So, now it’s 2013. We survived the end of the world and the Holidays with the families and friends. I’ve been meaning to write a new blahg and actually believed I might get another one done in 2012. Fat chance. Well, I’ll start off the new year with a new blahg and forget about 2012. Okay, so I won’t completely forget about 2012 or I’ll have nothing to talk about. Hang tightly to this blahg because I’m making it up as I go along and flying by the seat of my pants.
2012 wasn’t so bad for me, I guess. I had a contract in the last quarter of the year that kept me busy and paid me a little. Jeanette and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary. The whole family met and enjoyed Washington for a few days (which lead to a good blahg: HELLO WASHINGTON, GOODBYE “THE LIFE OF RILEY”). My youngest daughter Abbie and I went down to a Stargate convention in Chicago. Oh yes, and there was that whole thing about me turning 50. There were also some bad things that happened and if you go back through some of my past blahgs you can read more about that. I want to move on.
What did I get for Christmas you may well ask? 
You may. In my pre-Christmas blahg, MY 2012 CHRISTMAS WISH LIST, I wrote that I wanted the book “Jean Arthur: The Actress Nobody Knew”. Well, I got it and it was a great read. I could hardly put it down because here was a life story about an actress I greatly admired and knew hardly anything about. I won’t give it away but if you can get a hold of a copy, you’ll enjoy it.
While I’m on the subject of Jean Arthur, I’ll talk about two Jean Arthur films. 
The first is the “The Whole Town’s Talking” from 1935 in which she costarred with Edward G. Robinson. This film has never been released on DVD in North America. There is a European release floating around but I don’t know what the quality is like. If you can track down the VHS, which is out of print, then that’s your best bet. I managed to find a download of this film and watched it over the holidays. It’a a great film and Robinson gets to play dual roles as a good guy and a bad guy. For Jean Arthur, this was probably the start of her wise-cracking female friend eventually gets the guy roles. I hope it gets an official DVD release.
The second Jean Arthur film I want to talk about is “The Devil And Miss Jones” from 1941. I guess if they made it today it would be Ms. Jones but you can’t knock them for that. This film also co-starred Robert Cummings and Charles Coburn. 
Jean Arthur and Charles Coburn would co-star together again in “The More The Merrier” in 1943 and “The Impatient Years” in 1944. Both of those films have official DVD releases but nothing for “The Devil And Miss Jones”. 2013 will see that all change. 
On March 26th, we will see this classic finally released by Olive Films/Paramount. It’s about time. Now, if we could only get a DVD release of “History is Made At Night” from 1937 with Jean Arthur and Charles Boyer.
I should talk about another book that I received for Christmas but I’ll give you a little back-story first. I have a whole rack of films I like to watch around Christmas and not all of them a
re Christmas themed but might contain a moving sequence that happens at Christmas. One of these films is the 1945 film “A Tree Grows In Brooklyn”. This too has had a couple of official DVD releases recently in expensive boxed sets of Eliza Kazan films. Kazan directed the film but the movie is based on the book by Betty Smith. My own children have seen it a time or two and know how special this movie is to me.
Every year, in our family, we draw names for $2 and $10 gifts. That way you don’t have to buy for everyone but just two gifts for two different people. This past year, my son Noah drew my name for a $2 gift. My children hate drawing my name because they say I am hard to buy for. I don’t think so. I’m always clear on what I want but I can’t help it if they can’t find those things around here. Noah left his shopping for me to the last minute and I had to take him shopping at a local thrift store to buy my $2 gift. He wasn’t discrete about it at all. He had been perusing the books and found a copy of the novel, “A Tree Grows In Brooklyn” for 25 cents. He asked me if I would like that for my $2 gift and I of course told him that would be fine. I was looking at some little ornaments at the time and he added that he might get me an ornament too if I pointed out the one I wanted. So I did. He also asked me to pay for it because he didn’t want to have to go to the cashier. Imagine that, knowing what your gift is and having to pay for it too! Later he bought me a coffee so I guess that works out somehow. At least he wrapped these gifts himself. I acted all surprised on Christmas morning and displayed the ornament on the mantle above our fireplace. I wish I had taken a picture of it before I put it away after Christmas.
The book was a welcomed gift indeed. 
I couldn’t put it down. Sometimes I would get up in the middle of the night to read it. I couldn’t wait to finish it and at the same time I hated to see it end. There is so much more in the book than there was in the movie. In fact, there’s a whole second half of the book that takes place where the film version left off. My understanding is that the first draft of the novel ended just like it did in the movie but the author thought there was more to tell. I’m glad she continued on with it. “A Tree Grows In Brooklyn” is now ranked among my top 5 favorite novels. Maybe that’s an idea for a blahg someday. I will only add that it was the best gift that my son ever gave me that I paid for myself. Oh, and thanks for the ornament and the coffee Noah!
