CAT

Our sweet boy cat is gone.

Our girl cat is not taking his absence well. She joined our family when she was a kitten and has never been without her brother before. She can't understand why he isn't here and keeps going through the house looking for him. Sometimes she yowls for no reason. Her appetite has dwindled.

After a couple of weeks hoping she'd get better, I took her to the vet. He's a new vet--very nice--who bought the practice from our old vet, so he hasn't dealt with our baby before. I explained that she's a temperamental cat. That she's missing her brother and has never liked strangers--she actually bit the old vet who laughingly referred to her as a "*itch"--and that I always took her out of her carrier and held her during examinations.

Making me out a liar, she behaved beautifully. When we had to leave her for a couple of hours while he ran a blood test, I was afraid she'd act up, but we reluctantly went off.

When we came back to get her, the vet said she'd been fine. He'd given her a shot and she hadn't tried to scratch or bite or anything. She'd been a perfect lady.

I don't know if he's lying, but he didn't look upset and he had no visible wounds. If he's telling the truth, this is probably the first time in her life she hasn't threatened a vet. Maybe she's taken a fancy to him?

MORE CRIME BLOTTER

This wasn't from our local paper but another county reported on a man ticketed for eating while driving. The policeman followed him for two miles watching him eat a double-Mac before citing him under Georgia's distracted driver law: "You just can't go down the street eating a hamburger." Looks to me like they ought to be after people on cell phones!

A woman and man got to arguing while riding in a car. At a red light, she grabbed the car key, and they got into a fight that attracted a crowd. Both got arrested. !

A shoplifter tried to steal Tide Pods. Guess he needed clean clothes.

A woman called police because she was being harassed by her ex-boyfriend's new girlfriend. The situation heightened after her ex and she exchanged lengthy texts about him being in town for the holidays. Hmmm. Maybe the new girlfriend needs to make him her ex, too!

After being warned once about calming down during an argument with their mother, two sisters got arrested for running around her house, beating on windows and doors while their kids were inside. I'd be hiding, too!

A man punched his boyfriend in the face while he was asleep. The boyfriend called 911 for help; then the man called 911 back and said they were no longer needed. The cops showed up anyway. Seems the boyfriend had called another man "cute" on FaceBook which precipitated the argument leading up to the punch. When the boyfriend pressed charges, the police started to carry the suspect away but he fell to the ground, screaming he didn't want to go to jail. No kidding!

Two 'friends' were arrested. The out-of-town visitor vomited in his host's hallway after a night of drinking, then fell asleep. His host woke him up, yelling that he needed to clean up after himself. That led to a big fight where someone's head got rammed into the sheetrock. Ugh! I'd have been yelling, too!

Finally, a policeman reported someone broke the window on his police cruiser and stole several things: a police ID and two pistol magazines along with the policeman's driver's license and credit cards. Other personal items taken were cash and a gift card. Not even a police car is safe!

I love our local paper!

CRIME BLOTTER

There haven't been too many crime reports in our newspaper the past few weeks. Maybe there hasn't been as much crime. Or maybe too many big headline stories have overshadowed the local stuff.

But we have had a few in the last couple of days, some of them dealing with food.

Seems a woman went into a store with her own cup, filled it from the soft drink dispenser, then lifted a pack of peanuts. While she ate and drank in the store, the clerk saw her and had her arrested. Don't know why she didn't sneak them out before consuming them. She might have got away with it.

Although in another store, a woman--I hope it wasn't the same one!--picked up a candy bar and hid it before trying to leave. She didn't get away with it. One candy bar's worth getting arrested? Even if it was a large KitKat, I don't see it.

In a different vein, a woman came out to her car parked downtown to find the rear window broken. She thought a bullet had damaged it. The item didn't say whether or not it was, but the possibility sure makes me not want to go downtown!

And finally, a man came into the hospital with a gunshot wound in his hand. He was hazy as to the location of his 'accident' and said the 9 mm gun fired after he'd taken out the magazine and was trying to extract the chambered bullet. Naturally, he had no idea where the gun was. He got reported to the Violent Crimes Unit anyway. Wonder if that had anything to do with the shattered car window?

And while it wasn't in the crime section, a rabid fox terrorized a neighborhood yesterday. It bit two people and a dog and rampaged for a couple hours before the husband of one of the victims shot it. Now people are asking why police or the DNR didn't respond to their 911 call. I'd like to know that, too. Good thing the husband knew how to shoot.

CATS

I've been a little distraught. My boy cat is old. Like about twenty.

