Kitten Update #3

We ended up with more baby mice, but we think they are all gone now (and that the kittens caught the mama mouse).  It's sad, but we just were not willing to share the house with mice.  And ideally the presence of cats is a sufficient deterrent that we don't have to keep going through this.

Anyway, I did get a pretty good scratching post that they have been using, sometimes perching on the very top, even though it doesn't have a proper platform.  I haven't decided if I am going to get one of those large wooden things with lots of places for them to lay on.  I kind of doubt they would use it.

I can report that Rho, the silver one, has gotten much more used to being petted and generally likes it.  Now whether she warms up to anyone else in the house is unclear, but hopefully so.  I'll pause for a short comment from a Star article (on "black cat boyfriends"): "Dogs were bred to be attentive. Bless them, they cannot be any other way. But when a cat loves you, you know you really earned it."

Rho still doesn't like being picked up, and I am dreading the first vet visit, but I need to schedule that soon, maybe if we get a bit of a break in the weather.  The other day I bought a couple of break-away cat collars, so I guess I will need to try to get them used to that, as well as having their nails trimmed, which is also going to be a lot of fun and will probably end in tears (more mine than theirs).

There have been a couple of evenings where one or both will snuggle up to me on the couch, which is nice.  I even saw Toby jump up into my daughter's lap.  So the bonding has largely taken place.

One interesting thing is that I was back from the pool, and I still had some chlorine or other pool chemicals on me, and they went absolutely berserk.  For some cats, this is just about the same as cat nip or something.  They definitely were nipping me more than was comfortable, and it also put them into this drugged out state where they were really fighting each other, so I will need to try to wash off even more thoroughly in the future.  (Not easy when the water pressure at these pools is pretty low...)

So I have been enjoying them, despite the occasional annoyances when they jump up where they aren't supposed to be or knock things over.  This will probably be a recurring problem for the next 2 or 3 months. 

I have noticed that Toby (the orange one) stares wistfully outside, even when there is snow on the deck.  I really don't plan on letting him or Rho be outdoor cats, but it may be a bit beyond my control.  Even more reason to get them used to collars, so I can put a phone number on the collar or something.

Charity Ranking

It's getting towards that time of year when I ramp up my charitable giving, and this year I decided it was time to do more investigation into whether the charities were worth giving money to.  Naturally, there is a site that investigates them and provides grades and some rankings.

Based on other things I have read, I was not terribly surprised that the Canadian Red Cross scored poorly, with a low percentage of funds actually spent in the field, though I was surprised that their impact grade was low as well, perhaps because more of the funding ends up cycled through for admin (and more fund raising!).  In contrast, Médecins Sans Frontières had a terrific score, one of the best across all categories and in the very top for international aid.  For me in practical terms, I think I will just cut out the Red Cross and redirect any donations to MSF.

I often give donations to the Heart and Stoke Foundation.  Their ranking was kind of middle of the road, with some softness around their impact and a slightly lower percentage of donations (65%) spent on programming rather than on overhead than I would like to see.  In practical terms, I will probably continue to donate but only in periods (like now) where there is a 2x or 3x match.

I was most surprised at their quite low ranking for the Toronto Star Charities (the Fresh Air Fund and the Santa Claus Fund).  While the percentage to programming and gifts is extremely high (94%!), they give it a D+ for not actually reporting much on the number of gifts given out and children sent to camp.  I'm not really sure why the reporting is lax, but I feel pretty comfortable in continuing to send money to them, usually twice a year (and indeed it's about that time again...).

Not too surprisingly my very local charity (Eastview) is not in the database, but I think I'll give money to them anyway.

I ran through some of the arts organizations I donate money to.  Not surprisingly, they were a mixed bag.  TSO and Soulpepper had reasonable percentages spent on programming (better than Canadian Stage certainly), though impact was a bit unclear.  Coal Mine and Esprit Orchestra weren't even listed. 

