52 BOLD

"I've taken a vow of poverty. To annoy me, send money."--Source Unknown

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."-- Oscar Wilde

I'm holed up at The Corporate Coffee Store; sucking down coffee, & their internet, since the internet at my home is still down. Many of the folks here at The Coffee Shop are without power, as are half of the people on the street that I live on.

The women sitting next to me are talking about buying candles, & a flashlight. Ga. Power is getting so many calls that they are not answering their phones. We just saw two Ga. Power trucks drive into our hood. Yeah!

The coffee has been made, and drunk; the cats have been fed, the turtles light has been turned on, and I have dropped the little green, "floating food sticks," that nourish them into their water. I have taken Morisson, Dylan, and Dude, who is visiting for three days, outside, and I have fed the dogs. Dude stuck his nose up to my glass front door, and started barking, when I, then, took Henry, and Anna, outside to do their thing. When they were done, I fed the great Great Danes. My morning animal chores are now complete.

Up at 8:30 something. I'm drinking milk from a box that a kind soul donated to my cause. Milk from a box tastes different than milk from a plastic gallon. I am glad to be alive on this Monday. I wonder how many Mondays that I have lived in 53 years on this planet?

Morisson spent the night with Henry, Anna, and The Good Neighbor. This is the first night that he has ever been away from me, other than when I have taken a short vacation, and have placed him with family members.

It is weird to not have him around this morning. It feels like something essential in my life is gone.

Dude is still visiting. Other than a couple of skirmishes through the glass doors with Bolton, the dog who lives, with Lisa, several doors down, Dude's visit has been a pleasant one. The cats, now, mostly ignore him, instead of hiss at him. I assume that they have come to see him as harmless, as more of an unwanted intrusion into their serenity, than a danger to their existence.

The turtles have clean water, this morning, because I cleaned their tank out, yesterday. I alway love it when I look over, and can clealy see my reptiles.

I moved the books off of my printer, and my cat is back, luxuriating on the machine.

Henry went to The 420 Festival in Candler Park, and had to leave because he broke a toe nail. At first, Henry loved all the people who were coming out of the huge crowd to say hello to him, and pet him; but then he started to get scared, and tried to withdraw from all the attention. He is home, asleep, now.

I didn't break my toe nail, this afternoon, at the also very crowded Dogwood Festival, but I did quickly walk away from the incredible number of people who surrounded me during my brief foray into the event, in Piedmont Park. I mean how do people live like this, ten deep to look at a piece of art, standing in line for a half hour to take a piss, line a mile long to buy some over=priced bad for you "food?"

One of the robins who inhabits the nest that they built at the front of our porch just landed. I would much rather spend my time here, with birds, and dogs, than be with the mass of man, and woman, at either festival. The road less traveled is the place to be.