Now on to Super Faster Hair. This has a back-story too. In 1985, I was taking a couple of summer courses at Trent University to finish up my degree. One of these courses was on classic greek literature, but I won’t bore you about that. It was, however, one of my favorite classes. 
I started up a friendship with another classmate named Dean Pappas. His father ran the local Pappas Billiards and it was a great hang-out for University students. That wasn’t the reason we became friends. It was more to the fact that he had a car and gave me a ride every day. Oh, and he also dated my roommate Dorothy…but that’s another story.
Dean and I have kept in contact and every year, just before Christmas, my family goes up to Peterborough to do some shopping and have a little visit with Dean. We always meet at Pappas Billiards, which Dean now manages besides being a City Councillor, and have a coffee and catch up on what’s been happening with our families. This past year, Noah was sick and didn’t get to go. That’s probably why he left my $2 gift until the last minute. Anyhow, we decided to also use the trip to Peterborough to aid in picking up my daughter Emily’s friend Holly who was going to stay with us a few days. She took a bus to Peterborough and we picked her up and brought her home with us. On the way to Peterborough we began to discuss our cat situation.
As readers of this blahg (do I have readers, I always ask) you will know that we adopted a kitten in the summer which we named Stella. Unfortunately Stella became very ill and we had to have her put down in September. That was the subject of the blahg, STELLA AND SHERRY, I HARDLY KNEW YE. That was one of those bad things that happened in 2012. The short of it is that June and Frank were the only cats in our house. We had talked about adopting another kitten but we wanted to wait until the Christmas holidays so that Emily could be home to enjoy the new kitten’s company. On the way to Peterborough we decided that maybe we could find a kitten in that city. We knew that Emily’s friend Holly would like this too because she told Emily she wasn’t allowed to pick out a kitten without her.
We asked around in Peterborough about pet shops but we were referred to the Peterborough Humane Society. Emily had her smart phone and checked out their website to see if they had any kittens and where they were located. Online, they featured a few kittens and there was one with the name of Super Faster Hair. We all laughed at the name but we couldn’t see a picture of this kitten. We drove to the Humane Society and were taken into the back where they had two cages containing two kittens each. 
We knew we wanted a female and we were referred to this one cage with two gray kittens. The attendant opened up the cage and one of the kittens flew out of the cage and climbed up onto Emily’s shoulder. Emily, Abbie, and Holly all agreed that was the kitten we would take home. When the attendant checked the kitten’s papers we discovered that this was the infamous Super Faster Hair.
Recently, I discovered a posting by Abbie, who would turn 14 the day after we adopted Super Faster Hair. Here is what she posted:
On December 15th we got a kitten as kind of an early birthday present. We went to Peterbrough and we went to see my Dad’s friend who’s family owns a Billard’s place. My sister and I were looking at the animal shelter website. It listed the names fo cats and sometimes had pictures of them. There was a cat listed and her name was Super Faster Hair. That was her name. Super Faster Hair. So we went to the animal shelter and there was one cat who really wanted to come home with us and was climbing all over our shoulders everytime we held her. We wanted this kitten. So we asked what her name was an it was Super Faster Hair. It was that cat. We actually renamed her Willow, but I wanted to name her Teaser the Willow Sheep.
Abbie gives away in the posting that yes, we ended up calling the kitten, “Willow”.
But there’s a little more to that story. Peterborough is a 2 hour drive from our current home. We didn’t have a cat carrier nor food and water for the ride home. We stopped out back of a Liquor store and I retrieved an empty cardboard box. We stopped at a thrift store and purchased a couple of dishes and an old towel to put in the box. We bought a bag of kitten food and we had a bottle of water so we thought we were all set. Not really. On the way home, the kitten kept climbing out of the box and onto the laps of one of the girls. The only time she spent in the box was when she got car sick and when she decided to poop. It began to stink in our van, let me tell you. I stopped in a small town and threw out the towel that contained everything Willow had endowed us with. Luckily there was a garbage can outside a local convenience store. This experience suggested some possible names for the kitten but, as you already know, Willow was the final selection.
Willow seems to be in fine health and Frank and June have accepted her and play with her. 
One thing I should add is that Willow has continued to be a shoulder cat. Check out this picture that I took today. Whenever I’m working at the computer, Willow likes to be on my shoulder. In this picture I was tapping on the top of the monitor trying to get her attention so I could take the picture. That’s why my left arm is stuck out. She’s a welcome addition to our family and hopefully will continue to enjoy good health.
Well, that’s about it for now. I don’t know what 2013 has in store for me but the world’s still here and I’m still here. Somewhere, that has to count for something.