So in the end I probably won't change much of what I have done in the past, aside from stop giving to the Red Cross and give more to MSF instead.

Halloween (Cheat) Week

I think I will wait another week or two before getting on the scales.  I was a bit surprised a few days before Halloween that I had kept the weight off, though of course I hadn't lost as much as I wanted.  But we had pumpkin pie in the office as well as candy corn (a lot of people don't like this, as it is pure sugar, but it is hard for me to resist, so I can't buy it on my own).  We had a reasonable number of trick or treators come by (and I gave most of them two pieces of candy), but there was still a bit too much left over in the house.  (I'm not sure it would have mattered, but the trick or treating stopped completely at 7:45, as all the parents went home to watch the game!)

I don't know what happened of the photos I took of our block, as people usually go all out, but I have a few good photos of the streets just west of us, where there is perhaps even more Halloween spirit.  That's certainly where I would have gone trick or treating had I grown up in Toronto.

On a more positive note, I got in a few extra laps in the pool on Sat., I did a pretty full workout on Sun., even squeezing in 20 minutes of cardio.  I biked to work on Monday, despite it threatening to rain, and I got in 23 or 24 laps on Monday, even though the Jimmie Simpson pool was more crowded than I expected.  That said, I am sure I have gained a few pounds, so I want to get back on track before I see what the damage is.  I actually came across the loose fit jeans I was wondering about (that are one size smaller than what I normally wear).  I couldn't quite get into them (and it wouldn't have looked right even if I could have squeezed in).  I probably need to lose another 10-15 pounds.  So not an impossible task, but one that will be challenging given winter is coming up and I won't be biking nearly as much soon.  I clearly need to get more serious about not snacking at work if I want to keep making any progress.

I also biked today, though I probably will not bike tomorrow, as it is likely to rain.  I came very close to going off to see St. Elmo's Fire right after work, but decided it was just a bit too much of a melodrama for my current mood.  Also, I didn't get quite enough work done during the day, and I wanted to help my daughter with some math problems.  Also, I still have 100 pages to go in Mrs. Dalloway, and the TPL event is tomorrow!  So maybe another time, as Carlton seems to cycle through these 80s and early 90s movies with some regularity.  I actually expect to watch quite a few in the second half of Nov., so there's no point in getting too upset over skipping over this one (for now at any rate).

Woolf Interlude

I was able to get through Orlando in time.  (I'm seeing a version of Orlando, dramatized by Sarah Ruhl, next Sat.  I have seen the film, but not in ages.  I might see if I can watch it some time this winter, assuming it doesn't show up at the Paradise.  It was one of the early screenings of the Queer Cinema Club at the Paradise when people were just emerging from the COVID shutdown.  I'm not entirely sure why I didn't go, and there may have been a conflict at the time.)

I am halfway finished with Mrs. Dalloway, and I should be able to read it by the TPL event on the 5th, as it is a fairly quick read, despite the stream-of-consciousness bits.  I hadn't remembered that the point of view skips around so much, over to Peter Walsh, one of Clarissa's former beaus, and even to Septimus Smith, a WWI veteran who was still suffering greatly from a form of shell-shock.  I also hadn't recalled just how morbid parts of it are, with Septimus saying repeatedly that he (and his wife) should kill themselves, particularly knowing that Woolf eventually ended her own life, so the death-drive (as Freud might put it) was strong in her.

Anyway, I will likely reread To the Lighthouse, which for me is her greatest achievement, at some point in 2026 or 2027.  I might eventually get back through all her novels and other major works.  I was looking over the list, and while I thought I had read everything in my 20s, I'm having some doubts now.  I am sure I never read her diaries or her letters, and I am still quite unlikely/unwilling to tackle that.

I guess I will put an x in front for anything I read as part of this cycle of reading Woolf as a middle-aged man, which is a very different thing from reading her in my 20s...

