Ciao Meow

Below you have got a cat I photographed in Venice during a time of very very hot weather in June 2002. Its kind owners shaved its body and left a ruff at one end and a tuft at the other. And so ends Friday Cat Blogging, since I will not inflict further pictures of Oliver and Popcorn upon you.

They do not panhandle for our approval. They won't for yours.

One other story from that visit to Venice: We attended a performance of Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" in a historically significant building -- and the name? too many vowels vowels vowels in the name for me to remember. The players were female, all dressed in heavy period costumes. Bright colors. Rich fabric. Cleavage. Just splendid.

Vivaldi's piece reflects many aspects of the seasons described, but his treatment of summer does not foreshadow Cole Porter's "It's Too Darn Hot." That June in Venice was too darn hot. Think super-heated. Think another 30 years of Bush indifference to global warming.

The back of the building was set directly against a narrow canal. That wall also served as the background of the performance -- which the musicians accomplished grimly but expertly, or so judged my wife who played the violin for many years. She said in spite of the fact the audience in its musical ignorance kept applauding at the wrong places, the musicians did not speed up just to get the damn thing over.

In that back wall was a long horizontal window -- wide open, naturally -- just high enough so that periodically during the music the disembodied head of a gondolier would appear, float for 15 or 20 feet and then disappear. I admired very much the way the gondoliers would glance in without a change of expression and turn away. Sometimes the top of a pole would appear as they chose that moment to give the gondola a shove. No expression at all. Utter indifference. They might as well have been Parisians. But I suppose after a while the job of gondolier is about as exciting as sitting in the engineer's seat in one of those miniature trains that run around the perimeter of a children's zoo.

Addendum/1.22.2005: My wife says the gondoliers weren't bored just being polite, respectful of the venue. What did you expect them to do, she says? Cross their eyes, stick out their tongues and wave? Pinch their noses with their free hand? Crouch down so their heads wouldn't show and risk falling off the boat? Like you cared, she says. Like you weren't staring at all that sweaty cleavage, you Philistine swine.