The last couple of years he's been blind and deaf, but he was able to find his food dish and his litter box and his bed. Then he began having some mental problems. Meowing in the middle of the night. Going around in circles. Wanting to eat every couple of hours.

But he was still in pretty good health so we catered to him. Feeding him three or four times a day, putting him in his bed when he meowed, moving him to a familiar place when he got lost.

We were making it fine until the last couple of weeks. Now he's looking tired and withdrawn. And he's making hacking noises that sound like whooping cough. When I pick him up, he's uncomfortable. He's always been a gentleman and would never scratch me, but I think he's beginning to be in some pain.

I can't see him suffer, but it sure is hard to let him go.

Here he's asleep in his little bed. I moved it into my bathroom because he likes it in there. The girl cat usually sleeps with him, but lately she's deserted him. I'm wondering if she knows he's feeling bad and is making it easier for him.

Pets are like children. Easy to love and hard to lose.

FOWL

We've been lazy over the holidays, not doing too much. We have been on some walks though. This morning, we saw these ducks in the neighborhood pond. One white one and three wild ones. Oops, four. I didn't see the little one till the group realized he was missing and headed back to pick him up!

And these blackbirds were down by the pier. Perched on the wires, they almost looked like a tree!

Tomorrow it will be 2015 so I'll wish everyone a happy new year today. I hope 2015 will be better for everyone whose 2014 wasn't so great. I can't complain about last year, so if  my 2015 is as good or better, I'll be happy!

SAPELO ISLAND Part 6 FINAL

The entire island is owned by the state of Georgia except for Hog Hammock, the only community left of the several on Sapelo settled by former slaves.  Reynolds moved the people on the north end here so, I've heard, he could expand his hunting preserve.

Anyway, Hog Hammock has its own post office, store, cemeteries, churches, et cetera. Even a night club, tiny as it is! No school or hospital though. The four or five children have to ride the ferry to the mainland schools, and if anyone's too sick to take the ferry to a doctor, a helicopter has to fly them out.

Besides the University of Georgia Marine Institute, the Georgia Department of Natural Resources works here. (The Marine Institute came about in 1953 because Reynolds pushed for it; his widow sold the rest of the island to the state in the sixties.)

This is the lighthouse.

It's been renovated and the light works. People can go up to the top, but not outside on the balcony. Several in our group climbed it. This is what the steps look like from the bottom looking up. 

And this is one of the last working range beacons on the east coast. There was another across the way, but it's gone. They were used in conjunction with the lighthouse for navigation.

And here's the beach. We visited one summer and even in the great weather, there was no one on the beach. Not even a footprint. How I'd love to stay for a few days!

And I'll leave with the turkey fountain story. Reynolds brought in Fritz Zimmer, a noted German-born sculptor who resettled in Atlanta, to create the fountain for his third wife. She detested it (During the later messy divorce, Reynolds accused her caring only for money.) and must have let him know in no uncertain terms because one night, he got drunk and decided to blow it up with dynamite. He only succeeded in knocking out the windows of the surrounding buildings (now used by the Marine Institute). The turkey survived!

And he's a fine specimen despite its attempted murder. A shame there's no water in the fountain part. I wouldn't mind having a fountain like this.

And that's it for Sapelo Island. If you ever have the chance, be sure and visit it. Or if you know a bunch of people who can afford it, rent the mansion!

SAPELO ISLAND Part 5

Bet everyone's tired of the mansion/lodge, but this'll be the last post before we go on another part of the island.

This is the upstairs ballroom.  Reynolds wanted a circus motif so Menaboni gave him one. The red and white striped ceiling is actually canvas stretched up like a tent.

Here you can see the trapeze chandelier. The docent said it and the two monkey chandeliers on either side (one shown in next picture) were built by hand in the garage of the man who later founded Georgia's Lithonia Lighting.

In this photo, you can see one of the benches in the inglenook by the fireplace. The walls were painted with two figures on either side of the fireplace. One was this snake charmer (you can just almost see the weightlifter between her and the fireplace) who I've heard had the face of Reynolds' wife at the time.

Across the fireplace is this warrior. Beside him, (backing up another bench that you can't see in the picture) is a blank space. From oral history, it was a rather macabre skeleton. Reynolds was on a trip when the painting was going on, but when he returned there was a big scene. In the end, he had it painted over.

Menaboni may have been miffed or Reynolds may have fired him. Anyway, there's a space where a figure should be.

The huge room is delightful. You feel better just being in it. The space would have been great for children's parties, but evidently Reynolds hosted adult parties here, too.