Friday, December 31, 2010

Meet Ozzie!

When a young Polish egyptologist was returning to Poland after a lengthy stay in Luxor she asked me to help find a home for her young cat, Ozymandias*. We managed to identify a new home for the little guy, but his new "owner" (or should that be "servant" or even "slave"?) was going to be out of town for a while, first at Esna and then in Cameroon for the holidays. So guess who ended up fostering Ozzie (we obviously had to shorten the name, since it was bigger than he was)?

Well, one thing I discovered right away was that his appetite was at least as big as his name! K. had said to me when she first approached me to assist with the adoption that he ate very little. NOT! He's now got a cute little pot belly...

And absolutely everything and everybody is a toy, as far as he is concerned. Two of his favorite non-toy toys are my laundry basket (above) and my bath towel (below). It is the funniest thing to see him lying on his side and spinning the basket using both his hind and front paws!
He wrestles the bath towel around the floor of the bath-
room and can often be found completely hidden under-
neath--just an Ozzie- sized lump!
He does the same thing with the bath mat, but I don't have any photos of that.

And he's a real "snuggle-bug"--such an affectionate cat, often to the point of waking me up in the night for some nose-rubbing! I can truthfully say that I will miss him when he goes to his new home, but it will be a bit of relief as well!

*The reference in the poem (below) is to the ruins at the Ramses II mortuary temple, or Ramesseum, on the west bank at Luxor:
    I MET a Traveler from an antique land,
    Who said, "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
    Stand in the desart. Near them, on the sand,
    Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
    And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
    Tell that its sculptor well those passions read,
    Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
    The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
    And on the pedestal these words appear:
    "My name is OZYMANDIAS, King of Kings."
    Look on my works ye Mighty, and despair!
    No thing beside remains. Round the decay
    Of that Colossal Wreck, boundless and bare,
    The lone and level sands stretch far away.                
              --Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandias

Friday, December 24, 2010

Seasons Greetings! Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas!

I couldn't decide between these two cards this year, so I decided to post both! 

This sunset photo was taken from the roof of CH looking towards the West Bank.
I couldn't resist taking a picture of this great graffito on a door in Porto (Portugal) when I was there in July. It's the Barcelos rooster (galo de Barcelos), often used as a symbol of Portugal.

Be well...Be at peace...Be loved...