Month: January 2013

Whenever there’s a movie shoot you’ll see signs like the ones below posted up and down the street. They list the production company and usually what is being shot, and they tell drivers they can’t park on this street on a specific day and time. Yesterday, on the way to the Municipal Archives I passed by so many signs for movie and tv shoots I stopped counting. The ones pictured below were for Law and Order SVU and a movie called Motel.

The show Person of Interest was supposed to be shooting last night, just blocks from where I live. Because I’m a big fan I went out to watch but no one was there. Damn you Person of Interest! Just kidding, I’m sure the shoot was cancelled due to the weather.

Thank God Shaggy’s adoptive mother is posting updates and new pictures of Shaggy to the Friends of Shaggy Facebook page. But I miss the livestream and I spent one night looking around for other animal cams and watched these for a while.

Ripley’s kittens, a stray cat and her kittens in the Purrfect Pals shelter in Arlington, WA. I like when the man named John comes in and weighs and interacts with the kittens.

Great dane puppies, who are part of the Service Dog Project in Ipswich, Massachusetts. Good dogs!

The Puppy Bowl puppies, who come from the Washington Animal Rescue League and will hopefully get homes now that the Puppy Bowl is over (I think it’s over, did the Super Bowl happen, oh it looks like it’s next weekend). I see they have a kitten cam as well!

Yesterday was a dreary day in NYC. Looks like today might be dreary as well. It doesn’t matter. I have choir tonight and singing the Bach Mass in B Minor makes everything okay.

For people who are new to my blog, I have an ongoing series called “Another Dress I Can’t Possess.” Because I live in New York City, where I can’t walk anywhere without passing window after window, each filled with beautiful clothes I can’t afford. (I live on a writer’s budget. Unfortunately, we’re not all enjoying sales like Stephen King.) This is looking in the window of the Vera Wang store in Soho. I was actually eyeing that black gown way in the back, although the black dress on the way and to the left is lovely. I like that white one too.

I was thinking though, as I walked through the East Village and then the Lower East Side, if I ever have any money to buy clothes again, there are endless, endless small dress shops, showing the works of unknown (at least to me) up and coming designers, and I should invest some time exploring them. There’s so many of them though, I would’t know where to begin.

Also, for the record, if I ever have enough money I won’t be buying a gown. I have not had the need to wear a gown since my wedding and even though I’m divorced now, and hope to marry again sometime, I do not plan to wear a gown. I plan to wear a bathing suit or perhaps shorts and a tshirt because I hope to be someplace where I can go swimming and kayaking afterwards.

Along with I don’t know how many thousands upon thousands of people all around the world, for the past few days I’ve been watching the Livestream of animal rescuer Eldad Hagar and his most recent rescue Shaggy. It was such a powerful display of fundamental human kindness and decency it was impossible to look away.

As I type, Eldad is taking Shaggy to the woman who has adopted her. Of course this is a wonderful thing for Shaggy, but I already miss her terribly. Crazy, I know. Anyway, here are a few screenshots I took this morning. (In a couple of cases I didn’t like the shot I got so I went back to the video record. I’m a perfectionist. It will be the death of me. Note to self: leave the apartment now.)

Goodbye Shaggy, and thank you Eldad Hagar and all your fellow rescuers. Sob. Speaking of sobbing, toward the end we could all hear Eldad crying. It takes so much courage to do what he and many others do. We all watched as Shaggy went from shrinking from human contact to happily laying next to Eldad, following his every move, and crying whenever Eldad left the room. Then, for the first time, this morning Shaggy was playing around on the floor with Eldad, completely transformed from the dog who hadn’t felt a human’s touch for the past five years.

How can rescuers not fall in love, at least a little bit, every time? And then you must say goodbye.

I took this picture to illustrate how cold it is. Storekeepers frequently put out bowls of water for thirsty dogs out on their walks. It’s a sweet tradition. Someone put out this bowl of water and it quickly froze, but look closer. It has slices of lemon in it.

This is both insane and endearing. This person not only wanted to give water to the dogs passing by, he or she wanted it to be especially tasty.