This painting is on the  cover of my American History class textbook. It's titled Fur Traders Descending the Missouri painted by George Caleb Bingham (1845). I love the cat and that the painter put a lease on it. Cute little details.

Bucket List

Some of the things and places I hope to see one day

At the very tip top of my list is Machu Picchu. Ever since I can remember its been on my places to see list.

I would love to get the chance to take six months out of my life and hike the entire Appalachian Trail. Georgia to Maine, 2000 miles of backpacking. I've never actually backpacked before, but I grew up hiking and camping, and I think this would just be amazing. 

Mount Everest and the Himalayas. I don't have the urge to summit Month Everest, but just to stand where that person is in the picture would be awe inspiring. Fun fact: Did you know the Himalayans continue to grow (4-10 cm/year!) as the Indian plate continues to crash into the Eurasian plate? 

These are just a few of what I would like to experience, but all three have been on my mind lately. School started two weeks ago and I'm taking Physical Geology lecture and lab and have been immersed in plate tectonics and the landscape of our planet including mountains and how they are made. And I have found it all so interesting and fascinating. I have found my calling in life and it's the best feeling. I can't wait to take more geology classes and learn everything there is to know. 

trash

I posted this article on my fb page the other day, and I'm kind of surprised no one commented on it.  I'm surely not the only one who is disgusted by the lack of urgency there is about all the trash humans have made and how we're going to get rid of it.  Litter/trash is everywhere I look.  I don't understand how thoughtless everyone seems to be about littering. Houston is covered in litter, it's gross. I can't believe the fourth largest city in America does not recycle as a whole and has no street cleaning system in place! I grew up in LA and every tuesday and every wednesday on my street if you slept in past 10am and did not move your car to the other side of the road you would get a ticket because those were our street sweeping days. Signs are posted on every street saying no parking on this day from this time to that time because a big truck is going to come and clean all the gutters, pick up all that litter. Here in Houston trash just builds up at all the curbs and then it rains and the trash gets washed into the storm drains and then eventually makes it out to the Gulf. It's horrible. And I don't even want to get started on what's happened because of this lovely system, Great Pacific Garbage Patch anyone? Makes me so sad thinking about how this is killing our lovely oceans and all the awesome creatures that live in them.
When I moved back out here two years ago I was surprised that our apartment complex did not provide a recycling bin of some sort.  You are in charge of taking your recycled goods to the recycling centers and there aren't very many around town. Why doesn't this city care more? Maybe because Texas is a Republican state and they have other more important issues they need to focus their time on like letting everyone own guns and trying to make abortion illegal.  Its hard being a Democrat out here.

I call this Dreaming Superman

I've caught Winston sleeping like this a lot lately. I like to imagine that he's dreaming of flying. Had to get multiple angles to really appreciate it :) When taking the pictures I was trying so hard not to make a sound or  any vibrations. I knew if he woke up he'd move instantly and ruin the photo shoot. He did sort of wake up, before each shot he would ever so slightly open one eye to check me out. Guess he was too comfy to care about what I was doing!

Wow how time flies!

Whoops! (again) It's been quite awhile since my last post. New things are happening and it's exciting. Today, however, was alittle on the sad side. It was my last day at the animal hospital I've been working at for over the past year. It was a really great job, learned so much useful information, worked with some fun and interesting people, and saw countless numbers of adorable kittens/puppies/cats/dogs. I'm going to miss working with the good friends I've made, but I'm also going to miss two little furry creatures.

Miss Fiona joined our crew a few months after I did. Some heartless person left her and her 4 kittens in a carrier at our clinics doorstep one night. We were thankfully able to adopt all of her babies out to good homes when they were old enough, but were never able to find a loving home for Fiona, so we adopted her! The staff was very happy to have her as our newest member :) She has quite the personality. Very, very active when we all get there in the mornings, runs full speed through out the clinic. And since the floors are very slick more often than not she slides rather than runs. She has discovered recently how to nudge the sink facet with her head to make it drip allowing her fresh running water to drink, haha. Very spoiled, her favorite spot is hanging out up front at the reception desk or checking out the patients in the exam rooms. Not too fond of other cats, but loves dogs oddly enough.

And then there's Buck.

Poor Buck, I'm really going to miss this guy. If I didn't already have two cats I would have taken him home with me. Our Doctor thinks he's around 6 years old. Poor little guy has the same beginning story as Fiona and her babies. Someone left him at the clinic when he was a kitten. From what I've gathered they adopted him out, but that didn't last long. The lady brought him back because he was too aggressive with her so they kept him for the clinic. At the time there were a bunch of teenage boys that worked in the kennels and they were not abusive to Buck, but they certainly weren't loving towards him either. So he grew up to be deathly afraid off people and in turn became abit mean. But for one reason or another he attached onto me like super glue. Whenever I was at work he was at my feet. Always talking to me, trying to get me to pet him, if I sat down for 2 seconds he was in my lap purring away. Everyone would tell me that when I'm not at work he walks around looking for me. He doesn't get along with other cats either so unfortunately him and Fiona aren't buddies.  I hope someone new comes along that he likes so that he doesn't spend all his time hiding in the back.

a fork in the road

Whoops, it's been awhile. Time flies by when you're having fun. My trip to So Cal was more than a success I'd say! It was a fast paced trip, on the move, trying to do everything and see everyone I wanted. I had a blast :)

But now back to my day to day. Been struggling with kind of a life altering decision, a fork in the road. One way seems like the smart, responsible, mature, adult way to go. A much better paying job which would also bring benefits and a much shorter (and cheaper, no tollroads) commute. The other way is more careless job-wise, but on the route towards finishing my education. Unfortunately I can't realistically do both.  The job is  8-5 mon through fri and school needs to be full time because of loans and the fact that I want to get that degree asap. But it's also that currently (and for the last year) I've been doing the 8-5 thing while my other half has been doing the opposite schedule. We never see each other and it's brought me really down (another reason I started this blog I guess). I think happiness is more important that money and I think that answers my decision.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

I love this movie, in fact I just put in on. It's inspiring. I love the images, the beauty of Spain, the music. Puts me in a creative mood. I wish I had appreciated Barcelona more when I was there. A week was not long enough to take it all in and explore. I hope to make it back one day...