THIS AND THAT

Mom survived her Big Birthday on Sunday, including a little party she had in the evening at Kokopelli's Mexican Cantina.  Nine people came to this event, and everybody ate Mexican food because that's the kind of food that is served there.  Mom had the crab enchiladas, which she said were very good.  But I wouldn't know whether they were good or not, since she did not bring any home for us dogs and cats.  Sigh.  Mom can be so selfish sometimes.

Aunt Jeanne bought Mom's dinner and also some dessert, which was made out of a tortilla filled with chocolate and a scoop of ice cream on top, plus a candle.  Then the server gave Mom a sombrero to put on so that he could take her picture.  The sombrero had a small head hole, so Mom had trouble keeping it on her big, fat head, but she kept it on long enough the have her picture taken.

Here's a picture of Mom and Aunt LaDene.

And here's one of Aunt Jeanne, Aunt Barb, and Mom.

Okay, well, that's all I'm going to say about Mom's birthday because I am tired of the subject.

Now I will talk about our foster kittens.  On Saturday, they got listed on the internet, and you can see them by going to the DivaPets site and then scrolling down to the kitties whose names start with "J."

On the same day that the kittens finally got put on the internet, Jeeves got conjunctivitis in his right eye.  Mom noticed that he was squinting, and that his eyelids looked kind of pink.  So she took him over to the shelter so that Dr. Regan could look at him and give her a tube of ointment stuff.  Now Mom has to put the ointment in Jeeves' eye two or three times a day.  Mom thought at first that Jeeves' eye was getting better, but then this morning she saw that his left eye was all pink, too.  So I guess he won't get to go to the adoption event at PetSmart on Saturday.

Sadly, nobody has filled out any applications about the kittens since they have been on Petfinder.  We feel kind of frustrated about this, but maybe someone will discover them soon and fall madly in love with them!

Last Friday, Mom and Aunt LaDene went to the art gallery to see a special exhibit about art from a whole bunch of World's Fairs.  There was a ton of very interesting and beautiful stuff in this exhibit, but people weren't allowed to take pictures of it, so Mom didn't.  Instead, she took pictures of a few other things.

This is the Rozzelle Courtyard restaurant, where Mom and Aunt LaDene ate lunch.  It was all decorated with flags of different countries where there had been a World's Fair.  And right in the middle of the courtyard, on top of the fountain, there was the Eiffel Tower!

In one of the hallways, there were some etchings, so Mom took pictures of them.  This first one shows a canal in China.  It reminded Mom of some towns where she had been in China, and there were very pretty canals there.

Mom took a picture of this etching just for me because it has several dogs in it.  The title was something about returning from hunting, but it didn't look like anything got killed, and maybe the people and their dogs would have to go hungry.

There was also an exhibit of work by Auguste Rodin, who was a famous sculptor and painter.  He lived in France from 1840 until 1917.  Maybe you have seen his famous sculpture that is called The Thinker.

Anyway, in 1891, a writers' organization in Paris asked Mr. Rodin to make a monument to honor the French writer, Honoré de Balzac.  Mr. Balzac lived from 1799 until 1850, and he was famous for his novels and plays.  Mr. Rodin spent 7 years studying the writer and trying to decide how to sculpt him best, since he was not exactly skinny.  So at the art gallery, there were a bunch of studies that Mr. Rodin did to try out different ways of making the statue.

The sculpture that Mr. Rodin finally came up with showed Mr. Balzac wearing a drape while he is looking fiercely into the distance.  The idea was to show Mr. Balzac at the moment when he had a brilliant idea for a new work.  But when Mr. Rodin showed the statue in 1898, nobody much liked it, and the newspapers made fun of it.  So the sculpture did not get cast in bronze until 1939.  Now you can see it at the Musée Rodin in Paris.

Mom took a picture of one other sculpture.  It was made by a famous modern sculptor named Isamu Noguchi.  I think this might be one of my very favorite things in the museum because it looks like two bones to me.  When I look at this sculpture, I start thinking about bones and how I wish they were real ones that were a little smaller, so that I could chew on them!