Today's lessons

1. Tepid renditions of "The Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gives to Me" give me the blues.

2. One really good waltz can make a two-hour drive suddenly seem worth it after all. (Yeah, that's two hours each way.)

Keeping warm

Everything is chilly and soggy here, and i am waiting on a replacement part for the woodstove. Until that arrives, i can't do much to warm things up. And until it does, i'm thinking warm thoughts. With that in mind, here's you cute cat photo of the day:

(Cooper, the sort of speckled tabby at the top, prefers to use various siblings as pillows; here, he's with Lucy, the elderly Manx. No, i don't know how he manages to breathe.)

Saints preserve us...

By way of an Etsy trade, i ended up with a commission to carve a block of a charming Saint Bernard named Dewey. It's been fun to do a pooch, after all the cats i've made prints of already... i just put the final touches on the block today, and will be starting proper proofs tomorrow. I'll be making a small edition of these - printed on extra-yummy Fabriano paper and hand-colored - so there will be a few available for the shop, too.

At least his coat is pretty high contrast (much easier than a tabby cat), but still lots of wispy hairs to follow!