All about books

I have to confess.
I'm a booknut. A bookhound. A bookcollector.
A confirmed Bookaholic!

One of my passions is books. Books new and books old. Almost any genre except Romance. (shudder) I have always been pretty heavy into Science Fiction & Fantasy. Recently I've gotten into Horror fairly heavy. Almost to the exclusion of everything else. I love Zombie tales!
I belong to a few book sites that are a lot of fun. (if you're into books. Which I am.) The first one I joined was PaperBackSwap.com. It's heavily structured and has a lot to offer.
The next site I joined and am most active in, was BookMooch.com. BM is as opposite a site from PBS.com as you can be. Which is one reason I like it so much.
The other reason is the forum. Singular. There is only one although that's soon to change. The members of BM.com are a great bunch and we have a load of fun yakking and argueing about books.

The site was created by John Buckman and is owned and operated by him with a bit of help. It's a free site and I just can't recommend it highly enough. If you're into books, belonging to these 2 sites will cover all bases for you.

Well, just this note for now. I'm going to be more active with my blog. It's been nearly a year since I last posted! I'm terrible!

brett

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Back again, once again.

I got so busy that I forgot all about this blog! Bad me! I've been doing some remodeling in my house and am about done finally.
My cats are all fat and happy. Even the 2 that I've adopted that stay outside. I bought one of those 2-piece doghouses for them and an electric hot pad to keep them warm. It's in a corner on my back deck now. Jr, or Prince as his owner calls him, lives here almost 24/7. He has to tolerate little kids and kittens at his real home. I can't blame him for staying here!
His house-mate, Buddy, or Phoenix as his owner calls him. Is nearly feral. His owner doesn't really take care of him anymore unless I shame her into it. I finally got her to take him to the vet when he was sick by paying for the visit myself! Anyway, he's come from being a very bony and wild cat to one that has some meat on his bones, his coat is clean and soft and he lets me pet him...a little bit!
I hope the winter isn't too harsh because I CAN'T let him in my house. It really wouldn't work with my 3 girls! There would be fur a flying!

That's it on the cat front.

Macintosh gets down

I just saw the new Macintosh. Holy smokes! I thought it was a hard drive at first. It's only 2" tall and 6.5"square and the damn thing is more powerfull than my G4! I think I've got it beat on expandibility though. But for $500 you can't beat it. It's a nice little computer for the average user to surf the net and do your taxes on. I just can't get over how small it is. They made the power supply as an external component and it's almost half the size of the computer. I have to wonder about heat and how much of an issue that's going to be. Plus, I can just imagine someone setting their 20" monitor on top of it and hearing "crack!"

We don' need no steenkin' weather!

Unlike other parts of the country, we in WA have had GREAT weather! Our only problem is that we are in a state of drought. The month of Feb. set an all time record for the lack of rain/snow. Nearly 0. So we are most likely going to have a pretty bad fire season this summer and fall unless something changes.
But if you forget all that, it's great! I've been running around in a t-shirt, washing my car in the yard and driving with the windows down. All the plants have buds on them and now we have to pray that we don't get a harsh freeze that kills everything. I think it's going to be a long and very hot summer this year. Then I'll be complaining because it's too hot! Ever since I lived in Alaska, I can't handle the heat when it gets into the 90's and above. And we generally will get several days/weeks of weather that hot.
Oh well. Ma nature will do as she wills.

Poor pup

It would seem that although I have the best of intentions, I'm not very good at keeping up with this. I guess it takes time.

Reading the paper today about a horrible story involving a puppy licking the top of a paper shredder. He lost his entire tongue down to the root and in the ensuing insanity, managed to bite off part of his owners pinky finger. They had to put the puppy down. There was no way he could survive. I immediately got up and went into the office to make sure my paper shredder was turned off. My heart goes out to the guy. Who could have ever thought of something like that happening? Sad.

Blah

The video game I've been waiting 3 years for came out today (Gran Turismo 4) and of of course, I haven't the means to buy it. Wouldn't matter if I did because I need to buy a new Playstation 2 as well!

I've 2 cats now. Synder who is a 5 year old anti-social long-haired tortoise-shell. Beautiful cat that no one but I ever sees as she is a super scaredycat. And then there is Niya. She is the complete opposite of Synder. Type A, extroverted, has to be the center of attention and into EVERYTHING cat. She's a short-hair, gray striped tabby with a light brown undercoat which makes her fur seem really rich and lustrous.
I mention this because A - I haven't before (good reason!) and B - I've adopted a stray. I know better and I know better but there he is. He's a long-haired, orange striped tabby that used to have a home. You can see the indentation that only comes from wearing a collar for a long, long time. So somebody abandoned him (my choice) or he ran away and somehow took his collar off to conceal his identity. I've named him Buddy because it's a gentle name to call him with and after about 3 weeks now, he seems to be responding a bit to it. He now will let me pet him very briefly as he eats. He shows up at the same time every day for dinner. Today was sad though. He sat out there staring in for nearly an hour. It's like he remembers having a home once and being able to come in. Really tears me up.
Did I mention I'm a softy?
I can't let him in though. My cats are indoor only and so don't have one of the shots needed to survive outdoors. So i need to take them in and get their shots. Then I'll have to snare Buddy and take him in for a complete checkup, get fixed and shots. Then he will become an indoor only cat as well. That is what I want to do. But seeing how he's been an outdoor cat and half wild for who knows how long, it may not be feasible. Plus, and this is the kicker, I'm currently unemployed. So getting a stray cat taken care is pretty far down the list from paying the mortgage!
Oh well, something has to happen. something good for a change.