sub-q fluids on Thursday has worn off. I'm more and more inclined to cancel the western Caribbean cruise at the end of January before the final-payment date, which is October 1. I'm not enthusiastic about the ports or the flight arrangements, or about the vloggers' convention, and my last winter cruise on that line was disturbing, not because of the cruise line or the ship, but because of the other passengers. (Fall and spring cruises since then on that line have been OK.) Because the airline has changed its schedule at least four times, I believe that I can get a refund of the air fare.

The Junior Cat woke me at 5:00 a.m. and for a moment I thought that she wanted to watch the Queen's funeral, but I remembered that she has no interest in television except when there are small, squeaky animals or birds. She purred next to my ear for about 15 minutes, then hopped off the bed and visited the litterbox. She returned to hiding, but not very well, since I could see her. I pulled her out at 10:00 and she ate some solid food on her own. For the Britannic participants, a butterscotch pudding in the U.S. is what you would probably call a blancmange: milk boiled with sugar and starch, plus flavoring.

I have been to Livorno, once, not happily -- I lost my wallet in Florence (not necessarily to a pickpocket; I could have dropped it or left it on the counter after making a purchase), and I thought that Pisa was boring. I happened to have my passport and an ATM card from a different bank with me, but later I had to call that bank from Mallorca because, although it let the first withdrawal through, it then locked the card. During the call I broke the frame of my glasses. If you ever need to buy Superglue in Spain, it's called Superglue. I'd better go easy on wife appreciation since it would be someone else's wife. Most stuffed shell recipes don't work for me, because one or another of the ingredients is something I don't eat, but here's a vegan recipe that would be OK: https://nosweatvegan.com/vegan-stuffed-shells/. Grüner Veltiner is always OK with me. I don't really appreciate coconut. The Junior Cat ate on her own this morning, after I took her to the food dish, and then she cuddled with me and purred for a while.

The Junior Cat has eaten a little on her own! The v-e-t had dispensed two special foods; one is a gel that doesn't meet all nutritional requirements but can give the cat energy to eat other food, while the other is a more complete food, highly palatable and digestible, intended for very sick animals. I gave her the gel several times last night and this morning, and when she started pushing the syringe away, I knew that she was getting stronger. This afternoon I switched to the other food, mixed with an equal volume of water. (When stirred, it liquefies enough to push through a syringe, but she has also been dehydrated and this is a way to get more water into her.) She hated it (the process, not the food) when I forced some into her mouth, but when I offered her the dish with the rest, she lapped some of it up. I'm leaving the rest there in case she goes back to it, but will replace it later if there's any left.

Soon after I left Petsmart, the v-e-t called with the Junior Cat's lab report. Several values were slightly off, but not to the extent of suggesting anything specific. He concurred with syringe feeding and suggested I stop by his office to get prescription foods that are formulated for it.

The Junior Cat is still hiding and not eating. When she came out this morning, I got a little food into her on my fingertip, but not much. I'm thinking that syringe feeding may be required, but I don't have the apparatus. I have to pick up prescriptions (for myself) this morning and I'll see what Petsmart or Petco has.

We're back from a last-minute visit to the V-E-T after the Junior Cat didn't eat for at least two days. She had had sniffles and a slight fever on Sunday, slept all (rather than merely almost all) day on Monday, and then stopped eating. She had also been hiding, and as she's a very small cat she can hide in places where I can't find her; this morning, when she emerged, I tried to get her to eat and then put her in her carrier, so that she couldn't hide again before the visit. She's been given a long-acting antibiotic, medication to settle her stomach, and vitamins, along with sub-Q fluids. Belize is in my plans for January, if I don't cancel the cruise, but the port call will be at Harvest Caye. I realized at once what flautas would be, although I think I might have seen them called something else. I'll pass on the cocktail but might like the wine, albeit not necessarily with the flautas.

I took a blue blazer for a recent cruise on the Voyager; it was in Europe, and sailings from those ports tend to have a higher percentage of British and European passengers who are more likely to dress up. I would say that more than half of women passengers dressed specially for those nights, fewer than half of men, and some men appeared to dress down on the formal nights (ball cap worn backwards, for example).

No ideas whatsoever! I have a mini 2 and a mini 5 but no experience with an iPad air.

Initially because of being slightly ill, and then because I had nowhere to go, I hadn't been out of the house since Wednesday. Taking the trash out this morning, I discovered a package that had been sitting in front of the garage door since Friday. I'll pass on the dumplings, but both the cocktail and the wine would be OK with me.

As far as anyone knows, it's no longer used as an arsenal -- BUT when the State of Ohio asked the Department of Defense to turn it over to the state, the request was refused, on the ground that the site had irreplaceable strategic value. The strategic value? Cloud cover. If anything is going on there, it can rarely be observed by satellite. The area is one of the least sunny places in the U.S.

I haven't visited Brest, but I remember these lines by the French poet Jacques Prévert. Rappelle-toi Barbara Il pleuvait sans cesse sur Brest ce jour-là. On 9/11/2001, I was living in Los Angeles and was wakened by a phone call from a friend in Connecticut. I wasn't quick enough to pick up the call, and heard the news on the radio before I retrieved the message. This will be a tedious day. I teach online at 10:30, then have an online meeting at 3:00 and another at 6:30. I'm the host for the 3:00 meeting but don't really have to participate.

I tested negative on Tuesday and again today.

Remember that my flight from Amsterdam was full of people who seemed ill? I caught whatever it was, and while I haven't been very sick, I've felt under the weather since Tuesday. I'm still thinking about cancelling my next cruise, from New Orleans on the Norwegian Breakaway, partly because of the mixed-up flight arrangements, partly because of the vloggers and their groupies, who are sounding more and more like a nuisance, and partly because I'm not enthusiastic about the ports. The final payment is due October 1.

Here's a prayer written by Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, the Chief Rabbi of the UK, in an artistic rendering by Joanne Fink. Our local rabbi read this in the services this Sabbath, and sang many of the prayers to the melodies typically used in British synagogues. This was a bit much for an American congregation, but he was in Canada for five years before coming year.

Paddington Bear tweeted, “Thank you, Ma’am, for everything,” the same words he said at the end of a video they made for the Platinum Jubilee. Here's the video: