Got a wife and kid in Baltimore, Jack

This morning's title brought to you by the weather outside, which is dreadful.  When I lived in Baltimore, I got used to breathing soup, but I never learned to like it.   Terrible thing for a native to say.  Alas, the soup has found Maine this weekend -- heat combined with ozone and pollutants showing orange-red-yellow all up and down the state.

We here at the Cat Farm have deployed the air conditioners and are going to stay inside, reading the contract set that arrived in this morning's mail, writing, and, for my part at least, not reading the news.  I will perhaps spend some time seeking out pictures of kittens and baby platypuses on the internet.  Or maybe I'll just curl into a corner of the couch and spend an hour or two with somebody else's book.

. . .There was a inquiry yesterday into the musical and film preferences of the cats.  Mozart prefers piano -- classical or soft contemporary; he doesn't much admire jazz piano.  He deplores bagpipes and classic rock, though he likes Abney Park and Gaelic Storm.  Go figure.  His politics are apparently liberal:  When he first came to live with us and was sulking in the basement, the first time he came upstairs of his own volition while we were still awake, was in order to view of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.  He also very much enjoyed Hugo.

Scrabble seems to have no musical inclinations, and film bores her.  She prefers to be where the computers are.  Little brown geek cat.

Like Hexapuma, Socks likes anime, and action adventure movies.  He adored RED, which was a surprise; I wouldn't have taken him for a Bruce Willis guy, but there you are.  He also seems eclectic in his musical tastes:  piano music, weird zither-y atonal music, Bruce Springsteen, Janis Ian, Steeleye Span, Grateful Dead -- it's all good.  Hex, of course, being deaf, had no musical opinions.

Which reminds me that the Music of Liad game is still going on. Rules here.  So far we have musical themes for the following books:

Agent of Change:  Secret Agent Man (Johnny Rivers), Life During Wartime (Talking Heads)

Carpe Diem:  Beethoven's Sixth

Crystal Soldier/Dragon:  Capriccio Italien, Smugglers Blues (Glenn Frey)

Fledgling/Saltation:  Somewhere over the Rainbow (Judy Garland)

Local Custom:  I would walk 500 miles (The Proclaimers)

Mouse and Dragon:  She was the Prize (Gaelic Storm), Come Undone (Duran Duran), Lullabye (Billy Joel)

Scout's Progress:  Sweetness  (Yes), Your Own Special Way (Genesis)

And! Character Themes

Daav:  The Clock Ticks On (Blackmore's Night); Renaissance Faire (Blackmore's Night)

Clutch Turtles:  Afro-Celt Sound System

. . .that's a lot of interesting listening, already.  C'mon and play -- you know you want to!

Books read in 2012

From Whence You Came, Laura Anne Gilman (e)
Frederica, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
No Dominion, C.E. Murphy (e)
The Prestige, Christopher Priest
Cuttlefish, Dave Freer
Intruder, C.J. Cherryh (read aloud w/Steve)
Blameless, Gail Carriger (e)
Changeless, Gail Carriger (e)
The Quiet Gentleman, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Unbroken, Rachel Caine
The Talisman Ring, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Sylvester / OR, The Wicked Uncle, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Death and Resurrection, R. A. MacAvoy
The Unknown Ajax, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Black Sheep, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Stealing the Elf-King’s Roses, Diane Duane (e)
The Reluctant Widow, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Friday’s Child, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Dragon Ship manuscript, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (e)
Kim, Rudyard Kipling (e)
Regency Buck, Georgette Heyer (read aloud w/Steve)
Pollyanna, Eleanor H. Porter (e)
Chimera, Rob Thurman (e)