    The Voyage Out (1915)
    Night and Day (1919)
    Monday or Tuesday (1921) - stories
    Jacob's Room (1922)
x   Mrs Dalloway (1925)
    To the Lighthouse (1927)
x   Orlando: A Biography (1928)
    A Room of One's Own (1929) - essay
    On Being Ill (1930) - essay
    The Waves (1931)
    Flush: A Biography (1933) (being the biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's dog!)
    The Years (1937)
    Three Guineas (1938) - essay
    Between the Acts (1941)
    A Haunted House and Other Short Stories (1944) - stories
    Mrs. Dalloway's Party (1973) - stories

I'm sure I never read Flush, as I am just not a dog person.  I am somewhat inclined to listen to Prunella Scales read a somewhat abridged version when that comes off the hold list.  I don't believe I read On Being Ill, and while I think I read Three Guineas, I am not 100% sure.  Similarly, I'm reasonably but not entirely sure that I read The Waves.  I'm less certain that I read The Years, though I probably did.  I'm actually not nearly as sure that I read Between the Acts, as the plot doesn't sound that familiar (and, intriguingly, sounds a bit like something Barbara Pym would come up with).

My overall reading list is already absurd, but I will probably try to get back through Woolf, alternating with Pym, who I am also rereading (though I am far more sure that I did read all of Pym's novels once upon a time...)

Disappointments

As will be very evident as I move through the day here, the whole city is basically in mourning that the Jays couldn't get it across the line.  The baseball gods were particularly cruel in Game 6 where the ground ball double rule probably prevented them from tying up the game, and they hit into a double play.  Then in Game 7 where the pitching just wasn't good enough (and frankly the manager was an idiot for not bringing the rookie pitcher back in) and the Jays just couldn't convert on some prime scoring opportunities in both inning 9 and 11.  So heart breaking.  I am certainly disappointed, but not being a die-hard fan, I just don't take it to heart the same way  I'm already back, thinking about how to squeeze in even more culture -- and whether I will pay the inflated price of the ticket for Theatre francais de Toronto next week.

Another disappointment that hits closer to home is that the kittens found (and killed) a baby mouse.*  Honestly, it's not at all clear what these mice are eating, as there really isn't any food on the 2nd floor, and we believe the adult mice have been caught.  Anyway, the kittens are doing their part at least, and we probably need to bring the exterminator back around again.

I'm going to head over to the gym now and see how hard people are taking it there.  Either there will be lots of people there working out their frustrations or maybe the gym will be more or less empty.  I'll know soon enough. 

 

* The disappointment being that there were still mice around, not that the kittens were doing their job in catching the things...

Edit: Well, they just caught a second baby mouse, so maybe the hunger is driving them out.  Anyway, we are trying to get the exterminators to come back round today...

Edit 2: I guess I need to apologize (slightly) for calling the manager an idiot.  He did put in the rookie pitcher, but he just wasn't sharp enough and gave up run 3.  Who knows if he would have settled down (and not given up run 4 in the next inning!), but he didn't get the chance.  This definitely was a game of inches, and the Jays just came up short.  Several commentators are saying this was the best World Series ever, but that is cold consolation to Jays' fans.  The gym was pretty light today, very likely because people were having trouble getting motivated...  Frankly, I would have put up big signs at the gym and the bars that this would be a sports news-free zone for the next 24 hours!

What I really hope doesn't happen is this serves as a portent that, despite being plucky and trying to forge new trade partnerships, the Orange One keeps up the pressure and industry in Canada just crumbles, sending the country into a recession.  The signs are not great, frankly.

Nov. book news

I guess I am jumping the gun just slightly, but I am already looking ahead.

One of the annoying things about getting busy (and now having to deal with kittens and their needs on a daily basis) is that I do let some things get away from me.  I never did make it over to the Trinity book sale, though honestly I just don't need more books at the moment!  I guess Art Toronto was last weekend, and I didn't do that either.  Maybe I would have if I hadn't been off in Stratford on Saturday.

