The Convivial Gist

She was roused from her sleep by her husband.  Bird sighting alert! A hawk just landed on their backyard deck.  She immediately scrambled out of bed and tiptoed to the kitchen window. They did not exchanged word for fear of startling the magnificent bird, both of them impervious to the fact that their house was insulated from the din of the outside world. They stood there in awe, hoping this feathered creature would stay for a little much longer. And it did! He was  in for the hunt, looking for his prey amongst the various rodents that create a ruckus at this time of day in the small expanse of green.   The territorial cardinal When did this  morning ritual of  bird watching started, two, three or four months ago? They can not recall, what they remembered were the joys of watching the cadre of  sparrows feeding, the brilliant scarlet red of the matured cardinals pe...

   Door Stopper  Last night, while I was in the roiling sea of  back pain, I decided to keep my creative juices on a high gear to to keep my mind off the pain. Our cat Pinay has an issue with our bedroom door.  She will meow, scratch her clawless paw on the door until you open it for her, she prefers it to be a little bit ajar.  You see, she wants to have the liberty of moving in to our bed  so that she can curl with us or have her neck rub .  If you are ready for a sleepless night then shut it tight.  We can not use the wedge door stopper for some reasons that I will not waste time discussing on my blog.  My husband uses his shoe, and it irritates me for it has no aesthetic sense. In order to solve this pestering issue, I made a door stopper. I got the inspiration on line. See the attached link if your cats need one.               ...

Lately, I had been watching a lot of Short feature movies. I find  these movies engrossing and thought-provoking.  No mega stars, CGI's or fancy props but it leaves an imprint on my mind that I can recall an entire movie even if I saw it months ago.  Last night I saw the brilliant work of Masanori  Babu, writer, producer and director of Chiyo. It's about the story of Chiyo (played by Miyu Tanaka) her quest to see her father (Hiromasa Takagi) , a soldier who went to war in 1944.  A year later on the night of the Obon, a Buddhist tradition wherein the dead  visit their relative, Chiyo searches  for his father.  During the course of her search she met various spirits but not her father. When she finally found him, he can not see her. He told her,the hell he saw in the arena of war  blinded him.  He was implying that there was  a limit to man's ability to endure extreme cruelty and not seeing what you were seeing was the only way to survive (his spirit not his physical being in...

Lint remover on my luggage bound to Southern Caribean? I need that for the same reason that a  50 year old lady needs  her Oil of Olay Reginerist.   Blame it on Pinay, our 3 year old shedding  cat.  I did not signed up for this, its fate.  When I married my husband, he had Jaz, a Welsh Corgi. Being a borderline obsessive compulsive housemaker (my self assessment, not a professional diagnosis)  , his hair  puts me in a state of frenzied mission to eradicate every speck of his hair in the house. Carpets yanked out of the floor, all imaginable brushes at my disposal (toothbrush to industrial grade) and a symphony of humming vacuum.  Cancer of  his pelvic bones set in  Jaz. Options were laid to us, give him up for adoptions for pet lovers who takes care of  diseased pet (bless these people)  or  a Chemotheraphy treatment. We opted to put him out of his misery, my husband cried like a baby in one blustery january Sunday. I cried too, I am not that heartless.  I was wondering if  I still  wo...