I'm alive! Writing a drabble or two! Still working on my trip pics - all the pictures are done, I have a few segments of video to edit and I've been listening to music to use for the finished slide show. Who knows, I might even finish it this weekend.

In other news, I've become quite anamored of two communities here on LJ - splodefromcute and baaaaabyanimals.
They tend to be a bit less contentious than the political journals I hang out at... or the TW fandom at its height.


And speaking of Squee-worthy stuff, I was introduced to
( kitten cam )
site a while back. They just started fostering a new litter of kitties and their eyes just opened a few days ago. Not too much going on yet except nursing, sleeping, pooping, but it will get more fun as the kitties start to interact.

So one more thing I wanted to share. When you start getting older you get interesting things in your mail. Like invitations to join AARP (that's American Association of Retired Person's for you non-USers). And offers for pre-paid funeral packages. And I'm now getting 'Dating for Seniors' spam at work, LOL.

And then there are catalogues. You know, the ones your grandmother likes. With cutsey stuff like T-shirts that say 'Worlds Greatest Grandmother' and lots of hideous kitty stuff.  I got a new one of those the other day.




Not really my taste, but whatever. (Actually, if I ever buy one of these, please feel free to cancel my credit card.)  So I continue browsing and come to this page.

( One of these things is not like the other... )

Not much else going on. Life is boring but good and I am silly.

Of all the places I visited on my trip to Belgium and Holland, the most most moving and disturbing was the day was spend in the Ypres Salient. Most Americans (myself included) are woefully ignorant about the details of the fighting during WWI. We've heard about trench warfare and mustard gas, but really don't have a good understanding of where the battles were fought, and how many died.  (I was much better prepared emotionally for the Anne Frank House in Holland, having more intimate knowledge of the Holocaust in general and having read her book several times).

We spent the day visiting memorials and cemeteries for soldiers killed in this area - mostly from the British Commonwealth, but also one German Cemetery as well. I finally understand why the men killed in WWI are called the Lost Generation in Britain. 

Here's a brief description of the video I made of my visit there:

The first pictures are from Essex Farm Cemetery where Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae of the Canadian Army Medical Corps wrote the poem In Flanders Fields in May 1915. The dimly lit image from the inside of a medical bunker.

The next images are from Langemark Cemetery which is the only remaining German/Central Powers cemetery. There are almost 25,000 coffins buried in a mass grave along with about 3,000 graves of student volunteers and other individual graves totaling 44,000+ burials in all.

A fallen soldier's medal left at a guest house by a visitor from Australia.

The base of a monument to Georges Guynemer, French flying ace. He shot down over 50 enemy planes.

The next image is at St. Julien's Cemetery in honor of Canadian soldiers.

This is followed by a series of images from Tyn Cot Cemetery near Passendale. This is the largest cemetery to British war dead in the world. I totally lost it at this point. It's almost too much to comprehend. Almost 12,000 individual graves - those who were known often have their country (e.g. maple leave for Canada) or regimental symbols on their headstones. But most of the bodies are unidentified - 8,300+ are inscribed with "known unto G-d."

And then there is the Memorial to the Missing - over 34,000 names of British Commonwealth soldiers whose remains are still missing - or are in some of the unidentified graves. Plaque after plaque arranged by regiment.  But you can see the disparity - many bodies have never been found - over 90,000 British and Commonwealth soldiers remain missing, a small fraction of which are in the unidentified graves. 

The final image is the top of the statue to Georges Guynemer. He was shot down in 1917 not far from where this monument stands. Neither his body nor his plane have been found.

We also visited a site that still had some of the original trenches, as well as bomb shells, display cases full of medals that have been found in the area, and other gruesome remnants of war.

I didn't get a good picture of the Menin Gate in Grote, which also has names of missing British & Commonwealth soldiers  engraved on it.  Every night, 365 days a year, someone comes out at 20:00 and plays "The Last Post" (what we Americans call taps) at the gate. The people of Grote haven't forgotten the sacrifices made by their British allies.

It was a very difficult day, but an important one. 

I'm writing! Really I am. I have two finished stories for TWfest bingo but I can't post them until I have bingo and then only at the Fest initially. And I have another story for Love_bingo that I'm in the process of revising. I'm hoping to get that up over the weekend.

Belgium & Holland were great fun. I'll put up a few pics over the weekend as well. I ended up buying the new phtoshop elements as its very similar to the really old version I had - and steep learning curve is important. (I had downloaded a freeware editor which looked very nice, but it was going to take a long time to get comfortable with doing even the basics).

Teddy and Ida were very happy when I came home. Ida's tail began to shake and she started to purr the moment she saw me. Teddy meowed loudly "Feed me, feed me, dammit."  Yeah, it's good to be home.

So I stole this from lilferret & ericadawn16,who were both Eco-Avengers. Can't say I'm surprised by the results. So what have you all been up to?

Yeah, I got one prompt filled for Love Bingo (and another one in progress) so I thought it would be a genius idea to sign up for another Bingo! The is Torchwood Fest Bingo and I like these prompts a lot. I asked for general prompts and these are very doable. I especially appreciate getting, 'crack' as one of them. No, please, please don't make me write crack, LOL.

I'm leaving for Belgium and The Netherlands tomorrow and will be gone for two weeks. There will not be any posting - I have a smart phone, but its not usable for any writing or posting beyond a few word comment to an entry. So if your entries get very short comments - its because its hard to type much on it.

B	I	N	G	O
Timeline	January	Kiss	Tech	Freebie
Research	White	Freebie	Dreams	Unit
Freebie	Illness	Ghosts	Animal Control	Foot Rub
Stillness	Buckle	Stars With	Freebie	Crack
Music	Freebie	Road Trip	Backstory	Meditation

There might be a story or two posted before I go, so I'd best get writing!

As some of you know, Teddy Boo had big fun at the Seder last Friday including knocking a soup pot onto the kitchen floor and trying to gobble down a matzo ball as big as his head before I could get it away from him. He barely stopped eating to acknowledge my presence when I came into the kitchen.  rose_cat made a wonderful interpretive rendition of this event:



Once again, Teddy Boo got himself into hot soup water.

You are bad kitty Teddy Boo!