I finally managed to make it through Woolf's Orlando.  It was fine, but I don't think it is as strong a novel as Mrs. Dalloway or To the Lighthouse.  I don't really expect to read it for a third time, so I did put it out front.  (No takers so far...)  I decided to try to get through Henry James's The Turn of the Screw by Halloween.  It will be a close thing, but I think I'll make it.  Now whether I will make it through Mrs. Dalloway by Nov. 5 (when I am attending this TPL celebration of Mrs. Dalloway) is definitely in question.  It certainly means that Empire Falls keeps getting pushed off.

Also for Nov., I should try to get to Miéville's The City and the City, as this is being read in a book club at work.  It turns out that all the TPL copies are on hold already, so I may need to get it through Robarts.  But since I can only keep it for two weeks, I might as well wait until I am actually ready to read the book straight through, so probably the second week of Nov.  After this, I need to try to wrap up Empire Falls and Canetti's Auto da Fe and then I'll see about reading Austen's Persuasion before the Austen anniversary celebrations in Dec.  If I get through this, then really the only Austen left to read will be Emma, and I might see about putting that on the list for 2027.  (Interestingly, Prunella Scales narrated an abridged and unabridged version of Emma that was very well received, though you have to buy the unabridged version on cassette(!) or CD.  I am toying with the idea of ordering a copy and putting it aside until I have actually read Emma first.)  

I decided just to buy Shteyngart's Vera and have him sign it (at his Dec. TPL event) rather than trying to read it in advance, particularly as this is a case where one really ought to read Nabokov's Ada, or Ardor first!  That was never going to happen.  I had thought I owned a copy of Ada, but it turns out that I don't, so I started hunting a copy down.  I went to the BWV near the Eaton Centre, but they didn't have it.  On my last outing to Tafelmusik, I had time to duck into Seekers Books.  They didn't have it either, unfortunately.  The BWV on Bloor did have one copy, so I snatched that up, then went off to hear a terrific concert, mostly of Vivaldi and some of his contemporaries.  I don't have a specific time-line, but I would like to try to get to Ada in early 2026 (and maybe my next trip up to Ottawa on Jan. 20 is a good opportunity to at least start the novel), and then read Vera at some point after that.  If I am successful in following through with this, maybe I should put Atwood's MaddAdam trilogy in the 2nd half of 2026, and slot War and Peace and Lessing's Children of Violence cycle (and Emma) into 2027.

One very long novel (700 pages) that I think I will just skip is Kiran Desai's The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny.  I just saw her at a TIFA event, and they were talking about her novel and the long, long journey to get it finished (20 years in the writing!).  I think partly I was stressed over my tight schedule, and the fact they had a meltdown and couldn't actually sell any copies of her new book, and they started late (with a somewhat insulting explanation that they were having sardines on toast and lost track of time), but there really isn't anything that she said that makes me want to read this novel.  I mean never say never, but I have literally 500+ books I want to read ahead of this, including rereading The Inheritance of Loss, which is a terrific novel.  I had pretty much given up on getting any books signed (since I had a concert to go to that started at 7), but even though they started late, they ended at 6:31, and I somehow managed to get in line towards the front (probably in the first 10 people).  She signed my copy of Inheritance, and I scampered off and made it to the concert after all.*  (I suspect that had I paid the hefty sum for Loneliness and thus had more skin in the game, I would have been halfway back in the (very long) line and would have bailed in the end.)

The last thing I wanted to touch on before I run off, is that I just wasn't paying enough attention, and a bunch of holds I had at TPL simply expired, as I usually put them on inactive status for long periods of time.  I guess this means I should just use the save function rather than trying to put them on suspended hold.  This is pretty annoying, and I am trying to recall just what was on there.  Over the past few months, I had whittled the list down a fair bit.  I DNR Ghosted after I found out what a morally bankrupt book it was.  I ditched holds for Vera and Pick a Colour, as I will end up buying those books.  I ended up getting a copy of Do You Remember Being Born? ✓ which is about a older poet (based on Marianne Moore) interfacing with an AI agent that needs to be trained in understanding language.  So this is one I need to try to finish up between Mrs. Dalloway ✓ and The City and the City ✓, but at least I have it in hand and won't just forget about it.  There were a few still on hold where the expiration date was far enough away.  This includes Aliens on the Moon by Thomas King and You've Changed by Ian Williams** and Murakami's latest.  I remember I had one book about architecture on hold, but I am not as interested in that at the moment.  I was able to reconstruct most of the list that evaporated:
The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Chakraborty
The Pleasures of Exile by George Lamming
What We See in the Smoke by Ben Ghan
The Tale of the Missing Man by Manzoor Ahtesham

(The last one was particularly hard to find as it is a south Asian novel, not an Arabic one!  And I kept thinking it was called Lost Man or something like that.  I wasn't terribly far off, but it took a while to turn it up again.)

I think in general, I will try to get through this list in 2026, as most of the books are not all that long, and not risk this happening again.  I am sure there are a few books that I am not remembering, but these were the ones that came to mind right away and thus am apparently the most interested in actually reading (one day).

Edit (8/31): I did finish The Turn of the Screw and thought the ending was poor. 😞    I'm not a huge fan of unreliable narrators in general, though these sorts of books can be amusing, depending on how the author tips off the reader.  What I don't care for, and The Turn of the Screw has in spades, is stories that are full of radical ambiguity.  James apparently wants the reader to vacillate between thinking there is a realistic and a supernatural ending to the story.  I just don't like that at all.  Period.

 

* It certainly helped that the TIFA event was at Victoria College and the ARC Ensemble concert was practically around the corner at Mazolleni Hall, but it was still pretty stressful, worrying if I would be late.  The ARC Ensemble concert was very good, though of the 3 composers they featured, Frederick Block's pieces were clearly the strongest of the bunch.

** I keep getting blocked from seeing Ian Williams.  Last year when he was giving the Massey Lecture in Toronto, I had a ticket but had to travel for work so sent a friend in my place (and did get a couple of books signed at least).  Right after Kiran Desai (and at the same time as the ARC Ensemble!), Ian Williams was at TIFA talking about his new novel, so I missed that.  There was another recent event in Toronto where he was featuring his new novel, but I was off to see Bremen Town that evening and just didn't feel up to trying to switch the ticket.  

Late Stratford Trip

Before I get too deep into this post, I will first mention that the Jays have outperformed expectations, and clearly there is a decent chance they will win it all.  That would be pretty exciting, and, while I don't really care in my heart of hearts, I would prefer that they win (and give the Orange One something else to sulk over).

There have been a lot of celebrity deaths lately, and certainly quite a few major losses among jazz musicians, including John DeJohnette.  I saw him play at least three times (including once with Herbie Hancock!) and possibly another time or two.  And a few months back, Hermeto Pascoal passed away, though I am less familiar with his work and never saw him play.  I was saddened that Prunella Scales also just passed away, though she had been suffering from dementia for some time.  I had seriously planned on doing a mini-marathon of Fawlty Towers, but I forgot how wound-up and high-strung they make me, and I just couldn't do it.  Maybe if I have a longer break over the weekend I'll try to watch a few.

Anyway, there are a number of other things I can discuss, but I would like to briefly write up the Stratford trip last Sat.  I biked down to the office and parked my bike, then changed my t-shirt (at the office actually) and walked over to the bus stop.  I wanted to travel as light as possible, so I basically only had my tickets, a book (Auto da Fe), my phone, glasses, an apple and some chips.  The bus was pretty well packed, and I ended up next to an older man who had a long phone conversation before finally hanging up and then texting the rest of the trip!  I made some progress on the book, though not as much as I would have if there hadn't been so much chatter on the bus.

The truth is I don't really like this novel very much, and I probably should just drop it.  I wasn't all that interested in the main plot about an eccentric book collector and his housekeeper, who after marrying him, takes an outsize interest in his bank account and whether she is in his will, and ultimately drives him from his flat.  This was unpleasant enough, but then he ends up in the hands of petty criminals, and the point of view shifts over to these shiftless crooks.  It just really drags in this section for some reason.  I'm sure it's just my mind making weird connections, but somehow this portion of the book reminds me of The Seven Madmen by Roberto Arlt, though not handled quite as well.  I'll try to finish it up, but this is just not really my cup of tea...

We made pretty decent time to Stratford, unlike the last time I went late in the season and was completely snarled up by the marathon or some other race that closed down a bunch of streets.  I debated between the Thai place I usually go to or a burrito place, which was a lot faster (and cheaper).  I decided to get the burrito (a sweet potato and black bean burrito) and eat it while wandering around town.  The leaves had really started turning red and orange in this part of town.

I starting thinking whether I would ever write up my script for "Stratford" where I would focus on the issues of being a bedroom community for Toronto artists (with still substantial numbers of American tourists) and being a small Ontario town.  Not quite town and gown conflict but along the same lines, with some of the high school students really falling in love with all aspects of the theatre but most others thinking it is lame and not that thrilled about living in such a tourist trap.  (One of them could have to dress up all in ruffles, almost as ridiculous as Judge Reinhold in that pirate get-up in Fast Times, and this would naturally cause lots of resentment, and endless mockery from his peers.)  I think it is somewhat unlikely I will do much with it.  Anyway, I did wonder if it might be better off as a comedy set in a Stratford bed and breakfast (the Bard's B & B), though that would be limiting in some ways and would set up inevitable comparisons with Fawlty Towers (where I would fail miserably).  This actually was a couple of days before the news hit about Ms. Scales's passing.  I think probably the first idea is better (though itself would suffer when compared to Slings and Arrows), though maybe there is just one episode where one of the main actors has to spend a couple of nights in a bed and breakfast -- and hears all about how much the company was hamming it up.

Unfortunately the "mall" where I bought the burrito didn't have any public restrooms, so I decided to walk over to Tom Patterson Theatre, as there is a place nearby with public washrooms.  Those were locked for the season(!), but I was able to go into the arena and finally found a washroom that was open.  If I ever do work more on this series, I would probably swap the hockey arena for a curling rink, as I remember from the exurban fringes of Saskatoon.

I found out that Art in the Park was no longer running due to it being so late in the season, so I just started walking back to the Studio Theatre.  It was sprinkling a bit but it wasn't too bad, so I didn't sprint back.  I had thought I might drop in at the other bookstore right next to the Studio Theatre, but apparently that has been shuttered for many years (before 2019 at least).  I think I did go in once or twice but never bought anything there.

It wasn't too long before the Goblins arrived.

This time around they were recruiting people to serve as the chorus.  These people got quite the workout. I'm really not that big into audience participation, so it is just as well they didn't ask me to do it.  

 

I enjoyed this a lot, though it wasn't such a radically new thing as Goblins Macbeth was.  One of the most amusing running gags was that one of the Goblins wanted to put on some version of the Christmas story and he often managed to include Christmas carols or sneak in lines from A Christmas Carol or even The Grinch!

There are four more chances to see it between now and Friday, but you clearly don't have a lot of time.  I still have some hopes that this will land at Tarragon, and I would go see it again.

Since the whole show, including a post-play dance party takes just about 90 minutes, I had a lot of time to kill before the bus back to Toronto.  I wandered back over to Shoppers but they didn't have any single-serve ice cream!  So I went to another place and just got over-priced ice cream, then hit the dollar store, and then went over to the Avon to wait for the bus.  It was much, much less crowded on the way back, and I had a seat to myself.  Unfortunately, the traffic was pretty bad, and the bus driver ended up taking the 401 (rather than the 427 to the Gardiner) and dropped most of us off at the Lawrence West station where we could just get on the subway.  So all in all a good outing, even if I (yet again) didn't get as much reading in as I had hoped.